I remember it well. October, 1997. Good Shepherd Catholic Church dedicated its new church. Catholic community in Frankfort began in the early 1800s with house churches. In 1847, the space all of us had always known was dedicated. I was married there, baptized my children there, buried my husband from there. Yet, now it was time to move. We had totally outgrown the church downtown.
There had been many ups and downs for more than 20 years getting ready for that day. I was the “Community participation” chair on the Dedication committee. It was my job to give as many people as possible an active role in the dedication. Each was personally asked. We had more than 300 active participants!
As we processed, surrounded the altar with flowers, sang, and ALL filled the worship space at one time, something marvelous happened. We not only dedicated a new church that day, we began to BECOME a new church.
I remembered that day as I read today’s first reading about the dedication of the temple in Solomon’s time. For all the history of abiding with the people of Israel, God had lived in a tent. Now God consented to having a house, a temple.
Solomon’s Temple
Solomon’s Temple (artist’s rendering in picture above) was a glorious place. I Chronicles describes it in detail. It was made of hewn stone and cedar timbers from Lebanon. Its size is described in cubits, not a contemporary measurement, but scholars say its ceiling was 180 feet long, 90 feet wide, and 50 feet high. At its highest point it was actually over 200 feet high (about 20 stories tall). There were courtyards and porticoes. The Ark of the Covenant was brought there in today’s reading. Sacrifices and praise were offered, and God filled it with His Presence.
All this was done with only the simplest machines, like levers, fulcrums, and inclined planes to help. It was built by transcripted labor of the Hebrew people. (They were “drafted” to work on the temple for a time. ) It was so costly to Solomon, that he had to “sell off” 20 towns in Galilee to King Hiram of Tyre in order to pay his debts to him for materials. (I Kings 9:11)
Yet how glorious the description of the dedication in today’s scripture:
The priests brought the ark of the covenant of the LORD
to its place beneath the wings of the cherubim in the sanctuary,
the holy of holies of the temple.
The cherubim had their wings spread out over the place of the ark,
sheltering the ark and its poles from above.
There was nothing in the ark but the two stone tablets
which Moses had put there at Horeb,
when the LORD made a covenant with the children of Israel
at their departure from the land of Egypt.
When the priests left the holy place,
the cloud filled the temple of the LORD
so that the priests could no longer minister because of the cloud,
since the LORD’s glory had filled the temple of the LORD.
Jesus at Gennesaret
In contrast to the grand glory of God coming into Solomon’s temple in tabernacle and cloud was the quiet glory of God coming to Galilee in the healing presence of Jesus.
Gennesaret was on the west side of the Sea of Galilee, between Magdala and Capernaum. It was a fertile plain, only about a mile wide, between sea and mountains, and known for its wonderful fruit. Just to the west of it was Galilee and Nazareth where Jesus had grown up. Today Jesus comes back to his home territory. The people recognize him. Doubtless they have been saying, “When that Jesus of Nazareth comes back this way, we’re going to carry Aunt Salome or Uncle Simeon to him so he can make them better.”
Scripture tells us,
As they were leaving the boat, people immediately recognized him.
They scurried about the surrounding country
and began to bring in the sick on mats
to wherever they heard he was.
Whatever villages or towns or countryside he entered,
they laid the sick in the marketplaces
and begged him that they might touch only the tassel on his cloak;
and as many as touched it were healed.
Let’s put this in context. Jesus, fully human, has recently learned of the death of John the Baptist. He just fed the 5000. Then, while perhaps he is trying to rest a bit and pray, he, also fully divine, sees his disciples in trouble in the middle of a storm on the lake. He walks on the water and calms the waves.
Now, “as soon as they tied up there,” Jesus is deluged with people who need healing—not just for a day, but as long as he is in the region. And “as many as touched it (the tassel on his cloak” were healed.”
The Presence of God and Worthship
Nothing compares to being aware of the active Presence of God–whether that Presence is perceived in glorious celebration or quiet adoration at church–or it is recognized in the healing work of one-on-one time with another. The natural response to such moments is to worship. Something inside of us folds in and bows down to bask in the loving Presence of our Living God.
This Sunday morning I will go to my parish church to worship. God will fill our worship space with His Presence: in the priest, in the assembly, in the Word, and in the Eucharist. I hope awareness of that Presence will fill me with a sense of “Worthship,” what the root of the word “worship” means—that God is worthy. God is God. Let me, let all of us at mass, praise him to recognize and name him. Let us thank him, respond to his Word with listening and careful thought. Let us honor him as we truly attend to His coming in the Eucharist. But let us also be filled with the awe and beauty of “worthship”—of awareness of God’s greatness and goodness–and bow our souls before it.
This Sunday afternoon I will carry the Eucharist to several of our carebound parishioners. While there will be no beautifully sung Gloria there, God will be equally present. He will be present in the consecrated Host, in each recipient, in me, and in the worship we confect. He will be present in the healing that comes from our carebound knowing “Jesus comes to see me every Sunday afternoon.”
There will most likely be no sense of miraculous healing—but Jesus will come to touch and heal.
And he will be equally worthy.
Prayer
Lord, let me worship this day, every day: let my soul bend and melt in Your Presence—at mass, on communion calls, when I sit and write, when I stop to talk with friends. You call me to recognize Your worthiness. You call me to worship, to awareness of your “worthship.” Let me see it and reverence it in any and all moments of every day. Amen.
