WELCOMING THE
LORD
Beloved people of God, grace and
peace to you from our Lord and
Savior Jesus the Christ.
On Wednesday evening the Welcome
Team sponsored a walk through the Cedar Hills neighborhood. Each team of walkers followed a
different route south of Butner.
The purpose was to get to know the neighborhood better. We were asked to observe the homes, the
yards, the parks, and especially the people. Who were they? What were they doing? What seems important to
them?
It was a beautiful evening, and the
picnic tables were full in the
Following the sermon we will sing
the beautiful hymn “All Are Welcome.”
The chorus goes: “All are welcome,
all are welcome, all are welcome in this place.” It seems fitting that a “Place of
Grace” would be a welcoming place.
The Welcome Team is committed to raising our awareness of what it means
for St. Andrew to be a welcoming place.
If we are committed to welcoming the neighborhood—that is, to showing
hospitality to our neighbors— it makes sense that we would seek to get to know
the neighborhood better. These
walking tours are a first step. The
Welcome Team intends to organize other opportunities for the people of St.
Andrew to get to know our neighborhood and our community.
Hospitality is an important concept
in the biblical tradition. Our
Gospel reading—Matthew 10:40-42— is one of the key hospitality texts. Jesus tells his followers: “Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and
whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me.” What is striking about this
particular verse is that the focus is not on welcoming others. The focus is on welcoming the one who
sent Jesus. The one who sent Jesus
so identifies with Jesus and Jesus so identifies with his followers that in
welcoming Jesus’ followers, people welcome Jesus and thus God himself. Yes, this passage is about hospitality;
but at the deepest level it describes the process of salvation. First, God’s love initiates the whole
process by sending Jesus to live among us.
Second, Jesus proclaims the good news of God’s love to human beings. Third, human messengers receive the good
news of God’s love from Jesus and pass it on to others. Fourth, those who welcome God’s
messengers and God’s message receive life for their souls.
When the message is proclaimed in
word and deed, therefore, it is as if God himself is knocking at the door. When we open the door and receive the
message, we welcome the Lord into our lives.
Notice in our Gospel reading that
the Lord comes to us in three basic forms: in word, in deed, and in need. The prophet proclaims the message of the
Lord in word. To take the prophet’s
word to heart is to welcome the Lord into our lives. Prophets, of course, have not always
been received warmly. That is why
Jesus puts such stress on welcoming the prophet.
The righteous person proclaims the
message of God’s love in deed. The
righteous know they are loved by God and live accordingly. Thereby they testify to the presence of
the Lord in them. To live in the
knowledge of God’s love for us is to welcome the Lord into our midst. Like the prophets, those who live God’s
love in their lives are not always warmly received. Jesus himself was put to death as much
for the way he lived as for what he proclaimed.
In what sense does the Lord come to
us in need? Matthew 10:42 gives us
a clue: “and whoever gives even a cup of
cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple— truly I tell
you, none of these will lose their
reward.” Many have pondered the
identity of these “little ones”— who are they? Holly Hearon suggests that “`little
ones’ seems to describe those members of the community who are most
vulnerable.” “This could be due,”
she says, “to age (young or old), illness, isolation, pressure, or
uncertainty.”[1] The most vulnerable of all may be
strangers. That may be why the
apostle Paul and the author of Hebrews emphasize showing hospitality to
strangers. Hebrews 13:2 reads: “Do not neglect to show hospitality to
strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing
it.”
The “little ones” reappear in
Matthew 18 where it becomes clear that there is a special place in God’s heart
for them. The Lord so closely
identifies with these “little ones” that it is as if their needs are the Lord’s
needs. To respond to their needs is
to welcome the Lord.
Jesus emphasizes this point in
Matthew 25, when the king says: “I was
hungry, and you gave me food, I was thirsty, and you gave me drink, I was a
stranger, and you welcomed me, I was naked, and you gave me clothing, I was sick
and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.” The righteous are puzzled. They do not remember doing any of these
things for the king. Then the king
explains: “Inasmuch as you did it to the
least of these you did it to me.”
Consider the ways the people of St.
Andrew respond to the needs of God’s “little ones”. For example, on Tuesday volunteers from
St. Andrew will be at the
In July our high school youth and
their leaders are embarking on a mission trip to
As I mentioned earlier, the Welcome
Team is committed to increasing our awareness of what it means to welcome people
into our midst. The Welcome Team is
building on a tradition of St. Andrew being a friendly place. On Sunday morning at times going through
the narthex into the sanctuary can be like running a welcome gauntlet. Certainly it is good to practice such
hospitality.
Our Gospel reading suggests,
however, that showing hospitality on Sunday morning is not simply a matter of
welcoming people. Our focus is on
welcoming the Lord. The primary
reason we invite new people is to join us in welcoming the Lord into our
midst. In worship the primary ways
we welcome the Lord are by taking to heart the proclamation of the Word of God
and by receiving the body and blood of Christ in Holy
Communion.
We tend to think of a sermon as
something the preacher does for us.
A sermon is actually a shared hospitality task—together we welcome the
Lord into our midst by receiving the Word of the Lord.
H. L. Gee tells the story of a young
man in a small village who became a minister. During his studies one of his mentors
was the village cobbler. The
cobbler was a voracious reading and a thoughtful person. The young man greatly appreciated what
he had learned from the cobbler. On
the day the young man was ordained to preach, the cobbler said to him, “It was always my desire to be a minister of the Gospel, but the
circumstances of my life made it impossible. But you are achieving what was
closed to me. And I want you to promise me one thing—I
want you to let me make and cobble
your shoes—for nothing— and I want you to wear them in the pulpit when you
preach, and then I’ll feel you are preaching the gospel that I always wanted to preach
standing in my shoes.”[2]
Surely this cobbler was serving
God in his own special way and helping proclaim the good news of God’s
love.
Now the point of telling this story
is not that someone needs to provide me with free shoes. Rather it is that the preaching of a
sermon is a collective act of hospitality. For example, how could I prepare a sermon
if the people of St. Andrew did not provide me with a salary so that I could set
aside time each week to write the sermon. In addition, welcoming the Lord includes
listening to the words proclaimed and taking them to heart. Welcoming the Lord also entails living
out our daily lives in light of the word proclaimed.
One could view our entire ministry
and mission as an act of collective hospitality. That means every contribution to our
ministry and mission— no matter how small—is an act of hospitality, a way of
welcoming the Lord. The simplest
act such as offering a cup of cold water is an act of welcoming the Lord. Those who offer even a cup of cold water
to one of God’s little ones, explains Jesus, will not lose their reward. What better reward could we receive than
to welcome the Lord into our midst.
In Jesus’ name,
AMEN.