[Sermon] Open Eyes, Open Hands
Pastor Hector Garfias-Toledo
October 4, 2026 + Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost + A Wider Table Week 1
Most of us were taught to close our eyes at the table. Pastor Hector remembers the day he peeked and found his cousin praying with eyes wide open, looking at the feast God had already prepared. Isaiah sings of a vineyard planted with care, and Jesus tells of tenants who forgot whose it was. Paul lays down his own impressive resume in Philippians and counts it as nothing next to what he has received. On this first Sunday of A Wider Table, we are invited to come with open eyes and open hands, ready to receive. Generosity begins in awe, and the table is already set.
Sermon Transcript
From YouTube's automatic captions, lightly edited by AI for readability.
Grace to you and peace from God, Abba, Father, Mother, Creator, and the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior, our Lord, who prepares the table for all creation. And we say, amen. I was going to look at the table, but I forgot that I need to put my hands behind, because David knows that I break things around here.
How are you doing today? Perfecto. Perfecto.
I hope that you had the opportunity to receive your materials for the journey of this month, with a letter, your devotional, and your commitment card. I received them. I received them at home, and when I saw Trinity Lutheran Church & Schools, I said, "Oh, that church name sounds familiar." I don't know why.
So I would like to ask you, just for a few moments, to engage in a brief conversation with one another. I will say, for those of you who prefer to reflect and to think by yourselves, that is fine, and we need to honor that. But if you feel that you would like to share with someone else and just interact with somebody else, you can do that too. If you see someone who cannot have the mobility to go over the building, just please go and visit with them. And the two questions basically are very simple. If you received the materials or you had a chance to see them, what called your attention in these materials for this season called A Wider Table, this generosity initiative for the coming year? What caught your attention, or what does a wider table mean to you? So, take a moment, look at someone who seems to be willing to share something. If not, you can stay in your place, and let's talk for a couple of minutes.
And remember that I'm going to ask you questions after that. For those of you who participate online, you can put your thoughts or insights in the chat section of YouTube.
Okay, let's share. I don't like when I ask you to talk and then I need to stop you, but you can continue the conversation after the worship service. I would like to invite one or two of you who would like to share what you heard in the conversation. Not what you think, but what you heard in your conversation, because this means we need to practice good listening. What did you hear in your conversation about this specific theme for the generosity initiative of this year? Anyone who wants to say something?
[from the congregation] We need more money.
We need more money. You mean we or I need more money?
[from the congregation] We need more money as a congregation.
That's one thing that we heard. One more. One or two. Say again.
[from the congregation] Forming a prayer group.
Thank you. One more.
[from the congregation] I always remember the words we used last year: building, belonging, and becoming, which I think is part of our statement as a congregation.
Building, belonging, becoming. I invite you to keep these things in mind as we reflect on the scriptures, and, as I said earlier, I hope and I pray that later, after this service and during the month, you will continue with this conversation together.
So, as David said, this is the time earlier, in the first meeting that we had before the worship service. This is the time when, good news, I was able to take morning walks, finally. So I was so glad, and I'm walking now again. You will see me zooming without my scooter anymore. You will see me zooming here in church. But I was walking last Friday in the early morning. It was a foggy morning on the fall here in the Pacific Northwest. And of course, I mean, there's no raining in the past few days, but I'm walking on these dry streets, passing by a foresty area. There are no cars, surprisingly, so I can hear perfectly what's going on around me. And then, by this foresty area, I hear rain. And I say, "Okay, my foot is better, but I think the rest of my body is not feeling right now. Something is wrong with me now." So I keep walking, and I keep hearing rain, and then I realized that it was raining. It was raining in the foresty area. Why? Because the fog was condensating on the leaves of the trees and making the fog into drops of water that were watering the area, the plants that grow below the trees.
And this was for me a perfect metaphor of what I believe we are celebrating for the next few Sundays: that the grace and the mercy of God is surrounding us and each one of us. The only thing that we need to do is to be willing to be exposed to that grace and transform it with our lives into the blessing that blesses everything else. We are the channels of God's grace and mercy.
We are talking about these few days with these images that today we have in the Gospel according to Matthew and the letter of Paul to the Philippians. These images made me think of this experience that I had last Friday, when we talk about the nature of the vineyard that is pictured in these passages. A vineyard that brings ideas or images of organic growth, uncontrollable growth, interdependence, fruitfulness, and more than anything else, of seasons, cycles of dying and rising again.
This is the source of God's generosity, a source that keeps giving, a synergy that keeps happening between God's grace, the very nature of God, and each one of us, as God's creatures, as God's people, in a relationship that is intimate, in a relationship that is perennial and present every day.
It is interesting for me when I look at the history of the church, when I see how churches, denominational bodies, through the centuries, we have come to this idea that the vineyard has to be something majestic that we build, that the vineyard becomes a building that contains the church and where it is expected that the church will gather. It is unfortunate that sometimes the churches themselves become, I mean, the buildings become the church, that we forget that the church is the people of God. We make, and we tend to make, these wonderful statements about how great, how wonderful, how beautiful, how costly buildings are, as a resume of the things that we accomplish and the things that we possess. And St. Paul reminds us of that, with his list of credentials and his resume that he presents in his letter to the Philippians. And then churches become congregations, and denominations become these solid rugs filled with dogmas and doctrines and expectations that prevent us from a natural and organic connection with one another and with God. We are led to believe that the building is what brings God to the community. And not only that, we tend to take ownership of that building.
