St. Timothy's Anglican Church
a Virginia Mission Parish in the Orthodox Anglican Church
Serving Poquoson and surrounding communities.
110 Odd Road
Poquoson, VA 23662
ph: 757-848-8218
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Sermons
Sermons at St. Timothy's...
The Eleventh Hour
The parable of the workers in the vineyard is about God grace. The early workers complained that by giving the eleventh hour workers the same pay, they were making them equal. God is saying to us by means of this parable: thats because they are equal. If we strip away all our advantages, all our lucky opportunities of being first, all our good looks, all our intelligence, all our good breeding, all our genetics, all our gifts and every other thing that has been given to us by God then we are all equal. The last is first and the first is last because we are all equal before God.
The Kingdom of Heaven
When we board the ark of the covenant that is booked for passage to Matthews Kingdom of Heaven, we do so as an act of surrender. We are a prisoner of war. We are being taken into the captivity of Christ as the Scriptures say: he led captivity captive And one of the first things that happens to us when we get on board is that we are all issued a beautiful wedding garment. We have never worn anything so exquisite. The moment we put on such a garment it literally begins to transform us from the outside in. Some say that we are completely transformed by the time we make landfall in the Kingdom of Heaven.
Third Sunday After Epiphany 2012
The Beginning of Signs
If this story is about the beginning of signs what is this sign all about? I would allege that Jesus wants his mother to see a gross irony in this situation. It is as if he is saying to his mother: Mom, Im not sure you understand. My whole lifes purpose is to give wine for a wedding feast. But it will be my blood that is given - and it will be for the marriage supper of the Lamb. In the final analysis, what stake do we have in this mere earthly wedding feast?
Second Sunday After Epiphany2012
The Epiphany of Baptism
You would think that of all the things that Jesus could have done as his first formal act his epiphany to Israel his debut he would have chosen some public gesture more becoming of his glory and power and authority than to participate in an enigmatic baptism ceremony which even John himself could not even begin to understand the purpose. Why couldnt Jesus call down fire from heaven like Elijah did as he confronted the false prophets of Baal...?
The First Sunday After Epiphany
The Boyhood of God
I think that Luke presents the story of Jesus' boyhood visit to the temple because Luke suspects that if he doesnt say anything of any narrative detail about the childhood of Jesus, the Apostolic mission - to present the Gospel of Christ to the world - not only its theological significance, not only its prophetic significance, not only its typological significance - but its historical significance - this project will be substantially compromised. Because if we dont have a believable childhood of Christ, we can have no final understanding - and even conviction about the incarnation of Christ.
The Burial of Renate Reagan January 7th 2012
If the Christian religion gives us anything, it gives us a solution for death. And it gives us a solution on every level. It applies to the poor and to the rich, to men and to women, to bond and free, young and old. And if Christianity is true and if it is relevant, it had better give us an answer precisely here. And it better be a good one. There must be no ambiguity. No begging the question. No benefit of doubt.
FirstSunday After Christmas 2012
The Benefit of Doubt
Matthew does not give Mary the benefit of doubt regarding the virgin birth because she doesnt need it. And it would be an insult to her and to the truth to panhandle for anything less that full conviction regarding her story. Now, Matthews story. And if we listen to Matthews story closely enough, we will see that this is his modus operandi concerning every article of Christian belief that he writes about. He is not panhandling for our faith. Matthew is saying that God doesnt need a single dime of our undisciplined credulity. Because Matthew knows that our level of conviction is directly proportional to our level of fidelity to God.
The First Sunday After Christmas (Evening Prayer)
Born From Below
Whenwe go back to the prophecies of the Old Testament as Christians, we must be careful. Especially if we are going to use them apologetically. Because they are not designed really to be used this way. The prophecies are designed to illuminate the logic of history and to illuminate in particular salvation history. Just like many of the ancient medieval manuscripts were illuminated with highly elaborate, decorated letters to help tell the stories which they adorn, so the prophecies of the Old Testament are giant, interpretive divine brushstrokes on the pages of history.
The Birth and Death of the Son of God
In Paul, Christ is essentially delivered to the world, like Venus, fully grown. If Christs death were only about settling a cosmic score a reckoning of which there can be no human comprehension, then there was really no reason for Christ to be born in a stable. Satan could have humiliated Christ in the highest reaches of the cosmos, without Christ ever setting foot in the world that he had made. But God doesnt do this. There is much, much more at stake here than settling a cosmic bet which God appeared to be losing.
A Reed Shaken in the Wind - Part II
If we believe, from the outset, that John the Baptist and also Jesus himself are nothing but reeds shaken in the winds of ordinary historical forces, we will never discover these characters. But if we let the ApostlesMatthew and John tell their story, every historical jesus which the world has constructed will be swept forcefully away in a floodof their narrative, historical and theological facts.The truth is that the Gospels are notwritten to tell us whatwould Jesus do. The Gospels are written to tell us who Jesus is.
A Reed Shaken in the Wind
In the real world of the New Testament we find that John the Baptist is not a fanatic. He is not a Sunday School storybook character, disengaged from history. He is just like one of us. And he is a prisoner of his circumstances, just as we are all prisoners of our circumstances. Jesus did not come to save us from our circumstances. He came to save us from our sins.
Signs in the Sun
So what is it about the sun that will give the world a sign of the second advent of Christ? More sunspots? Less solar flares? More solar wind? Less magnetic activity? We dont know. No one knows. What is Jesus saying here, then? Is he saying that the world should look to the astrologers to interpret what the stars and planets are saying these days? Surely that cant be right. But if there are no guides about what signs to look for or how those signs are to be interpreted - are we all left to mere conjecture as to when the Lord will return?
VENI VIDI VICI
The Messiah, when he arrives, completely ignores the project of political deliverance, focusing instead upon individual deliverance from an intensely personal bondage to sin, deep within the soul. This is what Matthew is trying to get across. And the prefect example of this is how he has manipulated the story of the triumphal entry of Christ. It perfectly illustrates that Matthew is telling us a parable of his design not a clumsy attempt to string historical episodes together to tell some sort of biography. Fundamentalists have a problem with the fact that the clearing of the temple occurs late in Matthew, while in John it appears to occur very early in Jesus ministry. But this problem entirely disappears once we accept what Matthew is doing. Hes not writing a loose biography, hes writing an unexpected parable. It is a parable about a very unusual advent of Christ.
The Meaning of the Miracle
What is it about this miracle of the healing of the noblemans son that qualifies it as one of the seven representative miracles of John? The nobleman implores Jesus to come down lest his son die. He does not yet realize that Jesus is able to raise the dead. But there is something else that he doesnt realize. This man merely believes that somehow Jesus knows that his son is recovered or will soon recover. But it is only after he gets home that he realizes what Jesus has done. 20 miles means nothing to us. But to the people then, that was one days hard walk. For us, our sick son might just as well have been in Afghanistan or on the moon. This man finally realizes what Matthews Centurion already knew. Jesus can heal through space.
The Parable of Righteousness
The parable about the Wedding Feast in Matthew - what is that about? The part about the man caught without a wedding garment? What is that all about? What is the wedding garment? Surely God is not throwing a temper tantrum that someone is not dressed properly; especially when his Son has specifically told us to take no thought of what we must wear, but to behold the lilies of the field and that God himself will clothe us And what about the line at the end: For many are called, but few are chosen. (?) Is this a story about a fatalistic election of just a few lucky souls to taste the esoteric joys of heaven?
The Authority and Power to Forgive Sin
The reason that the religious establishment has had such a difficult time in understanding what Jesus was doing and what Jesus was saying throughout the pages of all four Gospels was that they were coming at him from within their own theories of religion. Here they stood looking into the face of God and yet they forcefully cast away the very words of God in order to preserve their own cultic religion.
Whose Son is Christ?
