SEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER EASTER (Sunday after Ascension)B-Br. Simeon

Andre-Rublev's Saviour

Homily preached by Br. Simeon at Maroubra:Sunday 17th May 2015: 

SEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER EASTER (Sunday after Ascension)  B.



Gospel:  John 17: 6-19

"Sanctified and consecrated in God's truth"

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord my strength and my Redeemer. Amen.

Do you know why God created you - what purpose and mission he has entrusted to you?

You may not have sensed God leading you to become a missionary or a preacher, or whatever it might be, but you still have a calling! No other person than your Creator can tell you why He created you. You were brought here by God and for a purpose!

Jesus' aim and mission was to glorify his heavenly Father. All he said and did gave glory to his Father. On the eve of his sacrifice on the cross and in the presence of his disciples, Jesus made his high priestly prayer: "Holy Father, keep them in your name that they may be one as we are one". Jesus prayed for the unity of his disciples and for all who would believe in him. Jesus' prayer for his people is that we be united with God the Father in his Son and through his Holy Spirit and be joined together, in unity with all who are members of Christ’s body.

What motivated Jesus to lay down his life on the cross as the atoning sacrifice for the sin of the world? It was love - love for his Father in heaven and love for each and every one of us who are made in the image and likeness of God. Jesus was sent into the world by his Father for a purpose and that purpose was a mission of love to free us from slavery to sin, Satan, fear, death, and hopelessness.

Jesus saw glory in the cross rather than shame. Obedience to his Father's will was his glory. Jesus kept his Father's word even when tempted to forgo the cross. Jesus did not rely on his own human resources and strength to accomplish his Father's will. He trusted in his Father to give him strength, courage, and perseverance in the face of opposition, trials, and temptation. We also must take up our cross and follow the Lord Jesus wherever he may call us.

He will give us the strength and power of the Holy Spirit to live as his disciples. John Henry Newman wrote: "God has created me, to do him some definite service; he has committed some work to me which he has not committed to another.”



I have my mission, called to His service as a priest, and you have yours to do as well. Each of us has been called by God, whether you know it or not in this life, you shall be told it in the next. You and I are a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created you and me for nothing. Therefore, we have to trust him. Whatever, wherever we are. You and I cannot be thrown away.

Jesus prayed that his disciples would be sanctified and consecrated in God's truth and holiness. The scriptural word for consecration comes from the same Hebrew word which means holy or set apart for God. This word also means to be equipped with the qualities of mind and heart and character for such a task or service.

Just as Jesus was called by the Father to serve in holiness and truth, so we, too, are called and equipped for the task of serving God in the world as his ambassadors. God's truth frees us from ignorance and the deception of sin. It reveals to us God's goodness, love, and wisdom. And it gives us a thirst for God's holiness. The Holy Spirit is the source and giver of all holiness. As we allow the Holy Spirit to work in our lives, he transforms us by his purifying fire and changes us into the likeness of Christ.

I'm not always one for leaving challenges after my sermon has been preached, but today as we leave this place of worship, I leave this for you to ponder in this coming week: Is your life consecrated to God?

Amen.

Third Sunday of Easter-B-Br Simeon

Andre-Rublev's Saviour

  Homily preached by Br. Simeon at Maroubra on Sunday 19^th April 2015:  
THIRD SUNDAY OF EASTER. YR. B

Gospel:  Luke 24: 36-48

The two disciples told the eleven and their companions what had happened on the road to Emmaus, and how Jesus had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
While they were talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you . . . These are the words that I spoke to you while I was still with you -- that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.”

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart, be acceptable in Thy sight O Lord my strength and my redeemer. Amen.

It’s not enough that the tomb is empty. It’s not enough to proclaim, “Christ is risen!” It’s not enough to believe in the resurrection. At some point we have to move from the event of the resurrection to experiencing the resurrection. Experiencing resurrected life begins with recognising the risen Christ among us. That is the gift of Easter and it is also the difficulty and challenge described in today’s gospel.

