Today's sermon at St. John's
Jul. 27th, 2008 02:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chrishansenhomeJuly 27, 2008 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Sermon delivered at St. John the Evangelist, 10 am.
Readings: I Kings 3:56, 7-12; Ps. 118; Romans 8:28-30; Matthew 13:44-52
In the name of God, the one, the Undivided Trinity. AMEN.
Three priests were walking along a cold, rocky beach in England one day: a vicar, and his two curates. One of the curates stumbled over a bottle washed up on the shore and it broke.
Suddenly a great cloud of mist arose from the remnants of the bottle and a genie formed amid the mist. He looked around, blinked, and said to the three startled priests: “Thank you kindly for releasing me from that bottle in which I’ve ridden the seas for hundreds of years. In gratitude, I’m going to grant you three wishes, one for each of you. What do you wish for?” he asked the first curate.
The curate thought long and hard and said, “I would like to be transported to a Caribbean island where I will be able to lie on the sand, catch up on my reading, and have an endless supply of Pina Coladas for the rest of my days.”
“Done!” cried the genie, and the curate disappeared in a puff of incense. “And what would you like?” said he to the very startled second curate.
This one didn’t think for a moment before saying: “I’d like to go to an island in the South Pacific, where there is nothing but a simple house, lots of coconut palms, and a lovely sandy beach, where I can sit, drink lovely cocktails with umbrellas in them, and live out the rest of my life in peace.”
“Done!” cried the genie again, and the second curate disappeared in a wisp of incense smoke.
The genie turned to the vicar and asked him, “So, Father, what would you like?”
The vicar didn’t hesitate. He said, “I want my two curates back before Mass this Sunday.”
Getting what you wish for isn’t always guaranteed. I suppose that this Solomon might have been the inspiration for the multitude of “genie” stories you hear these days. It wasn’t a genie who appeared to him, it was God.
Solomon didn’t ask for riches, or a long life, or victory against his enemies. He asked for the gift of discernment, and this he got, in great measure.
The gospel, too, is concerned about things that might be considered gifts. But those who find them aren’t totally on the up and up. The person who owns the field owns the treasure that this person has found in it. So instead of going to the owner and saying, “Listen, mate, you’ve got a treasure in that field you own down the road.” he goes and sells everything he has and buys that field, with the owner still ignorant that he’s selling something that he owns but doesn’t know he owns.
The merchant who discovers the pearl of great value doesn’t tip the pearl’s owner off that it’s quite valuable; instead, he goes and sells everything he owns to buy that pearl.
In each of these cases we have something of great value: a gift from God to Solomon, a treasure in a field, and a pearl of great price.
Let’s think of the Pearl of Great Price. As is usual in parables, Jesus rarely tells us exactly what he means in a parable. This is useful for the homilist, as we can take the parable and stretch it this way and that in order to make our point. So, in this parable, I want us to think of the Pearl of Great Price as ourselves.
Our own selves are a gift from God. That gift is something unique, something that only we have, and something that is of inestimable worth to both us and to God.
Do we really and truly value this gift, both in ourselves and in other people? There are as many Pearls of Great Price as there are human beings on Earth. Each one has received that unique gift of life and breath, and each one is valuing it, or not valuing it, in different ways.
I’m sure that we often ask for things in prayer. We ask for health, we ask for success, we ask forgiveness for things we have done wrong. We hope that we get what we ask for.
We don’t always get it, though. We get health, sometimes, we get enough to feed our families and keep a roof over our heads, sometimes. We might even get wisdom, sometimes, although there’s little enough evidence for that in today’s world.
What we must never fail to do, whether we have the pearl of great price, or costume jewelry—wisdom or foolishness, is to give thanks to God for what we get.
The department of Giftgiving in heaven is always busy; the abundance in which we live today gives testimony to that. I’m afraid that the department of Thanksgiving in heaven is very much underworked.
If we truly value and honour those gifts which God has given us, we must not just pay lip service to them, we really must show God that we value them.
One of the two great commandments says, “Love your neighbour as yourself.” Well, that implies that we need to love ourselves as well. Do we always do the best we can in the circumstances we’ve been placed in? Do we use our gift to help other people, or just to help ourselves?
The last question in the gospel today is interesting. After telling them these parables, Jesus asked the crowds: “Have you understood all this?” The crowds answered, “Yes.” He then tells them that every scribe who becomes a disciple of the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who brings out from his storeroom things both new and old.”
Is this some kind of final test of understanding? I am having trouble with it myself, but looking back over this sermon, I find that I’ve dragged out things that are new (like the joke about the genie) and things that are old (like the theme of being thankful for God’s gifts). The commentators think that the scribe mentioned here is Matthew’s way of referring to himself in this passage.
But the Christian faith is constantly renewing itself, and its lessons of love of god and neighbour, with things both new and old. Using the gift of wisdom, let’s listen to those messages, both the new ones, and the old ones, and learn to praise and thank God for his gift of that pearl of great price, ourselves. AMEN.
