Rooted in Jesus

A Sermon preached on Feb. 2, 2020 (Candlemas) at St. Augustine’s, Wiesbaden

Isaiah 61:10-62:3, Hebrews 2:14-18, Luke 2:22-40

If you thought we have a lot going on today at church, just look at what is happening in the passage we just heard from Luke’s Gospel! 

First, we have the purification according to the law of Moses. This is the requirement, according to Leviticus (12:2-8) that for 33 days after the birth a woman “shall not touch any holy thing, or come into the sanctuary, until the days of her purification are completed.” And then, on the 33^rd day, “she shall take two turtle-doves or two pigeons, one for a burnt-offering and the other for a sin-offering; and the priest shall make atonement on her behalf, and she shall be clean.” In the old prayer book we had a service called the Churching of Women (now just called Thanksgiving for a Child), which while it focused on giving thanks for the safe delivery – and survival of the mother – and required no animal sacrifices was still a vestige of the rite of purification. 

Turning back to Luke, we next have the consecration of the firstborn based on Exodus (13:1-2 ): “The Lord said to Moses: Consecrate to me all the firstborn; whatever is the first to open the womb among the Israelites, of human beings and animals, is mine.” There was buy-back clause, you could redeem your child for three shekels. Sounds like a good fundraising idea to me!

Luke also references the presentation or dedication of Samuel in this passage. Samuel, the great prophet, priest and leader was dedicated to the Lord by his mother Hannah: “For this child I prayed; and the Lord has granted me the petition that I made to him. Therefore, I have lent him to the Lord; as long as he lives, he is given to the Lord.” (1 Samuel 1:27-28) 

And I’m sure that Luke knew the prophecy from Malachi and saw this event as its fulfillment: “See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple.” (Malachi 3:1) That would certainly explain the extraordinary reaction of two complete strangers, Simeon and Anna, who recognize Jesus as the Messiah or Redeemer – the Lord whom they both seek. 

Why all these different events and references? Luke wants to show that Jesus is rooted in his tradition and culture, that Jesus is the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies like Malachi’s, and that he is the Messiah. But he also wants his readers to understand but that Jesus’ mission will go beyond and even against everyone’s expectations: it will be fulfillment with a twist!

That is why it was so important that “they finished everything required by the law of the Lord,” and that Jesus was presented in the Temple like Samuel, another child born by the will of God. Jesus became “like his brothers and sisters in every respect,” (Hebrews 2:17) and as Jesus was born a Jew in Palestine that also means that the customs and traditions of that culture were adhered to. But being rooted in a particular tradition and culture does not mean that we cannot go beyond the culture and expand that tradition, just as Jesus did in his later ministry reaching out to those his culture rejected and neglected.

In Luke’s story, it is left to Simeon and Anna to explain the greater meaning, that in Jesus Simeon sees God’s salvation, “which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel." (Luke 2:30-32) Jesus is God’s plan of salvation for all people without any distinction. This is a moment of great joy, but when Simeon alludes to the means of salvation, the cross, a somber moment too.  In those haunting words, “a sword will pierce your own soul too,” (2:35) Simeon tells us that the child destined for glory is also destined for suffering. One day Jesus will return to Jerusalem for another purpose. The temple priests who bless Mary’s son today will one day seek to crucify him. On the cross, Jesus will make “the sacrifice of atonement for the sins of the people” and by being “himself tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested.” (Hebrews 2:18)

What’s the connection to today’s service – apart from there being a lot going on? We have commemorated the Presentation in our Candlemas procession; we will celebrate a 40^th wedding anniversary, and we will administer Holy Baptism. Commemorating the Presentation, and the Jewish traditions and rites it stands for, is a good way of reminding ourselves that our religion has Jewish roots, was founded by Jews and that we share many things with our brothers and sisters – much of our scripture and the same faithful God of course. 

I don’t want to compare John and Roxane with Simeon and Anna, though just as Anna “never left the temple” I do sometimes have the feeling that John and Roxane live here. Simeon and Anna were witnesses to Jesus and to Jesus’s power in their words and actions. John and Roxane are also great witnesses to Jesus in their lives. And just as a wedding is a sign, in our liturgy we pray that the couple will “make their life together a sign of Christ's love to this sinful and broken world,”[1] so a wedding anniversary is also a sign and witness, not necessarily to perfection, but to holding together through thick and thin, to being able to forgive one another’s mistakes.

Baptism is not quite the same as a presentation or dedication. For one thing, Leona and Justice, you can take Fredrick home with you after the service. But there are similarities. In bringing Frederick here for Baptism you are rooting him in Jesus and grounding him in the Christian tradition, culture, and especially the community of this church in which you grew up, Leona, and you and Justice met. We – this community - will all promise to support you and to support Frederick in his life in Christ. 

