Picture this: the world is dominated by one major power. There are sub-dominant powers, but essentially, there is one, and their interference, their engagement, their decisions affect the state of nations and people. They have a universal pull, they have strong and charismatic leaders, and they have a way of making the world conform to their image. In this world, there is also a profound sense that religion is generally accepted in the proper codes of the world. It is recognized that there is no one religion that is greater than any other religion. But there are one or two looked upon with suspicion, namely those that believe in One God. The world is also very much divided. It is divided between the growing rich and the growing poor, and the gulf between them becomes even greater. There is also a sense in which migrants are moving around the world with great speed in order to be able to provide cheap labour, a way of which these people can be used to increase the wealth of the richest. That is a world that I want you to imagine.
I suspect in the little parts of your brain there is a light going off, saying, “Is he talking about 2015? Is that what is on Andrew’s mind? Is that the state of this world?” Well, I am not! I am talking about the state of the world in 62 AD. I am talking about the power of the Roman Empire. Even though it allowed other states some room for independence, it was nonetheless for its part of the world a monolithic power. I am talking about a world where there were gladiators who were their sports stars, highly vaulted and respected and given places with the powerful – until of course they lost a fight! I am talking about the religious world of Rome, the idea of not only the Pax Romana, but also the pantheon of the Gods. As long as no one preached a God that was greater than the emperor of Rome. I am talking about a world where slaves were moved around, often from country to country, for the sake of being able to fill the gaps in Roman culture, Roman engineering, Roman transportation, and in Roman governance. I am talking about a world where life was often cheap, where people’s lives did not matter if you weren’t a citizen.
That was the world that existed when the Christian Church, the fledgling church, began to grow and to exercise its ministry. It was in that world, where the first believers would gather in homes to break bread and share wine, and talk about Jesus of Nazareth. It was in that world where Christians would be engaged in society, and had to live either as slaves or as masters in a world that was clearly defined by the wishes of the Roman Empire. I have often wondered, “What is it about them? What is it about that world that made the Christian community so prophetic? Is there anything about how they acted that is for us inspirational and aspirational? Is there anything that we can learn? Because we know that two thousand years have changed many things, but the fundamental needs of the human condition are just as poignant today as they were in A.D. 62.”
To answer this, I want to do a scholarly thing. I want to go to an original source. I don’t want to go to the historians, like Josephus and Tacitus, I want to go right to the very earliest Christian writings, one of the earliest was a letter by the Apostle Paul to the Philippians. The Philippians were a congregation that Paul helped create, though Paul is now writing from a prison in Rome because his ideas of the sovereignty of the One God were an affront to the Roman powers. Why to the Philippians? Well, this is because the Philippians were in Philippi, and Philippi was a crossroads city. It existed in the intersection of Asia Minor and Europe. Philippi was the place of commerce, the place of social engagement. In fact, one historian called it “a mini Rome.” Seventy per cent of its population were Romans! Philippi is a classical example of a cross-cultural, multicultural, highly Roman, very sophisticated business city between Asia Minor and Europe, very similar in many ways to Toronto in 2015.
Because it was a melting pot, because so many people went through it, the Philippian Church was important to the Apostle Paul. When he wrote this letter to them, he was writing out of great love and respect. You see, this Philippian community was important. He sends them a greeting and at the very end of the letter there are some priceless jewels for us to pick from the text. The Apostle Paul is talking about the greeting of one another and who is greeting whom. The language of greeting is a language that I think should be the language of the Church in 2015 here in Toronto, because it was engaging the culture. Paul says, “I give you and I bring you the greetings (of basically everyone) from all over the Church. I am bringing you the greeting from those who are with me in Rome. I am bringing you the greetings of all the saints”, and by saints he doesn’t just mean special people; he means all believers. Then, he says, “And I am bringing you greetings especially of those who belong to Caesar’s household.”
