Readings, John 20:19-31 and Acts 4:32-35
Image, Christ Appearing to the Apostles, Rembrandt (1656) It is incredible what is possible when fears are vanquished. From huddled in a locked room, to holding all things in common. Behold, the power of encountering the resurrected Christ! Jesus appears to his fearful and static disciples, and offers them peace. A picture of pastoral tenderness, Jesus shows them his wounds, assures them of his presence, breathes on them his Spirit, and entrusts to them the ministry of forgiveness. And then, when after a week they still haven’t moved (having perhaps been swayed by Thomas’ concerns), Jesus appears again, offers them his peace and presents his wounds. And second time’s a charm: by Acts 4 the community of Christ is no longer huddling in locked rooms. They live together with open hearts and hands, giving testimony with great power, and ensuring there was not a needy person among them. It is incredible, what is possible when fears are vanquished. You may have heard before that the most repeated command in Scripture is fear not. Closely accompanying this is the promise of the peace of God which carries us over tumult. Because what part of Christianity is possible if we are locked in a room of our own fear? How can we be hospitable when the doors to our homes are locked in fear? How can we love one another as Christ has loved us, when fear has locked the doors to our hearts? How can we feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit the imprisoned, share our possessions, offer forgiveness, or proclaim good news if our hands and tongue are gripped by fear? None of this is to imply that worry, anxiety, or fear is sinful and shameful. Jesus appears to his disciples not with judgment or condemnation, but peace, assurance, and purpose. This encounter transforms their fear into conviction. We shall know fear, caution, worry, but we must also recognise that if we do too little to check it, fear will motivate and consume us, and risk closing ourselves off to the path on which Christ is leading us. This is why that picture of flourishing in Acts emphasises the communal nature of the Christian life. Because there are many things that cause fear which can be addressed in our life together. The fear of where the next meal is coming from, or whether the rent can be paid, the fear of loneliness and isolation, of derision and dismissal, of change and confusion are fears that persist to this day, and each of them can stifle our ability to live lives of love, generosity, justice, and grace. And yet, as a community – open and accountable to one another, with eyes fixed upon the presence and promise of Christ – we can help each other to assuage fears through emotional, spiritual, and material support. With the Spirit’s power, we can help each other to be less fearful by helping one another have less reasons to fear. Because while the command, fear not, or the blessing, peace be with you, can sometimes be reached through an attitude change – more often than not, material circumstances will need to change first. As James wrote so succinctly, If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill’, and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? This is why the disciples devoted themselves to holding all things in common so there was not a needy person among them. They wanted to help people fear not, and know the peace and good news of Christ. Because it is incredible what is possible when fears are vanquished. As we follow on from easter, emboldened by encountering the resurrected Christ, let us pause and consider what fears grip our hearts. Let us enquire after and listen to the fears of others. What worries curtail our ability to love and forgive, offer hospitality and pursue justice, pray and praise, share possessions and good news? As a community of Christ, can we assuage each other’s fears through means spiritual and material? How can we pray, what can we provide, where can we be present so that we might have less reasons to fear, and more capacity to live the open, generous, and loving lives Christians are called to live. Christ appears to his disciples, then as now, with a pastoral tenderness to bring outward looking, purposeful conviction where there was inward focused static fear. And to sustain this transformation, Christ gifts to the Christian the Holy Spirit and the Church. No one leaves the locked rooms of fear alone. But with Christ, the Spirit, and the Church, it is incredible what is possible when fears are vanquished.
