“CHRISTJESUS: NOW”
Saint John 16, 16-23
Jubilate - The Third Sunday after Easter: 17 April Anno Domini 2005
Fr Watson
Make a joyful noise unto God, all ye lands!
The problem is sin. That is your problem. Sin is opposite of God's will Sin is rejection of love. Sin doesn't receive gifts rather it attempts to do for itself, to be for itself. One can be "independent" when one leaves home for the first time and gets a job, an apartment, a routine apart from one's parents. But if a creature (that's you) attempts the same separation from the Creator (that's God), it's not "independence, " but sin; death. A fish cannot live outside the sea. A mammal cannot live outside of oxygen. A man cannot truly live outside of, apart from, without, God.
Sin can't wait for anything. Sin wants and wants NOW. Sin doesn't believe the Word but rather demands proof! Eve and Adam were lied to, to be sure, but then their own sin embraced itself and they continued to lie to themselves. They rejected the Word of the Lord and they grasped, grabbed, stuffed, and "pigged out" on themselves, on sin and death. Sin delights in appearances, how things "seem to be." Sin relies on the mirages of the "hairy eyeball" of greed, lust, indolence and immaturity. But Faith, the gifts of a good giving God, comes by "Hearing" and hearing by the Word of God.
Faith isn't worked in us by us. Faith isn't what we do, it's what is given to us. The Lord gives us Himself: His love, His righteousness, His image, i.e. His Grace. Faith is also the hand that grasps the gift. Faith holds on tight to the prize. But even the strength to guard and protect the "pearl of great price," even that, is also a gift from God the Holy Spirit.
Abel's offering to the Lord of course wasn't needed. But, it did show that he had been given faith. Abel offered the first fruits of his flock trusting in the Word of the Lord that there would be others added to the flock, if it was the Lord's will. Cain, trusting in his own sight, rather than receiving faith, hedged his bets, and simply gave "some" produce. Esau's sin demanded that which he could see and taste: pottage when he wanted it. Jacob in faith waited on the Lord's deliverance. Israel relied on the Word of the Lord even when his eyes told him differently. Moses, Aaron, Caleb, Joshua and all the other believing Hebrews (although the minority) believed in the Word of God even when it took 40 long years to come to fruition. All the rebels, who constantly whined, murmured against their pastors, and required constant empirical proof, died in the desert, their bones bleached white and their souls burned black unto eternity. The history of the Jews is the history of the race of man. It's the church's history and your daily walk; your daily falling in thought word and deed.
There have been, there are, and there will be many periods of "in a little while." View them all, accept them all, understand them all, as the discipline of the Lord, as the exercise of your spiritual lungs. It is life under the Cross, the church militant. It's like the discipline of Lententide. Your eyes don't see the cross for 40 days, you don't "see" the glory of the victorious One, but by faith, that is, by the Word, the Cross and the Christ are given to you by Grace.
You pray to the Lord for deliverance and you intercede for others, and many times if not most, you are given, at first that is, another "in a little while." Yes, Manna didn't come 24 hours a day at the Israelites every whim, or "felt need." Manna came in the morning even as the dawning of the new sun doesn't come whenever it's raining or you need some additional light. But it does come every morning. Fasting is for a period, a time, a "little while" but the Feast which is Christ's Body and Blood, Love Incarnate, is eternal.
Every "little while" is but the passing cloud that momentarily veils the glory of the Day spring on high. You are nourished and strengthened by Christ not by sights, signs and sensory satisfying experiences. You don't "see" the adoption taking place but a new Christian is grafted into Christ's very side whenever a little one is made His in the Waters of + Life. You don't "see" immortality and divinity poured into yourself and you don't "see" yourself absolved, in the consumption of wine and bread, but your sins are forgiven and you eat and drink Faith Himself when you participate in the communion of His Body and Blood at the altar; the rail. You don't "see" chains snapped off your wrists and burdens lifted off your backs in the Holy Absolution, but when the pastor speaks Christ's very words: "I forgive you all your sins" the Faith, the Jesus, is there making you pure and spotless.
Your week from Sunday at noon to the following Sunday at 8:59 a.m. might be considered one of the many "little whiles;" although to be sure whenever you are in the Holy Scriptures, whenever you are in the Word through prayer, hymnody, or the remembrance of you Holy + Baptisms, Christ is Present there for you, as He is now.
From the Crucifix planted on Golgotha, from the Body Given and the Blood Shed, here now the Christ is given to you directly this happy morn in Forgiveness, Strength, and Assurance of Life Everlasting. You rejoice because He's here for you this day. The Faith is yours forever.
Make a joyful noise unto God, all ye lands. Amen.