March 29, 2009
The Fifth Sunday in Lent (Year B)
Jeremiah 31:31-34; Psalm 119:9-16; 1 Hebrews 5:5-10;
John 12:20-33
The reading from Jeremiah talks about the covenant between God and the house of
What is a covenant? Answering that question might be a place to begin. That is also a question the Covenant Committee asked us to consider and the answers were varied. I would define a covenant as “an agreement between God and God’s people, or God’s people and each other.” That is not the only definition for the purpose of this homily that is the definition I will use!
As I said the Jeremiah reading was concerned about the covenant between God and the house of
They would know each other by the way they kept that covenant, the people of
The Covenant Committee here at Good Shepherd is using the Baptismal Covenant as the center of their series of presentations and questions to those of us who attend the Thursday Re-Connect dinners. They are inviting us to begin to think about how, as God’s people here at Good Shepherd, we want to be in community with each other and how that way will reflect our community’s relationship with God. The questions they ask always lead us to think about our own faith and our own lives individually and in relationship with each other. In small groups we have spoken about how we have experienced the promises of the Baptismal Covenant in our lives and in the lives of others.
The confirmation class is also using the Baptismal Covenant as the center of their work in learning about the church and preparing for confirmation. And at the pre-confirmation retreat last weekend Bishop Harris likewise used the Baptismal Covenant. Indeed when we are baptized we take on that covenant as our way of life. In much the same way the Israelites took on their covenant of the law as their way of life to show God that they took seriously their relationship with Him. The Baptismal Covenant is for us the Christian “law” or covenant that seals us as God’s own and calls us to a certain way of being, acting, doing, and serving that follows those tenets of our faith. So, just as the Hebrews had the Levitical Law, our actions in response to keeping the Baptismal Covenant become our response to God for accepting us and calling us to be God’s own.
The experience of worshipping with the Jewish people of Beth Elohim was in a way a homecoming for me. As a teenager I dated a Jewish boy and I used to go to Friday Shabbat services with him and his family. So it felt familiar, except for the incredible cantor who sang the service who was a woman, a beautiful woman, with a beautiful voice! That would not have been possible when I was a teen, any more than I could have dreamed of becoming a priest. She transformed the experience for me. I was there to share the pulpit with Rabbi Lewis Mintz as we compared the holidays of Passover and Easter, and I think it was an enlightening experience for all of us. But as I reflect on it in light of these lessons, I realize even more how much we have in common and how closely our roots are intertwined. This whole idea of covenant seems to me to be an even greater way of saying we are God’s people both of us, that the common threads we found in the spring feasts of Passover and Easter are only the beginning of our common life as God’s people.
We both are a people who say what we do and how we are reflects what we believe and how we claim membership in God’s kingdom, how we are identified as God’s own. As we prayer the prayers from their prayer book, nicely translated from Hebrew for us on the left hand page, I was stunned at how truly appropriate they are for any of us Christians praying them. We know the same God. We are all God’s people.
So what does that say about being God’s own when we listen to the story in the gospel lesson today? Is covenant redefined? Does it exclude the people who do not follow Jesus? I don’t think so, and I am glad I don’t have to be the judge! – for I think this passage was what a good Jewish boy had to say about living the law, the law was about serving others, putting God first, God’s people first, before one’s own life. It was about losing one’s ego and self and certainly one’s sense of one’s own uniqueness, and it is about servant hood – all good Jewish signs of covenant. Jesus was talking about honoring God and in return being recognized by God as God’s own when we do so.
We always know that to be Christian is to live in the paradox of valuing what is not valued in the world – losing our life so we have it to be one of those paradoxes. We live knowing that our very lives are not our own, either in this life or the next, but that we belong to God alone. But when I hear such passages as the one in today’s gospel, I admit to having a bit of fear and trepidation. I do not want to die as Jesus did literally, on a cross, in bitter agony, for the good of someone else, to lose my life in such a way as a follower. And much of the time I am cautious at best about how much of myself I am able or willing to let go of; how much I am willing to “let die,” as I serve others. I know my own desires and life get in the way of my “losing my life so that I may find it.” Further, I am wary about my ability to actually live into the Baptismal Covenant. And I would wager that if you are honest with yourself, you have some fear and trepidation about these things also.
And that is the truth about being human and being God’s own people. We know the paradox. We even believe it. We just can’t always live into it ourselves as individuals. And that is when we get to be reminded that we are not alone; we are all together God’s people. And the day that I am feeling too enamored of my own life, someone else will lose theirs for me and for the rest of the community. And, frankly, vice versa! We are all in this together. Our salvation, our living into the Baptismal Covenant is not an individual prospect! It is a corporate responsibility. We are all in this together. Our covenant is not just with God. It is with each other, and we cannot expect perfect “life losing” from each other every day any more than God expects it from us. But we can as members of a community count on the fact that together we are God’s people.
We are God’s people and my prayer for myself and for you is that losing our life for God’s sake will become easier and easier for us all, that it will make our covenant keeping here and in all that we say and do.
Amen.
The Rev. Dr. Gale Davis Morris
Church of the Good Shepherd