Chirst has no body now, but yours

I am translating parts of our Chaplaincy's webpages to English which is much overdue as the pages were published last spring. Better late than never, though. The following quote is at a section where we talk about social justice and the church. It is a favourite of mine.

Christ has no body now, but yours.
No hands, no feet on earth, but yours.
Yours are the eyes through which
Christ looks compassion into the world.
Yours are the feet
with which Christ walks to do good.
Yours are the hands
with which Christ blesses the world.

St. Teresa of Avila

The beauty of my Lord

The following prayer popped up on my Facebook wall this morning and as I have a deep, deep love for all things Celtic it could not but touch me - deeply :). 


May I arise this morning
feeling your warmth
embracing me,
conscious of your love
forgiving me,
knowing your peace
within me,
feeling your Spirit
strengthen me,
hearing your whisper
encouraging me.
In all I do
and in all I say
may my life this day
and all days
reflect
the beauty of my Lord.

- Celtic morning prayer from Faith and Worship

May you be blessed

May you be blessed by living God, holy and eternal, Giver of Life.
May you be blessed by the Son of God, the promise of grace, living hope.
May you be blessed by the fresh and lush Spirit, the spring of joy and strength.
May you and all you love be blessed by the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Translated by me from a blessing by Heli Pruuki.

Doubting Thomas

Had I not studied theology I would have loved to have studied history. This sermon is a combination of a historian’s point of view to Thomas Didymus and mine. The name of the historian is Nathan Albright.

Thomas Didymus was so named because he was a twin – Didymus means twin as does Thomas in Armaic. Thomas is traditionally believed to have sailed to India in 52AD to spread the Christian faith among the Jews living in Kerala at the time. He is supposed to have landed at the ancient port of Muziris near Kodungalloor. Rather unfairly to Thomas his most enduring legacy is, however, to be regarded as the original “doubting Thomas.”

If you haven’t studied theology then it may be that you have not come across Gnosticism but Thomas (without his own doing) was a hero of the Gnostics. They forged a gospel and named it the Gospel of Thomas. Thus, Thomas has an importance beyond Christianity to the Gnostic sects. While the biblical (and true) Thomas appears to have been of a rather a rationalistic persuasion with a somewhat dark and pessimistic nature, the Gnostic Thomas is an odd dealer of bizarre Gnostic teachings.

The Gospel of Thomas was probably written in the first century by an early Gnostic sect. It has an odd organization, being made up of 114 sayings, most of them rather odd. This book has achieved popularity again in our time thanks to its inclusion as part of a Gnostic “Jesus Project” and its inspiration of certain parts of the novel The DaVinci Code. Most of the Gospel of Thomas appears to be a highly dualistic work, contrasting dark and light and there are also highly misogynistic leanings (misogyny meaning hatred of women). One example is a statement that the female element must make itself male.

The reason I take this up is the popularity of the book The DaVinci Code and also the fact that not all that sounds Christian is, in fact, Christian.

Returning back to Thomas as the Bible tells about him, he was probably not considered a high leadership character among the twelve. However, his loyalty to Jesus Christ was absolute. He appears to have known Peter, Andrew, James, and John before becoming a disciple himself. There are a few incidents recorded of his role among the apostles, but nowhere near as many as apostles like Peter or John had. Still, among the recorded incidents involving Thomas we have examples of doctrinal musings, stubborn loyalty to Christ, and fellowship with his fellow apostles. Thomas was a well-respected and constant member of the apostles.

Thomas’ popularity and reputation are somewhat paradoxical. Thomas is popular for all the wrong reasons. Among Christians Thomas is not often considered as a positive example although his reputation is unearned, as he was no less skeptical of the resurrection of Christ than the other apostles. Thomas was certainly not perfect but neither were any of the other disciples. 

Besides the lists of apostles in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Acts, the only mentions of Thomas occur in the Gospel of John. One reason for this was the need to combat the fake Gospel of Thomas. which had come out before the Gospel of John was written.

The four incidents in which Thomas is portrayed represent an apostle in a variety of circumstances. In the first incident, we find Thomas urging his fellow disciples to go with Jesus to Judea even as Christ proclaimed his own upcoming death. This is the act of a loyal disciple, even if a somewhat gloomy one given that Thomas was expecting Jesus to die there and his followers to end up with the same predicament.

The second incident finds Thomas pondering the imminent departure of Jesus and wondering how he can find the way to follow Him. A serious and loyal disciple is struggling with understandable sadness at the thought of Jesus dying.

