Sermon on Luke 13:10-17

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

Sabbath was our theme throughout last year. We spent a long time talking about how important rest is, how our culture doesn’t make room for it, and the biblical mandate for rest practices.

And yet in today’s Gospel, it sounds like Jesus was flouting the Sabbath laws given by God.He cured this woman even though it was the Sabbath. The religious leader in the story called him out on breaking the Sabbath commandments.

It’s not like the religious leader didn’t want this woman cured. He was just trying to faithfully observe the way of life given by God after the exodus. Sabbath means no work, and surely curing someone was work. If there were life-threatening circumstances, then of course, he could intervene, but why couldn’t Jesus have good boundaries and cure her tomorrow?

This was an ongoing controversy among God’s people. What counted as work? When was it permitted to do work even though it was the Sabbath: to save someone’s life? To ease someone’s pain? When were humans overstepping and pretending we’re too important not to work—essentially playing God? Even God rested on the seventh day of creation.

The synagogue leader seems to have fallen on the stricter side of the question. But instead of pulling Jesus aside to voice his concerns, he called him out publicly. And instead of speaking to Jesus himself, he addressed the crowds. Not just once, but he “kept saying to the crowds” that there were six days to work, and that they shouldn’t come looking to be cured on the day of rest.

But Jesus wasn’t having it.

Jesus was making it clear that Sabbath is about liberation. The language throughout the story uses imagery of bondage, not just healing and illness. Jesus used the language of “bound,” “bondage,” and “set free.” Jesus didn’t just cure the woman: he liberated her.

That’s important, because Sabbath isn’t just about rest. It’s about liberation.

When God liberated God’s people in the exodus, God gave them the Law, including Sabbath laws. Those laws reminded God’s people week in and week out that they were God’s, not Egypt’s. They were no longer enslaved—they had the freedom to rest and enjoy God’s creation, just as God had done at the beginning of time.

God reminded God’s people about the Sabbath laws in our reading from Isaiah, too. This came at the end of the Babylonian Captivity, when God’s people had been taken into exile by the Babylonians. They were once again being freed from a foreign power, and God was reminding them what it means to be God’s people.

The reading opens with reminders to live into their newfound freedom by speaking life-giving words and taking care of those who were hungry and afflicted. And then, it goes right into a reminder of the importance of Sabbath. Taking care of each other and observing Sabbath go hand-in-hand. These are what it means to be God’s free people.

God freed them from the oppressive power of the Egyptian Empire and the Babylonian Empire, as well as all other empires forever. The Sabbath laws weren’t just about the weekly Sabbath. They also included a sabbatical year every seven years and a Jubilee year every seven times seven years. During these special years, the land and the people and animals that worked it would get a break.

God promised to provide enough food to allow them to let the ground lie fallow for a year, restoring the land and its creatures to health and flourishing for the coming years. In the Jubilee year, debts wereforgiven, enslaved people were freed, and land was returned to its previous owners.

All of this goes against the human urge to expand and hustle and dominate. It goes against human empires’ desire to get bigger and more powerful no matter the cost.

Instead, God frees God’s people from that oppressive hunger for more by instituting cycles of rest and rejuvenation.

So, when Jesus set the woman free from her ailment, it wasn’t breaking Sabbath laws; it completely aligned with the spirit of Sabbath.

Sabbath is about liberation, and Jesus liberated that woman, just as God had liberated her ancestors.

The synagogue leader observed the letter of the Sabbath laws, while Jesus observed the spirit, but it’s still hard today to discern how to observe the spirit of Sabbath.

We talked last year about Sabbath not just being about showing up to church on Sunday mornings, though it’s wonderful to worship with you all. And it’s not necessarily about rigidly setting aside a 24-hour period of not doing certain things.

We spent a whole year talking about Sabbath, because it’s really countercultural today. Our culture values hustle and productivity, trying to squeeze the last drop of potential out of every second of our days and maximizing the profit. We’re not encouraged to rest unless maybe it’ll make us more productive tomorrow.

As we’ve been talking about today and all of last year, Sabbath isn’t about making us more productive. It’s about freedom, gratitude, and remembering Whose we are.

But it’s hard to live that out in a culture that doesn’t value rest and where we’re bound to systems that value people based on their productivity and not their inherent worthiness as human beings made in the image of God.

Our culture values some bodies and tries to ignore and even erase others. People who aren’t white, straight, cisgender male, able-bodied, middle-class and above, neurotypical, documented, slim, and young are marginalized, written off, given lower paid jobs, considered drains on the system,maligned with various unflattering stereotypes, and even criminalized.

