Introduction

Henri Nouwen calls the Icon of the Holy Trinity an invitation to "living in the household of love." ²  The icon, painted in 1425 by Russian Orthodox Andrei Rublev, shows three divine angels seated around a table. Rublev has set his triune vision of love within the story of Abraham, who welcomes the strangers to his home, pictured in the upper left of the icon. While we may question Rublev's use of the Hebrew Bible story, we can perceive his theological intent. The divine beings wear soft robes of gold, royal blue and purple. Their bodies are inclined toward one another, tenderly, intimately. ³  A chalice rests in the middle of the table1 symbolising the cost of love.

But when we look closely, we see the figures seated in a way that leaves the front side of the table open to us, the other strangers, who come tired and hungry from our dusty journeys. Rublev's image invites us to communion in the love of the Father, Holy Spirit and Son, who live united in a "household" of love.

1. Unity. Tonight's theme is about unity. At the end of the 20th century, seems like the Church universal has turned its thoughts to unity. Something about significant dates that calls forth our hopes, our dreams for unity. This December marks the Jubilee assembly of the World Council of Churches, in Harare, Zimbabwe. Over 333 member churches, plus special guests, participants and visitors will celebrate fifty years of formal ecumenical endeavours. On the table lie the spiritual concerns of Orthodox church participation and the economic concerns of world debt and reconciliation. The theme, Turn to God in Hope, invites the churches to recognise the context of global suffering, yet claim God's promise of a New Creation.

But we are also nearing the end of a second millennium (Western standard time). What will the third millennium hold in store? Could this threshold be a time of renewal and transformation? The year 2000 has captured the imagination and passion of churches around the world. Roman Catholics plan for "The Jubilee of the Year 2000." Konrad Raiser, general secretary of the World Council of Churches, calls Roman Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox and Pentecostals to use the year 2000 as a launch period for a process leading to a universal Christian council, similar to the early church councils.

Then there's the Uniting Church! Recently we've celebrated a 21st birthday. A young church by some standards, but bearing an old, old dream into the next millennium-that "they may all be one" (John 17:21). What dreams do we bring to this gathering? What visions spark the Uniting Church "forward" in mission for the next century? Look at the beautiful array of flowers we've collected! Each flower beautiful in it's own right, but even more so, in the profusion of colour, shape and perfume. Behold the beauty of the flowers! Like many other partners on the ecumenical journey, we bear great hopes for unity in the coming years. We bring great hope to our gathering tonight that not in spite of, but BECAUSE of' our great diversity, we can be uniting people for God's great mission in the world.

2. But you know, when we stop for a minute, when we take a breath from all our visions and hopes, we need to look out beyond ourselves. Look out into the world, what do we find? When we stop and turn to look beyond the church, we see that not too many people are out there waiting anxiously to hear the next word about the church's dream of unity. In fact, we need to ask ourselves, does any of this matter? Who's listening? Who even cares? The world beyond the church seems to be going on about its usual business. The world doesn't seem too concerned or even interested.

Now the context for our Gospel lesson today is a bit different than our own. John's people have just experienced a critical confrontation within their own religious community. They feel rejected. They carry the wounds of hostility and what they term "hatred" from "the world." ⁴

But what about our world? Certainly there are places in the world where the church is oppressed by those outside of it. Christians have come under attack by governments because of their religious identity. Their freedoms are curtailed and rights repressed. They feel hated to their faces. But for many Christians, the context is more of indifference than hostility.

Researchers Peter Bentley and Philip J. Hughes have found some interesting statistics. ⁵   This should sound familiar. People in a survey were asked where they find a sense of peace and well-being. 71 % of people sampled said they "often" found peace and well- being "by the sea." 66 % said often, "in the bush." 64% answered "with family." "Friends received 59% and "in a garden" received 56%- As you can imagine, "church services" received 28% of people responding "often." Only 9% responded that they "always" find a sense of peace and well-being in church services.

