Please, pray with me.
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable before you, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Please be seated.
Good morning my friends. It is so good to be here.
In the Sundays since the Feast of All Saints, on November 1st, the Lectionary of the Church conforms what some have called the Season of the Reign of God.
The Gospel lessons for each Sunday in this month of November have alluded, one way or another, to the promise, the hope, and the imminence, the expectation, that the coming of the Reign of God requires from you and me and the Church.
And this is understandable, since the liturgical season we will commence next Sunday is that of the Advent of Christ, the four weeks of preparation for our yearly commemoration of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth, our savior and Lord.
Today, as we celebrate the feast of the Reign of Christ, as we praise and sing to Christ the King, the Gospel starkly reminds us what this kingdom, what this reign of Christ is all about.
And the Gospel parable told by Jesus, both by need and appearance, urges us to look for its roots in the Old Testament.
If we look then to our first reading -you may have already noticed the similarities between this text and Matthew’s gospel for today.
Ezekiel, one of the great prophets of Israel, is speaking to Israel from the midst of its Exile in Babylon. The core of the people of Israel has been taken away, for the benefit of the Babylonian Empire, to dwell in a strange land -exactly what Psalm 137 talks about.
And Ezekiel, even from the midst of national disruption and suffering, speaks the voice of God calling Israel to act justly, and specifically so among themselves, oppressed by the same tyrant as they are. Ezekiel prophesied that God will come as shepherd to gather Israel, but also that God will feed justice to these sheep, judging (with some harshness it seems) against those who have abused and diminished others.
In the words of Ezekiel, God promises justice to Israel, yes: she will be restored to her land and green pastures --but justice will also be restored to the children of Israel. Justice, not wrath.
In the Gospel, Jesus is telling a parable with a very similar theme to that of the text from Ezekiel.
There are a few differences -which can likely be accounted for by the time elapsed between the sayings of Ezekiel and the ministry of Jesus of Nazareth, under seven hundred years.
Jesus speaks of the Son of Man, with a very visual proclamation of his coming as a sort of great shepherd, to gather all the nations of the earth -to gather all people, from all languages, cultures, religions.
I think it is safe to assume that we all have some idea about what this great gathering of all times would look like. It should look bigger than Woodstock from up in the air, I am sure.
But, again, I think it is safe to assume that we all have given some thought to what this grand reckoning is about, and so the poetry we find in this parable of Jesus connects very well with our own cultural notions about ‘when the son of man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him’.
In the midst of all this grand language, Jesus turns to the far more amicable figure of the shepherd.
The image of the shepherd separating goat from sheep is very telling.
Sheep tend to be mild and gregarious, while goats can often turn out stubborn, if not aggressive and antisocial. Sheep follow the shepherd, and goats, the heard-goat. So, you really want to keep these apart.
The basis for the judgement of the Son of Man on either sheep or goat, as we are told, is not very religious, or at least not very religious in the most restrictive sense of the expression.
The one plain theological point being made here is that Jesus is to be found in the hungry, the thirsty, the prisoner.
But beyond that, the basis for the judgement that Jesus proclaims for this end of times are those of love put into action, works of compassion.
In other words, Jesus equals true discipleship -the true character of those who follow and emulate his holy example- to the care we give.
This is not to say that doctrine, and good doctrine, is not really important. Doctrine is important, and good doctrine is very important for the well-being of the church and the coherence of our mission.
But doctrine, however good, does not, and in fact is not meant to replace our works of mercy, our service to Jesus who meets us in the sick, the thirsty, the hungry, and the prisoner. If anything, the well-being of our doctrine hangs on the generosity and commitment of our love made service.
This is a sobering message for the church today, for you and me. But let us be clear: the message was just as challenging for the church where this gospel of Matthew was composed because it likely addressed some part of the inner life of that specific community which called for a discernment of what the kingdom of God was really about for them, in their own context.
So -through the lens of this parable, in our commitment to those in need, and in whom we are met by Christ, I want to ask, which things is the reign of God about, for our congregation of this church of the Ascension? Let me mention a few.
