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Intro
Good morning ascension.
It is a pleasure to be with you again.
If there are any visitors or those with poor eyesight here, obviously, I am not father Joe Murphy, I don’t have the impressive beard that he has.
I don’t want anyone to be confused.
We are doing well in Warsaw, and my job with Humana is going very well.
Normally, my family comes down with me but we weren’t able to make that happen today.
They send their greetings.
The Season
Well, today is Trinity Sunday and we have just celebrated Jewish festival of Pentecost.
We just re-experienced the coming of the Holy Spirit that Jesus promised, which is mentioned in our text this Sunday from the Gospel of John.
Some refer to this part of the Christian calendar as “Ordinary time.”
I don’t find anything exciting about anything ordinary, and if you’re like me, my ordinary life can be quite discouraging at times.
When I was first introduced to the Christian calendar, it took me a while to learn, but ordinary time is that stretch of season in the Christian calendar where there are no major seasons.
But more importantly, we are invited to experience the fullness of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in our ordinary lives.
This morning, we will find that our ordinary lives are exactly where God desires to do his most powerful work, transforming us into his likeness.
That work is possible anytime,
anywhere,
and in any circumstance no matter how impossible or hopeless it seems
because of the ministry of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth.
We tend to fixate on that word “truth,” but the key to that transformation is relationship with the Spirit of truth, one another, and the world around us.
Some Background
This emphasis is quite a bit different than the evangelical roots that I was raised in.
I do deeply appreciate those who invested in me and who contributed to who I am today.
But for me, growing up there, was, and still is, a significant emphasis on a different form of truth,
that is, believing the right things,
doctrinal statements,
statements of faith,
and position papers.
If you could repeat those points to others, you could convince the wayward world how to remedy its ills.
Within the church, preaching and spiritual growth was oriented in the same direction.
Three point sermons with note-taking and a major emphasis on intellectual comprehension.
The three bullet points from the sermon held the key to a different me.
As I’ve learned over the years, however, no matter
how many books I read,
how many correct lists I put in front of me,
these never led to transformation.
In fact most of the time it resulted in further discouragement or a staleness of faith.
I suspect this is because the information-based approach to transformation put me at the center of that transformation.
Can any of you relate to this?
A Clarification
Now, before I am grossly misunderstood, I want to affirm that
there is an important role for statements of faith, they just don’t work well for transformation.
And, I hold a PhD in biblical studies, so I hope there is no doubt that I highly value intellectual knowledge.
And, as a priest, I affirm the Nicene Creed, the 39 articles, and so on, so, those are important to me.
The Problem
The Gospel of John raises some interesting questions along the lines of what I’ve just expressed above.
First, Jesus says in verse 13
“when the spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth.“
I thought the disciples had been hanging around Jesus for the last three years and knew the truth.
(Duh-sciples - BW3)
And how does one guide someone into truth?
Surely the Jesus club had a doctrinal statement or membership agreement they could pull out.
I know for sure they had a list of hard saying of Jesus.
And second, right before that Jesus says,
“I still have many things to say to you but you cannot bear them now.”
Note, He does not say they can’t understand them.
This points to the fact that the problem is not related to having enough or the right information.
Jesus is quite comfortable with where they’re at at that moment in time.
He just knows they can’t handle the things he’s not ready to share with them.
To put it another way, where we might wonder “Did they know enough to be saved?
I mean, what if Peter died that night?”
This is not Jesus‘s concern in the least.
The Good News
The good news Ascension is that
God makes his truth known in relationship.
You and I don’t need to know everything, we need to know the spirit of truth.
When we control the truth we acquire, our transformation is limited.
When the spirit of truth guides us into truth, our transformation is limitless.
The Readings
Before unpacking these two questions from John raised above, I want to point out briefly in our other readings this essential point, that God makes his truth known in relationship.
Truth in Isaiah 6
In Isaiah 6, it is the prophet’s experience of seeing the Lord in his glory and hearing the Seraphim call to one another in praise of God that brings the truth home to Isaiah about himself, his nation, and God.
He doesn’t read statements about God’s glory, he experiences it.
It is in relationship that grasps the depths of his sin, the source of it, and the problem the nation was in.
It was in seeing the king, the Lord of hosts that he discovered the truth.
It is also in relationship where he experiences forgiveness, as the Seraphim cleanses him with a coal.
And one last thing before moving to the Psalm, where else have you heard the words
“holy holy holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory?”
This occurs in the Sanctus during the Eucharist.
So, later as we celebrate together may you meet the Lord in a powerful way as we sing that together.
Truth in Psalm 29
In Psalm 29, we have a Psalm of praise.
The focus is on the voice of the Lord.
The voice of the Lord represents the ongoing and active relationship that he has with all creation, not just his people.
People in the temple cry “Glory” in response to deer giving birth and the forest being stripped bare presumably by a windstorm.
His people receive strength and peace through relationship with him.
They know truth through their relationship with the Lord.
Truth in Revelation 4
In Revelation 4, John is personally invited to
“come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this.”
The book of Revelation provides the 7 churches of John’s day with a serious critique of their relationship with God and the empire in which they lived.
Truth is not known in what the 7 churches claim to believe, but in their real life in ordinary relationships with the world around them.
They are exhorted to return to truth by returning to relationship with Jesus.
The good news Ascension is that God makes his truth known in relationship.
Truth in the Gospel of John
All right let’s jump back to the Gospel John and look at those two questions once more.
John of anyone makes my point the best when Jesus says in John 14:6
“I am the way, the truth, and the life.”
Right there we have clear evidence that truth is found in relationship with Jesus.
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