Category Archives: sermon

How to cope with your mother-in-law

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The reading for today’s communion service was Mark 1 29-34, and I got to thinking about what is making Simon’s mother-in-law unwell. I have a suspicion it was what happened a few paragraphs earlier – Jesus comes out of the wilderness and calls Simon to follow him – and Lo! – Simon does just that.

Now if you’re a good mother, and you see your son-in-law go off following some no-good preacher what’s your first thought going to be? Who’s going to look after my daughter and the family!? And in a situation where you have absolutely no separate power of your own, your world faces imminent collapse, and so you withdraw into yourself, you confine yourself to bed with a fever.

Which, of course, just makes things worse. Not only are you as a woman rather dodgy and untouchable, but now you are ill and you have all the social ostracism associated with uncleanliness to cope with. So nobody’s going to come near you and your stuck stewing in unpleasant juices.

What is a good son-in-law to do? There is only one thing to do: bring Jesus into the conversation. Miracle of miracles – Jesus touches the mother-in-law – hey he’s not such a no-good preacher after all – would you like a cup of tea my dear?

That’s the solution to family problems. Bring Jesus into the conversation.

And pray :o)

Innocence after Peak Oil

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Some thoughts prompted by the readings today for the Feast of Holy Innocents (Mt 2 and 1 Cor 1)

A couple of years ago, Rowan Williams preached on these texts and made the point that sometimes our wisdom has perverse consequences – in this instance, the Three Wise Men have set off a chain of events leading to the slaughter of all the male infants in and around Bethlehem. For once, I’m not convinced that Rowan has the right interpretation, however right that specific point might otherwise be.

In Scripture, wisdom as such is not a problem – and for the three it is certainly not a problem as it is how they are enabled to follow God’s will – so long as it is made distinct from the wisdom of the world. This is what follows from Paul’s arguments in 1 Corinthians 1. God has taken what the world despises and used it to shame the the strong – the structures of what the world values have been overturned – and so the Christian follows the one executed in shame, for that symbolises the arrival of the Kingdom. Yet that Kingdom, whilst rejecting worldly wisdom, is itself the rule by Wisdom, Sophia, the one who plays at the feet of God when the world is created.

This is the Word through which all things are created, and as such the one whom we are to follow. Consequently, we are to be in this world as He was to the Father from the beginning – playing at his feet. Consider a child opening up carefully wrapped presents at Christmas time – no care for what is being torn – simply a joy in what is being discovered. This is how we are to be.

Yet how can we do that in the face of the reckless hate displayed by such as Herod? For his actions have hardly vanished from our world. We are still surrounded by tragedy – how can we retain our child-like joy when the child-like are abused all around us?

We are to be perfect as our father in heaven is perfect – which Christ teaches us in the context of saying that God sends rain upon the just and the unjust. In other words we are not to judge. We are to forgive our brother seven times seven times. We are not to be scandalised by the evil that we see – and it is only by avoiding scandal that we are enabled to retain our humanity. We are called to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves – in other words we are to look clearly at the nature of the world we live in, with all its horror and the slaughter of innocents – yet we are not to give in to a despair, a weary cynicism, a bitterness which poisons all life. We are to love the world as the Father loved it, and as his Son loved us.

For to let go of the innocence – to take offence at the evildoer, to not love them – this is the Sin against the Holy Spirit, this is the refusal of forgiveness which destroys human community.

The perspective which Peak Oil opens out for us offers a vision of tremendous human suffering – the consequences of accident and malice, human greed and need – and the pressure to lose our innocence, to give in to the fantasies of the ‘die-off’ crowd and prepare for the apocalypse with relish – it is in this situation that our innocence is most essential. It is the retention of our innocence – our refusal to be scandalised by human wickedness – this is the struggle for our faith in the coming years.

Heavenly Father,
whose children suffered at the hands of Herod,
though they had done no wrong:
by the suffering of your Son
and by the innocence of our lives
frustrate all evil designs
and establish your reign of justice and peace;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord.
Amen.
(the collect for the Feast of Holy Innocents)

Love’s the only engine of survival

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“When they said ‘repent’… I wondered what they meant”

2nd Sunday of Advent: John the Baptizer comes preaching repentance. As Cohen sings – we don’t know what repentance means. So often we think of a stern moralistic preacher wagging his finger in judgement, predicting the doom of our civilisation.

Funny that, given all I’ve been reading up on in the last month or two.

From today’s Epistle: “Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation”. The thing I’ve been worrying about most is timing. How much time do we have to lay plans for alternative forms of life? What’s the shape of the slope on the other side of Hubbert’s Peak? How bad is it going to get?

“The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare”

Thing is, as Tom Wright often argues, this language is not about the prediction of heavenly events, but of the collapse of present day political structures. The ‘elements’ in 2 Peter are the powers that be.

