Posts Tagged ‘Worship’

Seeing what is in front of us

February 1, 2020

Feast of the Presentation – 2020

Luke 2:22-40

Marian Free

May I speak in the name of God, Earth-maker, Pain-bearer, Life-giver. Amen.

Sacramental worship in first century Palestine was a very different proposition from that in Brisbane today. Whereas we are used to celebrating Holy Communion every week in our Parish Churches, the Hebrews might, if they were able, attend the Temple for major feast days or to observe specific rituals that could only be carried out in the Temple. Passover seems to have been a must for most Israelites, but it is possible that not everyone was able to make these pilgrimages on a yearly basis.

It is difficult to know how many towns or villages had synagogues, but from the biblical evidence that Jesus taught in their synagogues and that the early believers came together every week, we can assume that it was the practice (of the men at least) to gather weekly to read from scripture, say or sing the Psalms and to expound on the biblical text. But as there was only one Temple, anything that required the services of a priest took place there, in Jerusalem.

In setting the scene for his gospel, the author of Luke is careful to establish Jesus’ Jewish credentials. This seems strange for a person who was writing for a Gentile audience, but the Roman Empire was suspicious of anything novel, in particular of different belief systems which they regarded as superstitions and as a threat to the Empire. Judaism was accepted and even respected by the Romans because of its long, established history. By making it clear that Jesus was a member of this ancient faith Luke establishes the credibility (and the heritage) of what, to many, appeared to be a new religion.

Luke builds up the picture of Jesus’ Jewish credentials in a number of ways. The parents of John the Baptist (Jesus’ cousin) are described as coming from ancient priestly families and Zechariah is in the Temple offering the sacrifice when an angel announces John’s conception. Mary and Joseph fulfil the obligation under the law to circumcise Jesus on the eighth day. Forty days after Jesus’ birth they make the long journey to Jerusalem to offer a sacrifice to redeem their first-born son and to undergo the rite of purification. Later, when Jesus is twelve years old, the family will return to Jerusalem for the Passover Festival. Five times in today’s the author refers to the law, the basis of the relationship between God and God’s people and Luke’s gospel both begins and ends in the Temple – the centre of the Jewish faith. In other words, the Gentile readers of this account of Jesus’ life (in particular Theophilus) are left in no doubt that this emerging faith has its roots firmly based in Judaism and is in fact nothing new but a continuation of that ancient religion.

In describing the presentation of Jesus in the Temple Luke moves the story forward. He suggests that the time of the prophets has ended. What God has promised to Israel has come to pass. Led by the Spirit, Simeon recognises the child as the Lord’s anointed – the one who will be the instrument of God’s salvation – a light to the Gentiles and the glory of God’s people Israel. Without labouring the point, Luke establishes that God has acted in the world and that going forward, Gentiles as well as Jews will be included in God’s acts of salvation.

Luke has established that this apparently ‘new’ faith has an age-old history. Now he makes it clear that, with the birth of Jesus, the faith is moving from one era into another. It is a continuation of the old while at the same time it is leaving the past behind and forging a new path. John the Baptist provided the bridge between the past and the present. From now on the focus will be on Jesus and God’s actions in the world through him. All this, the reader is led to believe, is completely in accord with God’s plan.

Luke moves the story forward in another way as well. Simeon’s words to Mary give us a foretaste of what it to come. Jesus’ presence will not be welcomed by all. His teachings and actions will be a source of division. People’s reaction to him will reveal where they stand in relation to what God is doing in the world and a once unified faith will be divided to the point of separation.

When I read this account, what strikes me is the wisdom, openness and spirituality of Simeon and Anna and their very different responses to Jesus. Both are near the end of their lives and seem to have led lives of prayer such that their connection to God is strong and their awareness of God’s presence in their lives is real and powerful. Mary and Joseph would have been little different from other parents visiting the Temple that day, that week or that year. They were poor (as is indicated by the sacrifice of a dove not a lamb) and had travelled from an insignificant village in the Gentile region of Galilee.  Yet Simeon, guided by the Spirit, comes into the Temple at the very moment that they do and recognises in Jesus the child whom God had promised he would see. Simeon’s reaction is to take the child and give thanks. Anna appears to be already in the Temple and has presumably seen or heard something. She wastes no time with the child and his parents but exuberantly praises God and announces the presence of the child to everyone who is ‘looking for the redemption of Jerusalem’.

As their lives come to a close, Anna and Simeon demonstrate a depth of faith that enables them to sense what God is up to and to recognise God’s presence in the world. They display an openness to the possibility that God might do the unexpected and they reveal their confidence that God will do what God has promised. May we too live such lives of faith and faithfulness that our relationship with God will make us aware of God’s presence in our lives and in the lives of others and may we live in expectation that God will act in the world.

