The upside-down kingdom

Here's the reflection that I shared in today's Eucharist at St Andrew's Wickford:

In 1997 guests at Spring Harvest, an annual teaching and worship event, created a set of alternative beatitudes, which read as follows:

Blessed are the wealthy, because there is the Dow Jones index. 

Blessed are those who enjoy a good party, for they will drown their sorrows.
Blessed are the assertive, for they will get to the top of their career.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after chemical stimulation, for designer drugs are more widely available with every passing year.
Blessed are the ruthless, because no one will get in their way.
Blessed are the cold of heart, for they won’t get hurt when relationships break down.
Blessed are those who are involved in the arms trade, for theirs are the best deals in developing nations.
Blessed are the directors of privatised utilities, for theirs are the fat cat bonuses.

(created by Spring Harvest guests, 1997, compiled by Rob Warner)

That was a set of beatitudes for our times, a set of beatitudes which are the complete reverse of those which Jesus gave us (Luke 6.20-26). Wealth replacing poverty, partying replacing mourning, assertion replacing meekness. That is the way of the world. That is the way we are told to live today. It is the way of selfishness not the way of saintliness and Jesus calls us to something different. He calls to live as saints.

Jesus’ radical heartbeat can be sensed in every word of the Sermon on the Mount. The core of the sermon is a call for God’s people to be entirely different. One writer identifies the key text of the sermon to be Matthew 6: 8, “Do not be like them.” Like lights set on stands (Matthew 5:14), like flavourful salt (Matthew 5:13) or like saints, the children of God are not to take their cue from the people around them but from God, and to be known by their radical lifestyle.

Some of the greatest examples of the call to be different are found in the Beatitudes. The Beatitudes give us a sense of the radical kingdom lifestyle that Jesus calls us to. It is as if Jesus has crept into the window display of life and changed the price tags. It is all upside down. In a world where ‘success’ and ‘self-sufficiency’ are applauded, and ‘the beautiful people’ are ambitious, accomplished and wealthy, Jesus teaches: “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” Our culture encourages us to discard guilt and the sorrow that accompanies pangs of conscience. Happiness is everything, entertainment is king but Jesus teaches: “Blessed are those who mourn.” In our competitive world, self-help seminars teach assertiveness and power is to be sought and used but Jesus teaches “Blessed are the meek.”

Donald Kraybill writing about this upside down kingdom says: “Jesus startles us … good guys turn out to be bad guys. Those we expect to receive the reward get a spanking instead. Those who think they are headed for heaven land in hell. Paradox, irony and surprise permeate the teachings of Jesus. They flip our expectations upside down. The least are the greatest. The immoral receive forgiveness and blessing. Adults become like children. The religious miss the heavenly banquet. The pious receive curses. Things aren’t like we think they should be. We’re baffled and perplexed. Amazed we step back. Should we laugh or should we cry? Again and again, turning our world upside down, the kingdom surprises us.”

The difference that Jesus highlights, David Oliver and Howard Snyder argue, is between Church people and Kingdom people. Kingdom people seek first the kingdom of God and its justice. Church people often put church work above work, above concerns of justice, mercy and truth. In the church business people are concerned with church activities, religious behaviour and spiritual things. In the kingdom business, people are concerned with kingdom activities, all human behaviour and everything which God has made, visible and invisible. Church people don’t usually like parties, alcohol or bad people. The King of the kingdom liked all three. When Christians put the church ahead of the kingdom, they settle for meetings and spend increasing amounts of time with the same people. When they catch a vision of the kingdom of God, their sight shifts to the poor, the orphan, the widow, the refugee, the wretched of the earth, and to God’s people. They also see with real insight and fresh vision the stressed, the fearful, the hopeless at work and both their heart and time reach out. If the church has one great need, it is this – to be set free, for the kingdom of God, to be set free to become relevant exactly as God intended.

We are called to be kingdom people, called to be saints who act out the upside-down values of the kingdom in all of our life and work. God calls us to turn our backs on the kingdoms of this world and simply maintaining the churches and piety of this world and to embrace an upside-down home. How will we respond?

