Gnats

Tackling the News of the Day

You probably saw in the news that, Friday Sept. 27th was a day of activism for climate justice.  Around the world people gathered at marches, rallies, and events to pressure governments to work together to address climate crisis. A global cry is outpoured: creation, the environment, the world is not ours. We do not own it.  It belongs to our children and our children’s children – if it survives. It has been put in our hands for a time – to manage. As a people, we are not gifted managers.
The Gospel for this morning talks about a shrewd manager. Shrewd is polite – honestly, the manager squanders the owner’s property, is dishonest, buys off friends, is focused on self-preservation, and tries to keep all options open and both sides content. The manager demonstrates a lack of being a gifted manager.
This portion of Gospel text is a convoluted parable that comes at the end of Jesus’ response to the scribes and Pharisees who have grumbled that Jesus eats with tax collectors and those they deem sinners.  Jesus has been pointing his finger at the grumblers to hold them accountable for missing the point of the covenant and the Law.  Jesus has used the parable of the lost sheep, the lost coin, the prodigal son, and now this parable of the dishonest manager to call attention to the heart of the matter – self provision has become more important than the fortune of others, the care for the widow and the orphan; mercy, compassion, justice are not the terms of management being used. Living covenant life where relationship is fostered through just management of the abundance of God’s world has become an absurd idea. Jesus tells this confusing parable, where a dishonest manager is rewarded for being a poor manager. Why?  Because are we not all poor managers of all that has been entrusted to us? We squander the owner’s property – the earth and the environment. We mismanage relationships, often for our own gain.
The mismanagement of relationships, also hit the news this week; the issue of race was used for self-serving purposes to confuse, confound, and complicate the politics of the day, as we move to the fall election. The issue was put on an individual and their actions, lost is an honest conversation about societal racism and relationships requiring  justice. Once again as a people, we are not gifted managers.
Today I need to be honest with you:
I confess that I have used single use plastics.
I confess that I have wasted water and electricity.
I confess that I have used insecticides, rat poison, and plant-killer.
I confessed that I have told off-coloured jokes in public spaces about people from specific geographic areas and cultures different from my own.
I confess that I have made judgements of others due to their religion, gender, and/or skin colour.
I confess that I have avoided areas of the city with a high volume of public housing.
I confess that I have believed that reserves and tax free status meant that Indigenous people were taken care of.
I confess that I have called people debasing names and used language, knowingly and unknowingly, that is  racist and homophobic.
There are no pics or videos, that I am aware of, of me doing any of these things. I am not anticipating anything from my past coming back to bite me in the rear end. None of these things were okay.  None of these things are okay. I apologize for these words and deeds. I am a dishonest manager.
Although you can likely make a similar list of confessions, I would like to think that most of us aren’t actively racist or purposefully destroying creation.  That said we are passively participating in climate crisis and systemic racism.  We are adjudged as dishonest managers. Now let us not get disheartened by this fact or use it as an excuse to continue on as if we are oblivious to the cries of the world.
Jesus’ parable speaks to this week’s top news items: climate crisis and systemic racism. Jesus plunges listeners into a story that throws out the idea of the ‘good guy’ and ‘bad guy’; where the ethical will win and the immoral will loss. Jesus has everyone in a entangled circumstance where options are not easy to choose, where choices are affected by a wide range of variables, and that poses the manager as a villain regardless of actions taken.  Let us take this to heart. No human being is owner, only a poor manager – can we not just start with the truth and accept and admit that each of us as individuals, and collectively as: special interest groups, political parties, societies, countries, and world organizations are dishonest managers.
