Living Gratitude

This sermon can be listened to here  

Gate Pa – 28^th Sunday in Ordinary Time- Year C -2022

Readings:
Hebrew Scripture:      Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7     
Psalm:                         Psalm: 66:1-11
Epistle:                        2 Timothy 2:8-15       
Gospel:                        Luke 17:11-19

What I want to say:
Use Karoline Lewis’s framework as applied to the story of the 10 lepers to talk about living gratitude. Then use that to show how Francis made room for God and lived gratitude. Finish by listening to “All Creatures Lament” by The Porter's Gate (feat. Fernando Ortega & Molly Parden) reflecting on how we are called to live gratitude

What I want to happen:
What are we being invited to be attentive to, so that we might turn back and praise God for who God is, that we might grow in gratitude to God and then go on our way living gratitude, continuing to be attentive.

The Sermon

       1.    Introduction:

Gratitude is something talked a lot about
Starting point for response of faith
Starting point our relationship with this world
-        God’s gift of this world
-        Our common home
One theme in this week’s readings
I wonder what these reading
-        especially Jeremiah and story from Luke
have to offer our understanding of gratitude
Exiles are surprisingly told by Jeremiah to live in gratitude
Work for benefit of those who had captured them and taken them far from home
“seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.”
Surprising ask in light of what has been happening.
Wonder how we would respond?

 2.    A Grateful Leper 

Gratitude is also at heart of story of Samaritan Leper who Jesus heals
-        Unlike 9 others – assumed to be Jewish
-        He returns
So many ways themes at play in this story
Luke’s outrageous use of Samaritan’s to show
-        how to love God with all your heart and soul and mind  - in this story
-        And who might be our neighbour that we both love, and receive love from, in Jesus parable of the Good Samaritan.
What might this story of the 10 Lepers teach us about gratitude?
What does it mean to live gratefully?

     3.    Grateful Samaritan

    One commentator I read – Karoline Lewis
Uses this story to explore gratitude as a way of being
-        Rather than saying thankyou
-        She sees this as more a way of life, of being
Suggests Samaritan does more than say thankyou
-        He embodies gratitude with God in mind
-        Helps us consider what theological and biblical gratitude can look like

     4.    5 steps

Offers steps circular steps from the story
a.    Starts with awareness and attentiveness
-        Not only to being healed
-        Learning to see though God’s eyes
-        To see that you are whom God has seen
o   Just as Mary did
o   And Elizabeth
o   And others
ð Who does God see when looking at you?
ð At us?
b.    Response is more than saying thankyou
Other lepers did exactly as Jesus told them
-        Went to Jerusalem to the priest
-        Offer thanks
-        Be restored to life in their family and community.
10^th Leper turned back
Not to life as it had been
-        Other 9 did that
Turns back to start again
-        to reimagine how we are part of God’s reign of justice and peace
-        as described in Jesus’ sermon in Luke 4.
ð What do we need to turn back to?
c.     10^th Leper not only turned back to reimagine himself in God’s life
-        But to praise God
Psalm today invites us to join the Samaritan leper in praising God
Before anything else
Praising God for whom God is
Recognising that God’s is gracious and merciful
That God’s name is holy and awesome
ð When do we praise God?
ð For what do we praise God?
ð Who is the God we praise?
d.    Then comes gratitude
Not just for what has led him to be thankful
Not just for what has led us to be thankful
But for God’s goodness and wonder.
e.    Lastly the Samaritan was called to go on his way
So too with us
Not enough to be thankful
Gratitude needs to be lived out so that others might join us in being aware of God’s goodness, and we begin the cycle again
ð I wonder how we live out our gratitude?

   

 5.    Francis 

On October 4 we celebrated St Francis of Assisi
Whose way of living the gospel I am called to follow.
Those 5 steps resonated so much with his story
Awareness awakened after prison in Perugia
-        God’s love through creation
-        Stillness of ruined churches like San Damiano
-        Embracing the leper ####
-        Saw himself as God saw him
Turned back and let go all that had defined him
-        Playboy
-        Crusading knight
-        Cloth merchant
-        Son Pietro Bernadone
Became Christ’s fool
God’s troubadour
-        Singing praise to God most high
-        Continuously praising the Omnipotent Good Lord
“You are love and charity, you are wisdom,
you are humility, you are patience,
you are beauty, you are sweetness,
you are safety, you are rest, you are joy,
you are our hope
and our delight,
you are justice, you are moderation
you are all our wealth
and riches overflowing.”
He gave thanks that all creation and all people were his brother and sister
Set out to do what was his to do
-        Lived his life going on his way
Praying that Christ would show his brothers what was theirs to do.
In all that he spent time in prayer
Paying attention to the crucified and risen Christ present
In all creation
In all those he met
Especially the lepers.

     6.    Reflection

4^th October also marks the end of the season of creation
Invite us to spend the next 5 minutes listening to song
All Creatures Lament by The Porter's Gate
Reflecting on how we live gratitude