Based on King of the Hill, Spring Harvest 2001 Study Guide by Jeff Lucas

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Delerious? - Love Will Find A Way.

Visual Arts and HeartEdge (2)

 

HeartEdge is programming some excellent sessions on the visual arts over the next few weeks:

Art and the Liturgical Year: Bringing the Church Kalendar to Life
Monday, April 26th, 3:00pm EDT

Please register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/149461829355.

The visual arts have the power to change our perceptions and even transport us to unfamiliar places. Think about how you feel when you sit quietly and contemplate a stained-glass window or wander the halls of an art museum. Art offers us opportunities to transform our vision and perspective and to step into someone else’s shoes and community.

Imagine the way art influences our thinking about our faith - a painting in an English cathedral will likely bring a much different perspective of Jesus than one portrayed in a Coptic icon. In viewing each, we expand our vision of what our faith means and how different cultures express fundamental truths. Art is a means to stir our imagination and bring fresh meaning to our faith.

During this workshop, our panel will discuss engaging artists with parishes and congregations to explore art in the context of the Church calendar. We’ll also look at how our liturgical year can be a source of inspiration for artists and explore how artists can use their talents to open up our understandings of the faith in new ways.

Attendees will leave with tangible approaches to using visual arts in conjunction with scripture and our Church calendar to bring concepts from the liturgical year to life for congregations. Learn how exhibitions and installations can amplify the message of seasons like Advent or Lent and hear how this work benefits both artists and congregations. This workshop is presented by the CEEP Network in partnership with the HeartEdge Network and CARAVAN.

Panelists include:

• Janet Broderick - Rector, All Saints Beverly Hills; Beverly Hills, California
• Paul-Gordon Chandler - Bishop, Diocese of Wyoming; Jackson Hole, Wyoming (moderator)
• Catriona Laing - Chaplain, St. Martha & St. Mary’s Anglican Church Leuven; Associate Chaplain, Holy Trinity Brussels; Brussels, Belgium
• Ben Quash - Professor, Christianity and the Arts & Director, Center for Arts and the Sacred, King’s College London; Director, Visual Commentary on Scripture Project; London, United Kingdom
• Aaron Rosen - Professor, Religion and Visual Culture; Director, Henry Luce III Center for the Arts and Religion, Wesley Theological Seminary; Co-founder, Stations of the Cross Public Art Project; Washington, D.C.

Introducing the Visual Commentary on Scripture

Thu, 29 April 2021, 14:00 – 15:30 BST. Register for a Zoom invite at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/introducing-the-visual-commentary-on-scripture-tickets-148377347641.

The Visual Commentary on Scripture, TheVCS.org, is the first online project to introduce visitors to the entirety of Christian Scripture in the company of art and artists.

Celebrated with a launch event in November 2018 at Tate Modern, TheVCS.org seeks to connect the worlds of art and religion as a ground-breaking resource for scholars, educators, churches and interested readers looking for insightful, original explorations of art and the Bible.

In this talk, Canon Ben Quash, the project’s director, will share some of the challenges and discoveries he has encountered so far in this ambitious undertaking.

Ben Quash came to King’s College London as its first Professor of Christianity and the Arts in 2007. Prior to that, he was a Fellow of Fitzwilliam College and then of Peterhouse, Cambridge, and lecturer in the Faculty of Divinity in the University of Cambridge. He is fascinated by how the arts can renew people’s engagement with the Bible and Christian tradition, and is directing a major 7-year project to create an online Visual Commentary on Scripture. He runs an MA in Christianity and the Arts in association with the National Gallery, London, and broadcasts frequently on BBC radio. He is a Trustee of Art and Christianity Enquiry, and Canon Theologian of both Coventry and Bradford Cathedrals.

His publications include Abiding: The Archbishop of Canterbury’s Lent Book 2013 (Bloomsbury, 2012) and Found Theology: History, Imagination and the Holy Spirit (T&T Clark, 2014), and he has written catalogue essays for exhibitions at Ben Uri Gallery, London, the Inigo Rooms in Somerset House, and the Vatican Pavilion at the Venice Biennale 2015.


