![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Sermon for Christ the King
Nov. 23rd, 2014 10:04 pmMost preachers either preach on this feast without reference to the readings, or preach on the Gospel, talking about various ovine characters. I have preached on the Gospel several times, and I'm tired of it. So I decided to preach on the Epistle. I don't care much for Paul's letters, but there's a lot of interesting meat to pick out of this one.
There’s an old epitaph, seen on a tombstone from the 19th Century:
Remember, friend, as you pass by,
As you are now, so once was I.
As I am now, soon you will be,
Prepare for death, and follow me.
Some wit wrote underneath:
To follow you I’m not content,
Until I know which way you went.
It’s appropriate at the end of the Church’s year to talk about death and the end of time. We’ve just come away from the Feast of All Souls, and now encounter the end of the year, and in a week the beginning of the next as Advent begins.
After Passover in the Jewish calendar comes a festival of the harvest, in which the High Priest would invite all the nation to come to the Temple with some of their harvested grain. At the appointed time, the High Priest would wave a sheaf of grain before the Holy of Holies, and the entire nation would do likewise. These were the first-fruits of their labours over the past year, and each Israelite farmer offered them to the Almighty.
We hear of Christ being raised from the dead as the first-fruits of the entirety of humanity that has gone before him. It seems to me that Paul is creating a vision of humanity as the seeds which create the harvest of souls for heaven, the first-fruits of that harvest being Christ.
We see salvation history as a kind of horticulture or agriculture, clearing the way for the resurrection of Christ from the dead.
If we are part of a harvest of souls begin by Christ, what does that mean for us?
First, it means that death is not the end of life, but a part of the process of living, both now and in eternity. In secular culture and thought, death is The End. Before birth there was no life, and after death there is no life either.
As Christians we believe that death is merely the hinge between earthly and everlasting life. We live with Christ, who blazed a trail out of death into eternal life with God.
Second, it means that death is not necessarily something to be feared. Years ago, before people went to hospitals to die, death took place at home. People would visit the dying to say “Goodbye, farewell!” in the certain hope of not only resurrection, but of meeting them again after their own deaths.
I do make a distinction between fearing the accoutrements of death: pain, suffering, loss of autonomy, and fearing the fact of death itself. People can rightly fear being tied to machinery at the end of life, and the pain that might entail. Our Christian faith makes it difficult to fear death itself.
Death was a constant in life up until recently. My great grandfather Child had three siblings. All of them died before their sixth birthday. Every family had a history of welcoming a new life into the world and, very soon, bidding it farewell as it left the world again.
In these days of pre- and ante-natal care, even babies that were born extremely prematurely can be saved and cared for until they can thrive on their own. There are, of course, still babies who do not survive to adulthood—but it is much less common than it was.
Third, we have lost the knack of dying. There is a skill to it. In days past we learned it at the deathbeds of grandparents, aunts, uncles, and friends. Children were brought to their older relatives’ deathbeds to bid them farewell, Godspeed, into the brightness of eternal life.
In these times, it is relatively rare that an attended death happens in the home. The sick person is brought to the hospital and connected to tubes and wires. Oxygen is provided with a mask or a nasal tube. When children are brought to see Grandpa in the hospital, he looks nothing like the grandpa who used to give them horseback rides or who barbecued in the back garden for the entire family.
We need to make the connections between life, death, and eternal life. Our ancestors made them very easily. We should perhaps try to remake those connections, not only for our own sakes, but for the sakes of our children.
The suffering, death, and resurrection of Christ will be essential tools in remaking those connections. The questions we could ask ourselves today are:
How am I preparing myself for death and eternal life?
Do I believe that I will be brought to life in Christ once death comes to me?
In death, will I be one of those who belongs to Christ, or have I abandoned that position to cling to life here and now?
Therefore to the One who is the King who destroys death, Jesus Christ, be ascribed all might, majesty, dominion, and praise both now and evermore. AMEN.
23rd November, 2014 Feast of Christ the King
Sermon delivered at St. John the Evangelist, 10:30AM.
