Sermon For November 21, 1999
Twenty-Sixth Sunday after Pentecost
CHRISTIAN GOSPEL: “An Unrecognized Christ” ~ Matthew 25:31-46
We are daughters and sons of capitalism. We believe that if you want something you should work hard for it. If you work hard for it and get it then you deserve it because you’ve earned it. We are also daughters and sons of the sports world, so we root for a team. We know that one team is going to be successful; the winners, the champions and another team is going to loose. We want to be on the side of the winners. We cheer. Try to do our best. Try to excel. Try to come out on top. Try to be number 1. We might think that those things are just a problem for us today, but it appears that those impulses have been with humanity for a long time.
Jesus was talking to his Jewish sisters and brothers, to those who believed that they had found the right way to live, that they had joined the right team, that they knew what the rules were so they could follow the lines of their faith and achieve the assurances that they wanted to achieve. That they could guarantee the love of God, and the blessing that would come to faithful people. They felt that they were on the winning side.
Jesus preaches and He turns things upside-down. He says, “You think because you are daughters and sons of Abraham, that every thing is set. You think because you followed the rules of the faith, that everything is guaranteed. I want to tell you that a time of sorting out will come. When that sorting out takes place, we are not going to ask you what team you have been rooting for. Or how hard you have worked. Or what you deserve. The test is going to be different. According to the criteria that we will set before you, you will be separated, sheep and goats. Saved and Damned.
It must have been a pretty sobering message. It began with a promise that at the end of time, people were going to get their rewards. Everybody settled back, ready to hear all the good things that were going to come their way. Then Jesus said, “Here is how we will decide, the sheep and the goats.” Like the Jews in Jesus time there are Christians today who think that if you join the right team, if you join the right church, if you follow the right rules, that everything is going to be guaranteed and you are on the express train to Heaven. But Jesus words come across the years and say to us once again, “It’s not the team. It’s not what you have earned. Instead it is going to be how you have lived your life. Most specifically how you have treated the least of those in our society.” Jesus is talking in the Sermon on the Mount, “What does it matter if you are nice to your friends. Everybody is nice to friends. You are always nice to people that are like you. That are interested in the same things you are. That view the world in the same way. That shop at the same places. It is easy to be kind to those people. But I call on you to love your enemies, to pray for those who persecute you. I call on you to care about people that are different than yourselves. I call on you to reach out with love and understanding to people who come from a different social class. To people who come from different educational background. I want you to share God’s love with everyone.” Those who were being “sorted out” in Jesus’ story said, “Well we are glad that we qualify, but when did we see you? When were you thirsty? When were you hungry? When were you sick and we visited you. When were you in prison and we came to comfort you?” Jesus says again, “When you have done it to least, you have done it to me.”
High standards. It doesn’t say, when you have accomplished these ten things that you are home free. It doesn’t say, when you have joined the right club you have nothing else to worry about. It says you need to live your life, caring about others, giving yourself and not being about what comes to you. I know you have already heard Christmas music in the store. You have already been paging through catalogs with Christmas presents and decorations. Usually ministers stand in front of their congregations and complain about how we haven’t celebrated Thanksgiving yet and we are already to Christmas time, but this year I’m going to jump along with everyone else to Christmas time, because Helen Steiner Rice, who has written poetry that you have read many times, has written a story called The Christmas Guest. In that story she retells Jesus parable…
It happened one day at years white end,
two neighbors called on an old time friend.
They found his shop so meager and mean,
made gay with a thousand boughs of green.
Conrad was sitting, with face a-shine,
When he suddenly stopped as he stitched a twine
And said, “Old friends at dawn today,
When the cock is crowing the night away,
The Lord appeared in a dream to me.
And said, “I am coming, your guest to be,
So I have been busy with feet a-stir,
Strewing my shop with branches of fir.
The table is spread, the kettle is shined.
Over the rafters the holly is twined.
And now I will wait for my Lord to appear.
And listen closely so I will hear
His step as he nears my humble place.
And I open the door, and look at His face.
So his friends went home and left Conrad alone,
For this was the happiest day he had known.
For long since his family had passed away and
Conrad had spent a sad Christmas Day.
But he knew with the Lord as his Christmas guest
This Christmas would be the dearest and best,
And he listened with only joy in his heart,
And with every sound he would rise and start,
And look for the Lord to be standing there
In answer to his earnest prayer.
So he ran to the window after hearing a sound,
But all that he saw on the snow covered ground
Was a shabby beggar whose shoes were torn
All of his clothes were ragged and worn
So Conrad was touched, and went to the door,
And he said, “Your feet must be frozen and sore,
And I have some shoes in my shop for you,
And a coat that will keep you warmer, too.”
So with grateful heart the man went away,
But as Conrad noticed the time of day,
He wondered what made the dear Lord so late.
And how much longer he would have to wait.
When he heard a knock, and he ran to the door,
But it was only a stranger once more.
A bent old crone, with a shawl of black
And a bundle of faggots placed on her back.
She asked only for a place to rest.
But it was reserved for Conrad’s Great Guest.
Her voice seemed to plead “Don’t send me away,
Let me rest awhile on Christmas day.”
So Conrad brewed her a steaming cup
And told her to sit at the table, and sip.
But she left, and after she left he was filled with dismay,
For he saw that the hours were passing away
And the Lord had not come as He said that He would.
Conrad felt sure that he had misunderstood
Then out of the stillness he heard a cry
“Please help me, and tell me where am I?
So again he opened his friendly door and
Stood disappointed as twice before,
It was only a child who had wandered away
And was lost from her family, on Christmas Day.
Again Conrad’s heart was heavy and sad
But he knew that he should make this little child glad,
So he called her in and wiped her tears,
And quieted her childish fears.
Then he led her back to her home once more.
But as he entered his own darkened door
He knew that the Lord was not coming today
The hours of Christmas had passed away.
So he went to his room and knelt down to pray
And he said, “Dear Lord, why did you delay?
What kept you from coming to call on me
for I wanted so much your face to see?
When soft in the silence a voice he heard,
“Lift up your head, for I kept my word.
Three times my shadow crossed your door.
Three times I came to your lonely door.
For I was the beggar with bruised cold feet,
I was the woman you gave food to eat,
And I was the child on the homeless street.
Helen Steiner Rice