This post comes from ELCA World Hunger’s weekly email list, “Sermon Starters.” For this week, Rev. Angela Khabeb of Holy Trinity Church in Minneapolis, shares with us her reflections on forgiveness and how we are called to make this gift more than an act, but a lifestyle as followers in Christ.

If you’d like to receive posts like these ahead of the liturgical calendar, please subscribe to ELCA World Hunger Sermon Starters by clicking on the link, or email us at hunger@elca.org.

Here is a recent review of the resource from Vernita Kennan of the Saint Paul Area Synod:

“I receive the ELCA World Hunger Sermon Starters each week from the ELCA and find it is a helpful way for me to look ahead and “preach my own sermon” in preparation of what I will hear next Sunday at my home church, Incarnation Lutheran…You needn’t be a rostered person in the ELCA to find them inspirational.”

February 24, 2019 – Seventh Sunday after Epiphany

Luke 6:27-38

We continue this week with the Sermon on the Plain. We hear Jesus proclaiming a new way. “Turn the other cheek, go the second mile, love your enemies.” Unfortunately, this passage has been misused in some religious circles.

Please allow me this commercial break…

If someone is in an abusive situation, they are not required to stay and risk their life and/or the lives of their children. There are times when it is best to forgive from a distance. We can continue to love the person but if the relationship is physically, verbally, emotionally, or economically abusive, the most loving and faith-filled response we can have is to practice self-care. When we try to enforce forgiveness like it is a law and not an act of God’s love and grace, all of humanity is in jeopardy.

We’ve heard these passages many times before. But for the original hearers, these words were earth-shattering. Jesus’ words were radical. More to the point, his life was radical. After all, Jesus constantly challenged the status quo. He repeatedly broadened the center so that those on the margins of society would be included.  He challenged the religious leaders of the day and caused so much political upheaval that he received the death penalty.

Jesus was revolutionary in ways that people never expected. Even today, Jesus enters our lives in unexpected ways and I love it. After all, Christianity should not be comfortable for us. The Gospel should not be like our favorite pair of jeans or a pair of old shoes or a worn-out sweater that we drag out this time of year. Certainly, we find comfort in God’s word. But we don’t need to have a hold on the Gospel because Jesus does not belong to us. Rather, the Gospel needs to have a hold on us because we belong to Jesus. Otherwise we are just nominal Christians playing church. We create our own brand of Jesus that suits our needs and pets our egos. We manipulate Jesus into whatever makes us feel safe, or superior, or righteous. So, what is the earth-shattering news we need to hear?

You see, the life changing power of the Gospel message has the greatest impact on our lives when it is destabilizing. Whenever we are challenged to redefine or examine who we understand Jesus to be, we grow. Whenever we challenge what it means to be a Christian in our world today, we grow.

In the Sermon on the Plain, Jesus is encouraging his followers to abandon business as usual. Through his sermon, Jesus turns the accepted societal norms inside-out. This is Good News because even when we dishonor God by our actions or inactions, God still seeks after us. Now, for the life of me I cannot figure out why. But Jesus chooses to use us as the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Jesus chooses us even though we are broken, selfish, and woefully imperfect. Jesus chooses us to broaden the center in our own communities so that all God’s people have a seat at the table. Jesus uses us to increase God’s healing and hope in the world. Is this the earth-shattering news for us?

Genesis 45:3-11, 15

It’s hard to ignore the theme of forgiveness in this week’s lessons—and believe me, I tried. Yes, the story of Joseph is a powerful illustration of love and forgiveness overcoming hatred and bitterness. But even as I encounter this undeniable witness to the hidden hand of God, I find myself distracted by many questions.

Firstly, what does true forgiveness look like for us? What happens to trust? Is it wise for me to trust this person again if they had deliberately betrayed me? What if the best I can do is just be cordial to them? Isn’t that enough? Isn’t it enough for me to simply not hate the sight of them? Let’s face it, forgiveness is hard. There’s no “forgiveness switch” on our hearts that we can simply click on or off when we need more or less of it. I’ve been wondering if forgiveness is like love. You know, when you give away love it multiplies and comes back to you.

Sometimes it seems, in our country, we are more concerned with punishment than we are with peace. We seem more concerned with revenge than reconciliation. We find it easier to fight than to forgive. No wonder some of us find it difficult to accept God’s extravagant gift of love. Even when we are receptive to God’s mercy and forgiveness, we may yet be reluctant to give mercy and forgiveness to others. Maybe we feel that we are giving away our power when we forgive. Maybe we are simply afraid of being hurt again and use our grudges to keep us safe. But, at the end of the day, ministry involves risk.

It can feel like a risk to forgive. But what exactly are we risking? Our power, position, politics, morals, self-constructed ideas of who we are and how others should perceive us seem to be potential risk-factors to forgiveness. But on the other side of forgiveness, on the other side of the tension and resistance we often experience when confronted with someone who has “wronged” us, we find relationship. We find a leveling and sharing of power, we find mutual respect and dignity, and we find the Holy ground that lives between us all. If hunger and poverty are symptoms of deeply broken relationships around the world, forgiveness could be our first-step on the path to living lives of abundance and sharing.

Forgiveness is not necessarily an event, but rather a lifestyle. God doesn’t expect us to forgive perfectly every time. But God is encouraging us to live our lives with forgiveness as our North Star. In doing so, we honor God and we help heal the body of Christ. C.S. Lewis illustrates forgiveness as part of our baptismal identity as Christians:

“To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.”