Since last Sept. we have been reading and studying the Gospel according to Luke. Luke has been forthright with us about his understanding of the Gospel, about the meaning of Jesus’ life and death and resurrection, and how the gospel and Jesus’ teachings are to be applied in our own lives. Luke’s story consistently speaks to the stewardship of material possessions and questions people about their ongoing obedience to the Law. Luke focuses on these two items because, as I delightfully read in a commentary, Luke was a hippy.  Luke’s description and presentation of Jesus came from his passionate desire for love among all  people and as an advocate for the poor and excluded. Luke recorded Jesus as compassionate to outcasts and in relationship with the poor, the sick, women, foreigners, Samaritans, Gentiles, tax collectors, and sinners. Jesus tells a lot of parables about money and wealth in the Gospel of Luke., but Jesus is not to be seen as rich person hater, rather one is to see Jesus’ concern in what wealth does to people.  Luke’s theology is serious about sin, but when judgement is cast somehow God’s mercy is greater than anticipated. This abundance of compassion is to turn individuals and whole peoples to living a law of love and inclusion through words and deeds.
With this in mind, although dishonest managers, as part of this community and as followers of Jesus we have been welcomed here in this place.  When we gather we experience a portion of God’s mercy and God’s grace. Jesus’ parable sets up the opportunity for Luke to compel listeners to live, not from the accusation of being a dishonest manager, but from the overall theme of the parables as recorded – turn to living a law of love and inclusion through words and deeds; sharing the compassion you have received or experienced, or if you think you have not received or experienced God’s mercy and compassion than be dishonest about it and live that way any way.
As I have moved off the playground, matured, and grown older, I have found myself more willing and able to change, to accept, to appreciate, to try my best to build relationship; to be more passionate like Luke the hippy, and Jesus the revolutionary.   To counter dishonest management on my part, I strive to live a law of love and inclusion through words and deeds.
Years ago, I was telling a story to a group of clergy. In the telling of the story I used the term Paddy Wagon to refer to the police vehicle that transported people to jail. A colleague interrupted and asked that I not use  that term; it was offensive. I apologized and then with a little embarrassment asked for an explanation because I didn’t understand. Paddy was a derogatory ethnic slur used to describe the Irish in 19th Century America. During riots of 1860’s, where poor Irish immigrants were protesting the army draft while the rich were given provision to buy a waiver, police arrested the Irish and took them to the station in horse drawn wagons; thus Paddy wagon.  For the next century the term associated a particular people with disorderly conduct, violence, drinking, and the criminal.  I no longer use the term, because I listened and learned the hurt that is experienced when the term is used.  This is a small example, where managing includes changing language to be loving and inclusive. In like manner, I no longer use the term Indian summer, as it is a derogatory stereotype put on indigenous peoples.  I now use, harvest summer. As one learns one can turn from dishonest management to a new wholeness, and in that wholeness experience a place of compassion and mercy beyond one’s understanding.
The Atlantic Ministry Area clergy met this past week and it was time for us to pick our next study book. We have decided to read a newly released book published by Augsburg entitled: Dear Church: a Love Letter From a Black Preacher to the Whitest Denomination in the US. The author, Lenny Duncan, is a pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. He preaches that, symbols are important; they shape the way we think about the world, often without us knowing it.  If we don’t deconstruct harmful symbols, we will slowly poison our children. Luke’s Gospel has been teaching us this too.  We are all sinners, get over it already; we are all dishonest managers.  Now get to work: love, include, right your relationship with the wealth you manage, and opulently administer compassion and mercy.
The product description for the book commissions dishonest managers who make up the church: It is time for the church to rise up, dust itself off, and take on forces of this world that act against God: whiteness, misogyny, nationalism, homophobia, and economic injustice.  Duncan gives a blueprint for the way forward and urges us to follow the revolutionary path of Jesus.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus is certainly revolutionary.
In the complexity of the parable, the dishonest manager who has acted shrewdly, making friends and building relationships through dishonest means to protect his own self-interest... when all is said and done, when all is gone, the manager is welcomed into eternal homes. Yes, what a revolutionary, upside down, “say-what,” conclusion. At the end the manager is welcomed home – despite the inability of being a gifted manager, and by the lack of mention in the parable of no remorse or apology or I will try to do better. The parable points to compassion, mercy, and welcome; period. Once again we are told a Jesus’ parable where God’s activity – God’s final judgement, the kingdom principle -   is outside of what we can conceive and imagine. The opulence of welcome, the extravagance of compassion and mercy, are given... this is Good News.

