Advent Sunday

Sunday 29^th November – Advent Sunday

The church year starts on Advent Sunday and 2020/2021 is Year B which means in effect that most of our lectionary readings we hear on Sunday will be from Mark’s gospel. Last year was mostly from Matthew, and after this year they will be mainly from Luke. John’s gospel gets distributed fairly evenly across every season

Isaiah 64: 1-9. This passage expresses both hope and frustration so is a fitting choice for Advent, a season that lives with the frustration of hoping and waiting for a better world that is beyond our capacity of human beings to achieve. In the time it was written, the Jews had returned from exile in Babylon and the re-building of the Temple was a possibility but lack of progress or any signs from God were undermining confidence.  

1 Corinthians 1: 3-9. It is a shame that the lectionary compilers left out the first two verses because they set the scene for what follows – that we are all called by God. Paul is called by God but also the congregation are called to be Holy and they all “call” on the Lord Jesus Christ. Importantly they are all “called into the fellowship on his son Jesus Christ our Lord”. This is important because of the factionalism that has to be addressed further into the letter. Given that the factions were based on the use and abuse of spiritual gifts, Paul makes sure he emphasises that the gifts are a gift from God and not as a result of any inherent merit in the congregation.

Mark 13: 24-37

As previously discussed, Apocalyptic expectations are all set within a very brief future which is why the readers were told to “keep awake.” The spirit of the piece is expectation of a new world order under the control of Christ “the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven”. However this should not be read in isolation from the previous verses in which the emphasis is on not thinking that the end is near and as verse 32 says not even Jesus knows when the end will come but “only the Father”.

 

It would be foolish to maintain that the church is not affected by the clamour and emphasis put on Christmas by secular and commercial interests.

And because of that our own clamour in the church is increasingly directed towards an endless Christmas season – so much so that the Christian season of Advent that immediately precedes Christmas is in danger of being lost and ignored.

Advent is much more sober and reflective – indicated by the fact that the traditional colour for Advent is purple – the same as Lent- and we don’t say the Gloria in services because that is too celebratory.

The season is defined by hope tempered by frustration.

We hope for a healed and redeemed world where all wrongs are righted, where every tear is wiped from every eye, where Justice and peace roll down like a river, and yet as we look at the world we realise that by our own efforts this is as unlikely now as it has been unlikely for 2000 years.

Yet hope springs eternal in the human heart, that this is the future we are committed to and we dare not let that vision slip from our imaginations.

It says in proverbs (29:18) that “without a vision the people perish” so we have to keep that flame of hope alive in our hearts, and while we have to realise that the end game is beyond us, we nevertheless are as a community of love, agents of God’s love and grace in the world and we work towards that future regardless. We are people of the Kingdom.

One of the most profound verses in the Bible about the coming of the Kingdom is in Luke’s gospel (17: 20-21)

²⁰ Once Jesus^[a] was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, “The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; ²¹ nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For, in fact, the kingdom of God is within you.”    

The kingdom of God is wherever you are, when you are as Paul used to say “in Christ”.

A transformed Christ-consciousness is where the kingdom of God is on earth.

So where we are, we bring the love and grace of God into every situation we find ourselves.

Thus, the Kingdom of God has no boundaries or limits

When Christ’s consciousness becomes our consciousness He becomes the cornerstone of a limitless spiritual building – the body of Christ.

The hope and joy of Christmas – the realisation that “God is with us” is the basis of the Christian life – that is where the story starts – but Advent is where the rubber hits the road, when we are called to live out that truth that God is with us in our daily lives and we find that our underlying joy is tempered with unfulfilled hopes and expectations.

Hope and frustration undergirded by Joy is a pretty good description of the Christian life and it is the life we are called to live as Paul writes in his letter today.

Like the Corinthian church then and the church now we find we go down many cul-de-sacs, and we fail continually to consistently maintain the standard set for us – and we then continually ask for forgiveness.

Nevertheless, God has chosen to work through us – yes – us – to bring people a taste of the Kingdom in these between times. We do so imperfectly, we fail often, but as I say quoting St. Teresa’s words so often – Christ has no other body except ours to work through.

But we go on regardless because we have seen the end. The end is Christ as he is also the beginning. I am the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord God, who is, who was and who is to come, the almighty.

