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Thought for the Week 16 May – 7th Sunday of Easter
Judas
has gone, the disciples have been reassured in their uncertainty about the
future and received the promise of the Holy Spirit contained in Jesus’
farewell discourses in chapters 13-16. Now here we are, with Jesus, in the
second part of his prayer time and conversation with the Father. The cruel
death of the criminal is rushing towards him and he knows it. Judas has left
the group to carry out his betrayal and it is only a matter of time before
the chief priests come to arrest him. Yet this Lord, this Messiah, this King
of our lives, this Son of God, this part of the God head takes time out to
pray for you and for me, the essence of our Gospel reading today. It’s
about love, it’s about peace and it’s about the glory of the Father and it’s
about the church. How so, you are entitled to ask? “God
so loved the world that he gave his only Son ……..” Christ so loved the world
that he is about to fulfil the Father’s wishes, and after that event the
disciples will believe through the Holy Spirit, who will testify as to the
truth of what Jesus was about, of all that he said and of all that he did. In
the immediate preceding verse to our reading, that is verse 19, Jesus
sanctifies himself. In the Old Testament it was only the priests and
sacrifices that were sanctified through consecration. In his love for the
Father and the world Jesus set himself apart to do the Father’s will ------
to carry it through to his death on the cross. In this way Jesus death was
not only to get us back into a right relationship with God but, through his
intention expressed in the words “….. that they too may be sanctified .”, to
consecrate us in God’s service. It was because of these words that Peter was
able to write in his first letter that we are all “a chosen people, a royal
priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God.” It was love that drove
God on, it was love that drove Jesus on, to make the sacrifice that results
in our sanctification. Last
week’s Gospel reading had Jesus saying farewell to his disciples. He said to
them “ Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you. I do not give as the
world gives.” It is a peace that has
at its centre the love of God, the love of Christ. Shalom the Hebrew word for
peace is a common form of greeting but also a way of saying goodbye. But this
peace that we find as a consequence of this all consuming love it’s an
everlasting peace and that is why it’s not a peace as the world gives. Peace
as the world gives is an uneasy peace --- it lasts as long as it suites the
convenience of the parties, but as soon as it no longer suites then its at an
end. “Peace in our time.” was Chamberlain’s famous expression and that didn’t
last too long. Peace between the Jews and the Palestinians, when it occurs,
is perhaps the best example of how uneasy the peace the world gives can be. In
reading a book whist travelling around Vietnam I learned that the people of
that neck of the world, the Orient, see westerners for ever chasing after and
seeking out happiness and peace through the accumulation of wealth, of
material things. Then when they have them being dissatisfied because we
discover that chasing wealth and material things doesn’t bring happiness nor
does it bring peace. This bemuses the Orientals because they see us chasing
after something we already possess ----- they see peace and happiness as
something babies are born with. Their task in life is to nurture and
cultivate what they consider we already have. It is fundamentally a Buddhist
teaching, but it is also to my mind a Christian teaching about which we don’t
seem to make much noise even though its what the world is after. Jesus said,
didn’t he, “Where your treasure is there your heart will be also.” “Seek
first his (the Father’s) kingdom and his righteousness.” If we go back to the
Old Testament, the book of Proverbs we read these words, “Two things I ask of
you, O Lord, do not refuse me before I die: keep falsehood and lies far from
me; give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread.
Otherwise I may have too much and disown you and say ‘Who is the Lord?’ Or I may become poor and
steal and so dishonour the name of my God.”
