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P I R I T U A L F O R M A T I O N |
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CHILDREN'S EDUCATION |
SERMONS The
Seventh Sunday of Easter On the night before he was crucified Jesus gathered his disciples for a final meal. John tells us that as they were together Jesus prayed for them. Our gospel today is a part of that prayer. In it he prayed that the disciples might be one. Just as he and the Father are one so might they be one. And he didn't pray just for that group gathered there with him. He prayed also for those who would believe in him through their word. That's us. There in that room, on the night before he was crucified, Jesus prayed for us. He prayed that we might be one, just as he and the Father are one. Where is the unity? Over this past year we in the Episcopal Church have had more than our share of distress and disagreement and controversy-nationally, within this diocese, and here in our own parish community. Members of this community have been shaken and confused and dismayed. Where is the unity? We may be tempted to look backward. To look back to a time when the Church was not divided. To a golden age when there was no disagreement. To a time when the Church really was one, just as Jesus had prayed. But we can't find it. If we look at the earliest accounts we have of the life of the Church-the letters of Paul-we find controversy. In fact the occasion for the writing of most of Paul's letters was controversy. And Paul himself had some major fights with the leaders of the church in Jerusalem. Where is the unity? Perhaps we need to reconsider what unity is and where our unity might lie. Unity is not sameness. The comfort that I find when I get together with people just like me is not unity. Those meetings where we all know the rules and can agree on everything are not unity. Those times we gather with others who share our tastes or beliefs, others of the same color or heritage-those are not unity. Unity requires diversity. That seems paradoxical. But true unity requires the recognition that we are all created in the image of God. That each one of us was made by God out of God's love. True unity requires that we recognize that without those others who might look different or act differently or think differently, we are incomplete. Pamela Chinnis, former President of the House of Deputies of General Convention has said,
Any of you who have ever played with a prism know that when white light passes through the prism it separates into the colors of the rainbow. All of the color that we see in the world is contained within white light. And when we pass those colors back through the prism then the white light is reconstituted. But we only get white light when all of the colors are combined. If any color is excluded then the light that results is not white. Our unity is in God. We find our unity only in Jesus, the Christ, the Light of the world, who is one with the Father. Through the prism of God's love we are united in Christ. We are the diversity. If we are to begin to comprehend our unity in God we need every one of us. We cannot exclude anyone. Without being open to all people we are diminished; we are less than whole. So rejoice that in Christ we are called into a unity that comprehends without sameness all our differences, our conflicts, and our diversity; and uses them to bear witness to the universal love of God; to whom be all glory now and to the ages of ages. Amen. David
Christian Acts
16.16-34
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Chapel
of the Cross · 674 Mannsdale Road · Madison, Mississippi
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