This sermon is based on 1 Samuel 3:1-10 and John 1:43-51.
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Introduction
Once upon a time there was a teenager. I'll call him Jack and I think that he was probably about 16 or 17 years old. Jack had attended church all his life. He'd gone to Sunday School until he was about 14 and then - believe it or not - after he was confirmed he actually started coming to Sunday services!
That particular church had an active group for young people and one day, they arranged to visit a youth conference in Birmingham. It was one of those big worship events with several hundred young people and lots of good music. The kind of worship that we all need now and then in order to give us a boost and encourage us in our faith.
Who knows why God picks the times and the ways that he speaks to us in a special way, but at that service in Birmingham, Jack was able to hear God in a powerful way. He was touched by the hundreds of young people worshipping God together without worrying about what their friends might think. He was touched by words of the music.
And he was particularly touched by the speaker.
It was at that worship service that Jack felt that he really understood for the first time what the Gospel was all about. He understood in a personal way God's love for him. He understood in his heart that, even if he made mistakes, God would forgive him and give him a second chance. And Jack also felt that he really understood for the first time what it meant that the Holy Spirit would give him strength to be a disciple of Jesus.
Jack was overwhelmed by this experienced and, like many people when they first really 'get it', he felt overjoyed.
But on the coach trip him, Jack began to feel a bit betrayed. Why had no one ever told him this stuff before? Why hadn't his Sunday School teachers told him about the real Gospel? And, for that matter, why wasn't the minister preaching the real Gospel?
Jack, full of the boldness of his new-found understanding, resolved that he was going to have a word with the minister and ask her why she never preached the Gospel.
When he got up on Sunday, he thought 'There's no time like the present. I'll speak to the minister after the service.' And then, as Jack listened to the sermon, he realised that the minister was preaching the Gospel. So he decided to wait and see what happened the following Sunday.
And the following Sunday, miracle of miracles, the minister preached the Gospel again. On the third Sunday, when the minister preached the Gospel yet again, Jack thought to himself, 'Maybe the minister has been preaching the Gospel all along. Maybe it was me who just wasn't hearing it.'
Hearing God in Unexpected Places
When our perspective is changed, we can suddenly 'see' things that we have never seen before.
Like Jack, we can see God in places where we have never seen him before. We can see God in expected places. And this seeing of God in unexpected places is what seems to be going on in both of our readings this morning.
On the one hand, we have Samuel. Still a young boy, he is under the tutelage of Eli the Priest. Samuel doesn't have the ability or the experience to hear the voice of God on his own, but Eli instructs Samuel in how to do it.
Eli gives Samuel this instruction - he does the right thing - even though he knows that his own sons have been cursed by God for being scoundrels. According to the laws of the Hebrew people, it is not Samuel who is supposed to hear the voice of God, yet God has chosen him over and above the sons of Eli.
Through Samuel, God speaks through an unexpected source. Samuel's perspective was changed from then on and he was able to gain experience in hearing God speak.
I think that there is a similar thing happening in the story of Nathaniel. We have some hints from the reading that Nathaniel was a dedicated scholar of Jewish Law.
First of all, his name: a very Jewish name in contrast to the other disciples whose names have been translated into Greek. Secondly, the way that Jesus greets him as 'an Israelite in whom their is no deceit' And, finally, Nathaniel's habit of studying under a fig tree - a symbol for the nation of Israel.
What is unexpected here is not Nathaniel's interest in being a disciple of God but rather his confession of Jesus - of all people - as The Son of God and the King of Israel. In John's Gospel, these title are very intentionally Messianic.
The man who had just questioned 'Can anything good come out of Nazareth?' is now acknowledging Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah.
Something happens, and we don't really know what it is, that entirely changes Nathaniel's perspective. He moves rapidly from a stance of writing Jesus off completely to recognising him as the Messiah and becoming Jesus' disciple.
Samuel and Nathaniel both had their perspective changed. They were able to hear the voice of God and become disciples even though the voice of God seemed to be coming from an unexpected place.
History Belongs to God
The historian Arnold Toynbee famously said that 'History is just one (darn) thing after another.' (He didn't say 'darn' but I wouldn't want to shock you too much from the pulpit!)
Toynbee believed that human civilizations don't learn from history but that they simply keep making the same mistakes over and over.
The question as to whether anything good can ever come out of Nazareth is perhaps poignant in the context of current events where the government of Israel is locked in battle with Palestinian militants.
Two thousand years later, we can look at that area of the world - both Israel and Gaza - and wonder whether anything good will ever come out of that place. We might be very tempted to take the view of Arnold Toynbee and think that history is doomed to repeat itself over and over in this region.
I'm not imagining that I'm going to come up with a solution to the problems in the Middle East in this sermon, but I think that today's readings suggest to us at least the outline of a Godly response.
First of all, as Christians we do not believe that history is just one darn thing after another. History has a goal and that goal is the coming of the Kingdom of God.
A world in which human dignity is real and the presence of God is manifest. Where God's kingdom will come on earth as it is in heaven.
Even if we cannot see an inkling of The Kingdom at the moment, the Kingdom is in God's hands just as surely as the future of Israel was in God's hands in Eli's time. The world has seen the hand of God at work in human history. The healing of European tensions during the 20th century is one example. The peace in Northern Ireland is yet another example.
As Christians, it is central to our belief that there is always hope for human history.
Secondly, as disciples of Christ, we must be dedicated to the truth. We must have the eyes to see clearly when evil is being done, no matter who does it, and name it as evil. We must have the eyes to see clearly when good is being done, no matter who does it, and name it as good.
Both Eli and Nathaniel heard the voice of God calling from unexpected places.
If the world assumes that no good can come from Israel or that no good can come from Palestine, then there will never be clear enough vision to sit down at the negotiating table to begin the process of peace.
And finally, as disciples of Christ we are called to be agents of peace by being the agents of truth and righteousness and clear-headed ethics.
Please note that I'm not saying that Christians will be the only agents of peace. In fact, it is my belief anyone whose actions serve peace, truth, righteousness and clear-headed ethics will, in fact, be doing the will of God whether or not they call themselves a Christian.
However, to be a disciple of Christ is necessarily to be committed to the pursuit of these things.
It may be a lot simpler to simply pick a side and refuse to acknowledge when that side engages in injustice; but truth will not be served by such a process. Peace, forgiveness and reconciliation will not be served by such a process. And the Kingdom of God will not be advanced by such a process.
Conclusion
During the course of our lives, God will call to us from unexpected places and in the voices of unexpected people.
The principles outlined above can be applied in our personal lives and in our spiritual lives.
They are as applicable to Christian unity as well as to international relations and, of course, they are applicable to our personal lives as well.
How can we hear God's call when it comes from an unfamiliar voice?
I think that we can hear God's call when it sounds like Jesus. When it sounds like forgiveness rather than retribution; reconciliation rather than division; peace rather than war; inclusion rather than exclusion; service rather than personal glory; the good of the other rather than my own comfort.
My prayer this morning is that, as disciples, we can be clear-headed enough to recognise the voice of God by the message that it brings. May we be given the discernment to hear the voice of God even when it comes from unexpected places and unexpected people. Amen
Showing posts with label peace. Show all posts
Showing posts with label peace. Show all posts
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Sunday 28 December 2008 - God in the Mess
I couldn't preach this morning and ignore what has happened in Gaza this weekend with over 250 people dead. The sermon is based on the Gospel reading from the Common Worship Lectionary rather than from the Revised Common Lectionary. Luke 2:15-21
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The Messiah Has Come
In today's Gospel reading, we hear once again the end of Luke's story of Christmas. There have been miraculous appearances by angels, there have been shepherds and there have been hymns of praise, both earthly and celestial. Everything in Luke's narrative points to Jesus as the Messiah so that the reader is left in no doubt as to who Jesus is or what his significance is.
And, finally, when the momentous events have been accomplished and the shepherds and the angels have departed, Mary is left to ponder all of these events in her heart.
Then the next thing that happens in Luke's narrative is the circumcision of Jesus. Luke is affirming yet again the status of Jesus as the Messiah, the one through whom God's promises to the human race are to be fulfilled. Circumcision is a sign of God's covenant promise with his people.
Listen to what a modern Jewish rabbi has to say about the rite of circumcisions as an expression of God's covenant and what that means[1]: 'There will come a time when all human beings will live in full dignity and freedom....The covenant is that bond through which God and the Jewish people dream together and work together toward an alternative reality, a world in which human dignity is real and the presence of God is manifest.'
Other Mothers
Over the last week or so during the season of Christmas, we have been hearing stories of shepherds and lambs and wise men and gifts and mothers and babies. And our young ones have been acting in nativity plays; and the week of Christmas has been a time for celebrations and feasting and maybe a bit too much activity as well.
And I can't help but think that against this backdrop of our celebrations, the ceasefire between Israel and Gaza has fallen apart in the last fortnight and hundreds of people in the region of the Holy Land have been killed this weekend.
I don't want to take sides or appear to take sides. The current violence has a long and complicated history and there is always more than one side to any conflict. But as I was thinking about Mary's ponderings and her hopes for her own child, I came across the stories of two other mothers in the Holy Land.
