A widow’s hope

By way of a preface to my sermon from yesterday, I finished this sermon the day before the election. With everything happening, I wanted to be grounded in my “why” of preaching. For me that motivating force continues to be hope.

So this week, I found hope in the story of two women who, very aware of the reality of their situations, responded to God’s Word. They did not overlook their dire circumstance. They saw the world’s brokenness and unfaithfulness and dared to hope.

This week I have also read again Verse 8 of Pauli Murray’s poem “Dark Testament.”

Hope is a crushed stalk
Between clenched fingers
Hope is a bird’s wing
Broken by a stone.
Hope is a word in a tuneless ditty —
A word whispered with the wind,
A dream of forty acres and a mule,
A cabin of one’s own and a moment to rest,
A name and place for one’s children
And children’s children at last . . .
Hope is a song in a weary throat.
Give me a song of hope
And a world where I can sing it.
Give me a song of faith
And a people to believe in it.
Give me a song of kindliness
And a country where I can live it.
Give me a song of hope and love
And a brown girl’s heart to hear it.

And now a sermon offered on the 25th Sunday after Pentecost, November 10, 2024, at St. Catherine’s Episcopal Church in Chelsea, Alabama. Principal Texts: Mark 12:38-44; 1 Kings 17:8-16.