Foundry UMC DC: Sunday Sermons

I wonder what comes to mind for most people when they think about the Ten Commandments. Studies have shown that most folks are unable to name more than one or two of them. I bet many others would probably have to admit that when they think of the Ten Commandments, and this may just be, you know, thinking about the older generations, but for many of us, I imagine some when they hear about the Ten Commandments, they think of Charlton Heston with a gray bouffant hairdo, wearing a bathrobe, and special effects in the background. Others might have a visceral reaction to a phrase that, for them, conjures up feelings of a threatening, judgmental, angry God. But my guess is that most people probably don't think of the Ten Commandments much at all, which may be what drives some people to make such a fuss about trying to get these things posted in prominent places.

Have you noticed the spate of legislation being forwarded in a number of, I will have to say, mostly southern states to place the Ten Commandments in public schools and buildings? Have you been following this? It's a whole situation, friends. It's a whole situation. The youngest among us may think that that sort of thing is a new phenomenon. It is not.

A quick search revealed that perhaps the first large scale campaign to mandate public posting was launched in 1950. The first time the Supreme Court took up the matter was 1980. And then there's Roy Moore, the twice elected, twice removed justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, I won't go into all of that, but I can tell you if you're curious, I'm sure. During Moore's first stint on the bench, beginning in 2001, he waged and lost a stubborn fight to keep a Ten Commandments monument in his courthouse. One thing I remember about this episode is the fact that after being removed as Chief Justice, Judge Moore continued this crusade through speaking engagements and would bring along the Ten Commandments monument with him wherever he went to give a talk.

Now, I'm all for visuals to help you support your message, but get this: the monument weighs 5,280 pounds, roughly just a little more than 500 pounds a commandment. So Judge Moore would lug this massive thing across the country on the back of a flatbed truck. You cannot make this stuff up. It was reported that even the five-ton crane that was used to move the monument off the truck buckled visibly under its weight.

What an amazing mental image, really. I mean, it's so appropriate, since many of us may have a sense that the commandments are heavy and dangerous, that they hang over people like an ominous threat just waiting to crush you with their weight the minute you step out of line. This is the way that some folks use the commandments and the scriptures in general, as a heavy yoke that the masses, regardless of culture or creed, need to have publicly strapped to their backs and nailed to their walls so that they'll get into shape, lift those heavy laws, carry those burdensome commandments, and do three sets of ten repetitions every other day.

Weightlifting morality. That's what that is. However, I don't think we have to look too far to find a challenge to this way of thinking. Just look back at the text we read today from Exodus. The recital of the Ten Commandments begins this way: "I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery." This is God's reminder to the people of who God is and what God has done. God is no dictator. God doesn't impose the weight of unfair laws upon people. The commandments are not a mandate to enslave God's people. God is the one who has brought the people out of slavery, who has unburdened them from unjust laws. God is the one who has given the people freedom.

But I find that many folk focus less on that and more on the "thou shalt not" of the commandments. Why do they have to be so negative? If God cares enough about us to set us free, I imagine some people thinking, then why does it seem like God is trying to control us, to limit our freedom?

Now let's think about it for just a minute. Jesus experienced God as Abba, as father. All you mothers and fathers out there, all of us who have spent significant time caring for children, just think about when the children are very young. They're curious about everything. They want to touch everything. They want to put everything in their mouth. They want to get into anything and everything. And as a loving caregiver, you are trying to keep them alive. You want to do everything you can to keep them safe. And so you set boundaries for your children to keep them safe.

However, we do know any parent will tell you that children always push against the boundary. Can I get an amen from anyone? Children will always push against the boundary. I will say as a pastor, people push against the boundary. We really do not like to be told no. But really, only the most naive among us will assume that true freedom means total freedom from restraints. I just think of our dog, Daisy. If Daisy were allowed to run completely free with no restraints, she might catch sight of another dog and dash across our busy street in front of the house to chase it, and that would get Daisy killed for sure. Because we love Daisy, we provide restraints that keep her safe, that help her enjoy the world in ways that are good for her and for the other creatures around her. God, who has brought people out of slavery, is setting some boundaries for the people so that they will remain free, so that they may live in peace and safety together, so that they may experience the fullness of life.