The first story is Hava's{2]. A Jewish mother of three in a town called Sderot. On the 19th of December she said: 'A rocket landed 10 metres from my house last week. The ceasefire may have officially ended today, but in reality it was over long before that. I don't feel protected here, not at all. I hope that Israel does go into Gaza even if citizens there get hurt. Because here in Sderot we are getting hurt. Life is very difficult. We have my husband's salary from the bed factory here in Sderot, but it's barely enough. I am sure there are simple citizens like me in Gaza, who want nothing but to wake up in the morning, go to work and take care of the children. But if I have to choose between my son or someone else's son, I choose my son.'
...And what mother wouldn't?
The second story is Mirvat's[3], a Palestinian mother who lives in the Gaza. Her family was caught in the crossfire of a gun-battle between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian militants. Whilst taking cover in their own living room with her five children, her oldest son and daughter, aged 18 and 17 were killed by snipers when they accidentally moved into the snipers' view. Mirvat said: 'We feel like there is no reason to live any more....'We have to talk to the other side, we have to have peace, so that we can all - us and them - live safely.'
And what mother wouldn't want to live in safety with her children?
Christ our Saviour
So here we have the ponderings of three mothers: From Scripture, the pondering of Mary on Jesus' Messiahship and what that might ultimately mean. And from our world, the pondering of two mothers in an imperfect and dangerous world who are afraid for their children and their future.
Jesus came to the world as the Prince of Peace and yet it appears that we have no peace. In such circumstances, talk of a world in which human dignity is real and the presence of God is manifest can sometimes seem hollow and unreal.
The Christmas image of the baby in the manger may be a sweet picture, but ultimately the message of Christmas is not meant to be charming or bucolic. The message of Christmas is that God is in this messy world with us. And that he is here in fact as well as in Spirit.
The baby lying in that crib at Christmas will ultimately share the everyday sorrows of human life as well as all its everyday joys. But Jesus will also experience the worst that human life has to offer: betrayal, humiliation, shame and a painful, violent death. His last words will be words of forgiveness and his last act will unite us with God and with God's forgiveness forever. And his resurrection will be a sign that God is a God who is completely alive and without reference to death.
The message of Christmas is ultimately a message of hope, but is not a saccharine or unreal hope, but a gritty hope born out of the worst that humanity can do.
When human beings suffer at the hands of others and can still forgive, then we recognise the human dignity of those who hurt us and we access a dignity in ourselves that can only come from the Spirit of God. And when we we suffer randomly at the hands of life's circumstances, it is God's Spirit that gives us the strength to continue in hope.
Conclusion
The beauty of the incarnation does not lie in the sweetness of one newborn child. The beauty of the incarnation lies in the fact that God's salvation came through the reality of this world and through the reality of Jesus' humanity. Salvation does not come because human beings are removed from the world but because God has come into the world.
As we come to The Lord's Table in a few minutes, I pray that we, like Mary, will ponder the mystery of the incarnation in our hearts. And I pray that we will not only ponder this mystery but that we will trust in God's promises and that we will and pray and work for a world where all mothers dare to hope for a future of peace on earth for their children. Amen
===
The Messiah Has Come
In today's Gospel reading, we hear once again the end of Luke's story of Christmas. There have been miraculous appearances by angels, there have been shepherds and there have been hymns of praise, both earthly and celestial. Everything in Luke's narrative points to Jesus as the Messiah so that the reader is left in no doubt as to who Jesus is or what his significance is.
And, finally, when the momentous events have been accomplished and the shepherds and the angels have departed, Mary is left to ponder all of these events in her heart.
Then the next thing that happens in Luke's narrative is the circumcision of Jesus. Luke is affirming yet again the status of Jesus as the Messiah, the one through whom God's promises to the human race are to be fulfilled. Circumcision is a sign of God's covenant promise with his people.
Listen to what a modern Jewish rabbi has to say about the rite of circumcisions as an expression of God's covenant and what that means[1]: 'There will come a time when all human beings will live in full dignity and freedom....The covenant is that bond through which God and the Jewish people dream together and work together toward an alternative reality, a world in which human dignity is real and the presence of God is manifest.'
Other Mothers
Over the last week or so during the season of Christmas, we have been hearing stories of shepherds and lambs and wise men and gifts and mothers and babies. And our young ones have been acting in nativity plays; and the week of Christmas has been a time for celebrations and feasting and maybe a bit too much activity as well.
And I can't help but think that against this backdrop of our celebrations, the ceasefire between Israel and Gaza has fallen apart in the last fortnight and hundreds of people in the region of the Holy Land have been killed this weekend.
I don't want to take sides or appear to take sides. The current violence has a long and complicated history and there is always more than one side to any conflict. But as I was thinking about Mary's ponderings and her hopes for her own child, I came across the stories of two other mothers in the Holy Land.
The first story is Hava's{2]. A Jewish mother of three in a town called Sderot. On the 19th of December she said: 'A rocket landed 10 metres from my house last week. The ceasefire may have officially ended today, but in reality it was over long before that. I don't feel protected here, not at all. I hope that Israel does go into Gaza even if citizens there get hurt. Because here in Sderot we are getting hurt. Life is very difficult. We have my husband's salary from the bed factory here in Sderot, but it's barely enough. I am sure there are simple citizens like me in Gaza, who want nothing but to wake up in the morning, go to work and take care of the children. But if I have to choose between my son or someone else's son, I choose my son.'
...And what mother wouldn't?
The second story is Mirvat's[3], a Palestinian mother who lives in the Gaza. Her family was caught in the crossfire of a gun-battle between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian militants. Whilst taking cover in their own living room with her five children, her oldest son and daughter, aged 18 and 17 were killed by snipers when they accidentally moved into the snipers' view. Mirvat said: 'We feel like there is no reason to live any more....'We have to talk to the other side, we have to have peace, so that we can all - us and them - live safely.'
And what mother wouldn't want to live in safety with her children?
Christ our Saviour
So here we have the ponderings of three mothers: From Scripture, the pondering of Mary on Jesus' Messiahship and what that might ultimately mean. And from our world, the pondering of two mothers in an imperfect and dangerous world who are afraid for their children and their future.
Jesus came to the world as the Prince of Peace and yet it appears that we have no peace. In such circumstances, talk of a world in which human dignity is real and the presence of God is manifest can sometimes seem hollow and unreal.
The Christmas image of the baby in the manger may be a sweet picture, but ultimately the message of Christmas is not meant to be charming or bucolic. The message of Christmas is that God is in this messy world with us. And that he is here in fact as well as in Spirit.
The baby lying in that crib at Christmas will ultimately share the everyday sorrows of human life as well as all its everyday joys. But Jesus will also experience the worst that human life has to offer: betrayal, humiliation, shame and a painful, violent death. His last words will be words of forgiveness and his last act will unite us with God and with God's forgiveness forever. And his resurrection will be a sign that God is a God who is completely alive and without reference to death.
The message of Christmas is ultimately a message of hope, but is not a saccharine or unreal hope, but a gritty hope born out of the worst that humanity can do.
When human beings suffer at the hands of others and can still forgive, then we recognise the human dignity of those who hurt us and we access a dignity in ourselves that can only come from the Spirit of God. And when we we suffer randomly at the hands of life's circumstances, it is God's Spirit that gives us the strength to continue in hope.
Conclusion
The beauty of the incarnation does not lie in the sweetness of one newborn child. The beauty of the incarnation lies in the fact that God's salvation came through the reality of this world and through the reality of Jesus' humanity. Salvation does not come because human beings are removed from the world but because God has come into the world.
As we come to The Lord's Table in a few minutes, I pray that we, like Mary, will ponder the mystery of the incarnation in our hearts. And I pray that we will not only ponder this mystery but that we will trust in God's promises and that we will and pray and work for a world where all mothers dare to hope for a future of peace on earth for their children. Amen
Footnotes
[1] Rabbi Shai Held at: http://www.myjewishlearning.com/lifecycle/Ceremonies_For_Newborns/Overview_Contemporary_Issues/The_Circumcision_Debate/A_Difficult_Rite.htm Accessed 27 December 2008
[2] BBC Website, 15:13 GMT, Friday 19 December 2008. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7791522.stm Accessed 27 December 2008.
[3} BBC Website 15:54 GMT, Thursday 18 December 2008. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7790255.stm Accessed 27 December 2008.
[2] BBC Website, 15:13 GMT, Friday 19 December 2008. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7791522.stm Accessed 27 December 2008.
[3} BBC Website 15:54 GMT, Thursday 18 December 2008. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7790255.stm Accessed 27 December 2008.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Sunday 15 June 2008 - A Dangerous Gospel
This sermon is a thematic sermon loosely based around the day's Gospel reading: Matthew 9:35-10:23
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Introduction
I suspect that you are probably familiar with the 1930s American comedy duo Laurel and Hardy. Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy are a couple of friends who go through life together lurching from one disaster to another. These are usually disasters that are often caused by their failure to grasp the consequence of a particular situation. Except that Oliver Hardy always has someone to blame for his own incompetence: his friend Stan Laurel. One of Ollie’s (as he is known) oft-repeated phrases is ‘Well, here’s another nice mess you’ve gotten me into.’
