Pilgrim People

A wandering Aramean was my ancestor; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number, and there he became a great nation, mighty and populous. When the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, by imposing hard labour on us,we cried to the LORD, the God of our ancestors; the LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. The LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with signs and wonders; and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. (Deuteronomy 26:5-9 NRSV)

It was their story. It told them who they where and where they had come from. It reminded them that, as a people, they had come on a journey, a long journey far from their origins. It reminded them that the journey had been a difficult one. They had travelled a long way and endured much. It told a tale of going down and coming up; of being strangers in foreign lands; of suffering and promise; of affliction and hope. And of how, through it all, God had been with them. And here on the threshold of the promised land, they must prepare to honour God appropriately once the promises are fulfilled. They must prepare to give the first fruits of the first harvest in the promised land to God.

But this story was really being recalled by a people who were in a different predicament, a different foreign land, preparing for new entry into the land. They were in exile from the land that they believed that they had been promised. And this story was reminding them of what they owed God whether they were in the land or out it. They owed God the very best, the first fruits; because what they had received from God was far more. No matter how much suffering they had endured; no matter how long the journey had been, God had brought them through and they were still a great nation.

The Basis of Union tells a story too: one that we like to repeat often. It tells of another pilgrim people—the church; and of a different wanderer—not an Aramaen, but one whose journey also built a new people—the body of Christ. It reminds us that we are a people on a journey towards a different type of promised goal; and it reminds us that our journey is that of Christ.

A wanderer was our ancestor, our forebear, the firstborn of the new creation; and he went down from his home into a strange land where he was an alien. And he dwelt among us and lived as one of us. He lived our life and died and our death, and that we may might live no longer for ourselves, but for the one who came to us and for us, he showed that the power of death and all that is death-dealing could not hold him, and cannot hold us when we are enfolded in him.

This is our story. It tells us who we are and where we come from. It remind us that, as a people, we are on a journey; that we have been enfolded into the journey of the one who came to and for us. And it is into this journey that we have been enfolded in our baptism, when we went down under the waters and came up as the new people of God. But the land we live in is an ambiguous one—it is God’s good creation; yet it is marred by much human destruction—and we are called to be both resident aliens and native rebels in this land. It is a difficult journey to which we are called—the temptations are many; and the chances for losing our way are many. But we have been promised the gift of the Spirit in order that we may not lose our way. And our story reminds us of who we are and whose we are. We have been drawn up and together as the people of God. And here on the threshold of the promised realm of God, we must be prepared to honour God appropriately for the promises at once fulfilled and to which we are travelling. We must be prepared to offer our first fruits, our very selves, in thanksgiving for God’s providence, God’s care, God’s solidarity with us on our journey; and for being drawn into the journey of the Christ who wandered far, endured much and called the people of God home.

The wandering child of God is our ancestor… and Christ’s journey is the one we are called to follow and enfolded into as the people of God.

Lent

The season of Lent is a classic time for self-examination within the church’s year.

Based on the story of Jesus’ extended period of temptation in the desert, the image is one of retreat from our everyday preoccupations to take stock of the direction of our lives (Janet Morley, Bread of Tomorrow, p. 61).

But our faith has never just been about personal piety and individual lives. It has always been about God’s realm and that means justice not just us. So what if we understand Lent to be:

an opportunity to explore what is the nature of the promised Kingdom of God on earth that we long for; and to try and discern, amid various tempting strategies, how we are called to work for it (Bread of Tomorrow, p. 61).

Then we will be “contemplatives” not as “a retreat from the desperately disturbing challenges of the world into some private piety” but as an entry into God’s mission seeking to “see the world as it is”; acknowledge our part in “what is continuingly evil”; and enact the hope to which we are called through Jesus (BoT, p. 61)

May it come soon
to the hungry
to the weeping
to those who thirst for your justice,
to those who are waited centuries
for a truly human life.
Grant us the patience
to smooth the way
on which your Kingdom comes to us.
Grant us hope,
that we may not weary
in proclaiming and working for it,
despite so many conflicts,
threats and shortcomings.
Grant us a clear vision
that in this hour of our history
we may see the horizon,
and know the way
on which your Kingdom comes to us.
(From Nicaragua YMCA 1989, BoT, p. 63)

Creeds

What does the Uniting Church believe? Some people think that we don’t have any “doctrine” (agreed teaching), but that is certainly not the case. The Uniting Church has a number of significant doctrinal documents that help us to understand who we are and who God is for us. The Basis of Union is perhaps the most significant of these documents. It is the theological statement that helped the Congregational, Methodist and Presbyterian churches to agree that they could unite.

The Basis of Union points to other important documents that we share with other Christians. For example, as part of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church, we are committed to the historical ecumenical creeds (the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds). Paragraph 9 of the Basis of Union says:

The Uniting Church enters into unity with the Church throughout the ages by its use of the confessions known as the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed. The Uniting Church receives these as authoritative statements of the Catholic Faith, framed in the language of their day and used by Christians in many days, to declare and to guard the right understanding of that faith. The Uniting Church commits its ministers and instructors to careful study of these creeds and to the discipline of interpreting their teaching in a later age. It commends to ministers and congregations their use for instruction in the faith, and their use in worship as acts of allegiance to the Holy Trinity.