Bentley's and Hughes' research may tell us more about religion in Australia than spirituality. But still, the data suggests that most people are not out waiting around for the church's beautiful dreams of unity. Christian communal identity is not perceived as significant. Church participation doesn't really matter. Hostility is not the problem. Here, as in other parts of the world, the church suffers indifference. In the last few years, I've begun to wonder which hurts more.

3. Well, lets be honest. Let's just come out and say it. Can we blame them-can we blame "the world?" Why should it matter? Why should anyone care about the church when the hatred, hostility and ill-will within the church is as great, maybe even greater than without. Now you may say, what does Nancy know about the Uniting Church? Who does she think she is? Sure, I'm new here. But I'm not new to church communities. And I'm not new to looking in the mirror when preparing a sermon. Let's be honest.

How often do we arrogantly presume to know the full story about other Christians? We judge one another with impunity. We question others' motives. Little do we look within at our own. Sometimes our self-righteous actions do come from hatred. We resort to strategies of avoidance and disrespect. With anonymity we say the damnedest things. We take cheap shots when we can, but particularly behind closed doors. We collude with the people we like and ignore those we don't.

But you know, our lack of love is more evident in the little things: The smiles on our faces and then ridicule behind others' backs. Look at the jokes burning up email lines. The casual disregard of others shared with a friend over coffee. Amazing how we frame others as stupid or suspect. Would we ever dare ask them outright what they think or feel? Would we ever ask them to share their own stories?

Let's face it-we're not united. Are we even uniting? Sure we share superannuation funds. We share a listing in the Synod Directory. We share a Basis in word, but what about in deed? Sure, we're uniting in our attendance here this evening, but are we uniting in love?

So we settle for living side by side for years, no love lost here. No risk, no vulnerability. No sense of need for one another So why would anyone not in Christian community seek to live within it? Who can blame the world, "the unchurched" we call them! Who can blame them, when we ourselves are not willing to live up to the "high calling"? Perhaps those outside are actually more honest than those of us within. So let's be honest. We can say it. We are not living in a household of love.

4. Well, let's see. Let's turn from looking at ourselves to our Scripture text. You know what the good new is? Imagine that, we actually have good news here today! The Scriptures do give us good News! We may not be one, but the Son and the Father are. Jesus and the one he called "abba" are uniting in the Spirit's embrace. The Creator, Christ and Spirit, the Tri-unity, the Holy Community-they are one in the household of love. The Good News is, it is not our feeble love for one another that justifies us, but the love of God for us. All of us.

But that's not all... The good news is, God loves the world, the whole creation. All of the world to become the house of love, from magpies to crawfish, from people to pandas. For God so loved the world, that not even a cross, any cross, can undermine it.

You know, the amazing thing is, we've been invited to share in the Holy Community's kinship love. Kinship for our time, perhaps a better metaphor than Kingdom. May be we can say the "Kin-dom." ⁶  We've each been invited to share in God's Kin-dom of love. The difference is we're invited not as subjects to be ruled or to rule one another, but to become the vulnerable, loving friends of God.

Problem is, our theologies tend to sound like all the hard work's been done. Jesus is raised and the Church is One with him. Well, Christ IS RAISED, but that doesn't mean all's been said and done. In the resurrection, we see that all obstacles to love are put in their place---betrayal, deceit, self-righteousness, violence, hatred and fear... all these powers are rendered futile in keeping God's love from God's invitation.

See we have Good News here today. The Good News is that God's love is an open door. We are invited to the communion table of God. God's glory, the glory of the Spirit, Son and Father, is only complete when that glory is shared. ⁸  The Good News is, we've been invited to live within the household of love.

5. So what now? What do we do? How do we live? If we don't love one another as God first loved us, we'll bear no fruit! So, we're loved, brothers and sisters-let us love one another! Let us let the Spirit make our dwelling place a household of love.

