Category: preaching

We’re all at sea in our small boats

David Herbert2 Comments

This is a reflection on the sea and the troubled waters we call life for the 4th Sunday after Trinity (B).

I spotted “the other boats” in the gospel reading for the day, from Mark 4:35-end (text below). They played on my mind as we prepare for a UK election which some want to turn into an election on immigration. It made me think – “we’re all at sea” and the forecast is for more storms. This sermon comes with a health warning – it is metaphor heavy.

The first verse we see when we open our Bibles is “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep while the spirit of God swept over the face of the waters.” (Genesis 1:1-2) 

The last verses in our Bibles are also about water – the “river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb, through the middle of the street of the city, feeding trees bearing fruit for all seasons and leaves for the healing of the nations”. (Revelation 22:1-2)

In the beginning of the Bible there is total darkness. In the end, there is only light – no darkness and no hiding.

The Bible begins in water and ends in water. And between the two there is all the difference in the world – as different as night and day.

The Bible begins in water. The water is chaos. The first thing God does is make light. The second thing he does is sort the waters out. He separates the waters of heaven and earth, gathered the water together and let dry land appear. That’s how it began. 

This is a theological view of life. This is how we open our Bibles. We open them with an understanding that we are all at sea. From the very beginning we have been surrounded by water, the sea, the deep. We’ve been on flood alert since the time of Noah.

Probably all of us here have had times in our lives when we have felt overwhelmed, engulfed or drowning – and used these metaphors to describe how we felt, using so many metaphors drawn from our collective experience down the ages of chaos and the sea. So much of our language reflects this. Like “we’re out of our depth”, or “we’re in it up to our neck”, or “we’re all at sea”.

The Bible begins with water and ends with water. From day one there is storm after storm. The waves crash all around us until that day when the waters become calm and do God’s bidding of giving life and healing to the whole of creation.

These are the times we live in, when there is one storm on top of another. For the time being we are between the devil and the deep blue sea. (Another popular saying.)

These are the times Jesus lived in as well. The storms he faced were different to ours. With his contemporaries he was assaulted by religious oppression and exclusion, a taxation poor which kept them in poverty and debt, and an occupation by a foreign power which robbed them of their freedom.

His attitude at times like these is captured in the snapshot we have of him in today’s gospel reading. They’re all at sea. A great gale arose, and the waves were beating the boat and swamping it. And Jesus slept. Calm as you like.

There were other boats. It’s strange how you miss details like this. I must have read this passage hundreds of times, but I’ve never seen those four words before. There were other boats. Have I never noticed these other boats because the focus has always been on Jesus’ boat? Have I only spotted these boats now because of the small boats that desperate refugees are taking to to escape to safe havens. 

(Isn’t it terrible that some people are turning the election into an election about immigration and the people in these small boats?) It is Refugee Week – and we need to spot their boats, not stop their boats. There is a growing refugee crisis – that means a crisis for a growing number of refugees. 1 in 69 of the world’s population is now displaced, largely because of conflicts around the world. It’s important we respond to their Mayday.  M’aidez. Help me! It is, after all, the refugees who have the problem – all those who have no safe routes for escape. They have enough problems without being turned into a political football.

We’re all at sea. We’re not all in the same boat. We’re not in the same boats as the refugees. We’re all in our different small boats. We’re all at the mercy of troublemakers, powers-that-be, the forces that make waves, and the sea so dangerous. 

There’s a well known fisherman’s prayer that captures our plight. It’s become known as the Breton Fisherman’s Prayer: 

Dear God,
be good to me;
the sea is so wide, and my boat is so small. 
Amen.

They’re words from a poem by Winfred Ernest Garrison.

It’s not surprising that so many make that prayer their own. The words fit the experience we call “being all at sea”.

The sea is our life with its currents and tides, its ferocity and deceptive charm constantly eroding and undermining us. The challenge of our lives is how we navigate these waters.

We are like those who, in the words of Psalm 107 “go down to the sea in ships and ply their trade in great waters”, who have seen the works of the Lord and his wonders in the deep. While they were at their wit’s end as they reeled and staggered like drunkards, they cried to the Lord in their trouble and he brought them out of their distress. He made the storm be still and the waves of the sea were calmed.

Our lifetime at sea is summed up in our baptism. We are soaked in deep water, and brought through water as if this is an acknowledgement of our life at sea, weathering the storms faced by us all, Jesus included. The question we’re asked in baptism is, “Do you turn to Christ?” Our response then is “I turn to Christ”. It’s stated as a promise. Perhaps it should be stated as a habit. 