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The proper place to worship

October 12, 2019

Pentecost 18 – 2019

Luke 17:11-19[i]

Marian Free

In the name of God, from whom nothing can separate us. Amen.

While it is part of a long, historic conflict, modern Turkey’s invasion of northern Syria represents some of the malaise of the modern world. In Israel, the United States and in parts of Europe, nations are building boundaries to separate themselves from their enemies (real or perceived) and to protect their interests and to provide a barrier between themselves and any kind of danger. Nations feel that not only their safety is at risk, but that their identity is being compromised and their resources stretched, so they create borders not only to bolster their own security and so that they can determine who goes out and who comes in. At the same time those whom they wish to exclude are stereotyped, demonised and excluded.

In the Hebrew world, boundaries related to personal purity rather than to personal safety. Six whole chapters in Leviticus deal with the issue of purity, the ways in which uncleanness can be avoided and the ways in which purity can be restored. Pollution or contamination could be communicated by the consumption of impure foods, the release of bodily discharges, by menstruation and childbirth and through skin disease. The first of these pertain to boundaries between the body and the external world. Approved and unapproved foods enter the body through the mouth; blood, children and bodily discharges cross the boundary of the body through other openings. “Leprosy[ii]” is a little different from other forms of contagion because it concerns an external skin complaint – a flaky, repulsive or scaly condition that crossed the boundaries of skin, clothes and walls. It was impossible for those with a skin disease to keep their contamination to themselves, so they were thrust out of their families and communities and forced to live on the outskirts of society. Like anyone who was considered to be unclean, they were also excluded from the Temple and therefor from the worship of God.

According to anthropologists, cultures that are concerned with the maintenance of safe and secure bodily boundaries, are often as concerned about societal and geographic boundaries – in part, because they risk being polluted by those who do not observe the same restrictions as they do.

We usually associate the account of the ten lepers with gratitude, but in fact it is as much about worship and about boundaries. The scene is set in an in-between place, the boundary between Galilee and Samaria. Differing views of scripture, worship and what it means to be holy had created tensions between the two peoples. Centuries of hostility between the Samaritans and the Jews meant that most people would prefer to make the much longer journey to Jerusalem rather than to travel through Samaria. Anyone travelling to Jerusalem would not want to risk exclusion from the Temple (usually the point of their journey) by being polluted by association with the Samaritans.

Throughout the gospel, Jesus has demonstrated that he finds boundaries restrictive, limiting and even inhumane. He mixes with sinners, allows himself to be touched by a woman with a haemorrhage and comes into contact with the dead. He is not afraid of pollution or contamination. Jesus’ own godliness or purity means that rather than impurity flowing from the unclean to himself, Jesus’ presence and goodness make clean, restore and heal those with whom he comes into contact. Jesus has no need to be afraid of being contaminated by the Samaritans.

He has barely entered Samaria when he is confronted by a group of lepers who dare not cross the invisible boundaries that separate them from their families, their communities and him. They beg Jesus, not for healing, but for mercy – a word that means he should meet his obligations to them! As Jews, they were “owed” membership in the holy community of Israel, freedom to return to their families, freedom to worship God in the Temple and they ask Jesus to make this possible – to break down the barriers that prevent their return. Jesus responds to their request by telling them to: “Go and show yourselves to the priests”. In other words: “Go to the Temple and worship God”.

Jesus’ instruction is all well and good for nine of the ten. Once certified as clean by the priests they will be free to enter the Temple and to worship God with other members of their community. But the tenth, the Samaritan, is caught in a dilemma. He sets off with the others but stops short. He knows will not be welcome in the Jewish Temple and that nothing the Jewish priests say or do will make him fit (in their eyes) to be a member of their worshipping community. Does he go instead to the Samaritan place of worship on Mount Gerizim and to his own priests? Where does he go to worship God? Then it comes to him – God is no longer to be found either in Jerusalem or at Gerizim. God is to be found in the person of Jesus.

The Samaritan turns back “praising God”. He bows his face to the ground at Jesus’ feet and thanks him – using a word only used in the Greek for thanks and praise given to God.[iii] He is commended and the nine are censured, not for giving thanks, but for returning to Jesus and giving praise to God.

