24 January -- III Epiphany

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. AMEN.

One summer while I was a student at Nashotah House Seminary, the Dean decided to take a group of us on a working trip to Russia.  We worked in a village fifty kilometers outside of St. Petersburg.  In addition to the work of clearing the rubble from an old church which had recently been given back to the church from the state, we were able to do “touristy” things as well as meet a number of Russian Christians.

 

One afternoon, we visited a husband and wife who were created icons.  They explained the process from the time they would fast and pray for inspiration, through the making of the paints, to the actual producing (or writing) of the icons. 

 

They then showed us one of the icons which they had recently finished.  It looked a bit odd to me at first.  It was a very stylized Jesus, wearing an orthodox bishop’s crown, seated on a very odd looking multi-sided chair. 

Quite frankly, I found myself feeling very much the western Christian at that moment.  I did not like this icon at all.  As I said, I thought it looked a bit odd.

 

But then, they began to explain the symbolism behind the icon.  It represented Jesus as Head of the Church.  The chair was shaped like a multi-sided Orthodox Church.  The crown on his head was shaped much like the onion domes of the typical Orthodox Church.  The icon writer pointed out that the chair was portrayed in such a way that only Jesus’ head was above the top of the chair.  In other words, the only part of Jesus body that was above the Church-shaped chair was His Head. 

 

This icon literally represented that Jesus was the head of the Church.  From the Epistle reading this morning, St. Paul writes:

 

 

 

Just as the body is one and has many members, and all of the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.  For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body…For the body does not consist of one member but of many.

 

For the body does not consist of one member but of many.  If the foot should say, ‘Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,’ that would not make it any less a part of the body.  If the whole body were an eye, where would be the hearing?  If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell?  But as it is, God arranged the organs in the body, each one of them, as he chose.  If all were a single organ, where would the body be?  As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.”

 

 

 

How simple and straight forward this seems.  And yet, I think that the Church has lost sight of this simple, yet profound truth.  I think that we are often so caught up in the disagreements and arguments of the day, and the things which separate us, that we forget the truth that we are all one body, and that Jesus is the Head of the Body.

 

I think that this is true for us not only as individuals, but also as denominations.  Sometimes, I think that in the name of ecumenism we think that every part of the Body is supposed to be an ear or a foot.  St. Paul reminds us:

 

“If the whole body were an eye, where would be the hearing?  If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell?”

 

And, then he also reminds us that each part of the Body of Christ works together:

 

But as it is, God arranged the organs in the body, each one of them, as he chose.  If all were a single organ, where would the body be?  As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.”

 

And then, later on in this letter to the Christians in Corinth, St. Paul reminds us that as individuals, that we are a part of the whole Body of Christ.  He writes:

 

“Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.  And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, then healers, helpers, administrators, speakers in various kinds of tongues.   Are all apostles?  Are all prophets?  Are all teachers?  Do all work miracles?  Do all possess gifts of healing?  Do all speak with tongues?  Do all interpret?”

 

This, too, I think that we forget.  I think that often we forget that not one person within the Church is given all of the gifts needed for the ministry of the Church.    The point that St. Paul is making, and the point that I am making, is that we, together, as individuals make up the Body of Christ.   And that there are different parts of the Body of Christ which are gifted with different aspects of what it means to be the Church. 

 

It is together that we are the Body of Christ.  If we are a foot, then we are called to be the best foot that we can be.  If we think that we need to be a hand to be a part of the Body, then how is the Body to walk around with no foot?  Likewise, however, it is important to realize that a foot is not going to be able to perform the functions of an eye or an ear.  And if we are a foot, then let us be a foot.  We do not need to change our “footness” for the sake of the Body of Christ.


 

Ultimately, what is important is that there are many different parts to the Body of Christ, and many individual members with various gifts.  We are not called to focus on the individual part or the member as much as we are to recognize – as that icon pictured – that Jesus is the Head of the Church, and (despite the scary story featuring Icabod Crane) a headless body is not able to function, it is not able to live.  We are only the Body of Christ, because Jesus is the Head.  Let’s live that truth together. AMEN.

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.  AMEN.

I am not a psychologist, and I would not ever think to psychoanalyze the relationship between Jesus and Mary.  However, it has been an interesting exercise this week to think about their relationship as I meditated on this morning’s gospel lesson.  Let me share some of these thoughts with you.

 

I think that it is important to first set the context of this morning’s lesson.  The end of the first chapter in St. John’s gospel has the story of the calling of some of Jesus’ disciples.  Jesus has a conversation with Nathanael which ends with Jesus statement:  “…You shall see greater things than these…you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.”

 

Our story this morning is what follows this statement.  This story is the one which describes the first miracle of Jesus, as it says at the end of our lesson: “This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested his glory; and his disciples believed in him.”

