The
Homeward Journey of the Soul
A
Sermon for the Fourth Sunday in Lent
by Robert D. Crouse
St. James' Church,
Halifax, Nova Scotia
March 16, 1982
"Jerusalem which
is above is free; which is the mother of us all."
Galatians 4. 26
In the Bible and in Christian
tradition, numbers are often full of symbolical significance, and such is the
case with the forty days of Lent. These forty days, of course, recall the forty
days of Jesus' fasting and temptation in the wilderness. But they recall, as
well, those
forty years of Exodus, the forty years of Israel's journey from captivity in
Egypt, the struggle through the wilderness to the promised land of freedom, led
by a pillar of cloud by day, and a pillar of fire by night, sustained by manna
from the skies, and water from the stony rock.
Behind all this rich and complex
symbolism, there are ideas which are both simple and altogether basic for our
spiritual life as Christians. There is, first of all, a diagnosis of our
condition as alienation, exile, bondage, and captivity in a foreign land.
Spiritually, it means our alienation from God, our separation from our spirit's
home, and our wandering through a barren wilderness, a place of trials and
temptations, striving to return. Then, there is the journey’s destination, the
promised land, the city of Jerusalem, the house of God, the place of peace and
reconciliation. Spiritually that means the spirit’s home, the true and perfect
and eternal good, for which our spirits yearn. “Like as the hart desireth the
water-brooks, so longeth my soul after thee, O God. My soul is athirst for God,
yea, even for the living God. When shall I come to appear before the presence
of God?” [Psalm 42]. Thirdly, there is the idea of divine sustenance and
guidance through the journey. Spiritually, that means the Providence of God,
the watchful care and nutriment of our poor spirits by the truth of God, in word
and sacrament. “Behold, angels came and ministered unto him.”
Alienation, and home-coming, under
the providence of God: that is the story of Israel: forty years of Exodus from
Egypt, and forty years of captivity in Babylon. Symbolically, it is the story
of the struggle of the human soul, as it makes its homeward way to God. It is
the symbol, the shadow; the substance of which is Christ's journey through death
and resurrection, in which we follow him.
Lent represents to us this
pilgrimage, the inner journey of the soul, struggling in the wilderness of
trials and temptations, seeking a spiritual Jerusalem, the homeland of the
spirit. This wilderness, you see, is not some external place, or some external
circumstances; it is nothing but the soul's confused, unfruitful life before it
finds its meeting-place in God. With the passing of the centuries, of course,
the images do change. For William Blake, for instance, writing his poem on
Jerusalem, the place of alienation is not the wilderness, but the “dark, satanic
mills” of industrial-revolution England. The journey is symbolized by the
“sword of mental strife” and the “arrows of desire”; and the symbol of the life
of the spirit is not the city, but the “green and pleasant land”. Nowadays, I
suppose we are inclined to think of the wilderness as the place of peace and
recreation, and of the city as the place of dark and unknown perils. The images
do change, but the basic thought remains the same. The journey is the inner
journey of the soul, the soul's own transformation, as it finds renewal of the
mind in God, through the providence of God’s own revelation. That is the basic
theme of Lent—the journey to Jerusalem—and it is in that context that we should
think about our scripture lessons for the Sundays of this season.
The lessons for the past three
Sundays have all been about trials and temptations, about Jesus' fasting and
temptations in the wilderness, and the rebuking and casting out of devils.
Those demons are in some sense fantasies, and yet, they are certainly some sort
of spiritual realities, not easily dismissed. They are the false passions and
attachments and ideals which certainly exist, and enter in, and powerfully
possess our souls. That is to say, they are the false gods we so readily
entertain, and foolishly set our hearts upon, and thus separate ourselves from
the true and living God. That is our bondage and captivity—that is Babylon and
Egypt, the foreign land of exile.
Those demons, those false gods are
not impregnable, and their pretensions can be shattered. Often enough, they
reveal their feet of clay, and we become disillusioned with them, and cast out
one or two of them. But as last Sunday's Gospel taught us [St. Luke 11.14-28],
the casting out of demons is not enough—the empty, disillusioned soul is
vulnerable to more, and yet more vicious, demons. “When the unclean spirit is
gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest: and finding
none, he saith, I will return to my house whence I came out; and when he cometh,
he findeth it swept and garnished: then goeth he and taketh to him seven other
spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there, and the
last state of that man is worse than the first.” The vacant soul is vulnerable
to new and stronger frauds and fallacies, and the number waiting to enter in,
and make us captive once again, is legion.
The empty soul, the swept and
garnished house, is not enough; in fact, it is an altogether perilous
situation. And thus, today's lessons speak to us of spiritual nutriment, the
filling of our souls with the truth and grace of God. The Gospel lesson is the
story of the multitude in the wilderness, miraculously fed by Christ; and the
Epistle lesson bids us rejoice in the promise of the free and heavenly
Jerusalem, “the mother of us all.” Because of these themes, the day has several
traditional names: Sometimes it is called “Laetare Sunday”, from the first word
of the ancient Latin introit, which means ‘Rejoice’. Another ancient name is
“Dominica Refectionis”, which means ‘Refreshment Sunday’. And still another
traditional name, reflecting the theme of the Epistle, is “Mothering Sunday”,
and the day has been observed, especially in England, as Mothers’ Day.
These several names reflect one basic
thought: the homeward journey of our souls is sustained and nourished by the
Word of God in Christ, by that Providence which keeps alive within us the vision
of Jerusalem, the City of our freedom, our native land of pure and perfect
good. That is the bread which sustains us in the wilderness, and nothing less
will ever satisfy the restless heart. St. Paul speaks of the heavenly Jerusalem
as “the mother of us all”. Our mothers give us birth, and nourish us, and guide
our steps. So does the heavenly Jerusalem, the Providence of God, give birth to
our spirit’s life, and nourish it, and guide its upward way. It is the office
of the Church on earth to be an outpost of that true Jerusalem, the free city of
the spirit. That is what the word Parish means—a colony, or outpost—and thus,
the Church’s task is mothering, with word and sacrament, with discipline and
teaching; rebuking and casting out our demons, certainly, but also nourishing
our souls with the vision of a higher - and freer life. That is bread in the
wilderness, the daily rations for our journey, and the ground of our rejoicing.
O
food of men wayfaring,
The bread of angels sharing,
O
manna from on high!
We hunger, Lord, supply us,
Nor thy delights deny us
Whose hearts to thee draw nigh.
(O esca viatorum, English Hymnal
#321)