Inspired to Follow: Art and the Bible Story

‘Inspired to Follow: Art and the Bible Story’ helps people explore the Christian faith, using paintings and Biblical story as the starting points. The course uses fine art paintings in the National Gallery’s collection as a springboard for exploring questions of faith.

Register for a Zoom invitation at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/inspired-to-follow-art-and-the-bible-story-tickets-148401610211.

• Sunday 2 May, Session 16: The Resurrection. Text: Luke 24:25-35. Image: ‘The Supper at Emmaus’, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, 1601, NG172.
• Sunday 9 May, Session 17: The Ascension. Text: Acts 1:1-12. Image: ‘The Incredulity of Saint Thomas’, Giovanni Battista Cima da Conegliano, about.1502-4, NG816.
• Sunday 16 May, Session 18: Pentecost. Text: Acts 2:1-39 (extracts). Image: ‘Pentecost’, Giotto and Workshop, about.1310-18, NG5360.
• Sunday 23 May, Session 19: Death of Stephen. Text: Acts 6:8 – 7:60 (extracts). Image: ‘The Martyrdom of Saint Stephen’, Possibly by Antonio Carracci, about1610, NG77.
• Sunday 30 May, Session 20: Saint Peter. Text: Acts 10:30-48. Image: ‘Christ appearing to Saint Peter on the Appian Way (Domine, Quo Vadis?)’, Annibale Carracci, 1601-2, NG9.
• Sunday 6 June, Session 21: Saint Paul. Text: Acts 9:1-19. Image: ‘The Conversion of Saint Paul’, Karel Dujardin, 1662, NG6296.
• Sunday 13 June, Session 22: The New Jerusalem. Text: Revelation 21:1-5, 9-11, 22-27, & 22:1-5. Image: ‘Christ Glorified in the Court of Heaven’; central predella panel, probably by Fra Angelico, about 1423-4, NG663.1.

Navigating the Dark: A conversation between an artist and a theologian

Thu, 6 May 2021, 19:00 – 20:00 BST. Register for a Zoom invite at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/navigating-the-dark-tickets-148323582829.

Join us as artist Jake Lever is interviewed by Dr Paula Gooder, Chancellor of St Paul’s Cathedral, London.

Jake Lever is an artist who is interested in the power of visual art to draw us into an encounter with the sacred. He seeks to make work that invites a slowing down, a return to the liminal and the "real". During the pandemic, he has developed a new participatory project, making hundreds of tiny, gilded boats that people have sent by post as tokens of love, gratitude and solidarity to family and friends around the world. Website: www.leverarts.org.

Dr Paula Gooder is a writer and lecturer in Biblical Studies. Her research areas focus on the writings of Paul the Apostle, with a particular focus on 2 Corinthians and on Paul’s understanding of the Body. Her passion is to ignite people’s enthusiasm for reading the Bible today, by presenting the best of biblical scholarship in an accessible and interesting way. She is currently the Chancellor of St Paul’s Cathedral in London. Website: www.gooder.me.uk.

Art, Scripture and Contemporary Issues

In a short series, curators for the Visual Commentary on Scripture will speak about their experience of curating for VCS in order to assist in understanding more deeply the value and potential uses to which the VCS exhibitions can be put by churches.

The sessions will demonstrate a central premise of the VCS’s approach i.e. that the ‘world(s)’ of experience and action that the Scriptures describe can speak meaningfully to the ‘world(s)’ that present-day interpreters of the Scriptures continue to inhabit; and that the ‘world(s)’ to which art has responded in every epoch can speak meaningfully to both.

