Easter 7 - May 29, 2022
Readings: Acts 16:16-34; Psalm 97; Revelation 22:12-14,16-17,20-21; John 17:20-26
I arrived early to the little chapel where an early music concert was to be held. The door was open, so I went in. I admired the stained glass renditions of the stations of the cross, all done in a modern style. Near the altar, I noticed an inscription bearing part of our gospel lesson for today: "That they all may be one." Sad and ironic it seemed to me, because this was St. Ann's Chapel in Palo Alto, which is "part of the Anglican Province of Christ the King, a traditional Anglican jurisdiction established in 1977" -- splitting off from the Episcopal Church in opposition to "sweeping changes...that forced an ever-increasing secularization of the church" -- including the ordination of women.
How, I thought, could you have this prayer of Christ for unity front and center in a church that was established on schism? Perhaps, I thought, they see the Episcopal Church as the ones who have departed from the true path. After all, there are at least two ways to achieve unity: you can find common ground, or you can force conformity and expel anyone who refuses to be assimilated. In the history of Christianity, the latter has been far more common than the former, hence the plethora of Christian denominations. The Episcopal Church itself split from the Anglican Church, which split from the Roman Church, which parted ways with the Orthodox churches. We seem to be answering Jesus' prayer by making us all one... per church.
Perhaps you've heard the following, voted Best God Joke Ever on Ship of Fools in 2005, from comedian Emo Philips:
Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, "Don't do it!" He said, "Nobody loves me." I said, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?"
He said, "Yes." I said, "Are you a Christian or a Jew?" He said, "A Christian." I said, "Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?" He said, "Protestant." I said, "Me, too! What franchise?" He said, "Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?" He said, "Northern Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?"
He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region." I said, "Me, too!"
"Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879, or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912." I said, "Die, heretic!" And I pushed him over.
This joke is nearly forty years old, and today we might object to the exclusion of Islam and other religions (or non-religions) from the options for believing in God, as well as the dichotomy of Catholic vs. Protestant in Christianity. Never mind that most of Emo's subdivisions of Baptist don't exist. The point of the joke, though, is much more accurate than its details. The closer we are to each other in our faith, the less tolerant we tend to be of differences. We can't believe that someone who thinks so much like we do could be so wrong on that one issue. Perhaps it's an unspoken fear that we could be the ones who are wrong -- or worse yet, that the issue isn't all that important.
Our first lesson today from Acts includes the story of Paul and Silas in prison. When an earthquake frees them from their bonds and the jailer discovers that they haven't fled, he is so impressed with their faith that he asks, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" They answer, "Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household."
A fairly thick slice of Christianity has latched onto that verse as a one-time cure-all, fire insurance policy, wrist stamp for admission to heaven, Get out of Hell Free card. There's the contract, written in God's Holy Word, so that's all I have to do. Never mind that the gospels and all the epistles including Paul's teach that the Christian life is a difficult path that leads through the cross in a lifelong transformation into the image of Christ. What does the jailer mean by "saved" here, anyway? Certainly it must have something to do with exercising the same self-denial for the sake of others that Paul and Silas just evidenced by not leaving the prison. Believing in Jesus is only the first step that leads to following Jesus, and following Jesus is where salvation lies.
But that's a lot harder to sell than the quick fix that fits so much better with our transactional, automated, set it and forget it culture. If there's a problem to be solved, we want easy answers. We don't want a life-long commitment to transformation that challenges us at each step of the way to let go of the precious systems we have constructed around the previous step. That's too hard, and it's mostly out of our control. We have too many other things to tend to, so we need something simpler, something that makes us feel good about ourselves. We want God, but we want God on our terms.
This isn't limited to conservative evangelical Christians. Christian progressives often have their own little box for God. God help God if God wasn't in favor of our progressive causes -- we'd have absolutely no use for Him, Her, It, or Them. We, too, want to use God as a tool for solving problems or our own choosing, instead of surrendering to God's call.
Christian mystics, too, often fall into the utilitarian trap. Without saying so even to ourselves, we want God to help us achieve some form of enlightenment, some end game in the spiritual contest. But once we've reached that level of perfection, what need will we have for God? We've forgotten that the pearl of great price is a relationship, not an achievement.
The Psalm today begins with "The LORD is King" and continues with a lot of other dominator culture imagery that is quite out of vogue with progressive Christians these days. Kingship went out of style in the US around 1776, but the rule of the powerful over the weak by means of legitimized force has continued in various forms down to the present day. Our progressive awakening to these realities makes us uncomfortable with depicting God as a male ruler who "burns up his enemies on every side".
The last few verses, though, touch on a theme that runs throughout the Psalms: God defends the righteous from the wicked. In many Psalms, the wicked are also the powerful, and the righteous are the powerless: the poor, the widow, the orphan, and the stranger. It is precisely their lack of power that gives them no hope but in God. God's kingship, in this context, assures that God has the power to overcome evil.
Verses 7 and 9 seem to digress, bringing other gods into the picture, but this is actually a key point in the Psalm. Gods that are formed by human hands are false gods. The Psalm doesn't say that other gods don't exist -- in fact, verse 7 implies that they do: "Bow down before him, all you gods." But they aren't on the same level with God. Ancient Hebrew is a very concrete language. I think we can extend what is being said here: gods that are formed by human minds are also false gods. Like physical idols, they can be held and controlled. We use them to legitimize following lesser goals than the life to which God calls us. They are only an image of our smaller self, so they allow us to remain as we are -- while the true God is far beyond us, and calls us to grow into God's image. In the ancient Hebrew culture, there was no power greater than that of a king. That God is king in this Psalm is a concrete way to describe God as transcendent.
The Bible, as inspired by God as it is, was written by humans to humans. It thus communicates in human terms, and in the terms of its historical context. It's a type of incarnation. Incarnation means God coming to us in our mode of existence. In that sense, the whole world is the first incarnation, spoken into being by God and revealing God through its wondrous diversity of imperfect creatures. The second incarnation is when Jesus came in human flesh. Jesus had a frail human body -- a body that suffered all the limitations of our bodies -- a body that was capable of dying. Likewise, the Bible comes to us in the form of human thought and language, which is always imperfect and evolving, because any perfect formulation, if it were even possible, would be incomprehensible to us. In the world, in Jesus and in the Bible, God comes to us in our terms. In our terms, but not on our terms. God invades our existence, to call us to grow into a better one.
What is that better way? God for God's sake, and one another for each other's sake. So we come back around to our gospel lesson: "that they may be one, as we are one." If we really understand how limited our scope of understanding is, how all too human it is, we might learn something about humility. If we then also realize that God, knowing us as we are, is willing to enter into our imperfection out of love for us, accepting us as we are while also seeking to lead us to divine union, then the path to unity with each other also becomes clearer. We must learn to accept each other in love, even if we disagree -- to see each other's growth towards union with God as the real goal -- and in our humility to let God be the judge of what furthers that. This isn't easy, and requires discernment through prayer. There is no quick fix or magic formula. May God grant us ears to hear the Spirit. May we learn to follow God's call, in love for God and for each other. Amen.
Chip Camden
St Peter’s by the Sea Episcopal Church
Sitka, Alaska
