This is a thematic sermon for One World Sunday. We had a speaker who had spent two months working on a project in Kenya which is being sponsored by churches in our circuit. The speaker showed us photographs of people working, shopping, learning, building homes, etc. The scripture used in our service was Galatians 3:23-29 and Mark 10:13-16.
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Introduction
I was 9 years old in 1966. Cleveland, the city in which I was living, was at the time the tenth largest city in the United States. During the summer of that year, Cleveland, like many cities in the United States endured five days of race riots.
The riot itself was sparked off by an incident when an African-American man was told to leave a pub because they did not serve blacks. But like many an incident when social tension erupts into violence, there was almost certainly not one single cause.
I’m equally certain in my own mind that the main cause was the gross inequality in living conditions between African-Americans and white Americans at that time.
I’m not claiming that all inequality has gone in my lifetime, but I do want to testify as a witness to what I observed back then. Even as a child, I understood that people with different coloured skins had two different sets of living conditions. If I sometimes wondered why this should be so, adults would tell me that ‘They don’t need as much to live on as we do.’
The 'brotherhood of man'
This morning, Sue has talked to us about the people of Omwabini and the similarities of our lives.
Once you get to know people, we all have the same basic needs and desires. We all need a roof over our heads, we all need food in our stomachs, we all need basic hygiene and we all need healthcare. We all need to earn a living and many of us have the hope and aspiration that our children will be educated so that they can live productive lives.
One of the most important things we can do if we want to live out the great commandment to love our neighbour as ourself is to put ourselves in their shoes and really understand that every single person is like us. In other words, the most important thing we can do is to try to empathise with another person. To understand that just because a person falls into a category that we consider as being ‘other’ that it’s not true that their needs are less than ours.
If we’re reminiscing back to the 1960s, another favourite phrase of the era was the phrase ‘The brotherhood of man’. As corny as the phrase may sound today, and even though it was not a phrase invented by or used by the Christian church, the phrase communicates a central Christian truth: That all people equally precious and beloved in the eyes of God.
There are some Christians who think that the idea of the equality of all people before God is a ‘worldy’ idea and that the primary duty of the Christian church isn’t to try to break down categories of ‘us and them’ but to try build them up in order to maintain the purity of the church. If we believe this, then I think we’ve missed the significance of Jesus’ life, mission and teaching.
God’s universal offer of love
In the ancient world, there were three ideas about how the heavenly realms operated.
The first idea was that there were many gods in heaven and that each tribe or nation had its own god. The gods, just like the people they ruled over, might fight each other. This was basically humans bringing the human idea of ‘us and them’ into the divine realm.
Another option – held in a number of cultures and not just by ancient Israel – was to believe in one Supreme God who loves only my nation. So, for instance, the Masai believe that there is only one God and that He protects the Masai and that he aids them in battle against their enemies.
Many Jewish people invoked this idea of God during Jesus’ time and we even get this idea today – witness George Bush’s suggestion that America is engaged in a war against Islam and that God is on America’s side.
The third option is the belief that there is one God who is the God of all peoples, all tribes and nations. This isn’t a modern picture of God as some people might claim. Along with the two other views, we see it already in the Old Testament. The covenant with Noah and then with Abraham is viewed by both Jews and Christians as being indications of God’s universal offer of his love to all people.
And Jesus models this picture of God’s universal love by deliberately violating all the established codes designed to designate who was an ‘outsider’. He violated the ‘us and them’ codes when he ate with tax-collectors, when he talked with and touched women and when he healed lepers.
Jesus taught that there is no person to whom God will not extend his love. There is no tribe or skin-colour or age that puts us beyond the possibility of being blessed by God. There is no gender or disability that puts us beyond the possibility of being gifted by God. There is no life situation, no past sin that put us beyond the possibility of being forgiven by God.
The Gospel makes here-and-now demands
If we are true disciples of Jesus, it won’t do to proclaim the message of a ‘spiritual’ Gospel and then ignore the consequence of the Gospel message in the here and now. As Christians, we are called to proclaim the good news of God’s offer of forgiveness to all people. We are called to make disciples for Christ.
But, equally importantly, we are also called to show the love of God in a practical way. The practical consequence of believing that God offers his love to all people is that our offers of help are not to be restricted only to those who are Christians or who we expect might become Christians. Nor is our charity to be restricted to people like us.