Session 1: Tue, 11 May 2021, 14:00 – 15:00 BST. Register for a Zoom invite at: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/art-scripture-and-contemporary-issues-tickets-149131206453?aff=erelpanelorg. In this session Deborah Lewer will speak about her experience of curating an exhibition on Proverbs 11 exploring why she made the choices and decisions she did in relation to both text and images. Proverbs 11 is part of the oldest collection of proverbs in the book. It opens with a statement about the righteousness of true and accurate measures: Yahweh abhors a ‘false balance’ and delights in ‘an accurate weight’. Balance, uprightness, constancy, steadfastness, and diligence are characteristic of the ordered worldview of the proverbs. When their equilibrium is upset—by wickedness, crookedness, cruelty, avarice, folly, and violence—the ensuing consequences are both just and inevitable. Debbie is Senior Lecturer in History of Art at the University of Glasgow. In addition to her specialism in 20th-century German art, she is interested in relationships between visual art, faith and theology. She works extensively as a retreat leader and with churches, clergy and ordinands to open up the potential of a wide spectrum of visual art in worship, theological reflection and in pastoral contexts.

Session 2: Thu, May 13, 2021, 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM BST. Register for a Zoom invite at: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/art-scripture-contemporary-issues-tickets-149683719033. In this session Caleb Froehlich will speak about his experience of curating the Cities of Refuge exhibition exploring why he made the choices and decisions he did in relation to both text and images. Numbers 35, Joshua 20, and Deuteronomy 4:41–43 record the appointment of six Levitical cities as ‘cities of refuge’ to ensure that if there was an accidental killing, the accused killer could flee to one of these cities and be protected from the menace of the ‘avenger of blood’. This session will consider the provisions of the biblical cities of refuge from the perspective of sanctuary-seekers. Caleb Froehlich is a researcher for the St Andrews Encyclopaedia of Theology and an editor for De Gruyter’s Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception. He holds a PhD in Religion, Art, and Culture from the University of St Andrews and has two principal areas of research: the intersection between religion and popular culture (with a focus on twentieth and twenty-first century religious history) and culturally engaged theology (with a focus on art and media as spiritual, religious, and/or theological in potentia).

Session 3: Tue, 25 May 2021, 14:00 – 15:00 BSThttps://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/art-scripture-contemporary-issues-tickets-148748287131?aff=erelpanelorg. In this session Susanna Snyder will speak about her experience of curating the Ruth 3-4 exhibition exploring why she made the choices and decisions she did in relation to both text and images. The brevity of the book of Ruth belies its significance. It offers an answer to some of the most important questions the people of Israel grapple with throughout the Old Testament. How are we to respond to refugees? How should we understand and inhabit boundaries? Susanna Snyder is Lecturer in Ethics and Theology at Ripon College, Cuddesdon, and an Associate of the Centre for Theology and Modern European Thought, University of Oxford.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

T Bone Burnett - Image.

Called to be saints

Here is my sermon from Thursday's Eucharist at St Stephen Walbrook (based on King of the Hill, Spring Harvest 2001 Study Guide by Jeff Lucas):

Blessed are the wealthy, because there is the Dow Jones index. Blessed are those who enjoy a good party, for they will drown their sorrows.
Blessed are the assertive, for they will get to the top of their career.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after chemical stimulation, for designer drugs are more widely available with every passing year.
Blessed are the ruthless, because no one will get in their way.
Blessed are the cold of heart, for they won’t get hurt when relationships break down.
Blessed are those who are involved in the arms trade, for theirs are the best deals in developing nations.
Blessed are the directors of privatised utilities, for theirs are the fat cat bonuses.

(created by Spring Harvest guests, 1997, compiled by Rob Warner)

That was a set of beatitudes for our times, a set of beatitudes which are the complete reverse of those which Jesus gave us. Wealth replacing poverty, partying replacing mourning, assertion replacing meekness. That is the way of the world. That is the way we are told to live today. It is the way of selfishness not the way of saintliness and Jesus calls us to something different. He calls to live as saints.Jesus’ radical heartbeat can be sensed in every word of the Sermon on the Mount. The core of the sermon is a call for God’s people to be entirely different. One writer identifies the key text of the sermon to be Matthew 6: 8, “Do not be like them.” Like lights set on stands (Matthew 5:14), like flavourful salt (Matthew 5:13) or like saints, the children of God are not to take their cue from the people around them but from God, and to be known by their radical lifestyle.