And this is the thing about God's commandments: every "thou shalt not," every no, is protecting a yes. God says no to the things that enslave us, that diminish us, or destroy life together, so that we can say yes to the things that make life free and whole for everyone. The no is never the point. "Thou shalt not" is not the point. The life God is protecting, the freedom God is protecting, the dignity God is protecting, that is the point.

With this framework in mind, we see that the commandments might sound like this: the no to other gods, the no to idols and their empty promises, protects a yes to trusting the God whose word is good, to trusting the God who sets us free, to recognizing what is truly holy. No to using God's name to manipulate or to threaten or to serve our own agenda means yes to honoring God with humility and with reverence. No to endless work, to treating ourselves or anyone else as machines for production, is a yes to Sabbath, to rest, to delight, recreation, and remembering that the world does not stop turning because you take a break. Remember, a pause here, remember who God is speaking to in these commandments: former slaves, people whose lives had been measured by how much they produced. God says, you're free now, you can stop.

No to dishonoring those from whom we have received life means yes to honoring those who came before us, while telling the truth about what we've inherited, and choosing what we will bring forward. No to violence and to the destruction of life is a yes to reverence, to life, and for life. No to betrayal and broken promises and the cheapening of intimacy is a yes to faithfulness to the covenants that we make, yes to trust and intimacy cherished. No to taking what belongs to another is a yes to respecting our neighbors and building a community where theft is unnecessary because all have enough. No to lies, slander, and words that destroy another person is a yes to truth spoken in love and words that build one another up. No to coveting, to allowing someone else's life or possessions to make us dissatisfied with our own, is a yes to gratitude, to generosity, and to rejoicing in our neighbors' good.

Every no protects a yes. Every boundary opens space for life to be lived well, and a world shaped by all those yeses, what a wonderful world that would be.

That world isn't here yet. We still go so far astray. Think again with me about Sabbath. God says to people who have been slaves, whose worth was measured by their productivity, you can stop. And not only you, did you notice? It's a great part of that commandment. Not just you, your children, your workers, the immigrant living among you. Even your animals get to stop. Give them a break. Everybody gets to rest.

Now imagine taking that commandment seriously in a culture where people work multiple jobs and still can't make ends meet, where paid leave is a luxury for many, where productivity so easily becomes a measure of our human worth. It's one thing to post the commandment on a classroom wall, but are we willing to build a society in which people can actually live it? And we could ask that question not just about Sabbath, but about the one about idolatry, or truth telling, or violence, or faithfulness, slander, greed, and whether our neighbors have enough.

Even after all this time, we continue to misunderstand. We can turn even the commandments themselves into monuments, into idols, things to display and defend, rather than a way of life to practice. Are we hopeless? Sometimes I just wonder, are we hopeless? Is the answer to be found in posting bigger and heavier versions of the Ten Commandments wherever possible?

I don't believe we're hopeless. Newsflash: I don't believe we're hopeless. And I don't think, surprise, surprise, I don't think our hope lies in mandated public posting of the commandments. Our hope is found in the public living of the commandments.

Of course, to live the ways of God, we need to know them. We need to learn and study what they really mean for us in our time and place. We need to understand the law of God and teach the law of God in appropriate ways and in appropriate contexts. We need to understand that the commandments set us free to live together in such a way that nobody has to be enslaved, exploited, violated, betrayed, robbed, lied about, or consumed by another person's greed. Do I want to say that one again? Can I say that one again? There was a lot in there. Let me just say it again: the commandments set us free. They set us free. Oh, Lord, I'm going to say it again, they set us free to live together in such a way that nobody has to be enslaved, exploited, violated, betrayed, robbed, lied about, or consumed by another person's greed.

The more we learn and live and teach the commandments in ways that reveal their freeing and life-giving purpose, the less they'll seem like stones hanging over people's heads, 500 pounds a commandment, ready to crush or imprison us. The more we live according to God's way, the closer we will be to that world of all those yeses, a world that is safe and peaceful and whole.

To see how to live according to the law, we only have to look as far as Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus, the fulfillment of the law in flesh, says, "Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls."

We know that this teaching of Jesus doesn't mean the way will be easy. All you have to do is love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength, and your neighbor as yourself, and you have to do 25 sets of 100 repetitions daily for the rest of your life. Doesn't mean it's easy to take on the yoke of Christ. It does mean that Jesus gives us grace and strength and stamina to live according to the way of God, not so that we might finally earn our freedom, because God has already set us free.

The commandments show us how to live together in ways that honor the life and the dignity of all. That is the weight God asks us to carry, not 5,000 pounds of stones strapped to our backs, but the light burden of learning day by day how to live God's freedom together. May that be so, and may the day come soon. Amen.

Beloved, my invitation for us today, and as we go into the week: I was wrestling and praying about this, and there are two things I want to suggest. One is that you consider the commandments. If you haven't read them over, take a look at them again and ask, is there one of these things that I need to study and pray over so that I can receive the freedom that God wants to give me through its practice? That's an invitation, take a look at them again. Some of it's a little confusing. You can read my sermon for help, but think about it: is there one of these commandments that you just need to sit with, to discover where God wants to give you more freedom through practicing that commandment?

And the second invitation I want to extend today, and encourage you to think about as we move closer into this fall season, is: how are you going to stay close to the word of God? How are you going to stay close to the practices that sustain life and life together, through your participation here at Foundry Church? Begin to pray about it. Look at those opportunities that are coming up for service, for learning, for community, and begin to get clear. Make some decisions, or make a decision, not more. We have to make too many decisions. Make one decision: where are you going to, what are you going to do, to help you really stay connected in ways that help sustain your life and your freedom? That's my invitation today. Amen.

Part III — We Know What We’re About · Calling as Public Witness

Date: August 16, 2026.   Text: Ephesians 4:11–1, Isaiah 6:5–8

Yongchi Rhie

 

Let me begin with a confession from someone I knew, and I suspect it's one that some of you share.

“For most of my life, I was a pew warmer. You know the type; maybe you are the type. I had my seat. Not just any seat; my seat, and heaven help the visitor who took it. I knew when to stand and when to sit. I could sing the first and last verse of any hymn and mumble convincingly through the middle. I knew exactly how long a sermon should go, and I would let the preacher know, with my eyebrows, when he had gone over. I gave the building the warmth of my body for one hour a week, and I called that church. I thought my job was to show up, to be moved when the sermon was good, to put something in the plate, and to go home. I thought the church was something that happened to me. Something performed for me. A service I attended, the way you attend a concert.”

And Paul writes to the Ephesians to tell us what the church actually is. Listen: “And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ.” Did you catch what that does to the pew-warmer’s dream? It calls it what it is: a beautiful, comfortable, church-shaped lie.

Now listen closely, because there is a famous comma hiding in this passage, and that comma has done more damage to the church than almost any heresy I know. If you grew up on the King James Bible, you heard it read like this: Christ "gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ." Do you hear those commas? Three tidy tasks, all handed to the professionals. The clergy perfect the saints, and the clergy do the work of the ministry, and the clergy build up the body — and you, the saint, you sit in your pew and receive it.

But that comma is not in the Greek. Hear the difference. The King James, with its commas, gives the clergy three jobs: they perfect the saints, and they do the ministry, and they build up the body — three tasks, all landing on the professionals, while you sit and receive. But in the Greek there are no three jobs. There is one sentence that moves, and it moves in a single direction, and it turns on two little words. The first is pros — it means toward. Christ gave the apostles and prophets and evangelists and pastors and teachers toward one thing, and one thing only: the equipping of the saints. That is the whole job of the leaders. To equip. And then the sentence hands off to a second word, eis — it means for the purpose of. Equipped for the purpose of the work of ministry. Do you feel the current change? In the King James, the ministry stops at the clergy. In the Greek, the clergy are just the on-ramp — and the ministry flows on, past them, to you. The gifted leaders are not the ministers. They are the equippers. You are the ministers. The staff is not the church. You are. The building on this corner is not the church. You — the living, breathing, gifted, called people of God — you are the church. One little comma turned the whole church into an audience. And Paul, in the Greek, quietly takes it out.

And so this morning I have come to preach against a heresy. Not the heresy you're bracing for. Not a heresy about the Trinity: we'll defend the Trinity another day. Not the prosperity gospel, though God knows it deserves a sermon. Not complementarianism, not any of the usual suspects we love to argue about online. No. The most persistent heresy in the American church is quieter and far more comfortable than any of those. It is the heresy of passivity. The heresy of the spectator. The quiet, respectable belief that faith is something you consume rather than something you carry.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer had a name for it. He called it cheap grace. "Cheap grace," he wrote, "is the grace we bestow on ourselves … grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ." It is grace as a service you attend, grace with no summons attached, grace you can sit inside of and never be changed by. Against that heresy, against that comfortable, safe, spectator faith, the whole witness of Scripture rises up and says: no.