We are called to offer our prayers, our time and our talents for the good of all people.
As we celebrate One World Week, let’s remember Sue’s talk this morning and reflect on the fact that all people everywhere have the same basic needs and the same God-given humanity.
Let’s remember that there is no category of people who needs less than we do, no category of people who is inferior to anyone else and no category of people who is beyond the love of God. And let’s keep in our prayers all those who suffer because someone believes that their lives are less valuable than other lives.
Let’s pray for the peace of God and for his Kingdom to come quickly. Let’s pray for everlasting life for all people and for life before death for those who do not yet have it.
Showing posts with label Inclusion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Inclusion. Show all posts
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Sunday, September 02, 2007
Sunday 2 September 2007 - Dishonourable God
This sermon is based on Luke 14:1, 7-14.
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Introduction
When I was in my 20s, a friend of mine from University invited me on a weekend away to some friends of her parents. My university friend had developed a close bond with our host and hostess, whom she called ‘aunt’ and ‘uncle’ and they were very hospitable people.
They had a big house in the countryside and there were plenty of recreational activities in the area. These people liked to have weekend house-parties and they seemed to make a particular habit of inviting my friend to their home because they knew that she couldn’t afford to get away otherwise.
I was the only ‘stranger’ that weekend. There were four other guests besides me and my friend: two couples who were long-time friends of our hosts.
Our hosts made a feature of the evening meal and they owned large dinner table around which everyone could gather. As everyone was having drinks before dinner, I noticed one place that had a different place-setting from all the rest. It was set with a beautiful hand-made ceramic plate, silver cutlery and beautiful crystal. I remarked on this to the hostess.
She replied: ‘Oh yes. At every weekend we like to set one special place for a special guest.’ I said ‘Oh, what a nice idea!’ and I thought to myself ‘That place is for me since I’m the only person they don’t know well. I’m the special guest.’
When it came time to sit down to dinner, I was still certain that this was my place, but thank goodness I didn’t sit there! It turned out that the place was set for one of their friends – a woman who had just been let out of hospital after having an operation for cancer.
I can’t even begin to imagine how utterly mortified I would have been if I had not been saved by dumb luck from sitting down in that place. I was still extremely embarrassed in myself when I realised that, for all intents and purposes, I had been operating in my own mind as if I was the centre of the universe.
Of course, as embarrassing as this would have been today, it would have been even more embarrassing in Jesus’ time when being seen to be an honourable person was of the utmost importance.
Common Sense & Bad Advice
At first reading, this morning’s Gospel story might be seen as a story about good common sense in a culture which values honour. In such a society, the smartest thing to do is to take a seat in a relatively insignificant place and then wait to be invited to a higher place.
Just about the stupidest thing that you could do would be to take the seat of the guest of honour and then be asked to vacate it. This would expose you as a person who was, in fact, dishonourable.
Because in a society that operates according to code of honour, to be an honourable person is to observe, uphold and defend the values and the society structures of the larger group. In an honour culture the strict observance of group values, systems and structures leads to self-fulfilment and advancement as one is recognised as an upholder and defender of social values.
Any self-respecting Pharisee or Rabbi would see the sense in not taking the seat of the guest of honour without being invited first. That would be disaster!
I think that Jesus’ parable about the dinner guests would have been easily accepted by the crowd as simple common sense advice in a culture that prizes personal honour.
But what are we to make of Jesus’ further recommendation that the properly invited guests to our dinner parties should not be our peers but the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind?
It would have been a normal sight in Jesus’ time to see the poor and the disabled at a banquet being given by the rich. These people – who were deemed to be poor and disabled because of some sin they had committed – would be able to avail themselves of the charity of the rich, but they were most certainly not invited guests with seats at the table.
Jewish law and custom required those who had the means to give charity to the poor, but it did not require people to associate with the poor. In the honour system, to associate with the poor, to mix with them, to eat with them at your table, would be to dishonour yourself.
When we give charity to someone, we retain power over them. To mix with the poor or any dishonoured group is to be equal with them and thereby forfeit your own honour.
So, in the first story, Jesus seems to be giving some good common-sense advice to those of us who consider ourselves ‘honourable’ so that we don’t lose our honour.
