Easter 5 May 22, 2011

Jesus said, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.”

The Greek word here translated “dwelling place” in the King James as “rooms” is monai also translated “abide”. St. John 14:23 “Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and abide home with them.” 15:4 “Abide in me as I abide in you.” 15:10 “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love.” Jesus intends us to abide in him, to remain in him, to find our present and future place in his life, to gather with others in his body the church and to be reunited with him and the Father at death – or when he comes again, whichever comes first.

There were predictions of Christ’s final coming yesterday, and we’re still here. There have been such predictions before and will be again. That Christ will come again is a matter of faith in his promise, when he will come again he said only the Father knows, but in that day let us be found doing his will and enjoying his love.

          Professor C.S. Lewis, in the Preface to Mere Christianity, his BBC lectures during WW II, wrote, “Christianity is . . .  like a hall out of which doors open into several rooms. . . . in the rooms, not in the hall, . . .there are fires and chairs and meals. . . . you must be asking which door is the true one; . . . the question should. . . be, “Are these doctrines true: Is holiness here? Does my conscience move me towards this?”  . . . When you have reached your own room, be kind to those who have chosen different doors and to those who are still in the hall. If they are wrong they need your prayers all the more; and if they are your enemies, then you are under orders to pray for them. That is one of the rules common to the whole house.”

          Despite our divisions into our separate rooms the Church has always remembered Jesus’ prayer that the disciples and the church might be one as he and the Father were one, united in being, united in thought, united in action. Throughout history Jesus’ disciples have lived in the tension of spiritual unity and corporate division. Our first lesson tells of the death of Stephen the first martyr, chosen by the apostles to ensure the unity of the Jerusalem church by making sure that the Greek-speaking widows were not neglected in the daily distribution from the common supply of food. We call Stephen and his fellows the first deacons in the church. Several times in Acts we read of actions to preserve unity when division was threatened. Paul’s letters to churches in Corinth, in Rome, and in other places tell of the effort to preserve unity. Our epistle readings this Easter season from Peter, describing the church as “living stones, built into a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ, a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people, who have received mercy,” all descriptions that seek to preserve spiritual unity.

           But as the Church grew in numbers and time passed, spiritual unity broke down. The Gnostics came to rely on secret spiritual knowledge and broke the connection between faith and morals. They said, “if we are saved by faith (by which they meant the secret spiritual knowledge of Jesus’ teaching) then what we do with our bodies doesn’t matter. The Gnostics were, and are popular. You can feel part of a spiritual elite and not have that interfere in any way with how you behave. To witness to the truth against the Gnostics the gospels were written, and the Epistle of James writes “faith without works is dead.”

          In Egypt a priest-philosopher named Arius tried to explain how Jesus saves us and it took several councils of bishops writing what we call the Nicene Creed to state the paradoxical truth that Jesus is both and at the same time fully and completely God and fully and completely human. An Arian church continued for several hundred years.

       Some church divisions were over matters of conscience that could not be resolved. Other divisions came by what we now see as historical processes. In the eastern Mediterranean people spoke Greek; in the western Mediterranean people spoke Latin. The dividing line is the border in the Balkans between Catholic Croatia and Eastern Orthodox Serbia. The Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches have been divided since 1056. But both churches are working toward resolving the issues that divide them. One of them is about the Holy Spirit in the Nicene Creed. The Latin version says that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son (Latin filioque). The Greek says that the Spirit proceeds from the Father alone. Both agree that the Spirit is worshipped and glorified with the Father and the Son. The General Convention of the  Episcopal Church has said that if our churches can resolve other areas of disagreement we will not insist on the filioque.

         

          About 500 years ago the Western – Latin speaking – church divided north and south for reasons both religious and political. Much of northern Europe became Protestant; much of the south formed part of a renewed Roman Catholic church  England chose a third way, looking to the early church for a renewal that retained much Catholic practice with renewed attention to the Bible. For other reasons religious and political the Protestant churches divided into many fellowships, many of them brought by immigrants to America.