A Mantra at the Point of No Return

Pent 14C-2019
Thursday was a visiting day for me. During one visit, the conversation turned to the state of the world – the synopsis being that it might be too late to fix the current problems in the world; just as it was too late in the time of Jeremiah. One can turn around, peoples can turn and change their ways, but, there comes a point of no return.  It is as the saying goes, at the point of no return one can only stand back and watch the train wreck.  Or once the toothpaste is out of the tube, you can not put it back.
The conversation turned to questioning, that when it is too late, or we deem it too late, or we are beyond the capacity to work towards a solution, what are one’s options? In the moment of no return and the aftermath, what options are there?  The thought of the wise person I was visiting was that there is only prayer.  Asking what one should pray, the words that came to us were very simple:
Strength for today, and hope for tomorrow.
Later in the day, another visit happened via text because our face-to-face meeting was interrupted due to circumstance, the very words that were needed were the prayer: strength for today, hope for tomorrow.
I looked the prayer up, the words  are from Thessalonians.  Although not from the texts for today, the words speak to the texts of today as a whole.
Strength for today, and hope for tomorrow.
After the warnings voiced by Jeremiah the prophet last week, today’s text has moved on to a point of no return.  The people find themselves estranged from God. Their communal relationships are broken. Their relationship with the land is in peril. Armies have crossed into their territory and the land is being laid waste. The people can no longer turn around, can no longer make peace; destruction has started. What options do the people have?; to run – there are other armies on their other borders-, to fight – without weapons, without leaders, with a lack of will, to acquiesce -to be led away into exile?  In whichever choice there is an option available to the people, to pray. I have noted in conversations with people who have lived through war, various disasters, or trying circumstances, that in the telling of their tales most acknowledge turning to prayer. When everything is gone and chaos is the norm, prayer becomes the stable item; a place to turn, a concrete action, a connection, a hope, an option. Crazy though, is that it takes extenuating circumstances to draw people back to prayer – to relationship with God, with others, with creation. Everyday, not just those that fall apart, we could certainly pray: Strength for today and hope for tomorrow.
I am sure that you have noticed election signs going up around the city. I would love to see a party use the campaign slogan: strength for today and hope for tomorrow, to see those words on signs dotting the neighbourhood.; to have politicians who live the motto and provide strong leadership to tackle the tasks at hand -the environment, medi-care, immigration, reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, electoral reform, and so on; and in their actions and decisions grow hope for tomorrow. Unfortunately, too often people are praying the words strength for today and hope for tomorrow, as they witness and experience chaos at the hands of poor leadership, poor government.
And that is where we find Jesus – confronting poor leadership and poor government; while sitting with those who are in the kind of circumstances that require a prayer of strength for today and hope for tomorrow.
 It is the scribes and the Pharisees who start the interaction with Jesus.  Under their breathes they note that Jesus is eating with tax collectors and those whom the scribes and Pharisees label sinners. So, as was Jesus’ practice, he told them parables. The parables of the lost sheep and the lost coin are meant to point a reflective and accusatory finger at the grumblers; Jesus is confronting poor leadership by addressing the actions -or lack there of- of the scribes and the Pharisees.
Jesus confronts the leaders of the time who are responsible for interpreting the Law, that is the covenant God made with the people in the time of Moses.  The Law was a set of rules to assist people in strengthening their relationship with God, and with other human beings. In Jesus’ time the scribes and Pharisees taught the law and policed the Law.  They were responsible for executing judgement against people seen to be deviating from the Law.
So what were the parables about?
