‘St Laurence was a deacon of the Church of Rome in the third century, during the persecution of the Christians by the Emperor Decius. The Roman magistrate ordered Laurence to bring into the Church all its riches. He did not refuse: instead he accepted. He asked two days’ grace and used the time to set about his pattern of overaccepting [the Magistrate’s order]. In this case he considered what the riches of the Church truly were, and his habit taught him to look back to the neglected parts of the story. On the third day he invited the magistrate back to see the Church filled with the poor, the lame, the orphan and the widow. ‘These’, he said, pointing to the destitute people in front of him, ‘are the riches of the Church.’’ It was a perfect embodiment of the kingdom of God. But it was a rival kingdom to the Roman Empire, and the magistrate had Laurence roasted on a spit.' (Sam Wells)
Recall, for a moment, the words of Mary’s Magnificat: ‘He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty’ (Luke 1:46-55).
Mary’s song was based firstly on her own experience, as God looked with favour on her lowliness as his servant. From that point onwards all generations call her blessed for the Mighty One has done great things for her. Mary was an obscure young girl who became an unmarried mother and yet her child proved to be the very Son of God. The second reason she gave for being able to sing this song was that God had helped his servant Israel ‘in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.’ Both examples proved to her that God sees and responds to the lowly.
Similarly, Jesus, her son, was himself born in obscurity and weakness. Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes of “God as the one who becomes low for our sakes, God in Jesus … that is the secret, hidden wisdom… that “no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived” (1 Cor. 2:9).” It is a redemptive mystery “because God became poor, low, lowly, and weak out of love for humankind, because God became a human being like us, so that we would become divine, and because he came to us so that we would come to him”. It is also a mystery of judgment because the Christ child in the manger “pushes back the high and mighty; he overturns the thrones of the powerful; he humbles the haughty; his arm exercises power over all the high and mighty; he lifts what is lowly, and makes it great and glorious in his mercy.”
Jesus’ constant refrain was that the last shall be first and the first last, an overturning of expectations and hierarchies. He demonstrated this personally by washing the feet of his disciples and calling them to do the same. Through his death - that of a cursed criminal - he became the chief cornerstone to our faith. A sign that the rejected are the route to revival, the gifts that God is calling us to recover as the source of life for all.
Sam Wells writes that: ‘The stone that the builders rejected didn’t find a place in the wall somewhere by being thoughtfully included like a last-minute addition to a family photo. The rejected stone became the cornerstone, the keystone – the stone that held up all the others, the crucial link, the vital connection. The rejected stone is Jesus. In his crucifixion he was rejected by the builders – yet in his resurrection he became the cornerstone of forgiveness and eternal life. That’s what ministry and mission are all about – not condescendingly making welcome alienated strangers, but seeking out the rejected precisely because they are the energy and the life-force that will transform us all. Every minister, every missionary, every evangelist, every disciple should have these words over their desk, their windscreen, on their screensaver, in the photo section of their wallet, wherever they see it all the time – the stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. If you’re looking for where the future church is coming from, look at what the church and society has so blithely rejected. The life of the church is about constantly recognising the sin of how much we have rejected, and celebrating the grace that God gives us back what we once rejected to become the cornerstone of our lives. That’s what prophetic ministry means.’
That is the intent of the Magnificat: ‘He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.’ St Laurence realised that vision when he invited the magistrate back to see the Church filled with the poor, the lame, the orphan and the widow. ‘These’, he said, pointing to the destitute people in front of him, ‘are the riches of the Church.’’
The Magnificat rose out of the experience of Mary and Israel but was realised in Jesus. Louis MacNeice, although basically agnostic in terms of religion, recognised this when he wrote in his ‘Autumn Journal’:
‘There was a star in the East, the magi in their turbans
Brought their luxury toys
In homage to a child born to capsize their values
And wreck their equipoise.
A smell of hay like peace in the dark stable
Not peace however but a sword
To cut the Gordian knot of logical self-interest,
The fool-proof golden cord;
For Christ walked in where no philosopher treads
But armed with more than folly,
Making the smooth place rough and knocking the heads
Of Church and State together.’
The child born to capsize the values and wreck the equipoise of the wealthy and powerful became the cornerstone, the keystone – the stone that held up all the others, the crucial link, the vital connection. Those who follow him, as did St Laurence, should seek out the rejected because, in Christ, God himself became poor, low, lowly, and weak out of love for humankind and because those we have rejected are the energy and the life-force that will transform us all. Amen.
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The Call - The Walls Came Down.
