Introduction
Welcome to the triumphant end of Easter season when we celebrate the descent of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost also called Whitsunday.
We’ve just sung about becoming the place wherein the Holy Spirit makes his dwelling.
How can we understand this?
I’ve got an illustration.
Each one of us human beings is like a coffee pot.
We’re filled with so much goodness, love and patience to give out to others.
We give out and out and out - until we get empty. Then we find the difference between Christians and others.
What do you think that difference is?
Believers have found there's a lid on our coffee pot and a God willing to refill us, through it, with love, power and praise exactly when we’re empty and needy.
The 'lid' is faith and what gets poured in by the Spirit's power is 'grace'.
Our sin is linked to our self sufficiency, to our attempts to live in our own strength without the help of the Holy Spirit.
Let’s read through the confession before we say it together and ask God’s forgiveness.
Homily
So what were the signs when the Holy Spirit first came down?
Rush of wind, tongues of fire, sense of filling, speaking in other languages.
Remember the coffee pot getting filled, opening up for a refill of love and empowerment when the going gets tough in life? It had been tough for the first disciples, but they prayed for the Spirit and the Spirit came.
We believe he comes in every act of Christian prayer but especially at the eucharist where he speaks through the bible and makes bread and wine our heavenly food.
The first Pentecost must have been quite a wild occasion, all that wind and fire and speaking in tongues. Elsewhere in the bible the Holy Spirit speaks more quietly. He is also a still, small voice.
In 1985 a Canon John Dorman I hardly knew wrote to me with to share how the Holy Spirit had laid on him to write from Guyana to ask me to consider running a theological college for Amerindian priests. It was a job for two single priests and married priests were not under consideration.
The problem was that though I was then in the Company of Mission Priests who take annual promises to stay single I had been praying about marriage! So it was with some reluctance that I came to see John Dorman’s letter as the voice of the Holy Spirit.
How could you see the hinterland of Guyana deprived of the sacraments because I wouldn’t leave my comfort zone! I needed to go. I went and as I went, in God’s loving kindness, I met Anne. She was at the USPG College of Ascension where Fr Allan Buik and I went to train before going to Guyana.
Though Anne was going to Argentina to serve in the diocesan office both the Bishop of Argentina and the then Bishop of Guyana agreed to our marriage which was celebrated on Pentecost Sunday 1988.
It was a great Pentecost Day. The whole village came to the celebration which began with the slaughter of a cow at dawn and cost me a bag of rice, sugar and flour! A Hindu business man I played squash with provided a plane to fly in our parents. The Holy Spirit was there working to smooth the logistics of marriage in the jungle!
I’m telling you all this because I know the Holy Spirit is the soul of the Church. He is all powerful. He also writes straight through crooked lines as Anne and I have discovered.
You know that our charitable giving is for our new Guyana link this Sunday and next – we use the orange envelopes for this. This is why I want to underline Pentecost as a Sunday which sets our eyes on the mission field. The fact that the Bishop of Guyana is visiting us in six weeks time is also relevant. We want to give him our collection personally. You can read about the new bishop and the mission of the church in Guyana by taking away a free copy of El Dorado from the back of church
Meanwhile the Holy Spirit is also filling lives around us here in Horsted Keynes. I wish more of us could have been here last Sunday night with Fr Martin when two teams ministered prayer and anointing to a group of folk who seemed to gain a real lift!
God is at work here – here and now. Let’s stand to acclaim him as we welcome the holy gospel.
Sunday, 23 May 2010
Sunday, 16 May 2010
Easter 7 The road to salvation Sunday 16 May 2010
It’s been a momentous week in British politics.
David Cameron and Nick Clegg deserve our prayers as they lead a new coalition in the national interest.
They are building a way out of the deficit and we will all pay the price. Last week I was privileged to travel to Bavaria on behalf of the Diocese and gather with 40 participants from 16 nations across Europe to study Biblical ethics. As I learned we had a new government during the week my new Romanian friend Peter learned his wages had been cut by 25% and his mother’s pension by 15% by government order in Romania. I was impressed by his humility in the face of such a financial blow.
From David and Nick to Paul and Luke in our first reading. You may remember that St Luke is author of the Acts and he travelled with St Paul. Hence today’s passage begins One day, as we were going to the place of prayer. It goes on say we met a slave-girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners a great deal of money by fortune-telling. While she followed Paul and us, she would cry out, ‘These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation.' She kept doing this for many days. But Paul, very much annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, ‘I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.‘ And it came out that very hour.
‘These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation.' That’s the phrase from that leapt out at me as I was reflecting on the scripture fresh from my Bavarian study leave with the new coalition in mind.
In Acts 16:17 we read how the psychic slave girl embarrasses Paul and Luke by shouting out: ‘These men are working for the Most High God. They’re laying out the road of salvation for you.’
What a great image! - ‘laying out the road of salvation’. It sounds like laying out the red carpet!
Just as in the days of his flesh it was the evil spirits who seemed to know the truth of Jesus more than his human hearers so with the first believers. The devil knows a trick or two they rightly say.
As the days of Eastertide move to a close, we’re reminded today of the ongoing consequences of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ for the world. Jesus has opened up, laid out a road of salvation.
It’s the road that leads up to St Giles or to all we stand for, a road that goes up and down to a place of joyful freedom. I noticed that in my absence Church Road, though still up and down, has been smoothed out at the top. No holes left to trip our members!
Anyway we stand on a road to salvation, Church Road! Ups and downs, holes, yet a place for people going somewhere. St Giles isn’t really a cul de sac, did you know?
So what does it mean to be saved?
Last week I was sharing with men and women from all over Europe one in their admission of the truth of scripture and the Christian creeds. With me they were engaged in paving the road to salvation for people living in places as far apart as Iceland and Ukraine, England and Finland. To be saved, I think we all agreed, is to be drawn to God through Jesus and come onto the road of salvation destined for the Trinity.
As Paul writes to another of his companions, Timothy This is right and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one mediator between God and humankind, Christ Jesus, himself human, who gave himself as a ransom for all. (1 Timothy 2.3-6)
If God desires salvation for all he still requires our consent if we’re to move forward onto that road.
What is that road? Five thoughts.
It is a road into belonging. Our Lord prays his Father in today’s Gospel I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.
Salvation is a pathway into belonging to Jesus and his Father through their go-between, the Holy Spirit who seals our union in baptism, confirmation and eucharist. The road of salvation is a path through which isolated people can find belonging with us in the holy, catholic Church that can be renamed God’s never-ending family.
It is secondly a road into truth. To be saved is nothing less than to come to the knowledge of the truth. The wonderful, inclusive truth that is ours in Jesus our Saviour! At our conference in Josefstal, Bavaria we looked at the truth of scripture. A Lutheran professor, Karl Foitzik, gave us a helpful analogy. Biblical truth is communicated more in analogue than digital form. You know how precisely digital radios operate compared to the fuzziness of analogue sets. Expecting the bible to provide precise, literal truth, he said, was problematic. In our discussions we recognized the church as interpreter of scripture and our need to set issues such as homosexuality in a fuller context than literal prohibitions. The truth at stake in sexual ethics links to an age old understanding of the truth of marriage and sexual intercourse as the union of life-giving love by male and female. If the road to salvation is open to both homosexual and heterosexual it is arguable whether there can be a third state of life besides marriage and celibacy.
Back to the road. Salvation’s a road to belonging, truth and thirdly a way of compassion. Christianity got famous over love. ‘See how these Christians love one another’ they said at first. May people say it of us today!
Humanity and compassion are strongly linked and most often seen hand in hand where there is suffering. I find Buddhist teaching on spiritual detachment helpful. I do not find the image of the Buddha helpful. There is something that doesn’t resonate in a religious symbol of smiling contentment. For us this is the symbol – point to the Crucifix – and it is one with suffering humanity in every age. The salvation Christ offers is one that’s lit up the bed of suffering, the inner turmoil and psychological anguish of billions through the ages. The God shown us in Christ’s a God of compassion, which means literally one who suffers with you. Who indeed expects nothing of us that he’s not prepared to go through himself as he did on Calvary. Our altar stands by Calvary, our worship is Eucharistic, giving thanks for the Cross and determined to stay on the royal road of the Cross, the red carpet of salvation, til resurrection day of which every Sunday is anticipation.
