Archive for the ‘1 Corinthians’ Category

Lent is not about chocolate

March 21, 2015

Lent 5 – 2015

John 12:22-30

Marian Free

In the name of God who raises the dead to new life, and who raises us from our daily deaths to newness of life. Amen.

Some time in recent weeks, I was shown a column in The Courier Mail. It was written by a young man who was making comments about Lent that demonstrated that he not only did his misunderstand the purpose of Lent, but that he had completely missed the point. I don’t have a copy of the article to hand, but as I remember the writer was pointing out how foolish, even meaningless, it was to give up things for Lent. He urged readers to go out and indulge themselves and to ask themselves what made them feel better – going without or indulging?

The article was a stark reminder that a sad reality of today’s world is that the Christian faith has been transmitted in such a way that the faith and its practices are not only misunderstood, but are also, at times, a source of ridicule. I am not precious about my faith and I have no problem with people making fun of it, or of us, when that humour is properly informed. What does disturb me is that sometimes humour slides into misinformed derision. One only has to listen to some of the radio stations favoured by our youth to hear that misconceptions about, and negative attitudes towards, Christianity abound. Worse still, it appears that for a large number of people, such misconceptions are a result of their experiences of the church and its teaching.

This means that if the faith is misunderstood, if a whole generation does not understand what we are on about, and if there are many people in the world who do not respect the Christian faith, then the fault, broadly speaking, lies with us. I would contend that for decades, if not centuries we have failed to share the good news, reducing it to rules and regulations that can deaden rather than enliven. The season of Lent is a good example. There are people who give up something for Lent who then spent the whole of Lent either complaining or boasting about it? Such people give the impression that the discipline of Lent is something that has been imposed rather than freely chosen or implied that it is a burden rather than a form of liberation.

The problem with this is that Lent is NOT about self-abnegation or self-mortification, it is not – I repeat, not- about being miserable or imposed upon. Rather Lent, like all forms of spiritual practice, is a God-given opportunity to grow, to examine our lives, to stop and see whether there are areas in which we can improve, ways in which we can better live out our Christian vocation. If we chose to give up something for Lent it is to facilitate, not hinder, our spiritual development.

Traditionally Anglicans have given up a luxury item for Lent, something that is enjoyable but not essential – chocolate or wine. We might like chocolate or a glass or two of wine, but neither are absolutely necessary to our well-being. Ideally over the course of Lent we learn that we don’t need whatever it is that we have given up, that our lives are not determined by it and that we can live happily and well without it.

It could be argued that chocolate and wine are easy to give up. Other things, those that have the potential to stunt our spiritual growth are much harder to let go of. Such things can be material, emotional or even psychological. They will be different according to the individual. For example, in the gospels, the thing that was holding back the rich young man was his possessions, for the man who wanted to follow Jesus it was his desire to farewell his family and for the man who had been sick for thirty eight years it was his inability to give up his self-identity as someone who was sick.

Through each of these examples, Jesus challenges each of us to consider what it is that is constraining us, what it is that is preventing us from reaching spiritual maturity. So for example, it is possible that some of us are overly concerned with financial security, or that we are in the grip of unhealthy relationships or that we are allowing a long-standing grudge to define who we are in relation to God and to others. These and many other things prevent us from developing fully as human beings and they certainly prevent us from realizing our divine natures.

In today’s gospel Jesus says: “Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” The language of love and hate is strong to be sure but Jesus uses it to underline his point. We can be so focused the things of this world that we lose the opportunity to be engaged with the world to come. We can be so obsessed with material things that we do not pay enough attention to spiritual things. We can be so wrapped up with the trivia of the everyday that we overlook the bigger picture of a full and happy life.

Jesus says that those who love their life will lose it. He is claiming that those who are bound up with their own issues are not really living. Those who hate their life he says will keep it for eternal life. Jesus is pointing out that those who are dissatisfied with the chains that hold them back, will allow themselves to be changed, transformed and set free to grow. This is the promise – that if we die to ourselves, especially those parts of ourselves that hold us to worldly values and ideals – we will be raised to newness of life – again, and again and again.

