(Scriptures: Genesis 1:1 – Genesis 2:3 Psalm 8
2 Corinthians 13:11-13 Matthew 28:16-20)
Today is Trinity Sunday, in which the church lifts up the doctrine of the Trinity, one God in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or in other language, God the Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer. Trinity Sunday is always the Sunday following Pentecost, when we celebrate the coming of that third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit.
Given the amount of thought the church has given to this doctrine and the amount of conflict the doctrine has produced – there have been numerous controversies, and even the split in around the year 1054 between the Eastern and Western church was related to the way in which the Holy Spirit relates to the other two persons of the Trinity – not to mention the much more recent and much more localized split in New England and elsewhere between the Trinitarian Congregationalists, who went on to become part of the UCC, and the Unitarians, who did not - it is striking that the word Trinity is nowhere found in Scripture. While readings such as today’s mention the persons of the trinity and there are other hints of the Trinity elsewhere in Scripture, the full-blown doctrine of the Trinity is not explicitly stated in Scripture. I say this to remind us that the doctrine of the Trinity is a human creation, a human attempt to understand that One God who is presented in three persons in Scripture. Inevitably it a human attempt to comprehend the incomprehensible, to define the undefinable – for any God within our ability to define is inevitably a God that we have shrunken and made over in our own image. And whenever we discuss human doctrine, no matter how venerable, we need to maintain some measure of humility, recognizing that while doctrine is – one hopes - derived from Scripture, it does not carry the weight of authority that Scripture does. Nonetheless, the doctrine of the Trinity is among the most venerable the church has to offer.
One way in which the Trinity is understood is in terms of function: God the Father as creator, who created the world, and not just our world, but the cosmos, all that is, God the Son as the redeemer, who proclaimed the reign of God and by his death and resurrection liberated us from sin, and God the Holy Spirit as sustainer, God within us, God among us, giving us strength for each new day, praying in groans to deep for words when our human thoughts and words fail us. Yet all acts of creating, redeeming, and sustaining are done, not by three separate gods, but by our one gracious God.
However, the doctrine of the Trinity speaks, not of one God with three functions, but of one God in three persons. So there is an image of intimacy, fellowship, among the three persons of the trinity. This intimacy is defined under the Greek word “perichoresis”, meaning mutual interpenetration and mutual indwelling, beside which the deepest human intimacy appears only as the faintest of shadows. We get some sense of this in John’s Gospel in Jesus’ farewell address to his disciples, when he says such things as “I am in the Father and the Father is in me, and you are in me as I am in the Father. This only mentions two persons of the Trinity, Father and Son, but it’s no great leap to extend the metaphor to include the Holy Spirit in this image. Perichoresis – peri means “around”, and “choresis” comes from the same root as choreography – so we can think of the three persons of the Trinity in a continual, eternal, never-ending choreography or dance of mutual love. All of which is to say that we worship a God who is relational, both within Godself and in always reaching out in love to humankind, with a depth of relationship, of passion and yearning, that human beings can, at best, only barely begin to glimpse.
Our reading from Genesis shows our Triune God at work. As God speaks the universe into being – “let us create” – we remember that John’s Gospel affirms that Son, the Word made flesh, was present from the beginning, and we feel the Spirit moving over the face of the waters.
During the coffee hour last Sunday, we read the creation story, as we read it this morning. We noted that there’s something different in the creation of humankind than from the other parts of creation, that humankind is said to be created in God’s image. It’s the only part of the creation story where we read this affirmation – in God’s image God created them, male and female God created them. Certainly, we share much in common with animals – we have bodies, internal organs, and such. We have much of the same fight or flight instincts they do, what evolutionary biologists call our “lizard brains”. But as we think of the ways in which humans differ from animals – in having consciousness, a soul, the ability to think, to plan, to relate, to love – to name just a few – we can affirm that in these elements, humans resemble God in a way that animals do not. We’ve spoken of the dance of mutual love among the persons of the Trinity, and given that joy, we may well wonder, with the Psalmist, “what are humans that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them.” – and yet the Psalmist also affirms that God has created us a little lower than God, and crowned us with glory and honor. The miracle is that, even though God has no particular need of us, yet in his grace he passionately cares for us, whom God created in God’s image. Certainly sin has deeply marred that image of God within each of us, but the resemblance is still there, however faint. This is important to remember when we’re inclined to abuse others, to oppress others, to dismiss others, to use others for our own purposes – and we are all guilty at times of the sin of loving things and using people, instead of the other way around – that those whom we abuse, oppress, dismiss, and use – are, like us, bearers of the divine image, however deeply buried under the wreckage of sin, and passionately beloved by God.
Our Gospel reading today is the last four verses of Matthew’s Gospel, commonly called the Great Commission. It is one of the very few places in which all three persons of the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, are named together…..appropriate for Matthew’s Gospel, as, among the four Gospels, Matthew’s Gospel includes the most developed language relating to the church. However, we should remember that our reading is not called the Great Theological Summit, but the Great Commission – the focus is not on theological reflection, but on action, on mission. There are two uses of the word “all” that are noteworthy. The Risen Jesus says that “all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me” and “go and make disciples of all nations.” – and we are to make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything (or “all”) that I have taught.
This is all-encompassing language – Christ has all authority – not just over our Sunday mornings, but over all things; therefore we are to make disciples of all nations – which involves going way, way, way outside our comfort zones - and teach them to obey all that Jesus has commanded. But with this broad claim of authority and the broad mission statement comes an equally broad promise: I will be with you always”. Not just now and then. Not just on Sunday mornings. Always. Always.
Amid all that is mysterious about the Trinity, Jesus is the best revelation we have of the character of God. Remember that, in John’s Gospel, Philip asked Jesus to show the disciples the Father, to which Jesus replied that since they had seen Jesus, they had seen the Father. And so if we want to know what God is like, the best way to do that is to look at Jesus as presented in the New Testament, especially the Gospels. Jesus who came preaching good news to the poor, liberation of the captive, the reign of God, Jesus who ate and drank with those whom society scapegoated as sinners and confronted those who used their positions of power to oppress, Jesus who cast out demons and healed diseases, Jesus who, while we were yet sinners, died for us – this is the best image we have of what God the father is like. And as followers of Jesus, we are to live in the same way, going forth into all the world to make disciples and baptize and teach, so that through our words of caring and deeds of love, our neighbors nearby and our neighbors far away come to know this same Good News. May God use our congregation, Emanuel Church, to bring this good news to our neighbors down the block and our neighbors around the globe. Amen.
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Friday, June 17, 2011
That's the Spirit!
(Scriptures: Numbers 11:24-30 Acts 2:1-21
I Corinthians 12:1-13 John 20:19-23)
Today we celebrate Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came upon the believers and empowered them for ministry and proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Pentecost is also often called “the birthday of the church”. Before the coming of the Holy Spirit, Christ’s followers were a frightened huddle, meeting behind closed doors, uncertain what the future held for them. After the coming of the Spirit, they were united into the church, the body of Christ, empowered and equipped to proclaim and to serve.
Today’s Scriptures give us a variety, a kaleidoscope of images associated with the Holy Spirit. Our reading from the book of Numbers comes at a time when Moses was feeling overwhelmed by the burden of leading the Israelites through the wilderness. Moses told God that he’d rather that God killed him right there where he stood, than have to put up with the peoples’ complaints. Instead, God tells Moses to choose 70 elders that would help to share Moses’ leadership burden. God took some of the Spirit that was on Moses and gave it to the 70 elders. This is fairly typical of the Old Testament – it was not given to everyone to receive the Holy Spirit. Generally, when God wished to equip kings, prophets, and other leaders of the people, God gave the Spirit to them to provide the special stamina and insight needed for their special tasks. Likewise, when God had a special message that God wished to proclaim, God’s spirit would come upon the prophet or person God designated to carry the message. In our Numbers reading, we get the striking image of the Spirit falling upon the two elders who had stayed behind in the camp, so that they prophesied where they stood. Joshua is horrified and wants Moses to make them stop, but Moses responds that he wished the Spirit would fall on everyone. As it happens, Moses’ wish came true in our reading from Acts.
Our readings from John’s Gospel and from Acts give us two contrasting images of the coming of the Spirit. John’s image is quiet, almost unnoticed – Jesus breathes on the disciples and says “receive the Holy Spirit”. With that Holy Spirit comes the power to forgive sins. But John gives us none of the ecstatic behavior we see in Acts. In Acts, between the Ascension of Jesus and Pentecost, the disciples more or less mark time. They deal with organizational housekeeping matters – they felt a need to find someone to fill the position held by Judas, and choose Matthias for that role. But there were no mighty acts from them until the coming of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost. The 2nd chapter of Acts gives the image we usually associate with the coming of the Spirit – the rush of a mighty wind, divided tongues of fire on the heads of the disciples, and the disciples declaring the Gospel in the languages of the many foreign pilgrims who were in Jerusalem.
Nowadays, we usually associate Pentecost with…..Pentecostals, whose manifestations of the Holy Spirit include “speaking in tongues”, “being slain in the Spirit” and other forms of ecstatic experience. Indeed, Paul’s letter to the Corinthians indicates that speaking in unknown tongues was a divisive issue in the church at Corinth. But in the Acts account of Pentecost, the disciples were speaking in tongues unknown to themselves, but known to those listening. While “speaking in tongues” was a divisive issue for Paul’s followers – and is still an issue that divides churches today – in Acts, the speech of the apostles was not intended to divide, but to unite; not to confound, but to make clear the Gospel to those present. It was sort of the Tower of Babel story in reverse: in Genesis, human beings were united in their hubris in trying to build a tower so they could climb up and look in on God – in modern terms, to climb up to heaven so they can walk up God’s sidewalk, ring the doorbell, and say ‘howdy’ - and God confused their language. On Pentecost, through the Holy Spirit, persons of many different languages who normally would be unintelligible to one another, were able to understand what the apostles were saying. Human initiative and human overreaching resulted in division and confusion. Divine initiative resulted in mutual understanding among humans.
In reading these passages together, we may be left with a question: why was the experience of the Holy Spirit opened up to so many. In the Old Testament, the Spirit was uniquely bestowed on select individuals gifted for ministry. And this appears to be the model in John’s Gospel as well – just as God had anointed Moses, David, and others with the Spirit in preparation for their leadership responsibilities, in John’s Gospel, Jesus bestowed the spirit on his disciples in preparation for the work they were to do. But in Acts, it is such a dramatic, open display of the Spirit, by contrast with the other readings. Why is this account seemingly different?
Part of this is because it is expected that, in the church, all believers, not just a select few, would be carrying out the ministry of the Gospel in various ways. Our reading from Acts, quoting the prophet Joel, says that in the last days the Spirit would be poured out on all flesh – sons and daughters, young and old, even slave and free alike – and everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. I Peter 2:9 speaks of the church as “a holy nation, a royal priesthood” – and as ministers, those in the church – all believers - would need to be baptized with the Holy Spirit in order to be prepared for their duties. In his letter to the church at Corinth, the Apostle Paul goes to great lengths to describe the different gifts – wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy, speaking in tongues, interpretation of tongues – given to equip the church by the one Spirit. In the words of a newer hymn that we sang earlier in the service, “Many gifts, one Spirit, one love known in many ways.”
However, the point I want to underline is that, while in our reading from Acts the Spirit is more widely distributed, the purpose has not changed. The gift of the Holy Spirit is to prepare us for ministry, for worship and service. This was the case in the Old Testament, in John’s Gospel, in I Corinthians, and in Acts. The Spirit is not given to us for our own gratification. While the Spirit acts as our Advocate before God, interceding for us before God with sighs to deep for words when we ourselves cannot find it in ourselves to pray – it is there not only for us, but rather to make us more able to be there for others. This is where the Corinthian church went off track – those with the more flashy gifts, such as speaking in tongues, felt that this gift conferred some special merit on those who practiced speaking in tongues, lacking in those who did not. And this is where some modern-day Pentecostal churches may go wrong as well, if they see their speaking in tongues as something that sets them above and apart from others. But in Acts and in Paul’s letters, quite the opposite is the intent – tongues and other gifts of the Spirit are intended, not to divide, but rather to bring us together as the Body of Christ.
