Luke 17:5-10
“Setting the Table”
October 2, 2022 World Communion Sunday
Maybe you, like me, were given the job of setting the table for dinner as a child.
I still vividly remember where each of my 6 brothers and sisters and I sat along with our parents.
Dinner was usually a pretty noisy affair with everyone vying for the opportunity to tell what funny or strange thing happened at school or with our friends or in the neighborhood.
My mother was compulsively fair in doling out the food. I remember we almost never had any leftovers nor were their seconds, and we were not offered options.
There were inevitably arguments if it appeared that someone’s piece of meat was bigger than someone else’s or if it looked like someone lucked out with less of a yucky vegetable serving.
We also learned that there was no use in complaining about what we were eating.
We took what we got.
As you can imagine, it was quite an eye-opening experience when I arrived at college and got to choose what I would eat, not that the cafeteria food was fabulous, but I reveled in what my 18-year-old self saw as the mark of adulthood – choice.
I could go back as often as I wanted for more.
The apostles, who would not be following Jesus around if not for faith, want more of it, perhaps thinking that this will be what it takes to be more Christlike in their living.
Barbara Brown Taylor pointed out what a waste of energy and time it was in looking for the “key to the treasure box of More.”
What she emphasizes is that the only thing we don’t have “is the willingness to imagine that we already have everything we need.
The only thing missing is our consent to be where we are.”
We 21st century Americans relate easily to the concept of more.
We strive for bigger and better – in the form of cars, houses, computer-power, titles – at least that is what those with something to sell are counting on.
If we don’t strive for more, we’re told, our economy will come crashing down and that will be the end of life as we know it.
But Jesus here goes in the opposite direction.
He responds to the apostles request for more faith with two lessons.
One is on quantity and the other on quality.
It is understandable why the apostles would think they need more faith.
Right before the reading Jeff shared today, Jesus has told the apostles about just what discipleship demands of them.
They are called to a level of accountability that means not letting brothers and sisters sin and that they must possess an unending amount of forgiveness.
When they ask for more faith, they are thinking that with more they will better be able to face the challenges of a life as a disciple.
What Jesus is emphasizing with his mustard seed analogy is that it is not the amount of faith one has but rather what one does with it.
Instead of thinking of faith as a thing we possess, a noun, faith should be seen as something we do, a verb.
What we are being asked to do is to love one another, share with each other, and forgive.
We do not need some gigantic amount of faith, some epic level of hero-like faith to live the kind of life Jesus calls us to live.
When we think more faith is the answer, we are turning the spotlight on us.
We may be tempted to think bigger and stronger faith will demonstrate to God that we’re more worthy.
This kind of thinking dismisses the whole idea of grace – something we don’t earn because what we do.
Grace is given to us because God is good.
The quality of faith is demonstrated in the parable of the slave or servant in the second part of today’s reading.
When we are loving one another and forgiving these aren’t a means to an end.
We are not earning our way into God’s good graces.
We are just doing what needs to be done because we are children of God, created in the image of God.
Our worth and status in the eyes of God is already secure.
We love for its own sake, not for what it will get us.
And when we hear that word “worthless” used to describe the slave or servant, we need not think in terms of no value but instead the literal meaning which is a person to whom nothing is owed.
As we are about to celebrate Holy Communion with Christians around the world, we might give some thought to the idea that we “receive” Communion in the form of the symbols of Christ’s life and love.
Maybe, as we enter into this sacred meal, we could think in terms of “giving,” sharing Christ’s love with each other.
Offering love to the tough to love and forgiveness for those who have hurt us is the work of this lifetime.
Rather than more faith, Jesus is pointing us toward leaning into whatever amount of faith we have and exercising that faith.
The more we use it, the stronger it will grow.
As we draw round the Communion table with fellow Christians in all sorts of churches on every continent, each one with a faith that may look and feel different from ours, may we know in our being that we are enough and it is from that knowledge that we go out loving and forgiving, again and again.
Let us pray then these words from our United Methodist Bishop Devadhar:
…Faith, the size of a mustard seed
is ample, adequate, sufficient.
Faith the size of a mustard seed
is small.
Faith the size of a mustard seed
is enough.
O God who supplies all that we need
for life and love and forgiveness,
help us to trust that our small faith is
sufficient for the hard work of forgiveness.
We offer our prayer
in the name of Christ Jesus,
whose love sets us free, and
who lives and reigns with you
and the Holy Spirit, now and forever.
Amen.