Janet’s Blog

Can you remember the first time you saw a smiley?

By that I mean the symbol which is made from a colon a dash and a close bracket sign.

It might have been an e-mail, it might have been a text message, it might have been written text or you may be one of the people in the world who have still never received a smiley in a communication.

I think I suppose I probably got my first smiley on an e-mail in 1989, twenty years ago, but they are older than that.

The smiley is now technically and emoticon, and with super new e-mail programs you can get animated smilies that can bounce laugh cry go red or any manner of things. But back in 1982 when the first university based computer message boards were being used the smiley had a simple purpose.

On 19^th September 1982 Scott Fahlman proposed the use of the smiley to show that a message had been posted in jest, and also the ‘sad smiley’ with the bracket the other way round was a sign of seriousness.

Thus was a whole new world of emoticons born.

All three of today’s passages are about communication, how God communicates to us, how we communicate to God and each other.

We know that a lot of communication is not about words. It’s about other things.  The Psalm begins The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

2.Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.

3.There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard.

4.Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.

And most of us don’t go, don’t be silly the skies don’t speak, they can’t use words.

Instead we go, yes that’s right. Some people might even be humming a little bit of Haydn in their head. The heavens are telling the glory of God, the Universe declares his marvellous handiwork.

We understand, we understand that the communication is about more than the tight constructs of language. We can’t tie God down with human language. The Quakers of course take this to the extreme in their services, they say it is so important we don’t try to tie God down with our language that they don’t have any words in their services.

We don’t do that, but we need to be mindful that we never let us think that the words are enough or all we have, how does God communicate himself to us, not just with words with everything in all creation.

There’s a pop song I  like called more than words, West life covered it but it was actually written by a band called extreme. The video is great. Only two members of a four person group perform the song and so in the video the other two are shown sitting with their feet up looking at a magazine each. The song is about being in love about being to do with actions as well as words,

More than words is all I ever needed you to show

Then you wouldn’t have to say that you love me

Cos I’d already know

 

Even the heavens speak of God’s greatness…but what is it that we speak of?

James gives us a salutary warning of what it is that actually humans speak?

“Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be.”

I wonder what it is that you most ever regret saying?

I guess for each one of us that it is something of which we are so ashamed that we would never actually want to share it. We might not really ever want to think about it.

James warns us, and we should be more like the heavens and less like poor humans. We should be focussing on proclaiming the goodness of God and less on cursing.

This is hard if you are either naturally, or through circumstance a grumpy person…

But it is important.

It is important that our words and our actions tie up, last weeks passage from James, there is no point in sending someone a horrible message and sending a smiley after it, that just doesn’t add up. It is not consistent, it is not authentic, what is it that we communicate to others about God and what being a Christian is like.

So who is communicating what in the gospel passage?

Jesus says ‘what’s the gossip?’

What has been communicated by my actions, are they speaking louder than the words, are they more than words.

 

Jesus is important.

Jesus is good.

Jesus is from God.

Peter gets it.

Jesus is the Christ.

Hooray for Peter, Peter has understood.

But not everything.

Jesus says don’t be ashamed of me and my words.

Don’t be ashamed of me and my words.

My words again. Words useful, but not enough.

Work at UCLA has shown that when you give a talk only 7% of what you communicate is actually the words. The rest is to do with your voice and the way you use your body.

Jesus is talking about his death and resurrection, he is telling them about what is going to happen. Jesus knows that the ultimate path to this communication is via suffering.

So today, we recognise the heavens speak of God’s glory, but not with words. We should speak of God’s glory with words, but often don’t, and Jesus, well Jesus came to tell us how God loves us.

When we take communion the technical word for what we are doing is communicating. We communicate with God, but not with words.

 

 

More than words is all I ever needed you to show

Then you wouldn’t have to say that you love me

Cos I’d already know

 

For Christmas this year Sainsbury’s have a few suggestions for the man in your life.

An iDect telephone. A Canon camera, a Nintendo Wii, An assortment of glasses from which to drink, and a George foreman healthy eating grill.

I can say that my husband will be receiving none of the above, although we did buy the first bit of his Christmas present on Thursday afternoon!

I wonder what is on your Christmas list?

What is it that you want.

It is a cliché that when you ask a beauty paegant contestant what she wants that she will say world peace?

So what is there on our Christmas list somewhere between world peace and a pair of really nice thermal socks for keeping feet warm even in the coldest church buildings.

There are of course presents that we quite like, or quite fancy the sound of what will lie languishing at the back of a cupboard or drawer, only to be brought out when the person who gave them to us comes around to visit.

Because it’s not just what we get which is important, but what we are going to do with it. Many of us who have indulged in the cost of a gym subscription know to our cost that the money will leave the bank account but that what is really important is the going to the gym.

Bartimaeus was a man who knew what he wanted.

Bartimaeus is a curious character who is described in an interesting way. Most of the people who Jesus’ heals are not named, but here is Bartimaeus, but he is named as somebody’s son. He is only somebody’s son, Timaeus’ boy. Presumably he had some other name, but he was know as Timaeus’ boy. Not just that of course he was known as Blind Bartimaeus. Timaeus’ blind boy. That’s who he was, just Timaeus’  blind boy.

John Ayers speaks about this, for years he was Mr Ayers, the Revd Ayers, now of course he is Canon Ayers, John jokes that the next  accolade will be poor old. ‘Poor old Canon Ayers’.

So back to the outskirts of Jericho, Timaeus’ blind boy is sitting begging on the roadside. But Timaeus’ blind boy can see something which others are just beginning to get the hang of and it will be a while yet before the others fully understand the implications of anyway. The Son of Timaeus sits at the roadside shouting, Son of David, have mercy on me!