What does the coming of the Spirit look like in Bridesburg? What does it look like here at Emanuel Church. What are the signs of the Spirit here? Our congregation will not likely be mistaken anytime soon for what is commonly called a Pentecostal church. Anyone coming to Emanuel church to see people speaking in tongues, dancing in the aisles, falling to the ground, slain in the Spirit as the saying goes, will walk away sadly disappointed. The Spirit has not endowed Emanuel Church with those gifts. But look at the gifts the Spirit has given us. Here we bring together our Bridesburg neighbors with those who live in other neighborhoods. Here we are equipped to view our daily work not just as a way to earn a living, but as vocations dedicated to God’s glory. Here those who are weighed down with life find new hope and strength. Here the members of a small church “pray big”, remembering persons and situations all over the greater Philadelphia and New Jersey region. Like the small frightened huddle of disciples emerging from their locked rooms to go forth and minister across the known world of their day, we through our partnerships with the Bridesburg Council of Churches and the United Church of Christ send our prayers and our offerings to join with those of others to bless struggling people outside our door and around the globe.
As I said at the beginning of this sermon, Pentecost is called the birthday of the church. So, as we prepare for Communion, let me say, “Happy birthday, church.” As we prepare to approach the table, may we open our hearts to the Spirit’s prompting. Amen.
**************
Please join us for worship on Sundays at 10 a.m. at Emanuel United Church of Christ. We're on Fillmore Street, just off Thompson. www.emanuelphila.org
I Corinthians 12:1-13 John 20:19-23)
Today we celebrate Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came upon the believers and empowered them for ministry and proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Pentecost is also often called “the birthday of the church”. Before the coming of the Holy Spirit, Christ’s followers were a frightened huddle, meeting behind closed doors, uncertain what the future held for them. After the coming of the Spirit, they were united into the church, the body of Christ, empowered and equipped to proclaim and to serve.
Today’s Scriptures give us a variety, a kaleidoscope of images associated with the Holy Spirit. Our reading from the book of Numbers comes at a time when Moses was feeling overwhelmed by the burden of leading the Israelites through the wilderness. Moses told God that he’d rather that God killed him right there where he stood, than have to put up with the peoples’ complaints. Instead, God tells Moses to choose 70 elders that would help to share Moses’ leadership burden. God took some of the Spirit that was on Moses and gave it to the 70 elders. This is fairly typical of the Old Testament – it was not given to everyone to receive the Holy Spirit. Generally, when God wished to equip kings, prophets, and other leaders of the people, God gave the Spirit to them to provide the special stamina and insight needed for their special tasks. Likewise, when God had a special message that God wished to proclaim, God’s spirit would come upon the prophet or person God designated to carry the message. In our Numbers reading, we get the striking image of the Spirit falling upon the two elders who had stayed behind in the camp, so that they prophesied where they stood. Joshua is horrified and wants Moses to make them stop, but Moses responds that he wished the Spirit would fall on everyone. As it happens, Moses’ wish came true in our reading from Acts.
Our readings from John’s Gospel and from Acts give us two contrasting images of the coming of the Spirit. John’s image is quiet, almost unnoticed – Jesus breathes on the disciples and says “receive the Holy Spirit”. With that Holy Spirit comes the power to forgive sins. But John gives us none of the ecstatic behavior we see in Acts. In Acts, between the Ascension of Jesus and Pentecost, the disciples more or less mark time. They deal with organizational housekeeping matters – they felt a need to find someone to fill the position held by Judas, and choose Matthias for that role. But there were no mighty acts from them until the coming of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost. The 2nd chapter of Acts gives the image we usually associate with the coming of the Spirit – the rush of a mighty wind, divided tongues of fire on the heads of the disciples, and the disciples declaring the Gospel in the languages of the many foreign pilgrims who were in Jerusalem.
Nowadays, we usually associate Pentecost with…..Pentecostals, whose manifestations of the Holy Spirit include “speaking in tongues”, “being slain in the Spirit” and other forms of ecstatic experience. Indeed, Paul’s letter to the Corinthians indicates that speaking in unknown tongues was a divisive issue in the church at Corinth. But in the Acts account of Pentecost, the disciples were speaking in tongues unknown to themselves, but known to those listening. While “speaking in tongues” was a divisive issue for Paul’s followers – and is still an issue that divides churches today – in Acts, the speech of the apostles was not intended to divide, but to unite; not to confound, but to make clear the Gospel to those present. It was sort of the Tower of Babel story in reverse: in Genesis, human beings were united in their hubris in trying to build a tower so they could climb up and look in on God – in modern terms, to climb up to heaven so they can walk up God’s sidewalk, ring the doorbell, and say ‘howdy’ - and God confused their language. On Pentecost, through the Holy Spirit, persons of many different languages who normally would be unintelligible to one another, were able to understand what the apostles were saying. Human initiative and human overreaching resulted in division and confusion. Divine initiative resulted in mutual understanding among humans.
In reading these passages together, we may be left with a question: why was the experience of the Holy Spirit opened up to so many. In the Old Testament, the Spirit was uniquely bestowed on select individuals gifted for ministry. And this appears to be the model in John’s Gospel as well – just as God had anointed Moses, David, and others with the Spirit in preparation for their leadership responsibilities, in John’s Gospel, Jesus bestowed the spirit on his disciples in preparation for the work they were to do. But in Acts, it is such a dramatic, open display of the Spirit, by contrast with the other readings. Why is this account seemingly different?
Part of this is because it is expected that, in the church, all believers, not just a select few, would be carrying out the ministry of the Gospel in various ways. Our reading from Acts, quoting the prophet Joel, says that in the last days the Spirit would be poured out on all flesh – sons and daughters, young and old, even slave and free alike – and everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. I Peter 2:9 speaks of the church as “a holy nation, a royal priesthood” – and as ministers, those in the church – all believers - would need to be baptized with the Holy Spirit in order to be prepared for their duties. In his letter to the church at Corinth, the Apostle Paul goes to great lengths to describe the different gifts – wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy, speaking in tongues, interpretation of tongues – given to equip the church by the one Spirit. In the words of a newer hymn that we sang earlier in the service, “Many gifts, one Spirit, one love known in many ways.”
However, the point I want to underline is that, while in our reading from Acts the Spirit is more widely distributed, the purpose has not changed. The gift of the Holy Spirit is to prepare us for ministry, for worship and service. This was the case in the Old Testament, in John’s Gospel, in I Corinthians, and in Acts. The Spirit is not given to us for our own gratification. While the Spirit acts as our Advocate before God, interceding for us before God with sighs to deep for words when we ourselves cannot find it in ourselves to pray – it is there not only for us, but rather to make us more able to be there for others. This is where the Corinthian church went off track – those with the more flashy gifts, such as speaking in tongues, felt that this gift conferred some special merit on those who practiced speaking in tongues, lacking in those who did not. And this is where some modern-day Pentecostal churches may go wrong as well, if they see their speaking in tongues as something that sets them above and apart from others. But in Acts and in Paul’s letters, quite the opposite is the intent – tongues and other gifts of the Spirit are intended, not to divide, but rather to bring us together as the Body of Christ.
What does the coming of the Spirit look like in Bridesburg? What does it look like here at Emanuel Church. What are the signs of the Spirit here? Our congregation will not likely be mistaken anytime soon for what is commonly called a Pentecostal church. Anyone coming to Emanuel church to see people speaking in tongues, dancing in the aisles, falling to the ground, slain in the Spirit as the saying goes, will walk away sadly disappointed. The Spirit has not endowed Emanuel Church with those gifts. But look at the gifts the Spirit has given us. Here we bring together our Bridesburg neighbors with those who live in other neighborhoods. Here we are equipped to view our daily work not just as a way to earn a living, but as vocations dedicated to God’s glory. Here those who are weighed down with life find new hope and strength. Here the members of a small church “pray big”, remembering persons and situations all over the greater Philadelphia and New Jersey region. Like the small frightened huddle of disciples emerging from their locked rooms to go forth and minister across the known world of their day, we through our partnerships with the Bridesburg Council of Churches and the United Church of Christ send our prayers and our offerings to join with those of others to bless struggling people outside our door and around the globe.
As I said at the beginning of this sermon, Pentecost is called the birthday of the church. So, as we prepare for Communion, let me say, “Happy birthday, church.” As we prepare to approach the table, may we open our hearts to the Spirit’s prompting. Amen.
**************
Please join us for worship on Sundays at 10 a.m. at Emanuel United Church of Christ. We're on Fillmore Street, just off Thompson. www.emanuelphila.org
Saturday, June 11, 2011
Going and Coming
(Scriptures: Acts 1:1-14, Ephesians 1:15-23,
Luke 24:44-53)
Today’s reading from Luke and Acts remind us, if nothing else, that Acts is a sequel to the Gospel of Luke. Luke’s Gospel tells of the acts of Jesus during his earthly ministry, and Acts tells us about the acts of the Apostles, of the early church – the acts of Peter, of John, the acts of Philip, James, etc. - and after the account of Paul’s conversion, the focus rapidly shifts to the acts of Paul.
Acts is a sequel to Luke, and so Acts basically picks up where Luke begins. Luke tells us that Jesus led them out as far as Bethany, and as he blessed them, he was taken up from them. Acts begins by retelling and to some extent expanding and reshaping the narrative at the end of Luke. In Acts, Jesus’ “blessing” sounds more like a “challenge”. In today’s reading, Jesus is spending his final moments with his disciples before ascending to heaven. And as usual, the disciples are out to lunch, oblivious to what Jesus is telling them. “Now will you restore the kingdom to Israel?” they ask. Jesus is about to leave them, and they’re still caught up in their parochial, tribal, nationalistic concerns.
Jesus, even in his last minutes on earth, is to the last a master teacher. Jesus was unwilling to engage the explicit question the disciples asked, but he realized that behind their explicit question was an implicit question, sort of a “question behind the question”, which went as follows: “Where do we go from here, Jesus?”. Jesus’ response is worth noting. He redirects them from the specific question they did ask – which they had no business asking – to the implicit “question behind the question”– which Jesus answered graciously. He responds to their explicit question by basically telling them to mind their own business – “it’s not for you to know the times the Father has set by his own authority” – but then answers their “question behind the question” – “where do we go from here” - by going on to say that they will receive power to be Christ’s witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea and Samaria, and the whole world. Jesus gives them an expanded frame of reference, a greatly expanded mission field. The disciples prematurely want to declare “mission accomplished”, hoping that they can bask in the glory of having been by Jesus’ side as he restored independence to Israel. By contrast, Jesus is telling them that their adventures in faith, far from being over, were really just beginning. Like a loving parent caring for toddlers, Jesus had walked beside the disciples and held their hands through the course of his earthly ministry. Like tuckered-out toddlers, the disciples thought it was high time for milk and cookies and a nice nap. But instead, Jesus would now be ascending to the Father, and, like growing children, they were going to have to learn how to look both ways and cross the street on their own. It must have been a jarring conversation for the disciples.
It may also be a jarring conversation for us. Listening to the disciples may be like looking at ourselves in a mirror. Like the disciples, we may define our faith in ways that are narrow and self-centered. We may define our faith primarily in terms of “I” and “me” and “my” – Am I saved? What will happen to me when I die? Will I get to heaven? Will I see my family again? And there is a time and a place for these concerns. They’re very important concerns. When we’re grieving the death of loved ones, when we or our family members are on beds of pain and illness, when we or our family members faced with our own mortality, our faith can become a great source of personal strength and comfort. Truly, what a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and grief to bear. What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer. As the saying goes, when we’re at the end of our rope, it’s time to tie a knot and hang on…and we do that by leaning on the everlasting arms of God.
But if we define our faith in Christ primarily in those terms – what’s in it for me? – we’ve greatly truncated the mission Jesus laid out for his disciples. Sort of like that movie from a few years ago, ‘Honey, I shrunk the kids.’ - ‘Honey, we’ve shrunk the mission.’ We’ve shrunk the mission of witnessing to the Gospel in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, and the whole world into “Well, at least I’m saved” or “Well, at least my family will be together in heaven. Us four, no more. Everyone else can fend for themselves.” No wonder we may latch onto to those who huckster and traffic in myths about the end times. After all, we and our families are saved….what else is there to do? Mission accomplished! Time for milk and cookies and a nice nap. I think part of the reason so many get caught up in the end-times mania is that the mainline churches haven’t done what Jesus did for his disciples in our reading from Acts, haven’t done a good job of helping their congregations understand their mission, understand why we’re here. Because of this lack of a big picture focus, we’re prone to focus on ourselves, prone to declare “mission accomplished” when in fact our mission has hardly begun. Peter and Paul and the rest of the apostles didn’t sit around obsessing about their own salvation – come to think of it, they didn’t sit around much, period - they had much bigger things on their minds.
