How do you prepare to go on a road trip? On my family’s past two vacations to Colorado, my wife, my daughters, and I all wore matching tie-dye T-shirts. Although we spent most of the time driving in our minivan, we felt matching shirts brought us closer together and helped us feel more like a family unit. And you should’ve seen the adoring looks we got from fellow travelers as we checked into our hotel at our midpoint stop in Amarillo. We would get the occasional comment from a passerby about how cute we looked and I’d whimsically respond that we dressed this way so that we wouldn’t get lost. We were prepared!
We were ready for our road trip! We had someone checking our mail, we had snacks in the car, our pit stops were planned, our hotel room was reserved, we had books in our hands, a trash bag ready to collect wrappers and crumbs, and our electronics were charged, ready to bring the travelling tunes. We were equipped for any change or emergency we would encounter. We were prepared for our trip. Yet, we didn’t quite feel ready until we were wearing our tie-dye shirts. It was the last thing we needed to do in order to feel ready, ready for the trip ahead.
But sometimes life is unpredictable and we can’t really know what it takes to get ready, right? That’s why something is called unexpected… because it is unexpected. Jesus, in today’s gospel reading, tells us about the unexpected. He demonstrates how unexpected the presence of God feels in our lives and how shocking it will be when God finally shows up. At first, Jesus likens our waiting for God with that of a household servant awaiting the arrival of the master of the house. But just like the Greggs on a Colorado road trip, it didn’t matter how prepared the servants were, it didn’t matter if they had made everything perfect for the master upon his return. For you see, when the master returned home, he immediately made them stop what they were doing. The master fastened an apron around his waist, made the servants sit down at the table, and beautifully prepared and served a meal to everyone. And we see that the apocalyptic part of this narrative, the part where the master returns unexpectedly or the thief breaks into a house unaware, pales in significance to the action taken by the master. We must recognize the unexpected behavior of the master becoming the servant.
Postmodern author and preacher, Leonard Sweet, talks about how absurd this story of Jesus was. He says, “In the first century world of strict hierarchies and class stratifications to have the master of the household sit his servants down, in fact, recline them at a table while he offers them his service was an absurd notion. Put in today’s standards, it would be like offering your vacuum cleaner a steak dinner or putting your washing machine in a bubble bath. Ridiculous.” He goes on, “Yet this is exactly how Jesus would have us think. How absolutely strange, unexpected, beyond-our-imagining the presence of the Son in our midst will be. With such an unpredictable, seemingly unrecognizable master, how can we ever possibly be ready, be prepared, for the wholly unexpected?”
And that’s who we are called to be. We, as followers of Jesus, must model the master of the house and serve and care for others. We, as followers of Jesus, are called to be the servants of God in this city who know that the kingdom has been given to us. And with that confidence, we should lean into Jesus’s affirmation when he says, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give alms. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be.” If we are servants of the God of Creation, we should not be afraid of the unexpected. We should not be afraid to welcome all to the table and serve others. We must know that it is God’s good pleasure to give us the kingdom. And that’s why this parable told by Jesus is so important, because we are the servants at the house and the master is returning.
And I’m not talking about some apocalyptic reality or some end times rapture where Jesus comes back and it is the end of the world. No, I’m talking about doing something right here and right now. I’m talking about we, as the followers of Jesus, making the world a better place for God to come and inhabit. As we just saw in the text, the servants prepared the house for the master’s arrival. They knew the house wasn’t in good shape. Maybe they were relaxed about washing dishes. Maybe they hadn’t cut the grass. Maybe they had a party and didn’t pick up all the empty wine skins. Whatever the case, the master was important and the house needed to be in order. And as we saw in the text, when the master came home, those who worked for the betterment of their community were then served by the Almighty. Those who took care of their own lives and took care of others, those who prepared a loving home for God became the recipients of God’s good gifts.
Listen, I know we have a lot to fear in this world. The thief is prowling in the night and we are wide awake wondering when we will hear the alarm go off or a window break. We are always ready for that next shoe to drop. We listen to the news and wonder when a dictator might fire another missile. We see scientific reports that humanity is at the end of the line, the arctic is melting, fires are blazing, and temperatures are rising. We see more and more people dying of hunger, dying of war, dying of guns, and dying of disease. In our very city, our Dallas home, people can’t get affordable housing. My friend and pastor, Rev. Dr. Jamie Kowlessar of City Temple SDA, said that 40% of his congregation in South Dallas can’t afford the taxes on their properties. In our home of Dallas, black and brown bodies are being caged in order to keep the for-profit incarceration and immigration system lucrative. We, as Dallas people, have not kept our house in order. If the master were to return to Dallas right now, the city would not be ready to welcome Jesus. God would not say to us, “It is my good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”
But I challenge us as Royal Lane to make our house ready and to make our hearts ready. For if we do, we won’t have to be afraid for the future, as it will be God’s good pleasure to give us the kingdom. And again, we aren’t talking about God giving as a castle with a draw bridge and moat. No, we are talking about salvation and peace. We are talking about making this city, this country, this planet more like heaven, more like God’s realm of goodwill and love. And so, we need to get our house in order.
