Nothing is ever wasted – The Reverend Canon Michael Smith (Pastor)
Preacher: The Reverend Canon Michael Smith (Pastor)
Title of sermon: Nothing is ever wasted.
Date/time/service: Sunday 2nd August 2020 8th after Trinity
Passage of scripture: Matthew 14.13-21
A lot goes through your mind when you are training to be a priest. I remember talking with friends at college about how we would cope when we had to take the funeral of a child. The prospect of having to do just that was one of the many things that gave us trainee priests sleepless nights.
When I was ordained and in my first job as a curate, I can remember my boss, the rector of the parish, telling me that a funeral had come in for a family whose baby had died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. He said he would take the funeral but that I should attend, in the congregation. He was well aware that I was nervous about dealing with such a scenario.
I can still remember the full church and the baby’s family huddled together in inconsolable grief. The service began, my boss hitting just the right tone of compassion, humanity and authority. Quite soon we came to the bible reading. I was expecting John 14 – ‘in my father’s house there are many rooms’, or Romans 8 – ‘nothing can separate us from the love of God’ or Matthew 19 – ‘let the children come to me’. But we did not have any of those readings, instead we had Matthew 14 – The Feeding of the 5,000’. To be honest, I thought my boss had gone mad or made a mistake. What had the story of that miracle to do with the gut wrenching agony of the death of a child? I waited anxiously to see what he would make of it. He was a wonderful, holy, faithful and hard-working parish priest but preaching wasn’t his greatest gift. Then he began to speak and I have never forgotten what he said. Referring to the bible story he spoke about the fact that once the people had eaten their fill of the loaves and the fish, the disciples ‘picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces’. The important point being that nothing was wasted. Everything was gathered up. He spoke about how the baby’s short life had been lived in love and that that love would never die and just as the baby would never be forgotten by the family, so God would never forget the baby – I remember him saying that, with God, even that tiny little scrap of a life was gathered up.
We do have a tendency to think that God is really only in good and holy things but we have heard one or two sermons recently which have reminded us that God is at work, should we have the perception and the patience to notice, in the difficult and challenging aspects of life. A few weeks ago, Abi, preached about her calling to be a Deacon and how she understood that as being about discovering God on the fringes of things, in unlikely places and unlikely people, I think the phrase she used was ‘God is in the muck of things’. Then, a couple of weeks ago, Canon Emeritus Chris, on the Sunday he retired, preached about the parable of the wheat and the weeds, reminding us that Jesus taught that in our work for the kingdom we should not pull up and discard what we consider to be weeds in order to try and nurture a pure crop of wheat – it is not for us to judge what are the weeds and what is the wheat in God’s eyes. God can be discovered in the muck, in the weeds and in the scraps.
Winston Churchill said, ‘Never let a good crisis go to waste’. In other words, with some careful thought we can learn something from every crisis that assails us. Reflecting on the last four or five months there has been much that has been very painful and for many there has been, and continues to be, much suffering, but there has also been much to learn about the way we live our lives, much to learn about relationships, the way we work, the way we worship, the way we care for one another.
The more I have thought about this, the more I have come to believe that the gathering up of the scraps in the story of the Feeding of the Five Thousand tells us something that is at the heart of our faith, something that is integral to the very being of God. On the cross, the last vestige of life left Jesus in his agonising last breath and the broken scrap of his body laid and sealed in a tomb, but that was gathered up by God and, in God’s power, in God’s love, new life emerged.
Sometimes it feels as though our lives are overwhelmed with darkness. Illness, death or some other crisis assail us and we feel isolated, alone and God seems to have departed, but what we have to try and remember is that somewhere in the darkness the faint glimmer of God’s light will be shining ….. in time, all will be gathered up. Jesus teaches us in the Feeding of the Five Thousand, and as he walks from the tomb with the wounds of crucifixion still visible in his hands and feet to greet Mary in the garden, that nothing, with God, is ever wasted.
It is easy to say that nothing with God is ever wasted, but when you are in the midst of a crisis or a trauma, it is hard to believe. I never cease to be amazed, however, at the number of people who come to faith, not through wonderful holy experiences, but through painful and difficult experiences. The gathering up of the scraps in the story of the Feeding of the Five Thousand is a source of encouragement and hope to us all – God holds you and me and every tiny scrap of our lives, every tiny scrap of creation in the palm of his hand – and he never let go.
Trinity 8 – The Reverend Canon Michael Smith (Pastor)
Preacher: The Reverend Canon Michael Smith (Pastor)
Title of sermon:
Date/time/service: Sunday 2nd August 2020 Trinity 8 Evening Prayer
Passage of scripture: 1 Kings 10.1-13 & Acts 13.1-13
With all due respect, the Queen of Sheba seems to have a very peculiar idea about what constitutes wisdom. First of all, she came from Sheba to visit the notoriously wise King Sololmon, ‘to test him with hard questions’. And then the passage goes on to say, ‘When the queen of Sheba had observed all the wisdom of Solomon, the house that he had built, the food of his table, the seating of his officials, and the attendance of his servants, their clothing, his valets, and his burnt-offerings that he offered at the house of the Lord, there was no more spirit in her.’ Is wisdom really all about being able to answer hard questions and being really, really rich? Well, I suppose that might have been the understanding of what wisdom is in the Old Testament but I hope we have now moved on a little.
Solomon is famous for making a wise judgement when two women were brought to him who both claimed to be the mother of the same baby. Solomon’s judgement was that the baby should be cut in half so that each woman could have part of the baby. The one who was lying agreed and the one who was the real mother gave up her claim to be the mother to protect the baby. In this way Solomon worked out who the real mother was. This story reveals the wise way Solomon used his understanding of human nature.
So if wisdom is not about hard questions and wealth, what is it about? A dictionary definition is, ‘the quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgement; the quality of being wise.’
Within a few clicks on Google I came across a ten step plan to help anyone acquire wisdom, it wasn’t bad, it started with ‘Try new things’, then ‘Step out of your comfort zone’, ‘talk to people you don’t know very well’ and ‘Be open minded’.
If these are the steps to wisdom then I think Jesus is the example of a wise person we should emulate. He was constantly doing new and unexpected things, walking on water, talking to outcasts, making a Samaritan, member of a hated race, the hero of a story … the list is endless. It seems that for about 30 years of his life he lived within his comfort zone, presumably in Nazareth working as a carpenter, but then he marched right out of his comfort zone into dangerous places where he regularly spoke to people he didn’t know, in fact he made a point of speaking with the very people everyone else was trying to avoid talking to! And, of course, he was open minded. When he saw a tax collector, or a prostitute or a leper, he never did the lazy thing of characterising and judging them by their outward appearance. He spoke to them politely and respectfully and as a result, many of them found that their lives, once stuck in behaving the way everyone expected them to behave, were transformed by their encounter with Jesus.
Wisdom seems to be in short supply today and the problem, it seems to me, is that gaining wisdom is challenging and quite hard work and most people seem to be lazy. Most people seem to be content to steer well clear of trying new things, never straying far from their comfort zones, ensuring that their friends in real life, and in their online life, are people like themselves, people who broadly share their views, and allow their views and opinions to be shaped by a society that seems to close of debate and discussion.
