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

Christ became like us, one of us, a human being, so that we could become like Him, fully human, fully alive. The Word became flesh so that He could become flesh in us ... Christ in you, the hope of Glory (Col. 1:27).

Because we are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father (Gal. 4:6). God is at work in you both the will and to do according to his good pleasure (Phil. 2:13).

The Grace of God has appeared in person! Titus 2:11-14 says,

"11 For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. 12 It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, 13 while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, 14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good."

Grace begets holiness, freedom from controlling habits, and intimacy with the Father. This is our salvation. Grace empowers us to become Christlike as is the Father. The world hungers for transformation without Christ. Every New Year's Eve we take another stab at transformation. It never works. But the Good News is that the Grace of God has appeared! The Word has become flesh in order to enter our world, our lives and transformation us (save us) from the inside-out.

This transformation mirrors the divine Logos, now enfleshed. He enters our lives to restore our mental, verbal and volitional capacity - in thought, word and deed. As it was in the beginning, the divine Word conceived his good creation and spoke it into existence. Throughout salvation history, he not only imagined his creation, and thus spoke, he also acted with his mighty deeds, and delived his people in numerous ways.

As the Word, Christ, becomes flesh in us, we are transformed in thought, word and deed. We are transformed by the renewing of our minds (Rom. 12:1f.). In Christ, our thoughts precede words which release power. The effect of our words are witnessed by others. The tone and intent of our words are creative, effecting good and bad fruit. Our words in alignment with Truth accompany the presence of the Kingdom, the eternal realm of life. Our deeds become the good works prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them (Eph. 2).

Icon by Ivanka Demchuk, Ukraine

Happy New Creation!

Fr. Michael

Luke 1:39-55, Advent 4, Year C: Homily

Today is the beginning of our salvation; today the mystery hidden from all eternity is revealed. This happens when Gabriel proclaims the Good News to Mary, and when she, in turn, says, “Let it be!” When this happens, the eternal Son of God, the Word, becomes the Son of Man, the Word made flesh.

The Prologue of John’s Gospel makes plain what Gabriel is doing in Luke. John takes us back to the first creation and tells us that the Son, the second person of the Trinity, the divine Word, is the agent of creation. Through him, all things were made.

This is the One coming into the world. This is the One spoke the world into existence; and now, Gabriel is carrying out the same means. Gabriel speaks a divine Word and Mary responds with the same phrase, “Let it be, … according to your word.”

Who is this woman? In this divine moment, Mary becomes the spouse of the Holy Spirit by her open posture, using the same words in the creation account in Genesis, let it be. As God the Word spoke all things into existence, now New Creation begins in the virginal conception of Jesus Christ, the True Savior and King of the Cosmos, in his risen body is New Creation. In this moment, God becomes a Zygote, an embryo … In Mary’s womb, behold, God, the fetus.

Who is this woman? St. Augustine says, “Him whom the heavens cannot contain the womb of one woman bore. She ruled our Ruler, she carried him in we are, she gave milk to our Bread.”

Mary’s “let it be to me according to your word” reverses Eve’s “let it be to me according to my will, my desires, my way.” In this way, in the economy of our salvation, Mary becomes the New Eve, bringing forth the New Adam, who would restore his fallen creation, from death to life, eternal.

She offers a doxological proclamation so important to the early Christians that it is sung every day at Vespers in the West and at Matins in the East. And, it remains so. Our Daily Morning and Evening Prayer contains the Song of Mary, honoring both the Eastern and the Western tradition. The canticle, or song is a lesson in the art of worship. The crafting of this liturgical song is based on quotes, illusions and echoes of Scripture, interpreted through a Christological lens, pointing to Christ. Mary is riffing on multiple OT echoes and illusions, the song of Hannah, etc. "My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my savior."

The Collect of the Day

Third Sunday of Advent Collect:

Stir up your power, O Lord, and with great might come among us; and, because we are sorely hindered by our sins, let your bountiful grace and mercy speedily help and deliver us; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory, now and for ever. Amen.

The Word of the Lord came to John, a voice crying in the wilderness. John is the voice and Jesus is the Word. The whole theme of the second Sunday of Advent is Repentance and Transformation, a call to make straight paths for the Lord.

