Depending on our point of view, we might feel surprise, bemusement, or even outrage at this story.
In Matthew chapter 1 Jesus’ genealogy includes foreign women of doubtful origin. Then a betrothed virgin was found to be with child. And now these foreigners, astrologers, appear to offer worship.
Questions that arise are:
Who is God?
What is he up to?
Why is this baby significant?
The Gospel starts with Jesus, descended from Abraham, in whom all the nations of the world would be blessed. The Gospel ends with Jesus sending his disciples out into all the world to make disciples of all nations, teaching and baptising, and he is with us!
The wise men appear: what do they say to us?
1. Shift from spectator or speculator to participant
2. Shift from the theoretical and general to the specific.
Lesslie Newbigin has written about the scandal of particularity:
THIS baby, of THESE parents, living in THIS town. God’s love reaching out to the whole world is made real in this happening.
It is not the good life that Jesus lives or his teaching that impresses: initially, we are called to worship this helpless babe, who must be nurtured and protected.
All of the trajectory of human history, Abraham, Moses, David, the prophets, all narrows down to this one individual, in whom is fulfilled the promise and the mission of the nation of Israel.
This uniquely defines our faith in Jesus, that we are anchored to historic occurrences that have a global, timeless significance.
Yes, we face the questions raised in our sermon from last week about why God can allow suffering for some, and choose to bless others.
But we do this in the knowledge that our God has subjected himself to the same limitations, and ultimately ended his earthly life on the cross.
And it was through the Gentiles that God has made this known.
Herod was a foreigner, also from the east, (well, south east actually) but refusing to recognise and acclaim the true King of the Jews.
The wise ones have responded to the summons. Following the star prophesied by Balaam so long before, when he declined to curse the nation of Israel at the invitation of another foreign king, they have come.
We humbly bow before Jesus, acknowledging that we could never have worked this out for ourselves, and that all we can do is receive his grace. We are those who have heard his call and responded. That is the definition of church.
Paul writing to the Ephesians expands this thought. Our shared reaction to the babe of Bethlehem, our decision to devote our lives to him and to live in community with him and with each other, creates another scandal that rocks the heavens.
Through the good news about Christ, the whole of human kind has been invited to join God’s family. Within the company of those who have received him, all barriers have been broken down. We are brothers and sisters. The way that we get on together in love proclaims to the whole cosmos the wisdom and rightness of our God.
This epiphany, what kind of people does God want us to be?
Those who are searching and seeking, questioning, self giving, responding, taking part.
Monday, 14 January 2008
Friday, 4 January 2008
Sunday 30 December 2007 Matthew 2:13-end Melanie
Susanna and Jehoiachim were young parents, both twenty three years old, just getting started in life together. They had one child, little Davey, who at eighteen months had learned to walk and was getting into everything, was putting sentences together in strange ways, his soft, high pitched little voice giving a musical lilt even to the Aramaic gutturals. A healthy, happy child, he was the delight of their life. They named him David because they lived in the ‘city of David’, as their village was called, located a few miles south of Jerusalem.
Late one night while everyone was sleeping, the king’s soldiers surrounded the village, and at first light they came into town. They ordered all parents with small children into the village square, made a search to ensure that none remained, and without a word killed every boy younger than two years old. ‘Orders’ they said.
After the horror of that day had receded enough for the villagers to take account, they discovered that twenty one children had been killed.
It is a cruel world, and such things happen. In our time thousands of babies have been napalmed, gassed, starved, and shot down by the order or permission of unfeeling governments. But human beings are resilient creatures, and after periods of numbness, anger, bitterness, and acceptance, Jehoiachim and Susanna were able to pick up the pieces of their life and go on. Without hostility or condescension, they rejected the ‘explanations’ of the tragedy from well meaning neighbour theologians, having no answer to the question articulated for them in their own Bible prayer book, ‘My God, my God, why?’ (Ps 22.1). They even began to find new meaning in synagogue worship.
Until one day when they discovered that on the crucial night before the slaughter of the baby boys an angel had come from God to warn one family to flee. It turns out that God had arranged for Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus to escape and that they had been secure in Egypt. The little boy Jesus was alive and well, but not their little Davey.
When we read Matthew’s story in this way, it raises all sorts of ethical questions for us today. If God does indeed work in this way, and warn people of danger, is it right that only one family be warned?
Would any of us, with this information, share it with just one family and not with the other twenty one?
It also makes us think about other miracle stories – the healing of the blind person is wonderful, unless it is heard from the perspective of all those blind people in the world who were not healed.
Of course there are several responses.
Some people might say that if God had warned all the parents in Bethlehem, Herod would have grown suspicious and may have killed everyone in the village. Although what happened was bad, it was not as bad as it might have been.
Others might say that God was speaking to everyone in the village, but only Mary and Joseph were sensitive enough to hear God’s voice.
Still others might say that of course all this stuff about miracles is just part of the oral tradition of the Bible, and is a way of explaining what couldn’t then be explained through science. We don’t need such language of miracles today.
What all these responses have in common is the taking of the language of miracle stories as objective, true – in the sense that they would be true stories that we would read in the newspaper today.
The story that I quoted at the beginning of the sermon transposes Matthew’s story into a reported incident – a newspaper story.
Matthew’s story though is much more of an insider story. It tries to convey the idea that the God was at work in preserving the life of Christ for his future mission. This is the point, or the truth of the story.
The question we are faced with is not, do miracles happen? Or why should they happen?
But should this story be read as an objective account – a reported happening? Or should it be read as an insider language – to confess the church’s faith that God was at work and active in the birth of the Messiah.
Ultimately the decision is down to each individual. As I commented a few weeks ago in my sermon, Christ bears many interpretations, and we can’t expect him to tell us which one he likes.
However we choose to interpret this story in Matthew, we watch in awe at God acting in history. The transforming grace of God becoming human never loses its mystery and majesty – and that is a vital part of our own journeys in faith.
God works through a family of no real importance in their own society – through an unnamed woman on the edge of society.
God’s saving work for the world begins with this insignificant couple, and yet contains within that family all the dignity and greatness of God incarnate.
This may be the true miracle of Matthew’s gospel – that God is an incoming God,
Prepared to dwell with the most humble
Prepared to live a life of wandering and insecurity
And yet through that, is able to point to a deeper reality beyond anything that we can experience on earth
The reality of God exalted, divine, majestic,
in the shape of a baby.
Amen
Late one night while everyone was sleeping, the king’s soldiers surrounded the village, and at first light they came into town. They ordered all parents with small children into the village square, made a search to ensure that none remained, and without a word killed every boy younger than two years old. ‘Orders’ they said.
After the horror of that day had receded enough for the villagers to take account, they discovered that twenty one children had been killed.
It is a cruel world, and such things happen. In our time thousands of babies have been napalmed, gassed, starved, and shot down by the order or permission of unfeeling governments. But human beings are resilient creatures, and after periods of numbness, anger, bitterness, and acceptance, Jehoiachim and Susanna were able to pick up the pieces of their life and go on. Without hostility or condescension, they rejected the ‘explanations’ of the tragedy from well meaning neighbour theologians, having no answer to the question articulated for them in their own Bible prayer book, ‘My God, my God, why?’ (Ps 22.1). They even began to find new meaning in synagogue worship.
Until one day when they discovered that on the crucial night before the slaughter of the baby boys an angel had come from God to warn one family to flee. It turns out that God had arranged for Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus to escape and that they had been secure in Egypt. The little boy Jesus was alive and well, but not their little Davey.
When we read Matthew’s story in this way, it raises all sorts of ethical questions for us today. If God does indeed work in this way, and warn people of danger, is it right that only one family be warned?
Would any of us, with this information, share it with just one family and not with the other twenty one?
It also makes us think about other miracle stories – the healing of the blind person is wonderful, unless it is heard from the perspective of all those blind people in the world who were not healed.
Of course there are several responses.
