Tag Archives: hope

There Is Always Hope

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A thought for our Remembrance Sunday Service

When all else has gone there is always hope. When we hit rock bottom, there is always hope. When we can see no light at the end of the tunnel, there is always hope. Hope is the one think that we can be assured of because very often it is the only thing that is left when we feel that all hope has gone, which seems a real contradiction.

Today we are honouring the memory of the millions of men and women who answered the call of their country to fight against evil and oppression. Who fought to liberate innocent men, women, and children, caught up in conflicts whose agendas were against human rights, racially motivated or politically expedient.

From the First World War, we hear so many poignant stories of young men, barely adults (and sometimes not even that) taking up arms, marching away from their homes and villages, dreaming of being heroes and finding themselves in what might be described as the depths of hell on the Western Front.

From the Second World War, with more sophisticated weaponry, aviators took to the skies, using their planes like the infantry had used swords and bayonets in dog fights. Flying long range missions to drop bombs on strategic targets to try and disrupt and demoralise those targeted. Until the ultimate weapon of destruction was unleashed.

From more recent conflicts, in Afghanistan and the Middle East, trying to establish basic human rights for young men and in particular young women and today we find ourselves living in a world where once more innocent children and civilians are living in fear for their lives, for their families and for the future.

Wars are designed to spread fear, to crush resistance and to demonstrate both physical and psychological power, but the one thing they can never defeat is the hope of peace and restoration.

Today men and women of all faiths and none in our armed services, answer the call to bring about peace in the face of war and terror. They are willing to sacrifice their lives, if necessary; but as Christians we have the ultimate hope through the sacrificial death and resurrection of Jesus, that even death will not be the end.

For the Thessalonians, Paul was reassuring them that they should not be grieving deaths in their community without hope. If this life is all we have, then its end in death produces considerable grief. However, Paul says that if you believe that Jesus died and was raised (the basic Christian affirmation the Thessalonians had accepted), then you can also believe that God will raise our loved ones. Those who also believed in the death and resurrection of Christ are caught up into his eternal life.

Paul refers to Jesus’ own words, that the Son of Man will return in the clouds with the angels gathering the elect from the four corners of the earth to meet him and at this point the dead and the living will be gathered as one.

This is the hope that trumps all other hopes.

However, later this morning we will gather together to remember all those who have died in war and conflicts, those of our families and the unknown soldiers, sailors, and aviators. To honour their memory. Those long dead and those killed in more recent clashes.

We will remember that: ‘they shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old; age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.’

But above we will pray for peace to be the hope of all nations, that there will be no more killing of innocent civilians and children, that we respect the sanctity of human life because our common belief is that all life is precious to God and in him is our greatest hope.

Amen

Based on 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18

God’s Promises

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Part of an Old Testament series working our way through the key figures and stories, in which Abram looms large. Based on Genesis 15:1-6

May I speak and may you hear through the Grace of our Lord; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

‘Look towards heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.’ Then he said to him, ‘So shall your descendants be.’

A promised reward, a question of lineage, a vision of progeny, a silent indication of trust and a recognition of righteousness. In these six short verses lie the nub of the three great Abrahamic faiths. To date adherents of these number some 3.8 billion people in all the corners of the world, of which we are but a few. However, we first need to go back almost to the beginning, to understand why this one man would be so important both to God and to ourselves.

Our Old Testament reading begins with us needing to know after what things ‘the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision’. Here is a man with an impeccable lineage, whose eight times Grandfather was Shem, the son of Noah. His father, Terah, had set out with their family from Northern Mesopotamia to travel to the land of Canaan, what would become the promised land of Moses and the Israelites, but only got a far as Haran in Eastern Turkey.

However, God called Abram to leave behind his kindred and strike out once more towards Canaan, with the promise that ‘I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing’ (Genesis 12:2). Having reached Canaan, the question of progeny is affirmed, ‘To your offspring I will give this land.’ However, Abram and his wife Sarai remain childless, and a famine forces them into Egypt, where Abram’s sense of self-preservation allows him to use Sarai as a bargaining pawn with Pharoah. Deceit uncovered, they are sent out of Egypt, where the now wealthy and prosperous Abram is once more travelling, and whose destination of the land of Canaan is literally decided by Lot.

God again gives an insight into the breath and length of Abram’s future prolificacy, ‘I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth; so that if one can count the dust of the earth, your offspring also can be counted’ (Genesis 13:16). Yet, Abram and Sarai remain childless, blessed only with the offer of more riches and accolades by the King of Sodom, which Abram rejects, but receiving the blessing of the high priest Melchizedek. Now God offers Abram a vision, not only has he acted a shield and protector of him, but his ‘reward shall be very great’. For Abram though, there is only one reward that will do – an heir, a natural heir of his own.

Being childless can be a painful and heartbreaking process to go through. As human beings we inherently desire to reproduce, to leave a small part of our DNA embedded in our children and children’s children. Abram’s deepest desire to produce offspring allows him the tenacity to question all the promises God has already made to him.

God’s blessing though is not just to produce a physical miracle. The body can be a frail and vulnerable organism, but the divine Spirit is vital and lifegiving. Having promised an incalculable number of descendants comparative to particle of the dust of the earth, he now get’s Abram to look heavenward towards the stars.

For us looking up at night we can not imagine the vastness of the that promise, with our few pinpricks of light moving across the sky, but for Abram in a land where light pollution doesn’t exist, the stars almost smother the darkness.

