Sermons by Bishop Paul V. Marshall
Consecration of St. Brigid's Church, Nazareth
April 11, 1999
Bishop Paul V. Marshall1 Kings 8:22-23, 27b-30
Psalm 84
Revelation 21:2-7
Matthew 7:13-14, 24-25Sometimes when the Archdeacon kids me about something being unlikely, he'll say "that will be the glad, happy day." Well, today is that glad, happy day, if there ever was one, a day of victory and hope, the fruit of years of effort. It is a particular pleasure to greet Bishop Mark today, for it was under his leadership that St. Brigid's came to be.
The dedication and consecration of a church is the Christian Church's most solemn and complex liturgy. In some Eastern Orthodox churches you can barely do it all in a day. Why should that be?
Well, we are doing something more than cutting a ribbon to open a new supermarket here, and there is no grand opening sale. No, we are saying to God and to each other that, with all our souls, we pray that this place be set aside as the one where we hear the Good News of God Incarnate in Jesus Christ, the place where we enact that Good News in Baptism and the Holy Eucharist, the place where we will see our children confirmed and married, and of course, the place where our bodies will be brought for their last earthly liturgy.
We expect to learn here, to comfort and encourage each other here, to receive the forgiveness of our sins here, and to work together here to let the whole world see and know that things that had been cast down are being raised up, that things that had become old are made new, and that all things are being brought to their perfection through Jesus Christ, the pioneer of our faith, and the captain of our salvation.
So, as much as a church is a shelter, it is also a powerful collection of symbols: font, altar, lectern, fellowship hall, sacraments. Over the years it will accumulate a prayed-in, worshipped-in feeling as we fill it with prayers and memory, with praise and thanksgiving for all God's mercies.
Of course, we have a leg up, as this building has already been prayed in for years by another limb of Christ's body, and it is very important that we don't think of this day as somehow exorcising those previous Methodist prayers and hymns. No, we add to those prayers and praises, grateful that they went to the trouble of building this church, grateful for their preference to sell it on favorable terms to a religious group, and above all, grateful for the gift from a member of our diocese that made it possible for St. Brigid's to come out of the basement meeting room at the bank, and into the light of day.
So here we are at long last, hours and hours poured into place, joy and gratitude in our hearts -- what better way to express the resurrection than to see a young parish take a major step in its history of service.
And so we turn to the scriptures.
The Old Testament lesson begins at the end of a long story. Israel had a tent that housed the Ark of the Covenant; that tabernacle moved around with them. King David had been a guerilla warrior, fighting in the rocks and hiding out for years. Finally he consolidated the kingdom, captured the city of Jerusalem and set it up as his capital. He had achieved his political ambitions, and so to centralize his control of the whole 12 tribes, he brought the Ark of the Covenant, with its tent, to the city.
He had a twinge of guilt in that he lived in a brand-new raised ranch with heat pump, three glass-doored Sub Zero refrigerators, media room, and in-ground pool, while the special presence of God was in a tent. And David was grateful for all that he had become.
So David offers to build God a splendid house. What a fine gesture. God's reply isn't what he had hoped. Number One, David, I've done pretty well without all that hardware, and how can you, your hands still dripping with the blood of the Jebusites, build a temple for me? It's always a bit startling to us to learn that there are things that our money does not entitle us to, something that Americans for the most part have not yet learned. So David doesn't get to make his grand gesture.
It is Solomon, who wished for wisdom rather than riches or empire, Solomon, who would be remembered as something of a preacher -- it was Solomon who was allowed to build a temple. Solomon's prayer that formed our Old Testament reading shows he knew what his dad did not, that God doesn't need temples -- WE DO. God has made us to relate to places and things; we are physical creatures, and are shaped by our environment, shaped by our memories, shaped by where we locate the central symbols of our lives.
The lesson for us in the history of the temple is a profound one. The good points about the temple were many. It was a symbol of love for God, it was a place of prayer and praise -- we forget that the most common offering in the temple was the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. It was a place for Israel to focus its religious hopes and the memories of the great things God had done for them.
The bad news, the prophets tell us, was that the temple began to be taken for granted, and soon God began to be taken for granted. That's the temptation that apparent success always brings, and Israel, that is, the majority who were not poor, that majority developed the worst thing that can happen to anyone: they developed a sense of entitlement, and injustice went unchallenged. God, the prophets said, rejected the temple offerings because they were no longer linked to hearts that knew they had received grace and were determined to pass it on. The temple fell, and the people went into exile. We are not entitled to anything; we receive our life and our opportunities as a gift. That is why it is important to acknowledge that this building came largely as a gift -- remembering that will make this building a symbol of the central truth of our religion, that we are amazed by the grace that surrounds and upholds us.
Today I am not interested in knowing what your programs are like, what your unique style of evangelism and social ministry will be, not nearly so interested in those important things as I am that we all heed Jesus' advice, and build on the rock. I leave the fine point of civil engineering and architecture to the experts: the point is clear all the same -- if we want St. Brigids to be alive in this or any other building when 2099 comes around, its life must be built on the rock.
Built on the rock. If the foundation of our church is that we basically like each other, or that we have common interests, the church will be washed away. If the foundation of our church is that we all look and dress alike -- you know, the assembly of the understated -- the church will be washed away. Not youth work, social work, liturgy, music, or quiet good taste are enough to give a church the foundation that will keep it around for the next generation. None of those things will preserve a church anymore than having children will preserve a marriage or installing a new sound system will make your car run better.
Built on the rock. There is no other foundation that lasts than our common faith in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, our common commitment to the Risen Christ as our master, our joy, our teacher, savior and friend. That is the center we celebrate here today, that is the only thing that can keep us from being washed away in the ever-shifting flood waters of style, program, or virtue of the month.
It is from the unchanging foundation of life with God as disciples of Jesus that we reach out to serve the world as changing situations require. It is from the energy that is generated in our gatherings here that we go to serve the world in Christ's name. Christ before, behind, and within us, leading to serve the world in his name. There is no other foundation that will bring St. Brigid's to 2099 intact -- or useful.
And everything we do today is geared to show our determination that with God's grace, that will be the history of this place, that will be the history of the women and men, boys and girls, whom God will collect here to know the joy of his salvation, to feast on the Bread of Life, and to share that bread. Again I offer you my congratulations, my blessing, and my prayers that the future of this church will be one of faithful and effective witness to Jesus Christ, our foundation and our joy.
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