Service

Rebecca Sheridan
Sunday, September 28, 2025
Luke 16:19-31

    I have a friend from college who now also happens to be a Lutheran pastor who wore a small plastic spoon around his neck instead of a cross necklace.  He liked to use it as a conversation piece – “Why are you wearing a spoon around your neck?”  “I’m a Christian, so this spoon reminds me that I’m here to serve,” he’d respond.  We’re here to serve!  We have different gifts, talents, and abilities to serve, but this is a primary calling and identity for all Christians.  We don’t HAVE to serve, but the more we follow him and learn how much Christ has done to serve and love us, we WANT to serve as a natural response.
In our Bible study groups as well as on Sunday mornings in worship, we’ve been reflecting on different aspects of what it means to follow Jesus today as disciples.  We’ve heard Jesus encourage us to welcome all people, stretching our hospitality to include those we may not instinctively WANT to welcome. Last week, Jesus encouraged us to be generous rather than selfish with our wealth.  Today, we have this convicting parable of Lazarus and the rich man as a challenge for we who have much to serve.  Christ’s warning is pretty clear – don’t be like the rich man and pass a person in need by.  So far, we have been reminded that primary discipleship practices for a Christian include hospitality, generosity, and service.  These help us witness to Christ in word and deed.
    So today, our focus is on service.  When we are baptized or affirm our baptism, we make promises to God, including our desire “to serve all people, following the example of Jesus.”  You are not alone when you listen to this parable Jesus tells and immediately start to feel guilty or convicted of the times you have walked by the Lazaruses at your gate, the times you have failed to serve in following the example of Jesus.  “To serve ALL people? How can I possibly be an example like Jesus?” we might reasonably wonder with trepidation.  We live in the suburbs of Long Island, after all.  We like living in places where we have to go into the city perhaps or rougher areas of Long Island to be confronted with people like Lazarus.  It is easier to focus on ourselves and our own needs and wants if we do not encounter people we are called to serve immediately lying outside our gates. It’s easier if we keep those in greater need more distant from us.  But of course, the needs here across Long Island are great.  And probably most of us could do more, to not only wear the cross of Christ proudly around our necks as Christians, but also use those spoons in serving those in need.
    Of course, a commitment to serving the poor is not unique to Christianity.  All world religions practice serving and giving to the poor in some capacity, in fact.  Here in Luke 16, Jesus is speaking to his disciples who have grown up in the Jewish tradition.  Still today, it is a Jewish expectation that those who have much give to the poor – the rich man is not being a faithful Jew – as faithful Jews the disciples would have reacted harshly in judgment of this rich man!     We can be proud, though, of our particular call to Christian service.  We know that the early Christian movement grew because of Christians serving in powerful, public, countercultural ways.  For example, it was sadly an acceptable Roman practice to commit infanticide by placing unwanted newborn infants outside, exposed to the elements.  Christians started orphanages to care for these children.  Christians started support systems for widows which we have record of in the book of Acts.  They pooled their resources together to make sure more vulnerable members of their community were cared for.  People noticed and started joining this Jesus movement where people were willing to serve selflessly in these ways.  Christianity grew, even though it was not a religion condoned by the Roman Empire, because Christians were known for radical service.  
Lutherans have historically also been great at service, starting organizations like Lutheran World Relief, Lutheran Refugee Services, and Lutheran Social Services so that the Lutheran Christian community globally has grown because of our care for refugees, orphans, the poor, mentally ill, and hungry.  In fact, the largest Lutheran churches in the world today are in Ethiopia and Tanzania because we so effectively combined the gospel with service.  Our unique Christian legacy of service and Christ’s call to serve matters and STILL makes a difference!  When we serve, we are being Christ to others – we give others an opportunity to encounter Christ, and we often encounter Christ in return.
    Our service to the least of these like Lazarus matters.  Service is non-negotiable marker of a Christian.  We confess today that we sometimes neglect to include service as much as we could in our lives, so that we might listen and pay attention to the one who has risen from the dead!  The people at our gates have names, like Lazarus.  The name Lazarus, in fact, is a form of the Hebrew, “Eliezer” which means, “God is my helper.”  Our second reading from 1 Timothy encourages us that our baptism into Christ calls us to live differently, to be content with what we have so we might be generous in our giving and service to our neighbors.  And our Psalm, 146, truly gives us God’s grace and good news that we are able to help and serve others because like the name Lazarus, God has been our helper.  Look again at our psalm of praise – the Lord gives justice to the oppressed, feeds, the hungry, sets the captive free, opens the eyes of the blind, lifts up those who are bowed down, cares for the stranger and sustains the widow and orphan.  While others may have walked by or turned a blind eye to the plight of those in need, the Lord is a constant help, strength, and hope for the least of these.  
The rich man walks by Lazarus at his gate, but today we recommit ourselves to following Jesus who said he IS the gate.  Through this gate we enter into service to our neighbors.  Through this gate the Lazaruses of this world enter into the bosom of Abraham and life abundant.  Jesus came not to be served but to serve and give his life as a ransom for many.  Just as Lazarus is welcomed into the bosom of Abraham, so we are called to rely on the Lord for his help and strength in our time of need, and become God’s helper in service to the Lazaruses in our lives.  Jesus calls us to pick up our spoons and start serving, in his name.  Amen.