Some people might say that if God had warned all the parents in Bethlehem, Herod would have grown suspicious and may have killed everyone in the village. Although what happened was bad, it was not as bad as it might have been.
Others might say that God was speaking to everyone in the village, but only Mary and Joseph were sensitive enough to hear God’s voice.
Still others might say that of course all this stuff about miracles is just part of the oral tradition of the Bible, and is a way of explaining what couldn’t then be explained through science. We don’t need such language of miracles today.
What all these responses have in common is the taking of the language of miracle stories as objective, true – in the sense that they would be true stories that we would read in the newspaper today.
The story that I quoted at the beginning of the sermon transposes Matthew’s story into a reported incident – a newspaper story.
Matthew’s story though is much more of an insider story. It tries to convey the idea that the God was at work in preserving the life of Christ for his future mission. This is the point, or the truth of the story.
The question we are faced with is not, do miracles happen? Or why should they happen?
But should this story be read as an objective account – a reported happening? Or should it be read as an insider language – to confess the church’s faith that God was at work and active in the birth of the Messiah.
Ultimately the decision is down to each individual. As I commented a few weeks ago in my sermon, Christ bears many interpretations, and we can’t expect him to tell us which one he likes.
However we choose to interpret this story in Matthew, we watch in awe at God acting in history. The transforming grace of God becoming human never loses its mystery and majesty – and that is a vital part of our own journeys in faith.
God works through a family of no real importance in their own society – through an unnamed woman on the edge of society.
God’s saving work for the world begins with this insignificant couple, and yet contains within that family all the dignity and greatness of God incarnate.
This may be the true miracle of Matthew’s gospel – that God is an incoming God,
Prepared to dwell with the most humble
Prepared to live a life of wandering and insecurity
And yet through that, is able to point to a deeper reality beyond anything that we can experience on earth
The reality of God exalted, divine, majestic,
in the shape of a baby.
Amen
December 2007 Fourth Sunday of Advent Kim
One of the most memorable movies I have seen is the film of Charles Dickens’s novel ‘Little Dorrit’. It is actually two films, both very long. The two films do not follow in sequence, telling the first and the second halves of the story; instead, each film shows the whole drama, but from a different point of view. First we see the action through the eyes of the hero; then, in the second film, the same story through the eyes of the heroine. A few scenes are identical, but in the second film we understand many things that had not been clear the first time around. Like seeing with two eyes instead of one, the double movie enables the viewer to get a sense of depth and perspective on the whole dramatic story.
The story of Jesus’ birth in Matthew’s Gospel is seen through the eyes of Joseph; in Luke’s Gospel, we see it through Mary’s. No attempt is made to bring them into line. The central fact is the same; but instead of Luke’s picture of an excited Galilean girl, learning that she is to give girth to God’s Messiah, Matthew shows us the more sober Joseph, a caring, thoughtful and was somewhat older than Mary, discovering that his fiancée is pregnant. He did not seem to be an impetuous person but decides to quietly call off the wedding. He considered what to do about the situation and while doing this, the angel brought him guidance ‘in a dream’. As a result of this he had enough faith to go ahead with the wedding as planned. The only point where the two stories come close is when the angel says to Joseph, as Gabriel said to Mary, ‘Do not be afraid.’ These are important words for us, too in today’s world. It is fear that stops us from being the people that God wants us to be and stops us from doing his work. ‘What if I fail?’ ‘What if they turn against me?’ ‘What if’ can stop us dead.
Fear at this point in Matthew’s story is normal. For if people had found out that Mary was pregnant by someone other than Joseph, Mary would have probably been stoned to death and her baby with her and for centuries now many opponents of Christianity, and many devout Christians themselves, have felt that these stories are embarrassing and unnecessary, even untrue. We know (many will say) that miracles do not happen. Remarkable healings, perhaps; there are ways of explaining them. But not babies born without human fathers. This is straining things too far.
Some go further. Theses stories, they say, have had an unfortunate effect. They have given the impression that sex is dirty and that God does not want anything to do with it. They have given rise to the legend that Mary stayed a virgin for ever (something the Bible never says; indeed, here and elsewhere it implies that she and Joseph lived a normal married life after Jesus’ birth). This has promoted the belief that virginity is better than marriage. And so on.
It is of course true that strange ideas have grown up around the story of Jesus’ conception and birth, but Matthew (and Luke) can hardly be blamed for that. They were telling the story they believed was both true and the ultimate explanation of why Jesus was the person he was and is.
They must have known that they were taking a risk. In the ancient pagan world there were plenty of stories of heroes conceived by the intervention of a god, without human father. Surely Matthew, with his very Jewish perspective on everything, would hardly invent such a thing, or copy it from someone else unless he really believed it? Wouldn’t it be opening Christianity to the sneers of its opponents, who would quickly suggest the obvious alternative, namely that Mary had become pregnant through some more obvious but less reputable means?
Well, yes, it would; but that would only be relevant if nobody already knew that there had been something strange about Jesus’ conception. In John’s Gospel we hear the echo of a taunt made during Jesus’ lifetime; maybe, the crowds suggest, Jesus’ mother had been misbehaving before her marriage (7.41). It looks as though Matthew and Luke are telling this story because they know rumours have circulated and they want to set the record straight.
Alternatively, people have suggested that Matthew made his story up so that it would present a ‘fulfilment’ of the passage he quotes in verse 23, from Isaiah 7:14. But, interestingly, there is no evidence that anyone before Matthew saw that verse as something that would have to be fulfilled by the coming Messiah. It looks rather as though he found the verse because he already knew the story, not the other way round.
Everything depends, of course, on whether you believe that the living God could, or would, act like that. Some say he couldn’t (‘miracles don’t happen’); other that he wouldn’t (‘if he did that, why doesn’t he intervene to stop genocide, famine or wars?’). Some say Joseph, and others at that time, did not know the scientific laws of nature the way we do – though this story gives the lie to that, since if Joseph hadn’t known how babies were normally made he would not have had a problem with Mary’s unexpected pregnancy.
But Matthew and Luke do not ask us to take the story all by itself. They both ask us to see it in the light of the entire history of Israel – in which God was always present and at work, often in very surprising ways – and, more particular, of the subsequent story of Jesus himself. Does the rest of the story and the impact of Jesus on the world and countless individuals within it ever since, make it more or less likely that he was indeed conceived by a special act of the Holy Spirit?
That is a question everyone must answer for themselves. But Matthew would not want us to stop there. He wants to tell us more about who Jesus was and is, in a time-honoured Jewish fashion; by his special names. The name ‘Jesus’ was a popular boys’ name at the time, being in Hebrew the same as ‘Joshua’, who brought the Israelites into the Promised Land after the death of Moses. Matthew sees Jesus as the one who will now complete what the law of Moses pointed to but could not of itself produce. He will rescue his people, not from slavery in Egypt, but from the slavery of sin, the ‘exile’ they have suffered not just in Babylon but in their own hearts and lives.
By contrast, the name ‘Emmanuel’, mentioned in Isaiah 7:14 and 8:8, was not given to anyone else, perhaps because it would say more about a child than anyone would normally dare. It means ‘God with us’. Matthew’s whole Gospel is framed by this theme: at the very end, Jesus promises that he will be ‘with’ his people to the close of the age (28:20). The two names together express the meaning of the story. God is present, with his people; he doesn’t ‘intervene’ from a distance, but is always active, sometimes in most unexpected ways. And God’s actions are aimed at rescuing people from a helpless plight, demanding that he take the initiative and do things people had regarded as (so to speak) inconceivable.
This is the God, and this is the Jesus, whose story Matthew will now set before us. This is the God, and this is the Jesus, who comes to us still today when human possibilities have run out, offering new and startling ways forward, in fulfilment of his promises, by his powerful love and grace. This is the God and this is the Jesus, who wants to be allowed to come into the situations and events, the relationships, our work, in our lives, so that He can make a difference. Dare we, this Christmas, allow Him to do so? Go on I dare you! Let’s see what happens!
