Thoughtful Thomas

 

“Thomas, thoughtful though tentative, thinks through terrific tidings – takes time to trust – then, totally transformed, travels teaching truth.”

Thus a clergy friend of mine meditated on a statue of St Thomas in the church of St Thomas and St Andrew, Doxey, Stafford.
I think it is a very good summary of our Gospel reading for today which, as every year, tells Thomas’ story.

The disciples are together, hiding from the authorities, in the evening of that first Easter Day when the Risen Lord appears to them, and reassures them.
And then Luke tells us that Cleopas and his wife come racing back from Emmaus to tell them that they, too, had seen Jesus.

But Thomas wasn’t there.
We don’t know why, but he missed it.
And he isn’t inclined to believe the others,
thinking they must be deceived in some way.
Well, you can understand it, can’t you?
If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.
If it were true, it would indeed be terrific tidings –
but people don’t just come back from the dead!
Not even the dear Teacher.
Once you’re dead, you’re dead, thinks Thomas.
How can you come back to life again?
Surely this was wishful thinking on the part of the others?
Surely a group hallucination?
Surely they were mistaken, weren’t they?
Weren’t they?

Thomas remembers the last couple of years,
since he started being one of Jesus’ disciples.
How they had travelled together, quite a large band of them,
with a few women who saw to it that everybody had something to eat
and at the very least a blanket at night.
There was the time he had gone off with Matthew, on Jesus’ instructions, to preach the Good News,
and they had had such a great time.
And then it had all gone sour,
and Jesus had been arrested, tortured, and crucified.
But they were saying he was still alive?
Not possible, surely.
It couldn’t really be true, could it?
But then, there had been those miracles, people healed –
the time his friend Lazarus had died,
and Jesus had called him to come out of the tomb, and he had come.
Or when that little girl had died, only Jesus had said she was only sleeping.
Or that time when….
Thomas goes on remembering all the times Jesus had healed the sick or done other miracles.
But then, he couldn’t be alive, could he?
And so on, round and round, on the treadmill of his thoughts.

This goes on for a whole week.
It must have seemed an eternity to poor Thomas,
with the others, although still cautious and hiding from the authorities –
indeed, some of the fishermen were talking of going back to Galilee and getting the boats out;
safer that way –
the others, still cautious, yet fizzing and bubbling that the Teacher was alive!

A whole week.

A week can feel like eternity, sometimes.
I know when the lockdowns first started, over a year ago now,
each week felt like an eternity.
I think it’s as well we didn’t know it would go on for over a year –
and, of course, if things go pear-shaped again, it’s possible that restrictions will either not be eased on schedule or else will be reimposed.
But a year ago we had no way of knowing that,
and a week seemed like forever.
And I don’t know about you, but I certainly wondered where God was in all this!

Many of us had the virus, and some, sadly, have lost loved ones to it.
Some people have barely left their homes for a year,
and even though they’ve now been told it’s safe, as long as they are careful,
they are still reluctant to do so.
I personally am finding it absolutely impossible to make plans of any kind lest they have to be cancelled.
Even though more and more of us have been vaccinated –
and please, do get the vaccination if you’re offered it, it’s well worth it –
still find it hard to believe we’ll be free again one day.

Where is God when you need him?
We want to see God’s face, to hear the reassurance that all will be well and all manner of thing will be well.
We want the reassurance that God is truly there and hasn’t abandoned us.

We have learnt new ways of being Church;
did you notice how many people logged on for the Maundy Thursday and Good Friday Zoom services?
Given how many people were sharing logins, it was well over a hundred people!
Far more than would ever have come to a Circuit service if they had to go out.
While it’s wonderful to be together again, even with restrictions,
I hope that some services, and some meetings, will continue to be held via Zoom.
We’ve also learnt to livestream our services,
and to post the recordings so people who don’t want to come to church,
or who can’t come for any reason,
can still join us in worship.
God has been there, leading us and teaching us over the past year.
But it hasn’t always been easy to see the next step.

But you see, Thomas shows us that this is okay.
He had to wait a whole week until the risen Jesus came to him to reassure him –
and a week can be a very, very long time!
But that’s okay.
We don’t have to get immediate answers;
we don’t have to feel better at once if we are taken ill;
we do, perhaps, have to be very patient and keep remembering hands, face, space and fresh air.

For Thomas, it took a week.
That’s why we remember him on this day each year –
Low Sunday, I was taught to call it –
as it’s the anniversary of the day when Jesus did come to Thomas.
The disciples were still hiding from the Jewish authorities –
they could easily have been picked up, arrested, and crucified in their turn.
And this time, Thomas was with them.
He was still doubtful, still not convinced –
but Jesus came, specially for him.
“Here, touch my scars, touch my side –
it’s true, I’m alive, you can trust me!”
And Thomas’ immediate response was to fall down in awe and worship.

And he was totally transformed.
His doubts all fell away, as if they had never been.
He knew Jesus forgave him for having doubted,
just as he was to forgive Peter for having denied he knew him,
just as he would have forgiven Judas for having betrayed him,
had Judas been in any condition to receive that forgiveness.
Thomas was forgiven and transformed.

As we, too, can be.
You know this and I know this, but sometimes it feels as though that knowledge is only in our heads,
we don’t absolutely know it with all of us.
Except when we do –
and then we wonder how on earth we ever doubted,
why we don’t always believe with our whole being.
We have all had those mountain-top experiences, I expect –
and we have all had our times of doubt and even disbelief.
It seems to be normal and human.
Thomas certainly didn’t believe that Jesus had been raised;
it took a special touch from our Lord himself to convince him,
as it sometimes does to convince us.

And Thomas was totally transformed, from doubter to staunch believer.
And, what’s more, he then travels, teaching truth.

We have nothing in the Bible to tell us what may or many not have happened to Thomas after his encounter with the risen Lord.
But there are various traditions,
most notably that he went to India and founded the church there.
They say he was martyred in Chennai in about AD72, having lived and worked in India for over twenty years, and some sources say his remains were brought back to Edessa, in modern Syria, although others think he was buried in India.

Even today, almost two thousand years later, there are Christians in India who trace their faith history back to Thomas’ ministry.
How much of this is factual, and how much tradition, we don’t know.
But given that so many Christians in India,
Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant,
all trace their faith back to him leads me to suspect there might be something in it.

But whatever the truth, we know that Thomas travelled, teaching the truth about Jesus,
teaching, as did many of the other apostles, proclaiming the Risen Christ,
witnessing that he had actually seen and spoken to him,
being filled with God’s Holy Spirit to proclaim the Kingdom of Heaven.
He was totally transformed from the doubtful, worried disciple of that first Easter Day.

Most of us have been following Jesus for many years now.
We too have been transformed,
probably gradually over the years,
to be more like the people we were created to be,
the people God designed us to be.
We, too, proclaim our risen Lord, not only –
probably not even primarily –
in words.
And like Thomas, we sometimes take time to tentatively think through terrific truths, and we take time to trust.

And Thomas shows us that this is okay, as long as we don’t stop there.
As long as we can accept that our first views may be wrong, and allow God to heal and transform us.
And then, my friends, along with Thomas we too will be teaching the truth.

“Thomas, thoughtful though tentative, thinks through terrific tidings – takes time to trust – then, totally transformed, travels teaching truth.”

Journey to Jerusalem.

