St. Aidan's Anglican Church, Kansas City - weekly talks

The Missio Dei, the Mission of God, is an eternal plan being worked out by the Holy Trinity as Holy Church participates in the Holy Spirit. The Father sent the Son to offer himself as the fulfillment of Passover, then to be raised and ascended as King of Heaven, offering his risen body to the Father, the fulfillment of the Day of Atonement. The Father and the Son, then send the Holy Spirit to build and dwell in Holy Church, to complete the Missio Dei until God shall be all in all. Holy Church sends the call to join the Missio Dei. Amen!

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The vision of tongues of fires empowering the apostolic band to proclaim the Gospel to all nations. Questions emerged, such as, what does this mean? What must we do be saved? Peter releases the keys of the Kingdom, opening the door to the sheepfold. Jesus is the door and Peter proclaimed how to enter. Repent, be baptized for the remission of sins and the receiving of the Holy Spirit. This is all one step. Water Baptism is a Pentecostal Sacrament, the first Christian baptism commences on this day, the Promise of the Father is given through repentance and baptism. We respond and God does the rest. Grace upon grace upon grace.

Next week, the Feast of Pentecost, will complete the core of the liturgical year, from Advent to Pentecost, celebrating the birth, life, death, resurrection and ascension of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Today, we celebrate the Ascension (40 days after the Resurrection, last Thursday).

1. We might ask the question, why did Christ come to earth only to beam up again, transitioning from the visible to the invisible.

2. Why did he leave us here seemingly without a visible sign of his finished work on the cross and resurrection? Or did he?

3. Why wouldn’t, after rising from the dead, the risen Lord begin the restoration of all things, on earth as it is in heaven? He, in himself, had conquered death, sin and Satan.

4. Why Ascend into the heavenly realm, the invisible realm of the Spirit, with a promise of his final return … to judge the living and the dead, and inaugurate an everlasting Kingdom?

Fr. Gene Flanery, rector of the Mission of St. Luke in Kansas City, Kansas.

Jesus establishes the identifying mark of his New Community, the Church, his Body, as Costly love, the same kind of love wherein he loves us. This mark is the witness to the world that we are his disciples. All of our vast theological output will never provide this witness; only cruciform love, worked into the lives of his Church, will convince the world that we are his disciples.

Disciples not only hear and believe his Words, but they also assimilate and embody them, they do them by habitual practices, the culture of the Kingdom.

This love is demonstrated on the cross, the laying down of his life, for the life of the world. In like manner, 1 John 3:16 continues that we should lay down our lives for one another. This is how we know what love is, and this is how the world sees Christ in his body.

Father, make us one ... that the world may know that the Father has sent the Son into the world, that the world might be saved through him, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Fourth Sunday of Easter

O God, whose Son Jesus is the good shepherd of your people: Grant that when we hear his voice we may know him who calls us each by name, and follow where he leads; who, with you and the Holy Spirit, lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

We consider our response to the Voice of the Good Shepherd:

1. Listening

2. Knowing

3. Following

John 10:22-30

At that time the festival of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon. So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, "How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly." Jesus answered, "I have told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father's name testify to me; but you do not believe, because you do not belong to my sheep. My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father's hand. The Father and I are one."

Revelation 7:9-17

After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands. They cried out in a loud voice, saying, "Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!" And all the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, singing, "Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen." Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, "Who are these, robed in white, and where have they come from?" I said to him, "Sir, you are the one that knows." Then he said to me, "These are they who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. For this reason they are before the throne of God, and worship him day and night within his temple, and the one who is seated on the throne will shelter them. They will hunger no more, and thirst no more; the sun will not strike them, nor any scorching heat; for the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."

John 21 - The risen Christ appears a third time to the disciples.

Third Sunday of Easter

O God, whose blessed Son made himself known to his disciples in the breaking of bread: Open the eyes of our faith, that we may behold him in all his redeeming work; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen

The Apostle's Creed mentions that Christ, upon his death, descended to the dead, and the first letter of Peter reveals upon Christ's descent, he preached to the rebellious spirits in prison (Hades, Sheol), the very first Easter homily! We consider the impact of the three days laid in the tomb and what was happening in the realm of the Spirit and the realm of the dead. Christus Victor!

(In saying, “He ascended,” what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth? He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.) Eph. 4:9-10

For Christ also suffered[b] once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, in which[c] he went and proclaimed[d] to the spirits in prison, because[e] they formerly did not obey, when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. I Peter 3:18-20

The Easter Homily of St. John Chrysostom (4th C. AD) read by Bill Baldwin at the Great Vigil of Easter, 2019.

Two short reflections on the cross from St. John Chrysostom (4th C.) and Theodore of Studite (759-826 A.D.)