The Last Sunday after Pentecost, Year B

Proper 29 -- II Samuel 23:1-7; Psalm 132; Revelation 1:4-8; John 18:33-37
A homily by Fr. Gene Tucker, given at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon, Illinois on Sunday, November 25, 2012.

 

“CHRIST:  KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS”
 

(Homily text:  Revelation 1: 4 – 8 and John 18: 33 - 37)

This Sunday marks the end of the Church Year.  All through our year-long journey toward this day, we have been aiming at a close examination of just who Jesus Christ is.  And along the way, we have recounted His marvelous teachings.  We have remembered His miracles.  We have noticed His influence on the people who heard Him preach and teach.

All these things are part of Jesus Christ’s earthly ministry.  They affirm the reality that Jesus Christ came among us as one of us, fully human.

It was Jesus Christ’s humanity that Pontius Pilate could understand.  To Pilate, religious arguments about Jesus’ identity were so much Jewish nonsense…his Gentile mind simply was unaccustomed to the background of theological thinking that would allow him to understand some of what Jesus said in response to Pilate’s questionings.  But what Pilate could understand was the claim that Jesus Christ was a king…here, political realities emerge as Pilate says to the Lord, “So, you are a king?”  Jesus’ response points away from a temporal understanding of His kingship….the Lord says in response to Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world.”  Some other kingdom and some other sort of kingship is in view here….it is a cosmic view of the divine Christ.

The Lord’s miracles, His ability to multiply the loaves and the fishes, His ability to conquer disease, even death, His ability to control the forces of nature by stilling the raging waters of the sea, all of these point to another reality:  That Jesus the Christ is God, come among us, incarnate in human flesh.

Here we have the image of the cosmic Christ, He who existed from before all time, from the beginning.  In theological terms, we say that He is “co-eternal with the Father.”  The Nicene Creed affirms this reality in these terms:  “We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten[1] of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one being with the Father….”

It is in this sense that we come to the Sunday known as “Christ the King.”  We catch a glimpse of the glory and the power of the cosmic Christ in our reading from the Book of Revelation this morning:  “John to the seven churches that are in Asia….and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the first-born of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth.”

“Ruler of the kings of the earth,” we hear today.  The cosmic Christ will, one day, return, “Coming with the clouds,” as our reading from Revelation puts it today.

So here, we have both aspects of Jesus Christ’s kingship:  His humanity, and His divinity.

He is the eternal one, the eternal Word of God, present with us fully in our human condition, fully immersed in our humanity, even to the point of death, death on a cross.  (See Philippians 2: 5 – 11 for an excellent description of the descent of Christ from heaven to earth, and his ascension back to the Father.)

But what does all this mean to us, 21st century Americans?  I ask the question because we have difficulty relating to monarchs in general, given our democratic polity in the United States of America.

We are fascinated by royalty, but wouldn’t want such a system to govern us.  We love the British royal family, and our newscasts are filled with accounts of the activities of Queen Elizabeth II (whose 60 years on the throne were celebrated earlier this year).  And, on occasion, we also remember that other countries still have kings and queens (several European countries, e.g.).

But these days, a monarch who isn’t of the constitutional variety is hard to find.  Let’s return to the British system for an explanation of the modern conception of royalty….For all the pomp and circumstance which surrounds the British royal family, the truth is that it is Parliament which governs the country.  The royal family serves as a symbol of the state, and it fulfills various ceremonial and symbolic functions, but has little power beyond that of persuasion to alter or to chart the course of the governance of the nation.  (I believe my assessment of the situation is correct, but stand ready for any Englishman to correct these perceptions.)

 However, things were not always thus…in earlier times, the monarch was of the absolute variety, governing by what was called divine right.  The system regarded the monarch as the divinely-authorized head of state.  What he or she said by way of decisions was pretty much the law of the land…there was little need for debate, or for challenge.

We’ve lost sight of this sense of kingship, and it seems to have affected our understandings of just who Jesus Christ is, He who is King of Kings and Lord of lords.

You see, we Americans – who’ve just been through an election cycle – often tend to think that we can elect our head of state.  And if we don’t actually subscribe to that notion where kings and queens are concerned, we at least think that an elected body can actually govern things. And since we have some sway with such an elected body through the power of our vote, then it doesn’t really matter what the king or queen says or does, because we still have a voice in the matter.

You may be asking, “What does this attitude have to do with Jesus Christ, who is King of kings and Lord of lords?”