There is a longing – and it is there in residual form in much secular doomsaying – for God’s judgement to come and for a spectacular end to our world. That is what the Book of Revelation is about after all. Yet it is also the case that Jesus defers the expectations, for ‘about that day and hour nobody knows’.

It’s a displacement of our own – often deeply buried – awareness of our own sin, that is, our own awareness of how far we have fallen away from what it is to be truly human. Our culture is so profoundly inhuman, not least in the monopoly of time, and deep down we know this. We want it to end, and so we long for it to collapse, and we long for the father figure to come in and sort it all out for us. Yet we also fear such a judgement for the very same awareness of our wrongness implicates us in the wrong doing itself. So in our terror we offer up sacrifices to appease the wrath of the vengeful deity “Lord spare us”.

The religious authorities recognise the power that this gives to them. They wag their finger and engender the terror. They exult in the coming judgement. They set up temples and demand sacrifice. They exist, parasitically, on the guilt and sorrow of the meek.

Into this situation comes the baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. It is an invitation into life, it is not a death sentence, for “He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.”

Repentance – turn your life around – worship a living God – choose life – life for a community here and now, not the salvation of an individual soul at the end of time.

This offer of forgiveness comes first (like the resurrection) – no wonder they chopped off his head.

It’s all about time. The living God wants us to return to him, to break our hearts of stone and give us hearts of flesh, to become the community that we were called out of Egypt to be – and to be a blessing to the world, to show forth God’s blessing through that very same way of life which we show and which we share.

There is judgement – but it is not the judgement of a vengeful and wrathful deity. God’s wrath is simply when we experience the consequences of our own actions. God’s grace is when we are spared.

In the years to come we will experience the consequences of our actions (Kyrie Eleison) and many in positions of authority will seek to claim that this is the wrath of God – giving themselves authority at the same time.

Let us not believe them.

Instead, let us remember that Advent is the time for penitence (choose life!) and for hope – hope in the God of grace and love and vulnerability, revealed when he came to earth as a baby.

“With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day”

In the darkness of these days that are passing away, let us set all our hope on the mercy of Christ, and look “forward to a new heaven, and a new earth, the home of righteousness”.

The parable of the talents

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A couple of weeks ago we had this parable in the Matthew version for Sunday, and in the Luke version for the following Wednesday. Doing a bit of background reading made me wonder about the right way to interpret it.

My favourite lectionary site had a link to a remarkable paper that persuaded me that the references to a ‘king’ in Matthew’s parables were not necessarily – or even usually – references to Jesus or God, but in fact had specific political and contemporary resonances for those listening to Jesus teach. And I recall – though I cannot track down quite where – a reference to (I think) one of the Herods going to Rome to receive approval to become King ruling over the land of Israel. So I think there is this contemporary resonance to the parable of the talents – and that it isn’t, in the first place, a question of encouraging Calvinistic prudence.

So what is it about? Well, let’s run with the idea that Jesus is referring to a specific king (first) and that he is criticising a particular attitude, probably of the Pharisees (second) – given that this is where the parable fits in Matthew, in the context of the woes etc. Clearly the Pharisees, and even the general population, would have identified with the third servant, who didn’t provide the wicked king with a return on the investment made. And it is this attitude that Jesus is criticising.

Might it be that in fact Jesus is criticising the attitude of militant resistance? In other words, that where there is a usurper on the throne, the point need not be to overthrow or resist such a king – that reaps where they do not sow – but to get on with the business of life, thereby possibly achieving authority locally (over the ‘ten cities’ – presumably the area of the Decapolis?) leading to greater wealth for all? So an emphasis on prudence – not because the king is God, but because the king is wicked and exploitative, and that it doesn’t matter about whether the king gets more from you if you do more, what matters is ensuring that there is sufficient wealth to go round. The militant resistance of the third servant is held up as destructive; the cooperation is held up as fruitful.

This seems to chime with the idea that God rains upon the just and the unjust etc. We shouldn’t get caught up with, if you like, resisting capitalist exploitation. We should concern ourselves with God prospering the work of our hands.

I’m not entirely happy with this reading, but I prefer it to seeing the king as God, ready to damn us for being afraid.

The political Jesus

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(today’s sermon)

Simon – leading disciple – declares that Jesus is the Son of God; and then Jesus calls him Peter – Rocky! – ‘on this rock I shall build my church and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it’.

Peter, duly renamed, feels great.

Yet within moments, when Jesus starts to explain what it meant to be the Son of God – that there was suffering involved – Peter tries to talk him out of it.

“Get thee behind me Satan!”

Any chance of Peter’s ego being too large vanishes.

What did he get wrong? The problem is that Peter was using the Son of God language in the way that parts of the Old Testament sees the Messiah – a Son of David, who would restore Israel, fulfilling all the promises made by God. This was the secularisation of God’s intentions. God called Israel to be the holy people, the ones who would demonstrate justice and God’s own nature to the wider world. Not to be another country, squabbling and warring over who shall be in control. And Jesus was the fulfilment of God’s plans for Israel because in him God’s call is answered. Christ, perfectly obedient, displays to the world what God is calling humanity to be.

