“And [Jesus] said to them, ‘The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. If you are paying attention to our current cultural moment, you may know that yesterday, June 1, marks the first day of Pride Month. Pride Month is the latest celebration of our current civic religion. It is the time of the year when those who identify themselves as LGTBQ+ express their “pride” in who they are. The implication of this is, of course, that in the past, LGTBQ+ identified persons were living in shame of their lifestyle and their choices, and in whom they chose to “love,” because they once lived in an “oppressive” and “judgmental” society where their choices and their lifestyle were considered shameful. Today, things have changed for the better supposedly, and LGBTQ+ persons can now demonstrate their “pride” in who they are. And the only ones who are supposed to experience shame are all those bigots who refused to acknowledge the value and worth of the choices made by the LGTBQ+ community. How did we get here? How is it that we now live in a society and culture that now demands that we take pride in things that God condemns, in things that are harmful to people and to relationships? Fundamentally, it was because we thought that God’s laws were given to control us and make us miserable, rather then given by the God who loves us and wants us to experience joy and fulfillment. In today’s Gospel lesson from St. Mark, we read about yet another confrontation between Jesus and the members of the Jewish religious establishment. Once again, the Pharisees think that they have got Jesus in a “gotcha” moment; that Jesus is teaching His followers to be lax about honoring the Sabbath. What is really going on here is the Pharisees are grasping at anything that they can use to discredit Jesus and His followers, because they know the power and the authority of Jesus and His message and ministry, and they feel that Jesus and His ministry threatens their privileged position within Jewish society. As always, Jesus responds with love and truth. He reminds the Pharisees of what happened during David’s lifetime, when the priest gave David and his men the showbread from the Temple. While the Law stipulated that this bread was not to be eaten while it was in the sanctuary, the bread that the priest gave to David and his men was the old showbread that had been replaced by fresh showbread. A legalistic interpretation held that the bread should be disposed of, but the priest understand that it was okay to give the old bread away to hungry men who needed something to eat. To put it another way, a reasonable and proper interpretation was that feeding hungry people superseded their strict legalism regarding showbread. The Pharisees, in their desire to discredit Jesus, and in their desire to avoid any kind of violation of the Sabbath, missed the proper application of the Sabbath law itself. And we see in other episodes, where Jesus violates the strict legalism of the Law for the benefit of others: He heals a man with a withered hand in the synagogue on the Sabbath. He touches a leper with his hand to demonstrate love and compassion, even though this made him ritually “unclean.” Here, Jesus reminds the Pharisees, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.” Jesus tells the Pharisees that the purpose of the Law was not to put people in a religious straitjacket, but its purpose was to establish a way of life that would give glory to God, and bring health, happiness and fulfillment. To use the Law for any other purpose was to disrespect the Law and the God who made it. Sadly, we are where we are today as a society celebrating “Pride Month” because in part, we thought of God’s law as a straitjacket and a vehicle of oppression. Ironically, we looked that the Law the way the Pharisees did, as an instrument of power and control. We thought of people who were in bad marriages, of people with unfulfilled longings, and it seemed right that we should help people get free of those things that were supposedly keeping them captive. Like the Pharisees, we forgot that God gave us the law for our benefit, to nurture our hearts and our spirits so that we would be set free from the power of our passions and impulses and truly love ourselves and others. We overreacted to the use of the Law as a straitjacket by getting rid of all the boundaries and guardrails that surround our relationship with God and each other. We told God to get out of our lives, and He did. Today, we’re miserable and confused. We tried to satisfy our passions and our lusts, and to break through anything that was holding us back. It hasn’t helped. We are neither fulfilled nor happy. What’s worse is that today our society blames Christians for the fact that we’re miserable. It’s said that Christians are self-righteous and legalistic, and hypocritical. Maybe that’s true. But that’s not the reason that we are unhappy. St. Paul writes this, “We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s word, but by open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” The Church is under attack today not because it judges people or treats them harshly, but because it speaks the truth of God to a spiritually blind world. The Church has lost its credibility with people not because it proclaims an unwelcome truth, but because it tries curry favor by watering down the truth and by not living by it. If we want to see a revival in our nation, then we won’t see it come about by avoiding the hard issues. Instead, we must speak the truth and live the truth in love. You may have noticed that our Old Testmant reading for today is the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments are, as they say, an oldie but a goodie! They took them out of the schools, but do we teach them to our children? To our grandchildren? Can we recite them? Are we trying to live by them each and every day? Not so that God will love us; He loves us already. But to demonstrate our love for Him? In our civic culture, June is now Pride Month. But for the Church, June has always been the Sacred Heart of Jesus month. When we talk about the Sacred Heart of Jesus we refer to that completely self-giving, sacrificial love that Jesus has for each of us. That is something that we as a culture and as a society have forgotten about. Let’s bring it back. We can respond to the Sacred Heart of Jesus by endeavoring to love Him by keeping His commandments. And in so doing, our lives will be a powerful witness to others. As St. Paul says, “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
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+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