This is both gift and challenge.

To be clear, forgiveness cannot erase pain or eliminate the need for justice. But forgiveness is God’s gift to us. The Holy Spirit empowers us to share that gift with others. Fortunately, forgiveness, like most things, gets easier with practice. The more we remain open to the Spirit, the more able we are to forgive. Forgiveness can be extremely difficult, but it is possible. In fact, God makes all things possible for us. This is good news.

Children Sermon

Forgiveness seems to be an overarching theme in this week’s lessons. Forgiveness is an important concept that might be difficult for children to grasp. We learn to say we’re sorry but that does not always lead to forgiveness. Have you ever heard a child offer an angry “sorry!” because her mother told her she had to apologize?  It happens with my kids on occasion.

So, it might be a good idea to ask the children to help you describe forgiveness. This way you can gauge the understanding of the group. Invite the children to share examples of times when they needed to receive forgiveness or times when they needed to forgive someone (be prepared to share your own examples if need be).

For an object lesson, bring two items–something rather heavy and something rather light. A brick and a feather would work well and pretty easy to get. Grudges are heavy like this brick (or rock or concrete paver–probably less than $1 at your local hardware store). Forgiveness is light like this feather (or cotton ball or stuffing from a pillow). You could get a sturdy backpack and put several heavy objects in it and invite a child or two to try and carry it. Ask who would rather carry the heavy bag or the cotton ball all day.

Remind them of the words about forgiveness in the Lord’s Prayer. Say it out loud, “Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.” Encourage the children (and adults) to listen for those words later in worship. Remind them that Jesus helps us forgive and forgiveness brings joy.

The guests sit back, satisfied. The plates are scraped clean. The utensils are carefully stowed for the next meal. Where do we go from here?

In the first session of this study, Babette’s guests had finished their sumptuous, if strange, feast, praising the talents of their hostess, if not the exact recipes she brought to life. The eponymous meal was not the end of the story, however. Thirty-year-old spoiler alert: At the end of the film, Babette informs the two sisters for whom she works that she has spent all her newfound wealth on the meal and so, rather than returning to France, will be staying on as their live-in servant. Almost as important as the climax of the meal is the denouement of Babette’s decision to remain in their service. The feast is not a farewell dinner but rather a celebration of transition — from the servitude she was forced into by circumstance to the loving service she continues by choice.

In the second session of this study, Martin Luther extolled the virtues of Abraham, whose radical hospitality created an opening — both literal and figurative — for Abraham and Sarah to hear the promise of God in their humble tent. It was a model of hospitality Luther commended to the church, that it might be a place of refuge for all who are vulnerable, for all the strangers-maybe-angels in our midst. The people of God are called to be church for the sake of the world — and this starts with the concern for the well-being of others that gives rise to hospitality.

In the third session of this study, Paul admonished Peter for creating tables that were exclusive rather than inclusive. Peter had refused to dine with Gentiles and, in so doing, had decided who was in and who was out based on the law rather than on grace. Paul also held the Corinthians to account for their treatment of people in need, chastising them for mimicking in the church the pattern of relationships already present in the world, where those with earth and power received the places of prestige, and those in poverty had to make do with scraps.

Each of these threads is pulled together in Luther’s teaching on the most important meal in the Christian church, Holy Communion. Calling Holy Communion a “blessed sacrament of love,” Luther writes:

The fruit of the sacrament is nothing other than love. As Christ gave himself for us with his body and blood in order to redeem us from all misery, so we too are to give ourselves with might and main for our neighbor…That is how a Christian acts.

For Luther, Holy Communion draws those at the altar closer to God and closer to one another. To partake of the sacrament authentically, one must remember both dimensions — the presence of grace in the sacrament and the willingness to bear the burdens of the other people at the table. Holy Communion is a means of grace that forms us to be signs of grace to one another.

In Holy Communion, we are reminded of Christ’s sacrifice for us and are invited to give ourselves in like manner to one another. The sacred meal is nourishment for a sacred vocation. In fact, for Luther, the sacrament has no meaning without this: “For the sacrament has no blessing and significance unless love grows daily and so changes a person that he is made one with all others,” he writes. At the table, a community is fed and formed for service in the world. The sacrament’s significance does not end at the table where we eat but extends into the world in which we live — a world we shape by our witness to the hospitality of God, who welcomes all to the table. It is a somber meal of penitent reflection and a celebratory feast of new beginnings.

This season, as we have prepared for the arrival of Christ, it may be easy to see Christmas as the end, the culmination of what has gone before, rather than as the beginning, the inauguration of what is to come. But the coming of Christmas is not merely the end of Advent. It is the start of the life of the church in the world. Freed from sin and death by Jesus Christ, it is the beginning of the servitude we choose — service of the world in gratitude for the grace we have received. It is a celebration of the freedom to join with others at the table and the freedom to concern ourselves wholly with the needs of our neighbors. In Advent, the church is created to be part of the re-creation of the world begun on Christmas.

The “reason for the season” is Christ’s birth, certainly. But it is also the creation of the people of Christ, who are called into the world to “do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8).

The guests sit back, satisfied. The plates are scraped clean. The utensils are carefully stowed for the next meal. Now, the work of Christmas begins.

Questions for reflection:

• What memorable meals in your life have brought you into relationship with other people at the table? How did dining together help you become closer to them?
• How does Holy Communion help nourish you for service of others?
• Where is God inviting you to be in the new year?
• How are you renewed for service of the world by the holiday season?

