"Remembering and Re-membering"	May 24, 2009
Luke 24: 44-53	7th Sunday of Easter
Colesville Presbyterian Church	Ministry Intern Carolyn Tilley

Do any of you remember the song, “Try To Remember”? It’s from the show called The Fantasticks, and includes lyrical lines like these, “Try to remember when life was so tender, that love was an ember about to billow. Try to remember, and if you remember, then follow.” And then the song has an ending repeating, “Follow, follow, follow, follow…” and other wonderful lyrics as well.1

 

Today, I’d like to talk about 3 themes: (1) remembering, (2) “re-membering,” and (3) about following Christ. Now, when I speak of remembering it is in the sense of recalling past events. Memories. Recollecting. And when I talk about “re-membering,” I mean re-weaving, changing, re-constructing ourselves for the future.  To follow Christ to me means, among other things, to study Him, know Him, love Him, and serve him as his disciples, his followers. Following Christ to me means attempting to live our lives as if Christ’s ministry and teachings make a difference.  

 

Now, we remember all the time. We as believers, for example, remember that this is Sunday: we worship together on this day. And most of us probably all pretty much remember what weekend this is: it’s Memorial Day weekend. Memorial Day, Monday, is a holiday originally created to remember brave men and women who died in service to our country. About 3 years after the Civil War ended, an organization of Union veterans established Decoration Day as a time for our nation to decorate the graves of the dead with flowers. And originally, May 30 was chosen as flowers would be blooming, with plenty to place on graves. But today the holiday is officially celebrated on the last Monday in May.  Then, it seems to me, that Memorial Day changed again and became one to remember and honor anyone who had died. Well, Memorial Day has changed again, and now our culture recalls that this weekend is also the gateway to summer: you know, when swimming pools open, when we can wear white shoes again, with lots of barbeques and family gatherings.2

 

Today, tomorrow, last weekend, this weekend … we remember. We just had a “memorial day,” of our own of sorts, when we celebrated Colesville’s 50th anniversary last Saturday and Sunday. We remembered voices, persons, and events that have helped shape Colesville Presbyterian Church. And we remembered how faithful folks from the past followed Jesus Christ. It was great to remember and great to be together. But I think most of you will agree that not only is it important to recall where we’ve been but also to “re-member” to get to where we are going. And where we’re all going, where we’re all headed, is into our future.

 

I’ve been doing some remembering too. I’ve been recalling the wonderful months I’ve spent with you. Pastor Mike and Pastor Aaron and your Session and this wonderful congregation have taught me much in my ministry internship here. I fondly remember your many kindnesses. I have certainly enjoyed being a part of your church. What great teachers you have been for me! But I’m in the process of “re-membering” too, as I look forward to being re-built as I intern at NIH this summer and in learn about accompanying the dying at the Washington Home hospice next year. I believe I am created to seek transformation, and in transforming myself, I must change and learn to do some new things. Is change always going to be easy? No. You and I will have to work hard sometimes to change. I need to learn to be a presence with those who are perhaps overwhelmed, incapacitated, maybe unable to cope, even some may be alienated. I need to learn tell stories, and the disciplines of living with tension, and of tolerating ambiguity and irresolution. I need to learn more about exploring meaning, in discerning where God is in a certain situation, and about how to cope, take responsibility, and decide and enact changes and repairs in myself, doing some re-weaving of the fabric that is myself. In my remembering and “re-membering”, this I’ll do following Christ.

 

It is for Colesville too a time of remembering and a time for “re-membering”.  Recalling the past, but also building on the past with “re-membering”, meaning it is a time for “re-newal,” re-constituting.  Your future will also include new growth, transformation. With Pastor Aaron and your new interim pastor, your future will be a time not for just doing the same old things the same old ways. As Pastor Mike sermonized recently, we all need to more forward. You and I will move forward. Yes, change will be hard at times, but we will be transformed and renewed by “re-membering”, re-modeling ourselves. And we’ll do this by changing some outlines, by changing ingredients, and thus become changed bodies, transformed bodies as we continue to follow Christ. We will remember our history, yes, and we’ll build upon our past. Some of you may remember, as I included in our bulletin quotation, that the theme of building on the past by focusing on the future is part of your Website message. And in focusing on, and going into our future, we’ll also be engaged in “re-membering” ourselves. We’ll build new memories as we move forward and follow Christ.   