Is Jesus suggesting to the scribes and the Pharisees that they are the sheep or the coin - the lost?  They were lost; lost in the sense that the policing of the Law had become more important than the relationships it was meant to foster. The scribes and Pharisees had lost touch with God, with the people; they were out on their own, lost in their own self-righteousness. Or are the Pharisees and scribes the shepherd, the woman? In this case could Jesus be implying that the Law requires the leadership to be responsible, to focus on protecting, finding, restoring, every person, and to be about the wholeness of the community; where no one is lost or forgotten?
These thoughts are not new to us.  All year we have been listening to Luke’s theological themes. Again and again Luke writes stories where all those who are deemed outsiders are included in God’s grace. He emphasizes that the kingdom comes for everyone. Luke points fingers at a society that has become legalistic, rather than compassionate and merciful.  The Law is not being lived according to the heart, and when this happens everything falls apart. There are those who are forgotten and neglected, called sinners and kept out of relationship by being held at arms length.  If the scribes and the Pharisees were living the Law there would not be sinners because their needs would be met in community, met with compassion and mercy.  Right relationships would mean strength for today and hope for tomorrow for everyone.
Luke also tells us when we will know that we are living in a time of right relationships – where compassion and mercy abound- it will be at the time when people rejoice for each person who is restored into community.  There will be joy and rejoicing. Luke says it five times in just a few lines.
That is not the reality of the world – joy and rejoicing.
Jeremiah’s dower words, the lament of the Psalm, the self-righteous leaders labeling sinners and shunning tax collectors,  this sounds like a world moving towards a point of no return.  This sounds like now. The texts resonate because they capture some of what we feel when we look at the state of the world, the environment, relationships,  and another election season. In this climate before I consider my options – our options – with conviction I will pray: strength for today and hope for tomorrow.
National Bishop Susan Johnson has invited congregations, has invited you, to join her in a year of prayer -beginning now and running to the end of August 2020. The insert in today’s bulletin is a resource to help you in forming a daily prayer practice. She has said more than once, “wouldn’t it be wonderful if we were known as the church that prays.” Her conviction is that prayer is the essence of all that we say and do; prayer overtime works at a heart level. When we pray – connections are made – with God, with people, with creation.
This morning we were blessed to be part of Rebeca’s baptism.  Collectively we promised to pray for her in her new life in Christ. That’s relationship building. In the rite of Baptism, parents and God-parents are entrusted with responsibilities: the responsibility includes teaching the Lord’s prayer and nurturing the child in faith and prayer. This is important.  The why is written into the liturgy, so that the baptized (that’s us) can learn to trust God, proclaim Christ through word and deed, care for others and the world God has made, and work for justice and peace. Prayer does this to us.
When we stop praying, the opposite comes about, we do not work for justice and peace, we lack in our care for others and the world God made, we no longer proclaim Christ through word and deed, and our trust in God falters... and then we find ourselves at a point of no return, toothpaste out of the tube, a train-wreck in process.
I’m with Bishop Susan, I invite you to pray with me this week. My prayer for this week is the wise words from Thursday’s visit; I plan on praying the words before I put my feet on the floor in the morning, after listening to the morning news; when out walking I will silently pray the prayer for each person I pass; I will share the words aloud with those whom I visit; the prayer will be the last words I say before going to bed.Through prayer may we be once again washed in the waters of baptism, and by nurturing ourselves in prayer may we once again learn to trust God, proclaim Christ through word and deed, care for others and the world God has made, and work for justice and peace.
...to you and your household, strength for today and hope for tomorrow. Amen.