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Readings, Isaiah 25:6-9 and Mark 16:1-8
Image, Marko Ivan Rupnik, Resurrection of Christ (detail), 2006. Mosaic, St. Stanislaus College Chapel, Ljubljana, Slovenia. Isaiah captures the universal reality of death: the sheet spread-out over-all nations, the shroud cast over all peoples. It is often postulated that what separates the human from the non-human animal is awareness of the horizon of death, the many ways the mortal coil can be abruptly snaped. Of course, such knowledge is so terrifying that we develop a kind of muted acceptance of its inevitability. A lived ignorance, a quiet refusal to acknowledge that death is a heartbeat away… I mean, if we didn’t, how would we ever shop for groceries? If there is anything then, that the God of salvation can promise and deliver, that would dramatically turn all things on their head, it is to swallow death and rob it of its sting. For death is the great universal, the shroud under which we all live, the sheet within which we are all wrapped. There are none who live beyond its reach. No wonder then, when they hear Jesus has left his tomb, the women ran off in terror and amazement, or as another translation renders it: they ran off “convulsed and out of their mind with shock.” Because there is simply nothing to prepare them for the world-altering, reality-shaking, sense-denying proclamation that Christ has risen! Nothing to prepare them to neatly categorise this new piece of information as if it is just another thing that can happen. But then again, nothing can save us that is possible. In the beauty of an impossibility, Jesus is revealed as the one we didn’t even know how to wait for. Jesus was unable to be held in death’s garments; in the resurrection he tore through the sheet of death from the inside. And like any sheet, or garment that gets a tear, or splits a seam… there’s no arresting that. Death never learnt its way around a needle and thread. The hole just grows, and the shroud unravels until what was enough for one, is now fit for all of humanity to pass through. For Jesus’ triumph over death is not only his but ours, all of ours, the great our of humanity, the all-encompassing our of creation. God swallows up death forever, so that we might have life in Christ’s name. That is the promise: the voice that called Lazarus from his tomb, shall call to us all. All creation shall be restored in the power of his unquenchable life, let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation. This is the good news of Easter day! But what does this defeat of death mean after Easter, living as we do in a world still permeated with the reality of death? In the first instance, we take issue with what impinges on life. Living beyond the threat of death’s sting, inspires contempt and opposition to all which deals in death today, all that frustrates the abundant life Christ came to share and secure. As those who follow after Christ in the power of the resurrection, we devote ourselves to stamp out spot fires of injustice, exploitation, and harm. Our actions will not bring these ills to nought, but neither shall they be in vain. For they are forestates of the day when the One we await sets all wrongs to right, restores all that was lost, and wipes all tears from our eyes. In the second instance, although we and our beloved yet die, death, that moribund power of nothing, of absence, of abyss, holds no one in its power. Death as a malevolent force has no one in its grip and claims no one on its ledger. Instead, there is comfort in the mourning and hope in the grief, because death cannot separate us from God’s love in Christ Jesus our Lord. At and after Easter we are glad and rejoice for in life and death we are held in the everlasting arms of God, as God’s own beloved children. At and after Easter we are glad and rejoice as we are invited into a feast of rich food with Jesus our brother, who tore asunder the shroud of death so that we might share the resurrection and the life. Readings, Exodus 12:1-14 and John 13:1-17, 31-35
Image, Sister Oksoon Kim (김옥순 수녀), The Bread of Life from Heaven (2014) Jesus kneels to wash Peter’s feet, and Peter gets it wrong twice. In the first instance he fails, in a way so many have failed, indeed in a way Peter has already once failed, to understand that the Son of Man comes to serve, not be served. Fails to see that Jesus has emptied himself of his equality with God so that through this God shall be glorified and all things restored. Peter still yearns for the messiah who will not bend, suffer, or die. He still wishes to preserve his vision of Christ, who would not stoop to tend to one as lowly as he. But Christ replies, unless I wash you, you shall have no share with me. Necessary to receiving all that Christ shares: the inheritance of righteousness and grace, we must acclimate ourselves to the reality that we need Christ. That Christ has come for us, that Christ indeed will go to every length to make us his own beloved. We are worthy of such attention, worthy of such grace, worthy of such love, worthy of such salvation, because we need it, just like everyone else. Which leads us to Peter’s second mistake. Having understood that such