In this morning’s reading, Jesus tells the twelve – and by extension us – that being his disciple is going to get us into one fine mess after another if we decide to follow him. In Matthew 10, verse 16, Jesus tells his disciples: ‘See, I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves’.
Now like all good Jewish rabbis, Jesus sometimes exaggerates to make a point, but I’m not sure that he’s exaggerating here. At this point in the story of Jesus’ ministry, he is beginning to encounter opposition and I suspect that he is beginning to get an understanding of the very real dangers of proclaiming his counter-cultural message. And I believe that Jesus is very plainly telling the disciples that they will be in the same danger if they follow him: That when they proclaim the message of the Kingdom of God that they too will be like sheep in the midst of wolves.
A dangerous Gospel?
The question I’d like to ask this morning is ‘What is it about the Gospel, what is it about the proclamation of the Kingdom of God that makes the message dangerous?’ ‘What is it that makes the proclamation of the Kingdom of God that makes the message foolish?’ As Christians in the 21st century, should our message be a dangerous message or was the danger only for Jesus in his time?
This morning, I’d like to point two of the primary ways that I think that the Christian Gospel is both foolish and dangerous. You are, of course, free to make up your own mind and perhaps to think of your own dangers of the Gospel.
Forgiveness
The first ‘way of the Kingdom of God’ that I believe is foolishness is that the Kingdom is based on forgiveness. This is a topic that could be the subject of several sermons and I’m not going to pretend that the practice of forgiveness is easy.
Nonetheless, this is a patently foolish message in all sorts of ways if you start thinking about the practical applications of forgiveness.
Think of all the people in our lives who it would be difficult or impractical to forgive. Certainly God does not mean for us to forgive the person who bullied us in school and whose bullying handicapped us in so many ways as we grew into adult life? Certainly God does not mean for us to forgive the drunk driver who killed or maimed a member of our family? Certainly God does not mean for us to forgive the individuals who bombed a public square on mothering Sunday or the London tube system during morning rush hour?
It may seem obvious to us that Jesus wanted his followers in his day to forgive their Christian bothers and sisters seventy times seven, but it is equally obvious to us that God understands that some people have hurt us so badly that it is simply not possible for us to forgive them.
As I said earlier, forgiveness is something that can often seem impossible, or at least extremely difficult. I do believe that God understands that it can seem impossible to forgive and I do believe that he will have compassion on those who struggle to forgive and find it difficult.
However, God’s compassion for those who have been hurt does not mean that he lifts the standard. He does not say ‘OK, I understand that it is difficult for you to forgive, so in the Kingdom of God, forgiveness will just be an optional extra’. And I suspect that the disciples were just as challenged as we are at the commandment to forgive seventy times seven and that they felt is was just as impossible as we do.
To proclaim forgiveness in the 21st century is as foolish as it was in the 1st century. Those who proclaim these values wholeheartedly will be like sheep amongst wolves.
Peace & the Rule of God
Another foolish characteristic of God’s rule in the Kingdom is that it is characterised by peace.
Once again, the direct application of Jesus’ teachings on peace seem highly dangerous in our own context today. To make Christ and the Kingdom of God the centre of our political values as well as the centre of our own personal morality would be dangerous as well as stupid.
We can easily accept that Jesus really meant that Rome was an illegitimate government in the eyes of God. We can understand that Jesus thought that the accommodation of the Temple to the prevailing Roman values of the time made the Temple illegitimate. And we can easily agree with Jesus’ opposition to the Zealots’ plan to raise an army of resistance against Rome.
But when we try to apply Jesus’ teaching directly to our own situation, we can see the dangers and complexities very clearly.
We look at our world and feel threatened by terrorism; and we see our precious sons and daughters being killed in foreign lands. We look at our own complicated world, our threatened and threatening world and we think ‘God can’t possibly be asking us to behave as if peace were already upon us; its too difficult.’
The way of peace is not only foolish, it’s downright dangerous. Couple the message of peace with the commandment to forgive others and with the message that the last shall be first and you might end up getting yourself killed just like Jesus. The ways of peace and forgiveness are not practical. They are naïve and idealistic and ‘everyone knows’ that the world does not work this way.
The Good News
But Jesus never said that being his disciple was going to be easy. Jesus tells us that we are going to be sent out on mission without any of the usual resources that the world thinks necessary to do a good job. And he tells us that we are going to be like sheep: targets for all the wolves who think that the way of Jesus is foolish and impractical.
But he also tells us that the world is in need of our mission. We, his followers, may be like sheep amongst the wolves, but at least we have a shepherd: the world does not have a shepherd and it is crying out for guidance. Jesus’ mission of spiritual and physical healing is our mission too. It’s the mission of the Church in the same way that it was the mission of the disciples. God’s determination to bring about the Kingdom of God begins with the twelve tribes of Israel, and it reaches fulfilment in the death and resurrection of Christ.
This is the Good News and it’s the Good News that we as a Church are sent out to proclaim. Just like the twelve disciples who Christ commissions here, Jesus’ mission is carried forward by us – the Church of Christ in every age. In this reading, we understand that our mission will not be easy but we are promised that it will be worthwhile; the healing of body, mind and spirit are always worthwhile.
Faith in Jesus will make our mission possible, but it won’t make it easy and it certainly will not earn us the world’s stamp of approval. Nonetheless, just like each one of the disciples, each of us has been called personally into our discipleship.
My prayer this morning/evening is that we may each be given the grace to follow where God leads us. I pray that we may be faithful messengers of his Good News and that our lives reflect God’s love, forgiveness and peace. Amen
Introduction
I suspect that you are probably familiar with the 1930s American comedy duo Laurel and Hardy. Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy are a couple of friends who go through life together lurching from one disaster to another. These are usually disasters that are often caused by their failure to grasp the consequence of a particular situation. Except that Oliver Hardy always has someone to blame for his own incompetence: his friend Stan Laurel. One of Ollie’s (as he is known) oft-repeated phrases is ‘Well, here’s another nice mess you’ve gotten me into.’
In this morning’s reading, Jesus tells the twelve – and by extension us – that being his disciple is going to get us into one fine mess after another if we decide to follow him. In Matthew 10, verse 16, Jesus tells his disciples: ‘See, I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves’.
Now like all good Jewish rabbis, Jesus sometimes exaggerates to make a point, but I’m not sure that he’s exaggerating here. At this point in the story of Jesus’ ministry, he is beginning to encounter opposition and I suspect that he is beginning to get an understanding of the very real dangers of proclaiming his counter-cultural message. And I believe that Jesus is very plainly telling the disciples that they will be in the same danger if they follow him: That when they proclaim the message of the Kingdom of God that they too will be like sheep in the midst of wolves.
A dangerous Gospel?
The question I’d like to ask this morning is ‘What is it about the Gospel, what is it about the proclamation of the Kingdom of God that makes the message dangerous?’ ‘What is it that makes the proclamation of the Kingdom of God that makes the message foolish?’ As Christians in the 21st century, should our message be a dangerous message or was the danger only for Jesus in his time?
This morning, I’d like to point two of the primary ways that I think that the Christian Gospel is both foolish and dangerous. You are, of course, free to make up your own mind and perhaps to think of your own dangers of the Gospel.
Forgiveness
The first ‘way of the Kingdom of God’ that I believe is foolishness is that the Kingdom is based on forgiveness. This is a topic that could be the subject of several sermons and I’m not going to pretend that the practice of forgiveness is easy.
Nonetheless, this is a patently foolish message in all sorts of ways if you start thinking about the practical applications of forgiveness.
Think of all the people in our lives who it would be difficult or impractical to forgive. Certainly God does not mean for us to forgive the person who bullied us in school and whose bullying handicapped us in so many ways as we grew into adult life? Certainly God does not mean for us to forgive the drunk driver who killed or maimed a member of our family? Certainly God does not mean for us to forgive the individuals who bombed a public square on mothering Sunday or the London tube system during morning rush hour?
It may seem obvious to us that Jesus wanted his followers in his day to forgive their Christian bothers and sisters seventy times seven, but it is equally obvious to us that God understands that some people have hurt us so badly that it is simply not possible for us to forgive them.
As I said earlier, forgiveness is something that can often seem impossible, or at least extremely difficult. I do believe that God understands that it can seem impossible to forgive and I do believe that he will have compassion on those who struggle to forgive and find it difficult.
However, God’s compassion for those who have been hurt does not mean that he lifts the standard. He does not say ‘OK, I understand that it is difficult for you to forgive, so in the Kingdom of God, forgiveness will just be an optional extra’. And I suspect that the disciples were just as challenged as we are at the commandment to forgive seventy times seven and that they felt is was just as impossible as we do.
To proclaim forgiveness in the 21st century is as foolish as it was in the 1st century. Those who proclaim these values wholeheartedly will be like sheep amongst wolves.
Peace & the Rule of God
Another foolish characteristic of God’s rule in the Kingdom is that it is characterised by peace.
Once again, the direct application of Jesus’ teachings on peace seem highly dangerous in our own context today. To make Christ and the Kingdom of God the centre of our political values as well as the centre of our own personal morality would be dangerous as well as stupid.
We can easily accept that Jesus really meant that Rome was an illegitimate government in the eyes of God. We can understand that Jesus thought that the accommodation of the Temple to the prevailing Roman values of the time made the Temple illegitimate. And we can easily agree with Jesus’ opposition to the Zealots’ plan to raise an army of resistance against Rome.