Sermon delivered at St. John the Evangelist, 10 am.
Readings: I Kings 3:56, 7-12; Ps. 118; Romans 8:28-30; Matthew 13:44-52
In the name of God, the one, the Undivided Trinity. AMEN.
Three priests were walking along a cold, rocky beach in England one day: a vicar, and his two curates. One of the curates stumbled over a bottle washed up on the shore and it broke.
Suddenly a great cloud of mist arose from the remnants of the bottle and a genie formed amid the mist. He looked around, blinked, and said to the three startled priests: “Thank you kindly for releasing me from that bottle in which I’ve ridden the seas for hundreds of years. In gratitude, I’m going to grant you three wishes, one for each of you. What do you wish for?” he asked the first curate.
The curate thought long and hard and said, “I would like to be transported to a Caribbean island where I will be able to lie on the sand, catch up on my reading, and have an endless supply of Pina Coladas for the rest of my days.”
“Done!” cried the genie, and the curate disappeared in a puff of incense. “And what would you like?” said he to the very startled second curate.
This one didn’t think for a moment before saying: “I’d like to go to an island in the South Pacific, where there is nothing but a simple house, lots of coconut palms, and a lovely sandy beach, where I can sit, drink lovely cocktails with umbrellas in them, and live out the rest of my life in peace.”
“Done!” cried the genie again, and the second curate disappeared in a wisp of incense smoke.
The genie turned to the vicar and asked him, “So, Father, what would you like?”
The vicar didn’t hesitate. He said, “I want my two curates back before Mass this Sunday.”
Getting what you wish for isn’t always guaranteed. I suppose that this Solomon might have been the inspiration for the multitude of “genie” stories you hear these days. It wasn’t a genie who appeared to him, it was God.
Solomon didn’t ask for riches, or a long life, or victory against his enemies. He asked for the gift of discernment, and this he got, in great measure.
The gospel, too, is concerned about things that might be considered gifts. But those who find them aren’t totally on the up and up. The person who owns the field owns the treasure that this person has found in it. So instead of going to the owner and saying, “Listen, mate, you’ve got a treasure in that field you own down the road.” he goes and sells everything he has and buys that field, with the owner still ignorant that he’s selling something that he owns but doesn’t know he owns.
The merchant who discovers the pearl of great value doesn’t tip the pearl’s owner off that it’s quite valuable; instead, he goes and sells everything he owns to buy that pearl.
In each of these cases we have something of great value: a gift from God to Solomon, a treasure in a field, and a pearl of great price.
Let’s think of the Pearl of Great Price. As is usual in parables, Jesus rarely tells us exactly what he means in a parable. This is useful for the homilist, as we can take the parable and stretch it this way and that in order to make our point. So, in this parable, I want us to think of the Pearl of Great Price as ourselves.
Our own selves are a gift from God. That gift is something unique, something that only we have, and something that is of inestimable worth to both us and to God.
Do we really and truly value this gift, both in ourselves and in other people? There are as many Pearls of Great Price as there are human beings on Earth. Each one has received that unique gift of life and breath, and each one is valuing it, or not valuing it, in different ways.
I’m sure that we often ask for things in prayer. We ask for health, we ask for success, we ask forgiveness for things we have done wrong. We hope that we get what we ask for.
We don’t always get it, though. We get health, sometimes, we get enough to feed our families and keep a roof over our heads, sometimes. We might even get wisdom, sometimes, although there’s little enough evidence for that in today’s world.
What we must never fail to do, whether we have the pearl of great price, or costume jewelry—wisdom or foolishness, is to give thanks to God for what we get.
The department of Giftgiving in heaven is always busy; the abundance in which we live today gives testimony to that. I’m afraid that the department of Thanksgiving in heaven is very much underworked.
If we truly value and honour those gifts which God has given us, we must not just pay lip service to them, we really must show God that we value them.
One of the two great commandments says, “Love your neighbour as yourself.” Well, that implies that we need to love ourselves as well. Do we always do the best we can in the circumstances we’ve been placed in? Do we use our gift to help other people, or just to help ourselves?
The last question in the gospel today is interesting. After telling them these parables, Jesus asked the crowds: “Have you understood all this?” The crowds answered, “Yes.” He then tells them that every scribe who becomes a disciple of the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who brings out from his storeroom things both new and old.”
Is this some kind of final test of understanding? I am having trouble with it myself, but looking back over this sermon, I find that I’ve dragged out things that are new (like the joke about the genie) and things that are old (like the theme of being thankful for God’s gifts). The commentators think that the scribe mentioned here is Matthew’s way of referring to himself in this passage.
But the Christian faith is constantly renewing itself, and its lessons of love of god and neighbour, with things both new and old. Using the gift of wisdom, let’s listen to those messages, both the new ones, and the old ones, and learn to praise and thank God for his gift of that pearl of great price, ourselves. AMEN.