Look at the word Paul uses for you. "The saints." Hoi hagioi — the holy ones. And here is the good news buried in that word: you are not holy because of the work you do. You will never do enough work to become holy. You are holy because you have been made holy — set apart, washed, claimed — in the redemption of Christ’s cross. Your holiness is not your achievement; it is Christ's gift. Peter says it plainly: you are "a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people." A priesthood — all of you. Not because you earned the collar, but because Christ tore the curtain. So when I call you a saint this morning, I am not flattering you and I am not burdening you. I am telling you your name. The one God already gave you.

 

Now hear me, because this can start to sound like a guilt trip and it is not. I am not asking you to become something you are not. I am asking you to own what you already are, and to let it be redefined. And I know that word can sting. So many of you have been “redefined” by a system that never asked — restructured, downsized, quietly shown the door. And when that happens, you feel it: lost, cast aside, no longer valuable, waiting for some new role, a new job, a new title to tell you who you are again. I am not going to stand up here and pretend that struggle isn’t real; it is real, and for some of you it is raw right now. But hear me: God’s redefining runs deeper than any of that. It does not wait on a title the world hands out. It names something about you that has already been claimed and honored by God — that you are a minister, that you are a saint, that your one ordinary life is already woven into the holy work of God. That is the kind of redefining that heals. And it invites you to stop living beneath your own name.

Because all of this equipping, Paul says, is "for building up the body of Christ." The body of Christ. Stop there with me. Now, I know exactly where your mind just went. The moment a preacher says "the body of Christ," every good churchgoer's brain jumps to the same passage — Paul's other letter, the one about the one body with many parts. You know the scene. Christ is the head, and the rest of us are the assorted body parts, and everyone's having a little argument.

The hand turns to the mouth and sniffs, "I don't need you." The foot is sulking in the corner, jealous of the eyes — because eyes sit up there in a place of honor and the foot spends its whole life down in the dirt, in the sock, in the shoe nobody wants to smell. The nose is having an existential crisis about whether it even counts because it's not an eye. It's a wonderful passage, and it's a little bit of a family squabble, and every one of us has been every one of those body parts. Some of us are the eyes on our good days and the foot on our worst. But hold that picture loosely for a second, because I don't want us to stop at the anatomy lesson.

What kind of body do you picture when you hear "the body of Christ"? It is not the glorious, weightless body of some ancestral heavenly being, floating serene above our troubles. And it is not merely our own ordinary body, fragile and failing and afraid. When I hear "the body of Christ," I think of the resurrected body. The body that went down into the cruelest, deadliest battle in human history, and came back. The body that conquered death itself.

And here is the thing I cannot get past: that resurrected body still carried its wounds. Christ rose, and he rose scarred. He kept the holes in his hands, the wound in his side. But listen, after the resurrection those scars mean something entirely new. They are no longer the receipt of an unjust system that tortured him. They are now the proof that the body survived; and Jesus holds them out to Thomas, the doubter, and says, "Put your finger here. Reach out your hand. Do not doubt, but believe." That is the body we are being built into. A body that carries its wounds without shame, and offers them to the doubting world as the very evidence that love outlasts death.

Which brings me to Isaiah, and to the most important thing I will say all morning about how any of us ends up doing the work of God. Isaiah is in the temple, and the whole place shakes with glory, and his first honest response is not "send me." It is despair. "Woe is me! I am lost. For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips." He knows he is not qualified. He knows the people around him are not qualified. And notice what God does not do. God does not say, "You're right, clean yourself up and come back when you're ready." No. One of the seraphs takes a live coal from the altar and touches it to Isaiah's mouth and says, "Your guilt has departed; your sin is blotted out." And only then, only after the cleansing, only after the grace, only after he is justified by a fire he did not light, then comes the question: "Whom shall I send?" And now Isaiah can answer: "Here am I. Send me."

Do you see the order? The commissioning did not come before the cleansing. Grace came first. You are not sent because you are qualified. You are sent because you have been called. And that means ministry is not a plan to you have to figure out; Ministry is presence. It is a cleansed and willing person saying, "Here I am." That's all. Here I am.

So let me talk about our body. About Foundry. We began this whole sermon series by saying: we know who we are. And to know who we are, we have to tell the truth about our whole body — the parts that make us proud and the parts we are still learning to confess. This is a body with a painful history of segregation. A body that shut down the ministers because of their skin color, a body that showed contempt when others demanded a seat on our table. And it is also a body embracing radical hospitality; it’s also a people who have planted gardens whose harvest they would never live to see, who practiced a sacred resistance rooted not in rage but in grace and in hope. Some of our story makes us proud. Some of our story we are still trying to admit out loud, still seeking reconciliation for.

There is the courage of public witness in this body, and there is the fatigue of fighting battles that never seem to end. And here is the gospel: all of it — the pride and the shame, the courage and the exhaustion, the scars and the survival — all of it is the body of Foundry. A scarred body. A resurrected body. Being built, Paul says, "until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ."

Now indulge me one moment, because my name has something to say here. In Chinese character, Yong means to melt and Chi means wisdom. So my name, "Yongchi" carries the sense of melting everything down and turning it into wisdom. And I stand in a church called Foundry. A foundry, you know, is the place where metal is thrown into the fire, melted past all its old shapes, and poured into a mold to be made into something useful. Friends, I don't think that's an accident. This is what God is doing to us. We are melted down by the fire of the Holy Spirit. We are cleansed by the same burning coal that touched Isaiah's lips. And then we are molded — poured, shaped, set — and equipped. Equipped to be the ministers for the holy work of the kindom of God. That is what a foundry is for. Not to admire the fire, but to throw ourselves into the fire, and to be made into something that gets used.

And what does the maker say when the tool is finally ready? He says: go. The last word of Jesus was not "stay," or “remember me”.  It was "go into all the world." But hear me: I am not sending you off to some far mission field across an ocean. You are not being voluntold to fill a gap because the pastors are simply too busy. No. Go where you are supposed to go. Go to your home. Go to your family, Go to your friends. Go to your workplace on Monday morning. Go to your support group, because they need to see you and you need to see them — both of you still refusing to give up. Go but with your role redefined by the mission of God. Go and preach — with your words, with your life. Go visit someone who is frightened and alone. Go to your city – and serve not the anxious little kingdoms of status and fear — but serve your Lord. The One who first cleansed your unclean lips, and anointed them, and then turned to you and asked, "Whom shall I send?"

So here is my invitation and what I am asking. Not a volunteer slip. Not a program. Not a signature. Something braver: I am going to ask you to name, out loud or with your body, where God has sent you. However you can — stand up if you’re able, or raise your hand, or simply call it out from where you sit. Just a word. Just the name of the place your feet already carry the gospel.

But before I give it, I need to say two things gently, because I know both are in this room. The first is for anyone who is visiting today, or still just getting to know Foundry. You may not have a ministry to name yet — you haven’t plugged in anywhere, and that is completely fine. You do not have to stand, you do not have to prove you’re ready, and no one is counting. Just be encouraged: God already calls you part of the body of Christ, exactly as you are this morning, before you’ve signed up for a single thing.

And the second is for anyone for whom this next moment may feel like an altar call — because for some of you, an altar call is not a warm memory. Maybe you were called forward once by a church that used the moment to shame you, to pressure you, to tell you that you were not enough or did not belong. Maybe the church is the very place you were wounded. If that is you, I will not pretend the wound isn’t real. But remember the body we are being built into — the resurrected Christ, who did not hide his scars but held them out: “put your finger here.” We are a body that carries its wounds without shame. Your wound from the church is not a disqualification; in the risen body it can become the very proof that you survived and still came back to God. You do not have to be unscarred to be sent. You only have to be here.

So don’t be shy. When the Spirit nudges you, name it — get on your feet, or lift your hand, or call it out from your seat. Prayer team. Stephen Ministry. ID Ministry. Welcome and greeting. Children’s ministry. Family ministry. Discipleship Ministry. Small-group teaching. The LGBTQ+ community. Social and Racial Justice ministry. Music. The altar and worship. The board and the business of this church. Books to Prison. Hospitality. Whatever it is, whoever you are — don’t keep it to yourself. Name it, because the body needs to see itself, and the body needs to hear its own members say, out loud: here am I.