It's hard to practice the spirit of Sabbath when you have to work three jobs, take night classes, and take care of your kids as a single parent. Or when because of a disability, the system makes you choose between getting paid to do the meaningful work you feel called to and receiving the benefits that make it at all possible to pay for the treatment, equipment, and assistance that keeps you alive in a society that’s not built with you in mind.

There’s a lot of work needed to make our society and world more just for everyone. And it’s tough to discern how and when to rest, remembering our freedom and belovedness in God.

It’s hard to rest when there’s so much injustice in the world, and it’s also hard to keep going and not give up under the weight of everything wrong in the world.

And yet, God knows what in this world doesn’t align with the Beloved Community and still calls us to rest. God calls us to both rest and liberation. We can’t completely have one without the other.

But God also never calls us to do it alone. Even the big names like Moses didn’t do it alone. We sometimes forget, but Moses’ siblings, Aaron and Miriam, had big parts in the exodus too. Later on, God told Moses he was doing too much trying to be the judge in every matter the Israelites brought to him, so God gave him other leaders to help.

I know a lot of you have participated in choirs and other musical groups. Choral singers and wind instrumentalists have to stop producing sound when they breathe. So, in big groups like choirs, they do what’s called “stagger breathing.” They take turns breathing, so that the sound is maintained by those who aren’t breathing at that second. No one of us can sustain our work constantly by ourselves, but together, we can keep the liberating work going, even as we each participate in liberating rest.

And God works, too, when we rest. The breath of God’s ever-sustaining Holy Spirit moves through us and our world constantly, comforting the suffering and inciting good kingdom-building trouble, bringing about freedom and shalom for all.

The spirit of Sabbath is liberation. We observe the spirit of Sabbath by incorporating rest into our justice work and justice work into our rest. We do both together and with God’s help.

A lot of work needs to happen to make sure that every single human being is treated like the image of God they are, but instead of saying, “we won’t rest until that’s a reality,” we will rest as part of making that a reality.

Rest well, beloved. Continue to live into your divine calling to do justice and to love mercy. The God who created the world and called it good created and loves you and every one of your neighbors.

Live out the spirit of Sabbath by continuing to discern together the rhythms of rest and justice work that set the world free.

Sermon on Luke 12:49-56

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

Over the past few weeks, Jesus’ teachings have become scarier and scarier sounding.

We had the parable of the rich fool, where instead of being able to enjoy his riches, his life was going to end that very night. Then last week, we heard about being ready and staying alert for Jesus’ coming.

This week, we get fire and division and families fighting among themselves.And while the fire Jesus talks about here is metaphorical, I’ve seen too many Southern California wildfires to be comfortable with the image. In today’s Gospel, we see a side of Jesus that’s very different from themeek shepherd we sometimes think of.

Our reading from Jeremiah isn’t much better. It sounds nice at first: sure, God is close by—that’s a good thing! But then, God starts railing against false prophets. We even get another reference to fire. God sounds punitive and harsh here.

“How long? Will the hearts of the prophets ever turn back—those who prophesy lies and who prophesy the deceit of their own heart?”

“Is not my word like fire, says the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces?”

Our Gospel reading shows Jesus with a similar tone:

“I have come to cast fire upon the earth, and how I wish it were already ablaze!”

“Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!”

“You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?”

Yikes! This is not the God I’m used to encountering.

And still, something feels so familiar in these readings. Not God’s harshness, but the division and the deceit our readings talk about.It feels like they could be talking directly to us today.

We do have families turning against each other. We live in a politicized and polarized time. At best, holiday meals are often tense. For some, certain family members or even entire branches of the family get cut off. LGBTQ teensget kicked out of their childhood homes. Trans family members get disowned.Families are indeed divided, and people often use (and misuse) the Bible to justify it.

And as for false prophets, you can easily find someone today to tell you whatever you want to hear—whether a newscaster, a social media influencer, a commentator, a politician, a spiritual leader, or a lifestyle guru. Whatever you want to believe, you can find someone to follow.

Division and deceit are everywhere. It’s hard to discern what’s true and what’s meaningful.It’s no wonder our readings for today resonate.

But both the Jeremiah and the Luke passages remind us that God is engaged with our world. God is not far off, and Jesus wants to bring the world-changing power of God’s Beloved Community now.