So what if, my siblings in Christ, today's passages are actually pointing back to creation, when God created everything? God's original intent for all creation was, "It's good. And now go be fruitful and multiply." From the very beginning of the story, we have a God who is providing everything that is needed, and the only thing that we had to do is embrace it and let it be fruitful and multiply. Just as that fog was becoming drops of water that were watering the ground so that the plants at the bottom can grow and bring the fruits, so the next year we can have the blueberries again and other things. This is the image that God brings to us today.
And then, as I was thinking of this, as I was trying to connect all this with a table, with the theme of this month's generosity initiative, it took me back to many, many, and actually I realize many, many, many years ago, because I was like seven or eight years old at that time, when the earth was younger. And I remember, and you know that some people assume that, being Mexican, I love soccer. I watch soccer sometimes, but I don't love it. So don't tell other Mexicans about that. But anyway, that's another story.
Anyway, every Sunday after the worship service, where we used to attend with my father's brother, my uncle, and my cousins, it was the ritual of the Sunday. As soon as the service ended, we were out to his house, where there was a table that was already ready, because the family was coming, and the TV, because my father and my uncle, and two of my cousins love to watch soccer. I let them watch soccer. I sat somewhere else. And then by the time when everybody was called to the table, as I have also shared with you, growing up in a family where we're very strict in the traditions and the piety on how we do things, when you sit at the table you pray for the food, which is good and encouraged, but we were supposed to close our eyes, because we are praying, and we cannot pray with open eyes, right? That's the piety that I grew up with.
So the time of prayer comes, and always one of my cousins was going to pray. So for many, many occasions, I closed my eyes, trying to obey and follow the tradition. But I heard that my cousin, every time he was praying, he was saying, and I'm going to say it in Spanish first and then I will translate [Spanish]. So, "I thank you, God, dear God, actually daddy, for all the food that we are receiving today. Thank you for the beans and the tortillas and the lettuce and the hot dogs." And for many, many times I was like, how can he memorize all the food that we are going to eat? So one day I had to take a bold step, and I broke the rules. So when he was praying and going through the whole menu, I opened my eye, and I said, "How can you know all the food?" and I looked at him, and he was, "Okay, gracias…." with open eyes, looking at the food. I say, well, I was tricked here for all these many years.
But this makes me think, my siblings in Christ, that maybe that is the attitude with which God wants us to come to the table that God has already prepared through Jesus our Lord: that when we come, we come with open eyes and with open hands to be ready to receive the tortillas, the beans, and the hot dogs that were ready for us. That we are going to be ready to enjoy it, and to remember that there is a place for us and for every person that we cannot imagine but that God has in God's heart to invite to that table, that we are able to see the abundance that is in front of us. He was excited about the feast.
So the question that rises in my heart is, what do we see before us now that can propel us to open our hearts and our whole being to enjoy and to join the feast, the table, that God has prepared for this congregation, so that you and I can transform these blessings into blessings for the community?
I'm going to conclude with a couple of slides in a moment, but I just want you to think that God has entrusted to us and call us to be stewards of that abundance. We don't need to do anything. Just embrace with joy the blessing of joining God's table. No credentials, no titles, no impressive resumes, not a log of how many years we have been Lutherans. Just the willingness to embrace, in humble joy and boldness, what God has brought before us. Because this is not about wealth. This is not about position or status. This is about the God-given dignity that God has given to all people, and we have it already, as God has given us the gift of grace.
So let's look at the first slide. Thank you. So in the New Testament, we have stories of the church gathering. And if you notice, it doesn't say necessarily in Acts 2 or 5 or 8 or 10 or 11 or 12 that they were gathering in majestic buildings. Where were they gathering? In the houses, in the homes. Cornelius, and Mary's, and the jailer's, and Lydia, and Titus, and Prisca, and Philemon. The church was gathering in homes, at tables. I believe that in every home there was a table where they could gather, right, and on top of that table there were beans and tortillas and hot dogs that they were going to eat together.
And at that table, in the next slide, and I use this, borrowing this from another resource of a church that is also using a table as an image, is that the church was where the table was present. Remember when I tell you, you're ready to be the church every day. Remember that you are going to be the scattered church, the extension of your table. Metaphorically or realistically, I mean, putting the table at your home, opening the table at your home, is an extension of the table that God has prepared.
A church where people gather around, where you see the letters that spell table. It's a place where we come to gather together by God's grace. It is a place where we ask questions, and we have the opportunity to share the journey that we are walking. A place where we talk about the stories in the Bible that help us to connect with the stories of grace and God present through history. It is a place where we listen, where we live out that faith, but also where we have an empty chair: the chair that God has prepared for us, and at the same time, the chair that God invites us to have always open for the people that God has invited to our table.
Generosity begins in awe. Before we offer anything back, God has already cultivated a vineyard and prepared the feast. We move from an ownership mindset to a posture of grateful caretaking.
The table is set for us and for all creation, as a sign of God's generosity and a model for us to be an extension of that table in joyful response. And that, my siblings in Christ, is the good news. Thanks be to God. Amen.
