Monday, May 23, 2022

Paul + Lydia + The Holy Spirit*

Paul+Lydia+The Holy Spirit
6-Easter-C



 

In the Parish where Rob and I raised our family

The Easter Season was taken very seriously 

On every Sunday of the Easter Season 

Fr Steve, our pastor, would begin his homily…with 

“Happy Easter Church!”

 

Now this wouldn’t go over very well if there were half dead lilies all over

And we know how notoriously short-lived they are in dark churches;)

So the trick was trying to keep Easter Flowers fresh through the 7 Sundays of Easter. 

And that job was my very first “inside the church” ministry

 

Of course, every Sunday is a celebration of the resurrection

Every Sunday is Easter

But in the Easter season we sharpen our focus 

 

It’s kinda like birthdays

We celebrate the birth of people we love on a particular day

But we are grateful all year long…

We are glad they were born every day…or at least most days;)

but ONE day we set aside ONE day so that we can sing and eat cake and ice cream!

 

The best way that the Church helps us focus comes from the lectionary 

The Gospel selections tell of Jesus making his presence known

He pops in and out of rooms…never mind the locked doors

He sneaks up beside us on the Road

He cooks breakfast on the beach

And for the last three Sundays we are revisiting Jesus’ final words to his disciples… 

…today focusing on the gift of the Advocate…the Holy Spirit…the presence of Christ promised to be with us to teach and remind and give peace

 

And the first readings in Easter all come from the Acts of the Apostles

And many of these first readings tell of the miraculous growth of the early church… 

Myriads and myriads of joyful converts…and miracles too!

But today is different

Today we have the concise but important story of Lydia

 

 

Biblical Scholars usually refer to the gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles as one book: Luke-Acts

Written by the same author 

They mirror each other

Just as in the Gospel, Jesus moves from Galilee to Jerusalem

So, in Acts, Paul moves from Jerusalem to Rome 

The story of Lydia

Placed as it is at the hinge of the story of Acts

Is the pivot point

This is a significant episode

 

Midway through Luke’s gospel

Jesus sets his face toward Jerusalem

And midway through Acts 

Paul gets deliberate about Rome 

 

But Paul is not Jesus.

 

Before today’s happy meeting between Paul and Lydia…

 

Paul had been having his share of trouble

He had some relationship trouble with Barnabas

And then some directional trouble with “where to go next”

In fact

He tried every other compass direction

He tried

And he was blocked

The text says “the holy spirit put up roadblocks”

So here’s the picture in my head:

You know when you are trying to get somewhere new

And you are relying on your google-maps?

Then you make a wrong turn and that little circular crank starts to turn and turn???

Paul goes through that re-routing thing until…finally… 

There are no other options…which is when he has his dream;)

 

Why is Paul reluctant to go west to Philippi?

Well…because it is hard, and dangerous, and…well totally ROMAN!

 

The city of Philippi is a mini-Rome

The people who live there are the children, 

ancestors, or slaves of the original conquering soldiers. 

The natives are long-gone.

The success and vitality of this town is directly related to Rome

 

I bet every one of us would have saved Philippi for last;)

 

 

Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem

It wasn’t going to be easy

 

The Holy Spirit

Finally gets through to Paul

IMAGE: One hand on either cheek…

The Holy Spirit, with one hand firm on each of his cheeks

sets Paul’s face to Philippi and toward Rome

…where the story will end with Paul’s martyrdom

 

He is going.

But even then, Paul can’t escape his unchecked-cultural-assumptions

He sets sail believing that he is journeying to meet the “Macedonian Man” of his dream

 

Instead, just outside the city, he comes upon a group of women

He meets Lydia, a Woman from Thyatira!

Quite simply…NOT a Macedonian man;)

(I love that he gets things so wrong

It makes me feel better about my sometimes-wayward discipleship)

 

The Lord opened Lydia’s heart

And Paul spoke into it

And like those disciples on the road to Emmaus

Lydia “prevailed upon” Paul and Silas and they enjoyed her generous hospitality

 

This is only part 1 of the story…in part 2 Paul and Silas get into trouble in the city

They end up beaten and thrown into prison.

And after a swift conversion of the jailer and his family 

…the section ends with Paul and Silas back at Lydia’s
Back to her comfortable, lively, re-juvenating house-church

 

Lydia signifies something important

In the dramatic story of Acts

With its powerful sermons

And myriads and myriads of conversions

Lydia begins tending to the inside of the growing church

 

 

I am comfortable supposing

That the newbie Christian Church

Didn’t need a Macedonian Man

The Church needed a Lydia

The Church always needs Lydias

 

 

There is a lot going on in the lives of the people of St Stephens

 

1-Young people finishing College and transitioning to an uncertain world of work and Career. Where will I live, what will my work be like, will I have friends?

2-and young people moving on to college from High School

To being away from home…away from the familiar…

For the first time

3-on the flipside there are parents wondering what it will be like after he/she leaves

Will we like having a quiet house?

4- And among us there are many dealing with the slow creep of aging and the debility that often accompanies it

5- And one rests in a hospice bed while her beloved keeps vigil beside 

 

And I’m sure there are more…

 

These…shall we say…transitions

These Philippi experiences…

Where there is plenty of anxiety and fear

lots of questions

And hard to come by answers

Well…wouldn’t having a Lydia nearby make a difference?

 

 

I began with an emphasis on Easter

And an Easter message is always a message of promise and hope and presence

We are an Easter people

And being an Easter people takes us all—Pauls, Silas’, Macedonian men, and Lydias…it takes us all 

 

Some of us here today are coming up against road-blocks

Some of us are in the midst of a little re-routing

And maybe some of us are in a place

To take on the role of Lydia

To step into some inside-the-church ministry of caring

 

Even though I would never say that Church is the only place to rest in the presence of the Holy Spirit

I am comfortable saying that it is a privileged place

Especially here at St Stephen’s

Where both Pauls and Lydias seem to surface when needed

 

 

Each one of us

On this Easter Day

Made our way here

Perhaps some of us made our way in response to God’s love for us

And others did so in search of it

 

And the Easter Word

Gives us Paul and Lydia and the Holy Spirit 

 

 

In the power of the Holy Spirit

Christ is present among us

Helping us to be Christ for each other

 

It starts here…

Or better yet…here is a point on the ongoing pattern of Christian Life

THIS/HERE is both refuge and prompt

 

Paul was nourished and comforted

In the house-church that was Lydia’s home

That pattern continues

It is the Easter Pattern

It is our pattern

 

 

 

 

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