Yet none of this would have meant anything without Abram’s unshakeable faith that God would deliver. The enormous compassion of God in responding to what Abram desperately wants is only matched by Abram’s trust that God will deliver it. God sees his trust and ‘reckoned it to him as righteousness’ (Genesis 15:6). 

This willingness on the part of God to accept our trust in him as the equivalent of actual goodness is an abiding characteristic. We see it over and over again; ‘your faith has made you well’ to the haemorrhaging woman, the ten lepers, the blind beggar, but no more so than Jesus’ response to the penitent thief on the cross.

Here, as Paul will later refer to in Romans (4:3) and Galatians (3;6), is the first instance of justification by faith. Faith here is not based on the performance of good deeds or religious devotion – although they may be important ways of expressing our faith. Rather that faith is trusting God’s promises and acting as if it will be fulfilled. Throughout the bible God makes many promises – specifically in the New Testament, Jesus promises that he will be with us always and ‘whoever lives and believes in me shall never die’. For us, genuine faith holds on to those promises whatever life throws at us and acts accordingly believing them to be true.

At Abram’s calling God tells him that ‘all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’ because of him. Whatever, your description of family covers, a brother, a sister, a mother or father, adopted or fostered, church or community, you are blessed to be a part of it, and by placing our trust in God, we too can be a blessing to others, for he always keeps his promises.

The 200 billion trillion stars in the universe testify to the magnitude of his greatness, our faith in him testifies to our willingness to always look upwards and outwards and be beacons of hope in this world.

Amen

In-Dwelling of the Trinity

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Worship The Holy Spirit by Lance Brown

Talk given on Easter 5 based on John 14:1-14

May I speak and may you hear through the Grace of our Lord; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

‘Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me’.

We are being taken back to the Last Supper with Jesus still very much alive in the flesh. He has washed his disciples’ feet, foretold his betrayal and revealed it to be Judas Iscariot now in the thralls of Satan, given the remaining disciples a new commandment to love one another and foretold Peter’s denial of ever knowing him, but with a hint that eventually all will be well.

No wonder their hearts are troubled, events are moving so quickly and their emotions are about to be tested to the limit…and they don’t have the gift of hindsight. However, we do.

He tells them that he is going on ahead of them to prepare a place for them all be together again, and that they already know this place. This can be one of the most comforting and hope filled passages that is regularly used in funeral services.

Even so, I’ve often been puzzled, imagining what sort of place it would be. ‘In my Father’s house there are many dwelling-places’. The original Greek word μοναί (monai) in the Kings James Bible was translated as mansion meaning dwelling place, from mansio, not as in modern usage a manor-house or palace. But μοναί literally means places to stay, to abide, to dwell, i.e. the rooms within a house.

But do our minds conjure up those pale pink sun-soaked Moorish Mediterranean palaces or the stark white of the infinite Matrix rooms? Or perhaps a replica of our favourite cosy living rooms? Perhaps we’re being too earthbound in our imaginations.

The fact is, unlike the disciples at that point, we do know the way to go; through Jesus himself, ‘ the way, the truth and the life.’ But are we like Thomas and Philip, still in the dark about what is happening? I would say we are – to a greater extent – unsure as to what the literal and physical outcome will actually turn out to be and I can live with that. It’s more about what it means for us here and now.

In fact it might not just be about a physical dwelling but an in-dwelling. Jesus will soon be ascending back to the Father and as yet unknown to the disciples, Pentecost looms, when each will be filled with the Holy Spirit and also those who believe in Jesus.

Immediately after our passage today, Jesus reveals that the Father will send the Holy Spirit ‘in my name’, who will be known to you because he abides in you (another form of the verb meno – to dwell or remain in) and suddenly the close interpersonal relationship of the Holy Trinity suddenly becomes a little clearer.

I say clearer, but as always for John it does become highly metaphorical and he uses the verb meno in many of its forms to mean a spiritual abiding. Perhaps we can think of it like this – if something or someone abides in someone, then that person is motivated by what abides in them and are dependent upon it or them. God the Father is spirit and invisible, yet he has shown himself in various ways, his most authentic presence of himself being in Jesus. ‘If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.’

We also know that Jesus is his own human person, the son of God; and he is on the same page as the Father in all things, having the same nature of love and outgoing concern, not inward focused and prideful, and he has his own will.

However, all of Jesus’ provisions and needs are from the Father. ‘The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works’. But as John revealed at the very opening of his gospel, Jesus IS the very WORD, the intent, the purpose, the reason, the wisdom of God in the form of flesh.

Providing His spirit at Jesus’ baptism, filling him with this essential connection with the Father, gave Jesus the words, the attitude, the wisdom, the miracles and through consistent prayer, the will to accomplish his mission to get to the cross.

 ‘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’ and ‘If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it’. This is Jesus offering us exactly the same encouragement, support and ability through the provision of the Holy Spirit, as we try to continue his works here on earth.

All comes from God for us, just as it did for Jesus. Jesus had the Father dwelling in him – just as he and God dwell in us through God’s Spirit. We simply have to choose to accept his presence in us and allow our nature to be aligned with His.

Then and only then will we know the way to go

Amen

Walking the Emmaus Road

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Sermon preached on Easter 3 2023 based on Luke 24:13-35

May I speak and may you hear through the Grace of our Lord; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

May I speak and may you hear… sounds like a one-sided conversation to me, and I guess that’s what a sermon is. But it shouldn’t be just so. A sermon or talk should help interpret the words of scripture that have been selected as the day’s topic and bring it to life, using historical facts, contextual references and theological reasoning, so that it can be applied to people’s lives for today.

