An Inconvenient Prophecy – Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Title: An Inconvenient Prophecy
Preacher: Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Date: 10 December 2023, Second Sunday of Advent
Readings: 1 Kings 22:12–28, Romans 15:4–13
Power has the tendency to shape the things that are said around it. When someone has power to make our lives easier, or harder, it becomes tempting simply to say what the person wishes to hear. A rather cynical friend once told a newly consecrated bishop that two things in his life were about to change. ‘What things?’ the bishop enquired. ‘You’ll never have to pay for lunch again, and no one will ever tell you the truth’.
Well, I suspect that those days have gone (to some extent), but the story illustrates the idea that power can alter relationships in ways that aren’t always constructive or helpful. Our first reading this evening seems a rather odd story. It begins with all the prophets urging the King to go up against Ramoth-gilead, because they believe God will give it into the King’s hand. We hear that all ‘the prophets with one accord are favourable to the king’.
But then there’s Micaiah. Micaiah was a prophet with a reputation for being independent.
He didn’t simply go with the crowd or say what people wanted to hear. That’s a risky way to live and I’m sure that it caused Micaiah a lot of trouble.Indeed, in tonight’s reading from first Kings we find that Micaiah wasn’t with the rest of the prophets. He needed to be summoned to be present and give his prophecy to the King. Perhaps, like Jonah, Micaiah decides that keeping out of the way might be better than telling the King what he had in his heart to say. Who knows? Micaiah is urged to conform but replies that he’ll have to speak whatever the Lord has given him to say.
Yet, surprisingly, that doesn’t happen. Micaiah does conform and makes his prophecy fit with that of the other prophets. Fascinatingly, the King won’t accept this. Perhaps the King senses that Micaiah is simply playing along with the others and his characteristic passion is missing. In any event, he demands that Micaiah tells him the truth. And the truth isn’t what the King wants to hear. A leader of the group of prophets, Zedekiah, then intervenes and gives Micaiah a slap. But Micaiah won’t abandon the conviction he has in the prophecy God has given to him. So, our reading ends with Micaiah put in prison on half rations.
As I said, telling a truth that doesn’t bend to the liking of power isn’t a comfortable place to be. If you’ve read the Hilary Mantel novels about Thomas Cromwell, or seen the adaptations for TV or the stage, you’ll know just how terrible absolute power can be. In Bring Up The Bodies Mantel writes the following about Henry VIII:
“You can be merry with the king, you can share a joke with him. But as Thomas More used to say, it’s like sporting with a tamed lion. You tousle its mane and pull its ears, but all the time you’re thinking, those claws, those claws, those claws.”
In Advent there’s another courageous prophet who won’t bend to the will of a King. It’s John the Baptist and the King is Herod. Out in the wilderness John is like an earthquake disturbing the settled landscape of religious belief and custom. The tremors even reach as far as Jerusalem. John is there, preparing the way of the Lord – doing his best to alert the people to what’s coming. It’s not a message that Herod likes. John is preaching change, and the future he is describing is a danger to the people in power. As with Micaiah, John’s determination to speak truth to power will land him in prison – and then lead to his execution.
As we hear in the letter to the Romans, God’s desire is for harmony. The church should be an example of peace, in which we welcome one another just as Christ welcomes us. Yet, even here, when prophecy leads to change it generally ends in some sort of conflict.
The extension of evangelism into the Gentile world didn’t please everyone. When prophetic vision says God is calling us to change, it isn’t good news for everyone. In Romans St Paul celebrates the message of joy that comes to the Gentiles, and he wants the unity and peace of the church, but that is seldom what happens.
Prophets who do their job well and faithfully don’t often get a reward in this life. The poet TS Eliot wrote the following words for a tempter in his play Murder in the Cathedral: ‘The easy man lives to eat the best dinners’.
On half rations Micaiah in prison knew the cost of not saying the thing which a King wanted to hear. John the Baptist – also in prison – would lose his life to the whim of Herod when Herod was enjoying a very good dinner.
In Advent perhaps what we don’t want to hear, matters most – and making the effort to listen to those who make us feel least comfortable is the hard task of this season. Just as Advent begins with the call for us to be ‘stirred up’, this Sunday reminds us that we need to pay attention to the stirrers.
The people God calls to challenge our complacency and to make us alert, ‘now in the time of this mortal life’. It is a calling that can be very costly, but the Kingdom of God breaks into our world, in part, due to the faithful determination of the prophets sent to us in each and every generation.
“If you prick us do we not bleed?” – Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Title: “If you prick us do we not bleed?
Preacher: Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Readings: Isaiah 64. 1–9, 1 Corinthians 1. 3–9, Mark 13. 24–end
Date: 3 Dec 2023, First Sunday of Advent
There is no doubt that the people of Israel have a troubled history. As we know, part of that history of antisemitism and violence lies in the past of this city. It was very moving recently to be at Clifford Tower, here in York, to hear the actor Tracy-Ann Oberman speaking about her experiences of growing up and experiencing discrimination. She was speaking just before dashing to the Royal Theatre to star as Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. Before leaving, Tracy-Ann recited one of the most famous speeches of the play when Shylock pleads the case of our common humanity. ‘If you prick us do we not bleed?’
Tragically, the Jewish people also have a deeply troubled present. Standing beside Tracy-Ann was Rabbi Elisheva, the first resident Rabbi in York for 800 years. Rabbi Elisheva prayed for peace – an intercession made all the more poignant and as it was spoken on the site where so many of the Jews of Medieval York lost their lives.
Understandably, the experiences of the people of Israel and Judah often left them asking where God was in their time of need. More than that, on occasion it led the people to blame God for their misfortunes. A few verses before the passage from Isaiah we heard read this morning, the prophet portrays the people questioning God as follows:
Why, O Lord, do you make us stray from your ways and harden our heart, so that we do not fear you?
It is out of this sense of abandonment and desolation that Isaiah addresses God at the beginning of chapter 64 – begging for God to come down, tangibly and powerfully, to intervene and save the chosen people. It is almost as though Isaiah is reminding God of what it means to be God. That God is like a small fire becoming a blaze; still water beginning to boil; the steady ground that begins to shake. Isaiah wants God to be stirred up and present in the midst of trouble. This is the God who does unexpected and awesome deeds. Without God the people are like autumn leaves, and their iniquities are the wind that strips the trees bare.
