What is eternal life?
SERMON PREACHED MAY 3, 2026
THE FIFTH SUNDAY OF EASTER, YEAR A
THE COLLECT, ACTS 7:55-60, JOHN 14:1-14
From the Collect: Almighty God, whom truly to know is everlasting life: Grant us…perfectly to know your Son Jesus Christ to be the way, the truth, and the life
We know that Jesus Christ, in dying and being raised to eternal life, opened the way for us to eternal life. But the question presents itself: how exactly do we lay hold of that eternal life? Do we just wait until we die, and then discover that we are over the threshold, discover that we are there?
Not quite. Laying hold of eternal life is a little like living in the Kingdom of God, which is what we do now as Christians. Even though the Kingdom of God will not spread across the whole earth until Jesus comes again, we believers live there now. We display and enact and speak the Kingdom even now.
God’s Kingdom is where the ways of the world are turned inside-out. Here it is the poor, not the rich, who are blessed: they have pride of place. The ones who mourn are granted happiness; in the hands of the meek are all earthly powers; and those who suffer injustice have justice worked on their behalf. Mercy carries the day. Goodness is embodied, peacemakers are blessed and war is no more. And to be persecuted for the sake of Jesus is to inherit the Kingdom.
We live as much as possible as if these Kingdom things are real. They are the reality of God. But this reality doesn’t rest on its own foundations. The reality of the Kingdom of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ. What we do is seek to know Jesus more nearly, more dearly, more deeply, as this leads to eternal life.
And this knowing is God’s initiative. We receive the grace, the self-communication of God, at God’s pleasure. And, mystery of mysteries, God is pleased to abide in us, and to permit us to abide in him. “Abiding” is a kind of lasting, deep protected in-dwelling. Abiding is profound hospitality. When we receive the Body and Blood of Christ in the Holy Eucharist, we benefit by receiving Christ to abide in us, and we enter there to abide in him.
This relationship of abiding appears in numerous places in Scripture. For one, 1 John spends some time explaining this aspect of God’s love: God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us, and his love is perfected in us.
He develops the abiding link between God and us: By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.
And further: God abides in those who confess that Jesus is the Son of God, and they abide in God.
So close is this bond, that not one breath, not one thought, not one action of ours is taken without breathing, thinking and acting within God’s hold. Knowing this should shake us to our foundation. It might even be paralyzing to know that God is in us and we in Him.
When we speak to our friends, or to strangers, or to enemies – God is in our speech, even if we forget or ignore this holy relationship. If on the other hand we remember, we open ourselves to godly speech, where before we might have just spoken off the cuff, or spoken gruffly.
One who depended on the indwelling of God is Deacon Stephen, the first Christian martyr. He defends the new religion before the Sanhedrin, the senior board of Jewish authority. Boldly taking a stand, the Holy Spirit fills him, and he abides in the Spirit. Gazing into heaven he witnesses the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. “Look,” he says, “I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!”
His adversaries cover their ears, and with a loud shout all rush together against him. Then they drag him out of the city and begin to stone him. While they are stoning Stephen, he prays, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Then he kneels down and cries out in a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” Having said this, he dies.
This is Love speaking through Stephen, and Love that gives him the fortitude to witness to Jesus Christ. With the abiding presence of God, all things are possible.
Stephen teaches us that we can rely on God to lead us in all things. Even, or perhaps especially, in great life upheavals and terrors.
We can count on the abiding love of God to teach us the ways of Jesus, to lead us in the paths we should follow. And to have the heart of Jesus. This is the case when our lives turn to terrifying sickness, when we can rest in God, in the arms of our Abba. This is the case when we are perplexed and confused. When we witness violence in the world. Or when we need to defend the love of Christ against doubters, against people who refuse to accept that the poor, weak and afflicted are blessed.
In all these things, as we live into the fullness of God dwelling in us, we are filled brim full with a deep knowledge of him – and this is eternal life. To know God is eternal life. And it is ours now. This very day.
THANKS BE TO GOD. Amen.