According to the Dictionary of Human Geography, imperial power is "the creation and/or maintenance of an unequal economic, cultural, and territorial relationship, usually between states...based on domination and subordination." Got it? There will be a quiz at the door when this liturgy ends!
The key words, there, I think, are domination and subordination. To achieve their goals, empires demand unwavering conformity to their laws, norms, and values. Empires suppress dissent and debate.
When St. Paul appeals to those Christians living in
first-century imperial Rome and says to them: “do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing
of your minds,” he isn’t making an abstract theological statement. He is
saying something very radical and countercultural and quite pointed in a very
specific place and time, as he makes his
appeal to these brothers and sisters in Christ who are living in the “belly
of the beast.” He reminds them that even though they may own homes in Rome,
they reside “in Christ.” Like Jesus himself, they are called to be in,
but not of, this world. They answer to a higher
authority than Caesar.
As they seek to live their faith and love their
neighbors, Paul says that they need to resist the dominating and
subordinating power of conformity by opening themselves up to the liberating
and freeing transformational power of love that is God’s Holy Spirit. A love
that, as the former Presiding Bishop liked to say, will transform this world
from the nightmare it is for so many, into the dream that God has for us.
Paul appeals to those first- century
Christians in Rome to keep Christ, not Caesar, at the center of their lives. He
implores them to remember that when they say
“Jesus is Lord” that they are making a political statement. All of the
dominant cultural messages of the imperial Roman world insisted that Caesar was
lord. If you wanted to get ahead and to fit in, you needed to play by Caesar’s
rules. You could do what you wanted on the weekends, say your prayers to whichever
god you wanted to, if it turned out that you had a little bit left over at the
end of the week. Just be sure to keep it private and spiritual and
compartmentalized. Just be sure you knew who really mattered: Caesar.
What exactly is it that Paul hopes these Christians in
Rome will be transformed into? Into people who can discern the will of God.
Into people who know the truth so that truth will set them free. Into people
who can figure out to whom they really belong and for what purpose; and then to
live into that reality not just on Sunday mornings but 24:7, 365 days a year,
one day at a time. Paul wants those
followers of Jesus, in Rome, to grow into the full stature of Christ. And ditto
with us.
Each new generation of Christians must ask the very
same hard questions that Paul raises in Romans 12: Where does your allegiance
really lie? Where do you put your trust, not when you are sitting in this room,
but as you live your wild and precious lives? In money? Nation? The Democratic
Party. The Republican Party? Who shapes your values? Fox News? MSNow? Who wants
you to conform and fit in? And how can you resist to stay focused on Jesus?
“I appeal to you
brothers and sisters…do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by
the renewing of your minds…”
Paul doesn’t coerce us because, unlike imperial power,
authentic faith is never coercive. When faith does become manipulative and
demands conformity, it is no longer faith; it’s a cult. So Paul invites those
Christians in Rome and us as we gather here today of our own free will, to present our bodies to God. Not just some
segmented part of our spiritual selves, not that little piece of us that we
bring to Church. Not just our brains, but our whole selves, our souls and our
bodies. Present yourself as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God…
Sacrifice.
What a strange word to our ears! It makes us think of Old Testament people
cutting birds in half and offering dead animals to be burned as if burning flesh
could atone for sin, as if God could be made happy with a slaughtered lamb. It
seems so distant from our lives and frankly so bizarre. We do well to remember
that the prophets wrestled with this notion, too. They said that the sacrifice
God really wanted was a broken and contrite heart. They said, in the Old
Testament itself, that God didn’t want animal sacrifices or beautiful liturgy
but justice that flows like a river and righteousness like an ever-flowing
stream.
Sacrifice may
also remind us of the Lamb of God taking away the sins of the world by dying on
a cross. And we speak of soldiers who lay down their lives for others. More
metaphorically, we speak of parents who make sacrifices so that their kids can
go off to college. And sometimes, the reverse happens, as kids are sacrificed
on the various altars of parents who probably never should have had kids in the
first place.
The word sacrifice comes from two old English
words that mean “to make holy.” The word sacrament,
of course, is closely related to sacrifice
linguistically. A sacrament is an outward and visible sign that signifies an
inward and spiritual grace. We take everyday things like bread and wine, oil
and water, but they mean something much more: they signify the love of God. In
the same way, sacrifice suggests
taking what is ordinary and making it holy.
Most days, without even being conscious of it, we are
conformed to this world little by little. We mirror what we learned in business
school or at the naval academy or dare I say in divinity school as well. We
parcel ourselves out, bit by bit, as we render ourselves to “Caesar.” We may
not even be aware that this is happening. In fact conformity works best when we
are not aware of making any conscious choices at all; when we are on autopilot.
The empire likes us numb and mindless and obedient.
And then we come to this holy place. And it isn’t just
Paul or the preacher who makes his appeal to us; it is Christ himself. It is
God the Holy Trinity, through the words of our liturgy, our prayers, our
bread-breaking and cup-sharing who invites (not coerces) us to present
ourselves, of our own free volition, to present our souls and bodies, as a
living sacrifice to God. And then to allow ourselves to be transformed, rather
than conformed. Transformed into what?
There are some core truths that Paul holds to and they
come up again and again, whether he is speaking to the Christians in Rome, or
Corinth, or Galatia, or Thessalonica or Norfolk. One of Paul’s favorite
metaphors is that the Church is like a Body. Not just any body, but Christ’s own body. It has many different
parts that have different roles. But the goal is for the whole thing to be
working together so that eyes see and ears hear and noses smell. He tells the
Corinthians that. He tells the Galatians that. And today we hear him telling the
Romans that. It’s such a familiar image to us, part of the faith we profess and
sing about two thousand years later that we may fail to see the power within
it, the power of what it suggests about the Christian faith and our life in
Christ.
One bread, one body,
one Lord of all,
one cup of blessing
which we bless.
And
we, though many, throughout the earth,
we are one body in this one Lord.
In Holy Baptism we have been claimed and marked and
sealed as Christ’s own. We have been re-branded, called away from imperial
power and claimed for Jesus Christ, because there is room for only one lord in
our lives. One Lord, one faith, one
baptism. Paul goes on to say that we all have gifts, given to us by a
generous God: gifts that are different and unique to us. We are meant to use
those gifts to make the Body stronger, to build it up, so that we might bear
witness to the world.
None of us can be the Church on our own. But together,
we have what we need to do the work God has given us to do in Christ’s name. We
can only do this work, however to the extent that we refuse to be conformed to
this world, to the extent that we allow ourselves to transformed and become a
living sacrifice to God: for only then can we truly see our way forward. Only
then can we discern what is holy and of God, and only then begin to live the
prayer with which this day’s worship began—live it not just as words on our
lips but as that which defines who we are called to become, with God’s help:
Grant,
O merciful God, that your Church, being gathered together in unity by your Holy
Spirit, may show forth your power among all peoples, to the glory of your Name,
through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy
Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
May God grant you wisdom and courage for the living of
these days.
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