Emmanuel Episcopal Church

Homily for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost

The Gospel - Luke 9:18-24

Once when Jesus was praying alone, with only the disciples near him, he asked them, "Who do the crowds say that I am?" They answered, "John the Baptist; but others, Elijah; and still others, that one of the ancient prophets has arisen." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Peter answered, "The Messiah of God." He sternly ordered and commanded them not to tell anyone, saying, "The Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised." Then he said to them all, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it.

Homily be the Reverend John S. Ruef

Who is Jesus?

The question posed by the Evangelist is clear: Who is Jesus? The answer is clear also. He is the Messiah. Doctrinally, this is enough. But in terms of the needs of the Church, it is not enough.

The Jews had a picture of what would happen when the Messiah came: Israel's enemies would be defeated. The kingdom would be restored as in the days of David and Solomon.  But, as one wag scholar put it: “Jesus came preaching the kingdom of God, but what we got was the Church.”

The question implied then is: Is this what God intended? The Church, holding to the idea that Jesus was divine, believed that the worship implied in paying tribute to Caesar was blasphemy excluding one from whatever was coming in the history of God's dealing with the world. On the other hand, not paying tribute to Caesar was tantamount to treason and punishable by death. 

But in the eyes of this author that was alright because dying the death of a martyr was sharing the suffering of Jesus on the cross which had its reward in the coming Kingdom. Today the ones who know what this means are called whistle blowers. They do not get fed to the lions. They simply lose their jobs, their means of livelihood.

In the early Church, taking up one's cross and following Jesus meant more than living with an unpleasant boss, mother-in-law, or spouse. It meant giving up one's life. But, as in the present practice of extremist Islam, there would be a reward in the Kingdom. In a world where those who have the power take advantage of those who do not, there are still lots of opportunities to take up one's cross.

There are also still lots of opportunities to help those who are in need. But we have rather given up the idea of the Kingdom which is just around the corner. Instead, there is the Kingdom of Heaven which we hope we will enter when we die. It is a different way of expressing our faith. Our faith: that where there is faith, there is life.

Homily for the Third Sunday after Pentecost

The Gospel - Luke 7:36-50

One of the Pharisees asked Jesus to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee's house and took his place at the table. And a woman in the city, who was a sinner, having learned that he was eating in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster jar of ointment. She stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began to bathe his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair. Then she continued kissing his feet and anointing them with the ointment.

Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw it, he said to himself, "If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him-- that she is a sinner." Jesus spoke up and said to him, "Simon, I have something to say to you." "Teacher," he replied, "Speak." "A certain creditor had two debtors; one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he canceled the debts for both of them. Now which of them will love him more?" Simon answered, "I suppose the one for whom he canceled the greater debt." And Jesus said to him, "You have judged rightly."

Then turning toward the woman, he said to Simon, "Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has bathed my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little."

Then he said to her, "Your sins are forgiven." But those who were at the table with him began to say among themselves, "Who is this who even forgives sins?" And he said to the woman, "Your faith has saved you; go in peace."

 

Homily by the Reverend John S. Ruef

The One Who Loved More

There are three questions in this story:

1. Who is forgiven?
2. How do you know?
3. Who does the forgiving?

In the little story about the debtors, Jesus sets up his Pharisaic host so that he must answer that the one who is forgiven more will love more. Jesus then turns this around to say that he who loves more thereby shows that he has been forgiven more. Jesus' use of the passive voice (Your sins are forgiven) would indicate that the one who forgives is God. This circumlocution was used out of reverence for the divinity.

The way the story is told affords an opportunity to contrast the rude behavior of the host with that of the woman, who is designated a sinner, i.e. someone whose occupation places her outside the possibility of keeping the tradition. (Perhaps a prostitute?) But her behavior toward Jesus as contrasted with that of the host reverses their positions with regard to being forgiven: The woman is forgiven much, but the man?

As he does so often, Jesus leaves us with a question which we must answer. In order to do this he steps outside the tradition to reclaim one who was herself on the outside looking in.

In these tumultuous times, we may find ourselves looking out from a safe spot within the tradition at those who are marked as beyond the pale. If they "love much" where does that put them according to Jesus? 

Another in the series Things are not what they seem.