The story of Jesus’ birth in Matthew’s Gospel is seen through the eyes of Joseph; in Luke’s Gospel, we see it through Mary’s. No attempt is made to bring them into line. The central fact is the same; but instead of Luke’s picture of an excited Galilean girl, learning that she is to give girth to God’s Messiah, Matthew shows us the more sober Joseph, a caring, thoughtful and was somewhat older than Mary, discovering that his fiancée is pregnant. He did not seem to be an impetuous person but decides to quietly call off the wedding. He considered what to do about the situation and while doing this, the angel brought him guidance ‘in a dream’. As a result of this he had enough faith to go ahead with the wedding as planned. The only point where the two stories come close is when the angel says to Joseph, as Gabriel said to Mary, ‘Do not be afraid.’ These are important words for us, too in today’s world. It is fear that stops us from being the people that God wants us to be and stops us from doing his work. ‘What if I fail?’ ‘What if they turn against me?’ ‘What if’ can stop us dead.
Fear at this point in Matthew’s story is normal. For if people had found out that Mary was pregnant by someone other than Joseph, Mary would have probably been stoned to death and her baby with her and for centuries now many opponents of Christianity, and many devout Christians themselves, have felt that these stories are embarrassing and unnecessary, even untrue. We know (many will say) that miracles do not happen. Remarkable healings, perhaps; there are ways of explaining them. But not babies born without human fathers. This is straining things too far.
Some go further. Theses stories, they say, have had an unfortunate effect. They have given the impression that sex is dirty and that God does not want anything to do with it. They have given rise to the legend that Mary stayed a virgin for ever (something the Bible never says; indeed, here and elsewhere it implies that she and Joseph lived a normal married life after Jesus’ birth). This has promoted the belief that virginity is better than marriage. And so on.
It is of course true that strange ideas have grown up around the story of Jesus’ conception and birth, but Matthew (and Luke) can hardly be blamed for that. They were telling the story they believed was both true and the ultimate explanation of why Jesus was the person he was and is.
They must have known that they were taking a risk. In the ancient pagan world there were plenty of stories of heroes conceived by the intervention of a god, without human father. Surely Matthew, with his very Jewish perspective on everything, would hardly invent such a thing, or copy it from someone else unless he really believed it? Wouldn’t it be opening Christianity to the sneers of its opponents, who would quickly suggest the obvious alternative, namely that Mary had become pregnant through some more obvious but less reputable means?
Well, yes, it would; but that would only be relevant if nobody already knew that there had been something strange about Jesus’ conception. In John’s Gospel we hear the echo of a taunt made during Jesus’ lifetime; maybe, the crowds suggest, Jesus’ mother had been misbehaving before her marriage (7.41). It looks as though Matthew and Luke are telling this story because they know rumours have circulated and they want to set the record straight.
Alternatively, people have suggested that Matthew made his story up so that it would present a ‘fulfilment’ of the passage he quotes in verse 23, from Isaiah 7:14. But, interestingly, there is no evidence that anyone before Matthew saw that verse as something that would have to be fulfilled by the coming Messiah. It looks rather as though he found the verse because he already knew the story, not the other way round.
Everything depends, of course, on whether you believe that the living God could, or would, act like that. Some say he couldn’t (‘miracles don’t happen’); other that he wouldn’t (‘if he did that, why doesn’t he intervene to stop genocide, famine or wars?’). Some say Joseph, and others at that time, did not know the scientific laws of nature the way we do – though this story gives the lie to that, since if Joseph hadn’t known how babies were normally made he would not have had a problem with Mary’s unexpected pregnancy.
But Matthew and Luke do not ask us to take the story all by itself. They both ask us to see it in the light of the entire history of Israel – in which God was always present and at work, often in very surprising ways – and, more particular, of the subsequent story of Jesus himself. Does the rest of the story and the impact of Jesus on the world and countless individuals within it ever since, make it more or less likely that he was indeed conceived by a special act of the Holy Spirit?
That is a question everyone must answer for themselves. But Matthew would not want us to stop there. He wants to tell us more about who Jesus was and is, in a time-honoured Jewish fashion; by his special names. The name ‘Jesus’ was a popular boys’ name at the time, being in Hebrew the same as ‘Joshua’, who brought the Israelites into the Promised Land after the death of Moses. Matthew sees Jesus as the one who will now complete what the law of Moses pointed to but could not of itself produce. He will rescue his people, not from slavery in Egypt, but from the slavery of sin, the ‘exile’ they have suffered not just in Babylon but in their own hearts and lives.
By contrast, the name ‘Emmanuel’, mentioned in Isaiah 7:14 and 8:8, was not given to anyone else, perhaps because it would say more about a child than anyone would normally dare. It means ‘God with us’. Matthew’s whole Gospel is framed by this theme: at the very end, Jesus promises that he will be ‘with’ his people to the close of the age (28:20). The two names together express the meaning of the story. God is present, with his people; he doesn’t ‘intervene’ from a distance, but is always active, sometimes in most unexpected ways. And God’s actions are aimed at rescuing people from a helpless plight, demanding that he take the initiative and do things people had regarded as (so to speak) inconceivable.
This is the God, and this is the Jesus, whose story Matthew will now set before us. This is the God, and this is the Jesus, who comes to us still today when human possibilities have run out, offering new and startling ways forward, in fulfilment of his promises, by his powerful love and grace. This is the God and this is the Jesus, who wants to be allowed to come into the situations and events, the relationships, our work, in our lives, so that He can make a difference. Dare we, this Christmas, allow Him to do so? Go on I dare you! Let’s see what happens!
Carol Service Sunday 16 December 2007 Who can you trust? Bruce
Have you noticed how the familiar Christmas traditions are falling away? For years we have had a new instalment of the Lord of the Rings, but that is over now. Last year we had the Chronicles of Narnia. This year, by contrast, we have the Golden Compass, based on the novel known in the UK as Northern Lights, the first in the His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman.
Tony Watkins writes: “A child who is separated from his or her parents in some way, perhaps because they are dead, is caught up in a great adventure, faces great dangers and must shoulder immense responsibilities. It’s familiar fare in children’s fiction – Harry Potter, the Baudelaire children, the children who go to Narnia, even the Famous Five – and some of these heroes and heroines are among the most memorable characters ever written. The best of them are stories about growing up. Think of how much Harry has learnt and how he has matured by the end of J.K. Rowling’s seventh book, for example. (By contrast, it is one of the reasons why the Famous Five are not great heroes and heroines – they never change.) In the minds of many people, Philip Pullman’s Lyra Belacqua has a place with the best of them.”
When we meet her, Lyra is living with benevolent but rather remote Oxford dons, and looking for freedom. She encounters the mysterious Mrs Coulter, who takes her to a parallel world, on a quest.
She encounters the Magisterium, which stands for a repressive religion (for Pullman – all religion, including soviet communism)
She also encounters protectors and mentors like Lord John Faa & Farder Coram, who offer r benign, supportive and caring authority; an invitation to grow up at her own speed.
Contrast to the Magisterium & Mrs Coulter
Question: whom do we trust?
Can we trust God in the garden that he has the best interests of the man and woman at heart?
Can we trust God to keep his promise to Abraham?
Will God fulfil his promise to provide a successor to King David?
Can we trust the account of the virgin birth?
Can we trust Herod, that he really wants to worship the infant king?
Can we trust that Jesus is the light of the world?
If we trust in him, will we really become children of God?
According to Philip Pullman, you cannot trust in a harsh authoritarianism. Ironically, it is the paternalistic care we see in Lord John Faa & Farder Coram that is nearest to a Christian understanding of who God is and how he cares for us. It is the way that the Christian church should always have acted towards its members, and usually does.
Specifically, the birth of Jesus is an invitation to us to respond to the love of God.
By our worship, we acknowledge him as king and lord.
