Timothy serves as a Bishop in second century Asia Minor. His churches face persecution and outright rejection from the larger society. But Timothy encounters not only attacks from the outside, he struggles with subversion from inside as well. Heresies, desecration, outright perversities threaten Timothy’s parishes. Thus, taking these constant hits from outside and shouldering the dissension from inside, Timothy’s faith begins to unravel. He begins to go under. Can his faith hold up against the chaos and anarchy? Can he remain steadfast amid the fury and disarray? Enter Timothy’s spiritual director. We don’t know exactly who it is, but whoever it may be, this mentor begs Timothy hold fast to the sound instruction received from his grandmother, his mother, his companions in the faith. He tells Timothy cowardice finds no place in exercising the Gospel; he needs to preach it unashamedly and to stand in solidarity with those imprisoned for Christ’s sake. “With the help of the Holy Spirit living in us,” writes his mentor, “guard the good treasure entrusted to you.”

I

“Guard the good treasure entrusted to you.” Another translation urges, “Keep the great securities of your faith intact.” These great securities, what are they? This treasure we guard, what is it? The Church? The creeds? The Bible? To be sure they represent treasure. But they serve as witnesses to the treasure, not the treasure itself. Can we uncover the treasure through the stories of the Saints, from Augustine to Tutu? Do we discover the treasure in the grand doctrines of sin and salvation, through the profound liturgies of East and West? Not really. Clues we can find there, to be sure. But ultimately spiritual biographies, intricate theologies, elaborate liturgies point beyond themselves to a treasure we dare not confuse with all of the mileposts, clues, and compass readings on the map pointing to the treasure itself. Let us look at it this way: Look around you at this sanctuary. You know this beautiful room itself serves almost as a treasure map. We worship amid an almost symbolic overload. Each of the exquisite carvings on your pew ends is different. Follow the frieze around the room and watch it change: here a stalk of wheat, there a cluster of grapes, here oak leaves and acorns, there pomegranates. And look at the windows: over here five parables illustrating the hope our Lord holds for us; over there, representations of the miracles, a vision of creation made whole. Behind me (protected against the cranes stored out on Dartmouth Street repairing our building)—behind me a radiant Annunciation Window proclaiming the arrival, amid our common life, of the Prince of Peace. But it is that window up there, the far one on the right end defining our treasure. A Resurrection window. John and Peter, terror-stricken, confronting sentries at the tomb of our Lord, saying: “He is not here but is risen.” Everything we do here rests on treasure illustrated in that window. It is a promise, a trust, a leap of hope. It provides the absolute pivot, the primary hinge, the unshakable foundation undergirding our faith and witness.

What treasure do we see revealed? What security need we guard? The promise affirmed by that resurrection window, the treasure we mine whenever we meet in this room or risk ourselves for Love’s sake, is this: Nothing in human existence—nothing in human existence—not cancer, not AIDS, not lies, not Alzheimer’s, not nuclear or biological or chemical terror, not relationships going down the drain, not threats to our reputations, not the deaths of spouses, nor the rebellion and perhaps desertion of our children—surely not whether we are created Black or White, gay or straight, Jew or gentile, male or female—nothing we do to ourselves or to one another can ultimately break the bond of love offered us by the God we know through the victory of love over the worst life can do to us.

Oh, to be sure, like Timothy under siege, our faith may waver. We may forget the hope God holds for us. We may abandon God’s intentions for us. We can question, resist, doubt, shake our fists from frustration, surrender in resignation. We can leave like the prodigal for a far country and engage in some sad and dissipating stupidity. We can break God’s heart. But a searching, yearning, seeking, “never say die” Divine longing pursues us, as Francis Thompson envisions, “…down the nights and down the days, down the arches of the years with strong feet that follow, follow after…” like a hound of heaven, waiting to welcome us home. Yes, everlasting arms grasp and enfold us when our suffering and fear is worst, when our plans blow up in our faces, when life takes a hundred and eighty degree turn. Indeed, death, that most vivid metaphor for human bondage and division, as well as a profound reality, seeking in every way to sow strife, hatred, suspicion, mistrust, is itself, ultimately, the loser.