The question that Jesus has asked"whoseson is Christ"will remain. For you see, the question was not asked primarily to the religious establishment. Yes, it was designed to stop their mouths, but it did not stop them from crucifying Jesus. The question was not asked to end the argument. The question was asked to begin one. And for the next 40 years or so, the Church will struggle with the answer.
The Widow of Nain
Everyone of us are in the place of the dead young man from Nain. We begin with our whole life ahead of us, and then we ourselves watch as our lives slowly slip-slide away, seemingly further and further from our expected destination. Until we realize that without something eternal stabilizing our lives, giving our lives meaning, we are all in the process of being carried out of the land of the living to be buried in a place where no one will remember.No dirges will be sung. No flags will be at half-mast. The world will go on happily without us as if nothing of any significance had happened.
You Can't Serve God and Mammon
Paul says that We must die to all our earthy lovers and become a new creature in Christ. From now on, it is only our marriage to Christ that matters: the world is crucified to me, and I to the world. 'And if youve got any other priority ahead of that father, mother, sister, brother, wife, children, lands, power, notoriety, career you are not worthy to bemy wife,' Christ says. 'Dont pretend. Dont follow me. You cannot serve me and all your other lovers.'
The Tenth Leper
Just as spiritual leprosy has come upon all men by the action of one, so life and healing came upon all men by the action of one, Jesus Christ the righteous. The whole world has been healed of spiritual leprosy. But only a tenth turn back to give God glory and thanks.
Who is my neighbor?
The Jewish establishment did not judge Jesus as a nominal Jew. They judged him as a failure. So they hung him on a stake like so many other Reformation martyrs were hung upon their stake. But they hung him because he was a liar and a blasphemer full of sedition against the state and blasphemy against Judaism-and full of the devil himself. Jesus was no son of Abraham in their book. He had repudiated his own ancestry, his own people. His own blood. At every chance he gets he condemns the religious establishment as unfit to lead the people. Not now. Not ever. Because Jesus came not as a Son of Abraham. He came as the Son of Man. He came as the universal man. Thus everyman is my neighbor...
The Justified Life
We have lately talked of a happy death. And of the meaningful life. Todays lesson, the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican,talks about the justified life. The story is of two very different understandings of the righteousness of God. You would think that the religious establishment of Judaism would have gotten this right. Being right with God - being justified before him, leading a life of righteousness should be at the very core of our religion. But as in so many other cases in the Gospel of our Lord, the religious establishment had gotten this idea entirely wrong and the common people had gotten it entirely right.
The Time of Visitation
Jeus says to Israel: "Behold, your house is left unto you desolate. For I say unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. And Matthew adds just one more editorial effect of emphasis: And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple. He has two verbs of departure, when only one will do. There is a deliberate emphasis that Jesus is leaving the Temple. For good. Never to return. And he never does return. The Dispensationalists that are waiting for the Temple to rebuilt on the Temple mount are going to have a long wait, I think. Because the temple of the Lord has already been built in the hearts of theall fatihful believers -for almost two millennium. And they are not waiting for the New Jerusalem to be built on earth, but as St John says they are waiting for one descending from heaven itself, whose builder is God himself.
The Parable of the Prodigal Son
I don't this parable is about a prodigal Son or a Prodigal father. I think it is about a prodigal brother. And that brother is Jesus Christ. He not only came to pay our gambling debts to the devil, he came to lead us home to the Father and to reconcile us to his Love.
In Human Terms
Though we do not have the power to comprehend the word of God in its entirety, we can understand it truly, in part. Because God has the power to make us understand true truth even if it is partial. And if this one statement is not true, then the docetists are right. The incarnation of the Son of God is an illusion. There can be no final intersection between the finite and the infinite. But the New Testament gloriously affirms in ordinary human terms - that this is just what we have in Christ. The Word of God has become flesh and dwelt amoung us. In the person of Christ. And in the New Testament. God has spoken to us in human terms. And his words cannot be broken, they cannot be bound and they will not return to him until they have accomplished their purpose in us.
The Great Dinner Party
In every audience, in every venue, there will be those who are listening for every hint of the Kingdom of Heaven, and those who just dont care. Wild horses could not pull them away from their earthly fascinations. Even though a moments reflection would scream at us how foolishly temporary and trivial all these fascinations about our possessions and our relationships really are. Everyone can hear the parable of the Great Dinner Party except those who are caught within the clutches of their own imaginations about - something else.
Is There Unrighteousness With God?
In Jeremiahs time, men went awhoring after Baal; in our time the God of choice at least in the West is the God of the belly the kolia. Religion is not so much about good and bad; heaven and hell. It is like a bet that God makes with Satan at least according to Job and Jeremiah and John and Jesus story about Lazarus. God says that he can create truly free, moral creatures that will follow his Son into hell, if necessary, for the sake of his love, despite the allure of the world. Satan says do you want to bet? And God says: Yes Yes I do.
The Trinity is True to What isThere
The author of Hebrews says that God can truly speak to human beings: God, who at various times and in diverse manners has spoken in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken unto us by his Son. This is positive, content filled communication from God. God is not limited to saying: I am not this or I am not that. God says I am. God tells us who he is by using many media. And the most important media that he uses is human language. Now all human metaphors are in the process of dying the moment that they are uttered. Thats why we have an enormous bone yard of dead metaphors in our language. But the difference between a god made out of inanimate gold and talking about God in the dying languages of men is that the languages of men keep coming back to life. If language were not living, we couldnt talk about a living God. We could talk about a dead god, like the death of God theologians in the 1960s, but we couldnt talk about a living God.
The not yet of John that Suddenly Becomes Now.
The visible descent of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles was not for their benefit only. It was also and perhaps primarily - for those standing around watching what was happening. Just as the resurrection vindicated the Apostleship of Christ to the world, so Pentecost authenticated the Apostolic Church as the appointed representative of the Ascended Christ.
The First Sunday After Ascension (June 5th 2011)
A New Song: The Kingdom of God
All the Kingdoms of the earth will rise and fall. All civilizations will come to an earthly end including the nation state of Israel. Jesus predicted that it would, and this is partially why the Jews crucified our Lord. Like the Dispensationalists of today, they expected - and demanded an earthlyMessiah, an earthly ruler and an earthly Kingdom. But as we read the Law and the Prophets and the Psalms, everywhere throughout the Old Testament - as revelation develops, we begin hearing about a New Song and a New Covenant and a New Kingdom one that would never end. Christ calls it: "The Kingdom of God."
In Him
The first stage of revelation was parable and proverb. The Apostles and hence the world have complained: when will you speak plainly to us of the Father? The second stage of revelation Pauls letters and Johns letters - are just the kind of plain speaking that we have asked for. And yet the world has dismissed it because it is too direct. The world has dismissed the Gospel of John because it was too cosmic. But now they have dismissed the Apostolic letters because they are too crude. The author of Hebrews warns us: See that ye refuse not him that speaks. For if they escaped not who refused him that spoke on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaks from heaven.
Word Too Heavy To Bear
As we read John, how do we know that Jesus has left off speaking to the world and has begun speaking to us? Although I believe that John is shadowing the structure of Matthews Gospel, he does not use any of Matthews devices for distinguishing those who believe and those who do not. John, for example, has no parables. John does not recognize the inner three disciples - even though according to Matthews Gospel, he is one of them. And all four Gospels are clear that no one really knows who the hardened traitor is. Is it Peter? Is it Judas? The Apostles ask John to ask Jesus: who is it? If the Apostles are not sure who is in and who is out as late as ascension how can we be sure?
Our Unseen Lord
The realchallenge of the Christian religion is that we follow that which we do not see, not that which we do see. What we do see is a religion that is in complete disrepair, a laughing stock of the nations, universally despised by the modern world, militantly opposed by Islam, fed upon by a host of crazy cults like buzzards feeding on carrion unburied on the streets of Christendom. And it is in this context that we must practice our religion and our confidence and our hope and our blessed tranquility - that though a host of men will mock us for our faith, we will not fear, we will not falter, we will not be faithless. And the reason for this is not because we are particularly fearless and faithful people. It is because the Lord is our shepherd, as we discussed last week - and he is with us.