What’s distinctive about Christian salvation is its capacity to go not against but beyond the grain of human nature into what seem to be impossible realms through empowerment by the grace of the Spirit.
So salvation is fourthly a road to empowerment. When the heart of God touches our heart it lifts the stones that lie over the springs of renewing grace. As we heard in today’s second reading from the book of Revelation chapter 22 verse 17: The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’ And let everyone who hears say, ‘Come.’ And let everyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.The Spirit of God refreshes and empowers those on the Christian road. He can also break up the stoniness in our hearts like a heavenly microwave. The work of salvation takes us on a road the world so needs today, a road that builds mercy in the soul! The heart of God makes what is impossible for us possible through the possibilities of God – which makes it, lastly, is a road to holiness.
As we studied the bible for 8 days in Germany we recognized how its interpretation is not just about rational understanding. The best interpreters are the saints, the holy men and women who speak to us still from the faith of the church through the ages.
When we read the bible it’s got authority over us. If we’re submitted to the bible as God’s Word it will be his instrument. This doesn’t necessarily mean a literal understanding but a critical loyalty served by knowledge of the creed, engagement in Christian worship and obedience to God’s commandments.
Holiness is a quality of life that lights up the road of salvation to all who stand around enticing them to step on to it. Such holiness derives from trust in God’s promises in the bible as well as in God’s Spirit who comes upon us in prayer and worship.
We started with David and Nick laying out a road for economic recovery and moved to Paul and Luke.
Their road, our road is also a road for Britain today but it is more than that. It is the way we are charged with commending as Christians, a way into the heart of God no less and everlasting salvation.
It’s a laying out the red carpet towards belonging and truth, compassion, empowerment and holiness.
Thousands are living and dying without Christ and we want them to discover a purpose for living and a reason for dying - the very purpose and reason we have as Christians.
May the eucharist we celebrate make us better servants of sisters and brothers lost in life! May this morning’s worship hour lend us courage to lay out the red carpet for them by our words and deeds and by what God is making us in Christ. Amen.
David Cameron and Nick Clegg deserve our prayers as they lead a new coalition in the national interest.
They are building a way out of the deficit and we will all pay the price. Last week I was privileged to travel to Bavaria on behalf of the Diocese and gather with 40 participants from 16 nations across Europe to study Biblical ethics. As I learned we had a new government during the week my new Romanian friend Peter learned his wages had been cut by 25% and his mother’s pension by 15% by government order in Romania. I was impressed by his humility in the face of such a financial blow.
From David and Nick to Paul and Luke in our first reading. You may remember that St Luke is author of the Acts and he travelled with St Paul. Hence today’s passage begins One day, as we were going to the place of prayer. It goes on say we met a slave-girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners a great deal of money by fortune-telling. While she followed Paul and us, she would cry out, ‘These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation.' She kept doing this for many days. But Paul, very much annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, ‘I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.‘ And it came out that very hour.
‘These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation.' That’s the phrase from that leapt out at me as I was reflecting on the scripture fresh from my Bavarian study leave with the new coalition in mind.
In Acts 16:17 we read how the psychic slave girl embarrasses Paul and Luke by shouting out: ‘These men are working for the Most High God. They’re laying out the road of salvation for you.’
What a great image! - ‘laying out the road of salvation’. It sounds like laying out the red carpet!
Just as in the days of his flesh it was the evil spirits who seemed to know the truth of Jesus more than his human hearers so with the first believers. The devil knows a trick or two they rightly say.
As the days of Eastertide move to a close, we’re reminded today of the ongoing consequences of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ for the world. Jesus has opened up, laid out a road of salvation.
It’s the road that leads up to St Giles or to all we stand for, a road that goes up and down to a place of joyful freedom. I noticed that in my absence Church Road, though still up and down, has been smoothed out at the top. No holes left to trip our members!
Anyway we stand on a road to salvation, Church Road! Ups and downs, holes, yet a place for people going somewhere. St Giles isn’t really a cul de sac, did you know?
So what does it mean to be saved?
Last week I was sharing with men and women from all over Europe one in their admission of the truth of scripture and the Christian creeds. With me they were engaged in paving the road to salvation for people living in places as far apart as Iceland and Ukraine, England and Finland. To be saved, I think we all agreed, is to be drawn to God through Jesus and come onto the road of salvation destined for the Trinity.
As Paul writes to another of his companions, Timothy This is right and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one mediator between God and humankind, Christ Jesus, himself human, who gave himself as a ransom for all. (1 Timothy 2.3-6)
If God desires salvation for all he still requires our consent if we’re to move forward onto that road.
What is that road? Five thoughts.
It is a road into belonging. Our Lord prays his Father in today’s Gospel I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.
Salvation is a pathway into belonging to Jesus and his Father through their go-between, the Holy Spirit who seals our union in baptism, confirmation and eucharist. The road of salvation is a path through which isolated people can find belonging with us in the holy, catholic Church that can be renamed God’s never-ending family.
It is secondly a road into truth. To be saved is nothing less than to come to the knowledge of the truth. The wonderful, inclusive truth that is ours in Jesus our Saviour! At our conference in Josefstal, Bavaria we looked at the truth of scripture. A Lutheran professor, Karl Foitzik, gave us a helpful analogy. Biblical truth is communicated more in analogue than digital form. You know how precisely digital radios operate compared to the fuzziness of analogue sets. Expecting the bible to provide precise, literal truth, he said, was problematic. In our discussions we recognized the church as interpreter of scripture and our need to set issues such as homosexuality in a fuller context than literal prohibitions. The truth at stake in sexual ethics links to an age old understanding of the truth of marriage and sexual intercourse as the union of life-giving love by male and female. If the road to salvation is open to both homosexual and heterosexual it is arguable whether there can be a third state of life besides marriage and celibacy.
Back to the road. Salvation’s a road to belonging, truth and thirdly a way of compassion. Christianity got famous over love. ‘See how these Christians love one another’ they said at first. May people say it of us today!
Humanity and compassion are strongly linked and most often seen hand in hand where there is suffering. I find Buddhist teaching on spiritual detachment helpful. I do not find the image of the Buddha helpful. There is something that doesn’t resonate in a religious symbol of smiling contentment. For us this is the symbol – point to the Crucifix – and it is one with suffering humanity in every age. The salvation Christ offers is one that’s lit up the bed of suffering, the inner turmoil and psychological anguish of billions through the ages. The God shown us in Christ’s a God of compassion, which means literally one who suffers with you. Who indeed expects nothing of us that he’s not prepared to go through himself as he did on Calvary. Our altar stands by Calvary, our worship is Eucharistic, giving thanks for the Cross and determined to stay on the royal road of the Cross, the red carpet of salvation, til resurrection day of which every Sunday is anticipation.
What’s distinctive about Christian salvation is its capacity to go not against but beyond the grain of human nature into what seem to be impossible realms through empowerment by the grace of the Spirit.
So salvation is fourthly a road to empowerment. When the heart of God touches our heart it lifts the stones that lie over the springs of renewing grace. As we heard in today’s second reading from the book of Revelation chapter 22 verse 17: The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’ And let everyone who hears say, ‘Come.’ And let everyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.The Spirit of God refreshes and empowers those on the Christian road. He can also break up the stoniness in our hearts like a heavenly microwave. The work of salvation takes us on a road the world so needs today, a road that builds mercy in the soul! The heart of God makes what is impossible for us possible through the possibilities of God – which makes it, lastly, is a road to holiness.
As we studied the bible for 8 days in Germany we recognized how its interpretation is not just about rational understanding. The best interpreters are the saints, the holy men and women who speak to us still from the faith of the church through the ages.
When we read the bible it’s got authority over us. If we’re submitted to the bible as God’s Word it will be his instrument. This doesn’t necessarily mean a literal understanding but a critical loyalty served by knowledge of the creed, engagement in Christian worship and obedience to God’s commandments.
Holiness is a quality of life that lights up the road of salvation to all who stand around enticing them to step on to it. Such holiness derives from trust in God’s promises in the bible as well as in God’s Spirit who comes upon us in prayer and worship.
