Praise for deliverance from trouble

Here's the reflection that was shared during a Service of the Word at St Andrew's Wickford this morning:

Psalm 34 is a psalm of praise for deliverance from trouble. It relates to a story about David before he became King of Israel. David has won many battles for King Saul, including defeating Goliath, but, as a result, Saul had become jealous of David and felt threatened by David’s popularity. As a result, David felt forced to flee from Saul.

In 1 Samuel 21.10-15 we read about David fleeing to King Achish of Gath hoping to find safety there. However, he finds that his reputation has preceded him. The servants of Achish recognise him and say, ‘Is this not David the king of the land? Did they not sing to one another of him in dances, “Saul has killed his thousands, and David his tens of thousands”?’ As a result, David was afraid that King Achish would also feel threatened by his presence in Gath or let Saul know where David was.

So, he changed his behaviour before them; he pretended to be mad when in their presence. He scratched marks on the doors of the gate, and let his spittle run down his beard. Achish said to his servants, ‘Look, you see the man is mad; why then have you brought him to me? Do I lack madmen, that you have brought this fellow to play the madman in my presence? Shall this fellow come into my house?’ Achish then drives him out of Gath, and he is able to go away safely.

In Psalm 34, the Psalmist attributes David’s safety to God’s care. Looking back, the Psalmist says:

“I sought the Lord, and he answered me,
and delivered me from all my fears.
Look to him, and be radiant;
so your faces shall never be ashamed.
This poor soul cried, and was heard by the Lord,
and was saved from every trouble.
The angel of the Lord encamps
around those who fear him, and delivers them.”

As a result, the Psalmist encourages us to:

“taste and see that the Lord is good;
happy are those who take refuge in him.
 O fear the Lord, you his holy ones,
for those who fear him have no want.”

If we taste and see the goodness of the Lord know and learn the fear (or awe) of the Lord, then, when we are in trouble as David was, we will also seek the Lord and see him answer us delivering us from all our fears. As with David when he feigned madness, this may involve using our natural creativity to find an unusual way out of the difficulties in which we find ourselves.

So, let us do what the Psalmist commends and learn the fear of the Lord so that we will “bless the Lord at all times”, having his praise continually in our mouths. 

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After the Fire - The Stranger.

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. 

Meaning, significance, shape and purpose

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

Abraham Maslow was an American psychologist who is best known for creating a hierarchy of needs. ‘This is a theory of psychological health predicated on fulfilling innate human needs in priority, culminating in self-actualization.’ At the bottom of the hierarchy are the basic needs of human beings; needs for food, water, sleep and sex. Maslow’s model works as a hierarchy because a pressing need must be mostly satisfied before someone will give their attention to the next highest need, which includes our need for our lives to be given meaning and significance.

The stories of the feeding of the four thousand and the five thousand (Matthew 15:29-37) are stories of Jesus meeting the basic needs of the people with him but are also stories about that action having a deeper level of meaning and significance.

The people who were with Jesus had been with him in the wilderness for three days without any significant supplies of food. While some may have brought small supplies of food with them, in essence they had been fasting for much of the time Jesus had been teaching them and, for those of you who have visited the Holy Land, you will know that the Wilderness is unforgiving terrain in which to be without sustenance.

Jesus is concerned for these people and, out of compassion, meets their basic need for food in that testing environment but, just as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs suggests that once our basic needs have been met then our needs for meaning and significance come into play, Jesus’ actions here also have a deeper level of meaning, if we and they are alert to it.

We can see this if we think for a moment about the outline of this story and the extent to which it reminds us of another story. A group of Israelites are in the wilderness and are hungry because they have too little to eat. In response God provides them with bread to eat. That is the outline of the feeding of the four thousand but it is also, in essence, the story of God providing manna in the wilderness to the Israelites when Moses led them from Egypt to the Promised Land. The similarity is deliberate, whether on the part of Jesus or Mark, because through this action Jesus is seen as the new Moses for the people of Israel.

Following the parallels between these two stories through means that the people of Israel are to be seen as being in slavery once again – whether that meant the political oppression of their Roman conquerors or, as St Paul suggests, under the bondage of sin. The Exodus – the salvation of the people of Israel - began with the death of firstborn sons and, in the story of Jesus, our salvation comes through the death of God’s only Son. Jesus leads his people through water – in the original Exodus that was the path through the Red Sea, but, for Jesus’ followers, it is the rite of baptism. They go on a journey through the wilderness – where, as we have seen, they are fed and provided for – and end their journey when they enter the Promised Land – which Jesus spoke about as being the kingdom of God that he initiated but which is still to come in full.