. The persistent support to the work of St Matthew’s House - I encourage you to ask from Ruth and Jack Faulks and others involved.
. The ABC program, providing breakfast, every week, to children in school, with a very dedicated team with Jean, Catherine, Will, and others.
. The Pastoral Care initiatives, with Ruth Roberts and Diane and others, keeping tabs of love and prayers on those who we do not see often, and visiting and supporting those who may need it.
. The support this congregation provides to the Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund, as it seeks to empower people in impoverished areas or countries and in need of material support for their development.
. The work in the Mission to the Seafarers, with Deacon Janice and (now, server!) Sue Hawthorne-Bates, where they are so dedicated to being family and home to sailors touching port in Hamilton.
. The Advent boxes initiative, which has been announced today, as a means for supporting the winter reserves of food and other supplies at St Matthew’s House.
. The Giving Tree initiative, which will be formally launched next Sunday, seeking to bring gifts of Christmas to a family in financial need.
These are all programs and initiatives made possible by the generosity of many and the commitment and passion of specific individuals in our community.
One could say that we as community keep getting involved in these projects supporting people in need with the same persistence with which we celebrate the sacraments of the Church. Because there is just as much of the core of who we are and what the church is about at stake.
Now, the parable of the sheep and goats ends somehow drastically: those who did not act compassionately “will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life”.
Yes, there is judgement for us who have not cared enough, or chosen not to care for Jesus who meets us in those people who suffer.
But let us also notice that this is a parable about the fullness of times, or the end of times, even though it is spoken to us today. Which means, the gulf between those who choose and those who choose not to care for Jesus in those who suffer is, if nothing else, surmountable. It can be crossed.
In fact, one could say that this separation between the sheep and goats of the parable is actually meant to be overcome. These trenches between those who care and those who do not care for Jesus made sacrament in the suffering, often double as opportunities for transformation, growth, and conversion into service.
A final observation. According to the imagery used in the parable, one could say that no matter what our judgement may come down to, we are never judged in solitude, as individuals.
In the parable, whether we end up on one or the other side of the great shepherd, it seems as if we will end up in a multitude. Or maybe a smaller crowd. Who knows, if sixty something on any given Sunday.
And my point here is that, whichever that crowd may turn out to be, we are called to continual transformation, in community, to growth and conversion after the example and love and compassion of Jesus the Christ, our King and Lord, whom we now await. In community, and here and now, bearing witness to that just as actualized love of Christ, his reign of love and compassion.
All of this somehow accounts for the collect we prayed earlier for this feast of the Reign of Christ:
Almighty and everlasting God, whose will it is to restore all things in your well-beloved Son, our Lord and King, grant that the peoples of the earth, now divided and enslaved by sin, may be freed and brought together under his gentle and loving rule; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.
Amen.
(Sermon preached by Bishop Terry Brown at the Church of the Ascension, Hamilton, Ontario, on the Sunday after Remembrance Day, November 12, 2017. Texts: Joshua 24: 1 – 3a, 14 – 25; 1 Thessalonians 4: 13 – 18; and Matthew 25: 1 -13.)
Today we mark Remembrance Day. It is a state holiday, but we have brought it into the church, because so many veterans were Christians and we (and they) see their sacrifice as part of their Christian vocation. We thank God for countless men and women who have served in the armed forces and made the greatest sacrifice, their lives. We read their names, we build them monuments, we read their stories, we recall their faces, we write poems, novels and music, we lament and grieve, and yet we give thanks, aware that many of our freedoms have been preserved by their sacrifice. We are reminded, also, to treat veterans who are still alive with kindness, and to offer pastoral care and support to the women and men of the armed forces.
Yet there is a bittersweet quality to it all: what might have been, had war and death not intervened; the deep sadness of those who lost spouses, sons and daughters, and parents in war; the wasted resources and desecrated landscapes; and the mistakes, the glorification and sometimes worship of war and militarism; the traumas left in people’s lives that sometimes seem beyond healing.
