24 May
2009 St. Athanasius Lutheran Church
The
Seventh Sunday of Easter Vienna, VA
“One in Christ”
Text: John 17:11b-19
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, and
from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.
Alleluia!
Christ is risen!
[He is risen indeed! Alleluia!] Alleluia!
This
week we bring the season of Easter to an end. It has been a joyous and glorious
fifty days, remembering the great work of our Saviour
Jesus for us and for our salvation; His extraordinary victory over those great
enemies of ours named sin, death, and the devil. In Jesus, we need fear them no
more. In Jesus, they can harm us none. Next Sunday we will celebrate the great
Feast of Pentecost, when Jesus fulfilled His promise to send the Holy Spirit,
and we begin to consider Jesus’ ongoing work for us. For
His ascension - which we celebrated Wednesday night -
does not mean that He is gone - only that He is now working in a new way.
So how
appropriate to end this Easter season by hearing Jesus pray.
It is a good example for us, and a good reminder that Jesus is always praying
for you - even after His resurrection and ascension. When you forget to pray
for yourself, Jesus is bringing you and your needs before His Father, always
interceding for us - which I know at least for me, is
a very comforting thought.
But the
prayer of Jesus that we hear today is of special importance, because it is His
final prayer before His arrest and crucifixion. And when time is short, you
pray for what matters most. So what is it that Jesus prays? “Holy
Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that
they may be one, even as we are one.” He prays that His
disciples, His children, His Church, may be one. One, even as the Father, Son,
and Holy Spirit are united as one in the Holy Trinity. One,
even as “a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife,
and the two become one flesh.” (Matt 19:5) One,
as the number that cannot be divided. A true and
complete uniting.
But as
we look around at the world today, we see anything but oneness. Sin divides
what God has joined together. Marriages are broken, brother turns against
brother, ancient hostilities and prejudices turn country against country.
Perhaps these could be expected, the result of sin in our world. But most
tragically, we see this hostility and division also in the Church for which
Jesus prays, which has been shattered into literally thousands of
denominations, with fighting within every denomination, within church bodies,
within individual congregations. And if you have not shed tears about this, you
should. For every division hurts the whole church and effects every part of
her, whether you are directly involved or not. In fact, the fighting once got
so bad in the early church that a pagan historian remarked that “no wild beasts were so hostile to men
as were the Christians to one another.”
No
wonder Jesus prays that we may be one. No one knows the sin in
this world and its devastating effects more than He who made this world and
watched us fall. No one knows the destructiveness and depths of sin more than
He who took it all upon Himself on the cross. No one knows the sting of death
more than He who was swallowed up by it, so that He could swallow it up in His
resurrection. No one knows more than Jesus the hurt and pain you feel
because of sin and death, because of division and separation, because of
isolation and loneliness. No one knows more than Him that it is not good for
man to be alone. And so He prays for you. That you may
not be alone. That we may be one.
But how
is that oneness achieved, in the Church? Many
attempts are made today, but all fall short. Agreeing to disagree is not real
oneness, but a false unity. Tolerance is even worse than that, for it
acknowledges differences even while oxymoronically trumpeting unity. And then
there are those who deny that truth exists at all, and that our unity comes in
a common search for the truth - whatever size, shape, and form that search may
look like for each person. Let us shed tears over these developments in the
Church as well.
For all
these paths to oneness suffer a common malady - they are all man-made. And no
man-made unity is true oneness, nor will it last. There is only one unity that
is true and lasting - the oneness accomplished not by human hands, but by the
hands that were both human and divine. The hands once nailed to the
cross. The hands of our Saviour
Jesus. We are one when we are one in Him.
So how
is this accomplished? How are we one in Christ? Jesus mentions two ways in His
prayer - two ways that will not be surprising to you at all. First, He prays: “Holy
Father, keep them in your name . . . that they may be one.” We are united to
God and to one another when the Holy Name of God is put upon us in Holy
Baptism. In those waters is a work not that you do, but the applying of
the death and resurrection of Christ to you. There, Jesus unites you to
Himself, frees you from your slavery to sin, forgives you, and raises you to a
new life in Him. There you are given a new family of faith, and we become
brothers and sisters in Christ. . .
