Sermon for the Second Sunday After Epiphany
Sermon Text: John 2:1-11 (NRSV)
Grace, peace, and mercy are yours through the triune God. Amen.
What does it mean to faithfully commemorate the legacy of someone?
I’ve been asking myself that question as we approach the commemoration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the United States. Tomorrow, cities, towns, community groups, schools, and individuals across our nation will come together to commemorate the life and legacy of this well-known civil rights leader. Some will use their commemoration as a way to remember again the story of the civil rights movement in the 60s. Some will participate in this commemoration as a part of planned events at their school or university. Some will spend the day reflecting on the ways in which our country still has work to do regarding the liberation and equity of all our people. Sadly, there will be some that will undoubtedly and mercilessly use their commemoration of this day only to score political points or to rack up points on their social justice score card.
What does it mean to faithfully commemorate the legacy of someone? What does it mean to faithfully commemorate the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr?
There has been a rising sentiment going around that we should not take time to commemorate this day unless we are also able to commit ourselves to working towards the society that Dr. King envisioned. Having heard many empty sermons and having read numerous social media posts, I resonate deeply with this sentiment. In other words, we can honor Dr. King’s name, but only to the extent that we are willing to commit to taking action. Simply recognizing this day as a commemoration of an important historical event in the past, is actually a failure to recognize that the struggle that Rev. King spent his life fighting is still present with us today. It’s a failure to honor his legacy.
So, if commemorating this day requires that we also commit to the work that Dr. King championed, then we need to make sure that we are very clear about what that work was. When people think of Rev. King, they often think only in terms of a few key events. They boil Dr. King’s legacy down to the few major moments of his ministry. They think of the speech in DC known as “I Have a Dream.” They think of the marches from Selma to Montgomery and the demonstrations and boycotts in Birmingham that led to King’s incarceration (and ultimately to the “Letter from Birmingham Jail”). People know Dr. King for his advocacy and nonviolent protests in opposition to rampant racism, Jim Crow segregation, and in support of voting rights. The problem, however, is that most people think the story ends there. It doesn’t.
As Dr. King’s ministry continued over time, his understanding of the issues that plagued Black Americans and all oppressed people in this country progressed. He came to understand that it wasn’t just racism that was a problem in our country. Instead, he came to see that our country’s challenges surrounded three key issues that were all interconnected: racism, militarism, and materialism. Hear King describe this problem in his own words at Riverside Church in 1967:
“I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.”
Martin Luther King Jr.[1]
Racism. Extreme materialism. Militarism. These are the things that formed the core of the problem for King in the latter years of his life. He recognized that while his work was heavily centered in the Jim Crow south, the problems faced there demonstrated a deep resemblance to the challenges of Black Americans who experienced deep poverty and economic exploitation in the north. He had traveled through communities in Chicago and across the north. He had seen the plight and poverty of Black Americans who had been sequestered into the forgotten neighborhoods of our cities.
Speaking of militarism during the time of the war in Vietnam, Dr. King saw that the poor and oppressed people in America would never receive the access to support and economic wealth that they so desperately needed, so long as our society poured millions of dollars into bombs and guns. When it came to materialism, so long as profit was the gold standard in our country, someone would always have to bear its burden. All these things, spoke to a society that was structured in ways that left many people oppressed and exploited. In Dr. King’s thinking it was morally bankrupt. In time, he would come to speak of two different Americas. One America represented a people that had good food and adequate shelter. It was a place where, in Dr. King’s words, “children grow up in the sunlight of opportunity.”[2] In the other America, Dr. King found the “fatigue of despair,” where housing conditions are poor and unfit for living, education inadequate, and low wages that perpetuate poverty.[3] In fact, when Dr. King was in Memphis during the time when he would be murdered, he was there to support the strike of sanitation workers who were fighting for higher wages.
Racism, militarism, and materialism. We may be able to say that we have made some progress on any one of these, but all three still convict us even today.
This is the outlook on society that formed what Dr. King fought for. These things are the sum of the problem in society that Dr. King spoke against. Thus, for us to be faithful in commemorating his legacy, these are the things that should drive us to action as well. These are the things that should drive us to care for the housing crisis in our own backyard, the food insecurity that our neighbors face, the continued racism and xenophobia displayed to many in our society.
