“The Sneetches” Galatians 3:28 James 2:1-4

We have now reached our last Sunday in our sermon series about finding the gospel message in the stories of Dr. Seuss. This week we are going to focus on one of the stories that isn’t as well known by the good doctor, The Sneetches, which my computer tried to change to “snitches” each and every time I typed it. 

The Sneetches tells the tale of a community where two different type of inhabitants live - the Sneetches with stars on their belly and those without - aptly called star bellied and plain bellied. One would think that society would be fine with these two different types of Sneetches living in community but that was not the case. The Sneetches with stars on their bellies considered themselves to be superior to those with plain bellies. They walked past them without acknowledging their presence. They wouldn’t share picnics together or let their children play together. 

Brothers and sisters, is this sounding a bit familiar? We, too, live in a divided society today -though we think if we don’t talk about it then it must not be so. But I’m reminded of the division in society every time I eat at a restaurant with my best friend, who is bi-racial, and the waiter or waitress, regardless of their race will always ask me to order first. Divisions are deep and real in this country still today. But what makes the entire situation sadder, for both the Sneetches and for us, is that those plain bellied Sneetches bought into the lie. They believed they were not worthy, were not of value, and instead of embracing who they are, they wanted to become like the star-bellied Sneetches - those who looked down upon them and despised them. 

If any people should be proclaiming that all people matter to God, it should be the Church. The apostle Paul writes to the church in Galatians that there are no distinctions in the body of Christ, no one is better than anyone else, and I can guarantee that made just about everyone angry. The Jews thought that they were better then the gentiles, as God’s chosen people - yet there is no Jew nor Greek. Those that were free look down upon those who were slaves, both indentured and those by birth - yet there was no slave nor free. Men thought they owned women as property, and all of the religious teachings and political laws of the time were set up to agree with them - yet there is no male nor female. For there is no distinction outside of the most important one that we all bear “child of God.”

Spiritual author Henri Nouwen rocked my world in college with his short piece Life of the Beloved. To date it is the spiritual writing that I have gifted and handed out the most. The pages are tattered, highlighted, and filled with ink. The book is Nouwen response to his friend Fred, who asked him to explain in simple terms why life mattered and Nouwen’s answer has changed lives for generations “You are the beloved.” That is what matters - we are loved by God. We are loved by God with such a radical love that all of the other distinctions and labels people try to put upon us don’t matter. That is the message the church should be proclaiming.

I’ve have been deeply grieved over this past year with the violence that has been seen - church shootings, churches being burned, hatred spewed out on the news, random acts of violence, the list goes on and on. And what has been the response of the church, chiefly the mainline protestant church, to ignore it all. To try to sweep in under the rug or justify it. We are no better then the Star-bellied Sneetches when we do so - and we certainly aren’t proclaiming the message that all are God’s beloved. 

What resounds with me with the word “beloved” is the image of a groom eagerly waiting at the alter for his bride. Waiting to honor and protect her. Waiting to commit to actively love her each day of their lives together - no matter what the circumstances. And as powerful as an image as that is for me - God loves each of us even more than that. 

Brothers and Sisters, when we sit by when violence rocks the world around us, when we sit by in silent apathy or agreement, when we fail to proclaim the message that we are loved by God despite all that humans have created to separate us from one another, we are sinning. We have unknowingly bought into the belief that has come from the fall that some people are better than others, that some people bear the sin of the world and others get a free pass, and that God favors races, genders, or nations. When we see people differently then God sees them - whether we knowingly act upon those beliefs or not, we sin. When we turn away from people in need - we sin. When we think ourselves better than other people - we sin. Because the truth is that we are family, united by Christ, our head.

Sadly, the Sneetches’ story goes from bad to worse. Sylvester McMonkey McBean rolls into town with a solution for their problem. If the plain bellied Sneetches pay him a fee they could have stars on their bellies. And they did. In droves. All of the plain bellied Sneetches now bore stars on their bellies and went to their star-bellied siblings and proclaimed that they were now just like them! But the former star bellied Sneetches couldn’t have that. They liked thinking that they were better then the formerly plain bellied Sneetches - so they went to Sylvester McMonkey McBean and for a fee had their stars removed. And the cycle went on like this - stars on and stars off until all of the Sneetches were out of money. 

Less we think this is just a silly story, I read an article in a book recently about a young woman who grew up in the 1960s and went to summer camp. One day during that week away her counselors decided to play a game. They had all of the blue eye children get together and identify themselves as being superior to those with any other colored eyes. All day they got the best things, were able to eat in line first, and were encouraged to only play with one another, while looking down on the other-colored-eyed children. Everyone knew that it was just a game, yet it began to deeply effect the non-blue-eyed children, to the point where even half way through the day they were starting to wish that they too had blue eyes. The girl recalling this story spoke of how deeply troubled she was by the whole thing - so she went off into the woods to pray to God, where she decided, by the prompting of the Holy Spirit to break the rules of the game. She, a blue-eyed girl, started to invite brown and hazel eyed children to join her at the front of the line. She shared what she had and treated everyone as equal. And you know what happened - the other blue eyed children got mad at her! They wanted to keep the rules of the game going so they got more perks, even if it meant their fellow campers were ostracized and made to feel less valuable. 

The book this story was found in, God in My Life: Faith Stories and How We Share Them, was published in 2008, almost 50 years since this camp experience, yet it shaped the memory of that young girl and who she became. It shaped how she treated people outside of the camp after that day - where she actively tried to live into accepting others as God accepts them.

The Church of Jesus Christ has a unique opportunity to model unity. To buck the actions and attitudes of favoritism discussed in James, who says that we cannot both show favoritism and believe in Christ. Hard words to swallow. Especially for folks who have come to privileges at the expense of others, privileges that are so engrained in us that we don’t even realize them any more. When we choose to learn from each others differences instead of judging each other by them - we are the Church. We are proclaiming with our lips and our lives that what matters most is that we are God’s beloved, and all people under the banner of Christ deserved to be treated the same way, with love, honor, and respect. 

Thankfully, the story of the Sneetches ends in a powerful way - they all realize that star or plain-bellied isn’t what matters. They forgot about the stars and started to treat each other as community, as family. What would we need to risk to pave the way for unity, Church? What are we willing to set aside or give up, for the sake of the family of God? Amen.