For Faith's Sake

For Faith's Sake <-- Audio File - Sermon based upon Luke 18:1-8

Good morning. If you haven’t noticed, today is Children’s Sabbath. Children’s Sabbaths is celebrated throughout the world and throughout many faith traditions, not just Christianity. It is a special day to pause and appreciate the amazing gift of children… the ones in our midst and afar. It is also a time to bring awareness to the plight of children because they are among the most vulnerable in our world. Vulnerable to abuse and neglect. Vulnerable to the effects of poverty and marginalization. And vulnerable to be forgotten and ignored in public policy and politics. Finally, Children’s Sabbath is a day to call us to advocacy. And what that advocacy might look like, we’ll talk about later.

So, for now let’s dig into this Gospel text which is a true gem for such a day as this. You see, this parable is a bit interesting because first of all Jesus shares with us it’s intended meaning. Right out of the starting gate he says this passage is about the need to pray always and not to lose heart. What’s also interesting is that we hear from the bad guy’s inner voice. The unjust judge says of himself in this passage that “I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone.” And yet, in the end, he does what is right and just for the widow. And then Jesus ends the whole thing by turning it around on us to find out if we will persist by asking, “when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”

You see I think this passage has a lot to offer us and I could probably preach a different sermon from this text for weeks and weeks to come but we have to limit the scope through the question, “What is it that God wants us to hear today?” I think the message to us today is that for our faith’s sake, God calls us to persist in seeking justice. Let me say it again. For our faith’s sake, God calls us to persist in seeking justice.

Now you may ask how I got that seemingly simple statement from a parable about untiring prayer. Well, let’s dig into what the bible has to say to us. The first hurdle we need to make is to understand that prayer is far more than quiet meditation or private time with God. Deuteronomy, Matthew, Luke and many other scripture texts tells us are called to be a living prayer and 1 Thessalonians and Ephesians tell us to do so without ceasing. Mother Teresa said, “Prayer in action is love, love in action is service.” Dean Inge said, “Action is the normal completion of the act of will which begins as prayer.” From outside our tradition, Mahatma Gandhi said, “Prayer is not an old woman's idle amusement. Properly understood and applied, it is the most potent instrument of action.” You see, prayer and action always go hand in hand. Our actions are prayers. So a parable about faithful prayer is also about faithful action in the Christian life.

For our faith’s sake, God calls us to persist in seeking justice. Well, we’re definitely called to living prayers of action but what’s this thing of justice? The message of God’s justice is woven throughout the bible and maybe most famously stated in Micah 6:8 which reads, “what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God?” So this passage stands as one among many rather than a rare mention of justice. And just like we hear the inner thoughts of the unjust judge, we also hear Jesus’ clear reference to God and justice in this passage. So, our calling to work in justice is clear and clearly linked to our faith. But what does it look like?

This is where I think the passage has a lot to say to us on Children’s Sabbath. When considering the plight of children in poverty and suffering from the effects of poverty, the statistics are staggering. In looking at the global numbers we see:

• There are 2.2 billion children in the world and 1 billion of them live in poverty.
• 10.6 million children die each year before they reached the age of 5
• Over 11 million children die each year from preventable causes like malaria, diarrhea and pneumonia.
• 121 million children are not in any sort of formal education whereby they may better their condition. They are only living lives of survival.

And let’s look closer to home. In the United States:

• Every 18 minutes a baby dies before his or her first birthday.
• Every 45 minutes a child or teen dies from an accident.
• Every 5 hours a child or teen commits suicide.
• Every 6 hours a child is killed by abuse or neglect.

And if we look at those same numbers and only consider children living in poverty and marginalization, the numbers skyrocket. They were already overwhelming enough and poverty makes them worse.

So again I ask, what does justice look like? I mean, Repeatedly it has been shown that effects of poverty and inadequate healthcare hit children the hardest and have the longest legacy. So, what is justice? Well ultimate justice is a world where all those statistics are gone and all that’s left is the joy of looking into the eyes of children, all children, and seeing pure hope. A world where no child goes to bed hungry. A world where no child is bullied or teased for any reason. A world where how much money a family has does not limit the opportunities of a child. A world where children laugh and play without fear of returning to an abusive home. A world where the weeping for the joy of children is louder than the weeping of grieving mothers and families. A world where we’ve participated in making all that happen.