Our first reading shows us that God cares when people are teaching harmful things in God’s name and won’t passively stand by. God didn’t create the world and then walk away. God is paying attention and will hold people in power accountable.

And our Gospel reading shows us that Jesus isn’t just meek and mild, and that’s a good thing, because it means we have a passionate savior who’s willing and able to turn the world upside down for the sake of God’s justice and mercy.

There’s a reason Jesus got executed. His teachings were a threat to the status quo, to the people in power, and to the Roman Empire that kept peace by the sword. It’s not that Jesus didn’t want peace, but he knew his mission would bring controversy, and he even suffered a violent death for it.

And then, there’s the Hebrews reading we haven’t talked about yet, which chronicles stories of faith throughout the history of God’s people.These are people inspired to action by their faith in God—the God who is nearby and not far off, the God who fills heaven and earth.

They participated in miraculous works, they underwent terrible suffering, they forsook earthly comforts, and they were even killed. The writer of Hebrews was encouraging early Jesus followers in a time of persecution to remain true to their commitment to the Beloved Community. They weren’t the first and wouldn’t be the last to see God’s wonders and to suffer for their trust in God.

Throughout history, the writer of Hebrews reminds us that God has been faithful to God’s people, and they have trusted God, so we can too.

I’ve never been a runner. In fact, I was often dead last in the races in the annual Girl Scout Olympicsas a kid. But somehow, even gasping for breath with a stitch in my side, no one else still running, the cheers of the crowd got me to the finish line.

Despite not being a runner, I’ve always found the end of our Hebrews reading inspiring. I love the image of the great cloud of witnesses watching all of our earthly race: from the triumphs and high fives to all of the hurdles, leg cramps, and maybe even the occasional face plant—they’re rooting for us through it all. I imagine Abraham and Sarah, Queen Esther and John the Baptist, St. Augustine and Julian of Norwich, Martin Luther and Martin Luther King, Jr., and my grandparents, and so many others looking on with pride and joy, not judging my human failures, always seeing the best in me and cheering me on, waiting to celebrate together at the finish line.

We often talk about the Beloved Community here and now and our kinship with humanity around the world, but we’re also joined with all those who have gone before us and will come after us: in baptism, at this table, and through God’s love for each and every one of us.No matter what we face, we are not alone.

And when we face challenging readings like Jeremiah and Luke today, we can remember that our God is not passive or far off. God fills heaven and earth. God meets us with passion, wanting the fire of the Holy Spirit to fill the world with God’s justice and mercy.

Just as Jesus isn’t merely meek and mild, simply being nice won’t fix the things in this world that aren’t aligned with the Beloved Community. Being nice won’t get everyone fed or stop wars or end corruption or stop pollution or reverse climate change or protect the human rights of every individual.

It's good to be kind, but that’s not the same thing as being nice. Being nice means not rocking the boat. It means holding your tongue when you disagree, because someone might not like you as much if you speak up.

Being kind means telling the truth in a respectful way. Being kind means siding with the most marginalized, making sure those with the least power are still heard. Being kind means acting from our values, even when it might cause division, even in our own families.

It’s way easier to be nice, but this world needs people who are kind, who stand for community-building values, and who are filled with the fire of the Holy Spirit.So, be kind and not just nice. God is with you every step of the way, and you’ve got a whole cloud of witnesses cheering you on.

Sermon on Luke 12:32-40

Pastor Jennifer Garcia

We usually have readings like today’s Gospel during the season of Advent, leading up to Christmas: “Stay awake! Keep watch!”

During that season, we remember that even as the Christ Child came at an unexpected time in an inauspicious place, Christ could come back at any time, so we should always be ready.

That can sound fearful, though, like: “stay on your best behavior or Jesus might catch you doing something bad and punish you for it.Don’t forget that any moment the Second Coming might happen, so you definitely shouldn’t do anything like rest or have fun.”

But Jesus wasn’t trying to scare his followers into submission. In fact, our reading opens with the words “do not be afraid”!

Not only is there the face value meaning, but it also again evokes Advent and Christmas: when the angel Gabriel announced to Mary that she would be Jesus’ mother and when the angels announced to the shepherds that Jesus had been born. In both stories, the angels toldthe humans not to fear.

And in our first reading, we read another instance that’s less associated with Christmas: when God promised Abram a multitude of descendants. All of these proclamations of good news started with “do not be afraid.”

