We continue with week two in our foray
into the sacraments. Those here last
week were a bit surprised I did not talk more specifically about the Eucharist. I mentioned it, to be sure. Jesus blesses, breaks, and distributes the
five loaves and two fish, much as we distribute the bread and wine during the
Eucharist. Perhaps more significantly,
John calls Jesus’ blessing a Eucharist, a joyful thanksgiving! But, as I said last week, the Eucharist was
not the focus of last week’s readings.
John was more interested in telling his audience that Jesus ranked
higher than Moses. Much of what went on
last week was Jesus’ claim that He was the Son of Man, the Anointed. He was the One to whom Moses was pointing; He
was the One who had come into the world.
The Eucharist, as you and I understand it, is not formally command by
our Lord until the night of the Last Supper.
Seeing as how we have a small crowd and
everyone is Episcopalian and we are introducing a new service today, though, we
should spend a bit more time on our understanding of the Sacraments. If I asked you to define the Sacraments,
could you. An outward sign of an inward and visible grace. You thought you were done with such
quizzes when you were confirmed, did you not?
I notice nearly everyone joined in as we said the definition. Everybody seems to be able to say the
line. But do we know what it means? Are we able to describe to people in our
lives the nature of the Sacraments? I
suspect, were I to stop and quiz us, there would be some horrible panic. Don’t worry, we would not be alone. The idea of the Sacraments caused more than
one skirmish in Europe and a number of fights within our own church.
For example, how many sacraments are there
in our church? I heard a lot of “seven’s”
and a lot of “two’s.” Those of you who
said another number can see me in the Parish Hall about scheduling a new
confirmation class! The sevens and twos
drowned out all the other answers because that was where the fight was when our
church came into being. If we look at
the 39 Articles, yes we have articles of our faith, we can see that our
forebears settled on two dominical sacraments.
By that, our founders understood that Jesus only commissioned Baptism
and the Eucharist. The fact that our
Lord gave them makes them dominical in nature.
But, more than a few of us have migrated to Advent from RC and Orthodox
churches. Those stated seven because
Confirmation, Penance, Orders, Matrimony, and Unction are considered sacraments
in other churches. We will not be
resolving which tradition is right today, or any day in the future, for that
matter, but we will be exploring their role in the Church, as they speak to the
truth declared by our Lord today in the Gospel reading.
Our Gospel reading picks off right where
we left off last week. Jesus has crossed
over to the Capernaum by walking on the water, scaring His disciples in the
process. Finding Jesus in Capernaum,
they are surprised. He went up the
mountain while the disciples got into the boat.
How could He make it here ahead of them?
So they ask. What follows is a
conversation not unlike the one Jesus had with the woman at the well in chapter
4. Jesus gives them an answer to a
question they do not ask. Jesus tells
them they are looking for Him not because they understand who He is, but
because they ate and were satisfied. Then
He gives a warning: Do not work for the
food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the
Son of Man will give you. Fair
enough. Who would not want bread that
gives eternal life? So they ask Jesus
what they must do to perform the works of God, as if they are ignorant of the
torah. Jesus instructs them that the
work of God is to believe in Him whom God has sent. Naturally, the people are in the mind of the
Passover. Jesus has just blessed the
bread and fish and distributed. There
was no prayer to God to feed the people.
Jesus has accomplished this work on His own, laying claim to the idea
that He ranks higher than Moses. But it
is a remarkable claim! The people are
unwilling to let the claim go unchallenged.
Show us another sign, and we will
believe You are the Messiah.
Jesus’ answer is effectively, I have already given you the sign. But His answer is also far deeper than they
realize. God is the source of the
heavenly bread, and Jesus is the One sent by God. The true manna is God’s Anointed, Jesus! The crowd’s response is nearly identical to
the woman at the well a couple chapters earlier. The crowd asks for this bread, just as she
asked for this water. Jesus takes on to
Himself the role of the dispenser of God’s blessing. Water and bread were considered life giving
symbols of God’s blessing. Jesus, in His
instruction over these two chapters, is claiming to be The Distributor of God’s
blessing on the people, both Jew and Gentile!
It is an amazing claim! A claim
that, without the power and testimony of the Resurrection, would be vapid! We know the rest of the story. We are not surprised. We are simply awed by the depth and
presentation of Jesus to the people. Wow!
He really is the life-giving spring.
Wow! He really is the Bread of
Life. The leaders, of course, will
reject His teaching. But so will the
people.
Why do I share this story in this way
today and begin with the brief discussion of the sacraments? I wonder how quick we are, as the Church that
stands in the shadow of the Cross and the glory of the Empty Tomb, to forget
His promise and power and desire to do only good for us? Do we really believe He is the Anointed, sent
by God, who wants nothing but the best for us?
Our outward and visible testimony as a parish is that we do not. I am not a big fan of imposing my will on a
parish. In fact, I am not a big fan of imposing
what I think is God’s will on a parish during the first year of a
relationship. There is too big a chance
for hurt, for mistakes, for misunderstandings, and who knows what else. But we are a parish who, I have learned, is
slow to lay claim to the benefits of His Passion. If we look back in Acts, we see the Church
laying on hands and anointing, expecting God to work in their midst. The result was that people came to the Church
for healing. Some chose to join; others
chose to walk away. For all our claim of
modern superiority, we are really no different than the crowds about which we
read.
