It's a Love Story Baby, Just Say "Yes" - 2nd Sunday after Pentecost
Author: Pastor Carolyn Hetrick
June 07, 2026
Have you ever played those games where the question is
“Who said it?” Here we go- Who said it- a popular singer or the Bible?
“Love your neighbor as
yourself.”
“It’s a love story, baby
just say yes.”
“What shall I do with you?
Your love is like the dew that goes away early. I desire steadfast love.”
That’s Taylor Swift.
What about that last one though? Doesn’t it sound like
the angst of a love where one person clearly wants more than the other is
willing to give?
Can you imagine God saying that to us? It’s in Hosea and
the reason I am telling you that is that this passage is what Jesus is
expanding upon in the gospel when he’s talking to religious people who think
he’s got it all wrong. When he says “I desire mercy, not sacrifice” this is an
interpretation of “steadfast love.” Before he says what God’s desire is, he
says, “Go and learn what this means.” What is at stake is more than a fleeting
crush or passing phase sort of love or the way we can get close to discard
people. God desires the opposite of love that goes away early. God desires a
love that sticks around and goes the distance.
Jesus embodies three examples that give us a glimpse into
steadfast love and mercy. The first is love that is more than transactional and
may even involve an adversary. A leader shows up and asks Jesus to bring his
daughter back to life. This is not the story of Lazarus, of restoring a friend.
This is the story of being asked to perform a service for someone who has not
professed love or care for you but just inserts themselves into the story.
Arguably it is in Jesus’ interest to do this for a leader in power. But notice
that when the leader comes, he knows he is powerless. While in one way we are
prepared to dismiss him, we can see his love for his daughter seeks Jesus. He
is not ordering Jesus; he is pleading because the normal façade the leader uses
to exert power shatters. Jesus’ steadfast love gets up from the dinner table
and follows where love leads without a lecture or debate or even finishing his
meal. Love acts first to love this man.
The second example is about loving someone people don’t
want to be around, who cannot do anything for you. This woman has lived without
being heard for so long and is so weak she doesn’t even speak.
She interrupts Jesus on the way to address the first
interruption. Jesus sees even though others turn away. There is nothing attractive
about a woman who has been bleeding for twelve years, no one is drawn to this. She has been judged, separated and cast away. Surely
at some point in her life she was once loved. But not now. Not like this. Jesus
gives her his heart and she is healed. True steadfast love wades into the messy
and uncomfortable and restores dignity to someone whose beloved-ness has become
invisible and untouchable. He calls her “daughter” and pronounces not just
healing but restores her to family. Love is deep and didn’t need her to
convince Jesus to act.
The final example is about loving when it seems pointless
or hopeless to others. Jesus finally arrives at the home where the daughter is
and the crowd is there. They are the interruption. Presumably some claim to be
religious but loudly laugh at him. Another crowd will laugh say, “He saved
others, let him save himself.” Jesus acts in love for this girl to bring her
back. Many would decide that the social pressure of this crowd asks too much.
Jesus dismisses that and reaches out beyond what any earthly power can hope to
do. Instead of sacrificing love for comfort, convenience or power, Jesus shows
that God’s love is lasting. The leader’s daughter is God’s daughter too.
Each of these stories is every bit as disruptive as Jesus
calling a man whose job it is to collect tariffs. Matthew left his
participation in an empire that thrives by keeping people in their place by
impoverishing them. In a world that says he is just a hated and replaceable
tool, his humanity was restored. Equally disruptive is rubbing elbows with the
wrong people at dinner who are denied community because of the shackles of
judgmentalism. In an empire of “self-made” power the myth is that the power
dynamic shifts if we just pay our dues and play along. We may want to make
these stories gentle and joyful, but they are absolutely a disruption. And
empires in this world thrive upon convincing us to go along to get along. They
convince us to believe that as long as someone is worse off than we are, that
we are fine even when we are not.