The Lord is My Shepherd
David said: "The Lord is My Shepherd." In John, Jesus says: "I am the Good Shepherd." There is no mistaking that John is drawing a direct parallel between Jesus' dialogue about himself and David's confession in the Psalms. What is not so obvious is what John has done with dialogues like this. His "Last Supper" section isagreatly expanded"table talk" session, which deals with many teachings that haveto do with the post-resurrectional period.You can see how extended this section is by looking at the last sentence of John 14. Jesus says" "Arise, Let us go hence." But the disciples go nowhere. John continues the dialogue for another three chapters!
The Witness in Ourselves
Repentance is, primarily, a change of mind. Anyone can cry over his sins. Esau did it. Judas did it. Peter did it. But unless crying over sins is the first stage of a complete change of our minds - a metamorphosis of the mind - it will be in vain. So it is very important that we pay attention to what is going on immediately following the resurrection. What is Jesus saying? What is his attitude? What are the Apostles learning?If God is making a case for Christ, what case is he making? If God wants us to have a radical change of mind, what kind of mind does he want us to have?
A Note of Faithless Fear
The Kingdoms of this world have become the Kingdoms of Gods Christ. And from the moment of his Resurrection, he began to build his Kingdom. Stone by stone. He said that the stones would cry out in praise to him. He was right. He has taken away our hearts of stone and has given us hearts of flesh. And the process of his praise has begun. Because the process of our resurrection has begun. The process of my resurrection has begun. The renovation of my life has begun. The rubble of our lives is even now being reassembled in a renaissance of praise and thanksgiving for the regeneration of that which has died in us at the foundation of the world and the fall of man.
The Messianic Secret
Even if we completely reject the historicity of the Gospels and we completely reject the moral integrity of the Gospel writers, we still have this enormous literary inconsistency. Why does this powerful demi-god of a character make such a pathetically modest triumphal entry into Jerusalem?
Palm Sunday(Evening Prayer)
A Triumphal Entry?
In this mornings Palm Sunday sermon we talked a little but about Jesus triumphal entry into Jerusalem. It wasnt much of a triumph. At least in worldly terms. The crown they gave him was an unexpected crown of thorns. And the throne they gave him was a wooden cross. Jesus cleansing of the temple which Matthew, Mark and Luke connect with the triumphal entry - was only temporary, of course. As soon as he was gone, the temple precincts were once again given over to commercialized religion. And for that matter, the entire temple precinct area was completely destroyed by the Romans only 25 years later.
Life Imitating Art?
Christ does not imitate prophecy or myth. Prophecy and myth imitates life. Because Christ says: I am the way. I am the truth. And I am the life. No man comes to Father through tradition or myth. He comes by me.
Passion Sunday (Evening Prayer)
A New and Living Way
Our high priest is set down on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens; he is our personal intercessor of the true sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man. Isnt that wonderful? The law, the tabernacle in the wilderness and for that matter, all our own physical structures - are all but shadows of the true objects which exist in heaven. And this is why through the obedience and the work and the suffering of Christ - he has obtained a more excellent ministry than anything that has gone before. And he has become the mediator of a better covenant. Which was established upon better promises.
Beyond Allegory
If we were going to do a study of the allegories of the New Testament how many do you think thered be? There is just one. The rest of the extended figures of speech are not called allegories or analogies or any of the words that are of Greek descent that are in common use today. There is parable and sign. There is eikwn and tupov. There is muyov and musterion. There is shadow and example. But there is only one allegory. And this is the one that we find in Pauls letter to Galatians.
Fourth Sunday in Lent (Evening Prayer)
The Most Offensive Scripture in the New Testament John 6:28-58
Paul says I determined not to know anything except Christ crucified. In every possible way Paul says that we must unite ourselves with the death of Christ. We must feed on this death so that we might participate in his resurrection. John very succinctly summarizes and all encompassing metaphor. We must drink his blood. It is not that no one knew why Christ should die. It is that when they found out why Christ should die to atone for our sins, they couldnt take it in. They wouldnt drink it in. John says. Drink up. If you dont drink up the blood of Christ into your minds and souls and spirits by faith, you will have no part in him.
What do we Believe?
The first step in the Lenten renovation of our souls is to listen. The second step is to examine our beliefs. To have them examined by Christ - in our presence. We must be willing participants in the repudiation of our faith in our selves or in the world or in the fulfillment of our lusts or in our doubts about Gods existence, our doubts about Gods sovereignty, our doubts about Gods love and our doubts about Gods ability to speak to us. And we must consciously participate in their exorcism and replacement with the beliefs of the Kingdom of God. That Christ is Gods only begotten son. And that he is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and that he is the rightful and worthy sovereign of our souls.
Third Sunday inLent(Evening Prayer)
Lights in the Church
The Gospel says that no sign will be given to this evil generation, upon whom the end of the ages have come, except the sign of the prophet Jonah. And thats because when Christ is presented to the outer man, the inner man has already seen this light before. This is the light that burns unto eternal life and the icy cold of darkness is that which slowly sucks every ounce of heat from the soul. No other sign will be given to this generation. No other sign can be given. We are children of the light set upon the candlesticks in Church warming the world and illuminating our fellowman - as long as our inner light shall live.
The Syro-Phonecian Woman
It is not persistence that savedthe Syro-Phonecian woman'sdaughter. Jesus has set this whole thing up to demonstrate what was motivating this woman. She was certain that Jesus could heal her daughter. The leper knew that if Jesus wanted to, he could make him clean. The Centurion knew that Jesus didnt even have to come into his house to cure his servant. He could just speak the word and it was done. The men who broke up the tiles to let down the paralyzed man knew that they were forcing Jesus hand. The hemorrhaging woman knew that one illegal, unclean touch would cure her. Blind Bartimaeus throws off his cloak to he healed by Jesus because he knew that he would never return to his roadside begging booth. These people were not motivated by enthusiasm or desperation. These people were motivated by belief.
Second Sunday in Lent (Evening Prayer)
A Man After God's Own Heart
God could have easily avoided the Bathsheba affair being recorded in our Bibles. Not just not recording it. But making it so that it would have never happened. But he didnt. And that means that there is a purpose for it being there. And Im not being overly theological here. And Im certainly not being fatalistic. I think the story of David and Bathsheba is crucial. And Im certain that God saw the whole thing coming. From before the foundation of the world. This story is not just a piece of raw theater at which we just shrug our shoulders and say Huh. Aint that something? Or Huh, thats too bad. Because if we do, we will have a major theological problem on our hands. And the problem is this. David was a friend of God.
Area 51
Lent is a discipline we rehearse every year. And for good reason. Because Knowing ourselves is the ultimate discipline. And Lent should be a sabbatical of the soul. The disciplines or denials you undertake are all for you not God. And they should all be chosen to help create a quiet and disciplined and penitential environment in which we give permission to God to say anything that needs to be said. And to listen with all our might and mane. Just listen. This is the purpose of Lent. To visit the forbidden area of our souls. Area 51. And just listen.
FirstSunday in Lent (Evening Prayer)
TheExbasis ofTemptation
When Paul says that God will, "with the temptation, provide a means of escape that we might be able to bear it", we come acrossa serious problemwith translation. The word for escape is fuego which means "to flee" to run away - to escape. But there is no escape in this word that Paul uses. The word is ekbasis. It is not an exotic word.Itis used only one other time. In Hebrews: Remember them which have the rule over you, who have spoken unto you the word of God: whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation. The end of their conversation is an ekbasis.