an act of Christ is necessary to receive the share of his life, Peter goes “well, you can’t have too much of a good thing, wash too my hands and head. Imagine what share I’ll receive if I am triply washed by the Messiah of God.” But this is unnecessary. We cannot receive more of what Christ offers us. Grace is not incrementally allocated, salvation is not unequally bestowed, Christ’s love is not doled out in portions. What Christ achieves on the cross is once for all. In that singular, sufficient event, each and all are ushered under the umbrella of Christ’s grace, reconciled to God, and made a new creation. The disciples have long jostled for greatness and proximity to the Lord in his glory, but there are not two-tiers of Christians. We each have the same need, and each receive the same share; one body, one church, one priesthood, one baptism. And because of this, there is just one, very simple commandment. Love one another, as I have loved you. The disciples will not be known because they received any special initiation, or could show they didn’t need Christ’s service. The disciples will not be known from the length or intimacy of their relationship with Christ. Disciples are known to be Christ’s (then as now) when they love one another as Christ has loved us. A love which was displayed with humility and tenderness, beauty and compassion, righteousness and justice, solidarity and commitment, intention and equity. A love which was exemplified in the washing of feet, the breaking of bread, and the abiding kindness of Christ’s presence with those he loved until the end. Let us ready ourselves in silence, to receive the share that Christ has prepared for us, which is nothing short of his own divine life, remembered in the bread and the cup. Readings, Psalm 118:1-2, 19-29 and John 12:12-16
Image, Palm Sunday, A. Lois White (1935) We enter Holy Week together, and today’s psalm gives us one of those most succinct and sublime verses which teaches the very foundation of Christian proclamation: The stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. A couple of weeks ago Jesus had his confrontation in the temple, when after turning over tables and chasing out the money changers, he was asked by what authority he did such things. Jesus told them that if they tore down the Temple, he would raise it himself in three days. What no one realised, in that moment at least, was that Jesus was referring to himself as the temple, he was the stone which would be raised… but, as we know too well, he shall be rejected. All those here, in the days following this jubilation, turn away. But the stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. Easter is the great reversal, the grand table turning of God’s way over the ways of the world. This Galilean peasant arrives in the temple with a ragtag group of fishermen, tax collectors, wealthy women, and one guy raised from the dead. A strange sight to herald as the One who comes in the name of the Lord. But the ragtag group, the motley scene, the humble colt, all of which is there to confirm the teaching "do not be afraid, daughters of Zion." The one who comes in the name of the Lord comes not with sword and army, not with might and intimidation, not with fear and coercion, but in humility, mercy, grace, and above all, love. But what awaits one so blessed? He is opposed on all sides, betrayed by one of his own, denied by another, abandoned by a host more. He is arrested, subjected to a grand miscarriage of justice, and is tortured, exploited, violated - crowned with thorns and derision. His clothes they shall steal, his prayers they shall sleep through, his body they shall pierce, and his kingdom they shall bury. Or, at least, this is how it shall appear. Instead, the stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. For despite the fickleness of their hosannas, this is indeed the one who comes in the name of the Lord. And despite their intended irony, this is indeed the King. And despite his crucifixion this is indeed the glorified one. And despite his death this is indeed the living Lord. For God is Good, and God’s steadfast love endures forever. And the one who appears defeated shall reappear in the triumph of the resurrection. Death will be defeated through death, Sin will be vanquished by the one who became sin, the power of empire will be exposed as futile by the weakness of God. Goodness shall prevail, truth will out, love will win, for the stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This Holy Week, let us press in near to the foot of the cross, to see the great swindle of life over death, grace over sin, love over hate, God over all. For we are not those disciples in those crowds, who did not yet understand. We are those who have seen Christ glorified, and who look back and know: This is the Lord’s doing; it is marvellous in our eyes - the stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone Readings, Jeremiah 31:31-34, John 12:20-33