We started with David and Nick laying out a road for economic recovery and moved to Paul and Luke.
Their road, our road is also a road for Britain today but it is more than that. It is the way we are charged with commending as Christians, a way into the heart of God no less and everlasting salvation.
It’s a laying out the red carpet towards belonging and truth, compassion, empowerment and holiness.
Thousands are living and dying without Christ and we want them to discover a purpose for living and a reason for dying - the very purpose and reason we have as Christians.
May the eucharist we celebrate make us better servants of sisters and brothers lost in life! May this morning’s worship hour lend us courage to lay out the red carpet for them by our words and deeds and by what God is making us in Christ. Amen.
Sunday, 2 May 2010
Easter 5 Election 2nd May 2010
We stand at an important junction in national life so let’s take guidance from the word of God as we prepare to play our part in the events of the coming week.
Today’s scripture was in place before Gordon Brown set 6th May. What do the lectionary readings for the fifth Sunday of Easter have to say to us?
The first reading from Acts has a hidden warning against putting our historic party allegiances too high on our agenda as we prepare to vote. Peter, a devout Jew, is taken to task in Acts 11 for associating with another party, the ‘uncircumcised’. The Jewish believers had picked up on how the Holy Spirit had fallen on Cornelius’ household as described in the previous chapter of Acts. Peter defends himself by describing a wondrous vision in which three times he’s pressed by God to eat what he saw as unclean food. The vision connected with a word from God that came to the centurion Cornelius. It seems Cornelius’ household was simultaneously prepared by God to welcome Peter’s visit and with it the good news of Jesus and empowerment in the Holy Spirit.
This passage shows God as utterly non-tribal. The God and Father of Jesus isn’t God of the Jews alone but God of the whole world. He’s God of St Giles and The Green Man to put it Horsted Keynes terms. The Holy Spirit is in principle just as available in the village as in church. Sometimes, as in the blessing of The Crown, there’s been opportunity to demonstrate that.
The Christian vision of God’s inclusivity is a challenge to the politics that defends an elite. It is refreshing to have our main political parties speaking so inclusively today. On paper none support second class citizenship in terms of race, sex, or sexual orientation. Nor an economic underclass – in principle! All main parties have strategies to foster both the creation and just distribution of wealth. All would subscribe to Britain’s global role in redressing past colonial exploitation but with different emphases. Policies on immigration make interesting reading! Some political groups are fuelling a base sort of nationalism hiding racist agendas under the national flag. The election campaign has a lot to teach us about a degree of demoralisation through pockets of poverty in our nation. When people are demoralised they’ll very readily turn to false saviours. This is what happened in Germany between the World Wars.
30 years ago I was priest in a mining village in Doncaster. It disturbs me to see the neglect of the former coal fields and how it has bred civic unrest there. Social ills have now led to an investigation of the Mayor and Council in Doncaster. Civic life depends on good citizenship. We get the leaders we deserve. It’s also true we can never dream up a political system that escapes the flaw of having to be delivered by sinful human beings. As T.S.Eliot wrote we dream of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good. Eliot may have been referring to Stalinist Russia but we might apply it to the demise of the western economy – Goldman Sachs – allied to naive, foolhardy or maybe wicked politics.
What’s the root of such political corruption? The real challenge in our society has been described as the transformation of consumers into citizens. People resist the call to public service through a self interest unconcerned about the common good beyond making sure they have the consumables they want and the neighbourhood watch functions in case others want to take these from them. The lack of readiness among people to take responsibility for civic life and the common good is quite alarming. Many of us live in the mini world of our household and the mega world of Facebook, Twitter and MSN leaving out the midi world of the local community.
Thursday’s election is a call for us to take responsibility afresh for our village, county and nation as the citizens we are.
Let’s move on to the second reading from the book of Revelation chapter 21. John the visionary speaks there of a new earth and heaven and a new Jerusalem. These new things are to be found already in the church on earth inasmuch as the resurrection of Jesus thrills through her life. That’s why we read Revelation in Eastertide. God does indeed dwell with men and women through Jesus veiled in word and sacrament. We’ve got his life in the Christian community. This life is a foretaste, a preview of forthcoming attractions, where mourning and crying and pain will be no more. Oh yes there’s mourning and crying and pain in the life of the Christian church as much as outside it - but it’s mourning, crying and pain sweetened by the Lord we know who’s with us. Jesus has drawn the sting of death and suffering for all who turn to him.
The vision of St John, the vision of the Christian scripture, is a now and then vision. What is then to be in a transformed universe is now present – this is the gospel.
I always take heart when I receive Holy Communion at the coronation altar in Westminster Abbey. Above it there’s a quotation from Revelation Chapter 11 verse 15: The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ.
When we think about who should serve us in Westminster or in the local council the vision thing’s as important as their personal integrity. One of the frequently heard complaints about this election campaign is the lack of vision for the transformation of society. And yet the electorate has been made suspicious of visionaries after the failure of both state socialism and laissez faire capitalism evidenced in their foul consequences.
What does it mean to seek that the kingdom of the world becomes the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ?
Certainly the Christian vision is a robust vision of inclusion. As I have written in the P&P and this week’s news sheet, as we vote we have a responsibility to think about the common good in our community, nation and world. We have a duty to ensure the each and every person has the opportunity to reach his or her full potential. If society is to change should it not benefit those who are hardest pressed?
The kingdom of God is nothing less than his reign. That’s not just for the new heaven and earth but for now. God reigns now where folk will let him in. I am praying that among our new MPs we might have a Wilberforce or two or three! It says in Proverbs 29 verse 18 that where there’s no vision the people perish. Away from God’s reign there’s mourning and crying and pain without consolation. Those who promote a vision of God help keep us faithful to enduring values that pave the way to a heavenly Jerusalem.
Lastly let’s see what we can glean from today’s Gospel from St John chapter 13.
A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you. John 13.34
Love makes the world and the church go round. Last week we heard the diocesan missioner say to us that he thought the best sort of evangelism was a community that intrigued people with the love of Jesus.The vision thing centres in Christianity on loving God and your neighbour as yourself. It’s resourced by God’s love poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit as St Paul writes in Romans 5 verse 5.
As I have loved you – as God loves us – we’re to love one another. This is the Christian call and when it’s applied it brings transformation.
Wise politicians know their need of the voluntary sector. Communities can’t be built and neither can citizens be formed without people who’re prepared to put themselves out for others.
What’s the answer to the abortion rate? To family breakdown? To care for the elderly? To those who wish to legalise mercy killing?
The answer doesn’t lie so much in policies as in a spiritual revival bringing a fresh outpouring of love. A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you.
Just to take one of my list, isn’t the problem of people wishing they were dead and not suffering linked not just to low pain tolerances but also to the lack of compassion around in our families? If people know they’re loved they can brave pain. You can cope with no end of hardship if you know you are loved.
Values come from vision and we need vision in our society. May Thursday bring some visionaries into public office, some of Christian conviction with a yearning for the new heaven and the new earth where righteousness dwells.
May the kingdom of this world advance a little towards becoming the kingdom of our God and of his Christ through this eucharist, through our prayer, through our voting on Thursday and through a new wave of the Holy Spirit pouring his love upon our village, county, nation and world. Amen.
Today’s scripture was in place before Gordon Brown set 6th May. What do the lectionary readings for the fifth Sunday of Easter have to say to us?
The first reading from Acts has a hidden warning against putting our historic party allegiances too high on our agenda as we prepare to vote. Peter, a devout Jew, is taken to task in Acts 11 for associating with another party, the ‘uncircumcised’. The Jewish believers had picked up on how the Holy Spirit had fallen on Cornelius’ household as described in the previous chapter of Acts. Peter defends himself by describing a wondrous vision in which three times he’s pressed by God to eat what he saw as unclean food. The vision connected with a word from God that came to the centurion Cornelius. It seems Cornelius’ household was simultaneously prepared by God to welcome Peter’s visit and with it the good news of Jesus and empowerment in the Holy Spirit.
This passage shows God as utterly non-tribal. The God and Father of Jesus isn’t God of the Jews alone but God of the whole world. He’s God of St Giles and The Green Man to put it Horsted Keynes terms. The Holy Spirit is in principle just as available in the village as in church. Sometimes, as in the blessing of The Crown, there’s been opportunity to demonstrate that.