Not just to adore a baby, but marvel at who this baby grew up to become, and all that he achieved for us. In particular, when we fail to live our lives in accordance with his just and right laws, he himself died and rose again to bring us forgiveness, new life and a place in his family. To all who receive him, he gave the right to become his chidren.
Pullman is right that we need to be free of authoritarianism in order to truly grow up. But as with Lyra, maturity is not found in willful independence but in a relationship of trust and love with a benevolent father figure, God himself.
Tony Watkins writes: “A child who is separated from his or her parents in some way, perhaps because they are dead, is caught up in a great adventure, faces great dangers and must shoulder immense responsibilities. It’s familiar fare in children’s fiction – Harry Potter, the Baudelaire children, the children who go to Narnia, even the Famous Five – and some of these heroes and heroines are among the most memorable characters ever written. The best of them are stories about growing up. Think of how much Harry has learnt and how he has matured by the end of J.K. Rowling’s seventh book, for example. (By contrast, it is one of the reasons why the Famous Five are not great heroes and heroines – they never change.) In the minds of many people, Philip Pullman’s Lyra Belacqua has a place with the best of them.”
When we meet her, Lyra is living with benevolent but rather remote Oxford dons, and looking for freedom. She encounters the mysterious Mrs Coulter, who takes her to a parallel world, on a quest.
She encounters the Magisterium, which stands for a repressive religion (for Pullman – all religion, including soviet communism)
She also encounters protectors and mentors like Lord John Faa & Farder Coram, who offer r benign, supportive and caring authority; an invitation to grow up at her own speed.
Contrast to the Magisterium & Mrs Coulter
Question: whom do we trust?
Can we trust God in the garden that he has the best interests of the man and woman at heart?
Can we trust God to keep his promise to Abraham?
Will God fulfil his promise to provide a successor to King David?
Can we trust the account of the virgin birth?
Can we trust Herod, that he really wants to worship the infant king?
Can we trust that Jesus is the light of the world?
If we trust in him, will we really become children of God?
According to Philip Pullman, you cannot trust in a harsh authoritarianism. Ironically, it is the paternalistic care we see in Lord John Faa & Farder Coram that is nearest to a Christian understanding of who God is and how he cares for us. It is the way that the Christian church should always have acted towards its members, and usually does.
Specifically, the birth of Jesus is an invitation to us to respond to the love of God.
By our worship, we acknowledge him as king and lord.
Not just to adore a baby, but marvel at who this baby grew up to become, and all that he achieved for us. In particular, when we fail to live our lives in accordance with his just and right laws, he himself died and rose again to bring us forgiveness, new life and a place in his family. To all who receive him, he gave the right to become his chidren.
Pullman is right that we need to be free of authoritarianism in order to truly grow up. But as with Lyra, maturity is not found in willful independence but in a relationship of trust and love with a benevolent father figure, God himself.
Sunday 16 November 2007 10.30am Matthew 11:2-11 Melanie
We can almost touch the frustration that John feels at the beginning of this passage. ‘Are you the one who is to come’? John asks of Jesus. He is confused – who is this person? where does he fit? Does he have anything to say to John?
They are questions that we all struggle with. Even today, we ask the same questions of Christ. Who is this? Where is he coming from? Does he have anything to say to me?
We expect answers – as John did. We expect an answer to our question – are you the one who is to come?
And yet, as with John, the answer to the question remains obscure. Christ remains the totally enigmatic face on the wall, the cross, the bread and wine. Silent signs, as silent as he was before Pilate, consistently refusing a straight and simple answer. We can't feed him questions like a computer and receive tidy, systematic replies. He won't let on: we can shout and wave our arms at that icon, and it stays the same, a dark expressionless face that gives us nothing but itself to think about. We can shout and wave our arms at each other, appealing to Christ, and when we turn to him, all we meet is silence, a kind of annihilating judgment on all we say. Christ can bear all sorts of interpretations, and we can't expect him to tell us which he likes.
But interpret him we must. We're constructive, imaginative beings, after all, and we can't escape from language, so we must talk.
One thing interpretations and visions of Christ have to do with is reconciliation – our reconciliation with ourselves and each other and God.
Perhaps this is what John was looking for as he sat in prison – a way of finding reconciliation within himself, and reconciliation with God. Reconciliation often happens at key points in our lives. Dame Cicely Saunders, who founded the hospice movement, writes that reconciliation of our inner selves and reconciliation before God are often key at the end of a life. And yet, it doesn’t have to wait until then. The main task in any life is to find integration – the bringing together of what is scattered and diverse and forming a whole. Perhaps this was what John was seeking as he sat in prison – a means of making sense of his life, of regaining his identity, and reassuring himself that his life had made sense and been of value.
Perhaps it is something we all seek as we ask questions of this enigmatic figure in front of us. Seeking ways of reconciling our inner nature; reconciling ourselves to God.
Seeking reconciliation though from someone who provoked so much conflict in his life sounds paradoxical.
Time and again Jesus’ presence evoked conflict and contradiction. Even in his healing ministry there were voices of dissent; he was thrown out of the synagogue in Nazareth; crowds tried to stone him. Yet he never abandoned the precarious frontier where all dualities meet. He inhabited the nerve line of paradox and contradiction. We forget that Jesus knows contradiction, paradox and pathos from within. Both human and divine he lived an existence of two worlds – a divided, and yet completely whole existence.
Despite the tension of the frontier he inhabited, he always kept his dignity, balance and poise. This must have been the fruit of the thirty years of solitary interior work before he emerged in his public mission.
Whilst being a voice of conflict, Christ also occupied a frontier that was of greatest possibility and renewal. I imagine this is true in our own lives too. Those around us who occupy positions in areas of conflict and contradiction are often those to whom we turn in order to have some insight into reconciliation.
Think of Nelson Mandela – a man who was at the heart of enormous conflict in his country, and yet who now occupies a prophetic role in terms of reconciliation.
Or Gordon Wilson, the man who after the IRA bombing at Enniskillen publicly forgave the bombers, saying that "I bear no ill-will, no grudge".
Or Julie Nicholson, the parish priest who stepped down after she struggled to forgive those who had killed her daughter in the 7/7 bombings in London.
From my own conversations with other people, I know how much her own struggle has spoken to others also battling with reconciliation.
Perhaps the secret to this gift of reconciliation lies in the fact that unless we explore the silent and hidden places of our own hearts first, we are hardly in a position to find much of an echo in the hearts of others. The interface between the inner and outer worlds is almost like a two way mirror. To maintain a solid connection with the poor, the marginalised, the outcasts around us, we need to be always in touch with those within our own lives, We must always be trying to find and verify our own authentic voice while we fulfill the role of being a voice for those who cannot, or will not, speak out their own truth.
In a wonderful book called Near occasions of grace, the author says that he feels that the outer poverty, injustice and absurdity we see when we look around us mirrors our own inner poverty, injustice, absurdity. The poor man or women outside is an invitation to the poor man or woman inside. As we learn compassion and sympathy for the brokenness of things ; When we encounter the visible icon of the painful mystery In 'the little ones' ; then, if we have built bridges between the inner and outer, if we have learned to move between action and contemplation, then we'll learn compassion and sympathy for the 'little one', the broken one within ourselves. We' ll realise that you are a poor person too. (Rohr, Richard, Near occasions of grace, Orbis, 1993 p 108, I09) cited p 82.
John may have seen this gift in Christ – the ability to stand in the middle of contradiction, and yet to offer reconciliation to others. Although Christ’s reply is evasive, he does respond with a reference to the Isaiah passage that we had read today:
The blind receive their sight,
The lame walk,
The lepers are cleansed,
The deaf hear,
The dead are raised,
And the poor have good news brought to them.
There is an inner harmony here – a reconciling of people within themselves.
Did Christ see an inner disharmony in John that made him respond in this way? Or was the response intended for a wider audience? We shall probably never know this side of heaven.
We do know that Christ offers to bring a wholeness that cannot be found anywhere else.
