For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. — Romans 8.36
We are told that “scribes” (teachers of the Law) are mentioned nineteen times in the New Testament and only once in a positive light (Matthew 12.28). This scribe asks Jesus, “Which is the greatest commandment of all?” Jesus replies with the schema (love God with every part of your being) and love neighbor as self. And the scribe not only commends Jesus but adds (amazingly) those two commandments (merged into one) are more important than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices. And Jesus told this bright man that he was not far from the kingdom of God. Not far from getting in, but close.
So what must this fine person do to enter into the Kingdom of God?
At St. John’s we have many answers to this key question. It has little to do with doctrine or nifty theology. But it has much to do with “doing love and justice,” and radical inclusion. The God of the Hebrew Bible and Christian Scriptures is not a god of “exclusion.” When we begin excluding certain neighbors, we tear holes in God’s net of inclusive love, and rip to shreds our blanket of faith. So help me move from being “not far” to inside the kingdom of faith. This is Jesus’ invitation, and God’s call to discipleship. IN THE NAME OF THE CREATOR, REDEEMER, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.
This morning at the Washington Cathedral, Bishop Katherine Jefferts Scori was invested as the 26th Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States (ECUSA). I suspect that because of her gender, there are many in the worldwide Anglican communion who hated to see this day come. I think that there are others who will refuse to sit at the same table with her. How unfortunate.
I can still remember the sheer shock, utter delight, and then joy that flooded me in hearing the news that the House of Bishop had elected Bishop Schori of Nevada to be the chief pastor and Primate of the Episcopal Church. Shocked because I thought and hoped that Bishop Neil Alexander of Atlanta would be selected, and shocked because, in fact, a woman was elected. I was delighted and full of joy at what a surprisingly new thing God seemed up to doing.
In listening to interviews with Bishop Schori, subsequent to her election, and learning about her walk with Christ, in addition to reading some of the pieces that she has written, the emerging impression that came to me is that our new Presiding Bishop is a deeply grounded and faith filled believer in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, a loving pastoral leader, a hope-bearer, a reconciler and visionary — in short, just the sort of leader we need in the Episcopal Church in the twenty-first century. The work of the Holy Spirit seems powerfully at work. To learn more about our new pb, go to http://www.episcopalchurch.org/presiding-bishop.htm.
Bishop Frank Griswold, 25th primate of our church, said in a recent sermon that “tradition itself is made up of a series of provocative inbreakings of divine outrageousness focused for us as Christians in the scandal of the Incarnation: God's pitching his tent and dwelling among us as one of us in the person of Jesus, paradoxically both fully human and fully divine as the Council of Chalcedon declared in 451.”
I pray that we continue to be open, receptive, and responsive to other such inbreakings of divine outrageousness! We at St. John’s in Boulder, offer prayers for our new Presiding Bishop and for our church.