For Jesus to be acclaimed as the Son of David is hugely important, however feminists may feel about David’s appalling behaviour towards Bathsheba David is held up as the example of great Kingship. The moment when Israel lives as rulers of a huge part of the near east, a king who sought God, and whom God blessed, a special king. To be the Son of David is a position from which one can be merciful and Bartimaeus knows that he needs mercy.

Jesus asks him, “What do you want me to do for you?”

Batimaeus doesn’t want world peace, a new cloak, or a nice new full wineskin.

Bartimaues knows what he needs.

“Rabbi I want to see”

Bartimeaus was wanting his sight, in the old fashioned puritan sense of the word he was wanting his sight, he was lacking his sight and that’s what he wanted. He knew, he believed that Jesus, Son of David could give it to him and so he asked for it.

What did he do when his sight was restored.

The words are quite simple, quite easy in that it just says, Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road.

This is not as simple as it may first appear, the road is an interesting road. Remember this story is set on the outskirts of Jericho. Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem, in fact he will soon arrive to be greeted as a superhero, at least at first.

But the road between Jericho and Jerusalem is not an easy one. It’s about 15 miles and it rises 3 and a half thousand feet in that distance, it can be hot and rocky and is not an easy road.

We know that it is not an easy road because when Jesus wants an example of a difficult road this is the one he chooses as the setting for the story of the good Samaritan. This is a harsh, and difficult road, renowned for its robbers and general unkindness to travellers.  The traveller in the story of the good Samaritan travels down the hill, but Jesus is about to travel up, to tackle the climb. This is no road for a blind man.

But Bartimaeus isn’t blind any more, he receives his sight, and follows Jesus along this hard and difficult road.

If Jesus appeared now and said to us, “What do you want me to do for you?” what would we say?

We could ask for world peace,

 We could ask for an extra hour in bed every night.

We could to win the lottery and never have to work again or ever worry about money.

Or we could ask for what it is that we need. The thing which we need which would most help us be able to follow Jesus along the road.

 

Father, hear the prayer we offer:

not for ease that prayer shall be,

but for strength, that we may ever

live our lives courageously.

 

Not for ever in green pastures

do we ask our way to be ;

but the steep and rugged pathway

may we tread rejoicingly.

 

Not forever by still waters

would we idly rest and stay;

but would smite the living fountains

from the rocks along our way.

 

Be our strength in hours of weakness,

in our wanderings be our Guide;

through endeavour, failure, danger,

Saviour, be thou at our side.

So in the doctors surgery on 25th September I was asked why I hadn’t updated my Blog…

Here are my reasons

During August I was on holiday (yes more or less the whole month),

Then I preached once in September and got a bit behind, then I got ill,

Ill is an interesting word, the weekend of 26th/27th September I battled on, conducted a wedding, and managed to remain upright during the communion service which Alice led most of and Phil preached for.

Then on the Monday I was summoned back to the doctors who had some results of a blood test and were worried that I might have a pulomonary embolism and admitted me to hopsital. 24 hours later and one X-ray and one Q-test done they decided I didn’t have a PE but I was still sick, not having been helped by having an almost entirley sleepless night in hospital.

Then I was still poorly for quite a long time…one of my friends who is a doctor thinks I probably had swine flu, but they didn’t test me for it in hospital so we will probably never know.

Now I am back in action so I shall post some sermons, I’m very sorry, I will try to do better…

 

Psalm 24, Ephesians 1:3-14, Mark 6:14-29

I wonder what is the most exciting thing you’ve ever done?

 

The thing that made your heart race and gave you that thrill of exhilaration.

 

It may well have been a bit scary too…

 

Have you ever had a holy moment? An epiphanic moment when everything seemed clear or bright or holy.

 

 Maybe it was a response to a piece of music or a picture in a gallery or a sunset?

 

There was something, maybe it was sailing in just the right wind, maybe it was looking from a mountain or across a particular sunset…

 

What comes into your mind if I ask you to think of a holy man?

 

Do you think of a monk? Do you think of a great and famous saint? Is it the image of an Indian guru which comes to mind?

 

Who is the holiest person you have ever met?

 

Who is the holiest person with whom you regularly have a cup of tea?

 

When I say holy I don’t mean ‘religious’, necessarily, I don’t mean ‘pious’ or self important, I don’t mean someone who gets ten e-mails from God every day, I mean someone who is holy, who you can see lives in God and God lives in them, I think you’ll know really.

 

Herod has a problem with a holy man. Herod’s problem was with John the Baptist. It was John’s holiness that had led him into trouble, Herod’s wife was Herodias, and he shouldn’t have married her because she was his brother’s wife, and John kept on telling Herod this.

 

Herodias didn’t like this, for all Herodias is painted as the villain in this story she is a woman in a very vulnerable place, as any woman who had married into the Herod dynasty knew.  The last thing she needed was John going on about how they shouldn’t be married.

 

The roman emperor Augustus is quoted as saying that it was safer to be Herod’s pig than his son, this was not a groundless accusation for the dynasty.

 

Herod had ordered that John be arrested, but we hear that Herod is protecting John because Herod knows that John is a righteous and holy man.

 

Our response to holiness can be telling, maybe people are puzzled as we hear Herod is, but we also hear that Herod feared John and protected him.

 

Herod feared John and protected him.

 

I wonder if any of the people you know are afraid of your holiness as a Christian.