Isaiah’s plea and petition for God to return to the people is a fitting start to Advent. The prophet appears to imagine an apocalyptic appearance of the Divine: ‘O that you would tear open the heavens and come down’. It is a theme which continues in our Gospel reading from Mark. Here the Son of Man is seen as coming in clouds with great power and glory, with the sun darkened, and stars falling from heaven. It is an overwhelming image. Both Isaiah and Jesus call us to be awake and watchful, conscious that all our striving and anxieties will come to an end. In time, God’s time, history will be completed and both heaven and earth shall pass away.
But I think that there’s also another message woven into these prophesies of the end time. Because the end time has already begun. The fruits of the Kingdom of God can already be tasted ‘now, in the time of this mortal life’. The Risen Christ is present and active in the world, not yet appearing in clouds of splendour, but appearing in the acts of love and peace, the acts of forgiveness and reconciliation which are the works of grace. Wherever women and men recognise their common inheritance as children of God – to recognise, as Shylock says in the play, that all people are: Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means.
At the end of our reading from Isaiah the prophet writes in words notably similar to those of Shylock: We are the clay, and you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.
As we begin Advent, and journey towards Christmas, we think of the end times and also the acts of love now that are a foretaste of what is to come. At the most basic level it is simply to recognise and act upon our common humanity. To remember that we are all made in the image of God and that God’s love is for each and for all.
In both our readings today there is an explosive sense of God’s mighty descent to us in power and splendour. Yet in the Christian faith God does something completely unexpected. Perhaps the almighty potter recognises that stubborn humanity is going to need a bit more than another turn on the wheel. Remarkably, the days of Advent bring us to the moment when the potter becomes the clay.
God enters our world as a baby and knows that when we are tickled, we laugh; that when it is winter, we are cold and when it is summer, we are warm. And to know, in the bitter agony of Good Friday, that when we are pricked, we bleed. God in Christ dignifies the experience of being human. The gulf between the maker and the material of making, is closed.
Isaiah speaks repeatedly about the ‘presence’ of God and in Advent we are called to be alert to God appearing in ways that both challenge and surprise. And we are reminded, powerfully, of the sacredness of our common humanity.
‘We owe this charity to ourselves’ – Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Preacher: Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Date: 5 November, Fourth Sunday before Advent
The teaching at the end of our second reading today sounds lovely – and it almost sounds easy: ‘Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you’.
But down the centuries we know that those who have truly lived this ethic do so at great personal cost. It is not the way of the world.
The way of the world seems to say: ‘hate those who hate you and do to them, as they’ve done to you’. That feels like the reality of our world.
Writing about the suffering of Christ the contemporary poet NS Thompson talks about the ‘Silent Messiah’ and the love God ‘interposed’ on the cross. And that sounds the right word to describe the way love is called to intervene in the cycles of violence and hatred in our world. Without the remarkable people who interpose themselves between hatred and revenge, rage and retribution, I think our world would be in an even worse state than it is today. We see it in the lives of the twentieth century martyrs including Oscar Romero, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Esther John. People whose love and faith led them to interpose themselves in situations of division and hatred.
But I’m sure that these people, and the many more whose names we don’t know, would acknowledge the importance of the people who loved them and prayed for them. Christians are never alone, and it reminds us that even when we aren’t able to be in these situations, it’s vital that we support the people who are. There have been moments in history when hope has broken through in ways that are both surprising and inspiring.
In the year 1076 AD, the Muslim ruler of present-day Algeria wrote to Pope Gregory VII. He wrote because there were Christians in his Kingdom and they needed a Bishop to support them – and he asked the Pope to supply one. The reply from the Pope is remarkable, and hopeful, and includes the following:
‘The Almighty God, who wishes that all should be saved and none lost, approves nothing in so much as that after loving Him we should love our neighbour, and that we should not do to others, what we do not want done to ourselves.
You and we owe this charity to ourselves, especially because we believe in and confess one God, admittedly, in a different way, and daily praise and venerate him, the creator of the world and ruler of this world’.
For me, the key phrase in this unusual communication is that ‘we owe this charity to ourselves’.
In other words, that violence and endless hostility diminishes us as much as the people we oppose. It is a rare glimmer of hope in an age when, like today, violence linked to religion is a cause of so much concern to everyone. Those who persist in seeking peace in such situations, recognising that ‘we owe this charity to ourselves’, are needed in our world more than ever.
We have seen that peace can grow in the most unpromising places. Northern Ireland and South Africa offer two examples. They are not without problems and challenges today, but they are much better places than they were during the most intense times of conflict. Children go to school – people have access to basic supplies and the freedom to travel.
Jesus knew the cost of placing himself in the midst of hatred. He knew that healing isn’t some kind of soppy well-wishing, but a task that requires tremendous resources. In our reading we heard how, when he healed, ‘power came out from him’. There is no doubt that absorbing the pain of others, and putting right the wounds of the world, demands all the strength God can give us.
In our final hymn, which we shall sing in a few moments, we are reminded of all the saints who have gone before us. Like the vision of Daniel, the words capture that place of perfection and peace to which we are called. There the saints and martyrs are dressed in dazzling brightness, and attired in God’s truth. Woe, anguish and tears have ended, and they have found the peace which the world could not give.
We are bidden by God to love our enemies – because endless hatred resolves nothing. To live Christ’s story means to seek healing and, sometimes, to interpose ourselves to bring cycles of suffering to an end. Along with the saints, that great cloud of witnesses, we recognise that endless conflict is a kind of insanity. Because we are all one people, sharing this small planet, and we owe this charity to ourselves.
To shine as a light in the world – Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Preacher: Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Date: 15 October, Nineteenth Sunday after Trinity
I don’t know what to say.
There is such darkness in the news of the last week. It can feel as though our words tumble into an abyss of chaos and despair. As the Church we’re called to engage with the world in which we live, to seek peace and pursue it. But it can feel an impossible task – facing an enormity of horror and violence which defies our comprehension.
Christians have always borne the suffering of this world with the hope of a Kingdom yet to come, a paradise which will – one day – be restored. As our opening hymn put it:
There for ever and for ever
alleluia is outpoured;
for unending, for unbroken,
is the feast-day of the Lord.
Today so much feels broken, and the vision of what is to come can feel a long, long way off – and we don’t know what to say to those who hunger and thirst for that peace to be here, for all of us, now. For healing to overcome the wounds of so much injury, bereavement and hurt.
And then the prophecy of Isaiah, our first reading. Of a God who is ‘a refuge to the poor, a refuge to the needy in their distress, a shelter from the rainstorm and a shade from the heat’. No God worth worshipping wants destruction to be the final word. Rather, when we walk the darkest path, we yearn for a God who will light our way and bring us comfort.
