Sermon preached at Grand Oaks Retirement Home, Washington DC on September 25, 2011 on Philippians 2:1-13
In Paul’s letter to the Philippians we heard a list
of qualities for living together. Are they an accurate description of life in
your community here at Grand Oaks? Are you all always of the same mind,
do you regard all others as better than yourselves and do you never look
to your own interests? Unless this is a community of saints, and we know from
the stories of the saints that some of them could be a bit unpleasant at times,
I suspect not.
Because living in community is not and never has
been easy. And if the Christian community in Philippi that Paul was writing to
had lived up to Paul’s expectations I don’t think he would have written this
letter in the 1st place. Living in community is difficult, as I know from
experience. As a very recent seminarian I have been called to live in a small community
again as I go back to school after 30 years. The seminary also has high
expectations of how we are supposed to live together. We are called to study,
pray and eat together, we are called to respect each other despite our very
different backgrounds and opinions. We are called to serve others and to put
ourselves second, and others first. It “ain’t always easy”! And my age and
seniority suddenly don’t mean as much as they used to, there are a number of
professors who are quite clearly younger than I am – but they have more
experience than in their field than I do. So this is experience is a good
exercise in humility for me.
Paul knew of course that living a Christian life wasn’t
easy. He knew that concern for self is our driving force and that what he was
asking the Philippians, and Corinthians, and Ephesians and all the other
“-ians” ran against normal, destructive human behavior. That’s one reason why
he had to write so many letters to the communities he founded to remind them how
they should live. He also knew and tells us that it is not something we can do
on our own.
We need encouragement in Christ, we need Christ’s
example, his supreme example. For what greater humbling can there be than God
becoming human, what greater denial of self! In today’s Gospel Jesus is asked
where he gets his authority from. Who gave him permission to do what he did? Who
allowed him to speak and act that way, the political and religious leaders of
the day asked him. They did not and could not understand that his authority was
not one of from power, but from a demonstration of humility and complete
obedience. It was because he humbled himself and was obedient that “God exalted
him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of
Jesus every knee should bow”, and not the other way round.
As Christians we are called to model the ideal
community to the world; that is one way in which we preach the Gospel. We are
called to show people how we should live together in this world, as a sign of
how we will live together when God’s kingdom finally comes. It’s not easy and
we can’t do it on our own. We need to trust, as Paul puts it, that “God is at
work in us enabling us to will and to work for God’s pleasure”.
Living as a
community is not easy. But I reckon you have plenty of practice here, you know
that it makes sense to look out for each other’s and not only for your own
interests. You know how important sharing and selflessness are. With God’s help
you here can be a real model in the world for how we are all called to
live together. Amen
