Those who humble themselves will be exalted

Here's the sermon that I have shared at St Mary's Runwell and St Peter's Nevendon today: 

One of the things I did during my holiday was to watch a film about the life of the guitarist and rock star Eric Clapton. In part, this was because he experienced a conversion to Christ, about which he has written in some of his songs.

Clapton knew significant trauma in his life being brought up by his grandparents as his mother was unable to look after him as a child and did not bond with him later in life. Additionally, later in life, his four-year-old son, Conor, died in a tragic accident when he fell from a window in a high-rise apartment. The film was particularly interesting because of a radical difference in the way he responded to the painful issues he experienced in his life in his early and later years.

Clapton found fame, wealth and adulation as a young man because of his musical talents but finding those things, when combined with his early traumas did not bring joy and contentment. Instead, they led him into drug and alcohol addition which was focused on his own desires, needs and wants, including desiring a relationship with Patti Boyd, the wife of his best friend, the Beatle George Harrison. Once out of control, through excessive drinking, he also found himself making racist statements on stage that he later regretted because his career was actually based on discovering the blues, the music of Black America.

So, his selfish and self-centred behaviours, which derived in part from early experiences of pain and hurt as a child, had the effect of destroying his and other’s relationships while leading him to say and do many things that, when sober, he regretted. At a key moment in his attempts to kick his addictions, he cried out to God for help and felt that he was answered. Getting sober and finding faith meant that when the rebuilding of a new life was rocked by the tragic death of his young son, he didn’t revert to his former absorption in drink and drugs instead he committed to living in a way that honoured his son. The film ended with Clapton as a happy family man who has set up a charity providing support to those who could not otherwise afford the help needed to get free of their own addictions and using his talents and those of his friends to raise funds to support that vital work.

Our Gospel reading today (Luke 14: 1, 7-14) sets up similar contrasts to those we find in the life of Eric Clapton. The context is a party, something that would have been very familiar to Clapton in his hedonistic days, and the question Jesus poses is how should we enter. In his early years, Clapton would have become familiar with being the star, the one who turned heads when he walked in the room, and would have become used, as a result, to being given all he wanted and desired, even if it did him harm.

Jesus commends the reverse of entering as the star. He encourages us to be the one who takes the last and lowest place at the table. One of the problems, as Clapton discovered, with being at the head of the table is that the only way from there, at some stage, is down. But, as Jesus notes, if you are in the last and lowest place, the only way is up. Jesus is famous for prophesying that, in the final reckoning, the first shall be last and the last first. This is a part of what Clapton discovered in later life as he changes from a life centred on his own needs and wants to one centred on others – his family and those seeking to be free from addictions.

His understanding of this change shows up in his songs, particularly a song called ‘Broken Hearted’, where, in the context of looking forward to heaven, he writes:

‘there's a place where we can go
Where we will not be parted
And who alone will enter there?
Only the broken-hearted’

We live in a world where leaders are increasingly focused on self-promotion – constantly creating narratives about how wonderful they are and how awful their predecessors were – and are advocating policies based on selfishness, particularly by blaming the problems faced by nations on those who have or are migrating from issues and situations most of us can’t imagine and couldn’t cope with. Placing the blame for the issues we face on those travelling to different countries ignores all the other problems our countries face and seeks to portray those who are actually victims of violence or oppressions as invaders. The inherent selfishness that is at the heart of such policies is that of saying we must keep all our resources for those that we see as being the same as ourselves instead of being willing to share – ‘sharing is caring’, as my grandchildren are rightly taught at their school.

How should we respond to our changing and self-centred world, as those who are told by Jesus to take the last and lowest place at the table? The answer is to be found in today’s Epistle (Hebrews 13: 1-8, 15-16):

‘Let mutual love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. Remember those who are in prison, as though you were in prison with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured. Let marriage be held in honour by all, and let the marriage bed be kept undefiled; for God will judge fornicators and adulterers. Keep your lives free from the love of money, and be content with what you have; for he has said, ‘I will never leave you or forsake you.’

Christian love – taking the last or lowest place - involves showing hospitality to strangers, remembering those who are in most difficulty or distress as though we are experiencing the same ourselves, being faithful to those closest to us, and living contentedly with what we have, not chasing after material wealth, in order that we trust God for his presence which means more than all we might otherwise gain.

Jesus is clear that those who live self-centred lives are on the wrong path, as all who exalt themselves will be humbled. As we have seen from the story of Eric Clapton’s life that is also what he discovered as he came to see it was a path of destruction, both for himself and for those around him. He wrote in his autobiography: ‘From that day until this, I have never failed to pray in the morning, on my knees, asking for help, and at night, to express gratitude for life, and most of all, for my sobriety. I choose to kneel because I feel I need to humble myself when I pray, and with my ego, this is the most I can do.’

Each of us, however, has to come to that realisation for ourselves, if we are as individuals or as nations are to change tack and, as Clapton also did, learn the lesson of Jesus’ parable and the value in God’s eyes of taking the last or lowest place. All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. May it be so for each one of us. Amen.

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Eric Clapton - Broken Hearted.

Pressing on and going forward

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

Both our readings today are to do with responses to difficulties and challenges. Jesus experienced his own people turning against him in the story told in our Gospel reading this morning (Mark 6.1-6). The people in his home synagogue were astounded by him, recognising that he had been given wisdom and was doing deeds of power. But that recognition led them to question where it was that his wisdom and power came from and they became jealous that one of them, someone with whom they have all grown up, should possess wisdom and power beyond that of themselves. The result was that they took offence at him and he could do no deed of power there because of their lack of belief. However, Jesus’ response was to continue his mission by going about among the villages teaching.

In our New Testament reading from the Letter to the Hebrews (Hebrews 12.4-13), the challenges faced maybe on the one hand the threat of persecution and on the other our own fallibilities and failures. Whichever challenge is faced, the encouragement given by the writer of the letter to the Hebrews is to pick ourselves up, brush ourselves down, work to strengthen our areas of weakness, and carry on living our lives as followers of Jesus. When we do so, the difficulties and challenges we face become the things that strengthen us and enable us to cope and be there for the long haul.

It can, perhaps, seem from these passages as though we, or Jesus, are on our own and have to find the willpower or internal strength to overcome the opposition or difficulties that are being encountered. However, Jesus was continually reliant on God the Father and, by this stage, was also travelling with his group of disciples around him. They often didn’t fully understand what he was teaching or doing, but they would, no doubt, have been a source of support to him in this situation at Nazareth. Similarly, the Letter to the Hebrews was written to encourage and support a group of Christians undergoing, or about to undergo, persecution. The fact that the letter was written and sent meant that there were others supporting this group of Christians with advice and prayer.

As a result, in any situation of difficulty we might face, we should look around to see who is also around to help and support. In an age of almost instant communication, it may even be that help has never been closer at hand. For each of us, then, the challenge is not just to coping and coming through difficulties ourselves, but also to looking around in order that we see those who are experiencing difficulty and challenge that we can help.

