All Saints' Episcopal Church, Thomasville

Trinity 21, 2003

Today's collect represents the epitome of orthodoxy regarding God's will for us, as well as our place and direction in God's scheme of things as we go about our life in the Church

"O God, who blessed Son was manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil and make us the children of God and heirs of eternal life; Grant us, we beseech thee, that, having this hope, we may purify ourselves even as he is pure; that, when he shall appear again with power and great glory, we may be made like unto him in his eternal and glorious kingdom."

The first phrase defines for us where God meets us, and then describes the journey we undertake. It is a direct reference to our Baptism. This week, the president of the Prayerbook Society was moved to write the following: "If pressed to say what is the most precious and non-negotiable part of the 1979 Prayer Book, many clergy, including the former and the present Presiding Bishop, would say "the Baptism service and primarily the Baptismal Covenant." (See 1979 Book pages 304ff.) Themes from it have dominated the General Conventions since the 1980s, and when Frank Griswold inducted himself into the office of the Presiding Bishop in the National Cathedral, he said that such action was his prerogative, and the taking of this office was the outcome and unfolding of his baptism."

In terms of orthodox theology such a statement is nothing less than preposterous, not to mention venal. How can he get away with this? Because in this Baptismal Covenant (totally new to the '79 BCP), the newly baptized promises to seek justice, promote peace, and to respect the dignity of every human being. Such promises never existed in any Baptism service until 1979, and ever since, many in the Church have used this covenant to justify their political and social activism often with the hope of reducing the Kingdom of God (which exists in part in this world but primarily in the next); reducing it from a Kingdom which is to come, into an earth-bound utilitarian paradise - a movement in the direct opposite from where we are supposed to be headed according to the collect.

The Baptismal Covenant has also been used by many to justify the opening of the ordained ministry of deacons, priests, and bishops, to all comers. I'm not talking about gender or sexuality. How has it done this? By the doctrine enunciated by Bishop Griswold at his enthronement in the National Cathedral. That is, there is given at baptism (so he seems to think) in embryo or in principle the wholeness and the totality of all the gifts of ministry. Baptism makes you right then and there everything you might ever want to be or hope to be.

Further, no matter how sinful one might be, and no matter how unrepentant one might be; no matter how off the wall one's tholgoy might be, he or she is to be accorded every dignity and ministry of the Church - for no other reason than that he or she has been baptized.

On the basis of this covenant, to deny anyone entrance to the Ministry for any shortcoming or really any quirk at all (all other things being equal) is to deny the meaning of this fundamental sacrament of our Christian religion. Such is the propaganda. The primary reason advanced at General Convention for Gene Robinson's election as bishop had nothing to do with his theology or his sexuality, but that he was baptized: therefore he should be consecrated a bishop. What is far worse than this particular instance involves the several priests who have been consecrated bishops, even though they were then and still are living with their third living wife. But for anyone to deny them this right to be ordained would be tantamount to the denier forsaking his own baptismal covenant.

It is for this reason that one of the speakers at the meeting last month in Dallas professed that the 1979 Book of Common Prayer contains a theology in practice which moves straight from creation to redemption: a nearly universalistic or in fact completely universalistic worldview in which the Fall and Sin have in essence disappeared. To be created in the Episcopal Church is apparently to be redeemed - or at the very most you simply need to be baptized. This is what is wrong with that book.

The primary reason the 79 Book of Common Prayer is wrong has nothing to do with modern language, or the order of its Holy Eucharist compared to its predecessors; the primary reason the book is wrong is its theology of baptism. If Baptism gives you everything you need, why bother to be confirmed? - Which is why the Confirmation service in the '79 book is so weak. If Baptism gives you everything you need, why strive for holiness and sanctification? (as the collect refers to). What you must do is promote peace (absence of conflict), toleration, and justice (everyone getting not what he deserves but what he wants) - otherwise you fail to respect his dignity.

Most important in light of today's collect, if Baptism gives you everything you nee, why bother to anticipate a Second Coming?

What we have done with this book is to codify and ratify as our doctrine of salvation, the exact opposite of St. Paul's statement: "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself." What the Baptismal Covenant says - along with the rest of that service is: "God was in Christ, reconciling Himself to the world." Think about this for a moment. God did not become incarnate in Jesus to check out the human race and then go back to Heaven. He became incarnate in order to embrace all of humanity in Jesus, and thereby bring us to Himself.