Because the mission that Jesus defined for his disciples – “you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea and Samaria, and the whole world” – still stands. It’s an ongoing mission. Think of it this way: everytime a baby is born, surprise! - there’s a new person who hasn’t heard about Jesus. So the mission field is ever before us.
Another way to think of it is to go back to the Luke narrative – Jesus led the disciples out to Bethany, from whence he ascended. Bethany, where Jesus visited Mary and Martha and Lazarus, and where he was hosted by Simon the Leper. While there are some disputes as to the meaning of the name Bethany, most authorities interpret the name as meaning “house of pain, house of suffering” – “Beth” means “house”, and “ani” or “anya” means “pain” and “affliction”. Some think there may at one time have been an almshouse or poor house there. So, before his ascension, perhaps Jesus gave the disciples not only verbal instructions, but visuals as well – a place of suffering, a place which needed the good news of Christ.
I suspect that, at this point, we may be feeling a little exhausted at the thought of witnessing to Jesus in Jerusalem, in Judea and Samaria, and the whole world. Me too. If it’s only up to us, we’re not going to get very far. We’ll feel worn out, feel like settling down for milk and cookies and a nap. Hey, I feel worn out after a morning of handout of Emanuel church flyers in Bridesburg. We’ll want to declare “mission accomplished” prematurely, want God to fast forward to the 2nd coming. And so here’s where it’s appropriate to lift up another part of Jesus’ words – “you will receive power when trhe Holy Spirit comes upon you.” God isn’t asking us to do all this on our own. God will send the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit will empower us to do far more than we could ask or think. One of the fascinations of Luke-Acts is watching how the disciples, who, as in the other Gospels, are about as clueless as can be, suddenly become powerful preachers and teachers and evangelists. Think of Peter, who, when he walked alongside Jesus during Jesus’ earthly mission, never missed an opportunity to put his foot in his mouth. After the coming of the Holy Spirit, Peter once again opened his mouth – and three thousand people were saved. Same disciples. Very different results. The difference is the coming of the Holy Spirit, having God’s spirit planted within them, empowering them and guiding them and directing their paths.
Next Sunday, we will celebrate Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit on the church. The Holy Spirit can empower and direct us, if we allow, if we get out of the Spirit’s way. Like the apostles, we may find that we have to set aside our own agendas. Like the disciples, we may find that if we are left with unanswered questions, it may be because they’re not the questions God would have us ask. We may be asking God the wrong questions.
I’ve taken beginners Spanish courses several times – despite which I’ve never really learned Spanish beyond a handful of phrases. I really don’t have an aptitude for language, and my brain forgets the unfamiliar phrases almost immediately. My middle-aged brain’s attempts to absorb Spanish is like a brick attempting to soak up water. But the last time I took Spanish, I remember our teacher telling the class that we need to learn to tune our ears to understand Spanish. And that phrase stuck with me. I remember when I visited Cuba with the Penn Southeast Conference, at first the conversations going on around me were just background noise, babble. But as the days went on, I could start to pick out a word or a phrase here and there. By the last day, I understood much of what was being said around me, and could even put in a few words of my own here and there. (Of course, when I got home, it all went out the window by the time I’d gotten home from the airport.) But in the same way I tuned my ears in Cuba for at least a few days to understand at least a little Spanish, we may need to tune our spiritual ears to hear the whisperings of the Spirit, in the midst of all the background noise – including all the religious background noise. We need to tune our ears to pick out the voice of the Good Shepherd, amid the voices of all the hirelings and hucksters that would lead us off course, who at best seek to fleece us, and at worst may seek to destroy us.
Having tuned our ears to the voice of the Spirit, may we be like the church at Ephesus to whom Paul wrote, saying, “I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him, so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of the glorious inheritance among the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power.” May Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians be answered for us as well, as in a few minutes we come to the table and share the communion meal, and in so doing experience the presence of Christ, now raised from the dead and seated at God’s right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name, not only in this age but in the age to come. May it be so for us, the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. May it be so for us at Emanuel Church. Amen.
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Please join us at Emanuel United Church of Christ on Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. We're on Fillmore Street (off Thompson). www.emanuelphila.org
Luke 24:44-53)
Today’s reading from Luke and Acts remind us, if nothing else, that Acts is a sequel to the Gospel of Luke. Luke’s Gospel tells of the acts of Jesus during his earthly ministry, and Acts tells us about the acts of the Apostles, of the early church – the acts of Peter, of John, the acts of Philip, James, etc. - and after the account of Paul’s conversion, the focus rapidly shifts to the acts of Paul.
Acts is a sequel to Luke, and so Acts basically picks up where Luke begins. Luke tells us that Jesus led them out as far as Bethany, and as he blessed them, he was taken up from them. Acts begins by retelling and to some extent expanding and reshaping the narrative at the end of Luke. In Acts, Jesus’ “blessing” sounds more like a “challenge”. In today’s reading, Jesus is spending his final moments with his disciples before ascending to heaven. And as usual, the disciples are out to lunch, oblivious to what Jesus is telling them. “Now will you restore the kingdom to Israel?” they ask. Jesus is about to leave them, and they’re still caught up in their parochial, tribal, nationalistic concerns.
Jesus, even in his last minutes on earth, is to the last a master teacher. Jesus was unwilling to engage the explicit question the disciples asked, but he realized that behind their explicit question was an implicit question, sort of a “question behind the question”, which went as follows: “Where do we go from here, Jesus?”. Jesus’ response is worth noting. He redirects them from the specific question they did ask – which they had no business asking – to the implicit “question behind the question”– which Jesus answered graciously. He responds to their explicit question by basically telling them to mind their own business – “it’s not for you to know the times the Father has set by his own authority” – but then answers their “question behind the question” – “where do we go from here” - by going on to say that they will receive power to be Christ’s witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea and Samaria, and the whole world. Jesus gives them an expanded frame of reference, a greatly expanded mission field. The disciples prematurely want to declare “mission accomplished”, hoping that they can bask in the glory of having been by Jesus’ side as he restored independence to Israel. By contrast, Jesus is telling them that their adventures in faith, far from being over, were really just beginning. Like a loving parent caring for toddlers, Jesus had walked beside the disciples and held their hands through the course of his earthly ministry. Like tuckered-out toddlers, the disciples thought it was high time for milk and cookies and a nice nap. But instead, Jesus would now be ascending to the Father, and, like growing children, they were going to have to learn how to look both ways and cross the street on their own. It must have been a jarring conversation for the disciples.
It may also be a jarring conversation for us. Listening to the disciples may be like looking at ourselves in a mirror. Like the disciples, we may define our faith in ways that are narrow and self-centered. We may define our faith primarily in terms of “I” and “me” and “my” – Am I saved? What will happen to me when I die? Will I get to heaven? Will I see my family again? And there is a time and a place for these concerns. They’re very important concerns. When we’re grieving the death of loved ones, when we or our family members are on beds of pain and illness, when we or our family members faced with our own mortality, our faith can become a great source of personal strength and comfort. Truly, what a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and grief to bear. What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer. As the saying goes, when we’re at the end of our rope, it’s time to tie a knot and hang on…and we do that by leaning on the everlasting arms of God.
But if we define our faith in Christ primarily in those terms – what’s in it for me? – we’ve greatly truncated the mission Jesus laid out for his disciples. Sort of like that movie from a few years ago, ‘Honey, I shrunk the kids.’ - ‘Honey, we’ve shrunk the mission.’ We’ve shrunk the mission of witnessing to the Gospel in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, and the whole world into “Well, at least I’m saved” or “Well, at least my family will be together in heaven. Us four, no more. Everyone else can fend for themselves.” No wonder we may latch onto to those who huckster and traffic in myths about the end times. After all, we and our families are saved….what else is there to do? Mission accomplished! Time for milk and cookies and a nice nap. I think part of the reason so many get caught up in the end-times mania is that the mainline churches haven’t done what Jesus did for his disciples in our reading from Acts, haven’t done a good job of helping their congregations understand their mission, understand why we’re here. Because of this lack of a big picture focus, we’re prone to focus on ourselves, prone to declare “mission accomplished” when in fact our mission has hardly begun. Peter and Paul and the rest of the apostles didn’t sit around obsessing about their own salvation – come to think of it, they didn’t sit around much, period - they had much bigger things on their minds.
Because the mission that Jesus defined for his disciples – “you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea and Samaria, and the whole world” – still stands. It’s an ongoing mission. Think of it this way: everytime a baby is born, surprise! - there’s a new person who hasn’t heard about Jesus. So the mission field is ever before us.
Another way to think of it is to go back to the Luke narrative – Jesus led the disciples out to Bethany, from whence he ascended. Bethany, where Jesus visited Mary and Martha and Lazarus, and where he was hosted by Simon the Leper. While there are some disputes as to the meaning of the name Bethany, most authorities interpret the name as meaning “house of pain, house of suffering” – “Beth” means “house”, and “ani” or “anya” means “pain” and “affliction”. Some think there may at one time have been an almshouse or poor house there. So, before his ascension, perhaps Jesus gave the disciples not only verbal instructions, but visuals as well – a place of suffering, a place which needed the good news of Christ.
I suspect that, at this point, we may be feeling a little exhausted at the thought of witnessing to Jesus in Jerusalem, in Judea and Samaria, and the whole world. Me too. If it’s only up to us, we’re not going to get very far. We’ll feel worn out, feel like settling down for milk and cookies and a nap. Hey, I feel worn out after a morning of handout of Emanuel church flyers in Bridesburg. We’ll want to declare “mission accomplished” prematurely, want God to fast forward to the 2nd coming. And so here’s where it’s appropriate to lift up another part of Jesus’ words – “you will receive power when trhe Holy Spirit comes upon you.” God isn’t asking us to do all this on our own. God will send the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit will empower us to do far more than we could ask or think. One of the fascinations of Luke-Acts is watching how the disciples, who, as in the other Gospels, are about as clueless as can be, suddenly become powerful preachers and teachers and evangelists. Think of Peter, who, when he walked alongside Jesus during Jesus’ earthly mission, never missed an opportunity to put his foot in his mouth. After the coming of the Holy Spirit, Peter once again opened his mouth – and three thousand people were saved. Same disciples. Very different results. The difference is the coming of the Holy Spirit, having God’s spirit planted within them, empowering them and guiding them and directing their paths.
Next Sunday, we will celebrate Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit on the church. The Holy Spirit can empower and direct us, if we allow, if we get out of the Spirit’s way. Like the apostles, we may find that we have to set aside our own agendas. Like the disciples, we may find that if we are left with unanswered questions, it may be because they’re not the questions God would have us ask. We may be asking God the wrong questions.
I’ve taken beginners Spanish courses several times – despite which I’ve never really learned Spanish beyond a handful of phrases. I really don’t have an aptitude for language, and my brain forgets the unfamiliar phrases almost immediately. My middle-aged brain’s attempts to absorb Spanish is like a brick attempting to soak up water. But the last time I took Spanish, I remember our teacher telling the class that we need to learn to tune our ears to understand Spanish. And that phrase stuck with me. I remember when I visited Cuba with the Penn Southeast Conference, at first the conversations going on around me were just background noise, babble. But as the days went on, I could start to pick out a word or a phrase here and there. By the last day, I understood much of what was being said around me, and could even put in a few words of my own here and there. (Of course, when I got home, it all went out the window by the time I’d gotten home from the airport.) But in the same way I tuned my ears in Cuba for at least a few days to understand at least a little Spanish, we may need to tune our spiritual ears to hear the whisperings of the Spirit, in the midst of all the background noise – including all the religious background noise. We need to tune our ears to pick out the voice of the Good Shepherd, amid the voices of all the hirelings and hucksters that would lead us off course, who at best seek to fleece us, and at worst may seek to destroy us.
