Joyful Ambassadors for Christ by The Rev. Bennett A. Brockman, Ph.D, Deputy Rector
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Sunday, October 12, 2014
Philippians 4:1-9 Psalm 106:1-6, 19-23 II Corinthians 5:14-21 Matthew 22: 1-14
I am very glad be here and to be able to help out while your rector is on medical disability leave; and of course I’m very sorry for the circumstances that bring me here. I know Father Hamer loves you and this parish, and you love him. We will all be praying earnestly for his speedy return to health.
On behalf of the parish, I want to most cordially thank Bishop Smith and Father Kirkpatrick, and Deacon Bonnie Matthews for so selflessly caring for the parish during Fr. Hamer’s absence, and to thank all the fine preachers who continue to bring us the Word from this pulpit, and all the excellent staff members, lay leaders and volunteers who keep this parish faithfully doing God’s work here.
If you happen to be a keen observer of such things you will have noticed that I’ve omitted the prescribed lesson from the Hebrew scriptures this morning, and in its place substituted the passage from II Corinthians 5.
The reason is simple. That passage really defines what I consider my ministry to be all about. I confess I was going to have us read that passage today that no matter what the appointed lessons were.
As a boy growing up I belonged to a church youth organization modeled on the Boy Scouts that included memorizing scripture passages as a part of advancing in rank. And II Cor. 5: 17-19 defined our calling and purpose. A bit grandiosely, we understood our calling to be “ambassadors for Christ,” in Paul’s words.
I have to acknowledge that those word of this passage stuck, and I want to say at the outset of our time together that proclaiming and trying to live out the ministry of reconciliation that Paul describes is what I hope we can do together here.
“God was in Christ reconciling people to each other and to God.” So, along with those words, my theme today is from Philippians—rejoice in the Lord always.
And I rejoice first of all that the music we’re singing proclaims that theme—and that both the Gospel and Paul’s words to the Corinthians explain how we can experience and live in that joy.
Now as the fine little book that you are reading as part of your stewardship awareness this fall—John Templeton’s Thrift and Generosity—explains, joy is not the same thing as happiness, and something I could never get my college students to understand, is hardly ever to be confused with “having a good time.”
Joy is something a whole lot deeper. It is an awareness of well-being in the very core of our deep self, at the heart of our existence. I’d describe it as a powerful sense of being aligned with the loving and creative power that brought the universe into existence and charts its course—and our own—with loving although often unknowable purpose. Joy is, in J R R Tolkien’s words, “beyond the walls of the world.” And it is available—and so many of you here know this—even when our immediate circumstances are far from happy. Even when we are beset by pain, even when fear lurks around the corner or close at hand, this joy, this ability to rejoice in the Lord always and not let any kind of care overwhelm us—this joy frees us from the tyranny of pain and liberates us from fear.
And I want to suggest to you that one magnificent way we can know this fine joy and walk continually in it is by taking to heart Paul’s invitation to be ambassadors of Christ, ambassadors of reconciliation.
And I believe you in this parish already live out and bear witness in so many powerful ways to what reconciliation means—making right something that had been wrong. During the week, AA and other group-help programs meet here. And even if alcohol has never been the false god of your particular life or mine, all of us know what it means to worship some false god and to need and be grateful for God’s mercy, just as the Psalm says. We know God’s reconciling love first hand and are grateful for it.
Next, look around this parish, and you will see people present born in many different nations—I recently called Trinity the Church version of the United Nations.
And over our main front door is a rainbow banner. It proclaims to me this parish’s marvelous living into the reconciling truth that God creates human beings with individual gender and sexual identities. You proclaim that God calls us human beings to treat all of God’s children not only with dignity and respect, but with the welcoming love that God displays toward each of us, and with the invitation to share equally in this calling to reconcile the world to God and people to each other in Jesus Christ.
And that rainbow also bears witness to another magnificent testimony this parish embodies: if you look around, you will see every skin tone that human beings can wear, and that reality testifies to the splendor of God’s own nature, all of us being created in God’s image, and it is as splendid and awe- and wonder- and joy-inspiring as the most magnificent rainbow you’ve ever seen.