The third, and most famous incident is today’s Gospel reading. It shows Thomas doubting that Christ has resurrected and being gently convinced of the truth of the resurrection.

The fourth and final incident records Thomas (as well as certain other disciples) going fishing with Simon Peter, James, John, Nathanael, and two other apostles. This is when Peter is restored as the leader of the twelve after his denials on the night Jesus was taken. In these incidents we find Thomas as a solid and loyal member of the twelve.

Looking at today’s Gospel reading, the setup is that ten of the elven apostles were together when Jesus Christ appeared to them. For whatever reason, Thomas was not there. To poor Thomas’s lasting discredit he did not see the resurrected Christ as soon as the other ones did. After all, all of the disciples doubted Christ return some of them disbelieving Mary Magdelene and the other disciples who first saw the resurrected Christ.

Thomas then stated that he would not believe that Christ had returned unless he saw the print of the nails in Christ’s hands and put his finger in the spear wound in Jesus’ side. These are harsh words one might expect Thomas to have soon regretted, and it is likely that he said them out of intense grief over the death of Jesus. The way I see it, is that he did not want to be told that Jesus was alive when he himself had seen Jesus die. To give room for hope only to have it crushed again was not something he could deal with. Thus, he chose not to give room for hope in the first place.

Jesus was gentle in dealing with Thomas. Jesus knew what Thomas had said, and told him to look at the wounds in his hand and feel the wound in the side. And, thus, Thomas believed. Personally I think Thomas’s reaction was recorded for all of us to read in the Bible so that we would know that when we doubt we are doing nothing different from the apostles and that God understands us. In that sense Thomas honest if harsh reaction gives hope to all doubting thomases.

Thomas was one of the Twelve, part of the inner circle of Jesus’ earthly ministry. If you and I notice a resemblance to Thomas in our own lives, we can be reassured that God understands and loves us.

The loyalty of Thomas to Jesus was commendable. Thomas was willing to follow Jesus  to the death.  Thomas’ skepticism was that of a genuine seeker of truth, for when proof of Jesus Christ’s resurrection (in the form of Christ Himself) was presented, Thomas believed. Furthermore, Thomas genuinely sought the company of his fellow disciples and valued fellowship.

Forgiven

Sermon

From lack of reverence for truth and beauty;

from a calculating or sentimental mind;

from going along with mean and ugly things:

O God, deliver us.

From cowardice that dares not face truth;

laziness content with half‑truth;

or arrogance that thinks we know it all:

O God, deliver us.

From artificial life and worship;

from all that is hollow or insincere:

O God, deliver us.

From being dull, pompous, or rude;

from putting down our neighbors:

O God, deliver us.

From cynicism about others;

from intolerance or cruel indifference:

O God, deliver us.

From being satisfied with things as they are,

in the church or in the world;

from failing to share you indignation about injustice:

O God, deliver us.

From selfishness, self‑indulgence, or self‑pity:

O God, deliver us.

From token concern for the poor,

for lonely or loveless people;

from confusing faith with good feeling,

or love with wanting to be loved:

O God, deliver us.

For everything in us that may hide your light:

O God, deliver us.

On Monday here in Finland YLE broadcasted a program about a woman who travels around Finland praying for people. She also teaches and has stated that severe illnesses like cancer and depression are caused by the devil.

After the program bishops and other representatives of the Church of Finland reacted and stated very firmly and clearly that this is not the view of the church of Finland. It is irresponsible to scare people who are already vulnerable with talk about the devil somehow being the cause of their illness.

So the question about possession and exorcism is by no means only something connected to the time of Jesus; The point of the Gospel Reading of this Sunday of course not even being that but rather doubt and sin.

Those of you who were at the service last time you might remember these words from my sermon  about Jesus’ second temptation:

Dramatic signs, even when they are from God, do not produce faith; they only strengthen the faith of those who already believe. Demanding sensational proof is not evidence of faith but of doubt. To test God is to doubt God. And to doubt God is not to trust Him, and not to trust Him is sin which is, of course, what Satan wanted Jesus to do. 

Both the media and the churches themselves very often fall into the trap of talking about sinful actions. There are huge words like adultery and murder. And - for the most part since sex is so wonderful - sins that have to do with it fascinate us most.

A multitude of things are sinfully wonderful be it lingerie, chocolate or hair conditioner. But the thing is sin is neither wonderful nor has it any redeeming qualities. It is a part of the human condition and the part that was not originally supposed to be there at all. God did not create us to be sinful.