You know, Tim Winton tells an incredible story of love in his novel, 'Cloudstreet'. You know the plot. Sam and Dolly Pickles inherit a big old house from Sam's cousin. Trouble is they can't sell it for 20 years. So, since Sam's out of 'work due to his accident, he decides to rent half of the house to the Lamb family. They're new arrivals in town with their own share of rage and anguish. Two rambling families come to live side by side in the big rambling house on Cloudstreet. Well, Lester and Oriel Lamb set up shop in the front of their half of the house, selling home-baked goods and fresh vegetables. Sam finds a job at the Mint, but most Saturdays, he loses his money at the races. Dolly spends too much time in the pub or trading favours with men out back. Side by side for years, the Pickles and the Lambs live in the same house without much interaction. A word or two over the fence dividing their lot in the backyard. A knock and formal exchange on the first of the month. But they hear one another through the walls, crying, doors slamming, shouts of pain, the woodwork trembling with unreconciled loss.

Once, Dolly got so bad, they all thought she might die. Oriel took charge, caring for Dolly, washing up the never-ending vomit, cooking for the kids and cleaning up the house. But when Dolly pulled through, she decided she would never speak to Oriel Lamb again. Such were the humiliations and rage in her own life. "That woman" Dolly would snarl. "Mrs. Pickles," Oriel would mutter under her breath.

But then, on the river, amidst the dark night of fishing lines and stars, Rose Pickles and Quick Lamb fall in love. They decide to marry. The wedding goes off with the usual carnival of wonder. Fish Lamb singing, then falling asleep. The bride and her mother bickering to the end. The Pickles and the Lambs become one household in more than formal agreement.

Later, in the RSL hall, folks sit down to the chook and two veg with gravy, jugs of beer, sherry and lemonade. The dancing goes 'til late. At the very end, Quick and Rose lounge together, tired and jubilant with their clobber askew and their hair losing ground, while a very strange thing happens. Oriel Lamb hoists herself wearily from the chair she's occupied all evening at her end of the bridal table, crosses the floor to where Dolly Pickles sits frightening a group of young men with the kind of jokes she knows, and asks her to dance. There's no one else on the floor. The band sits around lighting fags and chatting up girls until Oriel catches the drummer's eye. Quick sees his mothers face; something massive has been summoned. Rose feels his grip on her tighten as her mother sits there losing resistance by the moment. The music strikes up quietly. Dolly puts out her cigarette. The lairs look horrified. Oriel Lamb takes her by the hand and waist and they move out on to the floor in a slow rhythm that sobers the entire place. The short, boxy woman slips around gracefully, holding the old beauty up, and turn by turn something grows.

They look so bloody dignified, says Rose. So proud.
As they wheel by like a miracle, there am spectators weeping." ⁹

So, how do we live out of love in God's great house? How do we live the glory of the Christ, Creator and Spirit. It may be as simple, and as wrenching as asking a sister or brother to dance. It may be as simple and as wrenching as getting up, risking the outstretched hand and responding in kind. When was the last time we intentionally risked sharing together in God's dance of love? In love, God's love, we find the energy for life, life lived as communion with others. While we build walls and listen through them, God opens doors, God plays the music. Only then, risking the household of love with God and with one another, will we bear fruit for God's mission-that the whole world-house may be one.

I want to close with another story, this one told by Konrad Raiser. The story is set in Spain, during the civil war. "A former monk returns as a prisoner of war to the Carmelite monastery he had left twenty years earlier when the world of the monastery had become too narrow for him. Back in his former cell, he is captivated by the memory of how he used to project an ideal island of bliss on to the ceiling of his cell. His spiritual father, an old mystic, had tried to convince him that none of these utopias had ever become true, but he clung to this projection, which he needed in order to maintain the zeal of his faith. Before he had left the monastery, his spiritual father had given him this final piece of advice; "God does not go to utopia! But God comes to this world, wet with tears- again and again! Because here, there is infinite poverty, infinite hunger, infinite suffering! God loves the wholly Other, God loves the abyss. God loves this world, because it is imperfect. - We are God's utopia, but in the process of becoming!" ¹⁰
Conclusion
People of God, people of faith. Can you hear the music? Do you see the open door? Shall we dance? We are in the process of becoming. Let us claim God's promise, that turn by turn we may come to live in God's household of love. Amen.

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