For some people listening they will find themselves pondering over a word or phrase that they heard at the beginning, such as the fact that Emmaus is about seven miles from Jerusalem and they were having to walk there, on dusty roads, in the hot sun, in sandals, over rocky ground… meanwhile the talk has moved on and they end up having to try and catch up with the main thread.

Whilst others will take on board the key points, weaving them into a coherent thought stream of consciousness. Hopefully, by the end of the talk, the listener will understand a little clearer what the message is within the text and the talk’s climax will reveal something to provide them with something to take away and share with others.

So, let’s see if together we can’t work out what we should be having a conversation about this morning, what questions we have, our ideas and thoughts and the possible and impossible answers we could come to, to help us leave a little bit more aware of what it might mean for us and for others.

We are imagining ourselves back to that fateful Friday. We have witnessed or heard that Jesus has been crucified, his dead body taken down and his body placed inside a sealed tomb. The joy of his arrival in Jerusalem and promise of change now dashed aside. We have spent a mournful Sabbath, wondering how so many people can have been so naive to have staked everything on one man – a man whom God has cast aside just like all of his prophets had been cast aside before.

And here we all are, walking that same road, with our thoughts and questions, our experiences of life, our hopes and dreams, wondering if we can believe all the things that have been told to us. Feeling foolish from time to time to admit that we believe something that we can never prove with incontrovertible evidence.

Therefore, we share our thoughts and alongside us comes a stranger, who wants to know what we are talking about; and we are saddened that here is someone who hasn’t heard about this man, but who appears willing to listen to us. So, we tell of this incredible Jesus of Nazareth, who seemed to have the voice of God and power that brought physical and mental healing and was able to do such things that would appear miraculous for just a man. A man who could have saved us and forever redeemed Israel before God.

A stranger who might appear in our very midst at any time, who wants to know what it is we believe in, what knowledge do we have that makes such a difference to the way we live, how we treat people, who we love and what we hope for.

And this morning reports of an empty tomb, a missing body and angelic visions speaking of resurrection! But we’re not afraid to reveal the fact that something amazing, incomprehensible, and downright impossible seems to have happened. People whom we have got to know really well and grown to trust have been telling us that Jesus is actually alive.

So, what do we tell our stranger this morning? Tales or legends, mythological stories and fables or the truth?

Truth that has been revealed from the beginning of time, through generations of people who lived as God’s people, who knew him and those whom he sent to guide them. God, who stood by them as they turned away and then welcomed them back with open arms. Who taught them to live according to his word, and whose Word appeared in the form of his Son, the promised Messiah. Whose life would be offered up, to suffer on the cross and whose resurrection would reveal the Saviour of the world.

The evidence is there for us to share as well. For those two disciples it was revealed in the breaking of the bread at a meal they invited the stranger to share. For us it could be through our hospitality, our outreach, our pastoral concerns, our love of God and our love of each other, both friend and stranger.

Eager to do so, we hurry to tell our own experiences to others and find that some of them have already heard the Good News. But there are still many more who haven’t, so we share our experiences, why our belief in God in making a difference in our lives and how the same could be true for them.

Our one-sided conversations has become a two-way discussion, and if our words can ignite a flame that burns brightly in other’s hearts then we will know that Jesus has been alongside us all the time, even if we have never seen him… until we break bread together.

Amen

Life In The Middle

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Sermon preached on Sunday 15th May 2022 at the beginning of Christian Aid Week based on the readings, Acts 11: 1-18, John 13:31-35 and Revelation 21:1-6

May I speak and may you hear through the Grace of our Lord: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

Today marks the beginning of Christian Aid Week and later some of us will enjoy a meal designed to raise funds for the work that the charity carries out around the world. Their recently retired CEO, Amanda Khosi Mukwashi, whom some of us will recognise from our Lent Course1, has spoken about the work of Christian Aid being based on three pillars, poverty, prayer and prophetic voice.

As she has said, ‘extreme poverty robs people of their dignity and denies them their rights. It renders them powerless and unrepresented, and vulnerable to abuse.’

The charity works with the poorest of the poor in some of the hardest to reach places in the world. When natural disasters strikes they are almost always one of the first aid agencies to be on hand to assist and give relief. However, what they would rather see is the world free from poverty and need. Hence their slogan ‘Life before death.’

Those three pillars, poverty, prayer and prophetic voice are reflected in our three readings this morning, and I say three readings because although we haven’t heard one because of the necessity of hearing Acts as well as a Gospel reading; the missing one from Revelation is quite possibly one of the most beautiful and hope filled passages in the bible, which is why it is so often chosen as a funeral reading.

Paraphrased from Revelation 21:1-6 ‘Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away … And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them… ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away… I am making everything new!”

Here is life after death, a promise for all those who believe, brought about by the death and resurrection of Christ. But until that unknown future time, we are called to do all we can to make this current world a place where people have the opportunity of life before death.

34 I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples,
if you have love for one another.’ John 13:34-35

Jesus tells his disciples that ‘where I am going you cannot come,’ which isn’t a final negative but a ‘not yet.’ Instead, he gives them a new command and direction that they are to use the love he has shown them to be reflected in what they do and say amongst themselves and towards others, so that through love others might be relieved of things that cause pain and sorrow; including the crushing pain caused by poverty.

We have so much that we take for granted in the developed, capitalist and also to a considerable extent communist, industrialised countries of this world, and democracies that give us what we see as inalienable rights. However, we should not forget that despite differing political systems or geographical climate, every person on this earth is deserving of a life to be lived in dignity and safety. If we are to be true disciples then we need to find ways to bring Christ’s love to all those in need wherever they are.

