Faith remains: the story of Joseph (Ray Webster's sermon prep for August 7)

First reading: Genesis 37:1-4, 12-28

Beginning the story of Joseph

This Sunday we read the beginning of the great story of Joseph. The story of Joseph is dramatic and interesting in and of itself, but his story also sets the scene for the stories of Moses and of the Exodus. Joseph’s story tells how the Jewish people ended up living down in Egypt, where they were enslaved. Then we are given the great story of how God acted in history to save the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt. This story is remembered in Judaism at Passover. It is the formative story of Judaism. It is remembered and echoed at the heart of the story of Jesus Christ.

Setting the story: the eleven sons of Jacob

Two weeks ago, you will remember that we read the story of Jacob’s marriage to Leah, and then to Rachel. Ethics had not yet developed the concept of having only one wife. Jacob had twelve sons by his two wives and two slave girls. At the time of this story, Joseph was seventeen, and there were ten older brothers. One brother younger than Joseph will later figure in the story, Benjamin. Have you ever heard a youngest child referred to as the “Benjamin” of the family? Joseph and Benjamin were the sons of Jacob’s beloved wife Rachel.

Jealousy and betrayal

Now Israel …

Remember that Jacob was given the name Israel by God --

Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his children, because he was the son of his old age;

It is a beloved detail of the King James translation of the Bible in the 17^th century, that Jacob gave his beloved Joseph a coat of many colors. In this translation it is a more prosaic long robe with sleeves. At any rate, Jacob clearly treated Joseph as a favorite and that made Joseph’s older brothers envious and angry.

Joseph loses everything – except his faith

Most of the brothers decided to kill Joseph and they threw him in a pit. The eldest brother Reuben tried to save Joseph, but the brothers took Joseph out of the pit and sold him to traders, into slavery down in Egypt.

Joseph lost everything – his freedom, family, homeland, language, possessions, and found himself a slave.

The one thing he had was his faith in God.

Second reading: Romans 10:5-15: The word is near you

We are reading from the Letter of Paul to the Romans and come to the great statement:

"The word is near you,

on your lips and in your heart"

(that is, the word of faith that we proclaim);
One of the great principles of the Reformation was that the Bible be given into the hands of the people, translated into the language of the people. In that extremely practical sense the word is indeed near each one of us. It is intended for each one, not for some special elite, but for every one.

(Ray Webster)

Sermon prep for July 17: poetic justice?

Commentary by Ray Webster

First reading: Genesis 29:15-28 Jacob marries

These great stories from Genesis tell us the story of the descendants of Abraham – our ancestors in faith, the first people (in the telling of it in Genesis) to believe in God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Today we come to the story of Jacob’s marriage. People are often startled by Jacob’s behavior in Genesis. He tricked his brother Esau out of his birth right, and now Jacob finds himself with a prospective father-in-law who tricks him in turn.

Robert Alter writes:

It has been clearly recognized since late antiquity that the whole story of the switched brides is a meting out of poetic justice to Jacob – the deceiver deceived, deprived by darkness of the sense of sight as his father is by blindness, relying, like his father, on the misleading sense of touch. The Midrash Bereishit Rabba vividly represents the correspondence between the two episodes: “And all that night he cried out to he, ‘Rachel!’ and she answered him. In the morning, ‘and, …look, she was Leah.” He said to her, ‘Why did you deceive me, daughter of a deceiver? Didn’t I call out Rachel in the night, and you answered me?’ She said, ‘There is never a bad barber who doesn’t have disciples. Isn’t this how your father cried out Esau, and you answered him?’”

Robert Alter, The Five Books of Moses W.W. Norton & Company: New York, 2004, pages 155-156

Laban tricks Jacob into marrying his daughter Leah, and then his daughter Rachel – the one Jacob loved. In the unfolding story in Genesis, Leah is the mother of six of Jacob’s sons: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar and Zebulun. Jacob had two more sons by the slave girl Bilhah: Dan and Naphtali. And then two by another slave girl: Gad and Asher.

Then Rachel would have a son, Joseph, whose story we will read – and then another, the youngest, Benjamin. These were the twelve sons of Jacob who was also called Israel, and the ancestors of the twelve tribes of Israel.

By the way, I highly recommend Robert Alter’s highly praised translation of and commentary on the first five books of the Bible: The Five Books of Moses, quoted above.