Prayer

Gracious God,

we give you thanks for the many ways you nourish us — with food, with family, with friends, with faith. In you, we are made new to be instruments of your grace in our world. Recall to us the many places of need in our world — places of injustice and violence, of hunger and poverty. Enrich us with love at the tables you set that we may seek justice, love kindness and walk humbly with you into the future you have promised.

In your holy name,

Amen.

Learn

To download this entire Advent study, click on the cover image below. To other congregational resources from ELCA World Hunger, please visit www.elca.org/Resources/ELCA-World-Hunger.

Give

Gifts to ELCA World Hunger are acts of love toward our neighbors living with hunger and poverty both here and around the world. This Advent, join ELCA World Hunger in working toward a just world where all are fed.

Give now

Connect

Sign up here and receive news, information and the latest resources from ELCA World Hunger.

Are you daydreaming about summer as much as we are? Around the country, ELCA congregations are already making plans for next year’s Vacation Bible School, and ELCA World Hunger is thrilled to invite you to explore our new VBS curriculum for 2019, “Who is My Neighbor?” This curriculum is a free resource that is now available to order and download!

“Who is My Neighbor?” invites children and youth to re-imagine what it means to be neighbors in Christ. Based on the Good Samaritan story, this full, five-day program contains skits, games, crafts, snacks and intentional activities for children to enjoy and learn how our faith calls us out into the world to love and serve our neighbors.

The skits for each day introduce a new character in the Good Samaritan story, starting with the lawyer who asks Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?” Each skit shares an important lesson that directly relates to the theme and theme verse, which groups will practice at the start and end of each day.

Themes for each day:

Day One – God loves us (1 John 4:19)

Day Two – Let your light shine (Isaiah 58:10)

Day Three – No fear (1 John 4:18a)

Day Four – God loves everyone (Acts 10:34b-35)

Day Five – Building God’s neighborhood (Romans 15:2)

Based on your feedback, we’ve made “Who is My Neighbor?” more user-friendly for VBS planning teams by organizing each section by activity categories, rather than by days of the week. Organizing the sections in this way allows everyone on the team to be able to flip to the activities that they are assigned so that all of your leaders can find the materials and directions for their roles in one section. The program is organized in the following sections:

Each day begins with a large group opening, including a skit to introduce the daily theme and a new character within “The Good Samaritan” story. This is followed by “family time” – small group sessions to dig deeper into the theme and bible verse. Then, participants travel through five rotations: crafts, games, snacks, storytelling and a “simulation station” – an interactive and engaging activity to learn more about hunger and how our faith calls us to respond. The stories for each day are based on real stories from projects supported by your gifts to ELCA World Hunger. Not only will children, youth and adults hear about the work this church is doing around the world, but through “Who Is My Neighbor?” they will be part of the response!

Leaders will find schedule templates, theme song suggestions and options for younger (K-2nd grade) and older (3rd grade and above) participants so that you can adapt to the needs of your group! Each lesson is rooted in Lutheran theology, drawing on our church’s strong tradition of theology and practice in the world.

The VBS program is also flexible, so you can adapt it to fit your needs. Already have a VBS for this summer? “Who is My Neighbor?” can also be used for Sunday School, family faith formation, and children’s sermons throughout the year.

How can I get my whole congregation involved?

A month or two prior to your VBS, create your own “Who Is My Neighbor?” campaign! Set a goal for your congregation to meet before the VBS starts and raise funds for your neighbors here in the United States and around the world through ELCA World Hunger.

Look for free posters, certificates and additional pictures accompanying the Storytime section coming soon!

If you have any questions about “Who is My Neighbor?” or ELCA World Hunger’s educational resources, please contact Ryan Cumming, program director of hunger education, at Ryan.Cumming@ELCA.org.

Learn

Click on the image below to download “Who Is My Neighbor?” To see some of ELCA World Hunger’s other congregational resources, including confirmation lessons, interactive immersion experiences, stories and videos, visit www.elca.org/Resources/ELCA-World-Hunger.

Share

We want to hear from you! Share the story of your Vacation Bible School on social media, or email us directly at hunger@elca.org.

Give

Gifts to ELCA World Hunger are acts of love towards our neighbors living with hunger and poverty both here and around the world. Together, we are creatively and courageously working toward a just world where all are fed.

Give now

Advent is a season of anticipation, but this anticipation is not passive waiting. Perhaps a better way to describe it is as a season of preparation — we prepare our hearts and minds for the coming of the Christ-child on Christmas. But more than this, Advent is a time for the church to prepare itself for the reign of God that “broke in” to human history on the first Christmas. It is a time to reflect on the year behind and consider the year ahead — and to evaluate both in light of the question: How well do the ministries of our church anticipate the coming fullness of God’s reign?

At a community meal at Unity Lutheran Church in Milwaukee, guests gather around long tables, sharing in the hot meal volunteers serve from overflowing warming trays. The room is full to bursting with families, couples and individuals. Among them are both neighbors dealing with hunger and homelessness and volunteers and visitors sharing in the evening experience. With the exception of the servers, it is impossible to tell at first glance who among the hundred or more diners is a member of which group. All dine together; every seat is an equal station in the room.

