Saint Andrew’s Church
Lake Worth,
Florida
Saint Andrew's Day [November 30, 2002]
Canon Richard T. Nolan
Today is
Saint Andrew's Day in the church calendar. According to tonight's reading from
Matthew (4:18-22), the first four disciples called to follow Jesus are two
pairs of brothers: Simon Peter and Andrew as well as James and John. All were
everyday fishermen by trade, and all were summoned to be fishers for people.
They are to call people out from their ordinary way of life, in order to
prepare for the coming of the Kingdom of God. In John's Gospel (1:35-42) it
appears that these men had already been followers of Jesus when he was
associated with John the Baptist. (The blue leaflet provides some information
about St. Andrew and the history of this parish named for him.)
Matthew
reported that they left their nets immediately and followed Jesus. Whether this
is an exaggeration, whether this was a natural progression of their association
with Jesus, or whether this is to be taken literally is uncertain. In any case,
symbolically speaking, they set out on the religious quest after the classical
example of Abraham and his journey of faith, leaving the familiar and the
comfortable to journey in search of an as yet unknown destination. The call of
the first disciples is a lesson of wholehearted vocation and acceptance, even
with the cost of great personal sacrifice. Their apparent mistake was their
expectation that the full establishment of the Kingdom of God was about to
occur. Thus, there was an urgency to spread the Word.
I cannot in
all honesty join those Christians who maintain that degree of urgency. For two
thousand years the Kingdom of God has been on its way, and it seems to me that
its fullness is no closer now than at the time of Christ. I am reluctant to
contrive a sense of urgency based upon what seems to be a miscalculation by New
Testament saints..
Nonetheless I
do sense a different kind of urgency. There is a desperate need for the
implementation of Christ's Summary of the Law (love of God, neighbor and self)
on a local and global basis, before the quality of life for all human beings is
reduced to mere biological survival at best. Like Saint Andrew, one of the
first disciples called and about whom we know so very little, you and I as
ordinary people are called to share God's Word of love in whatever circles we
mix and by communicating with governmental and business policy makers as we are
able. It is not enough to go to church. It is insufficient to be religious. In
whatever miniscule ways we can, none that will go down in history, you and I
are contemporary Andrews: accepting Christ's call to follow his way, his path
of active love that progresses ever so slowly toward the perfected Kingdom of
God.
The world has
had Abraham, Jesus, and Mohammed. The Kingdom of God in its fullest is on the
way, and in terms of quality of life, it offers so much more than what humanity
has settled for so far. Needed now are unknown Andrews everywhere to live out
and share the Word of love and justice. It is up to each individual worshiping
here to share in the same ministry lived by Andrew. By touching the lives of
others with equal regard and by allowing others to touch our lives as well, our
discipleship is fulfilled. As written in the blue leaflet, " ….. on each
occasion when [Andrew] is mentioned as an individual, it is because he is
instrumental in bringing others to meet the Saviour. In the Episcopal Church,
the Fellowship of Saint Andrew is devoted to encouraging personal
evangelism, and the bringing of one's friends and colleagues to a knowledge of
the Gospel of Christ." Our parish church is well named, isn't it?!
Following is "The Blue Leaflet" mentioned
in the homily.
SAINT ANDREW and SAINT ANDREW'S CHURCH
Most
references to Andrew in the New Testament simply include him on a list of the
Twelve Apostles, or group him with his brother, Simon Peter. But he appears
acting as an individual three times in the Gospel of John. When a number of
Greeks (perhaps simply Greek-speaking Jews) wish to speak with Jesus, they
approach Philip, who tells Andrew, and the two of them tell Jesus (Jn
12:20-22). (It may be relevant here that both "Philip" and "Andrew" are Greek
names.) Before Jesus feeds the Five Thousand, it is Andrew who says, "Here is a
lad with five barley loaves and two fish." (Jn 6:8f) And the first two
disciples whom John reports as attaching themselves to Jesus (Jn 1:35-42) are
Andrew and another disciple (whom John does not name, but who is commonly
supposed to be John himself -- John never mentions himself by name, a
widespread literary convention). Having met Jesus, Andrew then finds his
brother Simon and brings him to Jesus. Thus, on each occasion when he is
mentioned as an individual, it is because he is instrumental in bringing others
to meet the Saviour. In the Episcopal Church, the Fellowship of Saint Andrew is
devoted to encouraging personal evangelism, and the bringing of one's friends
and colleagues to a knowledge of the Gospel of Christ.
