Inspiring, to have a personal mission like that. A mission that truly impacts the lives of other people.

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1 HOMILY Sunday January 24, 2016 Episcopal Church of St. Matthew Clyde Kunz, licensed lay homilist From this morning s Psalm: 14 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, * O Lord, my rock and my redeemer. Last month, a colleague of mine received a Masters degree in Library Science at the University of Arizona. The inspiring speaker at her graduation projected up on the screen several images of his extensive private library, which quickly became the envy every reader in the room. Bookshelves in every room of his home run wall-towall and floor-to-ceiling. He explained his love of books by telling the audience about his upbringing in a rural part of Montana, raised in a household so poor that at night during the cold winters, ice accumulated on the INSIDE of the walls. He and his siblings did not own any books because his parents couldn t afford to buy them any. His only contact with books was at school, and it wasn t until he was in High School that he realized library cards were free and he could get one for himself at the town library! As a result of all this, he has become a man virtually obsessed with the idea not only of acquiring an extensive personal library, but who has spent his adult life working as an educator, and making sure that all children, regardless of their family s status, own at least one book of their own. One might say that it has become his life s Mission. Inspiring, to have a personal mission like that. A mission that truly impacts the lives of other people. I thought of that commencement speaker when I encountered this morning s Hebrew scripture reading from Nehemiah. We are told that the people all stood up when the scripture was opened by the priest Ezra, and that upon hearing the word of the Law, they wept. They actually wept! Can we even imagine being so overcome at hearing the word of God read aloud that it would cause us to weep tears of joy? Unfortunately, it seems to be part of human nature that we appreciate most that to which we have little if any access. 1

2 It s difficult for us to even imagine. We live in an age of availability, a world in which anything we want or desire can be obtained through Amazon.com as long as we have a credit card and are patient enough to wait two or three days for UPS to deliver it to our door. Even the Word of God can be accessed on several different websites offering texts from the King James Version, the Revised Standard Version, the NEW Revised Standard Version, the Latin Vulgate, the Jerusalem Bible, the Message, or any number of other versions of the Bible to fit each individual s particular liking. I ve got the entire Bible on my cell phone, searchable at a moment s notice, especially when one of the participants in this year s EfM group asks an impertinent Biblical question! I wonder sometimes if all of this access somehow diminishes our appreciation of things. And whether it has also diminished our appreciation of the Word of God. Do you suppose that humankind will ever again be capable of weeping with joy just at the sound of scripture being read? Two weeks ago, we remembered in our readings the Baptism of Jesus, marking the beginning of His earthly ministry. We are told by the Gospels that after His baptism, Jesus went into the countryside for 40 days and 40 nights, a time during which He fasted and communed with His God and with nature. His was probably not unlike the experience of countless young men throughout the ages, who as young adults, wrestle with who they are, trying to discern their role in the world, and attempting to define what they are to become in life. Jesus clearly got His answer. Today s Gospel reading tells us that after those 40 days, Jesus went not straight to Jerusalem to begin his ministry but back home, home to the area of Galilee and to the town of Nazareth. There, we are told He went to the synagogue and the writer of Luke uses the words as was His custom. Jesus was apparently a regular attender there, and probably knew most, if not all of the people present. They were His friends and neighbors, the people he d grown up with. His high-school buddies, as it were. His congregation. Synagogues didn t have priests in them leading services; priests were assigned to and officiated in the Temple in Jerusalem. But the synagogues in smaller communities like Nazareth were where the members of the congregation came together, to read and discuss the Holy Scriptures. Different members of the congregation would have taken their turn reading from assigned texts, much as we do here at St. Matthews on Sundays, using the Revised Common Lectionary that is used in most mainline churches. In the synagogue, the readings would be followed by discussions of their meaning. 2

3 Jesus, who d been gone for a few weeks, was probably warmly welcomed back with greetings of Where ve you been? and We ve missed you! But when He was asked to read, the members of his congregation found that during His time away, He had been changed. Like the Hebrews living several centuries before Jesus, weeping as they heard the Word of God, Jesus clearly loved the Scriptures and must have known them well, for when he was handed one of the largest scrolls, the one containing the book of Isaiah, he was able to find the passage he was looking for. It is remarkable to hear what he chose to read, and especially His proclamation afterward that Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. Remember, this is being read by a young man who just returned from 40 days or isolation and prayer, asking Himself the question: What is my life s purpose? This passage from Luke Chapter 4, especially verses 18 and 19, has been called by some, Jesus Mission Statement. In these few short lines, Jesus tells the members of His congregation that He has finally figured out His purpose, and points to His own understanding of why He has come to earth: to fulfill Isaiah s prophecy. It is for this reason that I have come to believe this passage Luke Chapter 4, verses 18 and 19 to be one of the most important passages in the Gospels: 18 The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord s favor. Period. A simple, concise statement from Jesus own mouth, expressing His own understanding of why He came to earth. The words themselves are powerful, but what I find even more interesting is what is NOT in them. There is absolutely no mention of coming to earth to atone for our personal sins. There is also no mention of coming to answer for mankind s original sin whatever that might be. Those are theologies that surface much later. Jesus Mission Statement is straightforward, and it is much simpler than later theories of why Jesus came to earth: to bring good news to the poor; to proclaim release to captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and to let the oppressed go free. 3

