Tuesday, May 31, 2016

The Centurion's Approach to Jesus: Luke 7:1-2

Proper 4, Year C, 2016
1 Kings 18; Ps 96; Gal 1:1-12; Luke 7:1-10
Rev. Adam T. Trambley
May 29, 2016, St.John’s Sharon

In the gospel this morning, we find Jesus healing from a distance the slave of a centurion.  As the story unfolds, we see examples of a number of approaches to God, all of which receive a response from Jesus.  Yet we also see the most powerful and important one, a faithful recognition of Jesus’ power and authority over everything that we might encounter, including ourselves.

Jesus has just finished his “Sermon on the Plain,” which in Luke’s gospel describes a great teaching event of Jesus that parallels much of Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount.  We shouldn’t be surprised that this important material was shared by Jesus on more than one occasion in different locations. Jesus now returns to Capernaum, which is his “home base” in Galilee. This area on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee, like all of Palestine, was under Roman rule at the time of Jesus. 

The gospel says there was a centurion there with a slave whom he valued that was very ill.  A centurion was a high ranking Roman officer that would have been traditionally in charge of a 100 soldiers.  Centurions were some of the highest ranking Roman military in their areas and were charged with keeping the peace.  The more enlightened centurions would use their connections and resources to be civic leaders in ways that endeared them and the Romans to the native people.  In Jewish communities, some of them were true God-fearers who worshipped the God of Abraham but never officially converted, while others basically bought influence with focused philanthropy. 

Centurions also had slaves, but Roman slavery was not the same as later American slavery.  A household or professional slave could become a trusted friend and important piece of centurion’s life in a foreign land, so the slave’s serious illness could have been very troubling for the centurion.

The Centurion hears that Jesus, this miraculous healer, is in town, and his first approach to Jesus is through the local Jewish officials.  They come and tell Jesus how worthy the Centurion is to be healed.  He is a good man who helps them and loves them so much that he even built their synagogue.  This message probably came with more than a little bit of self-interest on the part of the Jewish elders, since if they could get the Centurion’s favorite slave healed by Jesus, they could probably leverage that for favors later.  Then the gospel states, simply, “And Jesus went with them.” 

When Jesus is a short distance from the Centurion’s house, some of the Centurion’s friends come with another message and that message has two parts.  The first part is their message to Jesus to stop because, “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof.”  We can assume that there is a true humility here on the Centurion’s part.  He probably does feel unworthy to receive this holy man having done whatever manner of things he would have had to do to rise through the ranks to become a Roman Centurion.  At the same time, he is also probably savvy enough to know that if Jesus actually comes into his house, there will be all manner of trouble for Jesus, and maybe for others.  At that time, a Jewish person couldn’t go into a Roman house without suffering religious and social consequences.  Now it is more than a little ironic that a Jewish person couldn’t to the home of the guy who paid to have their synagogue built, but that was the way things were.  By saying he was unworthy, the Centurion not only expressed his feelings, but he also gave Jesus a safe out.

Of course, the Centurion still wanted his slave healed, and he followed up the confession of his own unworthiness with, “But only speak the word, and let my servant be healed.”  Then he goes on to explain that he is under authority and he has people under him who do what he tells them.  While the Centurion doesn’t spell it out, what he is also saying is that he recognizes Jesus authority over his slave’s illness, and maybe his slave’s life, and probably over a whole lot of other things, as well.  The Centurion is saying who Jesus is – even if he doesn’t use words like Messiah or Son of God.  Jesus recognizes what the Centurion is saying, too.  Jesus is amazed and says, “I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.”  The Centurion’s friends return home and find that the slave is in good health.

These three approaches to Jesus parallel the approaches we often take to God.

The first approach is the “Look, I’ve been very good and am worthy to have you help me, God” approach.  We may not come out and say we’ve built the synagogue, but people often have some expectation that God helps people who have been good or who are involved in church.  People fall back to whatever they think they have done that might “put in a good word” or even anything they can draw from family or other connections, trusting that such works can be used to merit the assistance of God or his people. 

The flip side of this approach is the bargain with God.  “I’m not worthy now,” we pray, “but if you do this for me, I’ll do whatever you want” usually followed by some particular promise.  Now we know that we can’t really merit God’s love.  It is freely given, and God’s care for us is not dependent on what we have or haven’t done.  Yet, at the same time, we see Jesus willing to respond to this approach.  The Jewish elders say that the Centurion is worthy, and Jesus comes with them.  He may have come with them with a slight smile – he loves the Centurion’s slave and would have been happy to heal him without bunch of testimonials.  At the same time, if that good work gives someone hope that God will listen to them and provides a connection, God will use it.  Without the Jewish elders, the Centurion might not have believed that Jesus would come, so if the best we can do is tell God, “Hey, I did a good thing once, so please help me,” God will take the crack in the door of our life to burst it open with his love.   

The flip side of the first approach is the second, which just says, “I’m not worthy to have you come to me, Jesus.”  These words are true, but if they stopped there they would still be incomplete, because it still makes the whole thing about us and what we have or have not done.  Jesus would no more avoid us because we haven’t been good than he would run to us faster if we have been better.  Of course we are unworthy, but our sense of our unworthiness can either come from a true humility or from our own ego’s desire to protect itself from God and other people by claiming unworthiness. 

