The Twelfth Sunday after Trinity.
The Collect.
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LMIGHTY and everlasting God, who art always more ready to hear than
we to pray, and art wont to give more than either we desire or deserve; Pour
down upon us the abundance of thy mercy; forgiving us those things whereof our
conscience is afraid, and giving us those good things which we are not worthy
to ask, but through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ, thy Son, our
Lord. Amen
The Epistle came from Paul’s Second Letter to
the Corinthians, the Third Chapter beginning at the Fourth Verse. Paul reminds us through the Grace of God we can be able ministers of the
new testament, on our own we can be in the end no good. If we are able to completely follow the
Law, with good intent, we can through that please God, but inasmuch as that is
impossible we fall short. The
letter of the Law, which cannot be complied with is death. But following the spirit of the Law
gives life. That is Jesus’
message, for in the Law is death and in the spirit life. For if there is glory in administering
the Law, how much more glory is there in the spirit of the Law, which is Jesus’
message?
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Uch trust have we
through Christ to God-ward: not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think
any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God; who also hath made us
able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for
the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life. But if the ministration of
death, written and engraven in stones, was glorious, so that the children of
Israel could not stedfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his
countenance; which glory was to be done away: how shall not the ministration of
the spirit be rather glorious? For if the ministration of condemnation be
glory, much more doth the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory.
Today’s Holy Gospel started in
the Seventh Chapter of the Gospel according to St. Mark, beginning at the Thirty-First
Verse. Jesus came in to the coast of Decapolis[1]. The people brought unto him a deaf mute. Jesus examined the man, put his fingers
in his ears, touched his tongue and said “Ephphatha”[2],
that is, “Be opened.” What Jesus
did here for the deaf mute physically is what he does for each of us
spiritually. Through Jesus, we
hear the Word of God and are given the ability to speak it. Conversely, there are none so deaf as
those who will not hear and none so blind as those who will not see. It is up to each of us to choose if we
will remain blind, deaf and dumb or open our eyes to see, hear and speak the
Word of God. When we receive the
gift of sight, hearing and speech we embark on a new life of freedom.
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esus, departing from
the coasts of Tyre and Sidon, came unto the sea of Galilee, through the midst
of the coasts of Decapolis. And they bring unto him one that was deaf, and had
an impediment in his speech; and they beseech him to put his hand upon him. And
he took him aside from the multitude, and put his fingers into his ears, and he
spit, and touched his tongue; and looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith
unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. And straightway his ears were opened, and
the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain. And he charged them
that they should tell no man: but the more he charged them, so much the more a
great deal they published it; and were beyond measure astonished, saying, He
hath done all things well: he maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to
speak.
Sermon – Reverend Jack Arnold - Time and
Action
Church of the Faithful Centurion - Descanso, California
Today’s sermon tied the
Collect, Epistle and Gospel together and talked, as is oft the case, of the
need
Consider the words of the Collect, wherein we ask God
who is … more ready to hear than we to pray, and art wont to give more than
either we desire or deserve; Pour down upon us the abundance of thy mercy;
forgiving us those things whereof our conscience is afraid, and giving us those
good things which we are not worthy to ask …
For the first time in a long time, this collect
acknowledges that we are continually pray to God, asking Him for what WE
want. Yet, how oft do we listen to
Him when He responds? If we will
listen to Him and DO what He asks, He will give us more than we have need of,
more than we ask for, more than we can even desire. Yet, it requires us to listen to Him, then ACT on what we
are told. When we ask His
forgiveness, when He gives it, we need to accept it and live it; if we live in
the past, we never will benefit. We have to accept it in the present. The
present is the only realm of time in which we have complete control of our
actions and thoughts and can influence people around us. The past has already
happened, we cannot change the past. The future has not yet happened, but can
only be influenced through the present. So that brings us to the present, which
is the most important part of time, where we can act directly for Him. We have
to remember that the only time in which we can influence our action with the
help of the Holy Ghost is within the present. We are never in tomorrow, and we
are never in the past, but we are always within the present. Then let us accept
His forgiveness now, not tomorrow, not yesterday, but today.
God gives us guidance through the Holy Ghost, if we
will but accept it. He gives us
the power to act in the spirit of The Law. The Law or actually 613 little laws turned out to be in of
itself a death sentence. The Jews
could or would not comply with the 613 Mosaic Laws, which brought them death.
The Jews only cared about following the Law, not
about the spirit of the Law which was intended. Following the letter of the Law
does not save an individual, following the spirit of the Law is the more
important matter. If you follow in the spirit of the Law, you are following
what the Law was meant for. Jesus is the ultimate embodiment of the Law. As the
embodiement of the Law, He gave us the important bits of the law, when He gave
us the summary of The Law, which through Him would bring life, everlasting life
and happiness here on earth:
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HOU shalt love the Lord thy
God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is
the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it; Thou shalt
love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and
the Prophets.
