The sermon text comes from the Gospel:
“In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
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The Fifth Sunday after Easter is known as Rogation Sunday, and the following three days leading up to Ascension Day are called “The Rogation Days.” Rogation comes from the Latin rogare, which means “to ask.” These are days of petition. Traditionally, parishioners led by the rector would “beat the bounds,” processing along the parish’s geographic border while praying for God’s blessing in the coming year.
In the Anglican tradition, Rogation has become closely associated with specific prayers for a bountiful growing season, as illustrated by the Collect appointed for the Rogation Days, which you can find on page 261 of the BCP:
“ALMIGHTY God, Lord of heaven and earth; We beseech thee to pour forth thy blessing upon this land, and to give us a fruitful season; that we, constantly receiving thy bounty, may evermore give thanks unto thee in thy holy Church; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”
This association makes sense, deep as we are in the season of spring. Fields have been sown and gardens planted. The work of tending the garden and caring for crops continues, but we begin to look forward to the harvest with anticipation and also some trepidation, because a successful harvest is not ultimately within our control.
As St. Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 3, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth” (v6-7, ESV). St. Paul, of course, is speaking metaphorically about spiritual growth but the metaphor faithfully describes literal gardening: we can plant seeds, we can water the garden, but the Creator of all things gives the growth. And so during these days we pray that God will do so.
This distinct Anglican emphasis fits naturally alongside the broader Western tradition of Rogation. The texts for this Sunday and the separate ones appointed for the Rogation Days that follow teach us about the nature and outcome of petitionary prayer, as we can see in our Sunday Gospel reading:
“Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you.”
This passage and others like it are much abused by charlatans, who treat the Lord of Hosts as an all-powerful wish-giver. Jesus does not mean that we will get whatever we want — so long as, instead of starting our wish list with “Dear Santa,” we end it with “in Jesus’ name.” The Name of the Lord is not a magical formula that compels an Almighty Genie to comply with our wishes. In Scripture, the Name of the Lord encapsulates who he is. It is his glory and his renown and the boundary marker of his kingdom.
“From the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same my Name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my Name, and a pure offering: for my Name shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of hosts” (Mal. 1:11).
The Name of the Lord identifies where the will of God is done, and we invoke it not as a formality appended to our wishes but rather to align our prayer with God’s will.
By contrast, to “take the name of the Lord thy God in vain” (Ex. 20:7) is to say and do in God’s name that which is not of God. Think of false prophets who claim to speak the word of Lord but instead speak lies, or of “name-it-and-claim-it” prosperity-gospel preachers who identify our Lord’s name with avarice and greed. “The Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.”
This does not mean that we should hide our desires from God, nor should we feel guilty for wanting the good things of this life. Asking for those good things is precisely what we are doing when we pray for a bountiful growing season, and it is what I am doing now, as I pray that God would bless our family with a good house in Florida! St. Peter tells us to cast all our “care upon him; for he careth for you” — but he does so immediately after declaring, “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time” (1 Peter 5:6-7).
Invoking the Name of the Lord compels us to subordinate what we think we need to what God provides for us, and to hand over our needs and desires to God, so that they may be brought into harmony with God’s will.
Note what the Gospel text for The Rogation Days on page 261 instructs to do, and note what we are promised in the end:
“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened… If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?”
Ask. Seek. Knock. What we will find is the Holy Spirit. What God will give us is himself.
I said earlier that the particular Anglican petition for a fruitful growing season arises naturally in spring, but there is more to it than this. During The Rogation Days we will read a lesson from Ezekiel in place of the epistles. It speaks of “showers of blessing” and “the tree of the field [yielding] her fruit, and the earth [yielding ] her increase” — but it is not about the bounty of this upcoming summer.
“I will make with them a covenant of peace, and will cause the evil beasts to cease out of the land… Thus shall they know that I the Lord their God am with them, and that they, even the house of Israel, are my people, saith the Lord God. And ye my flock, the flock of my pasture, are men, and I am your God, saith the Lord God.”
We look forward to an eschatological harvest when the Lord shall restore all things. That day is yet to come, and yet it is here already, for “now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming” (1 Cor. 15:20-23).
Easter has come. Our Lord is risen indeed. Soon he ascends to the Father — and sends to us the Comforter, who binds the Church together, so that we become not a collection of individual souls seeking Jesus but rather the Very Body of Christ, mystically bound together as one organism, knit together with the same unity that binds Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
This odd era of social distancing has been strange and grievous but also has felt superficial and surreal to me, as though “real life” were taking an odd and somewhat painful break. For our family, though, this physical separation will very soon become much more tangible and concrete. We are leaving the bounds of this parish for a new one — with an entirely different growing season.
Though we look forward to our next step with joy, we grieve our departure — doubly so under these circumstances. But we know that God is preparing for us and for you “such good things as pass man’s understanding.” We look forward to the day when God will right every wrong. On that day he will bring us together as one flock under one Shepherd — not only ontologically, as we already are and will always continue to be, but existentially and indeed physically. We shall meet again.
“In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
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