St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, Pictou,
April 3rd 2005
I HAVE FOUND THE HOLY
GRAIL!
Acts 2:14a, 22-32
Psalm 16
1 Peter 1:3-9
John 20:19-31
“The Holy Grail” has always been thought of
as the dish or cup which Jesus used at the Last Supper he had with his
disciples before his crucifixion. This was the dish from which he shared
the paschal lamb meat of the Passover meal and the wine of the new
covenant with his friends. The second indicator of importance is not in
the Bible but legend has it that Joseph of Arimathea collected blood in
this dish or cup from Jesus as he died on the cross. (Remember that Joseph
of Arimathea gave his family tomb over for Jesus’ burial.) You can see
from here how the cup finds itself transformed as the Chalice used for the
Sacrament of Holy Communion.
Now there are many dishes and cups, but we
say this one is Holy because it was distinguished and set apart for a
special use. To say that cup is “The Holy Grail” indicates that it has the
unique stamp of the divine. To drink of this cup is to drink the wine of
God that promises everlasting eternal life.
Over the last 2,000 years stories about the
Grail follow two groups: one is about the history of the Grail itself, and
the others are about the Quest for the Grail; “Grail Seekers” as they are
called. You may remember from your history study that during the crusades,
knights of the realm were on a quest for the Holy Grail. Wagner’s opera
“Parsifal,” and other legends, poems and writings focus on the meaning and
search for the Grail. One such poem has 60,000 verses.
Does the Grail still exist and where is it?
Some say it is in Ethiopia, Glastonbury Abbey in England, a
church in Scotland, and even Oak Island here in Nova Scotia. There is a
magnificent cup in Valencia Cathedral in Spain that is also supposed to be
“The Holy Grail.” 17 cm high, it has an agate cup at the top and bottom
with gold, two balaxes, two emeralds, and 28
pea sized pearls surround the base.
Part of the discussion around the grail has
to do about whether the Grail is a cup, i.e. a physical object, or whether
finding the Grail is a kind of religious insight or experience.
A number of years ago I bought a chalice, so
that I would always have my own grail. It is made of pewter and has a
classic style.
You might also find it worthy of note that
over the last 2,000 years even though the Grail is a religious object, the
church has never been very interested in it.
But is not the human quest for God, to drink
the wine of life, really a spiritual quest to drink from the Grail?
Before we talk about the Holy Grail, it
might be helpful to say that there are
“false grails:”
cups for which we seek and we drink that promise life, but instead bring
death and destruction. Heroin and cocaine promise eternal bliss the first
time they are experienced, but they are liars and bring nothing
destruction and death. “The Stanley Cup” is often referred to as “The Holy
Grail,” but it too has not lived up to its promise and has offered loss,
massive greed, debilitating injury, steroids, and in the case of Dan
Snyder, death. Beware of “false grails.”
I had an experience over Easter that I could
only describe as “Finding The Holy Grail.” I
didn’t find a chalice like the one in Valencia Cathedral, but my insight
came from Jesus talking about a cup.
The experience was like a grand
metamorphosis of every sermon I ever preached, every scripture I ever
heard, every insight I ever had, every question answered, every conflict
resolved, all creation coming to one simple insight or understanding. This
insight even embraced and gave understanding to every bad and good thing I
ever perceived. It was like all the dominoes going all over at once. It
was one of those, “Ahah!” experiences. The only response I could give was
“Wow!”
The event that set the whole thing in motion
was my Good Friday sermon at First Church. When Jesus was
being arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane, Peter did a very noble and
normal human thing: he stepped up to the plate to protect his leader. He
cut off the slave’s (Malchus’) ear when the
police tried to arrest Jesus.
Now my sermon was called “The Trauma of
Betrayal;” the thrust of what I was saying was that the betrayal of Jesus
(an intimate kiss by one of his beloved) set the whole Easter event in
motion, how painful betrayal is, and how Jesus understands our betrayals.
That is all fine, except that for Peter to
step forward appeared to ruin my whole point, because Peter, in stepping
forward was not only reacting in a very human natural and protective way,
but in putting himself at risk, Peter was effectively NOT betraying Jesus
as did all of the rest.
What does Jesus do? Appearing to go against
the thesis of my sermon, Jesus reprimands Peter for
not betraying him!
“Put your sword back in its sheath. Am I not
to drink the cup that the Father has given me?”
With this question, Jesus obliges us to
consider the answer as to what that “cup” is that God gave Jesus to drink.
In my message I said that “the cup” that God gave Jesus to drink was “the
cup of humanity;” almost the opposite of what our communion cup
represents.
In other words, Jesus being the Son of God
had to experience the absolute total entirety of human life and nature
from the very beginning to the very end: the scary birth, the life, the
pain, the suffering, the sin, the grief, the joy and celebration, the
brutal injustices, the limitations, betrayal, even the death! A savage,
public, humiliating death on a cross, that was irrespective of the beauty,
healing, and love that he brought to this planet.
It was this question from Jesus about “the
cup” that told me who he really was. At his betrayal and crucifixion, the
“Son of God” actually and literally became: you and I.
Then I understood all of his statements
about “The kingdom of God is like these children…” the
kingdom of God is like a banquet, the kingdom
of God is like a man finding a great treasure in a field, The kingdom is
this and the kingdom is that.
The kingdom of God is the
times, places, and people we meet, where heaven and earth intersect,
overlap, and become one!
To drink the wine of
“the kingdom of God” is to experience
the places where heaven and earth are the same!
Jesus Christ was the son of God, Saviour and
Lord, Divine, but who lived as a human being. His betrayal and crucifixion
is the negative side of human experience, just as the resurrection
principle is the corresponding positive divine part of the equation.
To drink the wine of life, to drink from the
Holy Grail is to experience those times, people, and places where heaven
and earth meet and are the same.
When Jesus was being question by Pilate, he
said, “My kingdom is not of this world,” because at this point the two
kingdoms were in conflict. When Mary met the resurrected Jesus in the
garden and they talked, were not heaven and earth the same place?
When you and I experience love and
forgiveness, are not heaven and earth the same place?
Over one year ago, I conducted a funeral at
First Church for Terri Lee Henderson, a 34 year old woman
who died with cancer and left two small children. It was sad, sad,
sad. There was no good part to this story in
the death of a beautiful woman. The family participated and gave me lots
of help with the preparation. At the end of what I had to say during the
funeral, I was absolutely loath to stop talking. I even looked at one
woman at the front and said, “Isn’t it a shame to stop.”
Now I know why. Something incredible had
happened. I hated to leave that time and place because bringing the love
of Terri alive for that hour made heaven and earth exist in the same
place. I didn’t want to leave heaven, even though it has to be temporary.
For today’s service, I knew that I wouldn’t
have to change the reading because “the Jesus principle” is true in all
scripture that lead us to God.
On the first day of the week the disciples
gathered together in the upper room in fear with the door locked. This is
an earthly experience: their leader had been tried and executed.
Then Jesus appears and stood among them and
said, “Peace be with you.” With the resurrected Jesus present with his
friends, Heaven and Earth were the same place; locked doors don’t matter.
In this kind of heavenly place on earth he breathed on them, he
commissioned them and his last statement is confounding: “If you forgive
the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any,
they are retained.”
Doesn’t God forgive sins? So if we forgive
sins, we are doing God’s work.
I saw this trying to happen on TV the other
day. A rape victim was being interviewed who didn’t want her attacker to
get the death penalty. The interviewer asks the solemn question, “So why
don’t you want this man to die?” She answers that to take his life would
be wrong, but before she can say more, the interviewer cuts her off to
talk to the victim advocate sitting beside her. That woman was speaking
for Jesus, but he wouldn’t let her bring heaven alive on earth, he was
interfering; he wanted to do something else.
When Jesus was first in the upper room with
the disciples, Thomas was not there. He didn’t have this experience that
the others had and did not believe them. We call him “doubting Thomas,”
but think for a minute. How do you explain heaven to someone who has not
experienced it?
A week later the scene is repeated only with
Thomas now present. You have seen the painting of Thomas putting his
finger in the wound in Jesus’ side. (The
Incredulity of St. Thomas, [1601-1602] by Michelangelo
Merisi da
Caravaggio 1673-1610)
To view that painting is to drink from the
Grail; heaven and earth are in the same place. There is no death in that
painting; the evidence of mortal wounds that no longer kill, they are just
history; faith is found, love and friendship are alive, peace and safety
reign.
The future of this church and of any church
is that with our love from God, our acceptance and our forgiveness,
we will create heaven here on earth.
Thomas believed and some of us believe
because we see, but Jesus will end this message with the best summation:
“Have you believed because you have seen
me?” he said.
“Blessed are those who have not seen and yet
have come to believe.”
AMEN Rev. Alan Stewart
alanstewart@ns.sympatico.ca
