THE SECOND SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST
Genesis 18:1-15, (21:1-7)
The Lord appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the entrance of his tent in the heat of the day. He looked up and saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent entrance to meet them, and bowed down to the ground. He said, “My lord, if I find favor with you, do not pass by your servant. Let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree. Let me bring a little bread, that you may refresh yourselves, and after that you may pass on—since you have come to your servant.” So they said, “Do as you have said.” And Abraham hastened into the tent to Sarah, and said, “Make ready quickly three measures of choice flour, knead it, and make cakes.” Abraham ran to the herd, and took a calf, tender and good, and gave it to the servant, who hastened to prepare it. Then he took curds and milk and the calf that he had prepared, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree while they ate.
They said to him, “Where is your wife Sarah?” And he said, “There, in the tent.” Then one said, “I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son.” And Sarah was listening at the tent entrance behind him. Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in age; it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women. So Sarah laughed to herself, saying, “After I have grown old, and my husband is old, shall I have pleasure?” The Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh, and say, ‘Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?’ Is anything too wonderful for the Lord? At the set time I will return to you, in due season, and Sarah shall have a son.” But Sarah denied, saying, “I did not laugh”; for she was afraid. He said, “Oh yes, you did laugh.”
[The Lord dealt with Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah as he had promised. Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age, at the time of which God had spoken to him. Abraham gave the name Isaac to his son whom Sarah bore him. And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him. Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him. Now Sarah said, “God has brought laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.” And she said, “Who would ever have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”]
Romans 5:1-8
Since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person-- though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.
The Bible texts of the Old Testament, Epistle and Gospel lessons are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Church of Christ in the USA, and used by permission.
REFLECTION
+In the Name of our faithful God+
Paul is the apostle who presents what I refer to as the three affectual states of Christian life: Faith, Hope, and Love. I call them affectual because they shape one’s response to the uncertainty that abounds in this life. Certainty is not a required condition of faith, hope, or love. In fact, it is our certainties; our expectations of what we think and believe should be or what we think and believe should happen that gets in the way of the effectiveness of these states and blind us to their function. Faith, hope, and love are fluid states of the heart, mind, and spirit that change every place, every time, and every situation into a thin place, a thin time, a thin situation in which to encounter and experience the numinous, the presence of God.
In the New Testament, faith is defined as “confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.” [Hebrews 11:1] Hope is described in Paul’s letter to the Romans, “…hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have?” [Romans 8:24] In Hebrews 6:19 hope is described “… as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure” against the uncertainty of life’s tempestuous seas, as a well-known hymns puts it. Love is described by Paul at length in 1Corinthians 13, but if I were to choose a succinct definition that ties all three affections together it would be verses7, “(Love) always protects, always trusts (acts in faith), always hopes, always perseveres.” Whenever God is sought and wherever God is found these affective states are present, which bring me to Paul’s prime example of faith, Abraham.
One of the most intriguing stories in the Bible is the mysterious story of the three visitors who suddenly appear while Abraham is at the entrance of his tent in the ‘heat of the day’ by the oaks of Mamre. What we encounter in this story is a liminal moment; a threshold moment (one of many) in Genesis’ story of Abraham.
Liminality here is associated with “the heat of the day” and the Oaks of Mamre. Perhaps all of us can recall sitting alone in the shade on a very hot day and have experienced our thoughts melting away in the quiet heat of the day; a good time and place to be receptive to divine visitation. The oaks of Mamre is a place that in Celtic spirituality is described as a thin place; a place where the mundane is at the threshold of the divine, where the everyday borders the everlasting.
In this receptive, mystical, and atmospheric environment Abraham welcomes and recognizes the Lord in the three visitors who speak with one voice In Hebrew, this could be identified as a “Shekinah” moment, similar to the two men that sat at the head of the stone slab of Jesus’ tomb and its feet, speaking with one voice or the two men who pointed the disciples gaze back to earth at Jesus’ Ascension. In that mysterious moment, Abraham is told, “I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son.” Sarah’s response was laughter and incredulity, “After I have grown old, and my husband is old, shall I have pleasure?”
The faithfulness of God is specifically demonstrated in the second part of today’s first lesson. Sarah may have laughed, may entertained doubt, and expressed hopelessness but God is faithful even when things seems hopeless for us, even when our faithfulness wanes, but love never fails. God never fails.
In closing, I want to focus on God’s faithfulness as grace.
Justification by faith is generally understood as meaning we are justified “if” we are faithful. The “if” part of this is unfortunate understanding readily can lead one to understand faith as a matter of intellectual assent regarding doctrinal beliefs about Jesus or God, but faith is not equivalent with assenting to specific ideological or theological beliefs. Faith is active and manifest in what we do within the situations we find ourselves in.
Scripture; in particular, the letters of Paul juxtaposes justification by faith with another form of justification; justification by grace. In fact, one can almost interchange these terms, except that grace is reserved to describe God’s faithfulness. Paul says, “all are justified freely by (God’s) grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” [Romans 3:24]
Our catechism defines grace as “God’s favor toward us, unearned and undeserved; by grace God forgives our sins, enlightens our minds, stirs our hearts, and strengthens our will.” [BCP pg. 858] True, but in my opinion that definition falls far short of what grace actually is; in that, it confines its application only to us human creatures. It treats grace in an anthropocentric manner; as something that came about only after the resurrection of Jesus. Grace has always existed from the very start of creation, and we are a product of it.
I would greatly expand the catechism’s definition to say, “Grace is God’ expression of faith in all Creation. Grace is God’s expression of hope in all Creation. Grace is God’s expression of love for all Creation.”
In God’s grace all creation is justified. The seal of God’s grace is recorded in Genesis 1, where it says, “ God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.” That is God’s eternal assessment of creation, and God has never deferred from that assessment. The Big Bang was an act of grace and grace will be there at our homecoming.
In the eternal presence of God’s grace, there is both creation and completion. We don’t see completion on this side of life because we’re still being created. We’re still evolving. We’re still living into being the offspring that God intended us to be.
Human kind started down paths that appeared to have devolved from God’s grace but God proved God's faith, hope, and love in us when God declared one of us, Jesus, to be the beloved Son. Jesus shows us the way and has made it possible for us, today, to take closer, faith-filled, hope-filled, and loved-filled walk with God in the here and now.
“Help then, O Lord our unbelief; and may our faith abound to call on you when you are near, and seek where you are found; that, when our life of faith is done, in realms of clearer light we may behold you as you are, with full and endless sight.**
Amen.
* * * * * * * * * *
Until next time, stay faithful.
Norm
The Bible texts of the Old Testament, Epistle and Gospel lessons are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Church of Christ in the USA, and used by permission.
No comments:
Post a Comment