Frontpage, April 11, 2021

New life in Spring – and in the risen Christ. All flowers at St. Peter’s!

April 11, 2021 – Easter 2

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April 11 – 11:00am, Holy Eucharist,

Sunday worship — Now available on Zoom at 11AM
Meeting ID: 869 9926 3545 Passcode: 889278

April 11 – 7:00pm, Compline on Zoom – Join here at 6:30am for gathering – service starts at 7pm Meeting ID: 878 7167 9302 Passcode: 729195

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April 12 – 6:30am – Be Still Meditation group in a 20 minute time of prayer Meeting ID: 879 8071 6417 Passcode: 790929

April 14 – 10:00am – Ecumenical Bible Study through ZoomMeeting ID: 837 2389 1841 Passcode: 067156

April 14 – 5pm-6pm. Village Dinner will feature ham, baked ziti, roasted vegetables, corn bread, and dessert. Reserve space by giving Susan Linne von Berg a call.

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April 18 – 11:00am, Third Sunday in Easter, Holy Eucharist

April 18 – 7:00pm, Compline on Zoom – Join here at 6:30am for gathering – service starts at 7pm Meeting ID 834 7356 6532 Password 748475

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 We are in Eastertide until Pentecost, May 23

Eastertide is the period of fifty days, seven Sundays from Easter Sunday to Pentecost Sunday. Easter is not a day but a season and it is one to examine the Resurrection, more broadly and deeply.  There are a number of questions.

Is Resurrection just about death has been swallowed up in victory (1 Corinthians 15:54-56) ? Is Resurrection of Jesus is a precursor to your own resurrection (1 Corinthians 15) ? Does it say something about our own ability to expect to see Jesus (Luke 24) ? How does the new Christian community begin to function making Christ the central part of daily life ? (Acts 2)  

Jesus physically appears in Easter 2 and 3 making the Resurection tangible. The shepherding part of his ministry is explored in Easter 4. From Easter 5-7, Jesus must prepare the disciples for his departure. He is going to leave them. Jesus prepares his disciples for continuing his ministry without his physical presence.  Themes explored include the holy spirit, the Prayer of Jesus and God’s glory through His Son and the church.

Christ ascends on the 40th day with his disciples watching (Thursday, May 14th). The weekdays after the Ascension until the Saturday before Pentecost inclusive are a preparation for the coming of the Holy Spirit.This fifty days comes to an end on Pentecost Sunday, which commemorates the giving of the Holy Spirit to the apostles, the beginnings of the Church and its mission to all  peoples and nation.  Note that the Old Testament lessons are replaced by selections from the Book of Acts, recognizing the important of the growth of the church.  

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 Lectionary, April 18, Easter 3

I.Theme –   Jesus is risen and present with us

 Mosaic at the Church of Heptapegon

“‘Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself.’.. And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering, he said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’ They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate in their presence.” – Luke 24:38-43

The lectionary readings are here  or individually:

Old Testament – Acts 3:12-19
Psalm – Psalm 4 Page 587, BCP
Epistle –1 John 3:1-7
Gospel – Luke 24:36b-48 

In today’s gospel, Jesus invites the disciples to touch his risen body and to understand the meaning of the scriptures.

They still don’t get it, even after the stone was rolled away, the cloths folded, the corpse vanished, the angel appeared and various testimonies given. Even then they think he’s a ghost. Their reaction is panic and fright.

And Jesus reaches out to them, exactly where they are. No scolding. No abstract theology. Jesus communicates on the only plane that will work. They might be spooked if he touched them. So he invites them to touch him. Drawing them out further, he asks for something to eat.

Nothing could better confirm Jesus’ identity and cement his bond with his friends than the sharing of fish. That is, after all, how it all began: an interruption when they were casting their nets, an invitation to a totally different kind of fishing. He who had no need of nourishment satisfies their hunger, that unspoken yearning which lurked beneath their fear, the quavering hope that he might be real.

