{"id":279,"date":"2019-06-23T13:04:32","date_gmt":"2019-06-23T13:04:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/?p=279"},"modified":"2019-06-24T20:06:41","modified_gmt":"2019-06-24T20:06:41","slug":"second-sunday-after-pentecost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/2019\/06\/23\/second-sunday-after-pentecost\/","title":{"rendered":"Second Sunday after Pentecost"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Isaiah 65:1-9, Luke 8:26-39<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grace to you and peace\nfrom God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How\nmany Cathedrals does it take to make a people religious? Cathy and I, with some\nfriends, were privileged to travel around a section of Western France this\nmonth, including Paris. The beauty of the castles, their gardens, their chapels\nand the cathedrals that we saw were amazing, as were the art pieces in their\nmuseums. Many of the cathedrals and castles were under some kind of\nrestoration, costing millions of Euros, supported by both government and\ndonated funds. Most are visited by tourists on a daily basis; most of the\ncathedrals and castles have little stores within them for the tourists to buy\nsouvenirs; most of the cathedrals are large enough to fit 4 or 5 of our church\nbuildings inside of them; most have statues and some gold leaf spread around\nliberally, pipe organs and have wonderful stained glass and leaded glass\nwindows. For the most part they take extremely good care of their buildings and\ngrounds; in many ways they put us to shame, since we are not always inclined to\npull a few weeds, pick up a piece of trash or make minor repairs as we see the\nneed and are able, at least not on our own. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But,\nthat is not what makes a church a church, just as the size of a church is not\nwhat makes a church a church and the amount of art and gold do not make a\nchurch a church; as wonderful as those things can be, it is, in fact, something\nelse that makes a church a church. I found it refreshing that at least two of\nthe cathedrals that we wanted to visit, barred our way from going in, because they\nhad services going on. Cathy, led me away from visiting one cathedral, when\nthough our group was told that it could tour the sanctuary, it was during what\nseemed to be a worship service; my guess is that we would have been welcome for\nworship, but the tour had its schedule and we felt uncomfortable intruding. My\nvisits to these cathedrals and chapels led me to the questions, \u201cWhat is Church\nand what makes a church a church?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reading\nIsaiah and today\u2019s gospel, we see worship as something that is connected to the\nrelationship between God and his people and the relationship between Jesus and\nhis people. The issues spoken of in Isaiah had to do with the people\u2019s failure\nto put their relationship with God above their fears and wants and so their\ntendency to turn to foreign gods for worship, even though God kept a place for\nthem in God\u2019s heart. And our gospel lesson shows us that religion is found, not\nin buildings, but in Jesus. In this reading, Jesus confronted a man who could\nnot be helped by those who served in Temples and religious buildings; he could\nnot be helped by the best of their healers. Jesus healed the man, this man who\nothers had thought was beyond healing, who lived out on a hillside, in tombs,\nmaybe an area similar to this place. Religion, through Jesus, was present in a\nplace where there were no stained-glass windows, or gold, no pipe organs\nplaying beautiful music, just Jesus, his disciples, swineherds in the distance,\nswine on a close-by hillside and a demented and tortured man. Jesus had\ncompassion for the man and Jesus confronted the demons that knew all too well\nthe power of Jesus and who threw themselves upon Jesus mercy. Church was on\nthat hillside as Jesus showed mercy and gave healing. Church is here today when\nthe Holy Spirit today comes out to meet us where ever we are, when we are in\nneed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jesus\nset the man free from the demons that tortured the man, and he today, by way of\nthe Holy Spirit is here to heal us of our brokenness. So, what is the\nbrokenness that the Holy Spirit is here today to heal? Admit it or not, you, we,\nall of us are broken in one way or another; we all suffer sadness, or illness,\nor anger, or loneliness, and sinfulness and we are all in desperate need of the\nHoly Spirit\u2019s healing, care and guidance. There are legions of demons attacking\nus on a daily basis; we may not use that terminology, but the result is the\nsame; we suffer and we need Jesus\u2019 comfort, we need the healing and care,\noffered us by the Holy Spirit; we need to be in a relationship with Jesus. And,\nit doesn\u2019t matter the number of demons that annoy us; as Jesus could remove a\nlegion of demons from that one man, the Spirit can, do now, the same for us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\nworship the Lord here today, surrounded not by sturdy walls and beautiful\nwindows but by the sounds of insects and birds, by the wonders of God\u2019s creation.\nWe speak and sing God\u2019s praises, using carefully chosen words and beautiful\nhymns. We ask for forgiveness and healing and we trust in the Lord to give it,\nif we open ourselves up to the Holy Spirit; and so, we know that we will be\nforgiven and we will receive the healing that we truly need. Of course, that\u2019s where\nit gets complicated; we sometimes want and ask for things that we do not need\nor may not be good for us; we sometimes look for a kind of healing, that in the\nmind of God, we really may not need. Still we want it and ask for it, and so we\nshould, the hard thing for us is accepting with joy the kind of help or healing\nthat we are given. The man who received Jesus\u2019 healing in today\u2019s Gospel, was happy\nwith his new and restored life, but he wanted to continue each day walking with\nJesus, and that was not permitted by Jesus. The man was sent back to his family\nand community to share the good news of all that Jesus taught him and did for\nhim and did for others. With Jesus, and now with the Holy Spirit, we do not\nalways get everything for which we pray, but rather receive that which God\nfeels we need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Look\naround at this wonderful place; if my trip taught me anything it is that I am a\nprivileged person, and you know what, regardless our issues, so are you\nprivileged; God has given us much more than we deserve. We join together in the\nworship of a God who loves us, died for us, forgives us and answers our many\nprayers, who wants little more than to grow a relationship with each and every\none of us. Buildings, stained glass windows, organs and such help, but we know that\nchurch is all about our relationship with God the Father, Jesus God\u2019s Son and\nthe Holy Spirit. In the end, that is really what matters. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Isaiah 65:1-9, Luke 8:26-39 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ How many Cathedrals does it take to make a people religious? Cathy and I, with some friends, were privileged to travel around a section of Western France this month, including Paris. The Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons-and-services"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":280,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions\/280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stpeterschestersprings.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}