In the second story, Jesus is suggesting that we consort and associate with the dishonourable people of the world. Jesus is suggesting that we give up our honour.
The Good News of the Dishonourable God
Is there any way to soften Jesus rather difficult commandment in the second story? A number of commentators have suggested ways of ‘softening’ the second story, but I think that if we soften it, we risk losing the point.
The point is that Jesus himself, God incarnate, mixed with the dishonourable, associated with the dishonourable and thereby dishonoured himself in the process.
But we seem to have a schizophrenic attitude toward Jesus and the Kingdom of God.
On the one hand, we will all utter a silent prayer of thanksgiving when we read in Philippians 2 that Christ Jesus did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself in the form of a slave to be born in human likeness. But do we really accept those words about slavery and emptying?
I suspect that we don’t. In our minds God somehow manages to remain high and mighty whilst simultaneously debasing himself. And that’s what we want for ourselves too.
Like James and John, we prefer to see God on his throne and we prefer to see ourselves sitting on his right hand in the Kingdom. We don’t want to think about a crucified Christ – even if he rises from the dead.
We are happy to think of ourselves as imitating Jesus by doing good works, but not if that imitation requires us to lose respect in the eyes of wider society.
So far, this morning’s Gospel reading perhaps risks sounding like bad news rather than good news, so where can we find the good news in these passages?
Well, the good news is that God will do anything, absolutely anything, to get alongside humankind. And God doesn’t reserve his hospitality for the honoured guests. God also invites the dishonoured, the poor and the outcasts to his celebration feast.
The good news is that God does not require the dishonourable to take their customary place on the fringes of the celebration; he does not require them to accept charity from a God who maintains his right to wield his power over them. The good news is that God goes out to the so-called dishonoured, makes himself their equal, associates with them and thereby turns everything upside down so that the fringes of the celebration become the place of importance.
And the good news is that, in one way or another, we are all dishonourable people. When God goes out to the fringes of the banquet in order to demonstrate that the dishonourable people are offered citizenship in his Kingdom, he’s going out to invite you and me into his banquet.
I was lucky. I had a narrow escape at my friend’s aunt’s dinner table. Sheer dumb luck meant that I didn’t voice my assumption that I was to be the person at the place of honour. Sheer dumb luck saved me from the shame and embarrassment of sitting down in the place of honour.
But in that narrow escape, I was also given a lesson – a lesson that I’ve had a number of times since then and that I will probably have again in the future! I was shown how I assume that I’m the centre of the universe: how, most of the time I neglect to think of others or to think of God.
But unlike me, God isn’t sitting up in heaven contemplating his divine navel and thinking about what he can do to attract more honour to himself. On the contrary, God is continually looking outside himself: to creation and to all living beings, doing everything that he can to draw everything and everyone into his circle of divine love.
Conclusion
In a few minutes, we will come to the Lord’s Table. The celebration of Holy Communion is a sacrament and an ordinance but it is also a physical symbol of the feast of the Kingdom of God. All are invited to this table today because all are invited to the feast of God’s Kingdom.
God goes out into the highways and byways in order to walk among those who are ‘not allowed’ into honourable society, and he invites them into the feast of his Kingdom.
I pray that we will not only heed the invitation to his table, but that we too will also look outside ourselves in order to invite the poor, the outcast and the dishonourable into the Kingdom.
===
Introduction
When I was in my 20s, a friend of mine from University invited me on a weekend away to some friends of her parents. My university friend had developed a close bond with our host and hostess, whom she called ‘aunt’ and ‘uncle’ and they were very hospitable people.
They had a big house in the countryside and there were plenty of recreational activities in the area. These people liked to have weekend house-parties and they seemed to make a particular habit of inviting my friend to their home because they knew that she couldn’t afford to get away otherwise.
I was the only ‘stranger’ that weekend. There were four other guests besides me and my friend: two couples who were long-time friends of our hosts.
Our hosts made a feature of the evening meal and they owned large dinner table around which everyone could gather. As everyone was having drinks before dinner, I noticed one place that had a different place-setting from all the rest. It was set with a beautiful hand-made ceramic plate, silver cutlery and beautiful crystal. I remarked on this to the hostess.
She replied: ‘Oh yes. At every weekend we like to set one special place for a special guest.’ I said ‘Oh, what a nice idea!’ and I thought to myself ‘That place is for me since I’m the only person they don’t know well. I’m the special guest.’
When it came time to sit down to dinner, I was still certain that this was my place, but thank goodness I didn’t sit there! It turned out that the place was set for one of their friends – a woman who had just been let out of hospital after having an operation for cancer.
I can’t even begin to imagine how utterly mortified I would have been if I had not been saved by dumb luck from sitting down in that place. I was still extremely embarrassed in myself when I realised that, for all intents and purposes, I had been operating in my own mind as if I was the centre of the universe.
Of course, as embarrassing as this would have been today, it would have been even more embarrassing in Jesus’ time when being seen to be an honourable person was of the utmost importance.
Common Sense & Bad Advice
At first reading, this morning’s Gospel story might be seen as a story about good common sense in a culture which values honour. In such a society, the smartest thing to do is to take a seat in a relatively insignificant place and then wait to be invited to a higher place.
Just about the stupidest thing that you could do would be to take the seat of the guest of honour and then be asked to vacate it. This would expose you as a person who was, in fact, dishonourable.
Because in a society that operates according to code of honour, to be an honourable person is to observe, uphold and defend the values and the society structures of the larger group. In an honour culture the strict observance of group values, systems and structures leads to self-fulfilment and advancement as one is recognised as an upholder and defender of social values.
Any self-respecting Pharisee or Rabbi would see the sense in not taking the seat of the guest of honour without being invited first. That would be disaster!
I think that Jesus’ parable about the dinner guests would have been easily accepted by the crowd as simple common sense advice in a culture that prizes personal honour.
But what are we to make of Jesus’ further recommendation that the properly invited guests to our dinner parties should not be our peers but the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind?
It would have been a normal sight in Jesus’ time to see the poor and the disabled at a banquet being given by the rich. These people – who were deemed to be poor and disabled because of some sin they had committed – would be able to avail themselves of the charity of the rich, but they were most certainly not invited guests with seats at the table.
Jewish law and custom required those who had the means to give charity to the poor, but it did not require people to associate with the poor. In the honour system, to associate with the poor, to mix with them, to eat with them at your table, would be to dishonour yourself.
When we give charity to someone, we retain power over them. To mix with the poor or any dishonoured group is to be equal with them and thereby forfeit your own honour.
So, in the first story, Jesus seems to be giving some good common-sense advice to those of us who consider ourselves ‘honourable’ so that we don’t lose our honour.
In the second story, Jesus is suggesting that we consort and associate with the dishonourable people of the world. Jesus is suggesting that we give up our honour.
The Good News of the Dishonourable God
Is there any way to soften Jesus rather difficult commandment in the second story? A number of commentators have suggested ways of ‘softening’ the second story, but I think that if we soften it, we risk losing the point.
The point is that Jesus himself, God incarnate, mixed with the dishonourable, associated with the dishonourable and thereby dishonoured himself in the process.
But we seem to have a schizophrenic attitude toward Jesus and the Kingdom of God.
On the one hand, we will all utter a silent prayer of thanksgiving when we read in Philippians 2 that Christ Jesus did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself in the form of a slave to be born in human likeness. But do we really accept those words about slavery and emptying?
I suspect that we don’t. In our minds God somehow manages to remain high and mighty whilst simultaneously debasing himself. And that’s what we want for ourselves too.
Like James and John, we prefer to see God on his throne and we prefer to see ourselves sitting on his right hand in the Kingdom. We don’t want to think about a crucified Christ – even if he rises from the dead.
We are happy to think of ourselves as imitating Jesus by doing good works, but not if that imitation requires us to lose respect in the eyes of wider society.
So far, this morning’s Gospel reading perhaps risks sounding like bad news rather than good news, so where can we find the good news in these passages?
Well, the good news is that God will do anything, absolutely anything, to get alongside humankind. And God doesn’t reserve his hospitality for the honoured guests. God also invites the dishonoured, the poor and the outcasts to his celebration feast.
The good news is that God does not require the dishonourable to take their customary place on the fringes of the celebration; he does not require them to accept charity from a God who maintains his right to wield his power over them. The good news is that God goes out to the so-called dishonoured, makes himself their equal, associates with them and thereby turns everything upside down so that the fringes of the celebration become the place of importance.
And the good news is that, in one way or another, we are all dishonourable people. When God goes out to the fringes of the banquet in order to demonstrate that the dishonourable people are offered citizenship in his Kingdom, he’s going out to invite you and me into his banquet.
I was lucky. I had a narrow escape at my friend’s aunt’s dinner table. Sheer dumb luck meant that I didn’t voice my assumption that I was to be the person at the place of honour. Sheer dumb luck saved me from the shame and embarrassment of sitting down in the place of honour.
But in that narrow escape, I was also given a lesson – a lesson that I’ve had a number of times since then and that I will probably have again in the future! I was shown how I assume that I’m the centre of the universe: how, most of the time I neglect to think of others or to think of God.
But unlike me, God isn’t sitting up in heaven contemplating his divine navel and thinking about what he can do to attract more honour to himself. On the contrary, God is continually looking outside himself: to creation and to all living beings, doing everything that he can to draw everything and everyone into his circle of divine love.
Conclusion
In a few minutes, we will come to the Lord’s Table. The celebration of Holy Communion is a sacrament and an ordinance but it is also a physical symbol of the feast of the Kingdom of God. All are invited to this table today because all are invited to the feast of God’s Kingdom.
God goes out into the highways and byways in order to walk among those who are ‘not allowed’ into honourable society, and he invites them into the feast of his Kingdom.
I pray that we will not only heed the invitation to his table, but that we too will also look outside ourselves in order to invite the poor, the outcast and the dishonourable into the Kingdom.
Sunday, May 06, 2007
Spirit Values
This sermon is based on Acts 11:1-18 and John 13::31-35.
Introduction: The Story of Peter and Cornelius
The story that we heard this morning in our reading from Acts Chapter 11 is a story that actually begins in Chapter 10. It’s the story of Peter and of the Roman centurion, Cornelius - the story of the conversion and baptism of Cornelius and his household.
Who knows whether Peter would have even gone to the house of Cornelius if he had not had the vision that we hear about in this morning’s reading? But because of his obedience to God’s command, Peter visits Cornelius and, in the process, he comes to understand the gospel in a new light.
Peter articulates his new understanding when he says in Chapter 10: ‘I now realise how true it is that God does not show favouritism but accepts people from every nation who fear him and do what is right.’ If Peter had any doubts about his new vision of the Gospel, they must have flown out of his mind when the Holy Spirit spontaneously descended upon the Gentiles – in exactly the same way that the Spirit had come upon Jesus’ close followers in the upper room.
And so we arrive at this morning’s reading at the beginning of Chapter 11. Peter has arrived back home in Jerusalem and the circumcised believers there want him to give an account of what he has done. They want an explanation. They are not simply upset that Peter ate with Cornelius; they are very likely more upset that Peter has baptised Cornelius’ household, thereby including Gentiles in the Church of Christ.
And so Peter explains the situation to them step-by-step until they too believe and proclaim that ‘God has granted even the Gentiles repentance unto life’.
Gentiles Shall be Included in the Kingdom
Let’s not underestimate the drama, the anguish and the outrage that including Gentiles in the church of Christ would have caused this new church of Jewish believers. The controversy over Gentiles in the church not only presents itself in Acts. It is an on-going issue throughout the letters of Paul, particularly of course, the letter to the Galatians – which is largely devoted to the question of the inclusion of Gentiles in the Church.
It’s my personal belief that Saul, the Pharisee and the persecutor of the Church, understood very well that the message of Jesus meant the inclusion of Gentiles in the people of God. I think that this understanding was the reason for his zealous persecution of the Christian Church. And I think that it was also the reason for his equally zealous mission to the Gentiles after his conversion.
His conversion wasn’t so much about a sudden download of new information from God which he didn’t know about before. I think that his conversion was a turning around: from a fierce passion that Gentiles could not be included in the people of God to a fierce passion that they were already included in the people of God.
Like Paul, Peter also had to learn this lesson of inclusion, but for him, the lesson came through a vision and through personal experience. Already a disciple and apostle of Christ, Peter learned through his openness to the Spirit of God and from seeing with his own eyes the Spirit working in the lives of Gentiles. Although this remained an issue that Peter would apparently continue to wrestle with.
The Spirit's Working in the World
One thing that impresses me about the circumcised believers in Acts 11 is the way that they accepted the work of the Spirit of God with regard to Cornelius’ household. This particular working of the Spirit turned all their ideas about who is a child of God upside down, but they accepted this radical shift in the Church because they recognised the signs of the Spirit at work.
I wonder how willing any of us are to be so open to changes that the Spirit of God might be calling us to engage with?
In a fortnight, we’re going to celebrate the anniversary of this church and we’re going to spend some of our time together to think a bit about our congregation’s work and mission. Don’t worry, I don’t have any hidden agendas that I intend to spring on you about some great change that I think that God is calling us toward, but I do think that every Christian community could do well to ponder where the Spirit is at work.
How is the Spirit of God moving in our congregation? Where is the Spirit of God working in the community at large? Are we able to recognise the working of the Spirit if it doesn’t come with the usual labels that we would recognise as ‘Christian’ and if it doesn’t fit our usual categories?
But if we’re looking for a working of the Spirit of God that doesn’t fit our usual categories, how can we recognise it?
I want to briefly suggest three characteristics that might help us to recognise the working of the Spirit in our everyday lives. This is not an exhaustive list and neither am I saying that I have ‘the one right view’ on this matter. The following are simply my suggestions of ways that we might be able to recognise the work of the Spirit. Together, we might want to try to identify more ways in which we can recognise the fruit of the Spirit.
I think that, among other things, the Spirit of God brings
o inclusion
o restoration
o reconciliation
Inclusion
So, first of all: inclusion.
‘Inclusion’ is not only the main theme of this morning’s reading; I believe it’s also an essential ingredient of the Gospel.
The Gospel of Christ tells us that each and every human being has equal worth and equal dignity in the eyes of God. There is no individual who is beyond the pale in God’s eyes, no one who is outside the possibility of salvation; no matter what gender, race, colour, sexual orientation, nationality, ability, disability or status in life, each person is a beloved child of God.
So I would argue that activities which seek to include individuals who would otherwise be excluded from some aspect of society are under the influence of God’s Spirit even if those activities do not appear to be overtly ‘Christian’ or ‘religious’.
Activities such as human rights for asylum seekers, help for children with special educational needs, care which allows people to live in their own homes. Any activity which works to include individuals who might otherwise be excluded in full participation in society.
Restoration
A second Spirit value is restoration.
What I mean by the word ‘restoration’ is what the prophets call ‘justice’. But I’m using the word ‘restoration’ because I want to distinguish it from punitive justice. Exacting punitive or vengeful justice is not something for which we need the inspiration of the Holy Spirit; on the contrary, we are well able to take revenge without God’s help!
Restorative justice is a Spirit value because is the sort of justice that worries more about restoring well-being to the victim rather than punishment for the wrongdoer. It’s arguably mentioned in the 10th chapter of Acts when the angel says to Cornelius: ‘Your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offering before God.’
Within our own justice system in the UK, restorative justice is something that is increasingly being used with young people. This is a form of justice which requires juvenile offenders to listen to the effects that their crimes had on their victims. It also asks young offenders to perform a community service that is related to the crime that they committed.
Other examples of restorative justice would be activities such as Fair Trade and the campaign to reduce Third World debt. These are activities which seek to redress the imbalances that have been created by the exploitation of the powerful.
Reconciliation
A third Spirit value is reconciliation: another value that is absolutely at the heart of the gospel.
As Christians, we believe that because of God’s forgiveness of us, that we are able to come into a new relationship with him. A relationship of love and friendship. In today’s gospel reading, we heard Jesus asking us pass on the love of God and to love one another as God loved us. In other words, we are called to be reconciled with our fellow human beings because God has reconciled himself with us.
And so I believe that any group engaging in activities of reconciliation is engaging in the work of the Spirit, whether that group has a ‘Christian’ label on it or not.
Some organisations seek to mediate between neighbours in a community, other organisations seek peaceable and workable solutions to family break-ups. Still other groups are seeking peace at national or international level. I believe that any individual or group that is genuinely seeking reconciliation between formerly hostile parties is doing the work of God.
Conclusion
In this morning’s reading from Acts, Peter had a life-changing experience with God’s Holy Spirit.
This encounter with the Spirit turned his world and his values upside down.