When Paul wrote to the Philippians he knew that encouragement is needed. The early church was hard pressed and persecuted. In the face of divisions and discord, outward threats and inner tensions, Paul continues to encourage the Christians of Philippi to ‘rejoice’. Paul is convinced in the Gospel message that in God’s time, ultimately, all this suffering and sorrow will be reconciled and redeemed.
Paul’s call to the Christian community was to live that future hope today. To model gentleness and care for those who are traumatised by the harshness of human life. He exhorts the church to think about the things now which bear the stamp of the things to come: ‘whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise’. Even in the darkness of this passing age there are astonishing examples of kindness; of care and of love that somehow breach the walls of hatred.
In our Gospel Jesus tells the parable of a wedding banquet. It’s a parable of the Kingdom of Heaven, a meal where all are honoured, loved and welcomed. No one works on the day of the wedding. Cares are set aside as the celebration begins. The wine flows and old arguments are set aside. There is peace. But in the parable there are some who don’t want to join the party. Weddings celebrate love – but those who decline the invitation turn to violence. Those who carry the message of invitation are maltreated and killed.
We are the servants sent to invite. The ones who are called and tasked to call others. It is such a fundamental part of being a Christian that it sits at the heart of our baptism. To shine as a light in the world; a help to others to find their way out of darkness and to come to the brightness of God’s feast. And all of us at some point, to varying degrees, need that light held out so that we can find our way out of darkness. It’s what Christians do for one another and are called to do in the world.
So, as the church around the world gathers in worship today, our prayers and thoughts, music and words, continue to hold out the vision of a feast to which all are invited. As we stretch out our hands to receive the sacrament we are fed with the hope that in Christ, one day, this darkness will be turned into the Kingdom of light. This is our living hope and one which becomes ever brighter at those times when the world darkens.
It seems to me that it matters more than ever at the moment to follow Paul’s counsel that we should think about what ‘is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure’. When so much focus is on the darkest deeds people can perpetrate, we have an obligation to elevate our attention to the things that will restore our humanity. To pray for peace and to support those individuals and agencies that seek to build communities that are rooted in the life of God’s Kingdom.
I began by saying that I didn’t know what to say. And perhaps silence is also needed at this time. But I believe without a doubt that in our worship we proclaim what must, ultimately, overcome all the evil that is in our world. That as we gather here today we inhabit and model what that Kingdom means – and recommit ourselves to the pursuit of a peace which can only truly come from God alone. Together we are the messengers of that peace and of that Kingdom.
The Second Sunday of Creationtide – Canon Timothy Goode
Preacher: Canon Timothy Goode
Date: 10 September 2023, The Second Sunday of Creationtide
Before we moved up to York, I went to a superb exhibition on St. Francis of Assisi at the National Gallery and through that visit was encouraged to seek out Franco Zeffirelli’s film on St Francis, ‘Brother Sun, Sister Moon’. Towards the end of the film there is an extraordinary scene when Francis goes to Rome to petition the Pope for permission to found what will become the Franciscan and Poor Clare Orders, religious communities of men and women that to this day take the three-fold vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.
Picture the scene. Francis is ushered into the opulent Papal audience chamber to present himself to the Pope, passing armed guards as he makes his way. He kneels before the Pope who is seated on a throne some dozen or so steps up, with the great Papal crown, hovering majestically over his head.
To his left and right are rank upon rank of Cardinals and Archbishops. They all know inside out the protocols of the Papal chamber and they look down with utter disdain on this petitioner, dressed solely in a simple habit.
Francis unrolls the scroll and starts falteringly reading the prepared dry legal petition, but his heart is simply not in it. He rolls up the scroll, and in place of the text he exclaims at the top of his voice,
‘Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap, nor gather into barns…’
And before he can complete the biblical quote, bedlam ensues. How dare he, in his simple habit, challenge the opulence and power of the Papal court – the cheek of it. Red hats and golden mitres are knocked off in the scuffles that follow; screams of abuse are levelled at Francis and he is physically removed from the chamber.
As the melee recedes all eyes turn back towards the papal throne. The Pope is standing, his right arm raised high. His face looks as if in some sort of shocked trance. They follow the arch of the Pope’s finger as it points towards the ceiling of the chamber, and there above him painted as a great mural on roof of the apse, is Christ as the ruler of all, the Almighty. By those few words of Francis, the Popes heart, mind and very being, is re-directed towards the very core of the Christian faith – Jesus Christ, the Word made Flesh.
Francis is summoned back into the chamber, and the rest, as they say, is history.
And today in the opulence and splendour of this Minster, like the palatial Papal chamber, we too hear those same words in this morning’s gospel – of the birds of the air, and the lilies of the field – and we too are directed to what matters – to the very core of our faith, to our confidence found in our Lord Jesus Christ.
God sustains. God is good. Through the goodness and provision of his creation Jesus advises us that we should not worry about what we should eat, or drink; that we should not worry about our clothing. Surely this is good news!
Well, yes, it is good news, if you are like me and know where our next meal is coming from, or when our thirst will next be quenched; it is good news when we wake up in a comfortable bed and have access to a full wardrobe of clothes; it is good news when we are comfortably employed.
But how does this message land for those who are not fortunate enough to have the basics to sustain their life? Then this passage should pull us up short, for Jesus, as he so often does, is pointing all of us not towards to some carefree Utopia, not towards some esoteric heavenly dwelling place, but towards the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom we pray for every time we pray the Lord’s prayer. ‘Your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven’.
If we are being directed by Jesus to God’s kingdom through his two picture images of the sparrows and the lilies, then we are being offered a kingdom that feeds, a kingdom that quenches thirst, a kingdom that clothes: a just kingdom of profound love, equity, generosity and hospitality. A Kingdom, as conjured up in today’s passage from the Book of Revelation, where the water of life flows, a Kingdom of abundance and a Kingdom of peace.
It therefore follows that there can be no place in God’s kingdom for the oppression, insecurity and exploitation of God’s people; no room for the ugliness of hunger, deprivation, and fear; no room for the marginalisation and diminishing of people due to their race, gender, sexuality, economic status or disability; no place for the rampant exploitation of the world resources and the wilful destruction of its fragile eco-systems. For these are not characteristics of the kingdom – they are its opposite, and we are bound by faith and compassion to do all we can, individually and corporately, to eradicate those things that obscure the love, the beauty, the grace and the liberation that God wills for the whole of God’s creation.
