If love believes in me

Here's the sermon that I shared at St Andrew's Wickford this morning:

“God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength …

God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God.” (1 Corinthians 1.18-31)

Jesus chose Judas to be one of his disciples. What does it mean that Judas was chosen?

In The Last Temptation of Christ, the novelist Nikos Kazantzakis has Judas betray Jesus at Jesus’s own instigation. In our Gospel reading (John 13.21-32) Jesus said to Judas, ‘Do quickly what you are going to do’ which can be understood as an instruction to Judas to betray. In the novel Kazantzakis has Jesus say, “There is no other way for the Kingdom of Heaven to come”:

“You will, Judas, my brother. God will give you the strength, as much as you lack, because it is necessary—it is necessary for me to be killed and for you to betray me. We two must save the world. Help me."

Judas bowed his head. After a moment he asked, "If you had to betray your master, would you do it?"

Jesus reflected for a long time. Finally he said, "No, I'm afraid I wouldn't be able to. That is why God pitied me and gave me the easier task: to be crucified.”

In our Gospel reading, when Judas has gone out, Jesus says, ‘Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him’. It is as Judas goes to betray Jesus that Jesus says he is glorified, again showing the necessity of Judas’ betrayal.

If it is necessary for Judas to betray, which seems to be the case, then there may be a place for betrayal. The Irish poet Brendan Kennelly wrote a book called The Book of Judas in which he looks at the Judas of Gethsemane, the Judas in our culture and the Judas in us all. He writes:

Be a knife, bullet, poison, flood, earthquake;
Cut, gut, shrivel, swallow, bury, burn, drown
Till someone senses things ain't as they should be.

If betrayal is a service, learn to betray
With the kind of style that impresses men
Until they dream of being me

On this basis Judas becomes even more fascinating as a betrayer. He and his fate become a yardstick for measuring God’s kindness and forgiveness – does He allow Judas to go to Hell, given Judas was predetermined to betray his master?

In U2’s ‘Until the End of the World’ Judas sings to Jesus. The first verse discusses The Last Supper:

We ate the food, we drank the wine
Everybody having a good time except you
You were talking about the end of the world

The second verse is Judas’s betrayal of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane:

In the garden I was playing the tart
I kissed your lips and broke your heart

The third verse is about Judas' suicide after being overwhelmed with guilt and sadness:

Waves of regret and waves of joy
I reached out for the one I tried to destroy
You, you said you’d wait till the end of the world

In this song, Jesus is there at the end of time for Judas.

Jesus chose Judas as a disciple knowing he would betray and that his betrayal would bring about the salvation of the world. He chose someone who has been seen as foolish, weak, low and despised but in doing so chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God.

Jesus chose Judas to be one of his disciples. We’ve thought briefly about what it might mean that Judas was chosen but, ultimately, as U2 sing in a song called ‘Moment of Surrender’: “It’s not if I believe in love / If love believes in me” and so, we pray, “Oh, believe in me” and give thanks that love does believe in us, as love believes in Judas. Amen.

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U2 - Until The End Of  The World. 

Valuing passivity and passion over activity and action

Here is the sermon that I preached at today's midweek Eucharist in St Andrew's Wickford, drawing on materials from A Soul Laid Bare, Liz Horwell, Alison Morgan, Randall Nolan and Gregory Wolfe:

“Over thirty years ago, W.H. Vanstone, canon of Chester Cathedral, wrote a book called, The Stature of Waiting. Early in the book, Vanstone talks about Jesus’ betrayal by Judas. The word ‘betrayed’, he says, as when Judas betrayed Jesus, really means ‘handed over’.” He explains that, “The word ‘betrayed’ is used only once in 33 mentions of what Judas did; the other 32 times the phrase ‘handed over’ is used. Where that phrase is used in other contexts of the NT it has no connotation of betrayal – eg the talents are ‘handed over’, Jesus ‘handed over’ his spirit as he died, Paul ‘hands over’ the gospel by preaching it to the Corinthians. The gospel writers use it consistently and automatically; it must have been the stock phrase, perhaps the one Jesus himself used at the Last Supper.”

