A Sermon For All Saints Sunday - on the occasion of a baptism.

Sermon For All Saints:

                              

Historically, All Saints was a “catch all” provision to ensure that no Heroes of The Faith have been missed, or forgotten in the church calendar. As the church grew, and grew, and grew in the first few hundred years after Christ this became more, and more of an issue, as the year became crowded to over flowing with days for Saints and Martyrs .  Even today, as Christian persecution continues to rage across the world, especially in Iraq and Syria at this time, the number of those deserving of honour, the number of those from whom we have so much to learn, is growing day by day. As we heard from Jesus in this morning’s Gospel reading –

10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

11 “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely[b] on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

About 400 years after Christ, around 1600 years ago, when the calendar was already jam-packed, Pope Gelasius  the 1^st wrote of those “whose names are rightly reverenced among us, but whose actions are known only to God." There are dozens and dozens of Saints who now fit this category. Whose actions, and lives are lost, but whose images adorn our churches, in stained glass, painted relief, and folk tales.  But what about those whose names have been forgotten among us? What about those, who do not have mythic legends, stained glass windows, confraternities, and days in their honour?

Fortunately for us - being a saint is about none of these things.

Sainthood is about sharing in the life and activity of God. You can forget chiseled marble, polished brass, and plaster cast saints. Sainthood is about living in the strength, and power of God.  In the Incarnation, He (God) joined with our human life, so that we might join with his divine life – and that is what it means to be a saint, to participate in the life of God.

Participation in the life of God does not mean that we are expected to be perfect. We are not all expected to fulfill some great self-denying feat, such as those saints of old who took it upon themselves to flee to the wilderness, or those who suffer at the hands of militants in the world today. But we are to have perfection as our aim, our ambition, our end. Because we are animated, and brought to life by God who is perfection, as we seek after him.  The great self-denying feat to which we are called is to take up *our* cross – not St Peter’s, Not St Paul’s, Not St David or St George, St Teresa, or St Catherine – God is calling each one of you to participate in his life, to seek after him, and his kingdom.

Jesus says in verse six of the gospel passage: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” What is righteousness? A good place to start is Right Relationship – firstly with God, and then with our neighbours – so as we seek right relationship with God and Man, God gives to us his righteousness, his spirit, his Life. It is by God’s spirit that we can shine, as lights in t the world – because it is God’s spirit shines through us.

Christ begins to lay out for us what this new life might look like, what “sainthood” might look like, in the Gospel reading we heard today. Jesus gives us a pattern for life that reflects the new life that God has given us.

Blessed are the poor – theirs is the kingdom.

This simple set of verses has transformed the lives of countless millions, throughout the ages. All of whom have been swept up in the redeeming power of God’s action in the world. And it continues to do so now! Reading these verses we encounter, in plain and mundane letters on a commonplace page, the God who calls to us in the spirit, who longs for us to participate in his rebuilding of the cosmos.

Respond, I pray, to the God who came from very high, and lived among us. Not so that we could become famous, or preserved in statue form, or glass windows. But who came to change everything. Follow him, I pray, as he leads us. He will change our lives, as we follow him, through the waters of baptism, through our shared life, as we gather around his table.

Amen

The Wedding Feast of The King's Son - A Sermon.

Sermon on Matthew 22:1-14

This morning’s gospel reading was one of Jesus’ parables about the kingdom of heaven. Jesus uses these stories to draw a picture of how things are, and to show us how things should be. I’m sure many of us are familiar with these stories that he told, perhaps having grown up hearing them in Sunday school, and in children’s Bibles. The parables are so profound because they are stories about earthly things, yet they contain a profound, and challenging spiritual message.

I want to look at three surprises that jumped out at me from this passage of scripture, and I hope to make a little sense of the story.

This particular parable concerns a wedding feast; but not just any wedding feast, the wedding feast of the King’s son. I find it difficult to grasp the size, and splendour of such an event. The sort of thing that can draw a nation together, across age, and class boundaries. I wasn't born when Charles, the Prince of Wales, wed Lady Dianna Spencer at St Paul’s Cathedral in 1981, in fact, I wouldn't be born for another 6 years – Yes, I really am that young – but I am led to believe that 3,500 people filled the church, with two million spectators lining the route, waving flags, and cheering the young couple. 30 years later, we saw the wedding of Prince William, and Catherine Middleton – an even that has been viewed by 72 million people on YouTube. Huge public fascination was evident, regardless of our politics.

We would expect the picture of the Wedding Feast of the Kings Son,  that Jesus draws for us, to conjure up similar images. The wedding feast of the King’s son should have been a joyous event, and people should have been eager to come, but that isn't what we see in the parable.