Second reading: Letter of Paul to the Romans 8:26-39

When my home rector as a student, Bishop Wylie, died, many years ago, he left instructions that my old boss in New York, Bishop Rockwell, preach on Romans 8 – this great majestic chapter from the Letter of Paul to the Romans. Part of these words are indeed often read at funerals in the Episcopal Church and they are fitting statements of the central Christian belief in the resurrection in Jesus Christ.

Our passage this week starts with a less familiar verse – much less often read – but of equal importance.

The Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.

There are times when we do not know what to say to God. Either the situation is too tough. Or sometimes are hearts are too full. The Holy Spirit, who is God dwelling within us, speaks in the silence within, too deep for words, in love.

And then come these great words of Christian faith and hope:

What then are we to say about these things?

These things that happen to us, that happen in this life. What are we to say about death and loss?

If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else? Who will bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us.

And then these great words. In many ways they are the center of my faith:

Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52

Jesus put before the crowds another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in his field; it is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches."

The mustard seed is tiny, but a great plant grows out of it. Just so the kingdom of heaven – the sovereignty of God’s love in our lives, and our trust in that love – can be as small, as tiny, as a mustard seed but out of grows something great. Our lives. Our Christian lives. The life of the Christian community.

Looking ahead to the Second Sunday in Easter: John 20:19-31

Today’s Gospel reading contains two stories: in the first, Jesus appears to his disciples and in the second, Jesus appears to Thomas.  Several noticeable – even provocative – statements form the scaffolding of these stories, and indicate some important points.

20:19: …for fear of the Jews….  This is an uncomfortable phrase, to the extent that when Scripture is read publicly, “the authorities” are sometimes substituted for “the Jews” to indicate specifically who the disciples were afraid of and why they were afraid of them.  The people gathered in the locked house were reeling from Jesus’ arrest and execution and did not want the same thing to happen to them.  The author of John’s Gospel, however, is drawing a parallel between those disciples and the community to which he writes.  This was a Jewish community increasingly in conflict with mainstream Jewish institutions and Roman authorities in their time.   The important thing to note is not who the disciples were afraid of, but that they were afraid. 

20:19: … ‘Peace be with you.’  This was a conventional Roman greeting, but Jesus’ use of it here and in verse 21 is different.  The second time he says it, the disciples have just recognized him as “Lord.”  The peace which he brings, therefore, is more than conventional.  It is God’s peace, which Jesus had promised to give to all who follow him.  Only God’s peace can drive out the disciples’ fear.

20:27: ‘Do not doubt, but believe.’  Jesus’ exchange with Thomas is popularly interpreted as a story about doubt and belief.  Another way of looking at it is as a story about how we believe.  New Testament scholar Gail R. O’Day notes that the fearful disciples gathered in the locked house were no heroes of faith: they didn’t believe the women’s report about the resurrection, or else they would have been out looking for Jesus!  Instead, he came to them and showed them his physical body.  Thomas missed out on this, and was asking for the same thing that the other disciples had received.  Jesus didn’t chastise him, but offered himself again.  His statement, ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe,’ is a nod to the generations of believers reading the Gospel who were not able, like Thomas, to touch Jesus’ resurrected body. 

20:31: But these are written so you may come to believe ….  For the author of John’s Gospel, the written accounts of Jesus’ resurrection function for us (generations of successive believers) in the way that Jesus’ physical presence functioned for the disciples.  Like Jesus’ body, the Scriptures acknowledge our need for substance, for tangibles to ground and support our faith.  One issue that John’s author was keen to address was Docetism, the belief that Jesus was human only in appearance, and not in reality.  William Temple underlines the importance of John’s overall theme, the Word became flesh, in light of this concern.[1]  Jesus is really present – embodied – in Scripture, in sacraments, and in one another, and these are not crutches that artificially support belief, but are the real substance of faith. 

(Danielle Thompson)

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[1] William Temple, Readings in St. John’s Gospel (Wilton, CT: Morehouse Barlow Co., 1985), 79. 

Sermon preached on the Second Sunday in Lent

GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” (John 3:16)

Genesis 12:1-4a; Psalm 121; Romans 4:1-5, 13-17; John 3:1-17

There are many things around the world in our thoughts and prayers.