Today’s Gospel is the conclusion of Luke’s account of Jesus’ first post-resurrection appearance to his disciples. The two disciples who met Jesus on the road to Emmaus have returned to Jerusalem to confirm the women’s story of the resurrection. While they are excitingly telling their story, Jesus appears.

Luke goes to great lengths in his Easter accounts to make clear that the resurrection was not the fantasy of crazy zealots nor is the resurrection story a plot concocted by the disciples who somehow managed to spirit the body of Jesus away (according to Luke’s account, the disciples themselves had not gone near the tomb themselves or even expected any kind of “resurrection”).  In the details he presents here, Luke is countering the arguments forwarded to explain away the resurrection myth.  There can be no mistake:  The resurrection of Jesus Christ is a reality, a reality in which all of the Scriptures find their ultimate fulfilment.

For Luke, the power of Jesus’ resurrection is realised in the way it “opens” one’s heart and mind to understanding the deeper meaning of God’s Word and to fully embracing the Spirit of God.  In our faith and trust in the Risen Christ, we become “witnesses” of the mercy and forgiveness of God.

In the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus, God reveals in a specific moment of

history, in a specific location on earth, the limitless and eternal love the Father has for

his people.

God continues to make the miracle of the empty tomb present to us in the caring, compassion and love we receive and give -- the love we have witnessed in the suffering of Christ, a love that is victorious even over death.

In today’s Gospel, the Risen Jesus challenges his disciples -- and us -- to recall what he taught and what they had witnessed.  The Easter miracle is God’s assurance that love and forgiveness, even in the most difficult situations, are never offered in vain; in learning to cope without losing hope, in learning from the painful realities of life and in accepting the lessons learned in God’s Spirit of humility and patience, we become capable of growth, re-creation, transformation -- and resurrection.

Just as the Risen Christ asks the Eleven for “something to eat,” he asks the same of us today in the cries and pleas of the poor and needy among us.  In imitating his humble compassion we, in turn, discover meaning and purpose that “feed” our own hunger for meaning, for fulfilment, for God in our lives.

Easter faith opens our eyes and hearts to realise God’ hand in every moment of time, transforms our attitudes to realise the need for God’s compassion and forgiveness in every human encounter, lifts up our spirits to hope even in the face of life’s most painful and traumatic moments.

Amen.

Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Andre-Rublev's Saviour

Preach at Winmalee by Br. Luke on 14th September 2014

Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Gospel Matthew 18:21-35

Homily 14^th September 2014

Ok I want to just touch briefly on the Psalm, because there is wonderful imagery in that Psalm. “When Israel went out of Egypt the mountains skipped like rams, and the little hills like lambs. The seas parted” and the psalmist says, and notice that he speaks directly to the creation, “why you behaving like this”. And then he says “tremble you earth in the presence of the Lord”. At the presence of the God of Jacob, who turned the rock into a pool of water, and the flint into a spring of water. The psalmist is reminding us that God can do anything and his creation is so tightly tied to him that when he is excited, the creation follow suit.

Can you just imagine if we saw the mountains skipping like rams?  We’d, either be incarcerated in the mental ward of a hospital, or convinced that there was a huge natural disaster like some earthquake or other, or we’d all be convinced the end of the world had come and we would all be out getting drunk or something. But the imagery is there and just remember that it’s about the presence of the Lord.

And if you look at all of this, and look again at the reading from Exodus which really is the parting of the red sea. Biblical scholars will tell us that this is a mistranslation that it is not the parting of the Red Sea but the parting of the Reed Sea. There is a particular part of the sea in Egypt which is like a lake of Reeds. So what happened was that the reeds were parted and the people went through. Rather than the actual red sea itself.

