Proper 16 A - 2020- The True Foundation

Proper 16A – “On this rock… I will build my Church” 8/23/20 If you have lived in Charleston for a time, you may remember this… In the early seventies, Trident Tech began building their downtown campus on Lockwood Ave., near where the Joe is today. The site was on the river and it was beautiful. They had nearly completed the building when they realized they had a serious problem. You see, the site had been part of an earlier city dump that was active from about 1950- 1970… they apparently thought it would be and had gone ahead. BUT, when they were trying to hang doors in the building, they discovered that there had been so much settling that the doorframes were skewed. They tried to save the project but finally ended up abandoning it…what they had not counted on was that when matter decomposes, it emits methane gas and creates pockets which expand and contract.. the landscape was literally moving under their feet. There are times when the landscapes of our lives shift and move around us so intensely and sometimes so rapidly that we may feel unsteady, depressed, disoriented, anxious… We are in one of those very disorienting times right… and are experiencing what we could call a Convergence of crises: Covid 19 Economic consequences and the we see inequalities that have been there all along. Educational challenges – parents and grandparents trying to work, and homeschool their kids at the same.. and 780 children missing from schools. Racial inequities are on display and Political Dysfunction and then there are the crises of our own lives – our own sorrows and struggles , also our diocese does not have a bishop and Calvary is in an interim time—friends, that’s lot – if you are feeling depressed or unsettled, its not surprising.. and here's a question..when this happens in your life - and it happens in everyone's life - where can we find a steady and safe place to stand? I want to invite you to hold onto to that question... In our gospel reading today, Jesus and the disciples were having an important conversation…he asked them…who do people say that I am? The disciples had all kinds of answers Then, as we just heard, Jesus asked them the question that each of us has to answer sooner or later…but who do you say I am? And Peter, dear, impulsive, foot in the mouth, shoot from the lip Peter answered – You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God… Or to say it another way….You are the One, Jesus. The One for whom we and all of Israel have been waiting The messiah, the anointed one. And Jesus answered…Blessed are you Simon bar-Jona (which was Peter’s given name)…No human being has revealed this to you, but my father in heaven, you are Peter and on this rock I will build my church… Jesus has just done something really interesting here… First, he has given Simon a nickname – Peter - which means Rock… In Greek, which Matthew used when he wrote, he used the word petros (from which we get Peter… This is the kind of word play that people in Jesus’ day loved – Peter, You are Petros and on this Petra, I am going to build my church. Now I want to dip into the geography of the land because it has a bearing on this exchange. This conversation took place at Caesarea Philippi –in the Northeastern section of Israel known as the Golan heights..near the ancient city of Dan…they were right at the base of Mt. Hermon “.... Israel's highest mountain. The mountain towers at 11,000 feet above the level of the Jordan River valley -- so high it can sometimes be seen from the Dead Sea more than 100 miles away. Mt. Hermon had been known since ancient times as a holy mountain …A number of scholars consider this mountain, a strong candidate – the other being Mt. Tabor - to have been the site of the Transfiguration of Jesus…it was an important place…a holy place.. On the side of the mountain is a massive wall of rock which is well over 100 feet straight up and about 500 feet wide. So, try to visualize this…they were sitting there, on the ground, looking up at this wall of rock and the mountain and having this conversation… Simon you are like that rock, you are rock…and my church is built on a Rock…it’s going to stand the test of time and it will be sturdy, so sturdy in fact that the Gates of Hades, Death itself will not be able to overcome it… Notice a couple of things…. The last time Jesus and Peter had a conversation, Jesus was chiding Peter for being of little faith (he called him.. “you little faith man” …you remember, we had this reading a couple of weeks back…they were out oi the middle of the sea of Galilee ..it was night and it was dark.., Jesus came walking to them on the water and scared them to death – they thought they were seeing a ghost…when Jesus spoke to them, they realized it was him and Peter said, if it is you, let me come to you..and got out the boat and started walking on the water…looked down, panicked and began sinking like a stone. I wonder if was Jesus kidding Peter by calling him Rock? But, now you see, he’s not a rock who sinks but one that is laid upon the great foundation stone, Jesus himself… It also helps to remember that this “rock” language did not start here… There is a tradition in Judaism that says God passed over many generations as unsound until he saw Abraham and said, “I have found a rock”..and he called Abraham “rock”.. But even more than that …God himself is the rock…Rock of Ages, cleft for me…the song goes…and the Lord is my rock and salvation…(Ps. 18:2)…it’s all over the psalsm, Deuteronomy, the prophets.. strong, steadfast… So Peter is a rock but he is a rock set on a foundation stone…and the foundation is none Jesus Christ – the Son of the Living God…the Risen and Present Lord. It’s interesting that Peter himself comes back to this theme in one of his letters – he writes to the church members ---1 Peter, Chpt. 2…”Come to him to that living stone…and be yourselves built into a spiritual house, to be a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God, through Jesus Christ…… Human beings have managed to build some pretty spectacular church buildings over the years…but towering above them all is the invisible but very present church that God has and continues to build and it is founded on Jesus Christ, and the next layer of stone is that of Peter and the apostolic faith. and the generations of those who name and follow Jesus as the Son of the Living God, and then us today – we are the living stones in what God is continuing to build….....and this Church is not only established but established for a purpose --- to take on the powers of Sin and Death…and Hell itself will not overcome it... There was a time when I had to admit that Jesus was not at the foundation of my life…that there were so many other things that I had built my life on…a desire to have the approval of the important people of my life, a desire to feel secure, respected.. these things are not necessarily bad in themselves.. but when they are the foundation rather than the alpha and the omega, that house is built on shifting sand Is the Living Lord, Jesus Christ , at the bedrock of our lives? Is Jesus Christ - the foundation of Calvary’s life? What can we do? How can we respond? Here are some suggestions… 1. Ask The Lord to show you what is in his place, this requires radical honest and when he shows you-- confess it … and then ask God , working through the work of the Holy Spirit in our hearts and minds, to replace anything that is in his place…when we ask.. God is faithful and H is able 2. Identify for yourself three or four of his words or teachings or a truth we can see in his life that are important in your life…(its hard to choose – some of mine are: Jesus’ commitment to non-violence, the call to love not only our friends but our enemies, - that comment from Paul- that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself and he has given us the ministry of reconciliation….. the preciousness to God of each life, –the redemptive power of suffering and – that resurrection is real…God is trustworthy.. and his word is trustworthy…well, I could go on…but identify a few things of Christ that are your core values and around which you center and re-orient your life. 3. And, then, trust that God is at work in you and live it out….and when you slip, get right back up.. So, to the question I began with..… if you dig down in your life…what’s at the foundation…is it Jesus or something else? This week I’d like to challenge you, to invite you to look at what is at your foundation… I’d to invite you to take up a symbolic shovel, to go digging. If you have realized that you are standing on shifting sand right now...look to Jesus our bedrock, our foundation stone, our rock of ages… for he is with us to the end of the ages….may your life be built on him. AMEN.