Simply this:  We relegate Jesus Christ to the position of someone we have elected to be the head of our lives.  And – we theorize – because we elected Him, we can un-elect Him, too.  Or – if we don’t actually subscribe to that view – then we think that we can alter His authority over our lives by appealing to some other belief or entity which can ignore or modify Christ’s authority. Sometimes, the intermediate body we appeal to is actually the Church itself.  We believe that the body of Christ, constituted of freely associating members, becomes the authority.

But in God’s system of governance, the Church derives its authority solely from God the Father and God the Son, under the guidance of God the Holy Spirit.  Anytime the authority of these three – seen most clearly in the pages of Holy Scripture – is violated by the Church, then the Church has lost its standing.

It is easy to concentrate on Jesus Christ’s earthly ministry, and to hold ever in mind His kindnesses of love, shown to the down-and-out of His day, to the sinners and the outcasts.  It is easy, therefore, to begin to believe that Jesus is our friend, and only our friend.  Alas, I believe, personally, that the use of a lectionary over the past 35 years or so that concentrates on the gospel accounts of Matthew, Mark and Luke have shaped our expectations in this area.  These three gospel accounts, all of which share a synoptic[2] outlook, focus in on Jesus Christ’s earthly ministry, and they concentrate on His humanity (though none of them ignores His divinity).

But we need a jolt to rumple our comfortable notions of just who Jesus Christ is.  John’s gospel account provides that needed jolt.  (I rejoice whenever we have a gospel reading appointed from the Fourth Gospel, for I know we are going to get a much-needed dose of what theologians call “High Christology”, that focus on the nature and the person of Jesus Christ which emphasizes His divinity.)

 For Christ is King.  He is God with us, Immanuel.  He is King of kings and Lord of lords.  He who is from the beginning, co-eternal with God the Father, is King by divine right.  His Word rises in authority above all others.  His claims on our life assume first place.

It is this holy One, Jesus Christ the King, whom we love, serve and adore.

AMEN.

---

[1]   The use of the word begotten in the Creed is best defined as “flowing or proceeding from” the Father.  Elsewhere in the Bible, the word is used to denote a person’s fathering a child.  That isn’t the sense of the word as it is used in the Creed.

[2]   Synoptic is a word which comes to us from the Greek, and which means “similar view”.  It is a term which is applied to the gospel accounts of Matthew, Mark and Luke, which are known as the Synoptic Gospels.

25 Pentecost, Year B

Proper 28 -- I Samuel 1: 4 - 20; Psalm 16; Hebrews 10: 11 - 14; Mark 13: 1 - 8

A homily by Fr. Gene Tucker, given at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon, Illinois, on Sunday, November 18, 2012.

“THE GIFT OF GOD’S HOLY WORD”

(Homily text:  The Collect of the Day)

This morning, I’d like to do something a little differently in our homily:  I’d like to focus in on God’s holy Word, the Holy Scriptures, the Bible.  We’ve just concluded the first part of our basic Bible series entitled “Step by Step into the Bible” this past Tuesday (it will resume in January).

As a result, the topic of the Bible is very much in my mind these days.

As our text this morning, I’d like to make use of the excellent Collect of the Day for this, the Twenty Fifth Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 28).[1]  The prayer’s text  reads:

          “Blessed Lord, who hast caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning:  Grant that we may in such wise hear them, read, mark and inwardly digest them; that, by patience and comfort of thy holy Word, we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of eternal life, which thou hast given us in our Savior Jesus Christ;  who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.”

Using this Collect as our guide, let’s proceed through its main points, one by one, in the order in which we find them in the prayer itself.

Scripture’s origins:  The Collect makes clear that God is the originator of holy Scripture.  The Collect puts it this way:  “Blessed Lord, who hast caused all holy Scriptures….”  In our Step by Step classes these past weeks, we noted that the Bible has a divine thread and a human thread, which are wrapped around each other much like the shape of DNA.  But, we also noted, that because God is the inspiration for the writing of the Bible, it is the divine thread that predominates.  The human thread consists of the images and experiences of the human authors, who often make use of images and ideas of the culture and the time in which they lived to convey the timeless truths of God.

Learning:  The Collect reminds us that the holy Scriptures exist in order that we may learn the truths of God.  Learning, as we will come to understand as the Collect’s text unfolds, entails much more than simply knowing about God in the mental or academic sense.  Learning involves not only receiving the Word with our ears, eyes and minds, but with our understanding.  Read on for an explanation of this inward movement into the very core and depth of our being.