For, if we are the Body of Christ, then – as this season of Creationtide reminds us – we are inextricably bound to one another in mutual relationship, and to God’s created order. We are called to be stewards, stewards of each other, investing in the flourishing of the God given potential of our neighbour and stewards of God’s extraordinary creative action, the very planet we live on and whose wonderful bounty offers us more than we each can ever require.
And it is the very creative action of God that we are celebrating today. For as a church we are today investing fully in the flourishing of Rosanna, drawing attention to the reality that she is a unique and precious child of God, created and formed in the divine image, fearfully and wonderfully made. As a unique child of God, through her baptism, Rosanna is being welcomed into the Body of Christ and through the liberating lifegiving waters of baptism she and we are being offered a vision of the freedom of sparrows and the glory of lilies as we are offered a tangible glimpse of the Kingdom of Heaven.
In today’s Gospel Jesus presents to us the demands of the kingdom and we pray that throughout her life Rosanna will respond to those demands by walking faithfully with Christ, mirroring the immeasurable love, generosity and hospitality of God, Christ’s name emblazed on her forehead, bringing the light of Christ to the dark places of this world.
But, my friends, as Rosanna is being baptised, let us also respond by reaffirming our baptismal vows so that, as parents and Godparents, friends and fellow members of the Body of Christ, we may model and mirror for Rosanna the immeasurable love, generosity and hospitality of God and be that light which no darkness can repel. For it will be through our lived example of Christian discipleship that Rosanna will first come to learn and experience the Christian faith. We are called as Christ’s body here on earth to be co-workers with God in the divine creative action, for God calls his church to be a sacrament of the Kingdom – a sacrament of love, equity, generosity and hospitality,
And so, Rosanna, thank you. Thank you that through your baptism this morning you are blessing us all with a wonderous glimpse of the freedom of sparrows and the glory of lilies, a vision of the Kingdom of God. May God always be your light and may you always know of God’s presence alongside you and God’s love surrounding you, every step on the way. Amen.
A Sermon for Creationtide – Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Preacher: Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Date: 3 September, First Sunday of Creationtide
A highlight of a visit to Peru last year was a trip to Lake Titicaca.
The largest lake in South America and the highest navigable lake in the world. It is equivalent to more than a third of the size of Wales.
On the visit I was able to spend some time with descendants of one of the ancient peoples of Peru, the Aymara. Known today as the Uros islanders this is a community that lives on floating reed islands, continuing to draw on the lake to meet the basic needs of life. Of course, tourism now supplements that life, but during the pandemic the Uros simply disengaged from wider society and returned to their traditional way of life.
One of the things we learned was that Lake Titicaca is unusually full of water. At least a metre above its normal level. At first that sounds like good news, a plentiful supply of fresh water for both Peru and Bolivia. However, the reason behind this increase is the rapid thaw of glaciers that feed into the Lake. Slowly but surely this frozen reserve of water is filling the lake but, when it’s gone it’s gone.
Like many people around the world who rely on the natural environment for many of the necessities of life, the Uros are fearful about what the future will bring. Many of these communities are vulnerable to even modest changes in the natural world, and their survival seems to be teetering on the brink of disaster. Last year a report calculated that every 40 days another language becomes extinct. The changes taking place in our world are not simply about human survival but involve the loss of cultural richness and diversity. Often, as with the Uros, the cultures being lost are some of the least climate-damaging in the world.
When Jesus was conducting his ministry in Galilee, Jerusalem and Samaria, the natural world probably seemed a place of permanent patterns. Yes, there were better seasons for crops and seasons that were worse. There were years with hot summers and years when it was untypically cool. But the overall experience of the climate was probably fairly static. When there was a period of exceptional rainfall, it was burned into the memories of many people in the Middle East, not only the Israelites.
The flood of Noah’s time is echoed across the world in the myths of 200 or so different cultures. It was an extreme weather event that became lodged in the cultural memories of people, thousands of years after it had taken place.
In the Church of England we are now in a period of the church’s year called ‘Creationtide’. A month dedicated to God as the Creator and Sustainer of all life. Perhaps there will be those who see this as another ‘woke’ initiative in a church that bends too easily to the latest fad or liberal anxiety. Well, if there are, I suggest that they simply stop and listen to the lived experience of people like the Uros. Or read in the Bible of the devastation, fear and loss that resulted when exceptional flooding washed over the face of the earth.
The Church of England in its history has been deeply, deeply connected with the land. The Book of Common Prayer contains prayers for fair weather, prayers for rain and prayers in time of famine. Rogation days are appointed for prayer and fasting as we petition God for a good harvest. If anything, as a church, we wandered away from tradition when supply chains removed our reliance on what grows in the fields of North Yorkshire or is caught off the coast of Whitby. Today when we pray for places that supply our food we are praying for countries that are often far, far, away.
In his discourse with God in our first reading, the Lord reminds Job that human knowledge only goes so far. When Professor Brian Cox addressed the clergy of Leeds Diocese a few years ago he took time to emphasise the sheer vastness of the universe. It is beyond human imagination in its scale and complexity. It is akin to the scope and splendour of the opening words in our Gospel reading this morning.
Who amongst us can imagine all the way back to the beginning when the Word was with God. It would be a remarkably arrogant people who thought that they knew everything about something so enormous and profound.
Creationtide calls us to consider afresh our connection and reliance on the world we inhabit. To renew a relationship with the land and our environment that is deeply rooted in the Church of England’s heritage and spirituality. To listen to the people for whom change brings the greatest risk, and to handle with care the world we inevitably pass on to our children.
A Seat at the Table – Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Title: “A Seat at the Table”
Preacher: Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Date: 20 August 2023, The Eleventh Sunday after Trinity
Readings: Isaiah 56:1, 6-8, Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32, Matthew 15:21-28.
We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy Table. But thou art the same Lord, whose property is always to have mercy: in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.
What does it take to get a seat at the table?
I am assuming you all know that there is a world cup football match going on this morning- we’re about 20 minutes in, and, for this particular England Team, it has taken years of preparation to get here; it has taken courage and conviction to be seen, to be counted and to be celebrated.
To be at the table is not always easy, especially for women. But there are plenty of others in our society who have not been invited to take a seat at the tables of power and privilege, plenty of people who have been denied opportunities, plenty of people who have been ignored, slighted, belittled, prejudiced even hated because of their gender, sexuality, ethnicity, status, class or religion.
