Homily for 12 July 2015, the 7th Sunday after Pentecost--"St Paul Tells Us How to Be the Church"

St Paul Tells Us How to Be the Church

Homily for Seventh Sunday after Pentecost (12 July 2015, 3 July 2005)

Romans 15:1-7…………….Matthew 9:27-35

 

In his letter to the early Christian community in Rome, St Paul takes a lot of time to tell them how to live together as the Church—the people assembled in Jesus’ name.  In Greek, the word is ekklesia; in Hebrew knesset; in Arabic kniesseh.  All of these mean “the assembly” or “the congregation,” that is, the people gathered as the Church.

The passage from the Letter to the Romans that we have read today sums up in just a few sentences the four main themes of St Paul’s instructions on how to live as the People of God.

First, those who have strong faith have to work with those who have weak faith, in order to build them up.  We don’t get involved in the church for our individual pleasure or profit; we are part of the church so that all together we can grow closer to God, our loving Creator and Savior and Comforter.

Second, the Bible—both the Old Testament and the New Testament—was written to provide guidance and encouragement for God’s people.  We should read it, study it, and understand it so that we can apply its principles in our own lives and have hope in God’s love and mercy and justice and help for His people.  The Bible is not a rule-book or an instruction manual.  It is not a science or law or history textbook.  It is a source of hope and encouragement.

Third, the Christian people should live in harmony with one another, as Jesus taught, so that with one voice—that is, in agreement—we can give glory to God.  This doesn’t mean that all Christians must think exactly alike or worship in exactly the same way.  It does mean that we must respect each other and that we must be in agreement on the basic truths Jesus gave us.  We should concentrate on glorifying and praising and thanking God, not on fighting among ourselves over who is right about a certain point of doctrine or worship.

Not even all the different churches together—Eastern and Western, Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant—understand God completely.  We can’t.  We can’t, because God is our Creator and we are God’ creation.  But in many ways, our different ways of thinking and worshipping reflect God’s infinite variety and incomprehensible completeness that we are trying to understand.  Ultimately, though, all we can do is to seek to know and love and obey God according to the best of our understanding and ability, from divine revelation and human experience, with humbleness and gentleness.

Finally, continuing this theme of unity, Christians must welcome one another.  Not just tolerate or respect one another.  We must actively welcome one another.  No Christian can ever say, “This is our church for our people; you have to go to your own church.”  We have to say instead, “Welcome to our church; we hope you like our way of doing things even if it’s not what you are used to.”  We don’t try to change the way other churches worship, and we don’t change our way to conform to what they do.  Every kind of Christian prayer and worship, done in the right spirit, gives glory to God and adds richness and beauty and depth to our limited human understanding of God’s will.

Not all forms of Christianity are the same; not all are equal.  I’m not saying that one church is just as good as another.  We believe that some come closer to a full and authentic view of God’s plan for creation.  But we welcome and respect and love as brothers and sisters all who believe in One God, the Creator and Almighty Father; in the only Son of God, Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior; and in the Holy Spirit, sent by Jesus from the Father to be with us always and to guide us into all truth.

To the One God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, be thanks and praise and glory now and ever and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

Homily for 5 July 2015--the Sixth Sunday after Pentecost: "You Are Healed: Stand Up, Pick Up Your Pallet, and Go Home"

You Are Healed:  Stand Up, Pick Up Your Pallet, and Go Home

Homily for Sixth Sunday after Pentecost (5 July 2015, 26 June 2005)

Romans 12:6-14…………….Matthew 9:1-8

 

Two things stand out in today’s Gospel story of Jesus’ healing the paralyzed man.  First, Jesus forgives the man’s since before He heals his paralyzed body.  And, second, when He heals the man, Jesus tells him to stand up, pick up his pallet, and go to his home.

From this we learn that spiritual healing always goes ahead of, or along with, physical healing, and that part of healing is moving ahead, getting on with the activities of life.

These things are as true for communities as for individual persons.  If a community or a group of people is paralyzed, unable to move, stuck in one spot, incapable of seeing new directions or solutions to their problems, the first thing they must seek is spiritual healing and renewal.

The Church has a word for this, a Greek word—metanoia.  It is translated as “change of heart.”  It’s similar to repentance, but it’s more than that.  Metanoia signifies opening the heart to God, so that it can be filled with God’s love and grace and power.  More than any human action, God in us forgives our sins, breaks the bonds that keep us from moving, and enables us to move forward again.