 

There are people who today can become scared of holiness. There will be moments when christians are called to say something, or do something in a particular situation, sometimes God will give you an insight into a situation and you need to speak into that situation, this will not always make you popular, if it done truly with love it may be liberating to someone, or perhaps someone will respond to it by actually saying, woah that’s a bit holy, and they might be a bit scared, that is not necessarily a bad thing if it’s done in the right way.

 

Some people can’t stand holiness, some people are scared by holiness, some people are so frightened by the holy that they will show a physical response.

 

Some people respond to holiness with violence.

 

And that is what happens for John, John is holy, Herod knows that, Herod is frightened of this holiness.

 

Why does Herodias do it? Why does she ask for John’s head on a platter? I don’t get it, she was probably my age plus or minus a little bit. Married to a violent and powerful king, so you ask your husband to do something which you know that he won’t want to do, but he will feel forced to do it because of the promise he has made in front of all ‘the men’. Maybe she is worried he will divorce her, or kill her, maybe as a result of John’s nagging, maybe she wants Herod to prove how much more she means to him than John.

 

Whatever her complex motives she asks, she asks for John’s head and Herod feels obliged to give it to her.

 

But Herod was about to learn the holiness lesson of the centuries

U2 have something to say about this…

 

Early morning, April 4

Shot rings out in the Memphis sky

Free at last, they took your life

They could not take your pride

 

Herod was about to learn the holiness lesson of the centuries,

 

you cannot kill holiness with violence.

 

Holiness can suffer violence, but holiness can never come to a violent end.

 

When Herod heard about Jesus what does he say,

 

Goody another itinerant preacher, that will keep the masses happy for a few months.

 

On no, oh no no no!

 

Herod says this

‘John, the man I beheaded, has been raised from the dead.’

 

I don’t think there is any way in which I could possibly give any justice to the sense of panic which would have been rising in Herod’s heart, and presumably Herodias’ too,

 

‘John, the man I beheaded, has been raised from the dead.’

 

‘John, back from the dead’, followed by a huge gulp and intake of breath…

 

It wasn’t the case, it wasn’t John back from the dead but Herod had learned that holiness can never come to a violent end.

 

Jesus, the epitome, the prime example of holiness,

 

he would too suffer violence as a response to his holiness,

 

and he would show ultimately how holiness can never come to a violent end,

 

true holiness is eternal, and you cannot keep it down, even with death.

 

 

It is not surprising that some of the most heart stirring fictional writing is, and always has been, along the themes of holiness and violent response to it. For those of you of a philosophical bent perhaps there is actually only one story which exists, and all other stories are part of that story, the story of the encounter with holiness…and the response to it.

 

So what is our response to holiness, as a community and as individuals? Will we respond to holiness with violence, will we submit to holiness, or will we step one step further and ask God to make us holy too, so that we can do holy things together.

 

It is part of these spiritual blessings that God has lavished upon us.

 

God has chosen us since before the creation the world to be holy. Will we accept the challenge to be holy. God has lavished his grace upon us.

 

 

11In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, 12in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. 13And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, 14who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.

 

 

We are marked in him with a seal, we bear the holy mark of Christ, but how are we called to be holy?

 

It is like we start off knowing that God is holy, then we dare to think that we want to be holy too, then we ask God to make us holy, because when we are holy God and us can do things together until we are so caught up in holiness we cannot go back.

 

This doesn’t happen quickly and we make mistakes, we do or say stupid things, or things which are deliberately wrong.

 

So why should we want to be holy? Not because of a sense of pious self congratulation, but because we know that there is not anything more exhilaratingly exciting. We cannot think of anything better than to find our lives caught up in the purpose of God, but we know however exciting it may be we are 100% safe,

 

because even if our holiness would suffer violence, it can never come to a violent end.

 

Psalm 130, Mark 5:21-43, 2 Corinthians 8:7-15

Waiting

Waiting…

I wonder what you think of waiting…

Waiting is a strange, poignant, emotional phenomenon

and a practical everyday occurrence.

Maybe as British we have a cultural view on waiting because we so often wait, and wait nicely in queues. Neatly.

The emotional side of waiting is the key in the production of literature, plays and films.

Brief Encounter, that classic British film, is essentially about tow people waiting for a train, and what happens to them during that wait.

I wonder if you remember the play waiting for Godot

Waiting for Godot follows two days in the lives of a pair of men who divert themselves while they wait expectantly and unsuccessfully for someone named Godot to arrive. They claim him as an acquaintance but in fact hardly know him, admitting that they would not recognise him were they to see him. To occupy themselves, they eat, sleep, converse, argue, sing, play games, exercise, swap hats, and contemplate suicide — anything “to hold the terrible silence at bay”.

Godot never turns up, it ends up with the fact that these men have been waiting hopelessly for a considerable time, and Godot does not show his face.

The first person we hear who is waiting in today’s passage is the Psalmist.

I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope.

My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning.

The watch before dawn is the stuff of legend, the stuff of difficulty, the stuff of trauma. There is a fellowship of those who sit and wait in the night, they sit and watch for danger, they sit beside the ill and the dying, they tend to animals or small children, they guard armies or cities, and it is the watch the waiting for the dawn which is the important thing.

When the dawn comes, it brings renewal of hope. But in the last bit of the watch there must be a temptation to share the doubts with the  philosopher David Hume, that just because, we have always seen the sun rise in the morning, but we cannot show that it must do so tomorrow. For all we know, it shall not.

And so the watchman waits for the morning, waiting for the clarity of light, the warms of the Sun the companionship of others, but the psalmist waits in hope for the lord.

What is hope?

If I asked you to define hope where would you begin.

Oscar Wilde reflects the Psalmist’s thoughts when he says that

“all of us are in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”

 

 

“all of us are in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”

Hope isn’t some dream that one day things might get better.