Sometimes, the only way we can show our support for others is through prayer. Prayer doesn’t make us lazy or inactive; prayer can be the most powerful weapon we have to change lives. Prayer connects us with God and can be an insight into what he is doing and calling us to do.

It also gives us an opportunity to hear his prophetic voice. For Peter, his experience literally changed the course of the early Christian movement. Now longer was this to be a Jewish Christian sect but was to be a way of life that was available to all people. God’s chosen people had actually been chosen to witness at first hand the power that could change people’s lives.

For Peter, the prophetic vision and subsequent meetings with the gentiles confirmed that God was the God of all peoples. It turned Peter’s world upside down, set aside life-long rituals and blessed him with the understanding that he was, ‘not to make a distinction between them and us.’

The giving of the Holy Spirit, in the same way as the disciple had received it, displayed the true nature of God, that love was the most powerful gift that could bring life to all.

Love can help us move mountains. It can make us generous with our wealth, our gifts, and our time. It can turn the world upside down so that everyone is given the opportunity to experience life in all its fullness before being called into what will become the glorious infinity of a new earth and heaven.

 Love will ultimately crush poverty; prayer will bring about change and God’s prophetic voice will be heard and seen. ‘I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End’ for now though it’s what we do in the middle that’s important.

Let’s then make sure that how we choose to fill that time is by doing everything we can to bring about life before death for all.

Amen

1The Lent Course in which Amanda Mukwashi featured in was Embracing Justice by Isobelle Hamley

Chosen For A Reason

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Sermon preached on Sunday 9th May – Easter 6 based on the Gospel, John 15:9-17

May I speak and may you hear through the Grace of our Lord; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

‘You did not choose me, but I chose you’

What does it feel like to be chosen? Well looking back on those days at school when you all stood in a line in a PE lesson and two of your classmates had to take it in turns to select their ‘teams’ and you either had to be very good at sport or very popular, and you could see the level of both criteria dwindling as you still stood there till the bitter moment of being the last one standing, so not technically even chosen, just making up the numbers, it wasn’t really something you really knew about!

Of course, you knew the hurt of not being chosen, but today we hear Jesus confirming that the diverse and disparate group of people that he had gathered together were not there because they had chosen to follow and believe in him, but that he had chosen them, and in doing so he was continuing a long tradition that we can see throughout the bible and throughout the history of the church. Unlikely people chosen to accomplish extraordinary tasks.

The fact is God does not play favourites among his people, however, through the Old Testament we are made aware that God does designate the Israelites, the antecedents of the Jewish people as his ‘chosen people’ as they were the ONLY ones at that time to obey him in lieu of other gods. In Deuteronomy (7:6) it says, ‘For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession.’

However, with the coming of Jesus, that specific favouritism was, if not to be laid aside, was undoubtedly to be extended to a wider group. Instead, being chosen was to be based on faith, not on genealogy, as Paul tells us in his letter to the Romans, ‘No one who believes in him will be put to shame.’ For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him’ (Romans 10:11-12)

So why would he choose you or me? Maybe some of us might be extraordinary and totally obedient to God, but I would suspect that the majority of us are pretty ordinary and fall short some of the time, yet God still chooses us; and thus, it has ever been.

If we go back to Genesis, we can find many examples of ordinary people being chosen by God for extraordinary tasks, people like Noah, Abraham and Sarah, but perhaps the most surprising at that time is the story of Joseph, the one with the multicoloured coat, beloved son but hated brother. Who rose from captured slave, unjustly accused prisoner to Pharaoh’s right-hand man, who helped Egypt prepare for a great famine. Why? Well God had a plan for Joseph, as he told his brothers when they were reconciled, ‘Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it for good, in order to preserve a numerous people, as he is doing today‘. Joseph was chosen by God to preserve God’s chosen people. 

We can then fast forward to Moses, whom God also chose to preserve his chosen people, and to free them from slavery in Egypt. Unwillingly abandoned as a baby, then brought up as a prince by Pharaoh’s daughter; as a young adult he saw his people being beaten, and retaliated by killing an Egyptian and had to flee to Midian until he was chosen by God to confront Pharaoh and lead God’s people to freedom. An unlikely choice, who stumbled over his words and needed his brother Aaron to speak for him, but who turned out to be the perfect choice, because God intended it to be that way. 

Perhaps though one of God’s most astonishing choices was David, a talented poet and musician, slayer of giants (okay that’s pretty amazing) but an adulterer and inciter to murder who became a great leader; but most of all, a man after God’s own heart. Chosen by God to be king.

God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved
Colossians 3:12

And of course, we mustn’t forget people like Mary, a young teenage virgin from a small town, who would become the mother of God’s son. Such an unexpected choice. But Mary had a remarkable faith, an open heart, and a willingness to do whatever God asked of her. She turned out to be the perfect choice, but only God could have known that. 

There are countless examples in scripture of people being chosen by God, who had no other real qualifications, except that they were selected by God for these tasks, and the same was true of Jesus’ choices of his disciples. Fishermen, tax collectors, political activists and a suspected thief, not a religious leader among them. No experts in God’s teachings, no scholars. If anyone were asked to pick a team to plant a new church nowadays, I don’t think these would be the professions that would feature high on the job specification. Yet for the disciples they had one thing going for them, Jesus chose them.

And they needed to be reminded, when full of fear, anxiety and confusion after Jesus’ arrest, of that conversation in that upper room; of his command to love one another and to remain in him; and the fact that Jesus chose them. They didn’t choose him. He chose them – those particular people, after prayer and discernment, to continue to bring his love into this world, and to bear his fruit, fruit that will last. They may not have felt particularly qualified to do this, or very confident that they could pull it off. Except for one very important thing: Jesus chose them. 