Eucharist – The Reverend Canon Dr Chris Collingwood
Sunday 19th July 2020 – Eucharist
Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43
What have you been binging on in lockdown, I wonder? Think TV box sets rather than gastronomy! Early on, Sue and I decided we needed a little light relief, so we watched all 20 episodes of the Vicar of Dibley! Now we’re into slightly darker stuff, as we’re gradually working our way through all 12 series of the M15 spy thriller, Spooks. We’ve only just got to series four so far, though!
Between times, we watched the three seasons of Medici on Netflix. Set in 15th century Florence, the story’s based around the rise to power of the influential banking family. Beginning with the murder of Giovanni de Medici in 1429, it concludes at the end of the century with the decline in the Medici fortunes under Giovanni’s great-grandson, Piero, known as the Unfortunate. The broad sweep of the narrative, though, centres on Giovanni’s son, Cosimo, and, after Cosimo’s death, his son, Lorenzo. During this time, the Medici bank became the richest in Europe, its prestige enhanced by being entrusted with the papal finances.
The history of Florence in the 15th century’s heady stuff, in which religion and politics, family feuds and suing for peace, the grasping for power and concern for the poor, the desire to do all for the glory of God alongside the celebration of humanity, all converge and jockey with one another for supremacy. Amidst all this, they were great patrons of the arts. Cosimo put a great deal of effort and money into the completion of the dome of Florence’s cathedral; Lorenzo was instrumental in nurturing the talents of the artists Boticelli, Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci.
In 1482, a Dominican friar, Girolamo Savonarola, was sent to the convent San Marco in Florence as the lector or teacher, where, sometime after he arrived, he conceived seven reasons why the Church should be scourged and renewed. A charismatic preacher, Savonarola denounced clerical corruption, despotic rule – particularly, as he saw it, that of the Medici – and the exploitation of the poor. He called for the destruction of secular art and culture and for the establishment of Florence as the New Jerusalem, which he envisioned as becoming the world centre of Christianity, something that wasn’t looked upon kindly by the Papacy in Rome. In his zeal, he instituted a puritanical campaign by enlisting the active help of the Florentine youth. Such was the unrest he stirred up that the Pope banned him from preaching under threat of excommunication, something Savonarola ignored. Inevitably, perhaps, excommunication followed in 1497, and in 1498 he was hanged and burned in the main square of Florence on a charge of heresy.
In the light of today’s gospel reading, this seems to me to be a tale of wheat and weeds. The question is: which is which? The desire to purge of all that’s deemed to be impure exercises a strong hold on a particular type of religious consciousness. It’s as if everything that gets in the way of what’s considered to be purity, the weeds, has to uprooted and exorcised, so that the wheat might grow properly. We see this today in religious extremism, whether of the Islamic or Christian variety. We see it, too, in the vandalism and destruction of the art and architecture of churches in this country and elsewhere during the Reformation, to say nothing of monasteries and the monastic life. Attempts were made to justify this, of course, and there’s no doubt that some good things emerged as a result – the accessibility of the Bible in English, to cite just one – and yet how much was lost.
Nor is this desire for purging confined to the religious imagination alone. Think of the various 20th century revolutions, in Russia and China, for example. There can be little doubt that change was needed in both instances, but just look at the resulting cost of revolution in terms of the oppression, fear, brutality and death that followed.
Similarly, the motivation for the Iraq War in 2003 was to deprive that country of a brutal tyrant, believed to have manufactured weapons of mass destruction, but among the consequences of invasion – unintended and unforseen, of course – were the chaos that ensued, the rise of Islamic terrorism, and the heightening of tension between different cultures and worldviews.
‘Do you want us to go and gather the weeds?’ ask the master’s slaves in Jesus’ parable. ‘No,’ he replies, ‘for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. Let both of them grow together until the harvest.’ The desire to purge and purify always runs the risk of destroying not just the weeds but the wheat as well. And much of the time, it’s not entirely clear which is which anyway. We think we know, of course, but we’re so often proved wrong, which is why Jesus urges caution. Don’t let your zeal blind you to the ecology of the weeds, Jesus seems to say, even to their beauty, for your perspective’s limited.
This is something I’ve learned through the practice of Zen meditation. There’s a popular misconception that the purpose of meditation’s to realise blissful states and be untouched by the rest of life. There’s no doubt that meditation does lead to the experience of deep peace and equanimity. Often, what initiates the practice of meditation is the desire to be relieved of suffering, the sense that there’s more to life, a longing for the fullness of life. At some stage along the path of practice, though, we discover the paradox that the possibility of suffering being relieved is encountered as we begin to accept it, that the fullness of life involves not rejecting those aspects of life we judge to be unacceptable, but embracing them. The fullness of life mysteriously involves holding the wheat and the weeds together.
What I mean by weeds in this context will be familiar to all of us. Things like strong emotions, such as anger, grief and anxiety, unresolved traumatic experiences going back to childhood, disappointments and frustrations in the way life works out, conflicts at work and at home in our relationships with others and, goodness knows, sometimes these test and challenge us almost to the point of breaking. We know the way we deal with such things can be toxic and corrosive, so the temptation to purge them’s overwhelming. If we reject them without investigating what they might have to teach us, though, the possibility of these weeds contributing to the growth of the wheat is lost. For ultimately, the weeds have an important role to play, which is that they enable, if we let them, the growth of love, wisdom and compassion.
Zen meditation requires us to sit with all the gunk of our lives, the pain and discomfort, as well as the joys and delights, without making judgments about how things should be, trusting that everything’s held in a love and compassion that embraces everything. This love and compassion constitutes who we really are, and the practice of meditation is to enable these things to be manifested not only in meditation but in the whole of life. This can only happen, though, if we acknowledge and attend to the weeds as well.
This is why the weeds and wheat of Jesus’ parable is paralleled in the Buddhist symbol of the lotus, which can grow only in mud. As the contemporary Vietnamese Zen Master, Thich Nhat Hanh, says:
‘The lotus is the most beautiful flower, whose petals open one by one. But it will only grow in the mud. In order to grow and gain wisdom, first you must have the mud — the obstacles of life and its suffering. … The mud speaks of the common ground that humans share, no matter what our station in life. … Whether we have it all or we have nothing, we are all faced with the same obstacles: sadness, loss, illness, dying and death. If we are to strive as human beings to gain more wisdom, more kindness and more compassion, we must have the intention to grow as a lotus and open each petal one by one.’
Isn’t this exactly what we see at the very heart of the Christian faith? On the cross, Jesus entered into and embraced the mud of suffering, violence and inhumanity, and allowed them to be the very means by which the reality of divinely-human love and compassion were revealed. We can speculate, of course, as to what might have been without the cross but, in the end, such speculation’s futile. The plain fact of the matter is that the cross did happen. Jesus flinched from it, as we all would. ‘Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me. Yet not what I want but what you want.’ At that point, Jesus accepted the cross and embraced all it would entail as the very means by which the love and compassion of God would be revealed. Without the cross – the weeds, if you like – we simply wouldn’t know the love of God – the wheat – in quite the way we do. The two are intricately bound up with one another.
