Sermon for Sunday,  May 7, 2006

COMMUNION IN UNUSUAL PLACES

2nd in a series on Spirituality and The Arts

By

Rev. Dr. Harvey C Martz

¹³ Jesus went out again beside the sea; the whole crowd gathered around him, and he taught them. ¹⁴ As he was walking along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, "Follow me." And he got up and followed him. ¹⁵ And as he sat at dinner in Levi's house, many tax collectors and sinners were also sitting with Jesus and his disciples—for there were many who followed him. ¹⁶ When the scribes of the Pharisees saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, they said to his disciples, "Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?" ¹⁷ When Jesus heard this, he said to them, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners."

We had an inspiring weekend with folk singer Carrie Newcomer who performed on Friday night and led a writing workshop on Saturday morning.

Carrie Newcomer has deeply spiritual themes in several of her songs, and we are using one of my favorites as the background for this communion service this morning. She sings about a place called Betty’s Diner where a server named Miranda serves a variety of regular customers, and what is significant abut Betty’s Diner is that those regulars make up a real community, a kind of family with each other. When they come there they experience what people ought to be able to experience in church every Sunday: grace, acceptance, forgiveness, community, hospitality, compassion, listening, and renewal.

It is a kind of family table similar to the one we just heard about from the early verses of Mark’s Gospel where Jesus scandalizes the religious leaders—remember Jesus was accused by them of not being reverent enough, not being religious enough. Jesus is choosing to have Matthew the tax gatherer/shill be one of his friends and followers—and more than that, Jesus goes to eat with Matthew and share the table with other outcasts and sinful people. He says, of course, at the end of the passage, this is what he has come for: not to be with the “righteous” but with people who have been seen as sinners. The Greek word for “sinner” here is an archery term that means “missing the mark” or falling short of the mark. Is there anyone else here who has ever missed the mark or missing the ideals you have set and you’re still hoping and aiming to be better and do better?

The meals that Jesus attended offered the kind of grace-filled table fellowship that Betty’s Diner offered in Newcomer’s song.

Let me read you a few of the lyrics before we get a chance to hear the song during the offertory:

 Here we are all in one place

The wants and wounds of the human race

Despair and hope sit face to face

When you come in from the cold

Let her fill your cup with something kind

Eggs and toast like bread and wine

She’s heard it all so she won’t mind.

Carrie tells about a couple of other of the regulars in the rest of the song—people who have had hard times in life and have gotten through those times and then there are these lines:

Heads are bowed and hands are clasped

One more storm has passed.

I think the picture of Betty’s Diner is also the picture of what Christ is calling us to be when we come together anytime as the community of Christ, and I began to wonder how well we are doing at that—at being a place of welcome and grace and acceptance instead of a place of judgment.

I spent a little time last week at LIFEspot over the lunch hour and talked with Patrick Scriven about how that outpost for youth ministry is doing exactly what we envisioned when it began—becoming a place of belonging and safety for all kids, a place where kids can come to do homework or get a smoothie or sit down with one of the volunteers or Patrick and talk about what is happening in their lives. I thought of other times when our youth gather around eggs and toast at McDonald’s in our mid week breakfast gatherings before school where every person is welcomed and where our youth are just excellent at bringing a friend who has not yet come to church and the atmosphere is one of hospitality and grace.

I thought of the picture in our foyer of Jesus and his friends at the Passover meal and the diversity that is portrayed in that painting, the same diversity Newcomer sings about in Betty’s Diner where eggs and toast are like bread and wine.

And I thought also of Starbuck’s coffee shops. Did you know that when Howard Shultz came up with the idea of neighborhood coffee houses he wanted to model those on the ones he had experienced in Italy where that place is a gathering place for regulars and a place of hospitality which becomes after our homes and places of work, a “third place” where we feel community and hospitality and belonging—not just a place to grab a latte on the run but where we can sit and reflect and visit and feel at home.

And I thought of a story that Tony Campolo tells about being in Hawaii on a speaking tour. He is having trouble sleeping and gets up during the night and finds an all night diner to get some food and some company. About three o’clock a group of prostitutes comes into the diner and he can tell that they are regulars there by the greeting they get. He overhears them talking and one of them happens to mention that tomorrow is her birthday. Campolo gets an idea—because he has the same spirit of Christian hospitality that Jesus does. He talks to the cook who is the owner and asks if this group is in the diner every night; yes, they are. Campolo asks about getting a birthday cake to have for the woman the next night and that is arranged.

The next night—or morning at three AM Campolo is in the diner when the women come in. The cook announces that they have something special in store for the birthday girl and brings the cake and candles from the kitchen. All of those present sing Happy Birthday while the surprised woman begins to cry. She tells them that this is the only birthday cake she has ever had. They all have some cake and then Dr. Campolo asks the woman if he can say a prayer for her. He prays with all of them and asks for God’s best purposes to be fulfilled in her life. The group of women leave the diner and the cook is looking with astonishment at Tony Campolo and says, “I didn’t know you were a minister! What kind of church are you part of?”

Campolo says, “It’s the kind of church that throws a birthday party for prostitutes at three in the morning.” The diner owner says, “I could be part of a church like that!”

There is one more line that just grabs me from Carrie Newcomer’s song. In Betty’s Diner, the people bring “the wants and wounds of the human race” to that diner counter and the counter is a place where “despair and hope sit face to face”.

That is how it is at this communion table also. When we come here we bring all of our hurts and hopes, our despair and our rough edges and that is how it is supposed to be. I have heard people say to me over the years that they have been wanting to come to church but that they are trying to get their life together a little more before they come. How would you respond to that? Probably in the way I did.  I say they don’t have to wait to get themselves together before they come to church, that the church is the community where all of us are unfinished and incomplete and they are welcome to come just the way they are. Despair and hope sit face to face here and the wants and wounds of the human race are here as well. And this is also a place of grace.

This is a place where we can bring our wounds, our pain, our scars, and we can know that other people are bringing their wounds and scars as well, and that the Christ who also had wounds and scars touches us and begins to make us whole. But everyone who comes to this table brings some wounds and scars.

My friend Jim Harnish at Hyde Park Methodist Church in Tampa told in a recent sermon about visiting people in the hospital over his ministry and how often people would show their minister their scars! He said, “I suspect the reason people need to show their scar has something to do with the way it traces what they have been through. It can be a sign of healing; it can let us know who we are.”

We can bring our wounds and our scars here, scars that remind us as the song says, that one more storm has passed, and that when we know that and remember that, “heads are bowed and hands are clasped.”

Let’s hear the song.  (Check out Carrie’s website for the complete lyrics to her song www.carrienewcomer.com)

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