6 Easter, 2025-C: The promises of God in Christ

Lectionary: Acts 16:9-15; Psalm 67; Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5; John 14:23-29

 

En el nombre de Dios, quien promete vida, paz, protección y provisión. In the name of God, who promises life, peace, protection, and provision. Amen. 

Fronn the season of Epiphany until now, we’ve been reading about the spiritual development and maturation of the disciples and connecting what we learn from them to us, for example, how each journey is unique to the journeyer, how God is steadfastly present with us, meeting us where we are and leading us to where we need to be; how our spiritual maturation is a process that is enriched and developed over time - God’s time; how we hit walls on this journey and how God leads us through them to new freedom, new understanding, and new depths of our faith.

In last week’s gospel, we saw how Peter finally got it… through a dream. Hesitant, at first, to violate a long-held habit and understanding of necessary separation, Peter responded to God’s prompting and opened himself to connect with persons previously forbidden to him. Thus began his powerful, productive life of faith and evangelism. 

In today’s gospel, Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles, undergoes a similar growth experience also from a dream. Paul is clear about his divine purpose. He knows he is being sent by God in Christ to carry the Good News to the Gentiles and to expand the boundaries of the family of God to include them. But as this story shows us, even knowing our divine purpose doesn’t prevent us from hitting walls. Paul went to the Roman colony mentioned in his dream. He anticipated meeting a man, but instead, he met Lydia of Thyatira, a woman - a rich, astute business woman. 

If you know Paul, you know the nature of this wall he hit. With God’s help, however, Paul responded toLydia’s eager listening of his proclamation by baptizing her entire household, making them the first European converts to Christianity. But when Lydia invited Paul to stay at her home, he hit another wall: a Jewish religious leader staying at the home of a Gentile woman…? The writer tells us Lydia prevailed upon Paul, having to persuade Paul to accept her offer of hospitality. 

In this moment, however, we understand what the writer of Revelation meant when he said, “On either side of the river [of the water of life] - the Jewish side and the Gentile side - is the tree of life,” which in the original Greek means, “collective.” The two sides are mafe one.

That’s the work of God among us, then and now. It is our work too - the work God calls us to do until the whole world is reconciled to God. We have much to do, and we do it as the church, the body of Christ in the world. 

Church is a collective enterprise. We gather not to reassure ourselves that we’re on the path to heaven after we die, but rather, to learn and grow together so that we can go into the world and BE the presence of the path to heaven, which is God in Christ. What do I mean by that? Several things: 

1 - I mean that heaven isn’t a prize we earn after we die. Heaven is the reality of the eternal God in the present moment, living in us.  Jesus said, “my Father (Note: this word is plural, meaning Father and Mother, nourisher, protector, upholder) will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. “With them”here literally means “proceeding from them.” God is in us, acting through us. That is the primary promise of this gospel story.

The one whom God promises will proceed from us is the Holy Spirit of God. Spirit means breath, in Hebrew, ruach. This same ruach that breathed life into all creation, including the first humans, continues to breathe life into us now, and through us, into the world. 

2 - I mean that our church community is meant to be a safe place for us to learn and practice how to be people through whom God acts in the world. We listen together in the circumstances we confront, for the guidance of the Holy Spirit on how we can respond, bringing God’s peace, harmony, and well-being into the world where there is fear, hatred, and distress. 

3 - I mean that as we grow in spiritual maturity in our relationship with God in Christ, we remember that the love Jesus is talking about in this gospel is agape love: a deeply committed, sacrificial love, just like he had for us. A love that led him to the cross, the tomb, and the resurrection for our sake, so that we could believe and become witnesses for him, as Peter and Paul did.

God in Christ, who has agape love for us, abides in us right now, and acts through us to bring this love to all the broken people and places in the world just as he did. Knowing how this feels from his own human experience, Jesus promises us one more thing: his peace. 

When this gospel was written, there was peace. It was known as the Pax Romana… a peace established by the strength of the Roman military, funded by oppressive taxation, and maintained through threat of punishment and the ever-presence of soldiers. This is the peace the world gives. 

Jesus is offering a totally different kind of peace. Jesus’ peace proceeds from our harmony with the eternal God who abides in us.

This peace provides a foundation of well-being, tranquility, and hope, that isn’t disturbed by any circumstances. In fact, this peace transcends all external circumstances as it lifts us continually into the loving presence of God who protects us, provides for us, and holds us close to comfort us, while the powerful love of God works to redeem those external circumstances.

When sin and conflict happen, and they will continue to happen, Jesus says, ‘Remember that I am with you, my peace is with you. So, fear not. Don’t let your hearts be troubled. I am eternally present with you. Love as I love, go where I send you, listen when I speak in your dreams or give you visions, open your eyes to see the truth around you, then work with me to transform the systems of the world that harm my beloved ones and my creation.’ 

All of this may take longer than we’d like, or look different than we’d expected, but our faith assures us that God, who always acts out of love and mercy for us and for the world, will redeem all things. That is the promise. 

So... presence, peace, patience, guidance, provision, comfort, protection, redemption, mercy, and love… these are the promises of God, and they truly do exceed all that we can ask, imagine, or desire. 

