Preacher: The Rev Dr. Valori Mulvey Sherer, Rector
En el nombre del Dios: Padre, Hijo, y Espiritu Santo. Amen.
Scripture. Tradition. Reason. Who knows what these are?
They are the “legs” of the tree-legged stool, which is a theological construct given to us by Richard Hooker, a priest and theologian from the Reformation era, as a way to understand and balance the continuing revelations of God in Scripture, with the experiences of the early church, and the experiences of the church in the current moment in history, so that we may faithfully discern the will of God in our time.
Scripture: the story of God’s self-revelation to us. It’s a love story. Think of the story line as it proceeds from Genesis (where humans thought they knew better than God) to Easter (where God removed every barrier, including death) to Pentecost (where God’s Spirit entered our temporal bodies and formed us into the eternal body of Christ, the church) to Acts (where we began participating in the reconciling work of Christ and where we continue to participate until the whole world is reconciled and restored to unity with God and one another).
Tradition: everything from the history of God’s people we find in our Scripture, to the prayers, liturgies, worship, theology, and hymns handed down to us from our Jewish forebears, the disciples, and those among the communion of saints who came before us.
But tradition also includes what we are establishing now and handing down to the generations that will follow us. In their book, A people called Episcopalians, theologians Westerhoff and Pearson say “…we Episcopalians are a people who at the moment of our Baptism are incorporated into a living, changing tradition, established by a community of faith that continually strives to know and do the will of God.” (Morehouse, 2014, 12)
Reason: the ability to be present in our experiences and reflect on them until we see how God will use them and us to further the plan of reconciliation. For example, I commend to you the work done at General Convention on marriage equality, racism, alcoholism, the environment, ecumenism, gun control, women’s ministries (just to name a few) and the experiences that brought these issues to our collective discernment. That’s “reason.”
As PB-elect Michael Curry said, we are called to go out from the comfort of our churches and respond to the cries of those who suffer in our neighborhoods, to transform the ourselves and the world, until the world looks less like our nightmare and more like the dream of God.
Knowledge informs our faith but cannot replace it, and this is what Jesus is teaching his disciples – and us – in today’s gospel story from Mark. Jesus has returned to his hometown and is in the temple teaching with a wisdom that astounds his listeners.
His hometown folk remember the great deeds of healing Jesus has done and they begin to wonder out loud how this can be. This is where their thoughts step on their faith. They get offended and end up sounding like Vizzini from Princess Bride: “Inconceivable!” Isn’t that Mary and Joseph’s son – the carpenter? We know his brothers and sisters. This is inconceivable! It just can’t be!
And as long as it was inconceivable to them, as long as they limited the power of God’s love according to their own understanding of what was possible, Jesus’ reconciling work among them was impossible. It’s as if they dammed up the living waters until they were only a trickle and Jesus could cure only a few sick people, so he left – “amazed at their unbelief.”
You can almost see Jesus hanging his head, shaking it in disappointment. He had a great gift to offer them, but they refused it because they were unable to move from their heads (that is, their thoughts) to their hearts (their faith).
The gospel tells us the next thing Jesus did was send his followers out two by two. The language used by the evangelist is meant to link our hearing of this story to the story of Noah - where the animals boarded the ark two by two. In the story of Noah, God entered into a new covenant with the people. In the gospel story, Jesus IS the new covenant, so instead of entering the safety of the ark, Jesus is sending them out into the storm.
Mark says Jesus sends them out with authority, but this is new to them, so to help them rely on their faith and not their own understanding, Jesus told them to take nothing – no food, no money, no extra clothes. For us, he’d say, ‘leave your cell phones and tablets behind.’ (Gasp!)
As you know, the disciples were not yet very good at understanding Jesus. They regularly missed the point, failed to understand, and got it wrong. Just recently we heard Jesus ask them how they could have no faith as the storm tossed their boat while Jesus slept. Then, taking the disciples to the “other side” that is, where the unclean folk were, Jesus gives his disciples the opportunity to practice moving from their heads (thoughts) to their hearts (faith), demonstrating how the power of God’s redeeming love can accomplish the impossible: healing the Gerasene demoniac, the bleeding woman, and Jairus’ daughter – Jews and Gentiles alike.
I imagine the disciples thinking, ‘Well, of course HE can do that.’ But now Jesus is sending THEM to do it. How nervous they must have been! What if I can’t heal this person? Is it safe for me to approach that demoniac? What if they go nuts on me? I’m not God!
And that’s exactly St. Paul’s point in the epistle. We are NOT God, therefore, we must acknowledge our own weakness and make room for God to act in us, and through us into the world. We can do nothing relying on ourselves, but nothing is impossible for God, who dwells in us, and touches the world through our hands.
As Mark tells us in the conclusion of today’s gospel story, the disciples did as Jesus asked – and it worked! Having nothing to rely on but the sending words of Jesus and the example of his life and ministry, the disciples went into the world and loved as he loved. As a result, they brought peace to many who were troubled and cured many who were sick.
Now it’s our turn. Can we, like those first disciples, go TO the one who scares us, or frustrates us, or even disgusts us rather than AWAY FROM them confident that God will transform our hearts and show us how to move in love? Can we bear the love of God to them knowing that they and we will be changed by this relationship? Can we allow ourselves to truly desire that they be one with us and share our pews, our communion table, our life?
Our purpose as followers of Christ is not to come to a pretty church, pray pretty prayers in pretty rituals, and go home feeling good about our eternal souls. We have been chosen and particularly gifted to bear the love of God in Christ into the world where God has placed us.
We gather each Sunday to be nourished by Word and Sacrament and empowered by the Holy Spirit to be one body, one spirit in Christ, to be the church body so that we can “Go!” as PB-elect Michael preached at convention…to go out into the worldly storms bearing the presence and the peace of Christ; …go out into our neighborhoods bearing the love of God in Christ establishing relationships with those people whom others shun. As the sanctified body of Christ we are called to love ALL our neighbors, inside and outside our church, with pure affection, the kind that hopes for and works for the very best for them on earth as God desires it in heaven.
Given the state of the church and the world right now, does that seem impossible? Maybe in our thoughts, but not in our hearts where our faith assures us that nothing shall be impossible with God. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment