Laughter at Harvest Time - 3rd Sunday after Pentecost
Author: Pastor Scott Schul
June 14, 2026
We tend to think that it’s only in
our present day that the Christian Church has struggled. On any given Sunday, in just about any given
congregation, one can look around and lament that there aren’t enough
worshippers. There aren’t enough people
willing to commit to crucial volunteer roles. And we look at the collection plates and budget reports and wring our
hands because there isn’t enough giving to adequately support the budget. We blame all of this on the usual list of
suspects, like the COVID pandemic, the rampant rise of individualism which took
hold in the 1960s and 1970s, and a whole host of cultural and social issues.
And as we complain about our
present day, we simultaneously look back wistfully on some perceived golden era
of the Church, when we are quite certain the pews were always full of faithful
worshipers, the collection plate perpetually overflowed with cash, and young
people were lined up to go to seminary in order to serve Christ and his
Church. If only we could turn back time
and return to the “good old days,” right?
But were the good old days really
all that good? I want to read an excerpt
of an article one of Grace’s pastors wrote in a past newsletter. “Jesus… promise[d] that He will meet with those
who gather together in His name. And
yet…[h]ow many people every Sunday morning… conclude that they will not go where
their Lord has promised to be? Of
course, many of them have excuses… But how flimsy some of our excuses are! We are too tired… For some, the weather is
too hot or too cold… Or the preacher may preach too long, or too poorly, or not
in accord with our idea of things. Or we can stay at home and listen to the
service…
“They pretend to Christianity; they make a
pretense of love for the church and the worship of God’s house; they would feel
deeply wronged if they weren’t listed as part of the Christian body of the
community; and yet they think nothing of staying away when God desires to meet
with them… Then there are some people who don’t get far enough along to make an
excuse. Their conscience no longer
requires it of them. Perhaps they have never
gone to church, or they have stayed away so long that the issue of churchgoing
is never raised in their home.”
Do you know who wrote that? It wasn’t me or Pastor Hetrick, and it wasn’t
Pastor Lynn or even Pastor Miller. It
was the Rev. Dr. John F. Harkins, who preached those words (and many others
like them) in worship at Grace on June 18, 1944. The Council thought his words were so
important and so needed that they reproduced his sermon and, a month later,
mailed it to every member of the congregation.
In today’s Gospel, even Jesus looks
around and realizes that his followers are too few in number and too fickle in
their level of commitment. He says to
his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.” Friends, this notion of a golden age of the
Church is a myth. People are people
throughout every age and era. The bottom
line is that if the Church’s strength and capacity to make disciples and save
souls depended upon its people and pastors always showing up, always praying,
always volunteering, and always giving sacrificially; if the Church’s very survival depended entirely on us, then the Church in general and Grace Lutheran
in particular would have gone out of business long, long ago.
Thanks be to God, the Church’s
survival does not depend entirely on us. We have a savior, and his name is Jesus. He calls us to be laborers in the harvest not
because he needs our help, but because we grow and thrive as
disciples, as believers, and as human beings only when we immerse ourselves in
his Word, his ways, and his service. But
none of us are perfect. We are sinners
in desperate need of Christ’s holy healing. The very Good News is that Jesus knows all that and loves us anyway, and
he will always provide for us what we lack. That’s not an excuse for lazy or lackluster discipleship, but it is hope
and reassurance when we wonder if Christianity and the Church have a
future. Indeed they do, on account of Jesus’s
mercy, grace, and eternal love.
When Christians and the Church despair
and struggle to chart their way forward, the best move has always been to seek
wisdom from the stories of God and God’s people from the past. That’s one of the reasons I quoted Pastor
Harkins’ words today. But the most
powerful and reliable stories of all are of course the stories in Holy
Scripture. So I want to turn our
attention to today’s Old Testament lesson, because it’s a story God’s people
have long treasured as an example of God’s historic and unyielding faithfulness
in a world of flawed and broken humans.
The story takes place in the
wilderness of what we now call the West Bank of Palestine. It was midday, the hottest time of the day,
and Abraham and his wife Sarah were sheltering in the relative coolness and
shade of their tent. The quiet routine
of the day shattered as three men, strangers, suddenly appeared. Abraham hurried from the tent to extend the
customary hospitality to them, which is why this story is often referred to as
the “Hospitality of Abraham.” Who were
these three men? The text offers some
hints, but from the earliest days of Christianity, theologians have interpreted
these three visitors as a manifestation of the Holy Trinity: God the Father,
the preincarnate Son, and the Holy Spirit.
The three visitors were aware that
God had previously made some significant promises to Abraham and Sarah. Way back in Genesis Chapter 12, the Lord said to Abraham, “I will make of
you a great nation,” and in Chapter 15 God promised that Abraham’s descendants
would be as abundant as the stars in the sky. The three visitors reaffirmed those promises as they assured their hosts
that Sarah would bear a son “in due season,” which some translations render as
“at this time next year.”
The problem though was
obvious. Sarah and Abraham were both
elderly. From a biological standpoint,
their ability to conceive and bear children ceased decades earlier. Imagine what you would do if you were, say,
90 years old and some stranger came to you and confidently said, “A year from
now, you will give birth to a son.” How would you respond?
We know how Sarah responded. She laughed out loud. She laughed so loudly that even though she
was hidden away in the tent, eavesdropping on the conversation, the three
strangers heard her. The Holy Trinity heard her laughing at their sacred (though hard to believe) promise. Even worse, when the Lord confronted Sarah
about the laugh, she wouldn’t admit to it because she was afraid. So she denied it. She lied to God! Well, to make a long story short, despite
Sarah’s lack of decorum, lack of honesty, and lack of faith, God’s promise was
fulfilled a year later, with the birth of Isaac. And through Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac, God
did indeed raise up a great nation. Even
though Sarah laughed.
Friends, there’s no question that
here at Grace I would like to see more people in worship, more volunteers for
our many ministries, and a richer prayer and devotional life amongst our people. And we can surely use more generous
giving. But never before have I been so
optimistic about Grace’s present or Grace’s future. It’s not because any of us (including your
pastors) are perfectly faithful. No, our
future is bright because in, with, and through us, Jesus is doing
something very special here at Grace. Maybe such bold confidence will cause you to laugh, just like
Sarah. But the harvest is plentiful,
and Jesus is on the job. Amen.
© 2026 Rev. Scott E. Schul, all rights reserved
Sermon
Text: Gospel plus Genesis 18:1-15
Gospel Text: Matthew 9:35-10:8
35 Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their
synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every
disease and every sickness. 36 When he saw the crowds, he had
compassion for them because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without
a shepherd. 37 Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is
plentiful, but the laborers are few; 38 therefore ask the Lord
of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”
10:1 Then
Jesus summoned his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean
spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness. 2 These
are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon, also known as Peter, and
his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee and his brother John; 3 Philip
and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus
and Thaddaeus; 4 Simon the Cananaean and Judas Iscariot, the
one who betrayed him.
5 These
twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Do not take a road leading
to gentiles, and do not enter a Samaritan town, 6 but go rather
to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. 7 As you go,
proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ 8 Cure the
sick; raise the dead; cleanse those with a skin disease; cast out demons. You
received without payment; give without payment.”
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