In listening prayer, we learn to discern and level the mountains of pride and build up the lowly places, the valleys of despair and discouragement. We're getting ready for all flesh to see the salvation of God. People get ready, Jesus is coming.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells his disciples to be vigilant. It sets the tone for today, the first Sunday of Advent, the great liturgical season of vigilance, of waiting and watching in Word and Prayer.

Vigilance describes the action or state of keeping careful watch for possible danger or difficulties. It comes from the word vigil, a period of keeping awake during the time usually spent asleep, especially to keep watch or pray, such as the Great Vigil of Easter. The eve, the evening before a feast day, is called a vigil, such as Christmas Eve. The secular calendar considers Christmas Eve as merely the day before Christmas whereas the liturgical calendar considers it a vigil, a call to keep awake throughout the night, in worship and prayer.

To be vigilant is a posture of alertness, to be awake when others may, culturally or spiritually speaking, are asleep (let the hearer understand). The season of Advent calls us to wake up from any area of our lives given over to deadening practices and attitudes, as today’s collect provides,

"Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light, now in the time of this mortal life in which your Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious majesty to judge both the living and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal …

Head the wisdom of this call to awake to deeper levels of discernment, illumination, to hear and apply the words of Jesus in today’s Gospel:

Luke 21:34 f.

"Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day does not catch you unexpectedly, like a trap. For it will come upon all who live on the face of the whole earth.

Be alert at all times, praying that you may have the strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand before the Son of Man."

What will you do during this season of Advent? How might you pursue more transformation? Jesus recommends slowing down from the anxieties of life and the means of numbing them …

Set aside a time to sit silently in the Lord’s presence, offering him your burdens, your life’s challenges, to watch and wait on the Lord …

Lord, I’m waiting on you to help me, to strengthen me. They that wait on the Lord will gain new strength … a new way out of weariness and sleepiness. Throughout Advent, be attentive to his movement in your life.

In your time before the Lord, ask him to intensify his presence, for your heart to expand, to receive the gifts he wants to give … every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father of lights … ask, seek, knock, it shall be given, found and opened.

Today’s New Testament reading is a huge priestly blessing:

I Thess. 3:9-13

How can we thank God enough for you in return for all the joy that we feel before our God because of you? Night and day we pray most earnestly that we may see you face to face and restore whatever is lacking in your faith. Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus direct our way to you. And may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, just as we abound in love for you. And may he so strengthen your hearts in holiness that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints. AMEN!

Sermon Notes: Daniel 12; Hebrews 10; Mark 13:11f.

Today we enter back into the lectionary readings in preparation for Advent, a four-week journey of retracing our steps with the people of God across time and space. In this season, we celebrate the breaking down of the walls of division between Jew and Gentile and affirm that we as gentiles have been graciously and wondrously GRAFTED into the vine, brought out of Egypt, to fill the land (Ps 80:8), the whole earth, with the transforming presence of the Kingdom of God, on earth as it is in heaven.

The tone is apocalyptic, the same tone we hear in the first Sunday of Advent as we contemplate the end of the world as we know it.

The term 'apocalyptic is taken from the Greek word, found in Revelation 1:1, that means a 'revelation, an 'unveiling or 'uncovering. It is currently used to classify a group of writings prominent in the biblical world between 200 b.c. and 100 a.d. 'a genre of literature illustrated in our Old Testament reading, the book of Daniel and alluded to by Jesus in the Gospel, Mark 13.

Key elements of this literature include:

• the great cosmic crisis,

• resistance against God’s ultimate plan (war),

• dark, spiritual forces behind social structures & institutions and their ultimate disarming.

• The resolution of crisis and how to live and perceive reality while awaiting the final collapse of the tension between the already and the not-yet of God’s Kingdom, the final consummation and renewal of all things.

Today’s Gospel reading – Mark 13

The grandeur of Herod’s Temple – an architectural wonder – the disciple’s sense of awe meets Jesus' prophetic declaration of destruction.

Today’s passage: abomination of desolation – referring to a recapitulation of a former vile act of Antiochus IV Epiphanes (God Manifest), a Seleucid ruler in the 2nd Century B.C. One of many Antichrists that would emerge.

2 Maccabees 6:1–11 - Jesus alludes to this incident.

Jesus is warning of a repeat … pointing to 70 A.D. when Titus and the Roman Army would destroy the city of Jerusalem and its Temple.