Weren’t you thrilled this week that Malala Yusafzai and Kailash Satyarthi jointly won the Nobel Peace Prize?-- A grand and globally visible manifestation of the human longing for, and capacity to achieve, reconciliation by making education equally available to girls and boys and by ending exploitation of children. It’s a reminder of Archbishop Tutu who received the Nobel Peace Prize thirty years ago for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that brought racial peace to South Africa.
And I believe that what you are doing so well here, and what Malala and Kailash are doing without calling it that, is that you are walking in the Way of the Cross. As our great collect for Fridays says, yes, you are walking in the Way of the Cross and you are finding it none other than the way of life and peace, of joy beyond the walls of the world, and of the peace that passes all understanding. The Way of the Cross is reconciliation between God and human beings and God, and human beings with each other. It is the way of self-giving love, love that focuses on reconciliation, not retribution.
And how did you get there, to that amazing place? By putting fear aside. By trusting God to help you bridge the gulf that our basic human nature digs—the fear of what appears to be Other, with a capital O. Marilynne Robinson states the sad truth: “Fear is the default condition of being human” [NYT Magazine, Oct. 5, 2014].
But you, you are putting that fear behind you. In the metaphor of Jesus’ troubling parable, you have accepted the invitation to ENTER the wedding feast.And by being here and bringing your friends here and by so generously supporting the mission and ministry that Trinity Church brings to this neighborhood, this city, this state and nation and world, you are being doers of the word, and not hearers only [James 1:22].
How many people do you know who declare they are spiritual but not religious? SBNR folk. I think SBNR folk are those who are intrigued by the awe and serenity that emerge from spiritual tradition and practice and look at it longingly from afar. They are the folks in Jesus’ parable who come in off the streets in response to the invitation to attend the wedding feast.
But they have not yet put on their wedding garment. They have not set aside their fear. They are merely witnessing what is possible. They are spiritually and emotionally on the outside, looking in the window. They’re not experiencing the joy. But you in this place, you have put on your wedding garment. You have stepped beyond the fear and are joyful participants, feasting at the marriage banquet of the Lamb of God. You are wearing gorgeous robes, rainbow hued, robes washed in the blood of the Lamb and made spotless unto the day of the Lord.
You are living the joy and bearing witness to it. You are ambassadors for Christ and by your lives giving other people whose lives are closely bound with yours courage not only to enter this marriage feast and to see the joy, but to step outside their own fear and put on their own wedding garments and live in the joy and wonder that is the birthright of every citizen of the City of God.
Friday I was celebrating communion with the folks in the Caleb Hitchcock wing of the Duncaster Retirement Community. Now when I drove into the place I noticed construction equipment, a big excavation. And a sign that said, danger, blasting zone.
Which of course I forgot all about. Until during communion I held up the paten with the bread on it and said, “This is my body, given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” And at that instant, there was a great BOOM and the building shook, and of course we all jumped out of our skin—and then laughed out loud. We were all thinking the same thing, I’m sure—“OK boss, that was a little dramatic —even for you.
We need little reminders like that from time. I’m here. You’re here. And then the reminder—the Holy Spirit is here, and in the words of the fine old hymn, “to know it’s the Spirit of the Lord.” “The Lord is at hand,” Paul says. And you know what, that’s enough. We know this is the marriage feast and we are living in it all the time, living ambassadors, walking in joy. And that’s enough, and MORE THAN ENOUGH. HOW CAN WE NOT RESPOND WITH GENEROSITY TO GOD’S GLORY SO RICHLY MANIFESTED AS IT IS HERE?
Do you remember Paul’s words to the Ephesians that Bishop Smith reminded us of last week, words that close Evening Prayer? What did he say? Glory to God? What? “Glory to God, whose power, working in us can do more than we can ask or imagine.” And yes, “Glory to God, from generation to generation in the church, and in Christ Jesus for ever and ever.” AMEN? AMEN.