Quinquagesima 2011 (Holy Communion)
The Religion of Love
Christianity is the religion of love. And the moment you attempt to assert another religion in this logical place, you will see the nature of the vast canyon that yawns before Christianity and the world. Islam for example, would never make the claim that it is the religion of love. And no one could ever deduce this from its practical expression in the world. In Christianity the crusades and the inquisition and its denominational warfare between Protestants and Catholics were humiliating, shameful, though temporary embarrassments of an unbalanced practice of its foundational documents. A high school student can see the disconnect. In Islam there is no embarrassment that jihad and inquisition are continuing, primary and intentional characteristics of its expression in the world.
Quinquagesima 2011 (Evening Prayer)
The Apostle of Love
Our passage tonight is from first John chapter four. And if you could think of one significant word that is used most often in this passage what would it be? Thats right: love. Love is a huge theme with John to begin with He uses the word more times in his Gospel and almost as many times in his first letter as in all three Synoptics combined, the works of John accounting for nearly 40% of all usage in the entire New Testament combined. One could even call him the apostle of love. And we would not be far off the mark if we did. For there is another strange feature about Johns Gospel. Its one of the reasons that we are sure that he wrote it. Five times he refers to himself as the Apostle whom Jesus loved. What did he mean by that? Didnt Christ love everyone?
The Man of Gadarene
it is to Mark that we must turn if we are to understand the psychology of demon possession. This man was in agony, tortured from within And always, night and day, he was in the mountains, and in the tombs, crying, and cutting himself with stones. He runs to Jesus and suddenly we see something that Matthew has been trying to tell us with the leper, with the Centurion, with the hemorrhaging woman, with the Syro-Phoenician woman and now with this demon possessed man. They believed. . The Apostles did not. That is shocking. Its true. Even in the midst of the most terrible demon-possession, there is a bit of smoking flax deep within his soul.
4thSunday After Epiphany (Evening Prayer)
My Hearts Desire
Paul stood by, just as the Jews stood by, and watched the messianic role of Stephen come to pass. And now in the 10th chapter of Romans, we are beginning to see that Paul himself has now accepted that messianic role, and thats why he thought that he must be accursed from Christ and die. Instead, by his messianic role to the Gentile world, he died, not for the Jews, but by their hands. He died like all prophets and all reformers, to save the whole world. To save us. And that was the desire of his heart.
To Touch a Leper
If anyone thought that Matthew was a dumb Christian scribe mindlessly patching together random, verbal traditions about Christ, as soon as he sees Matthew bringing Jesus down the mountain after having given his Sermon on the Mount to meet a leper, he should begin to suspect that there is something dreadfully wrong with his theory. When we read Matthew, we are reading someone who is intent, from the very beginning of his Gospel, to completely overturn very much of conventional, popular religion. There is nothing more likely to bring a revolutionary comprehension of the Christian idea than familiarity with Matthew. Page after page of Matthew, we are constantly being shocked with things that we would have wished had never been said.
3rd Sunday After Epiphany (Evening Prayer)
The New Temple
Jesus taught that God honors our provisional institutions, even if they are conceived in error, but he will not hesitate to abolish them if they persist in error. God will quietly and with orderliness bring good out of evil. But he will not allow evil to persist indefinitely. He will bring good out of intransigent evil by destruction and desolation. Thus Jesus teaches that the altars of men sanctify the gifts that are placed up it, but both the gifts and the altars will be destroyed in the name of truth - if necessary. And for Israel, that time had come.
This is My Son
Peter said we dont follow myths. We are all primarily telling you what we have seen and heard. The Gospels say to us: you are looking in the wrong direction. Youll not find a universal field theory at the microscopic level. You will find it at the macroscopic level. Although the nature of the paint in the picture of our universe will tell us something about God; albeit fractally, the big picture must be taken in by stepping back and looking at what the whole picture of the universe is saying. Until now, we have said: but we are in the picture, how can we get this perspective? And God says: This is my beloved son. He has been with me from the beginning. He and I made the picture. He has come into the picture. Hear him. He will tell you.
2nd Sunday After Epiphany(Evening Prayer)
Is there unrighteousness with God?
When it comes to a mans outer life -a mans role in the world, God can do as he pleases. But even here we know that God is righteous. We know, for example, because of the case of Pharoah, that even if a man harden his heart, he will still be used by God to accomplish Gods righteous purposes. But in terms of a mans inner life, God very strictly adheres to the fundamental standards of righteousness.
Wist Ye Not?
Most people who decide to read the New Testament begin, at least at first, with the assumption that the writers of the Gospel are attempting to prove the existence of the supernatural which they are not. Or that they attempting to prove Jesus divine powers which they are not. These things are simply assumed by these writers. They are aiming for a much further, more illusive object. They are attempting to describe, to depict, who Jesus is.
1st Sunday After Epiphany (Evening Prayer)
On Loan From God
In our morning sermon we explored the possibility that Mary was not as ready as she should have been to understand that her son was to be dedicated to the service of the Lord, and that this service would have to commence sooner or later. For all we know, those who could have called attention to the fact that Jesus was not in the company of those returning in the foot caravan to Nazareth thought that perhaps Joseph and Mary were intentionally leaving Jesus in the care of the Temple hierarchy, just as Hannah had left her son, Samuel in the care of the high-priest, Eli. And that may be why no one said anything to Joseph and Mary about their missing son.
The Second Sunday After Christmas, Holy Communion
Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?
Matthew has written that when Joseph returns from Egypt that he turned aside into the parts of Galilee: and he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene. Matthew is explaining to us why the King of Kings and Lord of Lords comes from Nazareth. Because all the prophets predict that it will happen like this. The passage should not have quotation marks around it as in many Bible translations. For one thing, no one prophet makes a specific prediction that Jesus would be born in Nazareth primarily because Nazareth was not built at the time of their writings.But all the prophets said that there would be a complete twist about his coming into the world and in his coming to his temple. He would come to a lowly place upon the fringes of Israel; and he would come meekly and humbly, mounted upon an asses colt to the temple. And they were right.
The Second Sunday After Christmas, Evening Prayer
The Coming of Light
This season, we have celebrated the coming of the Son of God as the Son of Man. It is a blinding light of truth so bright, our eyes can hardly stand it. Paul says that God dwells in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see. And thats why God has come to us. All the ancient myths have said that he would come. We cannot come to him, but he has come to us. He laid aside the brightness of his glory and took upon himself the form of a man and more than this, he became man for reasons obvious and not so obvious - but so numerous that it will take the rest of the liturgical year to explore. Moses veiled his face so that the Jews would not see the fading of that light from his face for having spoken with God himself. But Christ veils his glory from us because we would be blinded if he didnt.
The First Sunday After Christmas, Evening Prayer
To Be Established in the Present Truth
Sanctification is the process of being made from day to day partakers of the divine nature. His nature is becoming our nature. Thats the plan. Thats the present truth. Yes, we do escape the lustful corruptions of the world. But it is for the purpose of making a creature which is full of virtue. Full of knowledge. Full of self-control, full of patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, and true love for God and for man and for ourselves. Peter says: be ye established in the present truth. For if you are, you will be ready for the Lords second advent. Not next Christmas - or the Christmas after that, but at the end of this world. You will be full of fruit and ready to make an eisodus an entrance in the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
The First Sunday After Christmas, Holy Communion
No Longer Servants to an Old Covenant
In Pauls letter to the Galatians, we see Pauls frustration at watching one of his beloved provinces turn back to the Egypt of Judaism. He throws down the gauntlet. He is not afraid of hurting any feelings. He desperately reaches out to save a Church which is in the process of returning to the same theological place from which it has so recently made its exodus. This was true of almost every Church within the Pauline diocese. After the Jews made it clear that Paul was no longer welcome in their synagogues, Paul extracted the believing Jews and the former Gentile Proselytes and helped them to set up their own assemblies in other places some in other buildings, like the school of Tyrannus or in private homes. But the controversy did not end there...