But when we try to apply Jesus’ teaching directly to our own situation, we can see the dangers and complexities very clearly.
We look at our world and feel threatened by terrorism; and we see our precious sons and daughters being killed in foreign lands. We look at our own complicated world, our threatened and threatening world and we think ‘God can’t possibly be asking us to behave as if peace were already upon us; its too difficult.’
The way of peace is not only foolish, it’s downright dangerous. Couple the message of peace with the commandment to forgive others and with the message that the last shall be first and you might end up getting yourself killed just like Jesus. The ways of peace and forgiveness are not practical. They are naïve and idealistic and ‘everyone knows’ that the world does not work this way.
The Good News
But Jesus never said that being his disciple was going to be easy. Jesus tells us that we are going to be sent out on mission without any of the usual resources that the world thinks necessary to do a good job. And he tells us that we are going to be like sheep: targets for all the wolves who think that the way of Jesus is foolish and impractical.
But he also tells us that the world is in need of our mission. We, his followers, may be like sheep amongst the wolves, but at least we have a shepherd: the world does not have a shepherd and it is crying out for guidance. Jesus’ mission of spiritual and physical healing is our mission too. It’s the mission of the Church in the same way that it was the mission of the disciples. God’s determination to bring about the Kingdom of God begins with the twelve tribes of Israel, and it reaches fulfilment in the death and resurrection of Christ.
This is the Good News and it’s the Good News that we as a Church are sent out to proclaim. Just like the twelve disciples who Christ commissions here, Jesus’ mission is carried forward by us – the Church of Christ in every age. In this reading, we understand that our mission will not be easy but we are promised that it will be worthwhile; the healing of body, mind and spirit are always worthwhile.
Faith in Jesus will make our mission possible, but it won’t make it easy and it certainly will not earn us the world’s stamp of approval. Nonetheless, just like each one of the disciples, each of us has been called personally into our discipleship.
My prayer this morning/evening is that we may each be given the grace to follow where God leads us. I pray that we may be faithful messengers of his Good News and that our lives reflect God’s love, forgiveness and peace. Amen
Sunday, December 02, 2007
Sunday 2 December 2007 - Swords into Ploughshares
The texts for this sermon are: Isaiah 2:1-5 and Matthew 24:36-44
Introduction
For out of Zion shall go forth instruction, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. So reads the second half of Isaiah 2: verse 3.
I suppose it’s the sort of thing we expect to hear from a prophet. And, given that this first Sunday in Advent is devoted to The Prophets, we probably don’t find this verse terribly surprising at first glance.
But what is surprising about this morning’s reading from Isaiah is the fact that much of Isaiah’s prophecy is directed toward calling Jerusalem to repentance. Jerusalem, in Isaiah’s day, is an unending problem from God’s point of view. Jerusalem is a symbol of self-sufficiency and a national, self-serving religion. It is a symbol of country’s focus of faith in the nation rather than faith in God.
Yet despite all these problems, Isaiah is given to see a picture of a new Jerusalem where God resides and where people of every nation acknowledge God as their Lord. In the new Jerusalem which Isaiah has seen, it is God whose judgement and arbitration of all nations has resulted in international peace. And is because of the rule of God that nations are able to exchange weapons for tools of peace.
In this morning’s Gospel reading, we are told that, as we look forward to the coming of the Lord, we are to keep awake and to keep ready. Our waiting and our readiness are not to be passive things, but they are to be active things.
So what does any of this mean for us? And how does it affect our lives today?
Well, the Gospel message is not all about pie in the sky by-and-by. I think perhaps that we are told about the coming Kingdom of God not so much to provide us with information as with motivation.
Motivation
It can be hard to stay motivated, however.
Perhaps our difficulty in staying motivated is a case of remembering how things were in the past in church and wishing that they could be that way again. Or perhaps it’s a case of feeling that decency is society is deteriorating in comparison with the way it was in our youth.
We might sit here and think ‘Well, it’s easy for Isaiah to talk about the coming reign of God when swords will be turned to ploughshares, because he lived in a time when people feared God. Isaiah didn’t have to face the problems that we have today.’ Well, listen to Isaiah just one chapter later (Isaiah 3:5): The people will be oppressed, everyone by another and everyone by a neighbour; the youth shall be insolent to the elder, and the base to the honourable.
That hardly sounds like The Good Old Days. And it hardly sounds like Isaiah doesn’t have a clue about the sort of issues that we are facing today. And yet, even in the middle of all this, Isaiah claims to have seen a vision of a world at peace. He claims to have seen a vision of people labouring for the production of food rather than for the production of weapons of war.
How can we catch a glimpse of that in a world where there is new unrest in the Philippines, in Pakistan and in Burma? Not to mention old unrest in Korea, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Sudan and the Holy Land? How can we catch a vision of a world turned toward the purposes of God in a society where the church ain’t what it used to be?
How can we keep our eyes on this New Jerusalem – on the purposes of God – without losing our motivation? How can we see God’s vision if it doesn’t necessarily look like what we’re expecting?
Guns into Sewing Machines
The image of ‘swords into ploughshares’ is a powerful one and one Christian charity in Mozambique used this idea in a very literal way when the decades-long civil war in that country ended. The charity, the Christian Council of Mozambique (CCM), was sponsored by Christian Aid and they recount the story of a man named Sousa Manuel Goao.
Senhor Goao was kidnapped at gunpoint by rebel forces in 1981 when he was 23 years old. He was forced to march 150 miles bare-footed to a training camp near the South African border. The prisoners were barefooted to prevent them running away but anyone who did attempt to escape was shot in front of the other prisoners. In order to survive, the rebels had to hunt wild animals, raid farms or attack civilians.
The war lasted 18 years and ended in 1992 but the United Nations forces which were meant to disarm both sides failed to find most of the weapons in the country, as most of them had been hidden and people were afraid of being reported to the government. But later in the decade, CCM came up with the idea of collecting weapons themselves. In 2001, Senhor Goao handed over his guns to CCM and in return, he received three sewing machines.
CCM is a small organisation, and it was working with a couple of old trucks that keep breaking down – but it nonetheless managed to collect more than 100,000 guns, hand grenades and rocket launchers. It was far more successful than the official agencies because former rebels feared being prosecuted by the government.
CCM provided former soldiers with ploughs, bicycles and sewing machines and these tools made the difference between life and death for many of the people who had nothing. When CCM wondered what it was going to do with all the weapons, it came upon the idea of disarming them, cutting them up, and giving the metal to local artists who turned them into sculptures. They even made chairs and coffee tables out of cut-up Kalashnikovs.
Mozambican Bishop Dinis Sengulane said the following about the CCM project: ”I say to people that sleeping with a gun in your bedroom is like sleeping with a snake: one day it will turn round and bite you. We tell people we are not disarming you. We are transforming your guns into ploughshares, so you can cultivate your land and get your daily bread. We are transforming them into sewing machines so you can make clothes. The idea is to transform the instruments of death and destruction into instruments of peace and of production and cooperation with others.”
Conclusion: Keep the Faith
This is one very powerful – and almost literal example – of turning swords into ploughshares.
The call from the Prophets on this first Sunday in Advent is a call to keep the faith. It’s a call to keep faith in God and in his purposes for the New Jerusalem when swords will be turned to ploughshares and where Christ will reign as the Prince of Peace. And it’s a call to keep this faith even when we are tempted to think that faith is not possible.
Jesus taught that the Kingdom of God grows from small mustard seeds. This morning, we have heard some examples of how small seeds can grow. Sometimes we have the satisfaction of seeing our seeds grow into healthy plants. Sometimes we don’t even have the opportunity to see them germinate.
But we are nonetheless called as Children of God to keep on planting the seeds. If we remain alert and on watch, we will find our opportunities.
We are told about what is to come not to provide us with information, but with motivation. If we keep our eye on the prophets’ vision of the New Jerusalem, our motivation will remain strong.
As we come to the Lord’s Table this morning, I pray that each of us can stay focused on the image of God’s Kingdom. And I pray that we may each be empowered to acts of kindness and mercy and to keep faith in the coming of the Prince of Peace. Amen
Readers of The Church Times will recognise an illustration from John Pridmore's commentary this week. I think Pridmore's commentaries are truly inspirational and I try not to write my sermon before reading them. Long may he continue to write!
====Introduction
For out of Zion shall go forth instruction, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. So reads the second half of Isaiah 2: verse 3.
I suppose it’s the sort of thing we expect to hear from a prophet. And, given that this first Sunday in Advent is devoted to The Prophets, we probably don’t find this verse terribly surprising at first glance.
But what is surprising about this morning’s reading from Isaiah is the fact that much of Isaiah’s prophecy is directed toward calling Jerusalem to repentance. Jerusalem, in Isaiah’s day, is an unending problem from God’s point of view. Jerusalem is a symbol of self-sufficiency and a national, self-serving religion. It is a symbol of country’s focus of faith in the nation rather than faith in God.
Yet despite all these problems, Isaiah is given to see a picture of a new Jerusalem where God resides and where people of every nation acknowledge God as their Lord. In the new Jerusalem which Isaiah has seen, it is God whose judgement and arbitration of all nations has resulted in international peace. And is because of the rule of God that nations are able to exchange weapons for tools of peace.
