TRINITY VII

July 18, 2010

St. Augustine Anglican Church

“But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

The Rev. Gerald Parks +

          It has always been interesting to me that things we fear the most, those things about which we pray for weeks, months, and sometimes years, have a way of being resolved almost, it seems, without our notice.  One day it just occurs to us, “Oh, I haven’t worried about that in quite a while,” and we are relieved and maybe even a little amused that we ever worried about it at all.

          Coincidence, some call it, that life’s problems can somehow resolve themselves if given enough time, without any need for divine assistance or intervention.  But those of us who have seen prayers answered time after time in ways we cannot understand or explain know that blind coincidence, if it exists at all, is not the answer to how prayers are rewarded.  God is the answer, and God’s answer to our prayers is not the result of coincidence, but the action of a merciful and loving Father.

          That our prayers are answered seems obvious to those who have experienced it; yet, the way in which they are answered can give us pause, and the answer when it comes is sometimes quite different from what we expected.  Next Sunday, the feast of St. James, will mark the first anniversary of our first service in this building.  Many of us had given up hope of ever having a “real” church of our own, and we were more or less reconciled to spending the rest of our days in “borrowed” surroundings.  Through the many years, of course, we had often plotted, planned and prayed about it, so much so that eventually we became less than enthusiastic, shall we say, about the whole idea.  Still, at times discussion of it would start again, and our level of excitement would rise again too, only to be disappointed yet again.  Twenty-four years is a long time to pray about something, but the answer when it came seemed sudden and unstoppable, with the result far exceeding all that we had hoped or expected.

          Now that we have been in this building for a year, and are more or less used to thinking of it as our home, I think we can be forgiven for forgetting occasionally all the prayer, hard work and sacrifice it took to make it a reality.  We should never, however, forget to be thankful to God for His gift to us, and I also think it is appropriate to remember, at least for this one day of the year, those whose dream and vision it was from the beginning, especially those who never saw it and were called home to their heavenly reward before the dream could be realized.  I have no problem at all in believing that Fr. Crum is still faithfully ministering to our departed brothers and sisters in Paradise, and still worrying about the welfare of St. Augustine’s, and of all the faithful.

          Being Christians, we bear a great responsibility.  St. Paul wrote in today’s Epistle (Rom. 6:19-23), “For when ye were servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness.” (Rom. 6:20)  But Christians take on the mantle of Jesus in Baptism, and are forever changed and brought into a new reality: “But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.” (Rom. 6:22)  From this we understand that Christians are different from non-Christians, that much is true; but it is also a great danger to think in those terms, because we are subject to the same temptations as everyone else and can easily fall into “iniquity unto iniquity” (Rom. 6:19) once again…”those things whereof ye are now ashamed, for the end of those things is death. (Rom. 6:21)

          Many Christians today regard sin in the same way as did those of St. Paul’s time, to whom the letter to the Romans was written: that sin is no longer a thing of deadly consequence once a person has received the new life of grace through Jesus Christ in Baptism.  While in one way that is true – Adam’s sin is forgiven in Baptism – it does nothing to lessen our responsibility for the sins we commit after that.  Those sins are our responsibility and a terrible burden as Paul tells us, “For the wages of sin is death.” (Rom. 6:23) 

          Obviously, no one would choose eternal death, certainly no Christian would; but eternal life is a reward, not an automatic result of saying and thinking we are Christians, while living and behaving in ways that are far from Christ-like.  That is what St. Paul is saying in the Epistle: we cannot expect God’s gifts unless we are first God’s people; and to be God’s people we must be conformed to His Will for us in living, and also in prayer.

          Quite simply, most Christians are unaccustomed and probably unwilling to engage God in prayer in anything but the most limited ways.  Their reasons vary of course: too busy, don’t know what to say, can’t remember, and many others; but whatever they say, the real reason is not complicated – they just don’t want to.  And they don’t think they need to anyway, because they believe themselves to be among the elect who are already saved, having declared it themselves.  It isn’t difficult to see the fallacy in that kind of thinking – St. Paul surely did – but it persists today just as it did two thousand years ago, and it is still dangerously and eternally incorrect.

          Prayer is the way we approach God when we ask for His favors, or when we beg His forgiveness for wrongs or ask Him for guidance, or just when we want to greet Him as His Children.  It doesn’t have to be complicated to pray, or long-winded either; and it doesn’t have to be limited to Church or any other place, though this Church is certainly the result of prayer.  But the importance of prayer to the health of our souls and for the welfare of this parish at this time of tension and unrest cannot be emphasized enough.  “Thank you Lord,” or “”I love you Jesus,” or “Praise God,” or “Lord, I’m sorry,” take no time to say and are easy to remember.  But more importantly, they (and other prayers like them) mark us as belonging to the family of God, to whom our Lord has promised the gift of life in Him if we believe and persist: “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”