The people of Japan are dealing with the aftermath of their worst recorded earthquake, and then a tsunami, and the ongoing crisis with the damaged nuclear power plant. We pray for those trying to find solutions, for those hurt and killed and those trying to help.

There are all the changes – earthquakes in society – in the middle east, and the unfolding situation in Libya. We pray for peace, for freedom, for democracy.

In the midst of the world, the church is called to speak the word that God so loved the world,

all the world, all the people in the world, everyone, not one left out of God's love, of God's intention of loving --

God so loved the world that God gave his only Son. So every one might see in him God’s love, and trust that love, believe in that love, and have life.

Nicodemus

Those words come at the end of today’s story, of a man called Nicodemus coming to see Jesus. Nicodemus is described as a Pharisee, a leader of the Jewish people. In our Lenten Gospel stories Jesus will reach out to a variety of people, crossing all sorts of human dividing lines. Next week he will encounter of woman of Samaria, sometimes definitely from the other side of the tracks in that culture and society. The week after Jesus will encounter the blind beggar – an outsider also.

Nicodemus was not an outsider. He was an educated leader. A few years later, another person appears in the story – just after the first Easter, in the Book of Acts – a young Pharisee named Saul of Tarsus. What great use God made of Saul, calling him to be, turning him into Paul.

Jesus did not send Nicodemus away. Jesus listened to him. Nicodemus paid him a compliment, an intelligent compliment. No one could do the signs Jesus did, apart from the presence of God. An intelligent compliment indeed, because that is exactly what the writer of John calls the extraordinary actions Jesus does – the seven miracles, but the writer doesn’t use the word miracle, the writer says signs. Feeding the great crowd with the few loaves and fish, healing the blind beggar in two weeks, and then the great seventh – calling Lazarus out of death. So may Jesus one day call each one of us.

Nicodemus says to Jesus that no one could do these signs apart from the presence of God. So Nicodemus goes straight to the heart of who Jesus was and is – God with us, Emanuel, the presence of God with us.

Jesus seems to change the subject – something that happens in John’s Gospel. His mother came to him with the news they had run out of wine at the wedding reception and Jesus said his hour had not yet come. He wasn’t changing the subject at all – he was stating very clearly what lay ahead. Drawing all our attention to the moment when he will say, the hour has come – and that will be the hour when we see him lay down his life for us in love – for there we see fully revealed how much God so loved the world, so loves the world.

Jesus tells Nicodemus he must be born from above, born of water and Spirit. “Born of water” most probably meaning that Nicodemus should be baptized, as Jesus was baptized – the great sign of entering the new life in him.

The Holy Spirit

And born of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the name for God who is present with us and within us, dwelling with us – did you not know your body is a Temple of the Holy Spirit? Paul would write. The Holy Spirit dwelling in us gives us the strength and courage and wisdom to love with the love of Jesus. Not always, not in everything. Until the day we die a necessary part of our prayer is to ask forgiveness for the mistakes we make. And we do make mistakes. But we are forgiven and go on. We are people who are forgiven, and who are given the Spirit

-- who gives us the love of Jesus to give, if we can just forget self for a moment and give what is given us to give.

-- So abundantly and richly gives.

-- So that we may give to a child, a friend, a lover, someone we forgive, someone we try to help.

-- So that we may love God here in worship, love God in prayer.

I believe the Holy Spirit guides our conscience, if we listen, learn to listen, in making choices. I believe the Holy Spirit gives light – I love the Quaker image of the Inner Light – as we wrestle out what to do. I believe the Spirit gives light as we read the Bible – oh, again, not in everything, not always. But pay attention when something speaks to you, spend time with it – or when something especially perplexes or challenges. Ask God what God is saying by means of the words or the image.

I think images speak quite as strongly as words – so Jesus at the Last Supper took the bread and wine as signs of God’s presence with us in him and we still do that today, a simple action people do around the world.

For me this spending time listening to the word of God in the Scriptures, in the stories of Jesus, is meditation.

And if God calls you to just be there silent, as two friends, two lovers might just be together sometimes – then trust’s the Holy Spirit’s guidance, and just be still. “Teach us to be still” wrote Eliot in Four Quartets. To be still and be loved and offer our love in silence and quiet and the dark, not seeing anything in the love which is the Light.