The reality in a world of conflict and change is that difficulties, challenges and even opposition are inevitable. The key to coping is linked to attitude. Jesus’ decision to continue his mission in the face of the opposition he faced and the encouragement in the passage from Hebrews to find difficulties as a testing ground – an assault course – to build up our strength in order to go on are both encouragements to look for the opportunities in our challenges. If we have a deficit mindset that is focused on all the difficulties we face, then we have lost before we have begun. If we have an abundance mindset that views God as providing resources, support and strength even in the most challenging of circumstances, then we can have hope in the possibility of moving on and overcoming the challenges we face.

When his own people took offence at him, Jesus continued his mission by going about among the other villages teaching. When the Hebrew Christians faced persecution and challenge, the encouragement to them was to lift their drooping hands, strengthen weak knees, and make straight paths for their feet in order to press on and go forward. And God was with them as they did so. May it be so for each one of too.

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Sweet Honey In The Rock - Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Round.

Visual Commentary on Scripture: Fishers of People

I'm delighted that my third exhibition for the Visual Commentary on Scripture has just been published and can be found at Fishers of People | VCS (thevcs.org).

This exhibition uses Damien Hirst's 'Isolated Elements Swimming in the Same Direction for the Purpose of Understanding (Left) and (Right)', John Bellany's 'Kinlochbervie', and Paul Thek's 'Fishman in Excelsis Table' to discuss Matthew 4:12-22 and Mark 1:14-20. These artworks give us what is essentially a collage of the kingdom whereby we are invited to imagine the kingdom of God as a body of water in which Christians are immersed and through which they are raised.

My first exhibition for the VCS was Back from the Brink on Daniel 4: 'Immediately the word was fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar. He was driven from among men, and ate grass like an ox, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven till his hair grew as long as eagles’ feathers, and his nails were like birds’ claws.' (Daniel 4:33). In the exhibition I explore this chapter with William Blake's 'Nebuchadnezzar', 1795–c.1805, Arthur Boyd's 'Nebuchadnezzar's Dream of the Tree', 1969, and Peter Howson's 'The Third Step', 2001.

My second exhibition is A Question of Faith and explores Hebrews 11 through the paintings of New Zealand artist Colin McCahon. McCahon is widely recognised as New Zealand’s foremost painter. Over 45 years, his work encompassed many themes, subjects and styles, from landscape to figuration to abstraction and an innovative use of painted text. His adaption of aspects of modernist painting to a specific local situation and his intense engagement with spiritual matters, mark him out as a distinctive figure in twentieth-century art.

The VCS is a freely accessible online publication that provides theological commentary on the Bible in dialogue with works of art. It helps its users to (re)discover the Bible in new ways through the illuminating interaction of artworks, scriptural texts, and commissioned commentaries. The virtual exhibitions of the VCS aim to facilitate new possibilities of seeing and reading so that the biblical text and the selected works of art come alive in new and vivid ways.

Each section of the VCS is a virtual exhibition comprising a biblical passage, three art works, and their associated commentaries. The curators of each exhibition select artworks that they consider will open up the biblical texts for interpretation, and/or offer new perspectives on themes the texts address. The commentaries explain and interpret the relationships between the works of art and the scriptural text.

Find out more about the VCS, its exhibitions and other resources through a short series of HeartEdge workshops introducing the VCS as a whole and exploring particular exhibitions with their curators. These workshops can be viewed here, here, here and here.

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Newsboys - Fishers Of Men.

Made complete in everything good

Here's the sermon that I shared at St Catherine's Wickford this evening:

The writer to the Hebrews ends his letter with a Benediction: Now may the God of peace, who brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, make you complete in everything good so that you may do his will, working among us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory for ever and ever. Amen. (Hebrews 13: 16-21)

What does it mean, I wonder, for us to be made complete? Following the feeding of the five thousand (John 6.1-14), Jesus asked his disciples to gather up the fragments left over, so that nothing may be lost. So they gathered them up, and from the fragments of the five barley loaves, left by those who had eaten, they filled twelve baskets. Similarly, through our offering of ourselves to God, Jesus provides a means by which what is disparate and fragmented within our lives can gathered up, unified and completed.

That was certainly my experience in offering for ordained ministry. In my working life I had experience of partnership working to create employment opportunities, with a particular focus on assisting disabled people in finding and keeping work. In my church life I had involvement in setting up a church-based day care business and a detached youth work project reaching out to disaffected young people. In my personal life I was writing and painting and finding a limited range of opportunities to share my creative work.

I realised, as I went through the selection process for ordination and then my ministerial training, that ordained ministry could hold and utilise all these disparate experiences and, as a result, could provide a frame within which all these disparate fragments of my life could be gathered up, held together and unified. And so it has proved, as each context for my ministry to date has provided unique opportunities to make connections between faith, work, art and social action through partnerships and projects. That has, of course, been even more the case since discovering the HeartEdge mission model which integrates congregation, culture, commerce and compassion.

Through HeartEdge, I have also experienced the way in which mission and ministry in, from and outside the church provides a framework, forum or context in which all of our skills, experiences, interests and failures can be gathered up, integrated and used for God’s glory and in God’s service. My personal experience of that reality has been in relation to ordained ministry but, again, the HeartEdge model of mission is clear that this gathering up of all that we offer applies to us all, whether lay or ordained.

Later in John 6, Jesus gives a cosmic or eschatological twist to this phrase we are considering when he says it ‘is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day’ (John 6. 37 – 40). These words come in the middle of Jesus’ teaching about being the Bread of Life which followed the feeding of the 5,000. When Jesus gave thanks over the bread, the word used is ‘eucharistesas’, the word which gives us ‘Eucharist’. Jesus shared the bread around in communion, then, when everyone was satisfied, he instructed his disciples to pick up the fragments using that same phrase, ‘so that nothing may be lost.’ Just as none of this ‘eucharisticized’ bread was lost after the feeding, so, because ‘Jesus is the bread of life, [those who] see and believe in him … receive eternal life [and] become a fragment which he will gather up on the last day.’ (John, Richard Burridge, BRF 1998)

Christ’s was a once-for-all action that is then re-presented and re-membered in and through the Eucharist. The Eucharist being our most significant and meaningful form of Remembrance. We bring the broken fragments of our lives to the one whose own body was broken on the cross but who endured that experience out of love for us to bring us through brokenness into reconciliation and resurrection. In return we receive his body and blood into our lives through a fragment of bread and a sip of wine. Our life is joined to his. The broken fragments of our lives are gathered up and incorporated into the story of God’s saving work with humanity. The fragments of our lives are accepted – overaccepted – and unified or completed as we are brought together to form a new body - the body of Christ – in which all things find their place and where all shall be well and all manner of thing be well.

God takes us and our offerings and places them in a far larger story than we ever could have imagined by giving them a sacred story and making them sacred actions. As we retell and re-enact what Jesus did at the Last Supper, we also remember what God did to Israel in ‘taking one special people, blessing them, then breaking them in the Exile before giving them as a light to the nations to bring the Gentiles to God.’ ‘In the telling of those stories and the performance of those actions we are transformed into God’s holy people.’ That’s what the regular celebration of the Eucharist is about. When the Eucharist is served, each of us offers all that we uniquely are at the altar and we receive from God everything we need to follow him by being a blessing to others in our daily lives.