And it doesn’t involve him sitting on a throne in Jerusalem.

So does this mean that Jesus wasn’t political? And that – as Christians – we shouldn’t pay too much attention to the political process? Not at all. Jesus’ ministry could not have been more political.

Consider how it begins: after being baptised, and tempted by Satan, Jesus goes back to his hometown, goes into the synagogue, reads from Isaiah and declares the Jubilee! So: all those who had become rich, who had accumulated land – sorry guys, time to give it all up. Whereas all those who had lost their land, who had got into debt – Hallelujah! Redemption Song!

It’s difficult to imagine anything more directly political than taking wealth away from rich people and giving it to poor people; yet that was the heart and soul of Jesus’ ministry – as it is of the Bible as a whole. “I am the God who called you out of Egypt” – out of slavery. That is still the promise which God makes.

This is not because wealth is itself sinful. It’s that the concentration of wealth in few hands causes, inevitably, other people to fall by the wayside. It’s the story of Lazarus at the gate, which should surely cause us all to tremble.

So why isn’t Jesus wanting to take that throne in Jerusalem? For the simple reason that Christ knows it isn’t force which is required. It isn’t a change of political system that is required. It is the change in people’s hearts. Think of the language of the leaven in the bread; or the salt that has lost its savour. It is, for Christians, never a question of changing the system, so much as of changing the people within the system. First we learn what it means to love one another, then we can seek to express that love through a political arrangement. The Christian calling is to live out a different life, one structured by the values of the Kingdom of God.

And that has profound political implications.

Those implications need not be headline grabbing. They need not, for example, be consumed with the exact whys and wherefores, the rights and wrongs, of what is going on in Iraq. They are, instead, very concrete, down to earth and specific. How will you relate to your neighbour? That may easily have political implications, but the roots of the behaviour lie not in a concern with power, but in a concern with love. We are called to follow the way of love, to love one another as He loved us; and this will have consequences.

Consider the story of André Trocmé. Trocmé was a pastor in central France in the middle of the twentieth century, at a place called Le Chambon. When France was conquered by the Nazis, and the Vichy regime started to implement the anti-semitic legislation required, Trocmé stood up in front of his congregation and told them that he was not going to co-operate with the state. He was not going to violently resist, but nor could he simply stand by and watch violence be done to his neighbour. And so – with the full and active support of his congregations, Trocmé established a system which enabled the hiding of hundreds of Jewish people, especially children, until the darkness could pass, and that system was destroyed. Trocmé risked his life for his neighbour, and it was a matter of sheer luck that he wasn’t executed. We are not in that situation; not yet – although if the anti-Islamic tendencies strengthen in the coming years then we must be clear about what the Christian faith calls us to do – to defend all those made in the image of God from actions which would blaspheme that image, and oppress or persecute our brothers and sisters.

This is the nature of the life to which we are called. And this is what Peter couldn’t quite understand. Peter sought the implementation by force of the right answers. And certainly, the forcible implementation of a Jubilee would have represented the establishment of justice – for a time. For the truth is that the use of force perpetuates and legitimates the use of force. Jesus’ way is a different path. It is a path which leads through death.

Peter cannot cope with the idea that Jesus might die. And it is precisely this fear of death which provides the authorities with their power. They trust that, because they have the ultimate power of killing those who oppose them, that they will be able to get their way. That might will make right. Yet what does it profiteth a man if he gain the whole world but lose his own soul? It is this fear of death that Jesus overcomes in the resurrection. The resurrection is the single most powerful political statement ever made – it dethrones all the powers that be, and exposes their nature.

Recently I came across a wonderful summary of the New Testament. It reduced it all to two short and succinct phrases. The first was: If you don’t love, you die. In other words, we are made in the image of God, and that means that we are made to love one another. If we don’t love each other, our soul begins to shrivel and wither, and we make ourselves less than human, we deface the image of Christ within. If we do not love, we die.

The second phrase was: if you love, they’ll kill you. In other words, acting according to our true nature and loving our neighbour will lead to opposition and conflict with the powers of the world. If we love, then we shall be persecuted. This is the way of the cross. This is the path which Jesus trod, and it is what we are called to follow. There is a glorious liberty about this path – it is the way of life, life in all its fullness, and everything else is stale and shallow by comparison. But it will lead to conflict with the values of the world.

Peter himself came to understand this, and at the end of his life, after a long and fruitful ministry, he too was crucified. Not many of us will be called to witness to the truths of our faith to that extent. But it remains the calling that every Christian must be prepared for. For we are not children of this world, we have a different Lord. May his grace surround us as we walk in the path, and give us the strength to take up our cross, and follow Him.