At its healthiest, telling God we are not worthy of him coming to us is merely an expression of his incredible awesomeness.  We recognize the gulf between him and us.  Then, ideally, we, like the Centurion, move from this confession to a profession of faith in God’s power and love.

Too often, however, our unworthiness becomes a barrier to try to shut the door to God.  We dishonestly tell ourselves that we are unworthy of love when in fact we are children of God whom God has created as worthy of love and being loved.  No matter what we have or haven’t done, nothing can take that special status away from us.  Nothing.  None of us have fully lived into the blessing that God intended for us by making us his children, but this falling short is why we have the cross and forgiveness and grace and mercy.  Sure, we aren’t worthy, but God doesn’t care and he has done a lot to reach out to us, and he will continue to do so, no matter how unworthy we are or how much we are afraid to let him in.      

The third approach to God, and the one Jesus commends, is the faithful acknowledgement of Jesus’ authority.  The Centurion combines it with what is best in the second approach, “I am not worthy, but only say the word and heal my servant.”  Actually some traditions use this as part of the preparation for receiving communion – “Lord, I am not worthy to receive you, but only say the word and I shall be healed.”  Here we are acknowledging that Jesus has the ultimate power and control over whatever we are praying about.  We are actually opening the whole situation to him in prayer and letting him take control.  This step may seem obvious.  I mean, why pray if we don’t believe that Jesus is more powerful than the situation and is able to fix it. Yet, too often, we do ask God for help, but without any belief that he might be able to fix it, or without a willingness to accept the way he might decide to fix it.  We hear the Centurion, “I tell people to go and they go, to do something and they do it.”  Are we able in prayer to say, “This situation is under your authority, Lord.  Tell us what to do and we’ll do it, and we know you’ll take care of the rest.”  These prayers are bold ones and powerful ones.  “We know you can do this, God, so come into the situation and make it right.”  When we ask in this way, God usually does come into the situation and starts to make it right.  Then we have to decide to either go along with it or not. 

This approach to God is also the basic one of the twelve step programs.  The steps tell us to admit that we aren’t in control, that there is a higher power who is in control, and that we need to turn things over in obedience to that higher power.  We here know that the name of that higher power is Jesus, the Son of God, who now sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty with all things in subjection under his feet.  The God we worship has this much power and authority, but he gives us control of ourselves and our own lives.  Our prayer of faith is to recognize his authority and turn the situations of our lives that need healing and restoration over to him.  Whether we feel worthy or not, whether we have been good or not, whether we are scared to death to ask him to come to us or not, if we recognize him and invite him to come, he will, just like he did for the Roman Centurion two thousand years ago.


I would encourage you today, as you come to the altar, to come with these words, “Lord, I am not worthy to receive you, but only say the word and I shall be healed.”  Repeat the phrase together.  Open your life, especially in its broken places, to God in humility, and faithfully ask for his healing.  Then pay attention in the coming days, weeks and months to see just what God does.    

Monday, May 16, 2016

Pentecost 2016: St. John's 150th Parish Homecoming Celebration

                                                           Pentecost 2016 (Year C)
                                     Acts2:1-21; Ps 104; Romans 8:14-17; John 14:8-27
Father Adam Trambley
May 15, 2016, St.John’s Sharon
150th Anniversary Homecoming

The early Christian monks of the desert tell the following story:

Father Lot went to see the elderly Father Joseph and said, “Abba, as much as I am able, I practice a small rule, all the little fasts, some prayer and meditation, and remain quiet; as much as possible I keep my thoughts clean.  What else should I do?”

The old man stood up and stretched out his hands toward heaven, and his fingers became like torches of flame.  And he said, “Why not be turned into fire?”

Why not be turned into fire, indeed?  As we stand at the midpoint of the first 300 years of ministry of St. John’s Episcopal Church in downtown Sharon on this feast of Pentecost, why not be turned into fire?

We have the amazing example of the early disciples in our reading from Acts sitting in the upper room, praying and waiting for something.  Jesus had tried to tell them what, but they didn’t understand.  Then all of the sudden, there was a noise like a tornado blowing through the house and tongues of fire dancing on the heads of each of them.  The Holy Spirit fell upon them, filling their hearts, setting them on fire like the burning bush that Moses saw – illuminating the world around them with a profound experience of God in ways that did not consume them, but unleashed their gifts and burned away their impurities.  They spoke in tongues. They proclaimed the good news of Jesus.  They healed the sick.  They raised the dead.  Their youth saw visions, their elders dreamed dreams, and even their slaves prophesied.  They went out onto the porch and, after convincing the crowds that they weren’t drunk, ignited the hearts of people from throughout the known world.  The fire of the gospel, lit by the Holy Spirit, was about to be carried like the Olympic torch to every part of the Roman empire.