But, back to the musings I had this week, as I thought about the relationship between Jesus and Mary.  St. John’s gospel has no birth narrative.   He has no stories of Jesus’ childhood.  In fact, this is the first story that St. John writes which features Jesus’ mother.

 

The other gospels are rather silent about the life which Jesus lived between His birth and subsequent flight to Egypt and return to Nazareth.  The only story which is told in the other gospels is the one in which Jesus is a young man in his late childhood or early teens and is discovered in the temple in conversation with the teachers of the temple by a worried Mary and Joseph.

 

There are other gospels which were written but not accepted as a part of the Bible.  These share stories of Jesus as a child, but I do not like to put much weight on stories found outside of the Bible.  If we go with the information which we are given solely in sacred scripture, we have little to point to for an understanding of the relationship between Jesus and Mary.

I wondered if Mary had seen Jesus do miraculous things during His childhood.  We are told (as I spoke about last Sunday) that Mary “pondered things in her heart”, but did she have any real understanding of who her son really was?  Certainly, she had the understanding of Messiah which had been handed down to her by generations of the chosen people of God.  But, as we know, Jesus did not fit that definition of Messiah.

 

I guess what I am saying is that I wonder what Mary thought would happen when she decided to approach her son with the problem faced at this wedding feast – “They have no wine.” 

 

Was this the first time which Mary had made such a request of her son?  Did she really know that He would be able to remedy the problem, or was this a way of testing out her own questions?  Was this a proud mother, or an inquisitive Israelite woman seeking out what her Messiah would do?  I guess we will never know.

 

I would like to take a moment and jump ahead in St. John’s gospel.  In this morning’s gospel lesson, Jesus says to Mary, “My hour has not yet come.”  What Jesus is referring to is His passion, death, and resurrection.  If we skip ahead to the passion, we see something that I would like to focus on as a way of transition.

 

St. John writes: “When Jesus saw his mother and the disciples whom he loved standing near, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, behold your son!’  Then he said to the disciple, ‘Behold, your mother!’  And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home.”

 

I would like to suggest that in that moment, Jesus has not simply given Mary to this disciple, but to everyone who is a disciple of Jesus.  He has given Mary to each of us.  The mother of Jesus is the mother of the Church.

 

I wonder, then, what Mary expects from us?  Would she approach us with a task that we do not wish to do?  Would she push us as she did Jesus in this morning’s gospel lesson?   I do not know.

 

But one thing I do know.  And that is that if Mary were to speak to us, she would say the very same thing that she did to the servants in this morning’s story – “Do whatever he tells you.”   “Do whatever he tells you.”   What miracles can Jesus work through us?  AMEN.

 

10 January -- I Epiphany

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. AMEN.

 

Bill Cosby tells the story of Mr. Washington, who comes in from surveying his farm, only to find that a cherry tree had been cut down.  “One of my cherry trees was cut down!” Mr. Washington declares.  “I cannot tell a lie”, says his son George, “I cut down the cherry tree.”  Cosby then says, “You see, he didn’t realize that his son was THE George Washington!”

 

These last several weeks, we have been celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ.  We have read about shepherds, and angels, and Mary and Joseph, and – this past week – even three wise men from the East.  Despite all of this, very few people knew that this baby – born in Bethlehem, raised in Egypt and Nazareth, was THE Jesus – THE Son of God incarnate.

 

 

With the story told in today’s lesson, all of that is about to change.  Before this story, a handful of people knew that this person was special.  They didn’t really understand what it was that made Him special.  Mary, we are told several times in Sacred Scripture, “Pondered things in her heart.”  But even she was not fully aware of who her son really was. 

 

If there was any doubt, today’s lesson begins to make things very clear:

 

“Now when all of the people were baptized, and when Jesus was baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form, as a dove, and a voice came from heaven, ‘Thou art my beloved Son; with thee I am well pleased.’”

 

This event made it clear -- this was THE Jesus, THE Son of God, THE Christ, THE Messiah.  And with this story, begins a change in the history of salvation. 

Certainly, this change really began with the annunciation by the Angel Gabriel to the Blessed Virgin Mary.  It was at that moment that the Incarnation began.  But it was not known to the entire world.  Until this point, Jesus was Mary and Joseph’s son.

 

But now, things were different.  And in the history of Salvation, as presented by Sacred Scripture, this was different as well.  With this moment in Scripture, things had changed.  We have now made the transition from the time of the prophets to the time of the Messiah.

 

St. John the Baptist was the last of the prophets, in the Old Testament sense of things.  He had done his job of preparing the way for Jesus, but now he was going to fade into the background:

 

 

“I baptize you with water; but he who is mightier than I is coming, the thong of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie; he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.  His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor, and to gather the wheat into the granary, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

 

Things had changed.  The prophets were no longer needed.  God Incarnate was here to save the world.  The process of our salvation was about to begin in earnest.  Jesus was about to be driven into the wilderness for a time of preparation, and then He would begin His earthly ministry, culminating with His passion, death, and resurrection.  On this day it was clear, Jesus was THE Christ, He was THE Way, THE truth, and THE light.