Better Than Biscuits

A pastor was attending a men’s breakfast in Farm Country. He asked one of the senior farmers to say grace before the meal.  The farmer began: “Lord, I hate buttermilk.” The pastor opened one eye and wondered where this was going. The farmer continued loudly proclaiming, “Lord, I hate lard.” Now the pastor was worried. However, without missing a beat the farmer prayed on, “And Lord, you know I don’t much care for raw white flour.” Just as the pastor thought to stand up and stop the prayer, the farmer said, “But, Lord, when you mix them all together and bake them up, I do love fresh biscuits. So, Lord, when things come up we don’t like, when life gets hard, when we just don’t understand what you are saying, we just need to relax and wait until you are done mixing, and probably it will be something even better than biscuits. Amen.”
A little levity on a Sunday when the readings are anything but funny. In Jeremiah God compares God’s self to a potter, who in the making a vessel reworks the clay many times over.  The prophet tells the people God’s work as potter includes shaping evil against the people and devising a plan against them; unless they turn around; turn and amend their ways and their doings. In Luke Jesus continues the conversation in a similar vein, teaching what amended ways look like, and graphically explaining what ‘doings’ are expected of followers.  Jesus is blunt; you did hear the Gospel read correctly, “whoever comes to me and does not HATE father and mother, wife, children...even life itself cannot be my follower.”
It is one thing to hate buttermilk, to hate lard, but, to hate father and mother and all those familial relationships where one hopes for relationships that are right and good and healthy. To hate, Jesus, are you being serious?
Yes, this passage is Jesus being very serious. Although perhaps with too much hyperbole, Jesus is stressing that being a disciple could lead to losing relationships with loved ones ... because you will be different. You will be set free to live, not for oneself, but, rather, for the health and wellbeing of the world. It might mean altering beliefs, affiliating with a different political party, changing one’s lifestyle, befriending a new group or groups of people, advocating for  ideals that contradict others in one’s own family circle. It means choosing beliefs, morals, ethics, attitudes, and actions for oneself; sometimes this is a drastic turn----and it can cause irritation, fights, and broken relationships. It will also create and build new relationships.
Jesus isn’t mincing his words. After the potential loss of relationship he comments that one needs to carry the cross, and this is not hyperbole to the hearers.  Rome was very adept at killing rabble-rousers, advocates, and social change makers.  The land was littered with people dead or dying on crosses along roadsides; the idea was to deter uprising; to deter people thinking for themselves; to deter people from giving hope and power to those who were hopeless, helpless, and powerless.
 Years after Jesus’ strong words, workers in the church were carrying the cross; literally dying for sharing the Gospel, for living a different way, for challenging the powers of the time to address social injustices, for giving hope to the forgotten, for lifting the poor out of poverty, for loving their neighbours, for opposing the Empire, for advocating for rights, for redistributing resources.  Paul writes his letter to Philemon, while in prison for preaching the Gospel. Others at the time had been killed -crucified on crosses- and more deaths followed. Paul writes Philemon with a very big, life altering ask. He asks that Philemon put his faith into action – to live the Gospel- by giving his slave Onesimus his freedom.  This is a big ask! Slavery was the norm in Roman households of Philemon’s time.  Colossae, the city, where Philemon, lived had many merchants, land owners, and magistrates who had slaves. To make ‘the ask’ more difficult Onesimus was a run away slave, this explains why Paul had met him while in prison.  Onesimus has been changed by the Gospel and wants to be an emissary for the Gospel – to do this he needs to be free, so he has the ability to go and teach, preach, and serve.
 Philemon is a Christian.  He has resources such that the church in Colossae meets in his house. He is seen as a patron of the church.  Paul fills his letter with accolades, and pressures Philemon to make the ‘right’ decision for the Gospel – to free Onesimus.  To do this was to carry a cross.  Philemon’s fellow social and class group would be upset at this revolutionary move, and it would ostracize him from colleagues. For goodness sake, such actions might give slaves ideas; it set people free, it changed the balance of power, it changed society values, it was not the perceived best practice, it would disrupt the comfort of the status quo, it could start a rebellion. This is exactly what Jesus meant in the Gospel – warning of hating father and mother, and that being a disciple was costly.
