A Homily given by Fr. Ben Jones,
For St. George’s Anglican Church, Raleigh, NC;
On the Fifth Sunday after Easter;
Commonly called Rogation Sunday; A.D. 2010.
“The Mediator”
+ In the name of God the Father, and of God the Son, and of God the Holy Ghost, Amen.
St. John 16:28.
“I came forth from the father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the father.”
Jesus is giving His disciples a declaration of His mission from the Father; and further states that He will return to His Father. In this one verse we have the entry of Jesus into our world and the conclusion of His earthly ministry. There was nothing which equaled what Jesus had taught over and over and over again to His disciples. By this example, Jesus wants to make sure that we understand these two statements and what impact this understanding has for us. The Pharisees remarked to Jesus that His “record is not true”1. “Jesus answered and said unto them, Though I bear record of myself, yet my record is true: for I know whence I came, and whither I go; but ye cannot tell whence I come, and whither I go.”2 If you think about it we receive tremendous Spiritual benefits, great comfort, and in the end, our salvation, eternal life from this set of divine truths. Let’s take a closer look at these truths.
Christ unmistakably authenticates Himself before the Pharisees just as He does for us each and every moment of every day. There are three proofs of His testimony of Himself. The first is that He was conscious of His own Authority. He was fully apprised of His ministry and was fully aware of whose work He was about. As well, He knew how His work would be finished. Most importantly He knew what He was before His manifestation to the world, and what He would be following His resurrection from the dead and His subsequent Ascension. Secondly, it is Christ and His Father who can only declare His Authority. Anyone of this world that would attempt to judge Christ as not the truth, would not be qualified because when they received the teachings of His coming from heaven and His returning to heaven, they thought it as foolishness, and consequently did not believe and thus did not have faith. We understand from this that as sinners, we cannot even begin to attempt to judge Christ. Thirdly, His testimony of Himself was sufficiently supported by the testimony of His Father. That is all that is necessary. The opinions of mankind are of no validity. By these three proofs, we begin to have the understanding of who is this Christ. In order to have a full understanding, we turn to the Incarnation and what that means for us.
It is through the Incarnation that Christ was born into this world. You may think it is odd that I mention the Incarnation at this time when we normally consider the Incarnation in Advent and at the Feast of the Annunciation. We are told in Scripture that, “He came from the Father” who sanctified and sealed Him for His work. Through the Incarnation, we were given the person of Jesus Christ, the Mediator. God and man meet in the person of Jesus Christ and the New Covenant is eternally established and ultimately fulfilled.
Through the Incarnation, in the midst of fallen humanity God comes in love, in the person of Jesus Christ and binds us to Himself. This is the Christian message, the Christmas message. IT is NOT of our self-will, or free-will that we have the saving grace of God, and are born anew from above. We have this saving grace of God, and are born anew from above due to the “Word becoming flesh”. This is distinct from all other acts of God. Here is what this means for us.
We must think of the person and the work of Jesus Christ as a whole, because Jesus Christ in the identity of His person and word reveals God the Father. As a result, Jesus Christ reconciles mankind to His Father in His identity as the Incarnate Saviour of mankind. The significance of the work of Christ on the Cross lies in the fact that the person of Jesus Christ is the one who sheds His blood for the sin of the whole world. Thus the atoning act is the person of Christ in action, and not the action itself. The atoning work on the Cross is of a divine decision that represents Jesus Christ as our Mediator which was only made possible by the Incarnation. Jesus Christ was the visible working out of what took place when the Son of God became man in the midst of our flesh. Here is how the gospels record this work.
In the Synoptic Gospels, (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), Jesus calls all of mankind to follow Him, and He leads them. In John’s Gospel, Jesus speaks of Himself as “THE WAY”. In the Synoptic Gospels, (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), Jesus teaches the truth. In John’s Gospel, Jesus says “I AM THE TRUTH”. In the Synoptic Gospels, (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), Jesus is set forth as saving mankind. In John’s Gospel, Jesus says “I AM THE LIFE”. Here we have from His being and His life, our redemption. We bring all of this full circle in that the New Testament sums up the whole gospel of His revelation and reconciliation in the name, Immanuel, which consists of two Hebrew words, EL, meaning “God” and IMMANU, meaning “with us”; God with us.
You may be thinking where did all of this come from out of that one, very short verse from the Gospel according to St. John, ““I came forth from the father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the father.”3 What we are given in our gospel lesson this morning is the over view of the earthly ministry of Jesus since we will be celebrating the Feast of the Ascension of our Lord on Thursday. From this one verse we have the entire earthly ministry of Jesus Christ. We receive a great deal of comfort from this verse in receiving the understanding of the relationship of Jesus Christ and His Heavenly Father through the Incarnation, as well as the understanding of our relationship with our risen Lord and His redemptive work on our behalf. We hear this summed up in the beginning of the Prayer of Consecration each and every time we attend Mass. “All glory be to thee, Almighty God our Heavenly Father, for that thou of thy tender mercy, didst give thine only Son Jesus Christ to suffer death upon the Cross for our redemption; who made there by His own oblation of Himself once offered, a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world; and did institute, and in His holy Gospel command us to continue a Perpetual Memory of that His precious death and sacrifice until His coming again.” When we approach the Throne of God to receive the Body and Blood of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, the grace conveyed in the sacrament by the mercy of God, will nourish us spiritually by cleansing our sinful bodies by His body and washing our souls through His most precious blood.
AMEN.
+
“AND NOW UNTO GOD THE FATHER,
GOD THE SON, AND,
GOD THE HOLY GHOST;
BE ASCRIBED ALL MIGHT, MAJESTY,
POWER, AND DOMINION,
MOST JUSTLY DUE THIS DAY,
BOTH NOW, AND FOREVER,
WORLD WITHOUT END.
AMEN.”
1 The Gospel according to St. John 8:13b.
2 The Gospel according to St. John 8:14.
3 The Gospel according to St. John 16:28.