First Reading: Ezekiel 34:11-12,15-17
2nd Reading: I Corinthians 15:20-26,28
Gospel: Matthew 25:31-46
“Christ has been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of all who have fallen asleep.”
In the name of God, the one, the Undivided Trinity. AMEN.
Sermon delivered at St. John the Evangelist, 10:30AM.
First Reading: Ezekiel 34:11-12,15-17
2nd Reading: I Corinthians 15:20-26,28
Gospel: Matthew 25:31-46
“Christ has been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of all who have fallen asleep.”
In the name of God, the one, the Undivided Trinity. AMEN.
There’s an old epitaph, seen on a tombstone from the 19th Century:
Remember, friend, as you pass by,
As you are now, so once was I.
As I am now, soon you will be,
Prepare for death, and follow me.
Some wit wrote underneath:
To follow you I’m not content,
Until I know which way you went.
It’s appropriate at the end of the Church’s year to talk about death and the end of time. We’ve just come away from the Feast of All Souls, and now encounter the end of the year, and in a week the beginning of the next as Advent begins.
After Passover in the Jewish calendar comes a festival of the harvest, in which the High Priest would invite all the nation to come to the Temple with some of their harvested grain. At the appointed time, the High Priest would wave a sheaf of grain before the Holy of Holies, and the entire nation would do likewise. These were the first-fruits of their labours over the past year, and each Israelite farmer offered them to the Almighty.
We hear of Christ being raised from the dead as the first-fruits of the entirety of humanity that has gone before him. It seems to me that Paul is creating a vision of humanity as the seeds which create the harvest of souls for heaven, the first-fruits of that harvest being Christ.
We see salvation history as a kind of horticulture or agriculture, clearing the way for the resurrection of Christ from the dead.
If we are part of a harvest of souls begin by Christ, what does that mean for us?
First, it means that death is not the end of life, but a part of the process of living, both now and in eternity. In secular culture and thought, death is The End. Before birth there was no life, and after death there is no life either.
As Christians we believe that death is merely the hinge between earthly and everlasting life. We live with Christ, who blazed a trail out of death into eternal life with God.
Second, it means that death is not necessarily something to be feared. Years ago, before people went to hospitals to die, death took place at home. People would visit the dying to say “Goodbye, farewell!” in the certain hope of not only resurrection, but of meeting them again after their own deaths.
I do make a distinction between fearing the accoutrements of death: pain, suffering, loss of autonomy, and fearing the fact of death itself. People can rightly fear being tied to machinery at the end of life, and the pain that might entail. Our Christian faith makes it difficult to fear death itself.
Death was a constant in life up until recently. My great grandfather Child had three siblings. All of them died before their sixth birthday. Every family had a history of welcoming a new life into the world and, very soon, bidding it farewell as it left the world again.
In these days of pre- and ante-natal care, even babies that were born extremely prematurely can be saved and cared for until they can thrive on their own. There are, of course, still babies who do not survive to adulthood—but it is much less common than it was.
Third, we have lost the knack of dying. There is a skill to it. In days past we learned it at the deathbeds of grandparents, aunts, uncles, and friends. Children were brought to their older relatives’ deathbeds to bid them farewell, Godspeed, into the brightness of eternal life.
In these times, it is relatively rare that an attended death happens in the home. The sick person is brought to the hospital and connected to tubes and wires. Oxygen is provided with a mask or a nasal tube. When children are brought to see Grandpa in the hospital, he looks nothing like the grandpa who used to give them horseback rides or who barbecued in the back garden for the entire family.
We need to make the connections between life, death, and eternal life. Our ancestors made them very easily. We should perhaps try to remake those connections, not only for our own sakes, but for the sakes of our children.
The suffering, death, and resurrection of Christ will be essential tools in remaking those connections. The questions we could ask ourselves today are:
How am I preparing myself for death and eternal life?
Do I believe that I will be brought to life in Christ once death comes to me?
In death, will I be one of those who belongs to Christ, or have I abandoned that position to cling to life here and now?
Therefore to the One who is the King who destroys death, Jesus Christ, be ascribed all might, majesty, dominion, and praise both now and evermore. AMEN.