I had a Christian history professor in seminary who over and over again, preached, that if the church is not being persecuted, it is not living the Gospel. He came out of a seminary experience that included participating in the labour union movement, the Pittsburgh steel riots of the 1970s, and various marches for this or that. He fought hard for the rights of workers...this came out of his understanding of the Gospel, that all should be free from slavery, whatever its form.  He carried this cross - losing relationships, building others, to follow Jesus’ revolutionary ideals – for the healing of the world.
Today’s scriptures tell us, in blunt and shocking words, exactly what being a follower – a Christian is about. We are told exactly how much it will cost us.  I wonder, how much has being a Christian cost you? Have you carried a cross?
Peter Claver was born in 1581 into a devout Catholic family.  His parents were prosperous farmers and land owners. As a young adult he attended the University of Barcelona and was known for his intelligence and piety; this led him to more study within the Society of Jesus. At the time, there was a lay brother, Alphonsus Rodriguez, at the college; he was known for having a gift of prophecy. Alphonsus believed that God had called Peter Claver to spend his life in service in the colonies in the new world – in New Spain.
In 1610, Claver arrived in New Spain, in the city of Cartagena, in what is now Columbia. He spent six years in study and living with the Jesuits before being ordained a priest. In these years, Claver was deeply bothered by the harsh treatment and living conditions of slaves being brought in from Africa. Slaves arrived on ships that were overcrowded and despicable in condition, with an estimated third dying on the voyage across the ocean. Cartagena was the hub of the slave trade, with 10,000 slaves coming into port each year; despite papal decrees having denounced slavery, it continued because it was a lucrative trade.
  The Jesuits had been ministering with the slaves for many years before Claver arrived to carry on the work of Fr. Alonso de Sandoval. Claver set up shop on the docks and met the ships -met the slaves- with medicine, food, clothing, and brandy, in hand.  In the off-season of shipping, Claver visited plantations taking along items in short supply. Claver took time to learn the language of the people, and taught Christianity in a vast number of African dialects. It is estimated that in his 40 years of ministry he personally taught and baptized 300,000 slaves.
But the Jesus work – the work talked about in today’s Gospel was his work that shock the powers that be.
He fought for Christian slaves to ensure they received their Christian and civil rights. Claver would return to plantations to continue to keep owners accountable. On such trips, he would accept the hospitality of slaves and lodge in these homes, refusing the hospitality of owners, overseers, and traders. His persistent advocacy for the rights of slaves annoyed city officials and magistrates.
His unrelenting work, determination, outspokenness, and actions saw the change, as slave situations improved. In time Claver was considered a moral force – and called the Apostle of Cartagena. Claver up to his death in 1654 from a prolonged sickness, referred to himself as “the slave of the slaves forever.”
Peter carried a cross;  a cross that set others free.  Because of the Gospel, whom have you free?
Jeremiah ends with the words of the Lord, Turn now, all of you from your evil way, and amend your ways and your doings. We are invited to live big picture thinking.  Philemon has the choice to free his slave Onesimus, Paul saying it is the ethical, the Christian thing to do, even though in his world this would have been a revolutionary act. We are told that carrying the cross is the expectation, the Christian best practice.
We might hate buttermilk. We might hate lard. We might not like raw white flour very much. BUT, we do like biscuits.  God is mixing the dough, mixing us up, cooking up a batch of Christians that are not afraid to live Christian lives... lives that through the Gospel set people free. Please God, when things come up that we don’t like, when life gets hard, when we just don’t understand what you are saying, help us relax, and let you mix....so that we have the power to act and to live into freedom...to participate in creating something way better than biscuits. Amen.