The Subtlety of Matthew
Zacharias prophesied upon the birth of his son John the Baptist that we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us. He was right. But he was not as penetrating or as subtle with his language as Matthew. For Jesus came to save us from our sins. He came to save Joseph from his sins. And he came to save the blessed Virgin Mary from her sins. And we were saved from our sins because the word did become flesh and dwelt amoung us. His feet touched the cradle and his hands touched the gates of hell and flung them open wide.
That Which is Lacking in My Faith
For the last two weeks, we have been looking at what has motivated the apostle Paul. We have talked about the great responsibility to preach the Gospel under which he labored. Woe to me if I preach not the Gospel, he said. And last week we took a look at the boasting of St. Paul - that he rejoiced that he was almost completely disentangled from the ordinary distractions of the world as he did preach this Gospel no wife no relations no real need for money. His rejoicing was that he could give himself completely over to the Lord in service. But we still dont know too much about what is truly motivating this man. Has he exchanged one zealotry for another?
Zachariahs Prayer
The most remarkable thing about Zachariahs prayer is that it is completely original. For those of us who have for years said the Benedictus (on page 14 of the Prayer Book), it is so familiar that it is really hard to realize this. It flows, from beginning to end like a song almost as if Zachariah is cobbling together Old Testament Scriptures. But the strange thing is, none of it is a quotation. Comparing words and phrases and ideas and themes and trains of thought is exactly the kind of linguistic analysis that I have done for the past ten years, so I am especially alert to the possibility that he might be quoting. Hes not. Thus the prayer stands as a huge oddity. Where did it come from? Did he make it all up? And isnt it strange that this all comes flowing out of his mouth after having been stricken with speechlessness for so long?
The Boasting of St. Paul
When we first meet Paul in Acts, he is a zealot for his God. He saw Jesus as a blasphemer, a charlatan, a desecrator of the Jewish religion - which St. Paul was zealous to observe and to serve. He saw that the new cult of the Nazarene would not only discredit his religion the traditions of Moses, the priesthood and the temple but it would also destabilize the Jewish nation in its already precarious position as a vassal nation, serving under the overlordship of the Roman empire. This new cult would completely dissipate the unity that had been achieved within the Jewish Psyche over the past few centuries. Their character, their charter, their ethos had finally become defined. They were holy. Everyone else were Gentile dogs and sorcerers and fornicators and liars and robber of temples. It was us against them. It was purity against filth. Right against wrong. Gods chosen people against the whole world. It was only a matter of time before the true Messiah would rise up and lead the great Jewish revolt and re-establish the Davidic monarchy, re-establish the glory of Solomon and fill the world with Jewish power and righteousness.
What is Holy Scripture?
Before all heresies, before all social tomfoolery, before all the troubles that have descended upon our civilization that has secularized our lives until all the decency, all the joy, and all the human blood has been bled out of them - is a single heresy. And the heresy is not the destruction of the Scriptures as divine. The heresy is not the toppling of the Scriptures to the place of ordinary human literature, written by mere men with mere human motives with no discernable divine intervention in the process. The heresy was the creation of the category of inspired literature in the first place. Because once you create the category of inspired literature, you also create, as a corollary, the category of uninspired literature. But can there be such a category as uninspired literature? Is there any place in this created universe where God is not? Is there something we can do on our own? Is there any discovery that we can make which is not wholly the process of God revealing himself to our minds? Is there any communication over which the Word of God has not presided?
The Foolishness of Preaching
When we look at Paul, we are really seeing the opposite of what happened to Jonah. Jonah was sent to Nineveh. He refused to go. Paul was sent to the entire Greek world to preach the Gospel of Christ. He went immediately. He dedicated his life to the preaching of the Gospel that he received by revelation from Jesus Christ. Some of us believe that Paul was commissioned as the thirteenth apostle, because the original band of the 12 Apostles and for that matter, the entire Jerusalem Church - was very sluggish to take the Gospel to the whole world, and not just to Israel. In a true sense, the Jerusalem church was behaving a lot like Jonah. Jesus had clearly told the Apostles just before his ascension. All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.
An Unglorious Shame
When a child of God forcefully wrests the reins of life from God, there are no more controls on where its lusts will lead that life. First here. Then there. Then nowhere. It becomes a burnt-out shell, empty of dreams. Empty of pride. Empty of purpose. Empty of Hope. Empty of love. Everything good has been supplanted by bitterness and rancor, and hatred and spite and envy, jealousy and grief. The program of self-glory comes to a miserable end. Our Prisons are full of them. Our psyche wards are full of them. Our nursing homes are full of them. Like Oural, the main character in C.S. Lewis Till We Have Faces, she spends her entire life nursing a grudge against the gods, for her ugliness, for which she wears a veil.
Trinity XXIII Eventide Communion
The filth of the World
So the prophet is the offscouring of the world. Certainly Jesus was. For all his fame, for all his healing, for all his miracles, for all his teaching, for all his confidence, he was dragged outside the city and crucified as a common criminal. And if they have treated him this way, I tremble what may be in store for me. What a job, this is. Yet I joy in what I could achieve as a prophet of the Lord. Firstly, I can be like him. I will go where he went outside the city of respect, bearing his reproach. And for my pay, I will tell him what I require - that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, and to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to enquire in his Church. And at the end - to hear him say to me: well done thou good and faithful servant.
Trinity XXII Reformation Sunday; Holy Baptism and Holy Communion
When you pick up the prayer book, you must think about it as a safety and operations manual. About how to do religion. Safely and effectively. Now that we have a Bible, what should we do with it? How should we do church? How should we then live in the world? How shall we pray? You may have thought that the baptism service, which we have just dutifully followed, was very wordy. But let me assure you that this wordiness is not the result of some pious windbag who didnt know how to get to the point. I want to say something about this book that we just used. And I want to tell you why Anglicans love this book. To the death, if necessary. Because this book, like the Bible itself, is written in blood. Almost every sentence in this book was written into human culture at the price of human blood. Christs blood was shed to redeem us from our imprisonment to the prince and power of this world. But many of his disciples have shed their own blood in imitation of our Lord in order to continue this process, and to preach his Holy Gospel.
The Shield of Faith?
It is what we believe that makes us who we are. It is through belief that we become the friends of God. The moment we believe him, everything changes between us. The curse is lifted. The punishment is over. A new life of joy, adventure and conquest begins. The prison doors have been thrown open and we are free from sin, we are free from the condemnation of our consciences, and we are free from devilish falsehoods. We throw down our shields of disbelief - by which we have protected ourselves from the truth - and take up the shield of belief. And now we foray out upon the stage of the world to play our part, to do our duty, to fight the good fight, to finish our course, to keep our shields up and proudly display them before God and angels and saints and before a watching world to lay hold of eternal life and to win a crown of righteousness.
kata sarka, Abraham?
One of the most amazing arguments in the New Testament is Pauls argument about what makes a Jew. What is the bottom line? What is the nitty gritty? What is the kata sarka? Kata sarka means according to the flesh. And if something is according to the flesh, I should be able to see it. It is a kind of bottom line to our existence as creatures in this world. Jesus says that a man doesnt live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. But a man does live by bread. If he doesnt, he dies. Yet, ironically, we find Paul arguing in Romans that if a man lives according to the flesh, we will die. Of course he means that if a man neglects to feed upon the word of God, he will also die. Because man is made of flesh and he is made of spirit. So there is an inner and an outer man. And Paul reasons according to the revelation that was given to him that there is also and inner and outer Israel. And this is one of the things that Abraham found, too.
To kill time, or to redeem it; that is the question
When Samuel the prophet is conjured up by the soothsayer for Saul to enquire what his strategy should be against the Philistines, Samuel tells him the forbidding news: there is no point to this campaign, for tomorrow is your dying day. If on our dying day, we could have back all the time that we have wasted - you know the time I mean. It is when we were just killing time. Waiting for the future. I think that this time represents an enormous part of our past. If all this time were suddenly given back to us, what would we do with it? Surely we would do something other than living for ourselves? Surely the time for living in ignorance and sin would be over.