Having tuned our ears to the voice of the Spirit, may we be like the church at Ephesus to whom Paul wrote, saying, “I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him, so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of the glorious inheritance among the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power.” May Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians be answered for us as well, as in a few minutes we come to the table and share the communion meal, and in so doing experience the presence of Christ, now raised from the dead and seated at God’s right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name, not only in this age but in the age to come. May it be so for us, the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. May it be so for us at Emanuel Church. Amen.
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Please join us at Emanuel United Church of Christ on Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. We're on Fillmore Street (off Thompson). www.emanuelphila.org
Love and Obey
(Scriptures: Acts 7:55-60, 1 Peter 3:13-22, John 14:15-21)
In this morning’s Gospel reading, Jesus and his disciples are celebrating the Last Supper, and Jesus is continuing his farewell address to his disciples. Jesus has been preparing them for the reality that he will not be with them much longer. Of course, the disciples are full of questions: where are you going? Why can’t we come? Are you coming back? Perhaps most pressing, how will we be able to live when you’ve gone away. As I considered how the disciples must have been feeling, a Laura Branigan song – or maybe the Michael Bolton remake, depending which version you’re familiar with – started playing in the back of my mind – “How am I supposed to live without you....” and the disciples may well have been thinking something very similar. How are we supposed to live without you, Jesus? How are we supposed to carry on, when you, who are all that we’ve been living for will soon be gone?
Jesus assures them that he will not leave them orphaned. Jesus’ words are mysterious: even though “in a little while” he’ll be going away, still, Jesus says, “I am coming to you.” “In a little while” Jesus says, “the world will not see me, but you will see me.” Jesus tells the disciples how they’re supposed to carry on, how they’re supposed to live: “Because I live, you also will live.” The earthly Jesus, the man of Nazareth with whom the disciples had walked for three years, would be with them no longer, but Christ’s spirit would continue to be beside them, even within them. Jesus tells them that he will ask the Father for “another Advocate”, whom Jesus calls “the spirit of truth” who will abide with us and be with us forever.” The original Greek word, “Paraclete” – means “someone along side us” – as an Advocate – like our attorney at trial – or as an intercessor, someone to go to God on our behalf – or a Helper - or a Comforter, one to strengthen us in difficulties. The world cannot see or receive the spirit of truth, because the world is not open to the truth. But Christ’s disciples will receive this Spirit. Two Sundays from now we will celebrate Pentecost, the story of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the early church.
Of course, I’m considering the text in light of last weekend’s excitement about Harold Camping’s false predictions about the Rapture. It was certainly interesting, if that’s the word, to hear Camping’s last-minute elaborations on his predictions – on May 21, there would be earthquakes at 6 pm in each time zone around the world, and the graves would be opened, the righteous would be Raptured, caught up in the clouds, and the bodies of any unsaved people would be thrown on the ground to be shamed. And, of course, the members of the VFW and legion posts visit our cemetery on the Sunday of Memorial day weekend every year…and we surely couldn’t have them seeing open graves and century old corpses and such. I’m only one person, 50 years old, overweight, short of breath and out of shape….How would I ever get all that mess cleaned up in time for the visitors from the VFW and the Legion and such later today?
OK…I’m being a little tongue in cheek. But, amid the laughter, I think that there’s some truly sad commentary to be found underneath the silliness. We may shake our heads wondering how on earth people can get caught up in Camping’s silliness, or the silliness of other End Times preachers that are just as off-base. People run around here, and there,
and everywhere, looking for Jesus’ second coming in glory, at the end of time – and it is indeed part of our tradition that Jesus will come again in glory, though we don’t know when this will happen - but, if we take today’s Gospel reading seriously, we realize Jesus never left. Jesus never left. Jesus said that, “in a little while, the world will no longer see me, but you will see me.” We live in an in-between time: Indeed, the earthly Jesus ascended to the Father – we’ll be considering the Ascension next Sunday – and Jesus will come again in glory at the end of time – but in between the Ascension and the Second Coming, this in-between time in which we live, Jesus said “I am coming to you. I will send another Advocate, the Spirit of truth.” And in two weeks we will celebrate Pentecost, when Jesus’ promise to come again to his followers, to send the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, the Advocate, the Spirit of Truth, was fulfilled. Jesus specifically said, “I will not leave you orphaned.” I will not abandon you. And Jesus did not abandon us. Why do we sometimes find ourselves acting like orphans, acting as if we’d been abandoned, acting as if God has left the building?
Where will we find Jesus? One place to find Jesus is in church. Jesus said, “where ever two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in their midst.” But it’s easy, especially in a small, struggling congregation like Emanuel, where I’m sometimes sending up prayers at 9:30 that more than 2 or 3 show up, to wonder some weeks if anything worthwhile is going on. We show up, greet each other, stand and sit for the various portions of the liturgy, hear some stirring organ music – or some hit or miss guitar playing – and sing some hymns, and take up the offering, and listen to Pastor Dave natter on in the pulpit – once a month we come forward for our cube of bread and cup of wine, and at the end hang around for coffee and cake and maybe a Bible lesson – and if we think that’s all that’s going on, no wonder we’re feeling empty at the end of the service. If we miss the presence of Christ in our midst, no wonder we feel let down. If all we expect to find the coffee and cake, or Ralph’s organ playing, or heaven help us my guitar playing, or the sermon, or even the fellowship, no wonder we leave feeling hungry. No wonder we feel leave feeling empty. No wonder we feel a need to look for someone or something that can help us feel more a more vivid, tangible connection to God.
I recently read part of one of Martin Luther’s sermons that seemed to speak to our present situation. Of course, Luther was preaching in the 1500’s in very different circumstances, and yet in some ways, the more things change, the more they remain the same. Luther’s sermon dealt with those in the Roman Catholic church of his day who advertised various religious relics, such as articles of clothing worn by various saints, which people would travel long distances to see, while missing God’s presence in their own churches and their own homes, missing God’s presence right in front of their noses. Here’s a few words from Luther:
“In times past we would have run to the ends of the world if we had known of a place where we could hear God speak. But now that we hear this in sermons, we do not see this happening. You hear at home in your house, father and mother and children sing and speak of it, the preacher speaks it in the parish church – you ought to lift up your hands and rejoice that we have been given the honor of hearing God speak to us through the Word. Oh, people say, what is that? What do we get out of it? All right, go ahead, dear brother, if you don’t want God to speak to you every day at home in your house or in your parish church, then be clever and look for something else: in Trier is the Lord God’s coat, in Aachen are Joseph’s britches, go there and squander your money. You have to go far for these things and spend a lot of money, leave house and home empty….all the while anyone can go to Baptism, the Sacrament, and the preaching-desk! How highly honored and richly blessed we are to know that God speaks with us and feeds us with the Word, gives us Baptism, and all the rest! But people say: What, baptism? Sacrament? God’s Word? – Joseph’s britches, that’s what does it!”
These days folks who are, in Luther’s words, being clever, no longer travel here and there to see religious relics. Joseph’s britches are no longer much of a draw. These days, instead of traveling to view relics, we clamor for people to tell us about the End times. And these days we don’t have to travel at all – we can stay home and turn the dial on our radio and TV for spectacular predictions of the End Times, one after the other, the more over-the-top, the more outlandish, the better. Reading the various predictions of end-time prognosticators is like listening to the old radio show, “Can You Top This?” Yet we forget that, for the prophet Elijah, God was not in the earthquake or the windstorm – not in the spectacular - but in the still, small voice that followed. We can find God right here, right now at Emanuel Church, in the sacraments of baptism and communion, in hearing the Word preached, and in the love we find when Christians gather. We, you and I can experience God’s presence here – both comforting us and challenging us - week by week, in worship, in hearing the Word, in the sacraments, in Christian fellowship. Like Jacob, having wrestled with the angel, we can say, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!” Having experienced God’s presence here at church, our eyes and ears will be tuned and our hearts opened to God’s presence elsewhere in our lives, as we see God’s hand at work in our lives, the lives of our families, our communities – and if we are open to it, we’ll see God at work in all manner of unexpected places. And having experienced God’s presence, we can share that presence in our homes, our offices, everywhere we go.
There is one part of Jesus’ words that always brings me up a little short: “If you love me, you’ll obey my commandments.” As protestant Christians we believe in salvation by grace through faith, not by works, that we should boast. And yet Jesus speaks of obeying his commandments. Is Jesus saying we need to earn his love by our works? If so, boy are we in deep trouble! Jesus’ words could also could come across sounding manipulative, like a spouse telling us, “If you love me, you’ll take out the trash.”
But maybe Jesus was not manipulating, not coercing, but just observing, just describing how his followers would act. If you love me, you’ll keep my commandments. And Jesus summed up the commandments in the two Great Commandments; Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and Love your neighbor as yourself. And Jesus also said, “A new commandment I give you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.” We can’t do this on our own. It is only by having God at work within us, that we can love God and neighbor. But with God at work within us, we will more and more live into being able to love God and neighbor more fully. We can’t please God on our own by trying to will ourselves to love. We can only love because God first loved us, and because God’s love is within us. But because God’s love is in us, we can carry out Jesus’ commandment to love – a love that’s not just about warm fuzzy feelings – heaven knows my feelings aren’t always warm and fuzzy, and yours may not be either – but in Christ’s love we’re can work for the good of others, even those we may not like very much.
Keeping Jesus’ commandments is not easy. It can be dangerous, showing God’s love to folks who may not necessarily be ready to receive it. We’ll need God’s help to do it. In Acts, we read the account of the martyrdom of Steven, the first Christian martyr, who was killed for proclaiming the Gospel of Christ. Stephen’s obedience cost him his life. But Stephen was granted a vision of Christ in glory. We also, when we’re struggling to be faithful, may find Christ’s spirit to be present, giving us strength to carry on. Likewise, our reading from I Peter tells us that we should be willing to suffer, for Christ also suffered for sins, once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring us to God. We need not despair over our weakness against sin and suffering, for, as Jesus told the Apostle Paul, God’s strength is made perfect in human weakness.
We may suffer, but we will not suffer alone. We have the community of the church to support us, to carry us when we can’t carry ourselves. And we have the love of God in Christ. Remember Christ’s words: On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. It sort of sounds sort of like a big cosmic group hug, doesn’t it? – an embrace that begins with our baptism, as we are washed from our sin and clothed with Christ.
As disciples of the Risen Christ, we are Easter people, expecting life where the world only sees death. We know that life, not death, has the last word. As we journey together in the Spirit, because the Paraclete, the Advocate, the Comforter from God is among us, we can comfort and advocate for one another in our needs and in our tragedies, and remind one another that whatever road we walk, however painful, however long, however seemingly lonely, we do not walk alone, for God’s spirit, the Comforter, the Advocate, walks with us. Amen.
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Please join us at Emanuel United Church of Christ for worship on Sundays at 10 a.m. We're on Fillmore Street just off Thompson St. www.emanuelphila.org
In this morning’s Gospel reading, Jesus and his disciples are celebrating the Last Supper, and Jesus is continuing his farewell address to his disciples. Jesus has been preparing them for the reality that he will not be with them much longer. Of course, the disciples are full of questions: where are you going? Why can’t we come? Are you coming back? Perhaps most pressing, how will we be able to live when you’ve gone away. As I considered how the disciples must have been feeling, a Laura Branigan song – or maybe the Michael Bolton remake, depending which version you’re familiar with – started playing in the back of my mind – “How am I supposed to live without you....” and the disciples may well have been thinking something very similar. How are we supposed to live without you, Jesus? How are we supposed to carry on, when you, who are all that we’ve been living for will soon be gone?
Jesus assures them that he will not leave them orphaned. Jesus’ words are mysterious: even though “in a little while” he’ll be going away, still, Jesus says, “I am coming to you.” “In a little while” Jesus says, “the world will not see me, but you will see me.” Jesus tells the disciples how they’re supposed to carry on, how they’re supposed to live: “Because I live, you also will live.” The earthly Jesus, the man of Nazareth with whom the disciples had walked for three years, would be with them no longer, but Christ’s spirit would continue to be beside them, even within them. Jesus tells them that he will ask the Father for “another Advocate”, whom Jesus calls “the spirit of truth” who will abide with us and be with us forever.” The original Greek word, “Paraclete” – means “someone along side us” – as an Advocate – like our attorney at trial – or as an intercessor, someone to go to God on our behalf – or a Helper - or a Comforter, one to strengthen us in difficulties. The world cannot see or receive the spirit of truth, because the world is not open to the truth. But Christ’s disciples will receive this Spirit. Two Sundays from now we will celebrate Pentecost, the story of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the early church.