The situation in Paul’s Corinth was very different. The meal Paul writes about in his first letter to the Corinthians is a corruption of this kind of community supper. The early meal he refers to is a first-century version of Holy Communion, at which the church would share not just bread and wine but an entire meal. Historian Helen Rhee writes that this meal was a primary way the church served the community. The sacrament, while ensuring that each church member received the means of grace through the consecrated elements, also ensured that the community received the more mundane nourishment of food, particularly for those who were facing the first-century version of food insecurity.

But that wasn’t the way it was working in Corinth. The early church included both members of wealth and members in poverty, according to Rhee, and in Corinth, it appears that the former received their fill while the latter yet again were left wanting: “One is hungry and another is drunk,” Paul admonishes.

This isn’t the first time Paul has written about eating and drinking in the church. In his letter to the Galatians, by some estimates written in the year before the letter to the Corinthians, Paul recollects his brazen challenge to Peter, the apostle of Antioch: “I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned” (Galatians 2:11). Peter, who used to dine with both Jews and Gentiles, has begun to limit his gustatory activities to more exclusive parties, dining only with Jews. The reason for this, according to Paul, seems to be the presence of a group of Jews (“the circumcision party”) who felt that such intermingling was unbecoming of a Jew like Peter.

Paul disagrees — forcefully. Confronting Peter, Paul charges that his exclusive dining choices are a transgression against the gospel, which teaches that it is Christ alone who justifies and not circumcision. By refusing to eat with uncircumcised Gentiles, Peter is reverting to the belief that it is the law that proves a person worthy of a spot at the table and not the grace of Jesus Christ. And you thought choosing a lunch table in high school was hard!

For Paul, the table is a sign of the reign of God. The community gathered to eat and drink represents the community that will be gathered together in the full reconciliation of God’s coming kingdom. The church, witnessing to the “already-but-not-yet” reign of God, reflects not what is or what has been but what is to come — a banquet to which all will be welcomed and at which all will be filled. Peter’s transgression, like the error of the Corinthians, was to fail to see how the gospel they preached was to shape the life of the church here and now. For Paul, there was no clearer evidence of where the church stood on the gospel than where its members stood on meals.

Paul’s letters — and much of Scripture — invite us to think about the people who join us at our tables. But it would be too narrow a question to ask, who will dine with us this holiday season? For Paul, the dining table was a central symbol of who the church is, but there are so many “tables” at which we choose to sit — or choose not to sit. Our communities are filled with tables — places where we are invited to gather with neighbors, to stand with one another, to advocate for each other and to meet our common challenges together. Will we be like Paul, who envisioned tables as places of grace where all have a place and all are filled? Will we be like Peter, who abandoned the gospel by refusing to dine with unclean Gentiles? Will we be like the Corinthians, whose corrupted table perpetuated hunger?

The tables the church participates in reflect our beliefs about who the church is called to be and the transformation of the world God is enacting in our midst. As we look back on the year past and look ahead to the year to come, we are invited to reflect on the tables at which we sat — and the invitations awaiting us. Where is God inviting the church to be? Who is God inviting the church to be?

Questions for reflection:

• Read Galatians 2:11-21 and 1 Corinthians 11:17-34. What problems did Paul see with Peter’s practices in Antioch and the Corinthians’ practices in their community?
• Where have we been invited to be present with neighbors in our community? How have we responded?
• Where is God calling your congregation to be in the next year?

Prayer

Loving God,

you sent your Son to invite the world to the heavenly banquet, from which no one will go away hungry. Remember us in our hunger for union with you and fellowship with one another. Inspire us to join with our neighbors at tables together, where we may work together toward a just world where all are fed.

In your gracious name,

Amen.

Learn

To download this entire study, click on the cover image below. To see some of our other congregational resources, please visit www.elca.org/Resources/ELCA-World-Hunger.

Give

Gifts to ELCA World Hunger are acts of love towards our neighbors living with hunger and poverty both here and around the world. Together, we are creatively and courageously working toward a just world where all are fed.

Give now

Connect

Sign up here and receive news, information and the latest resources from ELCA World Hunger.

December 1 is World AIDS Day, an important occasion to remember those who have died because of this disease, to re-commit ourselves and our church to accompanying people living with HIV or AIDS, and to raise awareness to continue the fight against HIV. This World AIDS Day, Pastor Joe Larson of St. Mark’s Lutheran Church in Fargo, North Dak., shares his story of hope in the midst of darkness and the congregation’s ministry among neighbors living with HIV and AIDS in Minnesota and North Dakota. Their work is supported by a grant from ELCA World Hunger.

“Bringing Hope into a Dark World”

“O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” is a favorite Advent hymn that puts into words the feelings that many of us face this time of year:

O Come, O Dayspring, come and cheer

   our spirits by your Advent here;

Disperse the gloomy clouds of night

   and death’s dark shadows put to flight;

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel

   shall come to thee O Israel.

This is an old hymn. Back in the Middle Ages, an unknown monk penned these words during a dark time. Humanity was threatened by the Black Death, wars and ignorance. Yet, out of the darkness came a beautiful song. Its haunting melody and poetic verses convey the mixture of sadness and hope that go hand-in-hand with a disease like HIV/AIDS.

I know what it’s like to create hope out of darkness. Thirty years ago, I lost a partner to AIDS. Since then, I’ve spent most of my career with programs for people living with HIV/AIDS. For 14 years, I served as executive director of the Aliveness Project, an AIDS service organization in Minneapolis that provides hot meals, a food shelf program, integrative therapies and other supportive services for people living with HIV/AIDS.