The parallels are plenteous and very close as the people of Jesus’ day were intended to view him as the new Moses. At this deeper level of meaning and significance it is possible, from this one action, to understand the whole of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection.

God is also at work in our lives to bring and to reveal meaning, purpose, shape and significance to our lives too, if we are alert to this deeper level of life and our not solely focused on the meeting of our basic needs. We all have a need and a desire for there to be more to our lives than simply the survival of the fittest; the scramble to meet our basic needs. As Maslow’s hierarchy of needs recognises, when we are in genuine need and poverty, it is very difficult to think about anything else other than survival. But, when we are in the fortunate position of having our basic needs met, we have the time and space and inclination to look around us to see the way in which God can bring meaning, significance and purpose into our lives; with that purpose including the development of a compassion, like that of Jesus, which sees the needs of those whose basic needs are not being met and responds to that by sharing at least some of what we have.

Your life is not simply about having enough to survive; the meeting of your basic needs. God wants you to see a deeper level of meaning, significance, shape and purpose to your life. Are you open to see the meaning and significance that he brings or does a focus of getting prevent you from seeing and receiving what he is already giving?

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Neal Morse - The Temple Of The Living God.

God with us like never before

Here's the sermon I shared at St Andrew’s Wickford yesterday:

“If it had not been the Lord who was on our side … then the flood would have swept us away, the torrent would have gone over us; then over us would have gone the raging waters” (Psalm 124). This is the Gospel in a nutshell.

To illustrate that statement, I want to share a story of one church in the pandemic. During the pandemic, I was at St Martin-in-the-Fields where, lockdown stopped our commercial activities overnight deleting two-thirds of the congregation’s income meaning that we had to shed three-quarters of our commercial and ministry staff. It was a devastating, depleting and distressing experience. Yet online, the congregation, its public ministry, and its music have found a reach, purpose, and dynamism like never before. All was made new. The musicians recorded music, weekly, for 4,000 churches across the land. HeartEdge seminars became a hub for innovation and evaluation. The Being With course drew participation from people far and wide, a good many of whom had been unable to attend services in a building before lockdown. Our national homeless charity had never been more in demand, or attracted more support, and worked fervidly to help people find secure accommodation.

Beautiful things happened – too many to recount - but it was also a complete nightmare, in which plans made and an institution crafted over generations were torn apart in ways a raging inferno couldn’t have achieved. And yet, like a ram in a thicket, something was always provided, or emerged, or suddenly changed. We were guided through the storm of these intense, distressing, but far from godless months, by some initial words from our Vicar, Sam Wells, who said:

“We come to church each Sunday, we pray and read our Bibles through the week, to prepare ourselves. Jesus grew up in Nazareth, travelled around Galilee to prepare himself for Jerusalem. In Jerusalem people discovered who he truly was, and what his words and actions really entailed. We’ve spent decades, many of us, preparing we knew not what for. Well, now we know. This is the moment when the world finds out whether being a Christian makes any difference or not.

In Britain, we say pray for a sunny day, but take an umbrella. I’m not saying in the face of the virus we don’t take sensible steps. We must follow public health advice. We do so not because others are a danger to us, but because we might, directly or indirectly, be a danger to them. We’re a community defined not by fear but by trust, not by scarcity but by plenty, not by anxiety but by communion. It’s time to show our true colours.

This is the moment to find ways to overcome isolation that don’t involve touch. We have this opportunity to explore the hinterland of the word with, that doesn’t always involve physical presence, but still means solidarity and kindness, generosity and love. We will limit our contact to protect the most vulnerable, but we still need to proclaim that there’s something more infectious than coronavirus – and that’s joy and peace, faithfulness and gentleness.

It was in its most bewildered hour that Israel in exile found who God truly was. This is our chance to discover what God being with us really means. None of us would for a moment have wished this crisis on anybody, let alone the whole world. But our faith teaches us that we only get to see resurrection through crucifixion; that we see God most clearly in our darkest hour.

