August 31, 2025 · Rev. Derek van Gulden · Hebrews 13:5-8,15-16; Luke 14:1, 7-14
When you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind, and you will be blessed. Rev. Derek van Gulden tells of the first scripture he ever understood: a 1976 dinner at a Newport hotel, given by two British officers for wounded veterans and young Navy corpsmen, whose hosts insisted the real host was Jesus. It's our work now, done because it's what we're called to do.
Transcript
People of God, would you join me in a moment of prayer? Gracious and holy God, this morning I ask you to move the words of my mouth by the meditation of all our hearts and help us. Actually, for thirteen years I've been saying this next part and I'd like you to join me in it. Help us not to be the instrument of our own or anyone else's oppression, but to be an instrument of peace in every step, in every breath, in every moment of every day. Amen.
I think we need to do that one more often. I mean everybody.
But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind, and you will be blessed. How often in our lives do we listen to these words and the rest of the part of the Luke passage? Whenever you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. This scripture was the first scripture that I ever understood. And there were two reasons for that. One is the story I'm about to share with you.
Back in nineteen seventy six. I was stationed in Newport, Rhode Island, at the Naval Hospital there, and I was eighteen, not that far from home. Vermont is. Well, you could still get there. But learning to live and work. In a way that I've never worked before. An environment I'd never been before. With rules. Lots of rules that I was still learning. Sometimes an easy way. Sometimes the hard way.
And there were other sailors like me, men and women who we were still new to this military life. And we were working in a hospital. And the hours were long. It was long before twelve hour shifts and ten hour shifts. You just worked until they said, your day is finished. Now go over here and do this other work.
And I can remember the first November that I was there Early November. It wasn't close to Thanksgiving, but getting there. Most of us knew we wouldn't be going home. And one day, these two. Senior officers not from the U.S. Navy, but from Britain, happened to come on to the floor that I worked on back in those days. The officers were treated in one place called the Sick officers quarters, single rooms, bathrooms they didn't share, and the enlisted people were in an open ward floor with fifteen beds on either side. There wasn't any privacy. If something was going on, we'd put screens up around them and within. Those active duty sailors were also. some medically retired military people. Vietnam era had only ended a little over a year before that. And we had a number of Vietnam vets who were still walking through their recovery from their injuries. We also had Korean vets. We had World War Two vets that for any number of reasons, would come to the hospital. There was not a VA down in that part of Rhode Island.
And this couple came in in their uniforms. A man and a woman and rank is universal throughout most militaries. So you can tell real quick and their presence. And they walked in and they just asked if they could say hi to everybody. And so we took them from bed to bed. That was back in the days when the doctors came. If you were able, you had to stand at attention at the end of the bed. With your crutch, with whatever. That ended pretty quick. But so the enlisted people who could got up and this couple came by and just thanked them, thanked them for their service, thanked them for what they do, and they went around to each one. And then they went up to see the officer's ward. I knew that because that's where I worked and did the same thing up there.
Later that day, from the commanding officer came down a letter, a letter that someone had written inviting everyone who are able to leave the hospital to come and share a meal together Outside of the hospital, outside the base. But they had to have the doctor's permission. So the doctor's grumbling had to come back and go. Yes, you can go. Oh no. You're on a strict diet. This, that. But there was probably, at least from the enlisted side, I'd say sixteen or seventeen and a couple of us corpsman, who were the younger ones and had no place to go, were invited to go with them. A couple very young nurse corps officers were going to go to just to make sure everything was all right.
And later that day, around dinner time, someone came in and said, there's two buses out front. If you're going to this dinner, go get on the bus. And of course, we get on the bus and we keep asking people what's going on. Or more importantly, for those of us who were younger would go, What do we do? What trouble have we gotten into without knowing it? And so we got on the bus, and the bus stopped at different places. It stopped. At an American Legion, some more vets got on, and eventually we ended up at one of the nicer hotels in Newport, Rhode Island, which they have nice places there in the ballroom was set six tables just. I mean, we're used to walking down the line and putting a tray out and they slap food on it and you go sit down and you eat. But here the tables were set cloth napkins, two forks. And they just.
We were invited to sit down and before the first course came out, this couple came out. They weren't in their uniforms. They were just businesslike. And they just said this. Thank you for coming. This dinner, this meal. Is for you. We made some of the arrangements, but we are not the host and hostess. He is. He is. And most of us like. Which he. But then the food came out and it was amazing, and it was wonderful to sit down at a table in a circle and not eat really quick because you had to be somewhere else.
And after that, people kind of pushed their chairs back. Sigh. And then came out. Fruit pies, six layered chocolate cake, coffee, tea and milk for some of us. And it was just great.
It was great to sit there and sometimes someone from another table would be hearing a conversation and come over and there happened to be a piano. Because in ballrooms, I guess, there's always a piano, and there happened to be a guitar up there. And one of the gentlemen who was picked up at the American Legion, who was in a wheelchair, asked, can I play the piano? Everybody's like, sure. And he goes up and he moves. Somebody moved the chair away from him because he couldn't get out of the wheelchair, and he just started to play. And then another gentleman came up from the hospital, one of the patients and said, whose guitar is this? No one said anything. He picked it up and they started to play. At first they were playing hymns. The old rugged cross in the garden. Blessed be the tithe that binds. And then they started playing more contemporary stuff. Peter, Paul and Mary. Remember, this is seventies, mid seventies. Crosby, Stills and Nash, Jackson Browne. They were just playing stuff that everybody knew. And periodically one of the older people would get up and say, do you know this song? And it would be something that was popular during Korea or World War Two, and people were just enjoying it and they were relaxed and they were having fun.