We human beings build our walls don’t we? We close our borders, inflict violence upon one another, we discriminate and we judge! Why, Oh, why do we do this? We all live on the same earth, we all breath the same air, we are all made of the same stuff. More than ever we need a vision of an undivided world and indeed an undivided church, where all are welcome and all are shown mercy, because in spite of our diversity, we are all children of God. Surely, we all need to be at the table? We will only overcome the challenges that we face as a human race and as people of this earth, if we work together, and recognise each other as beloved children of God.
Who gets invited is the question raised in our gospel today. With courage and conviction enough to match that of any lioness, a Canaanite women simply asks for a seat at the table.
The earliest Christian communities for whom the gospels were written, were beginning to make rules and form boundaries to maintain the integrity of this young, fragile church. Who was this church for? They wondered. Who would be invited to the table? At first, Jesus appears to conform to the traditional societal and religious expectations placed upon him. He knows he is not permitted to talk to such a woman as this. Women were literally second-class citizens. But a Canaanite as well? One of those foreigners? From the region of Tyre and Sidon- known to be an outpost of disobedience to God? She was beyond his cultural boundaries, and not the kind of person with whom one would socialise, not the kind of person you would invite for dinner.
At first, Jesus tries to ignore her. She roars at him, we are told that she shouts – and the disciples try to send her away. But her persistence, her courage and conviction, cause Jesus to see her face to face, and already one barrier is broken down. Jesus says, perhaps to himself as much as to her ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel’, reiterating his mission to God’s chosen people, but the woman persists -her daughters’ life hangs in the balance: ‘Lord, help me’, she says.
She knows who Jesus is and she recognises him as the Son of God. Jesus continues his argument, ‘it’s not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs!’ He was putting into words the commonly held belief at the time- that the Children of Israel had to come first, but it was a harsh way of responding to her. His words make us flinch even now. And yet she comes back again undeterred.
‘Sir’ she says, ‘even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table’
And in that one sentence, in that one particular sentence, the Canaanite woman changes everything.
I know I am not worthy even to gather the crumbs under your table -she says, but the crumbs will be enough and are you not the same Lord of all, whose nature, whose property is always to have mercy? This Canaanite woman, of all people, sees past the very human Jesus, and sees in him the divine mission of God and a glimpse of a kingdom for all people.
Through her courage and conviction, we see that this kingdom is expansive rather than narrow, inclusive rather than exclusive, this kingdom is for both jew and gentile, slave and free, male and female, and open to every person who kneels before the throne of God’s grace. She refuses to be ignored, she refuses to be excluded, she is staking her claim on the love and mercy of God. There are other vignettes in the gospels where we catch a glimpse of this kingdom: remember that Jesus is often accused by the Pharisees of ‘dining with tax collectors and sinners’ and hosting an open table so that all may eat together.
In the gospels it is often those outside of the tradition, and outside of the religious community who remind us that the love and mercy of God is for all people. In the twentieth century, William Temple, Archbishop of York said something similar- I’m sure you’ve heard it from this pulpit before: he said that the church is the only society that exists for the benefit of those who are not its members- we are always called to look out and to look beyond ourselves and our own communities.
Through her humility this Canaanite woman shows the world, that Jesus is for her, as much as the next man, and anyone can have access to his grace.
‘Great is your faith’, Jesus says to her, perhaps the greatest faith he has ever seen, and through his own death and resurrection, the door will be opened, and everyone will be invited to have a seat at the table in his kingdom. In the gospel it is often the least likely person, the least welcome guest, someone perceived as outside the covenant and outside the religious expectations of the day, who has the greatest faith.
In this one very human encounter, it becomes clear that Jesus mission, God’s mission, is to be wider, and broader than was ever thought possible. God’s love is to be shared among all peoples to the ends of the earth, there is no east or west, or south or north.
We might set our own boundaries and entrance requirements about who we think is worthy enough to sit at God’s table and eat his food. We might even think we are not worthy to be here- but whenever we fall into this narrow way of thinking, God proves that his mercy is wider, as wide as the sea. Perhaps we need the courage and conviction to recognise that we are loved, and so is everyone else.
Our world, and indeed our church, seems to be spiralling into yet more division. But our gospel reading today seems pretty clear. To follow Christ faithfully, we are called to err on the side of generosity and inclusion, after all God’s house is a house of prayer for all peoples. After all, there are no limits to God’s mercy, and his love is broader than the measure of our mind; there is no top table in God’s house.
God says to every human being, come dine with me, and he calls each and every one us to sit by his side.
This Love bids us welcome, and everyone is invited to sit and eat.
Amen.
The glory of God is humanity fully alive – Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Title: “The glory of God is humanity fully alive”
Preacher: Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Date: 6 August 2023, The Feast of Transfiguration
Readings: Exodus 34:29-end, 2 Corinthians 3
Towards the end of his life, the frail and slightly eccentric Archbishop Michael Ramsey, preached what would be his last sermon to a community of nuns in Oxford. The Mother Superior was fearful, that, because of his age and frailness, the old archbishop would not be audible. But every single word was heard, and every time he said the word ‘glory’ it came out as a triumphant shout. Michael Ramsey believed glory was everywhere.
On his memorial stone, in the cloisters of Canterbury Cathedral are inscribed the words of St Ireneus, a second century theologian: “The glory of God is the living man, and the life of man is the vision of God.’
Or in other words: The Glory of God is humanity, fully alive.
We sometimes get Glory very wrong. We think that Glory is a prize that we win, rather than the way that we live. We think glory is related to achievement or merit, we think it’s about coming first, about power, or wealth, or status or celebrity. We might even think that the more we do, the more glory we will get; the better behaved we are, the shinier we will be.
Well, it isn’t like that with this God of ours. God entered into creation as flesh and blood, as a vulnerable infant, in such a daring way, that it almost seemed like foolishness.
Glory, for this God, is about humility, about entering into our humanity, emptying himself, looking like a loser, being mocked, and beaten, and crucified. And why did God step into the arena of humanity in this most surprising way? God did this, so as to lead us to glory too. The incarnate God, makes humanity holy.
In the transfiguration, that moment of light and glory on the mountain top, God shows us the potential of what it means to be human. In this moment, all earthly existence is gathered in,
and we catch a glimpse of what is to come,
when we are fully realized and transformed.
The whole of creation is charged with God’s glory and there is fire and music under our feet. We are shown who Jesus is, and where we are heading. We are given the long view. These flesh and bones can be transformed, they live, we are not merely dust and ashes, there is something greater beyond the material, beyond anything that we can see and touch or imagine.