The Christian vision of God’s inclusivity is a challenge to the politics that defends an elite. It is refreshing to have our main political parties speaking so inclusively today. On paper none support second class citizenship in terms of race, sex, or sexual orientation. Nor an economic underclass – in principle! All main parties have strategies to foster both the creation and just distribution of wealth. All would subscribe to Britain’s global role in redressing past colonial exploitation but with different emphases. Policies on immigration make interesting reading! Some political groups are fuelling a base sort of nationalism hiding racist agendas under the national flag. The election campaign has a lot to teach us about a degree of demoralisation through pockets of poverty in our nation. When people are demoralised they’ll very readily turn to false saviours. This is what happened in Germany between the World Wars.
30 years ago I was priest in a mining village in Doncaster. It disturbs me to see the neglect of the former coal fields and how it has bred civic unrest there. Social ills have now led to an investigation of the Mayor and Council in Doncaster. Civic life depends on good citizenship. We get the leaders we deserve. It’s also true we can never dream up a political system that escapes the flaw of having to be delivered by sinful human beings. As T.S.Eliot wrote we dream of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good. Eliot may have been referring to Stalinist Russia but we might apply it to the demise of the western economy – Goldman Sachs – allied to naive, foolhardy or maybe wicked politics.
What’s the root of such political corruption? The real challenge in our society has been described as the transformation of consumers into citizens. People resist the call to public service through a self interest unconcerned about the common good beyond making sure they have the consumables they want and the neighbourhood watch functions in case others want to take these from them. The lack of readiness among people to take responsibility for civic life and the common good is quite alarming. Many of us live in the mini world of our household and the mega world of Facebook, Twitter and MSN leaving out the midi world of the local community.
Thursday’s election is a call for us to take responsibility afresh for our village, county and nation as the citizens we are.
Let’s move on to the second reading from the book of Revelation chapter 21. John the visionary speaks there of a new earth and heaven and a new Jerusalem. These new things are to be found already in the church on earth inasmuch as the resurrection of Jesus thrills through her life. That’s why we read Revelation in Eastertide. God does indeed dwell with men and women through Jesus veiled in word and sacrament. We’ve got his life in the Christian community. This life is a foretaste, a preview of forthcoming attractions, where mourning and crying and pain will be no more. Oh yes there’s mourning and crying and pain in the life of the Christian church as much as outside it - but it’s mourning, crying and pain sweetened by the Lord we know who’s with us. Jesus has drawn the sting of death and suffering for all who turn to him.
The vision of St John, the vision of the Christian scripture, is a now and then vision. What is then to be in a transformed universe is now present – this is the gospel.
I always take heart when I receive Holy Communion at the coronation altar in Westminster Abbey. Above it there’s a quotation from Revelation Chapter 11 verse 15: The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ.
When we think about who should serve us in Westminster or in the local council the vision thing’s as important as their personal integrity. One of the frequently heard complaints about this election campaign is the lack of vision for the transformation of society. And yet the electorate has been made suspicious of visionaries after the failure of both state socialism and laissez faire capitalism evidenced in their foul consequences.
What does it mean to seek that the kingdom of the world becomes the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ?
Certainly the Christian vision is a robust vision of inclusion. As I have written in the P&P and this week’s news sheet, as we vote we have a responsibility to think about the common good in our community, nation and world. We have a duty to ensure the each and every person has the opportunity to reach his or her full potential. If society is to change should it not benefit those who are hardest pressed?
The kingdom of God is nothing less than his reign. That’s not just for the new heaven and earth but for now. God reigns now where folk will let him in. I am praying that among our new MPs we might have a Wilberforce or two or three! It says in Proverbs 29 verse 18 that where there’s no vision the people perish. Away from God’s reign there’s mourning and crying and pain without consolation. Those who promote a vision of God help keep us faithful to enduring values that pave the way to a heavenly Jerusalem.
Lastly let’s see what we can glean from today’s Gospel from St John chapter 13.
A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you. John 13.34
Love makes the world and the church go round. Last week we heard the diocesan missioner say to us that he thought the best sort of evangelism was a community that intrigued people with the love of Jesus.The vision thing centres in Christianity on loving God and your neighbour as yourself. It’s resourced by God’s love poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit as St Paul writes in Romans 5 verse 5.
As I have loved you – as God loves us – we’re to love one another. This is the Christian call and when it’s applied it brings transformation.
Wise politicians know their need of the voluntary sector. Communities can’t be built and neither can citizens be formed without people who’re prepared to put themselves out for others.
What’s the answer to the abortion rate? To family breakdown? To care for the elderly? To those who wish to legalise mercy killing?
The answer doesn’t lie so much in policies as in a spiritual revival bringing a fresh outpouring of love. A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you.
Just to take one of my list, isn’t the problem of people wishing they were dead and not suffering linked not just to low pain tolerances but also to the lack of compassion around in our families? If people know they’re loved they can brave pain. You can cope with no end of hardship if you know you are loved.
Values come from vision and we need vision in our society. May Thursday bring some visionaries into public office, some of Christian conviction with a yearning for the new heaven and the new earth where righteousness dwells.
May the kingdom of this world advance a little towards becoming the kingdom of our God and of his Christ through this eucharist, through our prayer, through our voting on Thursday and through a new wave of the Holy Spirit pouring his love upon our village, county, nation and world. Amen.
Sunday, 11 April 2010
Easter 2 'Who is this Jesus?' 11th April 2010
I want this morning to summarise the ‘Who is this Jesus?’ Holy Week course building on the words of the healed doubter in today’s Gospel from John 20 verse 28: Thomas answered Jesus, ‘My Lord and my God!’
We’ve been engaging with the question Christ himself addressed to Peter: 'Who do you say I am?'
The Scriptures provide at least eleven different names for Jesus which directly or indirectly affirm his divinity – God, as in Thomas’ response (John 20.28), Son of God, as in Peter's response, Only Begotten Son (cf Mark 12:6), the First and the Last (Rev 1:17), Alpha and Omega (Rev 1:8), The Holy One (Acts 3:14), The Lord (Acts 4:33…), Lord of All (Acts 10:36), The Lord of Glory (1 Cor 2:8), God with us (Matt 1:23), Our Great God (Titus 2:13), God Blessed Forever (Rom 9:5).
Some of these titles are used of Jesus again and again.
In his book 'What the Bible teaches' R.A.Torrey shows how the Scriptures affirm these propositions:
Jesus Christ is all-powerful, all-knowing and all-present. He is from all eternity, always the same, in the form of God.
In Christ dwells all the fullness of the Godhead in a bodily way.
Jesus is linked to our creation, preservation, the forgiveness of sin, the raising of the dead, judgement and the bestowal of eternal life.
Jesus Christ is a person to be worshipped by angels and mortals, even as God the Father is worshipped.
When we pick up the New Testament we can’t avoid the centrality of Jesus Christ and the repeated claim of his divinity which echoes on from that first affirmation of St. Peter.
'Who do you say I am?' asked Jesus in Matthew 16:15. 'Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God".Yet Jesus went on to say how it could be that people, starting with Simon Peter, could be given an aptitude to see his divinity:
Verse 17 goes on: 'Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven.'
The Scriptures are essential to our seeing of Jesus but they’re inseparable from prayer, the Holy Spirit and the experience of his Church, which Christ goes on to elaborate.
'Who do you say Jesus is?' When someone reaches a firm answer, the conviction of his divinity they do so by a special grace, the scriptures say.
The Bible gives us the words, the pieces in the great puzzle of Jesus - what an awesome puzzle it is!
The pieces are to be fitted together around a living Person who is before us this morning if what the Spirit has said to the Church for 2000 years is true.
You may protest. Surely the knowledge that Jesus is 'Son of the living God' is something that can be reasonably proved as well as something to be received by grace through faith?
Fr. Prat of the Society of Jesus defines faith with this in mind: 'Faith is the amen of the intelligence and the will to divine revelation.'
It’s absolutely true. We can hear about Jesus, we can even believe notionally - in our heads - that he is God incarnate - but it may make no difference to our lives.
I believe Mongolia is in-between Russian and China but that belief makes very little difference to my life. I have prayed once or twice for Mongolia but I have never been there and have no friends from there.
