Thursday, April 28, 2011

Johns Hopkins 50th Reunion Memorial Service

May the great Name of God be exalted and sanctified, throughout the world, which he has created according to his will. May his Kingship be established in your lifetime and in your days, and in the lifetime of the entire household of Israel, swiftly and in the near future; and say, Amen. May his great name be blessed, forever and ever. Blessed, praised, glorified, exalted, extolled, honored, elevated, and lauded be the Name of the holy one, Blessed is he, above and beyond any blessings and hymns, praises and consolations which are uttered in the world; and say Amen. May there be abundant peace from Heaven, and life, upon us and upon all Israel; and say, Amen. He who makes peace in his high holy places, may he bring peace upon us, and upon all Israel; and say Amen.

That is an English translation of the Mourner’s Kaddish, recited in the synagogue service in memory of the dead. Records exist of its use in the synagogue service since the 13th century, and it reflects a tradition from the time of the Prophet Ezekiel in the Exile to Babylon roughly 600 years before Christ.   

We’ve been remembering the dead for a very long time.  About 200 years before Ezakiel’s time Homer’s Iliad includes memorial speeches for the heroes of Greece and Troy. Greek and Hebrew reflect a double tradition about memorials in Western culture. The Greek tradition is the eulogy. We talk about the events in the life of the person, remembering that person’s great deeds and their contribution to the life of the community. The Hebrew tradition includes the Kaddish which looks beyond the person to the God who created him, body and spirit, and inspired his life.

We are heirs of this double tradition. We have spoken the names of the members of our class who have died, and we have prayed “We remember them . . . From the rising of the sun, so long as we live, we remember them.”  We have also heard Psalm 121, “from whence comes our help, our help comes even from the Lord.”

There is a third part of the tradition of Western memorial services that focuses not on the person who has died nor on his creator but on those who offer the memorial, on us present. How shall we then live – we who remember the dead and their deeds and their influence on us and our lives – we who give praise to our Creator whose Spirit lives and moves in us – how shall we live in the remaining time we have. We who are here for our 50th, how many of us will be present for our 60th, for our 75th?

We gather this morning to remember our classmates who have died, to give thanks for their lives, and to think about our own lives and the time we have left to live. What values did we learn here 50 years ago? How have we lived out those values? What values do we offer to the class of 2011?

The university motto is drawn from the gospel of St. John  8:32  in the Latin, “Veritas vos liberabit” the truth will set you free. Truth and freedom are important values we learned here 50 years ago, values which have formed our lives over the past 50 years, values we trust the university to teach today.

Our understanding of the meaning of truth and freedom has changed over the past 50 years. We now recognize a subjective element in truth. Our understanding of truth reflects our personal history and our situation in life; what I find to be true you may find problematic. But I continue to believe with Thomas Jefferson that some truths are self-evident and that with some effort we can find sufficient agreement to live in freedom and peace in a civil society. There was a time, not too long after we graduated, that some questioned that, but we have moved on from that crisis to face new ones.

We have a broader understanding of freedom now, and we have fought and continue to fight for freedom. We honor those of our classmates, other members of the university, our fellow citizens, and others throughout the world whose lives and deaths witness to the cost of freedom. Freedom includes political liberty, and economic freedom, and freedom in our personal lives. We have learned that we cannot be free when others are slaves.

And so as we remember and honor the members of our class who have died, as we give thanks to the Creator who made and inspirited them and us, let us also give thanks to this university and resolve to live by its motto – the Truth will make you free.

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Easter Day

Easter Day April 24, 2011 St. Andrew’s Bessemer City

          We are an Easter people. Our lives are formed by the fact that Jesus is alive. As C.S. Lewis said, “The resurrection is like the sun; not only do I see it, but by it I see everything else.”

          Because Jesus lives, we live, and we live no longer for ourselves, limited by our own knowledge, skill, and strength, but we live for and in Jesus, in the unlimited knowledge and power of the creator of all that is and ever will be. The Holy Spirit of Jesus leads us; the Holy Spirit of Truth leads us into all truth; the Holy Spirit of power gives us all the power we need to love and serve Jesus in the world he has redeemed, the world he has made new by his Easter resurrection.

          Mary Magdalen got up early to come to the tomb in the early dawn. She and the other women had watched carefully as Jesus’ dead body had been taken down from the cross and laid in Joseph’s new tomb. They saw the stone rolled across the entrance to the cave tomb at dusk Friday. They rested on the Sabbath, and Mary came early Sunday morning to the tomb. She came with spices to spread on the body, came to weep at the tomb; came to weep for what might have been, for Jesus’ life cut short, for the people continuing in sin and oppression, for the moral bankruptcy of the religious, intellectual, and political leadership of the people. These leaders had thrown away their last best chance; they had chosen the limited short term goals of preserving the status quo, and they had killed their Savior.

