The Church of St.
Paul and Incarnation, Jersey City NJ
January 26, 2020
Year A: The Third
Sunday after the Epiphany
Isaiah 9:1-4
Psalm 27:1, 5-13
1 Corinthians 1:10-18
Matthew 4:12-23
Call and Response
A
few weeks ago I received the invitation to my thirty-fifth high school reunion.
Depending
on where you are in life that makes you think that I’m still pretty young - or
that I’m really starting to get up there.
I’ll
let you guess how it makes me feel.
But,
you know how it is when you reach a milestone – you think to the old days, look
back on the journey, and take stock of how far – or how not very far – you’ve
come.
I
arrived as a freshman at St. Peter’s Prep in the fall of 1981, stepping through
those doors with what I guess was the normal mix of excitement and fear,
wondering what it was going to be like, desperately hoping that I had what it
took to succeed in what everyone told me would be a much more competitive
academic environment than I was used to.
My
parents paid good money for those four years at Prep so I wish I could say that
I remembered more of what I actually learned in class – it’s in here somewhere,
I hope – but mostly I remember what went on outside of the classroom – the
extracurricular activities, both official and not.
But,
I do remember some of the classroom lessons I learned.
For
example, in freshman religion we were presented with a much more mature, much
more sophisticated understanding of the Christian faith than most of us had
received in Catholic grammar school or in CCD classes.
My
freshman religion class was taught by a young guy preparing to be ordained as a
Jesuit priest. He was very smart – very well educated – and seemed to be very
excited by the chance to teach us.
One
day he taught us the very surprising (to me, at least) truth that the four
gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) don’t always agree exactly about the
details of Jesus’ life and ministry.
The
gospels were written by and for different Christian communities, communities
that had their own traditions and memories, communities that were struggling
with different challenges and asking different questions – in the same way that
Christian communities today are united in Christ but are often also quite
different.
Maybe
sensing that our 14 year-old brains were about to explode, our teacher
continued that these inconsistencies and contradictions actually strengthened
his faith.
He
argued that if the church had somehow wanted to pull a fast one on people, it
would have smoothed over all of these differences among the gospels and
presented just one story of Jesus.
But,
instead these four different gospels were all included in the Bible, each one
inspired by God, but each offering different, sometimes very different, details
and perspectives on Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection – and different
reflections on what it all means for us and the world.
I
learned about this nearly forty years ago and obviously it has stuck with me,
though at the time I didn’t really think I would spend as much time with the
Bible as I do!
And,
I’m bringing this up today because if you were here last Sunday morning you may
remember that we heard the story from the Gospel of John, the story of Andrew
following Jesus, accepting Jesus’ invitation to “come and see,” and then quickly
sharing the good news with his brother Simon.
Today,
though, we heard a different story of how Andrew and Simon Peter became
disciples, this time from the Gospel of Matthew. They are quite different
stories but the larger point is the same:
Invitation.
Come
and see.
Or,
maybe better for today’s take on the story: call and response.
Today’s
gospel lesson begins with a kind of changing of the guard.
John
the Baptist has been arrested, bringing to an end his ministry of calling people
to repentance and baptizing them in the Jordan.
And
now Jesus begins his ministry with the same message as what John the Baptist
had proclaimed:
“Repent,
for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
But,
there are differences.
While John seems
to have stayed put at the River Jordan waiting for people to come to him, Jesus
is on the move – Jesus is on the move, returning to his homeland of Galilee,
making his way from his hometown of Nazareth to the fishing village of
Capernaum.
Jesus
is on the move, calling people – calling people - and expecting a response.
In
today’s story we’re told that while walking along the Sea of Galilee, he saw
two sets of fisherman brothers: Peter and Andrew; James and John.
Jesus
calls to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.”
And,
Jesus doesn’t have to wait long for a response.
In a truly
remarkable moment, both sets of brothers leave their boats and nets, leave
behind their livelihood, leave behind the only lives they had ever known, in
the case of James and John, leave behind their father (What did he make of all
of this?) and they set out on a journey with Jesus, an adventure they could
have scarcely imagined.
Call
and response.
In
addition to thinking back to my high school days, I’ve also been reflecting on
the year that has just passed, preparing for our annual meeting next Sunday
when we will report on the state of our church and look ahead to the future.
When
I look back on last year, I see a lot of good ministry that was done by so many
people here, from the Altar Guild to the Youth Group, and everything in
between.
But
it was also a year when we spent a lot of time focusing on internal stuff, replacing
leaking pipes, installing one new boiler and patching together the other to (hopefully)
get us through the winter, building a new bathroom, and working slowly toward
the sale of 68 Storms Avenue, the former home of the Church of the Incarnation.
This
is all very important stuff that needed – and in some cases still needs – to be
done, but, honestly I feel like we spent too much of the past year like Peter
and Andrew and James and John at the start of today’s story.
We’ve been sitting
in our boat, patching the holes and mending our nets.
But,
as always, Jesus comes along and issues his invitation and expects a response.
Come
and see.
Follow
me.
Sometimes
we say yes to that invitation, like we did on Friday night when Gail and our
choir sang so beautifully at Temple Beth-El’s Martin Luther King service, where
so many of our parishioners were present to stand in solidarity with our
neighbors and to be inspired by a stirring call to action by Newark’s Mayor
Baraka.
So, my hope for
this new year is that we’ll do more of that.
My
prayer is that like those brothers long ago, we will get up and out of our boat
and set off on a journey with Jesus – a journey into Jersey City and beyond, a
journey to where so many people are hungry – hungry with groaning stomachs and hungry
with a deep need for the Good News.
Jesus
is calling us to get out of our boat and begin a journey – an adventure that we
can scarcely imagine.
How
will we respond?
Amen.
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