. Now, as with all families, brothers
and sisters sometimes fight - but we dare not lose sight of the unity we have
in Christ. You may not like all your brothers and sisters, but you are still
their keeper, and we need to pray for them, help them, love them, correct them,
admonish them, and encourage them in the truth. Carefully and
patiently, not rashly and harshly. Knowing that as one in Christ, if you
hurt them you are really hurting yourself; and if you help them, you are
helping yourself. And so we are one
when we are one in Christ.
And then
second, Jesus prays: “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.” To sanctify means
to make holy, and we are made holy when we are forgiven. Forgiveness which is not
a feeling, but the objective Word of God pronounced upon you; the verdict that
you are not guilty because of the work of Christ for you; that His death
and resurrection has atoned for your sin and made you right with God. You do
not have to wonder about your standing before God, because the Word of God is
faithful and true and does what it says. For the Word of God is no dead and lifeless
word, a word without power. It is a living and active Word; a Spirit-filled
Word; a Word that became flesh. And so a Word that comes to you, works in you,
and sanctifies you.
And
nowhere is that more evident for us than here at the altar. For here in
the Lord’s
Supper, the Son of God, the Word made flesh, comes to you in truth, and gives
you His body to eat and His blood to drink. Here, the living and active Word
comes and forgives your sin as He gives you Himself. Here, Jesus unites you to
Himself in the closest bond of fellowship, and makes you one with Him and one
with each other. Just as with Baptism, here is a work not that you do,
but that He does. We come here as many grains, each with our own lives,
struggles, hurts, and problems - and are made one loaf in Jesus. One loaf, made
holy by the Holy One.
And so
unity and oneness in the Church comes from the Name and Word of God. But where
these are denied; where we judge the Word instead of the Word judging us -
either wholly or in part - our unity is broken, and in some cases, shattered.
And this is what we see today, as some deny that what God calls sin is really
sin. As some would deny the work and presence of Christ for
us in Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. As some would change the
Name of God and so change who God is and how we think of Him. As some would
belittle our Saviour and claim other ways to
salvation. And there are myriad other examples that could be listed here, of
how God’s Word
is denied among us. A denial which is no small thing, and
rents asunder Christian from Christian, brother from brother.
So what
are we to do? Well first of all: repent. For none
of us is guiltless. It is easy to look at all the false teaching and schism
happening in the Church around the world with a sense of either scorn or pride.
But when you repent, you are not looking at your brother with a
condescending look from above - you are with him in humility, in
brokenness, in need of forgiveness. And we are, together, where we belong -
focused not on ourselves, but on our Saviour. That He
may not only forgive you, but heal the hurt you have caused; unite the
divisions you have abetted; love those you have failed to love. That we may be one in Him.
And then
second, follow Jesus’ example and pray.
Pray that your Father would bring together His Church in oneness through your Saviour and His Spirit. And trust and rejoice that He is! That your prayer is heard and answered, in ways that sometimes we
are privileged to see, and in ways that often remain unknown to us.
But then
also, pray to stand firm in God’s Name and Word, and that those who now deny would come to
know the truth as well. For only in the Name of Jesus and His Word is the
forgiveness, truth, and holiness that we need. And it is through His Word that
your Saviour is working, making us One
in Him. If we lose that, we lose everything. But if we have that, we have
everything, for we have His promise that where His Name is there is He, working
through His Word to bless you and keep you.
And He
is. For just as Jesus
was resolute in setting His face to go to Jerusalem (Luke 9:51) to ascend the cross for you, and nothing could stop
Him - so too is He resolute for you, and for His Church, now. To bless
us and keep us and forgive us, until the last day, when Christ comes as the
Bridegroom, to take home His Bride, the Church, forever. On that day, the
oneness that is now hidden will finally be revealed.
You
know, the devil is constantly tempting us to look at the Church and despair -
at the division, and the scandal; tempting us to think that Jesus’ prayer for oneness went unanswered.
But do not believe it. Christ has not left His Bride, and His love for her and
for you remains undiminished. How our Father answers this prayer, and when,
is not up to us. Only know that He is. For that is His promise to us. His
promise, which is more sure than anything we can see
anyway. For if Christ is risen from the dead, is there
any problem of ours too great for Him?
So let
us trust, and trusting exclaim and rejoice into the face of our adversary one
more time, that Christ is risen! [He is risen indeed! Alleluia!] And truly in Him, we are one.
In the Name of the Father, and of the (+) Son, and of the
Holy Spirit. Amen.
Now the peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen.