Preacher's Study - 3 Easter

Thursday morning in the Preacher's Study

First thoughts about next Sunday's sermon (3 Easter Year C)

 

Todd Townshend

Some weeks the preacher does not begin sermon preparation until Thursday, so this week it will be “Thursday Morning in the Preacher’s Study”! 

In Acts we see some patterns of human response to the Resurrection Gospel and to the movement of the Holy Spirit of God. The patterns seem to be a response to the questions, “How does one become a believer? How does one acquire Christian identity?”

What follows can be applied to three passages from Luke-Acts, A) The Road to Emmaus (Lk24:13-35), B) The Road to Gaza (the Ethiopian’s baptism in Acts 8:26-40) and C) The Road to Damascus (the first account of Paul’s conversion in Acts 9:1-20). However, we will focus here only on the Road to Damascus as it will be heard this Sunday.

We are not Christians at birth, but through baptism. A person becomes identifiably Christian when he or she makes a confession that Jesus is Lord—Jesus is Christ—Jesus is Son of God. How do we get to that point? How do we lead others to it? I have learned a great deal from Louis-Marie Chauvet and his analysis of the patterns found in Luke-Acts. (see, The Sacraments, Chapter 2)

How does one make this “passage” to faith? First, in all three cases Luke places the action within “the time of the church”. The Lord is no longer visible. Beginning from Jerusalem (Cross, Resurrection, Ascension) and until he comes in glory, the time of the church must be a time of encounter and witness (“you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea, and to ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8)) in a particular place (on the road A: to Emmaus, B: to Gaza, C: to Damascus).

Second, all three narratives clearly show an initiative on God’s part. The Lord is no longer recognizable, but the Triune God is still at work in the story. In Acts 9 it is an intrusion into Paul’s mission of the light and the voice of the risen, but not visible, Jesus.

Finally, the third parallel characteristic is that, in all three narratives, “this divine initiative, which alone allows the witnesses to accede to faith, happens through the mediation of the church.”

Here, the preacher may choose to focus less on Paul and more on what Paul needed from Ananias—with the hope that listeners (the church) may identify with both of them. The church, through each member, may act as a mediation for the work of God—at three levels.

1. The first level is speech. Notice the role of speech throughout Luke-Acts (indeed through all of scripture).  God—through the Word and the Spirit—acts in and through the speech of God’s people. 

2. “However,” Chauvet notes, “this faith remains incomplete as long as it is not ‘informed’ by a ‘sacramental’ gesture.” In Acts 9 it is the laying on of hands, and baptism by Ananias. Only then is Paul’s ‘sight’ restored.”  

3. The third level of mediation is often ignored in the interpretation of these texts: the eyes open but on an absence. On the Road to Emmaus, the risen One disappears as soon he is recognized; likewise on the Road to Gaza, Jesus’ witness, Philip, is “snatched away” by the Spirit. And because this presence has become invisible, the witness is urged to go on a mission of proclamation, and the witness is urged to embody it that proclamation. The passage to faith, which relies so heavily on the divine initiative and the Word’s interpretation, is incomplete without the gesture of reception and the act of witness, both of which are empowered by the Spirit. 

This language does not translate easily into a sermon—however, it does help one to recognize patterns which deeply inform the church about its own identity and mission. Perhaps it will inform the sermon this Sunday.

 

Preacher's Study - 2 Easter

Monday morning in the Preacher's Study

First thoughts about next Sunday's sermon (2 Easter Year C)

Todd Townshend

What is the first thing on Jesus’ post-resurrection “to-do” list? In John’s gospel, on the evening of the day that Jesus was raised up from the dead, he enters a room filled with disciples who are trying to lock out all that threatened them. He appears twice amid their doubt and believing, brings them his peace, breathes the Holy Spirit on them, and sends them out again in his name. 

This encounter is necessary, continually, in the face of the Resurrection because the new Creation creates a kind of chaos in what remains of the old order. His followers have to get “in touch with” this new creation. It’s less about doubt than it is about the Word and Spirit moving the disciples past the perceived chaos, and their well-founded fear. 

So in contrast to the Easter gospel according to John (20:1-18), Jesus now allows his followers to touch and see him. The good news of Easter is still primarily heard, but the incarnate and risen One reaches out to them once more out of compassion and the desire to save. Jesus invites them to touch his wounds and to taste the goodness of his risen life. 

This appearance of Jesus is astonishing. The disciples are locked away in a room of fear. They’ve lost hope and are looking for a way out. Without Jesus, they are nobodies again. Threatened nobodies. They are confused and bewildered, not just by the appearance itself, but also by the fact that Jesus did not come through the door! Nothing is happening the way it’s supposed to happen. Nothing seems real. 

The physical evidence of his suffering helps to identify him, but it is his command “Shalom!” that reignites the whole biblical witness for them, especially the promise of life made in the face of death. The words “receive the Holy Spirit” (John 20:22), along with the breath of life upon them, bring them to a new Creation moment when the dust of the earth is formed into flesh, when dry bones are knitted together into life. Jesus establishes a new humanity from the people he loves, thereby giving all people a future in God. 

They have been re-membered. The future is God’s future, and God’s future involves God’s people in Shalom and in Spirit.