Sadly, this was not preached, as I was suffering from food poisoning and couldn't go to Church - fortunately, i had been sharing the service with our minister and was able to warn her in time.

So today is Palm Sunday. It’s the start of Holy Week, when we begin that long, sad, strenuous journey to the cross. In other years, we might have all met together last night for a Circuit Passover Supper, to mark the beginning of Holy Week. Obviously, with the current restrictions that couldn’t happen either last year or this year, but maybe next year we will be able to do so. Anyway, then today we remember Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, and, indeed, for many churches today’s service is a journey towards the Cross; there isn’t a sermon but together they read what’s called the “Passion Narrative”, the story from today’s reading right up to Jesus’ death. Or we can, as we are doing this year, make the journey last for the week. On Thursday we will meet together on Zoom to remember how Jesus washed his disciples’ feet, and how he took the traditional Jewish Friday-night ritual blessing of bread and wine and lifted it, transformed it into something quite different that we know today as Holy Communion. On Friday, also on Zoom, we will remember his death on the Cross. And next Sunday, of course, we will be rejoicing and celebrating the Resurrection and being able to meet together once again to do so!

But for today, we are focussing on the journey to Jerusalem. Now, Jesus had often stayed in Bethany before – probably with Martha and Mary, do you think? – and walked into Jerusalem. It wasn’t far – only a couple of miles, probably not much further than from here to Streatham. So why, do you suppose, he suddenly wanted to ride on a donkey? And why this particular donkey, which had never been ridden before?

Well, Mark doesn’t say, but Matthew’s version of the story reminds us of the promise in Zechariah: “Shout and cheer, Daughter Zion!
    Raise your voice, Daughter Jerusalem!
Your king is coming!
    a good king who makes all things right,
    a humble king riding a donkey,
    a mere colt of a donkey.”

That must have been a very odd image to the first hearers. We don’t know exactly what the prophet thought he was referring to – there was very often a local context, as well as one looking forward to Jesus – but obviously now was the time for this prophecy to be fulfilled. Again, we don’t know whether Jesus knew that, and was consciously fulfilling the prophecy, which he would have known from childhood, or whether he was just obeying the inner voice from God that was leading him step by step, inexorably, towards the Cross.

It must have been a very odd image, don’t you think, to those first hearers of Zechariah? I mean, a donkey is what the humble people rode, a beast of burden. Kings rode horses, or in chariots – they didn’t ride donkeys. Our Queen doesn’t drive a white van!

But this was the image. The King, God Almighty, riding on a donkey like any merchant or shopkeeper. Extraordinary, really, when you come to think about it.

But, of course, people didn’t know that this was God Himself in the Person of his Son Jesus Christ. If they recognised him at all, they saw the rabbi, Jesus of Nazareth, the teacher. The one who was getting up the noses of the Temple authorities. The one who said that God’s country was quite different from what you’d always thought, but that it was still worth giving up everything you had for. The one who said you should love your enemies. The one who had said some very extraordinary things about himself…. That he was the Light of the World; that he was the Good Shepherd…. And that, if you followed Him, you would be being God’s person even if you didn’t keep the Jewish law absolutely perfectly, even if you were not allowed to go to the Temple for some reason, even if you were a prostitute or a drug addict.

And, suddenly, it all came together and they began to cheer and shout. “Praise God! God bless him who comes in the name of the Lord! God bless the coming kingdom of King David, our father! Praise be to God!” The word “Hosanna”, which the Good News Bible translates as “Praise God” originally meant “God save him!” but it has transmuted into an affirmation of praise!

And they threw down branches on the road, and even their cloaks, which would have been ruined by the dust and the donkey’s feet! And they may well have been new cloaks, bought specially to go to Jerusalem for the festival, for this was the Passover, one of the most holy festivals in the Jewish calendar. You went to Jerusalem to celebrate the major festivals whenever you could, and especially for Passover – we know that Jesus was taken as a boy, all the way from Nazareth, and that he also went to the Temple when it was Hannukah, and possibly on other festivals, too. So there would have been big crowds going to Jerusalem. Those who had never heard of the new Teacher from Nazareth would have been told a bit by their friends and fellow-traveller when they saw him on the donkey and wondered what all the fuss was about.

And so they went to Jerusalem, cheered every step of the way, and, we are told, looked round the Temple for a bit and then went back to Bethany for the night, presumably returning the donkey to its rightful owners en route.

And? I mean, why does it matter? Why do we celebrate each year? Is it just a remembering thing, part of what happened to Jesus that we remember each year? Or is it something more.

It’s both, of course. Yes, part of it is certainly remembering what happened to Jesus. But it’s also about our own journeys towards God. And they are not always straightforward. People don’t shout and wave palm branches at us, which is probably just as well, as we are so prone to mess things up. Remember that lovely hymn we so often sing at this time of year:

“Sometimes they strew his way
and his sweet praises sing,
resounding all the day
hosanna to their king.
Then “Crucify!”
is all their breath
and for his death
they thirst and cry.”

We all waver between singing hosannas and shouting “crucify!” To take a Bible example, look at Peter – one minute he was declaring that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, and then the next minute he was being seriously unhelpful by saying he would never let Jesus be killed… which wasn’t what Jesus either wanted or needed to hear just then; Peter could and arguably should have given him a shoulder to cry on and bought him a pint! And later it is Peter who denies Jesus – but later still, he is able to accept forgiveness and be made whole again. Even Jesus wobbled a bit at times, as we saw in last week’s reading when he said he was scared and wished he could ask God to save him from this hour – but he knew he couldn’t. Similarly in the Garden of Gethsemane when he had a major meltdown and a real struggle to say “Not as I will, but as you will!” to God.

This year in particular has been so very difficult for so many people. I have struggled with not being able to see my family – thankfully the restrictions are being eased a bit tomorrow so we can go and visit my mother, out of doors, and take her her Christmas presents! And we did have a few weeks’ respite last summer as, I hope, we will have this summer. And I have had it easy – I did get the virus, and have struggled to recover, but I didn’t have to go to hospital and nobody close to me died from or with it. I’m retired, so the lockdown hasn’t impacted me financially. I live in walking distance of several “essential shops”, and we had plenty of loo paper to see us through the first shortage! But even so, it hasn’t been easy. I’m sure I’m not the only one who has asked God to just let it all be over, and to take this wretched virus away!

But we know, as St Paul reminds us, that God works all things together for good for those who love him. The bad is still bad – but God works it for good. We have been learning new ways of being church when we can’t meet in person. We’ve been learning that church committee meetings are a lot less onerous when you can do them from the comfort of your own chair!

It’s not easy to be God’s person all the time, and we all wobble. But Isaiah tells us that “If you wander off the road to the right or the left, you will hear his voice behind you saying, ‘Here is the road. Follow it.’” God won’t let us get too badly lost, however painful the road ahead may be.

So as we remember Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, let’s commit ourselves anew to travelling along with him, to being part of the crowd shouting “Hosanna”, and not the crowd shouting “Crucify him!” Amen. 

Tempted and Fallen

The first reading today was about a man, and a woman and God.
The man and the woman don't have names –
later on, they are called Adam and Eve,
but at this stage they don't need names.
They are just Man and Woman.
They are the only Man and Woman that exist –
God hasn't made any more, yet –
so they don't need names.
Man can just go, “Oi, you!”
and Woman will know he's talking to her.