In this morning’s Gospel reading, we are told that, as we look forward to the coming of the Lord, we are to keep awake and to keep ready. Our waiting and our readiness are not to be passive things, but they are to be active things.
So what does any of this mean for us? And how does it affect our lives today?
Well, the Gospel message is not all about pie in the sky by-and-by. I think perhaps that we are told about the coming Kingdom of God not so much to provide us with information as with motivation.
Motivation
It can be hard to stay motivated, however.
Perhaps our difficulty in staying motivated is a case of remembering how things were in the past in church and wishing that they could be that way again. Or perhaps it’s a case of feeling that decency is society is deteriorating in comparison with the way it was in our youth.
We might sit here and think ‘Well, it’s easy for Isaiah to talk about the coming reign of God when swords will be turned to ploughshares, because he lived in a time when people feared God. Isaiah didn’t have to face the problems that we have today.’ Well, listen to Isaiah just one chapter later (Isaiah 3:5): The people will be oppressed, everyone by another and everyone by a neighbour; the youth shall be insolent to the elder, and the base to the honourable.
That hardly sounds like The Good Old Days. And it hardly sounds like Isaiah doesn’t have a clue about the sort of issues that we are facing today. And yet, even in the middle of all this, Isaiah claims to have seen a vision of a world at peace. He claims to have seen a vision of people labouring for the production of food rather than for the production of weapons of war.
How can we catch a glimpse of that in a world where there is new unrest in the Philippines, in Pakistan and in Burma? Not to mention old unrest in Korea, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Sudan and the Holy Land? How can we catch a vision of a world turned toward the purposes of God in a society where the church ain’t what it used to be?
How can we keep our eyes on this New Jerusalem – on the purposes of God – without losing our motivation? How can we see God’s vision if it doesn’t necessarily look like what we’re expecting?
Guns into Sewing Machines
The image of ‘swords into ploughshares’ is a powerful one and one Christian charity in Mozambique used this idea in a very literal way when the decades-long civil war in that country ended. The charity, the Christian Council of Mozambique (CCM), was sponsored by Christian Aid and they recount the story of a man named Sousa Manuel Goao.
Senhor Goao was kidnapped at gunpoint by rebel forces in 1981 when he was 23 years old. He was forced to march 150 miles bare-footed to a training camp near the South African border. The prisoners were barefooted to prevent them running away but anyone who did attempt to escape was shot in front of the other prisoners. In order to survive, the rebels had to hunt wild animals, raid farms or attack civilians.
The war lasted 18 years and ended in 1992 but the United Nations forces which were meant to disarm both sides failed to find most of the weapons in the country, as most of them had been hidden and people were afraid of being reported to the government. But later in the decade, CCM came up with the idea of collecting weapons themselves. In 2001, Senhor Goao handed over his guns to CCM and in return, he received three sewing machines.
CCM is a small organisation, and it was working with a couple of old trucks that keep breaking down – but it nonetheless managed to collect more than 100,000 guns, hand grenades and rocket launchers. It was far more successful than the official agencies because former rebels feared being prosecuted by the government.
CCM provided former soldiers with ploughs, bicycles and sewing machines and these tools made the difference between life and death for many of the people who had nothing. When CCM wondered what it was going to do with all the weapons, it came upon the idea of disarming them, cutting them up, and giving the metal to local artists who turned them into sculptures. They even made chairs and coffee tables out of cut-up Kalashnikovs.
Mozambican Bishop Dinis Sengulane said the following about the CCM project: ”I say to people that sleeping with a gun in your bedroom is like sleeping with a snake: one day it will turn round and bite you. We tell people we are not disarming you. We are transforming your guns into ploughshares, so you can cultivate your land and get your daily bread. We are transforming them into sewing machines so you can make clothes. The idea is to transform the instruments of death and destruction into instruments of peace and of production and cooperation with others.”
Conclusion: Keep the Faith
This is one very powerful – and almost literal example – of turning swords into ploughshares.
The call from the Prophets on this first Sunday in Advent is a call to keep the faith. It’s a call to keep faith in God and in his purposes for the New Jerusalem when swords will be turned to ploughshares and where Christ will reign as the Prince of Peace. And it’s a call to keep this faith even when we are tempted to think that faith is not possible.
Jesus taught that the Kingdom of God grows from small mustard seeds. This morning, we have heard some examples of how small seeds can grow. Sometimes we have the satisfaction of seeing our seeds grow into healthy plants. Sometimes we don’t even have the opportunity to see them germinate.
But we are nonetheless called as Children of God to keep on planting the seeds. If we remain alert and on watch, we will find our opportunities.
We are told about what is to come not to provide us with information, but with motivation. If we keep our eye on the prophets’ vision of the New Jerusalem, our motivation will remain strong.
As we come to the Lord’s Table this morning, I pray that each of us can stay focused on the image of God’s Kingdom. And I pray that we may each be empowered to acts of kindness and mercy and to keep faith in the coming of the Prince of Peace. Amen
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Sunday 25 November 2007 - Christ the King
This sermon is based on: Luke 23:33-43
===
Introduction
Today we celebrate the festival of Christ the King. But today is also the last Sunday of the Church’s cycle of the seasons. With the coming of Advent next Sunday, a new cycle of festivals and seasons begins and we will prepare ourselves for the coming of the Christ Child, God-with-us in human form.
And so as this old year draws to a close it’s fitting that we end the year by recognising and affirming the Kingship of Christ. And it’s fitting that we acknowledge our belief that he is the one who will rule in the coming Kingdom of God.
The issue I want to explore this morning, however, is what do we mean by the word ‘King’? And what does it mean to acknowledge Christ as our King?
A Royal Figurehead
Queen Elizabeth II is obviously not a King, but her reign probably embodies what it means to be a monarch of a Western country today.
As I’m sure you all know, the Queen and Prince Philip celebrated their sixtieth wedding anniversary this week,
but the celebration at Westminster Abbey of this partnership between two individuals was nevertheless a public affair because of the identity of the two people involved. As one newscaster put it, the marriage of Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip has been a marriage that has always been punctuated by duty.
There are some people who think that they would fancy such duties as the Queen has, but I’m not one of them as I think that she has a demanding ‘job’. I actually think that she has what I’d call a pastoral role; she may not be a pastor in a church or in a school, but the nation does look to her in times of trouble to visit and encourage people - even if this is in a formal and official capacity.
And so the public admires the Queen - as it admired her parents - for her devotion to duty and her willingness to be among the people and encourage the nation.
And the Kings and Queens of other Western countries: The Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Spain, to name but a few, play a similar role in their own countries, albeit usually on a smaller scale. Although these royals are figureheads, they are nonetheless important figureheads who somehow embody the nation, its existence and its values.
I’m just not sure that our experience of Kings and Queens today is entirely what the early church meant when it talked about the image of Christ as King. Does the celebration of Christ the King bring to your mind a picture of a man remote but mild, dressed in royal finerery, for a state occasion? A figurehead, perhaps. A Head of State, perhaps. But not anyone with significant political power.
The Perils of Power
Ancient kings were certainly not figureheads and, even if they themselves were personally remote from the people, their decisions were anything but remote. Ancient kings may have been either good or bad, but they had power to significantly affect the lives of everyone under their rule.
Perhaps today’s equivalent of an ancient King is a Prime Minister, President or Ruling Political Party. The effects that a bad king could have on his people were significant and life altering.
We have only to look at Zimbabwe today to see one example the devastation that can be caused by a government wielding unfettered power against its citizens. This is a country where anyone who is even remotely suspected of being in opposition to the government is immediately imprisoned. Property is often confiscated and loved ones killed. In the summer of 2005, over 22,000 people in the slums of the capital of Harare were targeted because of their alleged opposition to the government; and people’s homes, communities and livelihoods were destroyed overnight. Today, many of the country’s own citizens do not have the basic necessities of life and South Africa recently reported that Zimbabwean refugees are regularly arriving in South Africa at the point of starvation.
This is an example of the horrible consequence of a modern government using unfettered power selfishly and for its own benefit. This is the kind of power that ancient kings had. They had not only the potential to for good but almost unfettered power to destroy the lives of their subjects.
God’s Reign Begins on the Cross
Scripture and Christian tradition, however, teach that the Kingship of Christ is something different.
Jesus is not a powerless, figurehead King who can only be pastoral. He is a King with real power for good or for evil. But his is also a King who refuses the temptation to enter into the game of Might Makes Right. Christ is King, but he refuses the temptation to play Superman.
When we understand this, we can begin to understand the significance of using Luke’s account of the crucifixion as the Gospel reading for the festival of Christ the King.
To wield unfettered power in the cause of Good was Jesus’ temptation in the desert and it’s the temptation that the unbelieving thief presents to him again in today’s Gospel reading: If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross and save us all. If you are the Son of God, throw yourself from the temple, gain political power and use that power to crush evil.
But Jesus is a King whose reign begins on the cross. And Christians throughout the ages have been forced to grapple with this image of a King who refuses to save himself in the way that we would normally expect: by coming down from the cross.