 

 

 

How does Jesus show us this truth in our everyday lives?  Do we go merrily along with our day to day living, and then suddenly, we are confronted with a dramatic opening of heaven and a booming voice?  Perhaps.  But, more often than not, we are reminded that Jesus is Lord of our lives in quiet ways, ways which are sometimes so subtle that we may fail to comprehend them.

 

We all need to take the time to look for these reminders – be they grand and dramatic, like the story in today’s gospel – or small and subtle.  And every time that these Epiphanies occur in our lives, we need to remember that we are in relationship with Jesus – THE Jesus.  AMEN.

 

27 December -- I Christmas

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. AMEN.

 

The Gospel of Matthew begins this way: “The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham.”  This genealogy is followed by the words:   “now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way.  When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child of the Holy Spirit…”  It is in this gospel that we have an account of the coming of the three kings and the star which guides them.

 

St. Luke begins his gospel with these words: “Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things which have been accomplished among us, just as they were delivered to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word, it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theolphilus, that you may know the truth concerning the things of which you have been informed.” 

This is followed first by the account of the conception and birth of St. John the Baptist, and then by the conception and birth of Jesus, including the story of the shepherds and the angels.

 

St. Mark begins his gospel very succinctly and to the point with these words: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.  As it is written in the book of Isaiah the prophet, ‘Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way; the voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight -- ’ John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins…”

 

And then we have St. John’s gospel this morning “In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the Word was God…”   and “…the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

 

 

I am sure that many of us took classes in creative writing or public speaking during our years as students.  In either case, it was made clear that the way in which you open a speech, or write the beginning of a paper or book, is important in getting the reader or hearers attention and giving them a basic understanding of what it is that you wish to convey to them.

 

We see in the beginning of each of these gospels an understanding of the approach that each of these gospel writers is going to use when presenting the story of Jesus Christ.  St. Matthew thinks that a genealogical connection between Jesus and the people of the Old Testament promises is important.  In fact, if we read through St. Matthew’s gospel, we will see that he takes the time to show, over and over again, how Jesus is the fulfillment of what is found in the Old Testament.

 

St. Luke thinks that it is important to show the progression from the promised prophet – fulfilled in the life of St. John the Baptist, and then the birth of Jesus.  He, too, traces the genealogy of Jesus.

St. Mark’s gospel was written in a time in which the early Christians believed that Jesus was going to return imminently, and so he does not have the time to trace a genealogy or tell of the birth of Jesus.  For St. Mark, it suffices to show that St. John the Baptist is the prophet foretold in the Old Testament, and that Jesus is the Son of God.  As I have said before, St. Mark’s gospel uses the word “immediately” quite often.

 

The opening chapter of the Gospel according to St. John, which I read just a few moments ago, is quite different from the other Gospels.  St. John’s gospel begins much more theologically.  We do not have ties to the Old Testament prophets, but he does begin with the very same words as the Book of Genesis – “In the beginning”.  This shows that this “Word” – in Greek – “Logos” which he is talking about is the same as the God who created all of creation in the Book of Genesis.

 

 

Each Gospel writer has chosen his own unique way to begin the story of Jesus.  Each tells the story in a different way, from his own perspective.  Each emphasizes a different aspect of who Jesus is.  They are all clear that Jesus is the Son of God, and that Jesus dies on the cross and is raised for the salvation of the world, but each in his own way.

 

The unbeliever or skeptic will often point to such inconsistencies or differences in the way in which the story is told as a way of disproving that any of it ever happened.  What is important to understand is that history was written in a very different way nearly two thousand years ago. 

 

Whereas historical accuracy is important today, it was not so when the Gospels were written.  In those days, writers of history would shape the facts in such a way as to tell the story and portray the truth through the eyes of the writer.  If the writer wished to show Jesus as fulfillment of Scripture, then that would be emphasized. 

If the writer was presenting the story to people who were familiar with Greek philosophy, then different language would be used.  Each gospel was shaped by the community for whom it was written. 

 

This does not mean that what is presented is not true.  It simply means that adherence to historical accuracy as we understand it was not important to the people who wrote the gospels.

 

During this week, it might be an interesting exercise to think about how it is that each of us might write the story of Jesus for our own community.  What would we emphasize as important?  In what order would we tell the story? 

 

None of us has to write the story of Jesus down – we have it written, but, we do need to tell others the truth of Christmas – that the Son of God became a human being and lived and died so that we might be brought back into perfect relationship with God.  How will you tell the story?  AMEN.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

 

 
   

 

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

17 January -- II Epiphany