Transfiguration holds out the possibility that the most ordinary life can be infused with glory. No matter how small or insignificant we feel we are, whatever our hopes or fears, or doubts, or sorrows, or sins, whatever we hide away and keep secret, God’s transforming power, takes all this, and turns it into glory. That essentially means that we are all extra-ordinary, we are all infused with the glory of God.
If we believe this to be true, it will have an impact on how we live with our fellow human beings as reflections of Christ. We are called to give glory to God and act in such a way that the nature of God becomes visible within us, in the way that it became visible in the face of Jesus Christ.
C.S. Lewis said that ‘Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If they are your neighbour, they are holy in almost the same way, for in them also Christ the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden.”
God stepped into the arena of humanity and God became one of us. We have all seen his glory, in the face of Jesus Christ and we see his glory in one another.
God has raised fallen humanity, and if we have eyes to see, we can see God’s glory in the mirror, and in the faces of those around us. Just look at the glory surrounding you! Glory is everywhere!
God’s glory is reflected in every human being, it shines, it glows, and so when we come face to face with our neighbour, our actions and our words towards them, reflect that glory back to God.
God’s glory is found in the little things, the kind gestures, the daring words, the unconditional love which we offer one another, the care and compassion we show to those in need, and all that we do to ensure that humanity can live to its fullest potential. When we give glory to God in this way, the nature of God becomes visible within us.
The Glory of God, is humanity, fully alive.
This glory, is not about success, or getting things right, or being perfect this is glory by God’s standards, this is about living life as people who are fully alive, people who are transformed from one degree of glory to another before the one and only living God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.
Love is proved in the letting go – Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Title: Love is proved in the letting go
Preacher: Canon Maggie McLean, Canon Missioner
Date: 23 July 2023, Seventh Sunday after Trinity
A kitchen shrine adorned with serpents, a bakery, human skeletons, exquisite frescos, and yes, a picture of something that looks very much like pizza. These are among the new finds being turned up at the Pompeii Archaeological Park. So reported the BBC this last week.
It seems that every year we hear about new discoveries in Pompeii.
While the destruction of the city by a volcano was tragic and devastating, it has left behind a unique record of life as it was taking place on one particular day in 79 AD. Normally, we don’t have access to this kind of precise and extensive historical information.
When we visited the site a few years ago the place gave an unforgettable impression of life interrupted – suddenly halted – in a way that was remarkable and extensive.
As archaeologists explored Pompeii they found one of the earliest depictions of any biblical story. On a wall in a house they discovered a painting of the scene described in our first reading this afternoon. This suggests that the episode of the two women arguing over the custody of a child, and Solomon’s surprising intervention, were celebrated as a moment of defining wisdom. It also suggests that God’s wisdom was seen as the source of all human wisdom, and the only basis on which any society would prosper.
While the conclusion of the story reveals divine wisdom, the events leading up to it are harrowing. There’s no other way to describe it.
We are told in most translations that the two women are prostitutes. But this isn’t accepted by every scholar. There is a view that the more accurate meaning is ‘tavern-keepers’.
Perhaps it’s not difficult to see why these translations aren’t altogether unrelated. Independent women have often found that their reputation is maligned, and for a woman to keep a tavern in her own right might well have produced the kind of slander designed to belittle and undermine her dignity.
Whatever the truth about these translations, the text goes on to make clear that a tragedy has taken place. The women live in the same house, and within three days of each giving birth, one woman accidently causes the death of her baby.
I cannot begin to imagine the degree of distress this must have caused. In this state the woman exchanges her baby for the living child of the second woman.
Then the two women argue. It is clear to the one who has been given the dead baby that this is not her child. For this reason they both go to petition the King.
They speak before the King, and Solomon has the wisdom to listen. But he cannot decide who is telling the truth. His solution – which we may well find disturbing – is to ask for a sword. As no agreement can be made, he suggests that he’ll kill the baby and give them half each. At that moment the true mother relinquishes her claim to the child so that it might live.
This is not a happy story. Even at this moment we feel for the mother whose child has died. Now, in addition to her loss, she is faced with public shame and royal displeasure. It does not seem a very pastoral or caring solution, for all Solomon’s wisdom.
To a large extent the women appear as foils to the display of the King’s wisdom, rather than characters with any depth or complexity. And in this story wisdom is only revealed because it is provoked by love. The love of a mother who would rather see her child given to another than be killed by the sword.
It reminds we of the poem by C Day-Lewis, Walking Away. The poet recalls his son playing football and then disappearing off to school for the first time. He writes these lines:
I have had worse partings, but none that so
Gnaws at my mind still. Perhaps it is roughly
Saying what God alone could perfectly show –
How selfhood begins with a walking away,
And love is proved in the letting go.
‘Love is proved in the letting go’.
For the mother of the child appearing before Solomon, love is revealed in her willingness to let go. A willingness to forsake a right in order to preserve a life.
For Peter and John in the second reading, we might almost say that their love for Jesus means that they are willing to let go of their lives. Confronted by the religious authorities in Jerusalem and threatened in order to ‘keep them from speaking further’, the disciples will not comply. With characteristic resolution Peter seems to shrug his shoulders, and responds that to shut up isn’t a choice they can make. Having witnessed love and peace in the person of Jesus, and his resurrection from the dead, they ‘cannot keep from speaking about what we have seen and heard’.
As with so many of the early disciples, this boldness comes with a cost. But as the true mother said; and C Day-Lewis expressed; love of life requires a willingness to let go – and to trust God with all that will follow.
Let them grow together, until the harvest – Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Title: Let them grow together, until the harvest
Preacher: Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Date: 23 July 2023, Seventh Sunday after Trinity
Readings: Wisdom 12:13, 16-19, Romans 8:12-25, Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43
In the name of the living God, who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.
We live in a very literal and judgemental world, a world which is impatient and impetuous. There seems to be no room for ambiguity, no room for asking questions, no room for transformation or hope in what might be possible. There seems to be no room for frailty and vulnerability, no room for mistakes, no room for forgiveness or apology. You are either in or out, you are this or that, you are right or wrong. It’s assumed that what we think today is what we will think tomorrow, certainty is prized, immovable opinions are lauded, complexity is overridden in favour of a salacious headline or making a quick buck- we all get sucked in. We divide, we judge, we condemn, we close our doors, we root out, we ban, we eject, we grandstand, we move on to the next story fed to us by the tabloid press.
