May God’s words be spoken, may God’s words be heard. Amen.
Well, apparently it is Memorial Day weekend. I don’t know about you, but until just a few days ago, I thought this holiday came next weekend, when we celebrate the Feast of Pentecost. Maybe it is living in this Zoom-O-Mania world where work/life balance has been obliterated (if it ever existed), and one day seems to get lost into a series of others, or perhaps it’s the fact that this is a weirdly early date for this holiday, but I still can’t wrap my head around how this crept up on me. I suppose Jesus would say to me the same thing he told his followers in the passage from The Acts of the Apostles we heard today, “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority.” Yeah, well good to know, because apparently the time or period of the month of May 2020 is a complete and utter mystery to me.
Still, as Memorial Day is about remembering those who are no longer with us, especially those who died in the service of others, perhaps this story in Acts we heard today is fitting, because it is about the Ascension of Jesus, the one who died for us all. Of course, the church celebrates this important Feast day on the 40th day of Easter, which was last Thursday, but we do get to hear it again today. The story of our faith, our very creed, focuses on Christ’s death, resurrection, and ascension, but this last one often gets short shrift in our hearts – maybe because it is celebrated on a weekday, maybe because it is a strange story that makes you want to sing Elton John’s “Rocket Man,” but whatever the reason, we need to, pun intended, lift this up to prominence in our faith if we are to really understand who we are as part of the Jesus Movement. So let’s take a closer look at this story in Acts.
Jesus has been meeting up with his followers in post-resurrection appearances all over the place, even having a family BBQ himself on a beach. And in today’s passage, with them all gathered together, he reminds them of the promise that the Holy Spirit will come to them (we talked about that last week), and then he is starts rising up into heavens until they cannot see him anymore. You know, I saw a Facebook meme that said that the ascension was the day Jesus started to work from home. Anyway, the disciples stand staring at the sky, until two men in white robes say “What the heck are you looking up there for? There is nothing to see here…move along now, move along. Jesus has left the building.”
Now, in defense of those earliest followers of Jesus, we all want to do that when someone we love is taken from our lives, right? Metaphorically speaking, we too stand motionless staring into an empty void, turning our eyes toward what was, and dwell there for some time. And that, my friends, is understandable. It is how we are able to process our grief. Yet we know that, if after some time has passed, we are not able to turn our attention toward the future, if we stay rooted in what was, we will never fully heal. Now to be clear, healing isn’t about forgetting, right? It is about discovering a new way to live into our changed reality, with our loved ones being with us in a different way than we had hoped. That is what the disciples had to do too – that is what those messengers were telling them.
Jesus has ascended, and that is when the disciples really began to understand that nothing would be the same again. Yes, their lives changed the moment they met him, and again when he was crucified, and still again as they came to know of his resurrection; but, it wasn’t until Jesus departed that it began to sink in that following him would not look like it did before. That is when they truly realized they had to reorient themselves to what it meant to be his disciple, to begin living a new normal.
Following Jesus in the before time meant that when he went to a town, they went with him. Likewise, when he sent them somewhere, they went. They had a routine, a way of being, with him at the center guiding their steps, and filling their heart with knowledge of God’s love. Now things had changed for them.
They had to discover a new way of being his disciples, while they lived in this between time, for that is what it was. See, this ascension moment is bookended by Jesus’ promise to send an Advocate, the Spirit of Truth, to guide them; and, as we will hear next week, the fulfillment of that promise – when the Spirit descends upon them all. But this moment, as they watched Jesus taken from them, was that time between what was, and what will be, and it was clear that even while they did not know what the future held in store for them, they had heard his parting words to them “…you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
And they were – they were his witnesses. They scattered across the world, spreading the good news, even sparking in decades to come a new literary genre called a gospel. They would figure out that they would need help, and appoint the first of those we call Deacons to serve the orphans and widows. They would gather as Jesus commanded and share the Eucharistic meal. They would take this gospel beyond their Jewish faith to the gentiles, even changing what they thought it meant to be a part of their movement. All because while everything had changed for them, they came to realize that the most important thing had not changed at all. Jesus was still with them, and they were his body in the world – guided by that Spirit of Truth – and filled with the grace of God.
Is this not good news for our time? Our way of following Jesus – gathering here in our church buildings on Sundays – has been changed. So we too are in the between time – a bit like those earliest disciples – between what was, and what will be, for our lives as followers of Jesus, and like them, things will never be the same again. Something has happened in this time of separation, and even when we return to worshipping within these walls, we have been forever changed.
What will be our “new normal?”
Well, to really answer that, we need to acknowledge where we are now – in this between time. You can’t get to a new place if you don’t really know where you are starting from, right? If you want directions from Google Maps, you can’t just put in a destination – you need to know where you are. And so we need to think about where we are in this between time – what is different – what do we hope to hold on to about this new way of being. It is also important that we think about where we have been too. What are we searching for in those proverbial clouds we stare at when we think about what we used to do as followers of Jesus? What do you miss about the before time? What is grieving your heart? And for that matter, what do you not miss? Think about those things, name them, but do not dwell there long.
