Sermon for the Sunday Next Before Lent – 19th February 2023: Exodus 24, 12-end; 2 Peter 1, 16-end; Matthew 17, 1-9.
Fr Leonard Doolan – St Paul’s Athens
It is an apophthegmatic saying, that is, a classic saying, of one of the great Archbishops of Canterbury in the last century, Michael Ramsey, when asked to sum up the 4th Gospel, the Gospel of St. John, that he used only one word. Glory.
Any reading – both surface and in depth – will understand why Michael Ramsay used this one word. In NT Greek it is δόξα. In English we get the word ‘doxology’ from this. The word, either with a large or small ‘o’ also gives us the word ortho-doxy.
In so many places in scripture we read of God’s glory being revealed. There is a God whose glory is not kept to himself, but has to be revealed, shown, to us in his wonderful acts – the outpouring of his very being into what he has created, ‘irradiating’ it with divine essence. It is almost as if he feels no option but to share his glory with others, with us.
As I was trying to say in last week’s sermon, based on the Creation Narrative of the Book of Genesis, God’s creation is not merely an ‘object’ but the very living and active creation of God. It is God’s glory revealed.
Dare I say it, the very existence of God, as we receive it as Christians, is that everything is shown, revealed. He has revealed his hand; nothing is hidden. He creates, and he constantly restores, not because we have a God whose existence depends on his ‘functionality’ ie. what is done in a mechanical way, but rather because he has created so that his glory can literally be revealed constantly. It is almost as if he cannot be God unless he is eternally outpouring of himself. This is a very extraordinary thing – something that can only evoke from us, his creatures, amazement, wonder.
Perhaps the greatest wonder – which should perhaps cause us to draw our breath – is that God should become Man, and dwell among us. We go back to the crib in Bethlehem, and do a double think. God becomes a baby; the Word becomes flesh. This very act is God placing his divinity into the heart, soul and veins of humanity – the 6th day of Creation, Man’s divine DNA. In all his creation Man is the divine vessel in which divinity is poured out, because Man alone is created in the image and likeness of God.
In saying this I am not using gender specific language. God, our Creator and Father, is no more male or female in gender specificity, as Man is, as I am using the term. His attribute does not mean male and female specificity. We learnt in the Creation Narrative that God has created us, man and woman, both in his likeness and image. There is another sermon there, however I wish to remain on the theme of ‘Glory’.
It was St. Irenaeus of Lugdunum who rendered us great assistance in understanding God’s glory. He is from the 3rd Century and was an outstanding teacher of the Christian faith at a relatively early time in the Christian era. Ireneaus – from the Greek word Eirini, meaning peace – was a bishop in what we now know as France – the Roman province of Gallia, and of Lugdunum, the city of which he was bishop, is now the French city of Lyons.
For my purposes, it was this Ireneaus who said this ‘The glory of God is man fully alive’.
What is it that the great early church theologian might have meant? First of all there is the theoretical response, then a more practical approach.
Man is created to reflect the ultimate expression of God in Creation. Man, fully alive, is when he is at the nearest point to God which is achievable for all of us, for this is our natural habitat. Our nature, our environment is to allow our Creator to inhabit us, to live with us – as the ‘Christ-child became man and dwelt among us’. When we allow this reality to take up our space then we are at our most human, our most natural. The more human we are, in the light of this reality, the more divine we are – in the St. Irenaeus model.
But we know that humanity does not live in this reality much of the time. So we are challenged. Let me take a few examples.
In South Turkey and North Syria a horrendous human tragedy has unfolded, and continues to unfold.
Last Sunday, when we reflected on the seemingly opposing views of Creation and the scientific theory I proposed that maybe we as Christians have to re-think our position; that we may not have to put all our eggs in one evolution basket. Yet today I am wanting to say something which on balance is in favour of the scientific view.
If we did not have science we would be ‘blaming’ God for the earthquake disaster, and using language of God’s revenge and judgement. Instead we understand about tectonic plates and their potential impact, and that from time to time tectonic, or seismic events, will happen that are not a divine judgement on us, but rather scientific realities that can be explained, however undesirable they may be. Our ancient forebears would have given some divine retribution as the reason for such a happening, thus presenting humanity with an adverse and negative view of God.
When such a disaster happens, it is of such human significance that people, certainly people of a Western mind-set, will use it as an excuse for not believing in God, despite the fact that there is a perfectly good geological explanation for it. It is a fault in creation! Interestingly in the midst of this carnage we hear ‘God is great!’
At the very core of this terrible geological disaster a side of humanity emerges that we don’t see day by day. Immense human strength; deep seated response of compassion; great nobility of human support emerges from this. Look at the rescue efforts – it even brings nations together. This is a hint of ‘man truly alive’.
Not so far away from us here a war is raging. Russia, sadly with the mis-guided support of the Russian Patriarch, is seeking to expand its territory in another nation, a desire based on the wrong divisions of human society – ethnicity, language, divided loyalties, fractured Christian unity. Though very complex, we have seen in this conflict bravery beyond expectation, political leadership transformed, and faith re-ignited among the Ukranian people. Another example of ‘man truly alive’, even though man should not be drawn into such tragic depravity; but there it is. Another human fault-line – tectonic plates of humanity.
We may see man at his best and at his worst in war; we may see creation at its worst in earthquakes but see human aspiration and effort at its best. Fault lines exist geologically, and fault lines get created by nations and governments.
What does it tell us about God? First, that God calls man to be fully alive at his very best, and he can achieve the best, but also that there is a flaw in God – yes, dare I say it – a fault line in God! This is why his creation and his created humanity exhibits this fault. It is difficult for us to accept this perhaps – and maybe it sounds heretical as I say it. Yet if it were not so, why do we need the Cross? One of our Eurcharistic Prayers expresses this ‘fault line’ very well, when it says, ‘You reveal the power of your love made perfect in our human weakness.’ (CW Eucharistic Prayer F.)
The gospel reading this morning relates to us the story of the Transfiguration of Our Lord. It is at one and the same time, the glorification of Christ, of Jesus the man, and the foretaste of his glorification when his body in real human flesh is raised on the cross. ‘This is my Son, the Beloved: with him I am well pleased; listen to him.’
It is not so easy, and maybe not so desirable for us to accept a wounded, indeed crucified Saviour. This is a prototype of our humanity. It is how God has made things – it is how God is. This is the glory of God – this is man truly alive.
Oh how I wish it was easier for me as a preacher, oh how I wish it was easier for us to have a God who just did away with all of our human tragedy and suffering!
But no – we are about to enter the holy season of Lent. It is not a season to withdraw from divine and human reality, but a time to enter more fully into it; to accept it for what it is, and to develop a sense of reality and to be brought alive by it. The glory of God is man fully alive. Amen.
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