Easter 5A 2023 -7th May

We’re still working through the season of Easter. After the first few weeks of fizz and celebration, the lectionary is taking us into times of doubt and questioning. That’s probably exactly where the first followers of the Way were in the days and weeks after the Easter happenings. If we think our lives were turned upside down by earthquake, mass murder in our city and pandemic,  however do you imagine they felt? Their leader was dead. No he wasn’t. Some of the first group of followers had seen him. Some hadn’t. Some found themselves fronting up to the scholars and teachers they’d been used to listening to, and arguing with them in public. Some of the women were finding themselves in an entirely new way of being part of a community – they were finding public voices. And these upheavals went on and on.

Today’s reading from Acts was about the first martyrdom. Stephen a Jew killed by fellow Jews, not by foreign rulers. There was uproar in the synagogues. The psalm for today is a good one for people at the end of their endurance. And overall, the readings are still engaging in the challenges of finding a new way of being, a new community, a new faith.

In these times we’re in danger of ‘information overload’! We get more and more opinions and more and more theories about what’s happening, and more and more questions:  what should we do next, who’s right, who’s wrong. And in the age of social media there’s less and less substance, and more and more hype and headlining. And, unfortunately, rather more sloppy research and lack of thought before rushing into print or on line.

Our reading from Peter, the apostle Jesus named as ‘the rock’, calls members of the new community ‘living stones’.  We don’t know whether Simon Peter himself wrote this but I’m pretty sure the word association was known by all the new believers. Living stones and cornerstones are problematic images in post-quake Christchurch. Maybe cornerstones aren’t the best metaphor of stability for us! Every age and culture has to find its right images for the language of the heart, and for us that includes the language we use to talk about our faith. In our sea-girt, volcanic and earthquake-prone landscape, buildings don’t guarantee safety. In long-ago hot, dry and politically unstable Palestine the temple in Jerusalem was still an image of the heart of the Jewish faith. Perhaps it gave rise to different feelings – of shelter and security. In this new world that’s emerging, do we still have a firm base on which to build our faith – and the way we live out our faith? Have we still got the certainty that will give us courage to declare where we stand?

Among all the other changes we have to come to terms with, we’re living in times when the church as we once knew it is disappearing as we watch – membership is bleeding away. Are we like children standing on a sandcastle as the tide comes in? Those of us who’ve stayed in the churches, are part of a small minority, surrounded by people for whom formal worship is totally irrelevant. That is to say, worship of the Christian God – there are plenty of people out there who’ve found other gods to follow.

Within the Christian churches, we live with a huge diversity of theologies, and, more and more, with a diversity of cultural approaches to Christianity. In all the established traditions, this has been one of the most divisive aspects of recent Assemblies, Conferences and Synods. We’re not very good at listening to other voices.

We’re also increasingly living among a mix of other faiths. We have to come to terms with other sincerely-held beliefs, and find ways to talk across the boundaries. Western Christendom in our part of the world isn’t any longer entitled to proclaim itself as the dominant voice.

The Church as we once knew it has changed and fragmented. What next? Is it downhill all the way? Well, actually, no it isn’t – for several very good reasons. Though it may be a wake-up call for us to be up and doing.

Does Peter’s metaphor still speak to us? First of all, what do we mean by ‘the cornerstone?’ It’s a theological metaphor I heard long ago without understanding its significance. Stonemasons weren’t valued craftsmen in my world. Maybe, for us, images of our rocks continually evolving into something else could give us images of change and dynamic growth and challenge, and, on the whole, that’s where we think the church should be. And for a metaphor of safety in our Canterbury landscape, how about the cabbage tree standing as a marker of solid ground in swampy terrain, and pointing a way ahead? We know our faith is built on a secure foundation – it just doesn’t have to be called a cornerstone – a ‘rock’!

