"Round Tables are Easily Turned" - Sermon for 4 Pentecost 7-6-25

“May I buy your breakfast?”

A street parishioner asked me that as we sat near each other at the Pork Store Café. I had intended to nod to the server to hand me his check, so I was surprised by his offer.

“Sure,” I said. “Thank you.” Turned out that he picked up the tab not only for my breakfast, but also for the half-dozen or so other unsuspecting patrons. The server complimented him on his generosity and gave him the total, around one-hundred ten bucks, as I recall. He took out his wallet, paid in full, and tipped her out, too.

There’s something of the gospel in that diner discourse. Jesus liked to keep the people he met just a bit off-balance by turning the tables on them, by presenting them with an unexpected answer or outcome. Two-thousand years later and halfway around the globe, he still does.

I expected to be a poor man’s benefactor – to see Jesus in the hungry and to be Jesus for the hungry. That’s how it’s supposed to work, right? But Jesus made sure that it went the other way round.

Jesus sent advance teams ahead of him, two-by-two, to announce the advent of the kingdom of God. To accept people’s hospitality when it was offered, or to rebuke the people when hospitality was denied. That time around it was a one-way event. It was clear enough just who was who: “Whoever listens to you listens to me,” Jesus said. This time around, can we be so sure?

When we reshape and restart our meal ministry, when we create community with food, I expect that as we not only serve our neighbors, but also sit down and eat with our neighbors, the line between the benefactor and the blessed will blur. Round tables are easily turned.   

And when we listen to Jesus maybe, just maybe, we’ll rejoice to find that our names are written in heaven, too.

Father Daniel S.J. Scheid, SCP

Fourth after Pentecost C: Proper 9 – July 6, 2025

All Saints’ Episcopal Church, San Francisco

“Round Tables are Easily Turned"