This treasure we guard, then, consists of God’s triumph through Jesus of Nazareth over the powers distorting, ravaging, wasting, killing the best in our life together. As a consequence, we call Jesus, “Christ.”

II

Now friends, as we gather about this table, I believe what we see and do here provides a seal on Love’s promise of ever-relentless pursuit. I believe what we see and do here authenticates the hold of God’s love on us and the deathless hope evident in the life and death of Jesus Christ.

What do we see here? What elements constitute this sacrament? To put it briefly, we see symbolically a body broken and blood shed. We see at this table the very elements that can threaten our faith and our hope—a brutal, terrible, miserable death of one who came to restore, to transfigure, to recreate our human community so we might live together in harmony and peace. That good life ended up a wreck: sad, sorry, crucified. What we see here at this table, then, in the first place, is a harsh, eye-averting human catastrophe. The body broken and the blood spilled can be witnessed today in the murderous rivalries in the Kashmir, bloody conflict in Bangladesh, cultural and religious fury worked out on Manhattan Island. We know this wounded body of Christ in broken hearts, broken lives, the worst life can do to us. It represents the tragedy of our human condition. These elements symbolize the fact that much of our life is a struggle finally ending in depletion, the good always under threat, and a temptation to cynicism saying finally, “Broken bodies? Spilled blood? That’s the way life is. To hell with it.”

But now hear this! Now hear this! The promise of this window and the presence of this table are bound inextricably. For as real as these wounds may be, as accurately as they may illustrate our human condition, we come to this table and we share these elements because the treasure we guard and cherish insists that brokenness and cynicism are not the last word. For all of its stark and bloody realism, this table is finally the Divine revelation of our hope. It defies explanation. It invites confession. This table assures us of power and love working to resolve, to renew, to recreate. This table conveys our God-of-love-and-hope victorious, working through the very events out to destroy love and hope. This table proclaims Power—Power—working and finally triumphing over those forces that seem to cripple, diminish and finally do us in. We gather about a table of human scorn and tragedy.

No! We gather around a table of transcendent hope.

So therefore, my beloved friends, as we break, as we pour, as we eat, as we drink, as we share this sacrament this morning—World Wide Communion Sunday—we do so with the men and women and children from the tank-ridden bloodied streets of Gaza and the bomb-mangled streets of Jerusalem, the plague-ridden streets of Kinshasa and the hunger-threatened streets of Kabul, the angry streets of Karachi and the drug-haunted streets of Boston—and yes, we join the man or woman right here in this room, in the pew beside us seeking, amid much that would deny it, assurance of love and hope sustaining, undergirding, hanging on to us thorough thick and thin. From Tashkent to Copley Square we will be claimed by unyielding Divine hope, enabling each of us in churches girdling the earth to vividly, joyously, gratefully celebrate and, yes, guard, disperse and share the good treasure entrusted to us.

Scripture Reading
II Timothy 1: 1-14

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, for the sake of the promise of life that is in Christ Jesus, To Timothy, my beloved child: Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. I am grateful to God—whom I worship with a clear conscience, as my ancestors did—when I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day. Recalling your tears, I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy. I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you. For this reason I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of my hands; for God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline.

Do not be ashamed, then, of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner, but join with me in suffering for the gospel, relying on the power of God, who saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works but according to his own purpose and grace. This grace was given to us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. For this gospel I was appointed a herald and an apostle and a teacher, and for this reason I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know the one in whom I have put my trust, and I am sure that he is able to guard until that day what I have entrusted to him. Hold to the standard of sound teaching that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. Guard the good treasure entrusted to you, with the help of the Holy Spirit living in us.