This time, they get it. In Acts, Peter speaks to the people in a tone that echoes Jesus’ voice: no condemnation, only words of peace and forgiveness. He preaches about the power of God in Jesus and calls his listeners to respond with repentance and conversion. He has full confidence that their turning to God will wipe out their sins. Like his master, he does not burden them with heavy dogmas or abstract philosophy. He reaches out to them with the same enthusiasm that Christ once reached toward him. Peter and John have the same tough-minded attitude toward sin that Jesus had. They do not deny it, nor do they allow it to overwhelm them. They place it under God’s mercy.

Peter and John had seen human evil in its worst form. They had witnessed the cruel betrayal and violent murder of God. Yet Peter believed that through the Messiah’s suffering, God’s promise of life would come to fulfillment. And John saw Jesus as an intercessor, an offering for our sins. When we get depressed about evil in the world, or become guilty about our own sin, they inspire us to take the next step, beyond the muck and into new life.  

Read more…

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The difference that Resurrection makes (Easter 3B)

By Lawrence Moore

"Jesus Christ and the Apostles" – George Roualt (1938)

The key question is whether this world and these bodies of ours have a future with God. It’s a question, therefore, about the meaning and content of salvation. Resurrection says that salvation is recreation – salvation for this world. God could have done at least two things differently. The first is to have abandoned us and our world because we rejected God. Resurrection tells us that God doesn’t do that – even when we have resisted God’s companionship to the point of murdering God’s Son! The second is to abandon creation but not human beings. In this case, salvation would be escape or rescue from the world. God could say, “You are not your bodies. The ‘real you’ is non-material. And this world isn’t ultimately ‘real’ – ultimate reality is another place altogether, called heaven. So let me rescue you from all this mess of creation (bodies, earth etc)”. God, in other words, could be a dualist.

But resurrection is anti-dualist. God isn’t a Hindu, or Buddhist, or classical Greek deity. The Hebrew and Christian God is a God who is inextricably linked to creation by love and a determination to save what has been created. Matter matters! Bodies matter!  God embraces body in Jesus (Incarnation) and enters into our world. God becomes part of our world. And God does so in order to save it by transforming it into all that it was always intended to be.

Read more  

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More than the Eye Can See (Easter 3B, Acts)

"We do not see things as they are. We see things as we are.” This Talmudic quote from Rabbi Shemuel ben Nachmani notes that seeing is not always vision. What we see in life is more than what the eye beholds. A person or circumstances right in front of us can be merely the surface of someone or something more profound.

The United States must forever recall the struggles, moves and marching of the women and men across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Fifty years ago, ordinary people walked for the right to stand up and be counted. To the naked eye, those sojourners lacked political clout as much as they did fiscal wherewithal. Those citizens were not persons of means, but their intentions were good. They meant well. They meant to do whatever—to get the right to vote.

No whips, dogs, horses or hoses would stifle their efforts. The Americans who marched from Selma to Montgomery may not have looked like much, but their actions changed this country’s political horizon and racial landscape. Yes, a yearning in their loins propelled them to create social change. They were going to vote at any cost, at any price.

In this week’s lectionary passage, a man crippled from birth wanted “change.” Actually, he wanted coins or any alms that Peter and John could offer (Acts 3:1-11). To this man, the two disciples were in better shape than he was. From his view, he could surely benefit from whatever they had to offer. Yet, Peter exposes their impecunious state: “Look on us. We don’t have a nickel to our names.”

There was nothing spectacular or dazzling about Peter or John. They were common, first century fishermen turned disciples. Their lot was that of trying to communicate the kingdom message of a crucified and resurrected Messiah. No bling. No gold. Nothing platinum about them. Nonetheless, what they gave to a man lame from the womb was beyond value or measure.

The duo could not give dollars or cents. Yet, through an act of mercy, they provided more than money could buy. Peter pulls the man by his right hand, stands him up, and the man’s limbs enable him to walk, even jump. This man who sought a fiscal handout was now the recipient of a physical healing. The desire for one type of “change” led to different degree of transformation.

In their human packaging, Peter and John demonstrated there was more to them than the eye could see. There is a simplicity of presence that cannot shroud depth of ability. The man at the Gate Beautiful witnessed it. Those marching over the waters of the Alabama River in 1965 affirmed it.

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