What’s true of Jesus, though, is true of us, too. He’s blazed the trail we’re invited to follow, so that love and compassion might be realised and manifested in us. It can be hard, often painfully so, but it’s only by attending to the weeds, rather than pulling them up prematurely, that they can be transformed to blossom into wheat. And who knows, come the harvest, it might just all be wheat after all.
Stop, reflect and pray – The Reverend Canon Michael Smith (Pastor)
Preacher: The Reverend Canon Michael Smith (Pastor)
Title of sermon: Stop, reflect and pray.
Date/time/service: 5th Sunday after Trinity Evening Prayer 12th July 2020
Passage of scripture: 2 Samuel 7.18-end & Luke 19.41–20.8
I wonder what the disciples thought when they saw Jesus weeping as he entered Jerusalem? Just before Luke tells us of the events of the first Palm Sunday he has been speaking about the coming of the kingdom, teaching about prayer, and wealth, healing a blind man, transforming the life of Zacchaeus, the tax collector and telling the parable of the Talents. All well known to us ….. Jesus is in command and revealing his power and authority in everything he says and does. Then he enters Jerusalem riding on a donkey and the crowds go wild, welcoming him and proclaiming him a king ….. and then …… and then …… he begins to weep! The bible tells us that Jesus wept three times in all. In John 11 he wept when he saw Mary and Martha weeping after the death of their brother, Lazarus. In Hebrews 5, we are told that he wept in the Garden of Gethsemane. Here, in Luke 19, we are told that he wept as he entered Jerusalem.
Grief over the death of a friend and the threat of arrest seem understandable reasons for tears. In Luke 19 his tears seem very strange. It appears that he is being acclaimed by an adoring crowd. In fact the Pharisees order him to calm the crowd down, but Jesus tells them that even if the crowd were silent the stones of the city would cry out. And then, in the midst of all this joyful mayhem, as he actually enters the city, he begins to weep. Through tears he talks to the city and seems to be condemning it, and the people in it, to destruction because they failed to recognize that they had been visited by God. The stones which, a few verses earlier, were going to shout out that the king has come, are now going to be toppled by Jerusalem’s enemies with not one stone remaining on another. So, within a few verses of Luke’s gospel there is a massive mood swing for Jesus from joyous acceptance of the crowd’s acclamation to despairing prophecies of doom and destruction.
And if that were not enough, within three of four more verses Jesus is seized with rage in the temple and rampages around, tipping up the tables of the traders there and saying that the temple was for prayer not for the selfish pursuit of gain.
I wonder how Jesus would have answered if, after all of this, someone asked him, ‘what sort of a day have you had?’
Of course, the important question for us is, what does all this mean and what can we learn from it? I have been thinking about that all week and I am going to highlight two things we learn from all this.
Firstly, it seems that Jesus understands the hypocrisy and inconsistencies that are never far from the surface of all human beings, particularly when they are in crowds. Because we know what happens next in the story of Jesus, we know that the crowd who acclaimed him king one day, were calling for his crucifixion a few days later. Jesus’ tears reveal that he is not taken in by the acclamation of the crowd, he knows it is mainly what we would call today ‘hype’ – not based on any profound commitment. We do not have to look far to see similar behaviour today. Over recent months there have been several media storms, many expressions of public anger and distress, all relating to some important issues and problems, but, rather than thinking carefully, praying faithfully, and acting wisely, many have been hyped up into a frenzy and the general response to the important issues has been a lot of shouting rather than a lot of listening, a lot of gestures rather than a lot of action, a lot of virtue signalling without much real virtue involved. Jesus clearly understood that some of those carpeting his way into the city with palm leaves were genuinely acknowledging their profound faith in him as the Son of God, while others, probably the majority were just joining in the fun, hopping on the latest band-waggon ……
For those of us prone to hypocrisy and inconsistency, in the end, what is important is, what is real? Are our celebrations or protests considered, prayed about and acted on and do they make Jesus smile, or are our celebrations or protests selfish, empty and simply about seeking to be seen to say and do the right thing, and do they make Jesus weep?
The second thing we learn from all this is that, just as we have moods that range from good and happy to bad and sad, and can include anger and distress …… so did Jesus. All of this reveals the humanity of Jesus. Jesus does not only love us when we are in the right mood, feeling good and holy. Jesus also loves us when we are feeling sad, let down and when our only response to a situation or experience is tears. And Jesus loves us when we are angry – he knows all about these moods and feelings because he experienced them too.
Once we know and accept that we can make Jesus weep with our hypocrisy and inconsistencies. Once we know and accept that we experience many different moods, some good and some bad – the only truly Christian response is prayer. We know that Jesus regularly stepped away from the crowds to find peace and quiet, to find space to pray. When issues and problems arise, when media storms are raging, when the latest band-waggon is passing by, we should stop, reflect and pray before speaking, acting or clambering aboard. When our mood is volatile, when we have one of those days in which we experience, joy, despair, anger and exhaustion, we should stop, reflect and pray before speaking or doing anything.
If we don’t stop, reflect and pray often we risk being diverted into working for a world the ‘crowd’ wants, or a world our passing mood wants, all of which are constantly changing, rather than working for the establishment of God’s kingdom ….. the world God wants …… and what God wants never changes.
God of reconciling hope, as you guided your people in the past guide us through the turmoil of the present time and guide us to your kingdom, where our unity can be restored, the common good served and all shall be made well. In the name of Jesus we pray. Amen.
Unwritten rules – The Reverend Canon Michael Smith (Pastor)
Preacher: The Reverend Canon Michael Smith (Pastor)
Title of sermon: Unwritten rules
Date/time/service: Sunday 5th July 2020 4th Sunday after Trinity
Passage of scripture: Deuteronomy 24.10-end & Matthew 11.16-19, 25-end
Professional cycling does not have a good reputation for having a high moral code. Most recently the confessions of Lance Armstrong revealed a huge amount of cheating in the sport by the taking of performance enhancing drugs. However, I learned recently that there are a number of unwritten rules, a kind of polite etiquette, that professional cyclists know and live by. For example, in the most famous cycle race of all, the Tour de France, it is accepted by all riders that if the race leader, the one wearing the yellow jersey, has a mechanical fault to his bike, or has to stop for what is euphemistically known as a ‘comfort break’ – he is not to be overtaken. Everyone slows down, and it is not uncommon to see a huge group of cyclists all taking a ‘comfort break’ at the same time as the race leader. These practices are not written down, professional cyclists just know them and obey them.
I thought of this when I read the passage from Deuteronomy we have heard this morning. The verses we read seem to have a similar feel, unwritten rules to help oil the wheels of society, not in favour of those in the lead, but in favour of the disadvantaged. So, if you loan something to a neighbour and they, as part of the deal, give you a cloak as a pledge or guarantee you must give it back to them at night so they will be warm when they sleep. You should always pay the wages of a poor man at sunset each day so they can get something to eat. You should treat aliens and orphans with justice. You should treat slaves well. Leave the odd sheaf of grain in your field after harvest for the alien, orphan or widow who may be starving.
