Time Shift

There's something a little bit odd about our Gospel reading today. I wonder if you noticed it? Maybe not. After all, 'odd' these days is really rather a relative concept isn't it? A bit like time. 

They say that time flies when you're having fun. I think we need a new saying for what time does when you're in lockdown. 'Time melds together in a conglomerate mess when you're staying home, staying safe, and saving lives'. Perhaps I need to work on the catchiness of that. 

I remember reading a meme on facebook the other day that renamed the lockdown days of the week. No longer are we subject to the linear confines of Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and so on. Instead, until further notice, the days of the week are now called Thisday, Thatday, Otherday, Someday, Yesterday, Today and Nextday. I say I read it the other day, it might have been two months ago for all I know. I guess that proves the point.

(Nextday, by the way, is the mythical day long since lost in the annals of history when your online shopping deliveries arrive.)

Time at the moment is all a bit mixed up. And it seems there is no difference for those who set our Bible readings for the week. Our Gospel reading today is out of order. We've already done Easter. Last Thursday (Sorry... Should that be last Otherday?) was Ascension Day (and, if you missed that meme on Facebook, Ascension Day is the day that Jesus returned to Heaven, and, following governmental advice, started working from home). But today's reading, in the chronological order of things, comes just after the Last Supper, and immediately before Christ's journey to the Garden of Gethsemane, where he is betrayed. This is Jesus' prayer before the whole process of Easter starts. The timeline is all mixed up! Why on earth do we have this reading today so long after we celebrated Good Friday however many weeks ago that was? (Do you remember? It was only last month, but, to be fair, this April did have about 90 days in it.)

I think we have this out-of-context reading today because of what Jesus says in his prayer. Obviously, in the context of the Last Supper, it's about Jesus praying for his disciples to prepare them for the hour of his death, but a similar thing happens after Ascension Day. Christ has already left them once, and returned in glory, but now... now he's ascending into Heaven; he is leaving again. The same prayer applies.

Today, 2000 years later, we think of Ascension Day as a day of victory and glory, but I think Christ's disciples must have had a more mixed view than that. Back in the first century, after the immense joy of Christ's resurrection, the disciples found their friend and teacher had been returned to them and risen from the dead, but now his disciples find he leaves them again, never to return - at least not in their lifetime. There must be grief found intertwined with this glory. Their emotions, like ours, were nuanced. In with the joy is always a tinge of sorrow. Perhaps his disciples found themselves returning to Christ's Last Supper prayer for them at that time, and found comfort in the words of their saviour.

We've seen then, that Christ's prayer after the Last Supper was not applicable just for that time. It crossed throughout that whole Easter period. Christ prays that his disciples will continue to know God throughout the difficult times ahead in the days and years to come.

And here's the second time-shift. It's not just the reading that has been taken out of time today. Listen as I repeat Jesus' words from his prayer, and remember that he is speaking not just before he has ascended, but before he has even been crucified. This is what he says: "And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world". 

Did you spot the oddness? Christ is talking in the present. He's not using the future tense. He says "now I am no longer in the world", not "soon, I will no longer be in the world"; it's now. Whilst he was praying for his disciples, Christ stepped out of time, to a future where his body has already been crucified, and to a future in which he has already ascended. And not just that, but to a future in which his disciples are confined to their homes, and meeting together virtually by Zoom and Facebook Live and YouTube. 

Right there, before his crucifixion, at the turning point of his life, and the turning point of the world, Christ is praying for us; for our protection, that we might be one, and that we will know God. And that prayer is not simply a snapshot in time; Christ's use of the present tense makes it perpetual. 

Jesus' prayer is true. Christ is no longer in this world, but we are in the world. And Christ is praying for us; rooting for us, and cheering us on. And in Christ's literally timeless prayer, he is doing this now, then, and always; today, tomorrow, yesterday, Nextday, Thisday, Thatday, Otherday... and Everyday.

Amen