4 Pentecost Yr C Proper 9 July 6 2025 Galatians 6:(1-6)7-16, Luke 10:1-11, 16-20,
Grace Episcopal Church, Mpls
Recently, the readings from Luke have been about the unfailing love and abundant grace that God has for us. We are called by love and grace into relationship with God, and that changes us. God does not call us away or out of the world, but instead calls us to do our work, to be in relationship, to go about our business in a way that reveals God’s unfailing love and grace to the world. This work that God calls us to
is about following Jesus. This is our call, this is our work. And the gospel of Luke is all about showing us what following Jesus looks like.
Following Jesus is to be on a journey of active faith formation, and following Jesus is to be part of God's dream of love and healing in this world. That is what Luke means when he writes about God coming near.
God coming near is the kingdom of God. And according to Luke, the kingdom of God is about reordering human interaction, we see that when Jesus brings to the center those who are on the margins. And the kingdom of God is about loving one another as God loves us. A sign of this love, a sign of God's dream in our interactions, is offering peace to all people we encounter.
In this gospel passage from Luke, we learn that God's call, God's love, God's kingdom, includes everyone. And we learn that following Jesus is about radical hospitality.
In the New Revised Standard Version translation we just read, we heard that Jesus appointed seventy disciples and sent them out in pairs. However, many New Testament scholars are convinced the earliest transcripts read 72. And the reason this is important, is that seventy-two is a significant number. At the time Luke’s story was told, the number of the world’s nations was seventy-two. Seventy-two is also reckoned in an apocryphal book, called Enoch, as the number of princes and the number of languages in the world. And according to legend, seventy-two elders were commissioned to translate the law from Hebrew to Greek, a project undertaken in order to win renown throughout the whole world for the Jews and their God.
All that is to say that seventy-two really means everyone, everyone is sent out, but never sent out alone.
So now it is not just the original Jewish disciples of Jesus that spread the Good News of God in Jesus Christ. It is gentiles as well, and that is all of us; every one of us is a follower of Jesus, a disciple, and we are all called to spread the Good News.
Last week the church celebrated the feast day of St. Peter and St. Paul. A gift that St. Peter and St. Paul
give to us in the 21st century is the gift of disagreement. At the very beginnings of the church, these two important church leaders could not agree on who’s in and who’s out. The argument about circumcision,
which is referred to in the Galatians passage, was a huge argument in the 1st century. Basically, the question was, do followers of Jesus have to be circumcised before they can be baptized? This question was really about what it means to be a disciple of Jesus, and what it means to be Jewish. It is a question that caused communities to stop talking to each other; it caused communities to split apart and even stop eating together. The answer to the question however, was always, Love one another as God has loved you. And, a sign of that love was to settle your differences before you come to the table to eat. St. Peter and St. Paul taught us to agree to disagree, because we are all part of one family. The way St. Peter and St. Paul taught us to agree to disagree is to practice radical hospitality.
These days I am finding it harder to agree to disagree. There are just some things that are wrong. But I don’t think we live in times different from Peter and Paul. And that is why this passage about hospitality is so important. All of us are called to radical hospitality; all of us are called to offer God's love and hospitality to everyone we meet, and to receive hospitality as well. First say “peace to this house” and then stay there and eat and drink, cure the sick and preach the Good News. You see, with the offer of hospitality also comes healing.I know this is so hard for us. When we are at that difficult family picnic,
we’d really rather not do any of it, right? We’d really rather not be there for starters, we’d really rather avoid the difficult conversations, and then we’d really rather put those idiots in their place, even though we are related to them.But what if we offered something else besides vitriol? What if we offered hospitality, kindness, healing. The kingdom of God comes near. Maybe then we make space for Grace.
Maybe then we can do as Jesus does and invite those on the margins to the center.
Grace Episcopal Church, Mpls
Recently, the readings from Luke have been about the unfailing love and abundant grace that God has for us. We are called by love and grace into relationship with God, and that changes us. God does not call us away or out of the world, but instead calls us to do our work, to be in relationship, to go about our business in a way that reveals God’s unfailing love and grace to the world. This work that God calls us to
is about following Jesus. This is our call, this is our work. And the gospel of Luke is all about showing us what following Jesus looks like.
Following Jesus is to be on a journey of active faith formation, and following Jesus is to be part of God's dream of love and healing in this world. That is what Luke means when he writes about God coming near.
God coming near is the kingdom of God. And according to Luke, the kingdom of God is about reordering human interaction, we see that when Jesus brings to the center those who are on the margins. And the kingdom of God is about loving one another as God loves us. A sign of this love, a sign of God's dream in our interactions, is offering peace to all people we encounter.
In this gospel passage from Luke, we learn that God's call, God's love, God's kingdom, includes everyone. And we learn that following Jesus is about radical hospitality.
In the New Revised Standard Version translation we just read, we heard that Jesus appointed seventy disciples and sent them out in pairs. However, many New Testament scholars are convinced the earliest transcripts read 72. And the reason this is important, is that seventy-two is a significant number. At the time Luke’s story was told, the number of the world’s nations was seventy-two. Seventy-two is also reckoned in an apocryphal book, called Enoch, as the number of princes and the number of languages in the world. And according to legend, seventy-two elders were commissioned to translate the law from Hebrew to Greek, a project undertaken in order to win renown throughout the whole world for the Jews and their God.
