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Years ago, I was a high school track parent. My older daughter Amy was a lithe, fast girl. She ran sprints and she ran relay races. Now the thing about being a track parent is that the meets take hours and your kid, the one you want to see, be seen cheering, runs for maybe five or ten minutes. We lived in a small town, so I knew lots of people, many in my congregation, so a track meet was a chance to mingle, check-in with people, maybe talk to one of the Trustees. The problem was that it was so easy to get involved in doing the business of being a pastor that it was easy to miss Amy\u2019s races. 100 yard dashes take place fast. They line up, bend over in the runner crouch, someone calls ready, set go, shoots of a phony gun and BAM! Ten or 15 seconds later the whole thing is over. It\u2019s easy to miss; it\u2019s easy to let every day things distract you. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is just what Jesus is talking about in the section we read today. Honestly?\u2014I\u2019m not sure why this set of verses was put together for reading; they don\u2019t go together. So let\u2019s take them apart and see how they can each feed us. The section begins with the startling statement, \u201c”Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.\u201d This verse really goes with what we read last week. Remember the parable of the rich fool who thought he could store up enough stuff to maintain his life? Instead of storing stuff, Jesus says God is giving us the whole kingdom. No bill: no payment, free gift, free grace. This verse and others like it led theologians like John Calvin, the originator of Reformed Churches, to talk about \u2018violent grace\u2019, by which they meant that God gives the grace of including us in the kingdom without our doing anything to earn it, whether we want it or not. This is freedom: freedom now, freedom to live in God\u2019s kingdom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If the kingdom is given as grace, what do we do then? We don\u2019t have to work at earning it; we don\u2019t need barns to store up grace. So Jesus tells this parable. Palestinian houses weren\u2019t like ours, they were little fortresses. Frequently several families lived in one house. Think of those old U shaped motels our parents took us to when we were kids: a bunch of rooms, surrounding a central courtyard. The houses were walled because robbers were a constant threat. So at night, the main gate into the courtyard was shut up. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now imagine the head of the house coming home late at night; Jesus says, coming from a wedding banquet. Wedding banquets could and did run for days at a time, so there\u2019s no way of knowing when the head of the house will return. What\u2019s the job of the servants? Their whole job is to be ready, whenever that return happens. “Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit\u201d, the parable says. Don\u2019t be asleep, don\u2019t be busy with something else, or you\u2019ll miss it.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What happens when you are ready and open the door to the Lord? \u201cBlessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes; truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them.\u201d Wow! It\u2019s a total reversal of things. Masters never serve slaves; what Jesus pictures is a total reversal of what we would expect that comes from being ready to serve. From the prophets to Jesus, the image of a banquet at which all are welcome is a fundamental picture of God\u2019s kingdom. Here, the kingdom is recognized by being ready to serve, so the moment isn\u2019t missed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
What does this look like in practice? It might mean something small, like passing by the school supplies aisle and remembering we\u2019re collecting such things this month. It might be saving someone\u2019s life. The village of La Chambon in southeastern France is just a small place. Most of the people worship in the same Reformed tradition we do here. Instead of German Reformed, they are French Reformed, called Huguenots. Hundreds of years ago, they were persecuted by Roman Catholics and the Kings of France, and they haven\u2019t forgotten. In 1940, when the Nazis defeated France, La Chambon was left in the unoccupied zone. But even there Jews were persecuted. Pastor Andr\u00e9 Trocm\u00e9 and his congregation offered shelter to these refugees. Many were not French; no one cared. They put them up in private homes, in schools, in their church. They forged identity cards and ration cards for them; some of them were guided across the Swiss border to safety. From 1940 to 1944, they sheltered 5,000 people; 3,500 of them were Jews. A majority of them were children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There was a cost. On February 13, 1943, Pastor Trocm\u00e9 and his assistant were arrested and interned. They were eventually released but had to go into hiding. His cousin, Daniel Trocm\u00e9 was arrested in 1943 and sent to Auschwitz, whether he was murdered. Others who helped were shot by the Gestapo. In recent years, they have been recognized by France and by Israel, where they were honored by being included in a list of rescuers called the \u201cRighteous of the Nations.\u201d After talking with many residents, a filmmaker was so impressed with how they saw what they did as ordinary, that he said, <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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