Instead of scare tactics, is it possible that our Gospel reading today is actually good news? Yes! And let’s look at how:

Jesus starts by saying that God is pleased to give his hearersthe kingdom. That’s a far cry from “behave or else.” Instead, Jesus is reminding them that by following him, they’ve become a part of the Beloved Community, not just in the future, but here and now. They were part of bringing God’s community of love, joy, and peace to the world around them, making earth a little more as it is in heaven wherever they went.

As we talked about last week, Jesus wants his followers to prioritize relationships over stuff. The parable of the rich fool last week showed that life is meaningless when it’s full of stuff and no one to share it with. This week, Jesus says to invest in what can’t be taken away from you. Stuff decays or gets stolen, but relationships with God and each other are what make life worth living.

So, when Jesus goes on to talk about slaves waiting for their master to come (always a challenging metaphor—it’s uncomfortable when Jesus talks about an unjust and dehumanizing system like enslavement without denouncing it), Jesus isn’t talking about “behave or else” here.

We might expect the slaves to need to wait for their master to keep from getting punished, but that’s not how Jesus tells the story. Notice the master’s surprising behavior: when he gets home, Jesus says he will sit his slaves down and serve them. Not what you’d expect.

As uncomfortable as Jesus’ use of slavery imagery is, he’s talking about a complete reversal of the social order, where the first shall be last and the last shall be first. Kind of sounds like Jesus washing his disciples’ feet, doesn’t it? The rabbi, not to mention God in the flesh, stooped to do the dirtiest, lowliest job that the unluckiest servant normally did.Jesus used this story to declare that Beloved Community upends human hierarchies.

When the Second Coming happens, the people who are living into the Beloved Community, loving and serving their neighbors, will be sat down at God’s banquet that will never end.

But remember that we don’t earn our place at God’s table—it’s there for us from the moment God imagined us into being. We don’t serve our neighbor to earn our invitation into God’s Beloved Community—we’re already here!

We serve our neighbor now, because we recognize the image of God in them, because that’s how we would want to be treated, because God loves us so much that it pours out of our hearts and our hands in the form of service to our neighbor.

That is Beloved Community. That is earth as it is in heaven.

And also, it’s easy to get distracted. Marketing campaigns try to get us to believe we’re not worthy without buying their product.

Society sells us business courses and status symbols that allegedly will help us reach a higher rung on the corporate ladder, regardless of who we step on to get there.

We spend our lives trying to earn a place at a table without wondering if it’s even worth sitting at.

We’re like the rich fool in last week’s parable, trying to find security in stuff, but stuff won’t save us.

Sure, we can pay for top notch healthcare and for someone to diversify our portfolio to maximize profit and minimize risk. We can optimize our schedules to be the most productive. We can network to be invited into the most exclusive and powerful circles. We can have the best security systems to protect our privacy and our belongings.

But none of that will guarantee us love, ensure us a meaningful life, or protect us from death.

Our society spends so much time and effort distracting us from what really matters in life. “Buy this eye cream so you don’t feel like you’re aging.” “Binge this tv show to help you forget the shallowness of your friendships.” “Drink this alcohol to numb your anxiety and this energy drink to override your depression.”

It's all a distraction.

Instead, Jesus says, “Be ready.” Stay awake. Not in an “or else” sense, but in the sense of: “I love you and I don’t want you to miss out on what really satisfies: community, relationships, generosity, joy.”

Shaolin Master Shi Heng Yi said, “Never allow pleasure or discomfort to distract you from your path.”

We human beings often want to ignore discomfort and lean into pleasure, but this quote reminds us that both can be distractions from what really matters. Do you want a momentary dopamine hit or the hard work of being in community? Do you want to indulge in complaining or refuse to use discomfort as an excuse to let yourself quit something worth doing?

In our reading, Jesus calls us to the path of Beloved Community. Don’t allow pleasure or discomfort distract you from that path.

We associate the message of our Gospel reading today with Advent and Christmas, but today we’re reading it in the long stretch of Ordinary Time. The commands “keep watch” and “stay awake” aren’t about obsessively policing our behavior so that Jesus won’t catch us doing something we shouldn’t. They’re about being present to what really matters in the day-to-day ordinary times of our ordinary lives.

Jesus invites us to be present to connection and community, the relationships that make life worth living.

Life isn’t about building bigger barns or guarding our stuff carefully against moths and thieves. It’s about loving God and loving our neighbor, living with open hands and open hearts.

Do not be afraid, little flock. The good news is that you are already part of the Beloved Community. Don’t let distractions or human hierarchies make you forget how much God loves you.Let your ordinary time be filled with connection and love.