God has made the Man and the Woman, and put them in a garden,
where there is plenty of food to eat for the picking of it.
It's lovely and warm, so they don't need clothes,
and in fact they are so comfortable with themselves and with God that they don't want clothes.
There are animals to be cared for, and crops to be tended,
but the work is easy and pleasurable.
And all the fruit in the garden is theirs, except for one tree,
which God has told them is poisonous.
If they eat the fruit of this tree, God said, they'll die.

Well, so far, so good.
But at this point, enter another player.
The serpent.
Now, the Serpent is God's enemy,
but the Man and the Woman don't know that.
They think the Serpent is just another animal.
Now Serpent comes and chats to Woman.

“Nice pomegranate you've got there!”

“Mmm, yes,” says Woman.

“Look at that fruit on that tree over there, though,” says Serpent.
“That looks well tasty!”

“Yes, but it's poisonous!” explains Woman.
“God said that if we ate it, we'd die, so we're keeping well clear of it!”

“Oh rubbish!” says Serpent.
“God's stringing you a line!
It's not poisonous at all.
Thing is, if you eat it, you'll be just like God,
and know good and evil.
God doesn't want you to eat it,
because God doesn't want any rivals!
Go on, have a bite!
You won't regret it!”

So Woman has another look at the tree,
and sees that the fruit is red and ripe and smells tempting,
so she cautiously stretches out her hand and grabs the fruit,
and, ever so tentatively, takes a tiny bite.
Mmm, it is good!

So she calls to Man, “Oi, you!”

“Mm-hmmm,” calls Man, looking up from the game he was playing with his dogs.
“What is it?”

“Come and try this fruit,” says Woman,
and explains how the Serpent had said that God had been stringing them a line,
and how good the fruit tasted.
So Man decides to have a piece himself.

But it's coming on to evening,
and at evening, God usually comes and walks in the garden,
and Man and Woman usually come and share their day.
But tonight, somehow, they don't feel like chatting to God.
And those bodies, the bodies they'd enjoyed so much, suddenly feel like they want to be kept private.
They look at one another, and both retreat, silently, into the far depths of the garden, grabbing some fig leaves to make coverings for themselves.

Presently, God comes looking for them.
“What's up?
Why are you hiding?”

“Well,” goes Man, “I didn't want to face you, 'cos I was naked.”

“Naked?” says God.
“Naked?
Who told you you were naked?
You've been eating that fruit I told you was poisonous, haven't you?”

“Well, er, um.”
Man wriggles.
“It wasn't my fault.
That one, the Woman you gave me.
She said to eat it, so I did.
Wasn't my fault at all.
You can't blame me!”

So God looks at Woman, and says, “Is this true?
Did you give him the fruit?”

Woman goes scarlet.
“Well, it was Serpent.
He said you, well, that the fruit wasn't poisonous.”

But, of course, the fruit had been poisonous
It wasn't that it gave Man and Woman a tummyache or the runs;
it poisoned their whole relationship with God.
They couldn't stay in God's garden any more.
Serpent was going to have to crawl on his belly from now on,
and everyone, almost, would be afraid of him.
Woman was going to have awful trouble having babies,
and Man was going to find making a living difficult.

But God did show them how to make warm clothes for themselves, and didn't abandon them forever,
even though, from that time forth, they weren't really comfortable with God.

Well, that's the story, then, that the Israelites used to explain why human beings find it so very difficult to be God's people and to do God's will.
And it shows how first the Woman and then the Man were tempted, and fell.

They fell.
But Jesus resisted temptation.
You may remember that he was baptised,
and there was the voice from heaven that said
“This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
And then Jesus went off into the desert for six weeks or so,
to come to terms with exactly Who he was,
and to discover the exact nature of his divine powers.

It must have been so insidious, mustn't it?
"Are you really the Son of God?
Why don't you prove it by making these stones bread?
You're very hungry, aren't you?
If you're the Son of God, you can do anything you like, can't you?
Surely you can make these stones into bread?
But perhaps you aren't the Son of God, after all...."
And so it would have gone on and on and on.

But Jesus resisted.
The way the gospel-writers tell it,
you would think he just waved his hand and shook his head and said,
“No, man shall not live by bread alone!”
But that wouldn't have been temptation.
You know what it's like
when you're tempted to do something you ought not –
the longing can become more and more intense.
There are times when you think,
Hmm, that'd be nice, but then you think,
naaa, not right, and put it behind you;
but other times when you have to really, really struggle to put it behind you.
“If you are the Son of God....”

The view from the pinnacle of the Temple.
So high up.... by their standards,
like the top of the Canary Wharf tower would be to us.
"Go on then –
you're the Son of God, aren't you?
Throw yourself down –
your God will protect you!"
The temptation is to show off, to use his powers like magic.
Yes, God would have rescued him, but:
“Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”
That's not what it's about.
That would have been showing off.
That would have been misusing his divine powers for something rather spectacular.

Jesus was also tempted with riches and power beyond his wildest dreams –
at that, beyond our wildest dreams,
if only he would worship the enemy.
We can sympathise with this particular temptation;
I'm sure we all would love to be rich and powerful!
But for Jesus, it must have been particularly subtle –
it would help him do the work he'd been sent to do!
Could he fulfil his mission without riches and power?
What was being God's beloved son all about, anyway?
Would it be possible to spread the message that he was beginning to realise he had to spread
if he was going to spend his life in an obscure and dusty part of the Roman empire?
And again, after prayer and wrestling with it, he finds the answer:
“Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.”
Let the riches and power look after themselves;
the important thing was to serve God.
If that is right, the rest would follow.

You may remember that Jesus was similarly tempted on the Cross, he could have called down the legions from heaven to rescue him.
But he chose not to.
It wasn't about spectacular powers –
often, when Jesus did miracles,
he asked people not to tell anybody.
He didn't want to be spectacular.
He'd learnt that his mission was to the people of Israel,
probably even just the people of Galilee –
and the occasional outsider who needed him, like the Syro-Phoenician woman, or the Roman centurion –
and anything more than that was up to his heavenly Father.

And, obviously, if the "anything more" hadn't happened,
we wouldn't be here this evening!
But, at the time, that wasn't Jesus' business.
His business, as he told us, was to do the work of his Father in Heaven –
and that work, for now, was to be an itinerant preacher and healer,
but not trying deliberately to call attention to himself.

And a few years later, Jesus was crucified. It is, I think, far too complicated for us to ever know exactly what happened then, but it is safe to say that a change took place in the moral nature of the universe. St Paul expands on this idea in our second reading tonight.

Paul compares and contrasts what happened to the first Man, Adam, with what happened to Jesus, pointing out that sin came into the world through Adam, which poisoned humanity’s relationship with God, but through Jesus, we can receive the free gift of eternal life, and thus restore our relationship.

Of course, it’s never as easy as that in practice. You know that and I know that. Can we really live in a restored relationship with God? All the time? Twenty-four seven? Well, maybe you can, but I find it very difficult indeed!
We know we’re apt to screw things up in our relationship with God. Usually because we screw things up in our relationship with other people, but not always. Sometimes we just screw ourselves up! We don’t take the exercise we promised ourselves. We lounge around all day and don’t get on – so easy to do, I find, in lockdown, don’t you?

