“The Least of These”
A Sermon Based on Micah 6:6-8 and Matt. 25:31-40
Pastor Deb Troester, STHPC, January 15, 2023
“So God created humans in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” This passage from Genesis 1 lays down the foundation of all our relationships with other people, and ourselves: each person is created in the image of God and is therefore endowed with dignity and value. Being created in God’s image doesn’t mean God has two arms, two legs, ten fingers and ten toes. Rather it means that, like God, we have agency, creativity, and intelligence. We are relational and have the capacity to love, to nurture, to protect. All humans are gifted with these abilities, to one degree or another.
Trappist monk Thomas Merton had a sudden insight into humanity’s creation in the divine image one day as he was running an errand in Louisville, Kentucky, not far from his Bardstown, Kentucky, abbey. He wrote, “At the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district…I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream…There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun…” In that moment of solidarity with the human race, Merton grasped that we are all created in God’s image, and each of us reflects God’s glory. Jesus knew this, too. When he said, “just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me,” he was affirming the truth that all of us are created in God’s image; therefore all of us have value.
The idea that each human being is worthy of respect, each person has value, simply because they are created in the image of God is foreign to our culture’s way of thinking. Ours is an individualistic, competitive society. We judge those with less ability as somehow worth less – the aged, the infirm, children born with disabilities. We admire those who get ahead. We idolize people who achieve fame and fortune - never mind if they had to step on others to climb to the top of the pile. This way of thinking is completely opposite to the Bible’s teachings. God doesn’t care how much money we have. The prophet Micah sets us straight:
“With what shall I come before the Lord
and bow myself before God on high?
Shall I come before him with burnt offerings,
with calves a year old?
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams,
with ten thousands of rivers of oil?
…He has told you, O mortal, what is good,
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice and to love kindness
and to walk humbly with your God?
Our culture is not alone in admiring wealth and judging the value of others by their acquisition of money and possessions, or lack of them. The Bible would not have so many references to caring for the needy if it had not been a problem back in those days, too. The Law of Moses and the Old Testament prophets taught that the poor, the widow, the orphan, strangers in the land – people who had little power or wealth in the culture of their day – should receive special care and consideration. Proverbs 22:9 reads, “Those who are generous are blessed, for they share their bread with the poor,” and Proverbs 29:7: “The righteous know the rights of the poor; the wicked have no such understanding.” Even back then, some were getting rich by exploiting others. Deuteronomy 24 stipulates that the poor should be paid promptly for their labor: “You shall not withhold the wages of poor and needy laborers… You shall pay them their wages daily before sunset, because they are poor and their livelihood depends on them.” For God, each person is worthy of respect. No person is better than another person because of their economic status. God’s commands are clearly stated in Proverbs 31: 8 – 9:
Speak out for those who cannot speak,
for the rights of all the destitute.
Speak out; judge righteously;
defend the rights of the poor and needy.
For those of us in positions of power, this is what God expects: advocating for the voiceless, defending the rights of the poor and powerless, speaking out for what is right; doing justice, loving kindness, walking humbly with our God.
Whether we realize it or not, most of us here today are in positions of power. We may not be elected officials or judges, but we have a voice. We live in a democracy, with the right of free speech and the privilege of advocating for the good of others. We may not be rich by U.S. standards, but we certainly are wealthy by international standards. According to the World Bank, about half of the world’s population lives on less than $5.50 a day, and about 10% of the world’s population live on less than $2 a day. Before I moved to Africa, I wondered how it was possible for anyone to live on that little money. But in Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Tanzania, and other places I traveled, I met people who lived from day to day. We would call them subsistence farmers. They eat what they plant, and raise chickens or goats. They harvest wild fruits and vegetables in season. Maybe they fish a little. They live simply, in homes built with their own hands from local materials, such as mud brick and thatch. As long as no one gets really sick or injured, and the rains come on time, they get by.
