Homily Recap 2.15.09

We continued in our series of homilies that are based roughly on the theology of the Nicene Creed. This week we reflected a bit on the role of the Holy Spirit in the life of the community of the local church.

Jesus made clear to his disciples in an astounding promise that he would would always be with them:

"If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you for ever. This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you." John 14:15-17

"Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age." Matthew 28:19-20

We have come to understand through the witness of the apostles in the rest of the New Testament that his promise is kept through the sending and presence of the Holy Spirit in and among the people of God who follow Jesus in faith and repentance.

"So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling-place for God." Ephesians 2:19-21

There is much discussion and speculation about the particulars of when and how the Holy Spirit resides among and animates Christian people. What many Christians agree on, however, is that the Spirit is God's presence in and among his people for the purpose of progressively bringing a person's whole life into the fellowship shared by the Father, Son, and Him. But the emphasis in the New Testament is never on the individual as separate from the work of the Spirit in the community; thus, any conversation about the presence and work of the Holy Spirit in the life of God's people must be a conversation about His relationship to God's people in the context of the Christian community of the local church. Hence, it is ironic that a passage like 1 Corinthians 12 comes up so often in discussions among Christian people in the context of who has what spiritual gift, how one might know what gift one has, and how one might acquire a certain gift, etc. This consumerist, individualist approach to the gift of God's spirit in and among God's people causes us to miss the heartbeat of this portion of 1 Corinthians: "to each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good". How God's spirit manifests Himself will be unique within the context of each person's life, but this heterogeneity of spiritual experiences are from the same God whose plurality is joined in unity (three-in-one). So, the work of the Spirit in and among God's people is to enable and empower us to be uniquely ourselves while serving one another through the one Jesus. The point of all of this is that the community should, without diminishing the uniqueness of any of our members, see our unique lives as gifts of God's grace to one another for the common good.

'Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses." 1 Corinthians 12:4-11

This is how Rowan Williams talks about the topic at hand:

".... the community lives in the exchange, not simply of charisms... ... but of stories, of memories. My particular past is there, in the Church, as a resource for my relations with my brothers and sisters - not to be poured out repeatedly and promiscuously, but as a hinterland of vision and truth and acceptance, out of which I can begin to love in honesty. Mycharism , the gift given me to give to the community, is my self, ultimately; my story given back, to give me a place in the net of exchange, the web of gifts, which is Christ's Church. My self is to be given away in love, not because it is worthless, but because it is supremely precious, given to me by the hand of God as he returns my memory. Out of my story, the Spirit of the risen Jesus constitutes my present possibilities of understanding, compassion, and self-sharing. My identity as lover in the community is uniquely coloured by the loves in which I have already struggled, failed, learned, repented: they are the reason for my present love being in this 'key' or 'mode' rather than that, the irreducible particularity of my gift..... love in the mode that emerges from the past that is yours and no oneelse's , out of the process in which you have learned to accept yourself. Begin to see yourself as gift, love it as gift, from God's hand, and learn how the neighbour too is a gift, to himself or herself, and to you...... the state of 'fallen' humanity.... a chain of mutual deprivation, robbery with violence: here we see how redeemed humanity inverts this system to be a chain of mutual gift, exchange of life. And the pivot is the learning of ones' own self as gift, allowing it to be returned -whatever the initial pain or shame - by the risen Christ, hearing one's true name from his lips." (Williams pp. 37 and 38 of Resurrection, Interpreting the Easter Gospel).

Discussion Questions:

1. What benefit is it to you to think about God's promise to be present in and among his people? Does being reminded of this make a positive difference in how you practice your faith? If so, how?

2. What do you think Williams means when he says that we must learn to see ourselves as "gift" from "God's hand"..... "returned...... by the risen Christ"?

3. Do you think of yourself as gift in the way Williams suggests above?

4. How does seeing yourself as gift shape the way you think of your responsibilities to those in your community?