We come to the first of three surprises in this short passage. We see the guests, turn down their invites, and refuse to come to the party. Verses four to six say:

⁴ Again he sent other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, Behold, I have made ready my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves are killed, and everything is ready; come to the marriage feast.’ ⁵ But they made light of it and went off, one to his farm, another to his business,⁶ while the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. 

This is madness! 

Could we imagine people turning down invites to Kate & William’s wedding? No, of course not. And yet, it is the world Jesus saw around him. A world where the people had rejected God’s call to the banquet table; they had taken the meal that God had given them, the Passover, and changed it from a meal of release, into a meal of burden. And it is what we continue to do, even today. When God calls us, we all too often find something else, some other job of work, or pressing matter, crops up, and draws us away from the feast.

The next part of the story; the King’s vengeance, is striking – but surely it cannot strike us as a surprise? The anger is instinctive; and a very human way of explaining how, and why things keep going wrong, and falling apart, when we insist on doing things our own way. We need to be careful here – it is easy to find in this passage a vengeful god, far removed from the God of love and compassion who we find in Christ Jesus. We need to bear in mind that this is a story, to make a point. The historical reality of decline of the Jewish kingdom, the fall of the temple system, and the eventual exile from the holy land at the hands of the Romans is given voice here. But Jesus comes to offer a different way.

The second of my three surprises comes in the following verses:

 8 Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy.9 Go therefore to the thoroughfares, and invite to the marriage feast as many as you find.’10 And those servants went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good; so the wedding hall was filled with guests.

What strikes me about this part of the passage is not that the King decided to invite some new guests. People from the highways and byeways – that makes sense – Of course the King would want to replace the guests, and make up numbers. What is incredible is that the servants gathered “all whom they found”(verse 10 ) “both good and bad”.

Surely not!

Surely God cannot be interested in the bad people?! This seems awkward. God’s servants show no distinction between good and bad people when handing out invites to the Great Wedding feast. And, the teaching is, that we are to go and do likewise. As we invite people into God’s kingdom, we are to do just that – invite People. We need a realisation, that when we deal with people, we deal with “people”. We each have good and bad mixed up within us, throughout our lives. We all have the same “image of God” buried within ourselves, and we are all called by God, to his wedding feast.

The final surprise I want to look at comes at the end of the passage

11 “But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment; 12 and he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into the outer darkness; there men will weep and gnash their teeth.’

Considering the welcome that was given to all and sundry it seems rather odd that something so bad should befall someone, simply as a result of a poor dress sense. But actually, there is something else going on here. Verse 10 tells us that people were gathered, and the hall was filled. There is no mention of people nipping home, or to Moss Bros to pick up something more suitable to wear. Again, the parable is using a physical sign to discuss a spiritual reality. No-one in this story has changed into “wedding gear”, Jesus is talking about what is going on beneath the surface.

We act this out, in a way, up here near the altar. These robes, symbolic of baptismal robes, become our wedding robes, ready for the great feast that we are to join with later as we celebrate communion together. These baptismal robes, white to symbolise purity, talk about the purity of Christ in which we clothe ourselves.

This is the culmination of the parable; that having welcomed all and sundry to the banquet, God clothes them in Christ. He clothes them in the innocence, and goodness of Christ. This man who lacks wedding clothes has infiltrated the party, he has become a member of the church, but has failed to put on the righteousness of Christ.

Scripture hammers this point home, again and again:

Romans 13:14 “But put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh”

Galatians 3:27 “for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.”

Colossians 3:12 “Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.”

There are more! Look for yourself! Jesus is urging us to clothe ourselves in him, and in his nature.

And so, I say come! Come to the feast, we have bread, we have wine! Although we were strangers from God, he has given us fine robes to wear.

Amen.

A Sacred Duty (Repost)...

This is a post from the middle of 2011, not long after I was married; it was one of my favourites. Here it is, with amendments, and additions:

There is a role more noble than the Order of the Garter;

More sacred than the Society of the Holy Cross.

More ancient than the Holy Writ of Scripture.

John the Baptist alluded to this rank as 'friend of the groom'.

I speak, of course, of the best man.

Bestmanning.

It is my privilege to preform these duties twice this year (2011); for two very different men, who will have two very different days. As a result of these differences, my role will appear quite different; but, in substance it remains the same.

The best man's job is to ensure the groom comes ready for the wedding: mentally, spiritually, physically.

I remember the night before my wedding, when my best man was on the receiving end of about a hundred texts and tweets, requesting various items, from shoe polish, to cuff-links, to confirmation that he hadn't lost the rings. It wasn't simply that I required these items (I certainly didn't require them at One in the morning); Nor was it simply a matter of needing assurance that they would be remembered; it was, perhaps, most importantly assurance that I would be remembered.