This image of a dying, defeated King who nonetheless claims victory is a scandalous image and it’s supposed to be a scandal. On this last Sunday in the church year, let’s not skip forward too quickly to Easter Sunday. And let’s not turn the crucifixion into some kind of transaction that is too easily understood as a simple exchange between Jesus and the Father.
Let’s sit for a moment and be confused and outraged by the image of a King who refuses to come down from the cross as we would have him do.
If we turn the story of Jesus into the story of a Superman who eventually does use the method of Might Makes Right to crush evil, we’ve missed the point. The Christian faith affirms the Kingship of Christ in defiance of everything that denies it, including his apparent defeat of the cross.
If we believe in Christ-as-Superman, we will be tempted to say – we would be right to say - ‘There is no God. If there were, where is our Superman God in Zimbabwe? Where is God in Bangladesh? Where is God in my personal suffering?’
But the Christian faith affirms that Christ reigns from the cross. Jesus told the second thief ‘Today you will be with me in paradise’. Joining Jesus had nothing to do with dying. It had everything to do with seeing beyond the appearance of defeat to the truth that somehow God is victorious in the cross.
This is this kind of faith that conquers fear and leads to freedom. This is this kind of faith that gives us the courage to imitate Christ and to live our own lives in the power of the crucifixion.
The Christian faith affirms that Christ on the cross is present in Zimbabwe, that Christ on the cross is present in Bangladesh and that Christ on the cross is present with us in our own personal suffering.
And that’s not meant to be a glib statement. It’s meant to be a troubling statement. It’s meant to provoke at least a little bit of outrage. It’s meant to be a statement of faith.
Conclusion
My prayer is that, as we come before the table of the Lord this morning, we grapple with this troubling, outrageous Christ. The King who gave up his life on the cross, who participates in the suffering of the world and who invites us, by the power of the Spirit, to do the same.
===
Introduction
Today we celebrate the festival of Christ the King. But today is also the last Sunday of the Church’s cycle of the seasons. With the coming of Advent next Sunday, a new cycle of festivals and seasons begins and we will prepare ourselves for the coming of the Christ Child, God-with-us in human form.
And so as this old year draws to a close it’s fitting that we end the year by recognising and affirming the Kingship of Christ. And it’s fitting that we acknowledge our belief that he is the one who will rule in the coming Kingdom of God.
The issue I want to explore this morning, however, is what do we mean by the word ‘King’? And what does it mean to acknowledge Christ as our King?
A Royal Figurehead
Queen Elizabeth II is obviously not a King, but her reign probably embodies what it means to be a monarch of a Western country today.
As I’m sure you all know, the Queen and Prince Philip celebrated their sixtieth wedding anniversary this week,
but the celebration at Westminster Abbey of this partnership between two individuals was nevertheless a public affair because of the identity of the two people involved. As one newscaster put it, the marriage of Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip has been a marriage that has always been punctuated by duty.
There are some people who think that they would fancy such duties as the Queen has, but I’m not one of them as I think that she has a demanding ‘job’. I actually think that she has what I’d call a pastoral role; she may not be a pastor in a church or in a school, but the nation does look to her in times of trouble to visit and encourage people - even if this is in a formal and official capacity.
And so the public admires the Queen - as it admired her parents - for her devotion to duty and her willingness to be among the people and encourage the nation.
And the Kings and Queens of other Western countries: The Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Spain, to name but a few, play a similar role in their own countries, albeit usually on a smaller scale. Although these royals are figureheads, they are nonetheless important figureheads who somehow embody the nation, its existence and its values.
I’m just not sure that our experience of Kings and Queens today is entirely what the early church meant when it talked about the image of Christ as King. Does the celebration of Christ the King bring to your mind a picture of a man remote but mild, dressed in royal finerery, for a state occasion? A figurehead, perhaps. A Head of State, perhaps. But not anyone with significant political power.
The Perils of Power
Ancient kings were certainly not figureheads and, even if they themselves were personally remote from the people, their decisions were anything but remote. Ancient kings may have been either good or bad, but they had power to significantly affect the lives of everyone under their rule.
Perhaps today’s equivalent of an ancient King is a Prime Minister, President or Ruling Political Party. The effects that a bad king could have on his people were significant and life altering.
We have only to look at Zimbabwe today to see one example the devastation that can be caused by a government wielding unfettered power against its citizens. This is a country where anyone who is even remotely suspected of being in opposition to the government is immediately imprisoned. Property is often confiscated and loved ones killed. In the summer of 2005, over 22,000 people in the slums of the capital of Harare were targeted because of their alleged opposition to the government; and people’s homes, communities and livelihoods were destroyed overnight. Today, many of the country’s own citizens do not have the basic necessities of life and South Africa recently reported that Zimbabwean refugees are regularly arriving in South Africa at the point of starvation.
This is an example of the horrible consequence of a modern government using unfettered power selfishly and for its own benefit. This is the kind of power that ancient kings had. They had not only the potential to for good but almost unfettered power to destroy the lives of their subjects.
God’s Reign Begins on the Cross
Scripture and Christian tradition, however, teach that the Kingship of Christ is something different.
Jesus is not a powerless, figurehead King who can only be pastoral. He is a King with real power for good or for evil. But his is also a King who refuses the temptation to enter into the game of Might Makes Right. Christ is King, but he refuses the temptation to play Superman.
When we understand this, we can begin to understand the significance of using Luke’s account of the crucifixion as the Gospel reading for the festival of Christ the King.
To wield unfettered power in the cause of Good was Jesus’ temptation in the desert and it’s the temptation that the unbelieving thief presents to him again in today’s Gospel reading: If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross and save us all. If you are the Son of God, throw yourself from the temple, gain political power and use that power to crush evil.
But Jesus is a King whose reign begins on the cross. And Christians throughout the ages have been forced to grapple with this image of a King who refuses to save himself in the way that we would normally expect: by coming down from the cross.
This image of a dying, defeated King who nonetheless claims victory is a scandalous image and it’s supposed to be a scandal. On this last Sunday in the church year, let’s not skip forward too quickly to Easter Sunday. And let’s not turn the crucifixion into some kind of transaction that is too easily understood as a simple exchange between Jesus and the Father.
Let’s sit for a moment and be confused and outraged by the image of a King who refuses to come down from the cross as we would have him do.
If we turn the story of Jesus into the story of a Superman who eventually does use the method of Might Makes Right to crush evil, we’ve missed the point. The Christian faith affirms the Kingship of Christ in defiance of everything that denies it, including his apparent defeat of the cross.
If we believe in Christ-as-Superman, we will be tempted to say – we would be right to say - ‘There is no God. If there were, where is our Superman God in Zimbabwe? Where is God in Bangladesh? Where is God in my personal suffering?’
But the Christian faith affirms that Christ reigns from the cross. Jesus told the second thief ‘Today you will be with me in paradise’. Joining Jesus had nothing to do with dying. It had everything to do with seeing beyond the appearance of defeat to the truth that somehow God is victorious in the cross.
This is this kind of faith that conquers fear and leads to freedom. This is this kind of faith that gives us the courage to imitate Christ and to live our own lives in the power of the crucifixion.
The Christian faith affirms that Christ on the cross is present in Zimbabwe, that Christ on the cross is present in Bangladesh and that Christ on the cross is present with us in our own personal suffering.
And that’s not meant to be a glib statement. It’s meant to be a troubling statement. It’s meant to provoke at least a little bit of outrage. It’s meant to be a statement of faith.
Conclusion
My prayer is that, as we come before the table of the Lord this morning, we grapple with this troubling, outrageous Christ. The King who gave up his life on the cross, who participates in the suffering of the world and who invites us, by the power of the Spirit, to do the same.
Sunday 11 November 2007 - Remembrance Sunday
A meditation for the Remembrance Day Service, 2007. Based on 2 Thessalonians 2: 1-5, 13-17 and Luke 20:27-38
===
Introduction
Resurrection and the Second Coming of Jesus. These are the themes of this morning’s readings and they are particularly challenging themes. Especially for 21st century Christians where we have lost all the cultural influences that made texts like the ones we just heard meaningful to first century Christians.
There is no doubt that the very early Church – those believers who were Jesus’ contemporaries – expected him to return in glory in their lifetime and to set up the reign of God on earth. The second letter to the Thessalonians is addressed to a group of believers whose faith has been shaken by the growing realisation that they are not going to see Jesus’ glorious return in their own lifetime.
And our Gospel reading is about resurrection. It’s about the blindness of the Sadducees and their inability to see Jesus for who he is, but it’s also most definitely about resurrection.
So what do we make of these two concepts, so difficult for contemporary society? And what, especially, do we make of them in the light of Remembrance Day?
It was the sentence of one commentator on the Gospel reading that really struck me as tying all of this together. I paraphrase what he wrote: The Sadducees belong to this age and are so preoccupied with the details of the marriage system that they are unable to contemplate something radically new, the miracle of the resurrection.
And so too, it seems to me, that part of what we remember today as Christians is our human inability to see beyond ‘this age’. Today we remember our human inability to imagine something new like the miracle of peace.
Remembering the Sacrifice of Others
We remember and recognise the preoccupation of human society with individual and national honour, and we mourn the fact that 89 years after Armistice Day and the end of World War I, the world is still caught up in a system of greed, revenge and violence.
