Sermon preached by The Rev'd Dr. Susan Kraus

St. Paul’s on the Green, Norwalk, Connecticut

November 22, 2007

In the name of God, whose loving hand has given us life and all our many blessings.

We gather together this morning on Thanksgiving Day, a once a year national holiday and national “feast day.” In many ways this is a special day, a day when families and friends make extra effort to be together to enjoy an abundance of food and fellowship and, we hope, to give thanks to God for God’s abundant blessings. But for those of us gathered this morning at St. Paul’s, “thanksgiving day” is every day we come together to share the holy meal offered to us at God’s table. We come together in this place for “liturgy,” which means “the work of the people,” and our primary work is “eucharist,” or “giving thanks.” The words of every version of the Holy Eucharist are filled with thanks to God. Listen for all the words of thanksgiving as you participate in this morning’s service and other services of Holy Communion.

The act of giving thanks to God – if it is more than just saying words – is very powerful spiritually. When we make a habit of thanking God for our blessings, we change. We see ourselves differently, in relation to God, to ourselves, and to our neighbors, near and far.

Imagine with me how a day might begin if we thanked God for all our blessings. We would wake up and thank God for seeing another day. We would thank God for the bed we have slept in and the shelter of our home, for clean water and soap to bathe with and for indoor plumbing, for clothing to put on, for the people we live with, the pets we love, the plants we care for and enjoy. We might thank God for being taught to read the newspaper or book we will peruse at breakfast. We might thank God for the vitamins and medicines we will take with our meal, for the people who discovered and manufactured and prescribed them. We would thank God not only for the food we are about to eat, but also for the people who grew the food and who brought it to the store where we purchased it. We would thank God for the amazing bodies we have been given, so complex and wonderful. Obviously, I could go on and on. Our lives could literally be filled with thanksgiving to God.

What might happen if they were? I want to mention two things relevant to today’s scripture. The first is worry. In this familiar passage from the gospel of Matthew, Jesus focuses on worry. Using both convincing arguments (“can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?”) and beautiful images (“Consider the lilies of the field”), Jesus tells us not to worry. Good advice, but how do we follow it? I’m sure you’ve all been in difficult situations and had people say to you, “Don’t worry!” I know I’ve heard that myself, and I’ve given people the same advice. The problem is that it is very hard to stop worrying if that’s all you try to do. Worry must be replaced by something else. Thanksgiving may be the very thing to replace worry. If we focus on the gifts and blessings we have already received and are receiving now, our trust and faith in God’s provision for us may grow and crowd out our worry that God will not provide for our future needs. Jesus tells us to “strive first for the kingdom of God,” and I believe that giving thanks to God is and always will be at the heart of our life in the kingdom of God.

Another consequence of giving thanks to God for the blessings we enjoy is the recognition that others are not so abundantly blessed, and our compassion grows for those who lack the basic necessities of life – food, shelter, safety, health care. The more our hearts are filled with compassion, the more we will act to relieve the suffering of our sisters and brothers. This morning’s passage from the Epistle of James exhorts us to “be doers of the word, and not merely hearers,” and we are promised that “doers who act … will be blessed in their doing.”

Last Sunday Father Lang spoke about holiday traditions, ones we should keep and ones we might let die that God might create something new. The only holiday tradition that my husband and I have observed every year without fail is that he reads aloud Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.” He has read this story to me 36 times, and I look forward to hearing it soon for the 37th. It is a tradition we will keep, not only because we enjoy good stories, but also because this book contains a wealth of spiritual wisdom.

You are probably all familiar with the basic outline of the tale, from movies if not from the book. The miser Ebenezer Scrooge whose personality is transformed by the visits of three spirits – the Ghost of Christmas Past, the Ghost of Christmas Present and the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. The book begins with the visit of another ghost, the ghost of Jacob Marley, Scrooge’s business partner and fellow miser, seven years dead. Marley has arranged this night of ghostly visitations so that Scrooge might have the chance to repent and avoid Marley’s fate.

Dickens’ vision of the fate of those who had lived for their own gain and ignored the needs of others is fascinating. They wander ceaselessly in the air above the streets and places where people live, moaning and wailing as they see human beings in need. Scrooge is given the sight to see these tormented spirits, including “one old ghost in a white waistcoat, with a monstrous iron safe attached to its ankle, who cried piteously at being unable to assist a wretched woman with an infant, whom it saw below on a doorstep. The misery with them all was clearly, that they sought to interfere, for good, in human matters, and had lost the power for ever” (page 33).

Now this is just a story, one man’s imagination. It is not the gospel. But I think it is an image in keeping with the gospel message and specifically with the exhortations in the epistle of James. We who have been blessed to hear the word are called to act. As the epistle has it, “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress.” We may understand “orphans and widows” to mean all who are in dire need of help from others.

This Christmas season there are many ways for the people of St. Paul’s to be doers of the word. Father Lang has talked and written about parish support for The Women’s Crisis Center in Norwalk, a safe haven for women and children who are victims of domestic violence, and a place in great need of help. We may buy gifts for residents of Gilead House who suffer from psychiatric disorders or for those with HIV/AIDS who live in McKinney Residence. We may give generously to the food pantry collection. And we can give of our time, talent and treasure to this church.

Last Sunday Nancy Esposito spoke with clear conviction about her commitment to St. Paul’s. She reminded us that we “don’t just come to St. Paul’s, we are St. Paul’s.” That is very true. And following Nancy’s good example, may I remind us that we don’t just come together to receive the body of Christ at God’s holy table. We are the body of Christ. That is our calling, our vocation as followers of Jesus. We are meant to be the body of Christ in the broken world. We are meant to be not hearers only, but doers of the word. We are meant to have hearts full to overflowing with thanksgiving to God and with compassion for God’s creatures. We are meant to be so transformed into the likeness of Christ that we will act to relieve the suffering of our sisters and brothers as God calls us to do. This is our calling, a joy and a blessing forever. Amen.