Sin, to put it simply, is all of that which comes in between us and God. And there is nothing wonderful about that. Actions are in fact a minor part of the problem. By far the biggest problem is our attitude. The very same one that cannot see God’s work when it’s being performed right in front of ones eyes like in our Gospel reading. It manifests itself in things like arrogance, greed, and cynicism.

Sin takes many forms. We forget to value truth and beauty. We make calculated choices and we get sentimental when we really ought not to. We go along with mean and ugly thoughts, actions and words. Facing truth is often times the very last thing we want to be doing and half-truth serves us fine. Other times we’re pretty convinced that we know it all and those questioning our truth are just plain stupid. Of course we know better.

In our time of huge media influence artificial life in front of the television seems more real than our actual lives and so we let it determine what we regard as beautiful, worth striving for. And to top it of we let it creep into our life of worship by looking for big feelings and yet more feelings. We suffer when people are insincere and yet we turn around and are insincere ourselves. We hate hollow words and gestures but that is what we find ourselves uttering and doing, too. 

All of us are sometime dull, pompous or rude to others and a bit of gossip never hurt anyone right? We get cynical not only about others but about politics, teachers, doctors and so on and so on. And, so, we start to become intolerant to others and what is even worse we get indifferent. Aids, global warming, wars, famine. Horrible things of course but what are we supposed to do?

 “I” has become much more important that we. We are selfish, we indulge ourselves and at times when life shows it’s nastier side we happily allow ourselves to crawl into a hole of self-pity. We confuse faith with good feeling and yell on the top of our lungs to God when it turns out that it isn’t so. And we hurt ourselves and others time after time with relationships that are based on our need to be loved but not on our own willingness to love.

All of this and everything else in our mindset that hides God’s light in our lives this is what sin really is about. Murder, rape or armed robbery are awful things to do to others, yes, absolutely. But the minute raise of an eyebrow or a smirk in our face, that can hurt and destroy so much, too.

Have I managed to get you feeling awful, yet? Honestly this is really not the point. The point is that we as Christians and as God’s beloved need to stop pretending that we can do it all, to be faithful, sinless and perfect. We cannot. If we could Jesus would have died for no reason at all.

We really needed to be forgiven. We need to be forgiven. And we will continue to need to be forgiven. That is why we pray for forgiveness in every service and that is why God gave us Holy Communion. So that we would not only hear the words but become one with God’s Son and God’s forgiveness in the bread and the wine.

As a Lutheran I believe that we are at the same time holy and sinful. This sermon has been so predominantly about our sinfulness that I want you to remember this. We ARE holy at the very same time as we are sinners. We are forgiven and will be forgiven. We are loved. We are accepted exactly as we are and there is nothing God wants more than to start making our lives and us even more holy. So, be not afraid but stand in front of God at awe of His love toward you, ask for forgiveness and accept that you are forgiven and move forward.

Standing in God’s presence means standing in the presence of  absolute truth and absolute love. There is nothing He does not already know and yet it does not stop Him from loving us and never will. As you accept forgiveness forgive yourself, too. Who are you to condemn yourself if God himself does not choose to do so. We are forgiven; thoroughly, wonderfully and absolutely.

Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children, and live in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

Live as children of light —  for the fruit of the light is found in all that is good and right and true. Try to find out what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. 

Keith's Christ the King Sunday's sermon

Questions for the children: — What is a king?

— How do you know if someone is a king? Have you ever seen one?

— When you see pictures of Jesus, is he usually wearing a crown?

— Can you please draw for us a picture, either just of a king – any king – or of Jesus as a king?

______________________

Children move to Play and Pray area

______________________

I could ask the same questions of the adults …

When we call Christ our ‘King’, we are of course using a metaphor, an image. – 

I said “of course”, but most of the time we don’t stop to notice how much of our language is metaphorical, specially for talking about complicated things .. including almost all our religious language

So what does this image of Christ as king mean to each of us? It seems to me that kingship is an image of (1) the utter difference in scale between us and God; and (2) of God’s power as Creator and as Judge. Yet Jesus then undercuts that, when he says: The kingdom of God is within you.

And it’s a bit odd to use this metaphor of Jesus as King here, and now. It looks back to a time when all the power in the state was concentrated in one set of hands. Here: in Finland, where we have a republic, headed by very down-to-earth characters like Uncle Sauli and his cool wife Jenni, or comfy Auntie Tarja ..