Image, Eric Gill, The Body of Jesus is Laid in the Tomb (1917) Where I am, there will my servant be also. This is the call on the life of the Christian. That we serve Christ by following Christ, serve, that is, by living after the pattern of Christ’s own life. Christ who, late in the day, looked around and saw the mounting opposition, the increasing animosity, the threat intensifying, and did not seek to be spared what the hour required. Instead, despite his troubled soul, Jesus trusted that through his service of the world he would be glorified, and through his glorification the holy name of God would be glorified too. For Christ knew the saying was true and trustworthy: unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies it bears much fruit. Christ trusted that his crucifixion would not be a site of defeat, but his glorification, that his death would not be a site of loss, but of victory. He trusted that even if the world said “no” and rejected him, God would say “yes” and vindicate him. This “yes” is heard in the resurrection of Christ. It is in his word of comfort and commission to Mary, his word of peace to Thomas, his asking John to feed his sheep. This “yes” echoes in the fruit of Jesus’ followers, who receive the Spirit at Pentecost and spread out to be the body of Christ in all the world. The saying is true and trustworthy, Christ was planted into the ground in death, so that through his resurrection, he could bear much fruit. It is by this, Christ declares, that the ruler of this world will be driven out. That the powers of Sin, Evil, and Death shall be confronted and overcome so that their grip on the world will be loosed. Having driven out the ruler, having loosed the grip of sin that has traced its course through human history since Adam, Christ is able to perform that which he was sent to perform, the reason he has come to this hour: Christ is able to draw all people to himself. His arms reach wide upon the cross, wide enough to embrace the whole world, draw us toward himself and hold us fast, so that wherever we are, there he shall be also. In some ways, in the latter days of Lent, we are led back to where we began: The call placed on the Christian (to take up our cross and lose our life for Christ’s sake, to be found always where Christ is found) has been made possible by what Christ has already performed for us. Indeed, not only has Christ made it possible, but he made it the way to glory. To say it another way, the servant is able to be where Christ is, because Christ has promised already and always, to be with us. Christ is Emmanuel, after all. Christ went down into the ground so that in resurrection and ascension he would be with all people in all times and places. Through the Spirit the single grain bears much fruit. Now, it is good to delineate, that while Christ is Emmanuel, and has acted already to draw us to him and abides with us always, there are nonetheless places in which the servant is specifically called to be in order to be with Christ. Sites where the servant encounters and follows Christ in the most palpable and specific way. The first place is at the table of grace, where Christ shares with us his very body and blood. The church community is the body of Christ, where the Word is proclaimed and the sacrament administered. And so we follow him here, to be further conformed to his image, to learn again – hour by hour - how to bear the fruit of his grain of love. And the second place is with the least of these. It is when we love and serve the hungry, sick, poor, lonely, estranged, and imprisoned that we are most directly where Christ is. For what we did to the least, we did unto Christ. The servant of Christ is one who becomes a servant of the least of these in their struggle for freedom. Standing with those the world pushes and punishes, forgets and forsakes. It is with these the Lord of Glory sought fit to be intimately identified. The servant who intends to be found with Christ, must be found amongst the least, following in Christ’s way of mercy, friendship, and justice. Holy Week draws near, we shall see the grain planted in the earth once more. May we bear fruit worthy of this glory, finding ourselves with the One who drew all humanity to himself. Readings Numbers 21:4-9 and John 3:14-17
Image, Moses and the Brazen Serpent, Augustus Edwin John (1878–1961) At its heart, Lent is about learning where to look to see the glory and consolation of the living God. Where to raise our eyes to behold the path to life. As the Israelites trudged through the wilderness, the initial glee of their liberation from slavery diminished. In its place came a very human, perfectly understandable, and comically relatable kind of revisionist looking back. Were things really that bad back in Egypt? Was our toil so unbearable? Was our exploitation completely without benefit? Look maybe it was terrible, but at least it was consistent. I wonder how many of us can identify our own moments of such revision as we and pine for a time we couldn’t stand. As calamity for their ingratitude come the serpents, and as result of the serpents comes repentance, and from repentance emerges a solution: a bronze serpent held aloft, at which the people need only look in order to live. But is this not a rather inelegant solution to the problem of the serpents? Couldn’t God just blast them away, or at least send a pack of hungry mongoose. What meaning might we take from such a peculiar story? Last week we spoke