Why is that significant? Well, was he talking Caesar’s household – literally the home of Caesar and the Emperor – no! Was it only those who worked with or around the Caesar? No! What he is referring to is the whole of the Roman civil service. One thing we do know and that is that the early Christian had infiltrated and had an impact on the Roman civil service. Already by 62 AD, people who followed Jesus Christ were in all manner of positions and spreading throughout the Roman Empire. What was it about them that was so special? How did they have the impact that they had? There are some clues in this text from the Philippians, the first of which is their thoughtfulness and sharing of one another’s burdens.
You have to understand the culture at the time. The philosophy of the time that was really dominant in Roman society and in Philippi was actually known as Stoicism. Stoicism had its advocates – Epictetus, Socrates, and others. Basically, what they wanted to do was to remove all desire from human life. If you didn’t desire anything, you couldn’t be disappointed. If you didn’t want anything, or expect anything, you could not become depressed. In other words, if you could remove desire from the human heart by use of the mind, and as Epictetus says, “If something breaks, I don’t care! If something is taken away from me, I don’t care!” If you can live a life that is dispassionate, then you can live a life where you are not affected by what goes on around you. The highest state for many of the Stoics was a state where they were never depressed, anxious or worried about anything. The only problem is that can lead to a very, very cold heart. It stops you from investing and caring about others. It means that when you become dispassionate, even when you see other people sufferings, you stand back and let it happen. Not the Christian community!
The Christian community didn’t worry about anything. Paul says this in this text here. This is because he knows that it is Christ who is going to meet all his needs. He is not worried or anxious, because he believes in the provision of Christ. But, what is especially powerful is that he sees the care of one another coming as a sign of the grace of Jesus Christ. The great William Temple said, “Christianity is the only cooperative society that exists for its non-members.” The Church, according to William Temple, as he was illustrating this passage from Philippians, was a church that was always caring for the other, was always reaching out for the other, and was not self-absorbed. Paul talks quite clearly and openly about how kind and generous this congregation was, this group of Christians in Philippi. They were always giving. They sent gifts to him when he was in prison in Rome. They sent Epaphroditus, to visit him. They met his needs. They had been servants of Christ in reaching out to others. They were passionate to their core.
I was reading a fascinating quote from our great Canadian photographer, Freeman Patterson. He was talking about how he was able to create such magnificent photography. He wrote:
Letting go of the self is an essential pre-condition to real seeing. When you let go of yourself, you abandon any preconceptions about subject matter, which might crank you into photographing in a certain pre-determined way. When you let go, new conceptions arise from your direct experience of the subject, and new ideas and feelings will guide as you make your pictures.
What is fascinating about Freeman Patterson is his suggestion that to really understand the subject matter, you have to let go of yourself. You cannot be absorbed with self and your own scene, but rather see the subject and put yourself into the caring of that subject above all else. This is exactly what the Christian community did. When the world was cold and harsh, when life was treated cheaply, when slaves were put down, when even the most enlightened were dispassionate and detached, the Church in Philippi was engaged. It was not self-absorbed. It was loving, and it put itself on the line. It thought of the other, and it gave itself for the other. That is one of the reasons why they were so great.
They were also equally generous. Listen to what Paul wrote:
You Philippians indeed know that in the early days of the Gospel when I left Macedonia, no church shared with me in the matter of giving and receiving except you alone, for even when I was in Thessalonica, you sent me help for my needs. Not that I seek a gift, but I seek the profit that accumulates to your account. I have been paid in full and more than enough. I am fully satisfied now that I have received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent – a fragrant offering, a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God. And my God will fully satisfy every need of yours according to his riches and glory in Christ Jesus.
Isn’t this gorgeous?! This Church is generous, it gives of itself, it just doesn’t think of itself, but out of its own love and compassion for the ministry of the Church it supports it and encourages it. It seems to me that on an anniversary of a church like our own, the voice, the experience, the tradition of the Philippians speaks to us so loudly and clearly to continue to be a generous people, to be a people who look for the other, who care for the other, not to gain credit as Paul says, but rather to be motivated and moved by Jesus Christ. Sometimes an event like this morning reminds us to recommit ourselves to that giving.