 

Hope isn’t David Hume’s questioning that the sun might rise, true hope knows that the sun will rise, that God will smile on us. The Psalmist knew this,

 

 

7 O Israel, put your hope in the LORD,

       for with the LORD is unfailing love

       and with him is full redemption.

 

 8 He himself will redeem Israel

       from all their sins.

 

And so we wait in hope.

 

Hope is knowing that unlike Godot in the play, God will turn up.

 

In the gospel passage we find that the woman is waiting, she has been waiting a long time.

 

She has been waiting for God to turn up as they say in the states, the longest time.

 

This woman had been unclean for 12 years, unable to take part in the normal patterns of life, for twelve years, we don’t know anything else about her but commentaries suggest that because of the bleeding she would likely to have been unmarriagable or divorced. So vulnerable, and we hear that she had been suffering at the hands of the doctors.

 

This should be a woman who is hopeless, she has no right to hope, her life is truly hopeless and as she wait, as one with no hope. Because what hope could there be for her?

 

No hope of children, no hope for a marriage, I wonder how she supported herself this woman for whom even prostitution wouldn’t have been a viable option…

 

And so she does something daring, she feels her waiting is over and she comes up and touches Jesus. When she touches Jesus she should be making him unclean, anyone she touches she makes unclean, she can’t make God unclean. The only possible outcome from this encounter is that God makes her clean.

 

I don’t know how often I have heard people say ‘I am not good enough to come to church or be a Christian’  I sometimes find it hard to know where to begin with contradicting that statement, but maybe this would be a good place to start. This woman comes up to Jesus, untouchable, unclean she has been waiting for so long, in Jesus she sees enough hope and reaches out to touch him to see if this hope is real.

 

She has spent twelve years lying in the gutter, and now she believes that the stars are now close enough to reach and she reaches out, and is healed.

 

She has waited, and now Jesus waits.

 

Then follows a short but very tense wait, Jesus is not going to go until he knows, he is not going to go until this person has come to come and he has spoken to the person who has touched him.

 

I wonder what the woman expected, harsh words of declamation, a condemnation of how could someone who is so unclean dare to come into a crowd.

 

 

33Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. 34He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”

 

 

Others have been waiting,

 

Jesus has made them wait and their wait has been agonising.

 

Jairus has just seen Jesus’ heal this woman, this untouchable woman, and at home, his beautiful daughter has been lying dying and then they turn up and say that because Jesus’ has made them wait it is too late.

 

It’s too late, don’t bother Jesus any more, it’s too late, and hope has gone. Jairus’ wife has been waiting, she is now convinced her daughter is dead, and Jesus’ gets to the house and finds a commotion, people crying and wailing, these people who believe that hope is gone, hope has fled that house, there was waiting with hope, but the hope is gone. They had given up hope and turned to despair, they had stopped looking for the stars, instead they were looking at the gutter.

 

Jesus sends them away, he dismisses them.  He goes and wakes up the girls and tells them to give her something to eat. I hope, I so hope that it was good Jewish chicken soup. Apparently there is clinical proof that the way traditional Jewish chicken soup is cooked is good for you.

 

So this morning what is it that we hope for?

Are we hoping to win the lottery? Are we hoping that we will be rich, that money will solve our problems? Are we hoping merely for a good nights sleep? Are we hoping that we will feel better? Are we hoping for healing for ourselves, or for someone we know?

 

Whatever it is that we hope for we do just that live our lives in Christian hope.

 

Jesus promises us at the end of Matthew’s gospel that he will never leave us or forsake us.

 

We may feel that we are lying in the gutter but Jesus promises that however remarkable it may seem we can reach out and touch him, we can reach out and touch the star we are looking at any time.

 

This encounter itself will bring hope, a sure and certain hope, and that sure and certain hope will affect how we wait. It will affect how we wait for the bus, it will affect how we wait for news, it will affect how we wait for anything.

 

Jairus’ family had to wait for Jesus’ but they found out that when you hope in Jesus’ that hope is not in vain.

 

 

I wait for the LORD, my soul waits,

       and in his word I put my hope.

 

 6 My soul waits for the Lord

       more than watchmen wait for the morning,

       more than watchmen wait for the morning.

 

 7 O Israel, put your hope in the LORD,

       for with the LORD is unfailing love

       and with him is full redemption.

 

 8 He himself will redeem Israel

       from all their sins.

 

 

Psalm 54, Hebrews 13:10-16, Matthew 10:29-30 Patronal Festival for Thomas Becket

(we transfer it usually 29th December see http://www.excitingholiness.org/first-edition/index.cgi?m12/d29.html )

 

What is your favourite sort of river?

Would you choose a grand majestic city river like the Thames in London or the Vltava in Prague or the Tiber in Rome, or even the Avon in Bath.

Maybe you like your rivers a little smaller perhaps a little navigable river, on which one can paddle a canoe or row a little boat, maybe there are bits of the Wye which stir your heart.

Perhaps you like your rivers even smaller, perhaps little like the Bybrook, perhaps even a mountain brook or stream which will flow bubbling and gurgling  through the heather topped moor until it meets up with others in similar vein which will come together to make a larger watercourse.

When Abraham left Ur on his great journey when he discovered that all of God is everywhere his route was determined at the beginning by the flow of the two great rivers the Euphrates and the Tigris. Abraham began his journey needing the support of those two rivers and the communities they supported.

Rivers are important they give us water to cleanse and sustain us they provide landmarks to follow and even transport and recreation for those who enjoy swimming, fishing, kayaking or even recreational bridge building.