This teaching also tallies with the use made elsewhere of Harvest imagery for the Last Judgement – a sense that all can be safely gathered in - and is reinforced for us in the Letter to the Colossians where it is stated that in Christ all things hold together, as through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross. Christ came to gather up and reconcile to God all the disparate fragments of our lives that none should be lost, even through death. That is why he gave us parables of lost things being found. It is why he states that there is room for all – many rooms - in his Father’s house and that he goes there to prepare places for us. It is also why St Paul teaches in 1 Corinthians 13 that faith, hope and love remain. The word he used for remain hints that such actions continue beyond the grave into eternity i.e. that we can take something with us when we die, that the fruit or acts of faith, hope and love grown in this life continue into, and continue to bear fruit in, the next. In other words, our deeds of faith, hope and love are not lost with our death in this life but continue into eternity where they are completed.

As a result, we have, I think, a basis for saying with Walt Whitman that: ‘Nothing is ever really lost, or can be lost, / No birth, identity, form — no object of the world, / Nor life, nor force, nor any visible thing; / Appearance must not foil, nor shifted sphere / confuse thy brain. / Ample are time and space — ample the field and / nature. / The body, sluggish, aged, cold — the embers left / from earlier fires, / The light in the eye grown dim shall duly flame / again; / The sun now low in the west rises for mornings / and for noons continual; / To frozen clods ever the spring's invisible land / returns, / With grass and flowers and summer fruits and / corn.’

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Walt Whitman - Continuities.

Cheering us on in our endeavours

Here is the sermon I shared yesterday at St Catherine's Wickford:

Hebrews 11 tells the stories of many people of faith who we know of from the stories contained in the Old Testament (Hebrews 11. 32 – 12. 2). These are the great figures of the Old Testament; Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and Moses. The section we have heard read this evening comes towards the end where the writer of Hebrews realises that he is running out of space and does not have room to fully tell the stories of all those that he wishes to mention.

In shorthand he asks us to picture many who because of their faith have experienced persecution, torture, poverty and ill-treatment. Finally, he asks us to picture all those who have lived lives characterised by faith as being like the crowd filling an enormous stadium and cheering us on as we run our race of faith through life. All these wonderful heroes of the faith who lived such exciting and eventful lives, they are cheering us on in our endeavours to all live lives that are faithful to God and his purposes. Not only are they there supporting us but the writer to the Hebrews says that their experiences are not complete and that only in company with us will they be made perfect.

As God’s people, we are on a journey or running a race with an end point, a destination in view. What is this endpoint or destination? It was set out for us in our reading from Isaiah 65 and is the coming new creation; the moment when God will make a new heaven and new earth fusing the two together to create a new existence for human beings in a world that is characterised by joy and not sorrow.

This is the wonderful future towards which we run, for which we minister both in our individual lives and together as a Church and towards which those who have gone before us and who now cheer us on from the stands point by the way in which their lives were lived and the inspiration that their lives provide for us.

Madeleine Channer is a lovely former nurse who was a member of the congregation when I was at St John’s Seven Kings. She wrote a book called Echoes from the Andes telling stories of those she met while nursing in Peru. Her book is, I think, imbued with this reality about which we have been speaking. In the book Maddy says that she went to Peru “with the aim of serving” but that her actual experience was that she received as much, if not more, than she gave. The Rev. Colin Grant, to whom Maddy dedicates the book, and the Doctors with whom she worked in Peru all influenced her deeply but it was the beauty of the Quechua people that influenced her most profoundly. Maddy writes:

“Things were happening in my heart and mind. I had come to Peru with the aim of serving, but I was receiving. As well as the emergence of spiritual truths, the Quechua people exemplified priceless qualities: humility, generosity of spirit, quietude, kindness and longsuffering.

Like the petals of a flower gradually unfolding to the rays of the sun, this was another unfolding, another lifting to the light. It shone into the corridors of my mind, and into the shafts and labyrinths of my soul like a searchlight. I saw and beheld; the Spirit of God was moving, spurring me on, the Spirit of life and peace.”

In this short extract from the end of Maddy’s book, we see how the examples of those around her where both an inspiration and a lesson to her and how they were used by God to move her forward in the race which had and has to run. It can be the same for us as we look for God in the people around us and as we find out about those people of faith who have gone before and who are alive today and ministering in different parts of the world.

We have this large crowd of witnesses round us and we have Jesus in front of us. We know the destination towards which we run; the joy of the new earth and new heavens. So then, let us rid ourselves of everything that gets in the way and let us run with determination the race that lies before us. Amen.

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David Grant - Wake Up Everybody.

Visual Commentary on Scripture - Faith: To Our Hopes

The Visual Commentary on Scripture’s Lent offering this year is based as usual around 14 ‘Stations’ which began on Ash Wednesday and continue on Mondays and Fridays until Holy Week. All the commentaries in the series have an audio feature so that you can listen to them while viewing the works of art. Their 2024 Stations share with you a series of seven works exploring, first, the seven vices most commonly included in lists of the ‘deadly sins’, and then, second, the seven cardinal and theological virtues.

The Christian practice of listing vices and virtues has a long history, going back at least to the times of the very early desert monks in the fourth and fifth centuries. As they cultivated their little patches of land in order to sustain themselves, they also cultivated their bodies and souls to make them as fruitful as they could. Later, medieval Christian manuscripts featured the motif of the ‘virtue garden’, in which the virtues (usually seven) are shown as trees, being watered by prayer.

Christianity, like Judaism, likes having things in sevens. The sixth-century Pope Gregory the Great codified what he thought of as the seven ’capital’ sins—the vices from which all other wrongdoings flow—establishing what we still commonly refer to today as the seven ‘deadly’ sins. The list has varied a little over time. Some vices have dropped out and others have been dropped in. But overall, it has been remarkably consistent.

There has also been variety in the seven virtues Christians have listed for special consideration and imitation. Some lists are based on Jesus’s teaching in the Sermon on the Mount (‘the Beatitudes’); some were developed to describe specific antidotes to each of the capital vices; and one was a combination of four ‘cardinal’ virtues, celebrated in ancient classical philosophy as well as in Jewish and Christian tradition—Prudence, Justice, Temperance, and Fortitude—with the three ‘theological’ virtues outlined by St Paul in 1 Corinthians 13—Faith, Hope, and Love.

Their commentaries explore what some of the more archaic-sounding virtues, like fortitude and temperance might have to teach us in a 21st-century context. Perseverance and self-restraint are, after all, things we need as much as ever.

And because vices are usually good things gone wrong—inordinate or disordered love for something that isn’t necessarily bad in itself, but bad when desired too much or in the wrong way—then you may find the occasional surprise along this Lenten journey: for example, a ‘vice’ having more of the qualities of a ‘virtue’ than you expected.

Lent is a time for spiritual gardening. They hope you will find this year’s Lent Stations a helpful way to take stock of what you might like to weed and what you might like to nurture in your own contexts.

 
Today's Station - Station 12 Faith: To Our Hopes - uses my second exhibition for the Visual Commentary on Scripture which can be found at A Question of Faith | VCS (thevcs.org). It's called 'A Question of Faith' and explores Hebrews 11 through the paintings of New Zealand artist Colin McCahon.

