Holiday Update

THE SAINT LUKE LETTER

A Publication of the Richmond Chapter

of the International Order of St. Luke the Physician

8787 River Road, Richmond, Virginia 23229

www.oslrichmond.blogspot.com

An ecumenical Service of Healing is offered every Thursday at 10:30 a.m. in the

All Saints’ Chapel, 8787 River Road, Richmond, Virginia 23229

 

A couple of reminders: 

There will not be a Healing Service on Thanksgiving Day.

The Christmas Luncheon will be December 8 following the Healing Service. Please plan to come, bring a dish and a friend.

Membership renewals are due by January 1.

 

The Rev. April Greenwood’s Homily Based on one of the Healings at Capernaum

Matthew 8:14, Mark 1:29, Luke 4:38

If you had to miss the November 10 OSL service in which the Rev. April Greenwood based her homily on the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law and the brown-bag luncheon message, you missed a blessing. Here are two brief overviews of her messages.

She said that in researching the three passages scholars agree that the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law must have happened because the healing passages appear in the three gospels. I had always thought this was a slightly sexist passage because the woman was healed only to prepare a meal for the men who stopped by after attending synagogue. The Rev. Greenwood suggested that after you have been healed you want to do something that you enjoy. Obliviously, this woman enjoyed cooking and serving.

Laying on of Hands

The Rev. Greenwood shared her earliest experience with the laying on of hands. She was a toddler with a temperature of 106 that her mother could not bring down. Her family lived in a rural area located over an hours drive from the nearest hospital. The family priest had recently returned from an Anglican convention in England where the laying on of hands was introduced. The mother asked the priest to lay hands and pray for her only child. Greenwood said she remembers as the priest prayed a bright light appeared to her and the fever broke. They later decided she must have had meningitis but it was not confirmed because she never went to the hospital.

How to pray over the sick

The Rev. Greenwood shared a time when a parishioner’s son had a heart attack while driving and almost died. The family called her as the ambulance was rushing the young man to the Medical College of Virginia. At the time of the accident he was driving slowly and did not suffer more than a few bruises but the cardiologist had to place him in a comma because of the lost of oxygen to the brain. The family and friends in the waiting room asked the Rev. Greenwood to pray. She thought “how should I pray for this tragic situation?” And then she thought I will pray as if this young husband and father was my own son. They continued to pray for him and one day the wife felt an unexpected squeeze to her hand as she sat at her husband’s bedside. When the mother visited her son, she also felt the movement. The nursing staff discouraged these signs of recovery as muscle spasms. Greenwood and the family chose to believe their prayers were being answered and continued to pray for recovery. The young man lives today to love and serve the Lord.

The Brown-Bag Luncheon Reflection – “Parting of the Curtain”

1Thessalonians 4:13-18

The Rev. Greenwood was the speaker for our brown-bag luncheon and I wondered how she could top her Healing Service Homily?

She explained that she places the words on page 507 of the Book of Common Prayer on the bulletin of every burial service she officiates – The liturgy, therefore, is characterized by joy, in the certainty that “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

This joy, however, does not make human grief unchristian. The very love we have for each other in Christ brings deep sorrow when we are parted by death. Jesus himself wept at the grave of his friend. So, while we rejoice that one we love has entered into the nearer presence of our Lord, we sorrow in sympathy with those who mourn.

Soon after her ordination, she was called to be the Chaplin for a school in Rhode Island. Her daughter was placed in Miss Amy’s Preschool. April and her husband soon became aware they shared mutual interests with Miss Amy and her husband and the two couples became friends. The Greenwoods always wondered why their friends never started a family but never asked.

Years later after the Greenwoods were called to another parish they received the news that Amy had uterine cancer and was taking the latest treatment at Duke University. The Rev. April Greenwood had a difficult time accepting the lost of her sister like friend. She even told God that when she finished her current post she would hang up her clerical collar. At this point in her life she was the mother of two little girls and had accepted a call to a new parish. During this time of transition, she was looking for affordable housing for her family. She was constantly stymied by real estate brokers misrepresenting their houses.

April’s Dream

One night she had a dream about a ranch house she went to see. She was so disgusted with the thought of looking at yet another boring and abused ranch house that she was rude to the agent by not shaking his hand or looking into his eyes. He patiently took her into the house and she was amazed. The first room was huge and well appointed. The following rooms were equally as beautiful. She could not believe the vastness of the little rancher. The final room was the most beautiful sunroom she had ever seen. As a devoted gardener, she was taken aback by the botanical perfection of the room. It even had a thick carpet of moss on the floor and the furniture was covered with flowers. The only words she could say over and over were, “Oh my God!!! I never imagined that there could be anyplace so beautiful and so perfectly designed for me!”

The real estate agent said, “I thought you would like it, April. I designed it just for you.” The moment he spoke her name she knew who He was and instantly regretted her rudeness.  “As I turned to look into my Savior’s eyes, He disappeared before I could see His face. As I woke I heard him clearly say, ‘In my Father’s House are many rooms. If it were not so, April, I would never have told you.’”

She woke up and shook her husband and told him that she knew her friend Amy, who had shared her love of gardening, was in a better place.

The Rev. April Greenwood said “This dream has sustained me throughout the last fifteen years of my spiritual journey.”

She is still wearing her collar and blessing us with her insight. Thanks Be to God!