On this first Sunday after Pentecost, the Church observes what is called Trinity Sunday. It is right that we do this, because we worship a God of three Persons: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. This is a great mystery, something that we cannot fully comprehend. Nevertheless, over the centuries, men have tried to illustrate the Holy Trinity in ways that we can better understand. St. Patrick is said to have used the shamrock to illustrate the Trinity--each of the leaves of the shamrock representing Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and the entire shamrock being one God. Or there is the analogy of water: water comes as a liquid, a vapor, or as a solid, yet all three are water. But all that really does is get you mocked by Lutheran Satire for using bad analogies! Fundamentally, if we look at the Athanasian Creed, we confess that God is a God of three Persons, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Each Person is co-equal and co-ternal with the others. There are not three Gods, but one God. While the Scriptures reveal this to us, the Trinity is not explicit. The word trinity never appears in the Bible. But over the centuries, as the Church has reflected on the Scriptures and on God's saving acts through history, it came to understand that God has revealed Himself as a Trinity of Persons. St. Athanasius said that the Son of God was fully God. St. Basil and St. Gregory declared that the Holy Spirit was also God. And when we then read the Scriptures through the lens of this understanding, we can see all three Persons of the Godhead at work in the economy of salvation. In Exodus, we see God the Father speaking to Moses from the burning bush, commissioning Moses to go in His name to deliver the people of Israel from bondage in Egypt, and then leading the people through the wilderness with the pillar of flame. In Romans, St. Paul talks about God the Holy Spirit works in us to transform us from the inside out. Through the power of God the Holy Spirit, we are empowered to cast aside our sinful nature (the flesh) and walk in the power of the Spirit; to live a life of holiness and righteousness. St. Paul says, For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, "Abba! Father!" Then in today's Gospel lesson from St. John, we read about Jesus' famous encounter with Nicodemus, where Jesus declares to him, "You must be born again!" To be born again is to be spiritually transformed by the saving power of God, the saving power revealed in the mighty works of God the Son Jesus Christ through His death, resurrection, and ascension, and through the power of God the Holy Spirit. Jesus then declares those famous words, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life." Here again we see the Persons of the Godhead at work: God the Father sends the Son who dies on the Cross for the salvation of the world. God the Father also sends the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, the empower the Church to carry out its mission of proclaiming the Gospel, to draw people into God's fellowship, and to transform them so that they die to their sinful nature and live according to the divine nature of God Himself. To believe that God is a Trinity of Persons is to believe in the God of the Bible and to recognize His saving acts on behalf of the human race. The evidence for this is to observe the claims of the counterfeit religions of the world. They deny the Trinity. Whoever they are; Moslems, Mormons, or Moonies, they all deny the holy Trinity. And to deny the Holy Trinity is to not only reject God, but to reject the salvation that God the Holy Trinity brings us. Because without each Person of the Trinity, salvation is not possible. Rather than exhaust ourselves by trying to fully understand this sacred mystery, it is better for us to simply worship and adore the Unity. As we spend time in His presence, and we experience His love and power, we recognize that He is God and we are not. And when we fully rest in that truth, then we begin to understand who we are and what we were created for. We begin to live in the reality that our God is holy and mighty, and that we are to love Him, serve Him, and give all the glory to Him. +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions…And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. A very blessed Pentecost Sunday to all of you! Today marks the 50th day since Christ’s resurrection on Easter, Today is the day we celebrate the coming of the promised Holy Spirit in a way that had not been seen before. In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit fell on certain individuals whom God had chosen prophets, priests, and kings. But today, on the Feast of Pentecost, we see God pouring out His Spirit on all His people; young and old, rich and poor, people from every tribe and tongue and nation. The coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost transformed those gathered in that Upper Room from a beleaguered group of people hiding out from the authorities into divinely empowered and bold group of men and women who went out into the Greco-Roman world boldly proclaiming the Gospel of salvation through Jesus Christ, living a life of radical discipleship, and turning the world upside down with their lives and their message of love and truth. This new humanity redeemed through Christ’s death, resurrection, and ascension is what we call the Church. The Church born on this day at Pentecost was and is a living organism where every member has a vital and important role to play in the building up of the Body of Christ and in the spread of the Kingdom of God. This Church was so powerful and alive that nothing could stop the spread of the Gospel. As we read in the Book of Acts, persecution of the Church in Jerusalem led its spread to Judea and Samaria. Persecution in Judea and Samaria caused it to spread to the wider world; to all the places mentioned in Acts Chapter 2: Rome, Cyrene, Crete, Asia, Pontus, Cappadocia, Arabia, Mesopotamia, and Iran. The British historian Edward Gibbon, writing in his magisterial work, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, credited the spread of the early Church to the power and authenticity of its message and common life. Through the Church’s ministry of healing and deliverance ministries, through its universal message of salvation through Jesus Christ, it appealed especially to those of the lowest parts of society. It took just 300 years for Christianity to spread throughout the Roman world and displace paganism as the official religion of the Empire. Today, the Church is a worldwide movement with Christian communities existing in nearly every country and nation in the world. All this was set in motion when the Holy Spirit fell on that small group of people in the Upper Room on Pentecost. Sadly, we Christians here in the West seem to believe that the power and zeal of the early Church is lost to us. We’re not seeing the growth. We’re not seeing lives transformed. But that power and zeal is not lost to us. Growth and a harvest of souls is still possible. My friends, the Holy Spirit is still here and He is at work. The Church that Christ established and that was born on Pentecost has the same power and authority that it had in those early days. We need to open the eyes of our faith and we need to surrender to the love and power of God. When I was the Chaplain at the Union Gospel Mission in Fort Worth, we ran an adult Christian discipleship class called the Alpha Course twice a year. At the conclusion of each Alpha Course, we would have what was called the Alpha Celebration in the main chapel on campus. It was a time to give thanks and celebrate what the Lord has been doing during the just completed Alpha Course. We would sing songs and hymns and I would give out certificates to residents and volunteers. I would also administer the Sacrament of Baptism to those who asked for it. I would then close the evening with a time for people to stand up and give testimony how the Lord had been working in their lives. What I discovered during my time at the Union Gospel Mission was that every time we gathered to thank God and to worship Him, lives were touched. At the Alpha Celebration last May, four people came forward to be baptized and six people came forward to rededicate their lives to Jesus Christ. A woman who was baptized declared that Christ had freed her from 30 years of addiction. A 9-year-old boy who was also baptized testified that Jesus Himself appeared to him in his dreams and that Jesus was calling him to preach salvation to others. There were tears of joy and a celebration of God’s great and mighty works. It's not just happening at the Union Gospel Mission, but it’s happening all around the world. People are coming to Christ in places like Iran and Nepal and China. In Africa, it’s not Islam that is on the move, but Christianity! “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions…And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” The