Perfected, Not Perfect: A Homily for the Twenty-fifth Sunday After Pentecost

 Preached at All Saints, Collingwood, and St Luke’s, Creemore, Anglican Diocese of Toronto.

Readings for the Twenty-fifth Sunday after Pentecost: (Proper 33B):  1 Samuel 1:4-20; 1 Samuel 2:1-10 as canticle; Hebrews 10:11-14 (15-18), 19-25; Mark 13:1-8

“For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified”.  (Heb 10:14)

We have a complicated relationship with the idea of the perfect.   We can admire perfection in highly technical and measured ways, as in sports; Nadia Comaneci and Mary Lou Retton’s “perfect tens” in Olympic gymnastics come to mind.   Perfection might be worth striving for in school exams or in cake baking competitions, but in most of life, which is messy and chaotic, perfectionism can get in the way of just getting things done on time, hence the expression, “perfect is the enemy of good enough”.   Perfectionists can be wonderful people until you have to work with them!

I’m not sure that we’re very comfortable with the idea of “perfect” in our faith lives.   Because we often understand the word “perfect” as being “faultless”, we doubt that we can ever be good enough or holy enough to please God.   Today in our first lesson we hear that Jesus “has perfected for all time those who are sanctified” and we wonder, does that apply to me?  Am I one of the perfected?  one of the sanctified?  Because I don’t think I’m perfect or especially holy.   We may want these qualities, but we doubt that we possess them, and we tend to distrust those who act as if they are perfect or holy.

And if we are confused about perfection and holiness, then I think we might be excused, because scripture can seem to give us mixed messages.   On the one hand, during the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells us to “Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (5.48).   But, on the other hand, we hear in Romans that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom 3.23).  These conflicting messages seems to suggest that, spiritually speaking, we can’t get there from here.

The good news is we don’t have to get there by ourselves.  The big idea in the letter of Hebrews, made repeatedly, is that Jesus is the perfect priest who allows us to come to the Father.   Earlier in Hebrews tells us that “We have  a great high priest who has passed through the heavens” (Heb 4.14).  Later on in the Letter, Jesus is described as  “holy, blameless, undefiled” and “perfect” (Heb 7.26-28).  Jesus is the high priest who brings us out of our sins and who leads us to the Father.

Somewhat startlingly, the author of Hebrews says that all the efforts and all the sacrifices of all the earthly priests could not rescue us from our sin.   Only Jesus can and will do this.   This week we as Anglicans especially needed to hear this message, because our earthly high priest, Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, resigned this week.   

As you may have already learned, the Archbishop took responsibility for failing to investigate a powerful layman, John Smyth, who had abused many minors in the English Church, and who had then allowed to find more victims in churches in Zimbabwe and South Africa.  A document called the Makin Report found that the English Church had known about Smyth’s “prolific, brutal and horrific” crimes since the 1980s, but had covered them up.

The Makin Report was especially damning because, for decades now, the Church of England has said it is committed to prevent abuse and misconduct, but totally failed in this one case.   In his weekly letter to the Diocese, Bishop Andrew wrote that all of us, clergy and lay leaders, have a “duty to serve one another, in particular the most vulnerable. We must always be vigilant and aware of the safety of others in our care.”

I’m grateful to Bishop Andrew for addressing this story, because the danger of this story, and the danger of any story about abuse and sin in the church, is that it might lead us to give up on the church.   If the church is imperfect, if it is contaminated by human sin and frailty, then what good is it?  How will we draw closer to God?

In the Jerusalem Temple, the one that Jesus and the disciples are looking at in today’s gospel, there was a thick curtain that separated the people from the innermost room, the sanctuary or the Holy of Holies, where God was thought to be present.  Only the High Priest could go in, on behalf of the people.   There are other kinds of curtains that keep the people from God.   They are curtains of abuse, curtains of secret and scandal and coverup, and they lead to fear and mistrust, they shake the people’s faith in church and in God.  They are curtains of sin, and Christ will always pull them down to let the light and the truth in.