“The gospels show a marked change from activity to passivity, action to passion, at the point where Jesus was ‘handed over’ – a phrase [which was] in common Christian currency in the first century.” According to John’s account … when Judas leaves the Last Supper to set in train the handing over of Jesus, John tell us ‘that it was night’… which must mean that the ‘daylight’ period is over and that the time foreseen by Jesus has come - the time at which ‘no one can work’, the time at which ‘working’ must give place to ‘waiting’…and is also associated, in a most striking way, with the end of Jesus’ freedom from restraint by human hands … ”from working to waiting and from freedom to constraint.” “The handing over of Jesus was His transition from working to waiting upon and receiving the works of others, from the status and role of subject to that of object, from ‘doing’ to ‘being done to’.”

“Jesus moves from being active to being passive in the Garden of Gethsemane when Judas hands him over.” “Until Gethsemane … Jesus had chosen to spend the whole of his ministry ‘demonstrating God’s kingdom’ both to individuals and to the people as a whole. And his ‘demonstrating’ invited people to respond. He longed for them to respond by choosing to deepen their relationship with God and work in the cause of justice: but that was their choice, it could never be obligatory.”

Vanstone “tells us that the word ‘passion’ comes from a Greek word meaning ‘suffer’: or ‘allow events to happen’.” It means, being passive. “The emphasis is … on being the subject not the object; being a patient.” “The passion then describes the time in Jesus’ life when he stopped taking control of the situation and simply allowed people to respond to him as they chose.” “So Vanstone says: ’The passion is not the pains he endured or the cruel manner in which he was treated by the hands of men but simply the fact that he was exposed to those hands and whatever those hands might do.’”

“This point is important because many people see God as ALWAYS taking control, always active, never passive; yet if Jesus is the perfect revelation of God’s character, Jesus’ passion demonstrates that being passive is also God-like.” “So Vanstone argues that Jesus’ death was the result of his passion, his ‘allowing events to happen’”: ”It wasn’t Jesus’ death that brought us benefits … It was his willingness to spare himself nothing, not even his own life, in the cause of winning the nation to the discipleship of God’s kingdom. He sought from the nation’s leaders that which could not be compelled: the response of discipleship.” “So, when Jesus prays in Gethsemane he still hopes that the priests might respond positively, though he knows it’s unlikely. He prays that God might be able to find him another way through this, another way for his message of love to be heard and understood. And until the moment when the priests come into the garden mob-handed there’s still the slim chance they’ll turn themselves around and support him. But in the garden they make their choice and he’ll accept it for what it is: their choice.”

“Jesus did the only thing that love can do: it can only offer itself out and wait for a response. With love, action must give way to passion, to waiting for a choice to be made. Because, as we know, Love is not possessive: it doesn’t insist on its own way; it never uses force. God offers such a love to us: an abundant, free-flowing, bountiful, love: and he waits longingly for us to want to love him in return. Jesus shows us that God’s love is not only active in showing itself, but passive in allowing us to choose what our response will be.” “The activity of love is always precarious … Herein lies the poignancy of love, and its potential tragedy. The activity of love contains no assurance or certainty of completion: much may be expended and little achieved. The progress of love must always be by tentative and precarious steps: and each step that is taken, whether it 'succeeds' or 'fails', becomes the basis for the next, and equally precarious, step which must follow.” “Love proceeds by no assured programme. In the care of children a parent is peculiarly aware that each step of love is a step of risk; and that each step taken generates the need for another and equally precarious step.”

So, “the hallmarks of the creator’s love for his creation [are] an endless love that must always shift with circumstances to see to the good of the beloved. And a vulnerable love that cannot force a response from the beloved but must watch and wait and hope for a response, whether it comes or not.” “Theologian that he is, Vanstone could not help feeling that these were the characteristics of God’s love for us — a self-emptying (kenosis) love that is always attempting to find out how to address the welter of circumstance that is every individual life.” “In the kenosis, or self-emptying of Christ, nothing is held back, nothing unexpended (Phil. 2:7). In this we recognize God’s love as unlimited. God’s love is also vulnerable. The Lord risks rejection at the hands of His own creatures and is pained by our refusal to accept love. And lastly, God’s love is precarious. By the humble condescension of the Lord, we have power to determine whether His love succeeds or fails in its communication, or its intended effect.” “The vulnerability of God means that the issue of His love as triumph or tragedy depends upon His creation.” This is the form of authentic love. If we want to know 'what love ought to be', we need enquire no further than what the love of God is.

