The
Empty Chair
Sermon preached by Rev. Brad Beeman
November 20, 2005
Scripture:
Ephesians 1:15-23 and Matthew 25: 31-46
From
a 1595 version of Deuteronomy, “Thy feast is to last seven days,
when thou hast gathered in thy corn and thy wine. And thou shalt rejoice
in thy feast, thou, and thy son and thy daughter, and thy servants,
and thy maid, and thy ministers, and the stranger, the fatherless,
and the widow, that are within thy gates. And give ye thanks.”
This is the scripture most likely utilized by those first pilgrims
as they gathered together to give thanks and this is what we’ll
be dealing with this morning as we look ahead to Thursday, the day
set aside for Thanksgiving. This is also Christ the King Sunday –
a day to look back on the Christian year.
Over
this past week I’ve read a bunch of articles related to that
first Thanksgiving of 1621. Many seek to demythologize that first
Thanksgiving, and make it more historically accurate. Others take
each element of the day and seek to explain how or where or why it
came into being over the years. I also looked up the meaning of some
of the items we use to celebrate this holiday, like the cornucopia
you see on the altar table this morning. I found out that even it
is based in mythology. So where does that leave us on this Thanksgiving
– Christ the King Sunday? There are a few things that I believe
are foundational as we look ahead at Thursday and at Christ, the one
we seek to follow.
The
real Thanksgiving was probably sometime between August and early October.
It was probably a harvest festival celebrated by the Pilgrims based
on the scripture I read out of Deuteronomy. The reason that the fourth
Thursday of November was chosen was because it was simply a random
fall day, an arbitrary day. A day set aside to remind us to say “thanks”
every day for the food, the friends, the homes, and other bounties
we have in our lives. For the earliest of the pilgrims, thanks giving
or giving thanks to God was a significant part of their everyday lives.
But this gathering was not necessarily to give thanks to God. It was
probably to say thank you to the Indians who had assisted these earliest
colonists to survive. That year, 1621 had been a particularly good
year of harvest, of fishing and hunting and of the relationships with
the Indians.
And
what of the traditional cornucopia – this horn filled with fruit,
fall leaves, corn and other vegetables, overflowing with obvious abundant
goodness, this other Thanksgiving tradition? It probably wasn’t
present at the event in 1621 but is an essential piece of the tradition.
The cornucopia comes out of both Roman and Greek mythology. Particularly
in Roman mythology, the goddess Copia
always wore
or carried a horn (continued...)
"The
Empty Chair" by Rev. Brad Beeman, November 20, 2005
filled with fruits and drinks whose contents and abundance could
never be emptied. She represented a harvest of abundance, overflowing
with goodness and food, enough for all to eat and drink their fill.
Isn’t that the hope – for all to be filled, overflowing
with goodness and food, sharing so that all might have their fill? Whether
because of the turkey, the cornucopia, preparation for Christmas shopping
or other traditional elements Thanksgiving has become a day of anticipation,
of expectations, over-indulgences and for many - significant family
traditions.
For
some like my Southern mother, more than the food or the decorations,
it was the empty chair that was the most significant Thanksgiving tradition.
Each year as she grew up an empty chair would be left at the table.
There was an empty chair with a full table setting to signify that there
was always room for one more…always room. After she married my
father, the empty chair tradition continued but became a family tradition
with a bit of a twist. Out of my dad’s tradition, the empty chair
always needed to be filled by someone in need. It was how he grew up
– and therefore so did we.
For
us, Thanksgiving was a day of immense anticipation. My mom would get
up consistently at 4:00AM and place the turkey in the oven – the
aroma made us anticipate all the more. It was a day of football. It
was the one day when we ate more than we should, watched more football
than we should, had more dessert than we should, slept more than we
should, used more dishes than we should and felt the after-effects longer
than we should. It was purely a day of overindulgence. It was also the
one day, the only day really, that this somewhat poor pastoral family
lived beyond our means. It truly was the one day when we were able to
feel as though we had enough. Because of the combined traditions of
my parents, it was also a day when we always had guests for Thanksgiving
dinner - always. Most times we didn’t know the guests but gathered
them in as family on that day. It might have been a homeless man or
woman in need of family. It could have a particularly needy person or
family in the church. It could have been anyone and often was more than
one. We would sit and listen to their stories as though they were our
own. It was the tradition in our home. That’s why this next part
is so difficult to share.
It was in my second church as a pastor that the Thanksgiving tradition
of an empty chair took on an even deeper meaning - all in the small
town of Sunnyside, Washington. Sunnyside was a community divided. On
the one hand were the rich ranchers, the wealthy business owners, “vineyardists,”
winery owners, and well to do farmers. These were the ‘haves’
who felt that because they had the fields and worked so hard they deserved
to be ‘haves.’ But on the other side were those families
living in divest poverty - lots of them. These were the field hands,
the pickers, the migrant workers and their families all trying to survive
on the meager wages offered them by those for whom they worked. Multiple
families living in dilapidated chicken coups, in tiny barns with dirt
floors, or shacks they called ‘migrant housing’ –
one-room dwellings with make shift curtains that divided men from women,
boys from girls. These were the “have nots.” It is also
safe to say that there was no love loss between these two populations
– partly because of race, partly because of socio-economic divisions,
and partly because of the attitudes around how the whole empty chair
mentality was handled. Dorothy, our children, and I saw this played
out over and over again in our time in Sunnyside.
(continued...)
"The
Empty Chair" by Rev. Brad Beeman, November 20, 2005
You
could literally cut the community tension with a knife. But after
our second year and heading into our third Thanksgiving, things began
to change and I was to receive a lesson I would never forget.