But we have to come to God, conscious of our paralysis and need for healing, and we have to ask God to fill us with His healing love and mercy.

And when we turn to God and receive healing, we have to carry out the second part of the deal.  Like the paralyzed man, we have to stand up, pick up our pallet, and go home.

It’s easy to understand the first instruction Jesus gives:  stand up.  That’s the natural action anyone would take after being healed from paralysis.  It’s the first move, the one that tells us the healing is real.  Until we stand up, we don’t know we are healed and we can’t go anywhere.

Jesus’ second instruction is to pick up your pallet.  In a way, the pallet or bed symbolizes the paralysis—it’s where we are stuck until we are healed.  We might just want to leave it behind and forget about it, but we have to pick it up and carry it away.  It reminds us of what we have been healed from by the power of God.  It reminds us to be thankful.  And it reminds us of where we could end up again if we lose our closeness to God and let sin paralyze us again.

Finally Jesus tells the man to go to his home.  After he was healed, he might have wanted to go out and celebrate.  He might have wanted to show off to everybody that he could walk and run and dance again.  But Jesus tells him, “Go to your home.”  Home is the center of our life.  It’s the place where we share life with those we love.  It’s where we learn to pray, where we praise God in the morning and thank God in the evening.

So before we can go out in new directions after being healed, we have to go home, to the center, to get re-oriented, to get focused, to decide what’s important and how we will use our restored ability to move.  And from there we will be able to begin again, to go forward knowing that God is with us, that God has healed our souls as well as our bodies.

And then we can give thanks and praise and glory to God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

Homily for 28 June 2015--the Fifth Sunday after Pentecost: "We All Have to Submit to God"

We All Have to Submit to God

Homily for Fifth Sunday after Pentecost (28 June 2015, 27 June 2010)

Romans 10:1-10…………….Matthew 8:28-9:1

 

In today’s reading from the Letter to the Romans, St Paul warns that people who don’t know about God’s righteousness, and try to establish their own righteousness, fail to submit to God.

In today’s reading from the Gospel of St Matthew, the demons possessing the two men challenge Jesus by asking, “What do You have to do with us, Son of God?”  They don’t want to submit to God, but they know they have to.

The point here is that we all have to submit to God, whether we want to or not.  God is the Creator of the Universe and all that is in it.  God is the Savior of the world from sin.  God is the Judge who can grant us eternal life.  God is the Spirit of Truth, our guide and counsellor and comforter.

Whether we are led astray by ignorance or by pride or by demons, ultimately we have to submit to God.  St Paul says we are saved by faith—by what we believe in our hearts and confess with our mouths.  And that faith is in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Savior of the World.

This is why we can’t take our religion or our faith or our salvation for granted.  If we don’t believe in our hearts that Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior, the Son of God who rose from the dead, and if we don’t proclaim that belief by our words and our actions, and if we don’t submit to the righteousness of God, we will end up destroyed like the demons who entered into the pigs and plunged off the cliff into the sea.

Probably we don’t like the idea of submitting to anyone or anything.  We like to think of ourselves as independent and strong and able to take care of ourselves.  We think of submitting as defeat.

But submitting to the righteousness of God is not defeat.  In fact, submitting to the righteousness of God brings liberation and victory—liberation from sin and victory over death.  Only God, the Almighty Creator and Redeemer, can give us that.

And in two separate Covenants or contracts with humankind, God has promised that liberation from sin and victory over death to us, as long as we submit to God’s righteousness.

In the Old Covenant, God gave the Law of Moses to guide God’s Chosen People in living in righteousness with God and each other.

In the New Covenant, God fulfilled the Law by sending God’s Living Word, God’s only Son, to teach all people the new Law of Love.  The Law of Love—love God completely and love your neighbor as you love yourself—shows us how to live in righteousness, not by observing the details of many rules, but by being conscious of how we relate to God and to other people—all the time.

We don’t need to invent our own righteousness because we know what God wants.  We don’t need to ask, “What do You have to do with us, O Son of God?” because we know that we are nothing without God, who loves us so much that He sent His only-begotten Son to bring us life instead of destruction.