It is easy for us to read such a passage and take this encouragement to be generous and thoughtful for granted. Behaving in line with these unwritten rules for us seems normal to most of us, but, we have to remember that these unwritten rules emerged maybe six or seven hundred years before Christ at a time when most tribes, nations and empires were fiercely focussed on themselves and their power – the poor, aliens, widows and orphans were of little or no worth. What we have read this morning from Deuteronomy was radical in the extreme. It is in such passages that we see the seeds of a way of living that fully bloomed in the life and teaching of Jesus and the writing of St Paul. In the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5) Jesus teaches, ‘if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also a second mile’. In Matthew 20 we hear a parable of Jesus where a generous landowner pays all his labourers a full days wage when only a few of them have worked a full day. In Galatians 3.28 St Paul writes ‘There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.’
We should never underestimate the influence all of this has had on much of what we take for granted today. Many humanists, atheists and agnostics today would have us believe that we developed the concept of human rights ourselves, but the historian Tom Holland in his recent book ‘Dominion’ argues that concepts like human rights, equality and caring for the weak and vulnerable have only emerged through faith traditions. In the Introduction to his book he says ‘Assumptions that I had grown up with – about how a society should properly be organised, and the principles it should uphold – were not bred of classical antiquity, still less of ‘human nature’ but very distinctively of that civilization’s Christian past. So profound has been the impact of Christianity on the development of Western civilization that it has become hidden from view’ p.xxix
It is important for us to remember this and to rejoice in it, but, of course, it is much more important that we live by the unwritten rules that began to emerge in the earliest pages of our scriptures and, we believe, found their fullest and clearest expression in the life and teaching of Jesus Christ. I would summarise the unwritten rules that should undergird our lives as disciples of Jesus as compassion, generosity and grace. We see these flickering and shimmering in the pages of Deuteronomy and other Old Testament books and we see them flowering in Jesus Christ, we see aspects of them in the best parts of our human society – the question is – as each of us seek to be obedient disciples of Jesus, do we see compassion, generosity and grace also flowering in everything we do and everything we say?
Sermon for the Second Sunday after Trinity – Canon Victoria Johnson
Sermon for the Second Sunday after Trinity
By Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Gospel: Matthew 10:24-39
The composer Beethoven, was apparently, a mercurial and sometimes ill-tempered man. When asked to play piano for polite company, he would begin with some of his slow and gentle melodies, lyrical and easy on the ear, everyone swooned at the music; it was beautiful and inoffensive. But just as the piece came to an end, he would bang down with the length of his arm on the keyboard to disturb his listeners and give them the shock of their lives. Music for Beethoven was a reflection of a world which was full of beauty and tragedy, joy and pain, music sounded the depths of human passion and was not merely the soundtrack to polite conversation. It wasn’t just a hobby – it was life or death. I think Jesus was doing much the same thing in our gospel reading. Metaphorically slamming his hands down on the piano.
As he sent out his disciples into the world he wasn’t inclined to sugar coat his message. He tells his disciples that they will be hated for following him. There was nothing covered up with Jesus that wasn’t going to be uncovered. He wasn’t going to hide the truth or the seriousness of the Gospel message. There were no secrets that wouldn’t become known.
But wait, didn’t Jesus come to bring peace to the world? Don’t we call Jesus the Prince of Peace? Jesus says ‘do you think I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you but a sword’ The division that he brings will divide families, Father against son, daughter in law against mother in law. Finally, Jesus tells those who claim to be his disciples that that they will need to take up their own cross and follow him. They need to lose their life, to gain their life. These were hard words to hear.
From the beginning Jesus never claimed that following him would be comfortable. Throughout the gospels we are presented with an image of Jesus as a man who turns the world upside down and challenges expectations. Sing Mary’s Magnificat and know that this child, hailed as the prince of peace, would also raise up the poor, send the rich away empty handed and bring down the mighty and privileged from their thrones. He was always destined to be dangerous to those who were content with the status quo and turn a blind eye to injustice. His message is one which many through the ages have found unpalatable.
There are still those today who want to silence the message of Jesus, to sweeten it so it doesn’t offend. There are still those who want to make Jesus and his message ‘safe’, by colluding with sin, silencing protest and victimizing those who speak out about racism, injustice, poverty and oppression. There are those who want to maintain that Jesus music was always ‘easy on the ear’. But sometimes the song that Jesus calls us to sing, isn’t easy for the world to listen to, sometimes it isn’t even an easy message for the church to hear, so it’s not surprising that now as then, some would rather the message of Jesus was kept private and personal. Jesus once again challenges this and says ‘what I say to you in the dark, tell in the light, and what you hear whispered, proclaim from the housetops’. That doesn’t sound very private. It sounds gloriously and dangerously public.
Anyone who saw Jesus as representing ‘business as usual’ was misreading the signs just as surely as someone who saw a dark cloud and predicted sunshine. Jesus was a radical reformer and he was never willing to conform or collude with expectations. He brings about a new social order, we call it the Kingdom of God and this Kingdom sometimes clashes with the Kingdoms of this earth and the old order of sin and death; like the encounter between hot and cold air there will be rumbles of thunder along the way.
People thought Jesus was a king and he acted like a servant, he was fully God but fully human, he said he would bring peace and yet he also brought division, he taught in the temple and ate with tax collectors and prostitutes, he would die and then he would rise again and bring us all new life. People have long tried to make Jesus more palatable for polite company. People wanted Jesus to look and behave like them. They wanted to hear the nice kind things he had to say, and leave the difficult bits out.
Jesus is the living God who turns things upside down, and constantly challenges us. He can shock us, and he doesn’t promise us an easy ride. Jesus doesn’t want to move into the house of our hearts just to slap on a few coats of fresh paint and nice new curtains. God’s word is like fire, and he is like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces.
No, when Jesus moves in to our lives he brings a bulldozer to tear down whole walls, gut the rooms down to the foundations and basically build a whole new house. That’s why the image of rebirth is such a strong one in Christianity. We have to be constantly re-born and re-built. This is why the image of losing life to gain a life is so central to the gospel message. It’s perhaps why Christian’s claim the cross to be theirs: a sign of suffering, a sign of subversion, a sign of resurrection.
These images of re-birth and re-building are ones which we as the church of today might hold on to as we emerge from Lockdown. The last few months have certainly uncovered and exposed the cracks and fractures in our world as well as revealing new futures. What kind of church are we re-building? How have our hearts been re-born? What kind of world do we want to fashion? What kind of Kingdom do we proclaim?
Anyone who follows Jesus, knows that the way of faith is not always smooth. It’s certainly not easy. Remember Paul’s journey in the book of Acts (Acts 27:1-12), as he recounts the dangers and perils he faced as he followed Christ to proclaim the good news. He said, ‘I can see that the voyage will be with danger, and much heavy loss, not only of the cargo and the ship, but also of our lives’…he understood the challenge of the Gospel.
