Fifth Sunday after Epiphany, year B-Br Luke

Andre-Rublev's Saviour

Homily preached by Br. Luke at Blaxland on Sunday 8th February 2015: 

Fifth Sunday after Epiphany, year B

Readings:

Isaiah 40:21-31; Psalm 147:1-11; I Corinthians 9:16-23; Mark 1:29-39

" As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them."(Mark 1:29-31 NRSV)

And then they came from everywhere to be healed by him

Jesus cured many people of various diseases and cast out many daemons, and remember what we said at Bible Study last Thursday about Jesus silencing the daemons, he silenced them and cast them out. Mark says again “He would not permit the daemons to speak” and every time he cast a daemon out, he said to the daemon “be quiet, and go! He always said that, when the daemons spoke, he would not let them say who he was, people might think – well, why won't he let them speak? Was he frightened of them, no of course not, what he doesn't want is for them to start telling people who he is because at this point in time he is beginning his ministry and later on he doesn't want the events that unfold to be brought forth more quickly, which is obviously what Satan wants, so they cannot interfere and disrupt his plans, his mission, so he said ‘be silent’! And when God says ‘be silent!’ what do you do? Be Silent.

I won’t speak about Isaiah, this morning because we will do that along with the Psalm at our Parish Bible Study on Thursday.

(Holy Redeemer Christian Community does Bible Study by Skype at 7.30pm AEST each Thursday)

I am going to go to someone many people don't like very much– our friend Paul

“If I proclaim the gospel, this gives me no ground for boasting, for an obligation is laid on me, and woe betide me if I do not proclaim the gospel!

What is he saying? It’s no good me going look at me aren't I wonderful I’m proclaiming the gospel! No! Just because he does it doesn’t mean he can boast about it, and say how good I am. You can't puff yourself up and make yourself important:

‘I am such a good Christian for preaching the gospel’- because you have an obligation to do that as a Christian- so you can't run around saying ‘I’m such a good Christian, look at me I'm preaching the gospel’. No, being a Christian is about doing.

We have the obligation to preach the gospel, St Francis of Assisi said how do you proclaim the gospel, you can do it in the way you live, you don’t necessarily have to use words, he didn't actually say it in those words, did he Andrew?

The intention behind whatever the words he did say was– “Preach everywhere, if necessary use words” In other words what Paul said is that ‘I have an obligation on me to proclaim the gospel’ so I am doing it. If I do it for my own will I have a reward, but it is not for his own will because he had been subject to the commission. He is following the command given to him by Christ. 

Later in the gospel, in what comes to be known as the Great Commission Jesus says to the disciples go out and make converts of the whole world In other words go out there and spread the Message, spread the Good News, and we all know what the Good News is, the message of the gospel in its fundamental form, God is Love, as John said in his Gospel, he couldn't have made it any plainer, God is Love! 

The whole message of the Christian Gospel is Love and Reconciliation to God.

We are reconciled back to God through the action of Christ.

Paul then says this really complicated thing:

“To those under the law I became as one under the law (though I myself am not under the law) so that I might win those under the law.” [1 Corinthians 9:20b NRSV]

He is not under the Law! What is he talking about? He has these lovely convoluted arguments, he does that all the time, what he is simply saying is that he is not under the Law, but what law is he referring to here? He is referring to the Mosaic Law, he is referring to the Jewish Law, he is not under the Jewish Law anymore he is not under the Mosaic Law, why not?  Because he is under the Law of Christ and we know that the church in Jerusalem decided that Christians were not bound to follow the Mosaic Law, which is why many Christians are not circumcised.

If we had to follow the Law of Moses every Christian male would be have to be circumcised; because we do not follow the Jewish Law there is no obligation on us to be circumcised which is one of the things discussed by the church in Jerusalem where it was decided that Christians were not bound by the Mosaic Law.

I am not under the Law but for those Jews who are under the Law I will act as though I am under the Law  so that I don’t frighten them, don’t scare them away and I can convert them to the Message of Christ by them understanding that I understand the message of the Law. Which is why he said “To the weak I became weak, so that I might win the weak I have become all things to all people, so that I might by any means save some 

(1 Corinthians 9:22 NRSV)

In other words Paul is saying he will do anything that is required for him to preach the gospel to convert people to the Faith; what is conversion to the Faith? Bringing them the knowledge of God’s love and the gift of Reconciliation… So it is not really that complicated when you start to unpick him; and you don’t worry about he argues this and then he argues that etc. that is his rhetorician style, the way he was taught to argue.

I want to go back briefly to Mark and then we will stop.

All night Jesus had been healing and casting out daemons so he must have been somewhat tired, I know I would be very tired, wouldn't you?  

