St Richard, Haywards Heath Feast of St Andrew 30 November 2022

It's St Andrew's Day and Scotland rejoices!  So does the Church throughout the world as it keeps the great apostle's Feast.  

Famous for bringing his brother Peter to the Lord, Andrew ranks after Peter and Paul as a great Christian hero.  He even has a special X Shaped cross.  The tradition is that he died spread-eagled on a cross to associate himself with his Master, just as Peter is said to have been crucified upside down out of humility.

In the first reading St Paul speaks of the welcome footsteps of those bringing good news and how that news has gone out through all the earth as evangelists have succeeded the apostles generation after generation.

That good news centres on the coming, life, teaching, healing and miracles of Our Lord succeeded by his death upon the Cross and his rising again. Through that Cross God, the maker of all things, has bound himself forever to humankind. Christ’s resurrection underlines the extraordinary action of God’s love revealed in taking human flesh and, as one of us, giving himself up to death for all of us. How can we doubt, as Christians, the dignity of human beings exalted by our Maker above all things? Destined to immortal life as the image of God in us grows towards his likeness in the glory to come?

St Andrew headed to that destiny bearing a special Cross evident in the Scottish flag. Crosses look fine in church in the stories of the Saints - but when they come our way – well that's a different matter! ‘If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow me’ Jesus tells us (Mark 8:34). The things that land on us – the difficult neighbour, the physical ailment, the inner pain of emotional loss – these are blessings in disguise.  As it once said outside the florists "crosses made to order".  Indeed they are – our trials we have to make the most of.  

Crosses made to order, as God has permitted or even, dare we say, directed. For Andrew it was the cross of spread-eagled martyrdom.  For us it has been, is and will be different sorts of trials but we can be sure that the Lord Jesus who appoints our crosses has our crowns in mind as He does so.

God has bound himself to us forever by the Cross of which this service is a living memorial. As we receive Holy Communion we accept with it the gift of the Cross through the hardships of life, take courage and lift our heads to move forward into paths he has prepared for us which can make us holy like him.

Thank you, Lord, for the courage you gave St Andrew to bear his cross.  We ask your help in the trials you set before day by day in Jesus' name.  Amen.

St David, Barbados Luke 21:5-19 13 November 2022

 

It's good for Anne and I to be back in the Caribbean where we were married - in Guyana actually - and to be at the altar with Canon Burke with whom I have a friendship tracing back 35 years to my first involvement in the Diocese of Guyana. I was Principal of the Alan Knight Training Centre for Amerindian clergy liaising with Codrington College when I first met your parish priest, identifying with his bright mind, warm heart and administration acumen which has enriched the church in this island for so many years. 

I drew the short straw with today’s liturgy didn’t I? You need something of a theologian to make sense of the Gospel and steer you away from both literalism and scepticism, the two bugbears of the Church in our day. Our three year Provincial Sunday lectionary is an amended version of the Roman Catholic form. This Sunday of Proper 28 there’s a cheerful bit of Isaiah switched for the doom laden Old Testament reading from Malachi set down for the Catholics! I guess that was done for pastoral reasons so we don’t over depress our congregations and make them shrink further. I’ve just come from England and we’re mightily depressed, outside of Church, with three Prime Ministers in a year one of whom caused a mighty dent in national and personal finances - and that’s before you consider Ukraine and Russia. How blessed Anne and I are to escape to Barbados - but we know you well enough not to be blind to the challenge there is here so far as the cost of living. At least you don’t have our heating bills though air conditioning doesn’t come for free!

So, with that prelude, let’s look at Luke 21 verses 5 to 19. It weaves around the words of Our Lord later prophetic thinking about the significance of the destruction of the Temple in 70AD, almost 40 years after Christ’s death and resurrection, which is when we date Luke’s Gospel. It’s so-called ‘apocalyptic literature’, taking the lid off history to unveil its deeper meaning. The Greek verb linked to apocalypse means taking the lid off a jar. When I googled definitions of the word I got ‘prophetic revelation, especially concerning a cataclysm, in which the forces of good permanently triumph over the forces of evil. Any revelation or prophecy, any universal or widespread destruction or disaster, such as the apocalypse of nuclear war’ - that last part of the definition has chilling relevance! In the Lucan passage we can’t be sure where genuine sayings of Jesus end and apocalyptic writing from a generation later begins, but the passage like Luke’s Gospel as a whole has authority across the Church as part of the Canon of Scripture so debate about the origin of texts is secondary to that perspective. Holy Scripture, our Collect reminded us, is ‘written for our learning… to read, mark, learn and inwardly digest… that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of eternal life’. 