So we proclaim Jesus as Lord.  We believe in our hearts that He rose from the dead.  And we submit to the righteousness of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

Homily for 21 June 2015--Fourth Sunday after Pentecost: "Active Faith Frees Us to be Slaves of God"

Active Faith Frees Us to be Slaves to God

Homily for Fourth Sunday after Pentecost (21 June 2015, 8 June 2008)

Romans 6:18-23…………….Matthew 8:5-13

 

Today’s readings from St Paul’s Epistle to the Romans and St Matthew’s Gospel present two ideas that seem to contradict themselves.  They appear paradoxical until we examine them carefully.

Here are the two ideas:

Faith as action, and slavery as freedom.

We usually think of faith as static, as something that just is.  But the Centurion who comes to Jesus and asks for the healing of his servant has active faith.  It brings him to Jesus and it makes him declare, “Just say the word and my servant (or slave; the word is the same in the original Greek) will be healed.”

This Centurion knows that God’s word is true and that God’s power is effective.  And so he has no need for drama or making a fuss—even though he’s probably worried sick.  After all, he depends on his slave for all kinds of assistance—taking care of his clothes and his weapons, preparing his food, delivering his messages, maybe even writing for him.  And he also has to deal with the pressures of his job as an army commander.

Very likely, then, there is a strong bond of affection and dependence between the Centurion and his slave.  Certainly we can see that he does not regard his slave as just his property—if his horse was sick, he would not ask Jesus to heal it.  The Centurion recognizes his slave’s human worth and dignity, despite his status as a slave.

This reminds us that Christ came to save all people, regardless of status, or family, or money, or anything else.  It also reminds us that we therefore need to pray that God will save other people, not just ourselves.  Our faith is personal but communal, not individual.

People who keep their faith private or think that they are already good enough or pious enough or holy enough, or that they deserve salvation because they were born into Christian families, may in fact not be saved.  Faith has to be active.

At the same time, as St Paul tells the Romans, once we profess our faith in Jesus Christ, once we are baptized into His life, we become slaves to righteousness.  That is, we willingly accept God as Master of our lives.  In faith, we turn our lives over to God.  We basically say, like the Centurion, “Just say the word and your slave (me) will be healed.”

It seems obvious that being a slave is a bad thing—you have no freedom, and freedom is very important to us.  But accepting slavery to righteousness means being free from slavery to evil and sin.  Slavery to God is freedom from slavery to the Devil.

Being slaves of God’s righteousness makes us free to live in faith, without fear or anxiety.  We know that we can come to the Lord and ask for healing—for ourselves and for others.  We know that our faith can be put into action in every aspect of our lives—like the Centurion, who lived his faith in his military job and in his personal relationships.

Being slaves of God’s righteousness puts responsibility on us to do our Master’s will all the time, not just for an hour on Sunday.

Being slaves of God’s righteousness means we have to practice love and mercy and justice at home, dealing with our spouses and children and brothers and sisters; at work, dealing with our bosses, our employees, our co-workers, our customers; in our business dealings; at school; on the athletic field—everywhere.

Our faith has to be active—always asking God to take care of others, as the Centurion did.

Our faith has to be humble, like the Centurion’s when he said, “I am not worthy to have you come to me.”

Our faith has to be strong, like the Centurion’s when he said, “Just say the word and it will be done.”

When our faith is humble, strong, and active we can give ourselves voluntarily as slaves to God, confident that He will say the word and we will be healed, we will be free, we will be saved, we will gain eternal life.

So with active faith, as slaves to God, let us give thanks and praise and glory to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and ever and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

Homily for Sunday 14 June 2015--Third Sunday after Pentecost: "Don't Worry!"

Don’t Worry

Homily for Third Sunday after Pentecost (14 June 2015, 17 June 2007)

Romans 5:1-10…………….Matthew 6:22-33

 

In today’s reading from the Gospel of St Matthew, Jesus says that we can’t serve two masters.  We can’t serve God and money.  If we are devoted to money, we will neglect God.  And if we neglect God, we are giving our lives to the Evil One.

Jesus also says that since we cannot serve two masters we should not worry about food or drink or clothing—in other words, we should not worry about all the details of everyday life.

The Lord knows us well.  He knows that we do worry about food.  Not just “Is there enough to feed my family and to keep them healthy?” but also “Is there enough so that my guests won’t think that I’m cheap?” and “Is it organic?” “Does it have trans fats?” “How much cholesterol is in it?” and so on.

