January 20, 2008

by The Rev. Constance Jones

Matthew 2:1-12

Once upon a time in the 1990s, for seven years running, every June
I went to Trinity University in San Antonio Texas,
where along with 699 other American historians I would grade essays for the Educational Testing Service.
These were the Advanced Placement Exams.
I’d score around 150 answers to the same question a day, for a whole week.
One of the friends I made there said it was like a cross between summer camp and a Russian gulag.
It was excruciating. I did it for the money. Saving up for seminary.

The Educational Testing Service didn’t recognize Sunday morning church-time.
But I discovered there was an Episcopal Church in walking distance of the Trinity campus,
and that I could trade an hour on Sunday morning for a lunch hour.
So I went to church. I worshiped. I walked back to my pile of exams.
But what I experienced, three years in a row, was the coldest shoulder I’ve ever been subjected to in church.
And I made an effort, mind you. I smiled. I made eye-contact. I introduced myself.
You’d have thought a wet mongrel puppy with muddy feet had wandered into the church.
Actually no, that’s not it. You’d have thought an invisible person had come in.
Alas, I have had this experience in other churches as well.

Now, I am not telling you that Grace Church is like this
It isn’t.
There is a way of greeting strangers and newcomers that you all have figured out
that is warm and inviting but not overbearing.

It won’t surprise you, though, that hospitality is one of the marks
of a “healthy” and thriving and growing parish.
Strong congregations are intentional about hospitality,
but it also seems to come naturally to them,
almost as though it’s coming from their insides out, rather than a result of following a rule.
I have to say I can testify personally to the warmth of your hospitality.

So I am not saying this in order to either scold or exhort.
Rather, I am thinking about a phrase that St. Paul uses
in his rather affectionate greeting to the Corinthians in today’s epistle.
We know from the two letters we have remaining of his correspondence with the Corinthians
that they were a rather contentious lot.
But here Paul speaks warmly, appealing to their better nature,
saying, “the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you.”
If you look at this phrase in your bulletin insert,
it’s in the second column of the passage from I Corinthians, lines four and five –
the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you.

These words jumped out at me, so I looked at other English renditions of it.
The New International and King James translations refer to
“the testimony of Christ” being “confirmed in you” rather than “strengthened among you.”
That’s a little different.
But two renditions that are called “versions” rather than “translations” differ much more markedly.
The Contemporary English Version says for that same line,
“Now you are certain that everything we told you about our Lord Christ Jesus is true,”
which to me implies a more passive response –
that what the Corinthians do well is agree with Paul’s preaching.
On the other hand, the very colloquial version called “The Message” puts it this way,
“The evidence of Christ has been clearly verified in your lives.”

Oooh, studying the Bible can be so interesting!
You’d probably walk out on me if I went any further with this translation business.
But translation does matter. Because I think it makes a difference
whether you say that Paul recognizes a Christian community when he sees one because
a. they say yes to what he’s preached, or
b. they are testifying, or preaching, all the time, and saying the right things, or
c. the way they live their lives testifies to, or reflects, Christ himself

I must say I have no objection to a) or b). I am in favor of right doctrine,
and in favor of speaking up and telling the Jesus story.

But I think c) cuts closer to the heart of the matter,
for to be a Christian is to live a life in its entirety,
in all that we say and do, as Christ.
How we live ....... think and pray, live and breathe,
should reflect Christ in this world here and now.
A tall order, obviously, and something none of us ever lives up to adequately.
Put us all together on our best day, and we still can’t manage it fully,
but at least that’s our objective.
I think today’s Gospel reading from John says the same thing.
John the Baptist didn’t demand that people just take his word for it that Jesus was the Son of God,
but he said Look! See for yourself!

I’ve heard it said that the church in our time lives in a world much like the first century.
Obviously this doesn’t mean we don’t use electric lights and the Internet.
But in Europe and North America these days
there are whole clumps of the population who do not know Jesus in any meaningful way at all.
They may be outsiders looking in,
learning about Christianity from what they read about Christians in the paper.
They may hear about Christians whose modus operandi
is tearing each other up in disputes and mutual recrimination.
They may think Christians require you to check your brain at the door,
or that Christians will rob you blind.
They may be scared to walk in the door.
I’m not making this up. I’ve seen it.
Walk in there? Are you kidding?

It’s obviously a matter of importance how we Christians act amongst ourselves.
Do we forgive and encourage one another,
bear one another’s burdens?
Of course I’m interested in how an outsider coming into Grace Church sees us.
But I think more important still is
what people would think of Jesus, judging by how you and I behave out in the world.
Do our lives do we shine forth with the knowledge that we are forgiving and forgiven, for example?
Do we say our prayers and give over our anxieties in God?
Are joy and inner peace evidently part of how we live?
Do we help the weak, turn the other cheek,
pay people fair wages,
and tell the truth even when it is inconvenient?
If the world judges Christ by the testimony of our lives,
what will the world conclude?

During Lent you all are being invited to join a small group.
Signups start today.
If you ignore our plea we will probably follow you around with a clipboard and tap you on the shoulder.
The name of the curriculum we have put together is “Journey with Jesus.”
It’s about the signposts that indicate the presence of Christ in our community,
and the message our lives reflect outwards to the world.
I began this morning with a story about hospitality, which is one of the markers.
A habit of deep contemplation and reflectiveness is another.
Eight traits, picked from what might be an infinite number of ways
that the presence of Christ in this needy world can be seen.

We aren’t undertaking this study to congratulate ourselves,
or to scold ourselves either.
We are striving onward, always reaching to the next level –
for the sake of this community, of course,
but also for the sake of a needy and hurting world.
Each of us has only one lifetime.
Grace Church is only one church in Yorktown.
But we remind ourselves, thank God,
that it doesn’t depend on us alone.
This is God’s world, and God’s story of reconciling the whole world to himself.
So what is our part?
Well, it seems to me that getting doctrine right is fine.
Speaking well and worshiping in a beautiful and orderly manner count.
But I think it’s far more significant that our whole lives testify to Christ,
reflect Christ in the world.
When we live lives of gratitude, peacefulness, and hope, for example,
we are doing exactly what St. Paul commends in the Corinthians.

Well, it’s a cold and disagreeable Sunday morning in winter.
Some of us are here, and some of us are being Christians at home this morning.
Our small groups will get underway right after Ash Wednesday, which is coming soon.
But Jesus is here in this place, and Jesus is with us anywhere we are,
claiming us as his own,
asking us to show forth the miracle of himself to the world.
Thanks be to God.

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