Haywards Heath owes an immense debt to the heart for social renewal possessed by William Allen (1770-1843) who founded the town’s America estate. Allen was a man of many parts, a scientist and pharmacist, educationalist and prison reformer, pacifist and slavery abolitionist. He established a ‘home colony’ to build self-sufficiency and empower agricultural workers from Lindfield off Gravelye Lane. This was when people recalled the poor being sent across the Atlantic to what had then just become Britain’s former colony. Haywards Heath street names, including my own in Marylands, recall Allen’s contribution through the America estate.
On All Saints Feast we recall a succession of folk who have gone before us spurred by a Christian vision like William Allen and Mary Otter, benefactor of Presentation Church, not enrolled in the Calendar of Saints but ‘of virtuous and godly living’. The unselfish contribution of these two to the good of our town lives on to our benefit as they themselves we trust live on with the unclouded vision of God with all the saints that fulfills Christian faith. ‘When Christ is revealed, we will be like him, for we shall see him as he is. And all who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure’ writes St John
Looking to that ultimate reality William Allen wrote these words. In the multitude of things which harness the mind, the main object is the good of others. It’s true, the human mind gets harnessed by a lot of unworthy things and is in sore need of purification. Sometimes our minds feel overwhelmed currently by the flow of news concerning the pandemic. As Allen writes, in the multitude of our thoughts, good or ill, we should not be distracted from our main object as Christians that is outside of ourselves in God and other people. As deeper knowledge of how God loves us through and through breaks upon us we grow in self knowledge and self love and generate a self forgetfulness that looks more and more in love to God and neighbour.
Making our main object the good of others is a lifelong struggle for the self knowledge, self love and self forgetfulness Our Lord describes in his Sermon on the Mount. Eugene Peterson's paraphrase of today’s Gospel draws out the challenge of a passage so beautiful and familiar we can miss its force. Here is Matthew 5 in The Message translation:
‘Arriving at a quiet place, Jesus sat down and taught his climbing companions. This is what he said:
“You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.
“You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.
“You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are - no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.
“You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.
“You’re blessed when you care. At the moment of being ‘care-full,’ you find yourselves cared for.
“You’re blessed when you get your inside world - your mind and heart - put right. Then you can see God in the outside world.
“You’re blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That’s when you discover who you really are, and your place in God’s family.
I like those words but they are discomfiting. Behind them is the ongoing challenge to wake up from the negativity and self delusion of much of my thinking to what God, what scripture, has to say about me, about who I am and what I shall be as a child of God. As we heard in the wonderful paragraph read for our second lesson, 1 John 3:1-3: ‘See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and that is what we are… we are God’s children now.. when he is revealed we shall see him as he is. And all who have this hope purify themselves, just as he is pure’.
The first reading from Revelation Chapter 7 portrays the ultimate gathering of God’s family in the communion of saints with people ‘from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages’ gathered in triumphant song with that sight of God in Jesus Christ for which the saints yearn. After the many trials of Christian life ‘[we] will hunger no more, and thirst no more; the sun will not smite [us], nor any scorching heat; for the Lamb at the centre of the throne will be [our] shepherd, and he will guide [us] to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from [our] eyes’.
This is our faith - this is the faith of the Church - ‘the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting’.
On All Saints Feast we look back in thanksgiving on all whose selfless service has made a difference to our lives, our circle and our town and forward with a recommitment to service of God and neighbour. This morning as we contemplate God in communion with the saints we are changed - and so is the world weighing on each of our hearts. In pleading this memorial sacrifice of Christ’s death and resurrection we are lifted into the heavenly hub of adoration, in communion with the Church in paradise and on earth, to effect the consecration of all that is to God’s praise and service.
‘Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honour and power and might be to our God for ever and ever. Amen’ (Revelation 7)
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