about the difficulty of proclaiming redemption in a world so flagrantly unredeemed. The difficulty of trusting Christ’s triumph over sin, evil, and death, in a world wracked by all three. The foolishness of God which proclaims Christ crucified as the site of God’s power is not reached by signs and wisdom but encounter and embodied faith. Is the cross not itself an inelegant solution to the problem of the serpents of sin, evil, and death? But this is what makes the image so compelling for the Christian alive in the world today. For even though we have encountered Christ, have gone down into the waters of his death through baptism and been raised up to share in his life, serpents abound. The wickedness in human hearts and structures that fuels the imperial violence that put Christ on his cross besieges cities and makes martyrs of the innocent to this day. The fear and fragility in the human heart that caused Peter to deny, Judas to betray, and the disciples to flee, wells up in us to this day, clouding our moral compass with apathy and self-protection. The short-sighted ingratitude of the wilderness generation which made them pine for the familiar evil over unfamiliar new beginnings, takes hold of communities still today, foreclosing the possibilities of the radical changes needed to avert a climate catastrophe. We still live in a world of serpents, reminders that the sins of the world bite at our heels, and lead people to ruin. But what good would the Christian be without an awareness of these serpents: the ones which constrict our own hearts, and the ones that have their fangs in our neighbours. What good would the Christian be if we were able to turn our eye from the inequalities and injustices of our world? If we cease to feel the tragedy of those exploited in workplaces, intimidate in their homes, and bombed while seeking refuge… what good would the Christian be if they were sent into the world without the wisdom of serpents? But, in the same breath, what good would the Christian be if all we saw were serpents? What good would we be if there was no north star to set our course, no way to live amongst sin and death without being consumed and defeated? And Christ, like the bronze serpent, is raised up for us to see. We have Christ crucified, a symbol of God’s willingness to stand in complete solidarity with the world so that we might live. For our sake he was raised up, so that we can lift our eyes to see the one who trampled serpent under foot, swallowed death, vanquished sin, overcome evil with good, and ascended to the right hand of God, advocating mercy for all, until the great and glorious day when he shall return, and all wrongs will be made right, all tears wiped from our eyes, and all creation restored. What a sight to behold! The sight of Christ in the present age, does not occlude our vision of the serpents of this world. Serpents remain in the present age and we must not ignore the sorrows of our neighbour or the suffering of our world. But we are not overcome. For the sight of Christ gives us somewhere to look to empower us in our vital task of defanging the serpents of our times. It gives us somewhere to look to console us that a day will come when the sin, death, and evil of the world shall be no more. The sight of Christ crucified and glorified, standing with and setting free, shows us the path to the kind of life a Christian is good for: a life of doing justice, loving mercy, and walking humbly with our God; trampling serpents under foot. Readings, 1 Cor 1:18-25 and John 2:13-22
Image, Mirka Mora, Crucifixion (1976) When I was thinking about hymns for today, I was considering, Come as you are. But it felt a funny paired with today’s gospel reading. If anything, “come as you are” could sound a bit like the cool dry wit of a Hollywood action star preparing for a fight. The Jesus of this story feels a little at odds with the pastoral image of the good shepherd, or the compassionate image of the suffering servant, or the hospitable image of Christ at the table. Even our images of Jesus as one who stands for justice, are a little harder to square with this man, fashioning a makeshift whip. So given that this is a picture of Jesus that might cause us some questions, let us consider how we might understand it in its place, and then in our own. First, it is good to establish that Jesus’ act is not unprecedented. To act with prophetic zeal to purify the temple stands in a line with the Jewish/Hebrew prophetic tradition. The protest is not one against the Temple, nor the sacrificial system, but a call for a truer worship, a challenge of the encroachment of the market (and its varying inequities and inequalities). It echoes, in this way, the commission given to Jeremiah by God: Stand in the gate of the Lord’s house, and proclaim… Amend your ways and your doings, and let me dwell with you in this place. Do not trust in these deceptive words: ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.’ As an act of prophetic zeal, Jesus’ critique nonetheless affirms the Temple as a place in which God’s presence abides. Now, Jesus’ act not only echoes the prophetic tradition. It also reflects the hopes of his people at the time that God would bring forth a a new, purified, indestructible and incorruptible temple. Some hoped God would build this, for others it was their responsibility, while for some it will be the heir of David’s throne, or the Messiah who will establish this glorified temple. Such a desire is understandable. It would likely have been intensified following the seizing and desolation of the Temple by Rome and its reclaiming and purification in the Maccabean revolt some centuries earlier. The temple remained a place that could be taken, could be misused, could be locked from the people, and so in this context there is the hope that a temple shall be raised which could never be destroyed. This all goes some way to explain the response of those in the temple. Because if someone came in here today and chased the elders around with a whip, I can’t say with much confidence that our first question would be: what sign can you show us for doing this? That’s a question born of a history of prophetic reform, and a present hope in renewal. And so, Jesus offers them a sign. Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up. Of course, no one understands Jesus, not even those closest to him, who as John points out, only make this connection following his resurrection. Because this sign, like the crucifixion and resurrection it is pointing toward, is one which reflects the foolishness of God. This proclamation of Jesus prefigures his conversation with the Samaritan woman at the well, where Jesus speaks of a coming time where we shall no longer worship in the temple or the mountain, but we shall worship in spirit and truth. Jesus teaches that the temple shall be rebuilt in his own body, which can never be destroyed, for even in death it is raised up. Such teachings would resound with greater profundity for those with fresh memories of the destruction of the temple forty years after Jesus’ death. The promise of the temple abiding in the body of the ascended Christ, gives hope in the face of such a devastating loss. And yet, such a promise is not without its challenges. It is not easily reached through signs and wisdom. It asks one to accept that the temple which was stone is now found in the body of a man killed on a cross. That like this body which can’t be grasped or seen, our worship too will not be in one holy land or place, but a dispersed spirit and truth. It asks us, in other words, to trust in the foolishness and weakness of God. For what Christ promises is only comprehensible after we have encountered his death and resurrection. It asks us to lay aside the desire for sign and wisdom, and take as the centre of our faith a stumbling block, to take as the ground of our hope an event which by all worldly appearances seems a failure, to take as the justification of our worship that by some divine paradox the crucifixion of Jesus is the site of the power of God. It asks us to confess that this moment in the story, where Jesus has been sentenced by the religious and political powers of his day, condemned by the people of the city, betrayed, denied and abandoned by the bulk of his followers, and cries aloud on a cross that God has abandoned him, is somehow the moment that assures us that when he said he would raise up the temple in three days he was right, that when he said he was sent by the Father to save the world he was right, that when he said that the kingdom of God was near he was right. What’s more, such a foolishness asks us to proclaim of redemption within a world that feels flagrantly unredeemed. Of those other visions of the glorified temple brought on by the messiah, none would have the audacity to claim that this could happen in part. That we could claim the victory of God over sin in a world still riddled with sin, that we could claim the overcoming of evil with good and yet still live in a world wracked by evil. It asks us to claim that Jesus has brought the salvation of the world while all of creation is still groaning out for redemption. This is not an easy path to take, not only in the absence of signs and wisdom, but indeed despite all worldly signs and wisdom pointing to the opposite: the world is unredeemed, the temple, like the body, was not raised up. And so we need something other than signs and wisdom: we need the story of Easter. And to grasp that story we need the season of Lent to prepare once more for the paradoxical foolishness of God who snatches victory through defeat, and glory through humility. We need this season to encounter the cross and the tomb in such a way that they do not prove a stumbling block, but rather reveal the power of God. Like the disciples trying to decipher Jesus’ inscrutable comments, our faith in Christ is made possible by an encounter with his death and resurrection. This encounter cannot be reached through signs and wisdom, but by allowing the weakness of God to work within us. Through ordering feeling, thought, and act, after the way of Christ. It happens as we take up our own cross and come to understand the way to glory is pathed by solidarity, humility, and justice. It happens as we allow the topsy-turvy nature of the kingdom of God to become our vision of the world as it should and will be. It happens, in short, in the act of living after the way of Christ, accepting the invitation to come as you are: taste, hear, and see the good news of great joy. Readings, Genesis 9:8-17 and 1 Peter 3:18-22
