One day, quite a few years ago, I got
into a good-natured religious discussion with a dear friend of our family, who
happens to be a practicing Roman Catholic. Aside from friendly jibes and jokes,
we had never really talked about faith issues before. Our conversation gave me
some very real insights about the values and faith of an educated, urban,
ethnic middle-class American Catholic. During the conversation, our friend told
me that either she or her husband made a special effort to attend Mass every Sunday
with their daughters. Inquiring minds want to know, so I asked if she took the
Sacrament every time she attended Mass.
"I do it, if I've been good
enough." She said. At the time, I thought she was reflecting some purely
Catholic values with that statement. But in the intervening years, I've come to
see that her reply was typical of the attitudes of many Protestants as
well. We Protestants aren't on the
whole, very comfortable with Holy Communion. We like it, but we don't
necessarily like to do it too often.
When I was growing up, it was only a
quarterly event in the life of most churches. World Communion Sunday was
inevitably one of those days. Nowadays,
most of our churches offer it monthly—usually on the first Sunday of the
month—some take it twice a month--as we do here. But those can be the most
sparsely attended Sundays of the month.
There are a variety of reasons for that.
Many of us aren't really quite sure of Communion's significance in our tradition.
We fear that taking it too often might somehow cause it to lose its' meaning.
We don't relish having to leave our pews and traipse up front in front of
everyone. We may not care for the prayers or the liturgy associated with
Communion. It feels too Catholic, or too penitential or just plain takes too
long to get done.
Many of us though, maybe even most of
us, share the sentiments of our Catholic friend. We're not sure that we've been good enough to
take Holy Communion. We know that God is righteous, holy, glorious, good and
wondrous. Too holy, too righteous, too
glorious, too good and wondrous for the likes of us. God is waaaaaay up there
and we are waaaaay down here. We've no
business, we think to ourselves, communing with our Maker. We aren't worthy
enough, the church tells us in one of its historic prayers, to lick up the
crumbs under God’s Table.
We're sinners. Or if you’re
uncomfortable with that tired phrase-- we’re far from perfect. Sometimes we
yell at our kids. Sometimes we get so aggravated we just want to hit someone.
We may lie to our spouses and cheat on them—or at least think about it. We
smoke too much, drink too much, swear if we get aggravated, we overuse—sometimes
abuse drugs, (either legal ones like caffeine and nicotine, or prescription
drugs-- or downright illegal ones. )
We overeat. Or alternatively, we
don't finish what's on our plate-- even though people in Europe are starving. We fritter away, or maybe even gamble away
our paychecks and generally indulge ourselves at our family's expense. Or alternatrively, we become greedy
tightwads. We exploit and abuse and oppress, or simply ignore and avoid other
children of God-- because they’re different from us in tongue or culture or
creed or class, or color or behavior or even intelligence.
We're in thrall to our emotions. Our
hearts are too often ruled by lust or greed or the desire for revenge. Our
thoughts are petty and parochial. Our lives are too often ruled by anger and
impulse. For far too many of us, the absolute center of our universe is our own
sweet selves. We come to church out of fear of hell, or social pressure, or
simple habit—rather than out of love of God.
(Example:
Kenworthy “I’m not a wretch”
We wonder
how can such self-serving, broken and imperfect wretches as we, dare to even pray to-- much less commune with such a good and holy,
transcendent, God? In our minds, we have placed God so high above ourselves and
ourselves so low that we have made our Maker inaccessible. In the Book of Job,
we read of humanity's age-old desire for an intermediary, an advocate before
God, when Job declares in hope and bewilderment at the injustice of his fate.
"Behold!
I know that my Redeemer lives... He must live!"
Eventually of course, God came to
live and minister among us in the person of Jesus-- showing us the human face
of the Divine. But within a couple of generations, the church had done the same
thing to Jesus-- placing Him too far above us to be approachable. But along
with our fearful awe of the transcendent,
the people of God's church have always had a deep yearning for access in
prayer to a more imminent God.
Over the centuries the faithful have
continued to seek an intermediary between God and humankind-- an intercessor
who is both personal, and yet holy enough not to let us down. That desire
apparently was going on in the First Century church to which the Epistle to
the Hebrews was addressed.
The people of this congregation were
Jewish converts to the faith. They were not necessarily in danger of forsaking
their Christianity. But they were as a
community, undergoing some sort of crisis of faith. Their initial enthusiasm for the Gospel was
beginning to wear thin. Offerings were
down. Attendance was down. They were in
danger of drifting away in their disillusionment or disappointment.
We don't know why they were so
discouraged. Maybe they'd been having internal disputes and the rank and file
were getting fed up with all the feuding and fussing among the so-called
leadership. Maybe they didn’t like the
new pastor as well as the last guy. Maybe it was a backlash because after all
their praying and preaching and working and waiting, Jesus hadn't come back to
earth as soon as they had expected.
Maybe somebody said or did something,
and somebody else's nose got out of joint, and the next thing they knew, people started taking sides and they found
themselves in the middle of a messy church fight. Maybe everybody started
getting worried that they wouldn't be able to make the budget. Maybe they got tired of old Paul, their D.S.,
always coming around asking them to kick in more money for missions beyond the
local congregation.
