Know Your Place

The great preacher Ray Stedman used to tell a wonderful story of a faithful missionary couple returning from Africa back in the days of Teddy Roosevelt. After years of service they came back on the same ship as President Roosevelt, who was returning from a big game hunting expedition in Africa. When they pulled into New York harbor there was a band playing Roosevelt’s favorite songs, and all the high officials of the city were there to meet him. But the missionaries slipped off the ship unnoticed and unmet, and rented a run down flat on the East Side of New York. The man was really depressed about this contrast, and said to his wife, “It isn’t fair, it just isn’t fair! Here we are after years of hard work and heartache, we haven’t any money, we don’t have anyone to take care of us, we don’t even know where we are going next. God has promised great things, but nothing’s happened. We’ve given him everything we’ve got, and now we’ve come home to nothing. But just look at what happens when the president comes back from a big game hunt! It isn’t fair!”

His wife said, “Dear, I know it isn’t fair, but this isn’t the right attitude. You mustn’t think this way. Why don’t you go into the bedroom and talk to the Lord about it, and see what he has to say?” So he did. He went in and knelt by the bed, alone. He was there a long time, but when he came out his face was alight, and his wife saw that something had happened. She said, “What happened?” And he said, “I got down on my knees and poured out the whole story to the Lord. I told him that I thought it was so unfair and especially that when we came home the president got this big welcome but no one cared about us. I told him that he was really letting us down. But you know what the Lord said to me? It was almost as though I could hear the voice. He leaned down and said, ‘But you’re not home yet.’”

Today is Communion Sunday. In fact, it’s more than just any old Communion Sunday, it’s World Communion Sunday. It’s a time when we anticipate the day when Christ comes in final victory, when all the saints will feast in the joy of his eternal realm. But even though it is only a foreshadowing of that day, not the great celebration itself, on this day each month, we are, in fact, served by the Lord himself. He is present in the breaking of the bread and the sharing of the cup, we receive the spiritual nourishment which we need to continue in his service. But guess what? It doesn't always feel like anything has happened. You may look surreptitiously at your neighbor and wonder if there is something is wrong with you that you still feel spiritually empty, flat, stale. I'll Let you in on a secret. Everyone that I know sometimes feels like that.

Because you don’t stock up on faith like filling up the gas tank in your car. We do receive spiritual nurture and encouragement and strength from worship and the sacraments, whether our emotions have caught up with the act or not. Quite often we are blind to what God is doing in us until we turn around and look backward.

Jesus warned his disciples against thinking of faith as something that he could just pour into them like wine out of a jar. And church isn’t like a gas station or a grocery store, a place you come to stock your spiritual shelves. It's more like a gym, or a fitness center.

In order to understand today’s passage, it’s helpful to look at the context. We’ve been looking at what it means to be a disciple. We’re supposed to be ready, we’re supposed to put Jesus ahead of family and friends, we’re supposed to be good stewards of God’s gifts, we’re supposed to listen carefully to God’s word, recognize and repent of our sins, and have compassion for one another. And right at the beginning of today’s chapter Jesus adds two more very stringent requirements.

“Occasions for stumbling are bound to come,” he says, “but woe to anyone by whom they come! It would be better for you if a millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea than for you to cause one of these little ones to stumble.” And then he adds, “Be on your guard! If another disciple sins, you must rebuke the offender, and if there is repentance, you must forgive. And if the same person sins against you seven times a day, and turns back to you seven times and says, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive.” [Lk 17:1-4]