And, of course, today we also remember all the men and women who are currently serving in the armed forces and who have served in the past. We remember especially those who have been injured and those who died in service of their country.
We remember those people on the home front who suffered hardship, who worked for the welfare of their neighbours and we remember those who died as casualties of war.
We also remember other public servants whose vocations require them to lay their lives on the line for the greater good of society, particularly police and fire brigades.
People who are called by vocation and circumstance to lay down their lives for others are living out the great commandment of Moses and Jesus to love their neighbours, whether or not they consider themselves to be people of faith. And as Christians, we recognise this sacrifice, we respect it, and we thank God for giving these people the courage and grace to consider the welfare of others before their own.
Such actions are not only examples for us, but they must certainly elicit within us a wellspring of gratitude, awe and thanksgiving. And it is for these reasons that today we remember them.
Remembering the Prince of Peace
However, as Christians we are called to remember these people and their sacrifices in the context of the Gospel. We are called to remember those fallen in the service of their country in the context of what Scripture tells us about God’s love for each and every human life.
Our Epistle and Gospel readings this morning remind us that we are also called to remember God’s vision of his Kingdom: a vision of a New Creation where Christ will reign in glory as the Prince of Peace. However we conceive of these difficult biblical notions of resurrection, New Creation and the reign of Christ, we are called to remember that God’s intention for all of his children is life in all its fullness.
As Christians, we remember that Jesus is the Prince of Peace. And we remember that the origins of war and national conflict were the same in Jesus’ time as they are today: greed, empire-building, a desire for revenge and the world’s failure to understand that the person who we call an enemy is also a beloved child of God.
As Christians, we are called to stand back from the values of this age so that we can remember God’s vision of the Kingdom and the reign of the Prince of Peace. We are called to imagine a radical new world where the miracle of peace is made manifest.
However improbable it may seem, however cynical the pundits of the world may be about the Church’s message of hope, the Church is called to keep her light of hope burning until the bridegroom arrives. At the core of our faith is not only our conviction that God’s love is for all of humanity. It is also the conviction that the death and resurrection of Jesus proves conclusively that such an apparently mad and wide-eyed hope for peace on earth is not in vain.
At the core of the Christian faith is the conviction that the sacrifice of Jesus was worth something and that God himself knows exactly what it means to suffer and die at the hand of human sin.
On this Remembrance Day, let us remember the sacrifice made for us – and being made for us - by all men and women in uniform.
Let us remember the sacrifice of all those who went before us so that we – their sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters – might enjoy freedom.
But, as Christians, let us most especially remember that the Church is called to keep alive God’s good news of the coming of his kingdom and of the reign of Christ, the Prince of Peace.
Let us not only imagine peace, but I pray that each and every one of us here today may live out peace in our daily lives.
Amen
===
Introduction
Resurrection and the Second Coming of Jesus. These are the themes of this morning’s readings and they are particularly challenging themes. Especially for 21st century Christians where we have lost all the cultural influences that made texts like the ones we just heard meaningful to first century Christians.
There is no doubt that the very early Church – those believers who were Jesus’ contemporaries – expected him to return in glory in their lifetime and to set up the reign of God on earth. The second letter to the Thessalonians is addressed to a group of believers whose faith has been shaken by the growing realisation that they are not going to see Jesus’ glorious return in their own lifetime.
And our Gospel reading is about resurrection. It’s about the blindness of the Sadducees and their inability to see Jesus for who he is, but it’s also most definitely about resurrection.
So what do we make of these two concepts, so difficult for contemporary society? And what, especially, do we make of them in the light of Remembrance Day?
It was the sentence of one commentator on the Gospel reading that really struck me as tying all of this together. I paraphrase what he wrote: The Sadducees belong to this age and are so preoccupied with the details of the marriage system that they are unable to contemplate something radically new, the miracle of the resurrection.
And so too, it seems to me, that part of what we remember today as Christians is our human inability to see beyond ‘this age’. Today we remember our human inability to imagine something new like the miracle of peace.
Remembering the Sacrifice of Others
We remember and recognise the preoccupation of human society with individual and national honour, and we mourn the fact that 89 years after Armistice Day and the end of World War I, the world is still caught up in a system of greed, revenge and violence.
And, of course, today we also remember all the men and women who are currently serving in the armed forces and who have served in the past. We remember especially those who have been injured and those who died in service of their country.
We remember those people on the home front who suffered hardship, who worked for the welfare of their neighbours and we remember those who died as casualties of war.
We also remember other public servants whose vocations require them to lay their lives on the line for the greater good of society, particularly police and fire brigades.
People who are called by vocation and circumstance to lay down their lives for others are living out the great commandment of Moses and Jesus to love their neighbours, whether or not they consider themselves to be people of faith. And as Christians, we recognise this sacrifice, we respect it, and we thank God for giving these people the courage and grace to consider the welfare of others before their own.
Such actions are not only examples for us, but they must certainly elicit within us a wellspring of gratitude, awe and thanksgiving. And it is for these reasons that today we remember them.
Remembering the Prince of Peace
However, as Christians we are called to remember these people and their sacrifices in the context of the Gospel. We are called to remember those fallen in the service of their country in the context of what Scripture tells us about God’s love for each and every human life.
Our Epistle and Gospel readings this morning remind us that we are also called to remember God’s vision of his Kingdom: a vision of a New Creation where Christ will reign in glory as the Prince of Peace. However we conceive of these difficult biblical notions of resurrection, New Creation and the reign of Christ, we are called to remember that God’s intention for all of his children is life in all its fullness.
As Christians, we remember that Jesus is the Prince of Peace. And we remember that the origins of war and national conflict were the same in Jesus’ time as they are today: greed, empire-building, a desire for revenge and the world’s failure to understand that the person who we call an enemy is also a beloved child of God.
As Christians, we are called to stand back from the values of this age so that we can remember God’s vision of the Kingdom and the reign of the Prince of Peace. We are called to imagine a radical new world where the miracle of peace is made manifest.
However improbable it may seem, however cynical the pundits of the world may be about the Church’s message of hope, the Church is called to keep her light of hope burning until the bridegroom arrives. At the core of our faith is not only our conviction that God’s love is for all of humanity. It is also the conviction that the death and resurrection of Jesus proves conclusively that such an apparently mad and wide-eyed hope for peace on earth is not in vain.
At the core of the Christian faith is the conviction that the sacrifice of Jesus was worth something and that God himself knows exactly what it means to suffer and die at the hand of human sin.
On this Remembrance Day, let us remember the sacrifice made for us – and being made for us - by all men and women in uniform.
Let us remember the sacrifice of all those who went before us so that we – their sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters – might enjoy freedom.
But, as Christians, let us most especially remember that the Church is called to keep alive God’s good news of the coming of his kingdom and of the reign of Christ, the Prince of Peace.
Let us not only imagine peace, but I pray that each and every one of us here today may live out peace in our daily lives.
Amen
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Sunday 19 August 2007 - Division and Peace
Today, Foley Park Methodist Church worshipped together with the Kidderminster West Team Ministry at Holy Innocents' Anglican Church. I preached and the Gospel reading was not exactly one that you might wish for at an ecumenical event: Luke 12:49-59.
There are strong Girardian overtones in this sermon. For Girard fans, it's a sermon and not a lecture on Girard; I'm not trying to set out Girard's anthropology, but I believe from the commentaries that it explains this reading well.
====
Introduction
It was just about a year ago that I came to my first Sunday worship service at Holy Innocents. Just like today, it was a service for all the churches in the Kidderminster West team ministry and it was my first Sunday in Kidderminster after moving house. I wasn’t supposed to worship at Foley Park Methodist until the first Sunday in September and so I thought I’d come to worship here with my Anglican brothers and sisters.
In the year that has passed, I have got to know the people who attend the Wednesday morning communion services quite well. And I’ve been very pleased to find that both the members of the Kidderminster West Team Ministry and the members of Foley Park Methodist Church are eager to get to know each other better. I’m very keen on ecumenical cooperation and I hope that, as time grows on, our relationship will build and that we’ll be able to cooperate together in our Christian witness in this part of Kidderminster.
So I think it’s slightly ironic that as we worship together this morning in unity as Christian brothers and sisters that we are given a Gospel reading like the one we have this morning: ‘Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!’
At first glance, this seems like a rather jarring thing for Jesus to say, particularly in the Gospel of Luke where ‘peace’ is one of Luke’s central themes. Early in Luke’s Gospel, Zechariah proclaims that Jesus will guide humanity in the way of peace; the angels sing of the peace that the baby Jesus will bring; and the 72 are sent out in front of Jesus to proclaim peace to all they visit. The word ‘peace’ is used in Luke’s Gospel more times than in any of the other Gospels, yet apparently in today’s reading Jesus is now saying that he comes to bring division even amongst the closest of relations.
The Gospel reading this morning is an urgent call to repentance as Jesus makes his way to Jerusalem to be crucified. Jesus, the Son of God, has come into the world and it is time for all of Luke’s readers – including us – to decide which direction they will take. Will we continue to walk in the direction away from the Kingdom of God or will we repent, turn to Christ and walk in God’s direction?
To choose repentance is to choose to be separated from what ‘the world’ holds to be true. To choose repentance is to choose God’s way and God’s Kingdom.