Our parable today is an antidote to the ways of our world, because at the heart of this parable is uncertainty, ambiguity, and possibility all held under the kindly gaze of God. At the heart of this parable is a God who judges with mildness and forbearance, a God who waits on us and thereby gives us hope in what we might yet become, and what might yet be possible. This is a God of second chances, of renewal and new beginnings, this is a God of forgiveness and love, a God who gives everyone and everything the opportunity to come good.
Matthew tells us yet another story of the Kingdom relating to seeds, and sowing and growth, we are presented with the parable of the wheat and the weeds, the wheat and the tares, as it is sometimes known. A parable for an early church trying to affirm its identity and purpose, perhaps being drawn into operating according to the ways of the world, a church also tempted into condemnation and exclusion, a church desiring a kind of purity and certainty, quick to make a judgement on who was in and who was out.
But the simple point of the story is this: these weeds are not bright and proud like poppies growing up in a wheatfield, they are not obviously different to the crop in question, these weeds are tall and slender, with ears and whiskers,- they are almost indistinguishable from the wheat they stand alongside, it would take a very discerning eye to pull them apart.
The slaves of the household, (let the reader understand these to be the disciples, the earliest church communities perhaps), the slaves of the household are very anxious about these agricultural imposters, they aspire to purity and conformity, they desire a perfect and unsullied community, so they want to root out these weeds, and to separate out the church from the world. They also want to cast their judgement on the situation. They want their turn at being God, but God alone is judge.
But surprisingly, the Master of the House, commands them to wait with patience. He says ‘let the wheat and the weeds grow together until the harvest’. The Master of the house is content to let them grow together, to risk the possibility that the weeds might be wheat. It is only when the harvest comes that everything will be revealed. Judgement will come, but in the meantime, we wait in hope.
Of course, you don’t need me to tell you that the Master of the House in this parable is an image of God, the Son of Man, Jesus tells us, and the harvest is the day of judgement at the end of all things, but it may surprise us that, until that day, God is content to wait and see what happens and Jesus tells his disciples to do the same. It seems there is always the possibility of change and transformation, of bad becoming good, of a sinner becoming a saint. With this God there is the possibility that the whole world might live into its vocation, wheat and weeds alike.
It’s acknowledged that this is one of Jesus more difficult teachings because its message goes against our human nature, our impatience and our propensity to make judgements on others. St Augustine said of this parable: ‘It may be so, that those who today are weeds, may tomorrow be wheat’, and so we get a picture of a God who, in the words of the book of Wisdom ‘has care for all people’, ‘will not judge unjustly’, but with ‘mildness’, who gives hope through the repentance of sins, who makes the rain fall on the righteous and the unrighteous.
Jesus makes no apology for presenting a view of life, and a view of the church, which is complex and requires discernment and patience and calls us all to risk letting God be God. The Church is not called to be a purity cult closed off from the realities and imperfections of the world and all of its challenge, but it is called to be a community where sins are forgiven and hope is restored, a community where all grow together, untidily, ambiguously, uncertainly, we are all dappled, variegated, mottled, a mixture of wheat and weed, all waiting to be changed and transformed and called to conversion of life.
Do we live in judgement of one another, or do we live in the hope of Christ? It seems to me that this parable is calling us to live in the hope of what could be, not in judgement of what is.
We might give thanks for this possibility because we all know that if the fields of our hearts were examined carefully, there would also be a complex mix of wheat and weeds. We know how close we are to sin and evil day by day, we understand that our motives are mixed and complex, we know that the thoughts of our hearts can be selfish, mean-spirited, cruel, we know that the lines between good and bad, between right and wrong, are as slippery as seductive as the similarity between the wheat and the weeds. Thanks be to God who looks upon us all with a kindly gaze. Thanks be to God that weeds are welcome too. It may well be that the weeds of today, may be the wheat of tomorrow that will bear the grains that make the bread for all to share.
In the meantime, all we can do, is look to Jesus Christ and grow under the light of his countenance. We look for the possibility and potential of everyone to grow in faith, we hope for what we do not yet see, and we wait for it with patience, we wait for the day when the whole of creation will be set free, as St Paul says, into the glorious liberty of the children of God. We wait for a re-creation, and the coming of the Kingdom.
This is the kingdom which Jesus speaks of today, a kingdom where all things are possible, where sinners find a place, where outcasts are welcomed, where evil is overcome with good, peace comes from conflict, life comes from death, wheat comes from weeds and we all give glory to the one and only live God, who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.
How to be good – Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Title: How to be good
Preacher: Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Date: 18 June 2023 Second Sunday after Trinity
Readings: Exodus:19-2-8a, Romans 5:1-8, Matthew 9:35-10.8
In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen.
‘Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in the all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, for as long as ever you can.’
It’s said that this sentence encapsulates what has been called John Wesley’s rule of life. Whether he wrote it or not, it’s a very clear command to go out into the world and be good and do good. Often easier said than done.
It’s a high calling isn’t it- to do good and be good- to always give thanks, to err on the side of generosity, to give and not count the cost, to share good news not bad, to realise that all our doings without love, are worth nothing.
Yesterday, I was catapulted into a panel discussion at the Big Tent Ideas Festival: it was like being grilled on The Today Programme on Radio 4, quite exhausting! The question being posed to the panel, a Rabbi, a Muslim leader and myself, was this: “Does Religion do more harm than good? Cause of global conflict and excuse for discrimination, or driver of social change and social good?” What would you say? Perhaps something to consider over Sunday lunch today!? How would you have answered that question?
We can’t deny that what we are doing here is ‘organised religion’, but does it make us good? On the panel, we talked about the good that religion can do- the grass roots ‘good’ of kindness, compassion and community- the practical ‘good’ that faith communities offer to the world through foodbanks, charities, advocacy, campaigning. But we did have to acknowledge the ‘not good’ too. The power and the privilege, the discrimination, the injustice, the abuse, the hypocrisy.
It hopefully won’t surprise you to know that I believe that at its very best, religion is a force for good, and that in some ways our faith will always both betray us and confirm us by the fruits that we bear in the world, by the difference that we make through our attitudes, and interactions and behaviours and imaginations, and importantly by our desire to imitate and embody the goodness of Jesus Christ.
Of course, we often fail in this aspiration, which is why the kind of question I was asked yesterday, keeps on being asked, again and again and again, and rightly so.