But the point is, Paul seems to think that we can live in a restored relationship with God. And so does John, when he reminds us that “Those who are children of God do not continue to sin, for God's very nature is in them; and because God is their Father, they cannot continue to sin.” He also, of course, reminds us that if and when we do sin, we need to confess our sins and we will be forgiven. We need to look at ourselves honestly, and admit not only what we did, said or thought, but that we are the kind of person who can do, say or think such things. And allow God not only to forgive us, but to help us grow so that we will stop being such people.

John Wesley very much believed Christian perfection was a thing.
He didn’t think he’d attained it, but he reckoned it was possible in this life.
He preached on it and it’s one of the sermons we local preachers are supposed to have read –
you can find it on-line easily enough.
Anyway, what he said about perfection was that it wasn’t about being ignorant, or mistaken, or ill or disabled, or not being tempted –
you could be any or all of those things and still be perfect.
Wesley reckons –
and by and large he reckons that the closer we continue with Jesus,
the less likely we are to sin.
I believe he didn’t consider that he’d got there himself, but he did know people who had.
He said even a baby Christian has been cleansed from sin,
and mature Christians who walk with Jesus will be freed from it, both outwardly and inwardly.
I hope he’s right....

But the point is, it’s not something we can do in our own strength; we have to allow God to do it for us and in us. The first Man and Woman listened to the serpent, and destroyed their – and our – relationship with God. Jesus was able to restore that relationship through the atonement. And because that relationship is restored, we can be indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and made whole again. Let’s do it! Amen.

Extravagance, revisited

 A rewrite of an old friend!

It seems a very long time since I was last able to give a party, or even to invite someone round for coffee – I keep dreaming I’ve been able to, and then wake up and find it was only a dream! I can’t even remember when I last gave a big party, although I’m sure I had a couple of lunch parties in 2019!

But one of the things about parties, or weddings, or any other big event that you’re hosting, is worrying whether you have enough food and drink – to the point that, very often, there is far too much! I do know we got it right when it came to buying the sparkling wine for our daughter’s wedding, all those years ago, but I also remember worrying lest we should, perhaps, have got another case…. As it turned out, there was plenty – we were even able to take a couple of bottles home with us!

But it seems to have been very far from the case for that poor host of the wedding at Cana we have just read about. As I understand it, back in the day wedding feasts lasted two or three days, and a host would expect to have enough food and drink to cater for the entire time. But something had gone badly wrong here. We don’t know what had happened, or why – only that it had. Such embarrassment – the party will be going on for awhile yet, but there is no wine.

But among the wedding guests were a very special family.
Mary, the carpenter's widow from Nazareth, and her sons.
Cana isn't very far from Nazareth, only about twelve miles,
but that's quite a good day's journey when you have to rely on your own two feet to get you there.
So it's probable that either the bride or the groom were related to Mary in some way,
especially as she seems to have been told about the disaster with the wine.

And then comes one of those turning-point moments in the Gospels.
Mary tells her eldest son, Jesus, that the wine has run out.

Now, as far as we can tell, Jesus is only just beginning to realise who he is.
John's gospel says that he has already been baptised by John the Baptist,
which implies that he has been out into the desert to wrestle with the implications of being the Messiah –
and the temptations which came with it,
and John also tells us that Simon Peter, Andrew and some of the others have started to be Jesus' disciples
and had come with him to the wedding.
But, in this version of the story, Jesus hasn't yet started to use his divine power to heal people and to perform miracles,
and he isn't quite sure that the time is right to do so.
So when his mother comes up and says “They have no wine,” his immediate reaction is to say, more or less, “Well, nothing I can do about it!
It isn't time yet!”

His mother, however, seems to have been ahead of Jesus for once, on this, and says to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you!”
And Jesus, who was always very close to God,
and who had learnt to listen to his Father all the time,
realises that, after all, his mother is right
and the time has come to start using the power God has given him.
So he tells the servants to fill those big jars with water –
an they pour out as the best wine anybody there has ever tasted.
As someone remarked, right at the fag-end of the wedding,
when people are beginning to go home and everybody has had more than enough to drink, anyway.

I don't suppose the bridegroom's family were sorry, though.
Those jars were huge –
they held about a hundred litres each, and there were six of them.
Do you realise just how much wine that was?
Six hundred litres –
about eight hundred standard bottles of wine!
Eight hundred.... you don't even see that many on the supermarket shelves, do you?
Eight hundred.... I should think Mary was a bit flabber-gasted.
And it was such good quality too.

Okay, so people drank rather more wine then than we do today, since there was no tea or coffee, poor them, and the water could be a bit iffy,
but even still, I should think eight hundred bottles would last them quite a while.
And at that stage of the wedding party, there's simply no way they could have needed that much.

But isn't that exactly like Jesus?
Isn't that typical of God?
We see it over and over and over again in the Scriptures.
The story of feeding the five thousand, for instance –
and one of the Gospel-writers points out that it was five thousand men, not counting the women and children –
well, in that story, Jesus didn't provide just barely enough lunch for everybody, quite the reverse –
there were twelve whole basketsful left over!
Far more than enough food –
all the disciples could have a basketful to take home to Mum.

Or what about when the disciples were fishing and he told them to cast their nets that-away?
The nets didn't just get a sensible catch of fish –
they were full and over-full, so that they almost ripped.

It's not just in the Bible either –
look at God's creation.
You've all seen pictures of the way the desert blooms when it rains –
look at those millions of flowers that nobody, for a very long time, ever knew were there except God.
Or look at how many millions and millions of sperm male animals produce to fertilise only a few embryos in the course of a lifetime.
Or where lots of embryos are produced, like fish, for instance, millions of them are eaten or otherwise perish long before adulthood.
And millions and millions of different plant and animal species, some of which are only now being discovered.

Or look at the stars!
All those millions upon millions of stars, many with planets, some with planets like our own that may even hold intelligent life.....
God is amazing, isn't He?
And just suppose we really are the only intelligent life in the Universe?
That says something else about God's extravagance in creating such an enormous Universe with only us in it!
Our God is truly amazing!

Scientists think that some of the so-called exoplanets they have been discovering lately might contain life, although whether or not that would be intelligent life is not clear, and probably never will be.

So how did God redeem such beings, assuming they needed redemption? We know that here, his most extravagant act of all was to come down and be born as a human baby – God, helpless, lying in a makeshift cradle fashioned from an animal feeding-trough. Having to learn all the things that human babies and children have to learn. Becoming just like us, one of us, knowing what it’s like to work for his living, what it’s like to be a condemned criminal and to die a shameful death!

But God, God who could only allow Moses the teeniest glimpse of his glory, or he would not have been able to survive it, and even then his face shone for hours afterwards, this God became a human being who could be captured and put to death.

You know, sometimes I think the main function of the church is to help us cope with God. Perhaps the church, quite unwittingly, limits God, or, like Moses, we’d not be able to handle it. St Paul prays that we might know “what is the immeasurable greatness of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power. God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come. And he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.”

The Church, which is His body. And yet we – we the Church – are so bad at being His body. We limit God. We tell God what to do. We tell God who God may love, and who is to be considered beyond the pale. We judge, we fail to forgive, we withhold, despite the fact that Jesus said “Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven; give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap; for the measure you give will be the measure you get back.”