What is extraordinary is that iff we have the courage to let go of the things that bind us, we will discover that we lose nothing and gain everything.

When we allow ourselves to be liberated from concerns about wealth, liberated from false sense of responsibility to other and liberated from the emotional baggage that ties us down we are free to grow and to life life to the full. To live as God has always intended us to live – free and happy and content. To live a life that not only gives us everything, but demonstrates to the world how much we have as a consequence of faith. Unless a seed dies …. unless we allow God to change and transform us, the world will never see the privilege and joy that it is to have and to live out our faith.

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The Trinity – heresy and orthodoxy

June 14, 2014

Trinity Sunday 2014

Matthew 28:16-20, 2 Corinthians 13:11-13

Marian Free

In the name of God, Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier. Amen.

 My childhood memories of Trinity Sunday are of my Father returning from church complaining about the sermon and in particular the use of bad analogies to try to make the Trinity more accessible for the lay people. Of course, as a child, I never really understood my Father’s problem. I liked the idea of tricycles and other tri-fold objects being used to help us get inside the concept of a God who was both three and one. As I preacher, I find it tempting to use simplistic images, but I am saved by my Father’s voice in my head and – from now on – by a humorous look at the problem as presented on Youtube by TheLutheranSatire.[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQLfgaUoQCw

As the clip points out, the best way to speak about the Trinity is that established as long ago as 381 in the form of the Athanasian Creed[2] that explicitly states that God is both three and one[3]. Trying to oversimplify the issue leads to misunderstanding, confusion and even “heresy”. At its heart the doctrine of the Trinity tries to come to grips with the biblical language for, and understanding of, God. It is a difficult and even dangerous exercise because as Thomas Aquinas stated: “we know that God is, but not what God is”. What we are doing in creating any doctrine is trying to find human language to describe what is utterly unknowable. As a result any attempt to describe or to capture God will always be finite and limited. In fact, if God could be captured by human thought or language, God would not be God. That said human beings, however limited and finite have, from time immemorial, experienced something completely other, something outside this physical and material world that somehow is engaged with and impacts on the created world. In the Judeo-Christian experience the relationship with and impact of the utterly other is related in the Hebrew and Christian scriptures – the Bible.

It is from this record that theologians have found the raw material for the Trinitarian expression/experience of God. It is true that the Old Testament does not provide any evidence for plurality in the Godhead and would have utterly rejected any suggestion that God was other than one. The Old Testament does however use language that is later used by the New Testament writers to capture their experience of God. For example, in the Old Testament, the language of breath, or Spirit, occurs in the very first chapter when God’s spirit moves upon the waters (Genesis 1:1). In fact the spirit of God plays a large role in the Old Testament – it comes on Moses and Saul, Elijah and Elisha and on the prophets. It is never a separate entity, but always the spirit of God. Other “Trinitarian” language that is found in the Old Testament is that of God as Father (albeit as Father of the nation of Israel). Word and Wisdom are said to be present with God at creation (Proverbs) and even though they do not indicate plurality, they open the way for such language to be used of Jesus and to suggest pre-existence (John 1 for example).

Turning to the New Testament, the conclusion of 2 Corinthians provides evidence that Trinitarian language was applied to God as early as the fifth decade of the Common Era. Similar language is found in the “Great Commission” at the conclusion of Matthew, which was written probably in the 80’s. Paul regularly uses different terminology for God interchangeably. So, for example in a few verses he can speak of the law of God and the law of the Spirit of life (Romans 7:25, 8:2). Shortly afterwards he speaks of the Spirit of God and the Spirit of Christ and the Spirit of God who raised him from the dead (Romans 8:9-11 – God, Christ and Spirit).

Long before theologians put their mind to discussing the nature of God, the early church seems to have had an experience of one God in three persons. Long before the Council that produced the Athanasian Creed, early believers were using language that implied that they thought of God as both one and three. In those early years of the church, there appears to have been no attempt to create a doctrine or a creed to defend this understanding of God, nor is there a clear line of development of the idea. The simple fact is that the early church was convinced that Jesus was God and that the Spirit was God and that they could hold this belief without damaging their confidence that “the Lord our God is one”.