Many of the great old testament narratives involve rivers. The events of the beginning of Exodus occur around the river Nile, the events of the second half of Exodus are defined by the lack of a river, or any much water at all in the wilderness.

Then the beginning of the next stage of the story finds God’s people crossing the river Jordan into the promised land.

In the New Testament narrative of Jesus’ ministry again begins with a river, the river Jordan again, as Jesus is baptised, and his position as God’s Son is revealed and confirmed to him and all those around him. Jesus is baptised in the river where hundreds of people had been coming and turning from their sins and coming back to God. As John baptises Jesus, the two soggy cousins dripping with river water, a voice comes from heaven and speaks of Jesus ‘You are my Son with whom I am well pleased.’

And as Abraham began the great human journey into what it means that God is God, beside rivers that give life, then John’s great vision of heaven in the book of revelation also speaks of a river.

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.

Some of you are currently sitting above a river, probably.

What I can say is that if you go and stand on top of the table at the back there is water flowing in a channel underneath, where it travels underneath the downstairs old boiler room I do not know.

We live in this place, this geographical place, which is defined by its water.

The Spring which somehow feeds not very poetically into our old boiler room and then I know not where. The Springs which rise in the Spring field and then travel through the water course via the pond in the wilderness in to the Bybrook. The Bybrook itself.

All these water sources have defined our place and the people of this place for years past. The evening that Fiona Castle came to speak here one of the band who were playing came up to me and said, a proper church building, he’d only ever belonged to house churches. And I was so proud when I said to him, people have been praying in this place for at least 800 years, this place and the community around it which is defined by the water on which we sit and flows around us.

So what was it and what is it that has defined the faith of the saints in this place over approximately a millennium give or take a few centuries we don’t know about.

 

Our reading from the Psalm today includes this phrase,

 

Surely God is my help;

       the Lord is the one who sustains me.

 

This was written thousands years ago, but the Psalmist recognises that it is God who sustains. God has sustained the Christians in this place, like the rivers and water here sustains the physical life God has lifted up and sustained the Christians here over centuries. God has provided them with water of life both physical and spiritual.

 

God sustains us with his care, one of my favourite Christian poems is this,

 

Hair 54, 329, 635 fell out today

God noticed.

 

God isn’t an absentee creator God, he didn’t create the world say, that’s good then disappear, he stuck around to sustain and care for us.

 

When Jesus says

“Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.”

One of the hardest conceptual tasks for the Christian is to believe and to live our lives like we believe it.

People have lived their lives here for centuries knowing and believing this, they have lived here through the Black Death, the Peasants’ revolt and the industrial revolution, two world wars and the rest, and the faithful have known this, that God sustains and cares for each one.

So what has given the saints, and by that I mean all those Christian believers through the centuries, so what has given the saints their confidence to believe that the omnipotent creator God cares for them and the boldness to approach this God. The confidence comes through Jesus, through knowing that he has made it possible for us to approach God. In the Hebrews passage it says this.

 And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood.

We, the people, have been made holy through the blood of Jesus.

What then should we use as a symbol of this holiness, well for centuries we have used the symbol of water. For those of you who have either been lucky or unlucky enough to attend a baptism which I have conducted here recently will appreciate that I like the symbolism of water, very much

 

Remember your baptism…

When by water you were washed

Not to clean your body

But to clean your soul.

 

For in baptism God has promised

To forgive you, to renew you,

To let your sad and soiled life be clean again:

You are not destined to be dirty.

 

And so the river reminds us that like the saints throughout the ages, we are sustained by God’s goodness, like the saints throughout the ages we are cleansed through his grace.

 

What should our response be to this sustenance and grace?

 

The Psalmist knew how to respond,

 

I will sacrifice a freewill offering to you;

       I will praise your name, O LORD,

       for it is good.

 

Hmnn a freewill offering, a sacrifice, should I be sending for the goats…

No, what does the writer to the Hebrews say.

Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that confess his name. And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased.

What sacrifice does God like Christians to make? He is pleased when we praise him, and when we do good and share with others.

 

That is what God calls us to.

 

I have preached for more than ten minutes on the day we remember Thomas a Becket, or ordinary Thomas Becket if you prefer, without mentioning him once.

 

Thomas is a man with a chequered reputation, was he just a stuck up Archbishop trying to pull one over on the King, or was he a holy man whose holiness annoyed the King so much that the only response to such holiness was obliterate it with violence. More than 800 years later it’s probably hard for us to see through the veil of history, we know thought that lots of people were very upset when he died, not least the King, who was penitent to the extreme.

 

The last lines of the psalm

 

For he has delivered me from all my troubles,

       and my eyes have looked in triumph on my foes.

 

So what for Thomas, surely if God loved him God would have stopped him being hacked to death in his own cathedral. It is no accident of design that Thomas’ emblem is a sword hacking through  a Bishop’s mitre.

 

Did God love Thomas? A or just plain Thomas Becket, of course he did, in fact he still does. And when the sword went into Thomas’ head God knew each hair that fell as he was killed, he knew the number of each one as it fell on to the stone floor.

 

What does the river teach us of this?

 

Back to revelation,

 

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city.

 

Life from God is not just for now, here on earth, but we cannot be separated from God’s love by anything, especially not death. We no longer rely on physical water to sustain or cleanse us, but the image of new life in heaven still stems from the river. This river of the water of life, but the sort of life with God we find hard to imagine, and when John tries to write down his incredible vision of it he struggles to find words to describe it. But amongst the words he does find, the image that we find accessible is the river the water of life.