How many times, I wonder, would they need to come back to that assurance? The times when they were ignored or laughed at, hated and persecuted, imprisoned and some of them were even killed? How many times did they remind themselves that God’s own Son chose them, and he chose them for a reason?

The disciples were chosen by God for a particular purpose. But they’re not the only ones. The fact is each and every one of us has also been chosen by God for a particular purpose in this world. We know this because as Paul tells the Ephesians, we were chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world; and to the Colossians, we are ‘God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved.’ 

Of course, we all have our moments of doubt. Moments when we wonder what on earth are we are doing with our lives; what are we really here for; and it’s good to sometimes ask ourselves these hard questions. Because if we dig deep enough, we will hear those words that God’s people have heard from the very beginning, ‘You did not choose me, but I chose you‘. We have been chosen to bear the fruit of God’s love in this world, and to bear it in a way that no one else can. 

And what an important time it is for us to bear the fruit of God’s love in this world. We can keep reminding ourselves it’s been a tough year, how our world has changed forever by the pandemic; the economic challenges, the rise in mental health issues, and a decrease in hope for our future. but perhaps you and I have been chosen by Jesus, for just such a time as this. Our world needs healing. Our world needs hope. Our world needs to be reminded of God’s love for us all.

If ever there was a time for the church to be the church, it is certainly now. And we are the church.

The words that Jesus spoke to those first disciples, he speaks to every one of us today: ‘You did not choose me, but I chose you, and appointed you to go and bear fruit.’ So may God bless us and help us as we step out in confidence to bring the light of Jesus into our world, and to bear the fruit of his love. Amen

Chosen For A Reason – Gospel and Sermon, St James’ Church, West End, Southampton

The Light Shines In The Darkness

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Sermon preached on the Second Sunday Before Lent based on the following passages – John 1:1-14 and Colossians 1:15-20

May I speak and may you hear through the Grace of our Lord; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

In the beginning was the Word… perhaps one of the most evocative starts to a gospel or indeed any scripture, where we are presented by a mystery. Of course, one would expect nothing less of John and whilst all four gospels can be said to be biographies of Jesus, as the former Archbishop of Canterbury William Temple once said, ‘the Synoptic Gospels [i.e. Matthew, Mark and Luke] are like photo albums, whilst John’s gospel is like a portrait’, and a portrait is something we can spend many hours standing in front of to try and gauge what the artist is trying to tell us.

In the beginning was the Word… John’s opening sentence echoes the opening words of the book of Genesis which firmly places the Word in creation, communicating God’s will and evidence that it is eternal and has always been at work throughout.

With its capital ‘W’ we can see that it is a title not a noun or a verb, and John identifies the Word as God in the person of Jesus; and although the term Word or the Greek Logos is not retained as a title in John’s Gospel beyond the prologue, the whole gospel presses the basic claim that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit together are one God. Here is God present to his people and knowable to his people in self-revelation and redemption.

Accordingly, Jesus is the source of life and light for all people everywhere; but what of that light? God had sent an advance messenger in John the Baptist to provide testimony as to the true light. A light that will enlighten, educate and clarify God’s purpose in wanting to redeem all who will believe in him. A light that will dispel the darkness and evil that shrouds the world in so many places.

Certainly, over the last year we have seen a lot of darkness in the world; darkness that is more like an invisible fog that clings to bodies and minds. Yet the one thing that has kept many people going is a sense of faith that there is hope for the future. In amongst all that darkness a small flicker of hope has burned steadily, ‘and the darkness did not overcome it’.

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it
John 1:5

And today, more than ever that small flame is burning even more brightly as we appear to be at a turning point in the Coronavirus pandemic, with the vaccine programme rollout and lockdown measures reducing the rate of infection. Yet, we can’t reduce God’s role to that of a single unextinguishable tealight!

However, the light is indeed eternal, and as mentioned, is a light that will enlighten people everywhere. It is a spiritual light, that awakens a response to the person of Jesus, but it is also a light that kindles in our heart and minds the knowledge and skills needed to bring light to others. 

In flashes of inspiration or eureka moments – from Archimedes in his bath; Newton under his apple tree and the scientists at AstraZeneca in their test tubes, to the light that shines out from people’s eyes in simple acts of kindness and love done purely for the benefit of others.

There is nothing that can stop this light from shining and yet people still choose, just as Jesus’ own people did, to turn away, to shield their eyes and fail to recognise God even when he walks among them.

And walk among them he did, which was quite extraordinary, that the Word of God, the agent of creation, should choose to become ‘flesh’, to become a human being, taking on our nature, with all its wayward appetites and frailties. But just like then, his death could not extinguish the light, and those who believe in him, whether then or now, all creatures of the original creation find themselves transformed through his blood on the cross into a new spiritual creation, as children of God, in which the light of Christ resides.

This then is the light that we all have within us as followers of Christ. Even so, for many people there have been times when the surrounding darkness has threatened to overwhelm us, unable to fully imagine the number of deaths related to the Coronavirus, the mental anguish of being parted from loved ones, the exhaustion, the rules, the sheer inescapable nature of the way we are having to live our lives; it all takes its toll.

Yet, the light still shines deep within us. slow and steady – we just have to allow it push away some of that darkness, to hand over our worries and concerns to God, to let him reveal the signs of hope and new life for each of us, just as he revealed his glory in the life of Jesus.