note that the joke was sent to me via social media

Borrowed Tables

This morning’s Gospel parable puts in front of us the complexity of a wedding banquet. The parable itself is not difficult to follow, it is quite simple and to the point.  Do not sit in the place of honour in case some greater dignitary has been invited ...what you should do is go and sit in the lowest place.
We all know it is far more complicated than that.  Consider the wedding dinners you have attended and the people with whom you have had to sit.  Consider seating arrangements you have drawn up. How do you decide who to invite, or not invite? Who sits where and with whom?  Do you choose not to have a seating arrangement – where people find their own table mates? How will the tables be placed to be most equitable? Do you take into consideration the attendees feelings or personalities? How do you inform people where they are sitting?  If you don’t like those you are sitting with, do you move or exchange places? And in planning, do you sit the most undesirable of guests, or left-overs, with the pastor and their spouse ... assuming that the pastor has an extra dose of patience and compassion?... trust me, this happens.
Such a parable is a great way for Jesus to start a conversation.  We all have stories, or experiences, of inviting or being invited to a meal at someone else’s table. The wedding dinner nicely showcases the variety of human emotion and the complexity of human relationships.

The Welcome Table is the name of the book I use for First Communion instruction.  The book is told from the eyes of a little girl who participates in her baby brother’s baptism.  As he gets a little bigger she teaches him about Jesus, helps him fold his hands in prayer, says table grace for him, and when in church gets him to loudly say the response to Go in peace. Serve the Lord. The little girl also invites a friend to church and invites her to come to the welcome table to receive a blessing.  She explains the importance of the meal. She says that it is kind of like celebrating Thanksgiving where everyone in the family can have a seat at the table.  She tells her friend if she likes to come to church, one day she too can eat the meal, just like her brother when he is older. When the little girls are at the altar rail, the friend notices all the people who share the meal: young and old, different races, males and females, people who are single, families, the grouchy and the happy.  She sees friends from school and complete strangers. It is obvious that everyone comes as they are and they are welcome.
When Jesus came on a sabbath to eat a meal in the house of one of the leading Pharisees, they observed him closely.
Let’s take a moment to think about this line. First note that it is the sabbath, a day set aside for people to right their relationships with God and with each other. A day for rest, relaxation, rejuvenation.
Second it is at someone else’s table. The Gospels never record Jesus eating at his own table, in his own home.  The Augsburg Fortress resource for this week says that Jesus eats at borrowed tables.  It began from the moment of birth, being laid in a borrowed manger.  He eats at the home of Mary and Martha; Jesus eats with Simon’s mother-in-law after raising her from her sick bed; Jesus eats at Zacchaeus’ table after calling him to change his ways; Jesus makes wine at a wedding feast; Jesus eats at borrowed tables with sinners;  the Last Supper is in a borrowed upper room; Jesus post resurrection meal is on a beach.  Borrowed tables.
Thirdly, Jesus borrows the table, to which he has been invited as guest, as a platform, a moment to usher in the Great Banquet, God’s feast. It is in the breaking of bread that a miracle happens...thousands are fed with two loaves and a few fish; at a borrowed table a woman is forgiven as she washes Jesus’ feet with her tears and wipes them with her hair.  When Jesus comes to dinner women and Gentiles are directly included in the conversation; people are healed; water is made into wine; Jesus washes the disciples feet and tells them to love one another; Jesus interprets the Law in new ways, pointedly admonishing the host in the process; besides this diners, at various dinner parties are challenged to see the world through different eyes and to act accordingly.  No wonder the Pharisees were watching when Jesus sat at the table with them.
When Jesus came on the sabbath  ...
When Jesus comes on the sabbath to eat a meal  ... in this house .. .what happens?

During my teenage years I spent summer weekends on a friends farm, a borrowed table.  My friend had a dad and three older brothers who were responsible for 75 head of milking jersey cows, a mom who was responsible for a number of pigs, my friend’s chore was to tend to her baby sister and to have supper ready when chores were done. I would help her in the kitchen.  The first night she said, “take the dish of what you would like to eat the most to the table last and keep it on your lap until after grace; help yourself before passing it.” I was perplexed but listened to her. No sooner was grace said, when all the dishes of food on the table were scooped up by the family; by the time dishes were passed, there was often little left in the bowls. The family were hard workers and they were hungry come supper.  It was no holds bar.  Give thanks then grab, eat, and go.