          We gather Sunday by Sunday in many rooms, and such is the power of familiarity that we assume that is what God intended. But the American denominational system is not the only way the church has been organized. In many parts of the world through history there has been one church that officially included all the people. Dissenters were forced to leave. Immigrants to America founded churches that either sought to reproduce the familiar church at home – or to be deliberately something very different from the church at home. Compare the colonial church in Virginia which sought to reproduce the Church of England and the colonial Congregational church in New England which sought to purify that church by reference to the New Testament and John Calvin. In all the colonies the various churches were influenced in various ways by their American experience. 

For the past 150 years Christians have worked together to recover spiritual unity and to understand and overcome our corporate divisions. I have spent much of my ministry in this ecumenical work.

          Today Anglican and Roman Catholic delegates are meeting at the Bose ecumenical monastery in northern Italy in the 3^rd session of the Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission. Previous sessions have come to significant agreement on theological questions. ARCIC III is studying how the local and universal Church discerns right ethical teaching. The local Roman Catholic bishop visited the meeting. He said that his cathedral’s baptistery is older than the division of Christianity, and he invites all Christians to use this baptistery, for baptism is common to us all. He also said, “The more we love our Lord the easier it is for us to come closer to one another.”

          One way we witness to spiritual unity and seek to overcome corporate division is through full communion agreements. These witness to agreement in faith and on that basis agree to invite members to share in holy communion and in common ministry. Such an agreement with the Moravian Church was concluded this year. The Agreement with the Lutheran Church is 10 years old. Discussions with the United Methodist Church and other American churches continue. Discussions with the Eastern Orthodox churches continue, and interfaith dialogues are beginning.

          So let us remember that Jesus intends us to abide in him, to remain in him, to find our present and future place in his life, to gather with others in his body the church and to be reunited with him and the Father.  And as Professor Lewis wrote, “When you have reached your own room, be kind to those who have chosen different doors and to those who are still in the hall. If they are wrong they need your prayers all the more; and if they are your enemies, then you are under orders to pray for them. That is one of the rules common to the whole house.”

Easter 4

Easter 4 May 15, 2011

This Easter season we are reading from the first letter of Peter, written probably 35 years after the Resurrection, 15 years after Paul’s letters, about the time the gospels began to be  written down to Christians in north and west Asia Minor in churches that included  both Jews by birth and Gentiles but born again in Christ, churches that had split from synagogues, churches under persecution, churches that included both free men and women and slaves. Just before today’s reading from First Peter comes this: ¹⁶  As servants of God, live as free people, yet do not use your freedom as a pretext for evil. ¹⁷ Honor everyone. Love the family of believers. Fear God. Honor the emperor. ¹⁸ Slaves, accept the authority of your masters with all deference, not only those who are kind and gentle but also those who are harsh.

Slavery in biblical times was not race based. Slaves were either prisoners of war or debtors. In classical time debt could result in slavery, one reason St. Paul (Rom. 13:8) commands, “Owe no one anything, except to love one another.”  Slaves legally had no civil rights; they were property, not persons. They had no legal right to make any choices in life; they had to do what the master orders. Children born to slave mothers were slaves from birth.

But Roman slaves could keep some of the money they earned. An industrious, healthy, and lucky slave could buy his freedom and though he did not have the rights of citizens freed slaves were protected as resident strangers.

The Christian faith offers spiritual freedom through service to Jesus Christ. As the Morning Prayer Collect for peace says, “his service is perfect freedom.” From the time of the early church oppressed people have continued come to Jesus for spiritual freedom. About a third of India’s 24 million Christians (2.3 per cent of the whole population) come from the Dalit or “untouchable” caste, who are still persecuted by the higher castes.  Despite severe persecution and burning of churches the Christian faith is growing in Muslim majority countries, in China and in Africa.

