The New England Church Pulpit New England Congregational Church UCC Aurora Illinois

Our expectations of what life is supposed to be like don’t always correspond to reality. The myths of family life, of jobs, of church, of God are always campaigning for our attention for what life should be. But the real thing is often less than the dream. Luke addresses the issue in the story about a banquet where those who expect one thing find a different reality. The ones who think they’re head table guests are seated at the back of the room. What’s promised by the accepted myth of a culture isn’t the way things actually are in the world God desires. The expectations we have of life may elude us, but that is good news.

It is good news because ultimately the goals the collective society says will make you happy, may indeed be your ruin. If you won $5 million in the lottery today, you might be inclined to buy a new house, quit our job and hopefully sit in the lap of luxury. But that is the campaign.

Some of you know the story of Babbette’s Feast. Babbette is a world-renown French chef you finds herself unemployed and seeks work as a cook in the home of a Danish family whose religion forbids any excesses. Living in a simple cottage, eating the simplest meals, and stifling any sense of laughter or enjoyment, ,the sole survivors of this Danish family, two elderly sisters, shun any excesses. One day Babbette learns that she has won the lottery in France, and the sisters are quite certain she will leave them. Babbette on the other hand, decides to spend her entire lottery winnings on one meal for the sisters and their friends in the village. She brings in quail and turtles, vegetables of all kinds, and the best wine. She spends days preparing and when the time comes to serve the meals, the sisters are beside themselves, not knowing what to do with such a lavish meal and sumptuous table in their little austere cottage. A few guests have been invited, but conversation is stifled by the opulence that they deem too extravagant to be enjoyed. But then the wine begins to loosen their spirits and their tongues as well, and before long the laughter and frivolity around the table opens up a whole new understanding of life and friendships. When the meal is over, everyone around the table realizes they have been transformed by that singular temporary meal upon which Babbette has spent her entire fortune. And yet, that single, solitary meal that lasted only a few hours has given them a new life, not only in their home but in the village.

If we seek to live by the campaign promises that lure us to selfish living, to put our trust in the future that promises bigger and better, we miss the many moments of grace and joy that invite us to the dance. If we buy into the accepted norms of culture, it is too easy to be swept away by the values society says are important: getting all you can, taking care of number one, making sure your children are involved in everything they can be, working your life away to get to the top of the ladder or the front of the table. Along the way we miss the joy of temporary moments that can inform a lifetime of peace and happiness: a child playing aimlessly in a mud puddle, seeing a shooting star, reading a book with the kids, walking through the Arboretum or just letting your mind wander and wonder.

It is too easy to buy into the campaign that says we find life by collecting all we can and protecting what we have. But when it doesn’t turn out as we had expected, we’re shattered or angry. Zen Buddhism uses a glass to illustrate. Holding a treasured and expensive glass in his hand, the master says “This glass is broken.” This glass is broken. If we realize that some day the glass will be shattered, we can learn to enjoy it in the present without concern for protecting it or fearing that it may break. Storing it away in some safe place doesn’t allow us to use the glass for it’s intended purpose, so to enjoy it and appreciate it each time you use it, knowing that some day it will be broken, is the secret of happiness in life. This job is temporary; I have an expiration date; campaign promises change once you’ve voted; this child, this friendship, this family, this day, this meal is a temporary gift to be enjoyed while it is here because there are no guarantees.

At the Parliament of the World’s Religions, a free lunch was served every day by the Sikhs. Can you imagine what it would take to serve 5,000 - 6,000 every day for lunch? It is part of their tradition since the 15th century when the Guru Nanak Dev Ji was sent out by his father in the northern Punjab region of India with 20 rupees to make a wise investment. The young boy invested in food and hospitality. Nanak’s egalitarian beliefs that all were equal in the eyes of God inspired him to create a meal called langar in a big white tent called the gurdwara where the high-class people would rub shoulders with the low-class people, everyone sitting on the floor so all were equal, the first and the last. Since that time, Sikhs have followed the practice of welcoming people of all castes, and at the Parliament all religions, to eat together. Guests had to remove their shoes and wash their hands before being served traditional food by observant male Sikhs wearing white tunics, turbans and long beards. It was the whole of the Parliament wrapped up in one simple, momentary meal that fed the body temporarily but fed the soul for a lifetime.

It’s easy to get caught up in the collective world business of retaliation, of waging wars, of fighting to protect self-interests as if it was our God-ordained privilege. Religion at its best is to serve the world and make it a better place to live. A religion that is self-serving only, whose rules are more to keep undesirables out and a select group in, is not the kind of religion the Creator of the universe would approve of. Jesus said that when you go to the banquet of life, don’t see yourself as deserving of sitting at the head table with God. You don’t know where you stand in terms of God’s priorities, and it’s embarrassing to be told you’re not the only game in town. You can’t count on the campaign to tell you the truth, you can’t count on your own understanding to give you the best assessment. So sit at the back where you can catch a birdseye view of the guests and celebrate the collective adventure of the temporary. Amen.

–Gary L. McCann

Luke 14.7-14,P> When Jesus noticed how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, he told them this parable: When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited. If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this man your seat.’ Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place. But when you are invited, take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all your fellow guests. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

Then Jesus said to his host, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.

Bhagavad-Gita 9.4-8

I permeate all the universe
in my unmanifest form.
All beings exist within me,
yet I am so inconceivably

vast, so beyond existence,
that though they are brought forth
and sustained by my limitless power,
I am not confined with them.

Just as the all-moving wind,
wherever it goes, always
remains in the vastness of space,
all beings remain within me.

They are gathered back into my womb
at the end of the cosmic cycle—
a hundred fifty thousand
billion of your earthly years—

and as a new cycle begins
I send them forth once again,
pouring from my abundance
the myriad forms of life.

(Translated by Stephen Mitchell)

Copyright © 2004 by Gary L. McCann. All rights reserved.

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