Of course, I’m considering the text in light of last weekend’s excitement about Harold Camping’s false predictions about the Rapture. It was certainly interesting, if that’s the word, to hear Camping’s last-minute elaborations on his predictions – on May 21, there would be earthquakes at 6 pm in each time zone around the world, and the graves would be opened, the righteous would be Raptured, caught up in the clouds, and the bodies of any unsaved people would be thrown on the ground to be shamed. And, of course, the members of the VFW and legion posts visit our cemetery on the Sunday of Memorial day weekend every year…and we surely couldn’t have them seeing open graves and century old corpses and such. I’m only one person, 50 years old, overweight, short of breath and out of shape….How would I ever get all that mess cleaned up in time for the visitors from the VFW and the Legion and such later today?
OK…I’m being a little tongue in cheek. But, amid the laughter, I think that there’s some truly sad commentary to be found underneath the silliness. We may shake our heads wondering how on earth people can get caught up in Camping’s silliness, or the silliness of other End Times preachers that are just as off-base. People run around here, and there,
and everywhere, looking for Jesus’ second coming in glory, at the end of time – and it is indeed part of our tradition that Jesus will come again in glory, though we don’t know when this will happen - but, if we take today’s Gospel reading seriously, we realize Jesus never left. Jesus never left. Jesus said that, “in a little while, the world will no longer see me, but you will see me.” We live in an in-between time: Indeed, the earthly Jesus ascended to the Father – we’ll be considering the Ascension next Sunday – and Jesus will come again in glory at the end of time – but in between the Ascension and the Second Coming, this in-between time in which we live, Jesus said “I am coming to you. I will send another Advocate, the Spirit of truth.” And in two weeks we will celebrate Pentecost, when Jesus’ promise to come again to his followers, to send the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, the Advocate, the Spirit of Truth, was fulfilled. Jesus specifically said, “I will not leave you orphaned.” I will not abandon you. And Jesus did not abandon us. Why do we sometimes find ourselves acting like orphans, acting as if we’d been abandoned, acting as if God has left the building?
Where will we find Jesus? One place to find Jesus is in church. Jesus said, “where ever two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in their midst.” But it’s easy, especially in a small, struggling congregation like Emanuel, where I’m sometimes sending up prayers at 9:30 that more than 2 or 3 show up, to wonder some weeks if anything worthwhile is going on. We show up, greet each other, stand and sit for the various portions of the liturgy, hear some stirring organ music – or some hit or miss guitar playing – and sing some hymns, and take up the offering, and listen to Pastor Dave natter on in the pulpit – once a month we come forward for our cube of bread and cup of wine, and at the end hang around for coffee and cake and maybe a Bible lesson – and if we think that’s all that’s going on, no wonder we’re feeling empty at the end of the service. If we miss the presence of Christ in our midst, no wonder we feel let down. If all we expect to find the coffee and cake, or Ralph’s organ playing, or heaven help us my guitar playing, or the sermon, or even the fellowship, no wonder we leave feeling hungry. No wonder we feel leave feeling empty. No wonder we feel a need to look for someone or something that can help us feel more a more vivid, tangible connection to God.
I recently read part of one of Martin Luther’s sermons that seemed to speak to our present situation. Of course, Luther was preaching in the 1500’s in very different circumstances, and yet in some ways, the more things change, the more they remain the same. Luther’s sermon dealt with those in the Roman Catholic church of his day who advertised various religious relics, such as articles of clothing worn by various saints, which people would travel long distances to see, while missing God’s presence in their own churches and their own homes, missing God’s presence right in front of their noses. Here’s a few words from Luther:
“In times past we would have run to the ends of the world if we had known of a place where we could hear God speak. But now that we hear this in sermons, we do not see this happening. You hear at home in your house, father and mother and children sing and speak of it, the preacher speaks it in the parish church – you ought to lift up your hands and rejoice that we have been given the honor of hearing God speak to us through the Word. Oh, people say, what is that? What do we get out of it? All right, go ahead, dear brother, if you don’t want God to speak to you every day at home in your house or in your parish church, then be clever and look for something else: in Trier is the Lord God’s coat, in Aachen are Joseph’s britches, go there and squander your money. You have to go far for these things and spend a lot of money, leave house and home empty….all the while anyone can go to Baptism, the Sacrament, and the preaching-desk! How highly honored and richly blessed we are to know that God speaks with us and feeds us with the Word, gives us Baptism, and all the rest! But people say: What, baptism? Sacrament? God’s Word? – Joseph’s britches, that’s what does it!”
These days folks who are, in Luther’s words, being clever, no longer travel here and there to see religious relics. Joseph’s britches are no longer much of a draw. These days, instead of traveling to view relics, we clamor for people to tell us about the End times. And these days we don’t have to travel at all – we can stay home and turn the dial on our radio and TV for spectacular predictions of the End Times, one after the other, the more over-the-top, the more outlandish, the better. Reading the various predictions of end-time prognosticators is like listening to the old radio show, “Can You Top This?” Yet we forget that, for the prophet Elijah, God was not in the earthquake or the windstorm – not in the spectacular - but in the still, small voice that followed. We can find God right here, right now at Emanuel Church, in the sacraments of baptism and communion, in hearing the Word preached, and in the love we find when Christians gather. We, you and I can experience God’s presence here – both comforting us and challenging us - week by week, in worship, in hearing the Word, in the sacraments, in Christian fellowship. Like Jacob, having wrestled with the angel, we can say, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!” Having experienced God’s presence here at church, our eyes and ears will be tuned and our hearts opened to God’s presence elsewhere in our lives, as we see God’s hand at work in our lives, the lives of our families, our communities – and if we are open to it, we’ll see God at work in all manner of unexpected places. And having experienced God’s presence, we can share that presence in our homes, our offices, everywhere we go.
There is one part of Jesus’ words that always brings me up a little short: “If you love me, you’ll obey my commandments.” As protestant Christians we believe in salvation by grace through faith, not by works, that we should boast. And yet Jesus speaks of obeying his commandments. Is Jesus saying we need to earn his love by our works? If so, boy are we in deep trouble! Jesus’ words could also could come across sounding manipulative, like a spouse telling us, “If you love me, you’ll take out the trash.”
But maybe Jesus was not manipulating, not coercing, but just observing, just describing how his followers would act. If you love me, you’ll keep my commandments. And Jesus summed up the commandments in the two Great Commandments; Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and Love your neighbor as yourself. And Jesus also said, “A new commandment I give you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.” We can’t do this on our own. It is only by having God at work within us, that we can love God and neighbor. But with God at work within us, we will more and more live into being able to love God and neighbor more fully. We can’t please God on our own by trying to will ourselves to love. We can only love because God first loved us, and because God’s love is within us. But because God’s love is in us, we can carry out Jesus’ commandment to love – a love that’s not just about warm fuzzy feelings – heaven knows my feelings aren’t always warm and fuzzy, and yours may not be either – but in Christ’s love we’re can work for the good of others, even those we may not like very much.
Keeping Jesus’ commandments is not easy. It can be dangerous, showing God’s love to folks who may not necessarily be ready to receive it. We’ll need God’s help to do it. In Acts, we read the account of the martyrdom of Steven, the first Christian martyr, who was killed for proclaiming the Gospel of Christ. Stephen’s obedience cost him his life. But Stephen was granted a vision of Christ in glory. We also, when we’re struggling to be faithful, may find Christ’s spirit to be present, giving us strength to carry on. Likewise, our reading from I Peter tells us that we should be willing to suffer, for Christ also suffered for sins, once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring us to God. We need not despair over our weakness against sin and suffering, for, as Jesus told the Apostle Paul, God’s strength is made perfect in human weakness.
We may suffer, but we will not suffer alone. We have the community of the church to support us, to carry us when we can’t carry ourselves. And we have the love of God in Christ. Remember Christ’s words: On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. It sort of sounds sort of like a big cosmic group hug, doesn’t it? – an embrace that begins with our baptism, as we are washed from our sin and clothed with Christ.
As disciples of the Risen Christ, we are Easter people, expecting life where the world only sees death. We know that life, not death, has the last word. As we journey together in the Spirit, because the Paraclete, the Advocate, the Comforter from God is among us, we can comfort and advocate for one another in our needs and in our tragedies, and remind one another that whatever road we walk, however painful, however long, however seemingly lonely, we do not walk alone, for God’s spirit, the Comforter, the Advocate, walks with us. Amen.
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Please join us at Emanuel United Church of Christ for worship on Sundays at 10 a.m. We're on Fillmore Street just off Thompson St. www.emanuelphila.org
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Beam Me Up! (From Emanuel's June 2011 newsletter)
Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ –
“So when they had come together, they asked [Jesus], ‘Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?’ He replied, ‘It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.’ When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.” Acts 1:6-9
Our Scripture readings from the book of Acts tell of a time of “going and coming”. On June 5, we remember Christ’s ascension, when Jesus was lifted up into heaven. We’re told that Christ went to prepare a place for his disciples, and intercedes for us before the throne of God. Christ’s “going” into heaven is followed by Pentecost, the “coming” of the Holy Spirit, which we celebrate on June 12. Christ and the Spirit, along with God the Father, make up the Trinity, which we’ll consider on June 19. One (admittedly greatly oversimplified) way of thinking about the Trinity is to think of God the Father above us, Jesus the Son beside us, and the Spirit within us – God as Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer - yet not three Gods, but one God in three persons. Through the Holy Spirit, God is present within us, giving us strength for facing our own challenges and for ministry to others.
Changing the topic a bit: In looking at the first two sentences from the Scripture that opens this newsletter, I’d ask us to think back to a spectacular prediction for May 21, 2011 that didn’t come to pass. Harold Camping and his followers proclaimed – via Camping’s “Family Radio” station on 106.9 FM, via billboards, via ads on the sides of buses, and via folks on the street handing out flyers – that the “Rapture” would happen on May 21. According to Camping, on May 21, all true Christians were to be snatched off the earth to meet with Jesus in the clouds, while all others were to be left behind. Despite the clear meaning of Jesus’ words to his disciples – “it’s not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority” and Jesus’ own words in Mark 13:32 and Matthew 24:36 that not even the Son knows the day or hour, but only the Father – Camping repeatedly proclaimed “Judgment Day – May 21, 2011” on his website “WeCanKnow.com” Camping has also proclaimed that on May 21st of another year, May 21, 1988 to be exact, the spirit of God left the churches, and Satan entered in. Camping repeatedly told his listeners “Come out from the churches – Depart out from among them!” My response is that perhaps Harold Camping’s arrogance had so completely inundated and overwhelmed the “ministry” of Family Radio that there was no longer time or space for God to get a word in edgewise. And, as Proverbs 16:18 states, “Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” I’m not privileged to know whether God’s spirit has “departed out” from Family Radio – but I strongly urge our members and friends, if you’re in the habit of listening to Family Radio, to turn the dial elsewhere.
Harold Camping is only the most extreme of a whole parade of would-be “prophets” – Hal Lindsey, John Hagee, Tim LaHaye, on and on and on and on – who have ripped Bible verses out of context and pasted them together (sort of like a ransom note pasted together from single words clipped from a newspaper) to construct supposed timelines for the second coming of Christ. As 2 Timothy 4:3-4 states, “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths.” Sensational (but false) myths about the End Times will always outsell sound (but demanding and perhaps disagreeable) teaching about how to live as disciples of Christ in the present. But listening to these sensational but false predictions, these myths, is escapism, a way to run away from the life of discipleship to which Christ has called us, as Jonah tried to run away from God’s call for Jonah to preach to Nineveh. I think of the predictions of Camping, Lindsey, Hagee, LaHaye and company as “spiritual junk food”. Like candy or “energy drinks”, spiritual junk food such as the End Times “rapture” myths of Camping, Lindsey, Hagee, and LaHaye may taste good and fill our bellies for a time, but it won’t help us grow strong in the Lord. A diet heavy in spiritual junk food will stunt, not strengthen, our spiritual growth. And if we habitually overindulge our craving for spiritual junk food, we may not desire or even recognize healthy spiritual nourishment even if it’s right in front of us. Like the sugar high we get from eating too much candy, we may briefly feel ourselves spiritually lifted up, may for a time feel “special” because we in our hubris mistakenly think we have an “inside track” on knowing the mind of God. But, like the crash that follows overindulgence in candy or “energy drinks”, we will inevitably find ourselves spiritually depleted and let down when these predictions fail, as they always have, just as Camping’s followers – some of whom, sadly, donated their life savings to help Camping broadcast his wild speculations – these days are likely feeling depleted spiritually, emotionally, and financially, and wondering just what possessed them to empty their bank accounts on Camping’s behalf.
