Sermon 17th Sunday after pentecost

Sermon

Text: Matthew 18:21-35

Grace and Peace to you from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ who in the feast wipes away our tears.

I love gatherings that include big meals. And in my family that's all of them. They tend to be some of my favorite moments. Sitting around the huge table at my grandparents, adults on one end, kids on the other (even though we are all in or done with college by now, and 3 of us have finished grad-school, we still sit like that.) Having to have 3-4 plates of stuff because one won't make it the whole way around. This could be Thanksgiving with turkey, Christmas with Schnitzel and Spatzle, Easter with Ham, or just breakfast with pancakes.

It's pretty nice.

But, it makes you wonder what is the most important meal people have. There was a recent news story from Texas that they have gotten rid of the last meal for prisoners sentenced to death. And when this occurred a chef who had been in prison volunteered to cook the meals for them.

What about first meal a infant has after being born?

Or a meal when I was at Holden Village, a Lutheran retreat center in the remote mountains outside of Seattle, every Thursday they have a meal of just a baked potato or rice and meager additions, no chili or the like to put on top. They do this so that the money that would be put into that meal goes towards ending hunger.

The simple meal of broth, or porridge, that someone who is starving receives. That moment when after days or weeks of travel people in the horn of Africa, or any place of famine, reach a place of refuge and get that small meal that means that for now they are safe, they are cared for.

That's a meal. Meals are important. We see important meals in both Matthew and Isaiah.

Jesus' parable in Matthew tells a story of a wedding feast where the the invited guests do not come. The king then invites everyone in the town, both good and bad, so the wedding hall was filled with guests.

It tells us that even though God's invitation was to one group only, through Jesus Christ it is now extended to all.

Can you imagine that happening? A big time celebrity inviting everyone in the street to their premiere party? Or a Royal feast including all the homeless in the back alleyways?

That is what is happening here and in Isaiah, where it says “On this mountain the Lord of Hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines.”

This feast where all peoples are invited, the good and the bad.

This is greater than any feast at the grandparents. It is greater than a last meal. It is greater even than that first food when you are starving.

To Isaiah's community, and to us, it is a feast of pure grace.

In the 24 chapter's leading up to this, all we have heard of is how they are going to be destroyed by what is coming. There seems to be no hope for them. Just last week we heard of Isaiah comparing them to a vineyard that grows bad grapes and will be destroyed. And the other sections are just as ruthless.

I looked back at Isaiah 24 this week. The chapter just before this. “Now the Lord is about the lay waste the earth and make it desolate, and he will twist its surface and scatter its inhabitants. And it goes on like that for the whole chapter.

I've seen stories of field fires around the midwest, a whole summers work gone. Heard of the fear of those who hunger, or don't know where their next meal or paycheck will come from.

Our reading from Isaiah 25 is written to those people and to us. This text is a spark of hope in the midst of destruction. It is that bowl of broth when famine is around you. It is a place of comfort in the midst of pain and death.

This meal is where we see that we no longer need to search. We no longer need to fear. Even though all this destruction and chaos seems to be coming our way, God does not abandon us.

In our fear, concern and sadness, we tend to not see God. But, it is then that God is there most deeply. God wipes our tears, allowing us to see.

Isaiah 25:6-9 On this mountain the LORD of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. ⁷ And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; ⁸ he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord GOD will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the LORD has spoken.

In this text we are nourished, allowed to see that we are cared for, we are safe, we are the unknown ones in the street welcomed into the wedding feast. It is the feast of our Lord. I can't think of a more important meal.

Let us pray,

God of food, we ask you to help us see the hungry in this world, those far, and those right next door. Help us to feed them, and help us to tell them of your care and grace. We thank you for the life giving food we receive through your Son.

Amen.