Citizenship of the Soul

Snake Eyes, by Somniodelic Workshop

  

Propers: The Fifth Sunday of Easter, AD 2025 C

Homily:

Lord, we pray for the preacher, for You know his sins are great.

Alleluia! Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

We have a famous letter from the second century, the Epistle to Diognetus, which describes life in the early Church to a curious pagan inquirer. It reads in part as follows:

Christians are indistinguishable from other men either by nationality, language or customs. They do not inhabit separate cities of their own, or speak a strange dialect, or follow some outlandish way of life … With regard to dress, food, and manner of life in general, they follow the customs of whatever city they happen to be living in, whether it is Greek or foreign. 

And yet there is something extraordinary about their lives. They live in their own countries as though they were only passing through. They play their full role as citizens, but labor under all the disabilities of aliens. Any country can be their homeland, but for them their homeland, wherever it may be, is a foreign country. Like others, they marry and have children, but they do not expose them [to the elements]. They share their meals, but not their wives.  

They live in the flesh, but they are not governed by the desires of the flesh. They pass their days upon earth, but they are citizens of heaven. Obedient to the laws, they yet live on a level that transcends the law. Christians love all men, but all men persecute them. Condemned because they are not understood, they are put to death, but raised to life again. They live in poverty, but enrich many … A blessing is their answer to abuse, deference their response to insult …

The Christian is to the world what the soul is to the body. As the soul is present in every part of the body, while remaining distinct from it, so Christians are found in all the cities of the world, but cannot be identified with the world. As the visible body contains the invisible soul, so Christians are seen living in the world, but their religious life remains unseen … Christians love those who hate them …

It is by the soul, enclosed within the body, that the body is held together, and similarly, it is by the Christians, detained in the world as in a prison, that the world is held together. The soul, though immortal, has a mortal dwelling place; and Christians also live for a time amidst perishable things, while awaiting the freedom from change and decay that will be theirs in heaven.

As the soul benefits from the deprivation of food and drink, so Christians flourish under persecution. Such is the Christian’s lofty and divinely appointed function, from which he is not permitted to excuse himself.

It’s inspiring, isn’t it? Humbling, yet convicting. When Luther writes that a single word can be for us at once both Law and Gospel, this is the sort of thing that he has in mind. Because on the one hand, it’s wonderful to hear what the Church has been and ought to be. But it also kind of kills us; because we know—don’t we?—that a non-Christian writing today, in 21st-century USA, would not have the same to say.

Are the dominant strains of Christianity in this country known for justice and generosity, beyond the requirements of law? Do we refrain from ostentatious displays of public religiosity, in favor of allowing humility and virtue to speak for themselves? Do we, generally, bless those who curse us, pray for those who wrong us? How about that bit where Christians are called to stand in solidarity with aliens and to treat our homeland, any homeland, as a foreign country?

That actually reminds me of a line from Moby-Dick: “Delight,—top-gallant delight is to him, who acknowledges no law or lord, but the Lord his God, and is only a patriot to heaven.” Perhaps such sentiment is more easily maintained whilst on a ship upon the endless ocean sea.

We read today from the penultimate chapter of the Revelation of St John. Here the heavens and the earth and the seas pass away, that a new earth-and-heaven, a single divine unity, might fulfill the promise of her predecessors, with all of God’s Creation as His Temple. The New Jerusalem descends as a bride adorned for her husband, a fantastic city of brobdingnagian proportions, encompassing more souls than one could ever hope to count, with doors that never shut by day, and there is no night at all.

“See,” proclaims the voice from the throne, “the home of God is among mortals … He will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away … See, I make all things new!”

That is the Heaven to which Christians should aspire: a City of God at the end of time where all are gathered home; where every wound is healed and every tear dried; where death and hell are no more and every mother’s child raised up from the loamy earth of the grave! That is the revelation: the victory of Jesus Christ, the Wedding Feast of the Lamb; where all are reconciled, all gathered home, and all are made one in Him. It is a vision of limitless glory, limitless mercy, limitless life. And it is yours, entirely by grace.

This is what we’re called to witness, the eternal reality to which we must point; not simply with words, but with our entire lives, with body and mind and spirit. Such is Jesus for us: the single spoken Word of God incarnate in this Man; that we might now be Him for others. Heaven isn’t simply some ideal. Nor is it merely reward, a posthumous gated community for the deserving or the righteous. It is the eternal reality, the beginning and the end, of the salvation God has wrought in Jesus Christ.

We are called, as witnesses, as martyrs, to be a foretaste of the feast to come: to live in such a way that people come to know Christ by knowing us; not just knowing about Him, mind you, but knowing Him as the Christ alive and present, here and now, in Word and in Sacrament, in sinners such as us, sainted by His Spirit. We are the Good News, reflections of God’s eternal glory, glimpsed as though through the shards of a shattered mirror. We are strangers in a strange land, citizens of Heaven, ambassadors of the one and only Lord and King of Kings.

This is what Jesus taught us, when He gave us His final commandment: that we are to love one another, as He has first loved us. “By this,” He promised, “everyone will know that you are my disciples: if you have love for one another.” And we must understand this as a collective command. We aren’t simply to strive to become more loving individually, but as a community, as Jesus’ Body the Church. We must foster a civilization of love and forgiveness, as an outpost of eternity in time.

The Kingdom of God cannot be found as any earthly nation: not as the United States, not as the British Empire, not even as the urbem et orbem of Rome; but as an invisible presence, as the soul within the body, bringing life, bringing Spirit, wheresoever winds the wind. We should go out, as Peter, trusting that God has gone before us; that He is waiting at the edges of the world for us to find; already present in all peoples, and especially amongst the marginalized; preparing all Creation for the coming of His Kingdom.

It isn’t simply that we ought to be good; Christ is good. It’s that we are called together now to share with others the grace He has given to us. We don’t need to earn our salvation; we couldn’t if we tried. Our salvation is assured upon His Cross and empty Tomb. All that Jesus asks is that we trust what He has promised—that we live into that trust in every aspect of our lives. We are citizens of eternity sojourning here in time. And people see the Christ in us, when we share His love.

Alleluia! Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Pertinent Links

RDG Stout

Blog: https://rdgstout.blogspot.com/

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St Peter’s Lutheran

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Nidaros Lutheran

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YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@nidaroschurch6026