3 Epiphany Yr C

I remember the days when we had one telephone line in our house; maybe we had two telephones, one on the kitchen wall and one in my parents’ room. I also remember being yelled at to get off the phone, because my dad, being a self-employed block layer and cement man as we called him, depended on receiving phone calls at home regarding work. I didn’t really spend that much time on the phone myself, but there were eight of us, I imagine it was hard for dad to get his calls.

I would watch my kids, talking to two and three friends at a time while listening to music and allegedly doing homework while sitting at the computer. If I need to make or receive a phone call I can do it from my cell phone, or even from the landline that gets very little use. From our computer we can keep in touch with friends that have been dispersed all over the country and all over the globe. Away from the computer we can facebook from our blackberry’s and iphones. Doctors can take pictures of our insides and send them anywhere instantly for another doctor to take a look at on their computer screen, and tell us what’s up almost instantly. It’s an amazing world. It is a world I lament and a world I rejoice in all at the same time.

When the words of I Corinthians were written, could anyone have imagined this world we live in today? In 200, and 2000 years, will anyone be able to imagine the world we live in today? Just the other day, there was a group of us meeting, and we were talking about language, and how the meaning of words we have taken for granted has changed, because the experience of people today has changed. Some of the words we talked about are community and body of Christ. How do you talk about these things in this world when community can as easily mean a group of people gathered together in a church to rehearse the story of salvation, as a group of people logged into virtual church in second life, miles or even countries away from each other connecting the dots of their own stories?

For some time I have lamented what I have perceived to be the lack of community and connection between people because of the internet and all it offers, good and bad. I have decided no longer to lament but to rejoice in the ability of people to connect not only face to face, but keyboard to keyboard. I am able to keep in touch with classmates by e-mail and facebook, and when we meet face to face it is as if we have never been apart.

I know all of this has not diminished, but in fact expanded how I understand community, how I understand the body of Christ. We are all connected, maybe even now more than ever. What we do here in Rapid City matters to people as far away as Haiti. Maybe if Paul were writing today he would use a metaphor like the one that James Cameron uses in the new movie Avatar. Maybe you’ve heard of it; maybe you’ve seen it. Avatar is a story about the “outsider” coming into a world of “insiders,” becoming one of the “insiders,” and saving them from destruction. The people are hunters and gatherers, and have a great spirituality of connection with the planet, the animals, and the plant life. Each can literally connect with creation through appendages from their heads. They can connect to their ancestors, they can connect to the beasts they ride, and they can even connect to their Creator. Our main character gets separated from his team and taken in by the indigenous people on the planet Pandora, and eventually learns to become one. Through the process, he learns to love them and become one in more than just his appearance. They accept him as one of them until he must go on his own journey of self-exploration to fight for the people and culture he loves. By becoming one of them, he ends up saving them.

There’s another story with the same archetypes, one that we Christians know pretty well. One about a true outsider who comes to our world, becoming like us in order to save us. We know this as the Incarnation. God, in the form of human flesh in Jesus Christ, becomes one of us, in order for us to be connected to God in a way we have never experienced before. Avatar’s story is one of incarnation, one of love for God’s creation, one of transformation in order to understand.

Many would say that the Messianic archetype stretches far beyond the story in which Christians have placed their faith. It’s a story that has been told in many religions pre-dating Christianity. But that’s what makes the story so good. It’s a story that will never end. Humanity will always need its saviors. Movies like Avatar create fantastic parables to help us understand the world around us. That we are in need of something greater than ourselves and how blessed we are to have a God who loves us so much that God wants to become one of us. Avatar may not be a factual story, but it is a true story. The people are connected as a web, to each other, and to the entire environment around them. Much like the body that Paul describes.

Jesus embodies, enfleshes, incarnates, and proclaims God’s love in ways that make a difference for the lives of others. This is what we mean by body of Christ. Transformation is something that doesn’t happen to us like magic, transformation is something that is effected by our participation in the body of Christ, the community of faith, by proclaiming and making a difference for the lives of others on Jesus’ behalf.

And transformation doesn’t happen unless all of the parts of the body participate; all of the parts of the body, even the stinky feet. We tend to place limitations on parts of the body. We tend to think that participation in the body has to be on our terms, and by that I mean on the terms of those of us who are already here, who already claim the salvation of Jesus, but the truth is that there so many who could contribute so much to the body of Christ but don’t, because we look at them like they are stinky feet. These are people who find community through the internet, through texting, and at coffee shops. These are also people like you and me who refuse community because it doesn’t meet their needs. Community is not meant to meet our needs, community is meant to meet the others needs.

But, the body of Christ is not complete, it only limps along when we are all not present, and I mean present in the relationship sense of the word. I can be present with someone even when I am not physically in the same room with me.

We are transformed by the telling of the story, the telling of the story of God’s creation and blessing, of God coming into our world as one of us to show us the way. We tell this story and we hear this story and it becomes our story. It becomes part of us and we become part of it and it makes us different, it transforms us into the people God intends us to be. And God intends us to be people who love and serve one another. Not only do we tell the story of God’s activity in the lives of God’s people when we gather together in whatever way we gather together, we also need to tell our own stories of God’s activity in our own lives. It is when all of us, all parts of the body, contribute our own stories that the body can be complete.

The challenge to us right now is how we build up the body of Christ in this world without walls, in this world without limits it seems, in this world where community no longer necessarily means the gathered people. How do we show forth God’s love and wholeness in the body of Christ, in a broken and fragmented world? How do we invite people into this web of relationship with one another and with God?

We do it by showing God’s love in the world, by being God’s love in the world. We are God’s face, and what we do and what we say matters to the web, to the body of Christ. Let us be the embodiment of Jesus in this world; let us manifest God’s love in ways that make a difference for the lives of other. Let us make visible God’s justice in every part of our lives, in our work, in our schools, and in all our conversations. And let us invite others into the work that God is blessing here at St. Andrew’s.

The Lord has shown forth his glory: Come let us adore him.