The Most Important Passage in the Old Testament
The Old Testament reading from Jeremiah 31:31-34 is probably the most important prophetic statement of the entire Old Testament. Because it foretells the giving of the New Testament. The book of Hebrews gives us our clearest statement about how this Old Testament stands in relation to the New: It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.
The Authority to Forgive
Christianity opens upon a scene of sin. The whole world lies in wickedness, John tells us in his epistle. And as soon as we hear this we know he must be right. It is as if the whole world is waiting in hopeless despair. There is really no reason for going on. Except to go to a party eat, drink, be merry, for tomorrow we die. There are those who speak of forgiveness, but it always turns out to be something far less than forgiveness. It always turns out to be a pretense that there was never anything to forgive. There is no sin. No harm done. No injustice. It was all just a big misunderstanding and we should all just join hands and pretend it wasnt so. God forgives us for being small - and we forgive him for bungling the universe and we all go forward in respectful silence. But this is not the idea of Christian forgiveness.
The Individual and the Collective
Pauls letters are not addressed to individuals in the Church, they are addressed to the Churchitself as if the Church was itself a person. The fact is, as individuals we become aware of individual sin. Against thee only have I sinned, David said. No one else is guilty. Just David. But when we become members of lager organizations we also share in corporate sin. Alas, its true. The Bible always tells us: evil communication corrupts good manners. If you play in the pig-pen, you can expect to get dirty. It is for this reason that many people have become detached from the institutional churches. There is so much trouble in them, people say. Why not stay at home and have a private, individual faith in God just like the private piety that Jesus teaches in the Sermon on the Mount.
Whose Son is Christ?
What did you answer? the Son of David? A better answer to the question, and the resolution to Davids perplexing dialogue is an answer upon which the entire New Testament turns. Its an answer that we didnt immediately see.We should have. Butwe didnt. When Jesus asked: What think ye of Christ, whose son is he?We should have answered - immediately: the Son of God. Butwe didnt.Why?
Trinity XVIII Eventide Communion
A Man Called Saul
Sauls name changed to Paul. From Hebrew to Latin. And weare allthe product in one way or another of that change. St. Paul began to preach the very message that he had sought to destroy. St. Paul, the greatest missionary Bishop that ever lived, finished the sermon of the man he helped to destroy. How could he not? St. Stephen was right. The temple was destroyed. And in that destruction a new covenant was brought to fruition. St. Paul led the people out of Jerusalem before the end. And he told them: "Don't look back!"
The Lowest Seat
You cant take power or happiness or riches out of the world. But you can take humility. Because humility is a virtue. And virtue can be learned by discipline and prayer. And we can come to love humility. And admire her. And desire her. The discipline of humility is the discipline of service not looking to our own things, but on the welfare of others. We cant see the glory of God if we are looking into a magic mirror. In fact, all the virtues can be taken out of the world. Every single one of them: righteousness, faith, hope, love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, self-control and humility. The blue fairy says to Pinocchio: If you prove yourself to be brave, truthful, and unselfish, someday, you will be a real boy. The higher seats are chosen to be seen of men. The lowest seat - of service is chosen to be seen of God, and to see him.
A Straight Spirit
Our Kingdom is not of this world. It is of the next world. The promised land we can only see afar off. Thats why its a promise. This world is its ante-chamber, its purgatory. Some are purged here, in this life. Some are purged, everlastingly, in the next life. In this worldly purgation, our outward form wastes away but our inner man is strengthened day by day. The woman who was bowed over by the spirit of infirmity was loosed from her infirmity and she was able to stand upright after many years. This promise is for us. This healing is for us. We pray that the Lord brings us back under his wings, back the path to the Promised Land. We ask him truly: Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a straight spirit within me. - Amen
The Lord is Coming For Us
Christians have always confessed: Christ has died, Christ is raised, Christ will come again. Hes gone now. We are his servants, waiting for his return. We live in the spirit. But we also live in the flesh and in the Kingdoms of this world. As our bodies are made clean by his blood, so our obedience spreads out radiating into the world with which we to do until our Lord returns for us.
Pre-Scientific Miracles
The men of the New Testament did not believe in immaculate conceptions. And they did not believe that men could walk on water. And they did not believe that dead men bleed...These men have already stated that their primary purpose in telling us about these horrific miracles is so that we be confronted by them in the same way that they were confronted by them. And that in facing them in their full force they will force us to face the historical fact of Christ. That he has complete power over disease. He has complete power over nature. And he has complete power over death.
The Lilies of the Field
In Matthews Sermon on the Mount, we come upon a spirituality that turns Maslows hierarchy of needs upside down. Jesus says: Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. When the religion of the Sermon on the Mount comes into our lives, it changes everything.
The Love of Money
We laugh at the mendicant orders and the monasteries. But so often it is the monasteries that have saved civilization from its own destructive greed. And their example can save us too. There can be no spiritual reality unless we part company with our love of money. Because we cant have two masters. And we cant have two bank accounts one on earth; one in heaven. We have brought nothing into this world, and it is certain that we cant take anything with us.
Free From the Law
Without law, the human animal soon becomes engulfed and consumed by unbridled appetites. We become savages. And all virtue ebbs away until nothing is left but social chaos kill or be killed. Surely we have all read stories in which the reign of law was overthrown and society collapses into primitive savagery. The law confines our appetites and creates an environment for industry, family, government, arts and virtue. But there is a price to pay for law. Because it is by the law that I understand my personal sinfulness. And the reckless savage in me would have preferred not to hear this.
Are There Few That Be Saved?
Misunderstood, despised, dejected, humiliated, whipped, spat upon, betrayed and crucified. Jesus' family does not believe him. His own disciples do not believe him. The religious establishment does not believe him. And in the end, the crowds turn against him. The disciples run away to save themselves. No one is left except a righteous man from Arimathaea to take him down from the cross and put him in his own tomb. Did anyone see anyone being saved in that Gospel story? Not many.
The New Testament never chides us for having no feeling. It chides us for not having any understanding or faith. For if we had those things we would not shut up our compassion for those who so obviously need it. There would be plenty of reasons not to. Were not talking about slick panhandlers that try to make you feel guilty just to get money for free. We are talking about the untaught that should be taught. The unchurched that should be churched. The unloved that should be loved. The unforgiven that should be forgiven. The sorrowful and wounded and hurt that should be pitied and cared for and fed and clothed and visited and honored and cheered and loved. And for no other reason except that they are our neighbor.
The Poor Shall NeverCeaseOut of the Land
There was a time in the Church when poverty was recognized as a virtue, not a vice. When the woman broke the alabaster container of expensive oil for Jesus sake, she became much poorer. Her act signified the utter worthlessness of our acquired goods if we do not bestow them upon the altar of our Lord. When the rich young ruler confronts the Lord about what he must do to inherit eternal life, the Lord toys with him briefly (no doubt for his sake and ours) and says: One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me. You must make the poor rich and make yourself poor. Giving your money away to the poor is not, primarily for the sake of the poor, it is for your sake. Because your possessions are the one thing between you and complete devotion to the Lord.
An Epistle of Glory
The Reformers began to have a relationship with religious faith, and it killed religious experience. The Charismatics of the 19th and 20th centuries began to have a relationship with religious experience and now arelationship with Jesus Christ has become indistinguishable from having a relationship with a toasted cheese sandwich. And our souls and the world are as lost as they ever have been.
Will loving our enemies bring world peace? No it will not. In many ways, it polarizes the world. To those who yearn for salvation, our love will bring them into the Church and cover a multitude of sins, just as a multitude of our sins were covered by those who brought us into the Church. But to those who scorn the truth of Christ, our love will drive them even further away. Just as the Saviors love provoked bitter envy and pride and hard-heartedness and a crucifixion in the end. He came to his own with a message of reconciliation and his own received him not. This is the limit of reconciliation on a divine scale. And if we are sons and daughters of God most high, so we too will be brought most low in our own ministries of reconciliation.
