Comfort in Our Digital Diaspora

Lutheran Church of our Saviour - Calgary - Hebrews 4:14-5:10

So this reading from the Letter to the Hebrews is a bit odd, isn’t it? It’s not one we really preach on a lot, or even hear read in church very much. It’s hard for us to relate to, I think. This talk of Christ as the high priest, and offering sacrifices - it doesn’t really resonate with our experiences of Jesus or our understandings of Communion, unless our church backgrounds include the Catholic or Anglican churches.

But this letter was written during a time of deep distress and trauma that has something in common with what we’re going through today in the world with COVID. And it offers us some hope, too, so I thought maybe today we could look at it a little more closely and explore the good news and comfort that God has for us today.
So. During the time of Jesus and his disciples––even earlier than that, actually––there was this understanding that the Spirit of God - which in Hebrew is called the Shekinah - dwelled in the Temple in Jerusalem. This is why the Temple was so central to the religious life of Jews during Jesus’ time, and why everyone went there. Maybe you remember the story of Mary and Joseph taking Jesus there as a baby, and then going there when he was 12 and he stayed there and they thought he was lost? And of course we have other stories of Jesus and his disciples going to the Temple, for various religious events. That’s because the Temple was where the Shekinah was, and so that’s where people went to connect with God and with one another as God’s community. Every Jew, including Jesus, felt that as long as the Temple was standing, they were assured of God’s presence amongst the people of Israel, no matter where they were living. (And you might remember the story of Jesus going into the Temple and overturning the money changers’ tables, and that’s because he was upset about how the Temple was being exploited, not upset that it was actually there.)

So, the Temple is central for the religious life of Jews, and then, in 70 CE, about forty years after Jesus’ death and resurrection, around the time when the Gospels and the various letters in the New Testament were being written, the Roman legions occupying Jerusalem burnt it to the ground. And by it, I mean the whole city, and the Temple. That’s the reason there’s actually no Temple in Jerusalem anymore. The Romans sacked the city, and the Temple fell. If you can imagine a city on fire, and the streets running with blood, and people screaming and fleeing for the hills, and total chaos––that was Jerusalem.

Obviously this was a huge trauma for the people. Their homes were gone, families were separated and killed, as bad as you can imagine. But even worse, and here’s where maybe we can begin to relate, is that the house of God, the dwelling place of the Spirit of God, was destroyed. Maybe you remember seeing the roof of the Notre Dame on fire, just two years ago? Or maybe you yourself have seen a church burn down? It’s an awful feeling, to see a house of worship burn to the ground. Now imagine that this is the house of worship for an entire people. There is no other. This is it. And now it’s gone. When the Temple was destroyed, it was as if God had left. I mean, where would the Spirit of God dwell if there was no dwelling place? The Jews all of a sudden found themselves spiritually homeless. They couldn’t go to the Temple to worship, they couldn’t go to gather with their families before God, they couldn’t engage in the rituals that helped them feel closer to God. They felt thrown into the wilderness. They were dispersed - the word we use to describe it is diaspora. After the Temple fell, the Jews, including Jesus’ followers, including Paul, were in a diaspora.

We, Christians, have spent the last year and a half in a similar diaspora. Ever since the COVID shutdowns of late March 2020, we have experienced being cut off from our gathering places of worship and dispersed. We have not been able to gather together to worship God like we are used to, to be with our families in sacred spaces. The last two Easters were online, if that, for everyone. There were no physical Easter services. Barely any physical Christmas services. We have been in a COVID diaspora. Spread out across distances, unable to gather. I believe that this will be a time of trauma that will have a lingering impact on Christians for years, similar to the way the destruction of the Temple impacted the Jews and Christian Jews. We have struggled to find new ways to be together, just as Jews struggled in their diaspora. We struggle to figure out what it means to be God’s community when we can’t actually be with one another. We struggle to understand how God can be with us “online” and not in a building. It has been hard. It’s been lonely, and depleting, and exhausting. And particularly challenging because every time we think we finally can get back together again, just like before, there’s another setback. Another wave of cases. A new variant to adjust to. We want to know, when will this end? When can we go back to normal? When can we be together again? Where is God??

This was the struggle of the Jews in the diaspora, of Paul and the first disciples, of the early church community (because remember, they were Jews who followed Christ). And what we see in the letter to the Hebrews, and in this passage about Jesus as the great high priest, and Jesus as the one who sympathizes with our weakness, and gives us mercy and grace, and deals gently with us, is the beginning of an answer to the struggle of how to be together while in a diaspora.

For those early Christian Jews, wondering where the Spirit of God was when the Temple had been destroyed, they began to realize that the Spirit of God had come to rest in Jesus. That Jesus was the dwelling place of God. And, because Jesus had ascended into heaven, that Jesus had extended himself as the dwelling place of God to the whole Christian family. That is why the church is called the body of Christ––this body, this body of Christians, is now the dwelling place of the Spirit of God. Wherever Christians went, God’s Spirit was with them, because Christ was with them. If you remember Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians (6:19-20) that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, this is what he’s getting at. The Temple in Jerusalem was gone––the Jews had given up hope that it would be rebuilt––but Paul, a Christian Jew, came to understand that God’s Spirit was not gone. It had found a new home in the bodies of the body of Christ. For these Christian Jews, in their Temple diaspora, that was an immense comfort. God was not gone! They were not cut off from one another!

This is our comfort, too. Even though we are not all worshipping together in the same space, some people are here, but many more are attending from their own homes, we are not cut off from one another, because Christ is with us. Christ is with each of you, in your home, in your pew, with every single one of you. And because Christ is in you, and you in Christ, as the Bible says, you are not truly separated from one another or from God. Although we are not physically together as we worship, we are together in Christ. We are actually together not just with those who are attending this service today, but with all those across the world who call themselves Christian who are gathered to worship. Across space, and even across the generations. Christ gathers Christians from all around the world, from all across time, and makes us one in him. We are dispersed, but we are not cut off. We are individual, but we are not alone. God––Father, Son, and Spirit––is with all of us.

Of course, it’s hard to really feel this, especially if we’re worshipping at home and we are the only one in front of the screen. I know that feeling. But God has given us a gift for this time, just as God gave to those first Christians in diaspora, and that is the gift of Holy Communion, the body and blood of Christ. This is why Holy Communion is so important at this time, especially online. The physical bread and the wine here, and the physical bread and wine you have at home, in whatever form that comes in, are all part of the one bread and the one wine that is the body and blood of Jesus Christ. When you hold that piece of bread or cracker in your hand, and when you sip that wine or juice, you are holding the same body that every single other person is holding in Communion, and taking into yourself the very same Christ as everyone else. You are engaged in communion with God, and through the Holy Spirit, with one another, whether you are here in this building or sitting at home. Holy Communion makes us one. Despite the COVID diaspora, God graces us with the Holy Spirit so that we are still one church, one congregation, one body of Christ. So, whether you are at home or here, as we continue through this time of disruption and dispersion, as we seek strength to get through this difficult time, know that through God, in Christ, by the power of the Spirit, we are still together. Thanks be to God. Amen.