Developing traditions



Epiphany 1C

 

In the name of Christ.  Amen. 

I’ll always remember a “little e” epiphany I experienced several years ago when I was participating in and helping to lead a conference in South Africa.  We were there to try to build bridges of relationships between Episcopalians in the United States and Anglicans in Africa.  Our churches, united in relationship through our shared heritage in the Anglican Communion were on the verge of being torn completely apart – ostensibly about disagreements about gender and human sexuality and leadership in the church, but in reality, it was mostly by the very highest rungs of leadership in the churches who were determined to dig in their heels, more for the sake of being right than just about anything else. 

The organizer of our work, Bonnie Perry, who is now the Bishop of Michigan, was, at the time, a priest in Chicago.  She couldn’t help but believe in the power and the promise that could come from people taking some time to actually sit down, to listen to each other, to learn where the other is coming from, and to really commit to getting to know one another.  She believed, and her work proved, that those kinds of relationships are a whole lot harder to just tear apart and throw away than are relationships that are defined entirely by “positions” and assumptions.  In short, she believed in the power of incarnation. 

We were working in small groups that were formed to be intentionally diverse, reflecting different cultures, different genders, and different sexual orientations.  So, every one of us basically had no choice but to hear perspectives we’d never heard before. 

In our tradition, we’ve always wholeheartedly believed the old expression, “praying shapes believing”.  So, for one of our sessions we focused pretty intently on similarities and differences in the ways that our different expressions of global Anglicanism worshiped.  When we started talking about baptism, minds weren’t just opened, they were blown open. 

We all believed in the centrality of baptism, but here, in the Episcopal Church, our baptismal liturgy is different than in many corners of the Anglican Communion.  We all recite the creed and affirm our beliefs, but in the Episcopal Church, our covenant goes a step further and talks about what it means to put those beliefs into practice. 

As our friends and siblings in faith from the African churches learned about this, they were deeply drawn to it, but it also helped them to really see for the first time how our churches had grown in somewhat different ways on matters of social justice.  Once we started to actually talk about how we would practice our faith, it’s obvious that our positions and assumptions would begin to shift and grow. 

From our perspective as Americans, it helped us to see how what seemed so natural and obvious to us, was, in fact, a product of our worship and belief that we’d been nurturing for some 40 years at that point. 

We all took baptism seriously, but we’d come to know it – and what it means to live as baptized – in different ways. 

Baptism is one of the two, so-called “great sacraments” - along with the Holy Eucharist.  They are the two sacraments that bookend the formal ministry that happens in the life of Jesus.  His ministry began by joining the crowds of people and participating in their ritual of cleansing, but then developing that ritual into something entirely new – something that brought new meaning – a baptism less about washing away impurity and more about claiming the blessings – and the kinship – of God. 

And his ministry ended with the Eucharist – the Great Thanksgiving.  In it, he and his friends joined in the solemn ritual of the people – the Passover – celebrating and giving thanks for their freedom, but even in that, he formed it into something new – a meal less about remembering God’s deeds of the past, and more about recognizing and honoring God’s loving presence among us, even now. 

In both of these great sacraments, Jesus met the people where they were, but then he pushed them further. 

This is the real heritage of our faith: that we keep pushing the limits of all that we find, until it leads to something more – something deeper and truer. 

Frankly, it can be pretty tough.  Have you ever been in that position?  When you’ve met your goal, but still have to keep pushing? 

Parents talk about that sort of thing all the time.  Like, when you’re just trying to get through the “terrible twos”, only to realize there’s even more work in the years to come…  Or, when you’ve been pushing through for so long to get the kids off to college, but then you remember and realize that even then they still need a parent, just in new ways. 

And it’s true in most of our relationships with each other.  Real love, for example, is defined less by passion or affection, or even proximity, and more by determination – the decision to keep loving, every day.  It’s a decision that, the more you do it, the more natural it becomes.  And what grows out of it is a deeper, more honest love than the earliest days and their simple passions allowed. 