There will be those among us who will struggle to read theology and to come to terms with non-heretical ways of speaking about the Trinity. Most of us will be content to accept the unity and Trinity of God as a part of the incomprehensible mystery that is God and we will be satisfied that the God whom we know and relate to as Father, Son and Spirit, Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier is both one and three –“yet there are not three Gods, but one God.”

 

[1] The fourth Lateran Council put the problem in this way: “Between God and creature no similitude can be expressed without implying greater dissimilitude.” In Hunt, Anne. Trinity. New York: Orbis Books, 2005, 3.

[2] p 487 of the Green Prayer Book

[3] Council of Constantinople

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A lesson in letter-writing

January 19, 2014

Epiphany 2 – 2013

1 Corinthians 1:1-9

Marian Free

In the name of God who reveals Godself in many and varied ways. Amen.

1:1 Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes, 1Cor. 1:2   To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours: 1Cor. 1:3   Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus,  5 for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind—  6 just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you—  7 so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ.  8 He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you may be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.  9 God is faithful; by him you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

John and Joan McFee have great pleasure in inviting Mark and Mary de Angelo to the wedding of their daughter Susan Maria to Joseph Anthony on July 31st at St Margaret’s Church, 4 George St, Marland, at 4:00pm and afterwards at Maryville Reception Centre, 23 Victoria St, Marland. RSVP July 17, 33458687.

Times have changed, but when I was at school children were taught how to write letters – personal letters, business letters, job applications, wedding invitations and replies and so on. Each form of communication had its own style. Even the form of letter closure differed according to how formal the letter was and the relationship between the writer and the recipient. It did (and does not) not make immediate sense that personal letters were signed “yours sincerely” and formal letters with “yours faithfully” but that is how it is done. These days there is a lot more flexibility. Text messages and emails have created entirely new and less formal styles of writing. Some forms such as Job Applications still have very structured formats – possibly even more structured than previously. So rigid are these styles that consultants exist to assist people in writing their CVs and job applications.

Given that in our more informal world we continue to have set formats for at least some style of letters, we should not be surprised that the Greek world also had criteria for writing different forms of communication. It is important to understand these forms when we read the letters in the New Testament. Paul’s letters exhibit a uniformity of style because Paul is using the letter-writing format common to educated people of his time. That said, there are some immediately obvious differences between first century Greek letters and twenty-first Australian letters. Our form of letter-writing might have an address at the beginning but with some exceptions (wedding invitations) the author is generally not identified until the end of the letter – “yours faithfully, Marian Free”. When we write a letter, we usually begin with an address to the recipient – “Dear Sam”. Greek letters reverse this pattern and begin with the name of the author and some means of identifying that person. In the letter to the Corinthians we read – “Paul, called to be an Apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God”.

Unless we use a line that indicates what the letter is in regard to, the reader has to wait for the body of the letter to discover why we have written. In Greek letter writing and certainly in the letters of Paul, the greeting prepares us for what is to follow. In his first letter to Corinth, Paul appears to be laying claim to his authority. Not only is he “an apostle of Christ Jesus”, he is an apostle by “the will of God”. This provides much more detail than is provided in the first letter to the Thessalonians which reads very simply: “Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy”. It is only as the letter progresses that we understand that Paul is drawing on his God-given authority in order to pull the Corinthians into line. No doubt the Corinthians were immediately aware of the tone that Paul was setting. He is making it clear that he is an apostle and that his authority comes directly from God.

Having begun with an introduction to the author, the letter introduces us to the recipients. Again, if we compare 1 Corinthians with 1 Thessalonians, we notice a significant difference. The Thessalonians are addressed quite simply: “To the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ”. The letter to Corinth includes much more detail:  “To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours.” Compared with the Thessalonians where the address is purely descriptive, here there is not only more detail, there is a degree of flattery. Those in Corinth are described as “sanctified, called to be saints” what is more, they are skilfully connected with all the other believing communities,  “together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours.” How do we explain the difference in detail? Is it because the lives of the Corinthians exhibit a deeper spirituality than those in Thessalonica? As we read on, this conclusion seems unlikely. The letter reveals that the Corinthians are a divided congregation who compete with each other and whose members engage in immoral behaviour. A more plausible explanation for the long greeting is that Paul, who will later castigate this community, is using both flattery (saints, sanctified) and coercion (with all who call on the name of our Lord). Paul uses flattery because he wants them on side, open to what he has to say. At the same time, he is drawing on the practices of all the other churches to pull them into line, to make them conform.

