Rise Up Ye Saints of God

 

 

SERMON

October 08, 2023

Matthew 21:33-46 

Wow! That’s all I have to say after reviewing today’s readings. We begin with Moses proclaiming God’s Ten Commandments to the Israelites who are wandering in the desert in search of the promised land. The commandments represent the initiation of a unique relationship between God with his chosen people. Nahum Sarna in his wonderful book, Exploring Exodus: The Origins of Biblical Israel, writes “[The Ten Commandments] forge a special relationship between God and Israel. This relationship is sealed by a covenant, which establishes Israel as God’s ‘treasured possession,’ a ‘kingdom of priests, and a holy nation.”’

Sarna closes this portion of his exegesis saying, “The narrative tells us that Moses transmitted to the people God’s vision for their future destiny, and that ‘All the people answered as one, saying, ‘All the Lord has spoken we will do!’ God’s election of Israel as his chosen people is matched by a corresponding response and commitment on the part of the people. The mood has been set for the solemn, formal enactment of a covenant between God and Israel. A covenant that will seal for all time this reciprocal relationship.” (p. 130-131)

From there we move on to Paul’s advice to the Philippians as he urges them to maintain a steady path in their right relationship with Jesus Christ. He points out, not for the first time, that in order to maintain this right relationship it is mandatory to cease boasting of worldly achievements in order to gain salvation through their relationship with Christ. Rather, in humility they must fully engage in their covenant with God to be a holy people. A people set apart by God for him and his purposes.

Paul spells out the difficulties that he has suffered in his journey to adhere to this covenant. He writes “For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him…forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.”

Toss out the rubbish in your life, the worldly stuff. Strain forward to meet the divine and the prize of the heavenly call of God given to us through the incarnation of his Son, Jesus Christ. 

And finally, in our Gospel reading from Matthew, Jesus tells his disciples “…I tell you; the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom. The one who falls on this stone will be broken into pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls.”

Jesus is placing a big exclamation mark on the Father’s commandments issued to us way back in the desert when Moses descended from Mount Sinai. Stay in the path outlined in the covenant that establishes you as a holy people. Straying from this covenant will lead you into the weeds. Will lead you far astray from my Father’s heavenly kingdom.

God lays it all out for us, right from the very beginning he sets the score straight with the ten commandments: I am God, your God…you shall have no other Gods but me…and I am a most jealous God, punishing those for any sins their parents pass on to them…But I am also an unswervingly loyal God to the thousands who love me and keep my commandments. If you want to be on my team, you must be loyal, and I must be your only God.

Centuries later Paul urged the Philippians to steer clear of being influenced by those who publicly do anything to keep up their appearance of loving God. Paul reiterates that real believers are those who quietly seek to be in relationship with Christ. Those who work tirelessly at Christ’s ministry. Christ’s ministry of love, compassion, and healing. Christ’s ministry of loving “The least of these.” Paul urges the Philippians to embrace true righteousness. Righteousness that comes from trusting Christ and being in continual relationship with Christ. Righteousness comes from keeping God’s covenant with us.

And then we have Jesus in the Jerusalem temple teaching the crowd that gathers around him, eager to hear what he has to say. Speaking in the midst of his followers, Jesus shares the parable of the two sons and the vineyard owner. Through this parable Jesus makes clear that those who do what the father says, no matter who they are, will go immediately to God’s kingdom. But those who fail to heed the father’s commandments will fall away from God’s covenant with his people and become lost in their search for membership in God’s eternal kingdom.

Amidst all of these critically important words from scripture, Dr. Kwok Pui-Lan’s exhortation that I spoke of last week rings loud and clear. “Awake, Arise, Act. It is time to make Jesus Christ known again. 

No matter what page we turn to in our bibles, the message is always the same. The same now as it was in the time of the Exodus which took place about 1310 BC, or in the time of Jesus around 30 CE, or of Paul around 60 CE. That message is that God has chosen us to be in right relationship with us and it is up to us whether or not we chose to be in right relationship with him.

It is our choice, and that choice carries with it many responsibilities. Responsibilities which many of us throughout our community, and throughout the world have lost sight of. We are chosen to be a holy people. And being chosen as a holy people means being fully devoted to and invested in God's kingdom.  

We are called to be a holy people. A people called to be fully devoted to and invested in God’s covenant with us. 

Of course, this devotion and investment looks different for different communities, in many different periods of time, and in many different places. But no matter time or place it remains the basis of our covenant with God and our life as Christ’s disciples.

In all cases it means that we must continually discern what the Spirit is saying to us. Where the Spirit is leading us. 

Now more than ever we at St. Simon’s must awake, arise, and act to the call of the Holy Spirit, to the covenant that we have with God and the relationship that we have with Christ.

What is the Spirit saying to us St. Simonites? Where is the Spirit leading us? How must we strain forward to what lies ahead? What rubbish must we toss aside in order to hear our call from God as we strive to live a life as true followers of Christ Jesus? As our participants in God’s covenant with us? 

With the words of Dr. Kwok in our minds and hearts, how do we press on, how do we ensure that the voice of the Holy Spirit is speaking loudly to all of us sitting here today and to others who are not here today? How do we make St. Simon’s shine like a star and move into the night to light all who are seeking, all who are lost so that they too many become members of God’s astounding covenant and Jesus Christ’s offer of eternal salvation? 

Rise up ye saints of God! Have done with lesser things, give heart and soul and mind and strength to serve the Kings of Kings.