Even before his presentation, Jesus dedicated himself to us, to all of God’s children. In return we dedicate ourselves to him, our Lord. “You are sealed by the Holy Spirit in Baptism and marked as Christ's own forever,”[2] is what I will say a little later when Frederick is baptized. Baptism is the moment in which we begin to share in the salvation that Simeon and Anna recognized in Jesus. In the water of Baptism, we “are buried with Christ in his death … share in his Resurrection (and) … are reborn by the Holy Spirit.”[3]  Being dedicated to Christ, as all of us here are, also means acting like Christ in the world. Not only do we share in his resurrection as a gift, we are called to share with others the Good News of God’s love and of the victory over death and the fear of death that the resurrection stands for. 

Of Jesus we read that when he and his parents returned home, “the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him.” (Luke 2:40) That is my prayer for Frederick also, that rooted in Jesus he will grow and became strong, be filled with God’s wisdom; that the favor of God remains upon him and that he – and all of us – share that favor with the world that so needs God’s wisdom, grace, favor and love.

Amen.

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[1] BCP, 429

[2] BCP, 308

[3] BCP, 306

Children of God

A Sermon preached on Dec. 29 Christmas I at St. Augustine’s, Wiesbaden

Isaiah 61:10-62:3, Galatians 3:23-25; 4:4-7, John 1: 1-18

If you were at our late service on Christmas Eve, just 5 days ago, you will already have heard the reading from the prologue of John’s Gospel. I am not at all tempted to reuse my sermon from a few days ago. For one thing, there are too many witnesses, for another I would get bored reading the same sermon again. But most importantly it would not be “contextual.” We interpret scripture in context, and there are many different contexts that apply. We have the context in which the passage was written – what was going on, what was society like, what was important for the Christian community of that time? We have the context and content of the reading itself – where is it in the Gospel, what has or is about to happen, what sort of text is it? And we have the context in which the passage is being read and heard. Today’s context, Sunday December 29, the 1^st Sunday after Christmas, is different to that of Christmas Eve. We are in the same place, but at a different time, with different (and fewer!) people and today we also have the context of Holy Baptism.

In that context, what jumps out for me among the many other wonderful promises of this passage is this:

“But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.” (John 1:12) 

And in Paul’s letter to the Galatians, we have a similar promise:

“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children. And because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, "Abba! Father!" So you are no longer a slave but a child, and if a child then also an heir, through God.” (Galatians 4:4-7)

What does this mean? Well a god or gods having children was nothing unusual in the religions and mythologies of that time. The senior Greco-Roman God Jupiter or Zeus was infamous for the number of children he had with goddesses and humans, some of them in circumstances that we would probably call rape today. Some of his many divine and usually also heroic offspring include Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Hermes, Persephone, Dionysus, Perseus, Heracles, Helen of Troy, Minos, and the Muses. But there are key differences between these children and our role as God’s children. 

For Jews, and for Christians, and also for Muslims, God, our God, can’t have children in a physical way, because God is not a being, God is wholly other, God is separate, God is the creator of all. That’s why Paul uses the language of adoption and spirit to describe how we become God’s children, and John – in the NIV translation – talks about “children born not of natural descent” (NRSV: “not of blood”). 

Both John and Paul also make clear that the power or ability to become God’s children is very closely connected to Jesus Christ. John says that it is those who receive Jesus and believe in his name who are given the right to become children of God. Paul says that it was necessary that God first send his Son, born of a woman, to redeem – liberate and release us – before we receive adoption as children, and that to strengthen and support this new connection with God, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts. Our direct, human to human relationship with God is through Jesus Christ, whose incarnation, whose becoming human we celebrate at Christmas. Put simply, with Jesus as our brother, God is our father. 

Now, this has all already happened. God became human on that first Christmas, and God’s Son redeemed us on the Cross in a once and for all sacrifice on that first Good Friday. 

So, Julie, (Omar), Jazmarie, and Mason are already children of God. Why does it sound as if we only making them members of God’s family today, in Baptism? What does it mean when we pray after they have been baptized with water and the spirit: “We receive you into the household [family] of God. Confess the faith of Christ crucified, proclaim his resurrection, and share with us in his eternal priesthood.”[1]

Well, what we are actually doing today in Baptism is recognizing and celebrating that they have accepted, acknowledged and chosen to believe in that relationship. In some verses we did not hear this morning – they were left out from the selection from Galatians - Paul makes the connection between being or becoming children, faith, Christ, and Baptism very clear:

“So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” (Galatians 3:26-27) 

He also immediately goes on to say (3:28) “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” God’s family is universal and inclusive and knows no barriers. The children of Zeus or Jupiter were just those select few, heroic, superhumans. In our faith, everyone has the potential and the power to become children of God and truly human, not superhuman.  

One more thing, and one more difference between today’s reading from the prologue to John’s Gospel and Christmas Eve’s. Today’s selection has four extra verses (15 – 18) including the last one we heard: “No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known.” God’s Son has made God known to us in his life, acts, teaching, and in his death. We have seen God’s love in the person of Christ and in the context of Baptism, as Paul writes, we clothe ourselves with Christ. That makes it our job as children and heirs, as Christians to make Christ known and through Christ, to make God known!  This is a key part of the promises you will make – together with everyone else here – in the Baptismal Covenant right now.

Amen.

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[1] BCP, p. 308