These creeds provide a framework for doing theology in a Christian way. They provide an outline for the “system” of Christian theology by defining basic Christian beliefs and showing us how different theological topics are connected to each other (e.g. the relationships between the 3 “persons” of the Trinity). When we are thinking theologically about a new topic or situation, the “systematic” theology outline must be kept in mind. It is part of the “Tradition” that keeps us within the Christian tradition. Tradition is one of the 4 sources for doing Christian theology. (The other 3 sources are Scripture, Context and Reason; but I’ll talk about those another time.)

By the grace of God...

“There but for the grace of God go I. There but for the grace of God go I.” You’ve heard it said. I’ve heard it said. You’ve probably said it yourself. I know I have. And you know most of the time, I have to confess that what I’ve been talking about has had nothing to do with God’s grace at all—not a jot, not a scintilla, not an iota.

Has it got anything to do with the grace of God that others fall when I do not? Has it got anything to do with the grace of God when others find themselves caught up in messes when I do not? Has it got anything to do with the grace of God when others suffer misfortune and I do not? And equally vice versa, has it got anything to do with the grace of God if others do not fall while I do; if others do not get caught up in messes while I do; if others do not suffer misfortune, while I do?

No, the grace of God has never been about being richer or healthier or more fortunate than someone else. That’s just not what grace is all about. And if it were, we’d know that we’d been graced by God if we were millionaires and lived exceedingly long and pain-free lives, and never, ever discovered that life had dealt us anything but the soft and comfortable options. But that is not what grace is all about. And we know it, or at least sometimes we do. A lot of the time we can get things quite mixed up.

And, you know, I’m not sure that Paul helps us out too much in chapter 15 of first Corinthians. Because it sounds pretty much like he’s saying that being able to work hard is what grace is all about (at least that’s what verse 10 sounds like); but if that were true, you and I wouldn’t be slowing down as we age, or feeling the creaks in our bones and aches in our muscles, if we were graced by God. Indeed, if that was what grace was all about, we’d be wondering why the life we have is the life we have, and not some life of privilege and success, if we really believed that we were the recipients of God’s grace. But the grace of God is not about being able to work hard, just as it is not about being rich and healthy and fortunate.

No, if we really want to focus in on what grace is all about, we have to look to the first part of the passage we’ve read from Corinthians today. We need to put aside our fascination with Paul’s apologetic for himself and his work as the “least of the apostles”; and look at his account of the apostolic message—the message which he received and is passing on.

For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God (verses 3-9).

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…For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle…” God’s grace to Paul is not that he has been able to work hard, not what he has been able to do, but that he has been included in what God has done in Christ. And this is surely God’s grace to us also.

It is not being successful at fishing that witnesses to the grace of God in the lives of the fisherman on Lake Gennesaret, but being caught up into the mission of God and the ministry of Christ, the power of the Spirit—God’s activity, God’s accomplishment, God’s doing. And it is not that Isaiah is a great speaker or will be an important prophet, but that he too is caught up into God’s work for God’s people—caught up into the praise and worship of God in his vision of God’s temple.

It’s a fine line; and we cross it so easily. We say so often, “Because of this or that, God must be with us”; but the truth is that this or that will never assure us of God’s grace. Fortune and health and wealth and the fruit of hard work are too easily lost in the vagaries of the world in which we live. We will never discover God’s grace or even its assurance in any of these fleeting things.

God’s grace is only fully discovered, it is only fully made known, only truly revealed, only completely recognised, in the coming of Jesus Christ into our world—in the gift of God entering God’s creation—in the demonstration of God’s utter love for that creation, by being willing to give up everything for its sake, for our sake and for the sake of the world in which we live.

And God’s grace does not come to us as the most important, the most significant, the most powerful, the richest, the most hard-working, the healthiest people to be called to follow. It comes to us as the least of God’s creation, the least of God’s creatures, the least of Jesus’ disciples, the least of Christ’s apostles, those who need it most and neglect it best.

It is not when we can say, “We can do it!”, but when we know that we can’t do it, and could never do it in a million years or a thousand worlds, that God says, “I am with you!” And even better, “You are with me!” and I will use you as my witness, my prophet, my apostle.” And I have some hard work for you to do.

Not “There but for the grace of God go I”, but “Here in the grace of God, we find ourselves together”; and if it is God’s grace, that we have recognised, that we have discovered, that has been revealed to us, our only response will be: “Here we are God, send us!”

“Here we are God, send us, even though we are weak, even though we will get it wrong, even though when we try our best, we’ll mess things up, even though we will never, ever be able to do enough. Because we have caught just a glimpse of what it is that you have done for us, and how much it is that you care for us, and just what you are prepared to do to get your message across. And, in the face of this glimpse of your unfathomable grace, we can do nothing else, but respond, but leave our nets, and follow.”