In the storms of life, when you’re all at sea, when you feel you’re drowning, do you turn to Christ? The faithful ones, like the ones in the psalm, will say, “Yes, I turn to Christ. He’s the one who can sleep in the storm. He’s the non-anxious presence. We turn to him to hear him say ‘Peace! Be still!’ – and when we do, the wind dies down and we feel the calm.”

It’s easier said than done because in the midst of things it is too easy to panic.

The waves that have panicked me have been so slight compared to what others have faced. Dare I say I’ve done enough doom scrolling to sink a battleship? I am only beginning to learn to wake Jesus in my mind, to hear him in the head of the storm, to find better things to think about, to take his word as gospel. 

I know that when the sea calms for me, it calms also for all the other small boats.

Here we gather. We call this gathering place the NAVE – the Latin word for ship. We are shipmates in our small boat.

Here we are, all at sea, our metaphorical sea. The metaphorical weather is awful. Even though the long term forecast is for beautiful, calm weather, immediately, all we can expect is one storm after another. There are dark forces within us, and all around us, threatening us – driving so many from their homes, driving them to the edge, condemning them/us to their/our fate on the sea of life.

We are shipmates. We’ve been through it before. We’ve been through the waters of baptism. We’re used to turning to Christ – who in today’s gospel we see in the same boat as ourselves. In the rage of the storm he makes himself heard. We hear him call us “beloved”. The wind and the sea hear him. ‘Peace! Be still!’ they hear him say. For the moment they obey him.

Here we are, churches in the Bridges Group of Parishes – like a bridge in troubled water for all those who live in these six parishes. When we’re weary, feeling small, when times get tough, when we’re down and out, when darkness comes and pain is all around – we know the words of the one even the wind and sea obey.

Mark 4:35-end
On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, ‘Let us go across to the other side.’ And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. A great gale arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. He said to them, ‘Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?’ And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, ‘Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?’

An uprising – the mustard seed and the seed growing secretly

David HerbertLeave a comment

Here’s a sermon for the 3rd Sunday after Trinity focusing on Jesus’s parables of the seed growing secretly and the mustard seed. They speak of uprisings and encouragement, perseverance and patience.

June 16th 2024

Our scriptures are the creation of a bruised and battered people, treasured and passed on by bruised and battered people for the sake of other bruised and battered people. It is a troubled people who have chosen the scriptures we inherit, and who have handed them on.

I keep saying this to remind myself whose these scriptures are and to remind myself to read the scriptures from that point of view.

Today’s gospel features a couple of parables used by Mark to end a sermon by Jesus. The sermon is given from a boat, to a crowd of people on the shore.

Their place on the shore is significant. Jesus and the crowd are from poor peasant communities, subsistence farming communities pushed to the edge by the taxation policies of the temple and Roman authorities. They were clinging on to life in any way they could. Jesus is one of them. 

His sermon was  particularly for them, the least and the frequently lost in the kingdoms of the world. Appropriately, for an audience of the least Jesus uses what is the least to make his points. Today, he picks a seed that grows secretly, and a mustard seed, “the smallest of all seeds”, which amazingly grows to be the “greatest of all shrubs” – and that picks up the prophecy of Ezekiel in our first reading. 

Ezekiel points us to a “lofty tree”.
In his mind it stands for empire and the highness and might of emperors and kings and all those who problematically lord it over others.
Ezekiel sees God cutting a sprig from the lofty top and planting it on a high mountain so that it produces boughs, fruit and shelter for all kinds of bird.
He calls this a “noble” tree rather than a “lofty tree”.
What makes the lofty tree is its highness, whereas the nobility of the noble tree rests in the shelter it gives.

Jesus is the sower.

He sowed seeds in his preaching – seeds of faith, hope and love – seeds of imagination which would grow in the hearts and minds of those poor enough in spirit to have the ears to hear and the eyes to see Jesus’ meaning of love in these parables. 

They will have loved his talk of the seeds for him highlighting the smallest of things as being full of life. They will have known that about themselves though generations of occupation, foreign rule and religious oppression will have eaten at their self belief.

Jesus takes two seeds. That in itself reveals so much about the kingdom of God, namely that the rule of God focuses on the smallest of things, the miniscule, on the least. When did you last hear an emperor, or a Mr Big, or a gang leader wondering about the smallest and least in creation?