A ‘glory’ not as a radiant vision or dazzling light but in his sacrificial love for the world that revealed his true worth. Centuries before, Moses realised that God ‘is compassionate and gracious… abounding in love and faithfulness’ but it is God’s Son who is ‘full of grace and truth’. And it is through this Grace that the invisible God is never truly hidden but is always revealed in the perfect light of his son, Jesus Christ, the light for and of the whole world, now and forever. Amen

The Right Man In The Right Place At The Right Time

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San Juan Bautista, Alvise Vivarini, c1475

Sermon preached on the second Sunday of Advent 2020 based on the following readings 2 Peter 3:8-15a and Mark 1:1-8

May I speak and may you hear through the Grace of our Lord; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

We have a saying in our family, ‘Patience is a virtue, virtue is a Grace. Grace is a little girl who wouldn’t wash her face!’ It was often quoted when one or other of the children were eager to attain something sooner rather that wait. Of course, waiting when you’re very young can be a hard thing to do, especially if it’s something exciting that might be about to happen; but it’s no less hard waiting whatever your age.

In Peter’s letter he is faced with a congregation who are disillusioned and impatient by the non-appearance of Jesus coming in glory, definitely an event to be excited about. Even so, the ‘I want it now’s don’t get – they need to learn a little more grace. Instead he encourages them to live lives of holiness and godliness, to wait in ‘peace, without spot or blemish’. After all God’s time-relativity is different to ours. Except, there is still the need to be ready for the unknown moment of his return to the Earth.

But patience is not an attribute recognised by the writer of Mark’s gospel, as he takes us back to the beginning of the story. He starts off like a bullet train out of the station and to be honest never slows down or pause to take on water or fuel till the very end… an end that actually needed something added to it later!

His opening sentence is like a shout, a proclamation, a declaration of intent, ‘the beginning of the good news’. This is the gospel ‘of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, a word derived from the Anglo-Saxon term god-spell, meaning ‘good story’. No starlit stable, no paternity angst, no migratory gift bearers, just straight into the reason that he was here on earth amongst us – to redeem us for all time.

Nevertheless, his first appearance is heralded by an unlikely character, a wild man of the desert, clad in camel’s hair and sustained by a diet of kosher protein and wild honey (locusts are mentioned in Leviticus as a ‘clean’ food). John the Baptist certainly dressed like Elijah and was fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah to be ‘the messenger’ who was preparing the people of God for the long-awaited Messiah.

But why was this messenger so different from the many prophets that God had send before? What was it about this man that was attracting people to come out into the wilderness from the region of Judea and Jerusalem to be dipped in a river as a sign that were re-turning towards God – a baptism of repentance.

Well, it had been about 500 years since Malachi had stepped off the earthly stage, and since then no genuine prophetic voices had been heard.  Without a prophet, people in the land began to divide into parties and groups, each claiming the right to interpret the scriptures and lead the people.

So, the time was ripe for the long-awaited Messiah to appear, even so we could ask why this was the moment in time that God chose to do so? What we do know is that he came according to God’s time schedule, as Paul states in Galatians, ‘When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law’ (Galatians 4:4-5)

And if we were to try and put forward a reason why it was a perfect time for the spread of the gospel, we might assume that the Pax Romana, a time of peace in the Roman Empire, and great road and water transport systems, allowed for information to be passed quickly. In addition, Greek was a common language with allowed the Gospel to be communicated to a wide range of peoples, although language is no barrier to the Holy Spirit.

Today’s technological advances in global communications might suggest that now would have been a better time to reveal the Messiah, but would people be prepared to go and submit to a need for repentance from an eccentric looking, religious firebrand in the wilderness of our city suburbs? Yet alone recognise and accept Jesus?

But do not ignore this one fact, beloved,
that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years,
and a thousand years are like one day.
2 Peter 3:8

God always communicates with us in ways we can understand and twenty first century humanity has sufficient reason to believe in Jesus. That he chose to come some two thousand years ago does not change the fact that he came and fulfilled everything that the Bible had predicted. Two thousand years ago, people were ready and able to understand just enough to get the message across; after all for the Lord, ‘a thousand years are like one day’ so it was God’s perfect time for him to come to us.

But it was not to be in the way that most people expected. He would not be a military leader. He would not crush the Romans and set up a Jewish state. The true Messiah would seem utterly defeated before he won.

Yet win he would, and John the Baptist knew this. Although his water of baptism would physically and metaphorically wash people clean from their sins, the power and glory of Jesus would lie in his ability to immerse, plunge or drench people in the Holy Spirit (from the Greek word baptizo).

For us, this drenching means that we are forgiven and brought back into a proper relationship with God; we are blessed with powerful gifts to prepare us for service and for building up the body of Christ, and we are given hope for the future, whatever that looks like and whenever it happens

As Peter says, ‘The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance.’ We can’t hurry time, but this Advent we can repeat our heartfelt wish – Maranatha – come Lord Jesus. Come amongst us and be with us once again and we will welcome you

Amen

Maranatha written in the Southwick Codex

The Best Laid Plans… On Being Prepared

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Blake - The Angel Appearing to Zechariah

William Blake – The Angel Appearing to Zacharias (1799 -1800)

Sometimes you think you’ve got it all under control, the necessary preparations have been made, the last minute arrangements set up, and you’ve just celebrated with nearly 800 people the Nativity story and the symbolism of a red beribboned orange, pierced with a foil held candle, four cocktail sticks and various fruits and sweets (a Christingle), when someone leaves you a voicemail saying that the readings for this evening’s most important service, to which many will come for what might be their only visit to church in a year are incorrectly printed in the carefully prepared service sheet, not only incorrectly printed, but basically incorrect. Now what would you do?