Yet I believe also in the resurrection of the dead. I have not experienced that either, but it has come real to me through One whom I trust, who has himself experienced resurrection and who has promised me a share as well when I die!
It is the Jesus we are talking of who has promised me this!
'Christ is as great as your faith makes him' said the evangelist D.L.Moody.
The question of Jesus 'who do you say that I am?' has in fact a billion answers.
When we talk of a person, as we talk of Jesus, if we believe him to be alive, who he is to us has as many answers as Jesus has friends let alone seekers or people who barely know his name!
Someone was on the tube and overheard a teacher with a group of children who were asked about the founder of Christianity and heard them all draw a blank!
Someone also overheard a girl in Jewellers asking for a Cross, but for one, to use her words, 'without the little man on'!
My own personal testimony about Jesus is very much that of someone who was given all the facts of Jesus at School and welcomed a day when the pieces came together around the living Lord.
For years I have prayed for people who are nominal Christians formed in a Christian society, that they will allow the Holy Spirit to put the pieces of the jigsaw together - all those biblical truths I mentioned earlier.
Now I pray that people will be drawn by the Spirit to get the facts, the pieces of the greatest and most wonderful puzzle in the world, so that they can fit them together.
Who do you say Jesus is? Very often the only copy of the gospels people see are Christians - they get to the Scriptures only after Jesus has drawn them through Christians.
There may be ignorance of Jesus around but there are also images of him around that we need to shatter sometimes for people to do real business with the Lord.
Like Jesus 'meek and mild', the effeminate image on holy cards. Our Lord is meek, but he is also the strong Shepherd of souls, the leader and pioneer of our faith.
Or take Jesus 'Superstar', the 'coolest' guy of all. Well there is no one like Jesus, but his uniqueness lies more in his call to suffer for us and with us than to shine above us as hero.
Some Christians give the impression that Jesus is like a sort of 'heavenly security blanket' there to help us escape facing up to reality and almost an escape from the responsibilities of life.
One could go on but undoubtedly the distinctive feature of Christianity is the claim to divinity of Jesus Christ and its implications for all who encounter this distinctive.
Anyone investigating Jesus Christ through encounter with the Christian Church, her Gospels, Creeds and Councils cannot escape the question of his divinity and all that implies.
Who do you say Jesus is? There can be a moment when the full implications burst upon us.
The missionary Roland Allen in his book 'The Spontaneous Expansion of the Church' describes the force of the testimony of a new believer, something that may well echo in many of our hearts as we listen to the description:
'He speaks from the heart because he is too eager to be able to refrain from speaking. His subject has gripped him. He speaks of what he knows, and knows by experience. The truth which he imparts is his own truth. He knows its force. He is speaking almost as much to relieve his own mind as to convert his hearer, and yet he is as eager to convert his hearer as to relieve his own mind; for his mind can only be relieved by sharing his new truth, and his truth is not shared until another has received it. This his hearer realises. Inevitably he is moved by it.'
For those of us who accept Jesus as Son of God there remains a continual call to answer the same question 'Who do you say that I am?' as part of the call to intimacy with God that Jesus brings us.
Few writers in past years have shed as much light on the issues facing Christianity as did Thomas Merton who lived as a Trappist monk and died in the late 1960s. It was on a rare visit to the town near his monastery when the truth he had previously accepted of Jesus took on a new dimension, what he called a 'second conversion' to humankind.
As he walked briefly in the crowd he felt deep in his Spirit what he called 'the immense joy of being man, a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate'.
Merton spoke of his Christianity beginning 'with the realisation of the presence of God in this present life, in the world and in myself, and that my task as Christian is to live in full and vital awareness of this 'ground of my being and of the world's being.' p320.
To live in Christ is to share immortal being in the Spirit. To Thomas Merton a dwelling upon and a facing up to death are essential as a means of deepening one's being into Christ and His victory.
It is the octave day of Easter and we come back to another Thomas – St Thomas who addressed Christ saying My Lord and my God.
Our basic optimism as Christians is rooted in the belief that in Jesus, God, has come earth, lived, died and rose….ed for the survival of the Church as guilty of an implicit denial of Christ's victory.
Yet it is that phrase 'I am a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate' that struck me in bringing up Thomas Merton.
By accepting the divinity of Christ we are granted purpose for life and reason for death. As Christians Eastertide is fro us the renewal of enduring joy at the coming of Jesus, which is the springboard of lasting hope for the human condition.
'Who do you say that I am' 'You are the Christ, the Son of the living God'.
What greater source of joy can there be for a human being than the knowledge of the salvation and dignity granted to us all by the coming of Jesus?
The birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus have put this planet, and one race within it, on the map of the universe opening up to us the possibility of endless life and communion with God the Blessed Trinity!
Yet for both our minds and hearts to say 'Amen' to Jesus we need to take his yoke - which means bending ourselves down before him.
For Jesus to take a deeper grasp of our lives we must come ever closer to him ourselves by acts of faith and love.
Let us close with the words of a hymn by Charles Wesley:
Jesus, confirm my heart's desire
To work and speak and think for thee;
Still let me guard the holy fire,
And still stir up thy gift in me.
Ready for all thy perfect will,
My acts of faith and love repeat,
Till death thy endless mercies seal,
And make my sacrifice complete.
We’ve been engaging with the question Christ himself addressed to Peter: 'Who do you say I am?'
The Scriptures provide at least eleven different names for Jesus which directly or indirectly affirm his divinity – God, as in Thomas’ response (John 20.28), Son of God, as in Peter's response, Only Begotten Son (cf Mark 12:6), the First and the Last (Rev 1:17), Alpha and Omega (Rev 1:8), The Holy One (Acts 3:14), The Lord (Acts 4:33…), Lord of All (Acts 10:36), The Lord of Glory (1 Cor 2:8), God with us (Matt 1:23), Our Great God (Titus 2:13), God Blessed Forever (Rom 9:5).
Some of these titles are used of Jesus again and again.
In his book 'What the Bible teaches' R.A.Torrey shows how the Scriptures affirm these propositions:
Jesus Christ is all-powerful, all-knowing and all-present. He is from all eternity, always the same, in the form of God.
In Christ dwells all the fullness of the Godhead in a bodily way.
Jesus is linked to our creation, preservation, the forgiveness of sin, the raising of the dead, judgement and the bestowal of eternal life.
Jesus Christ is a person to be worshipped by angels and mortals, even as God the Father is worshipped.
When we pick up the New Testament we can’t avoid the centrality of Jesus Christ and the repeated claim of his divinity which echoes on from that first affirmation of St. Peter.
'Who do you say I am?' asked Jesus in Matthew 16:15. 'Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God".Yet Jesus went on to say how it could be that people, starting with Simon Peter, could be given an aptitude to see his divinity:
Verse 17 goes on: 'Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven.'
The Scriptures are essential to our seeing of Jesus but they’re inseparable from prayer, the Holy Spirit and the experience of his Church, which Christ goes on to elaborate.
'Who do you say Jesus is?' When someone reaches a firm answer, the conviction of his divinity they do so by a special grace, the scriptures say.
The Bible gives us the words, the pieces in the great puzzle of Jesus - what an awesome puzzle it is!
The pieces are to be fitted together around a living Person who is before us this morning if what the Spirit has said to the Church for 2000 years is true.
You may protest. Surely the knowledge that Jesus is 'Son of the living God' is something that can be reasonably proved as well as something to be received by grace through faith?
Fr. Prat of the Society of Jesus defines faith with this in mind: 'Faith is the amen of the intelligence and the will to divine revelation.'
It’s absolutely true. We can hear about Jesus, we can even believe notionally - in our heads - that he is God incarnate - but it may make no difference to our lives.
I believe Mongolia is in-between Russian and China but that belief makes very little difference to my life. I have prayed once or twice for Mongolia but I have never been there and have no friends from there.
Yet I believe also in the resurrection of the dead. I have not experienced that either, but it has come real to me through One whom I trust, who has himself experienced resurrection and who has promised me a share as well when I die!
It is the Jesus we are talking of who has promised me this!
'Christ is as great as your faith makes him' said the evangelist D.L.Moody.