”In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed.” (Mark 1:35 NRSV)

Now that is the other pattern that Jesus followed, you remember that on many, many, occasions after Jesus had preached, after he had done a lot of work like this he retreated to a cave, to a mountain top, a deserted place to a boat to wherever and he prayed. Going to reconnect himself with the Divine, to recharge his batteries, as it were… not that he needs to from the divine perspective but in his humanity, his human body he did. That’s why we find that in the early church the earliest monks went to the desert, we now call them the Desert Mothers and Fathers, they went and they lived, literally, in the desert but they didn't live in Monasteries’ as we know them they lived very much like the Carthusians do, they each had their own cell and came together for meetings. 

That is the pattern of the Desert Mothers and Fathers:-the very earliest type of religious communities would go to the desert, mimicking what Jesus did, he had gone into the desert, stayed in the desert prayed in the desert, where it is different is that the monks and the nuns don’t come back, once they had gone into the monastery in the desert they didn’t come back out again. We Franciscans do come back.

And then Simon Peter says we’ve been looking for you, where have you been, everyone’s gone, what have you been doing? 

Jesus says come on let’s go to the next town, he doesn't even answer them, he doesn't say, “Well this is what I have been doing” …My job is to preach the gospel, proclaim the message, to visit the Synagogues and cast out daemons, come on, let’s go, and off he goes and on to the next town.

Paul is mimicking Jesus, isn't he? Preach Convert, next town. Preach Convert, next town.

I am often asked what is the difference between a friar and a monk. It is Very simple a monk takes a vow of stability and obedience to a Community, the same for a nun, and goes to the Community and lives there and doesn't leave. They go to that Monastery, wherever that might be and that is where they spend the rest of their life. They may move occasionally from monastery to monastery or from place to place but by and large it is to the one Community and one Monastery and that is where they stay.

Dominicans and Franciscans are called Friars and that is because they are mendicants and what we mean by mendicants is that the vows we take are to the Order and so we can be sent anywhere in order to do the Work of the Order, so in some ways a friar is more like Paul who goes from town to town and place to place preaching, converting, next town and so on and so forth and that’s what Francis wanted brothers, who were out and about.(Sisters couldn't go out in those days, for their own protection they had to remain in the monastery otherwise they would be raped and all sorts of things, so they remained inside and are Enclosed Orders.) The Brothers were out and about because that was what Francis wanted.

Francis was following Paul, who Paul was following? Jesus, who was Francis Following? Jesus.

Recorded and transcribed by Br Andrew

First Sunday in Advent year B - Br Andrew

Andre-Rublev's Saviour

Homily preached by Br Andrew at Warrimoo on   Sunday 23^rd November

FIRST SUNDAY IN ADVENT YEAR B

When we pray

The genesis of prayer in the People of the Hebrews began with the Sacrifices of blood, grain etc. and oblations offered by the priests in the morning and evening and during the day.

We do not know precisely when these hours became occasions of prayer but surmise they were first introduced during the Babylonian Exile (587-521 BC), when the Temple did not exist.  Synagogue services of Torah readings and psalms and hymns developed as a substitute for the bloody sacrifices of the Temple, a sacrifice of praise. The inspiration to do this may have been fulfilment of David's words, "Seven times a day I praise you" (Ps. 119:164), as well as, "the just man meditates on the law day and night" (Ps. 1:2).

And Evening, and morning, and at noon, will I pray, and cry aloud, and he shall hear my voice."  -Psalm 55:17 or "Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went into his house; and his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and prayed, and gave thanks before his God, as he had done aforetime." -Daniel 6:10

What is Prayer

Tefilah (prayer) is an essential constituent of religion it is a Sacrifice of Praise, the Shema in the morning is obligatory as is the evening Oblation. -Prayer is for the soul what food is for the body. It is praise intercession, hearing and listening of the finite to the infinite. It is "To love G-d, your G-d, with all your heart" (Deuteronomy 11:13) the complete unreserved service of man to God.

To pray continuously with our lips heart, hands and minds moves us toward an inseparable union between ourselves and God such that the hours of prayer draw us gladly from our current tasks to those three allotted hours.

OUR Lord assured his, disciples that he had not come to destroy the Law, but to fulfil, it therefore it is not surprising, to find the earliest Christians, notably the Apostles, conforming to the traditional customs of worship of the old Covenant: keeping the Passover, or going up to the Temple to pray at the appointed "Hours of Prayer,( it was Jewish practise to pray at morning, evening and three times a day “at the 3^rd, 6^th and 9^th hours),or keeping those hours as times of private devotion.

In the Scriptures we discover significant events and miracles occur at the ‘Hours of Prayer’

Jesus was crucified at the sixth hour and died at the ninth hour.

