Be at peace: Proper 23A

Recently, I saw a twitter thread about the six month mark of a crisis. It came from a crisis journalist: someone who covers long term conflict and trauma. He was writing to share his experience with these people and places. He wrote that the six month mark of any crisis looks and feels very similar to the beginning. Even though there is change, the exhaustion comes afresh. The feelings of grief, loss, and change rise to the surface again. Now is the time to remember to take care of ourselves, if we can: to eat and rest well, he wrote.

Here we are: six months into COVID social distancing and the grief resonates all around me. There is so much I miss. I miss restaurants, movies, and date nights. I miss coffee hour, Sunday school, and Communion. I feel the loss of having some sense of what each day will bring. Every day brings a remember that (to quote a friend) all 2020 plans are fluid. I’m trying to stay as flexible and adaptable as possible. And I want everything to go back to normal; except, what is normal? I am tired and tempted to fall into bad habits. I am trying to be gentle to myself so that I can be gentle with my neighbor. Sometimes, to offer rest to my soul, I come into the Cathedral to pray. I sit in the silence and wonder. I wonder which pew is your pew. I try to listen: for the choir, the creaking of the pews, children’s laughter, and the lifting of our voices in prayer together. I know that it will not be like this forever. I am trying to let myself grieve, so that my hope for the future can thrive.

Scripture tells the story again and again of God’s people in the desert, or metaphorical deserts. These are not always struggles. The desert becomes a place where the absence or search for God is palpable. Adam and Eve are thrown out of the garden. Abraham and Sarah finding God in the stars and sand. Joseph is sold by his brothers into slavery and taken to a foreign land. Moses, Aaron, and Miriam lead their people from slavery into a desert. The people of Israel watching their kingdom fall and sent into exile by foreign empires. Jesus driven into the desert encountering Satan. The disciples hiding in the upper room, afraid and grieving the death of their friend and teacher. Paul sitting in a prison cell, wondering if his life or death will spread the Gospel. The desert is not one place. It is the place where our grief and hope meet; our yearning to understand where God is in our deepest suffering and greatest joy. 

The letter or letters to the Philippians is written while Paul is in prison, probably in Rome. What we call the letter to the Philippians is likely the remnants of four letters. The threads of friendship, joy, and the glory of Christ hold our version of the letter together. Paul hints that the Philippians are suffering or facing opposition. Paul uses his suffering to encourage them. 
Philippians is a short book, four chapters. I encourage you to read it. Last week, the Sub-dean drew on those marvelous phrases: “I press on…straining forward to what lies ahead…” Provocative reminders that, whatever our circumstances, we continue to reach for Christ. 

Paul seeks purpose while in prison, believing his death will bring life to him and the Gospel. And Paul depends on the faith of his friends and the power of the Holy Spirit. Most of all, Paul binds himself, his life and death, to Christ. He encourages the Philippians, he encourages us, to do the same. The life we find in Christ, even as we suffer, strengthens us for all our circumstances.  

How, then, do we bind ourselves to Christ? In baptism? In the Eucharist? Yes AND in joy and gentleness and peace. There is no either-or. Baptism and Eucharist unite us to Christ’s life and death that he may dwell in us and we in him. The story, our story, though does not end there. We are sent into the world to love and serve. This is its own binding: glorifying Christ with our lives, loving God and our neighbor as Christ loves us. 

Our reading today comes just after Paul urges unity in the community. We don’t know the conflict between Euodia and Syntyche. We can imagine; there are all kinds of ways we are divided from one another, even in the church. He reminds the community, then, what they have in common: they “have struggled beside [him] for the sake of the Gospel.” For the sake of the Gospel, they must remember their common goal: the glory of Christ. This purpose binds them to one another and to Christ; this purpose is their community.

Then Paul encourages them. He commends practices of joy, gentleness, and peace. He invites prayer in the face of worry. Seek truth, honor, justice, and purity, a list of philosophies that pair well with the Gospel. His assumption is that we agree on what is true and honorable, just and pure. Because he assumes all of these are rooted in Christ. What are the things we have learned, received, heard, and seen in Paul? They are a life lived devoted to the ministry and glory of Christ. Follow Christ, yoke ourselves to Christ’s life, and we have all we need. In Christ, our divisions cease; we have union with God and one another.
Here we are in the desert. We miss our church. We miss our community. How can we bind our selves to Christ and one another when everything is so different? 

We practice. We study scripture, remembering the story of God’s ongoing activity in the world. We pray, giving thanks and interceding on behalf of all of creation. We seek Christ, practicing gentleness and turning our minds towards truth and justice. We practice all that we have learned and received. These words of Paul, to me, are a series of sayings we can keep in front of us at all times. Embroider them on a pillow or hand letter them on a card. Choose your favorite verse and write it on a post-it note. And, let’s remember that Paul wrote these words during some of his darkest days. They are not a glossing over of suffering and hardship. They are reminders that there is more to us than our circumstance. We are faithful members of Christ’s body; our lives vehicles for Christ’s peace to the world. 

Dear beloved children of God, be at peace. Be gentle to yourselves and one another; pray for one another trusting the Holy Spirit to empower and strengthen us. These days may seem dark and divided. And, as we seek Christ in all things, we will know His peace. For Christ is with us.