07 Apr SUNDAY, APRIL 7, 2024
What have you been privileged to hear or see? What have you gotten the chance to look at or touch so that something new was revealed to you? At least in such a way that because of your personal experience, you could testify of it and/or to it?
Think about what it was like to travel someplace new for the first time. It may have been a friend or relative’s house, a hotel or family vacation destination. You noticed how everything seemed different, the smell, the sights and sounds, the outside, inside, surfaces and faces of your new surroundings, the entrances, what was hung on the walls, what you sat on, where you slept and what you ate.
Remember when you first tasted a favorite food? As a kid, I remember thinking about foods I’d probably never get enough of. Strawberries, ice cream, red licorice and pancakes topped my list. Think about when you first grabbed the attention of a boy or girl in your neighborhood or class. Suddenly you noticed they were smiling at you and not looking at anybody behind you. How about when you first heard the words, “I love you,” come from the mouth of someone other than your parents? Remember how it felt to have a pair of arms wrap around you in such a way that you knew you were safe and being held with care?
A test of our bodily senses is important because that’s how we determine whether things are real or genuine. Nod your head if you can taste the difference between regular and diet soda? How about this? Does anything labeled constructed of 100% manmade materials feel like leather, wool, silk or cotton up against the skin? Case in point: I have a light gray sweater I only wear around the house made of pure Cashmere. It’s full of moth holes front and back, but I still wear it because it is the softest warmest thing I own. It’s the real deal for which I’ve found no substitute.
Attempts to simulate reality improve everyday, but hopefully, what’s fake will never pass for what’s real anytime soon with the exception of artificial replacements for diseased and failing organs. What we know is what’s familiar and until proven otherwise, we think we know what’s what.
For instance, growing up in Virginia then living in Maryland did not prepare me to know about Pennsylvania pot pie. I knew pot pie as something made by Swanson, Banquet and Marie Callender’s frozen foods. I knew what I envisioned, the thing I already knew, a thing that sounded like it but wasn’t it all. The name or words alone could not and would not suffice. They could not and would not fully represent the actual thing experienced for what it is.
In fact, what Steve and I envisioned was something almost entirely different from what’s known as Pennsylvania pot pie except for the fact that they both contain meat with a kind of gravy. By seeing and tasting the finished product for ourselves and getting to taste different families’ versions of what goes by the same name, we came to understand what folks were talking about all along. The lesson we learned is that folks are unified by a shared experience of a thing they come to know. We become unified by what we share in common, what we grow to appreciate, the people we associate with things of which we can testify of through firsthand experience.
These are the precursors to an entire group becoming one heart and soul. Among us, we have unique individual experiences, but as a whole, we share basics in common. We can relate. We can name differences while still recognizing similarities. Holding life experience in common leads to appreciation. We acknowledge the contribution of others. We compensate labor or are willing to labor on behalf of those no longer capable.
These virtuous traits are the opposite of individualism and pride. Selfishness claims superiority. It insists on being named the best or having things done one way. It won’t allow credit or gain to be things that are shared.
Listen to the following claim. After the resurrection of Christ, not one believer claimed private ownership of any possessions. Everything owned was held in common.
Of all things spoken in the Bible as true, I find this one the hardest to believe: No one claimed private ownership of any possessions. Wow. I struggle to hold much of anything in common. I have a bathroom full of “just my stuff, and two-thirds of the closet, one full dresser and claim use of most of our home’s square footage.
I insist on driving the one car we own. I write my name with a Sharpie on things that are “mine” like the jar of Natural Peanut Butter in the cabinet. I hide candy in the china cabinet along with other goodies. How could this be true of all believers in Christ’s resurrection? I wonder if it has ever been true or is just an ideal to which Christians aspire?
For as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold to lay at the apostles’ feet. How many of us of retirement age would sell our home or land and bring the proceeds to the feet of our children or grandchildren, the people we love most of all, much less so to lay at the feet of apostles. Who were the apostle’s anyway?
Those with great power and grace who gave testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. Wow. Apostles in Jesus’ day must have been extra special and unique, more deserving than believers in our day and time. The Bible says that “once proceeds were distributed to each as any had need, there was not a needy person among them.”
Wow. There was not a needy person among them. This fits the very definition of a communist society. Communism entails the absence of private property and social classes. Everyone’s an equal according to an economic ideology appearing as far back as the 4th century BCE.
Is that what Luke, the author of Acts purports, i.e., alleges as true when in fact, it was not truly so? If you research whether after Jesus’ time the apostles actually experienced this type of communal living, there’s no evidence of this being the case. So what is Luke’s point by painting such a picture?
The point Luke tries to convey aims toward a future to which Jesus spoke and envisioned. Luke, by nature, is the gospel writer who advocates for social justice: fair and equitable distribution of resources, opportunities, and privileges.
It may be hard to believe, but social justice was originally a religious concept. It’s not just the favorite child of ministry doted upon by the ELCA. It has become conceptualized as a sociopolitical construct through which access may be gained to economic benefits, however, it is the core of Christian ideology, the system of ideas and ideals to which we, you and I, subscribe.
Remember, Luke is the one who gives our faith the parable of the lost sheep, lost coin, prodigal son, and Good Samaritan. Each of those parables is an allusion to universal salvation: that Jesus, the Son of God, came to seek the lost, save the needy, and as the apostle John said, “to die not only for our sins, but the sins of the whole world.”
The idea of Luke is that none should perish for any reason whether their dire circumstances are the result of being ignorant, not paying attention, or acting foolishly. We are to have compassion on those who lack safety, security, or knowledge.
No one should perish for lack of being cared for. That is why God sends witnesses and counts on the efforts of bystanders. That’s why God expects those who become aware of a need to share equally in the responsibility for the dilemma.
While we may agree in theory, how to address these needs leads to conflict, a conflict of interests, to be exact, for our interests gravitate toward what we claim as our own, our loved ones, land, home, and possessions. So let’s listen again to the psalmist who says, “How good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity!” When brothers, sisters, families and neighbors dwell in peace and express mutual concern in real tangible ways, by what people see and hear, look at and touch with their hands. This is how people come to know God and how God cares for them.
That’s all Thomas wanted, to see and touch the Lord himself, so he could believe what he’d been told about Jesus. He wanted to see and taste the pot pie for himself, not hear about it, or believe what it was based on secondhand info and other people’s detailed descriptions. It’s why before Communion, we say, “Taste and see that the Lord is good.”
Jesus knows that it’s not enough to offer words of comfort or just be present. Human beings need to experience things directly firsthand or else their brains won’t allow them to accept spoken words or things experienced vicariously. Let us pray.
Today is another first day of the week, dear Lord, a day when we may have our perspective changed, when we may discover new things and expect to be surprised. We ask you Lord, for firsthand experience that convinces us to act, to make sacrifices for the good of those in need at our expense. Behoove us to share and therefore hold in common all that we are privileged to receive through thy bounty. In your holy name we pray, Amen.