WHEW! What a week this has been. It seems like each day brought news that overwhelmed or overturned everything that we had understood the day before. It seemed that a decision that we made one day was overturned by the news coming out the next day. To the point that if felt like at the end of the week that the decision we were agonizing over on Monday seemed quaint or unimportant by the time Friday rolled around.
Faith Like Nicodemus
Nicodemus first shows up in John’s Gospel in the reading that we just heard. He is a religious leader, he is a man of great respect and great influence in the community, he is a well-learned man, and he has seen what Jesus has been doing. He is intrigued, he is drawn to it, but he’s not quite sure what to make of it. He knows that God is at work in this.
Lent as a Pilgrimage
Today is the first Sunday in Lent, a season in the church calendar where we are bidden to engage in self-denial, fasting, prayer, repentance, and reading of Scripture — to prepare our minds and hearts to receive the gifts of Holy Week and Easter. One thing we don’t emphasize as much any more, but which historically has been an important part of Lenten piety, is pilgrimage, and especially pilgrimage to the Holy Land where the events of the Gospel took
place.
The Transfiguration
the event we hear about in today’s Gospel, when three of Jesus’ disciples saw him glowing white while talking with two of the most important people in the sacred story of the Hebrew people, clearly describes a different sort of transfiguration. While the Biblical account certainly describes a dramatic change in Jesus’ appearance, it was only a fleeting change, not a permanent one. There is no indication that from the point that they came down from the mountain Jesus looked any different than he ever had. No, I believe that rather than Jesus taking on a whole new look, it was how his followers saw him, their perception of him, that underwent a permanent change.
You Are the Light
In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and there was darkness over the deep. And God spoke and said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw the light was good. From that moment on, the light coming from God has never failed to shine in the darkness of this world. The creation story tells us that God created two great lights: the greater light for the day, and the lesser light for the night, the sun and the moon, a powerful reminder that even in the darkness of night there is still a light that God has provided for us. As we look back on history and the ways God has been working in this world, we see God has continued to shine light in the midst of our darkness.
The Importance of Sharing Our Faith
For the past several weeks we have been hearing stories about Jesus as an adult, his baptism, the beginning of his ministry, and the calling of his disciples. But our Gospel today takes us back to Christmas. It takes us back to his infancy when he was just forty days old. In some traditions, today is the end of Christmas. They have been singing Christmas carols, and have kept their decorations up until today because, as you heard at the end of the Gospel reading, today is the day Mary and Joseph went to the temple and then returned to Nazareth. This whole time they have been in Bethlehem, and some traditions celebrate that. It is not our tradition here because we have put that all aside after the Epiphany and have focused instead on the early years of Jesus’s ministry. But today we go back to his infancy. It might help us, as we hear the story, to get back into the Christmas mindset when we hear how Jesus was taken to the temple by his parents and is presented. We hear all the interesting details about that: they did what was customary under the law and offered a sacrifice of two turtledoves or two pigeons. This is an interesting detail, because it means they didn’t have quite enough money to get the lamb, but could only afford the bird offering.
The Shame of the Cross
The cross is one, if not the most central image of our Christian faith. We have it all over the church: in the Nave there is one behind the altar and on the baptismal font. If you go out into the church there are many more, both inside and outside. There are crosses on the wall, above one of the doors. Crosses are a central image for us. The logo of St. Mary’s is a cross, a stylized cross, but it is a cross. That is not unusual. Go to any church throughout this country, and most of them will be filled with crosses. It is a central image of our faith. It is an image or symbol of our identity as Christians.