The Samaritan, the outsider, recognised what the others from their privileged position of inclusion did not, that God was no longer to be encountered in the exclusive space of the Temple, but in the person of Jesus. In Jesus, the boundaries between clean and unclean, sacred and profane, insider and outsider are broken-down. The barriers between God and humanity have been torn apart. Through Jesus we have direct access to God. We do not need intermediaries to intercede for us or to praise God on our behalf. We are free to worship as we are and where we are. We have no need to feel worthy enough or holy enough to worship God.

It doesn’t matter where we are as long as together and individually we recognise all that God has done for us, and that we respond with praise and thanksgiving.

 

[i] I am indebted to John J. Pilch and Denis Hamm for some of these insights. (see http://www.liturgy.slu.edu for October 13, 2019)

[ii] What we know as leprosy is not very contagious and was not known in antiquity.

[iii] “eucharistein” is used in the Greek bible only for thanks and praise given to God.

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How good, Lord to be here.

March 2, 2019

Transfiguration – 2019fullsizeoutput_133a

Luke 9:28-36

Marian Free

In the name of God, transcendent yet immanent, awesome yet comforting, distant and yet as close as a breath. Amen.

“How good Lord to be here!” Whenever I choose the hymn with which we began this morning, I think that we should sing it every week! How good it is to be here! You may not realise this, but Michael and I have now been a part of this Parish for over eleven years – eleven years. That is long enough for you and I to be comfortable each other, way past the time when I might do something unexpected or surprising. With some exceptions, we do the same things week after week, year after year. We sing more or less the same hymns and we have the same preacher. It would not be surprising if, after all this time, our weekly worship might just be “more of the same”. Not at St Augustine’s! One of the real joys of serving this community is that more Sundays than not, at least one person leaves the church saying something to the effect of, “that was wonderful this morning”. To which I reply: “It always is.”

What a privilege and joy to be part of a community that finds our regular, repetitive Anglican gathering uplifting and joyful! How good it is to be here!

Why is it so good? It is good I believe, because in this place and at this time, we are transported out of our day-to-day lives into an experience that is transcendent and transformative. From the moment we enter the church we are confronted by the beauty and grandeur of the building and of the windows. It is obvious that we are in no ordinary place. Even someone with no faith at all cannot fail to be overwhelmed by the soaring roof, the warm timbers and the glorious colours. St Augustine’s is magnificent but in no way is it imposing or unwelcoming. Many who see the interior for the first-time comment on the beautiful feeling that seems to emanate from the walls. We are blessed to worship in a space that is both transcendent and familiar, in which we are both filled with awe and made to feel at home.

How good it is to be here. While our corporate worship might be formal and uplifting it is also comfortable and relaxed. Individually and corporately, we experience the presence of God through our hymns, our readings and, of course, through the Eucharist. Our familiarity with the words and with the pattern of the liturgy does not blunt our awareness of what it is that we do, nor are we allowed to forget that the God whom we worship is both here with us and yet just beyond our grasp. Our worship is moving, uplifting, informative and joyful. It is comforting and reassuring as much as it is awe-inspiring.

Yet though we might be transported by the beauty of our surroundings or deeply moved by the experience of worship, we are also grounded and in touch with the world from which we have been drawn. This helps us to maintain the balance between the transcendent and the immanent (to use the technical terms), to remember who we are and who and what God is. We have to be careful that we are not so enchanted with the experience of God’s presence, not so caught up in the transcendence of the moment that we lose sight of our mission to the world. Our experience of worship may seem to take us to another dimension but that must not cause us to lose sight of the fact that God is as present in our day-to-day living as God is present in our “mountain-top” experiences.

In today’s gospel it is Peter who says: “How good for us to be here!” Peter, with James and John has accompanied Jesus up a mountain to pray. Before their very eyes, not only is Jesus transformed, but Moses and Elijah appear and speak with him. It is as if heaven itself has opened up and gathered the disciples in. Peter’s awe-struck response is to try to capture the moment, to freeze it in time so that he with James and John, can spend the remainder of their lives caught up in this extraordinary moment – never again to have to engage with the nitty gritty of everyday existence.

Peter has yet to understand the reality of Jesus’ ministry, a reality that will be played out in his own life of discipleship. To be a follower of Jesus, he will learn, is not to live one’s life on an exalted spiritual plane but to be fully engaged with the human experience. Peter will come to know that moments of transcendence such as this are not to be held on to, but are to inform and energise the mundane, difficult and sometimes dangerous day-to-day work of being a follower of Jesus.

This morning’s hymn ends: “How good, Lord, to be here, yet we may not remain; but since you bid us leave the mount, come with us to the plain.”

