Fifth Sunday after Epiphany, Year C, February 10, 2019
Isaiah 6:1-8, [9-13]; 1 Corinthians 15:1-11
Luke 5:1-11; Psalm 138
St Thomas the Apostle
The Rev’d Leo Loyola
Fact: No one ever shares good news until it is at least eight in the morning. Seven, with coffee.
It was four am, when Dad called, and he clearly did not have good news.
“Leo, your mom is at the ER and her health is fading fast. They don’t expect her to last beyond 24 hours.”
I woke my wife up with the news, and she consoled me. Mom never had the best of health, so we weren’t too surprised.
Still, the reality of her impending death hit me hard at that moment, although she would eventually recover her third near-death experience.
When Benjamin finally heard about Mom’s situation, he came running into the house to find me, forgetting again to close the door behind him.
“Baba, your mom is dying,” he said, as if I hadn’t yet heard the news.
“Yes, I know, buddy. How do you feel about it?”
“Sad.”
“Sad, because Grandma is dying?”
“Yes, I’m gonna miss her. But I’m sad for you, too.”
Benjamin paused, as if thinking of the right words to say.
He then began to gently tap his sternum with his fingers, before breaking the silence:
“Baba, your mom will always be in your heart.”
Two thoughts popped in my head.
The first was this sudden rush of awe and gratitude. What a wonderful boy!
My second thought I suddenly blurted out: “Who is this child?”
Now, to be clear, I wasn’t upset or insulted or being sarcastic. Nor did I thought his choice of words out-of-place.
I needed to hear those kind words.
And I didn’t say it, because I doubted our parenting skills.
I said it, because I suddenly realized, that despite our best efforts, no one but God alone could instill in Benjamin such deep, deep love and empathy.
The perfect words said at the perfect moment.
I felt as if God was speaking to me through Benjamin.
Whose child is this? Clearly he is a child after Christ’s heart.
Our readings today share this theme of humble realization about our place in the world.
To paraphrase the Apostle Paul: “By the grace of God we are what we are…Though it was not we, but the grace of God that is with us.” (1 Cor 15:10)
As founding pastor of the church at Corinth, Paul felt such great pride for them:
(In Christ) you have been enriched in every way—with all kinds of speech and with all knowledge…You do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed (1 Cor. 1:5-7)
And, yet, as their founding pastor, I’m sure he felt that sense of duty to teach his children right from wrong:
“I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought.” (1 Cor 1:10)
Paul saw how the church’s very human nature was destroying the church from within.
So what did Paul do?
As we begin reading Paul’s letter, he seemed to call the Corinthians out for how they exercised their claims to power, by exercising his own:
Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain (1 Cor 15:1-2).
Now on the surface, this might be the kind of stance some power-grubbing politician or business leader would take. After all, it is human nature. But this was not what Paul was doing.
Instead he quickly pointed his finger away from himself:
And last of all he appeared to me, as if I were born at the wrong time. I’m the least important of the apostles. I don’t deserve to be called an apostle, because I harassed God’s church. I am what I am by God’s grace, and God’s grace hasn’t been for nothing. In fact, I have worked harder than all the others—that is, it wasn’t me but the grace of God that is with me. So then, whether you heard the message from me or them, this is what we preach and this is what you have believed. (1 Cor 15:8-11)
For Paul, as important as the messengers were, the message mattered most: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.
The gospel of Christ is our why.
Without our why, despite our will and our efforts, we have no purpose, or cause, or belief.
The gospel defines our being and our actions as followers of Christ, and not the other way around. Thus we can never boast about ourselves when it comes to our acts of faith, but what Christ does through us.
So as members of Christ’s Church, let us not deceive ourselves. Let us not become wise by the standards of this age and world.
Let us choose not to trust in our ways, the wisdom of the world: coercion, manipulation, deception, domination, and all the like.
Let us, instead, be fools for Christ. AMEN.
