Can't make it to church - 3 May 15

Eastertide is moving swiftly towards its close and today's readings challenge me greatly through the odd snippets found within them. The first, from the Acts passage, a response to the question, 'Do you understand what you're reading?' Is:

‘How can I (understand) unless someone guides me?’

This is something that challenged me many years back, leading me to study and to dialogue with others, so that I might be able to understand and to guide others - and the opening of the scriptures leads, and points, to Jesus - and that bring us to conversion and baptism.

The second comes from our 1 John reading which tells us that we cannot say 'we love God' and then hate those in front of us - because they are the image of the invisible God made visible for us. So regardless of the who or what or how or why - what we have when we look at another person is God made visible for us. What an opportunity we have therefore to tel them of the God they look like!

'I can't love God and hate the person standing in front of me'

Then we hit the Gospel and here we find a passage which speaks of relationship - life giving and enabling relationship - We can't live in isolation from one another! Doing that leads to us becoming dry and, withering, we end up dead. This is something I encounter in Christians and non-Christians alike:

Cut ourselves off from others and we become dry and end up dead!

And as this passage tells us: God is the person who tends the vine - if we are part of the whole that is tended and pruned and fed by Him then we will bear fruit; and if we don't we might look attractive for a while but then we will wither and die and eventually be thrown onto the fire.

This is a nod to the 'end times' and although many like to talk of judgement, I like to think that what we have here is judgement being portrayed as the result of something logical.

Sermon in a nutshell:  Church is one body - Telling others - Loving all before us

This is how we live and what we, as Christians especially (but it's true for theist and non-theist alike), do in the world: 

'We make know God's salvation which is free for all through faith in Jesus, the Christ, to those around us, and to a people yet unborn, declaring that he, the Lord, has done it and made it ours!' (That's the Psalm).

Now that's a pretty easy message for today, isn't it?

The Collect
Risen Christ, your wounds declare your love for the world and the wonder of your risen life: give us compassion and courage to risk ourselves for those we serve, to the glory of God the Father. Amen.

Have a listen to this and keep your ears open for the reference to today's Gospel passage in it:

Acts 8.26-40
Then an angel of the Lord said to Philip, ‘Get up and go towards the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.’ (This is a wilderness road.) So he got up and went. Now there was an Ethiopian eunuch, a court official of the Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, in charge of her entire treasury. He had come to Jerusalem to worship and was returning home; seated in his chariot, he was reading the prophet Isaiah. Then the Spirit said to Philip, ‘Go over to this chariot and join it.’ So Philip ran up to it and heard him reading the prophet Isaiah. He asked, ‘Do you understand what you are reading?’ He replied, ‘How can I, unless someone guides me?’ And he invited Philip to get in and sit beside him. Now the passage of the scripture that he was reading was this:

‘Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb silent before its shearer, so he does not open his mouth. In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who can describe his generation? For his life is taken away from the earth.’

The eunuch asked Philip, ‘About whom, may I ask you, does the prophet say this, about himself or about someone else?’ Then Philip began to speak, and starting with this scripture, he proclaimed to him the good news about Jesus. As they were going along the road, they came to some water; and the eunuch said, ‘Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptised?’ He commanded the chariot to stop, and both of them, Philip and the eunuch, went down into the water, and Philip baptised him. When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away; the eunuch saw him no more, and went on his way rejoicing. But Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he was passing through the region, he proclaimed the good news to all the towns until he came to Caesarea. 

Psalm 22.25-31
From you comes my praise in the great congregation; I will perform my vows in the presence of those that fear you. The poor shall eat and be satisfied; those who seek the Lord shall praise him; their hearts shall live for ever.
All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord, and all the families of the nations shall bow before him. For the kingdom is the Lord’s and he rules over the nations. How can those who sleep in the earth bow down in worship, or those who go down to the dust kneel before him?

He has saved my life for himself; my descendants shall serve him; this shall be told of the Lord for generations to come. They shall come and make known his salvation, to a people yet unborn, declaring that he, the Lord, has done it.
  
1 John 4.7-21
Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.

By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and do testify that the Father has sent his Son as the Saviour of the world. God abides in those who confess that Jesus is the Son of God, and they abide in God. So we have known and believe the love that God has for us.

God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them. Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness on the day of judgement, because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. We love because he first loved us. Those who say, ‘I love God’, and hate their brothers or sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen. The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also.

John 15.1-8
‘I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine-grower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. You have already been cleansed by the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.

Post Communion Prayer
Eternal God, whose Son Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life: grant us to walk in his way, to rejoice in his truth, and to share his risen life; who is alive and reigns, now and for ever. Amen.