When
Jesus gives his peace it is an ever-lasting peace, a deep-rooted peace that
produces happiness. So the love that the Father and the Son have for us, for
you and me, for the world, has a by-product called peace. It is this love
with its by-product that brings glory to the Father ------ but it brings
glory to the Father not because of anything we have done but through what the
Father has done though Jesus Christ. As Paul puts it by grace are we saved,
not because of anything we have done but simply because the Father and the
Son have both loved us. John in his first letter puts it this way, “This is
love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son as an
atoning sacrifice for our sins.” Of course in our reading Jesus talks to his
Father of the glory that the Father has given to him because of that atoning
sacrifice if you like. Because of that
glory manifested in Christ we are able to appreciate the Father’s glory in
allowing his Son to die for our sake. Christ’s
prayer is for the church as well ----- the catholic church with a small c,
the church universal. For he begins the prayer by praying for those that will
believe because of the disciples’ witness. Down the ages that witness has
been handed on by the writings of the New Testament, by tradition, and by
faith and grace and so here we are today. Jesus prayer is therefore for us,
for you and me, which brings me back to where I began. Each of us through the
witness of those that have gone before us have had to answer for ourselves
that question the Jesus put to the disciples “Who do you say I am.” When we
answer that question positively and acknowledge Jesus Christ as the Lord of
our lives we not only have the resource of the Divine Spirit making his home
within each of us but we become part of the universal church.. As such we
have a treasure, a responsibility, a duty even to love one another as Christ
has loved us, for in this way ---- if we go back to the reading of the week
before last --- all men will know that we are his disciples. It is not an
option for Jesus says you must love one another. It’s
not easy and how the church over the years has managed to let God down! We
have been judgmental, we have burnt at the stake, and we have vilified and
persecuted, excommunicated, shunned and hated other Christians, usually
because they have differing views to our own about scripture or how we should
live our lives. Often the reason has nothing to do with salvation, yet still
the mistrust and disbelief goes on. Not so much perhaps nowadays, we have
given up burning at the stake and persecuting one another. Listen to Jesus
words, “Father as you are in me and I am in you. May they be in us so that
the world may believe that you sent me.” Christ is praying for a unity
between the Father himself and us ----so
that the world i.e. non Christians --- may believe that you sent me.” I appreciate that Montesquieu, the
eighteenth century French philosopher was writing some time ago now but he
said, “No kingdom has shed more blood than the kingdom of Christ.” Such a
comment does not sit too well with the unity that Christ was praying for from
his followers. It was an absolute unity, “…..
that they may be one as we are one. I in them and you in me. May they
be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have
loved them even as you have loved me.”
Christ is asking that through the unity, for which he prays, that the
love that the Father has for Jesus may be the same love as the Father has for
Jesus followers. That is to say that we are loved with the same love in terms
of intensity and depth as Jesus is loved. Unity,
we must surely understand from Christ’s teaching, is closely allied with love
as he has loved us. Unity does not mean being boringly the same, it does not
mean that we have to agree with everything a fellow Christian determines. It
does not mean that we have to agree on controversial matters but it does
require us to respect the others point of view, it does not preclude
discussion, we are free to agree to disagree, it does mean forbearance on our
part. Paul in his letter to the Romans puts it this way “Accept him whose
faith is weak without passing judgement on disputable matters ………….. make up
your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brothers way.” So
we come back to where we started you cannot have the unity for which Christ,
literally in his dying hours prayed for, without love, without peace, without
forbearance. This unity that Jesus prayed about for his followers is a
treasure but at the same time is a responsibility for with it we show that we
are Christ’s. Let
me just say something to finish about the Holy Spirit in all of this. We are
all so different, we all have differing ideas and ways of seeing things, we
are individuals. Jesus knew it was not going to be easy that is why he sent
the Counsellor, the Spirit if Truth after his Ascension at Pentecost which we
celebrate next week. With the gift of the Holy Spirit we have a Spirit of
power, a Spirit of self-discipline and a Spirit of love as Timothy reminds us
in his first letter. But it is also a Spirit of unity, for Paul writes, “ Be
completely humble and gentle,: be patient, bearing with one another in love,
Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.”
That divine power, together with Christ and God himself lives within us for
we are the Temple of the living God. We have the tools and the equipment, we
have the desire for Jesus prayer to be realised. Let us be able to say with
the Psalmist “How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in
unity!” Mel
Fancy: Reader, Anglican Chaplaincy of Midi-Pyrénées & Aude To return to main Thought for the Week page, click X at top right to close this window. |