Homily for the Second Sunday after Pentecost

The Gospel - Luke 7:11-17

Soon after healing the centurion's slave, Jesus went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a large crowd went with him. As he approached the gate of the town, a man who had died was being carried out. He was his mother's only son, and she was a widow; and with her was a large crowd from the town. When the Lord saw her, he had compassion for her and said to her, "Do not weep." Then he came forward and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, "Young man, I say to you, rise!" The dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother. Fear seized all of them; and they glorified God, saying, "A great prophet has risen among us!" and "God has looked favorably on his people!" This word about him spread throughout Judea and all the surrounding country.

 

Homily by The Reverend John S. Ruef

It's a Miracle!

We are all acquainted with the saying “That's a miracle.” Someone close to death unexpectedly recovers. It’s the unusual, the inexplicable. We do not think in terms of what can or cannot happen. We think only of what does happen. In other words we are not concerned with a theoretical question. We are simply giving a name to what does happen. Those who have experienced the birth of a child know what it means when people speak of the miracle of birth.

The Enlightenment which started in the late Middle Ages was based, not on what people believe, but on what is observable and therefore what can be tested. People looked into the heavens and found that the movements of the heavenly bodies could best be explained by a model which showed their movement around the sun, rather than the older model, which showed that the heavenly bodies revolved around our earth. This Copernican Revolution is taken for granted by most people who even bother to think about it.

Nevertheless the Enlightenment notion that "miracles don't happen because they contradict the laws of nature" did not bother the people of ancient times. They simply wrote about what they saw as wondrous. These unusual occurrences were ascribed to God or some other spiritual being.

Science and technology tend to dominate our modern day culture. But, they only tell part of the story. They do describe our world. They tell us the “how.” They do not tell us the “why.” It is one thing to look up at the sky and know that perhaps some billions of years ago there was a mighty explosion. That is a theory of how things came to be. It is something else when we read in the Book of Genesis "In the beginning when God created..." This gives expression to the notion that there should be a why. There has to be a purpose, a reason for what we call creation. We seek to express that feeling in some form of religion.

These religions have traditions, which, quite often refer to their founders and early history. There will always be the question of why. Even when we understand the “how” of things in nature, there will remain the question of “why.” The religious expression itself often leads, not to rational understanding but to awe and wonder. We end up saying, “it's a miracle.”

Homily for the First Sunday after Pentecost: Trinity Sunday

The Gospel - John 16:(5-11)12-15

Jesus said, ["Now I am going to him who sent me; yet none of you asks me, `Where are you going?' But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your hearts. Nevertheless I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. And when he comes, he will prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: about sin, because they do not believe in me; about righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will see me no longer; about judgment, because the ruler of this world has been condemned.]

"I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you."

 

Homily by the Reverend John S. Ruef

                                         The Name of the Trinity

The doctrine of the Trinity looks a lot more difficult than it really is. First of all, we must understand Jewish thinking: They are extreme monotheists: God is one. There are no others.  In the early part of the Jewish scriptures, which we call the Old Testament, the existence of many gods is taken for granted.
 
After the first prophet Isaiah, the Jewish tradition denies the existence of any other god except the one who led them out of Egypt and granted them the covenant in the form of the teaching in what we call the book of Genesis. Muslims are also strict monotheists, having had their time with many gods in their history. The notion that God might not be one is therefore one which Jews and Muslims cannot and will not accept.
 

The Christians who thought up the notion of the Trinity were not Jews. They were Greeks, i.e. gentiles. Their way of looking at things provided a way to have three persons in one God: In their thought world any given part of it had an essence as well as those properties which were visible and/or tangible. To put it simply, anything was both what it was to the mind (its definition) as well as those things which made it visible.
 
What had become, in the first hundred years of the Church a predominantly gentile organization, would eventually give God a threefold name: Father evoked the notion of God as protector of the Jewish people as well as that of creator of all things. Son referred to Jesus, the Saviour, his life, death and resurrection. Spirit was based on the experience of the first Apostles upon whom the spirit descended in what came to be called the first Pentecost.
 

Now, as the theologians explained, these are not three gods, but three persons all having the same essence, i.e. all three were "God." Now you may think of this as linguistic or philosophical legerdemain slight of hand. On the other hand as a devout believer, you now know, after a fashion, how the name comes to be. You know the name. This should give one an entrée.
 
As for what follows, God remains a void, a mystery. But, we have a name. Let's use it. You know the drill. The Lord be with you. And also with you. Let us pray.