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.
Peace be With You – The Reverend Daniel Jones
Peace be with you
Sunday 19th April 2020 – Easter 2 – York Minster
John 20: 19-31
“Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book.” John 20:30
Today, we meet Jesus in lockdown … just like those first disciples did. Little time has passed since the resurrection, the disciples haven’t had a week since celebrating Easter, just a few hours, and now they are terrified and locked together in a room. Some are beginning to believe that Jesus has risen but Thomas says” Unless I can see the holes that the nails made in his hands and can put my finger into the holes they made, and unless I can put my hand into his side, I refuse to believe.” And then Jesus appears to “doubting Thomas.”.
The title “doubting Thomas” sounds as though it has an air of criticism about it, but I’m not sure that that it is wholly justifiable to criticise Thomas. What Thomas does here is to recognise his own needs. He needs physical evidence in order to believe and, far from pouring scorn on Thomas for his doubt as many have later come to do, Jesus meets him in his need. He does not try to change him but appears to Thomas physically in an encounter that will shape the whole of his future.
Is Thomas wrong to have this need for a physical encounter? I don’t think so. Had the Gospel reading begun just a few verses earlier we would have seen Peter and the beloved disciple arriving at the tomb to look for Jesus. What makes them believe in the resurrection is apparently the way in which the cloths that had wrapped the body are lying on the floor, but the cloth that had covered his head was rolled up in a place by itself. Modern readers often miss the significance of this. Jesus was a tekton, often translated carpenter but probably more akin to a handiman. Those in his trade would have folded their work cloths in
a very particular way and so for these two disciples that little glimpse of their friend in the way that he did things left them in no doubt that he had left the tomb and returned to the world.
If we had started the Gospel reading just a few verses before that, we would have read of Mary Magdalene’s visit to the tomb. Later in her story we find her weeping in the garden and what brings her to believe that Jesus has risen is the sound of Jesus calling her name. Thomas, Peter, John, Mary … all of them have their lives changed by an encounter with the risen Christ. But all of them are called differently according to their needs not according to a set formula. Thomas’s story is a reminder that different things affect different people. God changes different lives in different ways. Today you and I are in lockdown too, but even here, we are called to look for encounters with the risen Christ. Even now, God’s voice is calling out to us both in what we see and in what we do and in what we hear. Just as we are, what you and I have to do is look out for the small ways in which God is
calling out to us, meeting us in our needs as Jesus comes among us and says, ‘Peace be with you.’ And today, as we gather in our own locked room, the lips that Jesus will speak those words with, are yours.
Today, just like every day, people around the world are desperately longing to encounter the risen Christ
just where they are, one who meets them in their needs and speaks peace to them. And in this locked room Jesus says to you and to me, “… 20 As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’ 22 When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’ In a few moments time, each of us will speak the words that Jesus did: “Peace be with you.” That’s because
we know that we are called to be people who look for encounters with the risen Christ in every person and in every moment. Today, in lockdown, perhaps that’s in medics, and delivery drivers, and our armed forces, and our politicians, and even in our own families. John wrote that, “Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book.” So as you continue to look for those signs of the risen Christ, meeting you in your needs and calling you to do the same for others, may peace be with you.
Amen.
Life Happens – The Reverend Canon Dr Christopher Collingwood (Chancellor)
Palm Sunday 5 April 2020 – Online Eucharist
Matthew 21:1-11
AUDIO:
By the time my Mum died, she’d managed to amass a wonderful array of fridge magnets, ranging from the humorous to the serious. Two always used to catch my eye. The first would invariably make me smile, ‘We plan; God laughs!’ The second never failed to bring me up short. It contained a line from a song by John Lennon, one of the 1960’s pop group, the Beatles. Beautiful Boy was written in 1980 for his young son Sean, and towards the end we hear these words: ‘Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.
We’re always busy making plans: for holidays, for what to buy at the supermarket, for how to celebrate a wedding. Right now, planning’s going on with a vengeance, from government downwards, across this country and throughout the world, in response to Covid19, and it’s absolutely vital and necessary; lives and livelihoods depend on it.
Behind all our plans lie certain expectations, not least that we’ll be able to bring our plans to completion and that things will go the way we anticipate. Many are fortunate to see plans come to fruition: for starting a family, for a building project, for establishing a new business. It’s not always like that, though: life happens, life takes over, life intervenes, and all our plans go out of the window.