Rowan Williams quotes a poem :
You shall know him when he comes
Not by any din of drums
Not by anything he wears,
Not by the vantage of his airs ;
Not by his gown,
Nor by his crown,
But his coming known shall be
By the holy harmony
That his presence makes in thee.
Advent calls us to be reconciled to each other; reconciled to ourselves. But the only way we can reach this true reconciliation is through turning to Christ, and continually saying along with John the Baptist ‘who are you? ; are you the one who is to come? ; can you speak to me ? do you have a word of healing or wholeness for me?’
It is a reconciliation that has high rewards – because it gives us a freedom that anticipates the striving for the coming of the kingdom.
So this advent we look ahead for a coming Christ who will offer reconciliation and peace in the transforming message of the incarnation.
Amen
We can almost touch the frustration that John feels at the beginning of this passage. ‘Are you the one who is to come’? John asks of Jesus. He is confused – who is this person? where does he fit? Does he have anything to say to John?
They are questions that we all struggle with. Even today, we ask the same questions of Christ. Who is this? Where is he coming from? Does he have anything to say to me?
We expect answers – as John did. We expect an answer to our question – are you the one who is to come?
And yet, as with John, the answer to the question remains obscure. Christ remains the totally enigmatic face on the wall, the cross, the bread and wine. Silent signs, as silent as he was before Pilate, consistently refusing a straight and simple answer. We can't feed him questions like a computer and receive tidy, systematic replies. He won't let on: we can shout and wave our arms at that icon, and it stays the same, a dark expressionless face that gives us nothing but itself to think about. We can shout and wave our arms at each other, appealing to Christ, and when we turn to him, all we meet is silence, a kind of annihilating judgment on all we say. Christ can bear all sorts of interpretations, and we can't expect him to tell us which he likes.
But interpret him we must. We're constructive, imaginative beings, after all, and we can't escape from language, so we must talk.
One thing interpretations and visions of Christ have to do with is reconciliation – our reconciliation with ourselves and each other and God.
Perhaps this is what John was looking for as he sat in prison – a way of finding reconciliation within himself, and reconciliation with God. Reconciliation often happens at key points in our lives. Dame Cicely Saunders, who founded the hospice movement, writes that reconciliation of our inner selves and reconciliation before God are often key at the end of a life. And yet, it doesn’t have to wait until then. The main task in any life is to find integration – the bringing together of what is scattered and diverse and forming a whole. Perhaps this was what John was seeking as he sat in prison – a means of making sense of his life, of regaining his identity, and reassuring himself that his life had made sense and been of value.
Perhaps it is something we all seek as we ask questions of this enigmatic figure in front of us. Seeking ways of reconciling our inner nature; reconciling ourselves to God.
Seeking reconciliation though from someone who provoked so much conflict in his life sounds paradoxical.
Time and again Jesus’ presence evoked conflict and contradiction. Even in his healing ministry there were voices of dissent; he was thrown out of the synagogue in Nazareth; crowds tried to stone him. Yet he never abandoned the precarious frontier where all dualities meet. He inhabited the nerve line of paradox and contradiction. We forget that Jesus knows contradiction, paradox and pathos from within. Both human and divine he lived an existence of two worlds – a divided, and yet completely whole existence.
Despite the tension of the frontier he inhabited, he always kept his dignity, balance and poise. This must have been the fruit of the thirty years of solitary interior work before he emerged in his public mission.
Whilst being a voice of conflict, Christ also occupied a frontier that was of greatest possibility and renewal. I imagine this is true in our own lives too. Those around us who occupy positions in areas of conflict and contradiction are often those to whom we turn in order to have some insight into reconciliation.
Think of Nelson Mandela – a man who was at the heart of enormous conflict in his country, and yet who now occupies a prophetic role in terms of reconciliation.
Or Gordon Wilson, the man who after the IRA bombing at Enniskillen publicly forgave the bombers, saying that "I bear no ill-will, no grudge".
Or Julie Nicholson, the parish priest who stepped down after she struggled to forgive those who had killed her daughter in the 7/7 bombings in London.
From my own conversations with other people, I know how much her own struggle has spoken to others also battling with reconciliation.
Perhaps the secret to this gift of reconciliation lies in the fact that unless we explore the silent and hidden places of our own hearts first, we are hardly in a position to find much of an echo in the hearts of others. The interface between the inner and outer worlds is almost like a two way mirror. To maintain a solid connection with the poor, the marginalised, the outcasts around us, we need to be always in touch with those within our own lives, We must always be trying to find and verify our own authentic voice while we fulfill the role of being a voice for those who cannot, or will not, speak out their own truth.
In a wonderful book called Near occasions of grace, the author says that he feels that the outer poverty, injustice and absurdity we see when we look around us mirrors our own inner poverty, injustice, absurdity. The poor man or women outside is an invitation to the poor man or woman inside. As we learn compassion and sympathy for the brokenness of things ; When we encounter the visible icon of the painful mystery In 'the little ones' ; then, if we have built bridges between the inner and outer, if we have learned to move between action and contemplation, then we'll learn compassion and sympathy for the 'little one', the broken one within ourselves. We' ll realise that you are a poor person too. (Rohr, Richard, Near occasions of grace, Orbis, 1993 p 108, I09) cited p 82.
John may have seen this gift in Christ – the ability to stand in the middle of contradiction, and yet to offer reconciliation to others. Although Christ’s reply is evasive, he does respond with a reference to the Isaiah passage that we had read today:
The blind receive their sight,
The lame walk,
The lepers are cleansed,
The deaf hear,
The dead are raised,
And the poor have good news brought to them.
There is an inner harmony here – a reconciling of people within themselves.
Did Christ see an inner disharmony in John that made him respond in this way? Or was the response intended for a wider audience? We shall probably never know this side of heaven.
We do know that Christ offers to bring a wholeness that cannot be found anywhere else.
Rowan Williams quotes a poem :
You shall know him when he comes
Not by any din of drums
Not by anything he wears,
Not by the vantage of his airs ;
Not by his gown,
Nor by his crown,
But his coming known shall be
By the holy harmony
That his presence makes in thee.
Advent calls us to be reconciled to each other; reconciled to ourselves. But the only way we can reach this true reconciliation is through turning to Christ, and continually saying along with John the Baptist ‘who are you? ; are you the one who is to come? ; can you speak to me ? do you have a word of healing or wholeness for me?’
It is a reconciliation that has high rewards – because it gives us a freedom that anticipates the striving for the coming of the kingdom.
So this advent we look ahead for a coming Christ who will offer reconciliation and peace in the transforming message of the incarnation.
Amen
They are questions that we all struggle with. Even today, we ask the same questions of Christ. Who is this? Where is he coming from? Does he have anything to say to me?
We expect answers – as John did. We expect an answer to our question – are you the one who is to come?
And yet, as with John, the answer to the question remains obscure. Christ remains the totally enigmatic face on the wall, the cross, the bread and wine. Silent signs, as silent as he was before Pilate, consistently refusing a straight and simple answer. We can't feed him questions like a computer and receive tidy, systematic replies. He won't let on: we can shout and wave our arms at that icon, and it stays the same, a dark expressionless face that gives us nothing but itself to think about. We can shout and wave our arms at each other, appealing to Christ, and when we turn to him, all we meet is silence, a kind of annihilating judgment on all we say. Christ can bear all sorts of interpretations, and we can't expect him to tell us which he likes.
But interpret him we must. We're constructive, imaginative beings, after all, and we can't escape from language, so we must talk.
One thing interpretations and visions of Christ have to do with is reconciliation – our reconciliation with ourselves and each other and God.
Perhaps this is what John was looking for as he sat in prison – a way of finding reconciliation within himself, and reconciliation with God. Reconciliation often happens at key points in our lives. Dame Cicely Saunders, who founded the hospice movement, writes that reconciliation of our inner selves and reconciliation before God are often key at the end of a life. And yet, it doesn’t have to wait until then. The main task in any life is to find integration – the bringing together of what is scattered and diverse and forming a whole. Perhaps this was what John was seeking as he sat in prison – a means of making sense of his life, of regaining his identity, and reassuring himself that his life had made sense and been of value.
