This, sans the skippable optional insert, was today’s homily for Morning Prayer at St Mary the Virgin Anglican Church, Regina, Saskatchewan…
Jesus
is the first of two words I have for you today—as in Jesus Christ our Lord—The One in whom God’s free gift of eternal life comes to us according to St Paul in today’s reading from Romans (Ro6.23). The only one through whom that gift comes, as it happens. St Peter makes it clear in Acts chapter 4—not one of our readings for today, but to the point—when he wrote
there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men and women by which we must be saved. (Acts4.12)
No other name. No one else, but Jesus only.
Well that’s not very open and inclusive someone might say—and people do. So, George Carey, three Archbishops of Canterbury ago, once wrote that
This is the scandal of particularity with which we must live. Christians cannot yield this un-negotiable element in their faith. We believe that the God of the universe longs to reveal Himself and He does in many different ways and forms, through religion, through reason, art, and human intelligence, but each and every one of these ways is limited. Only in a personal relationship with Jesus Christ can God be fully known, worshipped, and obeyed. (The Most Reverend George Carey, Archbishop of Canterbury, “Archbishop’s Voice,”The Anglican Digest, Pentecost 1992, p63)
Jesus only.
So—more from Archbishop Carey:
Let’s not have any truck with bland theology, that Jesus is just one option among many. Dialogue with other faiths is very important, but I can respect another faith and a believer of that faith by saying I believe that Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation. Do with that truth what you may, but my job is to say that to you.
It’s our job, too, and just as the Archbishop wrote, Jesus, however scandalously particular, must always be the first, the most important, the defining Word on our lips and in the things we do and the places we go. Which leads me to the second word for today.
Optional bit if one wished to make this homily a little longer…
Being too scandalously particular or theologically bland aren’t the only things that can get in the way of us doing our jobs keeping Jesus front and centre. There’s another which thoroughly distorts any believing in, knowing, worshipping, obeying and saying Jesus is the only way of salvation—Sin. Do not let it “exercise dominion” (Ro6.12) over you, writes St Paul in Romans 6, because if you do, your wages will be death (v23)—that’s a pretty scandalously particular statement, too. Instead, “present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from the death to life” (v13) in Jesus. Death or Jesus. Gulp. But it’s the truth. The choices are:
Jesus: The Way, The Truth and The Life (John14.6)
Or
Not: where, instead of the utterly trustworthy, eternal life-bound Way, Truth and LIfe that Jesus brings; there are the dead-ends, lies and death that come from allowing sin’s mortal passions (v12), wickedness (v13), impurity, iniquity (v19) and shame (v21) to have their fatal dominion over us. It really is a matter of life and death. Everyone must choose. It really is as scandalously and particularly simple as that.
So, choose life (Dt30.19-20) and find out how to share the life Jesus brings to the people around you so they can choose it, too.
I remember Kate Berringer, our daughter, telling Emily and Samantha, her daughters, to “Use your words!” when things were tense. Things have been rather tense for us, too, for these last few months what with covid-19, losses and forced isolation. Sin’s dominion makes it worse, so use your words, too. Here’s a good one that goes along with Jesus, the first one. )
The word appears six times in our Gospel reading. It’s closely associated with Jesus. The word is WELCOME (Mt10.40-41, NRSV). Jesus is God’s Word of welcome into the eternal life we read about in Romans this morning. Just as Archbishop Carey wrote, our job as Anglican Christians is to say, in all our words and deeds, in our relationships and consumption, in the way we live, as winsomely as we can, that we believe Jesus is the only way of salvation— welcome! Come on in. Come with us. Taste and see how good He is (Ps34.8). Welcome to the freedom and relief of a forgiven life—in Jesus (Lk1.77). Welcome to the richest, most satisfying, most challenging, fullest abundant life there is—in Jesus (John10.10).
As you live your welcoming life—welcoming Jesus into your own life and welcoming others into His—do it with absolute confidence that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ
always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere (2Cor2.14).
Always. Sweet smelling. Welcoming. Even across the social distances visited upon us these days—perhaps especially across those “distances”—spreading the heady, heart-warming, heavenly fragrance of the knowledge of our unique and scandalously particular Lord and Saviour.
Two words which go together for today. Welcome, and
Jesus.
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