Praying to Ourselves
No matter how much our relationship as Sons and Daughters flourishes with God, - throughout the long process of justification, sanctification, glorification - we must always remember how we came into the Kingdom as the prodigals son. And just as the Churchs liturgy makes constant remembrance of the death of Christ upon the altar, so her liturgy gives constant opportunity to pray the Prodigal prayer, regardless of our spiritual maturity. Lord. Be merciful to me, a sinner. I came into the Kingdom as a Prodigal Son. Let me never forget this.
Who Shall Separate us from the Love of Christ?
The conclusion to Pauls laborious argument in Romans and to his own life is this: For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. There is nothing coming from without, that can separate us from the Love of Christ. If anything does separate us from the love of Christ, it must be a hell of our own creation. And we must keep creating it. Because even if we make my bed in hell, the Psalmist says, he is there too.
Rebuilding the Inner Man
Inthe end, there is something much more important than political reformation and religious renaissance. God can rebuild our inner man. No matter how broken it has become. For this is the time of Christs visitation in our own souls.Behold! the Lord does stand at the gates of the city of our soul. We must let him in. And he will completely rebuild the inner man.
The Transfiguration of our Souls
At the feast of the Transfiguration, which the Church just celebrated on Friday, we remember the temporary transfiguration of Christs outward form. In the epistles of Paul we learn to look forward to the permanent transfiguration of our souls.
Idols of the Heart
To understand our own idols we need to take a hard look at our own culture and our own lives. We now think it is silly to bow down before a carved image of wood or silver or gold, yet we ourselves bow down before our own technologies of titanium, silicon, uranium, steel and concrete. And when we look at this way we see what the Old Testament prophets saw all along. That an idol first begins as an idol of the heart. Ezekiel said it in our reading this morning: these men separate themselves from me, and set up their idols in their heart. Paul says it again in Romans men come to the place in which they worship and serve the creature rather than the creator, the true lover of our souls. And the creature is a cruel lover. It is a match made in hell - by the beast.
God isOur Father
The book of Hebrews is probably the most coherent and logically arranged book in the NT. There is no mystery in it. There is no special genre. Many believe that it is a difficult book, but it is not a difficult book. From the beginning to the end it is a general letter to all the churches which puts forward an astounding theological argument that changed the Apostolic world - and Christendom forever.
InDebt to Life
Paul says that we come into the world as mere animals but we are soon confronted by the moral law - which can only be understood by immortal souls. The law shows us that we are unworthy of immortality, but through the love of God and the death of his Son, we are redeemed from the punishment of the second death and made worthy of eternal life through his everlasting merits. We then must die to the morally stupefying attachments of the world lest the ordinary cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things, choke off our exodus from sin and our continuing relationship to the risen Christ, and we become, tragically, unfruitful.
Beware False Prophets
Beware false prophets. And the best place to begin this study is, of course, in our own souls. We all have this same tendency to be false. We should not be surprised to see others completely carried away with this, especially if they have made no attempt to surrender their lives to Christ. And we need to continue that study in the Scriptures. If the universe tells ordinary science something of the mind of God, surely the Scriptures tells us something extraordinary of the Spirit which orchestrated their composition.
Sin in the Pauline argument - is notyielding to a perfectly legitimate desire to have some wholesome fun. Nor is it choosing the wrong, existential path for reasons that we cannot understand. It is about making a conscious decision (sin of commission) to maneuver ourselves, our souls and bodies, into situations and conditions that will optimize opportunities for sin.
It is the wicked who have faith that they will never be brought to account for their treachery and cruelty and violence and tyranny. We believe they will. And the reason that we believe this is that God has clearly revealed this in his creation, in his Scriptures, in our own consciences and in the history of the world. God has clearly revealed the rules that we should play by. And the wonderful thing about it is that he plays by the same rules. He is righteousness. And that's why the good guys always win in the end.
Buried in Baptism
If we have been baptized into Christ, we have been baptized into his death. No part of Egypt can come with us now. We are completely new creatures in Christ. Dont look back, like Lots wife. Look forward. From now on the laws of Egypt no longer apply. There is a new law now. The law of liberty in Christ. We have died to all attempts to judge others by our personal morality codes and to justify ourselves by our labors. Now we are alive in his righteousness. We no longer eat Egyptian food. On our way back to the promised land, we eat the sacramental food of Christ.
From the Other Side of the Flood
After the death of Paul the Church somehow survives the terrible persecutions of hostile Roman emperors, hostile Pagans and hostile Jewish enclaves in virtually every community in the Mediterranean basin. Someone stepped up to take charge after Paul to see the Church over Jordan. Someone just like you and just like me. Exodus is just the beginning. Now we must struggle to make an entrance into our destiny. Having come from the other side of the flood where other gods were served, having come from 400 years of bondage in Egypt, having come from 400 years of bondage in Babylon, it is time to be free and to live out the drama of our own individual calling to fulfill our role our destiny in the promised land of the universal Christ. Amen.
Follow Me
Peter did not leave all and follow Christ. Not at first. It took him almost 40 years to get to his own promised land. To obey. To feed the sheep of Christ. To die for his Lord. And this after a lifetime of fear for his own program of self-fulfillment - chasing after his foibles; afraid of his fears. We know or we think we know, everything that Simon did not, at first, realize. We are the spectators. We see that Christ has all power over all nature. He has no needs. No fear. He was never in any danger. He is leading an exodus. He wants us to come with him. And he asks us not to worry so much about where the bread and meat and water will come from. He will take care of those things.
Poetic Diction
Our love of God must be like our worship of God; it is completely inappropriate to worship any created thing. Because only God is worthy of worship. Only God can receive and return the love that he is asking for. Nothing can compete for it because it is not of this world. The loves of this world are as categorically different from the love of God and things eternal as the east is from the west and love is from hate. And thats why Luke says we must hate our father and mother. Because Christ is God, and our love for him is categorically superior than any human love.
Redemption
Christ has redeemed us from sin and death and from our idleness while we sit on death row, waiting to die, fearing judgment, amusing ourselves in a dogged pursuit of human happiness that no one really finds. His father sent him to the market to buy some slaves. But why? He bought them to make them free. Now our job is to be free. To learn about freedom and responsibility and morality and virtue and gentleness and tolerance and love and faith and hope. He redeemed us. Now we must redeem the time we have lost by redeeming the time we now have.
Truth or Consequences
All the readings tonight speak of two religions. There is the religion of bad behavior and good behavior (which is impossible to achieve). And there is the religion of truth or consequences. I have nothing to offer to God in the first religion, even if I had a time machine at my disposal to correct every dumb or wicked thing Ive ever done (or will do). But in the second religion, everything makes sense. God wants honesty from me. Thats all. He wants me to understand his intentions of love and his desires to glorify me as he glorified his Son Jesus. He will take care of all the rest. He will wash away all my sin. He will blot out all mine iniquities. He will make me to know wisdom and have the joy that I so long for. But from me he wants a broken spirit, because a broken spirit is a spirit that has come up against his sovereignty and his righteousness and the truth about ourselves and kneeled before his love and good intentions.
A Man Named Matthew
Matthew was (perhaps)one of the first to realize that Christ was sent to conclude the final proceedings of a divorce between God and unfaithful Israel. And to begin the wooing process for a new bride, the bride of Christ, the universal - some would say Catholic - Church. Matthewunderstood that Christ was not sent to call together the ritually pure and self-righteous. Christ was sent to call together those who understood that they were sinners in need of a radical redemption. Harlots. And Publicans. Like Matthew. Like us.
