June 15th, 2025 - "Worldwide BBQ" - Rev. Dr. Michelle Morris

Matt Nelson: Welcome to the Sermon podcast from First United Methodist

Church in downtown Bentonville.

If you have questions related to what you hear today or just

want to find out more about the ministries at First United Methodist

Church, please visit us online at

FUMCbentonville.org or check us out at Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok.

Rev. Dr. Michelle Morris: We are in a series called Making Room.

And we're talking about how we can be more hospitable, especially as

we have started a new service here.

We wanna make sure that we're thinking intentionally about how

we make room for people and we make them feel truly welcome.

So with that in mind, we're gonna hear a passage from Acts, and I'm

just gonna share with you one detail that's important to have about this

passage as I'm reading it, which is that there are two main characters

to this passage, Peter and Cornelius.

And while Peter is a founding figure of Christianity, he is

in this passage and throughout his life, a good practicing Jew.

And that's important to remember because Cornelius is a God-fearing Gentile.

And those two details are important for this story.

So hear now the word of the Lord.

At noon on the following day as their journey brought them close to the city,

Peter went up on the roof to pray.

He became hungry and wanted to eat while others were preparing the meal.

He had a visionary experience.

He saw heaven opened up and something like a large linen sheep being lowered

to the earth by its four corners.

Inside the sheep were all kinds of four-legged animals,

reptiles and wild birds.

A voice told him, get up, Peter.

Kill and eat.

Peter exclaimed.

Absolutely not, Lord, I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.

The voice spoke a second time.

Never consider unclean what God has made pure.

This happened three times.

Then the object was suddenly pulled back into heaven.

Peter was bewildered by the meaning of the vision.

Just then, the messengers sent by Cornelius, discovered the

whereabouts of Simon's house and arrived at the gate calling out.

They inquired whether Simon known as Peter was a guest there.

While Peter was brooding over the vision, the spirit interrupted him.

Look, three people are looking for you.

Go downstairs, don't ask questions.

Just go with them because I have sent them.

So Peter went downstairs and told them, I'm the one you're looking for.

Why have you come?

They replied, we've come on behalf of Cornelius, a centurion and righteous

man, a God worshiper who is well respected by all Jewish people.

A holy angel directed him to summon you to his house and

to hear what you have to say.

Peter invited them into the house as his guests.

The next day he got up and went with them together with some

of the believers from Joppa.

They arrived in Caesarea the following day.

Anticipating their arrival.

Cornelius had gathered his relatives and close friends.

As Peter entered the house.

Cornelius met him and fell at his feet in order to honor him.

But Peter lifted him up saying, get up like you.

I'm just a human.

As they continued to talk, Peter went inside and found

a large gathering of people.

He said to them, you all realize that it is forbidden for a gew to

associate or visit with outsiders.

However, God has shown me that I should never call a person impure or unclean.

For this reason.

When you sent for me, I came without objection.

I wanna know then why you sent for me.

Cornelius answered four days ago at the same time, three o'clock in the

afternoon I was praying at home.

Suddenly a man in radiant clothing stood before me.

He said, Cornelius, God has heard your prayers and your compassionate acts

are like a memorial offering to him.

Therefore send someone to Joppa and summon Simon, who is known as Peter.

He is a guest in the home of Simon the Tanner located near the

Seacoast I sent for you right away and you were kind enough to come.

Now here we are gathered in the presence of God to listen to everything

the Lord has directed you to say.

Peter said, I really am learning that God doesn't show partiality to one group

of people over another, rather in every nation, whoever worships him and does

what is right is acceptable to him.

This is the word of God for the people of God.

Thanks be to God.

Let us pray.

Lord, open our hearts, our minds, and our eyes that we might see and know

the word you have for us this day.

In your holy name we pray.

Amen.

So it's Father's Day and I was also working on this particular series, and

so I had my dad in mind quite a bit this week, and I will tell you that I learned.

A great deal about hospitality from both of my parents.

They were both incredibly hospitable people and made space for all

kinds of people in our lives.

My mom's hospitality was much quieter than my dad's was, though for my dad.

Hospitality was a show.

Hospitality was an event.

Hospitality was bold in my dad's presence, and you could call

my dad the consummate host.

He was always making sure.

You were welcomed into his home and you were welcomed into whatever space

he was in, even if it wasn't his home.

Just like Peter welcomed in Cornelius into not his home, right?

That's how my dad would be, would welcome people and help them feel like they were

supposed to be there, and he was excited they were there and he took care of all

of the details, no matter where we were.

