During
this long Season after Pentecost, I asked you to listen for the connections
between the first lesson and the gospel.
I said that sometimes those connections would be easy to find and other times
they would be difficult. This is one of
the more difficult times with Isaiah talking about the restoration of Jerusalem
and Jesus sending out missionaries before him.
To be honest, I wasn’t able to make any kind of connection and turn it
into a sermon.
Thankfully
today’s gospel is full of material. From
focusing on Jesus’ travel plans, to God’s need for us to work for the kingdom,
to complete trust in God to the joy that comes from total commitment, there is
no shortage of material on which to preach.
With all of that material just waiting to be harvested, it certainly
would have been easy to preach a missionary sermon. It would have been easy to preach on how the
harvest is just as plentiful today with just as few laborers as it was in
Jesus’ day, and how we need to get out there and get to work.
Instead,
I found myself drawn to verses 5-7: Whatever
house you enter, first say, “Peace to this house.” If anyone shares in peace, your peace will
rest on them. Remain in the same house,
eating and drinking what they provide.
Do not move from house to house.
For
some reason this has been a week for faith and doubt. I’ve talked with people about being spiritual
but not religious. I’ve talked with
people about trying to understand how a loving God can hate a specific group of
people. And I’ve talked with people
about the divinity of Jesus. All of
those conversations kept bringing me back to verses 5-7.
Remain. Remain at the house where you are
welcomed. Remain there and eat what is
provided. Remain there and do not move
from house to house.
Peace
to this house. This was to be the
greeting of the missionaries to the homes they went to. It sounds like there was an assumption that
they just showed up, knocked on the door and greeted the people with this
blessing. If that greeting wasn’t
rejected outright, the missionaries were welcome. St. Augustine picked up on the randomness of
this and said, “Since we don’t know who shares our peace, leave no one out, set
no one aside.”
This
speaks not only to “out there” evangelism, but to “in here” welcoming. The missionaries were looking for a house of
peace. People who come here are also
looking for a house of peace. We need to
take Augustine’s advice and extend our peace to all who enter these doors,
leaving no one out, setting no one aside; for God is the God of love who yearns
for people to seek him out, and woe to us if our behaviors and attitudes keep
people from drawing closer to God.
This
should lead us to some self-examination.
Are we a house of peace? Do
people who are searching see or feel the presence of God here? Do we have any hidden behaviors or attitudes
that would keep people from coming close to God?
As I
said, this has been a week for faith and doubt.
Part of religious doubt comes from trying to reconcile ancient stories
with our modern sensibilities. Or it
comes from the belief that churches are full of hypocrites: people claiming to love their neighbors but
then acting in ways that are discriminatory, bigoted and judgmental. But if we are a house of peace, then those
people who are searching and struggling with doubt can have a safe place in
which to question. And it’s in the
questioning that we learn.
Here’s
where I think this gets interesting:
Remain in the same house, eating and drinking what they provide. Do not move from house to house.
Our
doubts lead us to question; and questioning is okay, it’s how we learn. I think the trouble comes when we demand
immediate answers to our questions; or we desire easy answers that make us feel
good. This, I believe, is at the heart
of church shopping and hopping. People
say they are looking for a place that feeds them. What they often mean, I think, is that they
want a place that only offers what they like.
But
if St. Luke’s is a place of peace, then the admonishment to not move from house
to house applies to us as much as the missionaries. Jesus tells us to remain here. Remain in this house of peace. Remain with your questions and doubts. Remain with those already here and struggle
with us as we work through our questions and doubts together. Remain here and eat and drink that which you
are freely given. Remain here and eat
and drink with us those holy mysteries which are the body and blood of our
Savior Jesus Christ.
Think
back to the second Sunday of Easter. Do
you remember the gospel for that day? In
a word – Thomas. Thomas had questions. Thomas had doubts. He was not with the other ten disciples who
met Jesus in that house with the closed and locked doors. He did not believe their testimony. He wanted proof.
But
notice that Thomas did not leave that house for another one. That house held his support system. That house held his friends and spiritual
family. That house was a house of
peace. Jesus himself said, “Peace be
with you,” as he entered. And that house
was big enough to hold his questions and doubts.
We
are all at varying stages of faith and belief.
Some believe that the earth was created in a span of 144 hours and is
only about 6000 years old. Some believe
that the earth has evolved over a period of 4.5 billion years in a universe
that is 13.77 billion years old. Some
believe that there is no valid religious barrier to full equality between race,
gender or sexual orientation. Some
believe in full equality as long as everyone is heterosexual. Some believe in the virgin birth, while
others are not so sure.
Faith
is an interesting thing. Aspects of it
change over time. We see things
differently as we grow and change. Our
faith must be strong enough to maintain a sense of certainty, but it must not
be so weak that everything must be certain.
It must also be strong enough to welcome doubts, but not be so weak that
those doubts erode it away.
As I
said, this has been a week for faith and doubt.
This week has reminded me that it’s important for you to know that we
can live into the tension of faith and doubt.
We are not a house where everybody thinks or believes the same. We are not a house that demands strict
adherence to a tightly defined list of authorized and approved beliefs.
We
are a house that allows different opinions.
We are a house that welcomes questions and doubts. We are a house that welcomes people, as St.
Augustine said, without setting anyone aside.
At our core, we strive to be a house of peace.
Remain
here with your faith. Remain here with
your questions and doubts. Remain here
and eat and drink of the holy food provided.
Remain here.
Peace
be with you, and peace be upon this house.
Amen.
Posts
3 comments:
Thank you for writing this, and thank you for putting it up here. I bounced around churches for a while, because I did not feel that a blessing was extended anywhere. Spiritual vagrancy was easier, except for on Slacktivist, and I'm really not sure that counts. But here (although some hours from St Luke), I think it might be time to admit defeat, of some strange and joyful sort, and go knock on the Episcopal church just off campus. (Er, sorry, the login does not want to work with me, for some reason.)
Thank you.
Based on the reaction from the parish, this was one of my better sermons.
"Joyful defeat" -- I like that.
Blessings in your journey.
Thank you again. I'm wandering back because I do not think I have ever gone to a church that was both welcoming and sincere and still cared about the Word. I kept bracing myself for the "...except for you" after the "All are welcome," but it didn't come, and although I should probably feel like a heretic, Episcopal services being just about the opposite of Baptists, I don't. So - thank you.
Post a Comment