It’s that same way in our relationship with God and with our experiences of faith.  Our relationships with God are – and should be – intense.  A true, honest relationship with God can be hard.  At times it may even seem impossible.  But even so, if we get stuck in the place of only ever expecting peace and calm and euphoric feelings like we might find in the early days of conversion, we’ll deny ourselves that unnamable something that’s deeper and truer. 

While Christianity takes a great deal of tenacity, tenacity alone will never be enough.  It was true for Jesus and it’s still true for us: individual tenacity needs community and prayer as its bedrock.  We hear in Luke’s account of Jesus’ baptism that he falls in line with the people to receive the baptism of John.  Luke doesn’t tell us anything about the act of baptism, other than that it happened.  For Luke, it wasn’t about the liturgy – what was said or what was done.  We’re not told hardly any of that.  The real power of the moment, however, came afterwards – when Jesus was praying.  It was then that heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended, and the voice from heaven came proclaiming, “You are my Son, the beloved; with you I am well pleased.” 

It’s the same way with us.  Most of us, if we were baptized as infants, wouldn’t remember the actual event.  The ritual and the liturgy are significant, because they put us on this road.  They bring us into this community where we covenant to live our lives in such a way that the community and the prayer will support us.  But the ritual and the liturgy, alone, are not the whole story. 

The real focus of baptism isn’t the water, or the celebration, or the sweet babies, or even the passionate, hopeful adults choosing to make a mature commitment to this faith.  The real focus of baptism is about everything that follows.  It’s about being God’s people.  For the baptized, it’s about welcoming them into this family.  For the baptizing community, it’s about sharing in the joy of seeing our family grow, and remaining hopeful for the ways that it will help us as a community to grow in our spiritual lives. 

For Jesus, the heavens opened and the Holy Spirit descended upon him like a dove, and a voice proclaimed, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” 

For us, we get to hear the words from Isaiah: “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name and you are mine.  When you pass through the waters I will be with you…  When you walk through fire you will not be burned  Because you are precious in my sight…  And I love you.” 

That’s what it means to be God’s people.  It’s not about the “moment”, no matter how powerful the moment may be.  It’s about the sustenance that the moment promises. 

God promises to sustain us.  When we feel vulnerable, God promises that we will never really be alone.  When we feel in danger, God promises to protect us; because we are precious in the sight of God, and we are loved. 

There are certainly times in all of our lives when we feel a little removed from that promise of sustenance.  There are times when God’s love and protection feels out of reach.  Those are the times when we most need to return to the fruits of our baptism - to this community and to nurturing our relationships with God through prayer. 

When Jesus opened himself through prayer, God’s presence was made known.  And when we open ourselves with prayer, God’s presence is made known again.  God is always there beside us.  God is always giving us that sustenance.  But we have to pay attention, or we might miss it.  Not because God is absent, but because we can be so absent-minded. 

This is the Season after the Epiphany.  I’ve taken to thinking of it as the season of epiphanies.  The season of seeing God’s light, in light of the incarnation of Christ, and seeing the world through that light. 

When the ancient Hebrew custom of washing away sins was seen through the light of God’s incarnation in Christ, it came to mean something entirely new.  It revealed a ministry among God’s people that was entirely new.  When we see our communities through the light of God’s incarnation in Christ, and when we truly appreciate the incarnation of each other, right in front of us, we will reveal a ministry that is also entirely new. 

In this season of epiphanies, take some time to listen.  Listen for those epiphanies of Christ.  Listen for God’s ongoing sustenance.  Listen for the fruits of baptism.  Listen for the promise God offers in those simple, important words, “I love you.” 

There is no greater truth in our faith than that: than the promise of God’s love.  We say it again and again in the Baptismal Covenant, but it’s important to remember: we can do anything with God’s help.  And that help is as close as our next breath.  It’s as close as our next glance.  God’s help is already here.  Amen.

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