St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, Owings Mills MD
August 27, 2023
Year A: The Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Exodus 1:8-2:10
Psalm 124
Romans 12:1-8
Matthew 16:13-20
The Foundation
For the past sixteen years, Sue and I have lived in church housing of one kind or another, including for the last two years in the rather grand rectory just down the road from here, surrounded by what feels like our own personal park.
Living in church housing has been an interesting experience. There are pros and cons to everything, but I have to say that I’ve always been grateful that when things go wrong at the house, I can just pick up the phone and there are people who take care of it!
I really appreciate that because it was not always so.
Although it’s so long ago now that I sometimes forget, in the early years of our marriage Sue and I owned a house in Jersey City.
It was the center house in a small row of three.
It was narrow – only fourteen feet wide, I think – not quite as narrow as a Baltimore row house, but still.
Built around 1900, it had lots of charming details that we loved – and, most of all, it was ours – our biggest investment – a place where we thought we’d live for far longer than we actually did.
I remember when we were in the process of buying the house and the home inspector made his walk-through. Since the house was fairly old, there were some issues – there are always issues, right? But I’ll never forget something the inspector said to us:
The foundation is the most important part of the house. Anything else can be fixed, but if the foundation is no good, then the house is no good.
Some years later when we were selling that same house and the buyer’s inspector came through – their inspector turned out to be much more thorough than ours, by the way – but when we were selling and I was sweating, I remembered those words about the foundation and breathed a deep sigh of relief when, although there were plenty of problems, the foundation was still solid.
The foundation is the most important part of the house.
And that’s true for the church – not just the old building with a new roof across the driveway – but our community.
And that’s true for each of us, individually, too.
The foundation is the most important part of the house.
We hear a bit about foundations – about our foundation – in today’s gospel lesson.
As Jesus made his way from village to village, teaching and healing, he attracted lots of interest.
No doubt, some people wanted some of his good food – all that bread and fish – that they had heard about.
Others wanted healing, for themselves or for a tormented family member.
Others, like some of the religious authorities, were suspicious of - felt threatened by - this mysterious teacher and healer.
As we heard in today’s gospel lesson, in some ways Jesus reminded people of other holy people - John the Baptist, or Elijah or Jeremiah or some other prophet.
But, although Jesus was reminiscent of others, he also taught and healed like no one had ever seen or heard.
So, who is he?
We know that Jesus’ disciples had a hard time figuring him out, so the question he poses to his friends, “But who do you say that I am?” seems like it’s going to be a tough one for them to answer.
But, probably to everyone’s surprise including his own, it’s Simon Peter – lovable but often bumbling Peter – it’s Peter who gets the answer exactly right.
The fisherman says, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”
I imagine all the others turning and looking at Peter, wide-eyed and open-mouthed.
Jesus declares that Peter didn’t figure this out on his own, and he didn’t hear about it from one of the others. No, God has given Peter this insight and understanding.
And then, Jesus makes a bold pronouncement.
With some wordplay that we miss in the English translation, Jesus declares that Simon - whose nickname “Peter” comes from a word meaning rock or stone – Simon Peter will be the first stone in the church Jesus will build – a church with the power resist evil – a church that holds the keys to heaven and to hell.
Now, at this point, if you’ve been following along, you might be getting a little confused or even nervous.
I mean we know Simon Peter pretty well – and we know that, like us, he messed up pretty regularly, sometimes in really big ways. Yes, he had a good day today, but if you come back next week, you’ll hear about one of Peter’s worst mistakes, when he tries to talk Jesus out of his mission.
So, if Peter – or any of us, for that matter - is the foundation of the church or even the foundation of our own lives, then we’re in serious trouble.
I can already see the cracks forming.
As a Church and as individuals, we often rely on our history, our wealth, our talents, our intelligence, our relationships, and that often works out OK. But, those foundations can crack oh so easily, endangering the whole house.
No, Christ is the only sure foundation of the Church – and Christ is the only sure foundation of our lives.
What might a life built on Christ’s foundation look like?
Back in Jersey City, we used to offer a service at a local nursing home.
Although many of the nursing home employees tried their best, this was a place for very poor people, kind of run down and with no fancy amenities.
Anyway, once a month, our choir director and I and a few other parishioners would head over a brief service that included prayers and a Bible reading, and some familiar hymns. I’d give a short homily and then make my way around the room, offering Holy Oil to anyone who wanted.
They almost all wanted to be anointed.
Many of the residents in the congregation were kind of in and out – more or less engaged during the singing and during the Lord’s Prayer – while many nodded off or zoned out during my homily – if you can believe it!
But there was one woman, about 70 years old, who was always fully alert and attentive to everything – saying the prayers with feeling and listening to my words, hoping – needing – to be fed, it seemed to me.
Her name was Theresa.
Eventually, we started exchanging a few words after the service.
Later, I would go over to the nursing home just to visit her. We’d meet in her room – really half a room – with barely the space for a twin bed, a dresser, and a chair where I could sit.
We would talk and pray and have Communion.
And gradually, she shared her story with me.
As a young woman she had been a nun but after a few years she left the convent and pursued a career in science, earning her PhD and working as a researcher at a prestigious university.
(She gave me a copy of her CV, maybe suspecting that I wouldn’t totally believe her story.)
But then her life fell apart – the death of a loved one, physical ailments, understandable emotional trouble – and eventually she lost nearly everything - her work and her home and her money and even her freedom – she ended up with a state-appointed guardian who made every decision for her.
I remember thinking, how can this happen?
But the truth is, it happens all the time.
All of Theresa’s foundations had cracked and failed, except, of course, for the One Foundation.
Having lost so much and now stuck in her crummy room, I would have expected Theresa to be profoundly depressed and angry – angry at God, certainly – and not wanting to talk with me.
But, although she definitely got frustrated at her circumstances, for sure, the truth was her faith had only deepened as she came to understand that all those other foundations she had thought she could count on were not so reliable after all.
She came to know the sureness of Christ’s foundation, supporting her no matter what, without fail.
Theresa was also a poet and I was honored that she shared some of her poetry with me – all of it beautiful, expressing both searing pain and confident faith.
Here’s an excerpt from a poem that she wrote in her little room:
I have been cloistered
In this room.
There are times that it is quiet;
Times I can immerse myself
In prayer with You, my Lord,
And I can be open
And still enough
For my heart to hear You.
One day I went over to the nursing home to visit Theresa and found her half-room empty, her few possessions gone.
I asked at the nurses’ station and they told me that she had died a week before. I never found out what happened to her or where she ended up.
I was so sad – and pretty angry at the nursing home – but now, mostly I feel very grateful to have known Theresa, and to have witnessed her faith.
Like all of us, I would really prefer to avoid her fate.
But, she will always remind me that the foundations of our life serve their purposes but they can all, each one of them, crack and fail.
There is only one sure foundation for the Church and for each of us – and it’s not Peter or me or any of us.
The sure foundation is Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.
Amen.
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