The question of Jesus 'who do you say that I am?' has in fact a billion answers.
When we talk of a person, as we talk of Jesus, if we believe him to be alive, who he is to us has as many answers as Jesus has friends let alone seekers or people who barely know his name!
Someone was on the tube and overheard a teacher with a group of children who were asked about the founder of Christianity and heard them all draw a blank!
Someone also overheard a girl in Jewellers asking for a Cross, but for one, to use her words, 'without the little man on'!
My own personal testimony about Jesus is very much that of someone who was given all the facts of Jesus at School and welcomed a day when the pieces came together around the living Lord.
For years I have prayed for people who are nominal Christians formed in a Christian society, that they will allow the Holy Spirit to put the pieces of the jigsaw together - all those biblical truths I mentioned earlier.
Now I pray that people will be drawn by the Spirit to get the facts, the pieces of the greatest and most wonderful puzzle in the world, so that they can fit them together.
Who do you say Jesus is? Very often the only copy of the gospels people see are Christians - they get to the Scriptures only after Jesus has drawn them through Christians.
There may be ignorance of Jesus around but there are also images of him around that we need to shatter sometimes for people to do real business with the Lord.
Like Jesus 'meek and mild', the effeminate image on holy cards. Our Lord is meek, but he is also the strong Shepherd of souls, the leader and pioneer of our faith.
Or take Jesus 'Superstar', the 'coolest' guy of all. Well there is no one like Jesus, but his uniqueness lies more in his call to suffer for us and with us than to shine above us as hero.
Some Christians give the impression that Jesus is like a sort of 'heavenly security blanket' there to help us escape facing up to reality and almost an escape from the responsibilities of life.
One could go on but undoubtedly the distinctive feature of Christianity is the claim to divinity of Jesus Christ and its implications for all who encounter this distinctive.
Anyone investigating Jesus Christ through encounter with the Christian Church, her Gospels, Creeds and Councils cannot escape the question of his divinity and all that implies.
Who do you say Jesus is? There can be a moment when the full implications burst upon us.
The missionary Roland Allen in his book 'The Spontaneous Expansion of the Church' describes the force of the testimony of a new believer, something that may well echo in many of our hearts as we listen to the description:
'He speaks from the heart because he is too eager to be able to refrain from speaking. His subject has gripped him. He speaks of what he knows, and knows by experience. The truth which he imparts is his own truth. He knows its force. He is speaking almost as much to relieve his own mind as to convert his hearer, and yet he is as eager to convert his hearer as to relieve his own mind; for his mind can only be relieved by sharing his new truth, and his truth is not shared until another has received it. This his hearer realises. Inevitably he is moved by it.'
For those of us who accept Jesus as Son of God there remains a continual call to answer the same question 'Who do you say that I am?' as part of the call to intimacy with God that Jesus brings us.
Few writers in past years have shed as much light on the issues facing Christianity as did Thomas Merton who lived as a Trappist monk and died in the late 1960s. It was on a rare visit to the town near his monastery when the truth he had previously accepted of Jesus took on a new dimension, what he called a 'second conversion' to humankind.
As he walked briefly in the crowd he felt deep in his Spirit what he called 'the immense joy of being man, a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate'.
Merton spoke of his Christianity beginning 'with the realisation of the presence of God in this present life, in the world and in myself, and that my task as Christian is to live in full and vital awareness of this 'ground of my being and of the world's being.' p320.
To live in Christ is to share immortal being in the Spirit. To Thomas Merton a dwelling upon and a facing up to death are essential as a means of deepening one's being into Christ and His victory.
It is the octave day of Easter and we come back to another Thomas – St Thomas who addressed Christ saying My Lord and my God.
Our basic optimism as Christians is rooted in the belief that in Jesus, God, has come earth, lived, died and rose….ed for the survival of the Church as guilty of an implicit denial of Christ's victory.
Yet it is that phrase 'I am a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate' that struck me in bringing up Thomas Merton.
By accepting the divinity of Christ we are granted purpose for life and reason for death. As Christians Eastertide is fro us the renewal of enduring joy at the coming of Jesus, which is the springboard of lasting hope for the human condition.
'Who do you say that I am' 'You are the Christ, the Son of the living God'.
What greater source of joy can there be for a human being than the knowledge of the salvation and dignity granted to us all by the coming of Jesus?
The birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus have put this planet, and one race within it, on the map of the universe opening up to us the possibility of endless life and communion with God the Blessed Trinity!
Yet for both our minds and hearts to say 'Amen' to Jesus we need to take his yoke - which means bending ourselves down before him.
For Jesus to take a deeper grasp of our lives we must come ever closer to him ourselves by acts of faith and love.
Let us close with the words of a hymn by Charles Wesley:
Jesus, confirm my heart's desire
To work and speak and think for thee;
Still let me guard the holy fire,
And still stir up thy gift in me.
Ready for all thy perfect will,
My acts of faith and love repeat,
Till death thy endless mercies seal,
And make my sacrifice complete.
Sunday, 4 April 2010
Easter Sunday evensong 4 April 2010
In the Eastern Orthodox Church they define the Great or Holy Week that ends tonight as the “spiritual spring which blossoms with the fruits of the Spirit - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” (Gal. 5:22).
As we come before the Lord this evening our deep gratitude for his risen presence among us, with us and in us serves that spiritual blossoming.
A folk tale of the Belgian Congo tells of a clearing made in virgin jungle. A patch of ground was exposed to sunlight for the first time in centuries. Strange shoots appeared, strange plants, with flowers of indescribable beauty. No one had ever dreamed such exquisite plants could grow in that dark place.
Isn’t there some truth is this story for us? We allow our sins, negligences and bad habits to grow to the point where our soul becomes like a jungle.
How do we get light into that jungle to get the promised new growth and beauty?
Through sincere repentance. Like Mary Magdalene we are free to reach out to the Risen Lord and hear him call us afresh into intimacy with him. Allowing the touch of his forgiveness upon our hearts brings assurance that He will there and then remove the sins that hide from us the life-giving sun of His Spirit.
Mary Magdalene knew this already. She was so very appropriately the first witness of his resurrection as we just heard. She stood in that Easter Garden thinking they’d taken away her Lord and yet he was there.
Jesus was there in a hidden way, as he is here tonight, hidden again under the appearance of bread in the Blessed Sacrament and hidden among us in the hearts of his faithful people.
Mary Magdalene was first to see the Day of Resurrection, that spiritual spring which was going to open up the possibilities of God in all ages to all believers for them to blossom forth. She’d already seen the jungle of her life cleared by her Lord. Spiritual flowers of indescribable beauty grew where formerly there were but weeds. Now that growth became literally other worldly as Christ’s resurrection took her, as it takes us, beyond the forgiveness of sin and into the promise of immortality.
Holy Week and Easter are one of the Church’s means of helping us clear away the jungle of our life and achieve our greatest potential. This is granted as we come close afresh to the risen Lord Jesus in repentance and faith.
On Good Friday the children built us an Easter Garden outside church. Today we gather inside Church before the risen Lord to seek his blessing.
Jesus wants to see Easter Gardens grow up inside church in you and me. The fixture of the Easter Garden is a reminder of how the resurrection gains for the world a spiritual flowering. It is a flowering of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control through you and me.
The beautiful time of year is surely coming. Sussex is a beautiful place. What does Jesus most want though – he wants inner beauty! Having given us life he came this Week to bring us his life, immortal life that to flow in us as we come clean with him and trust the empowering Easter brings to repentant souls!
May the beauty of Jesus be seen in us as we open ourselves afresh to that empowerment on the Day of Resurrection!
As we come before the Lord this evening our deep gratitude for his risen presence among us, with us and in us serves that spiritual blossoming.
A folk tale of the Belgian Congo tells of a clearing made in virgin jungle. A patch of ground was exposed to sunlight for the first time in centuries. Strange shoots appeared, strange plants, with flowers of indescribable beauty. No one had ever dreamed such exquisite plants could grow in that dark place.
Isn’t there some truth is this story for us? We allow our sins, negligences and bad habits to grow to the point where our soul becomes like a jungle.
How do we get light into that jungle to get the promised new growth and beauty?
