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Sep 27 2005 One body. One Lord. |
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Thursday, 17 November 2005 |
This coming Sunday is the celebration of Worldwide Communion Sunday.
This celebration had its beginnings in what is now the PCUSA in the
year 1936. If memory serves me correctly, that was also the year of the
Berlin Olympics and the early stirrings of Hitler’s move toward world
prominence through war and German imperialism. For sure, the nine years
following 1936 in the history of the world are years that are marked by
painful memories to many and the sobering realization of what war and
hatred and racial prejudice can destroy. Words like gas chambers, mass
graves, Auschwitz, gestapo, and concentration camps became known to the
world. It was not a good time in the history of God’s world or the best
moment of God’s people.
I point out this brief history to help us
understand that our lives as Christians – as followers of the revealed
God in Christ – are not live in a vacuum. Sometimes world events should
be the impetus for the called people of God to rise up and reclaim the
brotherhood and sisterhood that we all share. It is one of the
prophetic tasks to which the people of God are called. We are to speak
relevant words about God in light of current world situations.
Now, I don’t know how much the events of 1936
and the following years played in the formation of Worldwide Communion
Sunday, but I do know that being called to the table of God and
reminded that all people are God’s people and that none of us hold a
distinctive advantage over any other group or race of people is always
a good word for people to hear. The love of God shown in Jesus was, and
is, a worldwide love. It transcends anything and everything that we
cherish most or despise the greatest. Whatever walls we have built to
either separate or protect, God through Jesus is at work to break them
down. Whatever hatred we might feel for others, God is at work in Jesus
to melt. Whatever ignorance we have toward other people’s traditions
and societies, God is at work in Jesus to help us understand that
people don’t have to think like us or act like us in order to be
kingdom people.
As we celebrate the sacrament of Holy
Communion this Sunday, we are given the opportunity to specifically
consider how much bigger God’s idea of life, love, forgiveness,
salvation, unity, and community is than ours. It’s a tall task to
embrace the world and the people of the world. There are so many
differences in customs, societies, traditions, languages – we could
make a hefty list of what divides us and keeps us from being one. But,
God isn’t interested in those divisions. God spoke through Jesus and
gave us new words. Those words bind us. Unite us. Tie us together with
strings that cannot be broken. This Sunday, we will hear them again.
And we will remember. We will re - know. “ This is my body broken for
you. This is my blood shed for you. Take and eat. Take and drink. ” One
body. One Lord. Throughout the whole, wide world. Thanks be to God!
Thanks be to God!
Grace and peace,
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 17 November 2005 )
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