I like the red Sea story better because I like that imagery in the animated film the Prince of Egypt, when you see the walls of water with the whales and fish on the other side. I like that imagery of the Israelites walking on the dry land. Remember what this is about: creation responding to God. God wanted to save his people, so like in the Psalm, so is said to Moses stretch out your hand, and the creation responded by the sea being parted. And then you get the imagery of the seas crashing back and in Egyptians dead on the sand.  They drowned because there were not free. Pharaoh was pursuing the Israelites to bring them back to Egypt and make them slaves again. That’s the imagery from Exodus and is carried through into the reading from the Psalm.

This brings us to the parable in the gospel about the servant who does not give. Sometimes there just doesn’t seem to be any sense in the way we humans have treated debtors in the past. A man owes you 10,000 talents which is a lot of money, or even just a few denarii which is not as much as a talent and you put them in prison.  How are they possibly going to pay you if they are locked up?  Remember though it says earlier in the gospel, that they were sold. There was slavery in those days. And if you owe me 10,000 denarii, I’ll go and sell you, your family and all your possessions. And I’ll get my money and you will have repaid what you owe. And that’s what they talking about. They’re talking about, the selling of the people to recoup the debt. And in Rome you could even sell yourself into slavery to get rid of your debt. Why you would want to do that is beyond me.

In the story of the servant who is forgiven by his maser, the Lord, but doesn’t forgive his fellow servant, Jesus is illustrating clearly for us one of the problems you can have when you don’t give and you have received. If you’ve been forgiven but you in turn don’t forgive, then you haven’t really understood the purpose or the meaning of forgiveness. You really have not made much of the message at all.

Now in this case Peter it is not putting his foot in it. He is asking for clarification. Peter is actually saying to Jesus well how often do we forgive? Then Jesus tells the parable of the talents.  What Jesus is doing, is that he is saying: this is how it works, in a practical sense. And this parable is not a mystery.  There really is no mystery in here. Sometimes the parables have to be explained, like the parable of the sower. One can interpret the parable of the sower in whole variety of ways. But this one, you don’t have to interpret, it is very clear. If you don’t forgive then God is not going to forgive you! And why should he? If you are not prepared to extend the same mercy that has been shown to you, then why would you expect to receive it at all?

If we look quickly at Paul. In the last couple of verses, he is reinforcing that idea of forgiveness. Therefore let’s not judge one another anymore, but judge this rather that no man put a stumbling block in his brothers or sisters way for an occasion of falling. So in other words let’s make sure that we don’t put something in their way that will make them sin. So rather than condemning them, let’s make sure that they don’t get into the situation where they are condemned.  He’s also talking about mercy. Not forgiveness in the pure sense that Jesus was talking about in the gospel, it’s about making sure that we don’t do anything that will cause another to sin.

He then goes on to talk about things that are clean and unclean. When you talking about things that are clean and unclean, you’re talking about the Mosaic Law. The Jewish law about what you can and can’t eat. Which is why in the beginning he is talking about food. Now remember the other thing about Paul is that he is a very scholarly man.  He was a Pharisee, he was well trained in the Jewish Scriptures. He could probably quote from them with his eyes shut. So he knows and he understands the law, and is teasing out the Scriptures and then applying it to life. He links them together all the time. He’s saying: this is the law, this is how Christ filled the law, and this is how you live as a Christian. In this sense his very practical although on occasions he can be convoluted and to our ears, difficult to comprehend.

So forgiveness, mercy and the presence of the Lord are all linked in ways that we sometimes lose sight of. But tied together they are, and we would do well to recall this, as we go about living our lives and in our interactions with others.  Amen.

Easter Sunday - Br Simeon

St- Andre-Rublev's Saviour

Holy Redeemer

In the care of the Ecumenical Franciscan Order

Homily preached at Winmalee on

20th April 2014:      Easter Sunday, by Br. Simeon

Gospel:  Matthew 28: 1-10

“ Power and wonder of the Resurrection ”

Eternal God, on this most holy of days, stir up your Holy Spirit within us that are gathered here this morning, so that your words to us would lead us to be faithful always to your way, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

Today, we must visit a tomb.  That seems a bit strange.  Most people don’t enjoy going to graveyards.  Among our list of favourite things to do, no one places, "Visit the mortuary."  Yet, as Christians, we chose to visit this tomb and to visit it often.