And while the going may be hard and difficult at times, hearing words like that from Revelation, we can just echo Peter when he says “Where else can we go. You have the words of eternal life”

     

Christ the King

 Sunday 22^nd November – Christ the King

Ezekiel 34: 11-16, 20-24. Kingship has always been closely entwined with Shepherding in the Hebrew Bible and indeed had been a common motif for centuries beforehand. Pharaohs are often depicted carrying a shepherd’s crook for example. In the first section (11-16) God himself is the shepherd and in the second section (20-24) the shepherd will be a restored king of the house of David, which in Christian theology finds its fulfillment in Jesus Christ.    

Ephesians 1: 15-23. To modern ears this can sound quite mesmerizing and if actually written by Paul finds him in full “preacher” mode. Developing from his earlier “Rapture” phase, the church is now Christ’s body on earth – his “presence” (Parousia) in a spiritual unity. Christ is the universal spirit and presence of God on earth although we must still pray for wisdom (verse 17) as we “work out our salvation with fear and trembling” as Paul writes in Philippians 2:12

Matthew 25: 31-46. “Christ the king” was instituted by Pope Pius XI in 1925 as a counter blast to Fascism but like this text from Matthew it is ambiguous and subject to many different interpretations. The text appears to be about what happens on the “Day of the Lord” when “All the nations” (Verse 32) are gathered before the Shepherd king. Salvation is doled out not on the basis of faith, which isn’t mentioned once, but on how we treat others so on the face of it is “salvation by works”. A warning to complacent Christians perhaps? However one interprets it, the main point is that Christ identifies with those who suffer, and love for them is a service to Christ who fills “all in all” (Ephesians 1:23)

 

As I wrote in my notes “Christ the King” was instituted by Pope Pius XI in 1925 as a counter blast to Fascism. It was meant to say of course that Christ is king of our hearts not any earthly leader or movement.

But of course, kingship in itself is a problematic concept for many evoking harsh and arbitrary dictatorial images and is linked with brute force, injustice and serfdom.

It was ever thus and the writers of the Bible advanced a hybrid vision of a perfect and just and compassionate King – that of a "shepherd" king.

This idealized “Shepherd king” in the minds of the prophets would be embodied in a future king from the house of David.

Skip forward 1000 years, you can see why the early Christian church who were all Jewish of course and steeped in the scriptures and prophesy were so keen to emphasise the link between Jesus and the house of David, because for them this perfect Shepherd king, the Messiah, the Christ had come in Jesus of Nazareth.

In that link they found continuity but also discontinuity. Jesus was not the Messiah anyone expected. He was not a military leader who would rid the land of an occupying army by force. He never took up arms or even opposed the Roman occupation as far as we know.

One incident does come to mind of course that has great bearing on the Spirit of the feast “Christ the King”. It is the incident when Jesus was asked whether it was right to pay taxes to Caesar and taking a coin with Caesar’s head on it said Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s but give to God what is God’s.

All Jews knew that everything belongs to God ultimately, so in that one brief exchange Jesus acknowledges temporal power but asserts that there is a power far above anything in this world to which everything is subject which of course is exactly the focus of this feast day.

Whatever temporal control we are subject to, or powers we show allegiance to, there is a greater moral and spiritual power that has a prior call on our hearts and minds.

We are followers of the way of Jesus.

It is true that Jesus never asks us to worship him but does ask countless times that we should follow him.

In this way Jesus, the eternal Christ, is king of our hearts, when we follow his example and teachings.

The other main way that the shepherd king was different to what had been expected by so many, is that instead of being a saviour for the Jewish people exclusively he was recognised as the saviour of the whole world.

This was a Shepherd King for the whole world and everything in it. This universalizing of the  message is why it is important that we retain our use and understanding of the word “catholic” which simply means universal and we affirm that in our creeds every time we meet to break bread together.

I am a Catholic Christian because I believe that Christ is God’s revelation to and for the whole world. Healing and wholeness for all things is the will of God, made explicit to us in the universal Christ.

Christ’s message written in his life and deeds and recorded in the New Testament are for all people in every age. They are words of unity, peace, compassion, mercy and salvation and are rooted in the Divine revelation that God is Love.

It is this Christ that we invite to be king of our hearts and follow – the Perfect Shepherd King of our lives and he has prior claim on our lives above all temporal powers and authorities.  

