Letter from the Rector

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LETTER FROM THE RECTOR

Dear Holy People of God:

It’s in the numbers! I don’t do the lottery, but I’ve wondered, were I to buy a ticket, if I used biblical numbers would that increase my chances of winning? Three scriptural numbers are especially significant this month - 40, 50, and 3.

May begins with the celebration of the Feast of the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ, forty (40) days after his resurrection. This issue of FLEx may not arrive in time for you to respond to the opportunities for worship on this major holy day in the Easter cycle, but I hope many of you have been in regular Eastertide worship to hear and read in the Notices of our plans for keeping this feast and will join us for one of the worship opportunities on the Eve of the Ascension, April 31, or the Day of the Ascension, May 1.

The next number of note is fifty (50). It brings to a close the Great Fifty Days of Easter and celebrates the coming of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost (penta = fifty) to empower and enliven the gathering community of Christ followers - the church - to carry on the work and ministry of the risen Savior. Often mistakenly referred to as the "birthday" of the church, Pentecost might better be called the baptismal anniversary of the church - its "spiritual" birthday. I think it more accurate to recall that the church had its real genesis in the lives of those followers of Jesus who met together behind locked doors after Jesus’ crucifixion and in those who came to the tomb early on Sunday morning, the first day of the week and who all came to the slow, but certain, belief that the Lord had risen as he had promised. It was, I think, in their dawning belief in the resurrection of Jesus that the church was literally born. They went and told the great good news that, "He is not here. He is risen!" and thus the church came to life among them. They began to spread the good news and by the fiftieth day, the Day of Pentecost, scripture reports that thousands were gathered and the church’s evangelistic ministry was launched - big time! (By the way, have you noticed in all these gospel accounts, that believers gathered in community, that they came to know and share the power of the risen Christ in community...for them it was not "my" church or "my faith," but "ours!" But that’s another subject for another time.)

As much as the Day of Pentecost brings Easter to a close, it also powerfully opens the season after Pentecost, the great green season, the season throughout which we hear the stories of the mighty acts of God in both the Hebrew and Christian scriptures - how God remembers his people, cares for his people and re-members us - calls us to wholeness and brings our broken parts back together - time after time in the course of human faith history and how the Christian community grew and grows.

The third "holy" number of the month is three (3). Three is a number that makes Christians unique among peoples of other faiths because it reminds us of our Trinitarian faith. Trinity Sunday, the feast particularly focused on celebrating our faith in a triune God, is the First Sunday after Pentecost. On Trinity Sunday, the Church celebrates God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. Indeed, the name of the Holy Trinity frames our Christian life on this earth. It is in the name of the most holy and blessed Trinity that we are adopted by God in our baptism, I baptize you in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. (BCP page 307), and it is the name of this Triune God that we are ushered out of this life at our birth into eternal life, Depart, O Christian soul out of this world, in the name of God the Father Almighty who created you; In the name of Jesus Christ who redeemed you; In the name of the Holy Spirit who sanctifies you...(BCP page 464).

It’s in the numbers: Our Lord’s ascension to sit at the right hand of God and who there intercedes for us - forty; the coming of the Holy Spirit to empower us for ministry in the Name of the risen Christ - fifty; and the gift of the triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - three. "Holy, holy, holy, merciful and mighty. God in three persons, blessed Trinity."

Come, dear holy people of God...God’s saved, redeemed, empowered servants...come, let us worship.

In the Name of the transfigured and risen Christ,

J. D. Godwin +

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