McCahon is widely recognised as New Zealand’s foremost painter. Over 45 years, his work encompassed many themes, subjects and styles, from landscape to figuration to abstraction and an innovative use of painted text. His adaption of aspects of modernist painting to a specific local situation and his intense engagement with spiritual matters, mark him out as a distinctive figure in twentieth-century art.

The VCS is a freely accessible online publication that provides theological commentary on the Bible in dialogue with works of art. It helps its users to (re)discover the Bible in new ways through the illuminating interaction of artworks, scriptural texts, and commissioned commentaries. The virtual exhibitions of the VCS aim to facilitate new possibilities of seeing and reading so that the biblical text and the selected works of art come alive in new and vivid ways.

Each section of the VCS is a virtual exhibition comprising a biblical passage, three art works, and their associated commentaries. The curators of each exhibition select artworks that they consider will open up the biblical texts for interpretation, and/or offer new perspectives on themes the texts address. The commentaries explain and interpret the relationships between the works of art and the scriptural text.

The McCahon exhibition varies the usual VCS format slightly by providing a greater focus on works by one artist than is usually the case. That is possible in this instance because all of the works in the exhibition explore aspects of Hebrews 11.

My first exhibition for the VCS was 'Back from the Brink' on Daniel 4: 'Immediately the word was fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar. He was driven from among men, and ate grass like an ox, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven till his hair grew as long as eagles’ feathers, and his nails were like birds’ claws.' (Daniel 4:33). In the exhibition I explore this chapter with William Blake's Nebuchadnezzar, 1795–c.1805, Arthur Boyd's Nebuchadnezzar's Dream of the Tree, 1969, and Peter Howson's The Third Step, 2001.

Find out more about the VCS, its exhibitions and other resources through a short series of HeartEdge workshops introducing the VCS as a whole and exploring particular exhibitions with their curators. These workshops can be viewed here, here, here and here.

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King's X - Faith, Hope, Love.

Witnesses in the trial of life

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

“I have been used for many years to studying the histories of other times, and to examining and weighing the evidence of those who have written about them, and I know of no one fact in the history of mankind which is proved by better and fuller evidence of every sort, to the understanding of a fair inquirer, than the great sign which God has given us that Christ died and rose again from the dead.” Professor Thomas Arnold

The teachings of Jesus “are read more, quoted more, loved more, believed more, and translated more because they are the greatest words ever spoken … No other man’s words have the appeal of Jesus’ words because no other man can answer these fundamental human questions as Jesus answered them. They are the kind of words and the kind of answers we would expect God to give.” Professor Bernard Ramm

“Is not the nature of Christ, in the words of the New Testament, enough to pierce to the soul anyone with a soul to be pierced? … he still looms over the world, his message still clear, his pity still infinite, his consolation still effective, his words still full of glory, wisdom and love.” Bernard Levin

“Jesus was irresistibly attractive as a man … What they crucified was a young man, full of life and the joy of it, the Lord of life itself, and even more the Lord of laughter, someone so utterly attractive that people followed him for the sheer fun of it.” Lord Hailsham

“I believe there is no one lovelier, deeper, more sympathetic and more perfect than Jesus. I say to myself, with jealous love, that not only is there no one else like him but there never could be anyone like him.” Fyodor Dostoevsky

“A man who was merely a man and said the sort of thing Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call Him Lord and God … however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that he was and is God.” C. S. Lewis

“Brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand … For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.” Saint Paul

“Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. This man was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him.” Saint Peter

“You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” Saint Peter

All those testimonies to Jesus that you have just heard stem from the one testimony in today's Gospel reading (Matthew 16: 13-20), the moment when Peter speaks out his belief that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the living God. Jesus calls Peter ‘the rock’ and he is the rock because he was the first to testify to Jesus and all the millions of people that have followed him in testifying to Jesus have built on the foundation of the testimony that Peter originally gave.

Testimony is what is given by a witness in a trial. A witness makes his or her statement as part of a trial in which the truth is at stake and where the question, ‘What is the truth?’ is what is being argued. Lesslie Newbigin has argued that this is what is “at the heart of the biblical vision of the human situation that the believer is a witness who gives his testimony in a trial.”

Where is the trial? It is all around us, it is life itself? In all situations we encounter, there is challenge to our faith and there is a need for us to testify in words and actions to our belief in Christ. Whenever people act as though human beings are entirely self-relient, there is a challenge to our faith. Whenever people argue that suffering and disasters mean that there cannot be a good God, we are on the witness stand. Whenever people claim that scientific advances or psychological insights can explain away belief in God, we are in the courtroom. Whenever a response of love is called for, our witness is at stake.

Witnesses are those who have seen or experienced a particular event or sign or happening and who then tell the story of what they have seen or heard as testimony to others. That is what Jesus called us to do before he ascended to the Father; to tell our stories of encountering him to others. No more, no less.

We don’t have to understand or be able to explain the key doctrines of the Christian faith. We don’t have to be able to tell people the two ways to live or to have memorized the sinner’s prayer or to have tracts to be able to hand out in order to be witnesses to Jesus. All we need to do is to tell our story; to say this is how Jesus made himself real to me and this is the difference that it has made.

I want to encourage us today that this is something which each of us can do. The best description I have heard of it is to gossip the Gospel. Just simply in everyday conversation with others to talk about the difference that knowing Jesus has on our lives.

It is also important to remember that we are not alone in being witnesses. We are one with millions of others who have testified to the reality and presence of Jesus Christ in their lives. No courtroom on earth could cope with the number of witnesses to Christ who could be called by the defence. That is why the writer of Hebrews says, “Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith.”

This is what Peter began by saying, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” We are part of the witness that has been built on that rock. So let us be encouraged today by the incredible numbers of others testifying to Christ and let us be challenged to add our own testimony in words and actions to those of our brothers and sisters in Christ because every day in every situation we face, we and our faith are ‘on trial’.

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The Mercy Seat - Let The Church Roll On/I Won't Be Back.

An inspiration to many who have faced impossible odds

Here's the reflection that I shared at St Catherine's Wickford this evening:

St George was probably a soldier living in Palestine at the beginning of the fourth century. He was martyred at Lydda in about the year 304, the beginning of the Diocletian persecution, and became known throughout the East as 'The Great Martyr'. There were churches in England dedicated to St George before the Norman conquest. The story of his slaying the dragon is probably due to his being mistaken in iconography for St Michael, himself usually depicted wearing armour; or it may again be a mistaken identity representing Perseus's slaying of the sea monster, a myth also associated with the area of Lydda. George replaced Edward the Confessor as Patron Saint of England following the Crusades, when returning soldiers brought back with them a renewed cult of St George. Edward III made St George patron of the Order of the Garter, which seems finally to have confirmed his position.

In Hebrews 11 we are given a roll-call of heroes of the faith. It starts as we would expect: “They shut the mouths of lions, put out fierce fires, escaped being killed by the sword. They were weak, but became strong; they were mighty in battle and defeated the armies of foreigners. Through faith women received their dead relatives raised back to life.” But then it changes tack: “Others, refusing to accept freedom, died under torture in order to be raised to a better life. Some were mocked and whipped, and others were put in chains and taken off to prison. They were stoned, they were sawed in two, they were killed by the sword. They went around clothed in skins of sheep or goats—poor, persecuted, and mistreated. The world was not good enough for them! They wandered like refugees in the deserts and hills, living in caves and holes in the ground.”