Christ has no body but yours

 

Sunday 15^th November – 2 before Advent

Zephaniah 1: 7, 12-18. The God of blood-curdling vengeance is given full rein here. What starts with carnage against Israel ends with carnage against the whole world. There is a certain logic here though. If the Jews are supposed to be “a light to the gentiles” but in fact produce only darkness, then their fate will be shared. At any rate the passage warns against indifference or neutrality towards God who will “not do good, nor will he do harm” (v.12)

1 Thessalonians 5: 1-11. There is no timetable for Christ’s return and so Paul urges constant readiness using martial metaphors of a breastplate and a helmet. In other words, for a Christian, the answer to the question “When will the day of the Lord come?” is always “Now!”. This is a message that Christians living 2000 years after these words were written still need to take on board. God stands at both the beginning and end of all life “the alpha and the omega” and the question is not so much of timing but remaining faithful to the promise that Christ means salvation.

Matthew 25: 14-30. So, “God supports the capitalist system” is probably not supposed to be the take-home message of this piece. A “talent” was a weight of about 100 pounds so about 6000 Denarii, so to have even one was an extraordinary amount of money to play with. To have five meant extreme wealth. The church has always allegorized the talent to mean something more like our modern understanding of “Talent” or more like “spiritual riches” or “spiritual gifts”. If you have been given these gifts we should use them, whatever they are, for the good of the whole church to build up the body. Squandering a spiritual gift is almost a direct rebuke to God. The message is of course that whatever we have, we should use it for the good of the body of Christ so that it functions well, firing on all cylinders!

It is a naturally difficult thing for a Christian to come to terms with but what we believe as Christians today doesn’t have to be exactly what Paul or the apostles believed then.

The Parousia or the return of Christ in glory – the so-named second coming- is a prime case in point. Most of the early church, Paul included, (at least when he wrote this first letter) believed in the imminent return of Christ in their lifetimes. The end of the world was nigh.

Christ would appear to everyone all at once all over the world and take his followers up in the sky to be with him forever and the world would be at an end

This belief, known as Millennialism, was no doubt a powerful galvanising force, gave them a sense of urgency and every religion has millennial movements within it, including from time to time Christianity.

What unites Millenialists from all religions through the ages, including the early Christian church, is one rather obvious fact – they were all wrong.

Christ did not come again in his lifetime as Paul expected to take those believers still alive into the clouds to be with Christ

They were wrong in the literal sense of course. But the symbolism of the coming of Christ in glory still has a central place in Christian faith but it has to be interpreted sensitively. And Anglicans, like mainstream Christians everywhere are not Biblical literalists. Even so, few Christians are willing to just disregard what is written in scripture, so we need to re-interpret the text in a careful and spiritual way.  

The underlying reality underpinning the belief in return of Christ is the final defeat of evil and the triumph of God’s purposes.

Jesus never appeared in the sky but what definitely did happen in those early years though is that the church came into being – the church being a community of people  who have been freed from the power of sin in their lives, and God rules as king in an inward and spiritual way. Christ is present when the body of Christ is present

This is a foreshadowing of the final coming of God’s kingdom – the day of the Lord – the coming again of Jesus on the clouds of heaven.

In the Bible the phrase “second coming” just doesn’t appear. It is an interpretation of the word “Parousia” literally the “being present” of Jesus.

The “being present” of Christ – the Parousia – the second coming – is imminent in every moment of time.  

For such a community of believers Christ has already come in glory because he lives in them and is the binding spirit that constitutes us as Christ’s body. And obviously this did happen in Paul’s lifetime.

We are the first-fruits of the great triumph of God at the end of time.

In this way, the theological and spiritual integrity of the texts is maintained not in the literal sense but re-imagined in the light of historical facts.

Christ is present when I act in a Christ-like way, when someone loves, when the spirit of Christ is evoked in the Eucharist.

And this body of Christ – this community that embodies the love of God - needs all hands on deck when it comes to expressing God’s love in our lives which means “not burying our talents in the ground” in the words of the gospel parable.

We all have different gifts and abilities, which is the meaning the slaves being given different amounts – 5, 2, and 1 talent but whatever we have been given we should use them to the full in the service of God.    

Christ present and active wherever you as a believer are is the presence of Christ in any and every situation and this way of perceiving the parousia of Christ – his being present – is what lies behind that famous piece of writing by Teresa of Avia.

 

 

 

 

Teresa of Avila (1515–1582)

Christ Has No Body

Christ has no body but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which he looks
Compassion on this world,
Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good,
Yours are the hands, with which he blesses all the world.
Yours are the hands, yours are the feet,
Yours are the eyes, you are his body.
Christ has no body now but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which he looks
compassion on this world.
Christ has no body now on earth but yours.