Any such feeling of spiritual let-down is not because God is a liar or the Bible is untrue, but is a direct result of relying on the false teachings of charlatans like Camping and Lindsey and Hagee and LaHaye and company. Paul responds to the “false teachers” mentioned in 2 Timothy 4:3-4 by offering the following advice or “sound teaching” to Timothy in 2 Timothy 4:5: “As for you, always be sober, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, carry out your ministry fully.”And here’s some more sound teaching: In Acts 1:11, two angels told the disciples, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” Setting dates or constructing timelines for Christ’s return is exactly, precisely what Jesus told his disciples not to do. Clearly, rather than standing around staring into the sky (or sitting on our Barcaloungers reading the latest sensationalized “Left Behind” novel) we are to be steadfast in waiting on the Lord through prayer and study of Scripture and active in serving God and neighbor. We are to receive the promised power of the Holy Spirit, and be Christ’s witnesses – perhaps not in Jerusalem, Judea, or Samaria (though our giving to the UCC’s special denominational offerings helps us to witness in these and many other places) – but (to put Jesus’ command in local terms) to witness in Bridesburg, in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and to the ends of the earth.
Make no mistake: Christ will come again. Christ could come again before I put this newsletter in the mail or on email. Christ could come again today, tomorrow, next week, next month, next year. Or Christ may not come until long after all readers of this newsletter, along with their children and grandchildren, have passed on to their eternal reward. Despite what Camping, Lindsey and company tell us, God simply hasn’t given us that information. As Jesus said quite clearly and plainly and definitively and authoritatively in our opening quote from Acts, it’s not for us to know. We must accept that God has both the authority and the right to keep God’s own counsel on the timing of Christ’s return. Christ’s final word on the subject, before his ascension: “Mind Your Own Business!!” No matter: until that day, whenever it comes, we at Emanuel United Church of Christ are to be about the ministry that Christ has given us here on this earth that God has created and in this neighborhood in which God has placed us. In the words of an old hymn (“He Who Would Valiant Be”, #296 in the E&R Hymnal):
“Since, Lord, thou dost defend us with thy Spirit, We know we at the end shall life inherit.
Then, fancies, flee away! I’ll fear not what men say; I’ll labor night and day to be a pilgrim.”
May God be with each of us on our lifelong pilgrimage of Christian discipleship!
See you in church!
Pastor Dave
“So when they had come together, they asked [Jesus], ‘Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?’ He replied, ‘It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.’ When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.” Acts 1:6-9
Our Scripture readings from the book of Acts tell of a time of “going and coming”. On June 5, we remember Christ’s ascension, when Jesus was lifted up into heaven. We’re told that Christ went to prepare a place for his disciples, and intercedes for us before the throne of God. Christ’s “going” into heaven is followed by Pentecost, the “coming” of the Holy Spirit, which we celebrate on June 12. Christ and the Spirit, along with God the Father, make up the Trinity, which we’ll consider on June 19. One (admittedly greatly oversimplified) way of thinking about the Trinity is to think of God the Father above us, Jesus the Son beside us, and the Spirit within us – God as Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer - yet not three Gods, but one God in three persons. Through the Holy Spirit, God is present within us, giving us strength for facing our own challenges and for ministry to others.
Changing the topic a bit: In looking at the first two sentences from the Scripture that opens this newsletter, I’d ask us to think back to a spectacular prediction for May 21, 2011 that didn’t come to pass. Harold Camping and his followers proclaimed – via Camping’s “Family Radio” station on 106.9 FM, via billboards, via ads on the sides of buses, and via folks on the street handing out flyers – that the “Rapture” would happen on May 21. According to Camping, on May 21, all true Christians were to be snatched off the earth to meet with Jesus in the clouds, while all others were to be left behind. Despite the clear meaning of Jesus’ words to his disciples – “it’s not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority” and Jesus’ own words in Mark 13:32 and Matthew 24:36 that not even the Son knows the day or hour, but only the Father – Camping repeatedly proclaimed “Judgment Day – May 21, 2011” on his website “WeCanKnow.com” Camping has also proclaimed that on May 21st of another year, May 21, 1988 to be exact, the spirit of God left the churches, and Satan entered in. Camping repeatedly told his listeners “Come out from the churches – Depart out from among them!” My response is that perhaps Harold Camping’s arrogance had so completely inundated and overwhelmed the “ministry” of Family Radio that there was no longer time or space for God to get a word in edgewise. And, as Proverbs 16:18 states, “Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” I’m not privileged to know whether God’s spirit has “departed out” from Family Radio – but I strongly urge our members and friends, if you’re in the habit of listening to Family Radio, to turn the dial elsewhere.
Harold Camping is only the most extreme of a whole parade of would-be “prophets” – Hal Lindsey, John Hagee, Tim LaHaye, on and on and on and on – who have ripped Bible verses out of context and pasted them together (sort of like a ransom note pasted together from single words clipped from a newspaper) to construct supposed timelines for the second coming of Christ. As 2 Timothy 4:3-4 states, “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths.” Sensational (but false) myths about the End Times will always outsell sound (but demanding and perhaps disagreeable) teaching about how to live as disciples of Christ in the present. But listening to these sensational but false predictions, these myths, is escapism, a way to run away from the life of discipleship to which Christ has called us, as Jonah tried to run away from God’s call for Jonah to preach to Nineveh. I think of the predictions of Camping, Lindsey, Hagee, LaHaye and company as “spiritual junk food”. Like candy or “energy drinks”, spiritual junk food such as the End Times “rapture” myths of Camping, Lindsey, Hagee, and LaHaye may taste good and fill our bellies for a time, but it won’t help us grow strong in the Lord. A diet heavy in spiritual junk food will stunt, not strengthen, our spiritual growth. And if we habitually overindulge our craving for spiritual junk food, we may not desire or even recognize healthy spiritual nourishment even if it’s right in front of us. Like the sugar high we get from eating too much candy, we may briefly feel ourselves spiritually lifted up, may for a time feel “special” because we in our hubris mistakenly think we have an “inside track” on knowing the mind of God. But, like the crash that follows overindulgence in candy or “energy drinks”, we will inevitably find ourselves spiritually depleted and let down when these predictions fail, as they always have, just as Camping’s followers – some of whom, sadly, donated their life savings to help Camping broadcast his wild speculations – these days are likely feeling depleted spiritually, emotionally, and financially, and wondering just what possessed them to empty their bank accounts on Camping’s behalf.
Any such feeling of spiritual let-down is not because God is a liar or the Bible is untrue, but is a direct result of relying on the false teachings of charlatans like Camping and Lindsey and Hagee and LaHaye and company. Paul responds to the “false teachers” mentioned in 2 Timothy 4:3-4 by offering the following advice or “sound teaching” to Timothy in 2 Timothy 4:5: “As for you, always be sober, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, carry out your ministry fully.”And here’s some more sound teaching: In Acts 1:11, two angels told the disciples, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” Setting dates or constructing timelines for Christ’s return is exactly, precisely what Jesus told his disciples not to do. Clearly, rather than standing around staring into the sky (or sitting on our Barcaloungers reading the latest sensationalized “Left Behind” novel) we are to be steadfast in waiting on the Lord through prayer and study of Scripture and active in serving God and neighbor. We are to receive the promised power of the Holy Spirit, and be Christ’s witnesses – perhaps not in Jerusalem, Judea, or Samaria (though our giving to the UCC’s special denominational offerings helps us to witness in these and many other places) – but (to put Jesus’ command in local terms) to witness in Bridesburg, in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and to the ends of the earth.
Make no mistake: Christ will come again. Christ could come again before I put this newsletter in the mail or on email. Christ could come again today, tomorrow, next week, next month, next year. Or Christ may not come until long after all readers of this newsletter, along with their children and grandchildren, have passed on to their eternal reward. Despite what Camping, Lindsey and company tell us, God simply hasn’t given us that information. As Jesus said quite clearly and plainly and definitively and authoritatively in our opening quote from Acts, it’s not for us to know. We must accept that God has both the authority and the right to keep God’s own counsel on the timing of Christ’s return. Christ’s final word on the subject, before his ascension: “Mind Your Own Business!!” No matter: until that day, whenever it comes, we at Emanuel United Church of Christ are to be about the ministry that Christ has given us here on this earth that God has created and in this neighborhood in which God has placed us. In the words of an old hymn (“He Who Would Valiant Be”, #296 in the E&R Hymnal):
“Since, Lord, thou dost defend us with thy Spirit, We know we at the end shall life inherit.
Then, fancies, flee away! I’ll fear not what men say; I’ll labor night and day to be a pilgrim.”
May God be with each of us on our lifelong pilgrimage of Christian discipleship!
See you in church!
Pastor Dave
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Dinner With Friends
Scriptures: Acts 2:14a, 36-41, 1 Peter 1:17-23, Luke 24:13-35
If when you were young – or maybe not so young – you read Mark Twain’s book Tom Sawyer, you may remember the scene in which Tom and his friends walked in on their own funeral. Tom had gone fishing with his friends. Their raft had disappeared and was later found downriver, and those who found it assumed that Tom and his friends had drowned. So a funeral service was held, and the townspeople, who hadn’t previously had a whole lot of patience with Tom and his friends and their capers, listened to the minister eulogize Tom and friends right up to the heaven of heavens. How could they all have missed all the good that had been in Tom and his friends, that had been right before their eyes? Of course, by the time the minister has got everyone in the little country church, including himself, to sobbing, wracked with grief – why, right on cue, Tom and his friends, who had been up in the gallery listening to their own funeral, saunter down the center aisle of the church, to the wonderment of all assembled. As Aunt Polly and others smothered Tom and his friends in hugs, the minister shouted: ‘Praise God from whom all blessings flow – SING – and put your hearts in it!’ And their singing of Old Hundredth, which we sing here each week as the Doxology, shook the rafters.
Mark Twain’s story has more than a little in common with our Gospel reading for today. Our Gospel reading takes place on the first day of the week, the day of resurrection, after Mary and the women had told the disciples of their encounter with the angel, and after Peter had gone to the tomb and come back, reporting that it was empty. Two followers of Jesus – we’re told the name of one of them, Cleopas; the other is unnamed – are leaving Jerusalem. Their teacher, Jesus, had been crucified. They didn’t know what to make of the idle tale that the women had told them, and in any case there was no longer any reason for them to stay in Jerusalem. Any memories of Jerusalem would only bring them grief – or so they thought. So they headed toward Emmaus, a small town about 7 miles northwest of Jerusalem. Here they could get some distance and perspective on their disappointment and grief, before returning to the lives they’d led before they had met Jesus.
As they walked, they talked about all that had happened. And as they walked and talked, and sighed and hung their heads, a stranger joined them, who asked what they were talking about. They asked the stranger, “Are you the only one who doesn’t know what just happened in Jerusalem?” Today they’d have probably asked the stranger, “Have you been living under a rock for the past week?” And they unfolded their tale of woe. The stranger, whom the pair don’t recognize but whom we know to be Jesus, listened as they talked. It may have been a bit like listening to the eulogy for a funeral that had not been held, but perhaps Jesus wanted to hear their understanding of what they’d just experienced.