Remember what Isaiah tells us. You shall cross the barren desert; but you shall not die of thirst. You shall wander far in safety – though you do not know the way. If you pass through raging waters in the sea, you shall not drown. If you walk amid the burning flames, you shall not be harmed. If you stand before the power of hell and death is at your side, know that I am with you through it all. Be not afraid, says our God. I am with you like never before.

This is our faith.”

In a sermon from that same time, Sam also said: “God doesn’t spare us from the fire. God doesn’t rescue us from the fire … God is with us in the fire. ‘Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; for you are with me.’ ‘When you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.’ That’s the gospel …

Jesus isn’t spared the cross. Jesus isn’t rescued from the cross. Jesus is with God on the cross. The bonds of the Trinity are stretched to the limit; but not ultimately, broken. When we see the cross we see that God is with us, however, whatever, wherever … forever. This is our faith.”

As a result, we can say with the Psalmist: “If it had not been the Lord who was on our side … then the flood would have swept us away, the torrent would have gone over us; then over us would have gone the raging waters.” May we know that truth in whatever difficulty we face currently. Amen.

(Adapted from 'Finding Abundance in Scarcity')

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St Martin's Voices - All And More.

The Christ that has come and the kingdom yet to come

Last week I changed my sermon for Advent Sunday at St Martin-in-the-Fields at the last minute in order to make connections with the theme of the Radio 4 Christmas Appeal for St Martin-in-the-Fields. This is the sermon that I would have preached had I not made that last minute change:

As a teenager I listened repeatedly to a haunting song by Larry Norman based on today’s Gospel reading. It is called ‘I wish we’d all been ready’ and the second verse includes these lines:

‘A man and wife asleep in bed
She hears a noise and turns her head he's gone
I wish we’d all been ready
Two men walking up a hill
One disappears and ones left standing still
I wish we’d all been ready
There's no time to change your mind
The son has come and you've been left behind’

These images, from our Gospel reading (Matthew 24.36-44), of people being suddenly separated are taken from a block of teaching given by Jesus during his final week in Jerusalem that have become known as his eschatological sermon. This sermon, when combined with the Book of Revelation, has generated a huge amount of speculation about the where, when and how of Jesus’ second coming.

Norman’s song was first released in 1969 and was followed in 1970 by the best-selling book ‘The Late Great Planet Earth’ by Hal Lindsey. Both were based on the understanding that Jesus’ second coming was imminent and would involve a rapture with Christians being caught up to meet the coming Christ in the sky and non-Christians left behind. Lindsey’s book was influential – a best-seller – and, for a rock fan like me, was encountered again in 1979 when Bob Dylan released ‘Slow Train Coming,’ his first album after his conversion to Christianity. Dylan studied Lindsey’s book in the Bible classes he attended at the Vineyard Church. The slow train coming of his title was Christ’s second coming and the final song on the album was called ‘When He Returns’. 1979 was also the year in which a film of ‘The Late Great Planet Earth’ was released.

These ideas appealed as a way of understanding current events, as Lindsey tried to fit political decisions and actions to biblical prophecies, and also as a way of emphasising the urgency of making decisions about salvation. If Christ’s second coming and the end of time were just around the corner then decisions about our eternal future should not be postponed. These were appealing ideas to a newly fired up Christian teenager like me.

I now see these dispensationalist approaches to the second coming as constituting an instrumental understanding of salvation. In the same way as the fires of hell have been used as a scare tactic to frighten us into the kingdom of God, so too with the threat of being left behind in the rapture. These understandings of the second coming lead us to view salvation as a transaction that is about our own survival and not about knowing God for God's own sake. They also promise to lift us up out of this world in order that we leave it and those who are unsaved behind. In other words, as Larry Norman expressed it in the title of one album on which ‘I wish we’d all been ready’ appeared, we’re only visiting this planet.

Yet Jesus was most probably talking in this passage, and in the rest of his eschatological sermon, about this-world events that were actually in the near future for the disciples. While the disciples themselves, on the basis of what they understood Jesus to have said, expected his second coming within their lifetime, not at some point in the far distant future.

In my view, as N.T. Wright has argued, Jesus’ eschatological sermon was not actually about the end of the world but rather about the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem which occurred in AD70. The destruction of the Temple by the Romans was a time of sudden exile and separation, persecution and loss, as graphically described in today's Gospel reading and as it affected the majority of Jesus’ disciples. There was a sudden attack that resulted in some who were in Jerusalem at the time dying and others separating and fleeing the city; just the kind of events which are described in today’s Gospel reading.

