EASTER 7B – Acts 1:15-17, 21-26; Psalm 1: 1 John 5:9-13; John 17:6-19 – 24 May 2009 – A sermon given by The Rev. Peter A. Munson for St. Ambrose Episcopal Church, Boulder, Colorado
Taking the Next Faithful Step
INTRODUCTION – What shall we do next?
Imagine for a moment that you are one of the original twelve disciples picked by Jesus. And think for a moment, how you might proceed, if these things had recently happened:
- One of your group, Judas, had betrayed your leader and then, shortly after, went out and killed himself
- Your teacher, who you thought was the Messiah, had been arrested and crucified
- You all ran away from him during his time of death, and were hiding out in a locked house, because you didn’t know what else to do, and you thought the authorities might come for you next
- On the third day, some women friends of yours went to the tomb of Jesus and found it empty, and came back and told you of encountering an angel who said that he had been raised
- Later that day, Jesus suddenly appeared to you as alive and standing in front of you, and then disappeared again
- Over the next forty days, this alive-again Jesus kept showing up at different times and in different places, either hanging out with a few of you or the whole group, and then disappearing again
- Finally, and most recently, after telling all of you that you would receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and would be his witnesses in Jerusalem, in all of Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth, you had watched him be lifted up as a cloud took him out of your sight (Acts 1:8-9)
What do you do now? What is your next step?
SOME OPTIONS
They had some choices, didn’t they?
They could have just moved on as if the presence and the power and the guidance of God weren’t going to be available to them anymore. “Well, that was sure an interesting three years with Jesus. But he’s gone now. I guess it’s back to fishing (or tax collecting or…). I’ll make the best decisions I can, because I’m obviously on my own.”
They could have prayed and asked God to show them every single thing that would unfold next in their lives. “Okay, Lord. I’m sitting here until you reveal to me how the next thirty years of my life will go – what I’ll do for a living, who I’ll be with, where I should travel. Just show it all to me, and I’ll be obedient.”
They might have been sitting in that upper room in that house in Jerusalem for a while, but they could have adopted that approach.
What they actually did was something in between those poles. They left the Mount of Olives, from where Jesus ascended into heaven, and returned to Jerusalem, and they “constantly devoted themselves to prayer, together with certain women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, as well as his brothers.” (Acts 1:14) And after praying for a while, they decided to take the next step – the next step that came to them. Peter stood up among them and basically said, “We need to be a group of twelve again.” Other than replacing Judas, we’re not exactly sure why. Perhaps they would be going out in pairs again. Twelve was a holy number – the twelve sons of Jacob, the twelve tribes of Israel, Jesus picked twelve of them (and he was pretty smart). “Here’s the criteria, folks. It’s got to be someone who was with us from the very beginning, when Jesus was baptized, until now, and it’s got to be someone who is willing to be a witness with us to Jesus’ resurrection.”
And so all of them – the larger group of believers – proposed two, Justus and Matthias. They both seemed like very good candidates to be the new 12th man. They could see either one of them doing the job. So now what? Should they vote? As a couple of people said in our lectio class on this passage, maybe there would have been more potential for hurt feelings and other fallout if they voted. This wasn’t a popularity contest. They needed to fill a hole in their leadership. So they prayed again, and said, “Lord, … show us which one of these two you have chosen to take the place in this ministry and apostleship…” (Acts 1:24-25)
“And they cast lots for them, and the lot fell to Matthias; and he was added to the eleven apostles.” (1:26)
They cast lots? They left it all up to chance? Not exactly. They used their discerning minds to narrow it down to two, and then they trusted that God would reveal to them – through the casting of lots – which of the two God had chosen.
I like what Leanne Walther said when we were discussing this passage. “There are echoes of Jesus’ crucifixion, when the soldiers cast lots to see who would get Jesus’ clothes. The disciples are taking on the mantle of Jesus, and the casting of lots they do in choosing between Justus and Matthias reminds us of Jesus’ mantle being passed on to them.”
THE DISCIPLES AND US
This might seem like a relatively small episode in the book of Acts – choosing Matthias to replace Judas. But in the way that the disciples went about it, there is some really good wisdom for us.
We, too, are faced all the time with this same question: What next? What is the next thing that I am supposed to do as a person? That we are supposed to do as a family? That we are supposed to do as a church?
We can choose to be basically faithless people who say, “It’s all up to me. I’ll do whatever I feel like. God is not really around to help me with any of this.”
We can be people who ask and expect God to hand us a completely written book. “Here, Peter. Here it is: just read this book and you will know – from the beginning, the middle, and the end – exactly what you should do.” In my experience, the life of faith doesn’t work that way. God doesn’t hand us a magic book.
It’s something in between, a sort of middle way. We pray, we seek some guidance, we listen. We use our rational minds. We talk to other people of faith. And then we make a decision, as good a decision as we can, based on all that we know – on imperfect and incomplete knowledge. But “all that we know” includes what we are hearing from God – through prayer, through paying attention to scripture, through paying attention to what others are saying, through paying attention to circumstances, through paying attention to what inspires and moves and excites us, through paying attention – period.
God does indeed guide and direct us, through the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit can work through all the ways that I just mentioned. In general, though, it seems like God usually gives us enough light for the next step. The disciples did not know yet that a man who would soon persecute them, named Saul, would somehow become a key apostle – just like them – even though he hadn’t been with them from the beginning, from the time that Jesus was baptized. The dramatic event of that certain Pentecost had not yet happened, even though it was just days away. They did not know yet what roles Peter and John and James and Paul would have in the days and years to come, or who would end up writing the Gospels that the Church would accept into the canon of Scripture that would eventually become known as the New Testament.
Like us, they had to proceed one step at a time, one faithful decision at a time, for God was not going to reveal the next number of years to them, all in one vision. That just isn’t the way the life of faith works.
CONCLUSION
Is there some direction you are seeking for your life? Are you wondering what might be next for your family, or if a person you just met might become your spouse? Are you wondering what the future holds for us here at St. Ambrose? It probably will do us all some good to look at how the disciples went about their lives after Jesus ascended into heaven – how they prayed, stayed together, talked among themselves, prayed some more, decided, acted, even cast lots, stayed together, prayed and talked some more, decided, acted, prayed some more, when out in pairs, acted, came back, talked, prayed.
Lord, we thank your for your Spirit. Help us to pay attention to your presence and guidance, and help us to take the next faithful step, and then the next one. Amen.