I read a wonderful story about Queen Victoria and how she received what is known as the Kohinoor diamond from the Maharaja. The Kohinoor diamond is THE diamond in the crown. The Maharaja gave it to the Queen when he was a young boy, but years later he came back to Queen Victoria and requested that it be brought from the Tower of London to Buckingham Palace. The Maharaja took this diamond and kneeled again before the Queen and gave it back to her and said these incredible words: “Your Majesty, I gave this jewel when I was a child, too young to know what I was doing. I want to give it to you again in the fullness of my strength, with all my heart and affection and gratitude, now and forever, fully realizing all that I do.” For the Maharaja, the giving of the diamond in a perfunctory way as a child was not enough. It had to come from the heart; it had to come from a mind that knew what it was doing; it had to come with love and affection. So too, our gifts to Christ, to the world, to the Church, and to one another. They are not perfunctory, but t from the very depths of our hearts. We give because we know and we believe that when do so, we are giving because of Jesus Christ, and we seek his guidance in doing it.
The Philippian Church wasn’t just a church of generosity; it was a church that greeted one another warmly. It is no coincidence that at the very end of this letter, three times Paul uses the word “greeting.” The greeting from himself, the greeting from his friends, and the greeting from the household. For Paul, the greeting of one another, the acceptance of one another, the outgoing nature of one another was an ultimate sign of the greeting of Christ. It even uses that phrase “in Christ Jesus.” In other words, no church, no community of faith can be a community of faith if it doesn’t have the grace of greeting. Greeting isn’t just something that is done at the door of a church by wonderful and warm individuals like those who greet you here every Sunday. It is not the greeting of professionals; it is the greeting of one another in the bond and strength and the power of Christian love. What made that early Christian community so inviting and so winsome was that unlike the cold and lonely and hard world in which it lived, it greeted people in the love of Christ.
Many years ago, actually in the mid-1980s, I took part in a mission tour of northern and central New Brunswick. It was sponsored by the United Church of Canada and called The South African Mission Project. It was my job to go to speak about what was happening in South Africa in the mid-1980s, well before the end of apartheid. I went in the winter by train to the northern towns, up in the Miramichi and over to the border and into Quebec. I went to Campbellton and Dalhousie and Bathurst and Newcastle, names anyone who has been to New Brunswick knows well, and to go there in January, believe you me, is not what I would ask for! Finally, my last presentation was on a cold night in Campbellton, a really cold night. The minister there, the Reverend Archibald, who I remember to this day, a wonderful man, brought me to the church early to set up. I thought, “Here I am in northern New Brunswick on a cold night talking about South Africa! Who would possibly want to come and hear me?”
We got there, and on the church steps there was already a man seated. He had a bag around him, and clearly, he was not a member of the church, for Fred did not know him. The man said, “I was wondering if I can come to your event?”
Fred looked at him and said, “By all means! Of course you can. Rev. Stirling is going to be speaking on South Africa.”
The man sort of implied that he didn’t care what I was going to be talking about he just wanted to be there. He asked, “Is hot chocolate going to be served?”
Clearly, I was not the reason he was there.
Fred said, “Well, actually, we might have hot chocolate.”
Then, Fred said something to him that I have never forgotten. He said, “And I’ll tell you one thing, it is warmer in here than it is out there.”
The man went in. There were fifty people there. He must have been bored to tears. He sat in the back pew, listened to my presentation, came down to the hall afterwards for cake and hot chocolate and coffee, held it in his hands to keep him warm. He was there and he knew that he was warmer inside than he was outside. He was also, and this is what really moved me deeply, every single member of that congregation greeted him, every single one of them warmly welcomed him. The warmth that he received was not the warmth of the hot chocolate. This was the warmth of true Christian fellowship!
I have never forgotten that evening or that congregation in New Brunswick for the warmth of their welcome, the kindness of the way they received him, touched me. I thought, “What an image for the Church!” Often our world is lonely and cold, isolated and fragmented, but, the Church should always be warmer inside than the world is outside, and the greeting that we offer one another should be so imbued by the power of Christ that it is winsome in our world. If our congregation is going to continue to be a faithful body in the years ahead, this City needs to know, this world needs to know: they will find it warmer inside than outside, for that is what made the Philippian Church so powerful! Amen.