prophet Joel wrote these words five hundred years before Day of Pentecost. He wrote them to the people of God suffering in exile in Babylon, waiting for the day when they could return home and wondering if God had forgotten about them. Joel gave them these words of hope and encouragement to remind them and assure them that God had not forgotten about them, but He had great and wonderful plans in store for them, plans that were greater and more wonderful than they could imagine. As we gather on this Pentecost Sunday, it feels like we are exiles and strangers in our own land. Our country has changed in many ways over the past 60 years. The Church has experienced significant decline during that time; congregations have shrunk, churches have been closed. But that is not the final word. Today’s celebration is a reminder that the same God who sent His Holy Spirit to us on Pentecost, the same Holy Spirit who inspired the Prophet Joel to write those words, is the same Holy Spirit who is here and at work among us today. Will you yield to the Holy Spirit and let Him have His way with you? He wants to transform you and make you an instrument of His love and His power so that the Kingdom of God is advanced, and so that God will be glorified in our lives. +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. [Jesus said] “They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you have sent Me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Twenty years ago this month, I graduated from Nashotah House seminary in Wisconsin. As a gift to myself for graduating, I went on a guided tour of the UK led by one of my seminary professors. It was marvelous! It was fun being a part of a group and it was fun moving around from place to place. Two of the places that we visited really stood out for me: Iona and Lindisfarne. Iona is a remote coastal outpost in western Scotland, on the Irish Sea. Lindisfarne is in northern England, near the Scottish border on the North Sea. Both sites are known in history as the locations of famous Celtic monasteries. Celtic monks from Iona and Lindisfarne not only created a vibrant Christian community, where God was worshipped and beautiful manuscripts were made, but they also served as a base of operations for missionary work throughout the British Isles and Western Europe during the Dark Ages. These monasteries flourished during the 6th, 7th, and 8th centuries, after the fall of the Roman Empire in the West. Unlike earlier Christians who lived during the time of the Roman Empire, they did not have the benefit of Rome’s sophisticated transportation system, nor the peace and prosperity that Rome provided. Nor were they located in major cities, such as London, Paris, or Rome, but they chose to operate from remote areas. Yet they took the Gospel to places where it had never been preached, and to places where the Church had once existed, but had reverted to paganism. They took the Gospel to Ireland, Scotland, England, Wales, France, Switzerland, and Germany. They did not follow conquering armies, but came as peaceful missionaries, who brought the light of the Gospel and preserved the knowledge of earlier times through the copying of manuscripts. They lived in the time we call the Dark Ages, a time of chaos, warfare, with no stability or safety and a loss of knowledge. These Celtic monks were in the world, but they were not of the world. It was their zeal for the Gospel that led them to go out from their remote outposts to difficult and sometimes dangerous places. In a dark time, they brought the light of the Gospel and of knowledge to places that desperately needed it. Thomas Cahill wrote a book about what these men did, and he titled it, “How the Irish Saved Civilization.” The monks certainly must have understood the words that Jesus spoke to the disciples in today’s Gospel from St. John. In His valedictory address to His disciples, Jesus prays the High Priestly Prayer over them. It is His prayer of blessing, of exhortation, and of commissioning. Jesus is looking ahead to the time when He is no longer with them, after He has completed His mission on earth and ascended back to the Father. Jesus knows that they will start off as a small group of people in a hostile world. They have already witnessed the hostility to Jesus and His ministry, which will culminate in His arrest and crucifixion. And Jesus knows that even after His resurrection and ascension, that hostility will still be present and ongoing. So, Jesus prays that they would be properly equipped to go out into a dark and hostile work to proclaim the life saving message of the Gospel. First, Jesus prays, “Father, keep them in your name, which you have given Me, that they may be one, even as we are one.” Jesus prays that we, who are His holy and set apart people, would remain connected to the Father through the Son. This connection is to be as strong and as intimate as the Father’s connection to the Son. The organization that Christ established to accomplish this is the Church. Through the Church, we enjoy fellowship God and with other believers, we receive the Sacraments, and we are taught from the Word of God. Furthermore, the Church serves as the place of refuge from a hostile and dark world. Just as the Celtic monks established monasteries as refuges from a hostile barbarian Europe, so the Church is our safe place where we can worship God, love each other, learn the Word of God, and then reach out to a lost and hurting world. Second, Jesus prays, “I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one.” Although the world is a dark and dangerous place, Jesus did not take us out of it, but instead, calls us to go out into it. Rather than escape this hostile world, we can expect God to protect us and help us as we go out in His Name. Now this protection does not always mean protection from physical harm; throughout history Christians have suffered persecution—in the Book of Acts we read about how the early Christians and Paul suffered the loss of property, beatings, imprisonment, and even death because they believed in Jesus Christ. What Jesus is praying for is that we would remain spiritually secure in Him and would have the power to resist the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Third, Jesus prays, “Sanctify them in the truth, your word is truth.” Jesus prays that you and I would remain in the faith that was given to us from the Apostles; that we would be made holy by the Word of God. With this prayer, Jesus foreshadows His own great and mighty acts which He accomplished for our salvation, His death, resurrection, and ascension. Because of what Christ has done, we are sanctified and saved to be His people who are in the world, but not of it. Finally, Jesus prays, “As you sent Me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake, I consecrate Myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.” Jesus forshadows the Great Commission that He gives the disciples at His ascension. He commissions them to go out into the world in His Name, in the same way that the Father sent Him into the world for the salvation of the world. The Church is to continue the ministry of the Son of God to bring life and salvation to humanity enslaved by sin and death. The Church’s power and authority comes from Christ Himself, who, through His death, resurrection and ascension has sanctified the Church, and imparted His divine life into the Church. The past few weeks in Adult Sunday School, we’ve been talking about the Ten Commandments. Our discussion has caused many of us to lament the current state of American culture and society that has forgotten the Ten Commandments and has forgotten God. While American seems in many ways to be more prosperous than it was sixty years ago, morally and spiritually, it is a much darker place. And throughout what was once known as the Christian West, the Gospel has been forgotten and paganism has reasserted itself. That’s where we come in. Jesus Christ has commissioned you and me to go out into the world in His name and with His authority and power. And we can look to those faithful and brave Celtic Christian monks as our inspiration and an example. In a dark and dangerous time they went out into the world with the light of the Gospel, bringing truth and salvation to people who had never heard about Jesus Christ or who had forgotten about Him. They didn’t come from large cities, but from simple outposts of faith in remote areas. St. John the Divine Church is a small mustard seed of faith, a small outpost in a darkening world. Jesus Christ has commissioned us to bring the light of the Gospel to dark places. As St. Peter writes in 1 Peter 2:9, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. “[Jesus said] As the Father has loved Me, so have I loved you. Abide in My love.”