Rector’s Corner:

Sermon: There and Back Again

the Rev. Mike Wernick                                                                                                                                               May 22, 2022

Year C

Acts 16:9-15

Psalm 67

Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5

John 14:23-29-+

May the
words of my mouth O God…  speak your
truth…

When a
baby is born…  they experience themselves
as indistinguishable from their mother…  they
have no awareness that they’re a separate human being…  especially when they’re looking into their
mother’s eyes…  often while being fed…  and it’s in this mirroring…  that they begin to form a sense of self-worth
and identity…  and as infants develop…  they begin to differentiate…  to gradually become aware of their
separateness…  that’s why I label the
so-called Terrible Twos…  the Terrific
Twos…  because these toddlers are
becoming their own people…  learning to
learn how to set their own boundaries…

When I
was a child…  my father would sometimes
set a boundary for me…  set a limit…  tell me what to do…  or what not to do…  and sometimes I asked “Why… ” and
sometimes he’d explain in ways I could understand…  and sometimes he just said…  Because I said so…  and you’ll be a happier little boy when
you do as I say…  and this guidance
sometimes felt like nothing less than interference… 

And many
of us continue…  into our teenage
years…  resisting this authority…  we don’t want our sense of agency to be
challenged…  but then we sometimes also
want to hold authority accountable for our actions…  for example… 
those in the military can say they were “just following
orders”…  others can say…  well… 
so and so told me to do it…  and
we might remember that famous line from Genesis…  She did give to me and I did eat…

And now…  not only individually but collectively…  we continue to be in a time of transition…  we continue to struggle in many different
ways…  and on many different levels…  figuring out who we ought to listen to…  and what is authoritative in our lives…  who and what to believe…  what’s true… 
and what’s a lie…  figuring out
what serves only a few…  and what serves
the many…  figuring out how to be
neighbors to each other…  and our reading
from Revelation tells us that no one who practices falsehood will be able to be
a part of the beloved community…

But
sometimes…  some of us…  diminish… 
or attack…  or kill our neighbors…  as happened in the recent mass shooting at
the Tops Grocery store in Buffalo, New York… 
because they’ve collectively come to believe the lies of white supremacy…  you see… 
we came to this country looking for liberty…  but brought slavery…  and there are those who want to continue to
believe that they are better than people of color…  and they have chanted…   You Will Not Replace Us…   or Jews Will Not Replace Us…  as demonstrators did several summers ago at
the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia…  and let me be clear…  these are not Gospel values…  and for any of our elected leaders to remain
silent in their aftermath…  or to
minimize their egregious nature…  is to
be complicit in their actions…

Our
Gospel reading today began with v. 23…  but
in v. 22…  Judas…  asks Jesus… 
Lord…  how is it that you will
reveal yourself to us…  and not to the
world…  and in response…  Jesus makes a monumental distinction…  he says… 
my own Peace I give to you…  it’s
not the peace that the world gives…  the
peace that the world gives is temporary… 
inconsistent…  it’s variable…  it’s dependent on changing conditions…  it’s as easily broken as cease-fires are…  it comes and goes as dictators rise and fall…  as individuals or groups vie for power and
control…  or try to make a name for
themselves…  that’s why one of the
Beatitudes says…  Blessed are those who
support God’s Peace…  for they shall be
called God’s Children…  and the Peace
that God gives…  is a peace which passes
understanding…  it transcends human-made
words and phrases…  it comes not from
understanding intellectually…  but from
experiencing that in spite of any external events or lack of them…  that whatever chaos is swirling around us…  we are grounded in the silence of God’s
presence…  that our identity is rooted in
the Ground of Being…  that we remain
unshakable…  because God’s promise is not
place…  but presence…  and God’s face looks like hospitality…

In fact…  Jesus says… 
those who keep my word will be loved by the Father…  and we will make our home with them…  and the Greek word that’s translated as home…  is meno…  but meno also means to abide…  and this verse echoes Ch. 1:14 of John’s
Gospel which says…  And the Word
became flesh and dwelt among us…  
or lived among us…  depending
on which translation you use…  but the
Greek word from which dwelt and lived comes…  also means to abide…  it also means tabernacled…  it also means to pitch a
tent…  And the Word became
flesh and pitched a tent among us… and it makes some sense…  that when a nomadic people pitched a tent…  it meant they were going to be there for a
while…  and what Jesus tells them is a
continuation of what Jesus said to Nicodemus earlier in John’s Gospel about
needing to be born of the Spirit…  Jesus
says…  the Father and I will abide
forever with those who keep not my Word… 
but the Word of him who sent me…  but
the way we’re going to do it…  is that
I’m going to go away…  and send an
Advocate…  the Holy Spirit…  whom the Father will send in my name…  and the Spirit will teach you everything…  and remind you about everything that I have
said…  it sounds to me like God’s Law
written on our hearts…  when intuition
and revelation become as common as common sense… 

Fr. John
Meulendyk wrote…  perhaps we really don’t
understand Spirit…  or more importantly…  how deeply frightened we are of how the
Spirit might move in our lives if we allow her… 
in actuality…  the Spirit exposes
our deepest fears…  and longings…   and
desires…  and at the same time…   opens up a way for us to heal from what
frightens us…  and what frightens us the
most on a spiritual level is the fear that we are alone…  so we become preoccupied with ourselves…  preoccupied with our ideas about ourselves…  our opinions about ourselves…  and preoccupied by what we think other people
think about us…  we cut off our
relationship with God because we think that God couldn’t really accept us just
as we are…  so we try to find affirmation
in another place…  person…   job…   or
even in addiction…  but the Holy Spirit
breaks apart that falsehood…  it’s like a
butter churn where the paddle goes back and forth…  instead of up and down…  and sometimes our lives are like this…  we may take five steps forward and then slide
back three…  and it can be discouraging
until we realize that we’re not moving forward toward perfection…  but are making butter…  and that there’s a qualitative wisdom in this
honest…  humble…  and vulnerable way of walking through our own
life…  when we notice that we’re doing it
in a community of people who are doing the very same thing…

When a
baby is born…  they experience themselves
as indistinguishable from their mother…  and
as they develop…  they begin to
differentiate…  but that’s only the first
half of the story…  the second half of
the story is about our journey towards re-unification… not as Nicodemus
wondered about entering the womb again…  but
so that we can experience the same unity with our heavenly parent that Jesus
experienced…  and then we’ll wonder why
we didn’t let go of the grip we had on our puffed-up sense of autonomy…  in favor of the Spirit’s loving guidance…  that much sooner…  since as my Dad might have said…  we’d have been happier children…  if we had just listened to the Spirit that
much sooner…