Through sincere repentance. Like Mary Magdalene we are free to reach out to the Risen Lord and hear him call us afresh into intimacy with him. Allowing the touch of his forgiveness upon our hearts brings assurance that He will there and then remove the sins that hide from us the life-giving sun of His Spirit.
Mary Magdalene knew this already. She was so very appropriately the first witness of his resurrection as we just heard. She stood in that Easter Garden thinking they’d taken away her Lord and yet he was there.
Jesus was there in a hidden way, as he is here tonight, hidden again under the appearance of bread in the Blessed Sacrament and hidden among us in the hearts of his faithful people.
Mary Magdalene was first to see the Day of Resurrection, that spiritual spring which was going to open up the possibilities of God in all ages to all believers for them to blossom forth. She’d already seen the jungle of her life cleared by her Lord. Spiritual flowers of indescribable beauty grew where formerly there were but weeds. Now that growth became literally other worldly as Christ’s resurrection took her, as it takes us, beyond the forgiveness of sin and into the promise of immortality.
Holy Week and Easter are one of the Church’s means of helping us clear away the jungle of our life and achieve our greatest potential. This is granted as we come close afresh to the risen Lord Jesus in repentance and faith.
On Good Friday the children built us an Easter Garden outside church. Today we gather inside Church before the risen Lord to seek his blessing.
Jesus wants to see Easter Gardens grow up inside church in you and me. The fixture of the Easter Garden is a reminder of how the resurrection gains for the world a spiritual flowering. It is a flowering of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control through you and me.
The beautiful time of year is surely coming. Sussex is a beautiful place. What does Jesus most want though – he wants inner beauty! Having given us life he came this Week to bring us his life, immortal life that to flow in us as we come clean with him and trust the empowering Easter brings to repentant souls!
May the beauty of Jesus be seen in us as we open ourselves afresh to that empowerment on the Day of Resurrection!
Easter Day 2010 Jesus - the hopeful one
An Easter cake with trick re-lighting candles is displayed. Children try unsuccessfully to blow out the candles.
Jesus is risen – there’s no conquering him – the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has never put it out!
We believe it, but we also want to believe it more from the heart and less from the head.
How can we get a better hold of the hope Easter offers and make it more our own?
Hands up if you were on the Horsted Keynes history tour Bob Sellens and I led on Monday with the School?
Do you remember we said Horsted Keynes was built around four elements? Earth, air, fire and water.
These primitive elements are a way into seeing how our community has grown up.
This church stands on ancient earth works as a site sheltered from the wind. The ironstone it stands on draws lightning fire from heaven down to a village built on springs of water.
On this earth mound the worship of the risen Lord Jesus replaced that of the pagans.
For 1000 years people have sheltered here from winds and gales through our building and the woods surrounding it.
Horsted Keynes and its vicinity lie on ironstone that draws lightning down from above. Saint Giles needs its advanced lightning conductor as much as The Crown!
Earth, air, fire, water. St Giles lies on top of a series of springs and that’s why streams of water flow out of our churchyard.
Earth, air, fire and water make up Horsted Keynes. The same elements serve the new creation Jesus brings at Easter.
When he came back from the dead he came out of the earth. The Jesus they buried in the earth was seen alive over the next six weeks by over 550 people on 11 different occasions.
The Jesus who rose from the earth changed the earth and made graves beds of hope. The Jesus who appeared to his disciples changed the air as he breathed the Spirit on them.
At Pentecost he cast new fire on them from above and released streams of living water in their hearts. Earth, air, fire and water are made new by what we’re celebrating this morning.
Christianity’s a new start. It’s a new creation that can run and grow in my life and yours making us beacons of hope.
In Easter services we use the elements of fire and water to proclaim this hope. We blessed a new fire last night from which the Paschal Candle still burns. We blessed the font from which we’re to be sprinkled shortly to remind us of the baptism that makes us Christian.
Easter’s about getting the out-of-this-world fire of the risen Lord Jesus to light our lives. It’s about getting the out-of-this-world springs of living water flowing out of our hearts.
We’re in church this Easter Sunday to get our hearts warmed. What we’re celebrating in the resurrection is truth to warm any one’s heart if they can but see it!
This is the day that the Lord has made says the Psalmist let us rejoice and be glad in it!
Our hope as Christians is built on this day of resurrection. Easter Sunday proves the Friday Jesus died was Good which means God’s, God’s who so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. (John 3.16)
God become man to break the grip of evil over those in his image and invest in their future so they could move from his image into his likeness as part of a new creation.
Good Friday is God’s Friday of hope for us. It seals his investment in our race. If today is God’s so is tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow. This is Christian faith. This is the meaning of Easter.
Jesus is like a candle we can never blow out. His light shines in the darkness and the darkness has never overcome him.
Christian faith is under pressure in Britain today. That’s nothing new. G.K. Chesterton remarked that looking over the last two thousand years there’ve been seven times when Christianity seemed to be going to the dogs. Each time the dog died, be that ancient Rome, the barbarian invasion or eighteenth century rationalism.
We’re an Easter people destined to rise again and again with Jesus. Even the first letter of the Saviour’s name has a springing back about it. J is I pressed down to come back up again.
So we Christians are hopeful people. This morning is our waking up afresh to such hope.
That’s why we’ll soon be getting holy water thrown in our faces.
From Saint Giles on occasion water flows down Church Lane. This Easter morning, as you leave St Giles, you’ll be flowing out as living water to bring hope to the world. Jesus says to us through St John let the one who believes in me drink...out of the believers heart shall flow rivers of living water (7.38)
It’s as if we were called to be a spiritual version of the Gulf Stream. The Gulf Stream brings warmth to Britain as it winds its way north across the Atlantic through colder and colder water. However cold the water around it gets the Gulf Stream itself remains warm. It maintains its own warmth in the midst of water that gets bitterly cold.
This is a picture of we Christians in Horsted Keynes today. By receiving God’s word and drinking of his sacrament we’re made to overflow with God’s warm love.
Christ is risen! His great warmth is with us. It’s our hope as we brave and cheer the icy world around us. Because Christ is raised we get raised. We’re no longer affected by the climate of negativity – rather we create around us a new climate. We’re thermostats and no longer thermometers.
This Easter eucharist is thanksgiving for Christ the hope filled one who builds unquenchable faith in hearts that welcome him as Saviour. To have hope is to believe tomorrow also is God’s, and tomorrow, and tomorrow since Jesus Christ is ever the same.
Alleluia Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, alleluia!
Jesus is risen – there’s no conquering him – the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has never put it out!
We believe it, but we also want to believe it more from the heart and less from the head.
How can we get a better hold of the hope Easter offers and make it more our own?
Hands up if you were on the Horsted Keynes history tour Bob Sellens and I led on Monday with the School?
Do you remember we said Horsted Keynes was built around four elements? Earth, air, fire and water.
These primitive elements are a way into seeing how our community has grown up.
This church stands on ancient earth works as a site sheltered from the wind. The ironstone it stands on draws lightning fire from heaven down to a village built on springs of water.
On this earth mound the worship of the risen Lord Jesus replaced that of the pagans.
For 1000 years people have sheltered here from winds and gales through our building and the woods surrounding it.
Horsted Keynes and its vicinity lie on ironstone that draws lightning down from above. Saint Giles needs its advanced lightning conductor as much as The Crown!
Earth, air, fire, water. St Giles lies on top of a series of springs and that’s why streams of water flow out of our churchyard.
Earth, air, fire and water make up Horsted Keynes. The same elements serve the new creation Jesus brings at Easter.
When he came back from the dead he came out of the earth. The Jesus they buried in the earth was seen alive over the next six weeks by over 550 people on 11 different occasions.
The Jesus who rose from the earth changed the earth and made graves beds of hope. The Jesus who appeared to his disciples changed the air as he breathed the Spirit on them.
At Pentecost he cast new fire on them from above and released streams of living water in their hearts. Earth, air, fire and water are made new by what we’re celebrating this morning.
Christianity’s a new start. It’s a new creation that can run and grow in my life and yours making us beacons of hope.
In Easter services we use the elements of fire and water to proclaim this hope. We blessed a new fire last night from which the Paschal Candle still burns. We blessed the font from which we’re to be sprinkled shortly to remind us of the baptism that makes us Christian.
