Sermon: Christian Family Sunday

Our scripture reading today paints a picture of Peter’s summon to Tabitha back to life, to “Get up” and open her eyes to a welcoming family of God around her.

Today we’ll explore that perhaps it is Peter who is being summoned too. Called by women (mothers and grandmothers) of ancient times to mature into his potential as a human being and as a disciple of Jesus Christ. Calling him to grow into a higher vision of who is in and out. Peter has been on this journey of faith, and we have been journeying with him. Together with Peter we have been discovering what faith and discipleship means, and how God’s Love is ever-expanding our concept of family and kinship, in the ancient world and today.

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Our scripture reading began: Now in Joppa there was a disciple whose name was Tabitha, which in Greek is Dorcas.

What is interesting in Tabitha/Dorcas, is that we find a woman at the cross roads of culture and status, who challenges an early Christian ekklesia working through how to live together in community. Her two names Tabitha (in Hebrew or Aramaic) and Dorcas (in Greek) indicates that two different languages were being spoken, and probably two different cultures were colliding. The Hebrews were probably Jews whose mother tongue was Aramaic, and the Hellenists were Greeks, Romans or Gentiles, who converted to Judaism through Jesus (114). Different religious backgrounds, different cultural backgrounds, different languages. Tabitha was also a widow living amongst widows, which normally would have meant that she was very poor. However, scripture notes that she was a seamstress of talent and means.

The group of widows were being taken care of, as widows —elderly mothers and grandmothers with little or no pension. The Hebrew widows were performing the daily diakonia, a daily common meal or food portion. The diakonia was for all widows but their service to the Hellenist widows was less than generous. So, there was a rift between the Hellenists and the Hebrews in general, because the Hellenists were holding the Hebrews responsible for the neglect of their widows in the daily ministry.

This story can be understood as about this specifiic community of widows. And it can also be seen as a smaller version of what was a larger, systemic issue. Perhaps there was, at that time, an appeal to the Hebrew ekklesia as the majority of the Jerusalem, to change their undertanding of who is included in God’s family (115). Not knowing how to address the situation, the Hellenists call for Peter, a disciple of the rabbi Jesus, to help.

The Hellenists and Hellenist widows in this story are outsiders… and it is the outsiders who call Peter to guide their community toward our greater vision of who is to be an insider and who is to be an outsider in the family of God.

This story reminds me of when Jesus himself was school by the Syrophoenician Woman. Do you remember that story? The story highlights a pivotal moment in Jesus ministry, too, that expanded his undestanding of who was a child of God, and who he was to serve:

Mark 7:24-30

[Jesus set out and set the the region of Tyre.] He… did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet… a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet. 26 Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. 27 He said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” 28 But she answered him, “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” 29 Then he said to her, “For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.” 30 So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.

During the time of Jesus “the children” were considered the Jewish people, and “the dogs”, well, that was a derogatory word for Romans or Gentiles. At first Jesus says that his spiritual food was to nourish the Jewish people, not their enemies the Romans. But she challenges him saying, “even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs”. An powerful interpretation of this is that there is abundance in God’s love, that even non-Jewish people recognized it, and were spiritually nourished by it, and so saw themselves as members of God’s holy human family.

Jesus was called by this woman to reconsider who was to be included in the family of God. The woman calls Jesus to a higher vision of family. Not one defined by blood lineage alone, but one expanded into something more.

It seems the Hellenists, Romans and the Gentiles of ancient times were asking to be part of the family. They were calling Jesus, and Peter and the early Christians to a similar higher vision of family, a higher vision of family of God. One that includes, embraces and nourishes everyone.

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Today’s families are facing similar challenges. At their best families welcome more family in, and nurture into their highest calling: feeding us in our infancy, correcting us in our growing years, supporting us in our questioning; challenging us to examine ourselves as we mature; modeling to us the mystery of how we can hear the meaning behind the words. Encouraging us to seek, to respond, to care and… make more family! Nurturing each into a knowing of themselves as vital to each other’s growth into our highest sense of love and purpose.

And yet, similar to Tabitha’s family of widows, families can be disfunctional. Our members young and old, abled and disabled, can be vulnerable to the neglect, rejection, bullying or targetting that we know can and does occur. We can be taken for granted, and we may take others for granted. Our gifts and ways can be devalued, and we may devalue the gifts and ways of others. We move away or are left behind, and it’s hard to keep in touch. We put others’ needs before our own on a continuous basis… and we can take, take, take that which is not ours to have. Family members and family situations can hurt us, and leave deep emotional, physical, sexual, financial, spiritual wounds, that it may take a lifetime heal, loving community, and grace to heal.

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Friends, I invite you in this moment to close your eyes if you like, as we take a moment to let our inner vision soar, to see how God, the Creator and Sustainer of all things, nutures, guides and heals us, as I read aloud Psalm 23…

[gentle music begins]

Psalm 23

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures;

he leads me beside still waters;

he restores my soul.

He leads me in right paths

for his name’s sake.

Even though I walk through the darkest valley,

I fear no evil;

for you are with me;

your rod and your staff—

they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me

in the presence of my foes;

you anoint my head with oil;

my cup overflows.

Surely goodness and kindness shall follow me

all the days of my life,

and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord

my whole life long.

[music continues]

This experience of dwelling in the house of God who prepares a table for us where our cup overflows… isn’t this what our Hellenist widows were envisioning when they called Peter and their community to vision of a holy nurture.

“Peter… knelt down and prayed.” [He] turned to the body and said, “Tabitha, get up.” Then she opened her eyes, and seeing Peter, she sat up. He summoned the other saints and widows to come around her, as he now understood what it meant to be cherished as kin in the family of God.

A disciple empowers the widowed woman, because her death called Peter to his higher purpose. To help her to know that she is God’s own child. She is a member of his family, God’s holy family. That is nothing short of a miracle.

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How do we call each other to our highest selves in our families? To our highest purpose as members of God’s holy family? Maybe the answer is in living the question. As a learner and a follower of The Way. You know that Way… of presence, kindness, forgiveness when we can, and love. Love of self, love of neighbor, Love of God. A Love so Amazing! that empowers us to respond to the truth that no one is outside of the family of God. Hallelujah!

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This sermon was prepared for Wesley United Church (Montreal)

Scripture: Acts 9:36-43, Psalm 23, John 10:22-30