“We live in a world which values activity and action over passivity and passion. We have lost [our understanding of what it means to be ‘handed over’]; but perhaps we should recover it, and in recovering it find our human dignity enhanced, our powerlessness removed – for so we can be like God himself, attaining the dignity which is ours because we share in his being, and reconnecting with some of the values we overlook in our emphasis on doing over being.”

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Adrian Snell - Betrayal.

Re-inhabiting and re-interpreting wrongs

Here is my sermon from this morning's Eucharist at St Martin-in-the-Fields:

‘The Singing Detective’ is a TV drama serial by Dennis Potter that was first shown in the 1980s. The story concerns Philip Marlow, a writer of detective novelettes in the style of Raymond Chandler including one also called ‘The Singing Detective’. At the beginning of the series Philip is confined to a hospital bed because of psoriasis, the skin and joint disease, which has affected every part of his body.

Philip’s childhood beliefs and commitments to God and to his parents have been betrayed through key incidents such as his seeing his mother’s adultery and his allowing another schoolboy, Mark, to be punished for something that Philip himself had done; a particularly unpleasant present left by him for their teacher and, for which, Mark is unjustly punished. His inability to face these betrayals led him into a lifestyle where he abuses and betrays those he loves and it is only as he is stripped by his illness that he can begin to face these memories, come to accept who he is and move beyond these abusive relationships. Potter’s drama shows us how this happens.

The story is about the way in which Philip faces up to the key events in his past. Essentially, he has to re-inhabit his past and re-live it in order that he comes to feel sorrow for the way in which he betrayed Mark. This begins as he lies in his hospital bed, his body incapacitated but his mind on over-drive. Memories from his past and scenes from his books are brought to mind and fuse with fevered imaginings of present events. In his confusion he seeks support from a psychiatrist who journeys with him through his memories and imaginings until he is at the point that he can re-live the experience of betraying Mark and feel sorrow for what he did.

The incapacity that he has experienced throughout the drama, despite the very real pain of psoriasis, is revealed to be psychosomatic and, as a result, by re-inhabiting his past he begins to know change in the present and is able to get up from his bed and walk once again. Philip’s needs – his experience of near-breakdown – are the seedbed for the healing and new life that he eventual experiences. As we watch this drama, we may be challenged to live Easter by allowing the Holy Spirit to take us back into those aspects of our lives that we have abandoned or covered over.

What Philip experiences in ‘The Singing Detective’ gives an insight into what Peter experiences in our Gospel reading (John 21. 12-19). Like Philip, Peter is haunted by his own act of betrayal. When Peter meets Jesus by Lake Tiberias, Jesus forces Peter to re-live that experience of denial. That is why Jesus asks Peter three times, ‘Do you love me?’ These three questions mirror Peter’s three denials and take him back into that experience. Like Philip, Peter has to re-inhabit his past in order to be forgiven and let it go. As Jesus questions Peter, his sense of remorse for what he had done must have been immense.

Peter denied Jesus three times. So Jesus asks Peter three times, ‘Do you love me?’ When they have finished re-living the experience of his denial, Peter finds that he has three affirmations that counter-balance his three denials. By taking him back into the experience of denial Jesus turns Peter’s denials into affirmations. He also turns Peter’s memory of the denial from a negative memory into a positive one. It’s as if Peter has been curled up in a ball of regret and guilt, and Jesus uncoils him and lets him walk again. The denial happened, Peter would never have forgotten that, but now his primary memory is of affirming his love for Jesus. By helping Peter re-inhabit his experience of denial, Jesus enables him to re-tell and re-interpret the experience transforming its meaning from a negative to a positive. The experience still happened but the significance of it is changed enabling him to live for Christ in the present.

Like Peter and like Philip, we, too, can carry around with us the memory of bad events that have happened to us – things that we did to others or things that others did to us. Easter is about facing up to such troubling events from the past that burden us in just the same way as Peter and Philip are burdened. The way of release from the harm and hurt of these memories can be, with the help of others, to go back into them. To re-live them in order to feel sorrow for the wrong that we did or that was done to us. Then to find positive ways in which we can show sorrow or repair hurt, whether done by us or to us.