Easter’s about getting the out-of-this-world fire of the risen Lord Jesus to light our lives. It’s about getting the out-of-this-world springs of living water flowing out of our hearts.
We’re in church this Easter Sunday to get our hearts warmed. What we’re celebrating in the resurrection is truth to warm any one’s heart if they can but see it!
This is the day that the Lord has made says the Psalmist let us rejoice and be glad in it!
Our hope as Christians is built on this day of resurrection. Easter Sunday proves the Friday Jesus died was Good which means God’s, God’s who so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. (John 3.16)
God become man to break the grip of evil over those in his image and invest in their future so they could move from his image into his likeness as part of a new creation.
Good Friday is God’s Friday of hope for us. It seals his investment in our race. If today is God’s so is tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow. This is Christian faith. This is the meaning of Easter.
Jesus is like a candle we can never blow out. His light shines in the darkness and the darkness has never overcome him.
Christian faith is under pressure in Britain today. That’s nothing new. G.K. Chesterton remarked that looking over the last two thousand years there’ve been seven times when Christianity seemed to be going to the dogs. Each time the dog died, be that ancient Rome, the barbarian invasion or eighteenth century rationalism.
We’re an Easter people destined to rise again and again with Jesus. Even the first letter of the Saviour’s name has a springing back about it. J is I pressed down to come back up again.
So we Christians are hopeful people. This morning is our waking up afresh to such hope.
That’s why we’ll soon be getting holy water thrown in our faces.
From Saint Giles on occasion water flows down Church Lane. This Easter morning, as you leave St Giles, you’ll be flowing out as living water to bring hope to the world. Jesus says to us through St John let the one who believes in me drink...out of the believers heart shall flow rivers of living water (7.38)
It’s as if we were called to be a spiritual version of the Gulf Stream. The Gulf Stream brings warmth to Britain as it winds its way north across the Atlantic through colder and colder water. However cold the water around it gets the Gulf Stream itself remains warm. It maintains its own warmth in the midst of water that gets bitterly cold.
This is a picture of we Christians in Horsted Keynes today. By receiving God’s word and drinking of his sacrament we’re made to overflow with God’s warm love.
Christ is risen! His great warmth is with us. It’s our hope as we brave and cheer the icy world around us. Because Christ is raised we get raised. We’re no longer affected by the climate of negativity – rather we create around us a new climate. We’re thermostats and no longer thermometers.
This Easter eucharist is thanksgiving for Christ the hope filled one who builds unquenchable faith in hearts that welcome him as Saviour. To have hope is to believe tomorrow also is God’s, and tomorrow, and tomorrow since Jesus Christ is ever the same.
Alleluia Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, alleluia!
Friday, 2 April 2010
Good Friday 2010 Jesus - man of respect
Who is this Jesus? As Holy Week moves to its climax this is our question heading for a five part sermon series.
Over these three days running up to Easter we’re looking at five key aspects of Jesus: his origin, teaching, death, resurrection, his church and his return.
We started out of sequence yesterday with the church as this linked to the Maundy Thursday supper table.
Earlier this afternoon we looked at the origins of Jesus, evident as historical record. Now we ponder Jesus – man of respect – before we come to offer him respect as we come to his Cross together.
In Holy Week the world stops to respect Jesus.
It’s not so much what he taught but how he taught that catches us.
We live in a society where people lack respect. They tolerate one another’s differences but often times they do so without sympathy.
Think of the sympathy of Jesus. He listened to the rich young man. He loved him, scripture says, pointed him to the truth - but out of respect let him go away again.
Jesus was and is a man of respect, a man of dialogue. Today Muslims and Hindus also honour the Founder of Christianity. His teaching attracts them, even if the greater gift of his sacrifice affronts them.
Think of Jesus teaching how God’s rain comes down on good and bad people alike and demonstrating that teaching by reaching out with love to the social outcasts of his day.
There has never been anyone lovelier, deeper or more sympathetic than Jesus Dostoyevsky wrote.
Mother Julian of Norwich describes Jesus in these words: Completely relaxed and courteous, He himself was the happiness and peace of his dear friends, his beautiful face radiating measureless love like a marvellous symphony.
Jesus sees us, like a friend, with loving respect. He sees us as better than we are and by the events of Holy Week he helps to make us so.
There is a perception, or rather distortion of Christ and Christianity that sets forth a moral high-handedness about Jesus.
This goes against his own generosity in his encounters with individuals. The woman caught in adultery was not stoned because Jesus came into the situation and rescued her from the consequence of her sin.
Jesus did not come to rub it in but to rub it off as someone else once said of him.
There is part of us, even we who have come to join the few at Good Friday devotions, that is apprehensive about close encounter with Jesus.
We should be reminded of this - Jesus is more concerned to give us what we need than what we deserve, let alone what we think we deserve!
All of this witness to the respect and warm humanity in Jesus does not subtract from the challenge of Jesus.
I read about Napoleon, wrote Carnegie-Simpson, and I am edified. I read about Jesus and I am profoundly disturbed.
In one of her letters the writer and playwright Dorothy Sayers says that to call Jesus 'Gentle-Jesus-meek-and-mild' is 'about as adequate as calling a man-eating tiger 'poor pussy'..
In Jesus we find the perfect balance of love and truth and power. His loving acceptance of sinners is coupled to a burning conviction of truth and holiness and a readiness to empower people with the Holy Spirit given after his resurrection.
That power is with us this afternoon if we will open ourselves up to it as we approach the timeless mystery of the Cross of Jesus.
We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you, because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.
Over these three days running up to Easter we’re looking at five key aspects of Jesus: his origin, teaching, death, resurrection, his church and his return.
We started out of sequence yesterday with the church as this linked to the Maundy Thursday supper table.
Earlier this afternoon we looked at the origins of Jesus, evident as historical record. Now we ponder Jesus – man of respect – before we come to offer him respect as we come to his Cross together.
In Holy Week the world stops to respect Jesus.
It’s not so much what he taught but how he taught that catches us.
We live in a society where people lack respect. They tolerate one another’s differences but often times they do so without sympathy.
Think of the sympathy of Jesus. He listened to the rich young man. He loved him, scripture says, pointed him to the truth - but out of respect let him go away again.
Jesus was and is a man of respect, a man of dialogue. Today Muslims and Hindus also honour the Founder of Christianity. His teaching attracts them, even if the greater gift of his sacrifice affronts them.
Think of Jesus teaching how God’s rain comes down on good and bad people alike and demonstrating that teaching by reaching out with love to the social outcasts of his day.
There has never been anyone lovelier, deeper or more sympathetic than Jesus Dostoyevsky wrote.
Mother Julian of Norwich describes Jesus in these words: Completely relaxed and courteous, He himself was the happiness and peace of his dear friends, his beautiful face radiating measureless love like a marvellous symphony.
Jesus sees us, like a friend, with loving respect. He sees us as better than we are and by the events of Holy Week he helps to make us so.
There is a perception, or rather distortion of Christ and Christianity that sets forth a moral high-handedness about Jesus.
This goes against his own generosity in his encounters with individuals. The woman caught in adultery was not stoned because Jesus came into the situation and rescued her from the consequence of her sin.
Jesus did not come to rub it in but to rub it off as someone else once said of him.
There is part of us, even we who have come to join the few at Good Friday devotions, that is apprehensive about close encounter with Jesus.
We should be reminded of this - Jesus is more concerned to give us what we need than what we deserve, let alone what we think we deserve!
All of this witness to the respect and warm humanity in Jesus does not subtract from the challenge of Jesus.
I read about Napoleon, wrote Carnegie-Simpson, and I am edified. I read about Jesus and I am profoundly disturbed.
In one of her letters the writer and playwright Dorothy Sayers says that to call Jesus 'Gentle-Jesus-meek-and-mild' is 'about as adequate as calling a man-eating tiger 'poor pussy'..
In Jesus we find the perfect balance of love and truth and power. His loving acceptance of sinners is coupled to a burning conviction of truth and holiness and a readiness to empower people with the Holy Spirit given after his resurrection.
That power is with us this afternoon if we will open ourselves up to it as we approach the timeless mystery of the Cross of Jesus.
We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you, because by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.
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