Now I don’t know about you but that vision brings tears to my eyes. And I’d like to tell you such a world will happen in our lifetime but it probably will not. The reality is that children are thousands of times better off than they were 100 years ago because of the advancement of medicine. And better off than they were a few hundred years ago because they are no longer view as property but rather as people under the law. So we’ve made significant progress in protecting children and we’ll continue that… because that is what we are called to. This scripture passage calls us, just like the persistent widow, to persist in prayer and justice work regardless of how just or unjust the system is because it is our faith filled response to God. It is the right thing to do. The widow persisted and justice was restored. But even if the wrongs being inflicted on her had continued, she would have persisted because it was the right thing to do.

Now this is a good time to address one of the toughest parts of this parable. Verses 7 and 8 read, “And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them.” Now, to a child being picked on or suffering from a preventable disease, this verse must make them say, “When? I’m suffering now and where’s the justice?” When we look at the reality around us these verses make us pause and question if Jesus is really telling us the truth.

First of all, let’s be clear, all injustice is an abomination to God because it seeks to break down God’s good creation. But how is God restoring justice? What we need to recognize in this passage is something that is lost in translation from the original Greek text, the difference between chronos and kairos, calendar time and God’s time.

You know that old saying there’s our time and there’s God’s time? Well there really is. See, chronos which is calendar time or clock time is about how long it took for me to get from the start of this sermon to the end of it or my speed from here to the coffee. Kairos is about the “rightness” of the moment. It’s about being in a moment where there’s no doubt or hesitation or unwillingness. And it’s also God’s relationship to us in our moments. God is the “rightness” in the moment.

You see when we look at this parable, we are told that God will “quickly” grant justice. The word we translate as quickly and the words around it are not talking about speed or chronos. The words used are talking about assuredness and lack of hesitation or kairos. God will quickly grant justice because God has not hesitated in proclaiming injustice. God will quickly grant justice because we don’t need to wonder if God wants us to advocate for the poor and oppressed because God has already on their side and has been sitting at the side of the poor and suffering as a comforter for a long time. I don’t know what date and time is when we’ll live in a world without suffering children but I can assure you that we don’t have to convince God that there’s injustice or beg of God to hear because God is already her in the midst of it! God is on the side of the oppressed and suffering EVERY TIME.

God has been working through the parents, advocates, and all those who heed the call of love throughout all time and all creation. God has been comforting the afflicted through the work of our hands, the compassion in our eyes, and love and passion in our voices for a long time. We ask “How long O Lord how long will the children suffer?” and God has answered until the work is done. We ask “How long O Lord how long will the children suffer?” and again God answers until the work is done. But rest assured those who are suffering always have an advocate and a comforter in God. The question to us, is how hard will we work to make sure those suffering experience that advocacy and comfort?

So, what advocacy can we do to make a difference? Advocacy can take on lots of different forms. Whether it’s being the regular neighborhood front porch where all kids know they can come to talk or donating money to an after school program, it’s still saying that children matter. We can be involved in letter writing campaigns or public advocacy about policies that support children. That work is much like the widow and the unjust judge. If we persist, sometimes even unjust politicians relent and do the right thing even for the wrong reasons. There are all kinds of programs to be involved in and all kinds of relationships we have with children in which we can be their comforter and their advocate.

Even if you don’t realize it, this congregation is already doing lots of good things for kids. These children and youth would not be participating in the service were it not for your faithful witness. Portions of the offering go into programs that make a difference in children’s lives. And all of us have made a difference in some child’s life whether we’re 9 or 90. We have been, are, and continue to be God’s hands at work in the world.

You know, I entitled this sermon “For Faith’s Sake” on Monday last week but yesterday I was at the association meeting which is the United Church of Christ’s equivalent to Presbytery meeting. While I was there, I found this bumper sticker, “For God’s sake, do something.” I think that would have been a better title for this sermon. For God’s sake, do something. For God’s good creation’s sake, do something.

Our call is to continue the work of advocacy and comforting, faithfully and persistently. Our call is to seek more ways and new creative methods for doing that work. When you leave here what more can you do? What child will be touched by your time, love, resources, and most importantly by our faithfulness?

Amen