Sermon at St. Thomas by Lynn Cunningham

April 23, 2006

Easter II,

Acts3:12a-26, First letter of John 5:1-6, John 20:19-31.

1.        In these past few weeks of Lenten and Easter sermons, I have been engaging in a variety of theological reflections. And so today, I wanted to bring these reflections more down to earth, to present them again in a way that is user-friendly for your everyday living.

2.       Two weeks ago, I compared the Holy Spirit rescuing the soul from sin in Paul’s terms to the hand of a person reaching down and rescuing a struggling mouse from a cat.

3.       I suggested that we have three helpful friends in the three major narratives found in the Bible:

a.        Creation

b.       Exodus, and the

c.        Ministry of Jesus and resurrection

4.       In the Easter sermon, I suggested how putting on the mind of Christ, in Paul’s phrase, can help to break up in our thinking the internal domination systems, including the power death sometimes seems to hold over our lives.

a.        I offered a different take on that haunting question asked by the women in Mark’s Gospel as they approached the tomb to anoint the body of Jesus: “Who will roll away the stone from the tomb for us?”

5.       So much spiritual richness and room for theological reflections in our Bible, and also, so many ways to approach them. I wanted to go over some of the same material with a more pastoral slant. I have heard from many of you in recent weeks how your lives have involved serious personal challenges, pastoral moments, life crises.  We have heard of each other’s

a.        Sudden, painful illnesses

b.       Decisions about moving to new locations

c.        Job issues, and what to do with the summer opening up before us.

d.       Other life crises.  You can name yours in your own mind.

6.       I had my own little incident on this past Tuesday, as many of you may have heard.

a.        I flipped myself off of my new mountain  bicycle early on Tuesday morning on the road right near Jo Story’s house.  In my crash landing, I managed to mash my left elbow and right knee and gash my eyebrow.  I caught my shoe lace in the chain, which jammed the chain, jerked the bike to a stop and sent me toppling over into the gravel.

b.       There was sudden intense pain, and the sort of mild shock that comes with that kind of fall.

c.        As I picked myself up from the ground, my mind was clouded and in mild shock.

d.       My body suddenly did not work the way I was used to.  And for several days interesting challenges trying to carry on the tasks of everyday living with just one arm and leg.

e.       What was I to make of what just happened?

f.        And I am sure each of you have asked yourselves the same question in whatever has caught you. Probably all of you know the drill when you fall and hurt yourself.

7.       Now I must confess that, as my bike and my body were briefly airborne, I did not suddenly wonder, should I view this accident in light of the creation narrative? 

a.        I did not wonder, how does this pain fit into the exodus narrative?

b.       In the shock of a traumatic event, it is all most people can do to try to hold on until the ferris wheel, whatever form it takes, stops spinning and we can catch our breaths a moment and get re-oriented.

8.       These catastrophic, and near catastrophic events are disorienting.  They have a way of shutting down thinking and feeling – except pain –  and understanding of the world.  It is hard to focus on anything more than the pain, hurt and loss.

9.       The three friends, the three narratives, I talked about a couple of weeks ago are hidden during these moments, or at least they were to me.

10.      I call them narratives, but after years of reflection, I believe that every encounter with the world is steeped in the realities of these narratives. So, reflect again on them with me, this time in a pastoral context, rather than in a more theological context.

11.      First, the CREATION narrative

a.        Whatever your affliction or trauma is, have you noticed that you in fact do not suddenly end up in an alien zone, cut off from God?  You may feel disoriented, but is the world disoriented? No.

b.       You are still surrounded by the air that God made in creation.  You are still walking or hobbling on the earth that is God’s creation.  You are still touching and seeing and smelling this earth, the garden of creation that God began it all with. 

c.        When I landed on the ground after falling from the bicycle, I did not encounter anything other than the good old earth.  It was pretty hard, but it was not another reality outside of God.  Instead, I landed on the earth that God made and called good.  No tragedy or misfortune carries us away from the created world around us.  One message of the creation story is that there there is no place that human beings can go, that God is not there with them.

d.       Compare what Psalm 139 teaches:

i.        Lord you trace my journeys and my resting places...

ii.       Where can I go then from your Spirit?

iii.      If I climb up to heaven, you are there, if I make the grave my bed, you are there also.

iv.       And so on.

e.       In other words, in the midst of your worst nightmares, learn to pause and ask yourself is God still with me in all this?

f.        And our friend the Creation story responds to that question: there is no place you can go that is outside God’s creation.  The Holy Spirit is with you wherever you go, whatever you experience.

g.       That is completely fundamental.