The gift of tongues during the day of Pentecost occurred during the third hour at nine am -Acts 2:15

God chose the time of afternoon prayer (3 p.m.; the Jewish "Ninth Hour") to send an Angel to the Centurion Cornelius: 

"When Peter and John went up together into the temple at the ninth hour of prayer, and healed the man, lame from his birth in the name of Jesus    -Acts 3:1-6

Likewise, we find S. Paul, wherever he might be, seeking out the local synagogue on the Sabbath, taking part in its worship and availing himself of its opportunities for teaching. At the same time we find Christians keeping strictly Christian observances, notably the First Day of the Week, with its Eucharistic Breaking of Bread as the distinctive act of worship. Even when the Church had overflowed the bounds of Judaism and was overwhelmingly Gentile in its membership, there was a survival of devotional practices of Jewish origin. Chief among these was the observance of the "Hours of Prayer," as services supplemental to the central Eucharistic Rite.

Church today

Members’ of the Universal church – for that is what catholic means, come from almost every nation on earth, and the English Church was a very different entity from its Vatican counterpart. The English were a polyglot nation, a unique blend of many peoples, and the result of the many invasions and conquering over the centuries, speaking at least 4 main languages, it was the variety and separation from Continental Europe which made this corner of the Church Universal so different from that one built upon the ruins of Rome.

Here the Protestant Reformation began outwardly as an act of independence driven by the political necessities of Henry the eighth while on the Religious front those such as William Tyndale, John Wycliffe, John of Gaunt not only began to question  the Doctrine of the roman Church but to establish various movements against it, Such as Wycliffe and the Lollards.

The Lay members of the church experienced poorly educated priests, poor pastoral care, and were less inclined to religious vocations hence the decline of the monasteries.

Despite this, many parishes remained vibrant and active places of worship even though while continuing to attend mass regularly they rarely received communion. During the Reformation, the weekday masses that had become the norm were eliminated and some German reformers sought to reincorporate the practice of Morning and Evening Prayer.

The Prayer Book

Under the reign of Edward VI, successor to Henry VIII, the primary language of public worship in England and other areas ruled by Edward was changed from Latin to English, a prayer book for the laity was composed and the first Book of Common Prayer came into use. It was first used on Pentecost Sunday, 9 June 1549, and the occasion is now commemorated "on the first convenient day following Pentecost." The Book was the work of a commission of scholars, but primarily of Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury. It was based primarily upon the Latin worship tradition of the Use of Sarum (similar to, but not identical with, the Roman rite used by most Roman Catholic between 1600 and 1950), with some elements taken from the Greek liturgies of the Eastern Church, from ancient Gallican (French) rites, from the new Lutheran order of service, and from the Latin rite of Cologne.

 Key components of this BCP grant us the reading of the psalter monthly across Morning and Evening Prayer and the reading of most of the Old Testament and Apocrypha across a year and the reading of the New Testament 3 times a year. Our prayer book continues this pattern with a two year office lectionary. This systematic course reading of the books of the Bible and the praying of the Psalter are an important part of the rhythm and continuity of the Daily Office.

One disadvantage was that in changing the language to English this left those in Ireland, Wales and Cornwall out in the cold and may have contributed to the schism between the Irish and the English.

Altogether there have been at least 3 editions and re-prints of the Book of Common Prayer not including a 2004 version produced in October 2004 for use in the Irish Church.

The official version for use online is that of 1549.

This English Prayer Book has had far reaching influence on the liturgies of the Prayer books in other Denominations from the Roman Church to the Southern Baptists.

Sermon Extra 4 - Did Christ have to die for our sins?

Sacrifice_of_Isaac-Caravaggio_(Uffizi)

The theology around Christ being sacrificed for our sins, is, I think as old as the faith.

There is another slant on this, which when I first heard it, made a light come on. It’s all about an ancient blood covenant.

You will recall that when God made the blood covenant with Abraham, that the people would inherit the land, God instructed the patriarch to slaughter animals and then divide them so that there was a path between the carcasses.  That night a smoking pot and a torch was seen to pass along the path. (Genesis 15).  As I understand the rules around covenant at that time, each person had to pass between the slain animals. Thereby each person was pledging that they would keep their part of the covenant. And the only way to break the covenant was the death of one of the parties. However in this passage Abraham does not pass between the animals, God does – twice.  Meaning that God was making a covenant with both Abraham and himself.  So if the covenant was broken then God has to honour his pledge, not Abraham.  God eventually did this, when he had Moses bring the people out of Egypt.

 Later on God told Abraham the sign of the covenant was circumcision – which again is a blood covenant.

After Moses read the law to the people in the desert and when they accepted the law, Moses then sprinkled blood from a sacrifice on them. (Exodus 24) – another covenant sealed with blood.

At the last supper Jesus said of the wine: this is my blood which will be poured out for many, so he was again initiating a blood covenant (albeit with a substitute substance) for the disciples and through them, us.  

The physical part of the blood covenant was his death on the cross. So it’s not so much that he dies for our sins, but rather that he was making a blood covenant with God for us.  As he was both human and divine he, like the old covenant with Abraham, was making a pledge, both as God and as man.

  His physical blood sealed the new covenant and thereby opened for us, our part of the covenant, which is salvation, forgiveness of sins and eternal life.  Hence the idea, that he died to save us.