And when we look at royalty in Europe, riddled not only with privilege but also with scandal – royal supercelebs…

And now: in the 21st century, when for the past five or six centuries Western culture has been trying to get away from that idea of all the power being concentrated in one person. This is particularly true for the Constitution of the United States, where the three functions of government are strictly separated from each other: making the law (Congress), running the country (the President’s Administration), and the courts and judges that deal with things when the law has been broken. In Europe the separation is not usually quite so extreme, but we do regard the independence of the judiciary as a crucial features of a democratic society. Where the government can interfere with the courts, we talk about ‘show trials’ and call it a tyranny.

Just this week, when President Mori of Egypt suspended all rights of appeal against his Presidential rulings, one of the criticisms of him was that “He’s behaving just like a pharaoh” … that’s to say, like an oldfashioned king …

So: should we talk about Jesus as President? (It doesn’t feel right, though, does it?)

What does ‘kingship’ suggest? Power; authority; magnificence; remoteness; Otherness. This image of Christ as King takes us back along way in history: to the way that political power functioned in Jesus‘ own time: Pilate, as Roman Governor of Judea, represented the Emperor, and he was not only the governor but also the senior judge; and in all the civilizations described in the Old Testament; or indeed probably in the majority of human civilizations so far on this planet.

And it is meant positively (unlike the comments on most individual kings mentioned in Scripture!)

But Jesus said to Pilate: “You say that I am a king; but my kingdom is not of this world…”; and to his disciples and followers: not only: “Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand!”; but also: “The kingdom of God is within you…”

Maybe, for some of you, the Biblical imagery of heaven, which is often associated with the feast of Christ the King, really works as a way of thinking about the kingdom of God. I have to say it doesn’t work very well for me: all those descriptions in the Book of Revelation – or in Isaiah or Ezekiel or Daniel – of thousands or thousands, or ten-thousands of ten-thousands of angels, and the throne and the gold and the precious stones. It’s intended, of course, to convey something of the majesty of the Creator. And I do recognize and respect that sense of awe at God’s magnificence; but what I love and respect more is the counter-imagery that Jesus uses: that the kingdom of God is within us.

In your heart (to use a different image), in your feelings, your convictions, your conscience, your hopes and fears. God, not in the whirlwind or the fire or the storm, but a still small voice. If we can get that right – if we can recognize the voice of God quietly speaking to us in our inner selves – then, and only then, we will also be able to fulfil our roles in God’s kingdom.

Keith's sermon Jan 13

Sermon at TCIC            

2nd Sunday of Epiphanytide: Baptism of Jesus

Stories, and the telling of stories, are at the heart of our Christian faith. Each week, when we gather for worship, we tell stories – from the Hebrew Scriptures, which we usually call the Old Testament, and from the Christian Scriptures of the New Testament.

And in fact the Eucharist itself is a kind of storytelling:
of Jesus at the Last Supper, part of the larger story of his whole life and work: his birth and growing up and preaching ministry, his arrest and death, and his resurrection –

And the calendar of the Christian year, too, is a kind of mega-story, – particularly from Advent into Christmas and Epiphany, and then on into Lent and Holy Week and Easter.

I love these stories at the heart of our Christian faith. As Christians, we’re not just stating some general principle such as “The universe is meaningful”, or even just that “God is a loving god”; we’re saying that it happened: that at this point in time and in this place, God’s reality and ours intersected in a unique way, in the life of this extra-ordinary man from Palestine two thousand years ago, Jesus.

And today, on the Second Sunday in Epiphanytide, we remember and re-tell one of the most significant moments in Jesus’ life: [a moment which was the starting point for his three years of preaching the Kingdom; leading to his arrest, trial, and execution; and the even greater story of his resurrection:] the story of Jesus’ baptism, by John, in the River Jordan. 

In the story-sequence of the Church’s year, the festival we call Epiphany – celebrating the mysterious scholars from the east who find their way to the infant Jesus in Bethlehem using a star as their GPS satnav –  comes right after Christmas. All across Christmas, we have the wonderfully rich narrative of the Nativity; and the story of the Magi, with the strange encounter in Bethlehem, is then the final episode: the first revelation of the Christ to the Gentiles.

[Chronologically, of course, this should lead to the terror of Herod’s slaughter of all the baby boys in Bethlehem, and the Holy Family’s hurried flight into exile in Egypt, but liturgically, we’ve already remembered that terrible part of the story, on 28 December.]