To be religious does not guarantee you an automatic persona of goodness, it doesn’t mean you are good, but the life of faith does perhaps help us to know that God is good, and that God so loved the world, that he gave us his Son Jesus Christ…for our good.
To be religious then, could simply be to acknowledge that we are on that journey towards the good and we are hopeful of the good which is found in God alone.
In our Gospel reading, Jesus says to his disciples: ‘as you go, proclaim the good news’. What does good news look like in our world today?
Two thousand years ago, ‘Good news’ looked like curing the sick, raising the dead, cleansing the lepers, casting out demons. ‘Good news’ looked like forgiveness of sins, finding the lost, giving without expectation of payment, giving voice to the voiceless, good news looked like compassion for the lonely and the unloved. ‘Good news’ was turning the world’s hierarchies upside down, raising the fallen and making the last first, and the first last – and ultimately the good news was the new life that Christ wrought through his resurrection. We do have some idea what good looks like and what it could look like in our world today.
It seems to me, that a fully embraced faith in a good God, will leave goodness in its wake. I suppose the task of the Christian, is to discern and to learn what is good. We are called to inhabit goodness in the name of Christ, who is the expression of God’s love for the world and everything in it.
Our vision of what good is, comes from God, who, we have been promised, holds everything together in love. To be good, says Rowan Williams, is to desire for the deepest and most hopeful love of love itself, and for all people to long to love one another. The Good life, for the Christian person, isn’t just about living well- it’s about living as people shaped by Christ’s command to proclaim the good news.
We know this won’t be easy, St Paul tells us so, but if we boast in anything in this life, may we boast in our hope of sharing the glory and love of God.
So yes, I think religion is bad, when it discriminates, when it divides, when it self-serves, when it fails to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ, when it breaks down rather than builds up, and when, in its wake it leaves only sorrow, hatred and death. Let’s not pretend it’s easy to be good in our world, it never has been, and it never will be.
To be good, to desire love over everything else- is the hardest thing that any of us will ever do and yes, we will suffer for it, we will have to endure all kinds of persecution for standing up for the good, but through all this we still have hope, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts and we long for that love to be shared with the world Christ came to save.
We are drawn to this table in love, and this serves to sustain us in our mission of love for the world. As we take bread and wine today, Jesus says to each one of us, ‘As you go, proclaim the good news’.
So, in the strength of God’s love, do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in the all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can, in the name of the God of love, who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.
Trinity Sunday: There is only the dance – Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Title: There is only the dance
Preacher: Canon Victoria Johnson, Precentor
Date: 4 June 2023 Trinity Sunday
Readings: Psalms 93 and 150, Isaiah 6:1-8, John 16:5-15
Do you remember the final of Strictly Come Dancing 2021? You might deny you watch it, but I know you do really!
To re-cap: The actor, Rose Ayling-Ellis and her partner Giovanni Pernice performed a routine which wowed the nation and won them the glitterball. Part way through their routine, the music stopped. But there in the stillness, there was movement. The dance carried on. All you could hear was the sound of bare feet on what seemed like holy ground. To see Rose dance through the silence, was incredibly moving. Silence, for her, was her daily experience of the world, because she was profoundly deaf. The ten seconds of quietness in the middle of the routine came to an end as the music launched back in and Rose and her partner hadn’t missed a single beat.
Faith is sometimes a bit like a dance that keeps going. Faith does not stand still. Faith is a moving thing, it is like someone on a pilgrimage, like fish swimming in a river, like a bird flying through the air, it’s like the joining of human hearts in love, it is like the comings and goings of life itself, from birth to death. Faith is about movement, about growth, about evolution, about spinning, and whirling, and circling, about being drawn in and then being sent out. When faith stops moving it becomes brittle and fragile, its energy and life is in the dance.
Our two readings pick up on this sense of movement, Isaiah is called into a vision of worship as he is stood in the temple. A seraph flies towards him, touches his lips with a coal from the altar, and commissions him in the name of the Lord. Whom shall I send, says the Lord, and who will go for us? Here am I, says Isaiah, send me. Isaiah is drawn in and then sent out.
Then Jesus articulates the movement between himself, the Father, and the spirit of truth: the dance between Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Jesus is returning to the one who sent him, but the Spirit of truth will come. In the persons of God, there is always a coming and going, a giving and receiving. It’s sometimes easy to think of religion as static, and concrete and still. Unchanging and immovable. Perhaps we are sometimes reluctant to take a leap of faith, or be open to what God is calling us towards, or where God is moving us to. It’s easy to think of Christians as stuck in their ways, and their views as set in stone but Christians have always been people ‘on the move’.
The God we believe in is also a God of movement and transformation, the God of a pilgrim people: turning hearts of stone into hearts of flesh, the God we believe in brings water from a rock, makes rivers in the desert and causes the wilderness burst into song. The God we believe in, cracks open the tomb and brings out new life, turning nights of sorrow into mornings of joy. The God we believe in is all about transformation and change. We are called to travel even when we are standing still, we are called to keep dancing even when the music stops. At the heart of God there is movement. There is energy. The God we believe in, is a community, ebbing and flowing, giving and moving, spinning, dancing together in perfect unity and concord, the moving heart at the centre of the universe.
At the still point of everything, says TS Elliot, in his Poem ‘The Four Quartets’, there the dance is and ‘there is only the dance’. The nature of God, as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, has long been interpreted as a movement, as a dance. This is how the earliest christians in the second century came to describe God: as a perpetual movement, entwined and embracing, an eternal dance of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The word they used was a Greek one: perichoresis, which means to go or come around. The word implies an all encompassing movement and relationship. It is in the midst of this movement, this dance, that God is, and this is where God calls us all to be: in the dance which orders the universe, in the movement of faith, in the drawn-in and being sent-ness of our calling, to speak, to share, to care, to tend, to grow, to love, to approach the altar like Isaiah did, and be sent out from it day after day after day. All is movement with God. And even at the still point there is the dance, and only the dance.
We so often fall into the trap of imagining God into a box, of wanting God to be predictable, when God is there on the dancefloor, spinning together as one, drawing the whole of creation into their self, and drawing our stubborn hearts and heavy feet into the music and movement of their love.
This is God as Trinity, God as Unity, God as one, and as children of God’s love, we are invited in. Are we brave enough to step onto the dancefloor with God? God takes our hand, calls us to put on our dancing shoes, and says, dance then, wherever you may be, I am the Lord of the Dance, and I’ll lead you all, wherever you may be, and I’ll lead you all in the dance.
To the one and only living God, who dances for all eternity as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen