Powering the light of Christ in our lives

Here is my sermon from today's Eucharist at St Stephen Walbrook:

Jesus speaks of himself as being the light of the world. Therefore light is a common New Testament metaphor. In Jesus' day light was provided through fire and fire required a container in order to be managed and contained. In this story (Matthew 25. 1 - 13) the container is lamp with a finite supply of oil to fuel the wick. In his second letter to the Corinthians St Paul uses the image of a clay jar with a flame within (2 Corinthians 4. 1 - 12).

This second image has been inspirational for an art installation currently displayed in the Light Well at St Martin-in-the-Fields. The artist Anna Sikorska has worked with many of the different groups at St Martins to create porcelain lanterns which glow when lit from within because of the translucency of porcelain. The lanterns that have been made are glazed ceramic globes whose size, surface decoration and character differ, although the base material - and overall look - is consistent white ceramic, roughly made. In the Light Well these lanterns have been joined together with cord covering the stone floor in a random constellation. The cord also connects a light bulb within each lantern, so each one shines from within.

Porcelain, like all clay, is malleable when wet and able to be moulded and shaped but, once formed and fired, is firm but fragile at one and the same time. Porcelain, however, unlike most other clays, is also translucent meaning that light can be seen through it. It glows with a transparency individual to itself. All these aspects of porcelain are factors in these verses which say that ‘God … has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ’ and that ‘we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us.’

In the installation the lit lanterns are lit by light bulbs powered through the electrical cord connecting them together. In today’s Gospel reading the fuel for the light is oil. Half of the women in the story thought ahead, realised that they may well have to wait some time and brought with them sufficient supplies of oil so that when they bridegroom did finally arrive, much later than planned, they had all they needed to be ready for his arrival, unlike the other five who had to go to buy more oil and then were too late for the wedding feast. The point is that Jesus wanted his disciples to be like the wise women; he was emphasising to them the vital importance of being ready and prepared for what was to come.

So, to sum up, light in these stories symbolises Jesus; he is the light of the world that illuminates the darkness of our lives. The containers for the light are our bodies. The light of Christ enters our lives at baptism or conversion but is then intended to shine out from within, like the glow created by the lightbulbs inside the translucent porcelain lanterns. For this to happen the clay must be thin and with cracks; both of which make it fragile. The analogy is to the faults and fallibilities in our lives which paradoxically enable Christ to be seen more clearly.

If the clay jar, the container of the light, were to be perfectly formed, then the light inside would not be seen from the outside. The light of Christ would effectively be hidden. People would look at our perfect life and not Christ, because they would only see us. Instead, St Paul says, because we are not perfect and have difficulties and flaws we are like cracked clay jars, meaning that it is then clear that where we act or speak with love and compassion, this is because of Christ in us, rather than being something which is innate to us or simply our decision alone.

Finally, we need a consistent source of power for the light within. The wise women prepared for the wait by bringing sufficient supplies with them to keep their lamps lit. For the installation, the source of power is the cable which connects all of the lanterns. Our source of power, as Christians, is the Holy Spirit and we need to be constantly filled with the Spirit in order that we are consistently empowered to shine with the light of Christ. In his letter to the Ephesians, St Paul encourages us to go on being filled with the Holy Spirit or to drink the Spirit of God, huge draughts of him (Ephesians 5. 18 - 20). The Spirit empowers Christians to live a life of growing and overcoming, of transforming our lives to become like Jesus Christ. So, like the wise women with their supplies of oil, we can never have too little of the God’s Holy Spirit.

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Bruce Cockburn - Closer To The Light.