Barely weeks ago, many of us might have expected to gather today outside the Mansion House in York to begin our Palm Sunday procession to the Cathedral. The Precentor would have made elaborate plans for the smooth running of the service: palm crosses would have been ordered, the brass band invited, rotas sent out, and the donkeys booked. Which of us could have predicted then that we’d be taking part in this service from the confines of our own homes, effectively under lockdown? It would have seemed unimaginable. But then life happened, upsetting all our plans and expectations.
On the surface, it appears very different from that first Palm Sunday, but I wonder. The gospel narrative itself suggests a degree of planning in advance. Jesus himself had arranged for donkeys to be available, two disciples were despatched to collect them, and a crowd seems to have assembled in anticipation of something historic taking place in the city of Jerusalem. What were the expectations of the crowd, though? What kind of a king did they think they were acclaiming? Perhaps the hopes and expectations of many were invested in and projected on to Jesus: that at last there’d be a king to overthrow the hated Romans, and that, after centuries of occupation and oppression, another golden age like that of King David would be inaugurated. It was so full of promise and hope.
But then life happened. Within days, this ‘King of the Jews’ was betrayed, arrested, subjected to a mock trial, tortured and executed, dying an ignominious death on a cross as a common criminal. All the pent-up hopes and aspirations of a forlorn people, all the mental planning for the day that was so longed for, all the expectations for the future, evaporated into thin air in moments. Above all, the people had longed for God and they’d dared to hope that God had come in the person of Jesus, but then life happened.
Good Friday, of course, is the supreme example of how we can’t plan life, of how things don’t always go the way we expect and, most of all, of how we can’t control God. God happens, so often in unexpected ways, and constantly breaks free of the limitations of our expectations and plans. Who in their right minds would have expected God to happen on a cross, in the midst of suffering and death? We could have planned God in a much better way, couldn’t we? And yet that wouldn’t have been God, not the God we see in Jesus.
So here we are with a global pandemic turning our lives upside down and inside out. Life has happened. Can we dare to see God in it, as we see God on the cross? It’s an unpalatable thought, isn’t it? It offends all our sensibilities, and it would be the height of insensitivity to dismiss in a cavalier fashion the suffering and deaths of so many. But what we see above all else on the cross is the immense love and compassion of God embodied in the one hanging and suffering there, containing, embracing, enfolding everything and everyone in it. The cross invites us to see in it more than just suffering and death, but also to find in it the love and compassion of God, present, paradoxically, in the most seemingly God-forsaken circumstances. Jesus shows this love and compassion to be not just who God is, but who we truly are, too. And we can see it, can’t we? Love and compassion are happening across the world in ways we could scarcely have expected, revealing who we really are. With this divinely-grounded love and compassion we can meet everything that occurs when life happens, including Covid19. For when life happens, God happens.
Reflection for Passion Sunday – The Reverend Catriona Cumming
The Revd Catriona Cumming, Succentor
AUDIO:
Inevitably over the past week or so, my mind has been on people I love: some I talk to regularly, and others who are more remote. Each of us has no doubt been thinking about those whose presence in our lives we have taken for granted, and how we can support them.
The icon pictured sits on my piano. It’s known as the icon of friendship and was given to me by a friend. I’ve looked at it a fair bit over the past few days, as I have prayed for people, and I have been struck by the contact within it, in this world where that is no longer possible for many of us. I have also been struck by the cracks which run down the icon: cracks which seem to, but actually don’t quite, cut off the figures, one from the other.
Our relationship with God needs careful attention as much as our relationships with our families and friends. This Lent, perhaps more than in previous years, we need to tend to that relationship, and find new ways of keeping in touch, of speaking, and listening.
We also need to be kind to ourselves, allow ourselves to feel doubt and uncertainty, and share those things, as well as the silly stories, memes, and photos.
As we enter Passiontide we will glimpse once more, the depth of God’s love for us.
As is so often the case, we see this love in Jesus’ care for the people immediately around him, but also for those who come long after Lazarus, Mary, Martha and the others are laid in the ground.
Today we remember Jesus’ love for his friends, his compassion, and we see where he will go for us: down to the grave itself.
God does this for us. We don’t earn it by being especially good, or even especially good at being in touch.
Over the next few weeks and months our relationships will be tested, including with God. As we look for ways to support one another, it is worth keeping that icon in mind. Though we may feel ourselves cut off from God, those cracks will not divide us. God will reach out to us, again and again.
We are not alone.
