Would You Walk Hand in Hand with Just Anyone?
Psalm 40: 1-11
JOHN 1: 29-42
January 18, 2026
On most Sunday mornings I start the day off the very same way. After glaring at the alarm clock that tells me to wake up because it is 6AM I slowly make my way downstairs. I try to spot wherever Tyler has chosen to sleep for the waning hours of the night so I can pet him and say good morning. And, then I get the coffee brewing and prepare my weekly Sunday starter of waffles, peanut butter and bananas.
And of course, I take the five medications that supposedly are keeping me healthy and well.
I have been eating EGGO waffles for most of my life … yes, I have my own waffle maker on which I make homemade waffles but at the ungodly hour of 6am on Sunday mornings I choose to reach into the freezer section to pull out two EGGO’s and there’s no one to battle with so I don’t have to say LET GO OF MY EGGO. As for the peanut butter and banana routine … that’s from dad.
I am sharing this because this past week I discovered that I was preparing my EGGO Waffles the wrong way … I read the print on the side of my newly purchased waffles and was in shock. I am supposed to toast them twice at low heat to get the perfect waffle. So that’s what I did this morning … twice toasted. I wish I could tell you that they were better than the once toasted method I had used for years but they weren’t … they were merely EGGO waffles ready for peanut butter and bananas.
We are all humans … I am sure that all of you remember reading in God’s Word that ALL of HUMANITY was created in God’s Holy Image. Not just folks who worship at St. Paul’s United Methodist Church in West Deptford either in person or online … if we were the only ones created in God’s image that would make us feel extra special wouldn’t it … or if we just lied and bragged that we were God’s special people that would empower us in our own mind to run rough shod over others because we were claiming only we were special to God not them! We might even choose to punish those who were not like us … because after all we are the special folks … us not them … us versus them.
God created humanity … in God’s own image … in the divine image … God created them. That’s GENESIS. It should then come as no surprise to anyone that Jesus Christ throughout His ministry emphasized two messages with absolute clarity … LOVE GOD … LOVE ALL YOUR NEIGHBORS AS YOURSELF because after all … Jesus was saying, you/we were ALL created in God’s divine image whether you have lived next door to each other for generations or whether the human you are encountering is a total stranger to you who you are meeting for the first time. And not surprisingly Jesus even covered that situation when He said, “I was a stranger and you welcomed me. You will receive good things from my Father including inheriting the Kingdom that was prepared for you before the world began.”
So, just like my EGGO waffles … one toast or two … we humans are all the same whether we like peanut butter and bananas on waffles or detest the very thought of enjoying that for breakfast. At least in God’s eyes … God’s expectations for true believers requires an active welcoming and caring for other humans. It should not be surprising that in the beginning of our Scripture God declares, “You must not insult a deaf person, you must not take revenge, your must not hold a grudge against anyone, ANY immigrant living with you MUST be treated as if they were one of your citizens you MUST love them as yourself, if there are poor persons among you open your hand wide to them; generously give to the needy among you and the poor who live in your land.” Of course God didn’t wait until Jesus to issue this command, which according to Jesus is the second greatest commandment right after LOVE GOD with your heart, soul, and mind, it is right there in Leviticus, “YOU MUST LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR as YOURSELF, I AM THE LORD.”
THAT IS GOD TALK … GOD SPEAK … GOD COMMANDS … did you hear the word MUST? Quite a list of things that we, as the faithful MUST do or MUST not do. Requirements that God has laid out for humanity to choose to follow or reject. God’s love is an open invitation, but God also clearly states what happens to those who choose to reject God’s teaching and God’s expectations. And the end results of going against God … are not very appealing.
God spoke to Ezekiel about the sins that led to the destruction of Sodom … “They had plenty to eat and enjoyed prosperity but did not help the poor and the needy. They became haughty and I turned away from them. Their sins were pride, gluttony and laziness while the poor and the needy suffered outside her door.” A failure to be hospitable and welcoming … and they were destroyed.
