First Sunday After Trinity

‘Whoever welcome you welcomes me and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me.’

By this time next year we will be in the midst of the run-up to the 2012 Olympic Games in London. And so picture this scene. It’s the final of the four by four hundred metres relay at the Olympic Games. We’re cheering our teams as each of them runs their lap, each one of them pushing themselves to the very limit. The baton is handed on smoothly each time. After they’ve handed on the baton the exhausted runners stagger to the side of the track to cheer their team mates as each of them complete their lap. For victory to be certain each team need to pick up the baton and run as hard as they can. At last they’ve done it and victory has been won.

A relay is very much a team effort and victory demands the best efforts of every single runner. When you take the baton the responsibility is yours. There is something of the relay race in today’s Gospel. Jesus is handing on the baton to those who will follow him. He is sending out his closest disciples to continue the mission which he has begun. He has as it were, completed the first stage of the race for the Kingdom of God. Now he is handing the baton on to his disciples. Now it is their turn.

In this chapter ten of his Gospel Matthew tells us that Jesus has named his disciple whom he now calls apostles. The word apostle means one who is sent – sent out on a mission. Then we hear of the instructions that Jesus gave these apostles as he sent them out. They were to heal the sick. They were to cast out evil spirits. They were to announce that the Kingdom of God was near. It would be a difficult task. Not everyone would be willing to hear and to respond to their message. They would face rejection and indifference. The message they had to proclaim would cause division – even perhaps with their own families.  There would be hardships and even personal danger.

If you think about it that is a very similar job description to the one which Jesus had accepted for himself. It is what he did. Those apostles are being asked to do what Jesus has done. To carry on the work of the proclamation of the Kingdom of God which he has initiated. He is handing the baton over to them. There is a sequence here. God reveals his word of love and forgiveness and healing to Jesus. Who passes that same word onto his apostles whom he sends out? And they pass it on to those who in their turn will listen to them and welcome the word of God into their lives. That is how the faith is passed on - from one person to another. One receives the message of the Gospel of the Kingdom of God and passes that message on to another who in turn passes it on. And now it is our turn. It’s our turn to be the apostles of our day. It’s our turn to be the ones sent with message of Gods Kingdom. It’s our turn to be sent out to a world and people in desperate need of the healing and restoring and transforming power of the love of God. The baton has been passed onto us. There is no getting round it even if we wanted to. We are Gods people here and now in this place.

Someone once said that the Christian faith is always just one generation away from extinction. If you think about it that must be true. For if we in our generation fail to pass on what we have received in such a manner that others will hear the message and see it being lived out then the Christian faith will indeed be extinct. The baton and the further are in our hands. Here in the parish, here in St Mary's we have the great responsibility to ensure the future of this church and the faith for which it stands. That is for us the greatest privilege and the greatest of responsibilities. We are here not just for ourselves but for others so that they may hear the good news of God’s love and find that their lives can be transformed by it. The extract from Jesus commission to his apostles which was read as our Gospel for today and which I have chosen as my text adds yet another dimension. Let me remind you of what Jesus said to his disciples as he sent them out.

‘Whoever welcomes you welcome me.  And whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me’.

Those are amazing words if you think about them.  Jesus is identifying himself with those whom he sends out. He is saying when you go out it is just as if it’s me going with you. So that whoever welcomes you welcomes me.

There is a tractate in the Jewish writings known collectively as the Mishnah.

It says this: ‘ A man’s agent is like to himself’.

Wherever the disciples go in Jesus name, Jesus is with them he is in them. There is the closest identification and identity between Jesus and his disciples. Jesus and his disciples are one. We are the disciples of Jesus in our day. As he sends us and calls us to be his apostolic Church so he identifies himself with us shares himself with us. This is a great and awesome privilege. For Jesus Christ the Son of God is the one who calls us to serve him in his church and to witness to him in our lives. When the Lord calls us to serve him we need to remind ourselves who it that calls us. To serve God in and through the church is a sacred calling from God himself. The Church is not a club to which we may offer as much as we fell we want to. The Church is the Body of Christ on earth. If we are called to serve the Lord in any way it is the Lord that we are serving. Not the Rector. (Not even the Rural Dean.) No the Lord calls us to serve him and to witness for him. To bear witness for him. He is present within us and amongst us – the great mystery at the heart of the Church is none other than Christ himself. He who calls us to witness is with us in our witnessing. He who sends us out as his apostles and in his name goes with us. He enables us in our mission. In this Eucharist we welcome the Lord amongst us in his word and in his sacrament. And as we receive him here so he hands the baton of the Gospel to us that we may play our part in sharing it with all who will hear it and see it and respond to it.