thy True Religion (sermon)

From Cranmer's  Book of Common Prayer that we oldtimers grew up with, “We beseech thee so to direct and dispose the hearts of all Christian Rulers, that they may truly and impartially administer justice, to the punishment of wickedness and vice, and to the maintenance of thy True Religion, …” You may be seated.

For over 400 years our church prayed for Christian rulers to maintain True Religion, and as I grew up it was fine with me because I knew what true religion was: the Episcopal Church, the Anglican Communion. My arrogant youthful Certainties are now long gone, and do we really want government deciding and maintaining true religion anyway? What is “true religion”? The Letter of James has it right.

Linda and I were in Apalachicola the last three days, to officiate the wedding of a bride who was four years old when we retired from there twenty years ago, but we know her mother, her grandmother Dot, her great-aunt Helen, and we knew her grandfather and her great-grandmother, all part of a Trinity family dating back into the nineteenth century in that historic old church of True Religion that I first knew and loved as a boy more than seventy years ago visiting with my father in his fish business after World War Two, and then again loved and served as priest from 1984 through 1998.

The other reason, and for this we went over a day early, was to have martinis and dinner with friends from our days at Trinity Church, Apalachicola. So much changes when you are gone and return for a visit, as we’ve done several times since retiring. People move away, and die, and new people come in so that things may look the same although you know almost no one anymore. 

Evolved from the quaint fishing village of my youth into a tourist mecca of boutique shops, hotels, and restaurants, Apalachicola is still the town I knew and loved from 1945 through my teen years going through there to summer church camp into the 1950s. To me, still the same little town. 

Panama City is home and beloved, but Apalachicola has such a place in my heart and history that when we sold our family homestead, we spoke briefly of relocating back there.

Why do I say these things to you? I don't know, I’m not sure. Maybe to help you know me a little better. Maybe because we did see so many dear old friends this trip and Apalachicola is still in my heart this morning. Maybe because the beautiful reading from the Song of Solomon takes me back to Richard Rogers’ song in The King and I , Anna singing “Hello, young lovers, whoever you are,” and to my own years as a young lover not always the old fogey in your pulpit this morning, and I remember, and the Song of Solomon stirs the Love that makes life worth living, because the Song is written between lovers. I have been there too, and I remember, and the Song of Solomon stirs memories of the love that makes life worth living. I pray that when you are my age you also will find life to have been as blest, and love to have been as true.

But the Letter of James: what is it, who wrote it, to whom, why and when, what’s the buzz, tell me what’s happenin’. 

The Letter of James is ancient. You think it was written by James the Brother of Jesus, but James was martyred, murdered by Judeans about 62 AD and many scholars date this letter 80 to 100 AD, after James was dead. Go on believing anyway if that pleases you, but Jesus’ Brother James did not write it, though the content of the letter seems to say what James would have said.

This letter seems written to Jewish Christians who are distressed that the newly developing gentile Christian Church of St. Paul appears to be teaching that works of the Law do not matter, that the faith of Jesus is not Works but simply accepting the God of Israel. James is correcting that, telling Jewish Christians who grew up under the Law of Moses that works of the law, kindness and works of love, are indeed the essence of Christian life. 

It’s folly to separate this letter from Jesus’s brother James, an orthodox monotheistic Jew of the Law. But it’s equal folly to think that James, a Jew who spoke Aramaic and perhaps some Hebrew and maybe a bit of Greek (but probably was as illiterate as the Bible tells us Peter was - ἀγράμματοί - Acts 4:13), folly to think James wrote a document in impeccable literary Greek. So here’s what I submit: 

Jesus’ brother James was a leader prominent in the Jerusalem church in the three decades after Jesus’ Resurrection. Cast as a bishop, James would have taught, given speeches, preached many sermons, including what’s in this letter, teaching that simple belief in the existence of God is not what the Faith of Jesus is about. Romans 10:9, “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead you shall be saved” -- maybe okay for “saving” gentiles (as was Paul’s mission) but folly for Jews, even the devils believe, and they are terrified of God, is Satan “saved”? μὴ γένοιτο, God forbid, let it not be so, never happen! Paul wrote Romans 10:9 for gentiles. Writing to Jews, James teaches that Jesus is about how you live your life, that the God of Jesus calls you to kindness, love, charity, thoughtfulness, consideration, feeding and clothing the poor, caring for widows and orphans. And that’s consistent with Jesus’ life and teaching, Love your neighbor as yourself, where “Love” is not eros as in today's reading from the Song of Solomon, but agape, how you treat other people.

If the letter expresses the mind of James, and it does, it’s because someone years later picked up on James’ gospel, his teaching, his sermons as bishop, and assembled them into this teaching for Christian Jews who are being overwhelmed, crowded and voted out of leadership in the church by newcomer gentile Christians who have learned from Paul that they do not have to become circumcised Jews bound to the Law of Moses in order to become Christians. Yet even Paul himself told his fellow Jews, as Jews, you are still bound to the Law of Moses even though you choose to accept Christ and follow Jesus.

Paul’s agenda was urgently to bring gentiles into the faith of Jesus before what he felt was the imminent Second Coming, when Christ would return as the Son of Man, God’s earthly ruler to overthrow the old order and establish the kingdom of God on earth. And for Paul, to be "saved into God’s new kingdom," one would have to believe in the God of Jesus, the one true God and Creator who was the God of the Jews.

But James is speaking to Jewish Christians. And James is also a correction burn today for us who swallow the σκύβαλον that once you accept Christ “you are as sure for heaven as if you were already there.” Both Paul and James preach about life on this earth, not about your salvation ticket into heaven. Will you persevere in resisting evil, and whenever you sin repent and return to the Lord? Will you proclaim by word and example the good news of God in Christ? Will you seek and serve Jesus Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself? Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being? 

The Gospel is not about believing, it’s about doing: how you live your life because of what you believe about Jesus. I can be a Navy officer, as I've been for sixty years and more, but being a Navy officer is not about wearing a uniform, it’s about doing what is expected. You can say the Nicene Creed Sundays at church, wear a cross on a necklace about your neck, receive Communion at Mass every Sunday, but it’s the way you live your life that proclaims by word and example the good news of God in Christ. 

Not do you believe? Even Satan believes, and shudders. But Will you, Will you, Will you, Will you, Will you?

This is True Religion and that’s what the Letter of James is all about. 

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Sermon in Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, Panama City, Florida. The Reverend Tom Weller, Proper 17B, Sunday, September 2, 2018. Texts: The Song of Solomon 2:8-13, James 1:17-27. Never posted from pride but purely to keep a longstanding promise to a dear friend.

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