The Neighborhood Podcast

"The Miracle We Share" (November 23, 2025 Thanksgiving Sermon)

• Rev. Dr. Stephen M. Fearing

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Preaching: Leslie Loyd, President & COO of A Simple Gesture

What if the miracle starts before the bread ever breaks? We open with a prayer for wisdom and peace, then move through Psalm 100 and Philippians 4 to ground a timely, human conversation about hunger, dignity, and the quiet borders that shape who we consider “ours.” Drawing on Claude Lévi-Strauss, we explore how the “edge of the village” still shows up in grocery lines, policy limits, and the moments we look away—then we challenge ourselves to notice, name, and widen those edges.

From the hillside of the Sea of Galilee to a local market where a child cheers for pasta and applesauce, we trace a throughline: compassion begins with seeing. The feeding of the five thousand becomes a pattern for today, not as a spectacle of multiplication, but as a practice of participation. One person opens their bag, another follows, and abundance grows where fear of scarcity once stood. Along the way, we confront the reality of SNAP cuts that turn six dollars into the price of a latte or a day’s meals, and we refuse to let numbers eclipse neighbors.

Together we lay out concrete, hopeful ways to join the work: donate food because meals are urgent; give money because infrastructure matters; volunteer because presence restores dignity; advocate because policies have faces; pray because attention tunes our hearts to act. Gratitude deepens when it meets need, and the truest Thanksgiving table may be wherever food is shared, circles widen, and people hear the words you belong here. Listen, reflect, and then take one small step with us—subscribe, share this episode, and tell us how you plan to widen your village this week.

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SPEAKER_00:

Let us pray. Holy and gracious God, may your Holy Spirit give us a spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that with the eyes of our hearts enlightened, we may know the hope to which Christ has called us, the riches of his glorious inheritance among us, and the greatness of his power. This we pray in Christ's name. Amen. Our first reading is Psalm 100. Let us listen for what God is saying to God's church. Make a joyful noise to the Lord all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come into God's presence with singing. Know that the Lord is God. It is God who made us. And we are God's. We are the Lord's people and the sheep of the Lord's pasture. Enter God's gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. Give thanks to God and bless God's name. For the Lord is good. God's steadfast love endures forever. And God's faithfulness to all generations. And then from Philippians 4, verses 4 through 9. Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything. But in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable. If there is any excellence, and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. As for all the things that you have learned and received and heard and noticed in me, do them, and the God of peace will be with you. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks, being God. And now we'll invite my friend and colleague Leslie to come bring us a good word.

SPEAKER_01:

Smell so good. Good afternoon. A couple of months ago, I read a quote that I haven't been able to get out of my mind. It's from the anthropologist Claude Levy Strauss. I had to read it a couple of times, but I'll read it slowly because it's kind of long and that would take too long to read it a couple of times. He writes, for the majority of the human species, and for tens of thousands of years, the idea that humanity includes every being on the face of the earth does not exist at all. That designation of humanity stops at the border of each tribe or linguistic group, or even at the edge of a village. The edge of a village. I have to admit that some days my village boundary is embarrassingly small. It ends when someone double parks at Harris Theater. But that's the point, isn't it? These boundaries show up where we least expect them. Sometimes they're historical, sometimes they're political, and sometimes they're just human. If I'm honest, this boundary still exists today. It's just harder to spot. It might look like a line at the grocery store between one person paying full price and the other paying with benefits. Or the invisible border of those of us who are planning out our Thanksgiving meals and those who are wondering how they're going to feed themselves tonight. Several years ago, I visited the Sea of Galilee, where the Bible tells us Jesus fed the 5,000. Y'all, it's beautiful. It's basically a human or a natural amphitheater looking over this beautiful sea, and the light that was shining that day was like honey. It reminded me of why we call it the land of milk and honey. As I stood there, I realized Jesus didn't feel feed an idea. People with grumbling stomachs, tired feet, with children tugging on their sleeves. And the miracle didn't begin with the bread. It began with seeing. With Jesus looking at the crowd of strangers and recognizing them as Ken. Maybe that's the heart of the story, that compassion always, always starts with seeing someone else. I was thinking about that recently when I was taking a simple gesture food over to backpack beginnings. The way they're set up is like a grocery store where families can come in and pull off what they really want. And there was this mother with her little boy, he was maybe three or four, and he was calling out things as we were putting them on the shelves, like they were old friends. He was yelling, pasta, applesauce, peanut butter, jelly. He was so excited. And his mom just stood there with her hand on her heart. It wasn't that she was getting food, it was that she was finally being seen, finally getting dignity. That's where the miracle begins, not in abundance, but in recognition. This week, as we prepare for Thanksgiving, I've been thinking about what it means to truly see someone, to look beyond the edge of our own village, to recognize in the face of a stranger the same divine image that we see in Scripture. That sounds lovely here in a sanctuary where everybody is freshly bathed and sitting politely in our pews. It's a little bit harder when we're standing behind somebody in a grocery store who is pulling out their coins and still coming up short. This month, nearly a hundred thousand of our neighbors in Guilford County lost their Snap benefits. Snap only pays$6 a day to feed yourself, to feed someone.$6. That's literally what my latte cost. It's two bananas, a box of cereal if you're lucky. And for so many people, that is the difference between hope and hunger. Gandhi once said, There are people in the world that are so hungry that God cannot appear to them except for in the form of bread. That line always gets me. I wrote it on a chalkboard in my office and then quickly realized that that chalk doesn't come off. So now it has stayed there. But what if it's true? What if someone encounters God through us, through the kindness of a neighbor who shows up with food or dignity or time? What if the miracle of the loaves and the fishes isn't about multiplication, but participation? About person realizing I have something to share. When I picture that scene by the Sea of Galilee, I imagine someone pulling out a small loaf from their bag. Maybe it was intended for their family. Then another person seeing that and doing the same, and suddenly there is more than enough. Not because heaven rained down bread, but because love cracks open something inside of them. That's what happens when we see the divine. We loosen our grip and we share. This is the kind of miracle we still need. Hunger isn't just about food, it's about belonging. It's about being seen, being named, being known. When we hand someone a bag of groceries, we're not feeding their body. We're saying, you're a part of this village. You belong here. We refuse to stop at the edge of our village. So how do we join the miracle? We donate food because food is holy. We give money because generosity is contagious. We volunteer because our presence is sometimes more nourishing than any meal can be. We advocate because policies have faces and keeping silent keeps people hungry. And we pray. As Pope Francis said, we pray for the hungry and then we feed them because that's how prayer works. And if you're thinking, like I often do, I can't fix everything. Welcome, you are human. God never asks us to fix everything, God asked us to see. And seeing always comes before the miracle. Barbara Brown Taylor writes that faith is not about certainty, but about paying attention. So maybe our calling this Thanksgiving is just to pay attention to the hunger around us, to the sacredness of just ordinary things, and the divine spark in every person we meet. Maybe the truest Thanksgiving table is not in our homes at all, but wherever food is shared, wherever compassion is given, wherever the circle widens just a little more, and in the quiet decision to give more than we thought that we could. So this week, when you bow your head to give thanks, remember this. You, my dear friend, you bear the image of God. So does your neighbor. And somewhere between those two truths, in that tender, ordinary, sacred space, the miracle begins. Amen.