Sermon Recording:

Sermon Text: 

It’s good to see all of you, and to see some of my local family and friends here at St. Martin’s, which is in so many ways my spiritual home.

This summer I have been working as a chaplain intern providing spiritual care to a rotation of patients at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield. When I visit patients, I mostly listen to them, and sometimes I pray with or for them. I meet with people of many faiths and none, at all stages of diverse spiritual journeys. My job is to serve and comfort them, and this much I was expecting when I signed up for the summer program, but there are some things for which I was not fully prepared.

During my time at Baystate I have been tending to the highest acuity floors in the hospital, working with patients who face serious pulmonary or cardiac disease. A few weeks ago I had a patient–we will call him Greg, suffering from heart failure, among other things. Greg is approaching fifty years of age–five zero–which is extremely young for a patient on any of my assigned units.

During my initial visit with Greg, I found him sitting up in the lounge chair in his room. This was a little surprising because most of my patients are lying down, and a fair number are intubated and catheterized. But Greg patient was sitting up, speaking freely, and watching sports on television. I greeted him and the nurse in the room and introduced myself as usual. Greg shared about his family, his partner and children, and he told me about his faith. He doesn’t go to church anymore, but he believes in God and the power of prayer. I prayed for him, I felt good, I felt hopeful for Greg.

Our next visit was different. I walked into Greg’s room and found him lying in bed, now intubated, and there was a team of nurses tending to him, not just one. Before I could stop myself, I blurted out, “What happened?”

The nurses were unfazed. One said, “Eh, he’ll be fine.”

I learned that Greg had just received an LVAD, a Left Ventricular Assist Device. Again at fifty years of age, the left ventricle of his heart had been replaced by a mechanical pump that runs on a battery. I did not know that was possible. I went to Greg’s bedside and looked down at his face, and it was the first time all summer that I felt fear.

To break up the gloom, I said, “Greg, blink twice if you want me to bust you out of here!” The nurses laughed, and of course the patient blinked twice. But then I saw a tear roll down his face, and I asked if he would like to pray again. He nodded with his hand, since he could barely move his head, and we prayed.

When I looked up from our prayer, I saw that Greg was drooling profusely. Intubation is not a neat and tidy experience. At first I went to get a nurse to clean him up, as I had done for other patients before, but the staff was literally running around, doing a million things I barely understood, and it didn’t seem like I should interrupt. I suddenly felt annoyed at the recent layoff of staff members across twenty-two departments, and the constant stretching of nursing teams just about everywhere in the country. I felt angry that this meant my patient’s drool was not a priority, and I thought about how anxious I would feel if I couldn’t help but drool down my face onto my neck. I prayed again, silently, this time asking God what I should do, feeling a little silly and helpless in this unfamiliar situation.

Then the Spirit spoke to me in my heart and said, “You do it.”

This may sound obvious, but every day at the hospital I find myself asking how much I should touch the patients, how much I can help them, and what might be harmful. You can’t blame me for being worried about wiping a patient’s face around the tube that was keeping him alive. But I took a deep breath, and I carefully wiped the drool off my patient’s face with a paper towel, trying my best not to touch any life-preserving measures.

This is going to sound a little crazy but, when I was wiping my patient’s face, I suddenly felt that I was touching the face of Jesus. And I don’t say that to brag. I wish I was more saintly than I really was in that moment, acting out of pure intentions, but I was frustrated at the medical system, and felt a tiny bit of annoyance at the staff, warranted or not. I share this with you, not to fish for kudos, but because I believe the Creator of the Universe offers us unexpected and profound grace like this all the time, to God alone be the glory. Through the fear, frustration, and pain of that moment, Love broke through and God appeared to us. Listen, I have never actively wanted to wipe up someone else’s drool in my entire life! But GOD was revealed on that hospital bed in an act of love that was not my doing, but rather a sacred surprise.

In today’s Gospel, the disciples almost miss their opportunity for a sacred surprise. They follow Jesus to a desolate place where he and they presumably want to be alone. As the persistent crowd appears, following after Jesus, the disciples ask him to send the people away.

Wait just a second. You know the people who follow Jesus; they are sick and poor, they are demoniacs, lepers, and epileptics, they are sex workers and tax collectors, doctors and lawyers, just to name a few of our favorites…and they are all following Jesus! They follow the Great Physician, seeking healing, forgiveness, and nourishment. But his disciples, precisely the people who are supposed to get it–they say no, send them away, we have nothing to offer. We have no food, we have no money, we already gave to charity this month. When will these people get back on their feet, earn a living for themselves, and go back to their own country?

Do you hear it? Jesus hears it. And he answers them, just as he answers all of us today in the Gospel reading. When we bring our problems to him expecting an easy solution he says, “You do it! You give them something to eat.” Stop asking me to send them away, stop praying instead of acting; “you give them something to eat.” You wipe up his drool when there isn’t a nurse with a second to spare. You shelter the homeless, you feed the hungry, you clothe the naked, you visit the incarcerated. You open your arms wide to the refugee, the asylum seeker, and the immigrant. You stop the bombs falling no matter the cost.

St. Teresa of Ávila put it like this: “Christ has no body on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good. Yours are the hands with which he blesses all the world. Christ has no body now on earth but yours!”

I know this is hard because, when I was writing this sermon, I started thinking about my wallet. It’s empty! I don’t have much to give. Most of what I have these days was given to me by you people sitting here. But Jesus wasn’t thinking about our wallets when he told his disciples to feed the crowd. Charity is good, but Jesus did not instruct the disciples to take up a collection of coins. Offerings are good, but Jesus did not pass an offering plate. In our Gospel, Jesus instructs the disciples to simply take what they have, whatever it is, and share it.

And it’s not about the miracle. I believe in miracles, trust me, I love a good miracle, but this miracle story is not about the miracle. Jesus is not walking around Galilee, Judea, and Samaria doing party tricks. This Gospel teaches us more about the lie of scarcity, than about some miraculous abundance of food. The lie of scarcity needs to be corrected. We need to tell ourselves the truth about what we have.

Here’s the truth: we have more than enough. Collectively, globally we have a lot more than five loaves and two fish. Humans throw away enough food every year to end world hunger twice. The problem is not what we have or don’t have, the problem is not our broken system. The system is working exactly as intended–hoard wealth for a few while most suffer, and Jesus Christ will flip that table in time, don’t you get too comfortable. The real problem is that supposedly good, supposedly faithful, supposed Christians, who possess a large share of the wealth in the world, would rather turn to Jesus and pray for him to fix it than do anything about it themselves. Prayer is good, I love prayer, and Jesus is listening. Now hear his answer. Find where your heart breaks for those in need–that is where the Spirit is leading you. Follow that lead and hear Jesus say, “You do it.”