The ultimate proof that a person was a prophet was understood, at the time, as being found in the extent to which their prophecies came about. So, when the destruction of the Temple occurred in AD70, it was proof to Jesus’ disciples that Jesus was a true prophet. This was, for them, the vindication of Christ; he was not a failed Messiah that had been killed on a cross, instead events had proved him to be a true prophet. That meant all he had said about being God’s Son could also be trusted and believed. The destruction of the Temple was, therefore, also a sudden sign of Jesus vindicated, revealed and come again as the Son of Man, the Messiah, God’s Son.

In addition, we heard last Sunday in the reading from Ephesians 1.15-23 and in Sally Hitchiner’s sermon that Jesus is the head or source of the Church and we are also told, particularly in Paul’s letters, that the Church is the Body of Christ. On that basis, I think, we can then understand Christ to have returned within the lifetime of his disciples when his Spirit filled them on the Day of Pentecost and the Church was born. The Spirit brings Christ to the Church and the Church becomes Christ for the world. So, as Christ’s renewed Body on earth, the Church became, in the words of Teresa of Avila, the hands and feet of Christ, with which he walks to do good and through which he blesses all the world.

These understandings would then seem to give us two ways in which Christ returned to the disciples within their own lifetime. First, when he filled them with his Spirit giving birth to the Church as the Body of Christ in the world, and, second, when he, and his teachings, were vindicated and proved to be true by the destruction of the Temple in AD70.

The word ‘Advent’ is derived from the Latin word adventus, meaning ‘coming’. Advent has traditionally been observed as a time of preparation for both the celebration of the first coming of Jesus at Christmas and as a time of prayer for the return of Jesus at the Second Coming. It is this second aspect to Advent which results in Jesus’ eschatological sermon featuring heavily in the readings during this season. Advent asks us to reflect on the nature of Jesus’ first and second comings and on how we are to live in the time in between. But, if Christ has already returned, as I am suggesting, what is still to come?

The answer I would give is that the kingdom of heaven is still to come. The Church, although it is the Body of Christ, is not the kingdom of God. The Church only creates signs of the coming kingdom. It was the kingdom of God that was at the heart of Jesus’ teaching. It was the kingdom of God that was demonstrated to us through his birth, life, death and resurrection. Jesus’ incarnation, his first coming, introduced the kingdom of God into the world. Christ's Spirit now teaches us about him, so we can live like him and thereby show others what the kingdom of God looks like. As his Body animated by the Spirit, Jesus is with us enabling the Church to continue to create signs of the kingdom that is to come. However, as it is still to come, it is the kingdom, not Christ, for which we now wait. This is why we are taught to pray for the kingdom to come on earth as in heaven. Rather than looking for ways to escape this world through a second coming and rapture at the end of time, instead we look to see how we can bless the world as Christ’s Body in the here and now.

With this understanding of the second coming we can then see Christianity as an alternative society, overlapping and sharing space with regular society, but living in a different time – that’s to say, modelling God’s future in our present. As Sam Wells has said: ‘It’s not enough to cherish the scriptures, embody the sacraments, set time aside for prayer, and shape disciples’ character in the ways of truth, if such practices simply withdraw disciples for select periods, uncritically then to return them after a brief pause to a world struggling with inequality, identity, and purpose. The church must also model what the kingdom of God (its term for the alternative society, its language of God’s future now) means and entails in visible and tangible form.’

I want to suggest, then, that these are the comings we remember and on which we reflect in Advent. As a result, to reflect in Advent is to reflect on the whole of salvation history from Christ's first coming to be God with us to the coming of his Spirit at Pentecost that we might become his Body to our future with God in a kingdom where there is no fear and no transactions, only love. Our Advent reflections here this year enable us to focus on both these comings. Inspired to Follow focuses on Christ's first coming, his incarnation, by looking at significant characters in the story of his conception and birth. Our Advent booklet then focuses our thoughts more on the coming kingdom through our prayer for light to come in our present darkness.

