Date: June 30th & July 3rd
Preacher: Pastor Ashley Rosa-Ruggieri
First Reading: Isaiah 66:10-14
Psalmody: Psalm 66:1-9
Second Reading: Galatians 6:7-16
Gospel: Luke 10:1-11, 16-20
When I was a kid, I was in the Girl Scouts for a few years, and although the method seems to be different now, I remember back then that I would campaign my neighborhood when it came time to sell cookies. My parent or grandma would come with me, and I would walk up and down the street, knocking on doors, offering my order form for the variety of cookies these neighbors could buy. Many of the houses were welcoming, sometimes even offering me lemonade or a cookie before I kept up my walk through the block, but some were not so. In some cases, I would knock on the door, to be greeted by a neighbor, looked over quickly, told they were not interested, and then had the door promptly shut in my face. At first, these rejections sent me away feeling disappointed and rejected. Eventually, I got used to the occasional rejection of my delicious Girl Scout cookies, and would make my way onto the next house, leaving the first behind without another thought.
I was reminded of this time in my life when reading this week’s Gospel passage. As we look at this reading, I first want to fill in the context of the passage before this one. Just before today’s reading was our Gospel from last week, where Jesus is traveling along with his disciples, and is not welcomed by a village as he heads toward Jerusalem. The disciples with him ask if they should call fire down on this village for their inhospitality, and then are rebuked by Jesus and continue on their journey. Jesus has been traveling with his disciples, adding more as he goes, and has been telling them to follow him, sometimes even leaving the comforts or emotional attachments of home behind. Then we have today’s Gospel passage, in which Jesus sends out this group of seventy into the world. He tells them to go ahead into the villages he plans to visit, and to respond to each in kind according to how they are welcomed.
If the disciples visit a town or a house and are welcomed, housed, fed, and cared for, then they are to return that hospitality and kindness to their hosts. They are to heal their sick as they meet them and accept the generosity given them by these welcoming households. However, if they enter into a place and they are not welcomed, then they are to go out into the streets and loudly declare that even the dust of this town shall be removed from their sandals, as a protest to the lack of welcome that has been given them. After this they are to move on to the next place, using the same method of meeting and relating to others.
Although these two responses are different, depending on how the disciples are received, they still end in the same way. Jesus tells the disciples being sent that in both cases, you are to tell the people that “the Kingdom of God has come near.” Perhaps the kingdom just came through on the edges of your town and was unwelcomed, or maybe it dwelt within your very household because of your hospitality, but either way, the Kingdom of God was among these people. This is because the Kingdom of God is not only a far away concept, but it is one that is living and active among God’s people here on Earth.
The disciples themselves were sent out to proclaim that the Kingdom of God was among each of these places not because Jesus was there, but because the message of Jesus had been shared through the representatives who were journeying to these places. These disciples did not come in as a force or power meant to intimidate or belittle the places they were visiting. Nor were they to call down condemnation when they were unwelcome like the disciples traveling with Jesus suggested in last week’s reading. Jesus only instructs them to treat the places they go the same as they have been treated. With hospitality, or with indifference. Each of these disciples came into these villages as Jesus instructed, with nothing to call their own. By entering into these places empty of supplies, these disciples were able to connect with the people who welcomed them from a place of mutual community building. Their vulnerability allowed them to break down the walls that could have existed and instead rely on the hope that the Kingdom of God they were proclaiming would be shown to them through the generosity and kindness of strangers along the way.
It is important to notice that Jesus is making a statement about hospitality here. Many of Jesus’s disciples came from different backgrounds, they were fishers, tax collectors, trades people, students of the faith, and so on. And much like our world today, people in Jesus’s time could very easily be judged for who they were and deemed unworthy to enter someone’s home or their town simply for existing in a way that was seen as wrong by some of society. We too in modern day find that there are people that the church has told straight out or in subtle ways that they are unwelcome here. But Jesus knows that the disciples will find difficulties in some places, and so he tells them what to do when they are unwelcomed. Remove their exclusion and inhospitality from your entire being, even to the dust on your sandals. Do not let their unwelcoming presence stop you from continuing on the journey. And for those who see you for all that you are and welcome you in, feeding you, lodging you, opening their sacred space to you, reciprocate these actions in kind. Form community in this way that is welcoming to all who are willing to have an expansive heart of hospitality.
There is a song that is from the Taizé community in France, and the lyrics are this: “The Kingdom of God is justice and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. Come Lord, and open in us, the gates of your Kingdom.” I find this song to be so helpful with our reading today. At different times, we are called to be like the disciples here, or are called to be like the hospitable villages and homes that welcomed them, and by doing this, we are to be the Kingdom of God here and now. As community who is seeking justice, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit for all people in a way that welcomes and affirms and comforts all. In this way we are praying like the song says—that the gates of God’s kingdom be opened in us. In our lives, in our minds, in our hearts, in our congregations, and in our actions. So that when we are the disciples, journeying for a place of belonging, we find the places that welcome and care for us, or we dust off their inhospitality and move on. And when we are the people in the houses and villages, being called to care for others, and welcome them into our lives, making space for them to inhabit among us, we do so lovingly, justly, and willingly. In doing this we are recognizing the Kingdom of God coming near to us here and now. A kingdom that is justice and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. May the Lord come and open in us the gates of the Kingdom wide enough for all to enter into hospitable, welcoming, sacred community. Thanks be to God.