MUSTARD SEEDS OF JUSTICE
Rev. Dr. Joyce Antila Phipps
Texts: Amos 5: 14-24; Luke 17: 5-10
This past week the President hosted a White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health. It was the first such conference addressing these important issues since Richard Nixon hosted a similar conference in 1969. Around 500 attended the event personally and another 1,000 virtually all over the Nation looking for solutions to hunger in America.
As Biden succinctly put it, “If you look at your child, and you can’t feed your child, what the hell else matters?”
In the wake of the pandemic, in addition to the end of certain benefit programs, such as the child tax credit and certain school nutrition programs, we here in America are also facing supply shortages due in part to a shrinking work force and in part to the increase in the price of gas due to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
We are no longer a “Fortress America,” so described by those who opposed America’s involvement in European problems during the 1930s. Like it or not, we are part of one world, and what happens abroad affects us, just as what happens here at home affects the rest of the world. Our ball in space cannot be torn apart or it will not survive.
Listening to a radio discussion about the conference, I noted how many people used euphemisms for the serious issues that confront us as a Nation. The one for hunger is “food insecurity.” I have to admit when I first heard the term, I was taken aback. But it seems to cover a broader range of problems than just raw hunger.
It measures the availability of food and a person’s ability to access it. Sounds more like money insecurity to me, but although the lack of money is a large part of the problem, it’s not the totality of it. Food insecurity also is caused by other problems we face in our society, such as affordable housing, social isolation, location, and chronic health issues.
Note that the White House Conference was not just about getting food on the table but also the right kind of food. As you can imagine, every food industry group and farm subsidy group wanted to add its two-cents worth and then some.
There’s an American Frozen Food Institute pushing for the inclusion of frozen foods, of course, but if we look carefully at a frozen food package, some contain more than just the corn or peas in the photograph. Labelling has become an issue, some would say a justice issue because the picture may not reflect what is really inside.
As the King of Siam said, “It’s a puzzlement.”
In the short statement Luke’s Jesus says, “If you had the faith as the grain of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea, and it would obey you.” The mustard seed is one of the smallest seeds around. Planted and properly cared for, it can yield a large bush.
Having the kind of faith Jesus talks about here is not just sitting still and contemplating. It is the kind of faith that moves us to get up and work to change the world around us. It’s the kind of faith that we actually grow into by living faithfully.
Living faithfully means breaking down our traditional boundaries, becoming a truly inclusive community. Usually that phrase is applied to speaking about same-sex relationships, but it’s much more than that. It means reaching out to the marginalized just as Jesus reached out to the marginalized of his time.
Jesus reached out to the pariahs of his time, the lepers, and shared not just his healing power but his heart with them. Breaking down our boundaries of fear to let the mustard seeds of justice grow does not mean removing what we consider the causes of our fear from our society. It really means changing our attitudes towards others and taking positive action to broaden society’s acceptance of people we consider different than us.
If we look at the prophetic tradition in Hebrew Scripture we claim for our own, we will see that Amos was not the only one to point out the difference between what so-called “good people” do in their churches, synagogues, or other religious organizations and their behavior towards others. “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” was one of Martin Luther King’s favorite verses as well as that of a former pastor, John Bates.
But justice will not roll down unless we open the floodgates and let the stream flow. We cannot let groups that preach hate and fear based on Scripture to hold us hostage. We need to speak out as people of faith. The Gospel demands nothing less.
Historically, people have been categorized and stigmatized based on perverted readings of Scripture by the radical right cherry pickers. As people of faith, we bear some of the responsibility for this. If we keep our distance from the so-called nasty world of politics, others will step into the vacuum created by our absence.
One week before it may be the issue of homelessness; another week it is the suicide of young people stigmatized as other than normal. Charity alone does not help homelessness, just as being an ONA/WNA church alone does not address the question of societal attitudes towards homosexuality.
We need to examine how attitudes that marginalize people, whether they need food, help with the rent, or mental health services develop. We need to change our own attitudes toward people who are marginalized. Only then will the mustard seeds we plant become trees of justice and God’s righteousness for all.
Let us pray: Holy One of welcome, open our minds, our hearts, and our senses so we can bring the hope of real change to the world around. Help us to overcome our own fear of involvement and distaste of confrontation with others to have justice roll down like waters so your righteousness is indeed an ever-flowing stream. In the name of the one who welcomed all, even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.