Always good to be honest with God

Nicodemus honestly expressed his perplexity. "How can these things be?” Always good to be honest with God – one of the best kinds of prayer. Authentically who we are. Remembering Jesus in the garden that night after the Last Supper when he said exactly what was in his heart – please take what is coming away – and then said, not my will but your be done. Not that God’s will was or ever is that God’s innocent Child suffer, that is never the will of God – but God’s will for Jesus and for those who would follow him is that we not run away but face what comes in his love.

“How can these things be?” This story closes with Jesus giving a brief set of statements that are among the most beautiful in John’s Gospel – the Sermon to Nicodemus. Jesus will do the same thing, on the larger scale, at the end of the much longer story of Jesus and the blind beggar, when the final words of that story are followed by the great statement by Jesus “I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.”

The Son of Man must be lifted up

In today’s story, Jesus says that the Son of Man – he, Jesus – must be lifted up. A double meaning to lifted up. Jesus would be exalted in glory – but the hour of glory would be the hour when we see him love with nothing held back, and that hour was the hour when he would be lifted up on a hill outside the city walls on the cross.

“ so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.”

John 3:16

Then come the words I opened with today, the great words Martin Luther called “the gospel in miniature.”

If you see someone holding up a sign at Wrigley Field saying “John 3:16” this is the verse referred to! I remember many years ago, on an el in New York, coming back with the kids from the Bronx Zoo, rattling by, looking down from the train on a huge Pentecostal church called just this, John 3:16 – great name for a church, may it be the message of the church in the city and world today, the message to the world, what we have to say:

"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” (John 3:16)

God so loved the world, the whole world, all the people in the world, everyone one – that he gave his only Son, so that whoever believes in him – trusts in his love – may have life.

"Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world,”

Not to condemn. No. Not to condemn the world. Never. God sent the Son into the world

“ in order that the world might be saved through him."

(This sermon was preached by the Rev. Raymond Webster, Rector, in St. Chrysostom’s Church, Chicago, Illinois, on Sunday, March 20, 2011, the Third Sunday in Lent.)

The texts of the Gospel lesson is from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA, and used by permission.

Looking ahead to the Second Sunday in Lent: John 3:1-17

 Our Gospel this coming Sunday (John 3:1-17) is the first of three stories of encounters people had with Jesus. 

There was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. 

Someone who was a leader of the Jewish people, a prominent citizen, a member of the Pharisees who were a source of much of the criticism of Jesus. Interestingly, this would be the description much later of Saul of Tarsus, who became known as St. Paul.

He came to Jesus by night 

Which has the distinct implication that he did not want to be seen coming to Jesus.  

and said to him, "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God." 

Nicodemus makes a nice compliment, leading us to think he had seen and heard Jesus before. Note the emphasis on the word “signs” – “these signs that you do” – which is the word the writer of John uses for the extraordinary actions or miracles Jesus did. Nicodemus compliments Jesus, I think quite sincerely. But Jesus turns the discussion back to Nicodemus, and what he has seen.   


Jesus answered him, "Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above." Nicodemus said to him, "How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother's womb and be born?" Jesus answered, "Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be astonished that I said to you, 'You must be born from above.' The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." 

Jesus places a very great emphasis on the Spirit – the Spirit will also be a theme in his encounter with the woman of Samaria. “Spirit” – the Holy Spirit – is the name for God who is present with us and within us, unseen, like the air we breathe.

We need to be born of water (perhaps a reference to Baptism) and Spirit. The Holy Spirit helps us see who Jesus is, what he has done, what his story means to us. The Holy Spirit gives us the love of Jesus to give – to God in prayer and worship, and to others in loving service. The Holy Spirit gives us the strength and wisdom and courage to love, to see how to love.


Nicodemus said to him, "How can these things be?" Jesus answered him, "Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?


"Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you do not receive our testimony. If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.” 

Now Jesus turns to the story of Moses in the Book of Exodus, to a scene where Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness. Just so Jesus must be lifted up – and here I think there is a play on the image, for Jesus will be lifted up on the cross, where we will see his love for everyone human being fully and completely given. He will be lifted up in the resurrection from the dead and exalted to glory at the Father’s right hand. There is the double meaning of “lifted up.”  


“And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.”


Then come the great words Martin Luther called “the gospel in miniature.” If you see someone holding up a sign at Wrigley Field saying “John 3:16” this is what they are referring to!!!

"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”

God so loved the world, the whole world, all the people in the world, everyone one – that he gave his only Son, so that whoever believes in him – trusts in his love – may have life.

"Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him."

 A WORD ABOUT OUR FIRST READING

 

Our first and second readings are tied together in an important way, and I should offer some notes about them as well.

Our first reading is from Genesis 12:1-4a.

In the Book of Genesis, Abraham and his wife Sarah were the first people to believe in God. Abraham’s original name was Abram, and Sarah’s was Sarai. Their new names were a sign of their new faith in God.

God sent Abraham to live in the new land. God promises Abraham and Sarah that a great nation will descend from them. Both the Jewish people. And also everyone who believes in God.   

The Lord said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him.

A WORD ABOUT THE SECOND READING 

 

Our second reading is from the Letter of Paul to the Romans 4:1-5, 13-17.

In this passage from his Letter to the Romans, Paul takes a verse from the story of Abraham in the Book of Genesis, to be at the center of his theology in this letter.

“Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.” As noted above, in the unfolding story of Genesis, Abraham and his wife Sarah are the first people to believe in God. Belief meant acceptance of faith that God truly existed, and it also meant trust in God – trust in God’s mercy and loving kindness. 

 

Paul takes this verse to mean, that Abraham was put right with God not by being perfect, but by his faith in God. Our righteousness is not based on our works, but on our faith – our own trust in God’s mercy and loving kindness. 

 

What then are we to say was gained by Abraham, our ancestor according to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness." Now to one who works, wages are not reckoned as a gift but as something due. But to one who without works trusts him who justifies the ungodly, such faith is reckoned as righteousness. 

For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.

For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, as it is written, "I have made you the father of many nations") -- in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.

This is a very great passage: that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, who Paul goes on to define as those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, as it is written, "I have made you the father of many nations").

Pope Pius XI, who died in 1939, is said to have told a group of Belgian pilgrims, We are all Semites – a courageous statement in the face of the anti-Semitism of the late 1930s. That statement is rooted in the words of Paul today. 

(Raymond Webster)

The Bible texts are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA, and used by permission.

Sermon preached on the Last Sunday in Epiphany: The Transfiguration

At left: an image from the 1947 George Seaton film, "Miracle on 34th St." 

Exodus 24:12-18; Psalm 2; 2 Peter 1:16-21; Matthew 17:1-9

The movie, “Miracle on 34^th St.,” ends with a scene that’s a lot like the one we’ve just read.  A mom, her new husband, and her daughter drive from their city apartment to a house in the suburbs on Christmas Day, thinking they’re on a work errand.  The little girl actually wants nothing more than a house in the suburbs for Christmas, but the grown-ups have been pretty clear that Santa doesn’t do large structures.  Once the family is inside the house, they see that this has been no mere errand, but the house is, in fact, theirs for the taking.  And they notice something that causes all of the pieces to fall into place.  A walking cane is leaning up against the corner of one wall.  The parents look at one another with their mouths open, a deep realization washing over them.  The gift is real, and so is the giver: Santa Claus has actually given them this house.

The brilliant piece of the movie – the most revealing piece of the movie – happens right here.  Up to this point, these two adults have spent a lot of time becoming friends with a man called Kris Kringle, the owner of the walking cane.  Kris believes that he is Santa Claus.  Eventually, they come to believe that he is Santa Claus, they affirm their child’s belief that he is Santa Claus, and they invest a lot of time and energy into convincing other people that he’s Santa Claus.  So you’d think that they actually believe he’s Santa, right?  Well, in a way, they do.  Up until now, they’ve allowed Kris Kringle to be Santa.  And they’ve believed in Kris, in their friend.  They’ve believed in his goodness, his ethical soundness, his decency, his sanity.  They’re happier when he’s around, he’s a positive influence on their child.  He’s made New York City a friendlier place to live in. But he’s their Kris Kringle – their buddy, Santa on their own terms. Do they really believe that he flies all the way around the world in one night?  Or that he gives people houses for Christmas?  Does he have real, actual, Santa powers?  

Miracle on 34^th St. works so well on us because we recognize the sort of holding back that happens when we are asked to truly believe in something.  The last scene of that movie isn’t meant to uncover the cynicism and hard-heartedness of the man and the woman who, despite having said they believe in Santa Claus, don’t really believe until this one “aha moment.”  It’s just a point of connection between us and them, a place for us to recognize how hard it is to give ourselves over to faith in something that we think is impossible, or unimaginable.