Perhaps it is something we all seek as we ask questions of this enigmatic figure in front of us. Seeking ways of reconciling our inner nature; reconciling ourselves to God.
Seeking reconciliation though from someone who provoked so much conflict in his life sounds paradoxical.
Time and again Jesus’ presence evoked conflict and contradiction. Even in his healing ministry there were voices of dissent; he was thrown out of the synagogue in Nazareth; crowds tried to stone him. Yet he never abandoned the precarious frontier where all dualities meet. He inhabited the nerve line of paradox and contradiction. We forget that Jesus knows contradiction, paradox and pathos from within. Both human and divine he lived an existence of two worlds – a divided, and yet completely whole existence.
Despite the tension of the frontier he inhabited, he always kept his dignity, balance and poise. This must have been the fruit of the thirty years of solitary interior work before he emerged in his public mission.
Whilst being a voice of conflict, Christ also occupied a frontier that was of greatest possibility and renewal. I imagine this is true in our own lives too. Those around us who occupy positions in areas of conflict and contradiction are often those to whom we turn in order to have some insight into reconciliation.
Think of Nelson Mandela – a man who was at the heart of enormous conflict in his country, and yet who now occupies a prophetic role in terms of reconciliation.
Or Gordon Wilson, the man who after the IRA bombing at Enniskillen publicly forgave the bombers, saying that "I bear no ill-will, no grudge".
Or Julie Nicholson, the parish priest who stepped down after she struggled to forgive those who had killed her daughter in the 7/7 bombings in London.
From my own conversations with other people, I know how much her own struggle has spoken to others also battling with reconciliation.
Perhaps the secret to this gift of reconciliation lies in the fact that unless we explore the silent and hidden places of our own hearts first, we are hardly in a position to find much of an echo in the hearts of others. The interface between the inner and outer worlds is almost like a two way mirror. To maintain a solid connection with the poor, the marginalised, the outcasts around us, we need to be always in touch with those within our own lives, We must always be trying to find and verify our own authentic voice while we fulfill the role of being a voice for those who cannot, or will not, speak out their own truth.
In a wonderful book called Near occasions of grace, the author says that he feels that the outer poverty, injustice and absurdity we see when we look around us mirrors our own inner poverty, injustice, absurdity. The poor man or women outside is an invitation to the poor man or woman inside. As we learn compassion and sympathy for the brokenness of things ; When we encounter the visible icon of the painful mystery In 'the little ones' ; then, if we have built bridges between the inner and outer, if we have learned to move between action and contemplation, then we'll learn compassion and sympathy for the 'little one', the broken one within ourselves. We' ll realise that you are a poor person too. (Rohr, Richard, Near occasions of grace, Orbis, 1993 p 108, I09) cited p 82.
John may have seen this gift in Christ – the ability to stand in the middle of contradiction, and yet to offer reconciliation to others. Although Christ’s reply is evasive, he does respond with a reference to the Isaiah passage that we had read today:
The blind receive their sight,
The lame walk,
The lepers are cleansed,
The deaf hear,
The dead are raised,
And the poor have good news brought to them.
There is an inner harmony here – a reconciling of people within themselves.
Did Christ see an inner disharmony in John that made him respond in this way? Or was the response intended for a wider audience? We shall probably never know this side of heaven.
We do know that Christ offers to bring a wholeness that cannot be found anywhere else.
Rowan Williams quotes a poem :
You shall know him when he comes
Not by any din of drums
Not by anything he wears,
Not by the vantage of his airs ;
Not by his gown,
Nor by his crown,
But his coming known shall be
By the holy harmony
That his presence makes in thee.
Advent calls us to be reconciled to each other; reconciled to ourselves. But the only way we can reach this true reconciliation is through turning to Christ, and continually saying along with John the Baptist ‘who are you? ; are you the one who is to come? ; can you speak to me ? do you have a word of healing or wholeness for me?’
It is a reconciliation that has high rewards – because it gives us a freedom that anticipates the striving for the coming of the kingdom.
So this advent we look ahead for a coming Christ who will offer reconciliation and peace in the transforming message of the incarnation.
Amen
We can almost touch the frustration that John feels at the beginning of this passage. ‘Are you the one who is to come’? John asks of Jesus. He is confused – who is this person? where does he fit? Does he have anything to say to John?
They are questions that we all struggle with. Even today, we ask the same questions of Christ. Who is this? Where is he coming from? Does he have anything to say to me?
We expect answers – as John did. We expect an answer to our question – are you the one who is to come?
And yet, as with John, the answer to the question remains obscure. Christ remains the totally enigmatic face on the wall, the cross, the bread and wine. Silent signs, as silent as he was before Pilate, consistently refusing a straight and simple answer. We can't feed him questions like a computer and receive tidy, systematic replies. He won't let on: we can shout and wave our arms at that icon, and it stays the same, a dark expressionless face that gives us nothing but itself to think about. We can shout and wave our arms at each other, appealing to Christ, and when we turn to him, all we meet is silence, a kind of annihilating judgment on all we say. Christ can bear all sorts of interpretations, and we can't expect him to tell us which he likes.
But interpret him we must. We're constructive, imaginative beings, after all, and we can't escape from language, so we must talk.
One thing interpretations and visions of Christ have to do with is reconciliation – our reconciliation with ourselves and each other and God.
Perhaps this is what John was looking for as he sat in prison – a way of finding reconciliation within himself, and reconciliation with God. Reconciliation often happens at key points in our lives. Dame Cicely Saunders, who founded the hospice movement, writes that reconciliation of our inner selves and reconciliation before God are often key at the end of a life. And yet, it doesn’t have to wait until then. The main task in any life is to find integration – the bringing together of what is scattered and diverse and forming a whole. Perhaps this was what John was seeking as he sat in prison – a means of making sense of his life, of regaining his identity, and reassuring himself that his life had made sense and been of value.
Perhaps it is something we all seek as we ask questions of this enigmatic figure in front of us. Seeking ways of reconciling our inner nature; reconciling ourselves to God.
Seeking reconciliation though from someone who provoked so much conflict in his life sounds paradoxical.
Time and again Jesus’ presence evoked conflict and contradiction. Even in his healing ministry there were voices of dissent; he was thrown out of the synagogue in Nazareth; crowds tried to stone him. Yet he never abandoned the precarious frontier where all dualities meet. He inhabited the nerve line of paradox and contradiction. We forget that Jesus knows contradiction, paradox and pathos from within. Both human and divine he lived an existence of two worlds – a divided, and yet completely whole existence.
Despite the tension of the frontier he inhabited, he always kept his dignity, balance and poise. This must have been the fruit of the thirty years of solitary interior work before he emerged in his public mission.
Whilst being a voice of conflict, Christ also occupied a frontier that was of greatest possibility and renewal. I imagine this is true in our own lives too. Those around us who occupy positions in areas of conflict and contradiction are often those to whom we turn in order to have some insight into reconciliation.
Think of Nelson Mandela – a man who was at the heart of enormous conflict in his country, and yet who now occupies a prophetic role in terms of reconciliation.
Or Gordon Wilson, the man who after the IRA bombing at Enniskillen publicly forgave the bombers, saying that "I bear no ill-will, no grudge".
Or Julie Nicholson, the parish priest who stepped down after she struggled to forgive those who had killed her daughter in the 7/7 bombings in London.
From my own conversations with other people, I know how much her own struggle has spoken to others also battling with reconciliation.
