Skip to main content

Never Alone

You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ… (Acts 10.34-43 https://biblegateway.com NRSVA)
This passage is one of several early summaries of what the first Christians believed. It’s sometimes called ‘The Kerygma’, from the Greek word for ‘proclamation’. ‘The Kerygma’ is the message which the first Christians boldly proclaimed.
Peter explains that the original proclamation was to the Jewish nation, but here he’s preaching to Gentiles and at the end of his sermon some of his hearers are baptised, so the context makes clear that the message is now for everyone. This is borne out by Jesus’ ministry too. He repeatedly said that he’d come to call the Jewish people to make a radical recommitment to God, but he included in his mission the God-fearing Gentiles whom he met and other people whom more orthodox Jews considered to be beyond the pale - tax collectors, prostitutes and those who routinely ignored the Sabbath and other Jewish laws.
So what is the key message that Peter is so anxious to share? It’s that Jesus ‘went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, (for God was with him)..., [and was] put… to death by hanging... on a tree; but God raised him on the third day and [his followers] ‘ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.’
Like The Kerygma’s first hearers, we’re certainly being oppressed by forces beyond our control, unleashed into a world we previously took for granted by the COVID-19 virus. Whether we consider that to be the work of the devil, or just one of many things that can come between us and God’s purpose for our own lives and for our world, depends on our personal worldview. Peter makes clear where he stands.
Peter goes on to say that Jesus identified himself totally with our predicament by allowing his opponents to put him to death on a tree, but was then vindicated by God when he was raised from death, and now lives to eat and drink with his followers in Holy Communion - although here Peter is referring to some very specific occasions when this happened.
For us Holy Communion is difficult to share at the moment. But the central message of The Kerygma is that “God is with us in Jesus”, not just at Christmastime but at Eastertime too, not just when we’re celebrating together but when we’re struggling alone.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I don't believe in an interventionist God

Matthew 28.1-10, 1 Corinthians 15.1-11 I like Nick Cave’s song because of its audacious first line: ‘I don’t believe in an interventionist God’. What an unlikely way to begin a love song! He once explained that he wrote the song while sitting at the back of an Anglican church where he had gone with his wife Susie, who presumably does believe in an interventionist God - at least that’s what the song says. Actually Cave has always been very interested in religion. Sometimes he calls himself a Christian, sometimes he doesn’t, depending on how the mood takes him. He once said, ‘I believe in God in spite of religion, not because of it.’ But his lyrics often include religious themes and he has also said that any true love song is a song for God. So maybe it’s no coincidence that he began this song in such an unlikely way, although he says the inspiration came to him during the sermon. The vicar was droning on about something when the first line of the song just popped into his ...
14 comments
Read more

Luther and Loyola

James 1:17-27 Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23 Within Christianity there has always been a tension between two poles. At one end of the spectrum stands Martin Luther, who said that Christian faith is about trusting in God to put us right - or make us righteous - through the saving death of Jesus. Luther came to this conclusion when he was a professor of New Testament studies in a little town in Germany called Wittenberg. One year he decided to teach his students about Paul’s letter to the Romans and that’s when it suddenly dawned upon him that Christian faith is all about trust. At the other end of the spectrum , stands someone like Ignatius Loyola the founder of the Society of Jesus. He spent a lot of his later life in crisis, first struggling to overcome severe wounds that he had suffered when he was a soldier and then during two short periods locked up in a cell by the Spanish Inquisition. He came to believe that the Christian life is a similar sort of struggle, a lifelon...
Post a Comment
Read more

Sharing the Good News With People of Other Faiths

Together with other local Christians, clergy and lay people, I find myself – from time to time – giving thought to how we share our Christian faith with people from other religious backgrounds. It is a ticklish issue, because converting from one faith to another is a huge decision to make and it may not be appropriate for everyone. Becoming a Christian is always a life changing event, but for someone from another faith background it can sometimes cause immense dislocation and hardship, including estrangement from family members and friends who cannot accept their decision. It may even cut a person off from their entire cultural heritage, so it is not something that we can expect people to enter into lightly or thoughtlessly. Nor is it likely to be easy for them to make a gradual progression or pilgrimage to Christian faith. At some point they may have to choose whether or not to make a radical break with their past, unless they decide to be secret or closet believers. And they may deci...
2 comments
Read more