None of these problems can on
their own, destroy a congregation. But
it doesn't take much to kill a church if the members just choose to sit there
and let it happen. The truth is, any of these might have been what ailed the
church in Hebrews.
We do know though, that the problem
somehow or other got symbolized for them by some sort of arcane theological
argument about angels and their role in the life of the congregation. Maybe some of these folks were even offering
prayers and devotions and offerings to the angels of God.
Angels were, after all, also an
important part of the congregation's Jewish heritage of belief. The word
"angel" means "messenger". In Hebrew thought of that time,
angels were not thought to be former human beings who's earned their wings in
the after-life. Angels were believed to be spiritual beings—a different and separate
order of creation from humanity.
In the angels, some of the people
of that congregation of Messianic Jews must have believed they had found the
intermediaries between themselves and God that they had sought. Angels seemed
to impress this congregation. They became so concerned with angels that they
apparently forgot about being faithful human beings.
Hearing about their squabbles, an
anonymous bishop, or an apostle, or District Superintendent, or maybe just a
neighboring pastor wrote a letter to them about angels. Jesus, the author of the Epistle reminded
them, is right up there with the Creator and the Holy Spirit-- even higher than
the angels. Jesus Christ is,
"Son
of God... appointed heir to all things." And yet, added the author of the
Epistle, this same Jesus was not
ashamed to be called a human being. He
was not ashamed to call ordinary men and women his brothers and his sisters.
I don't know how you feel about the
existence vs. the non-existence of angels. Personally, I don't find the
question of whether or not there really are
such creatures as angels to be in any way central to my personal faith or
possible salvation. If angels are no more than a myth imported into the
Biblical faith from the Zoroastrian tradition of Persia
If, on the other hand, there
really are such creatures as angels-- heavenly beings of a different
order of Creation than you and I-- then so much the better. The truth is, I don't need to believe in angels, but I do kind of hope they exist.
Matthew Fox a contemporary mystic
I like to read, says that whenever
we read about angels in Scriptures, it's a signal to the reader that the
Biblical author wants to talk about things of cosmic rather than everyday
significance-- Creation, the Annunciation, the Nativity, the Resurrection
etc. Fox says that the way to keep that
in mind as we read those passages is to visualize the angel as looking like
Albert Einstein. Try that the next time you sing "Hark the Herald Angels Sing"
Lest you think I’m not taking the question
of angels with appropriate gravity, I remind you of the old query. Do you know why angels can fly? Because they
are able to take themselves so lightly.
Prophets, Angels, saints, Mary,
clergy, Bishops-- the truth is that you and I don't need any of these to
intercede between ourselves and our Maker. We need no middlemen. God our Creator has removed that necessity by
personally coming to this same tear-stained, blood-soaked earth that you and I
walk upon, in the same frail human form that we wear-- as Jesus.
He was born among the poorest of
the poor. He was a refugee and a working man, a homeless peasant preacher who
was betrayed and seized and deserted and persecuted and framed by the
powers-that-be, and ended up executed between two common criminals. There is no
path in this life—no matter how tragic or difficult—that Jesus did not walk
before us. There is no human joy or challenge that he did not—does not know. That’s
what is meant by the phrase “Pioneer of
our Salvation.”
He personally invites us each to
a life-long pilgrimage of growth and witness and discipleship. "Follow me", He says to us. In
His sacrifice, we are saved. In His holiness and righteousness, we can see the
model and the opportunity for the perfect human life.
Jesus is our intermediary. Jesus is God’s Messiah. Jesus is our
Advocate, Jesus is our Savior, and Jesus is our so long- awaited intercessor
with the Creator. He is that
Redeemer Job yearned for so desperately. He is the Pioneer of our
Salvation. In entering this world on our
human level, Our Lord Jesus became accessible to our most intimate prayers and
concerns— at all times and places of course-- but most specifically here-- at
His Table.
Kneeling all around us are brothers and
sisters, who encourage us and uplift us as we move ahead toward our common
goal. Just ahead of are our mentors and spiritual companions— parents and
teachers and pastors and friends who inspired us and on whose shoulders we
lean. Behind us are those younger in the faith, for whom we can set an
example. Ahead of us stride the communion of saints who have trod this way
before. On our shoulders, are perhaps the angels, rooting for us. And in the
lead is our Pioneer--the One who is not ashamed to call any and all
of us brothers and sisters.
The Savior of the world, who by
His ministry of care, and His model of life lived for others, breaks the trail
on your and my pilgrimage of faith. He leads us. He invites us all this day,
here to His Table, to be nurtured and forgiven and empowered.
Thanks be to God for the Divine Gift to
the world and to all of humanity, of our Lord Jesus the Christ! Amen.
Let us pray
We are not worthy to come to your
Table, Lord Christ. But you have spoken your Word, you have called us to
follow, you have healed us and made us whole. Your love and your sacrifice has
made us good enough. You invite us to
your Feast of Love. Nurture our Faith, Lord Jesus, Empower our lives, Holy
Spirit. Refresh us and make us new—here—now—in this place, Creator. Amen.
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