But Jesus told us (St. Matthew 5:11-12) “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”  And St. Peter in today’s Epistle, “For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps.”

We are the servant people to whom God has revealed his purpose and plan in the world, and his purpose and plan for our lives. We are those who know that Jesus “himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. For you were going astray like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls.” We know from experience how much we have been beaten up and beaten down by sin – by our own sin against ourselves and others, and by others’ sin against us. We pray to the Father, “forgive us our trespasses, our sins, and we forgive those who trespass, who sin, against us.” God’s love and grace are so much greater than our ability to receive them. “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us; by his wounds we are healed. Only by the wounds of Christ Jesus can we be healed, healed and set free from the inside out.

Half measures won’t do. An example: just before my last year in seminary I had all 4 impacted wisdom teeth removed. The wounds healed over but the upper right was always tender and ached. I’d put my tongue up and press on the place to relieve discomfort. After several months I felt a rough place and eventually was able to pull out a piece of bone about an eighth of an inch long. Once it came out the gum healed and I haven’t had any trouble for almost 50 years.  Unconfessed sin is like that. We may appear to heal but we’re always sore until we are really healed from the inside. By his wounds we are healed. 

The Epistle ends, “you were going astray like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls.” The word here translated “guardian” in Greek is “episcopos” and in the King James Version “bishop,” bishop of your souls. Martin Luther said Christians are “simul justus et peccator” at the same time justified by Christ’s death and resurrection and natural sinners. We have all gone astray, fallen short of the glory God plans for us, but now returned to Jesus our shepherd and episcopos. In the church bishops and other clergy exercise, in fear and trembling, spiritual authority to guard the flock of Christ, the body of Christ. One of the best revisions in the 1979 Prayer Book (is it a sign of age that some of us still call it the new Prayer Book?) is to put the sermon after the Gospel and before the Creed like a fence on either side of the preacher. God will guide us, through the Gospels and Creeds and conscience if we will listen and obey.

We are the sheep of his pasture; Jesus is our door. We have been bought with the shed blood of Jesus, ransomed from slavery to sin and death, slavery to our own uncontrolled and sinful desired and behaviors. We have become servants of the kindest and gentlest of masters, of God who loves us and knows and wants what is best for us, who gives us spiritual freedom to freely choose to love and serve him, and to love one another in the power of his love.  We rejoice in God’s love, in his gift of love for one another and for all creation. Truly his “service is perfect freedom.”

Easter 3

Easter 3 2011 St. Andrew’s Bessemer City

 

          “Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and to the other apostles, ‘Brothers, what should we do?’ Peter said to them, ‘Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to him.’”

“When Jesus was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him;” 

          We are forgiven sinners. We pray “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” We are forgiven because Jesus death on the cross and his resurrection from the dead have set us spiritually free, free to live a new life in him, free to forgive in the power of his Holy Spirit.

          Many of us have mixed feelings about the news of the death of Osama Bin Laden at the hands of American sailors. We feel that justice has been done, that the person who claimed responsibility for the death of 2,996 people from more than 90 countries - 19 hijackers, 246 on the four planes, 2,606 in New York City in the towers and on the ground, and 125 including 55 military at the Pentagon – that person has also died. He now faces God’s perfect justice.

The news reports are not clear, but Bin Laden may have been unarmed and his 12 year old daughter says he was shot in front of her. Every death diminishes all of us. We regret his death and we regret the deaths of those for whom he was responsible.

In spring, 1945, 66 years ago American soldiers liberated over 32,000 prisoners from the concentration camp at Dachau, 10 miles northwest of Munich. Dachau was the training camp for the SS – the Schutzstaffel, which translates as “defense squadron.” It was the Nazi party private army. The Dachau concentration camp was established in 1933 just weeks after the Nazi party took power. The guards for Auschwitz, Buchenwald, and other extermination camps were trained at Dachau.  Some of the prisoners were German nobles, about ten per cent were clergy – and they continued to offer the eucharist in the camp. Karl Leisner was ordained priest December 17, 1944. Truly Jesus was even there “known to them in the breaking of the bread.”

