Sunday, May 14, 2017, Easter 5 (full size gallery)
An important week in St. Peter’s life with connections to the past, current ministry and the future. Monday, May 15 is the 181st anniversary of the consecration of St. Peter’s in 1836 with Bishop Channing Moore. We hope our ancestors would be pleased with the role of the church. That role is explored with the Village Harvest distribution on Wed. May 17. We are reaching numbers that are double the size of our congregation. Shoppers come from three countiea – King George, Caroline and Essex countries. If you have never helped with this ministry, we could use you this week. Help unload the produce at 9am or at 2pm to help ready all of our goods for the distribution beginning at 3:30pm
The future is the Road to Emmaus Class. While its main audience is those to be received or confirmed with the Bishop in June, all are welcome and encourage to attend. It is a discussion which could go in many directions, includingi figuring out your ministry. It all starts at 6pm with a snack supper.
This Sunday we celebrated Michael and Bill’s birthday. We had 42 present.
Mother’s Day Sunday always brings extended families. Helmut welcomed his son David. The Felicianos had their son Chris home for the military. He will be shipping out to Korea by mid year. Catherine joined the family in a prayer at the end of the service.
Andrew updated us on the bees. There are 17 queen cells. Only one queen per hive. It’s survival of the fittest – only one lives usually. He found one dead queen and a live one. Hoping he will mark a surviving queen in yellow by next week.
He noted one danger – an ant, a predator. He is taking out some of the slats to rid the hive of these. The hive will decrease its population over the number of the weeks until the queen mates and the population increases.
He showed us the different types of bees. Drones are males, the product of unfertilzied eggshave no stinger and we passed it one boy who is allergic to bees. They do not gather nectar and pollen and sole purpose is to mate with a fertile queen.
This Sundays’s readings invite us to consider our lives as a journey with Christ to a glorious, final home with God. The idea of "house" is brought out both in the Epistle and Gospel. In Acts, that journey includes both misunderstanding and suffering at the hands of those opposed to the gospel of Christ. 1 Peter teaches that journeying with Jesus means being joined with him into a spiritual house, members of a holy nation. Jesus in the John reading assures his disciples that their earthly journey culminates in an eternal home with their heavenly Father
In Acts 7, Stephen gives a lengthy speech to the Sanhedrin charged with judging him. It is a summary of how the people of Israel have disobeyed their God, and have rejected their prophets over and over again. The final straw came when Stephen declared that he saw Jesus standing at God’s right hand. Stephen’s audience understood the enormous significance of this claim and resisted it, fulfilling Stephen’s description of their nature (7:51-53). He met his end by being stoned.
In the Epistle., the Christian community is described in several interwoven images. It is a spiritual house. The symbol of Jesus as the cornerstone was frequently used in the early preaching, especially as a touchstone for response to him. To some he is precious, but to others he is a stumbling-block. The community is also a holy priesthood appointed to offer the spiritual sacrifice of obedience.
Finally, the titles given to Israel are extended to Christians. Their duty is to declare the Lord’s deeds. They are now a family, a nation, a people transcending all ethnic barriers, for they are God’s own who have received mercy.
The gospel reading is taken from the farewell discourse of Jesus, explaining the significance and implications of Jesus’ glorification (13:31–17:26). As God’s glory is revealed in Jesus’ obedient suffering, so Jesus’ glory will be seen in his exaltation by God. Thus, his glorification means his departure from the disciples and return to the Father.
John 14:1-14 begins with metaphor to a house. In God’s realm there are many dwelling places; Jesus as the Christ prepares a place for us – a future and a hope we can rely on – that enables us to experience eternal life in the here and now. We can face persecution, aging, and death because of our faith in God’s everlasting love. The trials we face now are part of a larger adventure of growing with God.
The reading draws out the meaning of Jesus’ departure for his disciples: it brings not separation but deeper fellowship. They will be able to abide with him always, in the body of Christ, the Christian community. Philip’s request to see the Father and so be satisfied expresses the human longing for a real and intimate knowledge of God. This desire is answered in the present. Jesus is the revelation of God in words and works.