People of Coolidge, why do you stare up into the sky? He will return, in the same way as he left. And he won’t be mistaken for a bird, or a plane, or a superman here to save us one by one by silly means.
As he ascended, Jesus gave his disciples, and that means us, a job to do: a commission, to take his message to all people, at home right here, and beyond our comfort zone or even our knowledge.
We know this town, its people; we know ourselves. And yet we do not know what is coming. Not really. Though we may fear or gleefully await a change, or strive to keep the faith with what we know and love.
But there is more to the story than that: we have something to share, a story to tell, to every new person that walks through that door, and a new story to tell to every one we may see week after week. It is the good news of the story of the glory of God. It is from the beginning the story of God’s love for us, his people, and his people includes everybody.
Today we welcome a new person into our company. Last month she was only ten days old and here she is to be baptized.
In the story of the Church it is an unusual day to be baptized, or for anything to happen. Last week, or last Thursday, we began to accept that Jesus, who arose on Easter, is no longer with us.
We do not see God in Christ face to face. We must seek him in each other – and in the stranger we meet on the road, or in the hospital, or at the diner. He may help us, we may help him. But the image of God is in each one of us.
Next Sunday, the feast day of Pentecost, the Church celebrates a new beginning. You will notice that in our first lesson today things have already begun. Returning from saying good-bye to Jesus outside town, the disciples, including women, and the eleven apostles, begin to gather for prayer. They meet in an upper room, perhaps the very one they met on the night he was betrayed, Jesus’ passion beginning.
They gather in prayer. They will go on gathering in prayer and telling the story of Jesus, and of the life that ends not in despair but hope.
At Pentecost the promised Spirit will arrive in dramatic fashion. If you are down at San Xavier del Bac Mission Church, sometime. look for the painting on the wall of the disciples, each with a tongue of flame above his head. This shows us visually what happened internally.
They began to understand that the Spirit was within, and working in them, to bring that commission into action that Jesus had left them with. Left us with. To take the message home and to the whole world.
This morning we receive a new member into our midst, a new Christian, a new person, a new human being. One of God’s own delight. Evelyn. Our duty to her as to all new Christians is to remind them of their baptism. What it means.
And it means, among other things, that you are God’s delight. You are loved by God. And we try to show that in how we welcome you into our company. We are the company of God’s delight: the creatures he has made and in whom is his joy.
We show God’s delight in us, God’s love for us, in part in how we are together as one; one people, called together in faith by our own baptisms. We too, Evelyn, have had water splashed on our heads, oil spread on our foreheads, and our names proclaimed as God’s own.
Together as one family, one people, with one God father of all. Christ prayed for us, that we might be one.
You are one of us. You are one of us, now, and forever.
A visible sign of that unity will be our prayer together, in the Eucharist and in the Lord’s Prayer, as we all together say those words that our Savior taught us.
Simple words; but they cover everything.
They begin with praise for God and prayer that the will of God will happen – among us, and in part through us. As we pray, we are called to help bring into visible being that kingdom of God, reign of God, that we pray will become realized here. And we pray for our daily needs. And we pray for forgiveness, as we surely know we need it. But forgiveness as we forgive others and ourselves. And again we pray, acknowledging that that kingdom is already here; already real. Glory.
Watermelon seeds - and grandmothers.
When I was young Grandma Maxine came to visit.
She taught us two things on that visit. One was how to spit watermelon seeds. We were eating watermelon, the four boys, out on the back lawn, and she asked, do you know how to spit watermelon seeds? No. Well, let me teach you. She lined us up at the edge of the lawn. Just past it was a place my father had put down rich soil for a new garden. We ate - and got the seeds into our mouths - and we spat.
The seeds launched out into th new soil beyond the lawn's edge - and disappeared. But six weeks later - watermelon. First the vines, then the melons.
The other thing she taught me was the Lord's Prayer. It took a little longer for that to bear fruit.
And now, using the exact same words my grandmother taught me, the traditional words, let us pray.
As our Savior Christ hath taught us, we are bold to say,
| Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen. |
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https://sermonoats.blogspot.com/2012/04/seeds.html
For St Michael's Episcopal Church, Coolidge, Ariz. May 17th 2026. JRL+
© 2026 John Leech