And yet we still hold back from God. I don’t mean just money – although we do that, too, despite the promise that if we: “Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in my house, and thus put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts; see if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you an overflowing blessing.”

But we hold back ourselves from God. We aren’t – well, I know I’m not, and I dare say I speak for you too – we aren’t really prepared to give ourselves whole-heartedly to God. After all, who knows what God won’t ask of us if we do? We might even have to give up our lives, as Jesus did! Or worse, perhaps God would say “No thank you!” Perhaps we would be asked to go on doing just exactly as we are doing – how disappointing!

But I wonder if it’s really about doing. Isn’t it more about being? Isn’t it more about being made into the person God created us to be? Isn’t it more about allowing God into us extravagantly, wholeheartedly…. I would say “completely”, but I don’t think that’s quite possible. God is simply too big, and we would be overwhelmed.

Nevertheless, Jesus came, he told us, so that we can have life, and have it abundantly!
Abundantly.
Can we let more of God into our lives, to be able to live more abundantly? It doesn’t feel possible in this time of pandemic, but maybe we could learn what abundant life in lockdown is?
Do you dare? Do I dare? Do we dare? Amen!

The Light of the World

Preached via Zoom

In our Gospel reading today, that great Christmas gospel, the prologue to the Gospel of John, we find this verse: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has never put it out.”
“The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has never put it out.”

I have been holding very tight on to that verse for the last two months, ever since it sprang into vivid prominence on All Saints’ Day, when we sang “Thou in the darkness drear their one true light”. Jesus is the light of the world. In the darkness, Jesus is the one true light, and the darkness has never put it out.

Jesus himself said, if you remember, “I am the Light of the World. Whoever follows me will have the light of life and will never walk in darkness.”

You see, darkness can’t conquer light! Think about it one moment – you go into a dark room, and the first thing you do is flick a switch to turn the light on! You don’t have to scrub for hours to make the darkness go away. You don’t have to sit and chant or sing or beat yourself up. All you have to do is turn the light on. Or open the curtains, if it’s daylight outside.

Of course, it’s only been for about the past hundred years that we have had that luxury, and in some parts of the world it’s still not the norm. Even when I was a girl, I sometimes visited a house that was lit with gas, rather than electricity. And Robert, growing up in Northern Ireland, remembers his house being lit by oil lamps, known as Tilly lamps, before it was wired up to the electricity supply. The last part of the UK to be wired up to the national supply was Rathlin Island, of the north coast of Northern Ireland, which was only linked in 2005.

But even sixty years or so ago, when Robert and I were children, electric lighting was mostly the norm in the West. By then, there was a national body that governed the production and distribution of electricity, but prior to that, if you weren’t in a big town you had to have a generator to make electricity for your house, as they do in many parts of the world today.

And when you didn’t, or don’t, have a generator, you have to rely on gas, or oil lamps, or candles – or even a “button lamp” where a shred of material is pulled up through a hole in a button which sits on some grease in a pot, and you light the grease-soaked material and it works like a candle. Rush lamps work on the same principle, I believe.

But the point is, no matter what the light source, it is always greater than darkness! It seldom gets properly dark here in London unless there is a power cut, and that doesn’t happen very often. But when it does happen, we only need to find an emergency lantern, or even a tea-light, and we have light of a sort. It’s not, perhaps, enough light to read or sew by, but it’s enough to prevent us from knocking into the furniture. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has never put it out.

That, of course, is why we celebrate Christmas at this darkest time of the year. Jesus’ birthday probably isn’t on 25 December – if the shepherds were out in the fields, it was more probably spring, lambing time, when the sheep and their lambs were at their most vulnerable. But we don’t know the exact date – those who wrote Matthew’s and Luke’s Gospels didn’t think it important enough to record. And it doesn’t matter, anyway – after all, the Queen has an official birthday which is celebrated in June, where her real birthday is in April, and if the Queen can, so can Jesus! The point is, of course, that the ancient pagan festivals that celebrated the turn of the year and the renewal of the light, the fact that the days would now start to get lighter, rather than darker, were merged into the celebration of the coming of the Light of the World. The return of the sun and the coming of the Son….

Think of lighthouses and lightships. They aren’t quite so necessary in these days of satellite navigation, but still useful, to help ships know where they are at sea, and to warn them off rocks and other hazards. But, of course, there were people known as “wreckers”, who would purposely shine lights to lure ships to their doom, whereupon they would plunder the wrecked ship! It was a light in the darkness, but sadly, the wrong light.

Which, of course, brings me to another point about light – Jesus said that we, too, are light. “You are like light for the whole world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bowl; instead it is put on the lampstand, where it gives light for everyone in the house.  In the same way your light must shine before people, so that they will see the good things you do and praise your Father in heaven.”

Now, of course, some people like to dwell on that verse to make us feel guilty and fearful, and afraid that somehow we are letting Jesus down by not being light, or not being bright enough, or something. But it’s not like that. Jesus is the Light of the World, and if we are indwelt with the Holy Spirit – and if we are dedicated to being Jesus’ people, then we are indwelt by the Holy Spirit – then we will be shining with Jesus’ light. Sometimes we are not very bright lights, but even one candle is enough to drive away the darkness, and when a bunch of candles come together, the light gets brighter and brighter and brighter.

And there are times when our own light seems to flicker despairingly, and that’s when we depend on one another to get through. We will sing no 611 at the end of this sermon, because of the verse that goes:
“I will hold the Christlight for you
in the nighttime of your fear;
I will hold my hand out to you,
speak the peace you long to hear.”

It’s been a long, dark time for many of us, these past nine months, and it’s not over yet. There is light on the horizon – see what I did there – with the news that the Oxford vaccine is going to start being rolled out tomorrow, and I think they hope that by Easter, we’ll be able to be together again. But this time of year, when it is still really dark and although we know Spring will eventually come there’s no sign of it yet, this is the time when people’s mental health is going to really suffer. We’ve been suffering horrendous restrictions for the best part of a year, with only a few weeks’ respite in the summer, and right now it feels as though it’s going to go on forever. And it’s now we need to hold the Christlight for one another, now when we falter, someone needs to be there for us – they probably can’t be actually with us, as that’s not allowed, but they can be there at the end of a phone, or on WhatsApp, or whatever your preferred way of contact is. And similarly, when we falter – and I don’t know about you, but I’m finding it all too easy to falter just now – I know I can rely on you, or others, to hold the Christlight for me.

I imagine there was a bit of a giggle when Jesus said – and quite probably illustrated with gestures – that nobody lights a lamp and puts in under a bowl… although mind you, I have been known to light the torch on my phone and wave it around under the sofa when I’m looking for my crochet hook, which must have a lover or something down there, the way it escapes down there whenever I’m not looking! But that’s different. Jesus knew all about that sort of thing, too, as you may remember when he told the story of the lost coin – the woman who had lost it lit her lamp and took it to all the dark corners of her house to light them up and see if the coin was there.

I wonder what else she found while she was looking for her coin – you know how you so often find something you’d given up looking for when you are looking for something else! But the light also lights up all the nasties that live in the dark corners – the dust and dirt, the dead spiders, all the things we’d really rather visitors to our house didn’t see. I was horrified to notice, the other day, a really dirty stretch of floor in the corridor; we quickly washed it, but I’d have hated someone else to have seen it. Normally that part of the corridor was in shadow, but for some reason it got lit up and we noticed the grime.

