Our preacher at Evensong on Sunday, May 18, was the Rev. Jeff Murph, Rector of St. Thomas Memorial Episcopal Church, Oakmont, Pennsylvania, and Chaplain of St. Margaret's Hospital in Aspinwall. Propers for the Evening Office on the Fifth Easter Sunday, Year Two, were Psalms 8 & 84, Hebrews 12: 1-14, and Luke 4: 16-30.
Is there more than what the empirical indicators of the
world reveal? And if there is more then
what is there and how are we to recognize it?
These are two questions that I think actually are very pertinent in an
age where, at least in Western societies, more and more people describe
themselves as having no belief whatsoever.
And in addition to these so-called atheists, there are many more who
describe themselves as spiritual but avoid conforming themselves to any faith
system or faith community at all. Often
they seem to have devised a set of spiritual ideas, whether or not it has any
logical coherence that becomes their personal creed. Not surprisingly, these sets of personal
creeds often fit quite comfortably with the pattern these folks happen to live.
In contrast, we in the Church have a much more
inconvenient spiritual framework. We
subscribe to a revealed system of faith, which at times can present
embarrassing beliefs, politically incorrect perspectives and which can
articulate a framework that may be very challenging indeed to the way we might
prefer to live our lives. What may be
the worst is that we Christians all are expected to live out this faith in the
context of a community, the church, which is filled with all kinds of people
that we might much prefer not to associate with, not to mention the hypocrisies
and petty squabbles that can characterize just about any Christian community. But I am getting ahead of myself, I want
first to return to the original questions with which I began this sermon: Is there more than what the empirical
indicators of the world reveal? And if
there is more then what is there and how are we to recognize it?
In reality, there are more things in the world than those
things that can be tested empirically. An
overwhelming amount of human energy has been devoted to describing the power of
love and yet, it is very hard indeed to empirically quantify a human emotion. Despite this, very few would deny that love
is a great motive behind many human events.
We Christians, of course, maintain that there is a spiritual dimension
to this world that is very real. And
yet, it does not submit itself to the kinds of empirical experimentation that
our world tends to demand for authenticating reality.
In my last parish, I went to visit a parishioner who had
been ill for quite a long time and who, indeed, had a disease that could have
killed him. “I just don’t know for sure
whether I believe if there is anything that comes after,” he confessed to me in
the midst of his anxiety. I continued to
listen to him speak and, within ninety seconds of making this confession of
uncertainty, he then proceeded to tell me about how he had felt supernaturally
guided when he was going through some of things left to him by his recently
departed father. He almost seemed to be
like that old story in Mark’s gospel where the father of the epileptic boy
cries out, “I believe, help thou my unbelief! (Mk. 9:24). There was lacking perhaps that empirical
proof that he would so have liked to have; and yet, even so, almost in the
periphery of his field of sight, he could perceive God’s reality all the same.
Tonight, the writer of Hebrews, writing to a community
that was perhaps wrestling with doubt, with uncertainty, with anxiety because
of persecution and hard times, with the disapproval and rejection of the
Pharisaical Jewish authorities, calls his readers to open their eyes to a
spiritual reality that they were having trouble seeing. “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a
great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin
that so easily entangles. And let us run
with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the
pioneer and perfecter of faith.” This
verse has always fascinated me. In fact,
it has always conjured up in my mind a giant track and field event, held before
a great stadium. In this event, running
along the racetrack, going as hard as we can, are we. In the seats of the stadium, cheering
encouragement at the top of their lungs are all the saints who have already
finished the race; aiding us with their intercessions and, of course, with the
examples of their own lives.
For me, it is a dynamic vision of the reality of God’s
Kingdom, both here as well as in Paradise, as well as the connection that, in
Christ, binds us, the living, even to the dead—who, of course, are still alive
in the Lord. But the writer also points
us rather emphatically, and quite appropriately, to Jesus, “the pioneer and
perfecter of faith.”
Luke, in his short account, gives us an example of Thomas
Wolfe’s claim that “you can’t go home again.”
Jesus returns to Nazareth, but as a noted rabbi, not as the carpenter
that everyone thought they knew so well.
And he is greeted with rejection—such a common human experience—and one
that most of us fear so terribly. It was
not, it seems a rejection of him as a rabbi, because, at least at first, “All
spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his
lips.” But then he started saying things
that they didn’t like, nice things about Gentiles. “Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a
widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon.
And there were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elisha the
prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.” Only then did rejection come with fury and
even with violence, as they sought to toss him off a cliff. The writer of the Hebrews seems to suggest,
“Jesus knew rejection too—especially when he did and said things that other
people did not like.”
Fear of rejection can certainly cause people to avoid
certain things. In a way, it is how we
socialize one another—don’t do or say things that confront the status quo. Isn’t this what Hebrews is about—how to stand
fast in faith in Christ Jesus when the world around you is turning up the heat
of rejection? As a corrective to this
rejection, the writer of Hebrews reminds us of a very real dimension of reality
that is not visible to the naked eye. He
reminds us of the faithful priestly ministry of Jesus, who endured rejection
even to the cross and the grave to rescue us from the authority of sin and
death. He reminds us of the cloud of
witnesses, the saints, who were just like us, enduring the hardships, the
rejections, the ridicule, the sacrifices of life in this broken world and yet
who had been given the grace with their perseverance to finish the race.
Just a few weeks ago, the Pittsburgh Marathon was run
through your neighborhood (in fact, I imagine that a number of you weren’t able
to get to church that day because the streets were closed). The slowest time that I was able to research
was seven hours and thirty-four minutes, and some seconds. First, let me say how much I admire this last
place finisher—talk about perseverance!
My goodness gracious! He did
finish the race. And I don’t know but
I’ll bet he had his own cheering supporters on hand at the finish line, just
like everybody else.
Sometimes, life in this broken world can be so hard that
you can just barely put one foot in front of the other. Sometimes perseverance just runs out of all
its juice—and a encourager may be the only lifeline to help you going. People deal with hardships like illness,
unemployment, jobs they hate but are afraid to leave. They deal with caring for loved ones, with
unwelcome diagnoses, with despair. In a
lot of those kinds of things there seems to be a built-in rejection, even if it
is not explicit—and in some cases, like unemployment, the rejection seems loud
and clear. In times like that, is there
something to hold onto more than what seems empirically available—because all
that empirical stuff so often ends up seeming insufficient? Hebrews answers, “YES!”
Times will be hard in a broken world but we are not
alone. “Since we are surrounded by such
a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the
sin that so easily entangles”—and that includes fear, even fear of rejection. “And let us run with perseverance the race
marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of
faith. Jesus doesn’t just mark the race
route; he runs alongside us, helping us through the hard parts—if we let him. And like my old parishioner, maybe sometimes
your uncertainty bubbles over and you just aren’t sure about him—and you
certainly aren’t sure about whether you can make it. Keep your eyes fixed on Jesus, the pioneer
and perfecter of faith—and remember, he has been there for you in the past—and
he will be there for you to the end.
Amen+
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