 

So next time you see running water, maybe even as you leave the church today maybe you can remember these truths, these truths which sustained the Christians here over the ages, and Thomas himself. That God cares and sustains for us, giving us life physical and spiritual. That God has cleansed us from our sins through Jesus’ death and resurrection, that we are not destined to be dirty.

 

Then let us remember that this care and forgiveness is not only for now, but also for the future, remembering the image of the river of life in heaven.

 

If I could have held this service in the Bybrook I would have done. But that’s OK we have our image, and we know water passes beneath our feet.

 

 

We come to the river to pray, we come to give our sacrifice of praise. We come to the river to pray,  we come to repent ,to receive forgiveness and be cleansed. We come to the river to pray, We come to rejoice in God’s gift of life,

31st May was a family service with baptism for Pentecost, I’m not going to try to describe it, you had to be there…

7th June Morning Worship - Phil preached which will pop up on the church webpage…

I can’t remember when it happened, but sometime between my childhood and when I first started catering for cub parties a shift in British cooking and eating tradition occurred.

 

When I was a child sausage rolls were a real, treat, home made with much fuss from shortcrust pastry and sausage meat, the sausage meat may possibly have been purchased from that great 1970s institution of Bejam.

 

These treats would then arrive at a particular party or event, without much thought for refrigeration on the way.

 

However the shift has occurred and now it is easy to buy, perfectly acceptable sausage rolls which are pre-cooked. In fact they are ready to serve, all that is required is opening the packet placing the sausage rolls on the plate and putting out on the table.

 

The connoisseur may complain but I tell in the past ten years not one cub or brownie has noticed the difference between these offerings and home-made.

 

A line does have to be drawn somewhere, but where? Personally I have always baulked at ready to serve custard (although careful examination of my cupboards may find instant custard?) and ready to serve porridge (again how is that necessary when ready brek exists). In our instant world the whole concept of ready to serve has come a long way since my childhood of carefully rubbed in lard and margarine to make the pastry for the sausage rolls.

 

The gospel passage find’s Jesus praying for his disciples? It’s quite a long and complicated prayer, worthy of a sermon per sentence, but towards the end of the reading today Jesus asks ‘ Make them ready for your service.’ In other words, make them ready to serve.

Jesus says ‘For their sake, I am making myself ready to serve so that they can be ready for their service of the truth.’

 

Jesus knows that the disciples have been serving, but they need to be ready to do a whole lot more serving before their time is done here on earth. So what is it that makes the disciples ready to serve?

 

Today we listened to the NIV version, the Revised standard version translate these verses differently. It uses one word, Sanctify, instead of the ready to serve phrase so instead of

 

17.Make them ready for your service through your truth; your teaching is truth.

 

We have

 

17 Sanctify them in the truth ; your word is truth.

 

So Sanctify and being made ready for service appear to be the same thing. If I asked you to define sanctify as a word, thing s like, being made holy, might come up in the explanations. And so it seems there is something inextricably linked between the being made holy and being made ready to serve. If being holy is to do with being like God and being like Jesus, the great servant King, then yes of course Sanctify means being made ready to serve.

 

In the Acts passage we are looking for someone to replace Judas in the twelve. Why do they need to replace Judas, why not run with eleven? Well partly to do with the idea that they are to be witnessing to the twelve tribes of Israel, and partly to do with their innate Jewish sense of twelve being complete and eleven being incomplete.

 

So they look for someone to be one of the twelve, one of the apostles, they realise that some things are necessary in the person whom they are choosing after all they really do need someone who is ready to serve.

 

So what is it that makes the shortlisted candidates Matthias and Barsabbas ready to serve?

 

They realise they need people who have seen everything.

 

21 Therefore it is necessary to choose one of the men who have been with us the whole time the Lord Jesus went in and out among us,

22.beginning from John’s baptism to the time when Jesus was taken up from us. For one of these must become a witness with us of his resurrection.”

 

They need to be eyewitnesses, the disciples realise the continuity of eyewitness testimony will be the church’s foundation.

 

Then after they look for the qualifications they let God choose by lot the person it should be.

 

God is in one way not about to send the disciples on a leadership course, but in another real way he already has and he is about to take them on a huge learning journey.

 

The disciples realise the importance of having been a witness to Jesus’ time on earth, their training has been their experience of living in a relationship with Jesus, this has sanctified the, this has made them ready to serve.

 

So what makes us ‘ready to serve’? Is it to have lived in relationship with Jesus –Yes.

 

Is it to have been witness to God’s amazing acts? – Yes

 

Is it to have been sanctified and set apart holy by God, - Yes.

 

Maybe it’s easier to think about sanctification as something into which one grows, we are sometimes zapped, we are sometimes immediately changed with one thing or another in our lives. But often the process of sanctification is one which is characterised by slow growth.

 

The disciples had been being trained by their experience, and part of that experience was through serving.

 

The become more ready to serve by their experience of having already been serving. This is in one way a circle, or spiral, every time we do anything we are changed,. We serve God in one way, the service, the experience the reliance of God we see in that service, sanctifies us, changes us and makes us even more ready to serve.

 

So I guess the question for today is are we ready to serve?

 

Maybe we feel the answer is no, then we should do what it is we feel necessary to makes us ready to serve, because to be a disciple of Christ is to be ready to serve. If we feel we need more experience, then let’s get it. If we feel we need to spend more time with Jesus, then do it. But the disciples knew that serving led to sanctification which led to more serving, which led to more sanctification.

 

So today’s big question is, are we prepared to be ready to serve.?

Sheep, what’s the first thing that comes into your mind when I mention sheep.

Maybe I hesitate to say that, but if you have young children, or a passion for animation you may think of Shaun the sheep that creation of Aardman animations. If you’re really on the ball with children’s TV you’ll know that there is a new kid on the block. Timmy, star of Timmy time, apparently ‘he’s a little lamb with a lot to learn..’

