                           19980922.01

Date: Tue, 22 Sep 1998 13:10:00 -0400
To: Ernst Meyer 
From: Bill Edwards 
Subject: Re: Impromptu theology (1)
Status: RO

Thank you *very* much for this message, and pardon the length of this
response.  Attached please find a copy of the homily that I am giving
tomorrow--I would welcome your reactions.  In the meantime, here is my
favorite poem by C.S. Lewis, that pertains, I think, to the humility and
reality of Christ:

No Beauty we Could Desire (Poems, 124)

Yes, you are always everywhere.  But I,
Hunting in such immeasurable forests,
Could never bring the noble Hart to bay.

The scent was too perplexing for my hounds;
Nowhere sometimes, then again everywhere.
Other scents, too, seemed to them almost the same.

Therefore I turn my back on the unapproachable
Stars and horizons and all musical sounds,
Poetry itself, and the winding stair of thought.

Leaving the forests where you are pursued in vain
--Often a mere white gleam--I turn instead
to the appointed place where you pursue.

Not in Nature, not even in Man, but in one
Particular Man, with a date, so tall, weighing
so much, talking Aramaic, having learned a trade;

Not in all food, not in all bread and wine
(Not I mean, as my littleness requires)
But this wine, this bread...no beauty we could desire.


Cf. also Philippians 2:5-11: "he emptied himself, taking the form of a
servant".  -- Bill
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Year 2 Proper 20 Wednesday
Luke 4:1-13
9/23/98

In today's reading from Luke, Jesus fasts and prays in the desert for forty
days and forty nights, in preparation for His coming ministry.  There is
good precedent for our Lord's doing this.  Moses remains fasting for forty
days and forty nights on Mt. Sinai when he receives the Law, the Torah,
from the God of Israel.  After his victory over the prophets of Baal,
Elijah flees for his life into the wilderness, and also spends forty days
on Mt. Sinai, after which God sends him back to anoint his successor,
Elisha.

So Jesus has just fasted for forty days.  Then Satan, the Adversary comes
along and tempts Jesus ,as we read.  I believe that Satan tries to derail
Jesus and distort Jesus' ministry in three ways.  Satan tempts Jesus to be
any of:

* The Messiah of the Easy Way Out
* The Messiah of Worldly Power
* The Messiah Of  Gaudy Wonder working

I believe that the Church faces analogous temptations as it attempts to
witness to the Gospel and minister to the world.

The Messiah of the Easy Way Out

Satan first tempts Jesus to turn stones into bread.  This is the quick fix
for Jesus' hunger, the easy way out.  Will this be the precedent for Jesus?
Will His ministry consist of offering people the easy way out of their
problems, the quick fix that avoids any cost, any suffering?  Or will Jesus
rather say, "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take
up his cross and follow me." (MK 8:34)?

Similarly, does the Church want to make the Christian way of discipleship
easy by offering cheap grace and easy forgiveness?  Do preachers ever
proclaim that if you are born again, all your problems will disappear?  Do
we ever fall into the trap of sinning that grace may abound?

Grace and forgiveness are free, but they are not cheap and easy.  The
Christian life is not easy.  It is no picnic to struggle with our own
sinful natures.  It is not always easy to decide what is right.
Forgiveness, although it is the core of the Gospel, is extremely difficult.
The Church needs to opt for realism, here, just as Jesus did.  Suffering is
all too real.  But it does "yield the peaceable fruit of righteousness to
all who are trained by it" (Heb 12:11)

The Messiah of Worldly Power

Next, Satan offers Jesus the kingdoms of the world, with only one string
attached, of course, that Jesus pledge allegiance to Satan.  In a way, this
is an easy way out, too.  It would be so easy for Jesus to implement his
program with unbounded political power.

Or would it?  The problem with such power is that it corrupts, as Lord
Acton said.  Such power is bound up with pride and idolatry--worship of
self, and worship of power.  As Titus pointed out two Sunday ago,  such
idolatry is currently operative in Washington.

Unfortunately, the Church has  in certain times and places aligned itself
with the temporal power, and has  been corrupted in those times and places.
Such atrocities as the Crusades and the Inquisition become possible in the
proud and idolatrous atmosphere of power that came about.   We should thank
God, in fact, that the Church, at least in this country, has no temporal
power, and is spared the temptation to use it.

It is too also easy to confuse one's (however meritorious) social and
political goals with the spreading of the reign of God.  This confusion is
not only found among members of the religious right.   As much as the
Church must be prophetically engaged in society, we must also remember that
"here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city which is to come" (Heb
13:14)

The Messiah of Gaudy Wonder working

Lastly, Satan tempts Jesus to be a wonder worker,  and really to test God.
Jesus refuses to do this.  As my commentator says, Jesus believes that
salvation is "rather to be found in the humble and at times sorrowful way
of faith".   Jesus consistently refuses to give signs on demand.  Jesus'
miracles are not demonstrations or proofs of His power or Messiahship.  His
miracles rather are manifestations of the the goodness of a God who desires
that "the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers be cleansed, and
the deaf hear, the dead be raised up, the poor have good news preached to
them" (Lk 7:22).

Jesus' miracles are ministry, and this is what the Church as the Body of
Christ is about.  Again, all of us have ministries, and all of us have
spiritual gifts.   These gifts need not be gifts of miraculous healing or
deliverance, although they could be.

So in closing. let me turn the three temptations on their head:

* The Church is not called to the easy way, but to the true way of discipleship
* The Church is not called to power, but is called to humility
* The Church is not called to wonder working, but to ministry

Amen.


========================
Thank you for letting me read your homily.
I am impressed by its style and its clarity.

It raises for me, - no fault of yours, -
many issues of ecclesiology which I have pondered
over the years, but about which I remain uncertain
and confused, with the result that institutionalized
religion makes me uncomfortable.

If it interests you, perhaps we can talk about this
on Thursday.

Ernst Meyer

                            * * * * *