And I do think God has indeed found good pleasure with Royal Lane. We have become a place that values LGBTQ people and a place where all people, all people, can be leaders in this community, regardless of gender identity or sexual orientation. Royal Lane has had meaningful conversations around racial and economic justice and how we, as a primarily white congregation, need to understand race and racism and what we can do to hear the stories and affirm the lives of all of our black and brown sisters and brothers. God has found good pleasure with Royal Lane for our multi-faith efforts and our passion to recognize the beauty of God in other religious traditions as well as the common work of all people of goodwill to make the city a better place. God has found good pleasure with Royal Lane because we worship a big God, a God that calls us to serve the needy and welcome the stranger. God has found good pleasure with Royal Lane and your good work in this community. And I applaud you for helping to get this house ready for the master. I applaud you for making sure this church and this little corner of our city is a place made ready for the coming of God.
So, little flock, little church, don’t be afraid! Don’t be afraid of the folks that say you aren’t really Christian if you value the stories and lives of people of other faiths. Don’t be afraid of those who tell you that you aren’t valuing the Bible by saying that LGBTQ folks have an equal place at the table. Don’t be afraid when you try to take on the corrupt systems of housing and incarceration in Dallas and politicians who say we shouldn’t be messing with these parts of public life. Don’t be afraid when you show the other Baptists in town what it means to be historically Baptist like Roger Williams and create a city that is providential for all people. Don’t be afraid, church! God’s good pleasure is to give you the kingdom!
Last week we talked about how our possessions help us build and maintain community… very other centered. This week, we have done a 180. We’ve explored what our own hearts say about wealth and power. And we’ve thought about what we need to do to get our house in order, our church in order, so that the divine is made welcome in this city. We are servants in the master’s house. All of us. And we need to get this place and our lives ready for God. We need to really ponder this week what is most important to us, is it to focus on ourselves, or is it to make our world a better place where even God would want to inhabit this house?
Richard P. Carlson, of Lutheran Theological Seminary, says, “What is the ultimate concern of our lives? This text claims that our ultimate concern is God’s kingdom, because it was God’s pleasure to include us in this divine reign. Consequently, what we need, accumulate, and possess in life is transitory, as is time itself. God’s delightful decision for us is to empower us to use our possessions and our time to enact the values and agenda of God’s kingdom in the present as we anticipate its ultimate coming in the future.”
Friends, we must keep watch. We must relinquish our possessions. Not so much our money and our stuff, but our pride and our power and our position. All of what we possess, that make us who we are, are potentially things that distract us and keep us from getting our house and our city in order. Dr. David Schlafer, an Episcopal priest and professor talks about the duty that we have to make our house ready for God, and to not be distracted. He says, “Presumably the reason Jesus enjoins his disciples to relinquish their possessions is not unrelated to his assessment of the rich man as a fool. The resources his disciples are disposed to preserve (and the resource the affluent farmer [from last week] is determined to multiply) are dangerous distractions from their ‘duty watches’ – namely, attending to the riches of the kingdom it is God’s pleasure to bestow. Being rich toward God is not primarily about putting sizable sums in the offering plate. Making moth- and thief-proof purses is not merely a better business strategy than building bigger barns. What Jesus enjoins, rather, is an orientation toward the whole of life as abundant gift from a generous God—a gift that can, therefore, be given away with abandon.”
So, what is the ultimate concern of our lives? How are we preparing our church and our city for the way of Jesus, the way of love, acceptance, and salvation? For you know, where your heart is, there is your treasure. Maybe our hearts need to be changed. Maybe our hearts need to be broken at the hurting happening in our world. Maybe our hearts need to beat with the rhythm of sacred drums, pounding protests against injustice. Maybe our hearts must swell with the hope that Jesus coming back at the end of days is not ultimately what we should be preparing for and that, in fact, we must prepare the world, make it a better place, so that our church and our city and our lives are places where Jesus actually wants to come and inhabit it right now!
I know Jesus would want to come to a place where there is diversity, and agreement, and love, and friendship, and sacrifice. Remember the beginning of the text for today? Church, God doesn’t simply want to give us things, God wants to give us GOOD things. What is your heart telling you that you need to do for others, give to others? What is your heart telling you to do this week to prepare for the coming of the master? What is your heart telling you? Do you have your tie-dye T-shirts ready? Where is your heart?
Amen.