More Faith Than You Know In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. One afternoon a number of years ago, I was sitting in my office at Saint Mark s Philadelphia when the telephone rang. My caller was a man I knew from the parish, who wanted to come and speak with me about a pastoral matter. When I asked him what the nature of his concern was, he replied that he was concerned about some difficulties that his aging parents were facing. I made an appointment with him, he turned up at the appointed time, and I welcomed him into my office. I understand your parents are having a tough time, I said. Yes, he replied, I d like to talk with you about the ***parents*** my ***problems*** have. And sure enough, as we talked, it became clear that although he was concerned about his parents difficulties, what really was disturbing him was the disruption of his life that his parents struggle was causing. His slip of the tongue - whether Freudian or not - revealed much more truth than he thought that he knew. And his accidental truth-telling helped shape our conversation. It opened a door for healing and prayer in his life. It was a slip, but a slip that was, in some small but genuine way, inspired by God. I sometimes wonder whether Peter s great confession of Jesus messiahship wasn t something like that - a sudden blurting out of a truth Peter himself had perceived only dimly, if at all, before he heard his own voice speaking it. I really don t think Peter was sitting around during the disciples lunch breaks and meditating on Jesus messianic identity. It seems clear from the Gospels that Peter didn t arrive at his understanding of who Jesus is from deep study of the Scriptures, or from profound theological reflection, or from a top-flight seminary education. Peter was a practical, hardheaded man, trying to earn a living managing a business. He wasn t necessarily an intellectual, and he certainly wasn t a mystic. In fact Jesus himself says to Peter, flesh and blood has not revealed this to you. In other words, you didn t hear it from the local press or the rumor mill. You didn t sit down and work it out on your own, like a problem in a calculus textbook. No. My Father who is in heaven has revealed this to you, Jesus says. Peter didn t experience the enlightening knowledge of who Jesus is because he solved the equation, or thought up the right answer, or read the right scholars. He experienced the enlightenment of knowing who Jesus is because suddenly, perhaps to his own great surprise, he found that spark of knowledge kindled in his own heart. His own intellect and rationality and study didn t put it there - God put it there. Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you - but my Father in heaven HAS. Now this totally flies in the face of a great many of our Enlightenment-era assumptions about what knowledge is and how we get it. We learn things through our senses, or through manipulating the concepts we already have stored in our memories as the result of previous sensory impressions. We call things we learn in this fashion facts. We form these facts into very complex and sophisticated matrices that inform us in extraordinary detail about the universe in which we live, and we we call that process science. And science, at its experimentally verifiable best, is capable of showing us truth. That s the model of knowledge most of us operate in 24 hours a day, consciously or not. And that model is not all bad by any means - science has given us surgical anesthesia and incredible ability to travel and flush toilets and lots of other nice things. Don t think for a minute that I am
2 anti-science. I most certainly am not. Those anti-science people can just try prying the mouse of my Macintosh computer from my cold, dead hand! But scientism science not as a tool, but as an all-encompassing ideology, or theory of knowledge - doesn t have much room for this morning s Gospel. Our modern, scientific understanding of knowledge and knowing doesn t leave much room for discovering God-given knowledge hidden in our hearts like a lost copper coin, or an expensive pearl buried in a field. Talking about this kind of spiritual intuition, this kind of God-revealed wisdom, this non-scientific kind of knowing will get you dirty looks from most university science faculties. I know. I used to get them from the folks at the Yale chemistry department all the time. But here is a dirty little secret about our modern age, and about us modern people. I actually think most people have a touch of that God-given wisdom. I think most people have some small spark of the knowledge of God and of God s love down in the depths of their souls. After all, the Prologue of John s Gospel tells us that Christ is the true light which enlightens every person. I really believe that. I think most people do long for God, for the transcendent, for a life that is real and permanent and meaningful instead of tawdry and superficial and vapid. But our whole culture and world view and intellectual formation tells us to mistrust that desire, to dismiss it as irrational or as a superstition, or to medicate it or entertain it or career it until it just plain goes away. But for far more of us than care to admit, somewhere down deep, there is that spark of faith and hope and love. Way down deep inside, there is that intuitive sense that God is real and that he even cares about us. But for lots of us, even for lots of Episcopalians, I think that can be hard to admit. We think to ourselves, that s not very scientific. That s not very enlightened. Saint Francis had faith. Saint Paul had faith. Who do I think I am? In church some random Sunday, we suddenly find ourselves moved, touched in some new way by the words of a hymn, or by the moment when the Body of Christ touches our lips. Our hearts are stirred, changed, opened to God in some new way. And because we are good, modest, modern Episcopalians, we think first, This can t be happening to me, and second, If it is happening to me, I m not saying a word about it to ANYONE! I think for a great many of us, the problem is not that we have no faith - it s that we don t trust or share the small spark of faith and desire that we alreaady DO have. We decide that the faith we ve got isn t real enough, or isn t learned enough, or isn t something enough, so we don t trust it. We don t offer it to God and say, Fan this flame. We just sort of sit on it and keep quiet about it and then in our more honest moments we think, How come my spiritual life doesn t seem to be going anyplace? I know. I ve been there. Today we give thanks to God because Peter, first of the apostles, the rock upon whom the Church is built, did trust the little spark of faith that God kindled in his heart. Peter was willing to risk that his intuition, his hunch, his heart knowledge about Jesus was right, was truth. Peter didn t keep his faith to himself, he didn t torture himself with philosophical and theological doubts, he just put it out there. He let his faith be known. And out it came, those incredible, unfathomable, utterly true words - You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God. And what answer does Peter receive back from Jesus? What does Jesus tell him in response? What comes back to Peter when he puts his faith into practice and believes in who Jesus truly is?