Only two laws to comply with, which though simpler,
are harder:
1. Love
God
2. Love
your neighbor like yourself
Think about it, if you do those two things, you will
find you need no other real moral guidance. If you understand the Big Picture, you know what to do on
your part of the Little Picture to make your world line up with His World. Just like the sight picture on a rifle,
lining up the sights with the target. We want our sights to line up with His
Picture. We want our sight picture to be the same as His. The problem is just
like the Jews, we cannot perfectly follow those either. Because we come from
the same common ancestor, Adam, we have the curse of free will. We often
exercise this free will poorly, rather than in the way God intended it, which
is to focus on Him. But we can at
least do our very best to follow those directions and change course whenever we
aren’t.
In the Gospel, Jesus helped a deaf man with an
impediment of speech. We are like that deaf man, who cannot seemingly hear
God’s commands, or won’t. We have a speech impediment in that we often utter
incorrect or outright sinful words in our day to day lives. We are asking for
Him to heal us of both spiritual impediments. Without His help, we cannot be
cleared of our spiritual deafness and uncleanliness.
Only Christ can purify our hearts, souls and minds.
However, before He can do that, we have to make the conscious effort to let Him
into our hearts. He does not enter into hearts where He is not wanted. Only
with that continual, conscious effort, can He dwell within our hearts and save
us. It is through His faith, His sacrifice we are saved, but we must show that
we are with Him, by acting for Him. This is a continuous process that will go
on for the rest of our earthly lives.
Doing our best is all that God asks of us, not just
saying we are doing our best when we aren’t. But, happily for us, Jesus’ sacrifice on our behalf accounts
us as just before God. So, now
that we know that, who do we tell about it? Do we let people know, or do we hide our allegiance to the
Lord? If you hide your
allegiance, you really have none. But we must be open about our allegiance and
share the Good News with others, that they in time may come to seek the joys of
His Kingdom. They may not understand right away, but the seed of the Lord may
germinate and grow within them, so that within due course they may understand
the Word and come to seek Him. A seed does not instantly become a large
sycamore tree, it takes years of watering and good sunshine for the plant to grow into the large tree. It is
the same with us, it takes years of good spiritual food and drink (The Holy
Scripture and the Holy Ghost) and of being with fellow believers who are
learning along with you to grow spiritually.
The Holy Ghost is a large part of our spiritual
lives. Without Him, we could not be considered one of Christ’s sheep. We have
to let Him into our hearts and lead a transforming and a renewal of our minds.
Without His help, we cannot adequately follow Him. In other words, we are
doomed without the help of the Holy Ghost, which will give us His guidance and
advice in conducting our church lives, our professional lives and our personal
lives.
When Jesus opened the ears and mouth of the deaf
mute, He did for him what the Holy Ghost will do for us, if we will but let Him
open first our ears to hear, then our mouths to testify, communicate and
direct. We must lead people to
God, not try to push them. Thus,
we need to strive, each of us, to follow God more closely that we can pull on
the lead rope. Leading requires
being in front of the people you are attempting to lead, having them follow
your example towards an objective.
Study Jesus’ life, He is a perfect example of a leader. We cannot ever be perfect, but we can
strive for that perfection in our actions.
Action counts.
For by their actions ye shall know them.
Heaven is at the end of an
uphill trail. The easy downhill
trail does not lead to the summit.
The time is now, not tomorrow. The time has come, indeed. How will you ACT?
It is by our actions we are known.
Be of God - Live of God - Act of God
[1] Decapolis - ten
cities=deka, ten, and polis, a city, a district on the east and south-east of
the Sea of Galilee containing "ten cities, " which were chiefly
inhabited by Greeks. It included a portion of Bashan and Gilead, and is
mentioned three times in the New Testament (Matt. 4: 25; Mark 5: 20; 7: 31).
These cities were Scythopolis, i. e., "city of the Scythians",
(ancient Bethshean, the only one of the ten cities on the west of Jordan),
Hippos, Gadara, Pella (to which the Christians fled just before the destruction
of Jerusalem), Philadelphia (ancient Rabbath-ammon), Gerasa, Dion, Canatha,
Raphana, and Damascus. When the Romans conquered Syria (B. C. 65) they rebuilt,
and endowed with certain privileges, these "ten cities, " and the
province connected with them they called "Decapolis. "
[2]
Ephphatha the Greek
form of a Syro-Chaldaic or Aramaic word, meaning "Be opened", uttered
by Christ when healing the man who was deaf and dumb (Mark 7: 34). It is one of
the characteristics of Mark that he uses the very Aramaic words which fell from
our Lord's lips. (See 3: 17; 5: 41; 7: 11; 14: 36; 15: 34. )