Hearing:  The Collect reminds us that, in many cases, hearing the Word of God written is the first way we encounter it.  Certainly, in times past, including in the biblical era and in the life of the early Church, that was the most common way of encountering the Bible:  People heard it read aloud in Church or when believers gathered.  Since – until the 15th century anyway – there was very little opportunity to actually read a text, because mass production of Bibles was impossible before Gutenberg’s invention of the printing press, hearing the Bible read aloud was meant to inform the listener, and to serve as a tool for memorizing the Bible (or at least portions of it).

Reading:  At times, I think we fail to appreciate the worth of having the Scriptures in printed form.  I would wager a guess that most of us not only have at least one Bible in our homes, but we probably have many.  And, most likely, we probably have a goodly number of different translations, as well, ranging from the stately and majestic Authorized (King James) Version, to the paraphrase which is known as “The Message”.  So, we have the text itself in front of us.  One consequence of having access to the actual text in printed form is that memorization has become less common.  Furthermore, we also have a text which is divided into chapters and verses (a 16th century development), which allows us to find a given verse or passage easily.  Concordances which list key words in the text also assist us to find the same word in its usage elsewhere in Scripture.  The bottom line is that we have a lot of tools to assist us in our reading and studying of holy Scripture these days, tools that weren’t available in earlier times.

Marking:  The verb “mark” in the Collect doesn’t refer to marking up the text with a highlighter or with a pen.  It refers to the inward movement of the text into our minds, first of all, but then into the very core of our being.  To “mark” in this sense entails a careful reading of the text, sometimes over and over again, so as to capture the details which a brief, cursory reading would miss.  In the case of our Lord’s parables, for example, such a repeated reading would be very important, for the Lord is a master storyteller, whose teachings are full of nuance and fine detail that shouldn’t be missed.

Inwardly digesting:  Here, the Collect asks God to enable us to fully incorporate the meaning of the text, and of God’s will for our lives, into the very depths of our being.  In our last Step by Step class earlier this week, we noted that the reading and study of the Bible isn’t meant to be a mental, academic exercise alone.  Engaging God through the pages of His Word is meant to shape our thinking, to inform and to feed our souls, and to affect and purify our actions.  The way we put it in our class was to say that our engagement with God through His Word is meant to affect our minds, our bodies and our spirits.  Since we human beings are holistic creatures, what affects one area of our being also affects all the other areas of it, as well.  This is the biblical view of the human creation, which stands in opposition to the secular conception of it, a view that says that the mind is separate from the body, and from the spirit, as well.

Now, where is all this study and inward movement of God’s truth meant to lead?

 The Collect answers that question.  It asks that, with God’s help, we may “embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of eternal life.”  That is the goal of every Christian believer’s walk with God:  That our walk in this life is meant to be lived in the full sight and the full expectation of the life of the world to come, a life that will be lived out directly in God’s presence.  That eternal life is made possible, as the Collect says, by the gift of our Savior Jesus Christ.

Psalm 119: 105 reads, “Your word is a lantern to my feet, and a light upon my path.”[2]  Indeed, the light of God’s Word enables us to confidently walk the path of this life without stumbling and without straying off that path.  The light of God’s Word will also lead us home once this life is over and gone, when we stand in God’s presence and gaze upon His glory.

Thanks be to God, the giver of His only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, who is also the giver of the gift of His holy Word, written.

AMEN.

---

[1]   This collect may be found in the Book of Common Prayer, 1979, page 184.

[2]   This translation is from the Book of Common Prayer, 1979, page 772.

24 Pentecost, Year B

Proper 27 -- Ruth 3: 1 – 4; 4: 13 - 17; Psalm 127; Hebrews 9: 24 - 28; Mark 12: 38 - 44

 

A homily by Fr. Gene Tucker, given at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon, Illinois, on Sunday, November 11, 2012.

“WHAT HAPPENS OUT THERE MAKES A DIFFERENCE IN HERE, AND VICE VERSA”

(Homily text:  Mark 12: 38 - 44)

What happens out there (in the world), makes a difference in here (in the household of God)….what happens in here (among God’s people), makes a difference out there (in our actions and in the world)….