A few weeks ago, a few of us involved in the Artists and Craftspersons’ group set up an exhibition, ‘Leaves for Healing,' in the foyer downstairs. We took our inspiration from Ezekiel 47:1-12, a vision of a transformed desert landscape, with the two halves of the exhibition reflecting the transition from wilderness to fertile land. As we reflected on the passage we saw that the temple, the place where God’s presence was very real, was seen as the source of new life with water flowing out and into the landscape, transforming the barren, empty desert into incredibly fertile land. Then the passage finished with a wonderful vision of the fruit from the trees that grow being food and the leaves used for healing. Some of our artists took the opportunity provided by this passage to begin the exhibition with an artwork that reflected wilderness and then transform that same artwork to reflect change, fertility and growth.

One piece that does so is by Lois Bentley. Lois started by creating photographic collages on triangular pieces of sheet steel. Then, for the first half of the exhibition, she decided to hang them as three triangular steel sheets strung out in a line alongside each other with the points of each triangle facing down. In this configuration they remind us of the three crosses on Calvary, the central triangle showing imagery related to its title, ‘Bruised’. For the second part of the exhibition Lois chose to re-shape and re-organise the piece. It is now called ‘Re-United’ and the principal change is that she has hung the middle triangle point upwards to indicate that Jesus’ work on the cross is finished and the Trinity are restored to their coherent whole. She says that she was inspired to do this by Jesus asking Peter for the third time - do you love me?

In this piece, Lois demonstrates how the incarnation and crucifixion come together for our salvation. The incarnation tells us that the fundamental issues of human existence cannot be resolved or addressed from the outside; instead God has to be become one with humanity in order to open up to possibility of change on a continuing basis. In Jesus, God plunges headlong into the mess of betrayal, denial and scapegoating that causes violence and torture in our world and emerges on the other side to re-interpret those experiences and bring new meaning and direction.

Philip and Peter were perhaps surprised to find that salvation involved facing their betrayals not running from them. Jesus’ death does not eradicate or remove the original wrongs in human experience but, by experiencing wrong and the pain it involves, Jesus re-shapes and re-orders our experience of it in order to create a new story with new meaning and direction. So, instead of being overwhelmed by the world’s wrongs and our own, as Philip and Peter were initially, we can now follow the path first walked by Jesus of inhabiting and experiencing the world’s wrongs in order to re-shape and re-interpret our experience and understanding. The new story with new meaning that we inhabit is that of the Resurrection.

A further example from the ‘Leaves for Healing’ exhibition is of the two pieces shown by Ruth Hutchison. The first was called ‘Grieving for my Garden’ and reflected the sense of loss Ruth felt at no longer having ‘a beautiful garden with lots of everything including barbeques, family gatherings and places just to sit quietly, listen to trees blowing in the wind while the blackbird sings.’ Her garden had been the context for her creativity. Now art has become the outlet for her creativity. She combines this with her passion for recycling using art materials recycled from skips, charity shops and friends to create her second piece called ‘The Barbeque.’ This expresses in a different form the pleasure that she once found in the barbeques held in her garden. Her art enables her to express grief at her loss and also to express past pleasures in new forms.

That is the journey undertaken by Philip and Peter. It is the journey depicted for us by Lois and Ruth. It is the journey first walked by Jesus. It is incarnation, crucifixion and resurrection. It is Lent and Eastertide. Easter challenges us to face troubling events from the past that burden us in just the same way as Peter and Philip were burdened. Easter challenges us to inhabit and experience the world’s wrongs in order to live a new story with new meaning; that of resurrection.

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Max Harris & His Novelty Trio - Peg O' My Heart.

Discover & explore - St Peter

Today's Discover & explore service at St Stephen Walbrook was the last in the current series. I reflected on the life and thought of St Peter using a poem by Malcolm Guite and a meditation by Alan Stewart. The service featured the Choral Scholars of St Martin-in-the-Fields singing:

• Introit - Duruflé, Tu es Petrus
• Anthem - Britten, A Hymn of St Peter
• Anthem - Bairstow, The King of Love my Shepherd is
• Closing - Palestrina, Agnus Dei (I & II) from Missa ‘Tu es Petrus’

In my reflection I said:

The Singing Detective is a TV drama serial by Dennis Potter that was first shown in the 1980s. The story is about Philip Marlow, a writer of detective novelettes in the style of Raymond Chandler including one called ‘The Singing Detective’. At the beginning of the series Marlow is confined to a hospital bed because of the psoriasis which has affected every part of his body.