The author of Hebrews tells us that Jesus opens the curtain of the temple“through his flesh”, a reference to Christ’s sacrifice of himself on the cross.      In Hebrews, Christ becomes both priest and temple, he opens the way to God, so we can enter with “confidence”.    The big idea of Hebrews, indeed of Christianity in general, is that Jesus will allow nothing to separate us from the love of God.  

And the good news is that we don’t have to be perfect to go through the door that Christ opens for us.  We don’t have to be faultless.  We don’t need a 100% score on some spiritual test.  Christ will look after that.  “For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified”.   

In the original Greek, the word “perfect” doesn’t necessarily mean “flawless”.   It can have the sense of being made whole or being made complete, even of just growing up.    We get into trouble when we confuse perfect with flawlessness, which is why some people avoid church, because they fear they will never measure up.   Instead, think of how God gives us what we are lacking, fills whatever spiritual holes or incompleteness that might trouble us, so that we can be whole, healthy, and happy, the way God always wanted us to be.

How do we get there?  How do we become compete?    The author of Hebrews gives us tons of good advice.   Be confident in God’s love.  Don’t doubt how much God loves you.   Trust that your baptism has made you clean and a loved child of God.   Don’t give up on hope.  Trust in God’s faithfulness.   And meet together.   Be church.   Church at its best is a place where we can encourage one an other to “love and good deeds”.   In other words, be a community that helps one another to show love and hope in its actions.   You’re not in this alone.   We have Christ and one another, even if the approaching days seem dark and uncertain.     Doing all these things, always trusting in the love and work of Jesus is how we become complete.  This is how we become perfect.

In his resignation message to the Anglican Communion, Archbishop Welby confessed his sin and imperfection, but he also lifted up this hope.  He ended his message on a note of hope, saying that “my deepest commitment is to the person of Jesus Christ, my saviour and my God; the bearer of the sins and burdens of the world, and the hope of every person”.   He spoke well, and he spoke for all of us.

The End of History? A Homily for the Twenty Fifth Sunday After Pentecost (Yr B)

A Homily for Remembrance Day and for the Twenty-Fifth Sunday After Pentecost, Preached at All Saints, Collingwood, Anglican Diocese of Toronto, 10 November, 2024.

Year B Texts for this Sunday:  Ruth 3:1-5, 4:13-17; Psalm 127; Hebrews 9:24-28; Mark 12:38-44

One of my abiding memories of Remembrance Day is of standing beside my father at the cenotaph.   Even in old age, he would stand erect, as he was taught as a youth on the parade square.  Remembrance Day was the only day I would see his medals, pinned to his coat - medals from the Second World War, from Korea, and from his Cold War service.

The men and women of his era are almost all gone now, and yet they gave us the world we grew up in and took for granted.  It was not a perfect world, but it was a reasonably stable one.  We had clear ideas about freedom, democracy, human rights, and international law.   We believed that smaller countries should not be invaded and brutalized by larger ones.   Then, in the 1990s, the Berlin Wall fell, the Cold War ended, and we all thought we’d come to a good place,  thanks to the work started by the greatest generation.  Some people even said that we had come to the end of history.

History never goes away that easily, and this week it seems like we’re in a new and ominous era of history.  On this Remembrance Day, it seems as if all the good work and sacrifice we remember is in danger of being lost. The world is getting darker, and is being carved up by despots and strongmen.   For decades we looked to America to protect and defend us, but after this week it’s clear that America is turning inwards, trusting in a strongman for protection and greatness.   Smaller countries like Canada now feel exposed and vulnerable.  If anyone is going to protect our values, it will have to be ourselves, assuming that we can still agree on what our values are.