Made sure all the logistics were figured out, and he made sure

to pay for everything as well.

I have two very distinct memories around hospitality for my dad, and

it's because they were repeated so often, so they were sort of core to

how I understand my dad's hospitality.

And one is we lived in Benton and.

If you came to visit us in Benton, Arkansas, my dad was gonna make sure

he took you on a trip to Hot Springs.

It was his premier destination to take people to, and we were definitely

going to do the following things.

You were gonna go down Bathhouse Row, you're gonna walk the Grand Promenade.

You were gonna go up to the mountain tower and you were gonna finish out the day

with a Apple fritter at Granny's Kitchen.

And dad was gonna lay it all out and make sure you had a fantastic

time going to Hot Springs.

The other thing that I remember about my dad's hospitality were his cookouts.

And it didn't matter if we were roasting hot dogs or if he was grilling

burgers or he was grilling steaks.

Oh, it was a big affair and everyone had so much fun and that.

Is so tied into my dad's identity that at his funeral when my cousins were

gathered around, they said, we can think of no better way to honor your dad or to

remember your dad than to have a cookout.

I will share with you that grief doesn't number on memory.

It either makes you over idealize things, or it makes you question whether you

actually remember things correctly.

And as I have reflected on this, I have had some questions

about my dad's hospitality.

For instance, I don't remember there being a choice on whether you go to

the Hot Springs strip or not, right?

Like you had to go, you came to visit dad, you were going to Hot Springs.

And then I also don't remember there ever being a choice in how

your burger was cooked either.

And in fact, there's a, a sort of legendary story of my dad, he worked

as a short order cook for one day.

For one day he worked as a short order cook and that one day, no matter

how you ordered your burger, you were going to get a very well done

burger with mustard and pickle on it.

You could order a medium burger with mayonnaise and onion, but

you were gonna get a well done burger with mustard and pickle.

So.

Now I wondered how hospitable my dad actually was, or did he just wanna

do things that he wanted to do?

So it made me question my memory.

And I didn't know what else to do in that case, except to call my

mom and say, mom, am I remembering how did this really happen?

And she said, well, one thing you need to understand about your dad

is that he had a hospitality system.

He had a plan, he had it worked out and he had all the details figured out, and

there's a lot of value in having a plan.

There's a lot of value in not having to worry about the details when you have

the people in front of you, because then you can focus on the people and

you can focus on the moment because the details are already figured out.

It's no different than, honestly, religion is.

Us, we have a pattern.

You come in here, you pretty much know how the worship service is gonna

go before you pick up a bulletin.

There's a pattern, and it's a pattern reflective of our

theology and how we proclaim God.

But it is also something that we don't have to spend a whole lot of time thinking

about so that we can focus on the moment that is in front of us and we can focus

on the worship of the God we are called to worship, so there's real value.

In having a system, in taking out the worry of the details of things, the

problem becomes when the system becomes the point, the problem becomes when

the system becomes more important than the people the system was built for, or

the God we're meant to worship, that's when there is an issue and that's when

there's a real disruption to hospitality.

And I will tell you that God certainly gave us guidance to set up all of these

systems and then God comes along and regularly disrupts the systems, right?

We saw that last week when these galileans, who only spoke one language

where the carriers of the gospel and all of a sudden Pentecost comes

along and disrupts the system, and this faith becomes a worldwide faith.

Expressed in all languages.

In all cultures, we see it.

In this story.

The Jews had had strict rules about what they should eat and honestly

division between them and the Gentiles, and that they had practiced four

hundreds, even over a thousand years.

They had that in place and God comes in and disrupts the system.

And how disorienting must that have been for Peter to have that system disrupted?

But the reality is, is that true hospitality adapts true hospitality adapts

to the moment and to the people who are at the table and who could be at the table.

We have a hospitality system in this church.

It is run by Marie Clapper and Gail Crawford and those two ladies.

Run a tight ship.

They are very, very organized, and the people that are on the hospitality

team get a schedule out to them.

That's a quarterly schedule, and everybody knows when they're supposed

to be here and where, and all of the things, whether they're cooking.

Cookies or not, right?

They know all of those things.

They have a very well-defined system, but that system allows

them to make adaptations.

They could think ahead and think about when the bishop's coming, how

do we want to change the system?

They could think ahead and think we're starting a new worship service.

What does that mean?

How do we need to.

Flex the system who needs to be added in, you know, those sorts of things.