And that is what can happen, too, when we let the light of Christ shine into our own dark corners. All the dust and dirt and grime and dead spiders come into full prominence, and all need to be swept away and washed – I was going to say “washed in the blood of the Lamb”, which is a fearful cliché, but for once it’s accurate. We mustn’t try to hide the dark corners from God – I know it’s tempting, because we hate looking at them. But it’s only when we let God in to all the corners that there will be no darkness at all in us.

The Light came into the world, and the darkness has not overcome it. On the contrary, the light has brought light to all of us, and has lit us, too, so that we shine out into a dark world. Let us follow that light, wherever it leads us, and pray that we won’t be lured onto the rocks by the false light of the wreckers, but that, like the Magi of old – for it’s nearly Epiphany, when we celebrate the coming of the Magi – like the Magi, may we be led by the light of God’s shining star. In the words of the old hymn: 

“Lead thou my feet, I do not ask to see
The distant scene; one step enough for me.” Amen. 

Searching the Scriptures

The trouble with Luke's telling of the life of Jesus
is all the things he has to leave out!
Of all Jesus's childhood, adolescence and, indeed, young manhood,
we only get this tiny glimpse.
And there is so very much we don't know,
Which makes it very awkward, at times,
to know what to make of this glimpse of an adolescent Jesus,
such a tiny glimpse.

When my daughter was adolescent,
I spent a lot of time with this story!
It was so encouraging to know that Jesus, too, in his time,
had gone off to do his own thing without reference to his parents,
and when they had remonstrated, he was like
"You just don’t understand!"
And sometimes people said
"But, of course, it was different for Jesus!"
But was it?

You see, we know so very little.
All we are really told is that they went to Jerusalem every year for the
Passover, and that this year, Jesus was twelve.
And that is significant.
You see, from time immemorial, Jewish boys have become,
at the age of 13, a man.
They are required to keep the commandments,
and they may take their place in the synagogue,
taking their turns at reading the Scriptures.
Their presence helps to make up the "minyan", or quorum,
that is required before Jewish people can have a service.
And so on.
Nowadays, this transition is marked by a ceremony known as a Bar
Mitzvah, where the boy in question reads a passage of Scripture during a
special service in the synagogue, and makes a speech, and then there is
a bun-fight afterwards.
In Jesus' day they didn't do that, but the rising-13s would have expected
to be called upon to read the Scriptures in public any time after their 13m
birthdays.
So I am quite sure that those who taught the classes of 12-year-olds
really concentrated on the Scriptures,
to ensure that the boys knew their Bibles really thoroughly,
and would be able to make a good showing
whatever portion they were asked to read.

So Jesus, at 12, was engrossed in Bible Study.
And, for him, it became more than an interest,
more than something he had to Study at school
if he was to get good marks and avoid trouble.
It became a passion.
Now, here is where we get a little stuck,
because it simply isn't clear how much Jesus knew about who he was,
when he was 12.
We don’t know whether Mary and Joseph had told him anything about his
conception,
Or that Joseph was not his natural father.
We don’t know whether he knew there was anything special about him at
hope he didn’t.
I hope he had a really happy childhood,
quite untouched by these things.
And probably he did.

God, after ail, had chosen Mary to be his earthly mother,
and Joseph to act as "Dad" on purpose.
But nevertheless, as Jesus studied the Scriptures,
became engrossed in them.
God helped them become real to him.
And, of course, Jesus had endless questions.
I'm sure his parents did their best to answer him,
but perhaps they didn't know all that much themselves.
And his teachers, perhaps, didn’t have the time they would have liked to
answer his questions -
Or perhaps he wanted to go more deeply into these things than they
cared to do in an academic environment.
Who knows?
Once again, we are not told.
But we do know that when he reached Jerusalem that year,
he found all that, for then, he was seeking with the scribes in the Temple.
They knew.
They could answer his questions,
in the way that the folks back home in Nazareth could not.
They could deal with his objections,
listen to him,
wonder at his perspicacity at such a young age.

I hope the scribes didn’t laugh at him;
it's not clear from the text, but they might have.
But probably not, if his questions were sensible and to the point.

And Jesus, typically adolescent,
totally forgets about going home,
forgets that his parents will have kittens when they find he's not with
them,
forgets to wonder how he's going to get home,
Or even where he's going to sleep –
or, perhaps, thinks a vague mention of his plans was enough.
Anyway, Aunt Elizabeth and Uncle Zach will put him up, he’s quite sure.

And his parents thought he was with the company –
they would be travelling with a group of people, probably mostly from Nazareth.
It wasn’t just so safe to make that journey other than in a caravan of people, donkeys, merchants, and so on.
This gives us a glimpse that Jesus was, at that time, a normal human boy.
He was probably off with his friends –
they would tended to walk together, away from the grown-ups,
and then in the evening they’d all sit round one fire, singing, perhaps;
maybe a different parent each evening.
He’s fine, they thought.
He’s with the others.
And then they found he wasn’t…. panic!
So they went rushing back to Jerusalem –
not the safest thing to do on your own, but needs must. And there he was, safe and well.

No, his parents didn't understand;
of course they didn’t.
How could they?
It was, perhaps, the first glimpse they had had that he was somebody
very special.
Maybe Mary remembered the events surrounding his birth.
In any event, they were not aware of what he was talking about.
I expect they were livid with him, but then, that curious “I must be about my Father’s business” –
hurtful, to Joseph, but then, when have adolescent kids ever really thought about other people’s feelings?

Of course, later on, Jesus knew that searching the Scriptures was not
enough.
Remember what he said to the Pharisees:
search the scriptures because you think that in them you have
eternal life;
and it is they that testify on my behalf.
Yet you refuse to come to me to have life."
He knew that you needed more than just the words on the page –
but at twelve years old, this was what had intrigued him,
fascinated him,
to the point of ignoring anything else.

Jesus was fascinated by the Scriptures, but then – so what?
What has this got to say to us, this dark and dismal Christmas so unlike any other that we can remember?
Some of us may have teenage children or grandchildren and much of this story resonates with us!
But even if we don’t, it’s lovely to see that Jesus, growing up, was a normal human boy.
All too often, we forget that he was human, as well as divine.
The passage from the Epistle, which we didn’t read,
emphasises his divinity rather than his humanity:
“The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
For in him all things were created:
things in heaven and on earth,
visible and invisible,
whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities;
all things have been created through him and for him. 
He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
And he is the head of the body, the church;
he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy.
For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him,
and through him to reconcile to himself all things,
whether things on earth or things in heaven,
by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.”

Well, yes, but that passage, from Paul’s letter to the Colossians, emphasises that Jesus was divine.
He was.
He is.
But also human –
and this little glimpse of him growing up shows that.
It gives us a Jesus of flesh and blood, if you like;
a Jesus who played and sang with his friends,
who could get engrossed in a new interest to the exclusion of all else…
For me, it makes him more real, more approachable.
I hope it does for you, too.

I was interested to see that the story was paired with the reading we heard from Isaiah –
one of my favourite passages in the whole of Scripture!
And could anything be more appropriate for us right now?
“The desert and the parched land will be glad;
    the wilderness will rejoice and blossom.
Like the crocus, it will burst into bloom;
    it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy.
The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,
    the splendour of Carmel and Sharon;
they will see the glory of the Lord,
    the splendour of our God.”
and so on and so forth – wonderful words of comfort. It’s not now, it’s a one day, but one day…. One day. Maybe one day I will be able to hug my grandsons again. Maybe one day we’ll be able to travel. Maybe one day we will be able to sing “Joy to the World” and “Christians, awake!”

