July 6, 2025 · Rev. Derek van Gulden · Luke 10:1-11, 16-20
Jesus sends out the seventy with a blueprint: travel light, go in pairs, bless whoever welcomes you. Rev. Derek van Gulden remembers medical mission trips where leaving the extra stuff behind freed the team to listen, and reminds a congregation worried about its building that we are called to serve, not to keep a building, and never alone.
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 and the meditation of all our hearts by your love, and help each of us this day not to be the instrument of our own or anyone else's oppression, but to find ways to be an instrument of peace in every step, in every breath, in every moment of every day. Amen.
Friends. Last week, we listened to. The lukan passage of Jesus having spoken to the crowds from Simon's boat, then directing Simon and the others to take their boats out into the deepest part of the lake. Simon and the others complained immediately. But, master, we've been out all night long, working so hard and we got nothing. Not one little minnow. And Jesus says, go out deeper. Throw your nets over. They did. And the harvest of fish was so huge it was breaking their nets. And they had to call their compatriots in the other boat to come. And when they got to shore, they left that harvest, that massive harvest of food, and followed Jesus.
Today we hear another story Of Jesus calling and sending out in this story. He sends out seventy this time not just twelve, but seventy. In this story, though, Jesus tells him what to expect. Jesus tells them what to bring, tells them how to react if people welcome them, and how to react if they don't welcome, if they're not welcomed.
For me, it's always been one of those blueprint scriptures of showing me this is what you're facing. The harvest is plenty. Those to harvest are few. Go. I am sending you like sheep into a land of wolves. Don't take a purse. Don't take this. Don't take that. Don't even take food with you. Go. And heal and bless.
Sounds pretty simple, doesn't it? Given a road map, where are you going to go? What you do when you get there, how you're going to do it, and what you need to bring. How many of you start vacations with those instructions already laid out? I know we don't. I'll show up on vacation usually. We're camping with like eight t shirts and not much else. I don't know why. Or we'll go with so much. What do they call it? Car snacks. My grandchildren. Cars that when we get where we're going, we forgot to get food. And we get there too late to get any. That's why car snacks are important.
Now, I've shared with you, I've done mission work in different parts of this country, in the world. And the one time somebody read that before we left. Before we left, we all met together. But we came from two different airports. But each group met and had been sent that scripture by the people leading it. And this was not a particularly this wasn't a faith based group. It's a group of people that had experience health care and doing it in different parts of the world under very stressful situations. And the person who is leading us, very much a devout atheist, said, read that scripture and said, so wherever we go, people will give us what we need. wherever we go. If we're not welcomed, we will move on. But bless them as we go and wherever we go, we will be giving that which we need to do what we need. We don't need to bring it. It's fascinating because at the airport, someone had driven a minivan that was empty when we left. It was full because we realized we didn't need to bring all this stuff. I still had three t shirts, maybe.
But it was amazing because what it did was it freed us up when we got there to listen to the people where we were being sent to work or being called. And this was in Nicaragua. I know a few of you have been to Nicaragua before. Long before I got there. And what it made us do is to sit and listen. Listen to what their needs were, listen to what they were going through. Listen to what the supplies we needed to do it, which they already had or said will be there when we get to wherever we're going, which we didn't actually know where we were going each day. But the biggest lesson I learned is that when I showed up, showed up, and didn't have any extra stuff with me, didn't have anything in my mind except for to listen and be present. What I could offer was much greater than I think I ever could have done if I brought all the stuff I thought they needed and the things that they needed done for them.
Because we don't know. Even if something happened in Essex and we all decided to go over there and help with the assumption that we know best. We don't. It is a failure of many programs that go on in the world that people know what the other people need.
But Jesus gives us this whole playbook. This is what you're going to do. This is what you're bringing. And if people don't welcome you. He says, we're blowing off the dust from your city. That's on our feet. But the kingdom of God has visited you, which, if you pay attention, is the same thing that Jesus says to tell those people they're serving who want the help. There's no difference. If people don't welcome your help, it doesn't mean the kingdom of God is not there with them. I love this.