You can read about it in the writings of Josephus …

This was the end of the world … the sacking of Jerusalem and the Temple, putting an end to the sacrificial system and dispersing the Jewish people throughout the nations.

What relevance does this have with us today?

Anyone keeping up with the news this year alone might be somewhat fatigued by the repetitive trauma caused by wind, water and fire.

Currently, the ACNA website has a call to assist in three major disasters:

Hurricane Florence & Michael … now old news … while the California fires still rag with over 100 people still missing, over 300,000 misplaced. For many, this seems like the end of their world and for those caught in the fire, it was their end.

Keep watch, says Jesus … against false teaching, natural disasters, persecutions …

This is all very relevant for us. False teaching abounds … and for many of our Anglican and Christian brothers and sisters, persecution is at an all time level …

For us? The good life might be our plight.

The opposite temptation to stagnate, to become cynical, narcissistic, to conclude that nothing is really happening …

Luke 21:19 – In patience, possess your souls

Hebrews 10:31-39 - keeping confident endurance

Psalm 46 - Be still and know that I am God ... in the midst of everything shaking!

Foundations of Christian virtue are offered by Jesus, to be patient. To be still and know that God IS GOD.

Icon by Ivanka Demchuk, Ukrainian Iconographer and modern artist.

In 325 AD, bishops, priests and deacons came from east and west to form the first of seven ecumenical councils, the Council of Nicaea, to meet around the specific need to discipline the false teaching of Arius, an extremely popular Priest, who insisted that Christ was a created being, not homousious – of the same eternal being with the Father (homoiousious - of a similar being). Though a presbyter, his influence was akin to a modern day “super-apostle”, for a majority network of churches gathered around his teaching.

And he was extremely charismatic … incorporating this new revelation about Jesus and the Church; he also was a composer, creating loads of new worship material … applying much of his thinking into song with lyrics such as there was a time when he was not. For Arius, the pre-incarnate LOGOS was semidivine, created not eternally begotten, of one being with the Father. Let's go with John 1 and put Arius to rest: In the beginning was the Word (Logos) and the Word was with God and the Word WAS GOD.

So, in this case, the phrase in the Creed, one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church isn’t addressing the function of apostles today nor does it refer to independent, apostolic networks. On the contrary, the Creed aims to locate the Church within the historic succession of apostolic faith and teaching, handed down from Jesus to the original apostles, sent forth into all nations. The first generation apostles passed on the faith and ordained bishops (Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp, Clement, for example) to plant churches (bishop, priest, deacons) throughout their regional spheres. This is, one might say, the sacramental, organizational makeup of the Church for the first 1500 years, and continues in the Church of the Great Tradition.

Apostolic:

Apostolic faith echoes the letter of Jude v. 3 -

"... to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints." Nothing novel, creative or added to the apostolic tradition.

It reaches back to I John 1:1-5 ... read

This is what Paul in Ephesians 2:19-22 and chapter 4 is addressing … read

We are being built up as a supernatural, world-wide, heaven-wide, redeemed household of faith, filled with the Spirit of adoption, called to do the greater things in the power of the Spirit

Apostle – literally means “one who is sent”.

Before we think of the original twelve men Jesus chose, we should remember that Jesus is THE Apostle:

“Therefore, holy brothers, you who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession,” Hebrews 3:1.

(Also, Jesus is called in I Peter 2:25: “the Shepherd & Bishop of your souls.” Jesus is your inner pastor and your inner bishop!

The original twelve apostles derived their authority and formation from THE Apostle, Jesus. And Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession, continues to accompany his sent ones today. Luke describes it like this in Acts 1:1:

“In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach.”

Jesus continues to do and teach through his one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. So the Greek word apostle is used to describe the original 12, another group of 70, plus Matthias and Paul — and then 11 others.

As the first generation New Testament apostles passed away, successors to the apostles, called bishops (episcopoi) carried on the work of overseeing a province or a diocese of sorts.

This is where current apostolic movements diverge and move right from the NT to their current situation, bypassing historical continuity.

But Jesus is a historical figure and commissioned 12 apostles to disciple the nations, multiplying his life through sowing the seeds of the gospel. Through faith and grace, we are in this continuity made possible by the Holy Spirit animating the earthly body of Christ, the Church Jesus is building.

