Today is World Communion Sunday and Christians worldwide are celebrating the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. The bread is being broken in China and Haiti. The wine is being poured Africa and Guatemala. Again, we are reminded by the words of Jesus that as we consume the food and drink that we also consume his trust and love for God and make it part of our own lives and that we love one another, his primary commandment to us.

There is an opportunity for intimacy when people share a supper, a meal together. Eating and drinking across the table is a leveler in a way. No matter who we are, poor or rich, powerful or weak, young or old, we have the same daily need for nourishment to keep our bodies alive and functioning. No matter what nationality or role in society, we all chew and swallow and digest our food in the same way. When we invite people into our home for dinner or suggest lunch out together in a restaurant, we expect a time of talking, sharing of ideas and thoughts and maybe some personal stories as we go through the habitual experience of consuming our meal. Ideally there is a sense of trust and camaraderie between us. In restaurants that we frequent, the faces of strangers become recognizable over time. We nod and greet them even if we don’t yet know their names. The familiarity of shared mealtimes has the power to break down barriers through the common experience. Today, people worldwide are invited by Jesus to sit at the table of grace and love. We will begin the Communion, as is our tradition, by mending any broken relationships and greeting each other in peace. We are asked to do that by our host Jesus offering his peace to each other, not the peace that the world gives. "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid." His peace is not always peaceful for us in the way we traditionally think of it. The peace that he offers can be frightening when held up against the world’s idea of peace.

Ima Jean Edwards experienced that difference between the world’s peace and the peace of Jesus in Greensboro, North Carolina over thirty years ago. Her story is told by Westminster’s Alison Owings in her newly published book, Hey, Waitress, subtitled The USA from the Other Side of the Tray. It began as a collection of stories about waitresses across the country but soon became a study of how we treat each as human beings. Ima Jean’s piece as relayed by Owings begins like this. "On February 1, 1960, four teenage male students from a local college went downtown, entered the Woolworth’s department store, bought a few items, walked over to the store’s sizable and popular lunch area, and sat down at a counter. They assumed that the waitress who came over would say she could not serve them. She was white, they were black, and they were right. Then they said they would not leave."¹ It was the beginning of a movement that changed our nation all because of what a waitress could or would not do. Though it was non-violent, the act was not peaceful as the world calls peace. Ima Jean, who was not the waitress but was a counter-helper nearby, continued the story by saying, "’The next day they came back with more added at probably about eleven o-clock….Well, I seen them come in and sit down, you know, and they asked to be served, and then they just sit, they didn’t move. The waitresses worked more or less around them….They were dressed fine and behaved in a good manner.’ Ima Jean did sense a change in the air. ‘There was a difference. Yes, there was a tension. As time wore on, it was more tension.’"² There were snippy comments from some customers. There were members of the kitchen staff, also black, who were strongly against the action. One or two asked the students why they were trying to cause such trouble. As word got around, soon the whole counter was full of protestors without room left to serve the regular customers. Owings writes, "One photograph shows the students sitting in a row, neatly dressed, heads high, drenched with whatever had been thrown at them by onlookers. A mob of white people, mostly young men, screamed inches from the students’ faces. The photograph oozes hatred…"³

Ima Jean’s husband urged her to quit her job but she chose to stay saying that along with her, others of the waitresses were against segregation at the lunch counter. She remembered, "’It didn’t seem right. I felt like they should have been treated equally as we were. I guess that leads back to the Bible. How does it go?’ she laughed some, trying to remember. ‘Treat each…Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’"³

With Ima Jean’s introduction, Owings was able to speak by phone with another Woolworth’s employee, Geneva Tisdale, who became one of the first three African American customers served at the counter. As the sit-in began, from her work in the kitchen she could see that something was happening. She said, "It kind of shook me up because all you can think of is trouble. As long as it was just all white, you had no problem."⁴ "As the sit-in continued, Geneva’s focus changed. She recalled, ‘The more they got into it, I started thinking.’ She started wondering why black people could spend their money everywhere in the store but the sit-down counter… She said, ‘We all started thinking about it. The girls and I, we all talked about it, because we couldn’t sit down there either. We worked there, and we couldn’t sit at the counter. We were the ones fixing all the food for them to eat, but we felt we weren’t good enough to sit at the counter.’ As her consciousness rose, so did her anxiety. ‘I didn’t know what was going to happen, and I was carrying my third child then, and I really was scared.’"