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. When I was a kid, I can remember listening to the Beatles on the radio. One of their more famous songs was, “All You Need Is Love.” Released in 1967, the song became a hit during a time when our nation was rocked with conflict and unrest over things like the Vietnam War and civil rights. People were angry with each other, and it seemed like the nation was going to break apart. The song’s words and message were simple: All you need is love. It was a powerful message of hope. Love, the song promised, was the answer to all the anger, misunderstanding, and hatred that was raging through the country. Happily, things did improve in the country eventually. The Vietnam War ended, people embraced the civil rights movement and we started to figure things out and get along with each other once again. Sadly, it seems today that we are once again back where we were in the late 60s and early 70s. We’re fighting with each other once again. But today, things are different from the late 60s and early 70s, because when the Beatles sang “All You Need Is Love” we thought we understood what love was. Today we don’t. Today the word “love” has come to mean something completely different than what we thought it meant. “Love” today means a form of narcissistic indulgence combined with enabling. We say to each other, “If you love me, you will let me do what I want regardless of the consequences to myself or others. If you love me, you will always agree with my choices no matter what.” This new definition of love has left us perplexed, unfulfilled and unhappy. We get what we demand, and no one ever says no to us. And we’re miserable. In today’s Gospel lesson from St. John, we hear Jesus talking to His disciples. John has included in his Gospel Jesus’ great valedictory discourse to His disciples before His arrest, crucifixion, and death. Jesus is talking about love. He says, “As the Father has loved Me, so have I loved you. Abide in My love.” Jesus is talking about a love that we used to know and understand before our current madness. Jesus is talking about a love that is transcendent and powerful, a love that has the power to heal and transform. Jesus is talking about divine love or agape as it says in the Greek. Jesus is telling His disciples that the only way for them to grow and prosper in their life with God and with each other is to embrace love, the divine love that God the Father gives the Son, and Jesus the Son offers to them. Jesus exhorts them to “Abide in My love.” To abide means to rest in, to inhabit. Jesus says that His love is a way of being that we embrace and hold fast. The image that always comes to my mind is that of a child sitting on his father’s lap. Sitting on your father’s lap when you were a child is a place of warmth, safety, and intimacy. When you’re sitting in your father’s lap you know that all is right with the world and nothing can harm you. To put it another way, when Jesus invites us to abide in His love, He is inviting us to union with Him. Union means a oneness of heart and spirit. It means intimacy and trust. Jesus is inviting you and me into a relationship with Him that is like the relationship He enjoys with the Father. One of complete love, trust, and oneness of purpose. Our response to Jesus’ words is to ask, “How?” How do I abide in Your love, Jesus? Remember, we are confused about the meaning of love in our society today. We tend to think of love as a form of toxic narcissism combined with enabling. But Jesus is pointing us to something that we used to know but forgot. Love is always about the good and true. Love is directed towards another’s good. When we abide in Jesus’ love, we begin to understand that it’s not about us, it’s about Jesus. And Jesus tells us how to abide in His love: He says, “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.” Once we begin to yield our life and obey, then we will begin to abide in His love. When we abide in His love, then we begin to understand what true love is, and we are transformed by it. That’s why Jesus goes on to say, “These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” To obey is not slavery, because to obey is to embrace His love and life. To obey means we are free to become the people we were created to be. To obey means to break the power of sin over our lives. Jesus continues, saying, “This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” If we are to abide in Jesus’ love, we are to keep His commandments, particularly to love each other as He has loved us. And Jesus describes His love for us as sacrificial: It is a great love because He lays down His life for us on the Cross, so we, should lay down our lives for each other. Jesus defines for us what love looks like. Love means seeking the other’s good. Love means laying down your life for the sake of the other. Love means obedience to the good and the true. Love means intimacy, oneness of purpose and the yielding up of one’s life for something greater. Jesus then sums up the meaning of all this. He says, “You are My friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from the Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I choose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide.” One of the most encouraging things to know about our relationship with Jesus is that He chose us. It’s a great relief, because it means that we don’t have to do anything to earn His love. He chose us because He loves us, and because He loves us, He wants to bring us into union with Him so that we can participate with Him in the transformation of the world and the building of His kingdom. Because Jesus chose us, it means we don’t have to try to measure up, we only need to learn to walk with Him on the road of discipleship and transformation. The closer we get to Jesus, the more we learn that love is really all you need. It’s the love of Jesus that empowers us, heals us, and transforms us. It’s our love for Jesus that moves us to love each other to go out into the world and bear much fruit, fruit that will last. +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. “[Jesus said] If you love Me, you will keep My commandments. And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, to be with you forever…”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Today is an especially joyous day, not simply because we are gathered together to worship God and His Son Jesus Christ and receive His Body and Blood, but because we will also be welcoming Delilah Denny into the Body of Christ through the Sacrament of Baptism. Baptism is both a sign and a reminder to all of us that once we were separated from God because of our trespasses and sins. But God, in His great love and mercy, sent His Son to die on the Cross and rise from