Where we go from here is a conversation about civics and politics, and indeed, Remembrance Day, at least at during public services at the cenotaph, has always been about civics and politics.    Remembrance Day for the church, well, that’s a little more complicated.    Yes, we want to give remember and to give thanks for those who went before us, and yes, we pray that something good may come of their sacrifices.

At the same time,  I think that we the church must never forget that that God is greater than human history.   On Remembrance Day we are Canadians, but we are also followers of Jesus Christ and citizens of his kingdom.  We never see the kingdom of God clearly in this life, we only catch glimpses of it.   That’s because the kingdom of God  is found somewhere between hope and future, but it is real and it is the answer to all of our fears and darkness.    Our second lesson from Hebrews reminds us that “has appeared once for all at the end of the age to remove sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Heb   ).    In other words, the forces of fear, darkness, and hatred have already been defeated because Jesus carried them to the cross for our sakes.

Because the letter of Hebrews was written to a Jewish audience that understood the rituals of the Temple in Jerusalem, the message for that audience would have been clear: Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross  is the only sacrifice that matters, because it was done once for all.  Without the cross, all the efforts of all the priests, all the rituals, all the animal sacrifice, would be in vain, and sin and suffering would continue.

For us as Christians at Remembrance Day, I think we can draw a similar conclusion.    While we honour the sacrifices and the victories of the past, we also acknowledge the final sacrifice and the victory of Christ.   Without Christ, we would be trapped in an unending history of sacrifice and suffering, but, as Hebrews reminds us, we are “eagerly awaiting” the return of Christ that will truly be the end of history.

Eagerly waiting for Christ’s return does not mean that we are fatalistic, ignore the problems of the world,  and wait for pie in the sky.   Jesus gave his followers work to do in the meantime, the work of loving God and loving our neighbour.  In our gospel reading today, when Jesus notices the widow, he isn’t just praising her piety, he’s asking who has reduced her to such poverty (Mk 12:38-44), because the kingdom of God is also a kingdom of justice.  So yes, we have good work to do. We need to notice those that Jesus notices, and care for those he cares for. A dark world needs those who witness to the light, as Christians have been doing for two thousand years.    Maybe now more than ever, our neighbours need us to be a people of light and hope.

As I noted this week in our parish newsletter, we are a few weeks away from Advent.    Advent is a time of waiting for the return of the king.  It’s a time of trust that God will set the world to rights.   It’s a time when we light candles to show that we keep faith in the darkness.      So if the events of this week have left you troubled and fearful, then let us keep Advent with hope and confidence, trusting that Christ, the Alpha and Omega, will come to free us from darkness, free us from sin, and free us from history.

 

Rector's Message on the US Election

 This short piece appears in this week's parish newsletter and is offered here for wider circulation.  MP+

6 November, 2024

Dear Saints:

 As I write this I am, like many of you, I suspect, digesting the news of the American election.    Today some will be elated by the outcome, and others will be dismayed.   In the short term, I think it’s likely that the animosity and grievance between these two groups will only increase.  In the longer term, it’s easy to see only cause for fear and pessimism.

As Canadians, we are not insulated from how our American friends and neighbours govern themselves.   We are tied to them in so many ways, from culture and trade to sports and holidays.    For decades we’ve depended on America to guard our freedom and to uphold human rights, fair trade, and international law.    Who knows if these certainties will continue?   Perhaps, as it feels, we are on the brink of some new and ominous chapter in world history.

I draw comfort from this coming Sunday’s second lesson from Hebrews, which promises that “Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him” (Heb 9.28).  

Hebrews assures us that Jesus, who was present when God “created all things” (Heb 1.2), is our faithful king and high priest who will return to set all things to rights.   We may find ourselves living in dark and sinful times, but Jesus has already saved us from our sin and darkness.   Our task is to wait patiently, to obey Jesus’ command to love God and our neighbour, and to trust that light will prevail.

In a few weeks we will be in Advent, a time for patient waiting and trust in Christ, the light that no darkness can overcome.   It may well be that in Advent we find our true politics.

Fr Michael