There’s no doubt Our Lord repeatedly predicted the destruction of the Temple by the Roman authorities, just as he is quoted as saying in the first paragraph of today’s Gospel:

‘When some were speaking about the temple, how it was adorned with beautiful stones and gifts dedicated to God, he said, ‘As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.’  At his trial this prediction was one of the charges brought against Our Lord, though the accusation couldn’t be made to stick. The later paragraphs of our passage seem to be an expansion from that prediction linked to the event actually taking place in 60AD, and its sequence, so devastating for the Jewish people of those days. 

Bible scholar Reginald Fuller writes: ‘we may reasonably conclude that the predictions of historical disasters - war, earthquake, pestilence and famine - reflect the events of the 60s AD although some of it is described in conventional apocalyptic language. The predictions of persecutions are genuine warnings of Jesus addressed to the disciples… this Gospel reading confronts the preacher with two problems, one arising from its highly complex character, the other from the fact that it refers to a first century crisis which no longer obtains today. The best thing to do with such literature is to treat it as an inspired insight into the meaning of history which is a constant struggle between the forces of good and evil. The Christian has no right to expect that everything is going to get better and better… all he or she knows is that right will triumph in the end and that his or her task is to show patience and endurance: ‘by your endurance you will gain your lives’.

So, preacher, to application! What is there ‘to read, mark, learn and inwardly digest’ in this Gospel passage? 

Last time I was in St David’s, a year ago, Fr Noel and many of you were involved in liturgies linked to the transition from Queen Elizabeth II to Dame Sandra Mason as Head of State coinciding with a visit from the then Prince of Wales. Since then we in Britain have seen a sadder transition, with the death of the Queen and accession of King Charles III. Anne and I were privileged to pay respects to our late Queen in Westminster Hall and were invited to the proclamation of the King on 11 September outside the town hall where we live in Haywards Heath south of London. On the 6th of May next year in Westminster Abbey Charles will sit before the high altar of Westminster Abbey to be anointed and crowned. Before him, and billions of viewers across the world, will be this text from Revelation 11 verse 15 that is written over the coronation altar:  ‘The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ’. In Britain our head of state is still appointed in a Christian context, a king or queen, yes, but appointed within a context informed by today’s Gospel. That is, a belief that God is working his purpose out in history through thick and thin. As we shall be reminded in the liturgy of Christ the King next Sunday it is ‘an eternal and universal kingdom, a kingdom of truth and life, a kingdom of holiness and grace, a kingdom of justice, love and peace’. 

Applying today’s Gospel is about owning that ultimate reality and seeing everything in the light of it including all we learn hour by hour through the media of the tumult in the world, be that social, economic, political or environmental. All our endeavours as Christians are to be conducted head held high, looking to the Lord, putting faith in his working all things for good for those who love him, cultivating the patience and endurance through which we gain fullness of life with all the saints. As we start Advent season in a fortnight’s time we will receive further spurring on to work for ‘the kingdom of this world.. to become the kingdom of our God and of Christ, his Son’. 

The first Coming of Jesus was into the womb of a holy woman, the Blessed Virgin Mary, demonstrating that we human beings are no mere compartment of the animal kingdom but are capable of union with God. His Second Coming will occur when human beings, drawn to Christ and his Church in the Spirit, have completed the divine plan 'to bring all things together in Christ'. (Ephesians 1.10) 

As Christ waited for the holy woman to be his Mother he now awaits a holy people to be his Bride so that as heavenly Bridegroom he can one day embrace his church and ‘we may rise to the life immortal’. Christ awaits the purification of his church for this consummation just as he had to await a woman for his conception. In Advent season the Church encourages a deeper examination of conscience and greater availability of the sacrament of confession. Even this morning our priests are available after Mass for this ministry or the less formal ministry of prayers with individuals. Through these ministries and through our own individual prayer and bible study we can engage with the wonder of the love and judgement of God in Christ and his purpose for the church and the world.

It is a glorious truth that no one can take away or enhance who we are before God, such is the love he has for us and for all. As we welcome that love afresh this morning may we hold in our hearts those in our circle or our church’s circle who do not know the Lord Jesus, praying they too will open their hearts to him and experience his love. In this respect the anticipation of Christmas in carol services is a bonus. Church-going is less extraordinary on the Island in December. We have a chance to invite our friends to come along with us for a taster of the Church. In the UK some Churches run Christian enquiry courses in January that are promoted among attendees at Advent and Christmas services. 

Through deeper prayer and intercession, self-examination and confession and mission planning may we engage afresh in the coming weeks with the possibilities of God and see them realised in our lives, our church and our community so as to accomplish the deepening and the spread of Christian Faith. 