To be sure, at time we at Advent have
tried a Healing service. Always, I am
told, it has been a behind the scenes effort.
Maybe it was done at a weekday service; maybe it was done at a weekday
service for a season like Lent or Advent.
It does not seem to have been a primary focus of the parish. Why?
If God is God, if God has taught us to lay on hands and anoint for
healing, if there is a need in our parish community and the wider community,
and if so many of us devote our lives to healthcare, why is this not a central
part of our identity? Why are we not a
parish that expects God to move powerfully among us and heal us and heal our
visitors? Have we accepted the
sign? Have we accepted the Truth?
After some discussing with the Search
Committee, the Vestry, and Liturgy & Worship committee, I agreed to go
ahead and launch this service early. I
won’t go into all the details, but the event that caused me to ignore best
practices and plunge headlong into this was the Time & Talents work of the
Vestry. My small group all identified
healing as a gift, a charism, that I should be claiming. When I asked why, they had no real concrete
answer. All agreed; yet none could
explain. To me, it sounded much like a
Holy Spirit moment. You see, I have had
that charism confirmed far too many times to ignore. Here was another. They knew I should be about healing for God,
but they did not know the back story.
So, by way of sharing with you and lowering some anxieties, I now share
with the parish.
Some years ago I was called by a hospital
to come and do last rites for a man suffering from a brain aneurism. The nurse calling me said I needed to
hurry. It was after 2am, so this was her
way of saying he would be gone by morning and that I could not wait. I got dressed and headed to the hospital. When I got there, I grabbed my prayer book
and oil from the van. I headed to the
room to give last rites to a man from a neighboring parish (it turned out his
priest was on vacation). When I entered
the room, the medical staff cleared out to give me, the wife, and the dying man
some privacy. His wife, as you might
imagine, was pleading, crying, acting as one who could do nothing for the man
she loved. She was so sorry I had been
woken up, but she had nowhere else to turn.
I opened that prayer book, turned to page 462, and got stuck.
You have all only known me for seven
months. Have I struck you as someone
whose tongue is often tied? It’s ok to
laugh. I did afterwards as well. I am a pretty good reader. Before I was ordained, I was one of those
readers that would step in last minute at my parish. But I found myself unable to say the words, Almighty Father, look on this Your servant,
lying in great weakness, and comfort him with the promise of everlasting life. Three times I tried. Three times I failed. Then I recognized what was happening. Still, even though I realized that my tongue
was being bound, I was unwilling to give words to the prayer welling up inside
of me. I had a soon to be widow next to
me, softly crying and sniffling. If I
prayed the prayer willing up, what kind of sick bastard was I? I felt a . . . compulsion to pray a prayer of
life-giving power in front of a soon-to-be-widow. My words, I knew, would hurt her immeasurably
in the days, weeks, and months to come.
I asked her to step out. She
refused. I told her I was sorry, but I
had to pray a different prayer.
I wish I had written it down. Brothers and sisters, to this day it is the
most remarkable prayer ever to cross my lips.
I reminded our Lord that it was the season of Epiphany, that season when
we celebrate the revelation of Jesus to the Gentiles. I reminded the Lord that He was the Healer
and that I stood in a place that claimed to be full of healers. How cool would it be for Him to act yet
again, reminding doctors and nurses where true healing was to be found and
manifesting His glory to a world in desperate need!
I had no sooner got the words out when the
man sat up and said, “I’ve got to pee.”
Brothers and sisters, as your new pastor,
I would like to claim that I understood what had happened right at the
outset. I would be lying. I think the first words right out of my mouth
were “holy crap!” or something along those lines. I had a dying man trying to get out of bed
and go to the bathroom. We needed
help.
I don’t think the wife understood the
significance either. As I explained that
I would get a nurse and he continued to struggle to get out of bed, she
pig-piled him. Between the sniffles and
struggles, she was giving him the “you listen here” that only couples who have
spent decades together can get away with.
He was giving her the “what is wrong with you” just as well.
Now I had an elderly man and his elderly
wife wrestling on a hospital bed. I just
knew there was a broken hip or concussion headed our way. So I ran down the hall to find a nurse or
doctor. I found “Susan.” Susan,
I need your help. He’s up trying to go to
the bathroom and his wife is trying to pin him to the bed. “Father, father, I know you want to
believe that God does miracles. I have
worked as a nurse for 22 years. I can
tell you with certainty, God, if he exists, does not heal.” Great,
great, someone needs to tell the patient because he seems to think he needs to go
pee. “Father, he can’t be talking,
he can’t be moving. I’ve seen the
scans. He’s probably already gone. We just called you because his wife asked for
someone.” Great. You come tell him he’s
dead and does not need to pee and should not be wrestling with his wife.