They could make those adjustments and they could stretch.

They could allow for new times, new moments, new people, new situations.

That's what an ideal hospitality system does.

And they also give freedom within that to the people who serve.

Do you like to be a greeter?

Would you rather bake cookies if you're weren't part of the hospitality

team that's putting out the food?

Do you bake cookies or do you bring your own cookies?

They give flexibility to how the people serve within that system as

well to take into account those people.

But Marie likes to tell a story of when they almost let the

system overwhelm the point.

It was very disturbing to Marie that they would bake cookies and then the

kids would run in and eat all the cookies before the adults had any chance at the

cookies the kids were walking away with.

Piles of cookies and Marie's like, we gotta fix this.

We gotta make sure that there's enough cookies for everybody.

And so maybe I need to stand there and, and police the cookies.

Maybe I need to put a sign up.

Only one cookie per customer.

You know, she's trying to figure out how to, how to take care of this cookie

problem that she has until there's a Sunday where she sees a a little

girl who has a cookie in each hand.

And looks up and says, this is the best church in the whole world.

And then Marie was like, have as many cookies as you want, kiddo.

Uh, take 'em all.

Nevermind, uh, I'm not gonna police the cookies, because the reality is

that true hospitality pays attention to who's here and who could be here.

A true hospitality also involves setting aside our own expectations

and our own privileges.

That means a lot of times we're not getting the cookie.

So my dad did adapt.

My dad did adapt.

He did change the tour to Hot Springs to fit people's ability

and the time they had to go.

So if you had a hard time walking, you did the whole tour by car.

And if you had a very limited amount of time, we took Highway

70 instead of Highway five.

Highway fives are prettier dry, but it takes more time.

He also took into account like if you might get carsick, probably

don't go on Highway five, we'll take Highway 70 instead.

And dad did ask how people like their burgers, not when he

was a short order cook, but it turns out he wanted to be fired.

So mission accomplished.

But when you were in his home and you were at his cookouts, he found

out how you liked your burger.

How do you like your steak?

He just didn't ask me.

He didn't ask me how I like my burger and how I like my steak.

And he didn't ask me if I wanted to go to Hot Springs.

I was going to Hot Springs.

And the reason he didn't ask me is because I am part of the hospitality system.

I'm part of the family who's meant to welcome others.

And so yeah, I was going to hot springs 'cause I had to entertain the kids

who were also on this trip so we could make funny faces behind the adults

while we were on the big long drive.

I was part of that expected welcome and he didn't ask me how I liked my burger

because he knew I was already loved.

I was already welcome.

I was already part of the family.

He didn't have to find out how I liked my burger, but I was expected to walk

around to anyone else and ask them how they liked theirs or to ask them how

much ice or if any ice they wanted in their water, or to help out making a

side that was gonna go with the burgers,

because it was my job to make people feel welcome too.

The longer you're here.

The less.

It's about your comfort and the more it's about how you

make others feel comfortable.

We like Peter, have to be open to change and we have to be open to doing

things we never thought we would do, so others feel welcome and loved.

We have to make the adjustment.

We have to make the sacrifice.

We have to give up the cookie.

So others know that love, and we remember that we follow a God who

leaves the 99 to go get the one.

We follow a God who slaughters the fatted calf for the prodigal son and

expects us the elder brothers and sisters to still come to the party.

And we follow a God who will break God's own rules so that others

might know they are included.

That's the God we follow and as the family of God, that's

the welcome we are to provide.

God has the best barbecue.

If you are new to the party, welcome.

We need to know how you want your steak or your veggie burger if

you've been here a long time though.

We already know how you like your steak.

You better be in the kitchen, help 'em make the sides.

But no matter whether you're welcomed in.

Or you're working in the kitchen.

Remember, we are all, all invited to the feast.

Thanks be to God.

Matt Nelson: Thanks for listening to the Sermon podcast from First United

Methodist Church in downtown Bentonville.

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FUMC

Bentonville welcomes all.

Because we believe the communion table is God's table, we invite

everyone into our church family.

We welcome and celebrate every race, gender, gender identity, sexual

orientation, marital status, age, physical and mental ability, national origin,

economic station, and political ideology.

We come together in action and outreach, aspiring to follow Jesus' example of

radical hospitality, love, and grace as a transformative movement in our community.

Please join us for worship on Sunday mornings at 9:00 AM, 10:10 AM, and 11:00

AM, live and on our YouTube channel.

Grace and peace.