I can remember going to Africa, and I went with a classmate of mine for three months one summer in seminary. You've heard all that? Probably more often than you need to. But the part that I. We laughed about was when we got to Nairobi, each of us was missing a bag. And the bag we were missing. Each was the one that. We had collected all kinds of stuff that we thought we should bring with us. Flip flops, sandals, a lot of granola bars, deflated soccer balls, stuff like this. Those didn't show up for about a month. My dear friend Amity and I, unfortunately, I think with hers she had mixed stuff in her bag, so she also lost a lot of her clothing. But for a month we did what they had asked us to do. And when that stuff showed up, it was nice. We could give it, but it wasn't anything they needed. It was a great lesson for us. Frustrating at first, but as somebody wise always told me, if you're flying anywhere, make sure you have a change of clothing in your carry on or a bar of ivory soap to clean it when you get there.
But this is such powerful stuff and it's powerful today. Today, the harvest is plenty. It's growing plenty here every day with all the things going on in this world. So many people over the last few days, all of a sudden they're losing some access to health care To food programs, not to mention so many others. The need is great and it seems unsurmountable in this time.
But even in today, even as a church, a faith community will. I admit, as a pastor, I worry about things such as how do we keep this building up? How do we afford to keep it painted? What happens if one of our furnaces dies? What happens if the water goes out? What happens if what happens if we have a fire in this building is gone? And those are all possibilities. And those are all things we think about and we agonize about. And the trustees, I sit with them once a month, and I don't even know how they do it because there's so much that this facility needs. But.
We are not called to serve a building. I know it's hard to say for some people. We are called to serve. Jesus is sending out. And it might be that wherever we go, part of what we need to do when we get there is to help repair something. A house, cars, maybe another church's facility. And it may be when they're sent out and come here, that's what they end up doing. But we are called by Jesus to go out.
And right now, in this day and age, if you watch what's going on in our country, in the world, the need is so great. And when you try to figure out what to do, it can be daunting. Do I give money to this? Do I offer to do this? Do I give up that?
Remember what Jesus says. The harvest is plenty. The number of workers are few. When you go. Don't take anything with you. Go in pairs. In pairs. Sometimes we miss this.
What Jesus is offering is the kingdom of God. God is very communal. We don't do anything alone. We are called to go out in community, to communities to do this work. I can't think of any better instructions on how to go about things. Jesus doesn't say you're going out alone. Don't take anything with you or anybody. Good luck. He sends us out as a community. He sends people here as community.
The word is usually the kingdom of God will be there. These days you hear in progressive Christian theology. No longer is the word kingdom, but it's the word kin. Which is very hard. And for some people it's like, ah, I didn't grow up with that. It's not the words I use. But when you think about it, Kingdom, we are all kin to each other. If you don't believe me, go on Interesti dot com. You'd be amazed to see how many people you're related to.
Who remembers Jennie Stansfield? Lois Butts? When they retired, they spent a lot of time doing ancestry stuff before ancestry dot com was there. They did it the old fashioned way. They got in their car. They went all over the place. And it turns out, according to Jenny, that her and I are related because she had. I think she told me, four or five relatives on the Mayflower. On my mother's side or her father's family. The latest we can go back in this country is to immigrant Brown, who immigrated to this country in sixteen sixty three, I think was the next group of people coming over. And Jenny said three of those people on the Mayflower were brown. Those were my relatives. So maybe you and I are related. And I said that that would be really neat. And she said, yes, this is what I like for Christmas Eve in my stocking. It took me a while to figure it out, but Jenny had a really sharp wit.
But the kingdom of God. Is all of us. So if you start to get overwhelmed, which I do, if you start to feeling there's nothing you have to give, which I'm sure we all feel that Jesus never asked us to do it alone. We go in community. He gives us the directions on how to do it. He lays out the map of where we're going and blesses us on our way. And having experienced just a little teeny bit of that in my life. What I received when I go is much more than I could ever bring with me. Always. May it be so. And may we find ways to go out there. Because the harvest is so plenty. Amen.