Based on 2 Samuel 7:1-5, 8-11, 16 and  Luke 1:67-79
Actual readings heard Isaiah 52:7-10 and John 1:1-14

May I speak and may you hear through the grace of our Lord; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen

It’s wonderful to see you all here tonight, on this most important of nights; this holy night; this night when we celebrate once more the coming of God in the person of his son, Jesus Christ to earth.

However, they say that you should be prepared for anything and at about 8 o’clock this evening, it was pointed out to me that the readings that are printed in your service sheet are actually the ones for Christmas Eve – Morning Eucharist. An easy mistake to make I keep trying to tell myself, as we start this service on Christmas Eve, but we end it on Christmas Morning. I suspect when I was preparing the Worship rota in October, this minor, but important fact escaped me – I should have turned the page in the Lectionary – and so when I came to prepare my talk earlier for this evening it was the these ones that I’d used on which to base it

But I couldn’t let you not hear those beautiful readings from Isaiah and John, otherwise for some it would just not be Christmas, and I wouldn’t have got to read one of my favourite gospel passages from the bible – ‘the world became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory’ At least it also mentions John the Baptist…

It also wouldn’t be right to make you listen to both of the other readings as well, but please do glance through them so that you at least get an idea of where I’m coming from – the first one a message from God  through the prophet Nathan for King David and his kingship, and the second a song of thanksgiving, formally know as the Benedictus, and sung by Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist which prophecies about the coming saviour and the part that John will play in that.

The fact is nothing ever really happens without some preparation and for weeks (or months even) we have been preparing our workplaces, schools and homes to reflect this celebration. Or have we? Nowadays, we have to look hard amongst all the trivial fripperies, the giant inflatable Santas, the cheese advent calendars and unicorn reindeer to catch a glimpse of the real story of God coming among us.

But he is there, and your being here tonight is a sign that despite all the tinsel and the glitter, the message he came to fulfil still resonates at the deepest level with our needs as human beings.

The preparations for Jesus coming among us, probably started the moment that Adam and Eve stepped out of the Garden of Eden. God wanted us back, to heal the relationship that had broken down, to restore his trust in us.

Come forward several eons and we find ourselves in the presence of Nathan, a prophet in the time of King David, now only one thousand years before the birth of Jesus. Now at first there doesn’t seem to be any mention of a saviour, but again God is working on his preparations and it includes building a house – not a physical house – although the temple would be established by David’s son Solomon – but a dynastic house

To David, God has promised to ‘make for you a great name’. David, the unlikely king, a murderer, an adulterer, a drunken carouser – sounds a bit like he’d have fitted into the cast of Eastenders Christmas special, and yet a mighty warrior, a loving father and a great king. Originally a shepherd, one of the least amongst his society, yet an appropriate choice to be part of the lineage of Jesus.

Yet this was to be no ordinary royal dynasty – and if we want to be picky – the genealogical proof that both Luke and Matthew give us at the beginning of their gospels, that Jesus, in his humanity, was a direct descendant of Abraham and David through to Joseph, Jesus’ legally adoptive father and by birth, through Mary, is actually a messianic rather than a physical bloodline.

Come forward to another prophet, Isaiah, whose prophecy, ‘Unto us a Son is born, unto us a son is given….’ was a little premature – some seven hundred years premature to be exact, but it was further evidence of God’s preparations, before there began a silence…. A long silence… a very, very long silence…

Even at the next stage of preparations that silence was to continue as we now need to imagine we are in the temple, carrying out our priestly duties, we are called Zechariah and we have been drawn by lot to enter the sanctuary to offer incense. Zechariah probably wasn’t prepared for the sight of the angel that appeared to him, far less the news that his wife was about to embark on a geriatric pregnancy, hence why his incredulous questions rendered him unable to speak for the next nine or so months!

When he does regain his voice he uses it to confirm the child’s name and to break out into what we now call the Benedictus, his song of thanksgiving to God. It is this child that we hear about in his prophetic words, the child that will grow into the man John the Baptist, who will make the final preparations to announce Jesus’ ministry and the fulfilment of God’s promise.

And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High;
    for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways
Luke 2:76

But we’ve jumped too far ahead, because tonight we have come prepared for the Christ-child’s birth, in a stable, in the night, as a helpless babe. We’ve also prepared for it during the season of Advent, where each week we’ve watched and waited and thought about the reasons for his coming. Reasons, as I said, that we all instinctively know make the most sense for our lives but seem so difficult to achieve both on a personal and global scale.

The reason that he came to bring joy. A joy that was shared in the songs of Zechariah, of Mary and the angels; a joy that is heard in words and the music of the carols and songs that we sing tonight.` The angels that bent near to the earth, to bring glad tidings of goodwill from God, tiding of joy and of reconciliation. A joy that can be shared among us, in friendship and fellowship to all, not just tonight but every day

The reason that he came to bring peace. An outward peace in a world where men and women need to hush the noise of strife and warfare and look for ways of working together for the common good; and an inner peace, through the message that John will share, that ‘the dawn from on high will break upon us to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace’.

The reason that he came to bring love. A love that is all encompassing, limitless and freely given. Which bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things, as Paul tells us in his letter to the Corinthians. A love that brings its own peace from knowing that whatever situation we find ourselves in, whatever we might have done, there is forgiveness available to us, and because of that forgiveness we can be in a loving relationship with God again, and through our relationship with Jesus we can love one another better

Finally, the reason that he came to bring hope; the realization of the Messianic hopes of the Jewish nation as they impatiently borne the yoke of the Romans, and continually sighed for the time when someone from the House of David would be their deliverer and to whom Zechariah was pointing in his prophecy. That same hope that is offered to all of us, regardless of age, gender, sexuality or ability. A hope that is everlasting, because of what Jesus would go on to do through his death and resurrection in order to bring us back to him at the end of time.

