SERMON PREACHED at St PAUL’S,
ARROWTOWN
SIXTH SUNDAY OF EASTER (May 5th)
2024
READINGS
1 John 5: 1-7
Psalm 98
John 15.9-17
We don’t
need to be either Einstein or some sort of academic of the sociology of
religion to realise that much that is damaging has been done in the name of
religion, even in the name of Christ. Corporately as Christians, though for
once not necessarily for us each as individuals, a blight on our story. As one
who tends to dwell on the negative I’m told that I overemphasise it. That may
be my mistake but I don’t certainly want to minimise the impact of the negative
witness we have sometimes had.
At the same time I don’t want to
shy away from that which has been great in the name of Christ both on the part
of the body of Christ as a whole, and on the part of individuals who have
inspired greatness, either on a monumental or on a private scale. Those who
have inspired us, as well as the great saints who have changed society for the
better.
One of them, incidentally, is the
source of the writings that we call by the name of John, and which we have been
exploring these past weeks since Easter. One scholar rejoicing in the name of
Rudolf Schnakenburg (I studied theology for the German names!) made what I think
ink is a very accurate claim; , as the heart of John’s good news.he spoke of
the verses that I often use at funerals from the chapter before ours today, as
Jesus announces himself as the way, the truth, the life.
Jesus is in fact many other
things in this Fourth gospel, not least light, which we have been quietly
acknowledging since Easter morn with the paschal candle that sits unobtrusively
in the sanctuary. Light, that cancels darkness.
The wonderful rented vicarage
that I am now inhabiting is pitch black at night, yet the slightest light can
help me navigate my way around if I get home late at night or am, as is more
often the case, up and about in the wee small hours of the morning.
The slightest light.
So John in telling the Jesus
story writes about Jesus as light, as way, as truth, as life. The shadow side
of Christian witness that often drowns out that good news is the form of
Christianity that uses texts not as a source of joy but as a source of
condemnation. I am way, truth, light, life says Jesus, and the moment he says
these things and adds “no one comes to the father except through me” the
temptation for Christians has been to use his additional words as condemnation.
Sorry my friends, but if you don’t tally up with what I consider to be an
encounter with Christ, then you miss out on the benefits of salvation. So sad.
Too bad.
As my predecessor in my previous
role, the ministry educator before me, Alec Clark has often emphasised in
gospel conversations, the good news which we too readily suppress, is that
there is way, truth, light and life. That this way, truth, light, and
life exists despite global warming, global warfare, blocked Whakatipu roadways,
rampant inflation, despite even the tragedies through which our life may pass.
Way, truth, life exist. And in the passage that we have just read today John
goes on to emphasise what the earliest Christians realised was the absolute key
ingredient of our response to the encounter with Jesus: the call to love. In
John’s account of the Jesus story, as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, the
key verb is abide. Abide in love. Abide in the way, the truth, the light, the
life. Abide.
I was incidentally asked by a
bride the other day why we no longer use the much-romanticised response “I do” in
our wedding services. In recent decades we have opted instead for the more
intentional “I will.” In ordination and installation services we add the rider,
“God being my helper.” Perhaps we should introduce that to our wedding liturgies?
Intentionality: abide. “If you
abide in me,” says Jesus, “and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and
it will be done for you.” Not, as I’ve said before “Lord won’t you buy me a
Mercedes-Benz,” but “Lord please equip me with everything I can use to serve
and to advertise your way, your truth, your light, your love to the best of my
ability.” I guess it’s not quite so catchy and certainly far less cynical in a
song.
So in both readings that bear the
name John today we hear much about love. Perhaps the best prayer we can send in
our own prayer lives is “Lord, help me to love.” The intentionality of which I
spoke a moment ago is the key to that ingredient. The word that the author of
John frequently users to describe the commitment to Christ, the word we
translate as abide, is one of the few that have come directly from Greek into
English.
The Greek word, so I can show off,
is Mene M-E-N-E. Greek like Māori turns the vowel “e” into something more akin
to “eh.” “Mene in me,” Jesus is saying. That “mene” trickled down into English as
the second syllable of the word “remain.” Or that’s my theory, and I am
sticking to it. Mene in me. Remain intentionally connected to me. Remain
connected to me in prayer, in worship, in fellowship with other believers, in
fellowship with the scriptures about me, says Jesus. Be intentional.
Do I practise what I preach? Only
very poorly, but that I suspect is true of most of us, and fallible though we
are, poor advertisements though we may well be, our task is to keep on that
intentional remaining, mene-ing in Christ as best we can, with the rider stolen
from ordination services, “God be my helper.” Which funnily enough, is
precisely the extra dimension that Jesus promises when in the fourth gospel he
speaks of the future coming of the Spirit. But for that we shall symbolically wait
until Pentecost.
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