Our waiting for the coming kingdom means that there is always more to come where God is concerned. Another singer-songwriter, Carolyn Ahrends, uses a memory of herself as a three feet tall four year old trying to touch the stars and the cookie jar with both being out of reach, as an image of heaven. She writes of a yearning deep within telling us there's more to come:

‘So when we taste of the divine
It leaves us hungry every time
For one more taste of what awaits
When heaven's gates are reached.’

As we reach for the future this Advent, reaching for what is yet to come and therefore just beyond our grasp, may we realise that the something more which is yet to come is what Christ has already revealed, what we, as the Body of Christ, can sign, and what the coming kingdom of heaven is for.

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Carolyn Ahrends - Reaching.

Holy Week and Easter at St Martin-in-the-Fields

This Sunday marks the beginning of Holy Week with, at St Martin-in-the-Fields, a Palm Sunday procession, led by a donkey, with the Regent Hall Salvation Army Band and the Choir of St Martin-in-the-Fields, and our Eucharist includes the dramatization of the Passion Gospel, led by members of the St Martin’s community.The procession begins as we gather behind Admiralty Arch at 9.45am. For those not joining the procession the service in church begins as usual at 10.00am.

At 5.00pm on Palm Sunday, ‘From Creation to Salvation’ is a powerful service of readings and music as we enter into Holy Week, telling the story of salvation, with the Choir of St Martin-in-the-Fields.

We welcome you to all of our services for Holy Week and Easter. Join with us as we follow the way of Christ through death to resurrection. Meditations on the Stations of the Cross feature on Monday and there will be a Eucharist on Tuesday. Both are in the Dick Sheppard Chapel. Alternative Stations of the Cross, 6.00pm on 15 April will include pictures, poems and prayers that enable us to follow Jesus on his journey to the cross reflecting both on the significance and the pain of that journey as we do so. The poems are by Jonathan Evens and the pictures by Henry Shelton.

Bread for the World on Wednesday evening concludes the Confessions of Augustine with Sam Wells preaching and presiding. Maundy Thursday Foot Washing and Institution of the Eucharist starts at 6.30pm with Vigil until 10pm. Good Friday includes an All Age Service at 10am and The Three Hours, with reflections by Guli Francis-Dehqani, Bishop of Loughborough at 12-3pm, followed by hot cross buns and coffee in St Martin's Hall.



The Rt Revd Guli Francis-Dehqani is the preacher in our Good Friday Three Hours service of reflections on the passion of Christ. Her theme is ‘A Cry from the Cross for a Lost Homeland.’ With music from the Choir of St Martin-in-the-Fields. Bishop Francis-Dehqani comes originally from Iran. Since 2017 she has served the Church of England as the Bishop of Loughborough and has a particular interest in work related to diverse cultures and ethnic minority communities within the Diocese.

Easter Sunday begins with the Vigil and First Eucharist of Easter, with the lighting of the new fire on the Portico at 5.30am. It will be followed by Easter Breakfast, Parish Eucharist at 10.00am. 

Find out more about services during Holy Week and Easter here.

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Will Todd - Sabat Mater.

Imaging the Story: Rediscovering the visual and poetic contours of salvation

Imaging the Story: Rediscovering the visual and poetic contours of salvation aims to create imaginative encounters with the salvation story by bringing images and poetry into conversation with the Bible in ways that spark creativity in readers or course participants.

In my review of the book for Church Times, I say:

'This is a book full of ideas, theological and artistic. The wealth of material within its pages is structured in terms of content through ten themes that take us from Creation to Consummation, while exploration of each theme is structured in terms of reading (of the biblical texts), responding (questions using “visuo divina”), reflecting (theological reflection with images and poetry), and making (artistic exercises leading to an exhibition).'

A complementary resource to Imaging the Story is Inspired to Follow: Art and the Bible Story, a free resource to help people explore the Christian faith, using paintings and Biblical story as the starting points which has been created by St Martin-in-the-Fields in partnership with the National Gallery.

There’s an opportunity to experience one of the sessions of Inspired to Follow and to learn how to make the most of the resource at a short workshop on Monday 5 February. There’s no substitute to experiencing a session led by the course developer.

The workshop runs from 2.30-4.30pm at St Martin-in-the-Fields. It will be led by Alastair McKay, who developed the resource. Please aim to arrive at 2.15pm, for a hot drink before we start.

The workshop is being offered by the HeartEdge network, and is free to HeartEdge members. If you’re not yet a member of the Network, the cost is £10 per person. We are restricted to 24 participants, so do book soon.

