Sermon Easter 5: April Alford-Harkey
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April Alford-Harkey • April 24, 2016 • 5th Sunday after Easter
In today’s reading from Revelation we are told the heaven and earth that we know will pass away and be made new. In the story of creation in Genesis, God created heaven and earth as two separate places – the heavens above and the earth below. God dwelled in heaven and God’s creation dwelled on earth where there is pain and suffering.
In John of Patmos’ vision in the book of Revelation heaven and Earth will no longer exist separately. In John’s vision, both will be connected in a web of mutuality and reciprocity. Because in this new vision of heaven and earth, God dwells with God’s people, there is connection with God’s people and the realm of God – or heaven. The vision of a perfect world is one in which humanity is intimately connected to God.
The one thing that will not be changed is the profound love God has for us that has been manifested since the beginning of creation. In the creation story, we are told that God created humankind and declared us very good. God also provided a garden for human beings to live in that contained animals and plants of every kind. This was a place where humanity could flourish and grow.
The new order in John’s vision is a radical process of restoration to this kind of perfect union with God - the type of union that human beings had with God in the garden of Eden. John sees a new world where God is renewing all of creation. In this new world God will wipe every tear and eliminate death, pain and sorrow. It is a vision full of hope, possibility and human flourishing. It is a vision of God’s goodness with, in and among us.
Hildegard of Bingen articulates this union of God and creation best in a poem she wrote after one of her visions in which God speaks to her…
“I am the one whose praise echoes on high.
I adorn all the earth.
I am the breeze that nurtures all things green.
I encourage blossoms to flourish with ripening fruits.
I am led by the spirit to feed the purest streams.
I am the rain coming from the dew
that causes the grasses to laugh with the joy of life.
I am the yearning for good.”
In Revelation, there is a flow between heaven and earth. In African theology, the village is seen as such a place. In African theology heaven and earth are woven together with God in the midst of humanity. Some African theologians see the village life as a metaphor for how God is with and in people. The village is a place where people love one another and help each other. People depend on the community. It is a place where people, animals, and plants are cared for and cultivated. The village also a place where the ancestors walk with the living. This makes the village a place where all humanity is gathered (those who are living and those who have gone before us) with God.
Mary Getui, an African theologian, states, “It is the responsibility of the village to care for all life, especially of young and old. It is also our responsibility to help all of creation toward restoration and wholeness.” This village is a place where God’s people are gathered… Getui’s explanation allows us to see how all people can be co-creators with divine. We are God’s partners actively helping to bring in the new kingdom – the village of God.
Our gospel reading for today is part of Jesus’ farewell discourse. Farewell discourses were a common literary form in the ancient world. A farewell discourse has several pieces…Usually the person tells of their approaching death, offers some words of comfort and predicts what is to happen after they are gone. Farewell discourses in the Hebrew scriptures and the apocrypha come from Moses, Enoch, Rebecca, Isaac, Samuel and Noah.
In Jesus’ discourse he leaves directions on how the disciples were to be as a community and with each other. Jesus gives the disciples the commandment that they are to love one another as he has loved them. This is different from the commandment that Jesus gave earlier – to love God with our whole hearts and to love our neighbors as ourselves.
This commandment is specifically for Jesus’ disciples, and deals specifically with how Jesus followers are to treat each other. The love commandment focuses on community and relationship. The community of disciples were to continue to enact with each other the kind of love that Jesus had for them. The idea that the world will “know we are Christians by our love” speaks to the particular kind of love and care for each other that is evident to the rest of the world.
New Testament theologian Helmut Koester says that Christianity established a realm of mutual social support for the members that joined the church. He argues that the success of Christianity is not based solely on the fact that Christianity has a great religious message, but that it is also in the establishment of institutions to serve the needs of the community.
Without that love for each other, the Christian message of God’s restoration and renewal would be empty and shallow. It is the Christian community that should be the model for the restored and renewed realm of God of which John’s Revelation speaks. This is why Jesus has modeled love for others and love for one’s community throughout his ministry.
The love Jesus speaks of is radical and goes beyond feeling. It is a love that motivates people to do simple and even mundane tasks for each other. It can inspire people to lay down their lives, and to fight for justice for all people, not just themselves and their communities. This kind of love calls people into action. This is a love that allows us to be recognized as Christians. This type of love fundamentally changes the nature of how we treat others. It breaks down barriers of gender, class, race, economic status, and sexuality. It is a love the welcomes all of God’s creation.
In the village of Trinity Episcopal Church in Hartford, we take care of each other. We have a community that in many ways models the love that the disciples had for each other in Jesus’ time. We care for each other in profound ways, showing up for each other in times of celebration and in times of grief. This is a community that knows what it means to “love one another as Jesus loved us.”
And this is a community that has to continue to learn how to love one another and the rest of the world as our communal life changes. We may not know exactly how that will look, but it is certain that we know how to care for one another.
What we learn from the vision of God’s realm in Revelation and Jesus’ command to love each other, is that God dwells in us, in the gathered community and that the power of that love can bring about God’s realm here on earth.