All that is to say that seventy-two really means everyone, everyone is sent out, but never sent out alone.
So now it is not just the original Jewish disciples of Jesus that spread the Good News of God in Jesus Christ. It is gentiles as well, and that is all of us; every one of us is a follower of Jesus, a disciple, and we are all called to spread the Good News.
Last week the church celebrated the feast day of St. Peter and St. Paul. A gift that St. Peter and St. Paul
give to us in the 21st century is the gift of disagreement. At the very beginnings of the church, these two important church leaders could not agree on who’s in and who’s out. The argument about circumcision,
which is referred to in the Galatians passage, was a huge argument in the 1st century. Basically, the question was, do followers of Jesus have to be circumcised before they can be baptized? This question was really about what it means to be a disciple of Jesus, and what it means to be Jewish. It is a question that caused communities to stop talking to each other; it caused communities to split apart and even stop eating together. The answer to the question however, was always, Love one another as God has loved you. And, a sign of that love was to settle your differences before you come to the table to eat. St. Peter and St. Paul taught us to agree to disagree, because we are all part of one family. The way St. Peter and St. Paul taught us to agree to disagree is to practice radical hospitality.
These days I am finding it harder to agree to disagree. There are just some things that are wrong. But I don’t think we live in times different from Peter and Paul. And that is why this passage about hospitality is so important. All of us are called to radical hospitality; all of us are called to offer God's love and hospitality to everyone we meet, and to receive hospitality as well. First say “peace to this house” and then stay there and eat and drink, cure the sick and preach the Good News. You see, with the offer of hospitality also comes healing.I know this is so hard for us. When we are at that difficult family picnic,
we’d really rather not do any of it, right? We’d really rather not be there for starters, we’d really rather avoid the difficult conversations, and then we’d really rather put those idiots in their place, even though we are related to them.But what if we offered something else besides vitriol? What if we offered hospitality, kindness, healing. The kingdom of God comes near. Maybe then we make space for Grace.
Maybe then we can do as Jesus does and invite those on the margins to the center.
What does the discipleship of radical hospitality look like for us? As disciples, as followers of Jesus,
we are called to welcome the stranger. We are called to offer rest, to wash their feet, and a place at the table. When we offer this radical hospitality, we act as disciples and the kingdom of God is near. We, as disciples, are called to offer hospitality to everyone, people we agree with, people we disagree with, people that look like us, people who look different than us, people that we grew up with, people who are strangers.
As disciples we are also called to go out into the world, walking alongside one another, and say to all we meet, Peace to you, peace to your house, peace to your people. This is a weekend of celebrating freedom.
In these days I think we are wondering about what freedom really is. What if freedom is about walking alongside each other? Journeying together. Listening to one another. Offering hospitality, including and especially those who are different from us? What if freedom is really about following Jesus to the margins to place the most vulnerable and marginalized at the center of our common life? What if freedom requires dependence and interdependence. Dependence on God, and one another, the Body of Christ. There are few things more satisfying and life giving, it turns out, than sharing with others, giving of our abundance, receiving in our need, all the while being knit more closely together as the Body of Christ, a very different witness to people in this world who would exclude, divide, and keep out.
You, like me, are probably news weary, world weary, politics weary. You, like me, might wonder what the church and these stories we read have to offer the world. But the gospel is the gospel, the good news. The kingdom of God is near, Peace to this house, peace to your house, peace to the stranger’s house, offer hospitality, construct a bigger table, go to the margins and bring everyone to the table.
Amen.
we are called to welcome the stranger. We are called to offer rest, to wash their feet, and a place at the table. When we offer this radical hospitality, we act as disciples and the kingdom of God is near. We, as disciples, are called to offer hospitality to everyone, people we agree with, people we disagree with, people that look like us, people who look different than us, people that we grew up with, people who are strangers.
As disciples we are also called to go out into the world, walking alongside one another, and say to all we meet, Peace to you, peace to your house, peace to your people. This is a weekend of celebrating freedom.
In these days I think we are wondering about what freedom really is. What if freedom is about walking alongside each other? Journeying together. Listening to one another. Offering hospitality, including and especially those who are different from us? What if freedom is really about following Jesus to the margins to place the most vulnerable and marginalized at the center of our common life? What if freedom requires dependence and interdependence. Dependence on God, and one another, the Body of Christ. There are few things more satisfying and life giving, it turns out, than sharing with others, giving of our abundance, receiving in our need, all the while being knit more closely together as the Body of Christ, a very different witness to people in this world who would exclude, divide, and keep out.
You, like me, are probably news weary, world weary, politics weary. You, like me, might wonder what the church and these stories we read have to offer the world. But the gospel is the gospel, the good news. The kingdom of God is near, Peace to this house, peace to your house, peace to the stranger’s house, offer hospitality, construct a bigger table, go to the margins and bring everyone to the table.
Amen.
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