In today’s gospel reading, we come upon the scene as Jesus is sitting in the temple in Jerusalem.  He has already made His triumphal entry into the Holy City earlier in the week.  Since that time, His various adversaries, the Sadducees, the Pharisees, the Scribes and the elders, have all come to pose questions to Him, seeking to trip Him up so as to be able to bring charges against Him.  He has bested all His foes, so that Mark is able to tell us that “no one dared to ask him any question” (12: 34).

Now, sitting across from the treasury, He watches as various people come by. Some are dropping coins into the thirteen different metal, trumpet-shaped containers that ancient documents tell us were in use in the temple to receive the offerings of the people.  Metal coins hit the metal receptacles, and Jesus is able to hear the resulting sounds, so He knows what people are contributing.  No doubt He is also able to see the coins as they make their way into the throats of the different containers, each one set aside for a separate purpose.

Among the passersby are some scribes.  Since Jesus makes some comments about scribes in general, we need to remind ourselves about this group and their function in ancient Judaism….the scribes, as their name implies, were able to write (and to read).  Armed with this ability, they functioned as lawyers and as theologians, interpreting the Law of Moses and drafting legal documents. 

 It is in their legal function that Jesus makes a remark that exposes the disconnection between the scribes outward appearance and their behavior…Jesus says that they are corrupt, taking away the assets of defenseless widows through their legal abilities, possibly by crafting documents that, instead of protecting the widows, actually takes away their property.

As we look at Jesus’ description of these prominent men, it becomes clear that their focus is entirely on themselves….notice what Jesus says:  “They like to go about in long robes, and to have salutations in the market places, and the best seats in the synagogues, and the places of honor at feasts, who devour widows’ houses and for a pretense make long prayers.”

As we look at this behavior, we could remark in response:  “What happens in here (in their walk with God) is supposed to make a difference out there (in their actions).” 

The “out there” of this statement encompasses all of our behaviors and attitudes.  The “in here” refers to God’s presence and God’s demand for holiness and integrity of life.

The actions that Jesus is describing serve to make the scribes the center of attention….their distinctive dress marks them apart from others in society, while their places in the synagogues and banquets make them visible to everyone else gathered.  There is no connection between the scribes’ actions and attitudes, and God’s demands for holiness of life.  There is no integrity between everyday life and life in God.

While the scribes are going about making themselves the focus of attention, a poor widow woman enters, dropping her two copper coins into the metal collection box.  She has now given all that she had to God, everything, as Mark tells us, that she had to live on.  Her entire focus seems to be in God’s direction, for she has cast her last means of support into the treasury for the support of God’s presence among the people.

“What happens in here makes a difference out there.”

Indeed.  The widow’s outward actions tell us that she is being faithful to God, even to the last bit of treasure she had. 

 Life lived in God’s sight and life lived with God’s guidance is supposed to change our narcissistic ways.  God’s call demands that the focus of human attention be directed toward God and toward others.  We affirm this reality by beginning our Holy Communion service with a recitation of what is known liturgically as the Summary of the Law:  “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like unto it: Thou shalt love they neighbor as thyself.”

The widow woman gives until there is nothing more to give.  Her future now rests in God’s hands, and in the hands of God’s people who are commanded by the Law of Moses to care for the widow and the orphan.  Alas, it seems unlikely that the scribes will remember that part of the Law to come to her aid, given their self-absorbed ways.

The human condition that today’s gospel describes hasn’t changed all that much….many of those who claim to be God’s children continue to engage in attitudes and behaviors that deny the power of God to change lives and the call of God to amendment of life.  At the root of many such attitudes and behaviors lies a narcissistic, self-centered focus on the individual.  Such attitudes are often learned in the secular world around us, and are imported, intact, into the hearts of the people of God.    God’s call to love Him above all else, and to love our neighbors as ourselves, will find little room in the hearts and minds of those whose eyesight is so nearsighted.

Amendment of life begins by realizing that “what happens in here (in the house of God) is supposed to make a difference out there (in the world).” 

God’s call is to holiness of life, and to such an integrity of life that our interior attitudes are matched by our exterior actions.

Today’s gospel call serves as our call to action, our call to a different way of being, thinking, and doing.

May God’s Holy Spirit enable us to hear that call.

AMEN.

All Saints Sunday, Year B

Wisdom of Solomon 3:1-9; Psalm 24; Revelation 21:1–6a; John 11:32-44

A homily by Fr. Gene Tucker, given at Trinity Church, Mt. Vernon, Illinois on Sunday, November 4, 2012.

“JUST WHAT (OR WHO) IS A SAINT?”

We begin our homily with a bit of humor this morning…..

