Scripture Reading     John 17:1, 2, 6, 17-23

Read at the Inaugural Service of the United Church of Canada, June 10, 1925,
at the Mutual Street Arena in Toronto

Jesus Prays to Be Glorified

 1 After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed:
"Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you.
2 For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him.
 6 "I have revealed you [a] to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word.

17 Sanctify them by [a] the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. 19 For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.

Jesus Prays for All Believers

 20 "My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

It was June 10, 1925 at the Mutual Street Arena in Toronto –
the inaugural service of the newly formed United Church of Canada took place.
The prayer of Jesus, found in John’s Gospel, had been read.
Perhaps the most significant words in the passage for the new church  -
a union of the Methodist and Presbyterian,
Congregational and Local Union churches in Canada –
were these words which I believe were the hope of Jesus’ heart:
“… that all (of them) may be one.”

Those were significant words that Jesus spoke
even as they were significant words that day,
because the new denomination was not formed without controversy and division.
Many congregations and many individuals voted “No” to the union question.
Many walked away.
But the majority believed in it.
The majority dared to risk this new adventure.

They dared to leave behind the old and familiar for the new and uncertain.
            They dared to leave behind long held traditions to forge new ones.
                        They dared to bring to life the words of Jesus  ~
                                    “that all (of them) may all be one”   ~
                                                by setting aside those things about which they disagreed
                                                            and standing on the common ground
of those things they held in common.
                
On that June day eighty-five years ago they dared to form a new church.

The new church embraced
both the heritage and traditions of its founding churches …
and it embraced the principle of the General Council of Local Union Churches
                 that had already formed across the country prior to 1925:
“In things essential, unity;
in things not essential, liberty;
in all things, charity.”

No, unity does not come easily.  It didn’t come easily then.  It doesn’t come easily now.

 

And here we are, some four days shy of that day eighty-five years ago.
To celebrate on a day like today is not just to remember who we were …
neither is it to look at ourselves and think about and rejoice in who we are.
Surely it is to renew ourselves, to embrace the great hope of Jesus
for what we can yet become.

A few years ago I spoke of a moment when, by chance,
I turned on the television and watched a program on PBS.
                        Bill Moyers, a most wonderful conversationalist,
                                    was interviewing a Roman Catholic nun.
                                   
The nun was one I would describe as progressive.
She was being asked how she could reconcile her place in her church
     with Church doctrine and teaching and practice
                 that seemed so different from her own.
                            
And she was also asked to comment on the recent election of George W. Bush,
            a win which became his, by and large,
                        because of the vote of the evangelical right in the United States.

And after she had answered most graciously, and intelligently,
            Bill Moyers asked her,
                        “What could you possibly have in common with your own Church
                                    and its many practices with which you disagree
                                                and the evangelical right
                                                            and its many political-religious positions
                                                                        with which you disagree as well.”

She thought for a brief moment.
“What do you have in common with them?” she was asked.
She looked at Bill Moyers and answered with just one word.
 “Jesus.”

Without condemnation
without judgment
without divisiveness
without prejudice
she answered. 
“Jesus.”
I was blown away by her answer.
How full of grace, I thought.
How full of wisdom.

The thing we have in common is Jesus.
It is Jesus who makes us one.
So what are we to become in him?
What is the newness he calls us to embrace – day after day.

As he did when he lived in his day
I believe the call of Jesus
     is to be for others
                 all that He has been for us.
                             Jesus calls us, above all,
to “love one another as He has loved us.”

“By this,” Jesus said, “will all people know that you are my disciples.”

It is our loving  -  as Jesus loves us  -  that defines us. 
It’s as simple and complicated as that.

In every situation we face …
in every theological discussion we have …
in every social and political circumstance before us …
how does our faith in Jesus and love for Jesus –
as a church and as a Christian people -
inform us,
guide us,
challenge us,
shake us,
shape us?

We all long for change.
And sometimes in our longing for change
it’s to get back to the way things were,
and sometimes it’s to get on to a new place.
Sometimes it’s to sweep things under the rug
and sometimes it’s to have a clean sweep of things.

But more often than not, because love requires it,
it is, as we used to hear at the beginning of Star Trek,
to boldly go where no one has gone before.

For me, on this day, to be renewed
            is to include in our love
                        and to open wide the doors of our churches
                                    those whom the world shuts out …
                                                those whom the world shuns …
                                                            those whom the world ignores …
                                                                        those whom the world judges as “not worthy.”

For me, on this day, to be renewed
is to include in our love
and to open wide the doors of our churches
any person, regardless of sexual orientation …
any person, regardless of ability or disability …
any person, regardless of race, class or culture …
any person who is longing to believe in something bigger than themselves …
any person who yearns to be in a community where they are not judged.

For me, on this day, to be renewed
            is to include in our love
                        and to open wide the doors of our churches
                                    anyone and everyone                              
with the great hope that all of us, individually and together,
                                                            will fulfill the longing of Paul:

… that we will be new people in Christ,
renewed people in Christ …
… that the old will be gone and the new will come …
… that being reconciled to God through Christ
and not having our sins count against us
we will become agents of reconciliation …

 

 

As we have been welcomed and loved and accepted by God  -
            not because of our goodness , but despite the bad in us …
                        not because of our saintliness, but despite the sin in us …
                                    not because of our sure faith, but despite our doubts and struggles  -
                                                I pray that we will be as welcoming and loving and accepting
                                                            of those who are  perhaps different from us yet just like us …
                                                                        like us just trying to find their way.

The ministry of reconciliation has been given to us …
given to us with the hope, as Paul prayed,

 …that Christ may dwell in (our) hearts through faith …
… that being rooted and established in love, (we) may have power,
together with all the saints,
to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ,
that “for God so loved the world” love …
and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—
that (we) may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God …

And when we do that,
when we renew ourselves this way,
when we open our hearts in love
when we open the doors of our church in welcome,
the prayer of Jesus - “that all may be one” - will be realized,
and his great hope  - “that all may be won” for him - will be fulfilled.

 

SOLI  DEO  GLORIA