And then the stranger brought them up short, calling them foolish and slow to believe the prophets – and then the stranger began to unfold his own tale. He offered much better news, telling the pair that all that had happened had been spoken by the prophets, and that the end was not death, but glory. Perhaps the pair began to feel that they, not the stranger, were the ones who had been living under a rock. As the afternoon wears on, the two invite the stranger to the place where they were staying. And as the stranger blesses and breaks bread with them, suddenly they realize that they had been walking and sharing bread with Jesus – who at that moment vanished from their sight!
Last week we read John’s account of Jesus’ two appearances to the disciples, for one of which Thomas was present. Thomas had said he would not believe until he could feel the print of the nails in Jesus’ hands and the mark of the spear in Jesus’ side. We could say that for Thomas, seeing was believing. By contrast, the two disciples on the Emmaus road found that believing was seeing – their grief had blinded them to the presence of the risen Christ in their midst, and it was not until they had taken in all that the stranger had taught them on the road, that in the breaking of the bread, they recognized the stranger as Jesus.
Believing is seeing. It’s striking that, in effect, both the pair on the road to Emmaus and the stranger told the same story. The two travelers on the road told of the crucifixion of Jesus, and the stranger in their midst told of the crucifixion of Jesus. But the stories told of the crucifixion came from two very different perspectives. The two travelers spoke out of their immediate experience. The stranger on the road was able to take the pair’s story of the crucifixion and add context by tying it into the words of Moses and all the prophets, to show them that this was all within God’s plan.
Believing is seeing for us as well – or at least it can be. As Christians we are called to see, not only with our physical eyes, but with spiritual eyes, with the eyes of faith. Through the eyes of faith the cross - an instrument of torture and execution - becomes a symbol of God’s love. Through the eyes of faith, a splash of water, a cube of bread, a sip of wine become elements of the sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion, moments in which we encounter the Divine. Through the eyes of faith our weaknesses can demonstrate God’s power; through the eyes of faith our struggles and failures can be opportunities for God’s glory to shine through. Just as one of our Scriptures for two Sundays from now will tell us that the stone which the builders rejected – the stone that from their viewpoint belonged on the scrapheap – becomes the cornerstone, chosen and precious
But our spiritual eyes need to be open. We can go through life with blinders on, so caught up in our own daily routine, our own set of priorities, that we don’t give God a chance to break into our lives, or so wedded to preconceived notions of what God’s glory will look like that we can miss that glory when it’s right before us, but in an unexpected form.
Like Thomas, we can be so fixated on our need to see and touch that we allow no room for the mystery of God. For example, some listen to the History Channel explanations of how the parting of the Red Sea was due to an earthquake or a windstorm or such, seeking a computer model to give a literal explanation for this or that Biblical miracle. This approach turns Scripture into something flat, one-dimensional, linear. It turns the Scriptural narrative of our faith, the Great Story of God’s dealings with humankind and the cosmos throughout time and eternity, into a newspaper article. It leaves no room for the mystery of God, for the majesty of God. Such models may or may not tell us “how” something happened, but they have nothing to say on the more important questions of why it happened, or what its inclusion in Scripture tells us about God – about God’s holiness, about God’s love, about God’s justice, about God’s mercy. Or, if we are wedded to preconceived notions about where God is to be encountered – only on Sunday morning, only in church, only among church members – we may miss the presence of Christ in a chance encounter with the stranger we meet on the road.
The Danish philosopher and theologian Soren Kierkegaard said that “Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.” The two travelers on the Emmaus road, living life forwards, were engulfed in despair. Having encountered Jesus in the breaking of the bread, understanding backwards from that point, they could affirm, “did not our hearts burn within us as he opened the Scriptures to us.” And they acted on that understanding. Today’s Gospel ends with the two travelers retracing their steps, returning to Jerusalem, from which they had previously fled. Jerusalem, which had been a place of dread and despair, had become a place of hope, and a site to break bread with the apostles and do ministry among the masses.
C S Lewis caught something of this in his book “The Great Divorce” when he said that, as Christ works in peoples’ lives, their self-understanding and their memories of their lives are reinterpreted over time. Faith in Christ provides context for all that happens in our lives. For those in Christ, their memories of even difficult times are transformed in the light of Christ, and they can see where God was present in their struggles. Their earthly lives become outposts of heaven.
Believing is seeing. So may our spiritual eyes be open to seeing the risen Christ in the stranger on the road, the chance encounter on the bus, the conversation at work, and even dinner with family or friends. May our hearts be strangely warmed by Christ’s presence in all we say and do. Amen.
If when you were young – or maybe not so young – you read Mark Twain’s book Tom Sawyer, you may remember the scene in which Tom and his friends walked in on their own funeral. Tom had gone fishing with his friends. Their raft had disappeared and was later found downriver, and those who found it assumed that Tom and his friends had drowned. So a funeral service was held, and the townspeople, who hadn’t previously had a whole lot of patience with Tom and his friends and their capers, listened to the minister eulogize Tom and friends right up to the heaven of heavens. How could they all have missed all the good that had been in Tom and his friends, that had been right before their eyes? Of course, by the time the minister has got everyone in the little country church, including himself, to sobbing, wracked with grief – why, right on cue, Tom and his friends, who had been up in the gallery listening to their own funeral, saunter down the center aisle of the church, to the wonderment of all assembled. As Aunt Polly and others smothered Tom and his friends in hugs, the minister shouted: ‘Praise God from whom all blessings flow – SING – and put your hearts in it!’ And their singing of Old Hundredth, which we sing here each week as the Doxology, shook the rafters.
Mark Twain’s story has more than a little in common with our Gospel reading for today. Our Gospel reading takes place on the first day of the week, the day of resurrection, after Mary and the women had told the disciples of their encounter with the angel, and after Peter had gone to the tomb and come back, reporting that it was empty. Two followers of Jesus – we’re told the name of one of them, Cleopas; the other is unnamed – are leaving Jerusalem. Their teacher, Jesus, had been crucified. They didn’t know what to make of the idle tale that the women had told them, and in any case there was no longer any reason for them to stay in Jerusalem. Any memories of Jerusalem would only bring them grief – or so they thought. So they headed toward Emmaus, a small town about 7 miles northwest of Jerusalem. Here they could get some distance and perspective on their disappointment and grief, before returning to the lives they’d led before they had met Jesus.
As they walked, they talked about all that had happened. And as they walked and talked, and sighed and hung their heads, a stranger joined them, who asked what they were talking about. They asked the stranger, “Are you the only one who doesn’t know what just happened in Jerusalem?” Today they’d have probably asked the stranger, “Have you been living under a rock for the past week?” And they unfolded their tale of woe. The stranger, whom the pair don’t recognize but whom we know to be Jesus, listened as they talked. It may have been a bit like listening to the eulogy for a funeral that had not been held, but perhaps Jesus wanted to hear their understanding of what they’d just experienced.
And then the stranger brought them up short, calling them foolish and slow to believe the prophets – and then the stranger began to unfold his own tale. He offered much better news, telling the pair that all that had happened had been spoken by the prophets, and that the end was not death, but glory. Perhaps the pair began to feel that they, not the stranger, were the ones who had been living under a rock. As the afternoon wears on, the two invite the stranger to the place where they were staying. And as the stranger blesses and breaks bread with them, suddenly they realize that they had been walking and sharing bread with Jesus – who at that moment vanished from their sight!
Last week we read John’s account of Jesus’ two appearances to the disciples, for one of which Thomas was present. Thomas had said he would not believe until he could feel the print of the nails in Jesus’ hands and the mark of the spear in Jesus’ side. We could say that for Thomas, seeing was believing. By contrast, the two disciples on the Emmaus road found that believing was seeing – their grief had blinded them to the presence of the risen Christ in their midst, and it was not until they had taken in all that the stranger had taught them on the road, that in the breaking of the bread, they recognized the stranger as Jesus.
Believing is seeing. It’s striking that, in effect, both the pair on the road to Emmaus and the stranger told the same story. The two travelers on the road told of the crucifixion of Jesus, and the stranger in their midst told of the crucifixion of Jesus. But the stories told of the crucifixion came from two very different perspectives. The two travelers spoke out of their immediate experience. The stranger on the road was able to take the pair’s story of the crucifixion and add context by tying it into the words of Moses and all the prophets, to show them that this was all within God’s plan.
Believing is seeing for us as well – or at least it can be. As Christians we are called to see, not only with our physical eyes, but with spiritual eyes, with the eyes of faith. Through the eyes of faith the cross - an instrument of torture and execution - becomes a symbol of God’s love. Through the eyes of faith, a splash of water, a cube of bread, a sip of wine become elements of the sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion, moments in which we encounter the Divine. Through the eyes of faith our weaknesses can demonstrate God’s power; through the eyes of faith our struggles and failures can be opportunities for God’s glory to shine through. Just as one of our Scriptures for two Sundays from now will tell us that the stone which the builders rejected – the stone that from their viewpoint belonged on the scrapheap – becomes the cornerstone, chosen and precious
But our spiritual eyes need to be open. We can go through life with blinders on, so caught up in our own daily routine, our own set of priorities, that we don’t give God a chance to break into our lives, or so wedded to preconceived notions of what God’s glory will look like that we can miss that glory when it’s right before us, but in an unexpected form.
Like Thomas, we can be so fixated on our need to see and touch that we allow no room for the mystery of God. For example, some listen to the History Channel explanations of how the parting of the Red Sea was due to an earthquake or a windstorm or such, seeking a computer model to give a literal explanation for this or that Biblical miracle. This approach turns Scripture into something flat, one-dimensional, linear. It turns the Scriptural narrative of our faith, the Great Story of God’s dealings with humankind and the cosmos throughout time and eternity, into a newspaper article. It leaves no room for the mystery of God, for the majesty of God. Such models may or may not tell us “how” something happened, but they have nothing to say on the more important questions of why it happened, or what its inclusion in Scripture tells us about God – about God’s holiness, about God’s love, about God’s justice, about God’s mercy. Or, if we are wedded to preconceived notions about where God is to be encountered – only on Sunday morning, only in church, only among church members – we may miss the presence of Christ in a chance encounter with the stranger we meet on the road.
The Danish philosopher and theologian Soren Kierkegaard said that “Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.” The two travelers on the Emmaus road, living life forwards, were engulfed in despair. Having encountered Jesus in the breaking of the bread, understanding backwards from that point, they could affirm, “did not our hearts burn within us as he opened the Scriptures to us.” And they acted on that understanding. Today’s Gospel ends with the two travelers retracing their steps, returning to Jerusalem, from which they had previously fled. Jerusalem, which had been a place of dread and despair, had become a place of hope, and a site to break bread with the apostles and do ministry among the masses.
C S Lewis caught something of this in his book “The Great Divorce” when he said that, as Christ works in peoples’ lives, their self-understanding and their memories of their lives are reinterpreted over time. Faith in Christ provides context for all that happens in our lives. For those in Christ, their memories of even difficult times are transformed in the light of Christ, and they can see where God was present in their struggles. Their earthly lives become outposts of heaven.
Believing is seeing. So may our spiritual eyes be open to seeing the risen Christ in the stranger on the road, the chance encounter on the bus, the conversation at work, and even dinner with family or friends. May our hearts be strangely warmed by Christ’s presence in all we say and do. Amen.
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
A Divine Do-Over
(Scriptures: Acts 2:14a, 22-32
I Peter 1:3-9 John 20:19-31)
This morning’s Gospel reading tells of one of the most famous of Jesus’ appearances after the resurrection, namely, his appearance to Thomas. In a sense, though, today’s account of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearance is sort of a two-fer: buy one, get one free – because Jesus actually appears to the disciples twice. We’re told that on the evening of the resurrection, the apostles were all locked away behind closed doors, for fear of the religious authorities. For some unspecified reason, Thomas was not with them. Jesus appeared to them, showing them his hands, which bore the print of the nails, and his side, where the soldier’s spear had pierced. After this appearance, when Jesus was no longer with them, Thomas showed up. The disciples are all bursting to tell him “we’ve seen the Lord we’ve seen the Lord oh my goodness we’ve seen the Lord.” It was then that Thomas told the disciples “Unless I feel the print of the nail and put my hand in his side, I will not believe.” It is from this story that the disciple gets his nickname “doubting Thomas”. A week later, the scene repeats: same disciples, hiding in the same room behind the same locked door for the same reason: fear of the religious authorities. The only difference is, this time Thomas is with them. And once again, Jesus appears, and shows his wounds to Thomas as he had to the other disciples. Jesus invites Thomas to touch them, but we’re not told that Thomas actually did. Thomas cries out, “My Lord and my God.” It was then that Jesus says, “Do you believe because you have seen? Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed.”