My mother’s brothers served in Germany in the same 3^rd Army that liberated Dachau; both of them saw it before they came home. I was 6 years old when that war ended; the pictures of the liberated prisoners continue to have a powerful impact on me. They are on the web; you can see them at the Holocaust Museum in Washington or at Yad Va Shem in Jerusalem.

The Nazis killed over 11 million people – 6 million Jews and 5 million other “undesirables.” In the late 1970’s the Khmer Rouge killed 2 million Cambodians; in 1994 the Rwandan interahamwe (the name means “those who kill as one” murdered about 800,000. In Darfur in western Sudan over 400,000 have been killed and 2½ million have been forced to flee.

          Almost 100 years ago Turks massacred almost 1½ million Armenians. Russian and Chinese “wealth distribution” led to the death of millions. And in our own country millions of Native Americans have died in war and massacre.

 

          We have tried to deal with the reality of human depravity and injustice in a number of ways. One is denial; denial will help us in the crisis but eventually the truth is known. Another is anger and blame. All evil is in them –out there- and we must crush it. Sometimes true, but anger and blame eventually fade and we have to deal with the perpetrators as human beings. Eventually we have to repent of our own sins and ask God to forgive us, and having been forgiven to forgive.

          The Holocaust museum in Jerusalem is surrounded by “the garden of the righteous,” trees with plaques of the names of those who sought to save Jews. One so honored is Corrie ten Boom, sent to Ravensbruck concentration camp where her sister Betsie died. After the war Corrie offered a home to former prisoners and wrote a book The Hiding Place. I quote (pp 214-215):

          I continued to speak, partly because the home. .  . ran on contributions, partly because the hunger for Betsie’s story seemed to increase with time. I traveled all over Holland, to other parts of Europe, to the United States.

          But the place where the hunger was greatest was Germany. Germany was a land in ruins, cities of ashes and rubble, but more terrifying still, minds and hearts of ashes. Just to cross the border was to feel the great weight that hung over that land.

          It was in a church service in Munich that I saw him, the former SS man who had stood guard at the shower room in the processing center at Ravensbruck. He was the first of out actual jailers that I had seen since that time. And suddenly it was all there-the room full of mocking men, the heaps of clothing, Betsie’s pain-blanched face.

          He came up to me as the church was emptying, beaming and bowing. “How grateful I am for your message, Frauline,” he said. “To think that, as you say, Jesus has washed even my sins away.”

          His hand was out to shake mine. And I, who had preached so often the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side. Even as the angry vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more? “Lord Jesus,” I prayed, “forgive me and help me to forgive him.”

          I tried to smile; I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth or charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer, “Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me your forgiveness.”

            “As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me.

          And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world's healing hinges, but on Jesus. When Jesus tells us to love our enemies, he gives along with the command, the love itself.”

“Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and to the other apostles, ‘Brothers, what should we do?’ Peter said to them, ‘Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to him.’”

“When Jesus was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him;” 

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 13^th 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 50^th, how many of us will be present for our 60^th, for our 75^th?

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.

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.

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.

Last Epiphany

Last Epiphany A March 6, 2011 St. Andrew’s Bessemer City

          We come today to one of the turning points in the church year, the Last Sunday after Epiphany. This Wednesday March 9 is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the 40 days plus Sundays of Lent, to April 24 Easter, then 50 days including Sundays of celebration until Pentecost June 12, then 51/2 months until Advent and Christmas.

          Today’s Bible readings are about turning points – the Old Testament about God giving his law to the people, the Gospel about the Transfiguration, and the Epistle about our own transfiguration as members of God’s Church including the important teaching, “First of all you must understand this, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by human will, but men and women moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.”