However good it is to be here, our call is to take our knowledge of God into the world, to fully engage with everyday realities, both good and bad. We come here week by week for our mountain-top experience. Consciously and deliberately we bring ourselves into the presence of God. For this one hour we focus intentionally on our relationship with God. In this time and place we allow ourselves to be inspired, fed and nurtured so that reinvigorated, renewed and transformed, we can go into the world and live lives that are infused with the presence of God and the knowledge of God’s presence.

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With all the saints and angels

November 3, 2018

All Saints – 2018

Marian Free

 In the name of God who surrounded by all the saints of heaven. Amen.

I’d like to begin this morning with two stories. The first was told to me by a priest who, early in his career was a priest in the Diocese of Canberra – a place renowned for bitterly cold winters. As is the case in many Anglican Parishes, there was an early morning mid-week Eucharist. In the middle of winter only one older woman attended. On one particularly bleak morning the priest picked up the courage to ask whether, as she was the sole member of the congregation, the woman might consider that the time had come to abandon the service. “But I’m not alone,” the woman replied. “I am surrounded by the communion of saints.” Week after week, month after month, year after year, this woman faithfully joined her prayers with all those who had gone before her, confident that her worship was never an individual but always a collective effort.

The second story was told to me by another priest reflecting on her childhood experience of being a member of the Anglican communion. This woman grew up in an outer suburb of Sydney – or rather a suburb that was developing on what was then the outskirts of Sydney. The church, which was small in number, met in a cottage on land that would later support a hall and a church building. Though the worshippers were few, the priest of the time would remind them that rather than being an insignificant community they were in fact part of a much larger whole – the worldwide Anglican communion andthe communion of saints. My friend reports that, as a result she has always been conscious that the church community is always far greater than those who gather Sunday by Sunday but consists of Anglican Christians throughout the whole world and all who in every time and place call upon the name of the Lord – the communion of saints past and present.

At our baptism we, or our godparents, affirm that we believe in “one holy, catholic church, the communion of saints, the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.” And whether we are conscious of it or not, every Sunday those who gather for the Eucharist affirm that their worship joins with the company of heaven. Using language from Isaiah and Revelation we are reminded each week that our prayer and praise is not offered in isolation but is united with that of the heavenly host. The introduction to the Sanctus (“Holy, holy, holy Lord”) reminds us that we praise God and sing with the angels and archangels and with all the company of heaven. The words themselves come directly from Isaiah’s vision of God in the temple. He writes, “Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings, with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet and with two they flew. And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory” (Is 6:2,3). These words are repeated in the Book of Revelation in which the author sees winged creatures around the throne singing ceaselessly (6:11f). The same vision sees a vast multitude   of nations before the throne who sing: “Blessing and glory and wisdom and power and might be to our God forever and ever. Amen” words that are echoed in the final acclamation of the Eucharistic Prayer (Rev 7:12). In the Prayer of Thanksgiving we join our voices with all the heavenly host  – angels and archangels, prophets and martyrs and with all who those have been raised from death to life.  We become a part of the ceaseless praise of heaven.

Our worship is not only heavenly, it is corporate.

As we worship, not only do we participate in the continual worship of heaven, we also become part of the endless cycle of praise and prayer that continues day in, day out throughout the world. As the old hymn affirms: “hour by hour fresh lips are making your wondrous doings heard on high[1].” Before we began our worship this morning communities to the east of us had begun their own and before our worship concludes today communities to our west will begin to offer theirs. As the earth makes it way around the sun and as others rise to greet a new day, so prayer and praise will be continuously offered to God this day in almost every nation of the world. Whether we are many or few is irrelevant as we lift our worship in so great a company.

Our worship is not private but communal, not local but global, not earthly but heavenly. Our worship is not an expression of personal piety. It is not a comfortable, cosy gathering with familiar faces. Worship is an action that takes us out of ourselves and beyond ourselves, that transports us beyond our own limitations and unites us to something far, far greater – the world-wide church and the company of heaven.

The Prayer of Confession today will be introduced with the words from Hebrews 12:1: “We are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses.” As we celebrate the feast of All Saints, let us commit to living this reality and to allowing ourselves to be gathered up with all those who have gone before us as we join with them in songs of never-ending praise.

 

 

 

[1]The day thou gavest Lord has ended. John Ellerton, 1826-93.

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Moving the boundaries

August 16, 2014

Pentecost 10. 2014

Matthew 15:21-28

Marian Free

 

In the name of God who is constantly breaking down barriers and opening new possibilities for existence. Amen.

