John Hopkins Professor and Liturgist Wayne Koch delivered an opening message with a metaphor to Columbia Presbyterian Church, which is a PCA Church in Columbia, MD on July 25th. During his message, he came up with a terrible metaphor while hitting on all the worst talking points of the pandemic and its effect on our ecclesiology, including hinting that the Delta variant of the novel coronavirus may limit their freedom to worship, explaining that the church is gathered together “because of a vaccine, largely” which he describes as “protection, our assurance” and reiterates that we as Christians should ‘hope’ that the person next to has the vaccine inside of them, in the same way, that we ought to hope the Holy Spirit lives inside of others.
All this notwithstanding that vaccinated people are still catching and drying from COVID, whereas the Holy Spirit has a much higher success rate and assurance, as “Whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.”
Are you ready for this morning’s opening metaphor? Prof Koch is up here, so we’re gonna get a metaphor this morning. It takes a minute. Bear with me.
I was thinking about it this morning. We’re so happy to be here and unmasked. All we with unveiled faces, right? And to be together. And we’re watching the Delta variant and all that stuff and worrying a little bit about whether we’re gonna be able to keep this freedom to meet together this week.
And we’re here together and able to be together because of a vaccine, largely, right? That we’ve been vaccinated. And that is our protection, our assurance.
So here’s the metaphor. We actually are here longing for something much more than just getting back to life the way that we remember it. Being able to go on vacation, as some of our members have done, or go to a restaurant. And we have a much bigger problem, don’t we, than the COVID, coronavirus. Our problem is how can we come into the presence of the God who made us who we have sinned against, who we’ve disappointed?
And if you look at the bulletin verse [1 John 4:17], you see the metaphor for the vaccine. We have a much better solution that allows us to be together, and that is the Holy Spirit dwelling in us.
As you look to your right and to your left and you see the person sitting next to you, we hope that that person is vaccinated, but we also hope that they have the Holy Spirit dwelling in them, as we have hope that the Holy Spirit dwells in us. And by that Spirit, his love is perfected within us, so that we have confidence in the day of judgment to draw nigh. And that’s what we’ve come to do.
h/t to WokePreacherTV for the vid and transcripts.
