Dear friends,

From the early days of Christianity up to today, our entry into the Church was through the sacrament of baptism. Baptism is a Rite of Initiation, where sins are washed away and the one baptized is brought into right relationship with God. They are presented to the community of the faithful, who pray for them. 

This newly minted Christian receives the gift of the Holy Spirit. Baptism has a deeply spiritual element, and is best done in church on a Sunday morning, in the presence of the whole congregation. This is because, in baptism, we are reminded that God is among us - in the midst of the wider Christian family - and will continue to be so in our lives.

In the liturgy of Baptism, the celebrant asks the people to renew their baptismal covenant. One of question asked is,

Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?

This question about loving one’s neighbor comes from something that Jesus said; he was asked by a scribe, what was the first commandment? Jesus replied, 

“The first is, ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31)

Here Jesus distills the essence of the gospel message, and indeed the whole of the Judaic Law, into a single commandment, albeit one with two elements: love for God and love for neighbor. Note also that the love of neighbor adds the words “as yourself.” By this Jesus doesn’t mean we look in the mirror every morning and ask “who is the fairest of them all?” What Jesus means is that we love ourselves as God loves us, for who we are, and thus we are called to love others for who they are, and not for any other reason.

In Jesus we have the model for the one who fosters compassionate connections. He enters our broken human society as both fully human and fully divine. He is a teacher - his friends knew him as “rabbi” - who preached the sermon on the mount, which includes these words, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” Jesus teaches us how to be comforters.

Jesus’ presence in the lives of his people is mainly at ground level. He meets people where they are. He is a healer. The broken world Jesus enters is filled with people in varying stages of pain, grief and physical and mental suffering. Much of Jesus’ work lies in restoring people to wholeness. He restores sight to the blind, he heals the sick and even restores people from death to life. He displays all of the power of the divine Son of God. 

How did the early church reflect his teaching and example in their own ministries? In the Acts of the Apostles, we read that the followers of Jesus

“devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” (Acts 2:42)  

We also read that 

“day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.” (Acts 2:47)

There are two things to note here. One is the need for teaching and fellowship together. The Church is not simply a company of friends. Everything the Church does is informed by its teaching, worship and prayer. You can’t represent the Church by living outside of it. The second thing to note is that it is God who gives the growth. The Church grows as a blessing by God. 

In the early days, Christianity grew like wildfire around the Mediterranean. I feel sure that some of the popularity of Christianity was due to its members sharing their resources, so that, as we read in Acts, “there was not a needy person among them.” (Acts 4:34)

In Acts we also read of works of healing done by the apostles, including Peter. For example, in chapter 9, Peter heals the paralyzed man Aeneas. And when a disciple named Tabitha dies, Peter restores her to life.

In his letter, the apostle James, asks,

“Are any among you sick? They should call for the elders of the church and have them pray over them, anointing them with oil in the name of the Lord.” (James 5:14)

It is clear from our early church documents that one of the central aspects of Christian life was its emphasis on healing and caring. This is also confirmed by non-Scriptural accounts, such as the letter of the Roman Emperor Julian, written in AD 362. He is referring to Christians who worked under Roman Rule, and lived among the temples of Roman gods and priests. In his letter Julian is contrasting Christians with his own priests, and actually advocating that the Roman priests copy the Christians. Note also the word Julian uses when he refers to Christianity - he calls it “atheism”.

Why do we not observe that it is their benevolence to strangers, their care for the graves of the dead and the pretended holiness of their lives that have done most to increase atheism? I believe that we ought really and truly to practise every one of these virtues.And it is not enough for you alone to practice them, but so must all the priests in Galatia, without exception.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

Successful churches operate as alternative families; when Jesus is told that his mother and brothers are asking for him, he says rhetorically: “Who are my mother and my brothers? ... whoever does the will of God...” (Mark 3:33-35).

In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul explains how all have a part to play in being the body of Christ. He writes, “Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.” Christianity was empowering: Jesus had released people from the slavery of sin to follow him in building the “household of God” (Ephesians 2:19). In this new reality, all are called to minister to one another and share the same priest, who is Jesus Christ.

That means the work of ministering to others has a priestly aspect. We can trace this back to Moses and the book of Exodus. God tells Moses “if you obey my voice and keep my covenant...you shall be for me a priestly kingdom and a holy nation”. (Exodus 19:5-6) In the first letter of Peter, we become “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation.” (1 Peter 2:9) We are a royal priesthood because Jesus is our King and he reigns in heaven and earth. The caring work we do on earth has the seal of his Spirit and the health of his love. 

It is important to remember whose ministry is being carried out. The work that we do, the ministry that we perform, is all God’s ministry. We are merely “the laborers in the vineyard” (Matt. 20:1). It is God who harvests the vines. Our wages are love. Love is also our motivation. The first letter of John states that

“since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another…by this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.” (1 John 4;11,13)

This brings me back to baptism, which confers the gift of the Holy Spirit. After the candidate has been baptized, the priest offers this prayer,

Heavenly Father, we thank you that by water and the Holy Spirit you have bestowed on this your servant the forgiveness of sin, and have raised her to the new life of grace. Sustain her, O Lord, in your Holy Spirit. Give her an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love you, and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works (BCP 308).

We ask God to give the newly baptized Christian “an inquiring and discerning heart.” In our calling as Christians, it is the work of the heart that will be most important. When we are in situations where there is a pastoral need - prayer, support, listening - we are relying upon our heart to offer the right and loving response. With this heart we approach the whole of our Christian life, from worship to prayer to ministry. Our calling requires us to seek and acquire the heart and mind of Jesus, who is our model for compassionate caring.

This is a very basic theological and historical introduction to Christian care. We rejoice that God calls each one of us to minster to the other. Knowing how Jesus put no boundaries on whom he ministered to, then neither do we. Our work is not to judge, but to love and to be a healing presence in the lives of our brothers and sisters.

With blessings

Father David