Thomas has the reputation for being a doubter, but I think it’s actually a bad rap. While the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke just name Thomas as one of the disciples, with no other information given, John’s Gospel fleshes out our picture of Thomas a bit. Thomas pops up two other times in John’s Gospel, once when Jesus was returning to Judea to visit Mary, Martha and Lazarus – Jesus had just escaped a crowd that wanted to stone him, and the disciples were questioning why Jesus would ever want to go back there, but Thomas bravely said, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.” And at the Last Supper, Thomas’s question about the way to where Jesus was going led to Jesus’ declaration, “I am the way and the truth and the life.” So in John’s Gospel at least, Thomas wasn’t any kind of problem child disciple – he’s shown to have courage and to be theologically engaged with Jesus, willing to risk asking a question if Jesus is talking over his head. And in today’s reading, Thomas essentially had the same encounter with the risen Christ that the other disciples did – it just happened a week later. While this Scripture has a very explicit lesson for the readers of John’s Gospels – essentially, blessed are those who read this book and believe and are willing to stake your life on what’s written there – I think there’s also a subtle lesson about the nature of God’s love.
Jesus could very well have limited himself to just that first appearance to the disciples, the one when Thomas was absent. He could have left a message with the disciples for Thomas: hey, you had your chance, but you were out to lunch when I appeared. Or maybe you’d gone fishing. Or maybe you needed your beauty sleep. You snooze, you lose. But that’s not what Jesus did – instead, Jesus patiently waited a week and did a do-over of his earlier appearance, just for Thomas. The wording of the gospel is the same in both appearances, except for Jesus’ additional words to Thomas. In golf, if you take a really bad swing and your fellow golfers are forgiving, they may allow you to do the shot over, to take a mulligan. And in a sense, Jesus allowed Thomas a mulligan. God allowed a divine do-over of the appearance of Jesus just for Thomas’ sake. That’s how much Jesus loved Thomas, and that’s how important Thomas was to God’s plan for the disciples.
How about us? I think all of us need a do-over, a mulligan, now and then, not only in golf, but in life. Sometimes we’re not where we need to be when God is doing a great work. Sometimes we miss the boat. We don’t always understand immediately or get everything right the first time – far from it. But we worship a God of the second chance, a God who welcomes seekers whether they come early or late in life. We know so many stories: the parable of the prodigal son, coming home to ask his dad for another chance. Paul on the Damascus road, his life turned around to witness to the Christ whose church he had earlier tried to stamp out. God patiently waited for Paul to be in the place where God could reach him with a vision of the risen Christ. God seeks out the lost sheep and the lost coin, and when found brings them home rejoicing.
People come to Christ in different ways and at different times in their lives. Many – I suspect most of Emanuel’s long-time members, were raised in the church, were brought to Jesus as children and blessed. Fifty years ago, that was the norm. But not today. But not everyone finds Christ in that way. Some come to Jesus via a conversion experience, via a prayer for salvation that emerges out of some deep crisis. Some come to Jesus as a way to find deeper meaning to life or connection with others. Some come to Jesus early in life, and some come later. I’ve experienced that myself, as a fifty-year old answering a call after I’m already midway into a career in health care finance, well into middle age, sitting next to 20-somethings just out of college, responding to that same call. But nobody comes to Christ, whom Christ does not call first. At the Last Supper, Jesus told his disciples, “You did not choose me, but I chose you.” And when God chooses us, God waits for us, waits until we are ready for an encounter with Christ – be that in infancy, in childhood, in adulthood, in old age, or even on our deathbed. And we as Emanuel Church need to be ready to welcome those whom God chooses, no matter where they are on life’s journey when they find us.
Jesus told the disciples that he had chosen them so that the would go and bear much fruit. And, indeed, Thomas was more than faithful, more than diligent on this point. While we don’t read much more about Thomas in the Bible other than a brief mention in the book of Acts, there’s a very strong tradition that the Apostle Thomas brought the Gospel to India, specifically to a community of Jews living in a part of India called Kerela. Most Indian Christians trace their faith in some way through the Apostle Thomas. And we have two such congregations in Philadelphia affiliated with the United Church of Christ, including one whose members all came from Kerela, where Thomas was first said to have brought the Gospel. So the outcomes of Jesus’ calling Thomas to faith are not just long ago and far away, but are alive, to this day, in the UCC, in Philadelphia.
There’s one other point in our reading from John’s Gospel, a powerful point, but mentioned so briefly that we can miss it while we’re waiting to hear about Thomas. When Jesus appeared to the disciples, John tells us, Jesus breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” In essence, these words, brief as they are, constitute John’s Pentecost story, John’s story of the coming of the Holy Spirit, and the conferral of apostolic authority on the eleven disciples. In contrast to Luke’s account of the sound of a mighty wind and tongues of flame and the disciples speaking in foreign tongues, John’s account of the conferring of the Holy Spirit is quiet, possible to miss if you’re not looking for it. In fact, this sentence “Receive the Holy Spirit” is part of the sacrament of baptism, but again, it can go by so quickly we can miss it.
Today we will be celebrating both Sacraments – baptism and holy communion. May we be attentive for God’s presence, during this holy moment in our church’s history.
*****************
Feel the need for a do-over in your relationship with God? Join us for worship at Emanuel United Church of Christ on Sundays at 10 a.m. We're on Fillmore Street (between Thompson and Almond). www.emanuelphila.org
I Peter 1:3-9 John 20:19-31)
This morning’s Gospel reading tells of one of the most famous of Jesus’ appearances after the resurrection, namely, his appearance to Thomas. In a sense, though, today’s account of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearance is sort of a two-fer: buy one, get one free – because Jesus actually appears to the disciples twice. We’re told that on the evening of the resurrection, the apostles were all locked away behind closed doors, for fear of the religious authorities. For some unspecified reason, Thomas was not with them. Jesus appeared to them, showing them his hands, which bore the print of the nails, and his side, where the soldier’s spear had pierced. After this appearance, when Jesus was no longer with them, Thomas showed up. The disciples are all bursting to tell him “we’ve seen the Lord we’ve seen the Lord oh my goodness we’ve seen the Lord.” It was then that Thomas told the disciples “Unless I feel the print of the nail and put my hand in his side, I will not believe.” It is from this story that the disciple gets his nickname “doubting Thomas”. A week later, the scene repeats: same disciples, hiding in the same room behind the same locked door for the same reason: fear of the religious authorities. The only difference is, this time Thomas is with them. And once again, Jesus appears, and shows his wounds to Thomas as he had to the other disciples. Jesus invites Thomas to touch them, but we’re not told that Thomas actually did. Thomas cries out, “My Lord and my God.” It was then that Jesus says, “Do you believe because you have seen? Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed.”
Thomas has the reputation for being a doubter, but I think it’s actually a bad rap. While the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke just name Thomas as one of the disciples, with no other information given, John’s Gospel fleshes out our picture of Thomas a bit. Thomas pops up two other times in John’s Gospel, once when Jesus was returning to Judea to visit Mary, Martha and Lazarus – Jesus had just escaped a crowd that wanted to stone him, and the disciples were questioning why Jesus would ever want to go back there, but Thomas bravely said, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.” And at the Last Supper, Thomas’s question about the way to where Jesus was going led to Jesus’ declaration, “I am the way and the truth and the life.” So in John’s Gospel at least, Thomas wasn’t any kind of problem child disciple – he’s shown to have courage and to be theologically engaged with Jesus, willing to risk asking a question if Jesus is talking over his head. And in today’s reading, Thomas essentially had the same encounter with the risen Christ that the other disciples did – it just happened a week later. While this Scripture has a very explicit lesson for the readers of John’s Gospels – essentially, blessed are those who read this book and believe and are willing to stake your life on what’s written there – I think there’s also a subtle lesson about the nature of God’s love.
Jesus could very well have limited himself to just that first appearance to the disciples, the one when Thomas was absent. He could have left a message with the disciples for Thomas: hey, you had your chance, but you were out to lunch when I appeared. Or maybe you’d gone fishing. Or maybe you needed your beauty sleep. You snooze, you lose. But that’s not what Jesus did – instead, Jesus patiently waited a week and did a do-over of his earlier appearance, just for Thomas. The wording of the gospel is the same in both appearances, except for Jesus’ additional words to Thomas. In golf, if you take a really bad swing and your fellow golfers are forgiving, they may allow you to do the shot over, to take a mulligan. And in a sense, Jesus allowed Thomas a mulligan. God allowed a divine do-over of the appearance of Jesus just for Thomas’ sake. That’s how much Jesus loved Thomas, and that’s how important Thomas was to God’s plan for the disciples.
How about us? I think all of us need a do-over, a mulligan, now and then, not only in golf, but in life. Sometimes we’re not where we need to be when God is doing a great work. Sometimes we miss the boat. We don’t always understand immediately or get everything right the first time – far from it. But we worship a God of the second chance, a God who welcomes seekers whether they come early or late in life. We know so many stories: the parable of the prodigal son, coming home to ask his dad for another chance. Paul on the Damascus road, his life turned around to witness to the Christ whose church he had earlier tried to stamp out. God patiently waited for Paul to be in the place where God could reach him with a vision of the risen Christ. God seeks out the lost sheep and the lost coin, and when found brings them home rejoicing.
People come to Christ in different ways and at different times in their lives. Many – I suspect most of Emanuel’s long-time members, were raised in the church, were brought to Jesus as children and blessed. Fifty years ago, that was the norm. But not today. But not everyone finds Christ in that way. Some come to Jesus via a conversion experience, via a prayer for salvation that emerges out of some deep crisis. Some come to Jesus as a way to find deeper meaning to life or connection with others. Some come to Jesus early in life, and some come later. I’ve experienced that myself, as a fifty-year old answering a call after I’m already midway into a career in health care finance, well into middle age, sitting next to 20-somethings just out of college, responding to that same call. But nobody comes to Christ, whom Christ does not call first. At the Last Supper, Jesus told his disciples, “You did not choose me, but I chose you.” And when God chooses us, God waits for us, waits until we are ready for an encounter with Christ – be that in infancy, in childhood, in adulthood, in old age, or even on our deathbed. And we as Emanuel Church need to be ready to welcome those whom God chooses, no matter where they are on life’s journey when they find us.
Jesus told the disciples that he had chosen them so that the would go and bear much fruit. And, indeed, Thomas was more than faithful, more than diligent on this point. While we don’t read much more about Thomas in the Bible other than a brief mention in the book of Acts, there’s a very strong tradition that the Apostle Thomas brought the Gospel to India, specifically to a community of Jews living in a part of India called Kerela. Most Indian Christians trace their faith in some way through the Apostle Thomas. And we have two such congregations in Philadelphia affiliated with the United Church of Christ, including one whose members all came from Kerela, where Thomas was first said to have brought the Gospel. So the outcomes of Jesus’ calling Thomas to faith are not just long ago and far away, but are alive, to this day, in the UCC, in Philadelphia.
There’s one other point in our reading from John’s Gospel, a powerful point, but mentioned so briefly that we can miss it while we’re waiting to hear about Thomas. When Jesus appeared to the disciples, John tells us, Jesus breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” In essence, these words, brief as they are, constitute John’s Pentecost story, John’s story of the coming of the Holy Spirit, and the conferral of apostolic authority on the eleven disciples. In contrast to Luke’s account of the sound of a mighty wind and tongues of flame and the disciples speaking in foreign tongues, John’s account of the conferring of the Holy Spirit is quiet, possible to miss if you’re not looking for it. In fact, this sentence “Receive the Holy Spirit” is part of the sacrament of baptism, but again, it can go by so quickly we can miss it.
Today we will be celebrating both Sacraments – baptism and holy communion. May we be attentive for God’s presence, during this holy moment in our church’s history.
*****************
Feel the need for a do-over in your relationship with God? Join us for worship at Emanuel United Church of Christ on Sundays at 10 a.m. We're on Fillmore Street (between Thompson and Almond). www.emanuelphila.org
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