God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. That is, the whole point of His endeavor, as well as our life within His Body (which begins properly at our Baptism), is to make us better people: to do away with, or at least to reduce the sin in ourselves, in order to become something different and better - so that we might be made fit for Heaven.

The main assumption God begins with toward mankind in the collect and in the Gospels is not that we're just fine and dandy and not in need of, yet deserving His approval. Rather, God begins our salvation with the assumption that because of our sin we're lost and dying and in need of redemption. Not for nothing does Dante begin his epic poem by coming to the realization that he was lost in a dark wood.

All four Gospels tell us that the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost. God goes to Abraham and says, "Go to a lost world so that through you they will be blessed because they are not blessed now." Jesus tells in Luke 15 not one but three parables. The lost coin, and the lost sheep, and then - just in case we missed it - the lost son. The overwhelming conviction of historic Christianity is: If you don't have Christ, you're lost!"

Now, if anyone in this church this morning is the least bit like me, then I am not the only one who from time to time has thought: "All right. I'm a good Christian, or a reasonably good one - and I still feel lost from time to time." Does that mean that I don't have Christ? Or that He has rejected me perhaps because of my sin? Absolutely not. Our Gospel never once promises a life without problems and difficulty - which is the why the traditional baptism service speaks of our life as a journey: with our baptism marking the beginning of the journey.

It speaks of a journey full of confrontations with the world, the flesh, and the devil. It speaks of being Christ's faithful soldier and servant unto our life's end. It speaks of trials, but also of progress and growth through those trials as the Christian continues his journey toward his true home in Heaven. The 79 BCP says just the opposite: "You've reached the end of your road. Welcome to the party; now you have everything you need, and whatever you think you deserve - just remember that you're entitled to it because you've been baptized."

The two churches which gave Paul the most trouble were Corinth and Galatia. We've been reading I Corinthians, and one of the problems Paul wrestles with there is what theologians call "realized eschatology". If eschatology is the study of the last things, and if one of the last things involves the consummation of the Kingdom of Heaven, and if this consummation is already realized (that is if the Corinthians with all their supposed knowledge believe they have it all right there along with their incredibly lax morals and standards), why stive for anything better? Just live life the way you want. It then becomes possible to define for yourself as well as for your neighbor just what God should be like, in order for you and your neighbor to continue to think that God is loving and just. Instead of reconciling yourself to God, you reconcile God to yourself.

This is what the Corinthians did, and it is what a great portion of our Church continues to do today: to define for ourselves and each other what God should be like, in order for us to continue to consider Him a loving and just God. In short, we reconcile God to ourselves. The only problem is that once we've done this, then there is really nothing left for us to accomplish. Once we've reconciled God to ourselves, then there's no room for us to grow.

And most terrifyingly, once we've reconciled God to ourselves, God is incapable of redeeming us - because before He can begin the process of redemption, we have to believe that our lives are lousy enough to be in need of redemption. We have to believe that there's something more, something better, something yet to come. And we must remember: the closer we come to God, the more we'll realize ourselves in need of redemption.

Beloved, we are approaching the end of the Church Year as well as the new season of Advent, when among other things we contemplate the end of the world as we know it, along with our own day before the great judgment seat of Christ. We need never fear that day as long as we believe that God is in the business of finding the lost; that God is in the business of forgiving sin; that God is in the business of taking the worst possible things which might happen to us, and turning them into occasions of greatness - in and whereby we might become great. He is not in the business of making life easy. He is in the business of making life great.

There is no finer summation of the process and doctrine of our salvation than this wonderful collect. And I promise I can leave you with no finer thought or capsulization of our place in God's scheme of things than this prayer which we all need to memorize:

"O God, who blessed Son was manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil (a reference to our Baptism and that there really is something wrong with us in need of repair) and make us the children of God (that it, to turn us around) and heirs of eternal life (it's not here yet); Grant us, we beseech thee, that, having this hope (hope is what helps us follow God), we may purify (to sanctify, remembering that this is not a one-time momentary event) ourselves even as He is pure; that, when He shall appear again (in the future: no realized eschatology here) with power and great glory, we may be made like unto Him (reconciling ourselves to Him) in his eternal and glorious kingdom." (our true home)! Amen.