The tomb that we seek to visit is not just any tomb.  It is the tomb of our

Saviour.  This is the place where the body of Jesus was once laid.  Strange how sweet this place is to us.  Surely, it is not like the tomb of others. There was weeping here once, but no longer.  There was sorrow here once, but no longer.  There was hurt here once, but no longer.

The women going to the tomb that morning were not going there to celebrate a resurrection. No, they were going to finish the burial process, for on Friday afternoon there had not been time to properly prepare Jesus’ body. For them it was not going to be a good day.

They were not thinking springtime thoughts about flowers bursting forth from the earth, or caterpillars turning into butterflies, or new born baby chicks breaking loose from eggs. None of those thoughts entered their minds because you see they were in the middle of the Easter story.

What they saw and heard that day was an earthquake shaking the earth, a stone being rolled away, guards being so frightened that they became like dead men, an angel appearing, and last but not least, Jesus talking to them as they rushed back to tell the disciples that the tomb was empty and that, can you believe it, Jesus was going to meet them in Galilee.

He was going to meet them in Galilee, how could that be, after what happened to him on that Friday. They did not know how Jesus was brought back to life, but they believed it happened, just as we believe it happened. It was going to be a good day after all.

The early disciples witnessed the resurrection of Jesus Christ. They could not forget the open tomb and His pierced hands, and wounded side. The living Christ had a powerful and profound effect on them. The people who went to the tomb on that first Easter morning testify to the power of the resurrection. They were in awe and wonder. This sermon reminds us to revisit the empty tomb each Sunday and remember the wonder of it all.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ caught His followers completely by surprise.  The resurrection came as a wonderful surprise to the disciples. It is very evident none of the disciples were sitting around at the tomb waiting expectantly to see Jesus alive and worshipping Him.

Like the disciples being moved, in awe and wonder;  for us, Easter not only moves us, it touches something deep down inside of us. We encounter God's wonder, that feeling of surprise and awe aroused by something strange and unexpected. It's what Mary Magdalene and the other Mary felt when they learned that Jesus had risen. They departed "quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy" (Matt. 28:8). They were astonished. They went to the tomb expecting to find a dead man in need of embalming. Instead they found an empty tomb. Jesus was alive. That fact, while strange and unexpected, was wonderful and exciting.

One can't experience Easter without wonder. The trouble is that we don't feel wonder any more. Wonder is rare, especially as we grow older. The catch phrase of our culture is: "Been there. Done that." We are spiritually and emotionally not alert. We are a people saturated with analysis, explanations, and experiences - but void of wonder. G.K. Chesterton wrote, "The world will never starve for want of wonders, but only for want of wonder." It is that wonder and mystery of the resurrection that we want. And once we experienced it the most lavish purchase or the most thrilling experience can never substitute for it. For when God touches you, you know it. You can't explain it. You experience it. You feel it. It goes right through you.

Wonder begins in the presence of Jesus. Regardless of our geography or status or age, where the Lord is present, that place is alive with wonder. As we become more aware of God's presence we become more filled with wonder. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary felt it. It was a power, a vibe that went right through them. When they saw Jesus their only response was to fall at his feet in worship.

When you and I encounter the living Christ, our only response is to celebrate his presence. That's Easter. It is the presence of Jesus that moves us and touches us deeply. It is the rocking experience of Jesus' triumph and the relational experience of Jesus' presence. It becomes an experience to imagine that God will be present in our lives to roll the stone away from our hearts. Easter makes us want to fall at Jesus' feet in gratitude and praise for what he has done. That, my dear friends, is something you don't explain and never forget. You experience it. You feel it. It goes right through you. Christ is Risen, He's Risen indeed!

Amen.