Day: July 14, 2013

Sermons

Sermon for the Seventh Sunday after Trinity, Evening Prayer

“Who am I, O Lord, and what is my house, that thou hast brought me thus far?”

The first lesson from The Second Book of Samuel (2 Sam. 7. 1-end) is theologically rich and suggestive. Key to the understanding of it are the various sense of the word “house,” various senses, ultimately, about the meaning of God being with us.

David has observed to Nathan the prophet that “I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of God dwells in a tent.” That image of God tenting among his people in the various journeys and conflicts belonging to conquest and settlement is an intriguing concept. It reaches, we might say, its fullest expression and meaning in the great prologue to John’s Gospel read at Christmas. “The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us” is central to the Christian understanding of the Incarnation. Literally, it means tented among us, thereby picking up on a whole host of Old Testament images about God’s presence with his people and challenging our assumptions about temples and churches. In a way, they are nothing more than the tents of God’s being with us.

David is suggesting to Nathan that there is something wrong about the ark of God – the sign of God’s presence through the tablets of the Law conveyed in the ark or casket – being in a tent rather than a house. He is pointing to the idea of a temple for the ark, a temple to honour God; house as temple. God’s response to Nathan is to identify David desire, “would you build me a house to dwell in (house meaning temple)?” He points out that “I have not dwelt in a house since the day I brought up the people of Israel from Egypt to this day, but I have been moving about in a tent for my dwelling.” Even more, God points out that he has never requested, commanded or suggested the idea that “a house of cedar” should be built for him.

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Sermons

Sermon for the Seventh Sunday after Trinity

“I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now been with me
three days, and have nothing to eat”

Seven loaves of bread and a few small fishes. Compassion is dietary light, it might seem, perhaps a Gwyneth Paltrow special. Yet,  the story of the feeding of the multitude in the wilderness compels our attention. It is actually part of a kind of New Testament conundrum: there is the story of the feeding of the five thousand and the feeding of the four thousand almost juxtaposed, side by side. There are a host of intriguing differences which suggest some sort of larger design and purpose rather than incompetent mediocrity and forgetfulness, as if confused about a single event and how to tell it.

But without getting into the intricacies of comparing the accounts of Mark and Matthew in relation to Luke and John about these double miracles with differing figures – five thousand, four thousand, seven loafs, five loafs, seven baskets left over, twelve baskets left over, to mention a few – what does this story really signify?

I think it is captured in Mark’s succinct phrase. “I have compassion on the multitude,” Jesus says. In a way, these remarkable stories are all about the compassion of Christ, the Son of God, in whom we learn the love of God for our wounded and broken humanity, even more, for our humanity in its disarray, our humanity lost and hungry in the wilderness.

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Prayers and liturgy

The Seventh Sunday After Trinity

The collect for today, The Seventh Sunday after Trinity, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

LORD of all power and might, who art the author and giver of all good things: Graft in our hearts the love of thy Name, increase in us true religion, nourish us with all goodness, and of thy great mercy keep us in the same; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: Romans 6:17-23
The Gospel: St. Mark 8:1-9

Tissot, Miracle of the Loaves and FishesArtwork: James Tissot, The Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes, 1886-96. Watercolour, Brooklyn Museum.

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