Being a shepherd has a mixed history in the story of Israel. David, usually considered the greatest King of Israel, who was succeeded by his son Solomon. David started off his life as a shepherd, and then went on to be a King. Often Israelite Kings didn’t have much to reign but David’s Kingdom was huge, running through most of today’s Lebanon, Israel, the Palestinian territories, bits of Jordan and bits of Egypt. This guy had started off life as a shepherd.

David’s skill as a shepherd was what got him noticed in the first place, he took out the Philistine giant Goliath with the tools of his shepherd trade, a sling shot and some pebbles and whilst Goliath was still bragging, ‘come and have a go if you think you are hard enough’, he found himself struck with a stone from the slingshot, sprawled on the floor and his head cut off in double quick time.

So while David was around, people didn’t say bad things about shepherds, my guess is that they didn’t really want to make Goliath’s mistake, because David had proved that yes he really was hard enough, and so when David, who was also in his spare time fond of singing the occasional song wrote this Psalm.

This song actually in terms of total air time in the three thousand or so years since it was written has been even more popular than Robbie Williams Millennium, or Angels, or well anything much really.

David knew that he needed to be safe and he knew that it was God who kept him safe, God kept him safe like a Good Shepherd. Of course God had kept David safe in some pretty difficult situations, lots of difficult and horrible battles and also the notorious occasion when the then King Saul threw a spear at him at quite close quarters and managed to miss.

When David was writing about God being his shepherd it wasn’t some lovely dovey idea of fluffy little cartoon sheep,like Shaun or even Timmy. David knew about the harsh realities not only of his own life, but of shepherding in general, he knew that however tough his life had been God had been his shepherd. So David confidently writes that God cares for his needs, gives him green pastures, quiet waters and leads him in the right way.

David writes at the end of the Psalm, ‘Surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever.’

Somehow a thousand years before the arrival of Jesus it’s as if David already knows what will happen in the end game, what will be the outcome of this shepherding that God has been doing for his people Israel.

If we press the fast forward button roughly a thousand years to a hillside above Bethlehem, known as David’s city, about seven miles from Jerusalem. This one night when the whole town is full of people going, “I really do have better things to do with my time than waste it travelling for some idle paper pushing exercise”. And one young woman was giving birth after having discovered that travelling 70 miles on a donkey is actually a really good way of inducing labour.

So on the hillside above the town there are some shepherds. To say that the shepherd has had a bad press in the past thousand years would be an understatement of huge proportions. Shepherds have gone from being a profession fit for the apprentice king to the lowest of the low. Bad hours, bad pay, bad reputation. These shepherds would not have been washing their socks by night because I bet however cold it was they couldn’t afford any. When the angels appear to them explaining this good news I’m sure there was a lot of, what us, telling us the shepherds, what’s that about then. Nobody tells us anything because we are the lowest of the low. God has a long memory and he’d not listened to the press rumours of the previous thousand years, he knew that shepherds were good important people, not people to be despised, and the little baby, the one induced by the ride on the donkey, he was going to have something to say about shepherds soon enough in the time scale of a thousand years not being that long a time.

So in the context of shepherds having once been kingly but now being despised Jesus comes right out and says it, he says it.

“I am the good shepherd”

“I am the good shepherd”

What makes a good shepherd?

I am a child of my generation and if you ask me what makes a good shepherd I have to refer back to one man and his dog, which Wikipedia reckons ran from 1979 until 1999, I’m sure only coincidentally roughly equivalent to the time of the Conservative government.

So to win one man and his dog you have points scored on how well you cast, i.e. send you dog away to the sheep, then you are marked as you bring the sheep around the course and in to the pen, You start off with full marks and marks are deducted for each fault, if the dog bites the sheep, you can be disqualified!

You get no extra points for being quick, but if you do run out of time you can lose loads of points.

This I think is not what Jesus was talking about when he was talking about being a Good Shepherd.

Jesus says, I know my sheep and my sheep know me.

All good farmers know their stock, they know their foibles and peculiarities, they know where they are likely to wander off to if they are not around, they know what is going to frighten them and they know what is going to make them ill.

This is much more of the good shepherd scenario that Jesus is talking about.

Jesus says that the shepherd will not abandon the sheep, and he didn’t abandon us. He did die, he is the good shepherd that lays down his life for his sheep. But since as we remember death could not hold him in its grasp so he still cares for his sheep.

Jesus is talking about being the shepherd that David was talking about. God leads us in green pastures, quiet waters and leads us into the paths of righteousness. And that is our hope our prayer for the baby being baptised this morning, that, that will be her experience, that  she will have green pastures, quiet waters and paths of righteousness.

But David and Jesus know that it will not always be like that, David talks about how the good shepherd comforts even in the bad times, your rod and staff they comfort me, even when you walk through the valley of the shadow of death, even in the darkest of times, God is still the good shepherd. And that is also our prayer for baby being baptised that in the tough times she will discover that God is right there beside her, comforting her, leading her through it, defending her with his staff.

What does it mean for us to be a sheep of God?

God cares for us, he wants the best for us, he looks out for us when we are lost, he looks for good places for us to be, places where we can grow and flourish. God knows that our life will not always be like that, but he is not distant from us in that time, no he is right there with us, ready to lift us up if we fall in the ditch, or drive of wolves with his staff.

We believe that Jesus’ death and resurrection has made this possible for us in the way which David knew partly in his own life and prophesised for us all. When Jesus says there shall be one flock and one shepherd he reminds us that this care and grace is available to us all. All we have to do is come when he calls.