“What a record all of these have won by their faith!” the writer of this letter ends by saying and what an encouragement to us when we don’t always see St George defeating the dragon. Martin Luther King Jr concluded his last sermon, delivered at the Bishop Charles Mason Temple in Memphis, Tennessee on the eve of his assassination, by saying: "I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord." That is the attitude and trust that we need when facing dragons.

Just like Martin Luther King saying those words on the eve of his assassination, so the writer to the Hebrews says, “They did not receive the things God had promised, but from a long way off they saw them and welcomed them.” Howard Zinn, who was involved in the Civil Rights Movement, wrote this: “Social movements may have many 'defeats' — failing to achieve objectives in the short run — but in the course of the struggle the strength of the old order begins to erode, the minds of people begin to change; the protesters are momentarily defeated but not crushed, and have been lifted, heartened, by their ability to fight back."

The stories of the saints, like that of St George, aren’t there to give us a fool-proof cast-iron methodology for overcoming dragons but they can give us the inspiration and encouragement to take to the field and play our part. The saints have been an inspiration to many who have faced impossible odds in personal lives, communities, and globally. So, we pray: God of hosts, who so kindled the flame of love in the heart of your servant George that he bore witness to the risen Lord by his life and by his death: give us the same faith and power of love that we who rejoice in his triumphs may come to share with him the fullness of the resurrection. Amen.

For more on Hebrews 11, see my VCS exhibition 'A Question of Faith'.

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C.O.B. - Sheba's Return/Lion Of Judah.

Visual Commentary on Scripture: Yet to Come

From December 1, the Advent Calendar from the Visual Commentary on Scripture has featured a link to a specially selected artwork. You simply click on the day's image to view the artwork and its associated commentary. An audio option is available, so you can enjoy listening to the commentary while exploring the high resolution image.

Designed to take you on a journey from the creation through to the Incarnation, encountering theophany and hope in the midst of uncertainty, this Advent Calendar offers a unique way to experience the Bible in dialogue with works of art. 

Today this wonderful Advent Calendar includes one of three commentaries I have written on paintings by Colin McCahon. The commentary focuses on what is 'Yet to Come' and is read by Richard Ayoade.

This reflection comes from my second exhibition for the Visual Commentary on Scripture which can be found at A Question of Faith | VCS (thevcs.org). It's called 'A Question of Faith' and explores Hebrews 11 through the paintings of New Zealand artist Colin McCahon. McCahon is widely recognised as New Zealand’s foremost painter. Over 45 years, his work encompassed many themes, subjects and styles, from landscape to figuration to abstraction and an innovative use of painted text. His adaption of aspects of modernist painting to a specific local situation and his intense engagement with spiritual matters, mark him out as a distinctive figure in twentieth-century art.

The VCS is a freely accessible online publication that provides theological commentary on the Bible in dialogue with works of art. It helps its users to (re)discover the Bible in new ways through the illuminating interaction of artworks, scriptural texts, and commissioned commentaries. The virtual exhibitions of the VCS aim to facilitate new possibilities of seeing and reading so that the biblical text and the selected works of art come alive in new and vivid ways.

Each section of the VCS is a virtual exhibition comprising a biblical passage, three art works, and their associated commentaries. The curators of each exhibition select artworks that they consider will open up the biblical texts for interpretation, and/or offer new perspectives on themes the texts address. The commentaries explain and interpret the relationships between the works of art and the scriptural text.

The McCahon exhibition varies the usual VCS format slightly by providing a greater focus on works by one artist than is usually the case. That is possible in this instance because all of the works in the exhibition explore aspects of Hebrews 11.

My first exhibition for the VCS was 'Back from the Brink' on Daniel 4: 'Immediately the word was fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar. He was driven from among men, and ate grass like an ox, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven till his hair grew as long as eagles’ feathers, and his nails were like birds’ claws.' (Daniel 4:33). In the exhibition I explore this chapter with William Blake's Nebuchadnezzar, 1795–c.1805, Arthur Boyd's Nebuchadnezzar's Dream of the Tree, 1969, and Peter Howson's The Third Step, 2001.

Find out more about the VCS, its exhibitions and other resources through a short series of HeartEdge workshops introducing the VCS as a whole and exploring particular exhibitions with their curators. These workshops can be viewed here, here, here and here.

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James K. Baxter - Let Time Be Still.

Visual Commentary on Scripture: A Question of Faith

I'm delighted that my second exhibition for the Visual Commentary on Scripture has just been published and can be found at A Question of Faith | VCS (thevcs.org).

It's called 'A Question of Faith' and explores Hebrews 11 through the paintings of New Zealand artist Colin McCahon. McCahon is widely recognised as New Zealand’s foremost painter. Over 45 years, his work encompassed many themes, subjects and styles, from landscape to figuration to abstraction and an innovative use of painted text. His adaption of aspects of modernist painting to a specific local situation and his intense engagement with spiritual matters, mark him out as a distinctive figure in twentieth-century art.

The VCS is a freely accessible online publication that provides theological commentary on the Bible in dialogue with works of art. It helps its users to (re)discover the Bible in new ways through the illuminating interaction of artworks, scriptural texts, and commissioned commentaries. The virtual exhibitions of the VCS aim to facilitate new possibilities of seeing and reading so that the biblical text and the selected works of art come alive in new and vivid ways.

Each section of the VCS is a virtual exhibition comprising a biblical passage, three art works, and their associated commentaries. The curators of each exhibition select artworks that they consider will open up the biblical texts for interpretation, and/or offer new perspectives on themes the texts address. The commentaries explain and interpret the relationships between the works of art and the scriptural text.

The McCahon exhibition varies the usual VCS format slightly by providing a greater focus on works by one artist than is usually the case. That is possible in this instance because all of the works in the exhibition explore aspects of Hebrews 11.

My first exhibition for the VCS was 'Back from the Brink' on Daniel 4: 'Immediately the word was fulfilled upon Nebuchadnezzar. He was driven from among men, and ate grass like an ox, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven till his hair grew as long as eagles’ feathers, and his nails were like birds’ claws.' (Daniel 4:33). In the exhibition I explore this chapter with William Blake's Nebuchadnezzar, 1795–c.1805, Arthur Boyd's Nebuchadnezzar's Dream of the Tree, 1969, and Peter Howson's The Third Step, 2001.

Find out more about the VCS, its exhibitions and other resources through a short series of HeartEdge workshops introducing the VCS as a whole and exploring particular exhibitions with their curators. These workshops can be viewed here, here, here and here.

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 Crowded House - Weather With You.

God hears our cries, understands our needs and is with us

Our readings this morning (Psalm 102, Exodus 6.2-13 and Hebrews 10.26-end) provide three different responses to trouble and difficulty. In the reading from Exodus we hear of people so broken in their spirits by the cruelty of slavery that they cannot hear the message of redemption. In the Psalm we hear a prayer of complaint about the trouble and difficulty that the Psalmist is experiencing and in the Letter to the Hebrews we hear of people who show compassion towards others in the midst of enduring their own suffering.

