Sermon Sunday, October 10, 2010

“An Attitude of Gratitude, ” A Sermon preached by The Rev. Canon Dr. C. Denise Yarbrough on Sunday, October 10, 2010 at the Church of the Ascension, Rochester, New York

Were not ten made clean? But the other nine, where are they? Was none of them found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner? (Luke 17:17-18)

But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. (Jeremiah 29:7)

Our Gospel text and our text from the Hebrew Scriptures today give us much to ponder on this, the Sunday we have chosen to launch the annual stewardship pledge campaign for Ascension. Unlike the lessons we’ve been bombarded with for many weeks now, neither of these texts deals directly with issues of financial stewardship or money management, presenting me with something of a homiletical challenge. Having prayed with these texts this week, however, I find in them words of encouragement and wisdom for Ascension that I hope will become part of your prayerful reflection on your stewardship commitment for the coming year. And since stewardship really isn’t about money, or at least it is not simply about money, to distill wisdom from texts that are not talking about money is a more fruitful path of reflection.

The words from the prophet Jeremiah were written to the ancient Israelites who were living in exile in Babylon after the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the first temple in 587 BCE. These prophetic words are remarkably appropriate for Ascension at this point in her history. Jeremiah was writing to the leaders of the ancient Jewish community who had been taken into captivity in Babylon in the 6th century BCE. That community was mourning the loss of many things, including its homeland, its temple, which was the center of its religious life, and its old way of life and the comforts that went with that way of life. This ancient Jewish community was living as strangers in a strange land and struggling to find a way to remain faithful to their own religious tradition and values in a culture and country that was not their own. In Psalm 137 the Hebrews mourned their losses with the words, “By the rivers of Babylon there we sat down and wept when we remembered Zion. …For there our captors asked us for songs…How could we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?”

In that psalm the Israelites remember their homeland and mourn all that they have lost. They curse their fate and wish they could get things back to the way they’d always been. Jeremiah, in his letter to the leaders in captivity encourages them to change their attitude to their captivity, to see in it promise and opportunity, rather than loss and devastation. “Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there and do not decrease.” Jeremiah encourages these exiles to make good lives for themselves in the circumstances in which they find themselves, however unwelcome those circumstances might be. Jeremiah also encourages them to open themselves to the good things their foreign captors and the foreign land have to give them, to see in that foreign place opportunity for enrichment and abundant life.

For you, the people and leaders of Ascension, there is much in the emotional plight of these ancient Israelites with which you may resonate. You too are in a time of exile, even though you are still right here in the building you’ve occupied for over 100 years. You are on the cusp of a new era, as you search for new clergy leadership. You are well aware that you need to grow in numbers in order to maintain yourselves as a worshipping faith community, and yet the neighborhood in which you are planted and where you have always exercised your ministry has changed significantly. The activities and programs, the culture and worship styles and traditions that used to fill the nave and sanctuary no longer work, and the new ways of being church in the 21st century do not yet come naturally. While you have stayed put, the world around you has changed significantly and suddenly you are as truly strangers in a strange land as were the Israelites in Babylon.

And what does Jeremiah ask of you? To see in the welfare of the changed world around you your own welfare. To reach out to the changed community, to embrace the neighbors who surround you who do not necessarily look like you, or worship like you or understand the ethos of our Anglican traditional religion. Both Jeremiah and the Gospel text today urge us to embrace and respect the foreigners among us, and for churches who need to grow that is a value that cannot be emphasized too strongly. Your welfare lies in meeting the needs of and seeing to the spiritual welfare of those who now populate this neighborhood. Reaching out across differences is challenging but in that endeavor lies hope for new life and transformation for everyone, both those already members of Ascension and those who might be brought into this fold through creative engagement.