If we sign up to this way of life, we come to expect that we will be metaphorically moving house quite a lot, we will be setting sail sometimes in the midst of a storm. We will have the rug pulled from under our feet fairly frequently. We will be re-born regularly, we will be called to rebuild again, and again and again. We will face change in our own lives, and we will all at some point see the division and discord that following Christ brings and the peace that he promises. Just when we get too comfortable, Jesus wades into our lives stirs things up and slams down his hands on the keyboard.
However, do not be afraid, he says again and again, do not fear. If we persevere, as St Paul did, if we run the race that is set before us as best as we can, if we proclaim the gospel and live it- we will be rewarded, not with an easy plastic-fantastic kind of life which is risk free, or anaesthetized to pain or challenge, but we will be rewarded with a life which exhilarates, and defies our expectations and creates within us the capacity for profound love and the deepest kind of peace and contentment.
Jesus always keeps it real, life is messy, it’s sometimes difficult but through of all this, the God we worship, the Christ we follow, knows every hair of our head. We do not travel on this journey alone. So do not be afraid of following Christ, and proclaiming the Gospel. For the one whom we follow knows life will not be trouble, need or adversity, but the one whom we follow is full of mercy and love beyond our imagining and with him beside us, we will all make a better music. For a new day has dawned, and the way to life stands open.
Amen.
‘Mr You-don’t-want- to-do-it-like-that’ – The Reverend Canon Michael Smith
Passage of scripture: Matthew 9.35-10.8
The comedian Harry Enfield had a character who regularly appeared on his TV sketch show called ‘Mr You-don’t-want-to-do-it-like-that’! Each week, wearing his flat cap and with his annoying, whiney voice Mr You-don’t-want-to-do-it-like-that would be espousing his wisdom to people who didn’t want to hear it, on parking, football, politics, flower arranging, basically anything and everything – he was one of those annoying people who always knows best. If you have a few spare moments you can find sketches of him on You Tube, but please wait until the service is over to have a look!
I thought of Mr You-don’t-want-to-do-it-like-that when I was reflecting on our gospel this morning and read ‘When he (Jesus) saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.’ Matthew 9.36. In other words, the people needed some help and some guidance. They needed leadership.
Who would be a leader of anyone or anything today? Napoleon apparently referred to the British as ‘a nation of shopkeepers’ I think he was wrong. What we are is a nation of ‘Mr You-don’t-want-to-do-it-like-thats’. I am not just thinking about politicians, I am thinking of anyone who leads a business, committee, council, school or church today – they all receive the same treatment and are bombarded by critics who are basically saying, ‘you don’t want to do it like that! Everyone seems to know better than the person actually making the hard decisions. Perhaps it was ever thus and we are just more aware of it because of new efficient ways of communicating?
I have been scratching my head this week to try and think of leaders who escape the ‘you-don’t-want-to-do-it-like-that’ brigade. The only person who comes close is the Queen, but then I remembered the criticism she received around the time of Princess Diana’s death. Then, not too surprisingly, I thought about Jesus, the Good Shepherd, surely no one would have the temerity to do a ‘you-don’t-want-to-do-it-like-that’ on Jesus? In Matthew 16 Jesus told his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem to suffer, to die and to rise again on the third day. Peter’s response was, ‘God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.’ I am sure that most of you will remember that Jesus responded to this with a robust and somewhat harsh, ‘‘Get behind me, Satan! ….’
Rather worryingly I think we all have a tendency to be Mr You-don’t-want-to-do-it-like-that with Jesus. Not openly, sometimes not even consciously, but because the leadership of Jesus is, for most of us, tied up with how we read scripture, the church we go to, the preachers we listen to, the theologians we read and the way we pray – we can all end up creating the Jesus we want to follow, the Jesus who will guide us to the place we think we want to go.
We have become so used to being ‘Mr-you-don’t-want-to-do-it-like-that’s’ that we think it’s fine to just go the way we want. We are so besotted these days with doing what we like, ticking or giving a ‘thumbs up’ to on social media, that the thought of doing something we don’t want to do, or going somewhere we don’t want to go, is anathema. But the point is that following Jesus is not easy and Jesus will lead us to places we do not want to go and challenge us to do things we do not want to do. Following Jesus does not fit comfortably into our ‘like’, ‘tick’, ‘thumbs up’ world.
When we succumb to the temptation of being ‘Mr You-don’t-want-to-do-it-like-that’ with Jesus the problem is that we have a very limited vision and are drawn always to self-interest, whereas Jesus has a vision of the Kingdom of God for all people, and in order for us to reach the Kingdom of God we sometimes have to sacrifice our own self-interest, our own ego, our own ‘likes’, our own desire to be seen to be doing or saying what others might judge is the ‘right thing’.
So, where does this lead us? If we are the harassed and helpless sheep, how do we know when we are following Jesus, our shepherd, or just doing what we want to do? The answer is, that we never really know, but if we are spending time in reflective silence and in prayer, if we are reading our bibles carefully and prayerfully, if we are being drawn to do things which are difficult and challenging, if we are acting in ways that the world is saying to us, ‘you don’t want to do it like that’, then there is a good chance that we are following Jesus.
Following Jesus, our Good Shepherd is not all about ‘me’, it is all about the kingdom of God. We are called to entrust ourselves to the Good Shepherd and not just do our own thing …
‘The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures;
he leads me beside still waters;
he restores my soul.
He leads me in right paths
for his name’s sake.
Even though I walk through the darkest valley,
I fear no evil;
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff—
they comfort me.
…….. Jesus, I am more than happy for you to do it like that ………
The good news of Jesus is one of radical inclusion – The Reverend Catriona Cummings
Sermon from Sunday 7 June
This past week, the president of the United States stood outside a church in Washington DC, with a Bible in his hand. For once he didn’t say anything. I suppose he was trying a kind of shorthand, for those who support him. Without words he was saying: I still share your values – these values. But that gesture, and its subtext, shows a complete lack of understanding of what he held in his hand.
In that, he is not unique. Leaders through the ages have sought to persuade those who support them, that they are safe, because they hold religious values. And those ‘values’ have been used again and again: against those who are on the opposite side, or different from, or useful to, the leader and their supporters.
Church and society in this country is not exempt. The scenes on the streets of American cities have also been seen on British streets. A few days ago 100 people gathered outside York Minster, socially distanced, and took a knee.
When the leader of a nation calls those peacefully protesting terrorists, the struggle is not just about people being mean, or nice to one another.
What we have heard in the stories that have been told by black people across the world, is that racism is built into the structures of our societies: this goes deep.
We see it in the higher death rates from COVID-19 amongst BAME people in this country. We see it in schools results, and university admissions. We see it in the jobs market, and the media. We see it in the criminal justice system, and we see it in the church.
This is not a black-people problem.
This is our problem.
This is us.
And it is utterly unchristian.
Today the Church remembers God as three in one, and one in three: a God who through baptism invites us into the community of God.