Zechariah wasn’t initially prepared to trust what God was going to do through him, and too often we can be so distracted by the world around us that we find it difficult to just accept what God might be saying to us, how he calls us into a relationship that demands nothing of us but to simply be prepared to open ourselves up to the possibility that his joy, his peace, his love and his hope are all that we really need.

So tonight, be open to hear his invitation to come and be prepared to receive him into your heart. Tonight, be open to share with others the things that you discover about Christ and yourself and be prepared to be that herald of good tidings. Tonight, be open to having your life changed by the child in the manger and be prepared to be transformed. Tonight be prepared for anything and everything.

Amen

Starry Starry Night

O Holy Night – starry skies over Japan

A Heart of Stone?

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Heart of Stone

Evensong Message for Pentecost 2018 – Reading Ezekiel 36:22-28 and Acts 2:22-38

Today we celebrate Pentecost – an outpouring of the Holy Spirit – sent just as Jesus had promised – enabling and transforming those who were willing to receive it, with physical signs of flames and wind and a universal understanding of the truth being spoken to those listening and watching this in amazement. Just as Ezekiel had prophesied here was a gathering of the nations to hear the Word that would then spread out like wildfire from Jesus’ own land to ignite the flame that would become a global phenomenon – the birth of Christianity, with its message of faith, hope and love.

Here was something new then – or was it?

Surely people had had faith before? Jesus himself was a Jew, part of a well organised and structured faith; and whilst there were not necessarily a large number of organised religions as we would think of them today, there were many faith traditions. The Roman and Greek pantheon for example, Norse and Celtic traditions, many of which were Polytheistic, and often had an emphasis on communal public worship, and sacrifice (either of animals or humans) as an offering to the Gods; going right back to simple sun worship and pantheism.

 Hope is perhaps a little bit more difficult to measure prior to Christianity. What is it people were hoping for? For many it did centre on there being more to life than our brief span of three score years and ten – four score at a push. For the Greeks, a favoured few, were considered to have been physically immortalized and brought to live forever in places like Elysium. For others it was the ability to be reincarnated and to have the chance to live again, back on earth, albeit in a different way; but for most people, at the moment of death there was, however, no hope of anything but continued existence as a disembodied soul, endlessly swirling around in a cosmic soup.

And of course there was love, whether it was a strong feeling of affection and concern arising from kinship or close friendship or accompanied by sexual attraction. We all know that the Greek and Roman gods indulged in love with a relish, both among themselves and mere mortals, but rarely was it considered a love that was for all peoples, a love that begged relationship and which sought reconciliation as its ultimate goal.

Christianity though was and is different. Faith was not just something you did, it is how you live; hope was not limited, it is tangible and everlasting and love was not exclusive, it is mutual and unconditional. This wasn’t some distant deity dandling human beings like puppets, this is a God who lives right alongside us.

In order to love one has to engage with our minds and our hearts. The two organs in a human body that not only sustain life but which enable us to understand what life is all about. But it is our hearts that pump blood around our bodies to every other organ which enable us to think, to feel, to touch, to sense and which have become universal symbols of love; and a heart that does not love can be said to be as lifeless and useless as a heart of stone.

A heart of stone does not allow our ears to hear the cries of those in need or our eyes to see injustice being done. A heart of stone does not allow us to feel emotions of compassion or joy, it does not permit our arms and hands to reach out to hug or be hugged or comforted.

 A heart of stone does not allow us the desire to know God and to become followers of Christ, because a heart of stone cannot love either itself or others. Even so, God is able to reach out to the most hard-hearted individuals and to use them for his glory.

 ‘A new heart I will give you,
and a new spirit I will put within you;
and I will remove from your body
the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh’.

However, having a heart of flesh is not an easy thing to live with. A heart of flesh can feel the keenest of suffering, the deepest of sorrows and the innermost pain. There are times when it is almost unbearable to experience these things, but our hearts do not give up

The fact is that the heart it is the hardest working muscle in the body – the first organ to form during development of the body, and the last to shut down in death. But that’s just physiology. The difference is the presence of the Holy Spirit. It is the Spirit in the form of love that enables us to ‘bear all things, believe all things, hope all things, endure all things.’

 When Peter stood up on the day of Pentecost, it was the Spirit that enabled him to declare so boldly that despite what the people had done to Jesus, there was no power on earth that could have held him down and he used the scriptures to back up this declaration.

Quoting from Psalm 16, the Michtam of David, or the Golden Psalm, he spelt our very clearly the faith, the hope and the love Jesus knew was his in God,

“I saw the Lord always before me,
for he is at my right hand so that I will not be shaken;
therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced;
moreover, my flesh will live in hope.
For you will not abandon my soul to Hades,
or let your Holy One experience corruption.
You have made known to me the ways of life;
you will make me full of gladness with your presence.”

 It was the witness of the disciples through the power of the Holy Spirit that persuaded others that indeed, Jesus was both Lord and Messiah. As it says, ‘they were cut to the heart’. To the very centre of their being.

 When we are filled with the Holy Spirit, there is nothing that we cannot accomplish, whether it is showing compassion, sharing joy, or seeking peace. When our hearts beat to the same rhythm as God’s then nothing will be the same and everything will be transformed by love

Love of the Holy Spirit