The shepherds, David and Jesus knew didn’t use dogs to herd, they called the sheep, and the sheep came because they knew the sound of the shepherds voice. Today we celebrate that God has called Bay to himself but God doesn’t stop calling as we get older, he still calls to us, he calls us still to bring us to our green pastures, quiet waters and paths of righteousness. He calls to reassure us when we are stuck in a ditch, he is coming with his staff to get us out, he calls us when we are in dark places so that we can stay walking beside him, he calls us when we have wandered away, he calls us. As God’s sheep we listen to him call, we can hear the good shepherd calling us by name…

 

I have a friend…yes don’t laugh, I do have one.  I have a friend who doesn’t like to eat fish, she cannot even bring herself to let a morsel of the stuff past her lips.

She also doesn’t like blue cheese or mango.

So imagine how we felt when at a dinner, longer ago than I care to remember, we started with avocado with a blue cheese sauce, to be followed by knot of sole. I can remember to this day, how she carefully put her fork through the fish, splatted it, gently spread it around the plate and put the fork down without once ever raising it to her mouth.

 Then just to clear our palettes we were served with mango sorbet, to give her, her due, she did try with the sorbet.

 

Why do I mention this today, today’s gospel passage is a curious one and we know that Jesus ate a piece of fish. A piece of broiled fish.

It was all they had. One must assume that it was the best thing that they had, and Jesus eats it. Jesus eats it to show that he isn’t a ghost. He eats it to show that he is really alive, he eats it to show that he has really beaten the power of death and this new life is a real, live physical life.

And we know that unlike my friend, Jesus likes fish…

This is part of the transition for the disciples, part of the journey from grief to happiness that Jesus is alive, to the next bit, Jesus is really alive so what does that mean.

Jesus says ‘Peace be with you’ when he stands among them, then he says “Why are you troubled?”

It’s a really good question.

Why are you troubled?

I wonder what it is that troubles us?

Often there are small things that annoy us.

If I gave you all a minute to rant about something which really annoyed you I’m sure most of you would have no problem in finding something to say. Whether it’s a particular thing to do with language, or punctuation or when people drop litter, or are inconsiderate or when it says on the safety card on the aeroplane, if you can’t see well enough to read this card please don’t sit in the emergency exit row. Or something else.

These then are things which annoy us are these the things which trouble us?

One of the passages we often have read at funerals is from John 14 and Jesus says, “Do not let your hearts be troubled, believe in God, believe also in me…”

All sorts of things trouble us, our health, our family, supporting our families being able to clothe and feed and see them grow up. All these things trouble us. Other things trouble us, what’s really going to happen when we die, am I going to make a mess of my life, is God really going forgive me when it really matters.

Jesus says why are you troubled and why do doubts rise in your minds?

It’s a good question, why are we troubled and why do doubts rise in our minds?

Dr Pepper for some time have been running  a series of ads on the TV and in the cinema trying to encourage people to try Dr Pepper.

They say, Dr Pepper, what’s the worst thing that can happen?

They are trying to imply that actually if you try Dr Pepper the worst thing that could happen is that you might not like it.

I am not a very decisive person, and often I have to find myself asking that question. So what is the worst thing that could happen in that particular situation. If you think that however unlikely it may actually happen you could actually cope with the worst case scenario you are more likely to move forward.

And partly that’s what experience teaches us. If we think about the worst thing that could happen, and we realise that actually we’ve coped with something similar to that before, then it makes us braver to act.

I guess a lot of us are frightened of dying, it’s the ultimate leveller, it’s often not very dignified, and as Benjamin Franklin said it’s the only thing certain in life apart from taxation.

Jesus has of course returned from the dead, but in a different way to Lazarus, and the disciples were just trying to work out what that meant for them.

Jesus was sharing his experience that death does not have the power everyone thought it had, it is universal, true but look Jesus can even come back and eat fish.

We have hugely varying opinions of heaven even within different traditions of the church. There are a few certain things revealed to us in the bible, and lots of things which we don’t know. I’m sure my friend will be pleased if the resurrection life of heaven didn’t involve compulsory fish eating, but I kind of think that if it did, she would find she liked fish in her resurrection body.

Jesus comes back to tell his disciples they don’t need to be afraid of death, but as part of this package they do need to repent.

The psalm asks us to consider ourselves, ‘when you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent.’ What would you find if you searched your heart in quiet. We were talking at Little lights on Friday about prayer and how important it is to find a quiet place to pray. One of the little girls thought it was hilarious that mummys sometimes only found peace and quiet in the toilet with the door locked. But honest reflection in peace and quiet will reveal things about us, make us appreciate our need for repentance.

Jesus talks about repentance and forgiveness of sins being preached. Peter in Acts is found doing just that,

Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord,

We have repentance, forgiveness and security in God’s love. God’s love which is not limited by anything even death. If we’re not scared of death, what then is there left to be afraid of?

Today’s Psalm, Psalm 4 is used at Compline, the traditional monastic bedtime service which used to be said in the big dormitories.

Can you remember how it ends?

I will lie down and sleep in peace, for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.

We don’t need to be troubled, we don’t need to be afraid. If we live our lives showing that we believe that it will be transforming, not just for us, but those around us.

 

I wanted to end with some words of an old spiritual song..

 

Nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen

Nobody knows but Jesus

Nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen

Glory Hallelujah

 

Sometimes I’m up and sometimes I’m down

Yes lord, you know sometimes I’m almost to the ground

O yes, Lord, still

 

You got here before I do

O yes Lord, don’t forget to tell all my friends I’m coming too

 

O yes Lord, still