And the picture at the end of that passage, of the redeemed walking across the desert highway, singing as they go –
perhaps that was what Jesus experienced walking to Jerusalem with his friends and family.
And one day, we will, too. Amen.

 

St Nicholas

 

I hate to tell you, but I’m not going to preach on today’s readings! Instead, for reasons that will become clear in a bit, I’m going to tell you a story.

Once upon a time, long, long ago, in a – well, not in a galaxy far away, as this story takes place on this earth, but certainly in a country far away, a little boy was born. No, not Jesus of Nazareth – this birth took place a couple of hundred years later, and the little boy grew up to be one of Jesus’ followers. He was born in the city of Patara, in what is now Turkey, and you will remember from your reading in Acts that this was one of the places that St Paul visited during his travels, so it’s quite probable that his parents or grandparents were either converted by St Paul, or by the church he established there. His parents were rich, by the standards of their day, and when they died when the boy was quite young, he inherited all their money. But because he loved Jesus, he didn’t think it right to keep the money for himself, and began to give it away to the poor and needy in the area.

He dedicated his whole life to God, and was made Bishop of Myra while still a young man. One famous story about him tells of a poor man with three daughters, whom he could not hope to marry off as he had nothing to give for their dowries, something that was considered vital back in the day. And the future for unmarried women back then was bleak – slavery was probably the best option. So this young Bishop, anonymously, threw three purses of gold, one for each daughter, through the window of their house, and the purses landed in the shoes the girls had put to dry by the fire.

There are lots of other stories about this man – some probably legendary, as when three theological students, traveling on their way to study in Athens were robbed and murdered by wicked innkeeper, who hid their remains in a large pickling tub. It so happened that the bishop, traveling along the same route, stopped at this very inn. In the night he dreamed of the crime, got up, and summoned the innkeeper. As he prayed earnestly to God the three boys were restored to life and wholeness.

There are several stories of his calming storms for sailors, and one story tells how during a famine in Myra, the bishop worked desperately hard to find grain to feed the people. He learned that ships bound for Alexandria with cargos of wheat had anchored in Andriaki, the harbor for Myra. The good bishop asked the captain to sell some of the grain from each ship to relieve the people's suffering. The captain said he could not because the cargo was "meted and measured." He must deliver every bit and would have to answer for any shortage. The Bishop assured the captain there would be no problems when the grain was delivered. Finally, reluctantly, the captain agreed to take one hundred bushels of grain from each ship. The grain was unloaded and the ships continued on their way.

When they arrived and the grain was unloaded, it weighed exactly the same as when it was put on board. As the story was told, all the emperor's ministers worshiped and praised God with thanksgiving for God's faithful servant!

Back in Myra, the Bishop distributed grain to everyone in Lycia and no one was hungry. The grain lasted for two years, until the famine ended. There was even enough grain to provide seed for a good harvest.

The Bishop, of course, was made a saint when he died. And the stories of his miracles didn’t stop coming. One very early story tells how the townspeople of Myra were celebrating the good saint on the eve of his feast day when a band of Arab pirates from Crete came into the district. They stole treasures from the church to take away as booty. As they were leaving town, they snatched a young boy, Basilios, to make into a slave. The emir, or ruler, selected Basilios to be his personal cupbearer, as not knowing the language, Basilios would not understand what the king said to those around him. So, for the next year Basilios waited on the king, bringing his wine in a beautiful golden cup. For Basilios' parents, devastated at the loss of their only child, the year passed slowly, filled with grief. As the saint’s next feast day approached, Basilios' mother would not join in the festivity, as it was now a day of tragedy. However, she was persuaded to have a simple observance at home – with quiet prayers for Basilios' safekeeping. Meanwhile, as Basilios was fulfilling his tasks serving the emir, he was suddenly whisked up and away. The saint appeared to the terrified boy, blessed him, and set him down at his home back in Myra. Imagine the joy and wonderment when Basilios amazingly appeared before his parents, still holding the king's golden cup!

This man became the patron saint of children, and the patron saint of sailors, too. And as the years and centuries passed, he was revered in Christian countries all over the world, both Orthodox and Catholic. In the 11th century his remains were moved from Myra, now called Demre, which was under Moslem rule, to a town in Italy called Bari, where he is venerated to this day. Nuns started to give poor children little gifts of food – oranges and nuts, mostly – on his feast day. And his cult spread right across Christendom.

You will notice that I haven’t said his name! Who knows who I have been talking about? Yes, St Nicholas, Bishop of Myra. And now, these days, transmogrified into Santa Claus.

Today is his feast day, which is why I’ve been telling you his story, but, of course we associate him more with Christmas. Although in many European countries, children would have put their shoes outside their bedroom doors last night for St Nicholas to fill with small gifts. A few years ago, Robert and I went to the Christmas markets in Cologne on St Nicholas’ Day, and there was St Nicholas on the public transport network there, giving sweets to children (with their parents’ permission, of course); we saw him doing it!

But the association with Christmas came about because of the Protestant reformation – seriously! If you were Protestant, you didn’t revere saints, so you couldn’t possibly have St Nicholas giving you oranges and nuts on his feast day!

Here in England, with our gift for religious compromise, our folk traditions changed to include Father Christmas and yule logs and things, but in many Protestant countries, particularly the USA, Christmas Day was considered “just another day”. But it seems that German colonists brought the St Nicholas tradition to the USA, and gradually he became the “jolly elf” of the famous poem.

And, of course, the illustrations for the Coca-Cola advertisements began to settle his image as the fat old man we know today. A far cry, really, from a young Bishop in ancient Turkey!

But what, you may ask, has this got to do with us?

How does it affect us on this second Sunday of Advent in this pandemic year, when many of us won’t be able to celebrate Christmas as we usually do?

It’s going to be a strange, sad Christmas for many this year. Okay, some people will be glad not to have to socialise or perhaps even more glad to have an excuse not to have to invite their family to eat and drink too much, but for many people it will be a real hardship. We’ll hate not being allowed to sing carols, I expect – I know I shall, and belting them out in the shower really doesn’t count! Nor does singing on Zoom, as it distorts so!

But I find it comforting to know that even the secular side of Christmas has its roots in Christianity. Father Christmas was a devout Christian! And he is going to come this year – our politicians have said so!

Similarly it is comforting to know that we are loved by God. Isaiah, as we heard earlier, reminds us that

God, like a good shepherd, takes care of his people.
    He gathers them like lambs in his arms.
    He holds them close, while their mothers walk beside him.

I don’t know about you, but this year I really need to be reminded of God’s love. Emmanuel means “God with us”, and whatever happens, whatever we can or can’t do this year, we know God will be with us.

So as we prepare for our scaled-down Christmas, and continue with whatever Advent observance we have undertaken, let’s remember that even Santa Claus worshipped the God who is with us. Amen.

The Coming King

Preached via Zoom during lockdown.

So, Advent.