Finding Our Way Home
When Zacchaeus climbed the sycamore tree, he became the patron saint of all those who want to see Christ but cannot because he is obscured by the crowd - by popular religion (perhaps?)- and so he rose above the crowd. If we want to see Christ; that is, if we want to be found by him and not lost, we must change our own minds and transcend our own culture, which has its own ideas about religion and jesus. First, we must overcome our pride, on our knees.Second, we must overcome our shame, in a tree.
Do We Have Love?
Virtue. Loveliness. Permanence. Those are the things that God is building in us. Thats his work. Our work is to believe. If we do not believe, we must admit it to ourselves because whatever does not flow from belief is sin. But what does flow from belief is love. Without the knowledge of Gods extravagant desires for us, without the belief in Gods own virtue and worthiness to be praised, without the hope in our everlasting inheritance to dwell in the most beautiful city of Jerusalem - - there can be no love. Knowledge, belief, hope. Yes. But far greater than these is love.
Our Immortal Souls
We have inherited eternal life by virtue of the life that is now in us. That life will produce virtue, and thats eternal. And that life will produce beauty and thats eternal. And that life will create in me (who was once a temporary thing of vanity and desire) something permanent. Something that will not change. Something that I can know. And something that can be known of God.
Trinity I 2010 (Morning Prayer)
It is by the word of God that we know God. Not by super-spiritual experiences. People ask: how can there be so many false jesuses and false prophets and false holy spirits in the world? Because God has not sent them. They speak on their own. Do not follow them. How do we avoid being deceived as so many will when Christ returns? Come back to the narrow gate. Come back to the word of God. Come back to the Church. Just like the psalmist did. God is a God that can be known. His laws are indelible. His person is intelligible. It is good, it is clean, it is beautiful, it is bright and it is orderly. And he follows his own laws. He is not a God of chance, as the world now believes. He is a God of his word. So we know what will happen next because we know him. And that makes us all prophets.
Trinity I 2010 (Evening Prayer)
Christsays: Now you are clean through the word that I have spoken to you. His word cleanses our souls; but what will cleanse our past? This is why Jesus washes our feet. Our feet have taken us to places where we ought not to have gone. You can tell by the dirt on them. Jesus cleanses us from all sin. And this is one reason that Jesus washes the disciples feet.
A Stranger in Jerusalem
In our present schemes of Easter, everything is a blaze of glory and color and song, pomp and circumstance. Perhaps if we had written the Gospels we would have omitted the embarrassing story of Apostolic unbelief concerning the resurrection. But Luke is not making up stories. He is not saving any face. He is not protecting the reputations of the disciples. He is telling it like it is. And the facts are that on the very day of the resurrection, two principle characters of the story have walked almost seven miles away from the epicenter of Easter, sad and angrily arguing.
Be Not Unbelieving,But Believing
In our minds there is belief and then there are an infinite number of states of: not-enough-information-to-justify-belief- - - but-I-am-favorably-disposed-to-the-idea. In Jesus mind there are only two states. We either believe or we do not believe.
Do You Love Me?
In our lesson for tonight, John places Peter in yet another unfavorable situation on the shores of Tiberius, shortly after the resurrection. The greatest event in all history has just occurred and Peter can think of nothing better to do than to go fishing. Jesus had said: follow me and I will make you fishers of men. Peter is here saying: no thanks, Lord Ill stick to the more conventional fish, if you dont mind. But the Lord did mind.
All Things Have Become New
The definition of a man is not a sensory definition. How can it be? A man must be defined by his soul. What does he stand for? What does he believe? This defines a man. We do not believe Christ into our hearts, we believe ourselves into his. We recline in the bosom of Christ. And in so doing, we become a new creature.
ConcerningThose Who Sleep
What is this Pauline idea about being asleep in Christ all about? What about resurrection? What is in me that is resurrectable?
Agnus Dei
After all John has written, we suddenly come across a new title for Christ - the "Lamb of God." In the Revelation, St. John uses this title almost 30 times. What happened?
God So Loved the World
As our post-ascension, salvation history unfolds -from Pauls early epistles, through the writing of the Gospels, through Pauls prison epistles, through the writing of Hebrews till the Revelation, which is probably written just before the fall of Jerusalem by the armies of Rome -one book stands as a lighthouse -as bright as the light - giving us an outline of where we are. But it also tells us where we have been and it tells us where we might be going. It is the one book in which the editor has the most dialogue with the silent audience of future generations. That book is John. John is the most concerned about being secure in what we know. And so we have Jesus telling Nicodemus at the end of their meeting: For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him will not perish, but have eternal life.
The Age of the Spirit
Pentecost begins a new age in Gods relations with men. He begins a new age of men and women in knowing themselves. He begins a new age of the Church of God. The purpose of the Holy Spirit is to witness to Christ. Because the purpose of the Holy Spirit is the word. By the Spirit the world was created. By the Spirit the Church was created. By the spirit the whole world moves from age to age, completing the story that God has written for it thus making a stage for the individual soul to come into a personal relationship to God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
The Divinity of Christ
Liberalism has, for two centuries said that Jesus was just a holy man or a prophet, or a misguided megalomaniac. And the Church has not fully responded to this. And this is because she, like Martha and Mary, does not fully embrace the Son for who he is.
God Has A Son
If we have difficulties with the Trinity, do we have difficulties with the fact that God has a co-eternal son? The New Testament was assembled by the very people who would be the least agreeable to the idea that God has a Son. Yet they repeat this idea over and over again. The Scriptures are clear about the divinity of Christ and the personhood of the Holy Spirit and the plurality of the Godhead. One nature; three persons.
Video Connection
To see a video version of these sermons, click the respective link below
The First Sunday After Christmas
The Benefit of Doubt
The Birth and Death of the Son of God
A Glimmer of Glory
In Matthew, Jesus says that the Kingdom of God is like a man, “seeking goodly pearls: Who, when he had discovered one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it.” The picture we are given is of a man who catches but a glimpse of heaven but needs no more than a glimpse. As soon as he has sees the pearl, the rest of his life consists in off-loading all his tawdry, shabby, broken down furniture so that he can obtain this one object. That glimpse; that glimmer – is the righteousness of Christ.
The Load Line
Although we don’t start out like this, we must come to the place – whereever we might be along the load line of our own lives, that our faith is operating at maximum capacity. Whether we are rich or poor, healthy or sick, strong or weak, wise or foolish, honored or despised. Jesus will not start us at the extreme points. Just as St. Paul has said: he will not begin the test at a point too far from our comfort zone. At least not at first. But eventually he will lead us to a place in which he will say to us: “leave everything and follow me to Jerusalem to be crucified for my name’s sake.” The Lord Jesus knows where you operate your best. But in the final analysis he is not concerned with how well we operate as human beings. He is concerned with how well we behave as believing sons and daughters of our Father in heaven regardless of where we are on our human load lines.
Everlasting People
During our brief time in this world, we will always be caught between two worlds. There is, first, the world that we see before us. Secondly, there is the world that cannot be seen. When the devil offered Jesus all the Kingdoms of the world if only Jesus would acknowledge the power and prestige of Satan, Jesus refused. For many reasons. One reason was that Jesus doesn’t want the kingdoms of this world. The Kingdoms of this world are entirely temporary. They are all built upon sand. They are all made of sand. Even the people in them are made of sand. Jesus doesn’t want a temporary Kingdom with temporary people. He wants an everlasting Kingdom with everlasting people.
Repentence
We are saved by a change of mind, not a change of feelings. It is with the mind that we believe. We exchange our truths – about ourselves – about the world – about God himself - for the truth of God. And when Satan comes to us to challenge the reality of our conversion, he’s completely disarmed by this. Because God doesn’t base our salvation on the degree to which we believe. He doesn’t base our salvation on the intensity of our belief. He says simply: ‘if you have belief as small as a grain of mustard seed’ – if the fires of your belief are but a bit of smoking flax, you are saved.
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