the dead, thus destroying sin and death. Baptism is the outward and visible sign of the washing away of our sins and of our entrance into the family of God. What are the characteristics of the family of God, the Church? What does it mean to live as a part of this family? Fundamentally, to be a member of the Body of Christ means to be a part of a set apart people. As St. Peter says in 1 Peter 2:9, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” What this means is that we are no longer in the world. We live in the world, but we are no longer governed by its rules and priorities. On the contrary, we belong to God, and therefore, we are called to live for Him and represent Him in the way that we live our lives. In our Gospel reading for today, Jesus is telling His disciples what their life and the life of the Church will be like after He has completed His earthly mission. After reminding the disciples that He is the Messiah, the Son of God, and proclaiming to them that He intends to continue His mission through them, Jesus then declares to them, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” Here is the first characteristic of the Church: it is made up of people who demonstrate their love for Jesus Christ by keeping His commandments. The love of Christ is not simply demonstrated in professions of love and warm feelings for Christ, but in faithful obedience to His commands. Here we have clear evidence to support the idea that Jesus does not principally regard love as a warm feeling of affection, but as an act of the will that is rooted in obedience, a lifestyle marked by faithfulness. After declaring that obedience to His commands as being the true sign of love for Him, Jesus then says to the disciples, “And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, to be with you forever…” Jesus reassures His disciples that even though His earthly ministry is coming to an end, they and the Church will not be left on their own to try to figure things out and carry on Christ’s mission to the world. Jesus tells them that the Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Trinity will be with them and live His life in their midst so that they will have the power and the ability to keep Christ’s commands and to be Christ’s witnesses to the ends of the earth. To put it another way, the mark and characteristic of the Church is that it is a family marked by the presence and power of the Holy Spirit in its midst. And when we think about the role of the Person of the Holy Spirit in the Holy Trinity, we see that the principal role of the Holy Spirit within the Trinity is that of love or in the Greek, perichoresis. God the Father loves the God the Son, who loves God the Holy Spirit, who loves God the Father. The relationships in the Trinity are marked by intimacy and love. Jesus compares the oneness of this indwelling to the oneness of the fellowship of His Church. In John 17:21 Jesus prays, “That they all may be one, just as you, Father, are in Me, and I in You, that they may also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent Me.” Thus, the principal mark of the Holy Spirit in the life of the Church is love. The Church is not simply an organization, but something much more intimate. We are a family who enjoy God’s power and presence in our midst and we enjoy a special intimacy and love with God and each other. St. John the Divine, in our Epistle lesson for today, emphasizes the Church as a community marked by love and obedience filled with the Holy Spirit. He writes, “And this is His commandment, that we believe in the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as He has commanded us. Whoever keeps His commandments abides in God and God in him. And by this we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us.” In just a few minutes, we will receive Delilah Denny into Christ’s One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. Through the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, Delilah will not only be cleansed from sin and raised to new life in Jesus Christ, but she will become part of a holy nation, a royal priesthood, and a holy people. Delilah will grow up in a spiritual family with a life surrounded by love, marked by obedience and faith, and filled with the power and presence of the Holy Spirit. +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. “[Jesus said] I am the good shepherd. I know My own and My own know me, just as the Father knows Me and I know the Father.”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Just this past week there was a story that went viral on the internet about a mega church in North Carolina that hosted an event called the Stronger Men’s Conference. What the conference organizers did at the beginning of the conference was have a male stripper or pole dancer come out and do various things such as climb the pole and swallow swords. Apparently, this was supposed to be a demonstration of authentic and real masculinity. The conference’s guest speaker was Pastor Mark Discoll, a pastor who has been involved in some controversy over some of his actions as Pastor of the Mars Hill Church in Seattle. Well, Mark Driscoll comes out to speak and he immediately falls to his knees and calls out the male stripper, condemning it as idolatry and sensuality and Jezebel spirit and completely inappropriate. As the result, the pastor of the host church immediately dismissed him from the rest of the conference. This recent incident served to highlight the growing problems with contemporary American evangelical Christianity—that its leaders are too focused on entertainment, and not Christ centered worship, sound theology, sound teaching, and pastoral care. Rather than be faithful pastors, they want to be celebrities with large churches, book deals, and speaking/ preaching tours. Rather then be truly prophetic in the Biblical sense, they’d rather be edgy. Rather than challenge their congregations towards love of God and service to others, they would rather pander to the latest fad. As we wring our hands and fret about the state of Christianity in America, what a relief it is to hear our Scripture lessons for today, Good Shepherd Sunday. In John’s Gospel, we hear Jesus’ declaration, “I am the Good Shepherd.” Now you may remember that I told you that John’s Gospel is the little different than the other three. I told you that John’s Gospel is more thematic than chronological. John’s Gospel contains the Seven signs-the seven miracles that Jesus performs, and how they demonstrate His identity as the Son of God. John’s Gospel also contains Jesus’ “I am” statements, which also point to His identity as the Son of God. Jesus says “I am the good shepherd, I am the door of the sheep, I am the Way the Truth and the Life. Jesus’ use of the phase “I am” is deliberate. Do you remember what God said to Moses when Moses encountered God in the burning bush? Moses asks God His Name. And God replies, tell them that “I am who I am” has sent you. So “I am” is nothing less than the Divine Name of God Himself. Jesus declares “I am the Good Shepherd.” Not only is Jesus declaring His identity as the Son of God, but He is also illustrating for us His role and function as the Son of God. Jesus is the One who cares for His people. And Jesus proceeds to spell out what that looks like, the marks of a Good Shepherd. He uses the shepherd as a role model for two reasons: One, because people were very familiar with shepherds and how they did their work. Two, was because rulers in the ancient Middle East were often referred to as the “Shepherds” of their people. Jesus says, “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” The first characteristic of the good shepherd is that he places the welfare of his flock over his own personal welfare. He is committed to their well-being. He