If you’d like to attend the workshop, please contact me at jonathan.evens@smitf.org or phone 020 7766 1127.

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The Band - When I Paint My Masterpiece.

East London Three Faiths Forum Tour of the Holy Land: Day 2

Here is a meditation which I wrote while preparing for the East London Three Faiths Forum Tour of the Holy Land. The starting point for the meditation was the title of a song on the latest album by Deacon Blue:

Bethlehem begins.
Here, human hands hold God for the first time.
Here, God is fed from a human breast for the first time.
Here, God is struck on the back,
takes his first breath, utters his first cry.
Here, heaven and earth are rejoined.
Here, humanity is taken into the Godhead.
Here, God becomes vulnerable.
Here, God experiences created life.
Here, God enters his creation.
Here, God moves into our neighbourhood,
Becomes one with human beings.

In a place of forced migration,
Where no room could be found
For a pregnant woman
whose baby was not the child of her betrothed,
In less than ideal circumstances
Here begins peace on earth
Goodwill to all.
Salvation is birthed and named
The King of the Jews is sought and found,
The Messiah is recognised and praised.

Here the dividing wall
Between Jew and Gentile,
Male and female, slave and free,
Begins to be removed.
Here begins salvation, redemption,
Restoration for one and all.
Reconciliation between
the human and divine.

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Deacon Blue - Bethlehem Begins.

Pole Position article

Artway have just published an article I have written about Pole Position, an exhibition celebrating the work of Polish artists living and working in the UK throughout the 20th century. The article ends by focusing on Marian Bohusz-Szysko's Christ Crowned with Thorns: "Colour here is both violent and vibrant, as befits a world-changing event which is both suffering and salvation."

Bohusz-Szysko's is a story which deserves retelling, his work retains its power and vision and his contribution to the image and reality of hospices as landscaped, art-filled, home-like havens remains a significant contribution to have made not just to art but healthcare. ArtWay also have an earlier piece from me written following a visit to St Christopher's Hospice, the major collection of Bohusz-Szysko's work in the UK.

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Arnold Schoenberg - Moses Und Aron.

Spiritual Life: Resurrection

Here is my Spiritual Life column for this week's Ilford Recorder:

Death AND resurrection. Suffering AND salvation. This is the journey which Christians make, following in the footsteps of Jesus, as we travel through Lent and Easter.

While it is a journey which in no way minimises the reality and pain of suffering and bereavement, it is ultimately a journey of hope. One which leads to new life, where we proclaim that Jesus is alive and death is no longer the end.

As a result, to go on this journey, builds resilience and endurance in those who travel this way. As we look at our lives, the difficulties and challenges we might face, our Christian faith tells us that this is not the end instead change and new life are possible; indeed, that they will come.

The story of Christ’s death and resurrection takes us forward into a new life. The reality of his presence with us on the way helps us endure and persevere. The combination of the two brings hope for the future. Whatever we may experience in the here and now, ultimately Love wins.   

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The Danielson Famile - Lord's Rest.

Howson does not shy away from the role that Christianity plays in his life and work

It will be interesting to see what the New York art scene makes of the upfront focus on Peter Howson's Christian faith in the press notice for his forthcoming Redemption exhibition at Flowers New York:
"His paintings are not academic or didactic in the style of history painting, but the sublimation of revelatory personal narratives. Religious overtures are proceeded by confession, as intimate details of the artist’s familial and spiritual relationships punctuate the parables of his urban imagination.

Howson does not shy away from the role that Christianity plays in his life and work. Through this spiritual guidance the artist emerged from inner crisis. The dramatic and dynamic paintings of Hades, which make up the majority of this exhibition, depict the struggle to find hope in the dark recesses of existence. They reflect the suffering of a modern war-torn and technologically obsessed world, yet a sense of salvation can be found within. Paying homage to Bosch and Brueghel, Howson crowds his canvases with figures of various shapes and sizes, including many familiar echoes from his previous works, writhing in agony and praying for redemption. This deliverance often appears as a radiant figure symbolizing the painter’s daughter Lucie, another major factor in his road to recovery. In the painting Outcast Howson has used impastos to render a tranquil Christ, surrounded by a group of pariahs in search of atonement. This image could be deemed disturbing for many, however as with a good deal of Howson’s paintings there is a question here as to whom is the real outsider."