Now the crowd of people. Were all different. All of them had some physical ailment or an ailment, some maybe an appendectomy they just had, or heart disease or lung problems. Some were recovering from the wounds they received in the service of the country, the Vietnam or Korea, and some from World War Two continually. And many who were dealing with psychological wounds, PTSD. All those things were forgotten.
I saw somebody get up. Who hadn't? I had seen he had some surgery on his legs or his leg. He had lost one during the war and hadn't seen him get out of a wheelchair in the two months he'd been recovering at our place. And he got up with the help of somebody, and he went over and sat down next to the piano and then was invited to play four handed piano. Well, not the two of them. And it was amazing. And long after the food was gone and the coffee was finished and the tea in the milk people were still sitting there just enjoying being in each other's company.
The couple came in about that time and said, we hope you enjoyed this. The buses will be there to take you home when you're ready. And for some of you, we'll be coming this week to see you either at the American Legion or at the Navy Hospital, to see if there's something we can do to help you. And somebody said, raise their hand. Who are you and why did you do this? And they introduced themselves. They were very high ranking British naval officers. But they said, this isn't about us. This is not us doing this. He he is the one who laid the table for you. He is the one that invited you. It is all about him.
And then he read that piece. Well, he didn't read it. He knew it by heart. When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or sisters or your relatives or rich neighbors in case they may invite you in return and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind, and you will be blessed because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.
And an older gentleman stood up and said, you're reading from the Gospel of Luke. So he is Jesus, right? And the couple smiled and said, yes. They left in about an hour later, the buses started to fill up. and they were true to their word. They went to the American Legion. They met with some of the people that they had met. They came to the Navy hospital and they talked to different people, young sailors, old sailors, retired, medically retired, those trying to recover from wounds of many kinds. And they helped mostly by getting them in touch with other groups that could help them using the military stuff, but also other programs in the community.
I wonder, as I read this. I do have to share with you that years later, when I was working at a little hospital in Vermont Mont. On the fourth of July, I was walking across town to get to where the parade started. We had a lawn chair, drill team precision, of course, and I walked by the library, and the library had tables of books, outside, tables of books. And there was one table that was like off to the side. And I asked, what are these books? Well, those are the ones that have been out here for years and years, and they'll be going away. I didn't know what that meant, but I went over and I. You can't even read what the name of this book is. But I saw it, and I guess the color I liked it. It was about the right side. So I picked it up and I took it. Later that day I opened it up and started reading it. It's called Mr. Jones Meets the Master Sermon and prayers of Peter Marshall. And I started reading through it in. About a week later, I came across this sermon by invitation of Jesus. I read it, and what astonished me was I was there to experience it. Now, he wrote this in the Fifties or Forties. I experienced it in the seventies, and it was probably in the nineties that this book came to me.
For me, it's a wonderful story. It's a wonderful remembrance. It is the first time that I understood Scripture from that experience. It's the first time that I understood more when I started to read the book. I started to read more. I started to get more curious and even today I'm curious and.
I also like to talk about what's going on in the present time. How would our country change? If those in power, those in leadership, anywhere of any level listen to those words. Especially those who call themselves people of faith, of the Christian faith and listen to those. I can't imagine it. Some I can. But as a whole, I have no faith that they would understand those words.
And so what that means is it's up to us to share that word. We don't throw banquets. We don't invite people to sit and break bread with us. We don't do things for people either together or alone, but in community. With the hope that we will be repaid by that person or those people in any form, whether it's an invitation to a bigger dinner, whether it's an offer for a job, whether it's any number of things. We do it because it's what we are called to do.
Now. I believe this is the same with every faith. And I guess I struggle with the fact that there's so many of us out there, people of faith, whatever that is, who understand most of the time because we all slip. What those words mean. So why is it so few people. Can affect and change the world in some horrible ways and treat people well. Not like humans. Well, they don't treat them. I can't imagine. I think they don't care. I think what they do is they're trying to find something they can get in return.
I share that because I struggle with today. I struggle with where? Where do we make inroads? I know tomorrow there'll be lots of protests going on Plum Cove, down at the. Yeah. You know that place where you walk? Gloucester, the boulevard. Also in the circles, other communities. Boston. Huge. All across the country. I hope and pray that somehow we start to help those in power hear our voices, to help them realize that when you serve a community in whatever form that is. You do it because you feel and we all know that's what you should be doing.
I do want to share with you these words because. I was playing with my summer Music list. Having spent time with my grandchildren two weeks ago and not realizing that they had changed it on me, I knew they had changed it when I turned it on, and the first song that came out was Pink Pony Club. It's very catchy. It's very exciting. But another one came out that really well. It made me cry. Loggins and Messina were big when I was about that age. Kenny Loggins wrote lots of music. Jimmy Messina did, too, but Kenny Loggins went on to do a lot of movie stuff. But that's immaterial. But he wrote a song called Please Celebrate Me Home, and I remember the first time I heard it was that night in that banquet or ballroom with people a lot who I didn't know, some who I did, sharing a meal that was provided to us through love. And it just says, please celebrate me home. I'm not going to sing it. [recites a few lines of Kenny Loggins's song “Celebrate Me Home”]
Maybe that's what these people that are in charge need. Maybe they need to be welcomed home again, truly to home. But in the meantime, we have work to do. And remember, when we do this work, Jesus tells us we will be blessed. Amen.