As you can see, already, in just three verses, we suspect that Paul has something difficult to tell the Corinthians and that he will use the example of other churches to pressure them to change their behaviour. Paul follows the introduction with a standard greeting: “Grace to you and peace.” Paul adapts the usual greeting (charein – hello) to a term associated with the gospel (charis – grace) and adds the Semitic greeting of peace (shalom).

In most letters, the greeting is followed by a Thanksgiving. This serves to get the reader on side and to ensure that they are receptive to what is to follow. (The absence of a Thanksgiving rings alarm bells. For example, there is no thanksgiving in the letter to the Galatians. As we read that letter we can see that Paul has nothing for which to be thankful – he is very angry.)

Again, the content of the thanksgiving provides an introduction to the content of the letter as a whole. In this instance Paul says: “you have been enriched in him in speech and knowledge of every kind”; “you are not lacking in any spiritual gift”. As we read on, we cannot help but wonder if Paul is being sarcastic here. The Corinthians it seems put a great emphasis on wisdom, knowledge and spiritual gifts. They think that they have already achieved some sort of spiritual perfection (“Already you are rich! Quite apart from us you have become kings!” 4:8). In chapter 12, Paul tries to put their spiritual gifts into perspective – no gift is more significant than any other. Over and over again, Paul confronts the arrogance of the Corinthians, their belief in their own wisdom and knowledge and the fact that they compete with one another in areas of knowledge and spirituality. The refrain: “Do you not know?” is used repeatedly in Chapter 6 in which Paul exposes the fact that they do not know. “Do you not know the saints will judge the world?” Do you not know that we are to judge angels?” (6:2,3) and so on.

A good way to begin to understand Paul and his letters is to read the Greetings and Thanksgivings of his letters and to identify the similarities and differences between them. In so doing, it is essential to remember that Paul did not set out to write theology. He wrote letters to communities of faith, communities that – with the exception of Romans – he himself founded. Paul’s intention and deepest desire is that these communities share his faith, his knowledge of God and Christ, his conviction that faith in Jesus leads to freedom and that a life that is Spirit-led is a life that most closely conforms to the will of God. What is amazing is that these letters that were written to encourage, to chide and to correct, express the most profound theology and that over two thousand years later, these letters have become an integral part of our Holy Scriptures. Not before or since has one person’s letter-writing had such a profound effect.

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An unusual body

January 26, 2013

Epiphany 3

1 Corinthians 12

Marian Free

 

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer. Amen.

In December 2009, in Melbourne, conjoined twins – Trishna and Krishna – were separated in a complex process that took a large team of people thirty-two hours to complete.  You will all remember the details. As the twins were joined at the head, it was a particularly difficult operation. Doctors had studied the brains of both children to identify where the blood vessels and brain material needed to be separated. For months they had practiced on models of the twins until they were sure that they knew exactly what they had to do and how to position the girls at exactly the right angle in order to be able to carry out the operation with sufficient skill to cause the least amount of damage to their brains and to give the twins the best chance at survival.

The surgery required a team of sixteen surgeons including plastic surgeons and neuro-surgeons. Also taking part in the marathon event were anaesthetists, cardiologists, doctors nurses and goodness knows who else. Each member of the team would have been trained over a long period of time to ensure that everyone was proficient and knew exactly what their role was and how to carry it out. The absence of any one member of the team could have jeopardized or delayed the whole operation.

