Acts 6:1-7
John 14: 1-12
How
peppy are your Alleluia’s?
Anyone
text you “He Is Risen” lately?
Are
there any lilies? Alive ones?
Is
Easter beginning to fade a little?
With
today’s reading’s---It might seem---At first glance
That
the church has forgotten it is Easter
We
have one of the most popular funeral Gospels
“In
my Father’s house there are many mansions…
And
from the Acts of the Apostles
We
have the powerful story of the Stoning of Stephen
the
first Christian Martyr
There
is nothing sentimental about REAL Easter
It
is always rubbing up against the cross.
Easter
sentimentality ---As my dad would say of a salad dinner---
doesn’t
stick to the ribs
Well…the
lectionary gives us---REAL Easter
No
sentimentality here---Easter is about REAL
A
look at the Collect Prayer
Is
always a good place to go to clarify a Sunday theme
And
today it ends this way:
Grant
us so perfectly to know your Son Jesus Christ to be the way, the truth, and the
life,
THAT
WE MAY steadfastly follow his steps
in
the way that leads to eternal life.
So
the theme---The desire ---The goal of this worship
Is
to increase our steadfastness in following
IN
HIS STEPS---Right on through to eternal life!
And
our example is STEPHEN
This
community’s patron Saint
The
first Christian Martyr
Our
example---is a story about how a person
who
has perfected the art of Steadfastly
following in his steps
…
how such a person dies
Anyone
want to leave yet???
The
word Martyr is in fact a Christian word
It
comes from the Greek word for ‘witness’
But
according to church historians
there
are defining characteristics of Christian martyrdom:
-there’s
innocence
--- the victim is innocent
(so
you can’t be a Christian martyr with explosives around your chest)
-there’s
blessing/forgiveness
of ones enemies/executioners
-and
there’s a vision…a vision of God’s Glory
(and
the clue…the evidence…seems to be a palpable sense of peace)
in other
words
martyrs
die like Jesus died
Stephen
is innocent
He
forgives his persecutors
And
he sees the glory of God---it was reflected in his gaze
The
stoners are rushing at him
---but
note that detail
---they
have their fingers in their ears
But
even so…plugged ears and all
Their
other senses haven’t stopped working
That
innocence---That forgiveness---That peace and light
It
penetrates---It sinks in
Plugging
ones ears is a rather lame defense
And
in the story ---En route to the stoning
Their
“coats were laid at the feet of a young man named Saul”
This
is a gesture acknowledging Saul’s leadership
The
next lines read:
“Now
Saul agreed with his being killed.
And
on that day there began a great persecution
Against
the Church in Jerusalem.
…Saul
continued to inflict outrage against the Church.
He
went into one house after another.
He
dragged out both men and women.
He
handed them over to prison.”
If
I remember my high school English
That
is what you call foreshadowing
That
young man Saul
Will
soon (in Chapter 9) fall to the ground on the road to Damascus
That
Saul will become the Apostle Paul
The
greatest Missionary Witness the Church has ever known
Witnesses
to the martyr’s death
To
a death like Jesus’
Are
powerless
They
cannot resist being penetrated to their deepest core
Paul
witnessed
Innocence,
forgiveness, and glory
He
witnessed truth and light
He
couldn’t help but be changed
And
he couldn’t resist becoming a witness
telling
the story…that is what witnesses do
And
then
He
too was martyred
And
the church told his story
and
on and on
down
through the ages
countless
lives lived in the footsteps
…in
the pattern of Jesus
story
upon story
This
is the REAL Easter
The
pattern of dying and rising
I’ll
never forget a story I read a few years ago
It
was in a book by a New York Times Journalist named Danner
It
is a true story… gruesome but powerful
I
won’t give you all the details
It
was 1981
In
the middle of the bloody armed conflict in ElSalvador
I
don’t remember who was on what side
And
it doesn’t really matter for this story
There
was a tiny village called El Mozote
It
had a reputation for being neutral in the civil conflict
One
day Armed militia came to town and massacred everyone
There
was one young woman who was singled out
She
was taken a ways off to a hill outside the village
Fittingly
called la Cruz…the Cross
And
there
With
a handful of torturers
She
was subject to a day’s worth of unspeakable brutality
And
eventual death
The
story goes that all the while
This
young woman sang hymns
She
sang and sang
I
wonder…were her eyes fixed on God’s Glory?