Icon by Ivanka Demchuk, Ukrainian Iconographer and modern artist.

The word catholic was first used by St. Ignatius of Antioch in the 2nd C. as an adjective to describe the multiple Christian congregations, all professing and practicing the same faith as handed down from the Apostles, recognizable from city to city, province to province and continent to continent. Each congregation had the same hierarchical structure (bishop, presbyter, deacon) and practiced the same sacraments and believed the same essential doctrines – one body and one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all. He calls this phenomenon the catholic Church.

You can read his letters, written around 107, in the collection called the Apostolic Fathers. Ignatius [fire bearer] was the 3rd Bishop of Antioch in the Roman province of Syria, a successor of Peter.

As Anglicans, our understanding of the word catholic reaches back to St. Ignatius. Western Christians were not called Roman Catholics the first 1000 years. This is why we say we are catholic but not Roman. So, what do we make of this word as an adjective?

Catholic literally means “according to the whole.” It is most commonly described as meaning universal.

Ben Myers describes catholic as follows:

1. The Church is catholic because it is a microcosm of a new universal human society – new creation.

2. The Church is catholic because it proclaims a catholic, a universal message.

3. The Church is catholic because the Gospel addresses the universal, human condition.

4. The Church is catholic because it bridges the greatest, universal barrier of all, death.

Icon by Ivanka Demchuk, Ukrainian Iconographer and modern artist.

The Collect of the Day: Proper 25

Almighty and everlasting God, increase in us the gifts of faith, hope, and charity; and, that we may obtain what you promise, make us love what you command; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen

Isaiah 59:(1-4)9-19

( See, the LORD's hand is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear. Rather, your iniquities have been barriers between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear. For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, your tongue mutters wickedness. No one brings suit justly, no one goes to law honestly; they rely on empty pleas, they speak lies, conceiving mischief and begetting iniquity. ) Therefore justice is far from us, and righteousness does not reach us; we wait for light, and lo! there is darkness; and for brightness, but we walk in gloom. We grope like the blind along a wall, groping like those who have no eyes; we stumble at noon as in the twilight, among the vigorous as though we were dead. We all growl like bears; like doves we moan mournfully. We wait for justice, but there is none; for salvation, but it is far from us. For our transgressions before you are many, and our sins testify against us. Our transgressions indeed are with us, and we know our iniquities: transgressing, and denying the LORD, and turning away from following our God, talking oppression and revolt, conceiving lying words and uttering them from the heart. Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands at a distance; for truth stumbles in the public square, and uprightness cannot enter. Truth is lacking, and whoever turns from evil is despoiled. The Lord will punish and redeem The LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no justice. He saw that there was no one, and was appalled that there was no one to intervene; so his own arm brought him victory, and his righteousness upheld him. He put on righteousness like a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head; he put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and wrapped himself in fury as in a mantle. According to their deeds, so will he repay; wrath to his adversaries, requital to his enemies; to the coastlands he will render requital. So those in the west shall fear the name of the LORD, and those in the east, his glory; for he will come like a pent-up stream that the wind of the LORD drives on.

Mark 10:46-52

They came to Jericho. As he and his disciples and a large crowd were leaving Jericho, Bartimaeus son of Timaeus, a blind beggar, was sitting by the roadside. When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout out and say, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!" Many sternly ordered him to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, "Son of David, have mercy on me!" Jesus stood still and said, "Call him here." And they called the blind man, saying to him, "Take heart; get up, he is calling you." So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus. Then Jesus said to him, "What do you want me to do for you?" The blind man said to him, "My teacher, let me see again." Jesus said to him, "Go; your faith has made you well." Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way.

Part 2 of the Four Marks of the Church in the Nicene Creed discusses how the Church is holy. The key passages used are I Peter 1:13-2:10 sounding a call to holiness out of our powerful baptismal identity as a kingdom of priests. The Church is holy because God is holy and the Holy One indwells his people. Out of this gift of God's holy presence, we are called to conduct our lives in holiness ... to reflect God's Holy Kingdom.

The Church not only is called to pursue holiness, but to be a sanctifying agent in the world, in worship and witness.

Icon by Ivanka Demchuk, Ukrainian Iconographer and modern artist.