The invitation into the life of God, was first given to disciples who themselves were part of a persecuted people. God lifted them up – not the elite who ran Jerusalem.
Instead God in Jesus welcomed those who were fishermen at best, tax collectors at worst, and sinners all.
It was this rag-tag group to whom the Holy Spirit gave gifts of speech and prophecy, teaching and healing.
It was this group who took the message out beyond Jerusalem, to all the nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
And what was that message?
In response to that picture of Donald Trump with a Bible in his hand, many Christians have talked about the Good News of Jesus, who, in the Sermon on the Mount, said:
Blessed are the merciful,
for they will be shown mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called children of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.
But they’ve also pointed out that Jesus’ response to injustice in his Father’s house was to flip tables, and drive out the money changers.
The good news of Jesus is one of radical inclusion.
This isn’t an opportunity for us to show how ‘tolerant’ or ‘woke’ we are.
This is about God’s love for all of God’s creation.
Love which sees to the heart of a person.
Love which welcomes in.
Love which feeds and nurtures.
Love which builds up and sends out.
Love which draws us closer to God, and to one another.
Love which rejects the conventions of status, power, and lifts those who have been dismissed by others, into the heart of God.
The God we obey is a God of pure love: creative, generous, joyous.
This same God calls us now to worship.
Calls us to obey.
Calls us to go and teach others everything that Jesus has taught us.
Such a task may feel overwhelming to us.
How are we to change the course of centuries of oppression? How are we to build a new kingdom?
A few thoughts to end on. Doubt is fine: the disciples doubted, but were equipped nonetheless, by the Holy Spirit. We are not alone: Jesus, through the Spirit, is with us, to the end of the age.
We can do this.
By honouring people as precious to God – and getting to know them.
By listening, by being open to the lives of others.
By going to them, rather than expecting them to come to us.
By questioning and challenging the systems, policies and structures, which may appear to serve us well, but harm others.
By being peacemakers.
And occasionally, by flipping tables.
The journey of loss and grief – The Reverend Canon Victoria Johnson
Sermon by Victoria Johnson, Canon Precentor
Sunday 24th May 2020
Readings: Isaiah 65:17-end, Revelation 21:1-8, John 17:1-11
In the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.
The last few months have been for all of us, quite a journey. That journey, we each have to acknowledge, has been a journey through loss and grief. We have lost freedoms, we have lost certainties; plans that we may have had for March, April and May of this year, have suddenly been ripped up and thrown into the fire and it looks like any plans we may have had for the rest of this year will be disrupted too. Weddings, celebrations, travel, projects, new jobs, ordinations, schooling, exams, the list of things which have been disrupted goes on and on. Our lives have literally been turned upside down by a microscopic virus which has trampled through the whole world. Though the virus shows no partiality we have seen that the partiality in our society and the inequality in our world, has made some people more vulnerable to it than others.
Whoever we are, and whatever our situation, we have experienced a profound loss, individually and corporately and for many in our communities that loss has been tragic and devastating and many have had to say the ultimate and final farewell to those they love, and some have been unable to say the farewells they would have wished. As a nation we carry the corporate grief of losing nearly 37,000 people, that number is still sadly rising. But these are not just numbers, these are names, and lives and loves. What effect will all this grief, and all these losses have on us, as individuals and as a society and as a church?
One of the most well-referenced books on loss and grief is by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying. She reflects that after the loss of a loved one, the reality is, you will grieve forever. You will not ‘get over’ the loss, you will learn to live with it. You will heal and you will rebuild yourself around the loss you have suffered. You will be whole again but you will never be the same. Nor should you be the same nor would you want to be the same. When we experience loss of any kind, we may heal, and rebuild, and become whole again, but we will never be the same. We will have been changed and there is no doubt we have all been changed by our experiences over the last few months.
This pandemic has also upturned our notions of what church is and how we do church. As we have experienced ourselves, creating church online is not without its issues. It remains an imperfect means of representing the gathered Christian community, and it has become clear that when we do return to our church buildings our gatherings will look very different. We cannot now rewind back to what we have always done. We need to imagine a new future. The church will have been changed by this experience too.
For us here in York, our excitement about welcoming a new Archbishop and our hopes of saying a fitting farewell to an Archbishop who has served the North so wonderfully have also been thrown up into the air. This is not what anyone of us was expecting. We are all experiencing grief for what would have been. We have all said goodbye to long held hopes and dreams.
We have just heard in the Gospel of John (17:1-11), what is called the High Priestly Prayer of Jesus to his Father in heaven as he begins to face his future and say his farewells. He prays that what is yet to come, firstly his death and then glorification through the resurrection, will reveal the divine majesty of God to all people and help them build a new world in his name. He is the herald of change, the first born of a new creation.
The context of the farewell discourses as they are called, is important. We are with Jesus just after the last supper, the night before he was arrested, tortured and crucified. There is a kind of knowing in what Jesus says, he knows his end and the number of his days, but he also knows there is more to come. He is trusting his future to God, and the future of his disciples and the world he came to save.
Jesus understands loss and grief, remember he wept at the grave of Lazarus his friend. He understands the reality of a world being turned upside down because he is a sign of a new world which emerges from the old. He sees his future and beyond his future. He sees into eternity. This is his goodbye, his farewell to those he loves but he knows and understands that what is to come will ultimately glorify the Father and change the world. This is an ending which also marks a new beginning, a farewell which inaugurates a divine greeting. He is a sign of new life walking out of a stone cold tomb. He is the change.
Jesus prays for his disciples, those he is leaving behind, he prays that they may be one, that they are united and bound together through love, that they will be protected as children of God. He is praying for the embryonic church, that it may flourish and blossom and bear fruit, through and beyond a time of testing, a time of grief and a time of uncertainty.
The disciples are confused and upset about this coming and going of Jesus, they are distraught that Jesus speaks of leaving them, but they do not yet realise that the limitations of their earthly imagination will soon be overwhelmed by the reality of God being with them for all eternity.
Soon they will come to understand that from loss comes hope, from despair comes joy, from uncertainty comes faith, from death comes life. They will learn through Christ, how to see the world differently and how to carry the losses and the griefs that come with being fully human just as Jesus in his risen body also carried the wounds of the nails on his hands and his feet.
Jesus Farewell discourse with his Father actually begins to open up for his disciples a new future for the whole of humanity. Stephen Cottrell, our Archbishop designate, said this week ‘we’re all having to re-imagine how we live our lives and how we inhabit the world. What inspired me to follow Jesus is that vision of a new humanity that I see in him.’
That vision of a new humanity is laid out in the readings from the prophet Isaiah and the book of Revelation that we heard in morning prayer. In Christ we are promised a new heaven and a new earth, no more weeping, or cry of distress, houses will be built, vineyards planted, enemies will become friends. A new city will come down from heaven as a bride adorned for her husband, the former things will pass away and God is making all things new.
This is a vision of the Kingdom of God, a vision of what the resurrection means for the world, a vision for a people who will never be left alone, but always surrounded by the love of God. It is a vision of hope and comfort, but it is, and let us not ignore the fact, also a vision of change.