 

We remember that Christ changed. We recall how he was transformed by his resurrection. And, in our verses this morning we hear of another change. This is the change as he left this earth to be with God in heaven. It is called his Ascension; Jesus ascended or rose from earth into heaven. One of my friends seemed aghast when I said I was preaching on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend. “Oh,” she exclaimed, “how dreadful! You have to preach on Jesus’ Ascension!”   “Ah,” I replied, “I’m grateful for the chance to preach, and to remember how Jesus was transformed and changed. I’m in the business of becoming changed myself.   And maybe in examining the Scripture I can learn more about this ‘changing business’.”

 

The Scripture we read this morning is Luke’s recollection and remembering some history about Jesus. You may remember that after some period of time, Jesus stopped appearing to his followers. There are, you also recall, numerous appearances of Jesus to various of his followers recounted in the gospels. In our Scripture today we see Luke’s Jesus looking both backward and forward.3 In verses 44-46, Jesus talks about the necessity of his death and recalls that in this the Messiah fulfilled Scripture. Jesus speaks, in v. 45, of opening disciples minds to Scripture, and uses the same Greek verb, di-an-oi-gô, used when he, the Risen Lord, opens the eyes of followers who were with him on the road to Emmaus4, as Rev. Holly Ulmer preached recently. The mission of the church to preach repentance and forgiveness everywhere, in v. 47, gets expanded by Luke later in his Acts version of the Ascension. 

 

Now, most Presbyterians consider the Ascension to be an exotic notion, something reserved for more orthodox believers.5 Whatever our tradition and however we parse stories of the ascending of Christ, I believe we can see that the exalting of Christ to the right hand of God “in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 1:20) means “the Risen Christ belongs to the future”6 and that God has empowered Christ to be powerfully present to the world through the mission of the church.7 Of the Ascension, of Jesus leaving earth and rising to heaven, we don’t really get any Ascension tradition in Matthew or Mark, either, in its first edition. But Luke gives us two Ascension accounts, one in his gospel and one in his Acts of the Apostles, though these two differ as we heard when our Scripture was introduced. Some of us may also remember that the Ascension of Jesus was deemed so important by early believers that they included mention of it in the earliest creeds, like the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed. Early Christians saw the Ascension as a promise of great things to come for all believers. According to one ancient church father, Tertullian, Jesus’ Ascension is a guarantee that we will all find resurrection eventually in Christ.8

 

What do we remember about Jesus? Well, most of us remember the gospel accounts of his life, his healings, his ministry, as well as his death and resurrection. Some of us remember particular parables and favorite passages. In our Scripture this morning, not only does Luke concern himself with Jesus’ last appearance to his followers on earth, but we hear too Jesus saying he will send what God promised: the Holy Spirit and of believers being clothed in the future with a garment of power from on high. Luke’s Jesus looks backwards and forwards. He weaves both remembrance of the words of Jesus about his death as fulfillment of Scripture, the Messiah’s suffering, death, and resurrection, along with a view towards the future. In this morning’s verses, Jesus looks back, but, also, as we note, forward, telling his followers in the future to proclaim repentance and forgiveness of sins in his name to everyone everywhere. 

 

But this morning what’s really important to me in today’s message is that even though Christ has ascended, gone to God in heaven, that as Peter Gomes9, that great preacher of Harvard Divinity School, recalls, “despite indication to the contrary, we are not alone”. God, Gomes says, has given us 3 things with which to carry until Jesus comes again. First, God has given us the Holy Spirit, the comforter who is both the remembrance of what was and the sign of what is to be while the Spirit aids us in managing what is. The comforter who strengthens and fortifies us is the gift celebrated next Sunday on Pentecost. God has also given us, second, the Church, the body of Christ’s fellowship whose sacraments, word, and ministry transcend the boundaries of time and frailties of our human condition. And, dear friends, God has given us a third gift, the gift of one another, imperfect though we may be, as colleagues in the adventure of faithful living. These imperishable and rich gifts we are to receive and to enjoy. 