In a normal year people would starting to celebrate Christmas already –
the shops would have had their decorations up since the beginning of last month, or even earlier,

and the round of office parties, works celebrations, school festivities would be starting any day now.
And the endless tapes of carols and Christmas songs that would be played in the shops, I should think they’d drive the shop assistants mad!

But in a normal year, here in Church, Christmas wouldn’t have started yet,

and wouldn’t for another four weeks.  In fact, it still hasn’t, and still won’t,

because right now we are celebrating Advent, and it seems to be another penitential time, like Lent.

Were we allowed public worship, those churches that have different colours for the seasons would have brought out the purple hangings, and many would have no flowers except for an Advent wreath.

But not this year, when we are still in lockdown until, at the soonest, the end of this week, when shops where we might be doing our Christmas shopping are closed, where we can’t even meet in person to worship.  I’d even trimmed some masks in purple –the colour for Lent and Advent –specially!!!  I hope I’ll be able to use them before Christmas, but who knows?

But, even this year, Advent is really a season of hope.  We look forward to “the last day when Christ shall come again” to establish the Kingdom on earth.  We also look back to those who’ve been part of God’s story, including John the Baptist and Jesus’ Mother, Mary.

Today, though, our readings are about the coming King.  Our first reading, from the prophet Isaiah, tells how the prophet, and perhaps the people for whom he was speaking, longed and longed to see God in action.

“Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down,

that the mountains would tremble before you!

As when fire sets twigs ablaze and causes water to boil,

come down to make your name known to your enemies

and cause the nations to quake before you!”

I think we can probably all identify with that this year!

Scholars think that this part of Isaiah was written very late, after the people of Judah had returned from exile. They would have remembered the stories of the wonderful things God had done in the olden days, in the days of Abraham and Sarah, of Isaac and Jacob, of Moses, and of David the King – and then, they would have looked round and said “But hey, why isn’t any of this happening today?”

They reckoned the answer must be because they were so sinful.

“You come to the help of those who gladly do right,

who remember your ways.

But when we continued to sin against them,

you were angry.

How then can we be saved?

All of us have become like one who is unclean,

and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags;

we all shrivel up like a leaf,

and like the wind our sins sweep us away.

No-one calls on your name

or strives to lay hold of you;

for you have hidden your face from us

and made us waste away because of our sins.”

It does sound very much as though the prophet were longing for God, but somehow couldn’t find him, in the mists of human sinfulness and this world’s total abandonment of God.

One of the interesting things about this pandemic is how it has begun to bring people back to God.  It’s too early to tell whether it will last – after all,

“God and the Doctor we alike adore

But only when in danger, not before;

The danger o'er, both are alike requited,

God is forgotten, and the Doctor slighted.”

Nevertheless, you got people watching streamed services who wouldn’t normally go to Church; I believe All Souls, Langham Place, had a vast international congregation during the first lockdown.  And I have noticed that many YouTube services, those from my daughter’s church, for instance, or my mother’s, get many more views than they ever get congregations on a Sunday!  So God is definitely doing something during this time; exactly what, I don’t know, and what God is saying about how to be church in the 21^st century, I also don’t know – but I suspect we must think about this, and not just go back to “same old, same old” when restrictions are lifted, hopefully before this time next year.

Isaiah longed and longed to see God at work, feeling quite sure that God had abandoned his people.

Of course, as it turned out, God hadn’t abandoned his people at all! Jesus came to this earth, lived among us, and died for us, and Isaiah’s people now knew the remedy for their sin.  But Jesus himself tells us, in our second reading, that his coming to live in Palestine as a human being isn’t the end of the story, either.

Somehow, someday, he will come back again. He obviously doesn’t know all that much about it while he is on earth, and rather discourages us from speculation as to when or how. But he draws pictures for us:

“The sun will be darkened,

and the moon will not give its light;

the stars will fall from the sky,

and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.

“At that time men will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory.

And he will send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds,

from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens.”

But elsewhere he tells us that even when there are plagues and wars and rumours of war, we mustn’t assume he is going to return imminently.

Mind you, today, as at no other time in history,

communications are such that if Jesus were to come back,

we’d know about it almost as soon as it happened –

look how quickly news spreads around the world these days.

Half the time you hear about it on Facebook or Twitter before the BBC has even picked up on it. 

Although that is very often fake news,

people either posting misleading information or genuine misunderstandings.

But Jesus' return would be something totally unmistakable.

But lots of generations before ours have thought that Jesus might come back any minute now,

from the overthrow of the Temple in 70 AD,

through the various plagues and pandemics,

wars and invasions,

right down to this current pandemic.

And Christians throughout history have lived their lives expecting him to come home.

We have remembered Jesus’ warnings about being prepared for him to come, but He hasn’t come.  And we get to the stage where we, too, cry with Isaiah:

“Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down,

that the mountains would tremble before you!”

 

Like Isaiah, we long and long to see God come and intervene in this world, and wish that He would hurry up.  And that’s perfectly natural, of course.  Some folk have even got to the stage of believing it won’t happen, and have given up on God completely.  But Jesus said it will happen, and one has to assume He knew what he was talking about.

But that doesn’t mean that we can blame God – if You had come back before now, this wouldn’t have happened. Every generation has been able to say that to God, and it’s not made a blind bit of difference.  So maybe there’s something else.

You see, in one way, Jesus has come back.

Do you remember what happened on the Day of Pentecost, in that upper room? God’s Holy Spirit descended on those gathered there,looking like tongues of fire, and with a noise like a rushing mighty wind, and the disciples were empowered to talk about Jesus.

And we know from history, and from our own experience, that God the Holy Spirit still comes to us, still fills us, still empowers us.

One of the purposes of these so-called penitential seasons is to give us space to examine ourselves and see if we have drifted away from God, to come back and to ask to be filled anew with the Holy Spirit. Then we are empowered to live our lives as Jesus would wish.  We don't have to struggle and strain and strive to “get it right” by our own efforts. God himself is within us, enabling us from the inside. Jesus doesn’t just provide us with an example to follow, but actually enables us to do it, by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

All of us will face the end of the world one day.  It might be the global end of the world, that Jesus talks about, or it might just be the end of our personal world. Until this year, we expected, here in the West, to live out our life span to the end, and many of us, I am sure, will do just that, pandemic or no pandemic.  But we can’t rely on that.

You never know when terrorists will attack – or even muggers, or just a plain accident.  We can’t see round corners; we don’t know what will happen tomorrow.

None of us foresaw this pandemic, which has taken so many lives – although, it has to be said, far fewer than in most previous pandemics.  The Black Death, after all, is thought to have killed over half the population of Britain, which makes the 0.08% of the population who have so far died of Covid-19 look like peanuts!

Although, of course, each and every one of those who has died has probably left their family devastated, we must never forget that they are individuals, not numbers. They are people who God loved, and knew, and cared for.

But whether it is tomorrow, or twenty, thirty, forty or fifty years from now, whether of Covid-19, of an accident, or of “frailty of old age”, which is what they put on my father’s death certificate, one day each and every one of us will die, and then, at last, we will meet Jesus face to face.  And we need to be ready.  We need to know that we have lived as God wants us to live – and when we’ve screwed up, as we always do and always will, we’ve come back to God and asked forgiveness and asked God to renew us and refill us with his Holy Spirit.

We can only live one day at a time, but each day should, I hope, be bringing us nearer to the coming of the King.
Amen.