24th Sunday after Pentecost A; 11.08.26; G. Miles Smith+
Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25; Psalm 78:1-7; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18; Matthew 25:1-13
This past Tuesday, before any election results were in…the popular American historian, Ken Burns… published an essay entitled “We Face Our Nation’s Fourth Great Crisis.” (1) He began by saying, and I quote:
“There have been three great crises in American history: the Civil War, perhaps the defining event in our history after the Revolution itself, the Great Depression and World War II. These events tested our republic and our resolve in fundamental ways… [Now] we face our country’s fourth great crisis…[Ken Burns goes on to say] We have come back from crises before. We were more divided during the Revolution, the Civil War, Reconstruction, and Vietnam, than we are today. For 250 years, our country has prevailed in fits and starts, forging achievements, however imperfect…”
Once again, our beloved country is in the midst of working out where we are headed. This is something that we will not be adjudicating in church. But this is the larger context which has absorbed our attention this past week. And, this is the larger context in which we are called to be Christian today.
What does it mean to be Christian today when our country is in, as Ken Burns describes, “our fourth great [national] crisis”? I would say that the most important thing for Christians and churches to be focusing on in this time is…being Christian…and being churches.
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Yesterday I returned from our Annual Diocesan Convention in Fredericksburg, where I joined in events with our lay delegate Margaret Wachenfeld, and youth delegate Finnula Lopez and her mother Meghan. The theme of this Convention was established months and months ago and was: “Read the Book. Tell the Story.” And in case you are wondering which book—it is the Bible of course. :) So I’m going to quickly share [two takeaways: one related to a sometimes-popular misperception about Episcopalians…and then] one takeaway about the Bible.
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In 1897, after American newspapers falsely reported…that the American author Mark Twain had died in London…Twain famously cabled a response to the New York Journal, saying: "The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated".
I call this to mind in order to say that…any social media talk you might run across implying the death of The Episcopal Church…that this is greatly exaggerated. At the Diocesan Convention, it was reported that there are a large number of new candidates for ministry moving through discernment in our diocese, including of course our own Matteo Carter. There was an increasing, noticeable number of younger clergy who were delegates at this Convention. And this Convention also had the largest number of youth delegates to Convention in many many years, including our own Finnula Lopez. There
was overall a real vitality in this Convention. And, of course, there is a real vitality at Grace.
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At Convention, we heard that the most important thing for Christians and churches to be focusing on…in this time of our lives is…being Christian…and being churches. Which means…reading the Bible…becoming savvy about the depth and diversity of scripture…resisting simplistic interpretations…but also learning how to recognize the heart of scripture…praying with scripture…and finding ways to be in conversation together over scripture. This is crucial in these times…when there is an abundance of misleading talk by self-appointed media influencers about being Christian…and when Christianity is easily captured and obscured by partisan agendas.
What does the Bible really say?
How does Christ change the way we interpret scripture?
How does Christ change the way we interpret the world?
These are crucial questions.
The call issued at Convention for us to read the Bible…was of course stating what should be a truism…that Christians are people who read the Bible. But every denomination has its particular challenges with the Bible…and it is probably fair to say that the challenge for Episcopalians these days is that Episcopalians are not that practiced in reading the Bible. At one point at Convention, this story was told to make the point:
An Episcopal priest challenged her congregation to get serious about reading the Bible. And after church, one of her parishioners said to her…that he was moved by what she had said and was going to start reading the Bible. A few weeks later, the priest had an opportunity to ask him how his Bible reading was going. A puzzled look appeared on his face, and he said, “You know, the Bible is a strange book. I had no idea how much of the Bible came from the prayer book!”
Well, I don’t know if that story is factual or not…I hope it’s not!...but it does make a point…that Episcopalians are more likely to know the prayer book…than the Bible. But what we may not realize is that the prayer book really is full of scriptural quotations and allusions. The prayer book evolved through centuries when people read the Bible so much…that the authors of the prayer book could not help but quote and allude to scripture throughout the text. So, even if Episcopalians do not read the Bible as much as needed, we are still absorbing more scripture than we may realize. And that is of
course a gift. But…especially in times of great crises…of great decisions…where much is at
stake…and when Christians need to be Christians…then we need more than that. (2)
What was so clear again and tangible at Diocesan Convention is that Episcopalians need to spend more time reading the Book so that we can know how to tell the Story. Every Sunday, the liturgy we pray keeps mirroring scripture…and telling the Story of God. You’ll find it in different ways…in the Gloria…the scripture lessons of course…the Creed…and the Eucharistic Prayer. Some parts of our liturgical storytelling will be more accessible to you than others on any given Sunday…but it is always being told. Listen for it.
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The reading from the Book of Joshua captures a moment…when the ancient tribes of Israel were challenged by their leader Joshua…to decide whether or not they were going to serve the LORD. And what that moment became…was a time to remember that they had a story about God…that needed to be understood and told.
If your life depended on it…and well…our lives actually do…then how would you…tell the Story of God? Could you find the words and even write something down? It can be a very valuable exercise.
So, I did that this week. And this is what I’ve written so far:
In God’s infinite love for us, God is creating the world.
And each and every human being bears the very image of God.
Yet in a strange mystery, we have all fallen into sin and have become subject to evil and death.
God sent Jesus Christ to us on a mission of love to save the world.
Christ was not just a messenger, but shared the very nature of God, as well as our human nature.
Christ was merciful and truthful, was loved and rejected, and died an outcast in his own world.
And yet Christ was mysteriously resurrected by God from the dead.
Through him we have discovered ourselves reconciled to the God and Father of us all.
Christ gathers us together in the Church through the Spirit.
Christ is the source of the new scriptures, and reveals the wisdom and Word of God in both the old and new scriptures.
Christ calls us to love God, and all others as ourselves, especially paying attention to anyone cast away by the world.
But even having heard Christ’s call, we are still assaulted by the lingering powers of sin, evil, and death, and we easily lose our way, denying the Christ whom we are moved to love.
We are judged by God’s mercy and our own nighttime consciences.
And yet mysteriously, we are still being made into a new people in the Church, and called into an ongoing life of faith, hope, and love.
Christ is our peace.
And Christ will save the world.
How would you…tell the Story of God?
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(2) The presentation at Convention by the Dean and President of Virginia Theological Seminary and President of General Theological Seminary, The Very Rev. Ian Markham begins at location 1:16:36 at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pk2MGyTi05g. And if you would like more from Dean Markham, then you may begin at location 1:10:30 at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjMhuq1_K08 for the follow-up talk and Q&A on the next day in which he is accompanied by the Bishop of Minnesota, The Right Rev. Craig Loya. Both “conservatives” and “liberals” should anticipate being both affirmed and challenged, finding any number of points for serious debate. This is the Way.
