A sermon delivered by Keith Swatzel
on April 26, 2009
Luke 24:36-48

There are few times when most of us are able to gather our extended families together and share a meal. There is something about gathering together to eat that makes up for all of the time we spend apart. Thanksgiving is the meal of meals, the feast of all feasts. There’s no better way to show your gratitude for the abundance God has given than to enjoy it, a lot of it, with family. Yet, as millions of Americans each year travel hundreds of miles and gather around in homes to celebrate their blessings, something is not quite right. The turkey and dressing are good. The sweet potato pie is spectacular. In fact food is far from the problem. It’s the legend of Thanksgiving that is problematic. We all know the story.
The pilgrims land at Plymouth Rock and share a meal with the Native Americans living there. It is a celebration of abundance and of the settling of the United States. We are so busy stuffing ourselves with food, we never ask what happened to the natives. What was the end result of the ‘settling’ of North America? Why do we have to go back to 1620 to speak of Native Americans in celebration?

It is not difficult to find out why we mask the troubled history of our relationship with Native Americans. It’s also not difficult to see why we choose to ignore it. It is contrary to the values we have been taught are part of our national character. Americans do not conquer, we liberate. Americans do not steal, we share. Americans do not kill, we save life. However we may choose to believe we are today, our past is littered with mistakes. Our ideals have empowered us to dominate an entire continent, but at what cost? Who pays the price? This land was taken, not given. While our American dreams came true, Native American dreams became nightmares. In the face of such a sobering reminder of the past, where can Native peoples find hope? Where can we find redemption? How can the church of Jesus Christ bring healing and wholeness to a society built on such pain and suffering?

My contact with Native Americans has been very limited. In the entire state of Texas, there is only one reservation for Native Americans, the Alabama-Coushatta reservation. I remember going there as a child with my cousins. Like most guys that age, I loved to play cowboys and Indians. Of course I had not the slightest clue what a cowboy actually is and I was unaware that Native Americans are not from India. We wanted to go to the reservation to see how to make an Indian costume. The people on the reservation were very nice. They danced for us and showed us how to make different kinds of arts and crafts. We even planted some corn. The highlight of the visit was a trip on a miniature locomotive around the reservation, showing us their homes and way of life. We were surprised at how normal the Indians were. They looked a lot like us and many of them spoke English. After our trip, we always fought over who got to play the Indian, not the cowboy, but the sense of ‘other’ that I felt toward the Native Americans continued.

Why do we allow such a great distance to develop between us? The problem is not more common anywhere else than in New York. People who pass by on the sidewalk never look at each other as they pass. Even persons in the same subway car seldom speak to one another. Drivers navigating in and out of tunnels, on and off of bridges see the cars around them, but are blind to the humanity. It’s like each individual is fighting some kind of war with everyone else and it is a weakness to look them in the eye. Is there truly no time for compassion or understanding? Is time itself that important that we are all dehumanized and made into heartless machines without feeling, without emotion, without love? The call of Christ is to bridge the gap between ourselves, to become closer and more intimate with one another. As Christians we are called to be in relationship with everyone we encounter as God is in relationship with us. It is hard work and it even looks impossible. What can possibly be powerful enough to break a heart of stone? We feel defeated before we even try to break through.

Today’s text from Luke 24 is a remarkable one. Following the grief and mourning of Jesus’ crucifixion, the disciples are beginning to hear stories of Jesus’ resurrection and appearance to others. However, Jesus has not appeared to all of them. There is some doubt and disbelief. Jesus appears to all of the disciples together. It is surprising that they do not rush to embrace him immediately. Their rabbi, their teacher, their Lord who was crucified just 3 days earlier is there in front of them, in the flesh. The past 36 hours have been hell on earth for the disciples and the one person they wish was there to make it all go away is Jesus. They are frozen. The man who they sacrificed so much for to follow, the man who laughed and ate with them scares them. Why? Why are the disciples so afraid of Jesus? Is it truly because they mistake him for a ghost? The night that Jesus was arrested, all of the disciples abandoned him, including Peter. While a few of them did make it to the cross, no one shared Jesus’ pain and burden. Is it possible that the disciples feel guilty for abandoning their teacher? Is it possible that they are afraid because they have done something terribly wrong? What will Jesus do to them; surely he will punish them for their sin.

Jesus does not appear to the disciples to punish them. Jesus invites the disciples to touch his hands and his feet, twice. What is so important about touch? Of course touching Jesus will prove that he is a physical body and not a ghost, but there is more than just that. Jesus invites his friends who abandoned him to touch him. Jesus has forgiven them and he wants them to renew the intimate relationship that they had before the crucifixion. Come. Touch me. Fell that just as I have been restored, so have you been restored to me. Jesus does not stop there. Jesus’ relationship with the disciples was built on sharing meals together. Time and time again they gathered around the table and ate in community with one another. Their last meal, the last supper was painful. It is a reminder of betrayal, the betrayal of Judas. Jesus asks for some fish. He eats with the disciples to show them what they failed to learn from his hands and feet; they are forgiven. It is incredible that after such pain Jesus forgives and loves the disciples. Reconciliation is possible after such pain.

We are so distant from Native Americans. We have conveniently placed them on reservations, away from large cities and television cameras. While reservation sounds like a hotel accommodation, we know that it is not a comfortable life for most. As part of the country that hurt so many native peoples, we have a responsibility to seek forgiveness and reconciliation with them. As the disciples were invited to touch and intimately know the resurrected Christ, we now more than ever, must reach out and touch our Native American brothers and sisters. I am reminded of a Choctaw legend that the Choctaw tribe sprang forth from a cave called Nanih Waiya. It is only appropriate that they would come out of a cave as Jesus came out of the tomb, for it is in them that we can find the resurrected Christ. Native Americans are the resurrected people. It is with them that we will find our corporate redemption from our troubled past and reconciliation for the future.

Watching television as a child, I could not stand to watch Family Feud. I just never understood why two families would compete against one another to win money. I always thought if they both worked together that they would both win a lot of money. It would be impossible to lose. Unfortunately, the history of our treatment of Native Americans is often treated like an episode of Family Feud. The Thanksgiving meal is told as the ideal beginning. Later, we are led to believe that it is the Native peoples who killed and terrorized communities and that somehow we must work against them in order for the United States to succeed. The truth is that we need Native Americans to go forward. We have ignored the pain long enough. Through the resurrection of Jesus Christ we have the power to be redeemed and Native Americans have the power to forgive us. When our reconciliation does come, it will be a true Thanksgiving. In the gospel, Jesus’ meal fellowships were celebrations of joy with sinners whose ruptured relationship with God was restored. In seeking the face of the resurrected Christ in Native American peoples we can find joy in our own restoration. The power of Easter is the power to bring back to life. Christ’s resurrection gives Native Americans the power to revive their communities, and cultures, languages and customs. Christ’s resurrection gives us the power to build a new beginning, not on a Family Feud model of competition, but on a Family Food model of cooperation. Our national record of justice can be washed anew.