This week the whole church makes a prayer to God ‘Thy Kingdom Come’. In our current situation, we might begin to reflect on what that invocation means in our world today and what it means for each one of us personally. Despite the pain and the loss and the grief we are all experiencing in so many different ways, and the wounds that we will carry with us, perhaps we are being given the time to imagine a new future where the cities we are called to rebuild after this crisis reflect more closely the kingdom of God we pray for. When we pray Thy Kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven, we are praying for change, we are asking God to make all things new.
We hear very often these days, the phrase, ‘the new normal’- what will our new normal be like? We are told things will not be the same after COVID-19. And why should they be? We will not ‘get over’ the loss we have borne, we will learn to live with it. We will heal and we will rebuild our lives around the loss we have suffered. We will be whole again but we will never be the same. Nor should we be the same nor would we want to be the same.
Six weeks ago, we celebrated the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, and remembered once again that in him is life, in him is a new creation. As we all grieve what we have lost in the last three months, and say our farewells to what might have been, we also look to what Jesus Christ promises us and begin to live into that promise. We continue to celebrate the resurrection each day of our lives knowing that from death comes life.
Jesus calls us to lift up our eyes and imagine a new future, a new humanity, and perhaps even a new beginning. He calls us to imagine a refashioning of creation itself, and look to a new dawn, a new day, a new heaven, and a new earth.
We pray, Thy Kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven. Amen.
Commandment is to Love One Another – The Reverend Catriona Cummings
Thy Kingdom Come
AUDIO
Jesus said: I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.
These are the commandments Jesus gives those who follow him.
These commandments are not given or received lightly.
They are given as Jesus is preparing for the cross, and received by men and women who knew that the cost of this life of love could be their own deaths.
The love that Jesus commands, and that Jesus shows, is selfless, and constant. It is life-enhancing, indeed it is life-giving, even as it leads Jesus to lay down his life for his friends.
These commandments are given so that God’s kingdom – a kingdom of justice and peace – may grow.
Jesus is going to the Father. But he says to his friends:
Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father.
How is that possible?
The disciples do not have a stellar record thus far, when Jesus is physically present with them.
They are confounded by what he does and what he says.
They are frightened, and flee when it comes to his moment of trial.
How then, are they to do greater works even than he?
And how are we, frightened and constrained in so many ways, to follow in their steps?
Well, through the advocate.
The Spirit of Truth.
The Paraclete.
I wonder how long it took the disciples to recall these promises of safety, and presence, after the events at Calvary.
I know that when I am frightened, or worried, I need time to remember God’s presence and promise.
Throughout this Easter season we have been following the stations of the resurrections – accounts of the appearance of the resurrected Jesus in the Gospels.
Today’s station is also from John’s Gospel:
When he had said this, Jesus breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.’
As he has done throughout the Gospels, Jesus shows his love for his disciples, and for the world by action.
He does not expect the disciples to be perfect before he acts, but reaches out again and again, teaching them, providing for them, and loving them.
Each year at Easter, indeed each Sunday, we celebrate that active, expansive love, which Christ showed through the cross – and the promises kept to his disciples and to the church they built.
We do so with God present among us, because the promise of an advocate was kept too.
Jesus, ascending to the Father, did not leave his friends alone and frightened.
God’s spirit is given to the disciples, and to all who are baptised in Christ.
To this day we pray and worship in the power of the Spirit and in union with Christ.
I do not believe that the gift of the Holy Spirit turns the disciples into caped crusaders.
They are not superheroes, or demi-gods, and neither are we.
They, and we are human beings, subject to doubt, fear, jealousy, and any number of failings.
But they, and we, are not alone, and our humanity, which God cherishes, is transformed by the love of God, into the body of Christ.
Just as Jesus did not expect the disciples to be perfect before he invited them to be friends, to eat, and work together, so the Spirit does not wait for us to be perfect.
We need only ask, and God is there.
Jesus says to his disciples ‘I will not leave you orphaned.’
When we feel alone, and frightened, we need to remind ourselves of this promise, kept through centuries.
God is with us, indeed dwells within us, as close as our own breath.
That promise holds.
We are not alone.
Next week Thy Kingdom Come, an annual global commitment to prayer, begins once more.
Each day from Ascension to Pentecost, we will as a community pause and reflect on another station of the resurrection.
We will rejoice together, that God’s kingdom is near, and pray for the gift of the spirit, to comfort, equip, and inspire us he did the first disciples 2000 years ago.
Even in isolation, we can still witness to God’s kingdom, and pray for its fulfilment.
I was reminded of that powerfully this week, as I went into the Minster for the first time since lockdown began, to light the paschal candle, and pray for those who have been affected by the coronavirus.
It was one of the most powerful moments in my ministry.
Standing in front of the symbol of the light of Christ, I prayed the Lord’s prayer – a prayer which has been said in that place by countless people over the centuries.
That prayer, prayed through the Spirit, can be a space where we are reminded of God’s constancy, and where we meet God each day.
A life lived in love does not mean an easy life.
But love builds up hope and life as nothing else can, and enables us to live lives that build a kingdom, even in the midst of strange and fearful times.
In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.
The God who longs to be ‘at home’ with us – The Revd Canon Maggie McLean
Since Holy Week rooms have featured many times in our readings.
The upper room;
the disciples behind locked doors;
and now the ‘many rooms’ of eternity.
Of course, alongside these reading we have seen services taking place in all kinds of different rooms as we each take part in worship from our own homes.
Place is important.
When I do a funerals visit I often ask where the person who has died liked to be.
Did they have a favourite room?
Was there a chair by a window where they sat and enjoyed the view?
Maybe a garden or allotment?
The places we choose to be can unravel a lot about us; about the things we value and the space where we feel safe; comfortable – ‘at home’.
Often we feel that in our homes we can ‘be ourselves’.
When the front door closes we can relax and stop worrying what anyone thinks about us.
Our appearance matters less; what we wear or if we’ve put our feet up.
Home can be the perfect place for us to unwind.
Of course this is not the case for everyone – but is the reality most would choose.
There’s a lot about rooms and home in John chapter 14.
It’s an account of the teaching Jesus gave his disciples after Judas leaves the last supper. Night has come and Jesus is eager to speak with his followers during these last hours of his freedom.
Given what’s about to happen the teaching at first seems to be about the afterlife. About a place where, after all the suffering that is to come, the disciples will be at home with him in eternity.
But I don’t think we can see it simply in these terms.
It falls to Thomas to ask the blunt question which takes the teaching further.
There’s no Sat Nav; there’s no road map; how on earth are the disciples supposed to get to their heavenly future?
Jesus presses home the teaching he’s tried to give his followers so often. He seems to tell them to stop thinking in a limited way.
Forget the map – you need a person. Jesus: the route; the reality; the resurrection. Jesus is the co-ordinates and the vehicle; the bridge and the destination.
This time, Thomas isn’t alone in his forthright speaking. Philip hears what Jesus says but wants a bit more – or a lot more.
‘Just show us the Father – just a peak, and we’ll be right with you!’ I don’t know who to feel more sorry for – Jesus or the disciples.