A wedding can be should be a serious thing; it is not so much a matter of Life or Death, but more a matter of Life or Life. Which Life? That's the question. Marriage joins two people as one. Two families as one. Two pasts as one future. But where does that leave the groom?

Swallowed up into a homogeneous mass like Brangelina?

No. Marriage joins two, so that they can be more fully themselves, not so they can be a beige blob of humanity. And this, perhaps, is also the role of the best man; to see that the groom doesn't abandon himself, his loves, his passions, his life. Instead, the best man is prepare the groom for a life where he can be more truly himself.

The role of best man is the role of priest.

To take you to the altar, and to pass you the emblems of your promise

It is not the role of a priest to live an experience for you; it is his job to ensure that you come, ready and prepared.

The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete.

My prayer is that I don't balls it all up too badly.

Walking on Water - a Sermon

Readings:

1 Kings 19:9-18, &  Matthew 14:22-33

The picture of Jesus walking on the water is Iconic.

It is perhaps one of the most familiar images for us as Christians. It is also one of the few biblical narratives, or bible stories, that is still part of our culture, and known to people who don’t regularly come to church.

Perhaps it is the “otherness” of the story.

The fact that it is so unbelievable, so counter intuitive, and so contrary to the way we understand how the world works, that adds to the story’s popularity. This ‘fantastic’ element is found within all of the Nature Miracles, those miracles in which Jesus demonstrates His control over nature. Jesus walking on water; Jesus calming the storm; Jesus multiplying bread and fish to feed the multitudes. These events strike us as impossible, because they run so contrary to our experience of life, and our environment.

It would have been no less so for the disciples!

Sceptics often make the error of attributing these stories to the ignorance, or naiveté, of the apostles. The sceptic will say “these things can’t happen!” and assume therefore, that to have written about such things, the apostles simply must have misunderstood the laws of nature. 

Make no mistake here, although they did not understand the “mechanics” as we do, although they didn't have sophisticated scientific method to record their observation, they did know how the world worked. They did know what things could, and couldn't happen. If anything, I would say they had a greater understanding (if more basic) than we do, simply because they spent more time in nature.

These were fishermen; they knew people could not walk on water.

I'm not sure there is a people, or occupational group, in the world who would know this fact better than them. I'm certain that they knew more about the tides and waves than I will ever know. It would be preposterous to think, absolutely arrogant to think, that these people were confused by the event – somehow thinking people could walk on water.

We even know from the scripture itself that they couldn't believe it at first: Verse 26 says:

“And when the disciples saw Him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, “It is a ghost!” And they cried out for fear.”

A ghost. They thought it was a ghost. They thought a man walking on water would be so impossible, so unlikely, that their first thought was a ghost.  They knew men cannot walk on water. Further to this, after Jesus calls to them, calming them, they still do not think it can be – and they challenge him, verse 28:

“ And Peter answered Him and said, “Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water.”

Jesus, in his compassion, complies.

He takes Peter with him onto the water, with the waves billowing around them, they walk. Peter had taken a huge leap of faith, taking those few steps from the boat – My mind wanders to the moon landing, and those famous words “one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” –  This was indeed a huge leap for man, but unable to escape his surroundings, Peter cannot yet appreciate it.

You see, Peter cannot yet let go of his doubts, his fears, his presuppositions, his anxiety and he begins to doubt. Sinking into the water. Sinking into despair. Sinking into mistrust. Sinking. Jesus reaches out, grabs his arm, and helps him. Peter finally now begins to see him, to really see Him, for the first time.

There had been a lot of miracles so far, but nothing like this. Because men cannot walk on water. Peter is struggling for words to express his thoughts, his instincts, perhaps this frustration contributed to his doubts, his confusion. Because men cannot walk on water.

They climbed back into the boat; and everything had changed. Because men cannot walk on water. Peter knew that. And as he staggered, hands and knees, into the boat he remained face-down, his knees bent – I imagine his companions fell to theirs. Because, men do not walk on water.

I doubt at this point they understood, I doubt they knew for sure, I expect all they knew was that they had to do something – and there was only one thing that could be done -  they worshipped him.

Men do not walk on water. They knew this. And so everything had changed. The words came, I’m sure, after a moment of stunned silence that must have felt like eternity “Truly You are the Son of God.”

It must have been a mumble at first. You see, these words are no ordinary words; this was no ordinary act. On shore, back at home, these words could have cost them their life. Stoned to death for blasphemy. Talking about God in this way, talking about a man in this way. For most of the men on that boat, these words would cost them their life; even today, these words continue to cost men their lives, we think of Northern Iraq where ISIS have been committing the worst kinds of atrocities, filled with hate, and terrible anger. These words are important, they are, with no exaggeration, a matter of life and death; these words are a matter of Eternal life or Death. “Truly You are the Son of God.” We continue to use these words about Jesus, because, understand this: men do not walk on water.

