American Christians face a similar challenge to that of the biblical Queen Esther, with enemies plotting against them, but also serving a God who “turns things upside down,” according to an Anglican Archbishop who recently addressed student at Asbury Theological Seminary in Kentucky.
“As marriage is redefined, religious freedom will be a thing of the past,” warned Archbishop Robert Duncan of the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA).
Duncan addressed students at the seminary’s chapel. Associated with the Wesleyan Holiness tradition, Asbury trains nearly 30 percent of United Methodist clergy, even though it is not one of the denomination’s official seminaries. The evangelical school has a growing relationship with Anglicans who departed the liberalizing Episcopal Church in the past decade, the church Duncan was once affiliated with.
Duncan centered his message on Esther chapter 5, in which Haman, conspiring against Jews living in exile under the Persians, seeks to construct a gallows to hang the prophet Mordecai.
“Haman seeks to annihilate the Jews, his first task is to put away Mordecai, the righteous man,” Duncan noted. “He [Mordecai] is an inconvenient man, as righteous men always are.”
But Haman’s gallows in the Esther story actually gets used on Haman himself, hung on the gallows, not Mordecai.
“It is a direct result of Esther’s bravery, courage, and God’s will,” Duncan explained. “The situation that we face is not different, appreciably, than the situation that Esther faced, for those that would lead God’s people, that would be righteous in an unrighteous time.”
The Anglican Archbishop, who was effectively defrocked in the Episcopal Church and went on to help found the 104,000-member ACNA, noted that “in a time when we prove to be most inconvenient, our Lord will rescue.”
Naming God “the great rescuer,” Duncan, who emphasizes the sacramental, noted God has “rescued us in our baptism.”
“I wish that I could assure you that there were no gallows — that there were no lots that have been cast, but I cannot,” Duncan acknowledged, summarizing that “we do wage a war.”
The Anglican leader acknowledged that Christians are peacemakers, but specified that they “make the kind of peace that Jesus made, who accepts a cross to set us free.”
“The battle,” Duncan predicted “will likely get much tougher.”
Recalling his baptism as a child, Duncan noted in the service he was “adopted” and “given something I could not have by my own work or taking” – a new identity and new life in which he was instructed “to manfully fight under his banner against sin, the world and the devil.” It was under Christ’s banner that Duncan would “confess the faith of Christ crucified.”
Duncan recounted the modern Anglican baptismal liturgy in which the priest tells the baptized ‘”you are sealed in baptism and marked as Christ’s own forever.”
The words are true, Duncan observed, but “not much of an exhortation.”
“Nor is it much clue about what it is that we will have to do if we are to be faithful to the one who has called us and who we are promised will do it, Duncan shared. “Indeed, there are many gallows that others would set up for us.”
The Anglican Archbishop summarily announced that “there will be crosses to bear if we would follow Jesus.”
Naming Jesus as both the heart of the word of God, and the word of God written, Duncan noted that “the engrafted word is able to save you” – what he described as “the first piece of the Good News.”
“Because of what Christ has done, we are restored to fellowship with His father and enabled for fellowship with one another,” the Archbishop offered. Calling it a “remarkable thing” Duncan, who was raised in a troubled home, marveled that “there is nothing standing between us and the Father who does not disappoint in a world where there is so much fatherly disappointment.”
“Because we have been saved – restored – then we can talk about what we have been empowered for.”
Recalling a 1999 visit to Rwanda, Duncan recounted the continuing warfare following the Rwandan Genocide, and seeing the home of a World Vision worker from his native Pittsburgh who had to return home after his leg was badly injured in an attack.
“If we are going to do the Lord’s work in the Lord’s way, we are going to go down many unsafe roads,” Duncan promised. “If it doesn’t feel unsafe, it may be that you are not doing the Lord’s work.”
Noting that Esther must ultimately risk her life to save her people, Duncan recalled Mordecai’s words to Esther: “If you do not act, you and your family will lose their life, but the Lord will still save His people.”
Just as Haman’s gallows are turned against him, the cross, a “gruesome symbol of death,” in Duncan’s words, becomes a sign of life and “God’s sign of victory.”
Comment by J P Logan on October 29, 2012 at 9:08 pm
Lots of amusing little ironies here. Here is an Anglican bishop addressing people at a seminary named for the English Methodist (Francis Asbury) who gave himself the title “bishop” and considered the American Methodists to be separated from the Church of England even though his “boss,” John Wesley, never left the Church of England and only gave Asbury the title “superintendent.” More irony: Asbury Seminary, UNofficially Methodist, has endeavored to be true the Wesleyan heritage, while the official Methodist seminaries (including one named Wesley Theological Sem) are so liberal they probably have Wesley spinning in his grave. John Wesley had a low opinion of the Church of England, so no doubt it would warm his heart (catch the reference?) to know there is an Anglican bishop who propagates the biblical faith that Wesley himself practiced and preached. It might not surprise him that the Church of England and its American version the Episcopal church have gone so far off the rails, but it would horrify him to know that the Methodist movement he gave his life to isn’t far behind the Episcopalians in conforming to the liberal secular culture.
Comment by David on November 4, 2012 at 5:02 pm
I couldn’t agree more with J P Logan. As an Anglican (ACNA) under Archbishop Duncan, I have watched so many things change in modern church-ianity that are disheartening. They very rightly should make John Wesley roll over in his grave. As I read recently, the problem is that modern culture has raised up ministers and laity in the last 25+ years that have learned to eat from the tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and NOT from the Tree of Life. We have turned from giving people food for the soul to debating even the very Divinity of Christ. Perhaps that’s why orthodox Anglicanism has such a strong draw for the next generation (myself included): It is both catholic and evangelical. It is historical and personal. It centers both on Biblical foundations and church traditions. And for those things, maybe the good Reverend Wesley would be dancing in his grave. But then again, Anglicans might frown on that.