A sermon for the Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost: Proper 22
October 4, 2026, at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Hot Springs, AR
Readings: Isaiah 5:1-7; Psalm 80:7-14; Philippians 3:4b-14; Matthew 21:33-46
We learn early on to count our losses and gains. Growing up I had a toy abacus, one of those ancient instruments for counting and commerce. It had five or so rows of different colored beads. I would move the different colored beads from one side to the other to count and compare sides of a ledger, keeping track of what was pulling ahead, what was falling behind. I think the point of the toy was to help with math. But at a deeper level, perhaps, toys like this make us learn to attach value to things, to quantify everything. The one who has more is the winner, and that’s good. That means you’re worth something. The one who has nothing–or worse, the one who has less than nothing, who owes something–is the loser, less than. We can calculate worth on the beads of an abacus.
Continue reading “Break the Abacus”