It’s the same with the disciples, Peter, James, and John, as we follow them up the mountain with Jesus today.  Notice how the scene is set for us: “Six days after Peter had acknowledged Jesus as the Christ ….”  Peter, it turns out, says he believes in Jesus.  Six days earlier, he’s confessed him to be the Messiah, the one they have all been waiting for.  Over and over again Jesus has been revealing himself to those around him: at his birth, when the magi come to worship him; at his baptism, when the heavens open and God speaks from above; when he heals, and when he teaches, like we’ve heard him doing in the Sermon on the Mount.  Like us, the disciples have witnessed all of these epiphanies, and what’s more, they’ve seen other people – people who barely know Jesus – come to him from out of nowhere, and say they believe in him with no evidence, no grounds for doing so.  Peter makes a bold move and says, “They’re right – it’s you.”  And when we hear it, we hear him saying “I believe that you are God,” or “I believe that you’re not lying about being sent from heaven.”  What he’s really saying is, “Everything that I’ve been taught to look for, every hope that my people have pinned on God for deliverance, for restoration, for eternal joy and for eternal peace – everything Moses gave us in the Law and everything Elijah and the prophets proclaimed to us … everything we had started to believe could never happen … I think it’s you.  The Messiah does exist, and he’s come in you.” 

And Peter does believe.  But again, when he goes up that mountain and discovers what’s waiting for him, we have that walking cane moment.  Picture strolling around the Potomac with the president, and suddenly George Washington and Abraham Lincoln appear before you.  Well, for Jesus’ friends to see him with Moses and Elijah was more profound than that!  They symbolized the truth about God as these men knew it.  There’s no bigger thing that could have happened to Peter than encountering Moses and Elijah – except encountering God, which is the next big shocker.  While Peter is whipping himself up into a frenzy, a voice from heaven silences everything.  When Peter falls to the ground in fear, something in him has changed.  He believed before, but now he knows.  Like Kris Kringle’s friends, he would have testified in a court of law to Jesus’ being the Messiah, but now he can testify with every cell in his body to the fact of Jesus. 

Peter is an icon of faith for us because of his confession that Jesus is the Messiah.  But you and I know that his faith was not unwavering.  About six weeks from now we’ll sit in this same room and read about the hours before the crucifixion, when Peter denied Jesus three times.  And part of why he does so is because the Messiah he had spent his life hoping for was not supposed to die like a common criminal.  Reality didn’t match up with his belief.  Part of why the grownups in Miracle on 34^th street stopped believing in Santa Claus was because their world had ceased to be magical – it was busy, cold, lonely, even painful.  Reality and Christmas did not align.  What Kris Kringle revealed to these people was not that they were bitter, faithless, or jaded – simply that they were mistaken.  And the same is true for Peter – nobody could say that Peter was passionless or unhopeful.  What God shows him in Jesus is just that he’s made a mistake.  It’s a mistake we make every day.  We know that pain is real, that suffering is real, that violence and broken relationships, disparities of all kinds, are real.  But we think that they constitute reality.  The things that hurt us are real – there’s no denying it.  Reality, however, is about who wins the day.  Reality is about who sets the terms of the debate.  Reality is about who is finally responsible for all of this.   And that is God.  That is all that is healthy and reconciling and redemptive in the world.  That is love.  When Peter looks over at Jesus on the mountain and sees that his face is shining, he’s not seeing something new that has happened to Jesus – he’s seeing Jesus as he really is.  He’s seeing the reality of God’s good creation reflected in the face of God’s Son.   It is his great epiphany.

I would not be surprised if that next Christmas, the Miracle on 34^th St. family didn’t find themselves wondering about Santa Claus, even while living in their new house.  I think Peter probably had moments throughout his life when he wondered if it had all been a dream.  Each one of us lives with the routine ups and downs of belief.  Each one of us in this room will face a severe assault on our belief, if we haven’t already. Our challenge is to not hold back.  Our challenge is to remember the shining face of Jesus.  It is to develop a sense of the really real, to learn to recognize Reality as belonging to God, and to claim that reality as our own. 

(Sermon preached by the Reverend Danielle Thompson at St. Chrysostom's Episcopal Church in Chicago, IL on Sunday, March 6, 2011 at 8:00am, 11:00am, and 5:15pm)