          Mary came early to the tomb and saw the stone taken away. Was Jesus to suffer the final indignity of having his body stolen for the sake of its linen wrappings and the coins laid on his eyes and the body dumped naked in the ditch? Mary ran to Peter and to “the other disciple whom Jesus loved” – John who wrote this gospel. She said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.”  The men ran to investigate, young John and older, slower, Peter; Peter who had denied him two nights before impetuous Peter who two nights before had said, “I will never deny you” and then did just that, Peter went on in to the tomb.  Jesus’ body had not been removed for the sake of the linen wrappings. They were there and so was the head cloth. It wasn’t robbery; it was something else.  John got it and believed. Peter’s remorse and guilt slowed his response.  So the men went home to breakfast, but Mary stayed, stayed to pray, stayed to weep, stayed perhaps wondering, “What am I going to do with all these spices I’ve brought for a body that isn’t here?”

          As she looked in to the tomb she saw the angels. St. Matthew and St. Mark tell of one angel, St. Luke and St. John have two, and in the other gospels the angels speak. In St. John it is Jesus who speaks, and when he calls Mary by name she recognizes him.

          Jesus knows us each by name.  In baptism parents and godparents say, “We present (Name) to receive the sacrament of baptism.” That’s why we say Christian name. That is the name Jesus knows us by.  Jesus knows us each by name and Jesus calls us each by name. His Spirit speaks to our spirit and he calls us each to love him and to serve him. Just as he called the disciples on the shores of the Sea of Galilee so he calls us in Western North Carolina.

          Just as he ate and drank with them after his resurrection, as forgiven and Spirit-filled Peter preached to the gentiles, so Jesus eats and drinks with us this Easter morning.  

          And Jesus offers us today the same forgiveness of sins and spiritual truth and power that came to the first believers those many years ago. Peter and all those who heard him have died, but they died as forgiven sinners and they live in Christ Jesus.

          St. Paul tells us in today’s Epistle, “seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.”  Jesus’ resurrection sets us free from the death of sin and frees us to live new life in him. As forgiven sinners our Easter task is to live fully into Jesus’ resurrection.

          The resurrection opens for us an opportunity to forgive others as we have been forgiven. The resurrection opens for us an opportunity to live what the Prayer Book describes as “righteous, godly, and sober lives.” The resurrection opens for us opportunity to love others in the same way and with the same intensity that God loves us, to be “in love and charity with all.”
         
          Because Jesus lives, we live, and we live no longer for ourselves, limited by our own knowledge, skill, and strength, but we live for and in Jesus, in the unlimited knowledge and power of the creator of all that is and ever will be. The Holy Spirit of Jesus leads us; the Holy Spirit of Truth leads us into all truth; the Holy Spirit of power gives us all the power we need to love and serve Jesus in the world he has redeemed, the world he has made new by his Easter resurrection.

We are an Easter people. Our lives are formed by the fact that Jesus is alive. As C.S. Lewis said, “The resurrection is like the sun; not only do I see it, but by it I see everything else.”  Amen.

Friday, April 15, 2011

Palm Sunday

At St. Andrew's Bessemer City NC Palm Sunday April 17, 2011 after the Epistle and before the Passion.

Before we read the Passion I have a few things to say.

          On Palm Sunday we omit the Nicene Creed and the Confession and Absolution. These are in the Passion gospel, a dramatic reading with a narrator and speaking parts. On the occasion of his baptism and the eve of his birthday I have asked Vaughn Dutton to read the concluding words of the Centurion. These words are a profession of faith in the words of scripture to be repeated in the words of baptism. 

          All in the congregation read the words of the crowd before Pilate and at the cross. We are spiritually present then and there. The congregation of Israel at Mount Sinai received the Ten Commandments not only for those present but for all the children of Israel forever, both natural children and adopted children like us. When we celebrate the Holy Communion we join “with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven” including our family and friends and all who have gone before us into the presence of the Lord. So this morning we stand before Pilate and we stand at the cross, and the words of the crowd are our words.

          Jesus died on the cross for the sins of all - for our sins, and for the sins of the whole world.  Paul reminds us letter to the Romans (3:23 and 5:12) “all have sinned.” Some of us have committed major and public sins, but most of our sins are minor, private sins that we sometimes have trouble remembering. When we cry out with the crowd we are not spectators to a past event; we are participants in a present event with eternal consequences for our own souls and for the whole world.

Martin Luther wrote (Letter 99, Paragraph 13) “God does not save those who are only imaginary sinners. Be a sinner, and sin boldly, but let your trust in Christ be stronger, and rejoice in Christ who is the victor over sin, death, and the world.”

So we cry before Pilate and before the cross let it not be as spectators - other people in a far away land and a distant time but speak for yourself; sin boldly with full voice, laying your sins and the sins of the world boldly at the foot of the cross on which we crucify Jesus, looking with faith to his glorious resurrection and our new life in him.