Last Sunday after Pentecost-Christ the King year A

The Rev. Melanie Dickson Lemburg Last Sunday after Pentecost-Christ the King Year A November 26, 2023 A number of years ago, I attended a conference that was put on by TENS—The Episcopal Network for Stewardship. The speaker talked about how our understanding of generosity is deeply connected with our first memories of money and this, in turn is deeply connected with our understanding of who God is. The speaker asked us to recall our first memory of money, to reflect on what it taught us about generosity and how it impacted our understanding of who God is and to share that in our small group setting. My first memory of money began with my paternal grandfather, who also happened to be a Methodist minister. Pop was a growly, gruff, manly-man who was known to be a successful boxer in his youth. My brothers and boy cousins were all slightly terrified of him as he would often growl at them, “Boy, I’m gonna bite your ankles.” And they never really knew if he was serious or not. But I was the first granddaughter, and so I knew him differently. And one day when I was staying with my grandparents, Pop took me in his car to the bank where he opened a savings account in his and my names. (I still have the little bank book that they gave us where we wrote our deposits.) And over a period of time, Pop would save up the quarters that he emptied from his pockets every night; we’d deposit them in our bank account; and after we had saved enough money, we made a withdrawal to buy me a used piano that we could have in our home that I could practice on while I was taking piano lessons. As an adult revisiting this memory, I was struck by the fact that I didn’t have to do much of anything to participate in my grandfather’s generous act of saving up his quarters. I didn’t contribute anything except by riding with him in the car to the bank, and yet, I felt like I was a full-participant in the endeavor of saving quarters to get my piano. This memory gives me a tiny glimpse into what my relationship with God is like. How all I really have to do is (barely) show up, and God invites me to be a full participant in God’s generosity. Today is the last Sunday of the church year, the last Sunday after Pentecost, also known as Christ the King Sunday. It’s also the first Sunday of our church’s annual giving campaign which is titled Generations of Generosity. Eleanor Foster, the senior warden and I, chose this campaign because it is a way to tell the stories of those who have come before us, in our lives of faith and in the life of this congregation, as we approach the conclusion of our centennial year-long celebration. Each week for the next three Sundays, you will be invited to contemplate questions to help you reflect on the generations who have helped nourish and shape your faith, on what it means to live lives of generosity, and to tell those stories as a part of our common life. This will culminate on December 17 with a storytelling event, where we will share a video of many of you sharing your stories about how you have been nurtured by this faith community and your hopes for its present and future. In our gospel reading for today, we have the third in a series of three parables that Matthew’s gospel gives us in Jesus’s final hours. The first parable which we read two weeks ago is the parable of the wise and foolish bridesmaids in which Jesus is inviting us to live a mindful, joyful life. Last week, we had the parable of the three slaves who were given talents by their master and is an invitation by Jesus for us to live a daring, fruitful life. And then this week, we get Jesus’ last public teaching in Matthew’s gospel, the parable of the last judgement, in which Jesus invites us to live a generous, compassionate life. It’s tempting to read this parable as Jesus showing us that we can earn our place in heaven, or that our place in God’s kingdom is a reward for righteous behavior. But notice that the Son of Man says to the sheep, “Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world…” which shows that those who live lives of compassionate generosity are invited to join in the creative work that God has already done, as a free gift from God, an invitation to participate in God’s creative work and in God’s generosity; that when we practice our own compassionate generosity in our dealings with our fellow humans, then we are already active participants in God’s kingdom of eternal life, even here and now. i. Your invitation this week is to consider our questions for small group discussion: What is your first memory of money and how is that connected to your understanding of God? What important lessons have your learned from the members or events of a previous generation at St. Thomas? How has the influence of past generations affected how we have evolved as a congregation? Is the vision for how we live together as the body of Christ changing? In what ways? What stories does our church have that we should preserve and share? What is your vision of this church for future generations? i. https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2020/11/16/the-least-of-these-salts-lectionary-commentary-for-reign-of-christ-the-king-sunday