Jesus, Justice, Jazz

Summary

Today’s reading, the feeding of the 5,000, is a story that is so well known and remembered that sometimes it is hard to preach upon, because each of us have our understanding of what it is all about.  Well, this morning I want to share with you another aspect of what the feeding of the 5,000 is all about…it is about justice.  We tend to forget about this, but most of what Jesus did, and taught was about justice, justice through his grace, forgiveness and love.

So, this morning I want to share with you about an experience I had with youth that exemplified the type of justice that Jesus taught, and lived.

When I was back in Minnesota this last month I realized that many of the youth from my previous church were traveling to Houston, Texas for the triennial ELCA National Youth Gathering.  This of course made me think back upon the National Youth Gatherings that I have attended as a pastor.  One in particular, back in 2009 stands out, especially in regards to this morning’s text from the gospel of John.

Jesus, Justice and Jazz was the motto for that year’s gathering in New Orleans, but it became more than a simple motto to us that year.  New Orleans, the city upon which almost 38,000 of us Lutherans descended is the birthplace of jazz.  It is also a city that was still trying to recover, four years later from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.  Besides New Orleans my church group also stopped in Peoria, Illinois and Memphis, Tennessee to minister in impoverished areas, we sought to model Jesus teaching to do justice.

What do I mean?  Well let me share.  In each city where we worked and learned we encountered people in situations of injustice, quite often systemic injustice that had existed for generations, and was simply a way of life for many.  From the neighborhood in Peoria whose litter strewn sidewalks we patrolled wearing orange vest and carrying garbage bags, to the streets of Memphis which we toured learning of their history of racism concealed by beautiful statues and plaques, to the ghost-town like neighborhoods of New Orleans whose houses bore spray painted icons of deliverance or death from after the hurricane, in each we saw injustice.

Injustice is a way of life for great swathes of humanity, today and throughout all of history.  Injustice is the result of humankind’s greedy nature and selfish attitude toward life and one another.  Injustice is also one of the effects of sin that Jesus battled and taught his followers to fight against.  For true justice can only come from the only source of genuine goodness, God.

Along our journey we kept bumping up against Jesus and his teachings and his actions.  He did not turn a blind eye to the injustices that surrounded him, but rather he faced them squarely so that as he overturned them in people’s earthly lives, they could understand that he wanted to do the same for them in their spiritual lives.

This morning’s scriptures highlight this fact so well.  The gospel story of Jesus’ feeding of the five thousand with five barley loaves and two fish.  You see Jesus was teaching the people about the kingdom of God.  Jesus’ teaching was always aimed at helping people to realize that God loved them.  And that God wanted the best for his children.  But Jesus knew that it’s awfully hard to get people to listen to you when they are sick, or disease ridden, or oppressed, or in this case, hungry.  So he fed them, meeting their physical need, but also showing them an earthly sign of what God’s love can look like in their lives.

He did the same thing a multitude of times.  For instance when he stopped the men from stoning the prostitute, he reminded the accusers of their own sin, and boldly displayed to the woman the reality of God’s love in her own life, a love full of forgiveness and the encouragement to change her life for good.

But the earthly act, or miracle was not the end of his teaching, but rather the means to open the people’s lives to what Jesus wanted for them eternally, life with him in heavenly paradise.  As Jesus said to the people later on in John, “Don’t labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life.”

Donald Miller one of the speakers at that National Gathering one evening shared of a conversation that he overheard in a coffee shop in Portland, Oregon a year after hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans.  Two women were discussing how horrible had been the storm and the government’s tepid and uneven response to the death and destruction it caused.  After a few minutes of shared commiseration over the ineptitude of the help given to the survivors by the various government agencies one of the women said, “You know who’s really helping though?   Those Christians.  They’re doing something to help.”

Donald Miller than said to the youth, “You’ve done what caring requires, what justice requires, and that’s work.  Many people are satisfied with just writing a check and feeling they are doing justice.  It takes more than that, you’ve got to do something.  I’ve come here to thank you for doing something.”

During our journey we realized that we Christians, were the reality of Jesus’ presence in these situations of injustice, bringing if even for a day the reality of Jesus’ love to those in need.  We were told that in New Orleans over a span of three days we were providing 320,000 hours of labor for those still in need.  Each day thousands of pints of blood were given, some of the kids from my own group being the donors.  Hair stylists were on hand so that girls, or boys, could donate their hair, and besides all of the houses worked on out in the devastated neighborhoods, a Habitat house was built right in the convention center by our Lutheran youth.

Maybe the effect of the justice work done in New Orleans can best be summed up in the words of a New Orleans resident named Danielle, who said of the Lutheran volunteers, “Ya’ll make me want to join your church.”

Justice can only happen by living out the calling that Jesus puts in our hearts and on our lives.  He does not call us to believe and then hide out at home.  No.  Jesus calls us to action, to justice where we live and sometimes to journey to where other’s live.  For when we truly seek to live out God’s love, to shine Jesus’ grace into the lives of our neighbors we cannot but help to live out God’s justice in the world.

How are you going to live out Jesus’ justice in your life?  Are you going to feed someone, like Jesus?  Are you going to assist the neighbor who can’t do for themselves?  Maybe you’ll reach out in friendship across some societal “do not cross” line, like race, economic status, or religion?  Maybe you’ll simply refrain from telling a demeaning joke and say something positive about your earthly neighbor?  Whatever we might think of, each day we have to awake and ask ourselves.  How are you going to live out Jesus’ justice in your life?  You, each of you, need to be asking this question.

It is a question that needs to be asked each morning and answered each day.  But it can only be answered with the help, by the strength and in the love of Jesus.  Jesus will show you the way.

Amen.

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