When I started serving St. Mark’s Lutheran Church in Fargo nearly three years ago, I felt God’s call to continue in ministry among people living with HIV, so I reached out to Minnkota Health Project, a volunteer-led program that offers support groups and food assistance to HIV-positive individuals living in rural Minnesota and North Dakota.

Many of the group participants struggle daily with isolation, depression and chemical dependency. Some mourn loved ones who have died. Others have been rejected by their families because of their HIV status and sexual orientation. They come to the monthly meetings for the support and compassion that they cannot find anywhere else.

This year, St. Mark’s Lutheran Church received a Domestic Hunger Grant from ELCA World Hunger to provide grocery gift cards for Minnkota group members. Many of the group members lack the resources needed to cover the cost of rent, food, utilities, and medical expenses. For them, the assistance makes a tangible difference.

At their monthly meetings, I try to offer a sympathetic ear and a personal connection to St. Mark’s community. This Christmas season, congregation members are providing gifts to individuals in the group. When I asked our congregation for help, their response was immediate.

December 1, 2018, marks the thirtieth year of observing World AIDS Day, a day to remember those who have lost their lives, celebrate the progress that has been made in addressing HIV and AIDS, and to re-commit ourselves to the work that still needs to be done to reduce the prevalence of HIV and AIDS and accompany our neighbors who are living with HIV and AIDS. The people of St. Mark’s and the participants and volunteers in the Minnkota Health Project, work together to find light in the midst of the darkest nights. Their faces reflect the light of God that shines in the darkness. And the darkness has not overcome it.

Worship

Consider including pieces from the World AIDS Day worship resource in your liturgy on Sunday, December 2. You can find the ELCA World AIDS Day worship resource, bulletin inserts and more at ELCA. org/HIV.

Advocate

You can advocate for policies and programs that support prevention, testing, treatment and other important services for people living with HIV. Take action today to advocate for programs that support global health, including PEPFAR and the Global Fund.

Give

Through your gifts, ELCA World Hunger provides crucial support to ministries like St. Mark’s grocery gift card program for Minnkota members. You can support this important work by making a gift for HIV and AIDS ministries through ELCA World Hunger.

With the 501st anniversary of the Reformation calling us out into the world, ELCA World Hunger is excited to announce the completion of our confirmation lesson series, “Hunger Catechisms.”

The Hunger Catechisms are intended to encourage understanding of the Small and Large Catechisms as they relate to our faith, our personal life and our public life for confirmation, high school youth groups and mentoring programs.

Each lesson begins with Martin Luther’s interpretations in both the Small and Large Catechisms and discusses their spiritual implications and social applications. At the end of each lesson is an example of how the ELCA is working alongside neighbors within the U.S. and around the world through the ministry of ELCA World Hunger.

Each lesson focuses on a variety of topics related to our call to justice:

• Economic justice
  • (1st Commandment)
• Food insecurity
  • (5th Commandment)
• Wage theft
  • (7th Commandment)
• Immigration rights
  • (8th Commandment)
• Gender equality
  • (9th + 10th Commandments)
• Environmental justice
  • (1st Article of the Creed)
• Food waste
  • (Daily Bread)

The ELCA defines confirmation as, “…a pastoral and educational ministry of the church that helps the baptized through Word and Sacrament to identify more deeply with the Christian community and participate more fully in it mission.”

It is our hope that these lessons encourage your ministry to dive deeper in your faith conversations and inspire the youth of your community to participate more fully in our shared mission of working towards a just world where all are fed.

Suggested uses

Although you know your ministry best, here are some ways that other folks have used this resource:

• Youth group discussion guide
• Leader’s script (turn the main points and facts into slides)
• Supplemental curriculum during Catechism instruction
• Youth Advent or Lenten study
• Adult forums
• Mentor conversations

Please contact us at hunger@elca.org and tell us how you used these lessons in your ministry!

Learn

If you’d like to learn more about other resources that ELCA World Hunger offers to congregations,  please visit www.elca.org/Resources/ELCA-World-Hunger.

Give

Gifts to ELCA World Hunger are acts of love towards our neighbors living with hunger and poverty both here and around the world. Together, we are creatively and courageously working toward a just world where all are fed.

Give now

Connect

Sign up here and receive news, information and the latest resources from ELCA World Hunger.

As Reformation Sunday approaches and the winter months ensue, do you find yourself already daydreaming about summer? ELCA World Hunger would like to encourage that habit by offering a sneak peek into ELCA World Hunger’s newest VBS program, “Who is My Neighbor?”

Based on the Good Samaritan story, “Who is My Neighbor?” engages participants in a week of fun, laughter and play while learning about how we are called by God to love and care for our neighbors within our communities and around the world.

Each day focuses on a different character from the Good Samaritan story, with Day 1 introducing the main character—the lawyer who asks Jesus the question, “Who is my neighbor?”

This full, five-day curriculum will be free and available in print or through download. You’ll find skits, family time, games, snacks, crafts and stories that will help participants explore what it means to be a neighbor in Christ by learning about neighbors in six parts of the globe!

Please enjoy this Day 1 sample and be on the lookout for the full “Who is My Neighbor?” VBS curriculum to be available in mid-November!

We pray that the children in your VBS will see the ways God has blessed them and their neighbors—and the role they can play in God’s promise of a just world where all are fed.