Perhaps the secret to this gift of reconciliation lies in the fact that unless we explore the silent and hidden places of our own hearts first, we are hardly in a position to find much of an echo in the hearts of others. The interface between the inner and outer worlds is almost like a two way mirror. To maintain a solid connection with the poor, the marginalised, the outcasts around us, we need to be always in touch with those within our own lives, We must always be trying to find and verify our own authentic voice while we fulfill the role of being a voice for those who cannot, or will not, speak out their own truth.
In a wonderful book called Near occasions of grace, the author says that he feels that the outer poverty, injustice and absurdity we see when we look around us mirrors our own inner poverty, injustice, absurdity. The poor man or women outside is an invitation to the poor man or woman inside. As we learn compassion and sympathy for the brokenness of things ; When we encounter the visible icon of the painful mystery In 'the little ones' ; then, if we have built bridges between the inner and outer, if we have learned to move between action and contemplation, then we'll learn compassion and sympathy for the 'little one', the broken one within ourselves. We' ll realise that you are a poor person too. (Rohr, Richard, Near occasions of grace, Orbis, 1993 p 108, I09) cited p 82.
John may have seen this gift in Christ – the ability to stand in the middle of contradiction, and yet to offer reconciliation to others. Although Christ’s reply is evasive, he does respond with a reference to the Isaiah passage that we had read today:
The blind receive their sight,
The lame walk,
The lepers are cleansed,
The deaf hear,
The dead are raised,
And the poor have good news brought to them.
There is an inner harmony here – a reconciling of people within themselves.
Did Christ see an inner disharmony in John that made him respond in this way? Or was the response intended for a wider audience? We shall probably never know this side of heaven.
We do know that Christ offers to bring a wholeness that cannot be found anywhere else.
Rowan Williams quotes a poem :
You shall know him when he comes
Not by any din of drums
Not by anything he wears,
Not by the vantage of his airs ;
Not by his gown,
Nor by his crown,
But his coming known shall be
By the holy harmony
That his presence makes in thee.
Advent calls us to be reconciled to each other; reconciled to ourselves. But the only way we can reach this true reconciliation is through turning to Christ, and continually saying along with John the Baptist ‘who are you? ; are you the one who is to come? ; can you speak to me ? do you have a word of healing or wholeness for me?’
It is a reconciliation that has high rewards – because it gives us a freedom that anticipates the striving for the coming of the kingdom.
So this advent we look ahead for a coming Christ who will offer reconciliation and peace in the transforming message of the incarnation.
Amen
Saturday, 8 December 2007
Second Sunday of Advent. 9 December 2007; Matthew 3:1-12. Melanie Groundsell.
I came across this story recently :
A taxi passenger tapped the driver on the shoulder to ask him something. The driver screamed, lost control of the car, nearly hit a bus, went up on the pavement, and stopped centimetres from a shop window. For a second everything went quiet in the cab, then the driver said, ‘Look mister, don’t ever do that again. You scared the daylights out of me!’
The passenger apologized and said he didn’t realize that a little tap could scare him so much.
The driver replied ‘Sorry, it’s not really your fault. Today is my first day as a cab driver. I’ve been driving hearses for the last 25 years’.
Surprises are often jolts in what can be a sometimes mundane life. When they come they can force us to think again about priorities, direction in life, values, and spirituality.
We come to this passage in Matthew straight from an account of Jesus early childhood. The previous chapter ends with the comment that Jesus made his home in a town called Nazareth. And then, suddenly, we are launched into the opening of chapter 3 – In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near’.
This is a dramatic entry. Whereas Mark, Luke and John use John the Baptist as part of the opening theatre scene – as a person who is known to the audience before we get going on the journey, Matthew announces the arrival of John the Baptist with trumpets. The doors of the Gospel swing open, and there stands John in the wilderness of Judea, looking for all the world like Elijah of old. For us, it’s a shock to see him. Who could have guessed it?
His appearance is itself a claim that God’s ways with the world are often strange, unforeseen, and unpredictable. Here at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, John the Baptist announces a call to worship in the flesh. Not a benign and cheery Good morning, but a real call to worship that shakes the cobwebs off the pews: ‘Repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near’.
And so we are reminded of the action of God in history.
It is often sudden, unexpected, and sometimes we may feel intrusive.
In our comfortable ideas of Western pilgrimage, with an even road that meanders through the English hillsides, there is little to compare with the incoming presence of an awe inspiring God. Sometimes an Elijah appears, a nation repents, a Berlin Wall is dismantled, a Martin Luther King, or a Mahatma Gandhi emerges.
God’s will shatters the comfortable, ordinary ways of doing things, and breaks in on the world in a jarring surprise. I know that some of you will have been shocked by my news today
– and some of you may still be trying to absorb the impact, reflecting on your own experiences of illness.
Always though, when God breaks in this way – He is pointing beyond
– Beyond to somewhere different
– To a different reality
– To a world that is new
This connection to the ‘beyondness of things’ is vital in our own spiritual journey. We look on times when God breaks into our lives unexpectedly as times that can stretch and transform the normal fabric of life so that they let in cracks of eternity – and I think too help us to see those cracks in ordinary life as well. From those signs of eternity within ourselves, and our world, we are then able to speak something of eternity beyond.
How, though, do we describe this beyondness. We need to stretch the language and thought we use. Poetry goes some way towards describing in images what we fail to articulate through sentences. And yet even here, words often fail to describe the mystery that we see.
Perhaps we need to be led into the realm beyond words. As Solzhenitsyn has commented in his work on art, it is like that small mirror in the fairy tales – you glimpse the inaccessible, a realm forever beyond reach where no horse or magic carpet can take you.
(Alexander Solzhenitsyn from Nobel Prize speech titled The gift of art )
John the Baptist also struggled to describe what he was seeing. He knew in his own heart that the one to come would be greater than he, and would transform the world as we know it.
Yet how to describe this image of transformation?
We can almost sense John’s frustration with the Saducees and Pharisees as he tries to articulate what is to come – they can’t seem to understand what he is trying to tell them. What John sees is a little of the beyondness – the mystery of God – that lies beyond human language, and pictures, and poetry, and can only exist in silence.
Those of you who came to the Advent meditation on Tuesday will recognise the words of Walt Whitman :
After the seas are all cross’d (as they seem already cross’d)
After the great captains and engineers have accomplished their work
After the noble inventors, after the scientists, the chemist, the geologist, the ethnologist,
Finally shall come the poet,
The true son of God, singing songs.
There is a sense in which God is beyond all human knowledge, beyond human language, beyond any kind of shape that we can construct.
And yet, especially at this time of Advent we are confronted with this mystery that is God, breaking into our structured world, pointing us to somewhere that we can’t yet see, to an unknown world that seems to be beyond description; to a reality that seems to transcend anything that we can experience on earth.
We are faced with a challenge. In order to follow God on this journey, we have to take a road that we don’t know exists, to find a path that appears not to be there.
It seems to be an impossible task – and yet we are called to follow on this journey.
As John of the Cross wrote in the 16th century (and subsequently made famous by T S Eliot) :
In order to arrive at that which thou knowest not,
Thou must go by a way that thou knowest not.
In order to arrive at that which thou possessest not,
Thou must go by a way that thou possessest not.
In order to arrive at that which thou art not,
Thou must go through that which thou art not.
An impossible journey – and one in which in many ways I feel I am just beginning.
Just beginning to find a path that doesn’t exist;
Just beginning to leave the road in order to find it;
Just beginning to find the emptiness that will support and sustain me;
I think Thomas Merton put his finger on the struggle that many of us face when he said:
“We must live by a power and a light that seem not to be there. We must live by the strength of an apparent emptiness that is always truly empty and yet never fails to support us at every moment.” (Thomas Merton).
And so we wait.
We wait with John the Baptist for the coming mystery;
We wait in the silence that speaks beyond words;
We wait for an all transforming God to break in on the world, in the shape of a baby.
Amen
A taxi passenger tapped the driver on the shoulder to ask him something. The driver screamed, lost control of the car, nearly hit a bus, went up on the pavement, and stopped centimetres from a shop window. For a second everything went quiet in the cab, then the driver said, ‘Look mister, don’t ever do that again. You scared the daylights out of me!’