Marlow’s situation is that his childhood beliefs and commitments to God and to his parents have been betrayed through key incidents such as his seeing his mother’s adultery and his allowing another schoolboy, Mark Binney, to be punished for something that Marlow himself had done. His inability to face these betrayals has led him into a lifestyle where he abused and betrayed those he loved and it is only as he is stripped by his illness that he can begin to face these memories, come to accept who he is and move beyond these abusive relationships and The Singing Detective shows us how this happens.

The story is about the way in which Marlow faces up to the key events in his past. He has to re-inhabit his past, almost re-live it, in order that he comes to feel sorrow for the way in which he betrayed Mark Binney. It is only at the point that he re-lives that experience and feels sorrow for what he did that he is able to get up from his bed and walk again.

I mention this, because what Marlow experiences in The Singing Detective is very similar to what Peter experiences in our Bible reading (John 21. 12 - 19). Peter betrayed Jesus by denying him three times. Since the crucifixion Peter would have been in agony in his conscience over the way in which he failed Jesus at Jesus’ moment of need. The agonies that Philip Marlow experiences in The Singing Detective help us to flesh out this story as it is told in the Bible and to understand a little more of what Peter would have felt at the time.

When Peter meets Jesus by Lake Tiberias, Jesus forces Peter to re-live that experience of betrayal. That is why Jesus asks Peter three times, ‘Do you love me?’ These three questions mirror Peter’s three denials and take him back into that experience. Like Marlow, Peter has to re-inhabit his past in order to move on from it. As Jesus questions Peter, his sense of remorse for what he had done would have been immense.

Peter denied Jesus three times and so Jesus asks Peter three times, ‘Do you love me?’ When they have finished re-living the experience of his denial, Peter finds that he has three affirmations that counter-balance his three denials. By taking him back into the experience of denial Jesus turns Peter’s denials into affirmations and he turns Peter’s memory of the denial from a negative memory into a positive one. The denial happened, Peter would never have forgotten that but then he was given the opportunity to turn it into a positive affirmation of his love for Jesus and that would have been the memory that he carried forward with him.

Like Peter and like Philip Marlow we can carry around with us the memory of bad events that have happened to us – things that we did to others or things that others did to us. If we are not careful the memory of these events from the past will twist and harm our life now, in the present. The way to be released from the harm and hurt of these memories is, with the help of others, to go back into those memories, to re-live them, feeling sorrow what the wrong that we did and finding positive ways in which we can show that sorrow and repair the hurt that we have done or which has been done to us.

If that is your situation then put yourself in Peter’s place now as you read a meditation written by Revd. Alan Stewart based on this passage:

I am the one who ran away when I said I never would
I didn’t believe you when you said
‘the sheep will scatter’

I am the one who sat in the shadows avoiding eyes
I never believed I’d disown you like this
Not once, but three times

I am the one who wasn’t there while you died that death
I couldn’t believe that this was how
The story ends

‘do you love me?’ he later asked
‘I love you’ I replied
‘feed my lambs’

I am the one who hid in an upstairs room
I wanted to run but there was no longer
anywhere to go

I am the one who could find no solace nowhere
I wanted to open my eyes and see him there
Laughing

I am the one who wept my heart raw with regret
I wanted to tell him ‘I’m sorry…
I do love you.’

‘do you love me?’ he asked again
‘I do love you’ I replied
‘take care of my sheep’

I am the one who woke to the sound of women’s voices
I longed to believe they’d seen you, but hope
Was still on its knees

I am the one who ran to where they lay your body down
I longed to destroy the rumours
Before they destroyed me

I am the one who saw you arrive like a ghost
I longed to reach out and touch you, but I couldn’t
even look at you

‘do you love me?’ he asked for a third time
looking into my eyes
and my heart tore within me

‘you know that I love you’ I replied
‘then feed my sheep’

(Revd. Alan Stewart)

The next series of Discover & explore services will explore themes of stewardship & finance:

• Monday 3rd October: Time 
• Monday 10th October: Talents 
• Monday 17th October: Treasure/Gold 
• Monday 24th October: Guidance 
• Monday 31st October: Promises (All Souls Day) 
• Monday 7th November: Safety 
• Monday 14th November: Money 
• Monday 21st November: Security

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Maurice Duruflé - Tu Est Petrus.