Two or Three Plus Christ, Makes a Quorum

14 Pentecost, A p18, September 6, 2020
Ezekiel 33:7-11 Psalm 119:33-40
Romans 13:8-14 Matthew 18:15-20

Lectionary Link

Jesus said, "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, I am there among them."  This saying of Jesus is often quoted.  It is used as a consolation statement when just a few people show up for Mass and the priest opines, "Oh well, at least Jesus is here, because he said where two or three are gather, I am there too."

There are also comic version of this like, "where two or three Episcopalians are gathered in my name, there you have two or three different opinions."

There is also the cynical version of this, "where two of three are gathered in my name, you can be sure there's politics involved."

I often have heard this quoted in a romanticized way to refer to proverbial campfire Christianity with everyone in love, singing Kum by Yah my Lord.

I have to admit that the cynical version of this is closer to the actual context of this saying.  The context is that members have sinned against each others and there is disagreement within the community.  The community is threatened by this matter of community discipline and so the community needs wisdom to know how to proceed.

So why is this saying significant?  For several reasons.

This saying represents the transfer of the identity of the physical presence of Jesus of Nazareth onto the spiritual presence of the Risen Christ within the lives of the gathered followers of Jesus.

This is in keeping with St. Paul's Body of Christ theology.  We are members of the body of Christ; Christ is our Head presiding over the different gifted members of the Body of Christ.

Members of the Body of Christ can come into competition and disagreement and so the overall health and effectiveness of that body can be threatened.

The same thing happens in my body.  My stomach can be upset and threaten my overall effectiveness.  I need to resort to my head, my reasoning mechanism, to resolve body disagreement to move forward.

When members of the Body of Christ disagree or hurt each other, they still need to gather in the name of Christ and let the presence of Christ as Head of the Body provide the group, communal and even democratic wisdom to resolve differences and go forward in the mission of the Gospel.

Can you see in this saying the basis for a Christ-democracy to achieve consensus, collaboration, collegiality and communion within the church?  This saying is the basis for what became known as Conciliar Christianity.

Why is this saying not easy and not always so obvious?

It is one thing to have a very small group of people, 12 disciples or a small Jesus Movement, but what about when the Jesus Movement burgeons to take over the Roman Empire?  A dispute can have significant political ramification.  The Emperor Constantine noticed the success of Christianity even while he noticed that there was great disagreement among them.  So he convened the council of Nicaea to require a Christ-democracy of bishops to agree on and standardize the teachings of the church to prevent open fighting among the members.  Thus the two or three gathering, grew to larger gatherings of bishops to realize the presence of Christ to resolve the challenge to live together in love, agreement and communion.

How can you and appropriate this Gospel saying of Jesus in our time?  In our time, we have hundreds of different Christian groups who believe and practice the Gospel in different ways.  We have some large Christian bodies with strong centralized structures and the leaders of these body issue statements of doctrine and practice for large number of members.  We also have some independent congregational gatherings that issue their own practices and teachings.

For you and I, in our parish, in our diocese, in our Communion, in our Ecumenical relationships with other Christians, and in our relationship with people of all faith who seek love and justice, we can still apply this saying of Jesus as relevant to us.

First we need to gather in the Name of Jesus.  What does this mean?  It means that we live as a family member of Christ.  It means that we have taken a mystical identity with the death and resurrection of Christ and come to check our ego so that Christ can be in and through us.  And when we gather and everyone is deferring to Christ in and through us, we can come to the wisdom of consensus, collaboration, communion, collegiality and together execute the mission of the Gospel for us in our time and place.

Each of us in our prayer is asking, "what would Jesus do here and now in our time?"  Jesus would do love,  justice, and mercy.

And if churches have so many rules and laws, how do we know what do do?  St. Paul said, "Love."  Love fulfills the Laws, it fulfills all rules. 

And if one is ever uncertain about what Jesus would do, then we should ask, "What does love mean in this situation?"  And that is how both individually and as a group of people we can know what Jesus would do.  Amen.