And if, by ‘rock’ we mean the institution called ‘the Church’, then maybe we should rejoice that it has fragmented. The church was never meant to be enclosed in rigid walls, presenting a solid and impenetrable façade to the world outside. The heart of our faith lies in the person and work of Jesus. Jesus most certainly wasn’t interested in rigid structures. I don’t think he wanted Peter to go forth and build an institution – he wanted him to fish for souls, to feed the sheep. Those are all speaking of growth and change. After all, Jesus spent a lot of energy on trying to deconstruct the hard shell that had grown around a living faith.

I don’t suggest we throw everything out at once. I do suggest we need to shift our focus. Our faith is always shaped in part by our culture. We need to be aware of this, and recognise when we need to make shifts.

We need to give up what’s almost an obsession with the language of management. All that time and energy spent on mission statements and management plans. OK – maybe we needed to sharpen our focus, and become more confident about our identity. But we don’t stop there. When we move in new territory, we need to image our way into some strange places. It’s time to take the spotlight off mission statements, and think instead about theological vision.

Most of us move in and out of, many different communities – our church community is one among others. We’re mobile. We live in a state of diaspora. Kiwis are constantly moving house, moving between towns, moving between jobs – moving between church communities. Our communities have many who were born in other countries – they live between cultures. Even the language of community when applied to the church is problematic. We find our support systems in all sorts of places as well as in the church.

There’s nothing new about living in diaspora. After the destruction of the temple, the Jews scattered over their known world. The first Christian groups were thinly dispersed around the Mediterranean. It’s not a comfortable space to be in, but it’s not a negative space either. The root of the word dispersed has to do with drifting seed, and that’s an image redolent of new growth and new possibilities. It’s the space where change happens, and new things grow. In diaspora, the Jews learned the importance of narrative – of telling the story. They learned how to name their identity. A good model for us, living as a dispersed minority culture in this country.

We can take the fragments of our past structures, and work with them. That’s the challenge facing us. No, not fragments. I want something with a potential for life as my basic image – so I’ll go with drifting seeds. You need to find your own image for what our business is about!

So – what are these seeds for growth and change? There are a few that I’ll name – you may think of others to add. First, public theology. This becomes a poor relation when we focus on institutional survival. But in our post-Christendom world, we have to find ways of proclaiming the public relevance of our basic storylines. If we’re serious about the doctrine of God as creator, then we’re not talking about God as creator only of those who happen to turn up in church on Sundays.

We have to take ecotheology seriously. Creation is not a stage on which humanity works out its destination. That’s theology shows no concern for creation. We are most definitely required to have a concern for interconnectedness. Otherwise, we are, as the theologian Sallie McFague puts it, in danger of creating un-creation.

Then, there’s a seed called intergenerational ministry. This is especially important for our younger people. We need to recognise that the Bible isn’t particularly ‘user-friendly’ for young people, who are on the whole, suspicious of past traditions, and interested in their own experience. We who are older, need to listen, and learn the language. Probably many of the ideas and images of our tradition are alive and well in the youth culture. We just haven’t had our theological ears tuned in.

Then there’s ‘The Other’. No longer can the few determine the theology of the many – though some institutions still try. Handling differences is a key theological aspect of our church today.  We need to be able to enter into real dialogue with others. Maybe some of our stories will be helpful signposts.

Religion today is far too important to be left in the private domain. It’s not good enough simply to react against extremists – we have to understand our faith in the light of other faiths, and that’s never going to be easy.

These are only some of the seeds. You can work out others for yourselves. But I’ll leave you with this reminder. The person and life of Christ is at the heart of our Christian faith. It doesn’t really matter whether your entry point into faith is God, or creation, or the Spirit, or Jesus, or the church we can’t escape from this one foundational point. Christian faith is tied to discipleship, and discipleship is tied to how we understand the person and work of Jesus the Christ.

Whenever we use that word ‘we’, we need to be clear who ‘we’ are. Knowing your identity is crucial. We have a gospel – we affirm Sunday by Sunday, that we believe that there is something about our human condition, wherever and whenever we live, that needs wholeness and health – that needs what we name as the presence of Christ. How do we live this out? How do we become the living stones – the living seeds – that bring restoration and hope, especially out in the margins of our world?

Rev Barbara Peddie