May 29, 2011, Sixth Sunday after Easter: Acts 17:22-31; Psalm 66:8-20; 1 Peter 3:13-22; John 14:15-21
Acts 17:22-31: “Then Paul stood in front of the Areopagus and said, ‘Athenians, I see how extremely religious you are in every way. 23 For as I went through the city and looked carefully at the objects of your worship, I found among them an altar with the inscription, “To an unknown god.” What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. 24 The God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands, 25 nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things. 26 From one ancestor he made all nations to inhabit the whole earth, and he allotted the times of their existence and the boundaries of the places where they would live, 27 so that they would search for God and perhaps grope for him and find him—though indeed he is not far from each one of us. 28 For “In him we live and move and have our being” as even some of your own poets have said, “For we too are his offspring.”
29 Since we are God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the deity is like gold, or silver, or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of mortals. 30 While God has overlooked the times of human ignorance, now he commands all people everywhere to repent, 31 because he has fixed a day on which he will have the world judged in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.
John 14:15-21: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. 17 This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you.
18 ‘I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. 19 In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. 20 On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. 21 They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.”
Sixth Sunday after Easter Comment: The story goes that a Church School teacher asked the class, which Christian holiday is the most important? One student eagerly raised her hand and said, Easter because everyone is born but no one was raised from the dead, except Jesus!
Paul declared to the Athenians that by raising him (Jesus) from the dead, God proved the one they called the Unknown God is truly the Creator and Sustainer of all.
Jesus tells the disciples that he must go, which they learned meant death, but also resurrection. They also learned that the Advocate promised by Jesus would come to them, only after resurrection.
There are some circumstances in our living that we must go through before ‘resurrection’ occurs. As painful as the process may be, our hope is built and sustained by the Advocate whispering in our heart, Hang in there my child, resurrection is coming! Look around you, it’s spring!
Hallelujah, He is risen indeed!
Rev. Julia
©May 27, 2011