7th Sunday after Trinity 3rd August 2014
Evensong with hymns in The Parish Church of St. James, Louth
Picture of the early Church in Antioch:
- Worship, fasting and praying, laying hands and sending off
- Journey, seeking out the centres of Jewish community
- Meet enquiring pro-consul
- Encounter with false teaching
- Conversion of the pro-consul
- Journey carries on…
- Return to Antioch (14.26) and sharing of the events of their journey
The first part of this story seems to have many parallels to what we now call ‘ordination’ – the setting aside of someone within the body of Christ for a particular role – the service given by a deacon, the recognition of God’s love by the priest, and the oversight exercised by the bishop.
But this is probably reading back on this passage a later understanding of the Church – whilst laying on of hands is now closely associated with ordination, it was earlier a sign of commission – of sending out on someone’s behalf. Later, as its wider use fell away, the laying on of hands became something that is distinctive of ordination – but that is not necessarily what is going on here as Barnabas and Paul are sent on their journey.
The significance of the laying on of hands here is that Paul and Barnabas go out on this journey not just on their own initiative, but with the blessing and the support of the Church in Antioch, a support that is given in the context of worship and prayer – and therefore is seen to reflect the will and love of God.
Paul and Barnabas come together as a part of the Christian community in Antioch. They meet in worship and prayer and hear their calling. God’s blessing is placed on them by the community they are sent from and the go into the world to whatever awaits. Eventually they return, and come back to God in worship – sharing what he has done with those who sent them.
Here we have a pattern for the Christian life – a pattern where those who follow Christ open themselves to God in worship, and listen to him in prayer; a pattern where they then respond to God in service that is offered on God’s behalf (and not to their own glory). This is a powerful pattern that is completed by coming back before God to reflect on his presence in all that they have done, and so start the process again. This is a pattern that is a part of our life day-by-day, week-by-week (or perhaps for some, season-by-season).
So, what are the key features of this pattern of responding to God’s call?
Worship and Prayer, in Christian community
Individual service (but not alone!)
Gathering back together in thanks
We can see this pattern in the ordination of ministers to particular tasks on behalf of the Church:
· Ordinations take place in the context of prayer and worship
· People are ordained by a Bishop not on their own authority but as a representative of the whole body of Christ
· Ministers serve alongside others
But as I said, this pattern is not about ordained ministry. For each of us is called by our Baptism to respond to God’s call on our lives – each of us is given the gift of God’s grace by our baptism, and that is a gift that has the potential both to sustain us on life’s journey and (if we allow its power to touch us) to call us to live lives in response to it. So it is that among the symbols of the baptismal liturgy there is the powerful image of a light that shines into the darkest places. We need little reminder that human ingenuity and blind self-interest can create some dark places on earth – though not all dark places are quite so pitch black as some of those places we see in our newspapers and on our TV screens. By our baptism, the grace of God calls each of us to let the love of God – caritas, or true charity – glow in our hearts, so that it may be reflected in the lives we lead. In the stark terms of Baptism, we are to be lights that shine in the darkest places of the world in which we live.
Now this does not mean that we are called to go to the Middle East and sort out the problems of Mosul, or Gaza, or that we are to make our way to Eastern Europe and sort out the mess of Russo-European relations. There are things far closer to home where we are called to bring light to darkness:
Some may be dramatic, like the homeless and jobless person for whom a food parcel is the first step on a journey to living a sustaining and value-filled life;
or the worried mother-to-be for whom five minutes of a listening ear and willingness to pray led to thanksgiving for a successful birth, the baptism of a child and their marriage.
But not everything need be so dramatic: it may just be arranging for a room to be painted so that it is more welcoming;
it may be helping a child with their spellings;
it could just be visiting the person who hasn’t been at church (or bingo, or Rotary) and showing them that someone cares…
…in so many ways the love that is God can reflect in our lives.
But in tonight’s reading we are given a pattern to help sustain us in this task, and a pattern to challenge us to recognise it (if we challenge each other gently to see God in ourselves):
We are called to gather to worship God and open ourselves to him in prayer
We are called to do this together – not as company of perfect saints, but as imperfect people who strive to be a little more saintly
We are called to send each other out to do God’s work (however trivial that may seem to us)
And then we are called to come back and worship God by sharing what we have done, what we have been and where God has been in that.
And this is not a pattern that we see just in this story from Acts – we find it time and time again as Jesus worships and prays, sends his disciples, and then welcomes them back with fresh stories of God’s presence in their lives.
So let us bring our lives before God in worship, let us listen with open hearts in prayer, let us go from here to seek God in all we do (even the mundane), and then let us come back together to worship, listen and be sent again…
And most of all let us encourage each other as did those saints of old – let us be to each other the Simeon, the Barnabas, the Lucius, the Manaen, the Saul – that we might each become a little more saintly; and the love of God might shine, however dimly, in our hearts and through our lives.