I close with a familiar prayer by American theologian and monk, Thomas Mertom. Let's pray.

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore I will trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone. 

Amen. 

3 Easter, 2025-C: Children, have you Jesus?

Lectionary:Acts 9:1-6, (7-20); Psalm 30; Revelation 5:11-14, John 21:1-19

The Scripture stories we share after Easter are so empowering! We can see the various ways Jesus made himself known to the disciples and began the movement that became Christianity - a movement that changed the course of human history… and continues to change it.

These stories show us the gentle but powerful transforming love of Jesus at work in our forebears in the faith and assure us that we too can be transformed, each in our own way and in God’s time.

The reading from Acts is a story of how God transforms hate to love in a single heart: from Saul to Paul. From our perspective, 2,000+ years later, we can see how much the change of a single heart can lead to changing the world. Paul couldn’t have seen it while he lived. Neither will we while we live, but we know that it will happen because we believe that God is always redeeming, always acting in love.

Our Psalm reminds us that we all sing a song of hope and gratitude for God who forgives us quickly and restores our lives even when we have descended into a terrifying darkness or a death spiral that threatens to destroy us. The reading from Revelation reminds us that we are in this with all the company of heaven.

The gospel of John tells about the first revelations of the resurrected Jesus, and the various ways Jesus makes himself known - something that continues to this day. These post-resurrection stories contain so much symbolism! Here are just a few: 

• Night is Bible-talk for darkness of sight, understanding, or experience. 
• Light is Jesus’ presence with us - the light that penetrates the darkness and is not destroyed by it. 
• Water… remember our recent discussions where the chaos waters were calmed and ordered by the breath/ruach of God so that they nourish and don’t destroy. 
• Jesus cooking on the beach is him preparing a table for the disciples, pointing to Psalm 23. This story reminds us that transformation happens in the midst of our everydayness. Do what you always do and see how my presence in you transforms it into divine action. 
• 153 fish - a very specific number, don’t you think? This refers to the Hebrew word ‘rob’, which means abundance, greatness. The catch of fish the disciples brought in symbolizes that this gift from God is meant to feed so many more beyond themselves.

But it’s Jesus’ questions I want us to ponder. 

To the disciples, Jesus asks, “Children,” a term of endearment meaning little ones, and also refers to the Children of Israel. “Children, do you have no fish?” Fish, when this gospel was written was a symbol of Jesus Christ. We know it today as the Icthys.

Children, do you have fish? The disciples answer: ‘No.’ 

So, Jesus instructs them: Do as I say and you will, enough to nourish you and all others. The 153 fish not only symbolized an abundance, displaying the greatness of God, but also represented all nations, all peoples. Jesus was teaching the disciples to cast their nets wide, allowing divine grace to gather EVERYONE into Their community of love.

When they return with their huge catch of fish, Jesus says to the disciples: Come and eat. This is the risen Lord’s first invitation to Communion: God’s holy food for God’s holy people.

During their meal, Jesus asks Peter three times: Do you love me? The first two times, Jesus uses the word agape, meaning a strong, committed, sacrificial kind of love. Peter responds with the word philio, meaning affection, not as strong a commitment. The third time he asks Peter if he loves him, Jesus uses Peter’s term: philio, and Peter is hurt. We can’t know why, but we can see that Peter still doesn’t get it. He will, though - in God’s time.

The same is true for every one of us. Our faith journeys will take each of us where we don’t want to go - not necessarily to the deaths of our bodies, as for Peter, but certainly to the deaths of our ideas, plans, and understandings that don’t serve God or us - which is what the story in Acts of Saul’s conversion to Paul illustrates so powerfully.

Jesus’ responses to Peter are also important because the Good Shepherd offers guidance on how living out our faith will unfold for us - even today. 

1. Feed my lambs, Jesus says, my babies, my children (as he had called them earlier). This refers to those in the inner circle of our lives. Feed them, nourish them with the holy food prepared by God for the holy people of God. 
2. Tend my sheep. Sheep is Bible-talk for the flock of Christ - all followers of his Way. We all must look beyond caring for those only in our inner circles, our churches, and tend to the larger family of Christ. These will come in different varieties, like the 153 fish - all nations, all peoples. Tend to them all. Serve them all. 
3. Feed my sheep. This is Jesus’ invitation to us to serve the global community. All nations, all peoples are to be nourished with God’s love by the holy food prepared by God for God’s holy people; and it is to be given to them with the same abundance and generosity that God gives it to us.

Every one of us, of every age and ability, is invited to answer Jesus’ call to feed his lambs; tend his sheep; and feed his sheep. Jesus will make himself known to us, to each one of us, and to us as a community, so we must keep the eyes of our faith open to the way God chooses for us that we may behold God in all Their redeeming work, and serve Them proclaiming by word and example, the love of Christ for the world.

Then, when God in Christ asks us, Children, have you fish… have you Jesus? We can shout with joy and gratitude: Yes, we have! Christ is in me. Christ is in us, and we’re ready to tend and feed your sheep, with the gifts you have given us, in the way you have shown us. Amen.