7 Easter Cycle A May 24, 2020
Acts 1:6-14 Ps. 68
1 Peter 4:12-14; 5:6-11 John 17:1-11
The Gospel of John is significantly different from the other canonical Gospels. It was written later and includes different literary forms. It does not have parables; it does not have exorcisms, it does not have the Bethlehem birth story, and the miracles are called signs but it does have very long discourses and is the most significant "red letter/words of Jesus" Gospel. One of the long "discourses" of Jesus is the long prayer in John, chapter 17, which is in fact, can more likely be called the "Lord's Prayer," than the "Our Father," since the "Our Father," could be called the disciples' prayer. Remember the Gospel process involved persons who believe they were filled with God's Spirit, who had the mind of Christ, and who believed that when they spoke in the name of Jesus, they were channeling his words as an oracle of Christ himself. These oracle words channeled through the early preachers/friends of Jesus were then placed in narrative teaching contexts that became the Gospels. In the Gospel writings, there is a distinction of weaved words from the oral tradition of Jesus of Nazareth and the oracles words of the Risen Christ channeled through the early evangelists. John's Gospel is so distinctly different, it seems to involve more channeled words of the Risen Christ and the word are presented in a mystagogic form as a spiritual program for initiates to be on a transformational path to realize the end and goal of human life.
What is the biblical end and goal of human life? It is to recover and live out the image of God as our heavenly parent. Jesus Christ is the one who God gave to this world to help human being realize themselves as sons and daughters of God.
In the prayer of Jesus, which we read on Ascension Sunday, we have a prayer of Jesus speaking in the past tense about his time on earth. And he states his pray wish for his disciples. "Father, I pray that they may be one, even as you are one in me." This is the mystical goal of life. Jesus, told his disciples, if you have seen me, you have seen the Father." And now he wants it to be, "if you see my disciple, you also can see the Father; that is, you can see the image of God upon their lives as they have come into the power to be children of God."
What did the early Christians believe about the Ascended Christ? They believed that he had attained another state of glory, of profound influential fame, the influential fame of being next to God and interceding on behalf of his earthly friends.
You and I should use the interceding prayers of Jesus like our stairway, ladder or elevator to attain what St. Paul said, "be seated with Christ in heavenly places." This is the spiritual poetry of the early church to speak about mystical union with God in Christ in knowing oneself as a child of God.
John's Gospel is the most profound Gospel about the Fatherhood of God. Many of the words of the Risen Christ in the Gospel oracles are about the relationship between Jesus the Son and God the Father. Jesus is the unique Child, unique Son of God to help us realize, or have the power and authority to be sibling children of God.
In our modern era of coming into a fuller appreciation of the equality of women in our social order, but also into our theological symbols, the seeming limitation of "masculine" designation for the divine can seem starkly excluding of the feminine. And in charity, we need to understand the limitation of cultures of patriarchal dominance. Hebrew Scriptures has feminine designations for the divine, even while the masculine often prevailed because of the heavenly competition with the various goddesses of Canaan. In the old order when microscopic things were not yet seen, the contribution of the egg as equal in child birth was not known, and the masculine was given an omni-competence for generating the whole child, who had merely been planted in "soil" of the womb. In the old order, the masculine was the nature of a child and the feminine was but the nurture of the child. Since Paul wrote that in Christ, there is neither male nor female, but a new creation, we can understand the Fatherhood of God in a more androgynous way, as an omni-competent Heavenly Parent from whom we derived and whom we seek to be one with as we seek to perfectly bear the image of our heavenly parent.
The prayer, "that they may be one," has often been reduced to ecclesiastical policy. It is seen as a prayer of Jesus for the unity of the church. And yet there are so many churches which are not in such unity. I think that this prayer of Jesus has less to do with the administrative unity of everyone who calls themselves Christian; no, it has to do with each person coming into the power of being a child of God and bearing in the best possible way the image of our heaven parent and creator.
This is the daunting task of our lives; to bear the image of God into our world as we have been given the perfect example in the life of Jesus Christ.
And how to we bear the image of God into our world? With the practice of love and justice. What does God look like in our world now? God looks like love and justice as it can come to people in many ways through the practice of people who are seeking to bear and live out the image of God in this world.
Jesus said, "If you have seen me, you have seen the Father." And what did we see in Jesus? Sacrificial love, honesty and justice.
Now this day, on Ascension Sunday, we note the real absence of Jesus of Nazareth from this world. And what is it that takes the place of the absent Jesus of Nazareth?
The Risen Christ says, "If people see you, then they have seen your heavenly parent." Why? Because the prayer of the Risen Christ is always, "Father/Parent, make them one as you are one in me."
Let us use the power of the prayer of Christ for us, to realize ourselves as children of God today. Amen
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