Learn

If you’d like to learn more about other resources that ELCA World Hunger offers to congregations,  please visit www.elca.org/Resources/ELCA-World-Hunger.

Give

Gifts to ELCA World Hunger are acts of love towards our neighbors living with hunger and poverty both here and around the world. Together, we are creatively and courageously working toward a just world where all are fed.

Give now

Connect

Sign up here and receive news, information and the latest resources from ELCA World Hunger.

With more than 30,000 youth and adults from across the ELCA, ELCA World Hunger staff were in Houston, Texas, last week for the 2018 National Youth Gathering. The event is a great opportunity for youth and leaders to learn about the many ministries of the ELCA and our partners. This year, as part of ELCA World Hunger’s Global Farm Challenge, youth had the chance to support ELCA World Hunger’s accompaniment of farmers around the world by offering their donations, glimpse a village in Malawi through a 360-degree virtual reality video, and learn about some of the challenges and opportunities smallholder farmers face through the “Field Experience” track. In this interactive track, participants followed the story of a smallholder farmer and tried their best to bring one of four crops – ginger, corn, citrus trees, or rice – from seed to market. ELCA World Hunger’s interns were a critical part of the event, helping to build and staff the track, guiding youth through the “Feld Experience,” and sharing their own passions and wisdom with participants. Below, Jasmine, Hannah, and Petra share some of their reflections on the Youth Gathering – including the ways that the event shapes staff who work it as much as it shapes the youth who attend.

–

“I finally was able to realize what being Lutheran and being Church meant, and it was something truly special.”

This summer I had the privilege of attending the 2018 ELCA Youth Gathering in Houston, Texas. While I thought I was ready to welcome the Youth to our space Thursday morning, I soon realized that nothing could have prepared me for welcoming 30,000 youth! The experience was truly something indescribable, never have I ever worked so hard, stood on my feet so long and felt like I was apart of something so meaningful.

Nervous at first about how the field experience would go—especially the section my fellow interns and I put together—I easily became more comfortable in the space, allowing for me to focus on what was truly important about what was going on around me. What was so impactful and enlightening about this experience had nothing to do with how perfectly I worded each sentence, or how quickly we got the crops from the finish line back to the beginning of the track, it was the small talk, and the connections being made throughout and seeing/ recognizing that over 30,000+ Lutherans were coming together from all over the U.S to celebrate God and grow in faith.

Every morning I was greeted by Petra R. and Hannah N. we would walk down to breakfast debrief for the day then head to the event. Entering this trip with them I never expected our relationships to grow how they did but I guess when you spend nearly 24 hours a day with someone that naturally happens. We all became one another’s support and when I, being the grandma intern got too tired they helped push me out of my comfort zone by encouraging me to attend a mass gathering on Saturday, which I greatly thank them for. Not being a huge fan of speakers and talks I was initially turned off by the idea, but once I was there I realized it was so much more than that, it didn’t matter exactly what was being said on stage, it was the feeling of being in a room with 30,000+ people who all believe in the same thing as you. The theme for Saturday was Hope and I could feel and see hope all around me as I sat amongst the future generations of our country. I finally was able to realize what being Lutheran and being Church meant, and it was something truly special.

I am beyond grateful that I was able to attend the Youth Gathering both because it allowed me share with youth and others ELCA World Hunger’s mission and field experience, as well as it showed me hope for the future and presented a feeling of belonging I had never felt before. I can confidently say that this experience was like no other and will stick with me for a lifetime.

-Jasmine Bolden

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“I saw young people empowered to be the leaders that this church needs…”

When I was selected to be one of ELCA World Hunger’s interns, I had no idea what I was getting into. However, I did know that I would have the opportunity to attend the 2018 ELCA Youth Gathering, so I was super excited for what the summer would hold. This trip held an important significance for me, as I was born and raised in Houston, Texas. Welcoming 31,000 youth and their leaders to my hometown and educating them about the impact of ELCA World Hunger and the Global Farm Challenge was such a cool experience, even amidst the stifling heat of Houston (which you can never get used to).

The theme of the 2018 ELCA Youth Gathering was “This Changes Everything,” and from the moment I first arrived in the Interactive Learning space in Houston, I found that to be true. I met people from all over the United States and the Caribbean, and I like to think I showed them a thing or two about the challenges farmers face around the world.  I even had the privilege of guiding Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton through a section of the “Field Experience”—she could carry a 41.5-pound jerry can of water better than some of the youth!

In the Mass Gatherings, thousands of youth around me were enlivened by the speakers and the messages of hope and grace they brought to my generation. The speakers reflected the theme verse of the event in Ephesians: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8 NRSV). As you know, the youth of this vibrant church are a gift from God, and they were lifted up to be an important part of their churches not only in the future but now. Throughout the Youth Gathering, I saw young people empowered to be the leaders that this church needs, and I am so excited that ELCA World Hunger could be a part of this important faith formation event.

In the last Mass Gathering, the normally dark NRG Stadium was filled with light. The assignment for all the youth was to let someone important to them know that they were loved by sending them a text message with the note “May God hold you in the grip of grace.” After they sent the message, they were to turn their phone flashlights on. Quickly, the entire stadium became as bright as the noonday as thousands of people throughout the United States and the world were told that they were loved by the next generation of Lutheran leaders. After attending this gathering, I am filled with hope for what the church will look like moving forward.

-Hannah Norem

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“…this is what it takes to create a just world where all are fed.”

Beautiful chaos. Everything God-blessed, fast-paced, brightly colored and abundantly emotional— a light sprinkling of buzzwords that only begins to scratch the surface of the ELCA National Youth Gathering. Every three years, an inconceivable amount of sweat, tears, and hope breathes life to this event. Though I believe few people are blessed with having a grip on this whirlwind of an experience due to its sheer magnitude, I thought I had a pretty good idea after attending two. I easily recall the countless post-church potluck lunches, car washes, and wreath sales that brought us ever-closer to our financial goal of affording the Gathering. What I hadn’t realized was the equal anticipation felt by the staff, volunteers, and partners planning the event. Excitement, nervousness, expectation, and anticipation hummed around the office long before our arrival, for everything ELCA World Hunger’s part in the event would be. Everything I got to hear, see, and have a hand in bringing to fruition, though, was just a tiny part of the entire event. The massive floorspace we would curate was but a planet in the entire solar system of NRG Center activities, and a tiny-but-mighty speck in the galaxy of events participants would encounter in the week.

Rather than humbling, this realization was enlivening. It brought urgency to pouring ourselves into ELCA World Hunger’s area, ensuring it precisely and accurately reflected all the learning points we prayed groups would grasp. Despite my hoarse throat and empty stomach, I was committed to making my piece of ELCA World Hunger’s “Field Experience” meaningful, fun, and enriching for each group. This is the first and only time these folks that stood before me got to see the space. This was the time they had to learn about what I staunchly believe is one of the best examples of God’s work in this church and the world.

What I pray they carry home is the sentiment of injustice behind the stories they heard, and allow it to fuel action. The participants in the track each followed stories of farmers facing hunger, and in the track, they took on the voices of the farmers – and added their own excitement or frustrations to the mix. “My son is sick!” one girl screamed. Another, “I get to ride a bike!” Or, most often heard, “Aw man, I have to carry my crops?!” These were only a few of the reactions after reading how the “drought” affected each group’s “crops.” The track was a great opportunity for the youth at the Gathering to hear about experiences of others around the world – experiences that may differ from their own – and to be inspired to act.

Just how different would the world look if we each took the time to learn about other’s experiences in the world, what this means for everyone as a global community, where our Church stands in it all, and how God is calling us to respond to injustice and need? Asking these questions and creating avenues for people to explore them—this is what it takes to create a “just world where all are fed.”

-Petra Rickertsen

 From the halls of power to the fortress tower,

not a stone will be left on stone.

Let the king beware for your justice tears

every tyrant from his throne.

The hungry poor shall weep no more,

for the food they can never earn;

These are tables spread, ev’ry mouth be fed,

for the world is about to turn.

      -Canticle of the Turning ELW 723

Mary’s Magnificat in the Gospel of Luke, paraphrased in Rory Cooney’s 1990 “Canticle of the Turning,” is a powerful testimony of the fulfillment of God’s promise to those for whom the current state of the world just isn’t working. It is a striking testimony to the depth and breadth of God’s love and the significance of God’s promise, a promise that includes not only eternal salvation but also justice here and now.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations estimates that there are nearly 815 million people who are undernourished worldwide. This is a tremendously positive change from the early 1990s, when more than a billion people lacked access to sufficient food.

Change is possible. But so much more work needs to be done.

For the first time in a decade, famine was declared this year, with more than 100,000 people in South Sudan caught in the midst of a humanitarian crisis. One million more people in South Sudan were at severe risk of famine. That’s not even to mention the other countries where the risk of famine is imminent: Yemen, Somalia and Kenya. Access to this most basic of needs – food – is rapidly eroding for many of our neighbors. At the same time, many others have been driven from their homes by violence, drought and fear, their arrival in refugee camps and on coastlines and borders challenging the depth of our commitment to hospitality for the stranger.

In Advent, we focus a lot on waiting, expectation and hope for the future. But for our neighbors who hunger, thirst and flee now, the church’s witness cannot just be about the future. And as Lutherans, we know it is not. The world is about to turn, certainly, but Advent is also a celebration that the world has turned, that the fulfillment of God’s promise has already begun.

Mary’s Magnificat is more than a song of anticipation. It is a song of invitation, inviting us to “magnify” the One who has “done great things…shown strength with God’s arm…scattered the proud…put down the mighty…exalted those of low degree…filled the hungry with good things [and] helped God’s servant Israel” (Luke 1:49-54). Mary’ song recalls Isaiah’s prophecy and points forward to Jesus’ declaration:

“Today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:21).

The Christmas season that the end of Advent ushers in is just the beginning of the work of God through the church in the world.

In the first session in this study, we began at the end, and now, we end at the beginning. Mary’s song invites us to carry the promise of God forward, to take with utter seriousness the task ahead, with faith that the world has turned, is turning and will continue to turn as God’s promises unfold. It is an invitation to see Advent as preparation for both the bright dawn of Christmas and the work that lies ahead.

Theologian and poet Howard Thurman in his reflection on Christmas captures this sense of initiation in his poem, “The Work of Christmas.”

When the song of the angels is stilled,

When the star in the sky is gone,

When the kings and princes are home,

When the shepherds are back with their flocks,

The work of Christmas begins:

To find the lost,

To heal the broken,

To feed the hungry,

To release the prisoner,

To rebuild the nations,

To bring peace among the people,

To make music in the heart.