The kingdom of this world, counter to all appearances, is becoming the kingdom of our God and of Christ, his Son’. This is our faith and our hope - lift up your heads if they are drooping, look to the Lord

In Barbados and in the UK, may holiness reign, with justice and peace, and may our partnership in Christian mission across the Atlantic ocean continue ‘til the earth is filled with the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea! 

Picture: Antonio Campi’s Mystery of the Passion of Christ mid 16th century (Louvre)

St Richard, Haywards Heath All Souls' Day 2 November 2022

The Bible begins and ends in a garden, the garden of paradise. We read in the opening pages of Scripture that "God planted a garden eastward in Eden". In that garden "the Lord God walked" and He walked in close friendship with man.

The refusal by man of friendship with God led him into exile from that garden. No longer in peace with God and nature, man saw his garden overgrown and his destiny to labour by the sweat of his hands. Again and again God offered his friendship. Speaking of his people Israel, God said through Isaiah in Chapters 51 & 58: ‘Her desert shall be like the garden of the Lord…you shall be like a watered garden’.

Finally God came himself in the flesh, taking our human nature, to walk in a garden. St. John says in Chapter 18 that ‘over the brook Kedron in Jerusalem there was a garden’, and into that garden the Son of God came to sweat blood and tears for our redemption. Man created to walk with God in a garden is redeemed by perfect obedience offered by perfect humanity in a garden, the garden of Gethsemane.

That redemption is finally revealed to believers in a garden. ‘Now in the place where he was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb where no one had ever been laid. They laid Jesus there’.

Then on the third day the Risen Lord Jesus stands in that garden and addresses the weeping Magdalen: "Woman, why are you weeping? Whom do you seek?" supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him and I will take him away". Jesus said to her, "Mary." she turned and said to him in Hebrew, "Rabboni!" (Which means teacher).

The gate of heaven is opened to all believers in a garden, the Easter Garden! She supposing him to be the gardener. St. John recognises the significance of that empty garden tomb and the hailing of Christ as "Gardener".

Was it not fitting that he who had acted in creation to form man in a garden should also recreate man in the flesh of his own glorious humanity once again in a garden? And walk once again in a garden, side by side with women and men restored by the resurrection to new friendship with him, through the will offered in Gethsemane and the blood on Calvary?

Mary Magdalene, Peter, John, walking with our Redeemer in the resurrection garden is a pledge of the eternal destiny of all who welcome what Jesus did for them in the garden secretly, and on the cross on high. We too will walk one day with our redeemer in a garden! For the Bible ends as it begins with a garden. St. John the Divine writes in chapters 2 & 22 ‘To him who conquers, I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God...then he showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the lamb’.

Man created in a garden had his eternal destiny opened up in Gethsemane and the Easter Garden and he will enjoy that eternal destiny in another garden, the garden of paradise. Of this garden scripture uses few words save an affirmation that ‘no unclean thing shall enter there’ and that those who enter must be ‘washed in the blood’ of the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ. No good works, however good, lived by the holiest of men will provide robes suitable for the garden of paradise where man is to walk as first intended, in step with God.

It is All Souls' Day and our thoughts and prayers focus on those we love in Christ but see no longer. Inasmuch as they are washed in his Blood, inasmuch as they plead Jesus' perfect offering and not their own righteousness, Scripture says they will have a place in the garden of paradise. 

Yet ‘no unclean thing may enter there’.  Unrepented sin in the heart - this has no place in a Saint destined to walk eternally at the side of a holy God. So our thoughts turn into prayer today as we pray for those we love but see no longer. We pray a washing and cleansing of hearts set on Christ at the hour of their death, so that their uncleanness may disappear and their entry into paradise be gained. 

As we pray we recognise that we cannot change the basic orientation of departed souls, only beg the Lord to speed the cleansing and entry into eternal joy of those He is drawing already to himself.

The cleansing of souls I speak of reminds me of my own cleansing of an old Vicarage garden in North London.  Where the potential is there the Lord allows it to blossom by removing all constraints, just as I removed the briars and ivy to see that garden flourish on the slopes of Alexandra Palace. Our prayer for the Holy Souls today and always is like my efforts in the garden - in both cases we help God to have His Way. 

All Souls' Day reminds every mortal man and woman of their approaching death and the offer of an eternal destiny. That destiny is not automatic. It needs to be sought from the One who planned it in that first garden of Eden, won it in another garden of Gethsemane and now welcomes Holy Souls washed by his spirit in his blood into the garden of rest eternal and light perpetual, of gladness unalloyed and perfect bliss.

God make the picture words falteringly make of such a garden, a word picture supplied by the word of God no less, into a reality for us and all those we love in Christ but see no longer.

Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord - and let light perpetual shine upon them! May the garden of paradise be their eternal recreation!