For me, the matter is also personal since, as most of you know, I spent two years in the US Army in the late sixties, working in an army hospital in Japan treating casualties from the US war in Vietnam. It was a grim business and more than once I thought, “there must be a better way”. A few years later as a young priest teaching theology on Guadalcanal in Solomon Islands, I found myself surrounded by war relics and stories of World War 2, where Americans were revered for saving the country from Japan. Yet, standing on the beach of Iron Bottom Sound (named for the large numbers of battleships sunk there) I was aware of how many American contemporaries of mine would have lost fathers there, while my father, also a veteran of that war, survived and I grew up with the love of a father. Bittersweet: our thanksgiving today is tempered with sorrow and regret.
In today’s Old Testament lesson, there is the suggestion that one potential problem is idolatry. Joshua asks the gathered tribes of Israel, who will you serve, the Lord the God of Israel, or other gods of the past or present. The tribes of Israel declare, “we also will serve the Lord, for he is our God.” Joshua explains that such a commitment is very serious indeed and, if broken, will result in their destruction. The people again declare their faithfulness and Joshua makes a covenant with them, providing them statutes and ordinances so that they might fulfill their commitment.
There is a lot of idolatry that surrounds war. For example, glorification of violence rather than seeing it as the regretful last resort; promoting war for its economic benefits, for example, in weapon sales to unjust regimes or sales far beyond what is necessary; war as a way to gain power for a corrupt elite, sacrificing the poor and powerless in the process. In the US Army, I was surrounded by blacks, Puerto Ricans and poor southern whites with no place else to go; those with money and power often escaped the military all together but benefited economically from the war.
I believe that as Christians, when faced with choices in which war and violence are one option, we do well to declare with Joshua and those who were committed with him, “We will serve the Lord”, moving away from the idolatrous and destructive movements that so often accompany militarism, war and the military life: idolatrous ways such as routinely solving problems though violence (whether physical or verbal), love of guns and other weapons, dividing the world into “friends” and “enemies”, seeking and glorifying conflict rather than peacemaking, viewing the world in strictly hierarchical terms, etc. We cannot forget Jesus’ words, “blessed are the peacemakers”.
For Joshua and the Israelites, “serving the Lord” meant building a community of justice and love, worshipping God with all their hearts, minds and souls. For us as Christians, serving the Lord means seeking and providing the fruitful ground for God’s reign (or rule or kingdom) to flourish among us and move out into the world. The marks of that reign of God are love, justice, peace, kindness, patience, and all the other gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit.
The Gospel parable of the wise and foolish bridesmaids reminds us to be ready for this work of love and justice at any time and especially unexpected times. Our instincts may repel us or make us frightened but with self-discipline we can learn to accept, listen and encourage those even very different from ourselves. Canada’s military has a distinguished record of peacekeeping; as Christians, we can emulate that record. For the stranger in need, the refugee, the person with many personal conflicts and difficulties, the one who is “the other” in one way or another, we can go out, like one of the wise bridesmaids, with the lamp of comfort, peace, encouragement and reconciliation. In each small encounter, we help turn the world away from war to peace. Military chaplains do this work as well, helping members of the armed forces discern their vocation to love in a context in which violence is often the norm. Our acceptance and encouragement of veterans does the same.
None of these reflections are meant in any way to lessen the sacrifice of those we honour today. They fought for peace and a better live. Surely, they are among those who share in the resurrection from the dead that Paul speaks of in today’s epistle from 1 Thessalonians. My own experience of military life was not just the bad side of being trained to kill people but also of personal kindness, friendship, ministry and service, often across racial and social divides. Only with time have I begun to appreciate some of those experiences. (My mostly black company called me “preacher”, an encouragement of my vocation.) Thus, out of experiences that may seem brutal and unfair at the time, goodness and maturity can emerge; indeed, resurrection. We keep in our prayers all who have died in wars, we thank God for their service and witness. We remember also all innocent victims of war and pray for the power to do all we can do to work for the peace of the world.