4 Can we even imagine how our world could be transformed if each and every Christian lived into Jesus Mission as stated in those simple words? If we made Jesus Mission our own? Which brings us to this morning s reading from the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Corinthians. [By the way, we call it the first letter to the Corinthians, but most now believe that it is probably the second of four letters he wrote to the Corinthians one and four are likely lost and the ones that we call first and second Corinthians are in actuality second and third. ] But that really isn t the point, just an interesting fact-oid. What IS important is that the Apostle Paul tells the saints in Corinth that they are members of the Body of Christ. And now that Jesus is no longer bodily with them, they each must work together to BE the body of Christ in the world. Paul s words apply to us just as aptly as they applied to those ancient Christians in Corinth: not only that we need each other and must depend on one another, but that together - we become the body that must continue the work Jesus began on this earth. We are the only hands and feet, the only eyes and ears, the only voice, that Jesus has to fulfill his Mission. And as that body of Christ we are responsible for carrying out His Mission as He stated it Himself that morning in the synagogue in Nazareth: to bring good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and freedom for the oppressed. You know that instant access thing I mentioned earlier? A simple few keystrokes on the computer and I was able to find out some data about the poor, the captives, the blind and the oppressed. According to UNICEF, Nearly 1/2 of the world s population is poor, with three billion people living on less than $2.50 a day. And half of those live in what is called extreme poverty less than $1.25 a day. And as for captives? In the U.S. alone there are more than 2.2 million incarcerated adults, with an additional 54,000 in juvenile detention facilities. We who call ourselves the Land of the Free have the 2 nd -highest percentage of our citizens behind bars of all the countries in the world. We now hold more citizens in prison than were held in the Gulag under Josef Stalin. How shameful is that in a country that is predominantly Christian? Throughout the world, tens of millions live under oppressive political regimes that deny basic human dignity to their citizens. And most of the world lacks access 4

5 to clean drinking water or decent health care even the basic kinds of health care that could for many prevent blindness and disfiguring birth defects. The problems identified by the prophet Isaiah, quoted by Jesus in his Mission Statement and assigned by the Apostle Paul to us as the body of Christ in the world, are clearly not being fixed. In short, Christianity which is after all the world s largest faith tradition seems to be failing rather spectacularly in fulfilling Jesus Mission. These problems can all seem overwhelming, can t they? And I am pretty certain that we are each thinking: What can I as an individual do about problems that big and so far away? The enormity of these kinds of problems honestly makes them seem insurmountable, certainly for me as an individual, and even for us as an entire congregation. One has to wonder if even the entire Episcopal Church of the USA or the worldwide Anglican Communion not accustomed to working in harmony these days! could even make an impact. But is it conceivable that if we as a worldwide Christian faith of every denomination were ever able to put aside our rather petty differences and squabbling and come together on this one Big Thing to fulfill the Mission of He whom we proclaim to follow that change could actually begin to happen? I suppose I am lacking in faith. But I do believe that, if it ever IS to happen, it has to start with me and with every other individual Christian, doing whatever each of us can to bring about justice for all people. And maybe just maybe if enough of us are working at fulfilling Jesus Mission, at working to fight poverty, mass incarceration, and the inequalities and lack of access that afflict so many in our world we can make the Church what it was always intended to be as envisioned by the Apostle Paul: the Body of Christ. To make that happen, we each must be committed to a personal life s Mission like that commencement speaker I told you about. But our personal missions individually and collectively must be to become Christ s feet and hands and ears and eyes in the world. To becoming Jesus voice. To doing whatever small part we can to make a difference in the lives of others, and to continually fight for justice and equity for all. And why would we do that? So that together collectively, as the Body of Christ we can accomplish the earthly transformation that Jesus envisioned as His purpose, as his Mission, as His reason for coming to earth. Can you imagine learning that due to the work of Christians throughout the world, poverty had been reduced worldwide by 50%? That as a result of Christian ministries, prisons once filled with people we called hardened criminals were now being rehabilitated, trained, and released as members of a productive workforce? 5

6 That Christian healthcare organizations were providing access to life-giving treatments and wellness to hundreds of thousands worldwide, that sight was literally being restored to the blind? That could only be described as one thing: the fulfillment of Jesus Mission. And the dream of that, my friends, should make every one of us weep our own tears of joy. Amen. 6