What does this mean, and what are the apostles saying?

There is much conjecture among fans of Dan Brown, author of the DaVinci code, at what point the church started calling Jesus God, whether it was when the Nicene Creed was written, or when the church fixed the bible… these conversations make me laugh. It is there as clear as day, before your very eyes in the text, men do not walk on water.

Jesus is God.

There, I said it.

God revealed himself to the apostles there, on that stormy sea; on that windy night. God showed them His Face; and the face of God, the immortal one, the ancient of days, the all-powerful, and unchangeable God of all creation looked upon them with Jesus’ eyes of compassion, and the voice that commanded all of creation into being spoke to them saying “why did you doubt?”.

“why did you doubt”.

This isn’t a phrase that calls condemnation down upon the apostles as they knelt there, mouths ajar in awe. It was a phrase that stirred them, lifted them, and encouraged them to put their trust in Him, the Son of God.

God revealed Himself to the aspostles that day, just as he had done to Elijah 900 years before.

The stories resonate with a striking similarity: Verse 11 from the reading from Kings:

Then He said, “Go out, and stand on the mountain before the Lord.” And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore into the mountains and broke the rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind;
 and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; 12 and after the earthquake a fire,but the Lord was not in the fire; and
after the fire a still small voice.13 So it was, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood in the entrance of the cave. Suddenly a voice came to him, and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

First there is the wind, the storm, the raging nature – Elijah’s story tells us of the wind so strong it broke the rocks; our gospel reading tells us the wind lashed up billowing waves,  that tossed the boat to and fro.

God doesn’t choose to reveal himself through the storm

Then comes the fear; earthquake and fire in the Old Testament reading, fire that is unpredictable, and conjures up thoughts of the supernatural; the New Testament reading has a spoken fear “a ghost!” they cry, fearful of the dangerous and unpredictable spirit world.

God doesn’t chose to reveal himself through the fear.

Finally, verse 12 from Elijah’s story said there was a “still small voice” calling to the prophet; the same voice called from the lips of Jesus to the disciples that night on the sea. That voice still calls to us today.

Amen

Words.

The picture (below) has been doing the rounds on Facebook; it has inspired me to re-post (with edits):

Words have no intrinsic value. 

The arbitrary arrangement of letters and phonics, though steeped in rich etymological history, in the end mean nothing. Language exists not in the writing down, but rather, in the taking up.

When we write, and we do so often write, we veil our thoughts in heavy cloth. Some folk may, through eloquence or loquacity, craft more delicate silk to hold their ideas, but nonetheless, we can never truly know their intentions, their ideas, their mind. We can only know the outline of their thoughts. The shape underneath the drape of language remains to us merely a shape, we cannot know what lies beneath.

This is a problem, for People of The Book.

Yet, despite our ignorance, and despite our lack of seeing - we can expand our understanding.

We can, become acquainted with the author. We can grow to understand them, their motivation, desires, and passions; which can give us greater insight into what lies beneath the veil of words. Yet, our understanding of the author may be tainted, by our own prejudices, and expectations.

We must be humble, and subject ourselves to those who have known him longer. Not in hierarchy, but in love, earnestly seeking to understand those who understand. Those who understand must likewise seek those who understand more fully, and also those with fresh eyes. Together we can pool our senses, our thoughts, and our experience.

Scripture is therefore a community project.

(Best undertaken around a barbecue.)

Back on The Rocking Horse

They say the best  only thing to do upon falling from a horse, is to get right back up.

I can't ride a horse.

I haven't been banned, or anything. There have been no equestrian irregularities. I simply never learned. It seems, likewise, that neither did I learn to get back up.

I haven't posted a proper post on here for over two years. My last post, which has been (temporarily?) suspended, was a short poem following the death of a friend.

There was no plan to stop; no official hanging-up of my keyboard; no ceremonial smashing of my laptop. I simply had nothing to say. I'm sure that those of you who know me well, and those of you who have seen my posts on Facebook, may struggle to believe that I had nothing to say. Seldom am I not speaking. It seems however, that despite my proliferous posting, I have had hardly anything to say.

From grief, followed life.

Two years have gone in a flash of commuting, and child care. The ever eventful reality of becoming a fully grown family man, complete with fully grown ginger beard, and burgeoning belly mass, became my existence. Blogging wasn't avoided, it simply couldn't carve a cleft within my conscious.

So what has changed? Can it be that, Destry Rides Again?

That remains to be seen.

Clean-Slate Monday

Today is Clean-Slate Monday.

More to follow; much, much more.