There is a tension in the Gospel lesson. Jesus has told us that he and the Father are one; and we are one with them; one body among those who have made the decision to follow him. In the reading today he says that he comes to set father against son – between those who decide to follow, and those who decide not to follow Jesus. This is Jesus’ call to make a decision about what we do about him.
OT-Mosaic Covenant; not just with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob; but with the nation.
“If you obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession out of all the peoples…. You shall be for me a priestly kingdom and a holy nation.”
To be model for all nations, living according to the Law; 10 Commandments;
4-how we live out our relationship with God
6-how we live out our relationship with each other Found to be very difficult.
Paul writes to the Roman church about the NEW covenant that God established through Jesus Christ. Humankind falls short; we are put right again; reconciled; by the life and death of Jesus Christ. This covenant is unilateral and unconditional. Nothing we do takes away God’s love for us. Nothing. Through the sacrifice that Jesus made for us, we are a new community, God’s beloved family.
This is a very different kind of Sunday in the church year. Every other Feast Day of the year is about an event (like Easter or Christmas or Epiphany or Pentecost). But today we celebrate a doctrine. Brilliant minds over the last 2000 years have worked to clearly define the Trinity. Listen to some of the attempts:
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On Jesus’ last night with us; after the foot washing, after the Last Supper, and after Judas had been told ‘do quickly what you are going to do’, Jesus prayed to the Father what we now call Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer. In it we have the written record of Jesus giving 3 reasons for his life on earth. First, he is our intercessor.
A Baptist pastor once told a study group I was in that one of the highest callings we can have is to be an intercessor, praying for the needs of somebody else. It is a serious responsibility; it puts us between God and that person
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The “fruit tree” for Stephen was not his biological heritage; but it was something that proved to be even stronger. There was an indwelling of spirit between himself and Jesus that led him to publicaly proclaim Jesus as Lord, and to very boldly accuse the Jewish leaders of their sin in not recognizing who Jesus was.
When Stephen had incited the crowd to the point that they pulled him into the street and started to stone him, he said, “Lord, receive my spirit,” and “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” Do those words sound familiar? They are the same words that Jesus spoke from the cross. The fruit did not fall far from the tree.