Sunday Reflection with Fr Robin Gibbons - 1 May 2016

Apr 30th, 2016

Sixth Sunday after Easter

It's good to know a bit of church history, not only does it give us all kinds of surprises, but sometimes the past, if it is understood correctly, can act as an antidote to some of the unsubstantiated statements that good people produce when they think they are right and want to prove their point, especially about matters of faith.

You all know the kind of thing I mean and I am sure all of us have fallen into the trap of thinking or saying, 'it's always been done this way in the church, so we can't change'. I'm not knocking anybody but it seems to me that a little historical humility doesn't come amiss from time to time.

Reading Acts is good for us; it gives us important insights into the development of faith and Christian life in the early church. Acts 15 is one of those significant chapters, the point when Peter, Paul and James meet with others in Jerusalem and determine that faith is not dependent on the observance of the Torah but on God's grace and the gift of the Spirit.

We get hints that this momentous shift in the direction of the early community, the conversion of the Gentiles and the openness to adaptation was the work of the community discerning the way with the help of the Spirit. In the end the do not load the gentile converts with the old Law but ask them to observe four requirements and accept them as full members of the community.

From our vantage point that might not seem much, but if Paul had not pressed the point about freedom in Christ and the gift of grace we might not be reading this and Christianity would have remained a small sect split from Judaism! For us it is a reminder that the church is always open to new challenges, that true tradition is faithfulness to Christ. John's Gospel tells us not to be troubled and assures us that the ongoing presence of the Spirit will strengthen and renew us! Our true home is always wherever we are on the pilgrimage to the New Jerusalem.

That wonderful image from Revelation 21 can call us to hope, for our true destiny is with God revealed now in Jesus the lamb of God, the true light of the world. May these words from a hymn guide us in our prayers!

I want to walk as a child of the light;
I want to follow Jesus.
God set the stars to give light to the world;the star of my life is Jesus.
In him there is no darkness at all;the night and the day are both alike.
The Lamb is the light of the city of God:Shine in my heart, Lord Jesus.

Kathleen Tomerson

Fr Robin Gibbons is an Eastern Rite Chaplain for the Melkite Greek Catholics in Britain