A Sermon for the Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost

Isaiah 28:14-22
Psalm 46
Hebrews 12:18-19, 22-29
Luke 13:22-30

Today Jesus is putting us on a diet. Like dieting, these readings are not fun and games: There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when people can't get through that narrow door. Are we just too fat to fit through? We're too big for Isaiah's bed and "the covering is too narrow to wrap oneself in it." Sounds like we're in trouble. Better get skinny quick. It's time for a spiritual diet.

So what are you eating these days? How do you feed your spiritual hunger?

It seems that we have been created with a great empty space inside. And we spend our lives trying to fill it up. It's scary to be empty inside. And when we're starving, we'll try anything. We might try to fill the void with alcohol. Or with food or with drugs or with busyness. Or with money and possessions or even with someone we love. For a while the hunger may stop. But the hunger doesn't go away -- the more we feed it the hungrier we feel. We may become addicted. We may even grow fat -- too fat for that narrow door.

Our hunger is for God. The empty place is uniquely God-shaped. It's no good trying to fill it up with other stuff. Think about your spiritual hunger. What are you looking for? Love? Healing? Protection? All good things. The person in today's gospel was seeking something good: salvation. "Lord, will only a few be saved?"

And Jesus tells us that there's a narrow door for many who ask that question. And a closed door with weeping and gnashing of teeth for those who ask it with their first concern being their own salvation. Selfish folks get fat fast. Even those who eat and drink with Jesus if their first concern is getting something for themselves are liable to face a locked door. They are seeking something other than God.

Last week I went seeking seekers. I went to the Chautauqua Institution -- behind the gates there is a venerable self-consciously Christian and self-consciously cultured community. People who have spent lifetimes building up the church. There was superb music, first-rate art, a series of excellent lectures. Everyone was well dressed. They drove or were driven in expensive automobiles. Their ‘summer cottages' were beautifully maintained Victorian places with elegant rooms and splendid porches. The sermon was about diversity. It was excellent. But I wondered (forgive me) if that meant whether one drove a new Lincoln or was driven in an old stretch limo. Chautauqua. Good people, intentionally living as Christians. They're probably first in line for the kingdom.

Then I went to Lily Dale. Behind these gates was another faith community --a ‘little Chautauqua.' Somewhat smaller cottages. A few in disrepair. An assortment of vehicles and some decidedly weird looking people. There was a healing rather than a sermon going on in their amphitheater. These are mostly not Christians. Lily Dale is a spiritualist community. You have your choice of dozens of licensed mediums. Their lecture series includes a variety of speakers that many Christians would find laughable or frightening. I wear my clerical collar, buy an agate, and leave a larger offering than I did at Chautauqua. The donation goes to the local humane society and I am given a poem about the afterlife of pets. It makes me cry; but so did the sermon at Chautauqua. Good people, on a spiritual journey. Most of them seeking healing, love, and life. Most would say these folks are last in line for the kingdom.

"Strange is God's deed. Alien is God's work." Isaiah reminds us that God does weird and surprising stuff.

"People seeking God will come from east and west, from north and south, [maybe even from Lily Dale?] to eat in the kingdom of God. Indeed, some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last." How then are we to know who will be eating at God's table and who will be weeping and gnashing their teeth outside? Who will be first and who last? If we want to strive to get through that narrow door to salvation and eternal life, what are we supposed to do?

Go on a diet? That means letting go of a lot of stuff. Some diet items are more obviously unhealthy -- various addictions. But even obsessions with good stuff can fatten us up and keep us from real nourishment: good deeds and regular church attendance -- "we ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets" -- if it comes before seeking God it can make us spiritually sick. We begin to think we can get ourselves through that door on our own. Most of us are pretty good at making modern "covenants with death" -- trying find shelter and security, or nourishment and love everywhere but from God.

Letting go of all those things we cling to is terribly difficult. Just ask anyone who's gone through a twelve step program. Dieting hurts. Letting go of addictions isn't easy. It is indeed a divine "overwhelming scourge" when it happens; it is a scourging of selfishness. When God comes into our lives this way, it hurts to have our other hungers stripped away. The striving to enter the narrow door can be painful. That's part of the message of the cross.

So how are we to live with the hurt? A proper diet is necessary to live. What makes a good diet? A slice of Chautauqua? A garnish of Lily Dale? A Buddhist dessert?

A good Chautauqua Christian, doing good works and seeking salvation. A good Lily Dale medium, seeking contact with a lost loved one. One may be as easily stuck as the other in that narrow door Both are seeking something for themselves -- something fattening.

Remember what we sang just before the gospel reading? "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and all these things will be added unto you." Not that all the other stuff is necessarily bad; salvation & healing, good works & loved ones, are important. It's just that God needs to come first. Seek God first and your other hungers will be filled. When our starting place is to put God first, perhaps then those other things -- east or west, north or south, Lily Dale or Chautauqua, churchy or weird, can serve as appetizers in our search for God.

So just how, then, do we put God first? Jesus tells us that he is "the way, the truth, and the life" and that we are to love one another as Jesus loved us. Seeking God. Looking for life and truth. The way to do that is to love as Jesus loved. That's the way all will love when God's reign is complete.

Forget the junk food. The way to spiritual nourishment is to love one another as Jesus loved us. God feeds us when we, like Jesus, put ourselves aside and feed others. Then we are thin enough for the narrow door and hungry enough for God.

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