But this festival of the Epiphany, which we celebrated a week ago, is also Episode #1 in a new Season of the Church’s year. As many of your probably know, the name of the feast of the Magi, Epiphany, means in Greek ‘Showing’  or ‘Revelation’ – and that is why this following Season is called Epiphanytide that is to say, the Season of Revealings.

The structure of Epiphanytide, in the readings each week, is a new round of stories: stories which offer a series of epiphanies, showings, linked not chronologically, like the Christmas or Easter narratives, but thematically. Here, Jesus is revealed as God-in-Man

So, if you follow the Gospel stories over the next few weeks, you will hear about Jesus’ first miracle: the changing of water into wine, at Cana-in-Galilee; about his proclamation in the synagogue in Nazareth, that Isaiah’s prophecy of the Messiah was now being fulfilled; and in some churches, finally, just before we enter Lent, the story of his Transfiguration. In these stories, these epiphanies, then, we are given a series of glimpses of Jesus’ ‘other dimension’, as it were.

But what does baptism mean? and what did it mean for Jesus? For John, baptism was an act of cleansing from sin: Repent, be baptized, and be saved! And that meaning is also very central in the Christian understanding of baptism, too. None of us is free from the imperfection of sin; but through the act of sacramental washing, we are cleansed from the consequences of that imperfection and made full members of Christ’s church.

But what did baptism mean for Jesus? I think it was something he needed to do as a kind of rite of passage: a solemn turning away and moving on from what his life had been up to this point, to the new phase that lay ahead. We know very little about his childhood years, and nothing about his early adulthood; but from the fact that none of the Gospel writers have anything to tell us, we can perhaps assume that it was not so out-of-the-ordinary: helping in Joseph’s carpentry shop in Nazareth,  and perhaps, with his brothers, taking over responsibility for the shop when Joseph couldn’t run it any longer. That at least is how the local people seem to have thought  of him:

Isn’t this the carpenter’s son? Isn’t his mother called Mary? And aren’t his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And aren’t all his sisters with us? So where did this man get all this from?  (Matthew 13: 55-56)

But now, at the height of John’s mission of repentance and baptism, Jesus comes to him and asks to be baptized, — insists, when John protests. He says: Let it be so; because we must do all that God wants us to do. The Contemporary English Version translation, that we use for our Readings, paraphrases this very simply, and says: we must do all that God wants us to do; but the phrase that Jesus uses is to fulfil righteousness. This is probably a reference to a Hebrew concept, Tzidkat HaShem, ‘the righteousness of the Lord’, which is a phrase used about Moses, to highlight his holiness. In being baptized by John, therefore, Jesus is perhaps accepting the role which has been passed down to him in Jewish tradition: the role of the Messiah. And then there is this moment of epiphany, when the Spirit comes down upon him, and those present hear God’s voice: This is my Son, the Beloved, in whom I am well pleased (Matthew 3: 17)

For the God who is revealed to us is indeed the Trinity: God the Father, the Creator, beyond our knowing; God the Son, Jesus, the Redeemer, as human as we are; and God the Holy Spirit, whose grace is the means of interaction between God and humankind.

Afterwards, Jesus withdraws into the desert, and spends 40 days there, fasting, to come to terms with what he is now being called to do. He is faced with temptations about how to do it in the wrong way; but recognizes what is the right way; comes back from the desert, and begins his three years of ministry: healing the sick, and preaching the Kingdom of God.

So it is a crucial turning-point in Jesus’ own story.

And when Jesus is giving his disciples instructions about spreading the news of the Kingdom, at the end of Matthew’s Gospel, what does he tell them to do: Go to the people of all nations and make them my disciples. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teach them to do everything I have told you. I will be with you always, even until the end of the world. (Matthew 28: 19-20)

So, what does the Gift of Baptism mean for us as Christians? Surely, it means several things.

For many people, if they are baptized as infants, it is the moment when someone stops being just ‘Someone’, because they are given a name. In the tradition of John, it is a time of cleansing: of washing away the pollution of sin. But it is also for us, as it was for Jesus, a new beginning: the start of a new phase in our life: our own individual birthday-in-Christ.

Much of our thinking about Christian baptism actually comes from Paul, who makes it one of the central focuses in his preaching of what the Gospel means. Through our baptism, we are baptized into Christ, we share in his sufferings, and it is precisely through this, Paul argues, that we share in Christ’s risen life.

We don’t all go off into the wilderness for 40 days to meditate on Life, the Universe and Everything. But in our baptism, we become, as Paul says, baptized into Christ; and so his story becomes part of our story.