Image, The Rainbow: Study for 'Bathers at Asnières,' Georges Seurat (1883) Today’s readings lead us into Lent, the church’s season of repentance and preparation, with two reminders:
Earlier this week, I was speaking with a young guy who was very passionate about justice actively organising campaigns on climate, refugees, Gaza. He asked what had inspired me in the past to get involved with justice campaigns and action. I was able to share about how both my faith motivates a love of justice and relationships within the Christian community played a key part in guiding our activity. But what I also noted, was that a key way faith and relationships play in drawing one into the work of justice is that they allow a path for repentance without shame. I think one of the principal barriers prohibiting people committing to a justice issue, is that we must accept that the world is worse than we want to believe or have experienced. We have to accept, for example, that the astronomical and devastating statistics about domestic violence are in fact true (and who would want to accept such a thing). And if true, then also they are closer to home than we would like (present in our neighbourhoods, community organisations, schools, sport clubs, and churches). We then have to accept that these are not isolated, individual occurrences, but there are insidious and harmful views and values baked into our culture, which we have imbibed and need to do the work of unlearning and relearning. It is difficult to stay open through this process. It is difficult to remain open to the truth. All the more so today with the onslaught of news, exposing us to a preponderance of tragedies happening around our world in real time, and the rigorous work of history exposing us to injustices and atrocities long swept out of view. To be confronted with the prevalence of sin and harm in our communities, world, and history is not easy. We can quickly become ashamed that we didn’t know, that we hadn’t spoken, that we might have profited, that we could be unconsciously complicit. And shame is a negative spiral. Shame grabs right at the core of our being and activities that flight/fight/freeze response. When confronted with the truth of the scope of injustice and harm, it is so easy to run, to push away, to shut our ears and hearts. Insisting that the rose is on the bloom is one of the more understandable human responses to ugliness. And all the more understandable when we are alone. The call for us to acknowledge the truth, repent of our sin, and take up the work of justice that lies before us, is impossible alone. Alone it feels awful, immense, impossible. Alone guilt and shame dominate the conversation. Alone we falter and flail without hope. Lent is not meant to be about shame; it is about readiness. Repentance is not self-flagellation; it is a return to Christ. Truth is not scary; it sets us free. Justice is not punitive; it is restorative. To confront sin, we first must comprehend grace. To confess we must know we have been forgiven. To take up our cross we must first behold the empty tomb. For it is only when we know, deep in our bones, how loved we are, how safe we are, how accompanied we are, how saved we are, that we are ready to receive the truth of the world and ourselves, to repent and return, and to go forth in love for the sake of the world. And so we begin Lent with these reminders. 1) The bow in the sky signifies the promise of God’s covenant with all of creation which shall not be forsaken. And 2) Christ has died once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, so that all shall be brought closer to God. Christ even went to those spirits in prison, thought condemned from the days of Noah, to proclaim deliverance and salvation. We cannot be cut off or estranged from God’s love. We shall not perish, for the one granted all authority over heaven and earth has shared all things with us. It is only after all this is accomplished, only on the heels of this promise, only within the covenant, only when we know ourselves as under the umbrella of grace that we can begin the work of confession, repentance, and renewal. It is from here that we can tell the truth about ourselves and face the truth about our world and not be struck down by shame, stuck in apathy, or led away by falsehood. It is only from here that we can look rightly at the sin in our hearts, homes, and world and trust that we can make a change, trust that we can work for justice, trust that what has been doesn’t need to determine what will be. It is from the sphere of nurture that is the saving grace and restorative love of Christ Jesus our Lord that we begin our Lenten journey. Let us not fear, nor let us delay, the Spirit is calling, repent, be reconciled, and become the righteousness of God. Readings, Leviticus 19:1-2, 9-18 and Mark 9:2-10