The message to open oneself to the foreigner comes through again in the gospel lesson of the ten lepers healed by Jesus as he journeys from Galilee to Jerusalem. In that story, ten lepers are healed by Jesus and only one comes back to thank him and to praise God for that healing, and that one leper is a Samaritan, a foreigner. Samaritans and Jews were enemies in the ancient world. That the Samaritan is the one in the story who is praised for his faithfulness and gratitude to God would have been a surprising twist to the first century hearers of this story. Once again in this tale, we see Jesus reaching out to the stranger, the foreigner, and bringing someone who was twice cursed, as a leper and a Samaritan, into the realm of God’s mercy and embrace. Jesus not only sees him and treats him as a real person, he commends his faith and acknowledges the richness and authenticity of that faith. And he commends the gratitude shown by that tenth leper, the one who didn’t fit in even among the lepers, reminding us that the so called “outcasts” of our own culture may be the very ones whose faith and faithfulness will make us all well. At a bare minimum, this lesson reminds us that the faithfulness of those who are “outsiders” to our church community may well be the salvation of that community if we allow that faithfulness to take root here. It suggests that those who are not yet here might have valuable spiritual wisdom to offer those of us who are and therein lies the potential for transformation and growth.

Both of these stories are stories of exile and return from exile. The Samaritan leper was exiled from human society on two counts, his leprosy and his foreignness. The ancient Israelites were captives in Babylon for several generations and had to contend with being outsiders in a world that was not of their making. Their world had changed, things were not going their way, and yet they were called by God to bear fruit, to make a good life where they were, and to recognize that in the welfare of the city in which they were held captive, their welfare rested too. If they would open themselves to that foreign culture and decide to make good lives there, they would prosper and multiply. It was important for their future that they not clam up and withdraw from the strange environment in which they found themselves, but rather move into it with an attitude of excited expectancy and generosity. Jeremiah urges them to bear children, build homes, make investments, give freely to that foreign place because in so doing they too would prosper.

For churches in transition like Ascension, an attitude of expectancy and hopefulness and gratitude is crucial to the ability to survive the transition and thrive through the changes that accompany transition. The ability to look to the unknown future with an air of hopeful excitement is crucial to identifying new leadership, both lay and ordained, and discerning where the community is called to do its ministry in the coming years. The faithfulness of those who remain here and who are building that new thing in the new strange land is crucial to the salvation of the community as a whole. The tenth leper was the only one who exercised the virtue of gratitude when Jesus offered healing to the ten and it was that gratitude that Jesus praised so highly. For Ascension in these latter days of 2010 one important way to show gratitude of the sort that tenth leper demonstrated is to make a pledge to Ascension and remain faithful in financial support as the community transitions to new leadership and new ministries. The Episcopal Church has always maintained that the tithe is the standard of giving, while recognizing that many people have to get to that tithe by proportional giving, increasing the amount by small percentages each year. An important way to show gratitude in these days is to put your money where your mouth is and make a pledge to Ascension so that the wardens and vestry know what kind of budget they will have going forward as they look for new leadership and explore and discern new ministries.

Gratitude is an absolutely foundational Christian virtue. Our entire Eucharistic liturgy is about gratitude- giving thanks to God for all the blessings of our lives, with “ourselves, our souls and bodies” offered back to God. In our materialistic, money driven culture that old adage, “follow the money” applies to measuring gratitude! If people are truly grateful, they will give back out of the gifts they have received. If not, they won’t. So your pledge is truly a marker of your gratitude to God for all the blessings you enjoy through Ascension, and of your hope for Ascension’s future. As you consider your pledge over the next days and weeks, remember that tenth leper – the Samaritan – who joyfully and enthusiastically gave thanks. Heed the counsel of the prophet Jeremiah and make an investment in the new world in which Ascension is now living and the new ministries towards which she is moving. An attitude of gratitude will empower Ascension to move into an exciting and fruitful future, grounded on the solid foundation of its past and its rich tradition. When the pledge cards are in I pray that Jesus will not have to ask, “But the other nine, where are they?”

Amen.