Pr. Joseph Crippen

No one in this world is an orphan: the Triune God’s love includes the whole world, all people, all things, and the Spirit of God is moving and breathing in all, for life and wholeness.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Sixth Sunday of Easter, year A
Texts: Acts 17:22-31; 1 Peter 3:13-22; John 14:15-21 (also John 3, John 12, and Romans 8)

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

You are not alone in this world, no matter how frightening or lonely it feels.

That’s Jesus’ promise. The women and men who followed Jesus experienced God’s presence, God’s love, God’s teaching, God’s touch, God’s blessing with Jesus constantly.

And now, as he prepares them for his leaving, he says, “I won’t leave you orphaned. I will ask the Father, who will give you another Advocate, the Spirit of truth, to be with you forever.”

That’s your promise, too. And as Paul told his Romans, your Advocate the Spirit lives in your heart and joins your heart to God’s heart. Even praying for you when you can’t.

God’s Spirit abides with you, Jesus says, and will be in you. Forever.

But is Jesus excluding some from this gift?

He says something troubling amidst this promise of a divine Advocate, that “the world” can’t receive the Spirit of God, because “the world” neither sees her nor knows her.

But this is the same “world,” “cosmos,” that Jesus declared in John 3 was so profoundly loved by God that God came in the person of the Son, not to judge but to save, to heal. To bring all back to God.

Is Jesus changing that promise now? Does he not envision the gift of God’s Spirit to all God’s children in this “world” God loves so much? Are some to be left out?

And if the presence of the Spirit depends on whether you know or see the Spirit, can even you and I trust the promise?

See, that’s the problem, isn’t it?

On any given day you, or I, might not experience the Spirit, know or see the Spirit. Moments, times, even, when we aren’t sure God’s Spirit is with us. When we don’t feel the fire of God’s love and grace within. If Jesus is saying you only get God’s Spirit when you can see and know the Spirit, it’s not a promise of forever presence. It’s limited by your own challenges of faith. If having God’s Spirit depends on my perception of God with me, on the strength of my faith in any particular moment, then I have no chance. I don’t have that constancy.

But given everything else Jesus teaches and lives in the Gospels, the idea that some are just not given God’s Spirit makes no sense. “God so loved the ‘world,’ ” Jesus said. “When I am lifted up on the cross I will draw all people, all things to myself,” Jesus said.

And thank goodness Paul was listening.

Luke’s story of Paul in Athens is a ray of grace to every child of God on earth.

Paul’s doing the tourist thing, wandering through this cosmopolitan, pan-religious city and admiring what he sees. Including all the temples and altars to all the various divinities the Athenians worshipped. Including an altar to “an unknown god.”

So when he speaks to them he mentions their many altars and praises them for being so religious. Then he talks of this unknown god, who is the God of the universe Paul knows and proclaims, who came in Christ Jesus, taught, lived, loved, died, and rose from the dead.

But then Paul quotes from two of their Greek philosophers, one of whom said, “in God we live and move and have our being,” and another who said, “we are the offspring of God.”

And Paul says, exactly. This God whose love is known in Christ is the same God at the beginning of all time, who made the ancestors of everyone on this world. Who is the God of all. There are no orphans, anywhere. All are children of this unknown God, who is now made known in Christ Jesus.

And, Paul says, this God hopes that everyone finds God somehow, even if they have to “fumble about” to do it. But whether or not they find God, everyone belongs in God’s love.

So basically Paul says that Jesus was right in John 3 and John 12, and Jesus means it: the Triune God’s love is for the whole “world,” all God’s children.

Full stop. No exclusions.

And Jesus also is clear, by the way, that just because on any given day you can’t know or see the Spirit, it doesn’t mean the Spirit isn’t there. In John 3 he told Nicodemus that the Spirit is like the wind. You can’t see wind but you can see where it’s been. So you can see the Spirit by signs of where she’s been. But think of wind: it’s just air. And sometimes you can’t feel a single breeze. But you are still breathing that air.

So for you, and for all, this is the promise: no one is left orphaned by God. God’s love and God’s Spirit are for all and in all, forever.

And Christ would love for you and me to imitate Paul.

It’s what Peter’s talking about today, too. He says, “Always be ready to make a defense of your trust in God when someone asks you about your faith, but do it with gentleness and respect.” Paul couldn’t have been more respectful and gentle with the Athenians. He didn’t harangue them as pagans who didn’t know anything. He praised their faith, their religiousness, and he noticed something in their faith that gave him a way into a conversation about his trust in Christ for life.

That’s your call. To live in such a way, in the first place, that some other person might actually notice your love and grace and your trust in God and ask you “what’s that all about?”