Geneva’s husband was also worried but it was her supervisor, Rachel Holt, who convinced her to go home and rest until the baby came. Soon after her baby was born, the sit-in succeeded and the counters were to be opened to all people. Rachel Holt devised a plan. Geneva and two other kitchen workers would come to work in street clothes and be the first African Americans to be served at Woolworth’s. Geneva will never forget that day and that egg-salad sandwich served to her at the counter by one of her fellow employees. She quickly and nervously ate it. As she swallowed down the last bite, she hurried back to the kitchen, changed to her work clothes and began preparing food for the photographers and many, many people who came to be served and to observe that day.

Come to the table and receive the peace of Christ, but not the peace that the world gives. Even at that Last Supper, tensions were rising. Peter, after much refusal, finally accepted Jesus’ offer to wash his feet but was forced to hear Jesus’ prediction that Peter would deny him three times. Peter was still welcomed at the table.

Jesus, feeling deeply disturbed, told them all that one among them would betray him. Tensions rose as they all looked at each other wondering who it would be. Peter whispered to the one Jesus loved and said, "Ask who it is he means." To the question Jesus replied, "It is the one to whom I give the piece of bread that I dip in the dish." He dipped the bread and offered it to Judas Iscariot saying, "What you are going to do, do quickly."

God’s peace is not peace as the world thinks. It is not the absence of problems or differences. It is not lying in a hammock on a beach in Hawaii. It comes to us as we live into a life that is committed to all God’s people, all of God’s humanity. It comes in moments of welcoming the stranger on the school grounds, in the office, in the pew. It comes in offering a meal to a hungry person and then sitting down at the table and sharing the meal and conversation. On Thursdays, here in Findlay Hall, you have that opportunity. There can be tension. There can be fear as we move into God’s peace.

God’s peace comes to us as we seek out people whose backgrounds and life experiences are different from ours, as we try to recognize and understand, to speak and to listen, listen, listen. In February, you are invited to join with others of this congregation to travel to the Mexico/U.S. border and hear what life is like as a migrant, as a factory worker, and a citizen of Mexico living only a few feet from the United States. How do our lives affect others and what can we do that will contribute to peace? Today at 11:30, filmmaker Rachel Antell offers us her documentary that offers a brief insight into the struggles of a young girl in Mexico.

Today we all are worried about the prospect of war with Iraq. What is the most peaceful life-affirming response to the crisis that has been predicted by our national leaders? We don’t know how much to believe about the weapons accumulated or the bio-terrorism capabilities. If we make the first strike, what will be the second strike? Many of us hope for the "sit at the counter" approach. Will inspectors be allowed to come in quietly and stay there observing all the sites including the palaces? It is hard for us to trust that it will happen that way though it appears to be the most life-affirming response.

As we come to the Lord’s Table today joining with people from all over the world, we understand why Jesus said, "Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid." Yet, he offers and promises his peace to us whether we are sitting at a lunch counter or fighting homelessness in Marin County or sharing tortillas with a family in Mexico or writing letters to our President or Congress members or welcoming home for an afternoon play date a child who is longing for friends. We come to the Table today with people worldwide to be nourished and sustained for the opportunity to live life in God’s peace. May we open our hearts to God’s calling for us.

1. Owings, Alison, Hey Waitress, p. 37

2. ibid p. 41

3. ibid p.42

4. ibid p. 44