RCL Advent 4B
21 December 2014
Saint Faith’s Anglican Church
Vancouver BC
In
January of 2012 I made my first and so far only trip to Israel as part of a
Jewish-Christian clergy study tour. Some
of the more memorable moments were spent in the city of Jerusalem.
The
first day of our visit to Jerusalem was spent under grey skies and frequent
downpours. If the truth be told, I have
never been as wet nor as chilled to the bone.
As our guide became more aware of the wretchedness of his charges, he
sought refuge. In a narrow alley we
waited as he negotiated the opening of a museum whose staff had been hoping to
close early to prepare for the approaching Shabbat. Compassion, however, overcame the desire to
do some last-minute shopping and the doors were opened to us.
As
we entered the museum, we were led through what seemed to be a warehouse. We then descended a number of staircases
until we arrived at our destination:
several metres beneath the streets of present-day Jerusalem we entered
the ruins of the Jerusalem Jesus and his contemporaries had known.
The
museum preserved the ruins of the homes of Jerusalem’s religious elite in the
years before 70 ce. Here they awaited the Roman soldiers who were
bent on destroying the city as the first Jewish rebellion ended in
disaster. Here they saw Herod the
Great’s Temple, a wonder of the ancient world, burning and its religious
officials killed, some being thrown off the Temple Mount. Here they died as their homes were burnt
around them, the timbers falling down upon them. I know this.
I have seen it.
The
destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 ce
was a catastrophe both for the followers of Moses and the emerging Christian
movement. Both communities understood
Jerusalem and its ritual heart, the Temple, to be the earthly place where God’s
glory dwelt. For all the descendants of
Abraham this was holy ground. Here the
sacrifices, attended even by the Jerusalem community of disciples, were
offered. Here Jesus, along with other religious
teachers, had interpreted the Scriptures and debated their meanings. No matter where you turned, the city was
filled with religious meaning.
With
the destruction of the city and Temple, the residents of Jerusalem fled to
Galilee in the north, to Syria and the Persian empire in the east, to
Alexandria and Egypt to the west, to Rome and Spain in the far west. The spiritual heart of two religious
traditions ceased to beat and it no longer had a concrete geographical presence
in their lives.
In
many and various ways the religious cousins began to ask a new question: Where shall we find God’s glory if not in
Jerusalem? For the followers of the
covenant of Moses, whom we now call the Jews, the answer was found in a renewed
commitment to the study of the Torah and to the creation of a tapestry of
traditions, practices and laws intended to protect the identity and integrity
of the Jewish people.
For
the followers of the covenant of Jesus of Nazareth, whom we now call the
Christians, the question was answered somewhat differently. Among them a Greek rhyme began to
circulate: Naos tou Theou, laos tou
Theou --- The temple of God is the people of God. God’s glory was not to be found in temples of
stone but in the midst of the Christian assembly, in the faces, the lives and
the deeds of the baptized.
When
imperial authorities seized our books to prevent us from teaching and
worshipping, we simply asked our elders to recite them from memory as we
prepared new copies. When our meeting
places were seized, we simply moved to someone else’s home for worship. When our leaders were arrested and some
executed, we simply took counsel with one another and chose new ones. We did not need the physical artifacts of an
organized religion to thrive, because we believed that God’s dwelling place was
found, first and foremost, in human hearts, in human souls, in human minds and
in human faithfulness.
No
doubt this understanding of God’s glory underpins Luke’s story of the
annunciation of Mary. When Gabriel
delivers God’s message to Mary, there is a subtle shift from bricks, stones and
mortar as God’s dwelling place to the body, soul and mind of a young woman who
agrees, against all logic, against her own self-interests, against all social mores,
to participate in God’s great work of re-creation, reconciliation and
renewal. She had heard the prophets
speak of God’s carving the covenant upon human hearts; now she would embody
this with one simple word, ‘Yes’. And
with that ‘Yes’ a new vision of God’s glory took flesh and a new movement
towards the true freedom of every human being was set in action.
Look
around you. Behold the human vessels in
which the Word of God now becomes flesh and dwells among us today. Behold the ones who have said ‘Yes’ to God
and who go forth from this place of wood, stone, glass and mortar to be the
glory of God in homes, in schools, in work places, in malls, in all those
places wherever the people of God are found.
For the glory of God cannot be contained in buildings or institutions. The glory of God is found in human beings who
are becoming fully alive as they choose to follow the way of Jesus of Nazareth,
a path of justice, compassion and humility, a path of light in the midst of
darkness, a path open to all and any who share God’s dream of the peaceable
kingdom. May that day come soon. Amen.
1 comment:
Terrific!
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