Rev. Francisco Castillo and I were colleagues, friends and golf partners.
Francisco served a very poor Mexican Hispanic church in Mabton, WA
– seven miles from Sunnyside and a church filled with “have
nots.” The church was in trouble and Francisco, in his own humble
way, asked for my advice on how to help his church gain stability.
That was late summer. Over those first two or three months I have
to admit to you that I thought of Mabton United Methodist as our little
mission, our opportunity to help those less fortunate, the utilization
of our resources to save the poor of Mabton. Never once did I think
that they might have something to offer my church or me. I was a ‘have’
and they were “have nots.”
Later
that same fall Francisco sat me down one day after golf and said,
“Brad, I’ve noticed over these past three or four months
that you see us as second class citizens – don’t you…
as needy, as poor and as having nothing to offer. You look at us as
having less than you believing that that makes you somehow better
or stronger or healthier than us. Brad, that is not what Christ teaches
nor is it what we are to practice.” He went on… “Until
you see that we all have gifts that can be mutually shared you will
not understand what it means to truly give out of God’s abundance.”
Ouch. And he was absolutely right. He then asked this question, “Can
you allow yourself the opportunity to be humble enough to know that
you don’t have it all, nor do you know it all, nor can give
it all and make us like you?” “In many ways,” he
said, “you are poorer than us. Because of your attitude you
are spiritually impoverished and what you have set up is something
that makes us feel worse about ourselves.” “I won’t
have that,” he said, “nor would Christ want that. It was
never what Jesus did.” “And, by the way,” he said,
“how do you think Jesus ate? He was the recipient of the empty
chair…Jesus ate because others offered him the empty chair without
expectation of return. Can you do the same with the same attitude
of giving and receiving?” He was absolutely right on all counts.
He
wasn’t done. He then quoted the scripture you heard this morning,
with an emphasis on one word – “surprised” as in
“When were you hungry or thirsty and we fed you or gave you
something to drink?” Those that Jesus rewarded were surprised
that they were even being rewarded. For my sisters and brothers at
Mabton, giving came naturally for them and they expected nothing in
return as you will hear. Each gave out of what they had for the good
of the whole. They knew how to receive – with loving gratitude
and grateful hearts. We didn’t. I learned that giving shouldn’t
be something that comes over and above, something that one needs to
be recognized for, nor should it be something that causes anyone to
feel as though they are less of a person because what they need to
receive. Giving for the good of the whole should be the most natural
inclination of any of us has. I mean look at what we’ve received.
Ours, all of ours is to create equanimity, balance, comfort and community
for all. It was that day that I realized the empty chair mentality
has to go both ways to really work. Sometimes those of us who are
the “haves” are the least of these when it comes to spiritual
(continued...)
"The
Empty Chair" by Rev. Brad Beeman, November 20, 2005
health and wealth. It’s a tough concept for many of us. It certainly
was for me. We became those that filled Mabton United Methodist’s
empty chair that year – the recipients of their attitude of
always having enough for one more. There were two hundred of us, and
about forty-five of them. Mabton came and brought us Thanksgiving
that year. At the table that Thanksgiving Day was Cuban, Puerto Rican,
Mexican and Spanish food, and some traditional American Thanksgiving
items. When combined it was truly a feast. But the feast was not just
in the food. It was in the fellowship, joy, laughter, the struggling
with languages, the children, the music – and it began to change
a community. That day, it was all on equal terms, everyone brought
what they had for the sake of the whole. It really was what that day
in 1621 represented – giving out of our abundance of love. We
became the Body of Christ each learning and counting on the other.
I learned that how we give matters, that each of us, no matter the
life or lifestyle, the socio-economic condition, the race or culture,
all of us has something to give and something to learn or receive.
That is the miracle of the empty chair.
This
Thursday afternoon the empty chair is being offered to a group of
foreign students from SMC. The Bridge is supporting the ministry of
one of its own this year as we gather on Thanksgiving Day alongside
a group of foreign students from Santa Monica College. They are far
from home with little or no family here. Many have heard about Thanksgiving
but haven’t experienced it in true American style. We haven’t
experienced yet how we may be able to fill their empty chairs but
come Thursday from 3PM – 5PM we will find out. I think of this
third Sunday and our relationship with the Iware District in Nigeria.
Both will benefit from the relationship with each other, and even
more so as we now partner with them as individual prayer partners.
It is when ministry becomes mutual, when we realize that we have as
much to learn as we have to give that Thanksgiving becomes so much
more powerful.
When
we approach life with an empty chair mentality, we become the cornucopia
offering what we have as we are continuously replenished because of
what we are also open to receive. It really is a miracle when you
think about it and fully represents what God offers us and challenges
us to be. It was represented in that first Thanksgiving feast of 1621.
“And thou shall rejoice in thy feast, thy sons and thy daughters,
those who serve and are served, ministers and strangers, the fatherless,
and the widows…give ye thanks then for the bounty.”
It’s been that kind of year – of giving and receiving,
of offering and of learning, of remembering and thanking God for gifts
given and gifts received. It has been a year of responding to needs
throughout the world and identifying needs in this church, of helping
the least of these and of struggling to see ourselves in a similar
light. We continue to learn – thank God – and to grow
in our faith. We are a church of the empty chair and we keep getting
better at it, and for that I am grateful. And so it begins again next
week with Advent a new year of seeing Christ in new ways. Happy Thanksgiving
all – and may it truly be a day of blessing for each of you.
Amen.
©Brad Beeman, 2005. Permission is given for brief quotation with
attribution. All other rights reserved.
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