does not run away at the first sign of hardship or danger, but instead stands his ground to protect and care for his flock. By contrast, Jesus says that a bad shepherd is no shepherd at all. He is a hireling. He doesn’t care about the sheep or their welfare. He's simply doing a job. When hardship or danger comes, he runs away. By going to the Cross and dying on our behalf, Jesus truly does lay down His life for the sheep. Jesus says, “I know my own and my own know Me.” The second characteristic of the good shepherd is that he is close to his flock. He knows and understands their needs. He has a relationship with them. And because he knows them and has a relationship with them, the flock knows the shepherd too. Jesus tells us that His relationship with His flock is like His relationship with the Father. Jesus and the Father have an intimate relationship. Jesus even says, “I and the Father are One.” “I only do that which I see the Father doing.” In the same way, Jesus the Good Shepherd has an intimate relationship with each of us. He knows us deep down. He knows about our needs, our hurts, our struggles, and our joys. And Jesus desires that we would be so intimate with Him that we would make His desires, His purposes, and His plans our own. That we would abide in Him and bear much fruit as it says in John 15. Jesus then says, “I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to My voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.” The third characteristic of the good shepherd is that he is always searching for the lost sheep so that he can bring them into the flock and they can find safety and pasture. Jesus here is making a reference to the Gentiles, that He has come not simply as the Savior of Israel, but as the Savior of the whole world. Jesus has come to bring His salvation to all who would hear His voice and believe in Him. Jesus desires that the whole world come to know Him, love Him, and serve Him. Jesus the Good Shepherd is always out searching for those who are lost, so that He can gather them to Himself. As Jesus is the Good Shepherd, we have relationship with Him and He gives us salvation, love, and security. As the sheep, we are those who need to be led as we tend to go astray. Isaiah 53:6 says, “all we like sheep have gone astray.” The confession in the Prayer Book says, “Almighty and most merciful Father, we have erred and strayed from your ways like lost sheep.” We need to be cared for because we are vulnerable. We are vulnerable to the attacks of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Rather than trying to make it on our own, we need to cling to the safety of the flock, the Church. How are we, as the sheep, as the flock of God supposed to live? St. John describes for us in today’s Epistle reading how we as the sheep of God are to follow our Good Shepherd: First, a good sheep purifies himself as Jesus is pure. We are to progressively rid ourselves of sin. Jesus did not die for our sins so that we can keep on sinning. Rather, Jesus died for our sins so that we might abide in Him and live His life in us. To sin is to deny the life of Jesus in us, and to defile ourselves. To sin is to choke out the seed that God has planted in our hearts. John explicitly states that the evidence for those who are the children of God and those who are not is by the way we live. He says, “Whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God.” Second, John says, the one who does not love his brother also does not love God. We cannot, as Jesus says, love God whom we have not seen if we do not love our neighbor who we have seen. Therefore, if we are truly the sheep who follow the Good Shepherd, then we practice obedience to God’s commands, and we love our neighbor. To live this kind of life, we must continue to listen for the Shepherd’s voice and stay connected to the flock. The path of discipleship is not through conferences that excite us and stimulate our senses. Rather, the path of discipleship, of following the Good Shepherd is a steady one of faithfulness. It something that we practice each and every day. We pray, talking to God as a regular habit, asking for the things that we need, listening to God’s guidance and counsel, interceding on behalf of others, especially our loved ones, friends, and neighbors. We come together each Sunday to worship God, hear the Word read and taught and we receive the Body and Blood of Christ. It is this way of following the Good Shepherd that we begin to discover and experience those great truths found in Psalm 23: “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul.” +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands, concerning the Word of life—the life was made manifest , and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us—that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us…”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. You have probably heard the expression “One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.” We say it every Sunday, when we recite the Nicene Creed; “We believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church.” What does that mean? Let’s break it down: “One” means that we believe that the Church is one, that we as Christians are one with Christians everywhere in the world and throughout the history of the Church since New Testament times. We believe in one Lord, one faith, one baptism. “Holy” means that the Church is holy because the Holy Spirit dwells in the Church and sanctifies its members setting them apart to God in Christ and call them to a holy and righteous life. “Catholic” means the Church is “catholic” (according to the whole) because it keeps the whole faith it received from the Lord Jesus Christ, in continuity with the whole Church in all times and places. The Church is called “apostolic” because it holds the faith of the first apostles sent by Jesus Christ. In continuity with the Apostles, the Church is likewise sent by Christ to proclaim the Gospel and to make disciples throughout the whole world. Our Gospel lesson for today from St. Luke captures for us the moment when Jesus declares to His disciples the imminent establishment of the Church and its identity and mission. Here is St. Luke’s description of the incident we read last week in John 20:19-23: Jesus appears to His disciples, and He shows them that He is not a ghost, by showing them His sacred wounds and by eating food in their presence. As we examined last week, a ghost does not have wounds, nor does a ghost eat food. Once Jesus has established for the disciples that He is truly resurrected from the dead, and present with them, He then proceeds to sum up all that He has done and what will now happen moving forward. Jesus reminds them that He is the Messiah, the Christ, and that His coming, and His earthly ministry, His teaching and His miraculous signs, culminating in His death and resurrection, was all the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy—in the first five books of Moses, in the books of the Prophets, and in the Psalms as well. Then in verse 45 Luke writes, “Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.” This tells us that since the Scriptures are spiritual and supernatural writings, the ability to understand and proclaim their meaning to others is also a spiritual and supernatural act. It does not come principally from intellectual or academic study, but it comes from God Himself through the Holy Spirit. It is also a reminder that the Church’s authority and power comes from God through the Holy Spirit: remember last week in John’s Gospel, Jesus declares to the disciples, “As the Father has sent Me, even so I am sending you...Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.” With these words, Jesus declares that He is establishing His Church, and that this Church, made of up of all those who believe in Him and who led by His Apostles, those who were eyewitnesses of His earthly ministry, and His death and resurrection, all of whom are now commissioned to go out into the world in Christ’s name. To do what? Jesus continues, declaring, “That repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.” So then, the Church is a Holy Spirit empowered institution, created and established by Christ Himself, a supernatural body empowered by Christ, entrusted with the faith first given to the Apostles, to go out into the world and to preach the Gospel to all nations. St. John the Divine, in his first letter, uses the same kind of language he used at the beginning of his Gospel, to describe Christ’s commission to him and to the other Apostles, and to the whole Church. John writes, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands, concerning the Word of life—the life was made manifest , and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us—that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us…” This is the Gospel and the Great Commission that the Church, proclaims and practices. This Gospel comes to us from the Apostles, who as St. John says, heard it from Christ, seen it with their own eyes, looked upon and touched with their hands (remember Thomas?), this life and ministry and story of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, this we proclaim to you. For what purpose? So that you (all of us) may have fellowship with us (the Church and the Apostles). This then, is what we mean when we say that we believe in and are baptized into Christ’s one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. We believe in the Apostolic faith, which was handed down to the present day from the Apostles. We can find this Apostolic faith in the Scriptures and in the teachings of the Church. We are to take this faith that we have received and teach it to our children, and proclaim it to all the nations to make disciples of them. Here at St. John the Divine Church, we come together to worship God and His Son Jesus Christ, to glory Him in all that we say and do. We take the Gospel of Jesus Christ and we believe it, teach it, and as St. John the Divine, writes, we proclaim it also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and that indeed our fellowship is with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ. +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. “Then [Jesus] said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here, and see My hands; and put out your hand and place it in My side. Do not disbelieve but believe.’ Thomas answered Him, ‘My Lord and my God.”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Today is unofficially known as Low Sunday, as it is the first Sunday after Easter Day, usually the Sunday when many Rectors let the curate preach, the Sunday when many of the church regulars are away for the weekend. But this Sunday is also known as Doubting Thomas Sunday, since it is this encounter between Jesus and Thomas the Doubting disciple that is featured on this day. Back in my Episcopal Church days, Doubting Thomas Sunday was held up as a special day, since the leadership of the Episcopal Church believed that Thomas’ “doubting” made him special, and even more spiritually virtuous than his fellow apostles who believed in Jesus’ resurrection already. It’s like that old expression, “I’m from Missouri, show me!” This expression refers to people from Missouri, who want to be shown the facts and make an informed decision. Missourians are not gullible and will not simply take your word for it. The truth about Thomas’ original doubt that Jesus had truly arisen from the dead, and his insistence on specific evidence to be convinced of Jesus’ resurrection is not remarkable or special, even if it set him apart from the other disciples. On the contrary, Thomas’ doubt is commonplace. There are many examples of individuals demanding that God meet some specific proof so that they will believe that God is real. Who wouldn’t doubt something as incredible as the Resurrection? It’s not as if being resurrected from the dead is a commonplace event—it’s never happened before! Furthermore, it can be argued that doubt is simply a form of a defense mechanism—I don’t want to believe, because I’m not prepared to accept the consequences of belief. What is remarkable in this episode is the great love that Jesus has for Thomas and all of us, and that He desires for us to be believing, not disbelieving. St. John’s account of Jesus’ encounter with Thomas and the rest of the disciples starts off with a bang: the disciples have locked themselves up in a house, fearing that the authorities will come and arrest them at any minute. Yet, despite the locked doors, Jesus comes and stands among them. Jesus didn’t kick down the doors. Nor was Jesus a ghost—John tells us that the first thing Jesus does is show the disciples His hands and His side. Ghosts don’t have flesh wounds! So if Jesus isn’t a ghost, and He didn’t kick open the door, then how did He get in the room? I think C.S. Lewis describes it best: Lewis says that Jesus was able to enter the room and not kick open the doors and not be a ghost was because the resurrected Jesus was the most real and substantial being in the entire room. Compared to Jesus, the disciples were ghosts, and the walls were like fog. Having presented Himself in the room, and having demonstrated that He was not a ghost, but has risen from the dead, Jesus then blessed the disciples and gives them their Commission to go and continue His work in the world as His ambassadors: Jesus tells them that they will have His authority to go out into the world in His Name. Surprisingly, Thomas is not with the rest of the disciples when this takes place. Does this mean that Thomas is not one of the Apostles? No. Thomas is still numbered among the Apostles-even though Thomas is not physically present, he still has the same commission and authority as the others. Why is Thomas not there? Gregory the Great says that the reason Thomas is absent when Jesus appears to the disciples is because Jesus wants to have the opportunity to address the doubt that Thomas already feels, and in so doing, address the doubt that so many throughout the centuries have had about Jesus Christ’s resurrection from the dead. John then tells us that when Thomas rejoins the other disciples, they tell him all about Jesus’ visit and what happened. Thomas is skeptical, and tells them, “Unless I see in His hands the mark of the nails, and place my hand into His side, I will never believe.” Fast forward to the following week, Jesus comes and appears to the disciples again. And what does Jesus do? The first thing Jesus does is go to Thomas and invite him to do the very thing that will convince him to believe. Jesus invites Thomas to look at His hands and see the marks of the nail. Jesus invites Thomas to put his hand in Jesus’ side. Jesus says to Thomas, “Do not disbelieve, but believe.” This is such a beautiful example of Jesus’ heart for people. Jesus knew about Thomas’ doubts, and He wanted to dispel them. Jesus wanted Thomas to believe! My friends, the same is true for you and me and for everyone who wants to believe, but doubts. Jesus wants to answer our doubts. He wants us to believe in Him! Nevertheless, I think that it is important to note that complete and perfect proof about Jesus and who He is not available to those who don’t or won’t believe. On the contrary, that’s why Jesus wants us to have faith. He wants us to believe despite our doubts and our fears. It was St. Augustine who said, “I believe, then I understand.” It is faith that unlocks belief, which then unlocks greater understanding. When Thomas encounters Jesus, and sees His hands, and places his hand in Jesus’ side, he