***The
following would have been presented today at St. Francis had not wisdom
regarding severe winter weather dictated we remain sheltered at home.
We
are thankful for the opportunity to have worshiped by phone
conference call with
The
Rev. Cassandra Burton, Rector, & the good people of Christ
Church, Clinton, MD, & our colleague, The Rev. Mary Reese, &
members of St. Andrew's, Goldsboro.
Unpreached Homily by The Rev. Marcia McRae
St.
Francis Episcopal Church, Goldsboro, NC, 7 Jan., 2018, Epiphany 1,
The Baptism of Our Lord
Year
B RCL: Genesis 1:1-5; Psalm 29; Acts 19:1-7; Mark 1:4-11
Our
Gospel shows us lots of action today,
as
do our other brief scriptures.
In
Genesis we hear: In
the beginning...God
said...and it was good. A wind from God [also
translated God's Spirit]
sweeps over the waters.1
In
the beginning
of Jesus' public ministry, the waters of baptism flow over him, &
God's Spirit descends.
In
the beginning
as Christianity spreads, the waters of Baptism flow over believers in
Ephesus, as
Acts tells us,
& God's Holy Spirit fills them so they can serve God more
effectively, just as Apollos has learned to do in the previous
chapter [Acts
18:24-28].
This
information about Apollos & Paul & other details in our
scriptures show us:
our
work of sharing the Good News of Jesus & supporting each other as
we grow in God's grace continues the work begun in the beginning of
Christianity.
Beginnings
are important. When we speak of “a good beginning,” we reflect
the understanding in the Genesis account of beginnings.
The
book we call Genesis
is
the Greek name for the Hebrew book known by its first word,
which
means “In
the beginning,”
as
the Jewish Study Bible tells us2.
The
people in the world of Genesis consider beginnings very important,
reflecting both the origin & the purpose of what has begun.3
The
beginning in Ephesus gives a deeper walk with Jesus for the
Christians Paul encounters & who gain a new beginning of life as
God's people.
Our
lived
relationship with God & God's people takes precedence over our
abstract theology & intellectualism,4
as we change, grow & encounter new beginnings.
Today
we encounter the waters of baptism & God's spirit in our
scriptures. Mark tells us Jesus stands in solidarity with the people
of Isreal5
who are re-dedicating their lives to God.
This
Gospel tells us of Jesus' unique status6
when God's Spirit descends like a dove. God says clearly to Jesus:
“You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” This
is a lived
relationship with God.
How
does it feel when someone says something like this to you? “Great
job!” “I admire how you handled that.” “You are special to
me.”
I
usually see a positive reaction in the lived
relationship when a person hears such words.
As
we leave Christmas behind & enter Epiphany, we focus more on
God's reaching out to us Gentiles. We enter the world of beginnings:
commissioning
our new Vestry today,
our
new expectations for 2018,
new
challenges & insights as we grow in this changing world.
We
gain insights in many ways, including our regular study groups:
Our
fun, year-long journey with The
Year of Living Biblically7 & our weekly study groups, which change regularly.
Our
weekly January focus on embracing change [which
we had to postpone last week because of drastic weather changes!]
looks at Christianity's current changes, part of humanity's regular
500-year cycles of change,8
as
author Phyllis Tickle discusses in her book & a 6-session study
based on the book.
She
speaks of “the Church's Next Rummage Sale” in our study of
Embracing
Emergence Christianity,
based on her book, The
Great Emergence: How Christianity is Changing and Why.
She
delves into differences between doctrine & practice [what we
claim to believe & how we actually live]; differences between
competition & cooperation as she reminds us of our Christian
history which includes the Crusades & the Inquisition.9
New
ideas, new cultural norms, new scientific facts may challenge our
beliefs. We do not have to run from new ideas, new discoveries, new
perspectives.
Jesus does not run from change. The Ephesians do not
run from deeper understanding of faith.
Together
we can stand firmly on holy ground & walk confidently into the
future, knowing change is part of life.
Change
can deepen our relationships with God & each other.
Bibliography
Barclay,
William. The
Acts of the Apostlesk.
Edinburgh: The Saint Andrew Press. 1962.
Barclay,
William. The
Gospel of Mark.
Revised Ed. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press. 1975.
Harper’s
Bible Commentary.
General Ed.: James. L. Mays. San Francisco: Harper & Row
Publishers, 1988.
Holy
Bible with the Apocrypha.
New Revised Standard Version. New York: Oxford University Press.
1989.
Jacobs,
A.J. The
Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible
as Literally as Possible.
New York: Simon & Schuster. 2007.
Jewish
Study Bible: Jewish Publication Society TANAKH Translation.
New York: Oxford University Press. 2004.
The
New American Bible for Catholics.
South Bend: Greenlawn Press. 1986.
Tickle,
Phyllis. With Tim Scorer. Embracing
Emergence Christianity: Phyllis Tickle on the Church's Next Rummage
Sale.
Denver: Morehouse Education Rsources, a division of Church Publishing
Inc. 2011.
Tickle,
Phyllis. The
Great Emergence: How Christianity is Changing and Why.
Grand Rapids: BakerBooks. 2008.
1
Note: Examples include Jewish
Study Bible.
P. 12. Holy
Bible with the Apocrypha.
P. 1. The
New American Bible for Catholics.
P. 8.
6
Ibid.
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