Part of what the church is doing in places like that is helping farmers to use more productive agricultural methods, helping parents to build schools for their kids, training teachers and medical workers, helping women develop income-generating projects such as planting cash crops, making soap, or sewing school uniforms, so they can pay school fees for their kids or afford to see a doctor when someone is ill. One of the most useful programs I saw was a local church worker teaching people how to plan for yearly expenses. For example, he suggested setting aside one goat to be sold only in case of medical emergency in the family. Banks in Africa often walk on four legs.
We in the U.S. cannot claim to be powerless to help the poor and needy. We have much more power than we know, especially when we work together, through the Presbyterian Mission Agency’s Compassion, Peace, and Justice programs, which we contribute to through the One Great Hour of Sharing, coming up at Easter; by supporting our mission co-workers; through Bread for the World; through SMUM – Santa Maria Urban Ministry in downtown San Jose. I know most of you are already helping, but I want to make sure you understand how solid a theological and Biblical foundation you are standing on when you reach out to help those in need.
Caring for “the least of these,” is close to God’s heart. Jesus knew that, too. He said to the rich young ruler, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” He told his disciples, “when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.” Following Jesus means helping others. Pastor Jill Duffield, editor of Presbyterian Outlook, writes, “Humility. Kindness. Healing. Feeding. Visiting. Justice. These are the markers of the reign of God. These are the traits we exhibit in the world when we follow Jesus Christ… God is not far off and disinterested in the nations and their inhabitants, but rather active and working for wholeness. Christ not only judges at some far-off culmination of time, but is present in the people we see.”
We are called to see Christ in the faces of those around us: black, white, young, old, gay, straight. Until we begin to see Christ in all those faces, we haven’t begun to see Christ at all. When we reject others, we reject Him. I love this quote from the New Interpreter’s Bible: “Those who exclude others thereby exclude themselves…We are never free to set limits on who may receive God’s grace…How much more might God be able to do with us if we were ready to transcend the…limits of love that we ourselves have erected?” Mother Teresa famously said, “I know I am touching the living body of Christ in the broken bodies of the hungry and the suffering. Each one of them is Jesus in disguise.” Catholic theologian Christopher Dodson reminds us: “Christ is in the face of the person on death row. Christ is in the faces of those in prisons, jails, and immigration detention centers. Christ is in emergency rooms, nursing homes and clinics. Christ suffers in those caught in conflict, war, famine and fear. Christ is in the faces of those trafficked for labor or sex. Christ is in those bullied, sexually harassed and discriminated against. Christ is in the face of those with whom we disagree, our opponents and our enemies. Seeing Christ among us means seeing Christ in those in whom we do not expect to see Him. There are social and political consequences to seeing the image of God, the face of Christ, in each person around us, especially the most marginalized.”
Matthew 25:32 reads, “All the nations will be gathered before him…” In many versions of the Bible this section is titled, “The Judgment of the Nations.” “Nations” in Greek is ἔθνη. We get our word “ethnicity” from it. Mahatma Gandhi said, “The true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members.” By this standard, how do we in the U.S. measure up?
The Good News is that God will help us whenever we try to do God’s will. God does not expect us to be salt and light all by ourselves. God has given us the Holy Spirit, and God has given us each other. Christ’s body, the church, is called to feed the hungry, care for the stranger, visit the sick and imprisoned. No one person can do this all, not even a Mother Teresa.
Nor do we work as those trying to somehow earn salvation; rather it is communion with Christ that we seek in serving those in need. Mother Teresa said, “I serve because I love Jesus.” If we love Jesus, we will want to help him in whatever guise he comes before us. In the parable of the sheep and the goats, both sheep and goats are surprised when Jesus tells them what they have or have not done to serve him. Good works flow freely and unconsciously from a life of faith, from a heart in communion with God, from a heart that sees God’s image in the face of each person we meet. Lord, help us to see your face in the face of others, even where we least expect to see you. Amen.
Copyright (C) Deborah Troester, 2023