Some of the greatest examples of the call to be different are found in the Beatitudes. The Beatitudes give us a sense of the radical kingdom lifestyle that Jesus calls us to. It is as if Jesus has crept into the window display of life and changed the price tags. It is all upside down. In a world where ‘success’ and ‘self-sufficiency’ are applauded, and ‘the beautiful people’ are ambitious, accomplished and wealthy, Jesus teaches: “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” Our culture encourages us to discard guilt and the sorrow that accompanies pangs of conscience. Happiness is everything, entertainment is king but Jesus teaches: “Blessed are those who mourn.” In our competitive world, self-help seminars teach assertiveness and power is to be sought and used but Jesus teaches “Blessed are the meek.”

Donald Kraybill writing about this upside down kingdom says: “Jesus startles us … good guys turn out to be bad guys. Those we expect to receive the reward get a spanking instead. Those who think they are headed for heaven land in hell. Paradox, irony and surprise permeate the teachings of Jesus. They flip our expectations upside down. The least are the greatest. The immoral receive forgiveness and blessing. Adults become like children. The religious miss the heavenly banquet. The pious receive curses. Things aren’t like we think they should be. We’re baffled and perplexed. Amazed we step back. Should we laugh or should we cry? Again and again, turning our world upside down, the kingdom surprises us.”

The difference that Jesus highlights, David Oliver and Howard Snyder argue, is between Church people and Kingdom people. Kingdom people seek first the kingdom of God and its justice. Church people often put church work above work, above concerns of justice, mercy and truth. In the church business people are concerned with church activities, religious behaviour and spiritual things. In the kingdom business, people are concerned with kingdom activities, all human behaviour and everything which God has made, visible and invisible. Church people don’t usually like parties, alcohol or bad people. The King of the kingdom liked all three. When Christians put the church ahead of the kingdom, they settle for meetings and spend increasing amounts of time with the same people. When they catch a vision of the kingdom of God, their sight shifts to the poor, the orphan, the widow, the refugee, the wretched of the earth, and to God’s people. They also see with real insight and fresh vision the stressed, the fearful, the hopeless at work and both their heart and time reach out. If the church has one great need, it is this – to be set free, for the kingdom of God, to be set free to become relevant exactly as God intended.

We are called to be kingdom people, called to be saints who act out the upside-down values of the kingdom in all of our life and work. God calls us to turn our backs on the kingdoms of this world and simply maintaining the churches and piety of this world and to embrace an upside-down home. How will we respond?

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jon Foreman - All Of God's Children.

A Common Voice on Migration

London Churches Social Action hosted an extended day seminar on the topic of Migration at St Margaret's Barking on Monday. It was a timely opportunity for London Churches to develop some key "Common Voice" messages on this topic.

We considered how the church and UK society is being blessed/challenged by migration, who is weeping about, with and for migrants today, and what, from the treasures of our faith, we can draw on towards responding to issues related to migration. Many of the presentations can be heard by clicking here.

Contributors included Susanna Snyder, author of Asylum-Seeking, Migration and Church which addresses one of the most pressing issues confronting contemporary society, How are we to engage with migrants? Drawing on studies of church engagement with asylum seekers in the UK and critical immigration and refugee issues in North America, Snyder presents an extended theological reflection on both the issue of asylum-seeking and the fears of established populations surrounding immigration. This book outlines ways in which churches are currently supporting asylum seekers, encouraging closer engagement with people seen as 'other' and more thoughtful responses to newcomers.

Artist Revd Elizabeth Gray-King, sought to capture the day’s conversations in art form and shared her reflections with us. See Elizabeth's image from the day and read her reflections by clicking here: "We were reminded of the Tabernacle, the tent of God’s presence, erected wherever the people stopped to rest and worship; the two tents at the bottom of the cross show this stopping on journey, with the cross being the sign of the travelling God in Jesus. The cross also marks the reason why the good people of this seminar gathered for this discussion, Jesus having called us all to not only note our neighbours, but also to accompany and share life with our neighbours, no matter how their prior journey is coloured."

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Kerry Livgren - Seeds Of Change.