Quinquagesima 2014
Readings: 1 Cor 13 and Luke 18:31-43
A few thoughts….
Here we are. Quinquagesima… 50ish days before
Easter. The Sunday before Ash Wednesday.
We are about to enter the season of Lent, a time of
deep self-refection where we get to plumb the depths of the human condition.
Where we learn to rely only on the love of God as revealed to us through Jesus Christ.
And the writers who put together this lectionary in
the 16th century had something specific in mind as we prepare for
Lent.
The Collect is about Love.
The Epistle is about love.
And then there is this Gospel reading. A reading
where Jesus tells his disciples for the third time that as they go up to
Jerusalem, He is about to reveal to them something about the depths of love; the nature of love.
His single action on the cross is love; love that fulfills the law and the
prophets. Noisy gongs be gone.
I will begin, however by commenting that our new
parish council met this past Monday. There was much talk about pastoral
care for one another. A pastoral care team to visit people around our parish. It
was an encouraging discussion about Christian love.
But, before I speak a little more on pastoral care,
let me relate it to the collect and the readings. Let me start with the Collect.
The Collect we prayed today was one of those
written by Thomas Cranmer in the 16th century. [brief intro of
Cranmer for reminder] Here is the collect again, “O Lord, who hast taught us
that all our doings without charity are
nothing worthy: Send thy Holy Spirit, and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of charity, the very
bond of peace and of all virtues, without which whosoever liveth is counted
dead before thee.”
Charity
– Latin “Caritas” and from the Greek “Agape”. It is the highest form of love:
self-giving love. The Oxford dictionary of theological terms defines it as, “The
love placed by God in human hearts. It is the greatest of theological virtures.
Cranmer
wrote that, “With the gift of divine love we are able to achieve the works of
love which carry true value and worth. With the gift of love comes peace and
all other virtues. Love enlivens every action. Love builds a unity of
purposeful self-giving. With love we are counted before God.
1
Cor 13: “Faith hope and love abide, and the greatest of these is love.”
You
all know Martin Luther, the great church reformer. [brief intro].
Luther
argued for a theology of the Cross…here is the logic…
Jesus is resurrected and ascended. This is glorious.
Jesus was crucified. This too is glorious.
I want you to hear this. There is glory in Good
Friday.
We should never forget that the crucifixion as part
of the reality of resurrection.
Luther argued that the Church, and Christians, had
grown to have a hubris, an arrogance in the truth of the resurrection whilst
losing sight of the crucifixion.
He argued that to be receive the spirit of the
risen Christ we must be a disciple of the Crucified Christ. That we must have
the courage of suffering in love which points to Jesus’ kind of suffering love.
This, therefore, is not to walk away from this world
in search of a better world. It is not to dismiss the realities of the world as
we seek heaven, as if heaven is more of an after-hours nightclub for which we
desire a ticket. We are not to walk away from this world but to humbly go into
the very heart of the open wounds of this world, knowing that the kingdom of
God is at hand. Being present to the Kingdom of God, now, amid a world that is
hurting.
The walk up to Jerusalem today, the ascent to
Jerusalem, the ascent to the cross, like Jesus’s walk is also a descent into the
lost, hurt, pain and sinfulness of the world which remains dearly loved by its Creator.
Christ is alive. And His is not afraid to be among
the pain.
Christ’s path is through this world; Christ’s
church must be present to this world in a way that honours the suffering of
Christ. The task of the Christian is to follow Jesus.
A Christ-centred church is to seriously discern
discipleship of Jesus Christ, whose triumph was through humility (Phil 2).
The Church today is not humble enough. It is too
defensive.
God does not need us to defend God. We must simply
proclaim God, through the Grace of God as revealed by Jesus Christ.
We are called to be disciples now, in this world.
Michael
Lloyd, an English priest and theologian wrote, “God does not shout from a
megaphone, from a safe distance he came down to us became one of us. Lived our
live with us, suffered with us, offering up human life to God at every point.
Similarly, our pastoral care of one another should not be detacted instruction
but embodied identification. It will mean being there with one another and for
one another. It will make us not passionless but compassionate.”
He
went on to write:
A
man once went on a parachute jump for charity. He had never done it before and accidentally
he hit his head on the door of the aircraft as he jumped out. The instructor
realized that he had knocked himself unconscious and would be unable to pull
the rip cord to release the parachute. So he jumped out after the man, managed
by plunging headfirst to catch up with him and catch hold of him. And pulled
his own ripcord. He was just in time and they both fell safely to earth. And
that is similar to what is involved in pastoral care on the model of the
incarnation. First we need to get alongside the person and then we need to do
for them what they cannot do for themselves. We need to make use of the
resources that are available but which they are for whatever reason unable to
tap into for themselves. And the time will come when someone else to do the
same for us.”
As
our pastoral care team gets its efforts underway, let us remember that there
are those in this very parish who are lonely, sick and hurting. Christ is with
them always, help us to be with Christ. With the lonely, the sick and the
hurting.
Let
us be like that blind man at Jericho. We are sitting on a road, wondering what
is going on around us. Someone told him that Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.[what
an image…Jesus is passing by] The reason for this journey may not be entirely
clear to us. It is a journey of faith, hope and love.
Let
our journey to Jerusalem be a journey into the understanding of divine love
through the Cross of Christ.
In
the Kingdom of God there is only one charity, one love. It unites God and
creation. Christ and you.
Without
love all our efforts are worthless, “like a clanging gong” a distracting noise
of nonsense.
Without
love, we speak nonsense. Without love, we act with nonsense.
Let
this lent be a journey of love. A journey where you become more firm in the
bond of love extended to you by God through Jesus Christ.
Feed
on this in your hearts by faith with thanksgiving. Amen.