In our Wednesday evening Bible study this week, I was very struck by a saying of Jesus at the end of chapter 9 in Luke’s Gospel: “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” Out of genuine and loving respect for those who gave their lives for our country, we do briefly look back on Remembrance Day. But then we are reminded that we are on an onward journey, forward on the Christian Way, and not stuck in the past. Thus, the fellowship we shall share in the breaking of the bread and pouring of the wine in the Eucharist and our fellowship in our community lunch moves us forward to greater fellowship and connectedness with one another as we move forward in the Way of Love and Justice.
When we realized our monthly Sunday community lunch would come on our Remembrance Day, a parishioner asked whether this was appropriate. It is very appropriate. Even our friends in the Canadian Legion, after the solemnity of the morning’s observance, retire to the legion hall for food, drink and fellowship. They move forward. And let us do the same, welcoming all. Thanks be to God.
Good morning, my friends, It is so good to be here.
We all come from our time away from the gathering of the Church, a whole week. Many of us have faced difficulties, change, new things to learn, work, and joy. We know ourselves as children of God, in pilgrimage throughout our life on earth, until we come to meet our Maker.
The great Cuban storyteller, Onelio Jorge Cardoso, is the author of the tale Francisca y la muerte, -Francis and Death. Briefly, and freely, told, it is the story of Francisca, an elderly lady from a rural town in Cuba.
Francisca had retired as a school teacher, and always led a very busy life, before and since. She sung in the local choir, helped with after-school tutoring, tended to her garden and chickens, visited her ailing sister across town, attended meetings and events with the local community, spent lots of time with her grandchildren, and was learning to paint with watercolors. She went everywhere, and she walked everywhere.
One day, however, as it must happen to us all, Death came to town, looking for Francisca. It was her turn.
So Death went to Francisca’s house, early in the morning, confident to find her there.
But no. Francisca was gone. Not in the house, or the backyard, or the garden. She was just gone.
So Death walked around the block and ran into a neighbor.
--¿‘Francisca, you say?”, said the neighbor. “I saw her leaving her house very, very early, on her way to visit with her sister” --- Which, as we now know, was all the way across town.
So off went Death. The sun was rising, so was the humidity, and Death, with all those robes, and carrying that heavy scythe, was feeling the heat.
Death finally made it to the sister’s house. –
“Oh I am so sorry, ¡Francisca just left!”, said the sister. “She had a meeting with the local garden group, somewhere downtown”.
O brother, Death thought. This was supposed to have been an easy one.
Off he went -and so Death spent all day, chasing Francisca around town, walking from the garden to the school, from the theater to the market, from the clinic back to the school…
By sunset, Death was exhausted from walking, de-hydrated, out of breath. He sat in the town’s square. Suddenly -a tight pain in the chest, blurry vision -and Death dropped dead from a heart attack. -----
Meanwhile, Francisca was reaching her home, back from the clinic --and a neighbor greeted her:
--“Francisca! You are always so busy. ¡You are never going to die!”.
--“Not today”, replied Francisca. “Not today”.
But seriously. I do not know how many years Francisca went on to live. But it is true that we often associate a long life, with a sense of fulfillment, completion, wisdom, purpose.
May you live to 120 is a common blessing among Jews, based on the life and times of Moses.
Our first reading marks the end of the Exodus, the wandering of Israel in search for freedom and purpose, the end of the search for the Promised Land. This reading from Deuteronomy also marks the ending of the Torah or Law of Israel, the first Five Books of our Bibles.
And, as we know, it also marks the end of Moses’s earthly life:
“Never since has there arisen a prophet in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face. He was unequalled for all the signs and wonders that the Lord sent him to perform in the land of Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his servants and his entire land, and for all the mighty deeds and all the terrifying displays of power that Moses performed in the sight of all Israel.”
Moses died in Mount Nebo, in the region directly east of the Jordan River and just northeast of the Dead Sea, in what is today the country or kingdom of Jordan. This much we are told.
But what was this view that Moses looked at before he died?
As Deuteronomy says, Moses could see: Gilead as far as Dan, all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the Western Sea, the Negeb, and the Plain, that is, the valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees, as far as Zoar.
