Proper 13.B.24
Ephesians 4:1-16
The Rev. Melanie McCarley
In his letter to the Ephesians, St. Paul makes a case for unity. He writes: “I, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”
Unity is important. If you doubt me, consider this correction, found in the Cambridge Minnesota Star: “Isanti County Commissioner Tom Pagel has 100-percent support from his family to seek re-election,, not 10 percent, as was stated in last week’s.” Unity matters.
The Irish stateman and philosopher, Edmund Burke phrases the importance of Unity with simplicity. “What ever disunites man from God, also disunites man from man.”
That thought should cause us to take pause, for we live in a world that increasingly seems to embrace arrogance, violence and short-temperedness. But from what Burke writes (and I believe he is correct), there is no way of maintaining a right relationship with God if you are not able to love your neighbor. The two are connected.
Unity and Grace are the themes of today’s reading from St. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. Here, Paul is calling the followers of Christ to embrace humility, gentleness and patience—we are to live together in the bond of peace.
He writes: There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all.
This portion of the reading should sound familiar to us—for it’s how we began our service for Holy Baptism this morning. Baptism is the sacrament through which a person is made a Christian—welcomed into the family of Christ, a family which includes not only people of various and sundry denominations, but people who are living now and those who have gone before. When Paul was writing to the people of Ephesus, they were grappling with the concept of Jews and Gentiles welcoming one another into their fellowship. Today’s reading encourages us to look beyond those things which can divide and separate us from our common unity in Christ. Things such as language, race and even denominations. Happily, the sacrament of Holy Baptism (with only a few exceptions) reaches beyond this—all mainstream denominations, including Roman Catholics, recognize the validity of this sacrament. It’s a lesson of unity writ large through water, grace and the invocation of the Holy Trinity.
And it brings me to a letter I received this week from a parishioner of St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Dedham, who told me a story, reflecting this spirit of unity, which I had not known. Brian Keaney writes. Dear Rev. McCarley: You may have already heard this story about the man who had to be one of the richest parishioners in St. Paul’s history, Albert W. Nickerson. Just in case you haven’t here it is: in February 1880, Mr. Nickerson paid off the entire $800 debt of the fledgling St. Mary’s parish, which at the time was located a stone’s throw away from St. Paul’s on Washington Street.
That nearby Catholic church, filled with Irish refugees from the Potato Famine and their families, was bankrupt, yet was still bursting at the seams. Mr. Nickerson’s act of generosity enabled the parish to begin fundraising to build a badly needed new church, the impressive structure that today stands on High Street. The vestryman at St. Paul’s was not done, however. He then contributed $10,000 towards the new church. That second gift alone is worth over $300,000 in today’s dollars.
As a lifelong parishioner at St. Mary’s I am in debt to Mr. Nickerson…and all those not of my faith who contributed towards the construction of such a beautiful church. While I don’t have $300,000 to give towards the repair of the spire of your church (nor even $10,000), I would like to make a contribution in Mr. Nickerson’s honor.
So, when you receive a check in the mail from Dedham Savings in the days to come from an unfamiliar doner (as a Millenial I don’t have a checkbook), please know that while it does not have as many zeros at the end as I would like, it does comes with 144 years of gratitude.”
This is the kind of unity of which St. Paul is speaking in today’s lesson. Our faith in Christ reaches beyond denominational differences to a larger unity of our belief in One God, One faith and one baptism.
Which brings us to grace—a gift from God which is not based upon our work, our ability or our worthiness, but simply given through love.
As we gather to welcome into our fellowship Cameron and Austin, and at the same time recall our own baptism, we would do well to remember grace’s transforming power. God, after all, doesn’t just graciously accept and save sinners. God also works within us—that is, God’s Spirit makes us more and more like Jesus Christ. So, when Paul, in today’s letter, challenges God’s adopted sons and daughters to live in a manner worthy of God’s saving call, he's not saying that we must somehow be good enough to earn God’s grace—he's saying that we should simply reach out and accept the gift of God’s grace that has been offered to us. And through that acceptance, we shall be changed.
And this is how we know that God’s grace is working in us—that our actions and our beliefs more and more mirror the Gospel which informs our faith and the God whose love for us reaches beyond death to the promise and hope of the resurrection. That’s good news—not only for Cameron and Austin, but for all of us across the globe and our various denominations, who have been brought to the font—and the table of God, to be bathed and fed—and clothed with the Spirit of God. In the name of the Holy Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.