 

 

 

The way of Transformation

 8^th November - Remembrance Sunday – 3 before Advent

Amos 5: 18-24. This famous piece from Amos criticizing the sacrificial cult in Israel as ineffective as long as it was disconnected from justice and righteousness in society is as true for all modern worship today as it was then. Personal piety must be linked to just achieving justice in society so that at least for Amos religion and politics definitely do mix!

1 Thessalonians 4: 13-18. A piece of scripture often misinterpreted by fundamentalists and given to refer to what they call “the rapture”. This is actually a piece brimming over with hope concerning the future of fellow Christians who had died before the return of Christ which in the very early church Christians thought was imminent. Paul uses the only linguistic tools he has at his disposal, the language of “Jewish apocalyptic” informed by his belief in Jesus as the Messiah to try and explain what was happening  They were of course wrong in the prosaic physical sense – Jesus did not return - but right in the wider spiritual and theological sense that God wills the salvation of all things, so it doesn’t matter when you die. The guarantee of our own resurrection is based in the fact of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Matthew 25: 1-13. In this parable one could say (and I do!) that the ten bridesmaids represent all Christians and the fact they all fell asleep means that they all died before the return of Christ (see 1 Thessalonians above). But some had oil in their lamps, and some didn’t. Oil here represents the oil of good works – the outworking of faith in our character and actions without which our faith probably isn’t worth very much - The book of James has much to say on this point! This is not a parable to predict the number and fate of the damned but an exhortation to Christians to respond to Grace (the bridegroom) with the genuine light of goodness (the lamps)

 

 The overarching theme of today’s readings is transformation. Personal transformation in the case of the gospel parable, societal transformation in the case of the prophet Amos, and all based on that ultimate transformation from death to new life that underpins the entire Christian revelation.

On a day when we commemorate the millions who have died in warfare it is so obvious that such wholesale transformation is sorely needed.

Let’s start with the gospel parable which is directed towards Christian believers ourselves. The marriage feast is a symbol of the final consummation of all things and the bridegroom is Jesus. But the bridegroom is delayed (he doesn’t return immediately) and all the bridesmaids fall asleep which is a Biblical idiom meaning that they all died before Jesus returned.

When he did return, not all of them had oil in their lamps which means the oil of good works which makes them shine as lights in the world. And as a result Jesus didn’t recognise them as his own because they hadn’t allowed the Grace of God to transform their characters and their actions.

So this is a parable urging the change in people to become more Christ-like so that Christ himself will recognise himself in us.

This is no way negates the fact that we are saved by Grace, but Christian believers must surely respond to that Grace.

This is the major theme of the letter of James which I encourage people to take a look at, especially chapter two which ends with the famous verse “faith without works is dead”

But not only James. Paul too says of course, and it is axiomatic to our understanding of salvation that we are saved by Grace and this grace is made effective in our lives through faith.

As changed people we will naturally want to model the society we live in according to the same principles that guide our own lives which is what Amos was writing about.

He derides the Jerusalem cult for operating in a bubble completely divorced from the injustice, cheating, deceit and exploitation going on in Hebrew society as though it didn’t matter. Their personal piety was the only thing that mattered, even though the society in which it was situated was corrupt.

Amos writes, “Let Justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream”

So we have personal and societal transformation but why? Why should we want either and what basis for either change do we rest on and draw our strength and resolve?

They are both based on our faith in the resurrection of Jesus Christ which has always underpinned our faith. This is basically what Paul is saying. He states it within the context of people fretting that their friends were dying before the expected return of Christ and they were worried about what would be their destiny?

Paul asserts that they all share the same destiny because the Grace of God is all sufficient for all things whenever they died and whether Jesus has returned or not.  

And that message is a powerful one for remembrance Sunday. While we lay wreaths and commemorate their service and sacrifice and mourn the manner of their death in such terrible circumstances, we can be sure that our destinies are shared. Jesus died and was raised for the whole world. In death we are undivided.

For this act of remembrance to be effective in our lives it would force us to confront the systems, politics, and cultural norms that led to their untimely deaths in the first place.

We would let the grace of God flow though the very act of remembrance and allow it to change us and through the change effected through us, to subsequently change our societies.  

That is the overarching rationale of the Christian Way.