The account of the Canaanite woman is perhaps the most confronting story in the New Testament. Our familiarity with the Gospels means that we are not at all shocked by the way that Jesus befriends sinners and eats with them. Nor are we surprised that he allows a woman of the street to wash his feet. It seems perfectly reasonable to us that Jesus should heal on a Sabbath. But this story is shocking Jesus is rude and unsympathetic. He refuses to respond to a mother’s agonised cry for help. Worse still, not only does Jesus ignore the woman’s pleas, he adds insult to injury when he justifies his refusal by likening the woman to a household pet that does not deserve the same food as the children.

This hard, uncompromising Jesus is almost unrecognisable. Is this, we might ask, the same Jesus who only a short while ago had such compassion for the crowd that even though he needed to be alone he healed the sick and fed more than 5,000 people?

What is going on here? Such an unflattering and unexpected description of Jesus demands further explanation. Why would the Gospel writers include an account in which Jesus is so uncompromising, so rude? What is it that causes Jesus to withhold healing in this situation? Did he think that he would find the peace he was seeking outside Israel’s borders and did the woman interrupt that peace? We may not be able to find a satisfactory answer to those questions, but we can draw the conclusion that the purpose of this story in Matthew’s gospel is to explain how it is that the Gentiles have come to faith in a Jewish Messiah. – why it is that the faith community consists of both Jew and Gentile.

There are two versions of Jesus’ encounter with a Gentile woman in Mark and Matthew. A comparison between the two accounts shows that Mark’s record of the meeting is much less confrontational. Matthew has heightened the contest in a number of ways, which makes the outcome even more surprising. He elevates the position of the woman and he emphasises Jesus’ refusal to help. The woman recognises Jesus as the Son of David and falls down and worships him. This makes her a more formidable combatant than the woman in Mark’s account as she knows who Jesus is at a time when Jesus’ disciples have not yet made up their minds. The battle lines are more clearly drawn In Matthew, Jesus ignores the woman’s request not once but twice and his refusal to acknowledge her is supported by the disciples who urge him to send her away. Jesus’ response to the woman is strengthened by the assertion that his responsibility is only to the lost sheep of Israel. Matthew makes the woman stronger, Jesus harsher.

The basic elements of the story are the same in both gospels. Tyre and Sidon are on the Mediterranean Sea – a long way from Galilee and in territory that is primarily Gentile. It is Jesus, not the woman, who is out of place. The woman who seems to appear out of nowhere is desperate. An evil spirit oppresses her daughter. When Jesus rejects her plea for a second time she is not deterred. So confident is she in his authority and in his ability that she informs him that the crumbs will be enough. In her wisdom (or humility) she has understood that there is more than enough to go around and that even the left-overs will be more than sufficient to meet her need[1]. By helping her daughter, she suggested Jesus’ ministry to Israel would in no way be diminished.

Jesus is outside his territory on the woman’s home ground and she demands that he take her faith seriously. Consciously or unconsciously, the woman foreshadows the future. After Jesus’ death, the gospel will be preached in the regions beyond Israel. There the Gentiles will recognise Jesus and will demand their place in the community of faith.

In the final analysis, this account is much more than a story about one woman’s faith. It is in fact a reflection about boundaries, boundaries that turn out not to be rigid and immovable but fluid and ever-changing. The world into which Jesus was born was very clear about who was in and who was out and the lines between the two were fiercely guarded. Belonging was more than a birthright it also required adherence to strict purity laws. One could be born a Jew but still be an outsider. Anyone with a disability or skin disease was considered unclean, tax collectors and prostitutes were excluded. Temporary exclusion could result from contact with a corpse, a flow of blood or a failure to observe the purity laws. It was close to impossible for anyone from outside to be given admission to God’s chosen people. The woman’s insight and her refusal to be denied made it clear that the boundaries were moving and that Jesus’ message was intended not just for a few, but for the whole world.

Our readings today remind us that God doesn’t observe conventions or maintain strict boundaries. Genesis tells us that by default Joseph, the Hebrew slave of Pharaoh, becomes the ruler of all Egypt. In Romans Paul reminds us that, contrary to expectation, wIld olive shoots (the Gentiles) are grafted on to the rich root of the olive tree (the Jews).

The faith that grew in Jesus’ name shattered all previous boundaries and admitted as full members those who were previously on the outside or who were languishing in the shadows.

The Canaanite woman demanded and received recognition for her faith. She challenged Jesus’ narrow mind-set and forced him to think differently. In a world in which boundaries are becoming drawn ever tighter or being raised against perceived threats or new fears, perhaps it is time for us to consider where we stand and to ask ourselves whether our fences represent the mind of God or whether they are simply there to separate ourselves from others and to protect the ways of the past.

[1] An interesting insight in view of the quantity of leftovers from the feeding of the 5,000.

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