Because you are not a consumer of grace. You are a carrier of it. So make your song louder. Make your community visible. Make your story heard. Let your prayer be lifted. Be loud. Be joyful. Be courageous. Be bold. Be loved — and love God and love your neighbor — all of it for the glory of the God who has already called you a holy one, and who is asking you, right now, in this room: whom shall I send? And your answer? Here I am. Send me.

We are the church. Now Here we are. Let's go.

Amen.

A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger E. Gaines-Cirelli with Foundry UMC, August 2, 2026, tenth Sunday after Pentecost. “We Know Who We Are”series.

​​​   Texts: Romans 15:5-7; Luke 19:1-10​​​​

 

For days now, I’ve been ruminating on what it means to say of Foundry: “No outsiders here…” The clear intent of the phrase is to suggest that no one will be turned away, ignored, left out, or treated as less than. It’s one of Foundry’s corevalues to “make especially sure that people who feel excluded elsewhere are welcomed and invited to be an integral part of our congregation.” As Guy preached so powerfully last week, our biblically-rooted convictions around inclusion, affirmation, equity, and diversity are clear—regardless of the critiques those convictions draw.

Our goal is to practice what we preach—to mean it when we say you are welcome here “no matter what.” As I study our texts for today it becomes clear that, to do that, we can’t rely on our banners outside or the words of welcome we repeat at the beginning of every service to carry all our welcome water. We can’t settle for our core values tucked onto a webpage to be the only communication of our commitment to cultivate a certain kind of community. We can’t get so comfortable that we forget what it is like to be a stranger in a strange land, or to forget that souls tend to be shy and that people carry wounds that are often invisible to the eye. To truly advance our goal of radical welcome, we need a more muscular strategy, theologically and biblically grounded, physically embodied, and embedded in the very DNA of our congregation. And our texts provide the guidance we need.

The few verses from Romans 15 that were read aloud today are a summary of at least two chapters of Paul’s letter to the church in Rome. That community was experiencing deep tensions between Jewish and Gentile Christians—driven by disagreements related to Torah observance, holy days, and dietary practices. These issues were flashpoints for deeper questions: Who belongs? Whose interpretation of Torah is correct? What practices are central to our shared life? Paul writes to a diverse people who are all trying to follow Jesus. They have different backgrounds—some began as highly observant Jews and others as pagan Gentiles. But here’s the thing they have in common: they have all been welcomed “προσλαμβάνω (proslambanō)” by Christ. And because of that, Paul teaches, they need to welcome one another in the same way.

The question then, is how does Christ welcome people?

Our familiar text from Luke 19 helps us answer the question. For those who may not be familiar with the story of the “wee little man,” Zacchaeus, here’s some context. Just before our story Jesus has welcomed children his disciples tried to send away, taught a rich ruler what it would take for him to enter the kin-dom, and showed mercy to a begger at the roadside who asked Jesus to restore his sight.

Then Jesus enters the prosperous city of Jericho where his reputation precedes him. People know he is coming by. And Zacchaeus, a rich, chief tax collector wants to see him. Now to be a tax collector in that time and place was to be associated with the exploitation, violence, and ritual impurity of the Roman empire. A “chief” tax collector was at least in middle management—if not the CEO of collusion. All of that to say, Zacchaeus was not popular or trusted, but rather seen by the general public as an enemy and a threat.

The crowds must have been shocked when the CEO climbs a tree— high profile, wealthy men didn’t climb trees. Zacchaeus’ willingness to do so suggests something in him was already stirring. Jesus picks up on that and proceeds to invite himself over.

The text says, Zacchaeus “hurried down and was happy to welcome Jesus.”

The crowds were not so happy. Why is Jesus going in to share table fellowship with this sinner?

Because Jesus makes it his habit to welcome and befriend those whom others want nothing to do with. Children, beggars, the ill and disabled, women; and with those others judged as sinners—including rich tax collectors. Jesus puts it this way: “I came to seek out and save the lost.” And based on the whole story of Jesus, the “lost” include both those who inflict harm and those who suffer it. So which category of “lost” is Zacchaeus?

In one sense, he’s the one doing harm as he supports an exploitive and unjust regime. But the crowd has also written him off as unworthy of fellowship with Jesus and beyond the possibility of change. Jesus’ action creates an opportunity for transformation—not only for Zacchaeus, but also for those who have decided that he is nothing more than a hopeless sinner.

That day salvation comes because everyone is reminded that Zacchaeus is also a son of Abraham, a beloved child of God, worthy of mercy and care, capable of growth and change.

