Preacher: The Very Rev’d Frank Nelson
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and tomorrow.” These words from the anonymous author of the Letter to the Hebrews are quoted very early on Easter morning as the shape of the cross is traced over the Paschal or Easter Candle. I thought we’d light it this morning as a reminder to us of that glorious celebration of the resurrection. They are timely too just three weeks out from our annual Confirmation service when Bishop Tim will be here to confirm a number of young people and adults, some of whom will be baptised that day too. As you know, at both baptism and confirmation the shape of the cross is traced on the person’s forehead, marking them as Christ’s as they set out, or continue on, the journey, the pilgrimage with God’s people.
Over the past weeks we have been on something of a pilgrimage through the Letter to the Hebrews. Most of the chapters have been closely woven theological argument setting out who Jesus is and what he has done. But in today’s extract from Hebrews 13 the author moves from the theoretical to the practical, reminding his readers that being a follower of Jesus Christ is essentially practical. It is much more than simple head knowledge. We may know an awful lot about Jesus, and spend long hours debating the existence or otherwise of God, but until we respond to Jesus’s call to follow, and set out on the journey, we have not really begun. One of the features I really like about the architecture of this sacred space is that the font is at the main entrance. That is the beginning. And it is our custom here that immediately having been baptised, the new Christians set off on a journey – down the aisle towards the high altar. It is highly symbolic of our calling as Christians – to be always on the move, drawing, ever so gradually, closer to God; becoming more Christ-like, day by day.
Day by day – those are words that St Richard of Chichester incorporated into his well-known prayer and often set to music, including in the 1970s Gospel musical based on St Mathew’s Gospel called “Godspell”.
Thanks be to you, our Lord Jesus Christ,
for all the benefits which you have given us,
for all the pains and insults which you have borne for us.
Most merciful Redeemer, Friend and Brother,
may we know you more clearly,
love you more dearly,
and follow you more nearly,
day by day.
But back to Hebrews for a moment and the practical advice to the people who read the letter. Today’s passage from chapter 13 is one of those worthy of taking slowly, reading sentence by sentence, allowing each phrase to sink in – thinking through the implications for daily living. Ideas like mutual love, showing hospitality to strangers, remembering the prisoners, the tortured; upholding and honouring the institution of marriage and healthy relationships; being satisfied with what we have got. They are words that are easy to read, and easy to bypass – “I know all that”. But do we actually put them into practice? Do we allow these words of Scripture to permeate our lives and influence our decisions, the way we live and the way we conduct our business? The more I think about this, and similar passages in the Bible, the more challenged I am in regard to my own life.
What does it mean to practice hospitality to strangers? Just last Friday I was accosted, and I use that word intentionally, by a group of people asking, demanding, money for food. They had seen my dog collar and I felt targeted, singled out, threatened even. How to respond? Was this a genuine cry for help? I have become cynical over the years, hoodwinked and taken in too many times. Yet these words in Hebrews are there. And what of today’s Gospel about the wedding guests and who to invite to a meal, and where to sit at the meal?
In the context of the Gospel Jesus frequently uses the idea of a meal to refer to the Kingdom of God or Heaven. This very service is shaped around a meal, we are ‘companions’ on the way of Jesus Christ – a word coming from the Latin meaning to share bread. And our word ‘communion’ means sharing in common. So Jesus suggests that it is not enough to be companions, and to be in communion, only with those we get on with – our friends and family; those who can afford to invite us back in return. No, “when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind. And you will be blessed …” (Luke 14: 13)
It sounds so simple – but we all know it is so difficult to actually put into practice.
Perhaps that was the problem with the people who lived during the prophet Jeremiah’s time. They were not bad people – like us they wanted the best for themselves and their families and friends. But that was not what God wanted. Time and again in the Old Testament, we find the call going out to the people to return to the conditions of the Covenant – to love God and to love neighbour. Living a life worthy of the holiness of God meant, and means, paying attention to the underdog, the forgotten, the group who accosted me on Friday outside Cathedral Fashions. And it is not easy or comfortable.
In the old old story that is told and retold in countless ways throughout the Old Testament, and refashioned and recast in Jesus Christ, the comfortable conventions of the day are challenged, including the religious ones. We can hear the centuries of frustration reaching fever pitch in the words of today’s first reading from Jeremiah 2. Last week we heard of his call – from before birth. This week we hear something of his message, and it is not a comfortable one. Essentially the people of Jerusalem are being castigated for abandoning God. It is unheard of and God, through Jeremiah, calls on the heavens in a heart-rending cry full of confusion and agony: “Be appalled, O heavens, at this, be shocked, utterly desolate, for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and dug cisterns for themselves, cracked cisterns that can hold no water.” (Jer 2: 13) It is totally incomprehensible to God that the very people that God rescued and led into the Promised Land should abandon him – yet that is what has happened.
Jeremiah, Jesus, the writer to the Hebrews, all call their people back to God. For Christ, as we heard, is the same yesterday, today and forever. And the message is essentially the same: Love God; love your neighbour. And the cross, shaped on the foreheads of every Christian baptised and confirmed, reminds us of that vertical and horizontal relationship. Vertical – me to God; horizontal – me to you. Both are needed to make the cross. One without the other leaves us incomplete and lacking.
Thanks be to you, our Lord Jesus Christ,
for all the benefits which you have given us,
for all the pains and insults which you have borne for us.
Most merciful Redeemer, Friend and Brother,
may we know you more clearly,
love you more dearly,
and follow you more nearly,
day by day.
Richard of Chichester 1197 – 1253