It is Saturday morning, and the line outside the confessional booth is quite long.

The door opens, and the good Father hears someone sit down on the other side of the divider.  The unknown person begins, “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

After the usual preliminaries involving the length of time since the individual’s last confession and other formalities, the Father asks, “What do you have to confess, my son?”

The man says in reply, “Oh, Father, you don’t understand…one day last week, I was driving through town and passed a construction site.  There, on the ground, was a wonderful pile of brand new lumber.  Being a carpenter, I could appreciate the quality of that lumber.  I was overcome with temptation, loaded up that pile of good wood, and I stole it.”

The priest launches into the standard lecture about “Thou shalt not steal,” and assigns some penance.  He ends with the admonition, “Go your way and sin no more.”  The carpenter leaves.

The following Saturday, as usual, the line outside the confessional booth is, again, quite long.  One by one, the penitents make their way into and out of the booth.  Then, at the end, is the unmistakable voice of the carpenter:  “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

No need to ask how long it’s been since the man’s last confession….Father knows exactly how long that’s been.

 “What do you have to confess, my Son?” Father asks.

In reply, the man says, “Oh, Father, it’s me, the carpenter again.  You see, I was driving down another street in town where they are building another new house, and I saw another really good-looking pile of lumber….well, you know the rest of the story:  I was overcome by temptation, loaded it up, and stole it.”

The priest is beginning to think that he’s not getting through to this wayward man, so he makes the “Thou shalt not steal” lecture a bit sterner this week, ups the amount of penance, and sends the carpenter on his way.

The following Saturday, despite the large number of parishioners who come seeking absolution for their transgressions, Father notes with joy that the carpenter wasn’t in the line that morning….He thinks to himself, “Perhaps I finally got through to that guy.”

However, after the lapse of that one week, the carpenter again appears on the other side of the divider, saying, “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”  This time, for the third time, it is the same crime as before:  more stolen lumber.

Father is exasperated…. “What should I do to get through to this guy?”  He pauses for a moment, says a silent prayer, and then asks the carpenter, “My son, do you know how to make a Novena?” 

The carpenter says, “No, Father, but if you can get the plans, I can get the wood!”

Now, you may be asking, what does this joke have to do with being a saint?  After all, it is All Saints Sunday, the occasion that comes to us once a year to focus in on the matter of sainthood, and to give thanks for all the saints, those with capital letter “S”, and those with a small letter “s”, whose lives have shown forth the holiness of God.

Having mentioned holiness, it might be good if we pause for a moment to note that the dictionary definition of “saint” involves the idea that a saint shows forth holiness of life.   Put another way, we could say that sainthood involves being a godly person, a person who shows by what they do and what they say that God’s image is shining in the person’s actions and speech.

 Being a saint has to do with an integrity of life, that sort of living that involves not only what a person says, but what they do, day in and day out.  Here we come to a good illustration in our joke this morning of the wrong path to sainthood:  The carpenter recognizes that he’s done something wrong in taking the lumber, and realizes he needs to seek God’s forgiveness, but he can’t seem to apply that knowledge to his everyday actions….there’s a disconnect between his words, “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,” and his inability to keep the commandments of God which show forth the signs of living a holy life.

St. Francis of Assisi is believed to have said something like this:  “Preach the gospel.  If necessary, use words.”

Francis’ wisdom remains today:  Those around us will recognize that we are saints (OK, saints with a small “s”) by the way we behave and by the things we do, more often than by the words we utter.

Why is this so? 

Perhaps the reason is that our actions are often the first and most reliable indicators of our innermost thoughts, conceptions and ideas.  Others can see what we do, long before they have an opportunity to hear what we say, in many cases.

Living a life of integrity, that state where our deeds are matched by our words, is – in essence – sacramental living.  If we recall that a Sacrament is defined as being “An outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace,” we can see that the outward appearance of our behavior ought to mirror the inward disposition of our thoughts, attitudes and outlook on life and on others.

Of course, that was the heart of the carpenter’s problem, wasn’t it?  And, while we are returning to the carpenter’s problem, we should also notice that it was in the time of temptation and trial that he failed the test of sainthood.  Oftentimes, saints are most easily seen when the times of testing come.  Then, the saints of God shine most brightly.

May we, by the grace and power of the Holy Spirit, be able to bind our hearts and minds so closely to what we do and say that others will be tempted to exclaim, “I’ve seen a saint in action!”

AMEN.