Jesus presses on. See me – see the Father. See the Father – witness the Son.
I find this conversation so reassuringly normal!
We are so like these disciples – well, at least I feel I am. We always want just a little bit more. More evidence, more proof. Because then it’s not our choice – it becomes a given.
But Jesus says it isn’t like that. There is a leap of faith, a step we are all called to take to find what our heart truly desires.
We need to prise our fingers from the side of the boat and step onto the waves. It’s never easy.
When we take that step we are promised that God will keep faith with us. It’s not just about the rooms to come – the home we will make with God in the far future.
What we learn from this Gospel is that we can be at home with God now.
We can ask our deepest questions and be answered with love. God doesn’t want a show of faith or a performance of belief.
God wants to love us as our ‘at home’ self. The honest self that makes no effort to play a part for the world.
These first 14 verses of John’s Gospel only ever make sense to me if we hold them in mind with verse 23.
Jesus has spoken about the future rooms, already prepared, in his Father’s house. But in his discussion with the disciples we learn that God isn’t just there in the distance, he’s here now, in front of us.
Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.
So in verse 23 we aren’t given the image of a God we’re moving towards but instead Jesus tells his followers about a God who reaches into us.
When we love God, Jesus and the Father come to us. Not just come to us, but promising to make their home with us.
Those many rooms are already in the lives of those who have welcomed God and embraced the Son.
I want to finish with a few words by the poet RS Thomas that capture this sense that our movement towards God is always met by an even speedier movement towards us. In his poem “Gloria” Thomas says this:
Because you are not there
When I turn, but are in the turning, Gloria
Many of us are having to learn in a new way what it means to be at home.
Perhaps we can use some of this time, and this experience, to reflect on the God who longs to be ‘at home’ with us.
Who, even as we make the most modest move towards that truth, is already at our side – loving our at-home-self more than any other version of our lives.
Life in Abundance – Dr Christopher Collingwood (Chancellor)
Sunday 3rd May 2020 – Online Eucharist
John 10:1-10
Two or three weeks ago there was a news item on BBC Look North which made a considerable impression on me. It concerned a man – in his early- to mid-seventies, I should think – whose name I can’t quite remember, except that it was unusual. His first name sounded rather more like a surname – something like Lyle – although I don’t think that was it. Anyway, whatever his name actually was, Lyle’s what I’m going to call him.
The news report began with pictures of what has now become a rather familiar ritual of a restored Covid-19 patient being discharged from hospital through a line of applauding NHS staff. Nothing was mentioned as being of particular note about Lyle, compared with anyone else who’d survived, but perhaps the staff had glimpsed something in him of what came across in the interview that followed.
Lyle lived, as I recall, somewhere near Middlesbrough and he seemed to be fairly well-off. Interviewed in his garden, the house in the background looked rather like a country house or a modest stately home. He described something of what he’d been through: the struggle to breathe, the wonderful medical and nursing staff, and his weight loss, about a third of his body weight. What made such a lasting impression on me, though, was his characterisation of what his life was like having come through the illness. It was utterly different. In the first place, he was just so grateful to be alive. Secondly, having been through his ordeal, he was now experiencing life in a completely new way. It was as if he was encountering everything for the first time, and it was all full of joy, wonder and delight. Previously, he’d taken life for granted, perhaps, but now he understandably treasured every single breath. Birdsong was exquisite, the beauty of flowers overwhelmed him, and he said he could happily live on NHS food every day of his life, so fantastic did it taste! He seemed to me like someone who’d been released after a long spell in captivity. Now he was totally liberated and utterly exuberant as a result. So heightened was his newly-acquired appreciation of the sheer wonder and gift of life, it was as if he’d been born again. And this new birth had about it a quality of abundance.
‘I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly,’ said Jesus. Whenever I visualise abundance, the image that comes immediately to mind is that of the Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, which I visited when I was 18, where gallons and gallons and gallons of water endlessly cascade over a sheer drop. Something of this kind of abundance is conveyed in the story of the Wedding at Cana, where Jesus transforms gallons of water into wine. So, too, in the miraculous transformation of just five barley loaves and two fish into enough food to feed 5000 people, after which there are still 12 baskets-full left over. All this is a symbol, of course, of the unending, limitless nature of God’s life.
This life, though, isn’t marked primarily by quantity but quality. When Jesus also speaks in John’s Gospel of the gift of eternal life, the instinctive way we conceive of this is in terms of quantity of life, of life that doesn’t come to an end as a result of death. Eternal life, literally meaning ‘the life of the age to come,’ isn’t so much to do with longevity, though, as with the divine life-charged quality of every moment, to which we’re invited to wake up. I’ve no idea what Lyle’s religious beliefs are and, in one sense, they’re of little consequence, because Lyle’s transformed perspective demonstrates that he now experiences precisely this quality of eternal life at first hand; he savours every moment, cherishes the tiniest things, and seemingly vibrates in harmony with every aspect of life as it unfolds for him, as if life itself were a completely new discovery.
Lyle’s brush with death, though, also brings to light, a paradox that lies at the heart of life and which the gospel itself illuminates, which is that in order truly to wake up, to know and live this quality of life in abundance, we have to be prepared to let go of it, to die. Real life can only ever be lived in an open-handed way. This is what Jesus tries to tell Nicodemus, that we have to undergo a death of sorts in order to experience another birth, one which requires us to open our hands and let go of what we cling to – life as we think we know it – in order to receive life as we can scarcely imagine it, and yet which is our birthright. We have to be born from above, from the Spirit, the Lord the Giver of Life, and live every moment in freedom, trust and abandonment, for the wind blows where it chooses.
In order to enter through the gate of the sheepfold of which Jesus speaks, we have to let go of our ego, to die to our small, limited, narrow self, and awaken to a larger, unlimited self, which embraces all things and all people, and whose nature is love. This is the self which Jesus reveals, and this is why he himself is the gate to the sheepfold, because he lives not from the ego but from the expansive, inclusive, unlimited spaciousness of love. This is the shepherd-voice of real life and love, which knows that its truth sounds only in the letting go of self. By contrast, it’s the ego that’s the thief or bandit trying to climb in by another way for its own narrow, self-centred motives. It’s only by dying that we discover the real quality of life, one which is indestructible, and which is God’s gift to all, whether they know it or not.
In one sense, we can be grateful, perhaps, if we haven’t had to endure what Lyle’s been through. Covid-19 is having devastating consequences for many. What price would we be prepared to pay, though, I wonder, to experience life as Lyle experiences it now in the wake of Covid-19? And how might we begin to experience life as he does without having to undergo a similar brush with physical death? In small and simple ways, perhaps, like taking time to appreciate the sheer gift of life in all its many aspects, in the delicate and intricate beauty of a flower, in the kaleidoscopic taste of food, in the smallest of everyday acts of kindness, love and compassion that sustain us. Even just being aware of the miracle of the breath and being grateful for this breath that we’re breathing right now, as if it were our first – or our last. Then, with time and patience and practice, we might begin to experience every moment as filled with life in abundance.