Sermon, Easter 6B

I spent Monday – Wednesday of last week just outside of Silverton at the Oregon Garden Resort for the annual clergy conference.  It’s a beautiful place with wonderful facilities, and the weather this year was absolutely perfect.

The official event title was “Worship Matters – Enticing others into the Reign of God.”  I’m not so sure how well the conference lived into the second part of that title, enticing others, but it certainly revolved around the first part: Worship Matters.  As you can guess, liturgy was the overall theme of our time together.

I won’t’ bore you with details, but it is important for you to know a few things about the conference.  Liturgy, as you know, is the work of the people.  What we do, how we do it, why we do it, and where we do it as a body are all liturgical issues we need to address.  Liturgy is vitally important to our church.  It should never be done lazily or sloppily.  It should always be done to the best of our ability.  Liturgy isn’t just what happens up there in the chancel, but liturgy encompasses all of us – it is the work of the people, every one of us present.

And whether we participate in a service that is snake-belly low, or participate in one so high you can’t see the altar because of the smoke from the incense, we should always give and offer our best.  It is in the liturgy where we most clearly encounter the Reign of God.  It is in the mystery of the liturgy where we catch a glimpse of that heavenly banquet that is to come.  Liturgy encompasses Sunday morning as well as the mid-week Eucharist, Evening Prayer and Compline at vestry meetings, prayers during potlucks, home communions and hospital visitations.  To appropriate a phrase from Paul, it is in the liturgy that we live and move and have our being.

In short, liturgy is the most important thing we do.  And doing it well is a worthy pursuit.

It’s why I plan things carefully.  It’s why we have a worship committee.  It’s why I will ask you to repeat your response if I feel you aren’t offering your best.

We often say that Episcopalians believe the Prayer Book.  We don’t believe IN the Prayer Book, but we believe it.  It shapes our prayers.  It shapes our theology.  It shapes us as we use it on a regular basis.  And the act that shapes us is the liturgy – the holy work of God’s holy people.

If you don’t believe me, let me ask a few questions:  What happens at baptism?  What is Communion?  What is a sacrament?  Your answers don’t simply pop up out of the blue.  Nor do they simply come from a bible passage here or there.  Your answers come from, and have been shaped by, the liturgy.  And if we are doing this right, if we allow the liturgy to live in and through us, if we project the liturgy into our daily lives, then Sunday isn’t the day we spend a couple of hours doing our Christian duty.  If we do liturgy right, then Sunday is the day that most outwardly reflects how we live every single day of our lives.

So how does liturgy inform our lives?  The Day of Pentecost is in two weeks.  On that day we celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit to the Church.  That is also one of the designated days for baptisms and the renewal of baptismal vows.  In that liturgy you will be asked a series of questions:  Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?  Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?

We always answer in the affirmative, but what is the liturgy asking us to do?  How does it challenge us?  Who is our neighbor?  Are we willing to strive for justice?  Are we willing to seek and serve Christ in all persons?  Are we willing to respect the dignity of every human being, even those who are different from us?  Do we grasp the meaning of all?  Does all really mean all, or does it only mean all people who belong to our tribe?

Our liturgy also includes the lectionary, those readings assigned to certain days of the year in a three-year cycle.  Our lesson today comes from the tenth chapter of Acts.  By itself it might seem unremarkable, a story about baptism and the gift of the Spirit.  But inject it into the lectionary cycle and the liturgy and it becomes something very remarkable indeed.

Acts 10 is the story of the Holy Spirit being poured out onto the Gentiles.  Up to this point, all references to baptisms and the Holy Spirit have been mostly confined to Jews in Jerusalem and Samaritans.  But now the Gentiles are getting involved.  This is a precursor to our own celebration of Pentecost in two weeks.

In this passage, God’s Spirit is being poured out on not only the Jews, but on uncircumcised Gentiles.  The Jews, as the chosen people of God, are upset about God including others.  It is Peter who stands up and argues for their full inclusion into the baptized family of God.  In this passage, and in Chapter 10, Peter comes to understand that all means ALL.  He understands that those we consider Others are considered by God to be fully equal members.

Last week the voters of North Carolina passed constitutional Amendment One, an amendment which not only bans any and all forms of homosexual unions, but also has the power to banish, shun and abuse those who happen to be gay.  Women and minorities are constantly being treated as second-class citizens in areas of pay, voting rights and access to health care.  People suspected of being illegal aliens (read “people with brown skin”) are subject to random search, seizure and arrest.  The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that officials my strip search any person arrested for any offense before placing them in jail, even if there is no reason to suspect contraband.

How do today’s readings of love and inclusion inform your reaction to those situations?  How do these situations oppose our liturgical claim to strive for justice?  How is our claim to respect the dignity of every human being represented in these issues?  How does a liturgy that presents a foretaste of God’s heavenly banquet position us to respond to acts that are designed to keep out and oppress Others?

The liturgy is our life, not just a nice hour-long show on Sunday morning.  So when faced with the oppression of others, I believe we should look first to our liturgy; because it is here where we find examples of gospel justice and God’s love.  And if the liturgy is where the Reign of God is most clearly reflected, then how will you draw on this most important part of your life in your treatment of Others?