Rise up ye saints of God! His kingdom tarries long: Lord bring the day of truth and love and end the night of wrong.

Lift high the cross of Christ! Tread where his feet have trod: and quickened by the Spirit’s power, rise us, ye saints of God!

 

 

Awake, Arise, Act

 

SERMON

October 01, 2023

Matthew 21:23-32 

The Episcopal Church continues to decline in membership. A press release issued by the Episcopal News Service two weeks ago indicated that “The Episcopal Church’s 2022 annual parochial reports…continue to show a church experiencing gradual long-term membership decline...The Church’s tally of baptized members dropped just below 1.6 million in 2022, down 21% from 2013….” And “The church recorded an even sharper drop in average Sunday attendance in the past decade, down 43% to 373,000 in 2022.”

Perhaps most graphically the data indicated a drop from 33,000 marriages performed in 1980 to 5500 in 1922; with numbers much the same for baptisms. It is a small wonder why we do not have more youth in our congregations.

That same week Stewardship Reality, a New York City based organization our diocese has contracted to perform an assessment of St. Simon’s community demographics and potential ways in which to sustain our parish in the long run, also reported some alarming data. Within our immediate community over 60 percent of the population falls in the category “nones”, meaning no religious affiliation; and over 50% of the population falls well beneath the U.S. poverty guidelines and struggles to pay either rent or mortgage burdens.

At Elliott Point School 97% of all children qualify for the school lunch program, and currently the Okaloosa County School district has identified approximately 465 elementary and secondary school children who live without a permanent roof over their head.

Sharing and Caring, our local food pantry, sees over 25 families each day. Families who struggle to feed their children and themselves.

What is the message in the midst of these grimmest of realities?

I believe that Dr. Kwok Pui-Lan a scholar and theologian who is also a life-long Episcopalian responded both accurately and powerfully when she spoke at a conference in Baltimore last summer.

In an incredibly passionate voice Dr. Kwok implored us to Awake, Arise, and Act. She said, “It is time to Awake, to Arise, and to Act. It is time to make Jesus known, once again, in our communities and in the world.” It is time to leave behind the comforts of home and to venture into a community that is in desperate need of love, compassion, hope, and peace. The hope and peace that only faith in our Lord Jesus Christ can bring. Love and peace that offers reconciliation, forgiveness, and healing among all in our community. All in the world.

Dr. Kwok does not believe in the “nones.” Bravo Dr. Kwok.

I also refuse to believe that the “nones” are lost to the love that God has for all his beloved children. Rather, I choose to believe that the “nones” are seekers. Seekers whom we have failed to help “see” how stories like the Good Samaritan, the Woman at the Well, and the Prodigal Son apply to them, just as they apply to us. 

I refuse to believe that the “nones” are not seeking God. And more importantly that God is not seeking them. I refuse to believe that just because people are not sitting in church pews they are not seekers – seekers of God’s love.

I refuse to believe that God’s love is only for those who attend church. God’s love is for all. We are all made in the image of God. We are all God’s beloved children.

Awake, Arise, Act. We are all Jesus’ disciples whom he loved and whom he sent into the world as healers for those who suffer. We have been sent into the world to love as Christ loved us. To love those who have failed to understand that they, just like we, are beloved children of God. 

Of course, Paul did not believe in the “nones” either. In his evangelism journeys he traveled over 10,000 miles on foot, donkey, and boat to spread the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Gospel, to the “nones” of his day, the Gentiles. He suffered numerous encounters with hardship – stoning, jailing, and more – all in the name proclaiming the love of God, and the love and salvation brought to us through the incarnation of his Son, Jesus Christ. And, he met with tremendous success. He alone is responsible for the initial spread of Christianity throughout the Roman Empire, and its future as a world religion. 

Paul’s Epistle to the Philippians, written while he was in jail in Ephesus, is a letter filled with joy and praise for a group of people in Philippi who held fast to his teachings. Gentiles who were now Christians and who refused to bend to the pressures of the Roman Empire and their imposed worship of many Gods. In his letter he wrote,

“Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (Philippians 2:12-13) 

He went on to say, 

“Do all things without murmuring and arguing, so that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, in which you shine like stars in the world” (Philippians 2:14-15)

In The Message, Eugene Peterson translates these verses into language more accessible to us in today’s post-modern world. Peterson writes:

“Be energetic in your life of salvation…that energy is God’s energy; an energy deep within you…Do everything readily and cheerfully – no bickering, no second guessing allowed! Go out into the world uncorrupted, a breath of fresh air in this squalid and polluted society. Provide people with a glimpse of the living God. Carry the light-giving Message into the night…” (The Message, Philippians 2:12-16)

Awake, Arise, Act.  Shine like stars in the night. Carry the light-giving Message into the night. What joyous and exciting directives to those of us who know that as beloved children of God we are filled with sufficient energy and enough love to light the entire world. To demonstrate a way of being, a way of life that provides the guidepost and the path to reconciliation and peace.

We at St. Simon’s face tremendous challenges as we head into 2024. How will our Stewardship Campaign fare? What decisions must be made to ensure a solid and vibrant future for St. Simon’s in the Ft. Walton Beach community? How do we bring God to the “nones?” What is the Spirit Saying to St. Simon’s Church?

I end with Thomas Merton’s Prayer from his book, Thoughts in Solitude:

My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.

And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road,

though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always though
I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.

I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.