Year
B, Easter 2 John
20:19-31, Acts 4:32-35, 1 John 1:1-2:2
In 2001, there was a grassroots
movement to include Jedi as an option for religion in the census of all English
speaking countries. In England and
Whales, 330,000 people (that is almost 1% of the total population) listed Jedi
as their religion. Obviously it was a
joke- although no one is quite sure who the joke was directed to. While the Jedi phenomenon never gained
traction in the US, there have been growing a number of people who have listed
“none” when asked what religion they are.
This strikes fear in the hearts of clergy and all people who are
concerned about the future of the church.
Some people are proclaiming that we are in a post-Christian era and that
the church is dying. People will give
you statistics to prove this. If you
have been to any diocesesan church council in the last 5 years, you will have
heard these statistics and then theories about what we can do about them. It’s pretty depressing.
We have not given up but we are
unsure about how to move forward. Much
of the dialogue regarding the future of the church focuses on the past. I am not talking about the 1960’s when the
Sunday school was overflowing and businesses were still closed on Sundays. What we as a church are talking about is the
very beginning of the church which is reflected in parts of the New
Testament. We see it especially in
Acts. Today’s reading from the Book of
Acts depicts a beatific view of the early church. “Now the whole group of those who believed
were of one heart and soul…” Everyone
shared and helped one another. There
were no needy people among them. The
apostles provided their testimony with great power. It sounds positively magical. If only we could go back to that happy time
when no one bothered gathering census data and no one talked about a dying
church. However if you continue to read
just a couple of verses later in Acts, you will see that life in this new
Christian community was not perfect bliss. There was dissension because not everyone
agreed.
It is not only Acts that reports
such dissension. All five chapters of
First John are about division in the community.
People had left because they had different ideas about who Jesus
was. In this letter, John was trying to
reaffirm the correct beliefs while also maintaining the importance of
forgiveness in the community of believers.
Just because people had come to believe in Jesus Christ does not mean
that they had stopped sinning. It meant
that they now had someone in their lives who had the power to forgive. They were no longer a prisoner to their
sins. Jesus had freed them from that
prison. John was reminding them of that.
If dissension in the church started
as soon as the church was formed, what hope do we have? How can we possibly keep the church from
fracturing and inevitably dying off? We
need to go back to the words and actions of Jesus. Even Jesus’ little community (his disciples)
had a bit of infighting and dissension.
Judas completely abandoned the group and betrayed Jesus. That was their first major split. Another more subtle rebellion was
Thomas. After Judas left there were 11
disciples remaining, not including the small group of women. These 11 disciples were their own
community. Yet it was a community living
in fear. This was the first dying
community…until Jesus appeared to them. Jesus brought them out of that little room
they were trapped in. They were
witnesses to the resurrection. Not only
that, but Jesus gave them the Holy Spirit, which means that they shared in the
resurrection. They too had new life.
However, at least one disciple was
missing when Jesus appeared to them. It
was Thomas. He refused to believe that
they had seen the risen Lord. In many
ways, this was the first dissension in the newly resurrected community of
believers. But they did not kick him
out. They continued to include him in
their community and he stayed, even though he wasn’t quite on board with what
they believed. Not only did the
community refuse to push Thomas out.
Jesus refused to cut Thomas out.
He returned so that Thomas could see what the other disciples had
already seen. He went so far as to let
Thomas touch his scars. That was an
amazing gift that Jesus gave to the first church dissenter. Thomas received the gift because he was there
to receive the gift, because he stayed.
Yes, our church began in
dissension. It began in dissension
because we are sinners. We are flawed.
We get into arguments and our feelings get hurt. I am not saying that is fair or right, but it
is the reality that people face in communities made up of real people. Christian communities are no different than
other communities in the sense that we have infighting. And sometimes we act in ways that we should
not. What makes Christian communities
unique (what makes us Christian) is that we find the humility to call it what
it is, sin. Then once we have found the
courage to name our sin, we will discover the joy in forgiving one another and
ourselves. During all of that process,
we stick together. We remain a community.
I don’t think we are in a post
Christian era. I believe that we are in
a post label era. People don’t want to
be labelled. They don’t want to be put
in a box. In the church, we love
labels. High Church, Low Church, Anglo
Catholic, Conservative, Orthodox, Liberal, Progressive, Open, Inclusive,
Traditional, Contemporary. Those are
just the labels we use in the Episcopal Church.
They are not doing us any good. They are dividing the community; not
bringing us together. We can rise above
the labels. We can rise above
dissension. We don’t need to be boxed
in. Jesus opened the door for the
disciples and he opens the doors for us as well.
What kept the disciples together,
even when they were scared and fractured, was their belief in the love of Jesus
Christ. There was some confusion and
doubt, but it was not around the love of Christ. There is one label that is important that we
maintain, that is Christian. That is the
title that we are given in the Bible. One of the things we have to work hard at
is making sure that people don’t associate Christians with division, but with
love, humility, forgiveness and community.
In the 2011 census, the amount of
people who called themselves Jedi decreased by half. The number of Christians decreased as well,
although thankfully not by half. We
could look at these declining numbers and say we are dying. Or we could stop trying so hard to maintain
the box that we have built. We could die
to labels, division and pride. We could
hang those things on the cross and then rise again to a new way of being church…or
perhaps a very old way…back to 30AD.
Jesus could have looked at those 11 disciples who denied him, abandoned
him and doubted him. He could have said,
“This is the group I am supposed to start a church with?” But he didn’t. He didn’t see sin and
failure. He saw an opportunity for new
life.
What is it that we see when we look
at the state of the church? Do we see
boxes or do we see opportunity…do we see Jesus opening our doors? We have been given something greater than any
worldly powers, even greater than the force. We have the Holy Spirit. That means that even if we die, we always
have the power to rise again. And if any
church knows that, it’s St. John’s, a church that has literally risen from the ashes.
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