For Jesus is telling us to not get lost in the past, but get moving toward our future – our own future as witnesses to the ends of the earth. What will that look like? What will the next chapters of our church be? These are not only questions for us now, they were ones those disciples had to answer too. And they did. They went out into the world telling the story of Jesus. Those earliest disciples did not stop being his followers because he returned to dwell with God, any more than we did by not being physically here on Sundays. No – they stopped looking up, and started looking forward. The world has never been the same since. And, like them, this between time has revealed a truth about who we are that perhaps had been lost to us as we did what we have always done. And that is that being a follower of Jesus, the body of Christ, the church – isn’t an earthly and temporal thing.
This is a message we need to hear, and to proclaim, particularly now, right? I mean, just yesterday, the President of the United States said in a news conference that he was declaring houses of worship “essential,” and demanded they be opened immediately. “The governors need to do the right thing and allow these very important essential places of faith to open right now, this weekend. If they don’t do it, I will override the governors…” Constitutional issues aside, I have no argument about his statement that houses of worship are essential – they are indeed! But this poor lost sheep is still looking up at the clouds, and doesn’t seem to understand the faith he proclaims he has, and what church is to a follower of Jesus.
So Mr. President, let me make this perfectly clear – churches are essential, but they have also have never been closed! The church is NOT the building, but the body of Christ. And, this priest cares about her congregation and will NOT follow any directive any government provides, but will always do what is right by the people I serve. Perhaps, Mr. President, that might be something you should consider doing too, because right now it is not safe for us to gather physically together.
As for governmental orders to close or open the doors of our buildings – they are not the reason we closed them in the first place, nor will it be why we open them again. We closed the doors to our buildings because being a follower of Jesus, the one who commanded us to love one another as he loved us – means we cannot willingly ever endanger another person’s life. And one more thing I want to make clear along these same lines – not wearing a mask in public when you are not able to keep a safe distance away from others is not an option for a Christian in this time of pandemic. To not wear a mask when you should is to willingly risk the health of another person. It is not only selfish, but a denial of our baptismal covenant.
Folks, none of this is about politics – it isn’t about republican or democrat – this is about who we are as Christians – plain and simple. But while the President’s statement is misguided, what boggles my mind, and disturbs my heart, is that there are some church leaders of varying denominations who, like the President, have forgotten who they are, and what it means to serve Jesus. They claim a right to re-open their doors in the name of religious freedom, while they willingly ignore their role as shepherds – placing their sheep in danger.
And the result? Hundreds of people infected with the virus after attending services, with many dead. How could they? How could anyone who is a minister in the church be so blinded to what it means to follow Jesus? It is hard to point fingers at the President, when faith leaders, who ought to know better, are just as misguided. When did they begin to believe that the church they serve was something that had to be in a building, even if that meant sacrificing lives? When did their role as disciples get twisted from being about a call to serve others to being about their right to do what they want? When did they lose their way, and how do we help them?
Perhaps this is our fault. Perhaps we need to do some real soul searching about all that we think is really important, and all that we hold dear about our faith. And it starts here in this between time.
For now, in this time of separation, is when we must remember that the church isn’t a building, but the body of Christ universal.
All who were baptized into him, are a living part of that body of Christ.
This – these walls – as beautiful as they are – are not the church – YOU are the church!
And the only way the church can be closed to us is when we ourselves close our hearts to the Jesus who suffers today – in the poor, the outcast, the immigrant, the imprisoned, the addicted, the oppressed, and those who hunger and thirst spiritually. For when we value tradition over compassion, doctrine over service, dogma over love – it doesn’t matter if the doors are open or not, for we have stopped being the church because there is no Jesus to be found in our hearts.
If we learn nothing else from this story in Acts, from our time in pandemic, let it be this one thing: That our faith can never be contained in a time or place any more than Jesus could be contained in a tomb. Because our faith is not about something that happened centuries ago, but about the Jesus who lives today! Our faith is not about traditions, creeds, doctrine, and dogma, but about the Word made flesh! And that word, Jesus, isn’t sitting here in the pews wondering where the heck everyone is! Jesus is, and always has been, on the loose – and he is alive in you, in me, and in all the children of God.
Look, I know it isn’t the same in this between time. It is very hard for us to be apart from one another physically. I miss all of you deeply. These virtual services are no substitute for being gathered in one place as we celebrate the good news of God’s unconditional love and grace, and are restored in Christ’s body and blood in the Eucharist. This is our collective grief, and we can and should acknowledge it.
Yet I know too that while this pandemic, this between time, has changed us, changed how we are church in the world, it hasn’t kept us from being followers of Jesus, any more than his ascension kept those earliest disciples from their call.
It also hasn’t closed a single church, despite what anyone may try to tell you.
The church is open.
We always have been.
We always will be.
And nothing that any earthly power can do will ever change that.
Jesus has left the building.
Let us follow where he lead us to the ends of the earth.
Amen.
For the audio from the 10:30am service, click below, or subscribe to our iTunes Sermon Podcast by clicking here:
The Rev. Diana L. Wilcox
Christ Church in Bloomfield & Glen Ridge
May 24, 2020
The Seventh Sunday of Easter – In A Time Of Separation
1st Reading – Acts 1:6-14
Psalm 68:1-10, 33-36
2nd Reading – 1 Peter 4:12-14; 5:6-11
Gospel – John 17:1-11