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Deacon Blue - Bethlehem's Gate.

Ready, steady, slow

Ready, steady, slow. Hit the ground kneeling. Do nothing to change your life. Discovering what happens when you stop. These are all titles or phrases from publications by our Bishop, Stephen Cottrell, in which he asks questions such as, when was the last time you had a real day off? Ditched the 'to do' lists? Switched off the phone? Had a lie-in? Sat in the bath until the water went cold?

Most of us live at break-neck speed. Busy lives - work, family, friends, endless tasks - leave us with little time to sleep, never mind stopping and reflecting. We urgently need to stop imagining everything is so urgent. We need to learn to slow down, Bishop Stephen writes, and stop ... and breathe. I could certainly do with taking that message on board, although it is easier said than done. Even Bishops, given their busy schedules, could benefit from the practice and not just the theory!

August is one point in the year when it may seem slightly easier to stop and reflect, although school holidays and holidays per se are not without their stresses and strains. What a good holiday should do, however, is take us out of our usual routine and away from the constant notification of new tasks that characterizes our working lives. Even this is becoming more difficult to achieve as mobiles and the internet enable us to be contacted virtually wherever we happen to be.

Isaiah 30.15 - "In returning and rest you shall be saved" – is one passage that Bishop Stephen quotes. What kind of rest will you experience this summer and will it save you? The letter to the Hebrews suggests that we are made for rest; that the purpose of salvation is to enter into the experience that God had of resting on the seventh day: “… there still remains for God’s people a rest like God’s resting on the seventh day. For those who receive that rest which God promised will rest from their own work, just as God rested from his. Let us, then, do our best to receive that rest, so that no one of us will fail …” (Hebrews 4. 9-11)

Our summer breaks can be pointers to or reminders of this greater (eternal) rest that we can experience in God, perhaps as we trust him more fully with our lives or ultimately as we enter eternity. In an article for our parish magazine, I've asked the folk at St John's Seven Kings to reflect on how we can be saved by rest as they (hopefully) take some kind of well-earned summer break? Although that is the pot calling the kettle black, I will try to as well. It may even be that we can learn to manage our busyness and business differently in future as a result.

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The Kinks - Sunny Afternoon.

Xpedition Force (2)

Can you think of a time when you were simply bursting with good news that you had to tell someone else about? That is how the disciples after Jesus was raised from death and after they had been filled with Holy Spirit. There’s a song that by Cat Stevens which says:

“Oh, I can’t keep it in, I’ve gotta let it out,
I’ve got to show the world, world’s got to see,
see all the love, love that’s in me.”

Cat Stevens was singing about his love for another person rather than love for God but the idea is exactly the same. Something had happened to the disciples that was so wonderful that they couldn’t have kept it in even if they’d tried. They had to tell the world and the world had to see the love that God had shown them through Jesus’ death on the cross.

That’s also what God wants for us too. Jesus wants us all to be his disciples, to tell others about him and live the way he told us. You can’t see him but we know he’s near us, giving us strength and courage to talk to others about him. It doesn’t matter if we haven’t know him long or don’t understand everything he did.

To quote another song, this time by Larry Norman:

“When you know a pretty story
you don't let it go unsaid
you tell it to your children
as you tuck them into bed
and when you know a wonderful secret
you tell it to your friends
because a lifetime filled with happiness
is like a street that never ends

Sing that sweet sweet song of salvation
and let your laughter fill the air
sing that sweet sweet song of salvation
and tell the people everywhere
sing that sweet sweet song of salvation
to every man and every nation
sing that sweet sweet song of salvation
and let the people know that Jesus cares.”

When we truly know Jesus’ love and care for us then we are so joyful that the telling of others just overflows from our lives. The key is to know that love deeply, to allow Jesus’ love to flood over us and fill us with his joy and then the telling of what has happened to us comes as naturally as when we share the good news of our love for another person or the birth of our children or any other piece of good news that we simply can’t hold back and simply must share with others.

So let us pray that we will know more of Jesus’ love in our lives today:

Lord Jesus, fill us with an ever deepening awareness of the depth of you love for us. Help to truly appreciate in the very depths of our beings what it meant for you to give your life that we might live. May our lives overflow with your love that the world may see what you have done in us and for us. Amen.

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Larry Norman - Sweet Sweet Song of Salvation.