Day: February 24, 2017

Sermons

Sermon for the Feast of St. Matthias

“I am the vine, ye are the branches”

“I am the vine,” Jesus says, “ye are the branches.” It is one of the greatest of the so-called “I am” sayings of Jesus with predicates – metaphors which have to do with God’s relation to us through the divine self-relation. In this case, the metaphor is that of the vine and the branches that belong to the idea of indwelling, our dwelling in God and God in us. As one of the “I am” sayings it points us to the divine revelation of God to Moses through the Burning Bush, “I am who I am.” It is a strong endorsement of the essential divinity of Christ and a powerful image about our life in and with God sacramentally. It is significant that this is the Gospel chosen for the commemoration of St. Matthias.

Why? Because of the interrelation of the two concepts of substitution and indwelling or incorporation into the body of Christ. Matthias is the disciple chosen by lot and by prayer to take the place of the traitor Judas. As the Collect reminds us, we cannot think about Matthias without recalling Judas’ betrayal. He is chosen to take Judas’ place not as a betrayer but as a faithful apostle. He is chosen to be an essential part of the apostolic fellowship which lives and can only live from Christ. The imagery of vine and branches is something organic and dynamic. The life-blood of the Church as the body of Christ is Christ’s life in us sacramentally.

The Gospel and the Lesson are most instructive. The Lesson from Acts focuses on the act of choosing, implicitly confirming the origins of ecclesiastical polity but as based upon a theological insight. What is that insight? The form of our indwelling God through the Word made flesh and the way in which that truth is made known to us.

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Prayers and liturgy

Saint Matthias the Apostle

The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Matthias the Apostle, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O ALMIGHTY God, who into the place of the traitor Judas didst choose thy faithful servant Matthias to be of the number of the twelve Apostles: Grant that thy Church, being alway preserved from false Apostles, may be ordered and guided by faithful and true pastors; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Lesson: Acts 1:15-26
The Gospel: St. John 15:1-11

St. Matthias Abbey, statue of St. MatthiasThe name of this saint is probably an abbreviation of Mattathias, meaning “gift of Yahweh”.

Matthias was chosen to replace Judas Iscariot after Judas had betrayed Jesus and then committed suicide. In the time between Christ’s Ascension and Pentecost, the small band of disciples, numbering about 120, gathered together and Peter spoke of the necessity of selecting a twelfth apostle to replace Judas. Peter enunciated two criteria for the office of apostle: He must have been a follower of Jesus from the Baptism to the Ascension, and he must be a witness to the resurrected Lord. This meant that he had to be able to proclaim Jesus as Lord from first-hand personal experience. Two of the brothers were found to fulfill these qualifications: Matthias and Joseph called Barsabbas also called the Just. Matthias was chosen by lot. Neither of these two men is referred to by name in the four Gospels, although several early church witnesses, including Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius of Caesarea, report that Matthias was one of the seventy-two disciples.

Like the other apostles and disciples, St. Matthias received the gift of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Since he is not mentioned later in the New Testament, nothing else is known for certain about his activities. He is said to have preached in Judaea for some time and then traveled elsewhere. Various contradictory stories about his apostolate have existed since early in church history. The tradition held by the Greek Church is that he went to Cappadocia and the area near the Caspian Sea where he was crucified at Colchis. Some also say he went to Ethiopia before Cappadocia. Another tradition holds that he was stoned to death and then beheaded at Jerusalem.

The Empress St Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, is said to have brought St Matthias’s relics to Rome c. 324, some of which were moved to the Benedictine Abbey of St Matthias, Trier, Germany, in the 11th century.

Artwork: Statue of St. Matthias, St. Matthias Abbey, Trier, Germany.

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