This Sunday is going to look a little different than other Sundays because we’re going to dedicate part of our liturgy to do a service of healing with laying of the hands and anointing. It is a tradition that has always existed in the church, it’s already mentioned in the New testament, in James’s Epistle, so we know that the first Christians used to pray that way. James says: “Is anyone among you sick? Then he must call for the elders of the church and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord” (5:14). And of course in our readings today, we hear the story of how King David came to be anointed by the prophet Samuel. In Ancient Israel, anointing was a ritual to establish a relation of protection between two people: The one who anointed “adopted”, pledged support to the person to whom he gave the anointment. But when God’s prophet anoints someone, it means that it is God who claims this person, God renews God’s covenant, God’s commitment to the one who approaches God. It’s not reserved to special or extraordinary people, and actually we see that God picks David who is the one child even his father has forgotten about, in this God shows God’s preference for the little ones, those who live according to the heart and not according to the standards of the world, as God reveals to Samuel. And so today, we are invited to the altar to ask God to bless us and to be with us, to mark us with the sign of the covenant, as many of us were marked on the day of their baptism and on the day of their confirmation. It is not reserved for special, extraordinary people, nor it is reserved for people who are extremely sick or in great danger. God’s covenant and God’s protection are for everybody.
I think we have a good sense of that when we read Psalm 23 – one of the most famous songs of Israel. The poet claims that God is our shepherd. This psalm is often read in the church for funerals, but it should be read everyday because that’s what the poet claims, that God and God’s goodness “follow [us] all the days of [our] lives” and that we are adopted by God, we “dwell in God’s house” (v6) and how does God shows that to the people? God “anoints [our] head[s] with oil” (v5). The poet reminds us that God walks with us, provides food, water (we talk about that last week!), revives us and protects and guides us in times of darkness. It does not say that there will be no darkness, no adversity, but it says that God is present in them, face them with us and that God will see us through. This is to this type of confidence that we are invited today. When we receive the anointing, it’s a gift from God but it is also our gift to release (would it be only for the time of the prayer) our fears and our anxieties, our sorrows and sufferings and allow ourselves to experience that we are held in God’s hands (the sign of the laying of the hands). We see in the Gospel that Jesus used to do great miracles, we have to remember, especially in John’s Gospel, that those acts of healing weren’t made for a few elected, they were meant to be signs of God’s presence with the people, signs of God’s presence in the person of Jesus, the Messiah (which means the anointed one) the one who embodied this Covenant between God and humans and invited all to be part of it. We may receive a miracle when we pray for healing, but we also believe that if we have trust in our shepherd, God will will bring us support and comfort, strength and joy even in the midst of our difficulties and pain whether they are physical, mental, relational and we know how all those issues affect the others. When we do the rite of healing, we don’t ask God to be like a super doctor or to do a magic trick, we ask God to restore the wholeness in our lives, we ask God to help us find our balance again,we ask God to restore everything that is broken or damaged by the forces of sin and death in this world, and we ask God to give us new life.
So please, come forward this morning. Again, this rite is not reserved to those who are in extreme weakness and danger, but to all those who want to pray to receive God’s reassuring presence in whatever they are going through. You are also invited to offer yourself on behalf of someone else, if you have someone (or several people) you would like to pray for today you can name them during the litany or as you come to the altar. Feel free to stand or kneel as you are able, and you may share more of your prayer intentions with me, you may also just keep silent and bow your head and I will lay my hands on you and give you the anointing on your forehead.
This Sunday is a little different than others Sundays. It is known as “Laetare Sunday” (rejoicing Sunday), a break in the middle of Lent to focus less on sins and penitence and to receive God’s forgiveness and God’s healing as we continue our spiritual journey. Let’s do just that so God’s glory is manifested in our lives.