Sermon: Christ Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

Christ Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

          Nicholas, the meal you will receive this evening

—Holy Communion,

your first communion

—is a special meal.

It is a meal that reveals Jesus Christ to you, to us…

Reveals Jesus Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow,

in this meal we find the Christ of Memory, Christ in our Midst, and the Christ to Come.

Prayer

          Today we remember,

today we experience the Christ of Memory
-the Christ of Memory… in this church today, at that table right over there, we remember the words the Apostle Paul passes on to the Christians in Corinth as they wrestle with question of how to eat together as equals, in a world that insists on inequality.

-The Christ of Memory… Paul remembering words he’d received from Jesus’ disciples, described in multiple gospels, the words Jesus said on the night before he was handed over to Rome, killed by the powerful and the pious. Jesus’ promise, his covenant with us, made in this meal.

-The Christ of Memory…Jesus’ last meal also a Passover meal,
Passover a meal of memory too
—remembering God saving the People down in Egypt, a meal of flat bread for fast escape out of Egypt.

The Christ of memory in this meal of memory…

          Today we experience God with us, Jesus Christ in our midst, in this meal…

-Christ in our midst… God is everywhere, that is true, but here in this meal we experience him, because he promised to show up, so we are uniquely conscious of him—here in this meal Christ with us,
and where Christ is there is always forgiveness and love.

-Christ in our midst…the physicality of this love, a meal, consuming it, the promise becoming part of you,
-grit in your teeth, love…
-the warmth of wine, love.

-Christ in our midst… the physicality of it… love…
love commanded at our feet…
love not only described but enacted
—the intimacy, the closeness, the tenderness
—love one another in this way, kneel in service to one another, love one another with humility and amid one another’s humanity and mess…

-Christ in our midst… yes, here in community, here in word, here in meal, here in service of neighbor.

Christ is in our midst in this meal.

          Today we look for the Christ to come, the Christ of the future, the future feast to come, which is already here…

-Christ to come… when we become smug, confident in our own powers, we’ll look forward to the Great Feast to come and realize the Great Host will humble himself and wash our feet and be self-giving to the point of giving his very life.

-Christ to come… when we have been stripped bare, empty-handed, tears in our eyes, shell shocked by life, we’ll look forward to the Great Feast to Come, where every tear will be wiped away and we shall be sheltered by the wings of the Mother Hen, fed with the bread of life and cup of salvation.

-Christ to come… this future feast, running backward like water down a hill, filling our present with it’s power, shaping us to live into that which shall be—a gravity, an unseen force pulling us into the future.

The Christ to come in this meal today.

Christ Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

Christ in this meal which is an amazing exchange, the very commerce of the City of God. Christ and all His holy ones taking on all that is wretched within us and replacing it with all that is blessed, that we might continually turn ourselves to our neighbors in need, continuing this great exchange, for God does not need what he has already blessed us with, however our neighbor does.

Christ with all who cry to God, even in their silent yearnings, for freedom and an end to slavery.

Christ in this meal with friends, betrayers, deniers, doubters
—disciples all.

Christ in all times and places, in Catacombs and Cathedrals and infant’s crib, by bedside and graveside.

Christ closer than we will ever know.

Christ known in grit and fire, the physicality of our life
—this very moment.

Christ in emptiness and in fullness, the weighty pull of both.

Christ calling us forward to the future feast.

In this meal, the Christ of Memory, Christ in our Midst, and the Christ to Come.

Amen.