And we worry about what to drink—whole milk or low-fat or non-fat?  The right brand of liquor—Johnny Walker Red or Johnny Walker Black, or Blue or Green or whatever?  We worry about getting our favorite Starbucks coffee drink.  We even worry about water—chlorinated?  Filtered?  Purified?  Bottled, imported, “smart”?

And we worry about clothes, and cars, and granite counter-tops.  We worry about shoes and schools and sports scores.  We even worry about worrying . . .

And what does Jesus say about all this?  He says, “Don’t worry.  God will take care of what you need—as long as you seek first the Kingdom of God.”

Great!  That’s one more thing to worry about.

Actually, it’s not one more thing; it’s the only thing:  “Seek first the Kingdom of God and God’s righteousness, and all these other things will be given to you as well.”

But what does Jesus mean by this?  What is the Kingdom of God and how can I seek it?

The Kingdom of God exists wherever God’s will is known and accepted and fulfilled.  The Kingdom of God exists perfectly in heaven, where the souls of the righteous and the angels are in perfect relationship with God, living in God’s glory and love and mercy and justice and peace.

We also pray that the Kingdom of God may be established on earth, every time we say the Lord’s Prayer:  “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

We seek the Kingdom individually—each person in his/her own life—and also as a community, as the people of God in the Church.  To do this, we need to learn and understand God’s will, God’s love, God’s mercy, God’s justice.

We have to study and learn the teachings of the Christian Church.  We have to read the Holy Bible.  We have to participate fully in the life of the Church—praying, singing, going to confession, receiving the Body and Blood of our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ.

We can’t just say, “I went to Catholic school” or “I went to church with my mother” or “I know how we always did things back home.”  We have to make a conscious effort to find out and to understand and to live as Christians—here and now, all the time, every day, in every place and every part of our lives.

We must strive to make the Kingdom of God real in our homes, in the schools, in our workplaces, in the supermarket and the doctor’s office, even on the freeway (maybe especially on the freeway).  When we try to bring the love and mercy and peace and justice of God to every situation and every person, we will be doing what God asks us to do, and we won’t have to worry about anything else.

So let us seek first the Kingdom of God and God’s righteousness, and give thanks and praise and glory to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and ever and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

Homily for Sunday 7 June 2015--Second Sunday after Pentecost

God Shows No Partiality

Homily for Second Sunday after Pentecost (7 June 2015, 14 June 2009)

Romans 2:10-16…………….Matthew 4:18-23

 

In the Epistle reading for today, St Paul writes, “God shows no partiality,”

This is a surprising statement to everyone who thinks “my religion is the best.”  St Paul tells us instead, “Glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good.”  He means that all people have to live holy and righteous lives, obeying God according to the way God teaches different people.  God shows no partiality; God judges different peoples according to the relationships He has established with them.

In the Old Testament, God made His Covenant with the Jews, saying, “I will be your God, and you will be my people,” and giving them the Law through Moses.  The Law governed how God’s chosen people should relate to God and to one another.  It didn’t make the Jews better than other people; it just set up a special relationship between God and them; it made them responsible to God in a specific way.  This is what St Paul means by saying, “All who have sinned under the Law will be judged by the Law.”

In the New Testament, God makes a New Covenant with people, through Jesus Christ, the True Word of God who became human to gain salvation for the human race.  Jesus brings a new way of relating to God:  conscience, not Law.  St Paul says that “the Law is written on [our] hearts” and is witnessed by our consciences.  And it is the life and teachings of Jesus that form our consciences.

So the absence or non-applicability of the Law of Moses doesn’t mean that we can do anything we like, claiming that our conscience told us it was OK.  A properly formed and developed conscience will always reflect what Jesus our Lord has commanded us:  we will do by instinct what the Law requires.  And, though we will not be judged according to the Law, we will be judged according to our secret thoughts by God, through Jesus Christ.

So, just as the Jews will be judged according to their Covenant with God, we Christians will also be judged according to our Covenant with God.

Being Christians imposes responsibilities and obligations on us.  Becoming followers of Christ transforms our lives, just as it completely changed the lives of Andrew and Peter, James and John when, Jesus said to them, “Come, follow Me.  Now you are fishermen, but I will make you fishers of men,” as we heard in today’s Gospel reading.

St Paul says that it isn’t those who “hear the Law who are righteous in God’s sight, but the doers of the Law who will be justified.”  This is why we can’t simply claim to be Christian as if it were a race or nationality or birthright.

If we don’t live our Christianity through prayer and worship, through observing the fasts and the feasts of the Church year, and through acts of charity for all of our sisters and brothers, we’re not really Christians.

