3rd Sunday of Epiphany and Australia Day (texts: 1 Cor 1:10-18, Mat 4:12-25, Phil 3:15-21)
During Epiphany I have asked the parish to meditate on Jesus’ first words in the Gospel of John: "What are you seeking?"
In life, In faith, as a member of this part of the body of the church? In your minister?
We are heading towards our parish AGM next month. As people discern the call to serve the parish as part of the parish council, it would be good for us as a parish to be talking about the future. Talking about 'why we are here' and 'what we want to be and achieve as a community of God'.
Maybe the answer is that everyone just wants to worship and pray as long as we can just the way we are – recognising that we might be in the autumn of our season as a gathered community in this particular place - and that is a perfectly valid answer.
It is something I urge you to talk about over the next month. If we all talk about it in community - as a community we will have a sense where each of us is at - and that is community.
In preparation for that missional discussion Paul’s 1st letter to the Corinthians provides some excellent guidance. His letters remind us that the church has always been asking these questions, and calibrating the mission as it goes along. The conversation might look a bit challenging, the work ahead a bit tough – but we are not in an usual predicament – this is an ordinary part of ‘being the church’. Tough times makes us much more like those early first century churches and look what they achieved! These are exciting times to be Christian.
Paul says: Now I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you be in agreement and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same purpose. (1 Cor 1:1)
This parish is a diverse group of people. Within our community ideas of mission are different, our passion for various causes – climate, refugee, indigenous – are different, our ideas around doctrine and faith and worship are different. When I decorated the cross for the season of creation last year – some loved it, some hated it – all views were reasonable and valid. Also ideas about what the minister should be doing and how they should be doing it are diverse.
Who am I to point to Paul and suggest that we will come to a unified purpose on the mission for 2020?
This is one of the reasons I am boldly declaring that the AGM will be quick - and is not the place for a missional talk – because we are human and some form of homogenised unity just can’t happen, not in the time it takes to have dinner at least.
The point that I make is Paul’s ultimate point. The point of our Epiphany season.
While we acknowledge our diversity, we are united in the same mind and same purpose. That is to be a community of people who believe and follow Christ.
There is a song we hear often on the 26th of January: I am, you are, we are … Christian.
We are not perishing, we are saved! Because we have heard the message about the cross. We know it is the power of God. (paraphrased 1 Cor 1:18)
That is the purpose that brings us all together. All the differences in our thoughts and abilities, and even perception of God, are just the dynamics that make our community truly like a body. God is certainly complicated enough, and big enough and wide enough that it is possible we all see slightly different aspects of who He is and each of those are true.
What am I seeking? I have a purpose. That is to serve this community in its purpose – our purpose because I too am a member of the body.
Some of my purpose is easy to navigate – administering the sacraments, preaching and teaching Scripture, and offering pastoral care.
Some of it is not so easy to navigate - I promise that I am going to work my hardest this year to really open up this church, have all sorts of people coming in. I am assuming you want that – because the parish profile seemed to say that. It is going to mean doing new things this year. Some of them won’t please everyone, and no doubt many will seem to come too fast. Time is of the essence.
When Jesus calls, have you noticed that they follow immediately?
As someone who is fundamentally a chaplain and prefers the quiet conversations of pastoral care – making new things happen takes me out of my comfort zone. Those English TV vicars with their full churches, and busy schedule of weddings, preaching and tea with parishioners, make me envious. How easy that life would be.
As an ordinary average human, someone fundamentally broken like anyone else, I want to please everyone and have everyone happy with me all of the time – which just isn’t what being a Christian is all about. Being a Christian is a disrupted life – that makes us strangers to friends and family, aliens in the land we live in – citizens of one kingdom only, the Kingdom of Heaven.
From day one, Jesus’ ministry is disruptive - as we look to the Gospel of Matthew today, Jesus is travelling all over the place, to Gentiles and Jews, preaching, healing, drawing crowds. At some point, even his family will decide it is a bit too disruptive and head off to retrieve him. (Mk 3:21) He has headed over the Galilee because John the Baptist is in Jail, and things are getting a bit tense with the authorities.
The ministry is disruptive too in the way that people are drawn to the mission.
We sing in Lord of the Dance "I danced for the fishermen, for James and John; They came with me and the dance went on” and then we head into the chorus “Dance, dance wherever you may be…
It is easy to dance our way past the actual detail of the calling of the disciples. As Jesus walks by he saw two brothers casting a net into the sea and said “follow me”, "Immediately they left their nets and followed him”. He moved on from there and saw two men in a boat with their father he called them. They also “Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed”.
What a significant thing it was for those four men to just walk away. From family and relatives, all reliant on each other in subsistence living. Certainly they were relying on each other at that moment. Relying on that catch to eat. A father relying on his sons to get the nets mended so that they could be used.
The social significance of sons just leaving the father and wandering off. This is the prodigal son story with four prodigal sons. Peter, Andrew, James and John will have caused some serious disruption to their fathers and their family. Future disciples likewise.
Thankfully, the majority of us are not called to walk away from our jobs in the name of faith, (although some have). None of us (I hope) have been called to walk away from our family.
What we have all been called to do is come together as a community of God.
I love being a Chaplain because I just want to love my neighbour. But I am also a pastor and I know that loving my neighbour with all my heart doesn’t always mean I will be the most popular person. Sometimes people need to see the fruit before they understand the love. I also love being a Mum. When you are a Mum it seems it can take about 20 years before the ones you love see the fruit and understand the love. All of us, including those first disciples, had to see Jesus on the cross to understand the love of God. Thankfully we Christians today have seen the fruit and that should make it easier to 'get out of the boat' and follow.
This new season of 2020 promises an adventure. I pray that we will journey through it together – with unified purpose that comes from a shared vision.
I return to Paul’s letters, this time to the Philippians.
All of us, then, who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. Only let us live up to what we have already attained. Join together in following my example, brothers and sisters, and just as you have us as a model, keep your eyes on those who live as we do. For, as I have often told you before and now tell you again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Saviour from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body. (Phil 3:15-21)
May the Word live in us
And bear much fruit to his Glory
Amen