"…Jesus said to him, 'I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me…" John 14:12

There is a story told about St. Peter. Apparently he was showing new people around heaven. It was a heavenly mansion full of many rooms – rooms for all the different kinds of people. "Over there is the room for the Buddhists, Peter said. And here is a room for the Jews. The room over there is for the Moslems. But please be very quiet when we go past the next room. We must not make any noise." "Why is that?" asked one of the newly arrived. "Because that room is for the Christians," said St. Peter. "They think they're the only ones up here." (Copied)

It is the height of irony that this passage appeared this morning, just after the Pope's visit and when I, once again, told people planning a funeral that I would not read the above passage. I am not alone for, at Gerald Ford's funeral at the Cathedral, it was not read also. It has troubled me for many more years than the 21 I have been a priest. I have seen it used as an exclusionary bludgeon, one that was used by Hitler in defense of his slaughtering the Jews in Germany. I had almost decided to focus on the Epistle today, but decided, even if I did that, that I needed to do a bit more research. Fortunately I found a way to understand it, and I very much want to share it with you today.

John, as you know, came from a community that had recently been forced out of the synagogue because of their zealous proselyting. They were a small band of Christians, fearful of persecution and cut off from their familial and cultural roots. At that time it was extremely dangerous to claim that Jesus was the Messiah. It was complicated by the belief that Jesus was the child of God, fully human and fully divine. The passage as it is written is designed to give great solace to that small band of people. In it Jesus promises to be with them always, even unto death and beyond. The promise is that he will be with them in the midst of turmoil, not just after it has passed in the great by and by. It is clear that heaven is not a place, but a relationship, one into which all of us are invited, the relationship between God and Jesus. They are assured that if they have seen Jesus they have seen God. It is a present reality, not in the distant future.

One of the reasons that I have had a problem understanding this is that we are committed to using inclusive language. Hence, the Hebrew 'Abba,' meaning 'father' or generative parent, becomes God. In reality, the parental understanding of God, becomes lost in translation. What is intended here, I believe, is that Jesus was born of flesh and God, the incarnate God, fully human and fully divine. Oehmig has said:

"John, therefore, is not providing a proof text for Christian triumphalism. Nor is he implying that only Christians are loved by God. Nor is he claiming that people of other faiths are not only wrong, but condemned. No. Here John is proclaiming a blessing, not providing a bludgeon. It is a glorious, spine-tingling affirmation. He is saying that in following Jesus as the way, in trusting Jesus as the truth, in experiencing Jesus as the life of the Spirit, the believer comes to a knowledge of God in a wholly new and unprecedented manner: as "Abba." That is, the believer comes into a relationship with God assuming a preposterous familiarity and intimacy and confidence – a kind of relationship that a toddler instinctively has for a momma or a daddy…No other religion claims this. That is just the point. John is contending that – through this Jesus – humanity's relationship to God and God's relationship to humanity, are uniquely and decisively revealed. The "Abba experience" lies at the heart of the Gospel. While many roads might lead to "God," only one road leads to God as "Abba.". That road – that way, that life, that truth – is only through Jesus, in his incarnation. Nobody else comes close. In truth, in the end, the Gospel says that we are all saved by grace, and not by any "works righteousness" or "believer's righteousness" we might parade before God in order to be accepted."

(Synthesis, Vol. 11, No. 5, 5/2/99, H. King Oehmig.

I hope this helps you, as it did me, to solve the dilemma presented by this passage which is, otherwise, tremendously reassuring. Jesus, in his final discourse, of which this is a part, was, in John, talking to the disciples at the last supper. He was reassuring them that he would be with them always. He also issues a challenge: "Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to Abba."

This leads us to the marvelous letter of Peter, written to the churches in Asia Minor to assure them that they are loved and supported. He makes it clear that the church is not a building that we enter but a group of people of whom we are a part. That group is anchored by the cornerstone, Jesus. They are to build on that foundation, proclaiming the glorious works of Jesus Christ to the world and living out lives that imitate the life of Jesus. As Peter said, you do not stumble on that stone because you believe in Jesus Christ. "But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy." (I Peter 2:9-10)

What does it mean to us, here a St. Margaret's, to be a royal priesthood. I believe that, now we are God's people, our challenge is to proclaim in our words and our lives what Jesus taught and lived. It does not mean that we are offering burnt offerings at the altar, but rather spiritual sacrifices, ones that call us to care for one another and to reach out to the community that surrounds us. Once we were not a people, but now we are God's people. Our challenge is great and there are dangers. Look at the fate of that first person, Stephen, who proclaimed that Jesus was the Messiah. He, too, as he was being stoned, echoed Christ's words from the cross: "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." (Acts7:60)

In her sermon on this Gospel when she was retiring as Senior Warden of St. Margaret's, Dedie Tayor said: "St. Margaret's has earned a national reputation as an inclusive church – a place where all of God's children are welcome. We are not a white church. We are not a black church. We are not a straight church. We are not a gay church. We are Christ's church. That is because each of us, by our very presence, are living members of a spiritual house, of Christ's church, working in community to love God and our neighbor and to turn the world upside down in Christ's name. May it always be so and may we continue loudly to be joyful as we 'sing the glory of God's name.'"

AMEN