Peter and the church came to understand that it’s God’s intention that every category of human being should be included in his Kingdom. They were able to respond faithfully to the fruits of the Holy Spirit, even though the Spirit moved in ways that they did not expect.
As we come up to our Church anniversary and we look for signs of the Spirit in our own congregational life, I hope that we can rejoice and be thankful for the grace that we have been given to affirm the Spirit values of inclusivity, restoration and reconciliation. But I also hope that we can keep our eyes open to ways that the Spirit may be working in unexpected ways in our congregation and in the wider community.
And I hope that we can identify and use Spirit values as touchstones to help us find God in unexpected places.
I pray, as we go forward in our journey as Christian disciples, that we put God in Christ in the centre of all that we are and all that we do. And I pray that we may be able to see the Spirit of God at work in our community in surprising and unexpected places. And I pray this in the name of the risen Christ, Amen
Introduction: The Story of Peter and Cornelius
The story that we heard this morning in our reading from Acts Chapter 11 is a story that actually begins in Chapter 10. It’s the story of Peter and of the Roman centurion, Cornelius - the story of the conversion and baptism of Cornelius and his household.
Who knows whether Peter would have even gone to the house of Cornelius if he had not had the vision that we hear about in this morning’s reading? But because of his obedience to God’s command, Peter visits Cornelius and, in the process, he comes to understand the gospel in a new light.
Peter articulates his new understanding when he says in Chapter 10: ‘I now realise how true it is that God does not show favouritism but accepts people from every nation who fear him and do what is right.’ If Peter had any doubts about his new vision of the Gospel, they must have flown out of his mind when the Holy Spirit spontaneously descended upon the Gentiles – in exactly the same way that the Spirit had come upon Jesus’ close followers in the upper room.
And so we arrive at this morning’s reading at the beginning of Chapter 11. Peter has arrived back home in Jerusalem and the circumcised believers there want him to give an account of what he has done. They want an explanation. They are not simply upset that Peter ate with Cornelius; they are very likely more upset that Peter has baptised Cornelius’ household, thereby including Gentiles in the Church of Christ.
And so Peter explains the situation to them step-by-step until they too believe and proclaim that ‘God has granted even the Gentiles repentance unto life’.
Gentiles Shall be Included in the Kingdom
Let’s not underestimate the drama, the anguish and the outrage that including Gentiles in the church of Christ would have caused this new church of Jewish believers. The controversy over Gentiles in the church not only presents itself in Acts. It is an on-going issue throughout the letters of Paul, particularly of course, the letter to the Galatians – which is largely devoted to the question of the inclusion of Gentiles in the Church.
It’s my personal belief that Saul, the Pharisee and the persecutor of the Church, understood very well that the message of Jesus meant the inclusion of Gentiles in the people of God. I think that this understanding was the reason for his zealous persecution of the Christian Church. And I think that it was also the reason for his equally zealous mission to the Gentiles after his conversion.
His conversion wasn’t so much about a sudden download of new information from God which he didn’t know about before. I think that his conversion was a turning around: from a fierce passion that Gentiles could not be included in the people of God to a fierce passion that they were already included in the people of God.
Like Paul, Peter also had to learn this lesson of inclusion, but for him, the lesson came through a vision and through personal experience. Already a disciple and apostle of Christ, Peter learned through his openness to the Spirit of God and from seeing with his own eyes the Spirit working in the lives of Gentiles. Although this remained an issue that Peter would apparently continue to wrestle with.
The Spirit's Working in the World
One thing that impresses me about the circumcised believers in Acts 11 is the way that they accepted the work of the Spirit of God with regard to Cornelius’ household. This particular working of the Spirit turned all their ideas about who is a child of God upside down, but they accepted this radical shift in the Church because they recognised the signs of the Spirit at work.
I wonder how willing any of us are to be so open to changes that the Spirit of God might be calling us to engage with?
In a fortnight, we’re going to celebrate the anniversary of this church and we’re going to spend some of our time together to think a bit about our congregation’s work and mission. Don’t worry, I don’t have any hidden agendas that I intend to spring on you about some great change that I think that God is calling us toward, but I do think that every Christian community could do well to ponder where the Spirit is at work.
How is the Spirit of God moving in our congregation? Where is the Spirit of God working in the community at large? Are we able to recognise the working of the Spirit if it doesn’t come with the usual labels that we would recognise as ‘Christian’ and if it doesn’t fit our usual categories?