Folks, I was literally tugging at her to
come with him. I knew it was a matter of
time before we heard the crash of this older couple knocking over
equipment. The whole time down the hall she
is giving me the “lecture” about never seeing a miracle, never seeing a sign
that could point to a god. I’m like can we please
walk faster! Finally, we make it to
the room. It takes her a second. An eighty year old man and mid 70’s year old
woman are wrestling on a hospital bed.
But, professional as always, Susan recovered her wits, entered the room,
hit the emergency button, and started trying to disentangle the couple. The cacophony of sounds will stay with me to
my dying day. Susan trying to get the couple
to quit wrestling before someone got hurt, the wife telling the husband he will
be staying there until a nurse or doctor gets there, the patient fighting mad
about having to pee, and the voice at the other end of the button trying to get
us to state what response team was needed.
God had acted marvelously, and humanity was confused!—much like our
story these two weeks.
In many ways, though, it is the after-effects
of the sign that I want to point out.
After all, how many of us sitting here today tell ourselves that, had we
eaten of the fish and loaves, we would have known who Jesus was and never
demanded another sign? Don’t raise your
hand; just place yourself in the story.
In mine, there were a couple of interesting take-away’s. For some months after this miracle, I would
be grabbed by a nurse or doctor or someone who had heard about the priest in
the green shirt. The miracle had
occurred in Epiphany (and I wore white), but somehow it came to be associated
with the green shirt. Father, would pray over this one. Father, do you have a minute? Any time I went to visit a parishioner in the
hospital, someone was grabbing me to pray for the desperate, the ones for whom
medicine had no answer. What really
disappointed me as a parish priest was the fact that so few doctors and nurses
had come to my church in the aftermath.
I’m a parish priest. One of our
job descriptions, whether it is formally acknowledged or not is “grow the
church.” Surely, after such an
incredible miracle, and make no mistake—doctors and nurses told me repeatedly
for months that they had never seen anything like it--, people would be drawn
to the church, right? I think three
doctors and their family units made it to Easter, but none, so far as I know,
found their way into a church community.
I would ask. Where
were you? Where are you going? Maybe the sign was for you, why are you not
seeking Him? Over and over I would
ask, to no effect. Then a strange
blessing happened. My parish got
well. Although we were an older parish,
I went 26 months or so between hospital visits.
I was not shirking my duties. No
one was getting sick; no one was getting hurt.
We started to notice it. I
wondered aloud what was going on. One of
my intercessors, a lady who will be far closer to the throne than I, pointed out
that God was not allowing Himself or His priest to be used. The sign of healing had been given to
healers, and they had rejected it. Her
guess or prophesy was that I would not return until those doctors and nurses
had forgotten the sign. She was
right. Once illness and emergencies
return to my cure, most in the hospital had forgotten me.
Why do I share a downer ending and focus
on Jesus’ ignoring peoples’ questions today?
In a few moments, we are going to start a new service at Advent, one of
Healing. I will invite all those who
would like prayer and anointing to come forward. I will anoint with healing oil consecrated by
our bishop, lay hands, and pray. I do
not yet know the prayers I will say; I do not yet know the need in this
congregation. But I will pray. And you and I will expect God to act.
Here’s the thing. When we approach our Lord and ask questions,
He does not always give us the answers we seek.
He gives us, instead, the answers we need. In a few minutes, the brave will come
forward, hopeful that our Lord will act in their lives. Some will even come bartering, telling God if
He does this they will do that. Brothers
and sisters, God is not manipulated. God
is not a quid-pro-quo kind of Lord. He
is our Father in heaven who wants only great things for us. You will come and ask for pains to be eased,
for disease to be cured, for relationships to be reconciled, for provision, and
for any number of other perceived needs.
I will dutiful anoint and pray over you.
In the end, though, we must trust the One whom He has sent, the One upon
whom He has placed His seal and His pledge.
We must trust, no matter the outcome, that our Lord wants only good for
us and that He is always working to redeem evil in our lives. But, and we must hear this but, we are not
placing our faith in the cured backaches, the wiped away cancer, or even the
stalling of death that I shared this morning.
Our trust is in the Lord! He will
act and do what is best for us, whether we know it or not, whether we agree
with it or not, and whether the world will notice or not.
Each
week we gather around that altar and pray to God that we receive all the
benefits of His passion. Today, we will
begin to claim those benefits, not as timid or frail, but as deeply loved
firstborn sons and daughters. We will
approach that throne of grace asking Him once again to do what is best for us
because it is in His nature so to do. We
will ask the Healer to heal, not because we deserve it, but because we have
placed our faith in Jesus, His Anointed.
The Bread of life and the source of all life-giving water. But we will do so, and I will remind you in
prayers, cognizant of the fact that we have a share in His Son’s ministry. Sometimes, how we handle suffering is the
means by which God reaches into the lives of others. You and I may desperately want another sign,
as did our brothers and sisters in Capernaum 2000 years ago, but The Sign has
already been given. We will trust, as He
shows up this morning in power, that the healing He gives us is the healing we
need. Then fortified, and maybe in light
of yet another sign, we, many of whom who are healers, will return to the world
ready to tell yet again of the wonders the Healer has done.
Peace,
Brian†
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