A Sermon in the Series on the Statement of Faith of the United Church of Canada by Thomas R. Henry

August 6, 2006

Text: Matthew 25: 31-45

For those of you who were alive way back there in the late 1960s, you may remember that the word “community” began to replace the word “family” as a description of the church. The church family was very popular during the Ozzie and Harriet years in the 1950s when father knew best. But in those turbulent 60s, the times they were achangin, and calling the church “family” seemed to imply that one had to be married and have 2.3 children to be the church. (Having 2.3 children was the norm back then.) So every progressive congregation became a Community of Faith. And even our secular culture embraced the word and the concept. Nearly forty years later we still talk about our community all the time. Its a very popular word, but its a somewhat blurry concept because when we say community we may be talking about our church or our neighborhood; our close friends or our ethnic or racial group; our sexual identity group or a small group of people who believe and think just the way we do.

Within our heads and our hearts, our community is made up of those people we are comfortable being around for one reason or another. You know how some people say, “You cant choose your family, but you can choose your friends,” well, our friends often become our community. So, it was a bit of an awakening for me recently when I read some words written about community by Henri Nouwen, a Catholic priest, thinker and writer, who became a guru for Christians, and especially seminary students, in the 1960s before his death in 1976. Nouwen wrote: Community is the place where the person you least want to live with always lives.

“Now, thats what Im talkin about,” said Jesus Christ to all who would listen to him. Well, he didnt exactly use those words, but I think that is what he was talking about just about every time he was talking. Community is the place where the person you least want to live with always lives. Whether that person be among the least of these or among the pharisees; among Republicans or Democrats; Lebanese or Israelis; among progressives or evangelicals, Jesus understood that God intends for all humanity to live together in community for the common good.

But we dont. But we dont. Even we who are called to be the church dont always love others, let alone serve them. Yet, each and every week we stand up and say out loud together: God calls us to be the church…to love and serve others.

Actually, one of the problems we may have in getting beyond the saying of these words to the doing of them could be imbedded in our understanding of the word “others.” I just thought about that as I was writing this sermon. The “other” is “someone who is not me.” The dictionary defines the word as “different in nature or kind.” Not my kind of person. And Im more comfortable with my own kind. We all are. Unfortunately, if all of our time and energy is spent on being around our own kind, we will find it real uncomfortable to be around Jesus. It is none other than the Holy Spirit of God, the Spirit that was in Jesus, who keeps bringing into our communities the person we least want to live with.

And in the end, we who are called to be the church…to love and serve others have to contend with the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 25. In those verses of scripture, Jesus talks about a final judgment of nations. Note this is not just the judgment of individuals, but of nations. Jesus says:

When the Son of Man comes in his glory…all the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

All the nations will be gathered before God and a judgment will be made. So, you see, its not only our personal loving and serving that have eternal implications, but also the policies and politics of a nation. As Senator Barach Obama said of our own nation: “Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal rather than religion-specific values.” And that is exactly what Jesus is doing in this teaching from Matthew, showing that universal human values have eternal meaning.

In this judgment, Jesus realigns human community. Those people he worked all of his life to bring together, he now separates. And two new eternal communities are formed. Those who never expected to be together find themselves together as sheep or as goats. Among the sheep are those who loved and served others, the least of these: those who were hungry and thirsty and needed something to eat and drink; those who were naked and needed clothing; those who were sick and needed care; those who were in prison and needed a visit; those who were strangers and needed a welcome, only a welcome. And I would add: those who were voiceless and needed a voice. (Im sure Jesus would have added those himself if he had had more time!!)

Among the goats are those who probably needed to hear those words of Henri Nouwen: Community is the place where the person you least want to live with always lives. The least of these are among us. The least of these are not really “others”, in the way we use that word. They are us. Hungry for food; thirsty for water; dying for love. Those who are sick in body, and those whose spirits are not doing so well. Imprisoned at Dixon or Dwight or Cook County, or imprisoned in their own homes, in their own bodies, in their own fears. Strangers, not just on the street corner, but sometimes in the pews of churches. Strangers even at coffee hours or among friends.

What is shocking, totally shocking, to both the sheep and the goats, is that Jesus tells them that what they did to the least of these they actually did to him. When did we see YOU??!!! they ask. So, the sheep didnt do it to get the final reward. They just loved and served others because it was the human thing to do. And the goats, well, the goats might have worked harder at it if they had only known. Jesus tells them, Jesus tell us: Now You Know. This is how the judgment will be made.

Christian social reformer, Dorothy Day, who lived in Chicago and graduated from Waller, now Lincoln Park, High School, once said of herself, “I really only love God as much as the person I love the least.” And Henri Nouwen might have said: We are asked to love and serve the person we would least want to live with.

I had a personal experience of Jesus judgment this week. Im just thankful it wasnt the final judgment. It was on Tuesday night and I was here at church for a meeting. As I was leaving the air conditioned parlor that night, at about 9:30 p.m. when it was still almost 90 degrees outside, I walked down the hallway past the church gymnasium and felt a sense of pride in myself and St. Pauls. I looked into the windows of the gym and saw the shelter guests bedding down for the night. I was glad we were doing something good. I went on outside into the stifling heat and began to make the long commute home. I couldnt wait to get there and be able to go to bed in the air conditioned parsonage. But good old God came to me in the middle of the night and called me a goat. I woke up with a thought that so unsettled me I could not go back to sleep. St. Pauls gym and Oscar Mayer room, where the shelter guests sleep, are not air conditioned. Those people had to be sweltering, tossing and turning in the heat of the building that was certainly not less than the heat outside. Why didnt I think of that as I passed the window to the gym? Why didnt I see? Where was my head?

It is so easy for any of us, for all of us, to just not see. It may not be a malicious act of violence or even negligence. It may not be an intentional punishment of that “other” who is not me. It may not even be because we believe that those persons are already getting better than they deserve. Although I have certainly heard people say things like that about “others.” And we all have had thoughts like that amble through our minds. In the future, when I hear those kinds of comments, I will have to contend not only with the Gospel but also with words written by Charles Madigan, senior editor at the Chicago Tribune. Recently, when writing about Matthew, chapter 25, he said: “You will note that there is nothing in this Gospel about whether people deserved to be clothed, fed, visited, nurtured, cared for. Jesus just says if you did it for…(them)…then you did it for me.” (Chicago Tribune, July 18, 2006)

But there may be none of this feeling in us at all. No evil intent. It just may be that we did not see. We were just caught up in our own lives and livelihoods. We are human afterall, but we do need to get our eyesight and insight checked from time to time.

Yet, the judgment is not all bad either. We have a little goat and a lot of sheep in us. All those times you clothed, fed, visited, nurtured and cared for and welcomed people are not lost on God. Those votes you have cast have eternal implications. Those causes you have supported do matter. Not in some kind of cosmic tally kept by God, but in the contribution you have made to the common good of all Gods creation.

You have loved and served others, and in so doing you have loved and served God, the God whom we know in Jesus Christ.

I really like the newspaper ads that Loyola University of Chicago has been running. One especially stuck with me. It says: 90% of your brain is developed by age 5. The heart is another matter. As long as we live, we are developing heart. The Christian heart. The heart of Jesus Christ…to love and serve others.