Claimed, gathered and sent

This is the sermon I preached Sunday, June 19th, Juneteenth at St. Timothy Lutheran Church. The text was Luke 8:26-39. In the 1980s, going to live overseas as missionaries with small children, people worried about us, especially those that didn’t understand what it meant to follow God’s call. We were crossing several boundaries, including that of religion. Those Muslim terrorists—aren’t you afraid for your lives and those of your children? The call to prayer five times a day was something we really had to adjust to, since the mosque was close to our apartment. I came to love it. But these were some of the most meaningful, marvelous years of my life. Arab culture is one of total and complete welcome. No matter how busy one may be, if you came to their home expected or unexpected, they would drop whatever they were doing to spend time with you. That is what was supremely important, to make a guest feel welcome. Jesus, too, crossed boundaries: going places and doing things he shouldn’t