NUNTIATORIA

Tenth Sunday after Pentecost

by the Revd Dr Robert Wilson PhD (Cantab), Old Roman Apostolate UK

O God, who dost manifest thy almighty power most chiefly in showing mercy and pity; increase thy mercy towards us, that we, seeking the way of thy promises, may be made partakers of thy heavenly treasures.

Today’s collect speaks to us of God, who manifests his power most chiefly in showing mercy and pity. We pray that he increases his mercy towards us, so that we, seeking the way of his promises, may be made partakers of his heavenly treasures.

But why is the divine power manifested most chiefly in showing mercy and pity? It seems like a contradiction in terms. The world, both ancient and modern, looks up to those in positions of power,  who are usually noted for their ruthless determination to cling on to it at all costs. Those who show any signs of mercy and pity towards others usually find themselves excluded from positions of power, and looked down on as weak and feeble. The gods of the ancient pagan pantheon were also noted for their ruthlessness and unpredictability. They sustained a world in which the strong exercised power over the weak and were determined to keep it that way.

A different vision emerged in ancient Israel. The God of Israel was not only a national God, but also the God of the whole world. He had created the world because it is the nature of goodness to be expansive. God did not need to create, but did so out of love. He had created the human race in his image to reflect that love. Humanity had become infected by pride and had fallen into sin. God had not abandoned his creation but had chosen one people, the children of Israel, to bear witness to the truth about the need to worship him alone, and to renounce idolatry and self love. The people around them worshipped power, but he promised to Abraham that in his seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed. He delivered his people from slavery in Egypt, for he was not a God of the rich and powerful, but of the weak and enslaved. He gave his people through Moses the Law which taught them to create a society that was different from the nations around them. Instead of worshipping power they were to show mercy on the stranger, the fatherless and the widow. Sadly, the Israelites were as fallen and sinful as the people around them, and when they entered the promised land their rulers themselves became corrupted by love of power. But whereas the kings exercised power, the prophets preached righteousness. They condemned those who joined house to house and field to field and neglected the poor and the outcast. They looked forward to a time when the wolf would finally dwell with the lamb, and God’s kingdom would finally come on earth as it is in heaven.

In the coming of the Saviour into the world the hope of the Kingdom of God, future in its fullness, was now being manifested in his words and mighty works. He had not come to abolish the Law and the Prophets but to fulfil them. He declared his power most chiefly in showing mercy and pity. He blessed the meek, the peacemakers, the poor in spirit, those who mourn and those who are persecuted for righteousness sake. He healed the sick, gave comfort to the despairing and offered the social outcasts a new sense of dignity and hope. He taught a way of non-violence, of love for enemies, of doing good to those who hate us, and praying for those who persecute us.

His followers saw him as the anointed liberator of Israel, who would finally deliver the people from their pagan overlords. But he proclaimed that the world could not be won by the world’s own methods. His messianic destiny, enthronement and rule could only come about through reversal, repudiation, suffering and death. The kings of the nations exercised power ruthlessly over their subjects, but he showed to his followers a more excellent way, for the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. He would be despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, who bore the sins of many and made intercession for the transgressors.

The time finally came when Jesus no longer taught, but acted and suffered. He was himself the embodiment of his message. He turned the other cheek, in his non resistance to his arrest and trial, saying that all who drew the sword would die by the sword. He walked the second mile, when he was compelled to carry his own cross to the place of execution. He took the evil of the world’s hatred upon himself and somehow subsumed it into good.

St. Paul wrote to the Philippians that, although the Saviour was in the form of God, he did not use his power as something to be grasped at, but rather took upon him the form of servant and was found in human likeness. He humbled himself, even to death on the cross. Wherefore God has highly exalted him and given him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every tongue every knee should bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

St. John penetrated even further when he said that the passion was not only the path to enthronement and exaltation, it was itself the supreme moment of glorification, the lifting up of the Saviour upon the cross being the means by which the world is judged, the divine self sacrificial love revealed and the humanity is redeemed. He reigns from the tree.

The self sacrificial love of God in Christ reconciling the world to himself is sometimes spoken of as  surrendering the divine attributes of power in order for the Saviour to become man and suffer and to die. But if we take to heart the words of today’s collect about the divine power being manifested most chiefly in showing mercy and pity we can see the Incarnation not as the abandonment of the divine power, but rather the most powerful manifestation of it. The only begotten Son did not abandon his divine power to become incarnate and suffer and die. Rather this expression of the divine love was the ultimate exemplification of it. The most supreme power is not ruthlessness and violence, of lording it over others, but rather of suffering and dying for them, of the divine charity that suffereth long and is kind, that vaunteth not itself, that seeketh not her own, that rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth.

The poet Edward Shillitoe put it like this:

The other gods were strong, but thou wast weak;
They rode, but thou didst stumble to a throne;
But to our wounds, only God’s wounds can speak
And not a God has wounds but thou alone.

The world is now just as filled with violence and ruthless manipulation and self seeking as it was then. But we are not called to follow the way of the world, but rather to make our own the words of today’s collect, for we worship a God whose power is made known most chiefly in showing mercy and pity. Let us pray that he will increase his mercy towards us, so that we, seeking the way of his promises, may be made partakers of his heavenly treasures.