So, this brings me to today’s Gospel lesson and so much more …. Friends, I have so much on my heart this morning. I feel so challenged in many ways for which I have no answers … I fear the collapse of churches and the disconnect that every day citizens are having with God and Jesus Christ choosing to align with snake oil preachers who claim Christianity but fail to even glance at the Gospel teachings of our Savior. I urge perhaps even beg all of you to read the Gospels so that you too can read what Jesus said … I want you each to live as a disciple of Christ … I want you to hold onto the Jesus truths and live your life as one of the many candle lights of the faithful bringing light into the darkness of the world. None of us is perfect … I am the perfect example of imperfection replete with faults that most of you are well aware of. And, like each of you I am a sinner but thank God I was rescued from my personal denial of Jesus … I had reached a moment when I wasn’t recognizing Jesus, but we heard John also momentarily didn’t recognize Him. This Bible was given to me on that day of my rescue and it was opened to Philippians … “Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility consider others better than yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.”
Thank goodness I was rescued but as I read today’s Gospel message how Andrew and another disciple of John spent the late afternoon and evening with Jesus, I imagined what that was like. Would we each have chosen to go and talk with Jesus … wake up the next day in the same house … perhaps having EGGO waffles with peanut butter and bananas with Jesus. Would we have paid attention and changed our lives actually doing what Jesus taught and said if we met Him face-to-face? Sensing God’s amazing love … experiencung Jesus’ love. It’s clear that Andrew did … he excitedly told Simon Peter, “WE have found the Messiah” and then he led Peter to where Jesus was.”
I thought about Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who boldly declared his faith in the face of dogs attacking him and baton swinging racist police officers most of whom attended church on Sunday mornings. I thought about James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwenger who on June 21, 1964, were murdered by the Ku Klux Klan in their white sheets masking their faces and identities because Cheney, Goodman, and Schwenger were registering Black Americans to vote. As the father of a beautiful daughter named Megan who was born with a developmental disability this week I thought about how Serge Kovaleski was brutally mocked on the national stage merely because he is a disabled reporter and what he must have felt as some one cheered on by millions attempted to copy the gestures that are part of Serge’s reality in life out of hate and disdain and a lust to bully someone seen as weak because he is disabled like Megan was. I thought about the hate that is being poured out today from pulpits and grandstands towards human beings because of what they look like, sound like and where they come from and how folks who go to church are supporting the daily ravaging of the lives of their fellow humans who like themselves were made in the image of God. People … humans … whom God has told the faithful we MUST love like we love ourselves wondering how many of those cheering the disparaging of other humans would want to be pulled away from their 9-year-old son after dropping him off at a Princeton New Jersey school and being sent to some unknown gulag without a grand jury warrant being issued or any Constitutional Rights observed, like that 40 year old dad was leaving his son staring out crying … dad wouldn’t be home for supper.
Friends … today, here in this church are you recognizing Jesus Christ as your Savior? Are you loving God by choosing to obey God? God’s love is always there for everyone but we have to believe and in believing we have to change from the world into the faithful. As the psalmist said, “We have to put all of our hope in the Lord.” Believing that God’s love and faithfulness will always protect us.”
I sit here wondering in this year 2026 whether we are willing to hold hands with any and every human being we come across. Far too many amongst our communities want to spit on others or do worse harm. Would you go out of your way to hold hands or hug any human being like Megan … it’s a Megan Pretzel Sunday after all.
So, in closing I want to read a Scripture that is the essence of my personal theology as I think about Megan and her hugs. And, then as a reminder that tomorrow this nation still will celebrate the amazing life, patriotism, and faith of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I want to share a brief reading from his letter in a Birmingham Jail.
THIS IS THE WORD of GOD for the PEOPLE of GOD from Matthew’s Gospel:
““Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’ “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’”
APRIL 16, 1963 … But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages and carried their “thus saith the Lord” far beyond the boundaries of their home towns, and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco Roman world, so am I compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my own home town. Like Paul, I must constantly respond to the Macedonian call for aid.
Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial “outside agitator” idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.
You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city’s white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative.
There can be no gainsaying the fact that racial injustice engulfs this community. Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States. Its ugly record of brutality is widely known. Negroes have experienced grossly unjust treatment in the courts. There have been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in Birmingham than in any other city in the nation. These are the hard, brutal facts of the case. On the basis of these conditions, Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers. But the latter consistently refused to engage in good faith negotiation.
We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct action campaign that was “well timed” in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word “Wait!” It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This “Wait” has almost always meant “Never.” We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that “justice too long delayed is justice denied.”
We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse and buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, “Wait.” But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six year old daughter why she can’t go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children
I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil-rights leader but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.
Martin Luther King, Jr.