exclaims, “My Lord and My God!” This is the response that Jesus wants from all of us, that simple declaration of faith and belief. It is this confession that makes everything else possible. We know from church history that Thomas went on to become the first missionary to India. Thomas first proclaimed the Gospel to the people there. Did you know that when the first Western missionaries arrived in India, they encountered Indians who were already Christians! When they asked these Indian Christians who first brought them the Gospel, they said it was Thomas the Apostle! That is why there is a Church in India called the Bar Thoma Church, because it is descended from those first Indians converted by Thomas himself. When Thomas makes his declaration of faith in the risen Lord, Jesus exclaims, “Have you believed because you have seen Me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Here Jesus is not necessarily rebuking Thomas and praising the other disciples. Rather, Jesus is proclaiming that all of us who come to believe in Him later, after He is no longer present on earth in the flesh, are the ones who are truly blessed. If you’re like me, you wonder to yourself, “how great would have been to be there and see Jesus in the flesh, doing all those great and wonderful things!” Yes, it would have been great to be there! But one day we, like Thomas, will see Jesus face to face, and we will say to Him, ‘My Lord and my God!” +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. “[Jesus said] You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.”
+In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Back in 2015, I had the opportunity to go to Ethiopia on a short-term mission. Our team was ministering in the city of Gambella, in the western part of the country, near the Sudan. As a priest, I was invited to attend one of the local Anglican congregations in the city and preach. What first struck me when I arrived at the church was that there was no church building. In fact, the Anglican Church in that part of Ethiopia was growing so rapidly that they didn’t wait to get a building before they started having Sunday worship. They simply started meeting under a large tree and continued to meet there until such a time that they had the money to either rent space or build their own church building. The second thing that happened impressed me even more: as soon as I arrived, they bid me to sit down in a chair, and the leaders of the church brought out a large wash basin and they began to wash my feet. I was deeply moved by this experience for several reasons: First, I understood it to be an act of love and service to me as a fellow Christian. They demonstrated their love and hospitality to me and honored me as their visitor. Second, they demonstrated their humility and love for Jesus Christ by literally following His command. Third, by humbling themselves to wash my feet, they demonstrated true holiness, and their holiness and obedience reminded me of my own sin and brokenness and their washing represented Jesus’ washing away of my sin and shame through His life, death, and resurrection. On this holy night, we gather to worship God and to recall the great and mighty acts that Jesus accomplished for our salvation. Tonight, we remember and participate in two things that Jesus did for us and commands us to practice together. First, we remember Jesus instituting the Sacrament of His Body and Blood at the Last Supper. Using the Passover Feast as His backdrop, Jesus takes the bread and wine of the Passover meal and transforms it by the power of His Word. The Passover meal, which represents God’s deliverance of the people of Israel from slavery and death in Egypt, is now given a newer and deeper meaning. Through the Jesus’ words of institution, Jesus declares that the Bread and the Wine become His Body and Blood, and that His Body and Blood are now the food for the people of God, food for eternal life. Just as the people of Israel celebrate the Passover meal together to remember their deliverance from bondage, so at the Eucharist, the people of God eat the Body and Blood of Christ to celebrate and remember the salvation won by Jesus. Just as the Passover meal sustained the people of Israel during their journey out of Egypt to the Promised Land, so the Sacrament of Jesus’ Body and Blood is to sustain us on our journey to eternal life. You may recall from a few weeks ago, I talked about how Jesus’ feeding of the five thousand with the five loaves and two fishes not only demonstrated love and compassion for the people in need but was also a sign that pointed to Jesus’ identity as the Son of God. This sign was a reference back to the Exodus when God fed His people with manna in the desert. Just as the manna in the desert was real food, just as the five loaves and two fish were real food, so the Body and Blood of Jesus is also real food for our souls and spirit. And just as God’s presence sustained the people of God on their journey through the wilderness to the Promised Land, so Jesus’ presence in the Eucharist sustains us on our journey toward eternity. God is at work, feeding and saving His people. When we read all of salvation history in the Bible, we understand that that the Exodus foreshadows the Life of Christ, so the Passover meal foreshadows the Eucharist. This understanding is best captured by the painter Marc Chagall, whose work Exodus shows the people of Israel walking through the wilderness to the Promised Land, overshadowed by Christ on the Cross. At great an act as the institution of the Sacrament of His Body and Blood was, Jesus didn’t stop there. John tells us that during the Last Supper, Jesus performed another act of self-giving and humility. He washed the disciples’ feet. Now when we think back to what life was like back then, we know that most people didn’t have horses or wagons to ride on. They walked everywhere. Furthermore, many did not have shoes, so they walked everywhere barefoot. So, when you entered someone’s home, it was customary for a servant to wash your feet. This was considered a menial act, somewhat akin to cleaning garbage cans or bathrooms. Yet, at dinner, Jesus starts washing the disciples’ feet. Peter is offended at Jesus’ taking on of such a menial and degrading task, much like he was offended when Jesus started talking about His coming arrest and crucifixion. Peter declares to Jesus, ‘You shall never wash my feet!” And Jesus rebukes Peter, saying, “If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.” Jesus declares to Peter that only by remaining in Him and by living Jesus’ life of humility and service, can Peter gain eternal life. Through His washing of feet, Jesus demonstrates two things: First, His washing of feet is a physical reminder that Jesus cleans us from all our sin and unworthiness, and that we need this cleansing on a regular basis. Second, Jesus’ washing of feet is a demonstration of His humility and service toward each of us. By commanding us to do the same, Jesus is not declaring that we should literally wash each other’s feet; rather, Jesus is reminding us that we are called to imitate His life of humility and service. Just as Jesus gave all of Himself in service to you and me, so we are to do the same for each other. And just as Jesus’ washing of our feet represents His cleansing us from our sins, so when we serve one another in humility and love, we not only help another, but we ourselves are cleansed from the daily grime of our sin and shame. To “wash each other’s feet” is to be healed of our own pride and self-sufficiency and embrace humility. In so doing, we imitate the life of Christ, who came not to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many. +In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. |
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