Today is dedication Sunday- when we celebrate the point at which this building was dedicated to the praise, service and worship of God. Of course this is also a time when we re-dedicate ourselves to serving God through our participation in this Church community. We remember all who made this Church what it is today- those who, over the years, have given of their time, their energy, their financial resources, to ensure that a Christian community continues to worship in this place and that the building remains standing and a place of beauty. We locate ourselves within the Church’s ongoing history and commit ourselves to making this a place and community where future generations will continue to praise and serve God.
This might all sound quite lofty and remote; so how do today’s readings speak to such a manifesto? How do they flesh out what we mean by dedication?
Buildings, how they are used and what they represent, feature in both the readings from Jeremiah and from Luke’s gospel:
Until the Israelites were conquered by the Babylonians they had believed themselves to be under God’s protection. Because they had the temple in Jerusalem, the dwelling place of God, nothing could happen to them. God would not let foreign powers defeat the Israelites because this would mean his name would be dishonoured. Safe in this knowledge the Israelites believed that they had carte blanche to do whatever they wished; in doing so they, not any foreign powers, dishonoured the name of God. It is this which the prophet Jeremiah is seeking to show the people.
The place which has been dedicated, set aside, as the dwelling place of God is, because of the behaviour of the Israelites, no such thing. Whilst the LORD seeks to be alongside them they have made the temple unfit for his habitation.
The people are involved in self-deception; they want to believe ‘this is the temple of the lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the LORD’.
If they own the temple of the LORD what they do outside the temple of the LORD is of no consequence- or so they think: they have assumed that God’s presence with them is unconditional- that God gave their ancestors the land in which they now dwell and so they rely on the righteousness of their ancestors to ensure God’s safety and protection.
But God reminds them of a condition, an ‘if’; ‘if you do not oppress the alien, the orphan, and the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not go after other gods to your own hurt, then I will dwell with you in this place, in the land that I gave of old to your ancestors forever and ever”.
The people of Judah are being urged to recognise that both what they do outside the temple and what goes on within their hearts- both their actions and their inner intentions, are as much part of their relationship to God as the temple which bears His name.
What might this mean to us now on dedication Sunday?
Well, it seems then that we cannot think about outward things- the fabric of this building- the bricks and mortar- without also thinking about the community who meet within this building and what is going on within the hearts of the people who meet here. And having thought about these inward things we are called to examine what this gives rise to in the world around us. So there is a constant dynamic between the inner and outer aspects of our lives.
This is made even clearer in today’s reading from Luke’s gospel, in which another house appears- one that might seem on the face of it, very different from the house of God, to which Jeremiah refers.
This is the house of Zacchaeus; a wealthy tax collector- we do not know but the implication is that his wealth is a result of ill-gotten gains. Certainly he would be viewed with suspicion and disdain by Jews who had to pay their taxes to the Roman authorities. It seems Zacchaeus is intensely curious about Jesus and so climbs a tree to have a view of this man who says and does such amazing things. Jesus issues what might be a command, or an invitation- in fact he invites himself into Zacchaeus’ house: “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house today”.
Jesus, the incarnate God, has chosen to dwell, however briefly, in the home of a sinner. Jesus here is giving of himself, he is showing his dedication to Zacchaeus. Consequently Zacchaeus is transformed- we might ask what did this feel like for Zacchaeus? All we are told is that ‘he hurried down and was happy to welcome him’. What this transformation really meant however is shown in his actions when he says ‘Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” Once again, we can see that an inner transformation is given material effect- the salvation of Zacchaeus benefits the community around him. It is not something which simply brings him inner tranquillity and peace of mind – as it has given the Israelites in the time of Jeremiah – rather his salvation brings about a changed attitude and behaviour in relation to his wealth.
We might see in the case of Zacchaeus a model for our ministry and mission and what it means to dedicate this house of prayer to God. For we cannot dedicate this house to God without dedicating ourselves- we are called to contemplate how our inner relationship with God is given material effect, because- to quote an ‘80s pop song- ‘we are living in a material world’.
To acknowledge this doesn’t make our faith any more prosaic- it simply means our faith has to respond to the real, concrete challenges we face. It means recognising that we all have a role to play in the life of HPC, it means responding to the fact that the Edmonton area is going to have to cut the number of clergy in churches over the coming years and that in this climate the presence of 3 clergy here cannot be sustained unless our giving to the Common Fund can support this.
Talking about your role in the life of HPC raises another question- which is, to what extent do you feel involved in the life of this church? Is this a place where you present your outer, public face only, or is this a place where you feel able to allow those around you to see the ‘real you’? Obviously it isn’t an either/or situation. The more we go to church, the more comfortable we feel within a church community, and the more likely we are to contribute, to be our real selves. We will all be on a spectrum of belonging and some people instinctively find it easier to belong, to be their true selves, within any given community, than others. But as a clergy team we recognise that as the church grows there is a need to ensure that everyone feels welcome, that everyone feels they have a place within the community- and we need help to ensure that is the case. This is one of the ways in which our mutual dedication to God is shown in our responsiveness and service to one another. Only by building up our community from within can we sustained to serve the community without- which may very well contain modern Zacchaeus’ who are straining to see what is going on here.
So let it be our prayer today that, knowing God dedicates himself to us, we may make this real to others through what we give to this community. Amen