Preacher's Study - Passion C

Monday morning in the Preacher's Study

First thoughts about next Sunday's sermon (Passion Year C)

Todd Townshend

Do you know the Curtis Mayfield song, People Get Ready? It goes: People get ready there’s a train a comim', don’t need no baggage, you just get on board. All you need is faith to hear the diesels hummin’. Don’t need no ticket, you just thank the Lord.

         The Salvation train.

         In my mind there are many positive images of the train. Many of them from gospel music. In this week's playlist I have the song, “I Want to Ride that Glory Train.” The train rides rails to glory.

         But there is also one intensely negative image. It gathers up all the other negative images of derailed trains, exploded trains. It is the image of a train - jammed full of people - steaming its way through a gated opening in a high brick wall. The wall surrounds a very large area, big enough for the entire train to stop inside. The gate is closed and the doors to the boxcars open. Out pour bewildered men, women, and children. It is Auschwitz. The train rides rails to death.

         With these two different train images in mind, now picture Jesus. Entering the city of Jerusalem, through a gate in the wall. Palm branches being waved, hosannas being sung. Jesus riding on a colt. To what? What will become of this man, this life, this people? You know the answers, according to the story, but what if you didn’t? Where is this Jesus-train going? After gathering steam from three years of healing and teaching and miracle, with a crowd following him full of disciples and family, friends and enemies, they enter the city.

         Is this a train to glory, this parade into Jerusalem? Or is it simply a train to death? Or is it somehow .... both?

         If you decide to take the whole ride through Holy Week this year, there will be several stops along the way... places to slow down and look around. This is the week that we re-play the Passion story at its original speed. There will be the opportunity, especially over The Great Three Days, to hear the whole thing freshly - as if for the first time -  and to again make it your own. Through it, may Christ again offer us the key to learning how to live, and even how to die.

Todd Townshend is Canon Theologian for the Diocese of Huron, a member of the Faculty of Theology, Huron University College, London, ON., and editor of OPEN.

Merriman: Good Friday

Thinking about Good Friday

Reflections on the symbols and ceremonies of Holy Week by Michael Merriman

Back in 1979 when the American Book of Common Prayer was made official it seemed obvious that with a full rite for Good Friday for the first time, Episcopalians could stop putting together Good Friday services with little or no rationale such as a three hour "Preaching the Seven Last Words of Christ."  Or one congregation I knew that managed a three hour service composed of Morning Prayer at Noon with a sermon followed by the Great Litany with sermon, Liturgy of the Word with sermon, then Evening Prayer and sermon and finally compline.  Hymn being interspersed in these. 

What seems to have happened instead is a kind of attempt to preserve the idea of a three hour service and making the BCP's rite last that long.

Perhaps we can revisit that and accept the idea that the liturgy on Good Friday might be of ordinary length and the Good Friday rite in the Prayer Book be followed.  There is a logic in the rite that deserves to be respected as we move from Word to intercession to veneration of the cross and, if desired, Communion and then simply concluding without a dismissal.

There are some issues raised by elements in this rite.  I am particularly concerned to reflect on our reading of the Passion of John.  If it is read by a number of voices we may want to revisit the custom of giving the congregation the words of the crowd.  The people of God present are the Body of Christ.  Perhaps they might read the part of Jesus and have a small group read the parts of the crowd and the priests.

There is another issue in the Passion of John and that is the repeated use of the term "the Jews."  Many New Testament scholars tell us that in that context the writer was not speaking of the Jewish people but of the group of priests and other Jewish aristocrats who ruled Jerusalem under the watchful eye of Rome.  I wonder if we would be wrong to render "the Jews" as "the Jewish authorities" or even as "the authorities" or "the council."  When we do that the only time that the word "Jew" need be used is on the lips of Pilate, "Am I a Jew?" he asks.

Let us also remember that the Liturgy of Good Friday is not meant to be a funeral for Jesus.  We after all know the end of the story and to conduct this rite as if we don't isn't helpful.  While we don't wish to anticipate Easter, we might use hymns that glorify the Cross rather than penitential and sentimental hymns that stress individual piety rather than the praise of the community for God's great love inscribed (in words of one hymn) in shining letters God is love.

Michael Merriman is a member of APLM Council. He will be a featured presenter at Go, Make Disciples, a training institute offered by the North American Association for the Catechumenate, April 25-27, in Houston, Texas. For more info:

http://www.catechumenate.org

or

http://catechumenate.org/uploads/file/docs/Houston%20Institute%202013%20Brochure.pdf

About the image: The artist is Theyre Lee-Elliott (1903-1988), a man who was the son of an Anglican priest. Apparently he fancied that trees were like human beings. After a period of serious illness, he created this piece in which Christ crucified, trees, the violence of world war and his own sufferings fuse into a single image, with the hint of hope and glory evident in the background colors.

Lent 5, Year C 2013

A Prayer for Lent 5, Year C

Jennifer Phillips

Living God, you break into our mortal loneliness

by your coming among us.

You clothe the dry bones of our lives

with the flesh of your new creation,

and from the fearful tombs

you call us to come out and live unbound,

through the power of Christ’s resurrection,

in whose strong name we give thanks.