The core of Christian belief?

Sunday 16C 17^th July 2022

[Genesis 18:1-10, Colossians 1:24-28, Luke 10:38-42]

These three readings all tell us a magnificent truth about ourselves. Genesis includes this ancient myth of three mysterious strangers visiting the patriarch Abraham. They accept a meal of yoghurt and veal, then turn out to be God’s own self, just dropping by. We needn’t go here into the mysterious question “why three of them?”.

In Luke’s gospel, the sisters Mary and Martha welcome a visit of their friend Jesus to their home in Bethany. This was in the few brief years when he was wandering around teaching the Good News; before he was murdered, a victim of religion and government. The deeper meaning of Jesus’ life is that he did not answer violence with violence, but offered the same supreme and unifying love to all, thus turning upside-down the ancient and still common belief that the best way to keep order in society is by dividing it into groups, then victimising and crushing the weakest.

Paul, writing his letter to the people of Colossae, expands on these two hospitality stories by telling the Colossians – and us too – that the Divine Creator does not just visit us, but stays as our permanent guest. Paul’s magnificent phrase “Christ among you” explodes all previous religious understanding of God as remote and separate from us, with whom we need to plead or bargain. Paul’s daring claim fully agrees with the last words that John’s gospel reports Jesus speaking to his disciples – and to us! – on the night before he died. He prayed to his Father: “…that I may be in them”. (John 17:26. See also 14:20)

What does this actually mean? Our reasoning can tell us that the Being who created this vast cosmos must be in every part of it, sustaining it in existence. This stretches our minds to their limit, for we are speaking of a universe so big that light takes billions of years to cross it. The new Webb telescope allows us to peer into those unimaginable depths. But even more awesome, our Christian faith allows us to accept the Scriptures’ statements that the One who made those depths visited us as the human being Jesus of Nazareth, who passed through death and is now is intimately and permanently present in us.

The same God who, in the story, visited Abraham, and in history ate at Bethany with Martha and Mary, lives permanently in each of us, not just as some kind of electrical force, but as an awesome, personal friend! “Christ among you, your hope of glory.”

We all know that being hospitable to guests can be difficult and even cause conflict. In Genesis, Abraham’s important guests give him the unlikely news that he was to become a father in his old age. He managed to keep a straight face when they said this, but his old wife Sarah, safe in the shelter of the tent, burst out laughing. The divine visitors solidly rebuked her for lacking trust. Likewise, in the house at Bethany, Martha bitterly criticises her sister Mary for apparent laziness, choosing to sit listening to Jesus’ wisdom, instead of helping with the cooking and serving. Both Sarah and Martha had a point. In every situation, we need to face life’s practical realities and our bodies needs and truths.

It is always a loving thing to feed guests, for we are all members of the one human family. But our Divine Visitor – however God appears in our life – shows us that we can go further than the kindness of hospitality. Even when we have no food – as is happening to millions of people today – or we can no longer offer food and kindness to friends or loved ones because we are unable, or because they are sick or have died, it will always be profoundly true that Christ is among us, our hope of glory.

* * * * *