It would be easy to turn these into a hierarchy of responses; a kind of version of good, better, best that may be closer to bad, better and best. Yet, these are all stories of responses from God’s people; and in the stories all experience God’s presence alongside them. The people of Israel are rescued from slavery regardless of whether they can believe it is to happen or not. The Psalmist who anxiously prays, ‘O my God, do not take me in the midst of my days’ ends that same prayer with the statement that ‘The children of your servants shall continue, and their descendants shall be established in your sight.’ Those receiving the Letter to the Hebrews read that after they have endured their suffering, they will receive what was promised.

In differing ways God meets each in their troubles suggesting that we are not dealing with a case of bad, better and best but instead relating to a God who truly understands who we are and the differing ways in which we respond to trouble and difficulty. Years of slavery would break many, if not most of us, in our spirits. God understands that reality and hears the groans of those who are broken by abuse and oppression. All of us are likely to have been in same place as the Psalmist; of railing at God for the unfairness of life. I read a post the other night from a friend expressing the heartbreak of all the ways in which our current constraints were impacting their family. It was absolutely right that that person expressed their feelings and God is big enough to take it. As the Psalmist experienced, God doesn’t criticise complaint. Complaint means we are in conversation and relationship with God. In situations, like that of the writer of the Letter to the Hebrews and its readers, where we can have that kind of confidence in God then endurance in ourselves and compassion towards others also becomes possible.

We may each empathise with a different reading and response this morning in our own response to the trouble and difficulty that we all face at this time. Whatever our response these readings assure us that God hears our cries, understands our needs and is with us however we react and respond.

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Mark Heard - Strong Hand Of Love.

Love came down at Christmas

The ‘Love’ mosaic that has been hanging at the East End of the St John’s Seven Kings for the past couple of years came down in last night’s winds. It is undamaged and can go back in place when the weather improves but, for now, it is a reminder to us that love came down at Christmas.

Christina Rossetti’s wonderful carol, from which that phrase comes, focuses on the Christ-child as the ultimate expression of love:

Love came down at Christmas,
Love all lovely, love divine;
Love was born at Christmas,
Star and angels gave the sign.

Worship we the Godhead,
Love incarnate, love divine;
Worship we our Jesus:
But wherewith for sacred sign?

Love shall be our token,
Love shall be yours and love be mine,
Love to God and to all men,
Love for plea and gift and sign.

Through these words, she reminds us firstly that God is love. As the Apostle John wrote, “God showed his love for us by sending his only Son into the world, so that we might have life through him. This is what love is: it is not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the means by which our sins are forgiven” (1 John 4. 9 & 10). And, again, “This is how we know what love is: Christ gave his life for us (1 John 3. 16).”

But Rossetti also reminds us that the incarnation, God become human, is as much a sign of love for us as is Christ’s crucifixion. This is what she means by that marvellous phrase “Love came down at Christmas”.

But what does it mean that love came down? When I run Quiet Days on everyday prayer, I often use a prayer by David Adam which provides a clear answer to this question.

Escalator prayer

As I ascend this stair

I pray for all who are in despair

All who have been betrayed

All who are dismayed
All who are distressed
All who feel depressed
All ill and in pain
All who are driven insane
All whose hope has flown
All who are alone
All homeless on the street
All who with danger meet

Lord, who came down to share our plight

Lift them into your love and light

(David Adam, PowerLines: Celtic Prayers about Work, Triangle, 1992)

This prayer uses the imagery of descending and ascending an escalator to pray that those at the bottom of the descent will be understood and ministered to before being then raised up themselves. The prayer is based on the understanding that, through his incarnation and nativity, Christ comes into the messiness of human life, as a human being, to experience all that we experience for himself. The betrayals, dismay, distress, depression, illness, pain, insanity, loss of hope, loneliness, homelessness, danger and despair that many of us experience at periods in our lives and which some experience as their everyday life. Christ comes to understand all this and to bear it on his shoulders to God, through his death on the cross, in order that, like him, we too can rise to new life and ascend to the life of God himself. “Lord, who came down to share our plight / Lift them into your love and light.” This is the hope held out to us through the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem; that he was born into poverty, exile, danger, stigma for our sake, in order to reach out to and rescue us.

God, in Jesus, “had to become like his people in every way, in order to be their faithful and merciful High Priest in his service to God, so that the people's sins would be forgiven. And now he can help those who are tempted, because he himself was tempted and suffered” (Hebrews 2. 17 & 18). “... we have a great High Priest who has gone into the very presence of God — Jesus, the Son of God. Our High Priest is not one who cannot feel sympathy for our weaknesses. On the contrary, we have a High Priest who was tempted in every way that we are, but did not sin. Let us have confidence, then, and approach God's throne, where there is grace. There we will receive mercy and find grace to help us just when we need it” (Hebrews 4. 14 – 16).

This is the wonderful result of love coming down at Christmas - of Christ’s nativity and incarnation – we can have confidence to “approach God's throne, where there is grace. There we will receive mercy and find grace to help us just when we need it.” Lord, who came down to share our plight, lift us all into your love and light.
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John Rutter - Love Came Down At Christmas.

Facing giants

The story of David and Goliath (1 Samuel 17) has become synonymous with the facing down of seemingly impossible odds. The image of the man who temporarily stopped the advance of a column of tanks intending to forcibly remove protestors from in and around Beijing's Tiananmen Square is a David versus Goliath image which is widely considered to be among the most iconic images of the 20th century.

Of course, the tank man only temporarily stopped the tanks in Tiananmen Square but others – like Aung San Suu Kyi, Nelson Mandela, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr and Rosa Parks - have shown us that David can still overcome Goliath.

Rosa Parks said that she refused to give up her seat to a white passenger because she was tired of giving in. Her simple but brave action led to the creation of the Civil Rights Movement led by Dr. Martin Luther King and the dream of equality that he articulated has eventually resulted in the election of a black President of the United States. 

It can be done and the story of how David overcame Goliath has been an inspiration to many who have faced impossible odds in personal lives, communities, and globally.

The story starts with the facing of Goliath. So, David said to Saul, “Your Majesty, no one should be afraid of this Philistine! I will go and fight him.”

What are the Goliaths or giants that we have to face? In our lives? In our communities? In our world? Jeremy Alvin suggests that we instinctively know our own Goliaths: “You know your Goliath...? You recognize his walk, the thunder of his voice. He taunts you with bills you can’t pay, people you can’t please, habits you can’t break, failures you can’t forget, and a future you can’t face.” For many at the moment, the Goliaths we face are to do with debts and unemployment.

Accordingly, without our local community there are Goliaths to be faced concerning cuts in facilities and services together with the need to support and empower those who are in debt or out of work or both. Then, thinking globally, we still need to face the giant of making poverty history with all that that entails in providing aid, achieving trade justice, tackling corruption, reducing our carbon footprint, and reconciling those in conflict.

So we start by facing the reality of our giants; acknowledging their existence while refusing to be cowed by their existence. Then, we see David placing his trust in God as he says, “The Lord has saved me from lions and bears; he will save me from this Philistine.”