          Let me talk first about the Epistle teaching. We say in the Creed, “We believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church.” From that it follows that we give the church spiritual authority as we read and interpret the Bible. A continuing spiritual tension is between understanding ourselves as individuals responsible for working out our salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12) and understanding ourselves as part of the body of Christ saved by Jesus’ death and resurrection. One way to see the Reformation of the 15^th and 16^th centuries is as a Protestant individualist correction of a Catholic over-emphasis on salvation of the whole body.  The tension is resolved in Philippians 2:13, “It is God who works in you both to will and do his good pleasure.”

            We are at the same time both individuals born one by one, dying one by one, coming one by one to God’s judgment to answer for our sins. We are also part of the human family into which we are born and nurtured, a family essential to our survival and growth, a family in which we learn how to live, a family that supports and sustains us as we grow old, a family that mourns our death.

          As individuals we are responsible for making decisions of conscience about our lives. As part of the family our consciences are formed by our common life. In that context we come to a turning point – a decision to seek to know and do the will of the God who made us and loves us. The disciples had made their initial decision to leave their fishing business and follow Jesus. The Transfiguration was another turning point for Jesus and for the disciples.

The children of Israel made a decision to follow Moses out of slavery in Egypt. They learned to survive in the desert on God’s daily gift of manna, to trust God to provide water. They organized judges to settle disputes; they beat back an Amalakite raid. They were willing to enter covenant with the Lord. God called Moses up the mountain to receive the Law as a sign of that covenant. When Moses came down the mountain his face shone, shone with joy from being in the presence of God. It was another turning point for Israel.

          The Transfiguration was a turning point in Jesus’ ministry. Jesus had been baptized by John and tempted. He had preached and healed, and called the disciples and taught them about God’s coming kingdom. The disciples had been sent out with power and authority to preach and heal, and they had come back rejoicing. Jesus saw that they were ready to enter more fully into their calling. One day when they were alone he asked them, “Who do men say that I am?” They told them the many things people were saying about him. And then he asked them the question each one of us is called to answer for ourselves, “And who do you say that I am?” Peter answered, “You are the Christ of God.” Then Jesus told them plainly, “The Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes and on the 3^rd day be raised.” They didn’t understand. Even Peter rebuked Jesus, “God forbid Lord; this shall never happen to you.” Jesus responded, “Get behind me Satan.” 

          Shortly after this difficult teaching Jesus was called up the mountain, as Moses had been called up Sinai. While he was praying his appearance changed and even his clothing became dazzling white. Moses and Elijah appeared, Moses through whom God had given the Law, the sign of the covenant, and Elijah the first of the prophets through whom God had called Israel back to the glory of obedience, prophets through whom God had worked many miracles.  Moses and Elijah spoke with Jesus about his death and resurrection through which God would establish his kingdom through his church forever.

          From the cloud came the voice of God, “This is my Son, the Beloved, listen to him.” On Sinai God spoke in thunder and lightning to the people of Israel. On the same mountain he spoke to Elijah in the still small voice. We are not told what tone of voice God used at the Transfiguration, but the disciples heard and obeyed.

          From the Transfiguration Jesus’ face was resolutely set toward Jerusalem, death and resurrection. The Transfiguration was a turning point in Jesus’ life and ministry.

          What are your turning points? Have you come to the place in your life where you are ready to make, or to make again, your own covenant with Jesus, where you are ready to receive the love Jesus has for you and commit your life to him in the fellowship of Jesus’ body the church?  We all have to do that once, and repeat as needed.

          Have you received his love and committed your life to Jesus and now need to move on in new and hard and active trust in his forgiveness and new life? Who do you need to forgive? Who do you need to turn loose and trust to his love?

          The penitential season of Lent offers us opportunity for worship, fellowship, and study so we may grow in commitment.

          The children of Israel were never the same after Sinai. The life of Jesus and his disciples turned at the Transfiguration to death and resurrection.  May God grant us grace to turn and turn again to him in worship, love, and service.