Was
her singing actually powered by God’s Glory?
She
was eventually shot…and she sang still
Shot
again…and she sang still
The
men’s laughter soon turned to fear
How
do we even know this story?
On
that hill
There
was the victim
And
the perpetrators
Who
told the story? How did it get out?
It
is the pattern of Paul
There
is no power
Strong
enough to block
Innocence,
forgiveness, peace and light.
There
is a pattern---Someone always tells
The
truth ---the innocence---The light---The Glory
It
always penetrates
And
it won’t stay unspoken
If
we are getting REAL
We’ll
admit that for most of us
Most
likely…We will not find ourselves
in
the center of a frenzied mob with stones in their hands
or
atop a Salvadoran hill surrounded by blood thirsty death squads
so
one more story…a story closer to home
I met a mystic once
…a rural/southern Indiana/farm-raised/could be you or me…mystic.
The nurse called for the chaplain to visit with Lucy.
I paused at the almost closed door to Lucy’s hospital room,
and overheard the nurse: ‘Now Lucy, let’s put that cover back
over you
…the chaplain is coming.’
Lucy was at least ninety with a head of silken snow-white wavy
hair.
And skin like the surface of my favorite pearls.
She was very weak but mightily intentional.
First she wanted me to read to her from scripture.
I pulled out my trusty little green ‘Pastoral Care of the Sick’
book
and opened it to John 14…the same reading we had today
I went on reading until she asked me to move on to the greeting
cards
I opened them and read them to her…but not just the new
ones.
There was a stack of others from relatives and from neighbors and
friends.
She told me a stories about each sender
All the while Lucy’s right fist never let go of the sheet that so
concerned her nurse.
She grabbed it like my daughter used to grasp her ‘blankie’
As she grabbed she worked the fabric through her fist
Eventually she managed to pull the sheet off
completely.
And there she was, this beautiful woman
a woman of the deepest faith, near death,
and much to the discomfort of her nurse…naked…but for her adult
diaper.
At that moment I caught her staring off to the right…over her
shoulder.
“Lucy, what is it? What has grabbed your
attention?"
Lucy was staring at the crucifix on the wall,
her body a perfect mirror of his.
She turned to me,
and with a forcefulness not residing in her weakened body,
she proclaimed ‘I came into this world exposed and I will leave it
exposed…just like him.’
What kind of life leads a person to that proclamation?
Was there a consistency about the cross-shaped pattern
of her life?
And what does cross-shaped even look like?
I think it is that mixture of great joy and great sacrifice
Joy and sacrifice...isn’t that what brings life to life?
I want to
know
Because
all this makes me wonder
Am
I the subject of such a story?
Am
I, at least sometimes, a carrier of such innocence?
Am
I such a forgiver?
Do
I glimpse the glory of God from time to time
…and
more importantly
does
it show on my face? In my life?
To
celebrate Easter
For
REAL
Asks
something of us
from
each of us individually
and
all of us as a community
We are
asked to take our fingers out of our ears
We are
asked to LEAN IN
LEAN IN
Get within
earshot
Hear the
life giving stories
Share them
And make our
lives one for the telling
So
the Collect prayer
With
a small addendum
Grant us
so perfectly to know your Son Jesus Christ
to be the
way, the truth, and the life,
THAT WE
MAY steadfastly follow his steps
all the
way to eternal life
with
such style and grace that OUR living
And
OUR dying might become a source of nourishment for others.
Amen/Alleluia
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