This fire was passed from person to person for two thousand years.  Sometimes the heat of God’s love seemed like it almost died out until someone stoked smoldering embers back to life.  Sometimes the fire of God’s good news blazed like an uncontrollable inferno, transforming lives all around it.  Sometimes the light was kept alive as a grandparent passed on a valued candle to a beloved grandchild.  Eventually, in 1865, that fire came to rest in a particular way in Sharon, Pennsylvania when Rebecca and Rueben Williamson gathered together a small group Episcopalians in their home to see whether they could start a church here.

We don’t really know a whole lot from those early years.  We have some letters and some documents.  But the important things -- like who was home praying daily that a new Episcopal Church could be successful here, or who was standing up in faith and saying it could happen in the midst of the inevitable struggles, or who was going around encouraging everyone else with a positive word or a thank you note -- these flickers of spiritual gifts used to build up the Body of Christ of all remain unrecorded.  But recorded or unrecorded, a fuse was lit that would ignite the blaze about to become St. John’s

We do have records, and even experiences, of a church and its members that have been turned into fire to Worship God, Care for People and Grow as Christians over the past 150 years.  I won’t go into detail here of parish history – you can read about it in our 150th Anniversary Directory and if you don’t have one, call the parish office and we’ll get you one.  But at least hundreds of people, probably thousands, have offered themselves to the service of God through this parish in profound ways that illuminated this community with the love and salvation of Jesus Christ.  Their hearts and lives have been set aflame as they have lifted their voices in song, read the scriptures aloud, attended to the gifts on the altar, preached the gospel, led prayer services, and ensured that God could be worshiped in ways that elevated our spirits as we offered our sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving.  Many have sent sparks into the lives of others as they have fed the hungry, cared for the sick, offered housing to single women working in the city, met the needs of the lonely, mediated labor disputes, visited shut-ins, raised money for those in need, found people jobs, and spread the warmth of God’s grace throughout the community.  Still others have stoked the fires of their own and others’ hearts by teaching Sunday School, working with our young people, leading Bible studies, facilitating book studies, and helping us understand and activate the gifts that the Holy Spirit has given to each of us and wants us to use more effectively.

All of us here today are called to continue in this long line of parishioners at St. John’s who have answered God’s call to be turned into fire.  All of here today are called to continue to use the gifts God has given us to Worship God, Care for People and Grow as Christians. All of us here today are called to pass on the incredible fire of God that has been passed on to us so that St. John’s continues to blaze brightly as a beacon of hope, love, joy and salvation to the Shenango Valley for at least the next 150 years.  

To light a fire that not only burns in us, but will catch in other hearts and lives, we should heed Jesus instructions in today’s gospel.  Jesus is getting ready to leave, and he is looking forward with his disciples at what will happen next.  He says to them:

Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father.  I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.  If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.

Jesus promises us that we will do greater works than he did, and whatever we ask in his name, he will do it, so that the Father is glorified in the Son by answering our prayers.  This promise is incredible, but can be misinterpreted as a way to turn God into a vending machine. Jesus is not telling us to say the right words and get what we want.  He is telling us that if we believe and ask, we will do greater works to glorify our heavenly Father than he did.  He is telling us that if we have dedicated ourselves to loving God with all our heart and mind and soul and strength, then God is going to use us to love our neighbors in incredible ways.  He is telling us that when we have allowed ourselves to be turned into fire, we are going to shoot up like a solar flare to the glory of God.

Or, to put it another way, Jesus is saying that if we are willing to develop and use the spiritual gifts we are given in service of God, that our prayers are going to be pouring gasoline into the situations we are praying for.  With just the smallest spark from us or from someone else, God is going to come in with an explosion of energy, tossing mountains into the sea, bringing unimagined blessings to those we are praying for, presenting himself into lost people’s lives in palpable ways, or burning away the brushwood of sin, addiction, ignorance, and oppression that prevent people from leading lives of freedom and peace.  Our prayers are the catalysts that set off chain reactions of God’s movement through the world, bringing the light and heat of the fire of the Holy Spirit into so many places that desperately need it.  Such prayer fuels everything else we do and is indispensable to our work, and even to our very being. 

So we pray.  We pray on the days our kindling is wet and we seem to be striking again and again for nothing, but God is still at work.  We pray on days like today, with music and energy and celebration when flames seem to dance around us.  We pray with warm hearts for those we love and with cascades of tears for situations that seem broken beyond repair.  We pray for those in this congregation so that we may continue to worship God, care for people and to grow as Christians for the next 150 years, and we pray for our communities so that our ministry will bear fruit thirty, sixty and a hundred-fold.  And we pray for ourselves, that we may burn more and more brightly in this life before entering the light of Christ’s presence for all eternity.  Always, we pray in Jesus’ name, as he taught us. 

So on this day, our 150th Anniversary Parish Homecoming, we have gathered to pray and to recommit ourselves to being part of the Body of Christ in this place.  We look back in gratitude and celebration for the work God has done here over the past 150 years, and look ahead with anticipation and awe at the work God is preparing for us over the next 150.  I believe that work is going to blaze brightly from this parish, throughout the Shenango Valley, and to people and places we can’t even imagine yet.  Be part of the next movement of God’s Spirit burning forth from here.  Pray powerfully.  Be turned into fire.