If we get married in the church but don’t participate in the life of the church, and if we baptize our children and fail to bring them to church and teach them the faith, we’re not really Christians.

If we refuse to love and forgive our enemies, if we refuse to help the poor and sick and hungry and jobless and homeless, we’re not really Christians.

Like Andrew and Peter, James and John, we have to answer Jesus’ call to follow Him.  We have to let Jesus transform our lives.  We have to form our consciences according to Jesus’ teaching, not just follow the letter of the Law.  And we have to live in a conscious and deliberately Christian way, doing good because the Law has been written in our hearts by God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

Homily for Sunday 31 May 2015--All Saints Sunday

A Great Cloud of Witnesses:  We Are All Called to be Saints

Homily for All Saints (First Sunday after Pentecost) (31 May 2015, 3 June 2012)

Hebrews 11:33-12:2…………….Matthew 10:32-38, 19:27-30

 

Today, on the first Sunday after Pentecost, the Church commemorates All Saints.  Every day of the year, we remember and honor certain saints by name—some famous, some not.  We also remember and honor certain saints by name in the prayers and services of the Church—the Theotokos, St John the Baptist, St John Chrysostom, St Basil the Great, and others.  We all have our personal devotions to certain saints—maybe the one we were named for, maybe one belonging to our family or village by tradition, maybe one who is meaningful to us through personal experience or inspiration.

But today the Church reminds us that all Christians—all of us, and all of those who have gone before us, and all of those who will come after us—are called to be saints:  the “Holy Ones” of God.

St Paul reminds us of this when he calls the saints a “great cloud of witnesses.”  He also reminds us of what we have to do in order to join that great cloud of witnesses.  And in today’s Gospel reading, our Lord Jesus Christ gives us some very clear—and also pretty difficult—advice on how to live holy lives.

When St Paul calls the saints a “great cloud of witnesses,” he’s telling us two very important things:

First—like a cloud, the saints are sort of above us and around us.  Sometimes they seem closer and heavier, sometimes more distant and sort of fluffy.  Sometimes they storm; sometimes they provide shade.  Like the droplets of moisture that form a cloud, the individual saints form this great cloud of witnesses.

Second—they are a cloud of witnesses:  they have a function, to be examples to the world and to us, examples of Christian faith and life.  Like the people of the Old Testament whom St Paul describes, different saints have different talents, different experiences, different ways of witnessing.  But all their words and actions and trials and sufferings and deaths are meaningless unless they are connected to faith.

This is true for us, too.  Jesus says, “Whoever acknowledges me before other people I will acknowledge before my heavenly father,” but “whoever does not take up his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.”

We can’t call ourselves Christians unless we live as Christians.  We have to live in a way that joins us to that “great cloud of witnesses”—God’s Holy Ones.  This takes determination and work.  It’s not going to happen unless we make efforts all the time.  No one ever became a saint just by sitting around and wishing they were holy.

First, St Paul says, we must “rid ourselves of every burden and sin” that holds onto us and holds us back from living holy lives.  This means that we have to look honestly at ourselves, to discover and admit our shortcomings and failures, and to repent—turn ourselves around in the right direction.

Second, that right direction is following the lead of Jesus Christ.  We have to “persevere in running the race, keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the leader and perfecter of faith.”  He has done it; He is showing us how; He wants us to succeed.

Third, we have to follow Jesus in an open way, not secretly.  We should never be afraid to thank and praise Him for creating us, for loving us, for guiding us, for saving us.

Fourth, we have to put Jesus first in our lives.  It’s kind of hard to hear Jesus say, “Whoever loves father or mother, or son or daughter, more than me is not worthy of me.”  But our families are not God; we must not make them into idols and worship them.  They are gifts from God, so we must treasure them.  The best way to do this is by living holy lives and setting a good example.  Parents have to be witnesses to their children, showing them how to put Christ first, ahead of selfish desires.  Parents, let your children see you pray, teach them to enjoy coming to church, share with them the goodness of helping other people.

Finally, we can’t expect rewards in this life.  Being Christian is not easy or comfortable or profitable in worldly terms.  The only reward that counts is the joy of eternal life in God’s love.  That is the reward that awaits us when, by God’s grace, we will join all the saints in that “great cloud of witnesses,” giving thanks and praise and glory to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, One God, now and ever and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.