Martin Luther King concluded his last sermon, delivered at the Bishop Charles Mason Temple in Memphis, Tennessee on the eve of his assassination, by saying: "I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord." That is the attitude and trust that a David has when facing his Goliath.

Finally, we see David refusing the armour and weapons of King Saul and using what he has to hand and what is familiar to him: “David strapped Saul's sword over the armour and tried to walk, but he couldn't, because he wasn't used to wearing them. I can't fight with all this, he said to Saul. I'm not used to it. So he took it all off. He took his shepherd's stick and then picked up five smooth stones from the stream and put them in his bag. With his sling ready, he went out to meet Goliath.”

Similarly the "direct action" of the Civil Rights Movement — primarily boycotts, sit-ins, Freedom Rides, marches and similar tactics - relied on what was to hand, in others the mass mobilization of those who were discriminated against in nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience.

Using these means David defeated Goliath and the Civil Rights Movement gained the Civil Rights Act and other subsequent developments. But, having said this, we also need to acknowledge that David does not always defeat Goliath or, at least, not straightaway.

In Hebrews 11 we are given a role call of heroes of the faith. It starts as we would expect: “They shut the mouths of lions, put out fierce fires, escaped being killed by the sword. They were weak, but became strong; they were mighty in battle and defeated the armies of foreigners. Through faith women received their dead relatives raised back to life.” But then it changes tack: “Others, refusing to accept freedom, died under torture in order to be raised to a better life. Some were mocked and whipped, and others were put in chains and taken off to prison. They were stoned, they were sawed in two, they were killed by the sword. They went around clothed in skins of sheep or goats—poor, persecuted, and mistreated. The world was not good enough for them! They wandered like refugees in the deserts and hills, living in caves and holes in the ground.”

“What a record all of these have won by their faith!” the writer of this letter ends by saying and what an encouragement to us when we don’t always see David defeating Goliath. Just like Martin Luther King saying on the eve of his assassination - “I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land – the writer to the Hebrews says, “They did not receive the things God had promised, but from a long way off they saw them and welcomed them.”

Howard Zinn, who was involved in the Civil Rights Movement, wrote this: “Social movements may have many 'defeats' — failing to achieve objectives in the short run — but in the course of the struggle the strength of the old order begins to erode, the minds of people begin to change; the protesters are momentarily defeated but not crushed, and have been lifted, heartened, by their ability to fight back."

So, the story of David and Goliath doesn’t give us a foolproof cast-iron methodology for overcoming giants but it does give us the inspiration and encouragement to take to the field and play our part. Here at St John’s, we are trying to encourage and empower people to face giants at all three levels: personally, locally (in our community), and globally. Just this week in our Ministry Leadership Team we have reviewed our Peace & Justice ministry and, as a result, will shortly be introducing new initiatives and campaigns which we hope you will take to heart and act on.

May we each take encouragement from this story – personally, locally and globally – as so many others have done over the centuries and commit ourselves afresh, with God’s help and the support of each other, to facing down the giants in our lives, our community, and our world.

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Bobby Womack - Deep River. 

Why are we waiting?

Have you ever observed people waiting at a bus stop? Some people are entirely focused on the experience of waiting, constantly checking their watch to see how much time has gone by and how late the bus in question is in arriving. Others take the opportunity to look around them to observe other people and the area in which they are waiting, perhaps to notice things that they would not otherwise see. Which, I wonder, are you most like?

Many things in our world have become instant. Today we can connect to people, information and misinformation with a few mouse clicks in a way that was simply not possible a few years ago. But we shouldn’t assume that such changes make us any wiser or that the benefits we can gain by waiting have been eradicated by the speed with which our society moves.  

Hebrews 11. 1 - 2 tells us that:

“To have faith is to be sure of the things we hope for, to be certain of the things we cannot see. It was by their faith that people of ancient times won God's approval.”

In other words, faith is about waiting, and Abraham, who we heard about in our Old Testament reading (Genesis 17. 1 – 7, 15, 16) is held up in Hebrews 11 as a hero of faith precisely because he was someone who waited:

“It was faith that made Abraham obey when God called him to go out to a country which God had promised to give him. He left his own country without knowing where he was going. By faith he lived as a foreigner in the country that God had promised him. He lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who received the same promise from God. For Abraham was waiting for the city which God has designed and built, the city with permanent foundations.

It was faith that made Abraham able to become a father, even though he was too old and Sarah herself could not have children. He trusted God to keep his promise. Though Abraham was practically dead, from this one man came as many descendants as there are stars in the sky, as many as the numberless grains of sand on the seashore.” (Hebrews 11. 8 – 13 GNB)

“Each one of these people of faith died not yet having in hand what was promised, but still believing. How did they do it? They saw it way off in the distance, waved their greeting, and accepted the fact that they were transients in this world. People who live this way make it plain that they are looking for their true home. If they were homesick for the old country, they could have gone back any time they wanted. But they were after a far better country than that — heaven country. You can see why God is so proud of them, and has a City waiting for them.” (Hebrews 11. 13 – 16 The Message)

Abraham waited and was commended for his faith being held up as an example for all of us who come after him. Why? We can ask the question in the song traditionally sung by those waiting in queues - why are we waiting?

W.H. Vanstone is a theologian who has written particularly profoundly about the experience and he gives at least two answers.

Firstly, he wrote, in The Stature of Waiting, that as we wait “the world discloses its power of meaning – discloses itself in its heights and its depths, as wonder and terror, as blessing and threat.” We become, so to speak, “the sharer with God of a secret – the secret of the world’s power of meaning.”

When we experience moments of seeing the world as “a wonderful terror or a terrifying wonder,” we become “a point at which something in the world is not only registered but understood, experienced, recognized.” Because we are in the world seeing it as it really is, the world no longer “merely exists” but is “understood, appreciated, welcomed, feared, felt”; “the world is received not as it is received by a camera or a tape-recorder but rather with the power of meaning with which it is received by God.”

Our role within creation is to articulate and name the meaning of the world which God has created. As James Thwaites has suggested the creation is crying out (Romans 8: 19 - 22):

“for its goodness to be fully realised and fully released. The creation cannot be good apart from the sons and daughters because we alone were given the right to name it; we are the image bearers who were made to speak moral value and divine intent into it. We were created to draw forth the attributes, nature and power of God in all things.”

The world and its meaning cannot be understood and appreciated quickly or lightly - it takes time and experience, observation and reflection – and so we wait. We wait like those people at the bus stop who take the opportunity to look around them to observe other people and the area in which they are waiting to notice things that they would not otherwise see.    

Vanstone also wrote in Love's Endeavour, Love's Expense: “So it is with the love of God. For the completion of its work, and therefore its own triumph, it must wait upon the understanding of those who receive it. The love of God must wait for the recognition of those who have power to recognise … Recognition of the love of God involves, as it were, the forging of an offering: the offering is the coming-to-be of understanding: only where this understanding has come to be has love conveyed its richest blessing and completed its work in triumph.”

God waits for us; waits for our recognition, understanding and response to his love. His love is written in to his creation and his purposes are being worked out through history. Paul writes in Romans 1. 19 & 20 that:

“the basic reality of God is plain enough. Open your eyes and there it is! By taking a long and thoughtful look at what God has created, people have always been able to see what their eyes as such can't see: eternal power, for instance, and the mystery of his divine being.”  