Peace is a Divisive Issue
What I’d like to suggest this morning is that ‘peace’ – God’s peace in God’s manner and in God’s Kingdom – is a divisive issue. I believe that division amongst people, including close family members is a consequence of Jesus’ call to the Kingdom of God, not the desired end-product.
Peace is a divisive issue because, in our sinful world, it’s not safe. God’s peace is particularly dangerous because he calls us not only to reconciliation with himself but also with other people.
What is safe in a sinful world is power. Specifically, in order to be safe, we need to be the person or the group who wields sufficient power to silence those who threaten us or disagree with us.
We can see very directly how this works at the national and international level. Human history consists of a long litany of wars: of one nation or society looking to conquer another. Historically, human society has not put its faith in peace through reconciliation but in the idea that if we can gain enough power over our enemies, we can keep them in perfect submission and thus ensure our own peace.
This was exactly the philosophy of the Roman Empire. It was prepared to be tolerant up to a point but ultimately, the Pax Romana, the Roman Peace, rested on the might of the sword.
Of course, when it comes to relationships between individuals, power plays are a lot more subtle. Gone are the days when personal disputes were settled by battles and duels.
But often in our relationships we still jockey for the position of power. Sometimes we try to achieve the status of being the most successful, the most attractive or the most intelligent person in our peer group. ‘Peace’ is maintained as long as our friends don’t challenge our self-perception.
There are also times when we need to think that we are absolutely in the right and that others are absolutely in the wrong and we are therefore loathe to seek or grant reconciliation. The tenuous stability that results between people in this kind of situation is not what God means by peace. This is a stand-off. It’s a stand-off rooted in the ‘worldly’ belief that we hold so dear: that ultimately I will be proven right and will be vindicated, so I don’t need to seek reconciliation.
But time is short. Whenever we live and whoever we are, if we are human, the time that we have to share in relationship with other people and with God is short. The wisdom of the Kingdom of God cries out to us: what is more important to us, to be right, or to reconcile with those we love before it is too late?
The Way of the Cross
As I said earlier, in Luke’s Gospel, this teaching happens as Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem to be crucified.
In Jerusalem, Jesus will lay down his life willingly in order to reconcile us to God. For our sake, Jesus – God incarnate – did what we are incapable of doing: he put himself in a position of powerlessness for the sole purpose of achieving reconciliation with us. God became powerless and humble not because he was in the wrong but because there was no other way for humanity to be reconciled with God.
The self-sacrifice, humility and willing powerlessness of Jesus on the cross for our sake is the good news of the Gospel but it is also the scandal of the Gospel. Jesus Christ was vindicated not by gaining coercive power over his enemies but in laying down his life and, importantly, in rising from the dead.
This is a vindication – a declaration of Jesus’ Lordship – that the world does not and cannot recognise. In worldly terms, the resurrection is unbelievable and Jesus’ willing sacrifice on the cross is both dangerous and absurd.
‘Peace’ – God’s peace in God’s manner and in God’s Kingdom – is a divisive issue. The Gospel is a divisive issue. Reconciliation is, ironically, a divisive issue. The world believes that peace through reconciliation is a nice idea but one that ultimately does not work. The world believes that peace can only be won through power.
The world believes in the Peace of Rome but not the Peace of Christ.
Conclusion
In a few minutes, we will come together at the Lord’s Table. The celebration table of the Kingdom of God, a celebration that is physically present with us here and now.
My prayer is that, in coming together with our Lord and with each other, we will recognise our essential unity in the body of Christ and look for ways to cooperate and grow ever closer together. And I make my prayer in the name of Jesus, our risen and ascended Lord. Amen
There are strong Girardian overtones in this sermon. For Girard fans, it's a sermon and not a lecture on Girard; I'm not trying to set out Girard's anthropology, but I believe from the commentaries that it explains this reading well.
====
Introduction
It was just about a year ago that I came to my first Sunday worship service at Holy Innocents. Just like today, it was a service for all the churches in the Kidderminster West team ministry and it was my first Sunday in Kidderminster after moving house. I wasn’t supposed to worship at Foley Park Methodist until the first Sunday in September and so I thought I’d come to worship here with my Anglican brothers and sisters.
In the year that has passed, I have got to know the people who attend the Wednesday morning communion services quite well. And I’ve been very pleased to find that both the members of the Kidderminster West Team Ministry and the members of Foley Park Methodist Church are eager to get to know each other better. I’m very keen on ecumenical cooperation and I hope that, as time grows on, our relationship will build and that we’ll be able to cooperate together in our Christian witness in this part of Kidderminster.
So I think it’s slightly ironic that as we worship together this morning in unity as Christian brothers and sisters that we are given a Gospel reading like the one we have this morning: ‘Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!’
At first glance, this seems like a rather jarring thing for Jesus to say, particularly in the Gospel of Luke where ‘peace’ is one of Luke’s central themes. Early in Luke’s Gospel, Zechariah proclaims that Jesus will guide humanity in the way of peace; the angels sing of the peace that the baby Jesus will bring; and the 72 are sent out in front of Jesus to proclaim peace to all they visit. The word ‘peace’ is used in Luke’s Gospel more times than in any of the other Gospels, yet apparently in today’s reading Jesus is now saying that he comes to bring division even amongst the closest of relations.
The Gospel reading this morning is an urgent call to repentance as Jesus makes his way to Jerusalem to be crucified. Jesus, the Son of God, has come into the world and it is time for all of Luke’s readers – including us – to decide which direction they will take. Will we continue to walk in the direction away from the Kingdom of God or will we repent, turn to Christ and walk in God’s direction?
To choose repentance is to choose to be separated from what ‘the world’ holds to be true. To choose repentance is to choose God’s way and God’s Kingdom.
Peace is a Divisive Issue
What I’d like to suggest this morning is that ‘peace’ – God’s peace in God’s manner and in God’s Kingdom – is a divisive issue. I believe that division amongst people, including close family members is a consequence of Jesus’ call to the Kingdom of God, not the desired end-product.
Peace is a divisive issue because, in our sinful world, it’s not safe. God’s peace is particularly dangerous because he calls us not only to reconciliation with himself but also with other people.
What is safe in a sinful world is power. Specifically, in order to be safe, we need to be the person or the group who wields sufficient power to silence those who threaten us or disagree with us.
We can see very directly how this works at the national and international level. Human history consists of a long litany of wars: of one nation or society looking to conquer another. Historically, human society has not put its faith in peace through reconciliation but in the idea that if we can gain enough power over our enemies, we can keep them in perfect submission and thus ensure our own peace.
This was exactly the philosophy of the Roman Empire. It was prepared to be tolerant up to a point but ultimately, the Pax Romana, the Roman Peace, rested on the might of the sword.
Of course, when it comes to relationships between individuals, power plays are a lot more subtle. Gone are the days when personal disputes were settled by battles and duels.
But often in our relationships we still jockey for the position of power. Sometimes we try to achieve the status of being the most successful, the most attractive or the most intelligent person in our peer group. ‘Peace’ is maintained as long as our friends don’t challenge our self-perception.
There are also times when we need to think that we are absolutely in the right and that others are absolutely in the wrong and we are therefore loathe to seek or grant reconciliation. The tenuous stability that results between people in this kind of situation is not what God means by peace. This is a stand-off. It’s a stand-off rooted in the ‘worldly’ belief that we hold so dear: that ultimately I will be proven right and will be vindicated, so I don’t need to seek reconciliation.
But time is short. Whenever we live and whoever we are, if we are human, the time that we have to share in relationship with other people and with God is short. The wisdom of the Kingdom of God cries out to us: what is more important to us, to be right, or to reconcile with those we love before it is too late?
The Way of the Cross
As I said earlier, in Luke’s Gospel, this teaching happens as Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem to be crucified.
In Jerusalem, Jesus will lay down his life willingly in order to reconcile us to God. For our sake, Jesus – God incarnate – did what we are incapable of doing: he put himself in a position of powerlessness for the sole purpose of achieving reconciliation with us. God became powerless and humble not because he was in the wrong but because there was no other way for humanity to be reconciled with God.
The self-sacrifice, humility and willing powerlessness of Jesus on the cross for our sake is the good news of the Gospel but it is also the scandal of the Gospel. Jesus Christ was vindicated not by gaining coercive power over his enemies but in laying down his life and, importantly, in rising from the dead.
This is a vindication – a declaration of Jesus’ Lordship – that the world does not and cannot recognise. In worldly terms, the resurrection is unbelievable and Jesus’ willing sacrifice on the cross is both dangerous and absurd.
‘Peace’ – God’s peace in God’s manner and in God’s Kingdom – is a divisive issue. The Gospel is a divisive issue. Reconciliation is, ironically, a divisive issue. The world believes that peace through reconciliation is a nice idea but one that ultimately does not work. The world believes that peace can only be won through power.
The world believes in the Peace of Rome but not the Peace of Christ.
Conclusion
In a few minutes, we will come together at the Lord’s Table. The celebration table of the Kingdom of God, a celebration that is physically present with us here and now.
My prayer is that, in coming together with our Lord and with each other, we will recognise our essential unity in the body of Christ and look for ways to cooperate and grow ever closer together. And I make my prayer in the name of Jesus, our risen and ascended Lord. Amen
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