Image, Maquette for tapestry 'Death and transfiguration,’ John Coburn (1986) We have reached the end of Epiphany. Ash Wednesday is days away and with it Lent, the season of preparation for Easter. Through the season of Epiphany the glory of Christ is slowly revealed. The Wise Men arrive before the Christ child with gifts and praise. At the temple Simeon and Anna recognise him as the messiah. At his baptism a heavenly voice proclaims his belovedness. The first disciples witness signs of his power. And now, atop the mountain, the heavenly voice returns, Moses and Elijah surround Christ, transfigured in dazzling light. We enter Lent having seen Christ’s glory revealed and proclaimed by Gentiles in their pilgrimage, Israelites in their hope, demons in their anguish, and the heavens in their majesty. The hope of Advent and the joy of Christmas are vindicated in Epiphany – we were right to wait, right to rejoice, for Jesus Christ is the glorified one of God. And yet we move into Lent, where Christ is revealed to also be the man of sorrows, crowned with thorns. Opposition increases, contest heightens, confusion abounds, tragedy looms. Right back at the beginning of Epiphany, Simeon warned Mary that Jesus was destined for the falling and rising of many of Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed, and that this would mean a sword will pierce [her] own soul too. And now, as Jesus is enshrined in light atop the mountain and yet chooses to step back down to the woes, worries, and violence of the world he came to save that sword draws ever closer to its target. For the story of Christ is never one thing… or perhaps, it is, but that one thing is the story of glory amidst and through crisis. For the glory of Christ’s birth is followed by the massacre of the innocents. The glory of Christ’s baptism is accompanied by John’s arrest and execution. The glory of Christ’s miracles is accompanied by antagonism. The glory of Christ’s teaching is met with confusion and rejection. The glory of the Last Supper is punctuated by betrayal. The glory of Palm Sunday is followed by the trauma of Good Friday. This is not a fault in the plan of the incarnation, nor an unforeseen side-effect of the mission of Emmanuel. This is what it means for God to take seriously the world as it is and yet choose to be with and for us. This is the holy one coming to dwell in a fractured world and choosing not to enforce glory and submission on the creature, but to invite us into fellowship through the proclamation of good news and the ministry of mercy. Glory revealed amidst crisis is good news, because we know all too well the world is neither all one thing or another. Crisis and pain abound, but they are not all there is. Glory and joy break through, but they are not perpetual. Christ walked among us in a world of mountains and plains, and he abides with us today as we traverse our own peaks and valleys. It is for this reason we have the commands; a vision of the world as God wills it. The beautiful passage we heard read from Leviticus is the heart of the book, the heart of the ethical code of the Torah. It crescendos with the (equal) greatest commandment: love your neighbour as yourself. But this command doesn’t come out of nowhere; love takes a concrete and communal form, a structured, societal form. It is not simply a matter of affection, but action, not simply kindness, but justice. Because how else will we, as a community, buffer ourselves against the harsh winds of the world’s crises? How else will we organise ourselves to protect and dignify those most likely to feel its harsh effects? Ill-weather falls on all people but it does not affect everyone equally. The poor, the labourer, the refugee, the alien, the blind, the deaf, the widow, the orphan, are all adversely affected by the universal crises of life, not to mention the additional specific and particular crises an unequal society places upon them. And thus what it means to live for the glory of God is to head back down the mountain, back to our neighbours (particularly those most vulnerable and forgotten) and place ourselves amidst the crises of the world offering compassion and advocating a more just order. The culmination of the season of Epiphany is not to build tents on the mountaintop. Rather it is to draw strength from the power and wonder of Christ’s glory, take up our cross, and return to the world. After all, Christ is already there, his presence hidden amongst those most adversely affected by the world’s crises. Present with those who await most acutely communities that take seriously the ethical responsibility we owe to the least and last. We who behold the glory of Christ and hope in his resurrection, cannot simply live as if this glory didn’t stake a claim on every corner of our lives. For just as Christ didn’t not regard the glory of equality with God as something to be exploited, nor the mountaintop somewhere to retreat; so too we who have received a spirit of adoption, do not exploit that glory or shelter on mountaintops. Rather, in humility and purpose, we step humbly into the world, ordering our lives after God’s commands so that we might be ready to love our neighbours as ourselves. In the spirit of Epiphany, we stand alongside one another in the crises of the world, constructing shelters and addressing their sources, so that further glory might yet be revealed. |
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