Just as
Andrew was the first of the Apostles, so his feast is taken in the West to be
the beginning of the Church Year. (Eastern Christians begin their Church Year
on 1 September.) The First Sunday of Advent is defined to be the Sunday on or
nearest his feast (although it could equivalently be defined as the fourth
Sunday before Christmas Day).
Several
centuries after the death of Andrew, some of his relics were brought by a
missionary named Rule to Scotland, to a place then known as Fife, but now known
as St. Andrew's, and best known as the site of a world-famous golf course and
club. For this reason, Andrew is the patron of Scotland.
When the
Emperor Constantine established the city of Byzantium, or Constantinople, as
the new capital of the Roman Empire, replacing Rome, the bishop of Byzantium
became very prominent. Five sees (bishoprics) came to be known as
patriarchates: Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Byzantium. Now, the
congregation at Rome claimed the two most famous apostles, Peter and Paul, as
founders. Antioch could also claim both Peter and Paul, on the explicit
testimony of Scripture, and of course Jerusalem had all the apostles.
Alexandria claimed that Mark, who had been Peter's "interpreter" and assistant,
and had written down the Gospel of Mark on the basis of what he had heard from
Peter, had after Peter's death gone to Alexandria and founded the church there.
Byzantium was scorned by the other patriarchates as a new-comer, a church with
the political prestige of being located at the capital of the Empire, but with
no apostles in its history. Byzantium responded with the claim that its founder
and first bishop had been Andrew the brother of Peter. They pointed out that
Andrew had been the first of all the apostles to follow Jesus (John 1:40-41),
and that he had brought his brother to Jesus. Andrew was thus, in the words of
John Chrysostom, "the Peter before Peter." As Russia was Christianized by
missionaries from Byzantium, Andrew became the patron not only of Byzantium but
also of Russia.
Andrew is the
national saint of Scotland. George (23 Apr) is the national saint of England,
Patrick (17 Mar) of Ireland, and Dewi = David (1 Mar) of Wales. George, who was
a soldier, is customarily pictured as a knight with a shield that bears a red
cross on a white background. This design is therefore the national flag of
England. It is said that Andrew was crucified on a Cross Saltire -- an 'X'
-shaped cross. His symbol is a Cross Saltire, white on a blue background. This
is accordingly the national flag of Scotland. A symbol of Patrick is a red
cross saltire on a white background. The crosses of George and Andrew were
combined to form the Union Jack, or flag of Great Britain, and later the cross
of Patrick was added to form the present Union Jack. Wales does not appear as
such (sorry!). Whether there is a design known as the cross of David, I have no
idea. [by James Kiefer]
St. Andrew's
Episcopal Church is the oldest parish church in Lake Worth still on its
original site. It was founded by 15 of the original settlers of the city. The
first building was erected on the present site in 1914, little more than a year
after the city itself was founded. One of the founders, Mrs. Ada Cook, was
disappointed to find no Anglican Church when she settled in Lake Worth. So she
and her three children got out the kerosene lamp and walked to evening prayer
at the nearest Episcopal church, Holy Trinity in West Palm Beach, a distance of
seven miles each way! Their faithfulness so impressed Holy Trinity's rector,
The Rev. Gilbert A. Ottmann, that he promised to come to Lake Worth and form a
congregation, and he did. That small group would be the charter members of St.
Andrew's. Within a few months they had built a small church on the present
site.
A disastrous
hurricane in September 1928 destroyed that first little church. But the people
of St. Andrew's rolled up their sleeves, dug into their pockets and soon a new
church had risen out of the ruins. The 1928 church remains as the basic
structure for St. Andrew's today.
St. Andrew's
mission became a parish in 1947 under the leadership of its first rector The
Rev. Mason A. Frazell, who had been the priest-in-charge since 1936. Since that
time, three other rectors have served the parish: The Rev. Edward J. Watson,
The Rev. Garfield N. Brown and The Rev. William E. Hamilton, the present
rector. Fr. Bill came to St. Andrew's in 1986.
SOURCES
http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/Andrew.htm http://www.standrew-lakeworth.org/