2022 10 02 Sermon

Do what you can with what you’ve got

Pentecost 17 C

Rev. Karl-John N. Stone

Luke 17:5-10

Has this phenomenon ever happened at your house? You walk into the kitchen and open the refrigerator door. You look at all the containers of food sitting on the shelves and say “nothing to eat!” A couple minutes later you’re back, opening the fridge door, somehow hoping that in the intervening two minutes the circumstances inside that fridge have somehow changed, and this time you’ll find exactly what you were hoping for.

It’s not that there’s no food in there. It’s just that you haven’t thought of a way to use the food that is in there. And in the world we live in, where with a few clicks of a computer mouse we can order up “on demand” almost anything we can think of (including groceries), why shouldn’t it be the same in my fridge? “Increase my food!” I say. Click. Voila, the food I want should appear.

The disciples said to Jesus “Increase our faith!” This is in response to the previous verse (which was not included in today’s gospel reading) where Jesus tells the disciples, “if another disciple sins and repents, you must forgive. And if the same person sins against you seven times a day, and turns back seven times in repentance—then you must forgive.”

The disciples found it hard to imagine that they could forgive so many times after being so frustrated by a person who never seems to change, that they make (what must have seemed to them to be) a very reasonable demand: “Increase our faith!” – “Lord, we will surely fail to follow your teaching on this matter. We know the size of our faith. We know it’s not up to the task. So give us more!”

The reply Jesus gives them is basically to say: the size of your faith (like the contents in my refrigerator) is not going to change. Now, if the Lord suddenly filled my fridge with plenty of the right ingredients, then I could cook a 7-course gourmet meal. That’s not gonna happen. And if the Lord suddenly gave those disciples faith the size of even a little bitty mustard seed, then they could say to a mulberry tree: “Be uprooted and planted in the sea and it would obey you.” But that is not going to happen, either—and besides, Jesus was talking in metaphors, anyway.

What he is saying is that making a demand for the Lord to “Increase my faith” is simply asking the wrong question. Instead (like I’ve got to do with the food in my refrigerator), when it comes to faith simply do what you can with what you’ve got.

If I’m waiting until I feel like I have a large enough portion of faith—well, I may never feel ready enough, worthy enough, strong enough, brave enough; I may never feel like I know enough, believe enough, understand enough, or am faithful enough to live according to the way of Christ. The good news is that, through Christ who gave himself for us, that’s OK. You can accept as a given that your faith may just be smaller than a mustard seed. Yet that tiny speck of faith has been activated by a great God, who has more than enough grace to make up for your doubts, shortcomings, or failures. You may not feel like your faith is enough; but Jesus promises that God is enough. And God will use whatever little bit of faith the Spirit has given you, for the purposes of his kingdom, whenever you open your soul to God’s presence.

The thing is, I think we’re not so different than the disciples of Jesus’ day. It’s common to feel frustrated, discouraged, or simply unsure about your own faith. Throughout your lifetime, the intensity of your faith may ebb and flow. That’s not so unusual. And the desire to want more faith is natural. But take a mustard seed: it gets planted and grows into a great shrub bit by bit, without our hardly recognizing the little changes it makes day by day. Maybe that is a good analogy for our own faith.

The changes, even the growth, in a life of faith, often happen so incrementally and unnoticeably, until one day you realize—oh, I have a different understanding of faith now than I did back then. Maybe the way God increases your faith—counter-intuitively—is only when you’re not worried about whether your faith will be increased; when, day by day, you simply use whatever little bit you’ve got.

Like the disciples, though, most of us will want to demand of the Lord at some point: “Increase my faith!” What would cause you to ask Jesus to increase your faith? It’ll be a different reason for everyone.

Is it because living according to how Jesus teaches is really hard? Like forgiving someone seven times a day? Is it seeing the struggles in relationships, or health, or faith that someone you love is going through? Is it when you see a need for more compassion in a world that can feel full of contempt and even hatred? Is it when you see people dying in a war zone? Or homes and towns destroyed in a hurricane? Is it because of gun violence or drug addiction in our communities? Is it from seeing the need of people who struggle to put food on the table, gas in their car, or a roof over their heads? Is it from the continuing need for racial justice and healing in our country? Or the need for gay and lesbian friends to find a safe space to exist?

The reasons may be different for everyone for wanting the Lord to increase your faith, but just the same, the reasons can break your heart. They break God’s heart, too. And when you would like nothing more than for the Lord to increase your faith in the face of such extraordinary need, Jesus calls you to once again put what little faith you have in a great God who is full of grace; and whatever little bit of faith God has given you, to use it with great love. Amen.