Every one of these stories shows that we can buy into
this until some moment where we see our need, no matter who we are. Then we
hope someone hears us and sees us.
Jesus shows us that while our love may not always be
durable, God’s love in Christ is. And he calls to us by name, calls us children
of God and gives us a mission -to go and learn what this means and then embody
it like he does.
What does it mean to embody belief in this God of
steadfast love and mercy whose kingdom is not found in our power? We are all
learning what love really means for us and for the world around us. Don’t stop
learning what it means to participate in making God’s love known by committing
ourselves to more than a superficial love. To dare to ask the Holy Spirit to
help us to stand where God stands. To love where God loves in the world around
us even when we do not always understand. And while this takes a lifetime to deepen
our understanding, we can hear Jesus invite us to imagine we are sitting at the
table where others won’t sit and then do so. To allow our expectations and
comforts to be interrupted and to follow Jesus as he gets up from the table and
heads into a space of need. To not turn away from someone because we wonder
what others will think and to stay when people laugh at the love we risk.
To believe in this God of steadfast love is not about
self-preservation in the long run. It is about following Jesus who went to the
outcasts and died as one. To remain with those who are suffering and embrace
them even if we suffer as a result. To not abandon the few for the supposed
good of the many. As the leader and the woman saw, even as many did not, we all
need God. As Jesus shows, the steadfast love of God is there for all of us. This
love desires that we not sacrifice relationships. That we remember that we call
ourselves Christ followers not because Jesus belongs to us, but that we belong
to him. And this love asks us to go the distance even when find ourselves
feeling like Abram and Sarai where all we have to go upon is “ I will show
you.” When we go with Jesus in love, we are never alone. And as Taylor Swift
would say, “It’s a love story, baby just say yes.”
Copyright Rev. Carolyn K. Hetrick, 2026 All rights reserved. May
not be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission.
Sermon Texts: Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26
9 As Jesus was walking
along, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax-collection station, and
he said to him, “Follow me.” And he got up and followed him.
10 And as he sat at dinner
in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came and were sitting with Jesus
and his disciples. 11 When the Pharisees saw
this, they said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” 12 But when he heard this, he said, “Those who are well have
no need of a physician, but those who are sick. 13 Go and learn what this
means, ‘I desire mercy, not
sacrifice.’ For I have not come to
call the righteous but sinners.”
18 While he was saying
these things to them, suddenly a leader came in and knelt before him, saying, “My daughter has just died, but come
and lay your hand on her, and she will live.” 19 And Jesus got up and
followed him, with his disciples. 20 Then suddenly a woman
who had been suffering from a flow of blood for twelve years came up behind him
and touched the fringe of his cloak, 21 for she was saying to herself, “If I only touch his cloak, I will be
made well.” 22 Jesus turned, and seeing her he said, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has
made you well.” And the woman was made
well from that moment. 23 When Jesus came to the
leader’s house and saw the
flute players and the crowd making a commotion, 24 he said, “Go away, for
the girl is not dead but sleeping.” And they laughed at him. 25 But when the crowd had
been put outside, he went in and took her by the hand, and the girl got up. 26 And the report of this spread through all of that district.
Genesis 12:1-9
1 The Lord said
to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the
land that I will show you. 2 I
will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great,
so that you will be a blessing. 3 I
will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse, and in
you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
4 So Abram went, as
the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five
years old when he departed from Haran. 5 Abram
took his wife Sarai and his brother’s son Lot and all the possessions that they
had gathered and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran, and they set
forth to go to the land of Canaan. When they had come to the land of
Canaan, 6 Abram passed through the land to the
place at Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the
land. 7 Then the Lord appeared to
Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built there an
altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him. 8 From
there he moved on to the hill country on the east of Bethel and pitched his
tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east, and there he built an altar
to the Lord and invoked the name of the Lord. 9 And
Abram journeyed on by stages toward the Negeb.
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