12.      Second, the EXODUS narrative:

a.        Whatever your affliction is, have you noticed sometimes how trapped and confining the affliction is?  Life suddenly seems suffocating and oppressive.  People around you may seem to have an agenda for you.  You feel like you cannot make yourself heard and understood.

b.       Slavery to sin, slavery to other people, slavery to addictions, slavery to the dominant powers of society.  Sometimes our affliction grows out of slavery. 

c.        Slavery usually seems fundamental to the human condition, to my condition and yours, in one way or another.

d.       But, the Exodus story teaches that life does not have to be that way.  God does not want slavery for God’s children. God chooses liberation for us. There really is a way out of the most oppressive forms of slavery.  God is seeking to take you out of whatever form of slavery you find yourself in. 

e.       How often do people start to think, well my affliction is God’s will for me?  I have this bad situation in my life because God is punishing me for something, some people think.  Wrong!

f.        God may hope for you to learn things from your affliction.  I plan to be more careful with my shoe laces next time I get on that bike. You may learn things from your affliction, but God wills your liberation, not your further enslavement.  How can I know this?  The book of Exodus, the Exodus narrative and many, many of the psalms all teach this.

g.       If you find yourself thinking that the situation you are in is a form of slavery that you deserve for some reason, stop and rethink that attitude in light of the Exodus story.  Yes, you may find yourself in some form of slavery, but look around and ask yourself, what form of liberation is God holding out for you to grasp onto, like Moses turning aside to find the words of Yahweh in the burning bush.

h.       God’s will for you to be liberated from whatever form of slavery afflicts you, is truly fundamental.

13.      Finally, the RESURRECTION narrative.

a.        After setting out on a beautiful new mountain bike in the glorious Dubois springtime morning, suddenly in a crashing moment, I felt all but destroyed physically.   Severe illness, trauma, the severe illness of a close friend or relative, the death of someone close. All these afflictions can leave us thinking that maybe death is really the bottom line in life.

b.       Death and severe afflictions often leave people depressed, caught up in that feeling that there is no way out of trouble. That feeling that death is the most favorable possible outcome to life at its worst.

c.        The resurrection narrative teaches that death is not the bottom line, not the end result.  The story teaches that God always stands with us offering hope and renewed life that is completely beyond our ability to comprehend.

d.       The next time you begin to conclude that death all that is left, stop and ponder this story and what it teaches fundamentally about the nature of this life that God has made for you.  Ask yourself, who will roll away the stone from the tomb for me?

14.      When John in his first letter says that “everyone who believes in Jesus has been born of God”, he is helping you and me to re-discover in the darkest moments of our afflictions, that our very birth, our very roots lie in a God who wills our creation, our liberation, and our renewal of life.

15.      Peter and John in the passage from Acts retell how Israel’s liberation ties into the resurrection of Jesus Christ. They do this to teach that, guess what, our very roots lie in a God who wills our creation, our liberation, and our renewal of life.

16.      The story of Thomas, doubting Thomas, in the passage from John’s gospel, teaches us that our very roots lie, guess what, in a God who wills our creation, our liberation, and our renewal of life.  Thomas discovers this, to his utter shock and amazement, when the Risen Jesus steps back into his life and breaks him out of his worst nightmare, the death of his friend, Jesus, on the cross.

17.      Pray with me today, that when you are most deeply caught up in whatever afflicts you, you will let these three stories teach you how deeply God loves you. Let them teach you how to find your way to that God who wills your creation, liberation and renewal of life.

18.      In Jesus name, Amen.