Day: February 23, 2014

Sermons

Sermon for Sexagesima, 2:00pm service for Atlantic Mnistry of the Deaf

“But speak the word only”

What wonderful words! Here we see the power of God’s Word which goes forth not only to create but to restore and heal. Here we have a double healing, a healing within Israel and a healing outside of Israel, a healing touch and a healing word, the word tangible and visible, we might say, the word audible and intelligible. Jesus heals the leper by “put[ting] forth his hand and touching him,” touching the untouchable, the leper, and then says, “I will, be thou clean.” Here is the Word and touch of Christ near and at hand. Then, there is the healing of the Centurion’s servant, a healing from afar, by the simple power of the Word spoken and passed on, as it were, down through the ranks of the Roman legion!

It is not that Jesus is unwilling to make house calls. “I will come and heal him,” Jesus said. The Centurion’s response to this captures our attention and, more importantly, Jesus’ attention. The healing power of God in Christ reaches down through the centuries; it is not confined to time and place. Such is the meaning of God and here we see something of the marvel and the wonder of what God ultimately seeks for us. We are healed and restored, defined and dignified by his Word.

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Sermons

Sermon for Sexagesima, 10:30am Morning Prayer

“You are not your own”

Scripture tests our patience. But more often than not, it is about our willingness to hear and not simply our lack of understanding.

Today’s lessons are a case in point. The lesson from Genesis is the story of the blessing of Jacob, a story of deceit really, because Jacob disguises himself as Esau and takes his place, thereby robbing his brother Esau of his birthright, the blessing of the first-born. Jacob uses cunning or guile to obtain what he wants. And yet, Jacob will become Israel by wrestling with an angel, wrestling with God, with whom there can be no deceit. There is, in short, a transformation which takes place. Jacob, the man of guile, becomes Israel, “in whom there is no guile”, as Jesus says about a later Israelite, Nathaniel.

In other words, there is hope for us all! There is the hope of change for the better in our lives, the hope of transformation, the hope for something more than the endless and dreary round of our same-old sins which, if not deadly, at least deaden us to the life-giving reality of God’s Word. In the case of Jacob, God is able to make something good out of the treachery and betrayals of our lives, even out of our own treachery and betrayal.

Genesis can be read as a set of stories about brothers: Cain and Abel, Abraham and Lot, Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau, Joseph and his brothers. Through the various spectacles of sibling rivalry, God forges a people for himself through whom his will for all peoples is proclaimed. But are we willing to listen and attend to these stories?

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Sermons

Sermon for Sexagesima, 8:00am Holy Communion

“If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things which concern mine infirmities”

Storms and sports seem to define our Canadian winter but let’s hope they don’t define our souls!

These three ‘gesima’ Sundays provide us with some important moral lessons that prepare us for the journey of Lent, the journey of the soul to God. They involve the transformation of the classical virtues of temperance, courage, prudence, and justice through the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. This Sunday, Sexagesima Sunday, shows us the virtues of courage and prudence as transformed into love by the love of God.

God’s love seeks the perfection of our humanity. The virtues are the activities of the soul which seek human perfection. But the classical virtues, if left to themselves, can become, as Augustine argues, splendid vices. They are activities for we are not essentially passive creatures defined by what we have or simply by what we receive through our experiences for, then, we are not free. The cardinal virtues teach us something about the character and nature of our souls and the activity of our souls. But the activity seems to be from our side, the side of human seeking, human knowing and doing, as if we could perfect ourselves, as if we could attain to God on the strength and wisdom of our own. Therein lies the problem.

Does that mean that the virtues should be extinguished in us? No. Because, once again, we are not essentially passive beings. There needs to be our engagement with what comes to us; it is not just about what comes from us. That is where the transformation of the virtues by grace comes into play; the virtues become forms of love, forms of our participation in God’s love. Transitional between Epiphany and Lent, these ‘gesima’ Sundays remind us of the love of God manifest in Jesus and indicate how that love is to live in us.

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Events, Month at a Glance

Week at a Glance, 24 February – 2 March

Monday, February 24th, St. Matthias
4:45-5:00pm Conformation Class, Room 206, KES
6:00-7:00pm Brownies/Sparks – Parish Hall
7:00pm Holy Communion – Coronation Room

Tuesday, February 25th
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place
7:00 Christ Church Book Club (rescheduled): 419 by Will Ferguson and The Watch by Joydeep Roy-Bhattacharya

Thursday, February 27th
3:15pm Service at Windsor Elms
6:30-7:30pm Girl Guides – Parish Hall

Sunday, March 2nd, Quinquagesima
8:00am Holy Communion – Parish Hall (followed by Men’s Club Breakfast)
10:30am Holy Communion – Parish Hall

Confirmation Classes: Rm. 206 at KES. The dates are Feb. 24th & March 3rd. Please contact Fr. Curry, 790-6173

Upcoming events:

Tuesday, March 4th
4:30-6:30pm Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper, Parish Hall. $7 (adults), $3.50 (children 12 and under)

Saturday, March 8th
9:00am-4:00pm Lenten Quiet Day, King’s-Edgehill School, on the theme Lent and Original Sin, led by Fr. David Curry, sponsored by the Prayer Book Society of Canada, Nova Scotia and PEI Branch.

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Prayers and liturgy

Sexagesima

Tissot, The SowerThe collect for today, Sexagesima (or the Second Sunday Before Lent) from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O LORD God, who seest that we put not our trust in any thing that we do: Mercifully grant that by thy power we may be defended against all adversity; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: 2 Corinthians 11:21b-31
The Gospel: St. Luke 8:4-15

Artwork: James Tissot, The Sower, 1886-1894. Opaque watercolor over graphite on gray wove paper, Brooklyn Museum.

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