But action is difficult. It’s hard work to transition our internal beliefs and values into action because it often means that we must publicly acknowledge in the presence of others what we value. It means we might be challenged. It means that we might have to continue to confront how we ourselves perpetuate the very things we speak out against. It’s hard to express an unpopular opinion among family or friends who might not agree. It can be uncomfortable at times to go stand at the capitol to support voting rights. It might be uncomfortable to advocate at the state capitol in support of equitable housing and unfair housing practices. Action is hard, but it’s what we need to do.
The good news is that, like many of the civil rights leaders who were driven by their faith, we too can rely on our faith to provide strength in doing this work. In our Gospel text for today, we learn some key things about the God we profess faith in. In our church year, we find ourselves in the season after Epiphany. In this season, we learn all about what God reveals to us about God’s very self through various “signs” in the Gospel of John. The word Epiphany in Greek is ἐπιφανεία (Epiphania) and it means to “show up,” to “reveal,” or to “arrive.” In this season, we celebrate that the God made known to us in Jesus Christ has shown up in our world and through hearing stories of the ministry of Jesus we receive the revelation of who God is, what God cares about, and what God hopes for the world. The Gospel of John has many stories, but these stories often come to us in the form of allegory (stories that point to something else). They give us stories of signs that point to the very identity of God.
When we read our Gospel text, it’s easy to get sidetracked and to think that this is just a story about Jesus being the life of the party and blessing wealthy people with more wine. But there’s more here than that! When we read the Gospel of John as a book of signs that point to who Jesus is, we realize that this story is much more significant. The sadness of running out of wine at the wedding celebration can be seen as an allusion to the struggle and pain that we meet in the world. The fact that this story is noted to have taken place at a wedding feast and on the 3rd day eludes to the resurrection of Christ on the third day. Having defeated the powers of death, Christ now comes to offer to us an abundance of grace and mercy. This abundance of grace and mercy just so happens to be represented in this story by the best wine given in abundance. The fact that the kitchen workers are the ones who first recognize this blessing is a sign that this new thing that God is doing, this grace provided in abundance, is most easily recognized by those who struggle and those in our society who lack that very thing.
Thus, this Gospel is not just about a wedding feast that is blessed by Jesus with more wine for the party. This text is speaking allegorically. It’s a representation of the feast of abundance and grace that comes to us in Christ. It’s a feast of grace that as Professor Elisabeth Johnson notes, “is more than sufficient…to give us joy even amid sorrow and struggle.”[4] It’s not a blessing for material wealth and prosperity, but for peace in the troubled waters of life. Through our baptism and through communion we have received this grace and now it becomes a feast for us that provides strength to sustain the work that we are called to do in struggling for the society that God desires and that Dr. King fought for.
I think that we all know, deep down in our bones that God cares for the oppressed. That’s a common theme you hear regularly in our church. I think we know that God cares for those without a home, those who face economic hardship, and those who have been discriminated against. In fact, I’d be surprised to learn that this was the first time you all heard anything like this.
The larger challenge for us, however, is to continue moving from a place of knowledge to a place of action. The Peace with Justice committee of this congregation and all the partners they work with are a great example of how this community is acting in the spirit of Dr. King. They are working to build the “beloved community” that King always talked about. But there’s always more room for others to join in.
To truly honor and commemorate Dr. King, it is up to all of us (including myself) to get more invested in the work that supports creating the society that he advocated for. Don’t just pay lip service to this holiday but become involved! We recognize it may be hard at times, for a multitude of reasons. However, we can recognize in the midst of that struggle that we have a God and a faith tradition that gives to us an abundance of the best wine, the best grace in community together to sustain our work. Every time that we come to this communion table and every time that we remember our baptism, we are strengthened by the abundant feast of grace in community with one another to then be sent out in the world. What you find in this place is a feast of grace, a feast that God desires all people to join in, including you. Like the many civil rights leaders who demonstrated the way for us in the past, we find strength and joy in our faith to fight today for what is right in our world. Like Sandra McCracken notes in their song, “we will feast [here] in the house of Zion.”[5] We feast here and then are sent out in the world with the vocation of working to create the society that God desires, that Dr. King spent his life yearning for. Amen.
Footnotes:
[1] King, Martin Luther, Jr. “Beyond Vietnam: A Time To Break Silence.” Speech, Riverside Church, New York City.
[2] King, Martin Luther, Jr. “The Other America.” Speech, Grosse Pointe High School, Grosse Pointe.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Johnson, Elisabeth. “Commentary on John 2:1-11.” Working Preacher. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/second-sunday-after-epiphany-3/commentary-on-john-21-11-8.
[5] Sandra McCracken. “We Will Feast In The House Of Zion.” In Psalms. 2015, MP3.