 

We, this church and also me, do need to remember the past but we also need to grow new memories, and do some new things, following Christ, and be transformed as we change and grow into our future. One item I noticed was that Jesus says that disciples will be “clothed with power from on high” (v.49).10  Speaking of clothing, I believe you will be using past threads in your clothing, and weaving in new threads into that garment that is your ever-changing church. This new clothing, this garment, I believe you will weave together as a congregation in partnership with Pastor Aaron and with your interim pastor. In your future, I believe you will re-weave and re-affirm your mission as the body of Jesus Christ. It will be, I believe, an exciting future -- your re-weaving of new threads onto threads of past accomplishments. I, too, as I go on into my future, will be doing some weaving of new threads onto the garment that is myself. 

 

In the last of our Lukan verses, vv. 52 & 53, we remember that the disciples’ waiting for the Holy Spirit was in joy, praise, and constant prayer (Acts 1:14).11 May the Holy Spirit, your church, and each one be one in togetherness, in joy, praising, and in prayer, one another in community, remembering and “re-membering” yourselves as Colesville Presbyterian Church moves forward following Christ. And moving forward into the future of the next 50 years as Christ’s body in the world. And now may the peace of God that passes all understanding guide all our hearts and minds onto following Christ Jesus our Lord as we move forward, remembering and “re-membering”. Amen

 

FOOTNOTES 

 1 “Try to Remember” lyrics from: http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/thefantasticks/trytoremember.htm

 2 Ideas about Memorial Day from a sermon by Pastor Doug Givan, May 28, 2006, Memorial Day Weekend, Easter 7, “I Remember,” on the Web at:

http://www.christchurchindiana.net/ChristLutheran/Archives_files/Memorial%20Day%20sermon.pdf

 3 Culpepper. R. Alan. “The Gospel of Luke,” in The New Interpreter’s Bible, Volume 9 (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995), p. 486.

 4 Culpepper. R. Alan. “The Gospel of Luke,” in The New Interpreter’s Bible, Volume 9 (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995), p. 486.

 5 McClure, John S. “The Ascension – a promise of great things to come,” in: What Presbyterians Believe, May 2002, online at:

http://www.pcusa.org/today/believe/past/may02/ascension.htm

 6 Harms, Walter W. “A Mission Accomplished, A Mission to Accomplish, Goettinger Predigten im Internet (The Ascension of Our Lord, May 2004 sermon), printed p.2, online at:

http://www.predigten.uni-goettingen.de/archiv-6/040520-3-e.html

 7 Heen, Erik M. “The Season of Easter: Ascension of the Lord, May 21 or transferred to May 24, 2009, Luke 24:44-53,” in Heen, Erik M., Henry G. Brinton, Karoline M. Lewis, and David F. Watson, New Proclamation, The Essential Pastoral Companion for Preaching, Year B, 2009, Easter to Christ the King (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2009), p. 62.

 8 McClure, John S. “The Ascension – a promise of great things to come,” in: What Presbyterians Believe, May 2002, online at:

http://www.pcusa.org/today/believe/past/may02/ascension.htm

 9 Gomes, Peter

10 Culpepper. R. Alan. “The Gospel of Luke,” in The New Interpreter’s Bible, Volume 9 (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995), p. 488, comments on the ambiguity in v.49 which in Acts 1:5 is expanded with “You will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now”.

11 Craddock, Fred B. “Ascension of the Lord, Luke 24:44-53,” in Craddock, Fred B. et al, Preaching Through the Christian Year, Year B, A Comprehensive Commentary on the Lectionary (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International. 1993), p. 273.