Homily
by The Rev. Marcia McRae
St.
John’s Episcopal Church, Bainbridge, GA
31
Jan. 2016,
Epiphany 4 Year C:
Jeremiah 1:4-10;
Psalm 71:1-6; 1 Corinthians 13:1-13; Luke 4:21-30
Remember
Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz repeating
“There's no place like home”?
How likely is Jesus thinking of home from Dorothy's perspective in
today's Gospel?1
We
are told: “Home is where the heart is.”2
Home is a place to teach us love. Love teaches us why we have each
other. The letters of LOVE tell us to Live Our Values
Enthusiastically.
“Enthusastically is from Greek words that mean
“inspired of God”.3
Notice
how the people in our Gospel sense that Jesus' words are “inspired
of God”. Notice the rapid change as the
congregation starts over thinking & quickly turns into a
murderous mob. How quickly do our emotions change?
Our
emotions can change quickly when we are too close to a situation &
our perspective is challenged. When
facts get in our way, anger lurks. Think
of the resistance people gave these facts: Explorers started saying
the world is round not flat. People claimed Christopher Columbus
discovered America & then learned Leif Erickson discovered it
more than 4 centuries earlier. Truth can challenge us. Challenge can
anger us. Anger can block the gift of Love, the gift that lives on
when we will no longer need the other gifts from the Holy Spirit,
which
Paul discusses in his letter to the Corinthians.
We
see the gift of Love blocked in our Gospel after Jesus reads the
portion of Isaiah we read last Sunday & proclaims
the prophecy is fulfilled. Jesus identifies himself as a prophet like
Jeremiah, who speaks to people outside the chosen people4.
This angers Jesus' hearers.
Notice how bravely Jesus handles the
situation. Notice Jeremiah's reluctance to handle the work God gives
him. God assures young Jeremiah that God will be with him. How
reluctant are we, how reluctant are you, to take on the work God
gives us/you to do?
God
calls each of us to speak the Good News as only each of us can. The
Holy Spirit will be with you in this work. You can depend on this.
Although we may resist being dependent, we are wise to remember the
Godly quality of dependence, which
we hear in Celtic
Praise5:
As
a baby, Jesus depended on human love. As he taught & ministered,
he depended on human love. Each of us depends on human love. “To
depend on others is to imitate Christ”.
Jesus
is with us as we face challenges. Think of the challenges Jeremiah
faced serving God in his time & place:
the
destruction of Jerusalem & its Temple,
In
a crisis, it is hard to see clearly. In our reading from Corinthians,
Paul speaks of the difficulty of seeing clearly. His
mirror imagery spoke clearly to the Corinthians: their looking glass
industry produced polished metal mirrors that reflected dim,
distorted images.7
How
clearly do we see in a mirror? Do we see the beloved child of God
that God sees? Do we see a ghost of ourselves like the cat sees in
the book, The
Autobiography of Foundini M. Cat8?
After watching the cat in the mirror, she goes to animal friend,
flops down &, licking her paws, complains: “What a boring cat
is that ghost cat [in the mirror]...She spends hours licking her
stupid paws...”
How
hard it can be to see ourselves as God sees us: Beloved.
How hard
it can be to see each other as God sees us: Beloved & of value.
Like a mirror with a candle in front of it, each of you reflects the
Light of Christ. You carry the Light inside you. Your
Vestry shines this inner Light & lets Love lead our work.
Your
Vestry practices love by sharing ideas. Once an idea is offered, it
is OUR idea instead of So-And-So's idea. We explore it together,
which reduces irritability. This enhances our oneness as this
happening community where we live God's love.
“People have always argued & disagreed.
On every matter there
have been two sides.
Christ urged us to love & be united.
On
every matter he wanted perfect harmony.
Christians have continued to
argue & disagree.
On matters of doctrine there have been two sides.
Can we argue & remain united?
Can we disagree & remain in
harmony?
That is the true test of brotherhood.”
Bibliography
Bates,
The Rev. Dr. J. Barrington. “Living
Eucharistically, Epiphany 4(C) – 2016”.
Accessed: 28 Jan. 2016.
http://episcopaldigitalnetwork.com/stw/2016/01/20/living-eucharistically-epiphany-4c-2016/.
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.
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.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leif_Erikson
Accessed: 30 Jan. 2016.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary
Accessed: 29 Jan. 2016.
“Only
a Carpenter's Son”.
http://www.sermons4kids.com/only_a_carpenters_son.htm.
Accessed: 29 Jan. 2016.
Schaeffer,
Susan Fromberg. The
Autobiography of Foundini M. Cat.
New York: Alfred A. Knofp. 1987.
Van
de Weyer, Robert. Celtic
Praise: A Book of Celtic Devotion, Daily Prayers and Blessings.
Nashville: Abingdon Press. 1998.
1
Idea of home inspired by: “There's No Place Like Home”.
http://www.sermons4kids.com/
Accessed:29
Jan. 2016.
5
Van
de Weyer, Robert. Celtic
Praise: A Book of Celtic Devotion, Daily Prayers and Blessings.
P. 29.
7
Ibid. Harper's. P. 1185.
8
Schaeffer, Susan Fromberg. The
Autobiography of Foundini M. Cat.
New York: Alfred A. Knofp. 1987. Pp. 104-107.
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