But if we’re looking for a working of the Spirit of God that doesn’t fit our usual categories, how can we recognise it?
I want to briefly suggest three characteristics that might help us to recognise the working of the Spirit in our everyday lives. This is not an exhaustive list and neither am I saying that I have ‘the one right view’ on this matter. The following are simply my suggestions of ways that we might be able to recognise the work of the Spirit. Together, we might want to try to identify more ways in which we can recognise the fruit of the Spirit.
I think that, among other things, the Spirit of God brings
o inclusion
o restoration
o reconciliation
Inclusion
So, first of all: inclusion.
‘Inclusion’ is not only the main theme of this morning’s reading; I believe it’s also an essential ingredient of the Gospel.
The Gospel of Christ tells us that each and every human being has equal worth and equal dignity in the eyes of God. There is no individual who is beyond the pale in God’s eyes, no one who is outside the possibility of salvation; no matter what gender, race, colour, sexual orientation, nationality, ability, disability or status in life, each person is a beloved child of God.
So I would argue that activities which seek to include individuals who would otherwise be excluded from some aspect of society are under the influence of God’s Spirit even if those activities do not appear to be overtly ‘Christian’ or ‘religious’.
Activities such as human rights for asylum seekers, help for children with special educational needs, care which allows people to live in their own homes. Any activity which works to include individuals who might otherwise be excluded in full participation in society.
Restoration
A second Spirit value is restoration.
What I mean by the word ‘restoration’ is what the prophets call ‘justice’. But I’m using the word ‘restoration’ because I want to distinguish it from punitive justice. Exacting punitive or vengeful justice is not something for which we need the inspiration of the Holy Spirit; on the contrary, we are well able to take revenge without God’s help!
Restorative justice is a Spirit value because is the sort of justice that worries more about restoring well-being to the victim rather than punishment for the wrongdoer. It’s arguably mentioned in the 10th chapter of Acts when the angel says to Cornelius: ‘Your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offering before God.’
Within our own justice system in the UK, restorative justice is something that is increasingly being used with young people. This is a form of justice which requires juvenile offenders to listen to the effects that their crimes had on their victims. It also asks young offenders to perform a community service that is related to the crime that they committed.
Other examples of restorative justice would be activities such as Fair Trade and the campaign to reduce Third World debt. These are activities which seek to redress the imbalances that have been created by the exploitation of the powerful.
Reconciliation
A third Spirit value is reconciliation: another value that is absolutely at the heart of the gospel.
As Christians, we believe that because of God’s forgiveness of us, that we are able to come into a new relationship with him. A relationship of love and friendship. In today’s gospel reading, we heard Jesus asking us pass on the love of God and to love one another as God loved us. In other words, we are called to be reconciled with our fellow human beings because God has reconciled himself with us.
And so I believe that any group engaging in activities of reconciliation is engaging in the work of the Spirit, whether that group has a ‘Christian’ label on it or not.
Some organisations seek to mediate between neighbours in a community, other organisations seek peaceable and workable solutions to family break-ups. Still other groups are seeking peace at national or international level. I believe that any individual or group that is genuinely seeking reconciliation between formerly hostile parties is doing the work of God.
Conclusion
In this morning’s reading from Acts, Peter had a life-changing experience with God’s Holy Spirit.
This encounter with the Spirit turned his world and his values upside down.
Peter and the church came to understand that it’s God’s intention that every category of human being should be included in his Kingdom. They were able to respond faithfully to the fruits of the Holy Spirit, even though the Spirit moved in ways that they did not expect.
As we come up to our Church anniversary and we look for signs of the Spirit in our own congregational life, I hope that we can rejoice and be thankful for the grace that we have been given to affirm the Spirit values of inclusivity, restoration and reconciliation. But I also hope that we can keep our eyes open to ways that the Spirit may be working in unexpected ways in our congregation and in the wider community.
And I hope that we can identify and use Spirit values as touchstones to help us find God in unexpected places.
I pray, as we go forward in our journey as Christian disciples, that we put God in Christ in the centre of all that we are and all that we do. And I pray that we may be able to see the Spirit of God at work in our community in surprising and unexpected places. And I pray this in the name of the risen Christ, Amen
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