So I looked on the internet for some photos of Mount Nebo. (screen presentation)
Moses is so deeply revered by Christians, and one could say, even more so by the Jewish people, because of his place as the greatest prophet in Israel, his leadership of the people before and during the Exodus from Egypt, and his role in the giving of the Law, or Torah. We Christians look back to Moses and one could say to the whole of the life of Israel, as a place of revelation of the roots and overall context for the becoming of Jesus of Nazareth, and therefore our own story as well.
The Law of Israel, the Torah of God, in its origins had a very pronounced accent of liberation, coming into life as it did at the pinnacle of the Exodus of Israel, by the hand of Yahweh, out to the Promised Land.
Unfortunately, as we know, the Torah eventually also became an object of legalistic speculation, a tool for exercising power, and a justification for social hierarchies of power in Israel.
In our Gospel for today, the question posed to Jesus by a Pharisee, ‘a lawyer’, is visibly within this shape of legalistic arguing, and I think that it was meant to disqualify the authority of Jesus as teacher of the Law. Or, as the Gospel so eloquently puts it, the lawyer asked Jesus this question ‘to test him’.
“Teacher, which commandment in the Law is the greatest?”, --by all accounts, a popular topic of discussion among students of the Torah -¿which of the 613 commandments in the Law is the most important one? In our own context, the question could be instead, “¿Which is the best Gospel?”. Or, “¿Who is the best writer, Peter, or Paul?” And so on.
Jesus’ response, at first hearing, does pass the purity standards of the Pharisees -God is above everything, and so should our love for God be above everything. However, it is the bridge that Jesus makes, “and the second is like unto it”, what was likely to set off the ‘blasphemy’ radars in our dear friends the Pharisees.
We know, however, that seeking a right relationship with and responding to the love of God by means of loving our neighbors is the key human response to the message of the Scriptures -of which, for both Jesus and Pharisees, the Law was a key component. Indeed, for Christians, as John Newman wrote, “the way we define our neighbor -who is my, your neighbor- reveals the kind of God in whom one believes”.
This vital point, made by Jesus in our reading from Matthew, was likely lost to the Pharisees, in their also likely inner struggle in reconciling their zeal for the Law with the Love they are being spoken about.
And I mean, and I believe Jesus meant it first --Love not necessarily a sense, a feeling, a passion, but a purpose of fidelity to the covenant, a thing of our wills and our actions, a way of life or, maybe, a way of seeking to live on earth while hoping for heaven. To live on earth as if our lives in heaving hung on it.
Speaking of hanging -when Jesus says “on these two commandments hang all the Law, and the Prophets”.
On the one hand, Rabbis or Teachers of the Law say that the whole world hangs on the Torah, “even on the proper balance of every word in it”. Worship of God, works of charity, truth, peace -they all rest and hang on the Law.
On the other hand, in our reading from Matthew, Jesus flips this relationship, and makes the Law depend on those actions which speak to the character of the Law: love. That thing of our wills and our actions, that way of seeking to live on earth while hoping for heaven -indeed, to live on earth as if our lives in heaven hung on it.
After a life of struggle, faith, falling and rising, moving and rising, Moses met his Creator.
So did our ancestors -and so did Francisca, busy life and all. And so will we all.
In both life and death, however, just like Moses and Israel, we know that we are being led, we see the divine hand of Jesus piloting our lives, as we move, by grace, out of the slavery of death and to eternal life, that promised land of the reign of God.
That leading, however, happens here, starts here, and already reveals its grace here, among us. As we gather as church to be fed from the Scriptures, to be nourished in the Eucharist, we are being led.
But even beyond that. We are called to be Jesus to each other, and indeed we often struggle to be Jesus to each other, and we also struggle to discern Jesus in each other. But that is the point: we struggle, we persist in loving God with all our heart, and soul, and mind, and our neighbour as ourselves. And so we should. Nobody said it would be easy. We are told, however, that it is holy. Worth the struggle and the love. And our calling as Christians.
Let us pray. Lord God our redeemer, who heard the cry of your people and sent your servant Moses to lead them out of slavery, free us from the tyranny of sin and death, and by the leading of your Spirit, bring us to our promised land; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