We end at the beginning. Advent commemorates Mary’s preparation for a new life growing inside her, a life that represents the coming of a new era. This new life is a turning that brings hope to those who have lived in desperation – and brings anxiety to the powerful who have fostered injustice. Advent is also a story of God’s preparation of us, preparing our church to reveal the transformation of the world that again will offer hope to those who continue to live in desperation – and will again bring potent anxiety to those who continue to foster injustice.

Reflection questions

1. What does Mary’s Magnificat mean for us today?
2. Looking back on the past year, how has our congregation borne witness to God’s promise of hope for our world? For our local community?
3. How can or has our Advent journey prepared us for “the work of Christmas” year-round?
4. Reflect on each of the lines of the verse from “Canticle of the Turning” and Thurman’s poem quoted above. Which “works of Christmas” in Thurman’s poem highlight the church’s role in revealing the changes God is enacting in the song?

Prayer

Merciful God, you have filled the hungry with good things, remembered your people Israel in your mercy, and lifted up all those of low estate. Grant that we may be filled, remembered and lifted up this Advent. May the work of your promise within us inspire our work of Christmas within our world. Bless our efforts toward justice, peace and wholeness for all creation. In your holy name. Amen.

Hymn suggestions

Canticle of the Turning ELW 723

O Day of Peace ELW 711

Hark, the Glad Sound! ELW 239

To download this entire study, or to see some of our other congregational resources, please visit www.elca.org/Resources/ELCA-World-Hunger.

Have you ever thought of the “movers and shakers” in your community? This is one collective term we often use to describe the people we think of as powerful, important or effective in their leadership. Perhaps they have enough money to buy whatever they want or need. Perhaps they have a seat at important tables where decisions are made. Perhaps they have friends in high places or are in positions of influence.

These are the people who “keep the world turning.” At least, that’s what most of us think.

The Gospel reading this week describes John the Baptist encountering people sent by the Pharisees as a sort of screening committee, checking his references and reviewing his qualifications for ministry. “Are you Elijah?” they ask. “Are you the prophet?” (John 1:21). John the Baptist replies in the negative. He is simply a camel-hair wearing, locust-eating “voice of one crying out in the wilderness” (John 1:23). Yet, this “voice” is one of the most important the people can hear at that moment. The questioners go away dissatisfied; clearly, this crazed man does not have the pedigree it takes to be baptizing and preaching.

Pharisees often get a bad rap in Christian Scripture and history, though they were devout Jews, who believed sincerely in God’s law and God’s promises. Until the middle of the first century, they were known for their ministry among the people in what might have been called the working class of Palestine. Like John the Baptist and other Jews, they knew what Isaiah has prophesied about “good news to the oppressed” (61:1) and “the year of the Lord’s favor” (61:2).

The problem wasn’t that they didn’t believe, or worse, that they didn’t want release for those held captive. The problem was that they didn’t believe God would choose to announce this through a person who wasn’t a “mover or shaker” in the Jewish world.

Yet, the people God chooses to work through in Scripture are often not the people we see as successful, powerful and important. They are tax collectors, shepherds, fishermen, women, craftspeople and even former criminals who would barely merit a second glance in the temple – unless of course, the temple authorities wanted to throw them out.

Yet God lifts them up as disciples, prophets, rulers and priests.

So often, our attention is focused in the wrong places, and we miss what God is working on in our midst. Our eyes are on people with wealth, power and influence – at least, the kind of wealth, power and influence our culture deems worthwhile – and we can fail to see the transformation God is enacting in the overlooked spots in our communities. While the Pharisees were looking for salvation in other places, a poor young woman from an unimportant town was carrying a child that would announce the Advent of Isaiah’s promise.

As many of us look to the traditional centers of power for signs that the world is turning, the world is already turning in our communities. In Minneapolis, youth participating in St. Paul’s Lutheran Church’s Young Leaders Program are taking part in the transformation of their community through art, gardening and entrepreneurship. The word “youth” often implies negative stereotypes – too young, too unruly, too childish. But at St. Paul’s, the community knows that “youth” often means creative, intelligent and motivated leadership – the kind of leadership that can change a community for the better.

Their world is turning because God is working through youth and adults who know that real power is not always found in the places we expect. Their work is supported in part by ELCA World Hunger.

While Advent is a season of waiting for the fulfillment of God’s promises, the Gospel of John, the prophecy of Isaiah and the song of Mary (Luke 1:46b-55) invite us to recognize that God is already at work, “moving and shaking,” in communities our stereotypes about power might make us overlook.

Reflection questions

1. What does it mean to have power? Who has power in your community?
2. How have we acted as “screening committees,” denying the worth of the people God might work through in our community or church? How can we remain open to God at work among and through everyone we meet?
3. What are some ways that our congregation can be part (or is part!) of the transformation God is enacting in our community?

Prayer

God of all our hopes, we wait with expectation for the coming of your son into the world. Forgive us for the ways in which we have been blinded to your presence by worldly wealth and success. As we long for Christmas Day, keep our eyes open to your presence in our midst – in one another, in our neighbors, in the people at our doors. Open our hearts to receive the promise you reveal to us through each other and all creation. In your holy name, we pray. Amen.

Hymn suggestions

Unexpected and Mysterious ELW 258

All Earth is Hopeful ELW 266

My Soul Does Magnify the Lord ELW 882

To download this entire study, or to see some of our other congregational resources, please visit www.elca.org/Resources/ELCA-World-Hunger.