We need to come to a point where we see this for ourselves. Instead, as Paul writes in that passage from Romans, we have often trivialized ourselves into silliness and confusion so that there is neither sense nor direction left in our lives. We pretend to know it all, but are actually illiterate regarding the real meaning of life and the love of God within human history.

Recognition of the love of God involves, as Vanstone states, “the forging of an offering.” That is what Abraham did, he offered himself by obeying when God called him to go out to the country which God had promised to give him. He offered himself to God by leaving his own country without knowing where he was going and by living as a foreigner in the country that God had promised him. The offering which we make to God reveals the extent to which we have recognised and responded to his love. It is “only where this understanding has come to be” that love has “conveyed its richest blessing and completed its work in triumph.”

We are changed by this recognition and this response. For Abraham, this change was acknowledged by a change of name for him and Sarah and by the act of circumcision – outward signs of an inward grace. For us, as Christians, the outward sign of the inward grace is the act of baptism; the public declaration of faith in the forgiveness held out by Jesus and the enacting of that cleansing by dying to our old way of life as the water goes over us and rising to a new way of life as we emerge from under the water.

Why are we waiting? Like Abraham, we wait to see the meaning of world – its terror and wonder – and within this to see the love of God for us embedded in the beauty and fear of existence and threaded through human history. Why are we waiting? Both God and the creation are waiting for our full response to this love in creation; for us to fully offer ourselves to God, as Abraham did and as the greatest commandment (Matthew 22. 35 - 37) encourages us to do, with all our heart, with all our soul, and with all our mind.

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The Staple Singers - I'll Take You There.

Jesus: Priest and King

On the basis of one appearance in the story told within the Old Testament (Genesis 14. 17 - 20), Melchizedek has generated a huge amount of press over the years. Some people have thought he was Shem, one of Noah’s sons, others have thought he was a divine being or an angel, still others have argued that he was an archetype of Jesus or the pre-incarnate Jesus or, even, Jesus himself.  

There are two other references to Melchizedek in the Bible. The first is in Psalm 110, a Psalm about a King who is also a priest in the priestly order of Melchizedek. The second is a lengthy passage in the letter to the Hebrews (Hebrews 7) arguing that Jesus is the Priest-King in the order of Melchizedek spoken of in Psalm 110. 

The writer to the Hebrews suggests that Melchizedek and Abraham represent two different types of priesthood. Abraham represents the priesthood for the people of Israel which is formed while they wandered in the wilderness after being freed from slavery in Egypt. The tribe of Levi became the priests for the people of Israel who supported them by giving the Levites a tithe or tenth of what they grew or earnt.

Melchizedek, though, represents a different order of priests. He is both a King and a Priest and his priestly order is seen as being superior to that of the Levites. This is because he blesses Abraham. In scripture, as in the culture of the time, the one who blesses is always superior to the one who receives the blessing. So, the priest Melchizedek blessed Abraham, who was to be the father of all Israelites including their priests, the Levites. Therefore, the priesthood of Melchizedek is superior to that of the Levites. In addition, Abraham gives Melchizedek a tithe which is a way of acknowledging Melchizedek’s priestly office.

It is important for the writer to the Hebrews to be able to suggest this because he wants to show his fellow Jews why Jesus can be regarded as a priest even though he didn’t come from the tribe of Levi. More than that he wants to show his fellow Jews that the time for the Levitical priesthood has come to an end. The Levitical priests were for the people of Israel but Jesus is a priest for all peoples everywhere. The Levites were human beings who died and their priesthood ended but Jesus is eternal and is a priest forever. The Levitical priests had to continually offer sacrifices but Jesus made a once for all time sacrifice of himself on the cross.

So the writer to the Hebrews is saying that Jesus is the ultimate priest-king. He is the one that the example of Melchizedek pre-figures. He is the one about whom the Psalmist is writing in Psalm 110. Now that Jesus has made the ultimate sacrifice, there is no need for any other sacrifices or any other priests.

This is how the writer to the Hebrews actually puts it:

“The matter becomes even plainer; a different priest has appeared, who is like Melchizedek. He was made a priest, not by human rules and regulations, but through the power of a life which has no end. For the scripture says, You will be a priest forever, in the priestly order of Melchizedek. The old rule, then, is set aside, because it was weak and useless. For the Law of Moses could not make anything perfect. And now a better hope has been provided through which we come near to God ...

Jesus, then, is the High Priest that meets our needs. He is holy; he has no fault or sin in him; he has been set apart from sinners and raised above the heavens. He is not like other high priests; he does not need to offer sacrifices every day for his own sins first and then for the sins of the people. He offered one sacrifice, once and for all, when he offered himself. The Law of Moses appoints men who are imperfect to be high priests; but God's promise made with the vow, which came later than the Law, appoints the Son, who has been made perfect forever.” (Hebrews 7. 15 -19, 26 – 28)

So all this, strange and confusing as it is, is a way of emphasising to us the unique significance of Jesus and his sacrifice:

“The priesthood of the old covenant was temporary, but Christ ‘holds his priesthood pemanently’ (7:24). Those priests of Old Testament times were themselves ‘beset with weakness’ and constantly exposed to the same sinful tendencies as those who came to them for help, but Christ was sinless (5:2; 7:26). The priests of former days offered the blood of goats and bulls, but Christ offered himself (9:13, 7:27). Their sacrifices could effect only a partial cleansing, nothing more than ‘the purification of the flesh’, whereas the sacrifice of Christ purifies man’s disturbed and guilty conscience (9:9, 13-14; 10:22). The Old Testament sacrifices were a necessary reminder of the seriousness of sin (10:3), but by Christ’s offering our sins can be taken away (9:26; 10:11-12). Constant repetition was an essential feature of the Old Testament sacrificial system, but Christ’s sacrifice was offered ‘once for all’ (10:11-12).” (Raymond Brown, The Message of Hebrews, Inter-Varsity Press 1982)

In this way the writer to the Hebrews also gives one helpful way of thinking about and reading the Old Testament:

“It is not simply a graphic account of God’s dealings with his covenant people over the centuries. Old Testament Scripture is essentially Christ-centred … it eagerly anticipates his coming, it describes his earthly ministry, vividly relates the precise circumstances and eternal benefits of his death for mankind, and looks beyond itself to the eventual fulfilment of its finest hopes. Its historical development, spiritual value and moral lessons are all fully appreciated by our author, but he comes to its arresting narratives as a man equipped by the Spirit of God to discern a further message. It is a book about Christ. The Son of God dominates the word of God in both Testaments. The marks of Christ are clearly impressed on all its pages for those who have the eyes to see them.” (R. Brown)

So, as we focus more specifically on the Old Testament readings in our services during 2012, let us be seeking to discern Christ’s shadow on the words we read and, like the writer to the Hebrews, see the significance of Christ and his sacrifice comparison and contrast with the stories of the Old Testament. Let us thank God for the once for all, absolute and eternal nature of Jesus’ sacrifice of himself and praise him for that he has become the Priest and King for whom Melchizedek was a model.

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Delirious - Jesus Blood.