Surgery, particularly complex surgery, is not the only example situation in which individuals have to put their egos aside to work together to achieve a common goal. Fire-fighting, rescue work and the distribution of aid all have the best results when no one person is striving to stand out from the crowd and when each person is carrying out their allotted task to the best of their ability in order to contribute to a successful outcome. The reverse is also true, when teams do not work together or when one individual is seeking their own aggrandisement, the effort is at best ineffective and at worst damaging.

Good team work can save lives. Failure to work as a team can cost lives. Working together can achieve a desired result. Working against each other can be totally unproductive.

There are a variety of ways to talk about working together (or not). We talk about team-work, team building or pulling together. If a team is not working, we use language that refers to the weak link in the chain or to people not pulling their weight. In 1 Corinthians Paul uses the image of body to capture the idea of the interdependence of members of the Christian community. In using the term body, Paul is not being original. The term was used by the Greeks as a symbol of social unity. In fact “body” was the most common expression for unity as was the idea that all people are different and that all members of the body should work together for the greater good.

While it is not original, Paul’s use of the body imagery differs from that of his contemporaries in a number of ways. Firstly, Paul identifies God as the source of both difference and of unity. Second, rather than urging some (usually the less gifted) individuals to subordinate themselves for the sake of the body, Paul argues not only that members of the body should work together in such a way that everyone would benefit, but he makes the extraordinary claim that the weaker members are indispensable and deserve greater honour and respect. Further, when Paul suggests that the Corinthians are one body, he doesn’t mean just any body or the sum total of the community. The body that the Corinthians are called to be is Christ’s body.

Transferred to our time and place, the implications of Paul’s discussion on the body are profound and deserve some serious consideration. For a start, it means that on our own, you and I are not Christ’s body. The body of Christ on earth is expressed best when Christians together exemplify Christ. It means too that we are called collectively and not individually to be the presence of Christ in the world. It means that the community that formed in Christ’s name – the church – has to recognise that each member is dependent on all the other members, and how much Christ’s continuing mission relies on the efforts of the community as a whole and not on our individual efforts. Our part in Christ’s body, our contribution to the continuation of Christ’s mission on earth depends not just on what we ourselves do, but on what the community – with our help – does. What is more, the body of Christ is dependent on our recognition of the value of the contribution of every other member  – not just those whose contribution stands out or is more obvious. “We simply cannot afford for any part of the body to consider themselves unnecessary to the whole[1].” Nor can we allow ourselves to believe that our contribution is more significant than that of anyone else – that we alone make the difference.

In some ways the image of the body is comforting. It is reassuring to know that the continuation of Christ’s mission in the world does not stand or fall according to what I do – or for that matter what you do. At the same time the image is challenging. In order for Christ’s body to be a living reality, we all have to learn to work and grow together, to value, support and encourage each other.

In this individualistic, privatized western world, it is easy to think that it is our personal relationship with God that is all important, that our salvation stands or falls on what we do and how we behave. It is easy to convince ourselves that we can be a Christian without coming to church or that developing our personal spirituality is as important, if not more so than participating in the spiritual growth of the body as a whole. However, the opposite is true. Not only do we need the body, but the body needs us. Whether we are a foot or a heart, an arm or a nose, our contribution is essential to the proper functioning of the body. When we are not functioning, when we are absent or when we are suffering, the body as a whole suffers. Equally, whether we are a brain or a toe, a hip or an eye we will be unable to function properly if we are not connected to and working with the remainder of the body.

Our life in Christ is just that – in Christ – and therefore in the body of Christ – the gathered community of believers. One of the challenges for the twenty first century church is to recover a sense of our interdependence, to learn to recognise and value our place in the whole, to celebrate each other no matter how great or small, how visible or invisible their contribution and to understand that without us (or for that matter without any one of us) the gathered community is in some way diminished and impoverished. Unlike a surgical team, or a rescue crew, our commitment to the body doesn’t end when the job is done. Being part of the body is our life, our Christian responsibility and God’s gift to us.

 

Week after week we affirm “We are the body of Christ.” Let us do all that we can to ensure that that is in fact our lived reality.

[1] Gooder, Paula. Everyday God: The Spirit of the Ordinary.Norwich: Canterbury Press, 2012, 113.

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