Summer Picnic

Every year in September, one of my favorite days of the year was decoration day. We would all pile in the car and head out to Ole Bethel United Methodist to put flowers on my grandparents graves and worship. Afterwards came one of my favorite parts: one giant potluck which was spread out like a giant picnic table. I am convinced that potlucks are like the epitome of the southern welcome mat. There is something for everyone on the potluck table and everyone brings something wonderful and different. My plate looked like a beautiful food mosaic.

Mom was always introducing me to people and telling me how I was related to them. Soon I began pointing at everyone and asking “and how am I related to them? In a sea of family- who did I actually belong to? Who is my neighbor?

Finally after asking about each person we came across mom finally gestured her hands in a big sweeping wave and said “Oh Hannah, you’re related to all of them in one way or another.”

Who is my neighbor?

It seems like a simple enough question, but it can be dangerous if you want to actually live into its answer.

The gospel of Luke tells us a legal expert asked Jesus this question. He had already asked what was required of him to inherit eternal life. Jesus responded to his question by making him answer his own- “what is written in the law?” The expert answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus then said, “do this, and you will live.” Not just know it or talk about it but actually do it.

But then the legal expert, wanting to vindicate himself, goes on to asks “who is my neighbor?”

Let us not pass by too quickly over the phrase “he wanted to justify himself.” Jay Pathak says “the man wanted to define this word neighbor in such a way that he could not be found blameworthy. If his neighbor was someone he could choose, then he’d be okay. By asking Jesus to define the word neighbor, this man was looking for a loophole.” Don’t we do the same? Not everyone has to be considered by neighbor right?

Jesus wasn’t telling a fairy tale when he answered “who is my neighbor?” Normally, if we don’t really consider someone our neighbor, we don’t go out of our way for them. We certainly don’t take them to the hospital and pay their medical bills. But this story is meant to be more than an impossible ideal. It has to be more than “metaphoric love for a metaphoric neighbor.”

I want to invite you to pull out the insert in your bulletin with blank houses on it. Over the next few minutes, we are going to consider how well we know our neighbors.

The center house is where you live. The houses around you represent your eight closest neighbors. It doesn’t matter what shape your neighborhood is. It can be a close apartment complex or your nearest neighbor might be a few miles down the road. The concept is the same. Take a moment to imagine your neighbors and beside the letter a in each box, write the names of the people who live their. Maybe you only know their first names. That’s ok. Just see what you come up with.

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Next, by letter b in each box, write down some relevant information about them, some data or facts you can’t see just by standing in their driveway. Information you may have gathered by knowing them or speaking to them such as- grew up in Idaho, plays golf, is a lawyer, is from southern India, had an Uncle who harvested maple syrup. Has a pet iguana. Surface details.

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Lastly, by letter c, I invite you to write down some in-depth information you would only know because you have connected with your neighbors. This isn’t what you know because you heard it through the neighborhood gossip grapevine. Stuff like career plans, dreams, what they most fear, what they are passionate about, what their spiritual beliefs and practices are.

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So, how did you do? This exercise is from the book The Art of Neighboring and they claim only about 10% of people can fill out the names of all eight of their neighbors.

Only 3 % can fill out line b for every home.

Less than 1% can fill out line c for every home.

How many of us fall into the less than 1% category for line c? I know I do.

Think about what this means for your relationship with the people who are right around you. On what level do you know them? What might it look like to move beyond the surface?

Carolyn Lacey says “Jesus doesn’t divide the world into neighbors and non-neighbors. ..We sometimes get used to comfortable hospitality or neighborliness. We may like the idea of being part of a church family with messy lives, but we don’t always want to get involved in the mess ourselves. ..God’s hospitality isn’t comfortable and convenient. It is compassionate.”

Hospitality isn’t meant to measure up to our own comfort and convenience before we choose to engage. In fact, in almost every instance of genuine hospitality that I am led into, it is terribly inconvenient. Listening beyond the surface of someone’s life is messy and detailed. Getting involved beyond the surface takes time and intentionality. Making space beyond yourself leads to vulnerability. Sometimes it is downright uncomfortable. But there is holiness in our discomfort. The Spirit moves in our discomfort to mold us into Christlikeness. Jay Pathak describes how he and his wife had led a small group in their home. One day, after a super long day, he didn’t feel like leading the group. She suggested they just gather at the house and have dinner instead. He came home not only to his small group, but a whole bunch of ...strangers.… as well. Playing his guitar. Eating his food. Sitting on his couch. She had invited a bunch of the neighbors as well. As he looked around the room, he realized he needed to adjust his thinking to accommodate his neighbors. He realized he needed to reorient his heart and make room for what God might be doing in that moment rather than be annoyed and find an excuse to call it a night.

One of the key Greek words for hospitality, philoxenia, means love of stranger. Hospitality is meant to be lived out. As we do this, David Kirk says “hospitality becomes for the Christian community a way of being the sacrament of God’s love for the world.” Think about those people in your life who have been God’s love to you through their hospitality. People that were neighbors to you.

I have shared with you before that my mom’s dad died when she was just 10 years old. Her dad had been friends with the neighbor across the street, a man named Ken Kellerman. While some could have sent their thoughts and prayers and moved on, that wasn’t Ken. On the first Christmas after her dad died, she and her sister didn’t ask for anything for Christmas because they knew not to expect anything with just their mom working. Then on Christmas morning, they woke up to find their living room stuffed with toys. Back then, no one locked their doors. Come to find out, Ken had gotten together with his Sunday school class to gather toys and Ken and his wife Lloyce had snuck over to help deliver presents. Ken didn’t always know what to say to mom in the face of her loss, but he knew how to be present. He would sit under the tree in his yard and begin to whistle. He had a beautiful whistle that sounded like a flute and he would sit and whistle hymns. My mom would sit there and hum along, and in that moment, that was all it took. A couple of years after my mom’s dad died, she was 12 and it was time for the gathering of all the girls scouts in the area for a father daughter banquet. My mom didn’t sign up to go because she didn’t have a dad to take her. Ken Kellerman showed up in his suit and took my mom so she would have someone to stand in for her father. When my mom’s mother got sick, Ken organized with other men in the church to create a schedule where every Saturday afternoon they came and delivered groceries to her house. After my mom’s mother died when she was 16 and she began dating, Ken would come over and stay at the house to see her off and wait until she got home so she wouldn’t have to come back to an empty house. Years later when my mom got married, Ken called her and told her he was shining his shoes so he could stand in for the father daughter dance with her again. Years later, Ken shined his shoes again when when both my sister and I got married, twirling us around for the grandfather dance.

What beautiful relationships might happen if we are only willing to cross the ditch, cross the road, cross our differences, cross our judgments and hatred, cross the space between us to offer hospitality, the sacrament of God’s holy love.

What beautiful relationships might happen if we begin to gather:

Around the picnic table.

Across the street.

Because all are neighbors.

Because in Christ, we all belong to each other one way or another.