Surely this is not how Jesus finds us, when Jesus comes on sabbath to eat a meal in this house.
Each week we give thanks and invite Jesus to this house for a meal, a meal in his honour. Jesus comes to this borrowed table -to borrowed tables and places around the world- and is manifest in our midst, in the breaking of bread, in the sharing of wine. Christ’s presence opens our hearts and the rail -the seats around the table- to be a table of welcome; where all of us in our glorious diversity come and share equally bread of life and wine of blessing.  In the moment, Jesus challenges us:  to set aside greed, to enter into relationship, to eat side by side, to forgive others as we have been forgiven, to receive grace and love when we don’t feel we deserve it.  Jesus challenges us to eat our fill through a tiny morsel of bread and to go abundantly share it. The idea of eating at this borrowed table is to realize it is not our table, God borrows it for the purpose of miracles, healing, conversation, forgiveness, challenge. The expectation is that eating here is not like eating at my friends farmhouse table with her family, where diners were greedy, only focused on food, forgetting each other to fill their own bellies. Being part of God’s meal, at a borrowed table, has host and diner – every diner- sitting side by side.

There is a story of a journalist who is given the opportunity to have a tour of the afterlife; God’s great banquet.  St. Peter is the tour guide.  The journalist, of course, is interested in seeing what heaven looks like; so is shown a large room with a warm hearth, a large pot of yummy smelling soup, and loaves of freshly baked bread. The people seem relaxed, well fed, and enjoying each other’s company.  The journalist noted that the people were curiously tied to each other by their wrists; meaning everything they did they did together – co-operating. There was a large dinning table and those sitting at it were feeding each other with long handled spoons dipping into the tureen in the middle of the table, and serving the person opposite them.  The journalist appreciated the relaxed nature of the meal, the inclusion of all present, and the rich conversation.
St. Peter than took the journalist to see hell, which was the room next door.  The room had been set up identically to that of heaven. Yet the room felt cold, the fire in the hearth didn’t cast much heat- rather it put out quite a bit of smoke and soot. People looked annoyed, hungry, and lost. The large dinning table had a similar tureen and long handled spoons, as the counterpart in heaven.  The only difference was that those seated at the table were not eating. Due to the length of the spoon handles it was impossible to feed oneself...the hell of it was that no one would feed the person across from them at the table.

When Jesus comes on a sabbath to eat a meal in this house I like to believe that our welcome is as hospitable as that offered to us by Jesus through the meal. I wonder though, if we extend such a welcome because we have failed to send out invitations, meaning we are happy and comfortable with those who are part of the community and have not invited those who make us squeamish. Perhaps we have invited our friends, our families, people we know can add a few dollars to the collection plate, people we don’t mind sitting beside for an hour, people with whom we will gladly share a common cup.  Jesus has come to us on the sabbath, a day of rest in which to make right our relationships with God, all people, and creation. Jesus has sat down with us and borrowed the table to challenge us on our invitation practices. Via a wedding dinner parable Jesus pointedly admonishes us – the importance we have given ourselves; the choice we think we have in sending out invitations and making seating arrangements; insinuates that we are greedy, withholding bread and wine for ourselves. 
This week as Jesus comes to us at this borrowed table, may we be so filled with thanksgiving for being invited, welcomed, and included, that we are changed, recognizing the abundance given to us to share. Let’s be lavish in righting our relationships with all people. Let us have conversations with people – all people, every people, each person we meet. Let us invite your friends, relatives, or wealthy neighbours – remember though you may get invited to a meal in their house of worship -  and most importantly let us invite and welcome everyone -everyone- those without a faith home, those we would not want to sit beside at a wedding dinner, the person we would have trouble sharing the common cup with, the person we would not want to rub shoulders with at the altar rail, the person with the hand we would no want to shake during the sharing of the peace, the person we would not want to get stuck with during coffee fellowship...invite them specifically. These invitations are a top priority!

Do not neglect to do good, showing hospitality to strangers, and share what you have for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.