And then to gently, respectfully, listen to them. Notice them. And find a way to share what you know about God’s love for them and for the world.

You are not alone in this world, no matter how frightening or lonely it feels.

No one is. There are no orphans in God’s love. No people you can safely put outside God’s care. No enemies you can confidently trust are not in God’s embracing, loving arms.

So go from here confident that God’s Spirit is yours and is always with you. Even when, especially when, you can’t see or know her. When the air doesn’t seem to be moving.

And then find a way to let others know they’re not alone, either. Then you’ll be the blessing God has always known you could be for the healing of this world.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

Christ offers you abundant life, found in following him into the world and being transformed in the care of your Shepherd.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Fourth Sunday of Easter, year A
Texts: John 10:1-10; Psalm 23; 1 Peter 2:19-25

Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen

The thing is, you can’t stay in the sheepfold and live.

The idea of Jesus as the Good Shepherd who came to provide abundant life for those who trust in him, and also as the Gate who keeps the sheepfold safe, is a wonderful one. Like our Emmaus story last week, it promises a warm place inside the fold of our Shepherd, where we are cared for and loved. Where we meet God. Like in this room.

And it sounds pretty abundant just to stay in the room with Jesus. But that’s not where abundant life is lived. Last week, the Emmaus couple couldn’t stay in their little home where they met Jesus in the breaking of the bread. They needed to go out, back on the road. To witness to the others, to the world, what they’d experienced and seen in the risen Christ.

And we sang today that our Good Shepherd leads us out on right paths, to still waters and green pastures. Even though sometimes those paths lead through the valleys of the shadow of death, and in the presence of enemies. But it’s only out there that there is food and water and life for the sheep.

This image of a protected sheepfold sounds awfully familiar.

It sounds a lot like the locked upper room in which the disciples placed themselves Easter week.

But Christ met them inside their locked room, and met them at the Emmaus dinner table, and led them all out into new life. As the Shepherd calls the sheep out to pasture. They couldn’t stay locked away, because true, abundant life for them was only found out there. Stay inside, and you eventually starve to death.

And where they found life, so will we.

But if you and I stay locked up, closed in the sheepfold so we’re safe, how can we follow Christ in this world and find abundant life?

If we’ve locked away any possibility of Christ calling us to a new way of being, how can we begin to think about loving our family or our neighbors in the community or in the world?

If it’s off limits, locked away, for God to ask us to change how we react to people, how we treat others, how can we become like Jesus, how can we follow?

If it’s off limits, locked away, for God to ask us to give up getting our own way, to ask us to let it go when others seem to disregard us, how can we become like Jesus, how can we follow?

If it’s off limits, locked away, for God to ask us to understand faith as a calling to love, not a possession that keeps us safe, how can we become like Jesus, how can we follow?

And if we can’t follow, we can’t find abundant life.

Abundant life is when you and I follow Christ out of the sheepfold to be blessed and to be a blessing.

Because living in the servant love of God in Christ for you, such a rich, abundant blessing, only expands and deepens when you share that servant love with others.

When you bear the love of Christ in your life, in your neighborhood, you are blessed in turn. When you are transformed as Christ in a world of pain and oppression and fear, you are blessed while you make a difference and bless others. Whatever life is out there is only abundant when it’s shared, when all are safe, and fed, and clothed, and loved, and blessed.

And you can’t do this, I can’t do this, if we stay locked inside the sheepfold where we think it’s safe.

The good news is, the risen Christ is really good with locked doors.

As much as we think we’ve locked away all our problems and the things we don’t want to change, Christ is already there inside your locked doors, wanting to give you peace. Wanting to fill you with the Spirit. The One who is the Gate can open all locks and call you out of the sheepfold into abundant life.

But your Shepherd will also not force you out, force you to be Christ, force you to follow. Your Shepherd would rather you hear his voice and follow willingly.

There’s a lot that seems unsafe in all of this, and frightening.

Peter today says that suffering for doing good is often the result of following Christ, because Christ also suffered for loving others. We know Christ’s path is a challenging one.

But you are loved by the God who made all things and who cares for you as a shepherd, who is known to you in your Good Shepherd, your risen Savior.

Your Shepherd is standing outside the door, calling to you, to me, and asking us to follow. Don’t be afraid, because even though this path will lead to loss and change and through frightening places, even in your own heart, you are walking with and behind your Shepherd, who faced all such pain and suffering already and is risen. Who will keep you safe: from your enemies – both those inside of you and outside of you – and safe even in valleys of shadow and death. Who will transform death into life and enemies into beloved family.

Listen: your Shepherd is calling. Offering abundant life. Opening the door to go out from here as Christ’s love in the world. Follow, and find that life. Be that life for others. And rejoice in your Shepherd’s abundance.

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen