6th Sunday of Easter: Cycle A 22-23
Sixth Sunday of Easter
Acts 8:5-8, 14-17 | 1 Peter 3:15-18 | John 14:15-21
Grant, almighty God, that we may celebrate with heartfelt devotion these days of joy, which we keep in honor of the risen Lord and that what we relive in remembrance we may always hold to in what we do. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God forever and ever, amen.
This sixth Sunday of Easter is, in a way, the end of the teachings that started in the beginning of Lent when we saw Jesus entering into the world and getting ready to deal with the task that he had been asked to achieve by God. He was tempted and tested, and he proved that he had something in him that was going to enable him to be focused and to do what he was called to do. Next Sunday we celebrate his return, ascension to his Father. So what I love about the opening prayer of this liturgy is the beautiful way in which it describes what the scriptures are. I don’t know what life would be like without scripture. How would we know who we are or what we’re here for? And that beautiful image of we are reliving it as we remember it, what does that mean? If you remember a story and you’re reliving it, then it must mean the story that you’re talking about is your life. It’s who you are, why you’re here. People ask all the time, “What’s the truth? What’s true?” Well, the truth is this story. I don't know what we’d do without the Bible, without scripture. Religion is obviously grounded in it, and Christianity and Islam and Judaism all, basically, are founded on the story of Abraham, the beginning of this incredible revelation of God to his people. So it’s so important that you and I, if we’re going to be people of the truth, know the story, because whatever story is in us is the story we’re going to live.
I want to go back to sort of the essence of this story with you. The basic story begins with the whole notion, or let’s just say, it begins with a very strong theme of evolution. Human beings are engaged in a work, a life, and if it’s true, they will be on ⎯ what I see so much, when Jesus describes himself, since he is the truth, it is a way of life. Jesus says, “I am the truth, the way and the life.” I think what he’s saying is there is a truthful ⎯ there’s a truth, a way to live life here on this earth so that it is what is intended to be for you ⎯ for you and for your continual life after this life. And to turn that into a test of whether or not we obey the commandments of God just is to ruin the whole thing. You have to look at the whole story, the big story, and what it really does reveal is that we have been created, this earth has been created by God. Maybe three and a half billion years ago, a bacteria started forming in some warm water, and the genius of God is that that very thing that happened at that moment slowly evolved into the world as we know it. To believe that that’s the way God works is not to fly in the face of a denial of his power by saying he didn’t make people out of clay and then breathe life into them. That is another ⎯ it’s the same story. He created this, but I love the evolutionary theory, because it underscores who we are in this world and why we’re here. We’re here to evolve, to change, to grow.
So it’s interesting that, when God created the world, he also created angels, and that’s a big part of the story that often is not really paid attention to. Why is it important to talk about angels? Because they are beings with power, and God created them. And the story is that he explained to them one day that his plan was to create, out of this little bacteria, this thing that would grow and change and develop over millions of years, and it would become like the angels. The animal would become like them, and God would take that beautiful evolution of animals into humans. He would take it and guide it and lift it up to where it would be just a little less than the angels and join the angels forever. And Lucifer, the greatest of the angels, the thought of people less than him being a part of his life, he just couldn’t handle it, and he said, “I don’t like this plan. I’m opposed to it.” And if you don’t believe that, then you don’t believe in evil. You don’t believe that there’s a power out there that doesn’t want God to accomplish the task of inviting us into a process where together we complete our evolutionary cycle. That’s what this world is about, completing the work of our own particular path of growth and evolution to a higher level of likeness to God, and isn’t it interesting? Jesus created us, but then he did something that’s really very special. He didn’t ask trees if they wanted to be created. He didn’t ask angels, I don’t think, if they wanted to be created. They didn’t exist, but he’s asking us to participate in the way in which he has planned for us to grow. And we’re against another force. “Don’t grow. Stay in a lower level of consciousness. Stay in that more animalistic form of wanting nothing but the world to serve you.” And God is going to bring us out of that, but I think ⎯ and this makes sense. He said, “I want you to be a part of your own evolution. I want you to feel that you have had a hand in what you end up being.” It’s an amazing gift and a responsibility, but what dignity that is to give us that. And that’s one of the ways to experience this time on this planet.
The average age right now in this country is about 79 years you’ve got on this planet, and what are we here for? To evolve just like the entire New Testament/Old Testament story. Watch as God slowly evolved, who he is in our life, so that when we get to the fullness, which is where we are now, that he’s telling us the most mystical, wonderful things. He’s saying, “Look, I’ve come into the world to tell you something about your humanity. It is so potentially close to who you should be, and I will enter into you. I’m not going to tell you how to do it. I’m going to partner with you.” When Jesus is leaving his disciples, it’s like he’s leaving a time when we saw and experienced something that made it clear, God’s plan, and he’s saying to them, “Look, I’m not leaving you. I’ve come to establish a relationship with you, and I’m going to continue it with every single human being that comes into the world. I’ll be with them, and we’ll slowly, together, work on their own evolution. And as we grow and change, at the end, you will know that you too were part of what you are.” That’s what human beings want.
When you look at the story of Adam and Eve, they were given a garden, and he said, “Just tend it.” And Adam and Eve said, “Well, I want my own garden.” And that’s what they did. They said, “I want to be more like God, and I want to create. I’ve got a creative spirit. I’ve got a desire to figure things out. I want to build things.” And so God said, “Okay.” But the interesting thing about that moment in Genesis, it’s really about the moment when human beings were at a point where they were able to become their own guide. And what was it that they discovered at that moment? Well, they were told not to do something, and they did it anyway, which is not something that would be a big deal to somebody with their low, low level of consciousness. No, they felt something. They felt shame. That’s the issue. At that moment, when God entered into them, they had evolved enough, their brain was enough developed that they could feel something, that there was something inside of them that was destined for truth and obedience to the way things really are. And they chose not to do it, and somehow they knew that, when they didn’t submit to the plan, to the will of God, they felt separated from him. That’s sin. That’s the work of the dark angels. That’s the work of evil, to keep us out of the real work we’re here to accomplish, and we don’t have to do it alone. And we do live in a world, in the words of Peter, that is going to be not welcoming the truth. And it's interesting that all the men that Jesus worked with and taught, they all were executed by the world who said, “We don’t want this truth at all,” except for one, John.
So what is our story? How do we relive this? We relive it in a world that is antagonistic toward truth, the way of life, and what’s is the difference? What’s the resistance? One is the world is here for me, and I use it, and I abuse it. I take from it, and it feels great. It’s a low, almost animalistic way of living, yet we evolve, and we change into beings that are not on our own figuring this out, but we’ve allowed a Spirit to enter into us. It has spoken to us. It has told us that it’s in us, and then when it’s in us with humanity and divinity together, we evolve to the highest level of a human being, and our entire life is there for service. Another core thing to believe that is often hidden by the evil of the world is that God is not here, God is not in your life to be served but to allow him to serve us. So important. Unless we allow him to love us, to serve us, to be the source for us ⎯ and we know that without him we can’t do this work. That’s the work that we have with God, and when we surrender our egos to that power in us that is beyond us but part of us, so mysteriously connected, that Jesus has taught us that God the Father is in us, Jesus is in us, the Holy Spirit is in us. That’s the fullness of God, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, and when we’re in touch with that, we grow, we evolve but not without tension, not without struggle, not without suffering. And what is suffering? It’s accepting the fact that there’s a force against the good that we long to create with God. Once you lose that story, once you don’t see that story unfolding in you, then there’s no hope ⎯ no hope.
I love when Peter is saying, “When people look at you and you have God in you and they’re looking at you and saying, ‘What have you got? You have something I want. You seem to have a hopeful spirit about this corrupt system we’re caught in.’” He said, “Be gentle. Don’t say, ‘You don’t have it. You’re stupid. You’re not worth anything.’” No, just be gentle, because they’re going to attack you, and let them attack you for being a source of life for them. That’s fine, and it’s going to be tough on you. But don’t ever lose hope that you are reliving the story that began a million years ago when animals that were walking on all fours started walking. Bipeds started, and they evolved and developed into this whole wonderful event called salvation history. And you are never alone. That’s the story, and you have work to do. What it has to do is erase the image of heaven and hell, though there’s a reality there that there’s a price if you don’t do this work. But just think of it not as something that you’re doing to earn a place with God. You’re doing something that you’re always going to know and feel was partly your work. You helped create the being that you are by listening, surrendering, accepting. It’s a wonderful story, and it has a beautiful ending of being so in God and God in you that actually, when you let go of your body, there is only one, you and God face to face. That’s the end of the story. That’s the hopeful, wonderful end. Amen.
Father, teach us the story. Help us to integrate it into who we are and how we live. Your promise is beyond our expectations. Help us to trust more in what you have shared with us and who you are in us than who we are in our own humanity, and we ask this in Jesus’ name, amen.