3 Destiny comes to Peter. Self-knowledge comes to Peter. Meaning. True knowledge of who he is and what his mission in this world is. That s what comes to Peter. You are Peter, Jesus tells him, And upon this rock (Peter, the nickname Jesus gave him, means rock ) I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. Peter s profession of faith in Jesus is the key that unlocks understanding and knowledge and wisdom for Peter, wisdom about himself and about his life. It s wisdom that Peter could receive in only one way - by hearing it from the source - straight from the lips of the very God who created him. No learning however profound, no science however precise, could have revealed to Peter the deep secret of his own being and purpose in this life. Only Christ our God could do that for him. And only Christ our God can do that for us. You see, only God can tell you who you are. No one else can. No one. Not your parents. Not society. Not ideology or political affiliation. Not your best friend or your spouse or your dog. Not your problems or your conflicts or your failures. Most especially, not your sins. The secret of our identity, the hidden depths of our personhood, of who we are, is in the hands of Jesus Christ and nowhere else. Peter found that out, and he found out that it was good news. So let us be like him. Let us follow the example of the blessed Apostle Peter. Let us give God the gift of whatever tiny trace of faith and desire we can find in our hearts - and let us receive in return the vast blessing and knowledge and wisdom and healing that only God can give, that God longs to give, not because our faith in God is so profound, but because God s love for us is so profound. Amen. The Reverend Michael Scott Seiler The Parish of Saint Matthew August 24, 2008 Proper 16-A The First Reading Isaiah 51:1-6 Listen to me, you that pursue righteousness, you that seek the Lord. Look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the quarry from which you were dug. Look to Abraham your father and to Sarah who bore you; for he was but one when I called him, but I blessed him and made him many. For the Lord will comfort Zion; he will comfort all her waste places, and will make her wilderness like Eden, her desert like the garden of the Lord; joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the voice of song. Listen to me, my people, and give heed to me, my nation; for a teaching will go out from me, and my justice for a light to the peoples. I will bring near my deliverance swiftly, my salvation has gone out and my arms will rule the peoples; the coastlands wait for me, and for my arm they hope. Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look at the earth beneath; for the heavens will vanish like smoke, the earth will wear out like a garment, and those who live on it will die like gnats; but my salvation will be forever, and my deliverance will never be ended.
4 Psalm 138, Confitebor tibi I will give thanks to you, O LORD, with my whole heart; before the gods I will sing your praise. I will bow down toward your holy temple and praise your Name, because of your love and faithfulness; For you have glorified your Name and your word above all things. When I called, you answered me; you increased my strength within me. All the kings of the earth will praise you, O LORD, when they have heard the words of your mouth. They will sing of the ways of the LORD, that great is the glory of the LORD. Though the LORD be high, he cares for the lowly; he perceives the haughty from afar. Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you keep me safe; you stretch forth your hand against the fury of my enemies; your right hand shall save me. The LORD will make good his purpose for me; O LORD, your love endures for ever; do not abandon the works of your hands. The Second Reading Romans 11:33-36 O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor? Or who has given a gift to him, to receive a gift in return? For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen. The Holy Gospel Matthew 16:13-20 When Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, Who do people say that the Son of Man is? And they said, Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. He said to them, But who do you say that I am? Simon Peter answered, You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered him, Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of
Hades will not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. Then he sternly ordered the disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah. 5