The passenger apologized and said he didn’t realize that a little tap could scare him so much.
The driver replied ‘Sorry, it’s not really your fault. Today is my first day as a cab driver. I’ve been driving hearses for the last 25 years’.
Surprises are often jolts in what can be a sometimes mundane life. When they come they can force us to think again about priorities, direction in life, values, and spirituality.
We come to this passage in Matthew straight from an account of Jesus early childhood. The previous chapter ends with the comment that Jesus made his home in a town called Nazareth. And then, suddenly, we are launched into the opening of chapter 3 – In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near’.
This is a dramatic entry. Whereas Mark, Luke and John use John the Baptist as part of the opening theatre scene – as a person who is known to the audience before we get going on the journey, Matthew announces the arrival of John the Baptist with trumpets. The doors of the Gospel swing open, and there stands John in the wilderness of Judea, looking for all the world like Elijah of old. For us, it’s a shock to see him. Who could have guessed it?
His appearance is itself a claim that God’s ways with the world are often strange, unforeseen, and unpredictable. Here at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, John the Baptist announces a call to worship in the flesh. Not a benign and cheery Good morning, but a real call to worship that shakes the cobwebs off the pews: ‘Repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near’.
And so we are reminded of the action of God in history.
It is often sudden, unexpected, and sometimes we may feel intrusive.
In our comfortable ideas of Western pilgrimage, with an even road that meanders through the English hillsides, there is little to compare with the incoming presence of an awe inspiring God. Sometimes an Elijah appears, a nation repents, a Berlin Wall is dismantled, a Martin Luther King, or a Mahatma Gandhi emerges.
God’s will shatters the comfortable, ordinary ways of doing things, and breaks in on the world in a jarring surprise. I know that some of you will have been shocked by my news today
– and some of you may still be trying to absorb the impact, reflecting on your own experiences of illness.
Always though, when God breaks in this way – He is pointing beyond
– Beyond to somewhere different
– To a different reality
– To a world that is new
This connection to the ‘beyondness of things’ is vital in our own spiritual journey. We look on times when God breaks into our lives unexpectedly as times that can stretch and transform the normal fabric of life so that they let in cracks of eternity – and I think too help us to see those cracks in ordinary life as well. From those signs of eternity within ourselves, and our world, we are then able to speak something of eternity beyond.
How, though, do we describe this beyondness. We need to stretch the language and thought we use. Poetry goes some way towards describing in images what we fail to articulate through sentences. And yet even here, words often fail to describe the mystery that we see.
Perhaps we need to be led into the realm beyond words. As Solzhenitsyn has commented in his work on art, it is like that small mirror in the fairy tales – you glimpse the inaccessible, a realm forever beyond reach where no horse or magic carpet can take you.
(Alexander Solzhenitsyn from Nobel Prize speech titled The gift of art )
John the Baptist also struggled to describe what he was seeing. He knew in his own heart that the one to come would be greater than he, and would transform the world as we know it.
Yet how to describe this image of transformation?
We can almost sense John’s frustration with the Saducees and Pharisees as he tries to articulate what is to come – they can’t seem to understand what he is trying to tell them. What John sees is a little of the beyondness – the mystery of God – that lies beyond human language, and pictures, and poetry, and can only exist in silence.
Those of you who came to the Advent meditation on Tuesday will recognise the words of Walt Whitman :
After the seas are all cross’d (as they seem already cross’d)
After the great captains and engineers have accomplished their work
After the noble inventors, after the scientists, the chemist, the geologist, the ethnologist,
Finally shall come the poet,
The true son of God, singing songs.
There is a sense in which God is beyond all human knowledge, beyond human language, beyond any kind of shape that we can construct.
And yet, especially at this time of Advent we are confronted with this mystery that is God, breaking into our structured world, pointing us to somewhere that we can’t yet see, to an unknown world that seems to be beyond description; to a reality that seems to transcend anything that we can experience on earth.
We are faced with a challenge. In order to follow God on this journey, we have to take a road that we don’t know exists, to find a path that appears not to be there.
It seems to be an impossible task – and yet we are called to follow on this journey.
As John of the Cross wrote in the 16th century (and subsequently made famous by T S Eliot) :
In order to arrive at that which thou knowest not,
Thou must go by a way that thou knowest not.
In order to arrive at that which thou possessest not,
Thou must go by a way that thou possessest not.
In order to arrive at that which thou art not,
Thou must go through that which thou art not.
An impossible journey – and one in which in many ways I feel I am just beginning.
Just beginning to find a path that doesn’t exist;
Just beginning to leave the road in order to find it;
Just beginning to find the emptiness that will support and sustain me;
I think Thomas Merton put his finger on the struggle that many of us face when he said:
“We must live by a power and a light that seem not to be there. We must live by the strength of an apparent emptiness that is always truly empty and yet never fails to support us at every moment.” (Thomas Merton).
And so we wait.
We wait with John the Baptist for the coming mystery;
We wait in the silence that speaks beyond words;
We wait for an all transforming God to break in on the world, in the shape of a baby.
Amen
First Sunday of Advent; 2 December 2007; John 1:1-5; Kim
TALK FOR THE CHRISTINGLE SERVICE
A relighting Christingle, made possible, of course, with a trick candle. What we celebrate today, though, is no trick but reality: the truth of what God has done for us through his Son, Jesus Christ.
‘What has come into being, in him,’ said our reading earlier, ‘is life; life that is light for all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has been unable to extinguish it.’ No matter how dark it may seem, somehow that light keeps shining, bringing strength, hope, courage and peace into even the bleakest of circumstances. As one of the Psalms puts it: ‘If I say, “Surely darkness will steal over me, night will envelop me”, darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as day; for you both dark and light are the same’ (Psalm 139:11-12).
It’s time, then, for us to think about how we are going to be ready to receive this Light of Christ this Christmas time? How can we prepare to receive this Light of Christ? You could join us each Tuesday evening during Advent for Prayers and Meditation prepared by Melanie, you could come along to the Carol Service on the 16th December, you can join us for the Crib Service on Christmas Eve at 3.00pm. But today we are preparing to light up the darkness in the lives of Children who for one reason or another have run away from home and are in need of a ‘Big Bag’. A simple bag containing all sorts of things that will make that child feel valued, loved and saved.
Later we will be lighting our own Christingles, not relighting ones but nevertheless reminding us of light that cannot be extinguished: the light of Christ shining in the darkness of our world. As your candle is lit, ask God to help you prepare and to be ready for His coming. Amen.
A relighting Christingle, made possible, of course, with a trick candle. What we celebrate today, though, is no trick but reality: the truth of what God has done for us through his Son, Jesus Christ.
‘What has come into being, in him,’ said our reading earlier, ‘is life; life that is light for all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has been unable to extinguish it.’ No matter how dark it may seem, somehow that light keeps shining, bringing strength, hope, courage and peace into even the bleakest of circumstances. As one of the Psalms puts it: ‘If I say, “Surely darkness will steal over me, night will envelop me”, darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as day; for you both dark and light are the same’ (Psalm 139:11-12).
It’s time, then, for us to think about how we are going to be ready to receive this Light of Christ this Christmas time? How can we prepare to receive this Light of Christ? You could join us each Tuesday evening during Advent for Prayers and Meditation prepared by Melanie, you could come along to the Carol Service on the 16th December, you can join us for the Crib Service on Christmas Eve at 3.00pm. But today we are preparing to light up the darkness in the lives of Children who for one reason or another have run away from home and are in need of a ‘Big Bag’. A simple bag containing all sorts of things that will make that child feel valued, loved and saved.
Later we will be lighting our own Christingles, not relighting ones but nevertheless reminding us of light that cannot be extinguished: the light of Christ shining in the darkness of our world. As your candle is lit, ask God to help you prepare and to be ready for His coming. Amen.
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