Jesus’ welcome is fueled by the love of God: love strong enough to receive each of us as we are, and strong enough to call us toward growth, change, and restored relationship. That means Jesus’ welcome is not a cheap welcome characterized as indiscriminate acceptance and “anything goes.” Nor is it conditional welcome that requires change as the price of admission. It is welcome offered not simply for comfort, but for transformation through God’s embrace and mercy.

So back to us, what does it mean for Foundry to say, “no outsiders here?”

We rightly celebrate that people who have been excluded elsewhere often discover a home at Foundry. But every church eventually develops its own insiders and outsiders. We instinctively know whom we trust. And, if we’re honest, we instinctively know whom we’ve already decided not to trust.

If Jesus were walking through Washington today who would make us grumble if they showed up to see him? Whose house would surprise and disturb us if Jesus said, “That’s where I’m going to dinner.”?

Part of the invitation for us is to consider if there are those we really want to remain “outsiders”—if there are limits to our welcome. //

That question leads us to something Fr. Greg Boyle says. After decades in Los Angeles accompanying gang members through violence, incarceration, and new beginnings, Fr. Boyle writes:

“Human beings…settle for a puny, vindictive God when we are being nudged always closer to this wildly inclusive, larger-than-any life God. We allow our sense of God to atrophy. We settle for the illusion of separation when we are endlessly asked to enter into kinship with all.”

Our wildly inclusive God asks us to enter into kinship with all. Even when it’s hard. Through his journey with those whom others fear, judge, or write off as hopeless cases, Fr. Boyle knows something about that kind of kinship.

Paul doesn’t ask the diverse members of the church in Rome to agree on every matter of faith and practice, but to learn how to enter into kinship with one another in the manner of Christ. He asks believers to become more committed to welcoming one another than they are to winning every disputed argument.

Jesus creates space for people in Jericho to remember that even public enemy #1 is a sibling and a beloved child of God who is not beyond God’s capacity to save AND that they are also the “lost”—the recipients of harm, the grumblers, the judgy ones—who Jesus came to seek out—and who need some saving as well.

That is the pattern of Christ’s welcome. And it is the pattern our welcome is meant to follow.

Radical welcome—which is Christ’s welcome—is neither cheap welcome nor conditional welcome.

At Foundry, everyone is welcome. No matter what. No conditions required. //

But no one is welcome to deny someone else’s belovedness. No one is welcome to demean another child of God. No one is welcome to make this community unsafe for those Christ has welcomed. And no one is welcome to declare a person beyond God’s capacity to save while forgetting that we all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23).

The boundary, then, is not ideology. The boundary is love.

And that means radical welcome asks more of us than hanging banners and opening the doors. It asks us to notice who enters and still feels invisible. It asks us to cross the room, learn a name, make space at the table, and remain curious about a life we do not yet understand. It asks us to confront harm when it occurs—not because we have stopped loving the person doing harm, but because love refuses to abandon either the one being wounded or the one whose soul is being diminished by the wounding. It asks us to believe that transformation is possible, even in people we have given up on.

And perhaps most difficult of all, it asks us to remain open to our own transformation—to the possibility that Christ may expose the limits of our welcome, unsettle our assumptions, and lead us into kinship with someone we would never have chosen for ourselves.

This is the more muscular welcome to which we are called. Not mere politeness. Not tolerance from a safe distance. Not the pride of believing that we are already the welcoming people and everyone else needs to catch up. It is the patient, courageous, embodied work of becoming a community where strangers become neighbors and neighbors become siblings; where those who have been pushed aside are drawn into the center; where harm is named and interrupted; where repentance is possible; and where grace keeps making more of us than we believed we could become. The measure of our welcome is not whether people like us feel comfortable. The measure is whether people unlike us encounter the welcome of Christ through us.

That is a demanding call.

But it begins not with what we are able to accomplish. It begins with what Christ has already done. Christ has welcomed us. Christ has come looking for us when we were lost. And Christ has not given up on us.

So we do not practice radical welcome in order to prove that we are good people or the right kind of church. We welcome because we have been welcomed. We make room because Christ has made room for us. We enter into kinship because, through grace, Christ has already made us one.

“Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.” Amen.

 

Benediction: May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

A sermon preached by Guy Cecil with Foundry UMC, July 26, 2026. “We Know Who We Are” series.