Jesus casts the mustard seed as the smallest seed, which grows to become the greatest of shrubs giving shelter, shade and blessing to all the birds of the air. His hearers will have loved that. This is what can become of us is what Jesus is leading them to imagine. This is what can happen to the least of us. The least of us can become the most hospitable. The least of us can be the shelter, shade and blessing for so much and so many.

These are parables for the poor in spirit, for the weary, for the belittled.

They encourage us to believe
life will change for the better for the least, the lost and the last –
that the little, least, lost are great in the eyes of God and come first in his kingdom,

They remind us that the seeds of the kingdom are already embedded in the world
by Jesus the sower,
in our own paths and ways
a seed in edgeways

And those seeds have a life of their own.
We don’t know the effect of them – and we can’t control the effects of a kind word, or affirming gesture.

And they make small beautiful.

Small is beautiful in the eyes of the one who puts the least, the lost and last first.
We don’t need to lie
about how little we are
or what little we have
when Jesus sees the kingdom in a seed.

These parable have always encouraged the church,
particularly encouraging us these days
when the church is struggling,
when you’re feeling like there is so much to do
with fewer and fewer people – in a vacancy as well
we can love being small,
being the unlikely seed of the kingdom,
for ever unsure how it’s going to turn out,
just going day to day
with our small seed of faith
our small seed of hope
and our small seed of love,
sprigs cut from the high and mighty,
cut down to size and carefully planted
to be noble in the kingdom.

These parables encourage us to persevere with patience,
to carry on scattering seed in our small ways along the paths of our lives,
never put off by the idea of a harvest we will never see,
to carry on with those small things
that come naturally to those with a joyful heart:
a smile,
a touch,
a word of welcome,
small kindnesses
in all our ways
scattered like seed.

There was a song Jesus heard at home. He’d heard his Mum singing it. We know it as the Magnificat. It goes like this:

Her song praises the work of God showing mercy on those that fear him from generation to generation, scattering the proud in their conceit, casting down the mighty from their thrones, lifting up the lowly, filling the hungry with good things, sending the rich away empty.

This is the song that seeded Jesus’ imagination.

It is no wonder that he turns to the smallest in his preaching, to seeds to show us faith, hope and love. The seed growing secretly and the mustard seed represent an uprising – an uprising of the least, the tired and the broken.

Mark 4:26-34
He also said, ‘The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.’
He also said, ‘With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.’
With many such parables he spoke the word of to them, as they were able to hear it; he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples.

Ezekiel 17:22-end
Thus says the Lord God:
I myself will take a sprig
from the lofty top of a cedar;
I will set it out,
I will greek a tender one
from the topmost of its young twigs;
I myself will plant it
on a high and lofty mountain.
On the mountain height of Israel
I will plant it
in order that it may produce boughs and bear fruit,
and become a noble cedar.
Under it every kind of bird will live;
in the shade of its branches will nest
winged creatures of every kind.
All the trees of the field shall know
that I am the Lord.
I bring low the high tree,
I make high the low tree;
I dry up the green tree
and make the dry tree flourish.
I the Lord have spoken;
I will accomplish it.

Who is the strong man who needs binding and casting out?

David HerbertLeave a comment

This is the question I explore with a small congregation in rural Warwickshire for the 2nd Sunday after Trinity (year B) at the end of a week where we have celebrated the bravery of the boys involved in the D-Day landings in Normandy, who forced their way to a toehold in the strong man’s stronghold. The gospel, binding the strong man, is printed below – Mark 3:20-end.

D-Day 75 Garden at Arromanches-les-Bains
D-Day 75 Garden at Arromanches-les-Bains – photo by Alan Wilson, picturing a 97 year old veteran looking back at himself as a 22 year old climbing on to the beach.

The Ins and Outs of the gospel.

Today’s gospel passage is crucial for the gospel of Mark. It is so crucial that one of the most important commentaries on Mark’s gospel lifts words from today’s passage for its title, Binding the Strong Man, as if this sums up Mark’s gospel and the mission of Jesus (and work of God).

In the week we’ve celebrated the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings it becomes appropriate to explore this understanding of Mark’s gospel and the particular verse: no one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his property without first tying up the strong man. By doing so we will honour the bravery of those involved in the D-Day landings – and the bravery of Jesus.

The strong man, Hitler, was always driven by his need for lebensraum (living room) and his occupation of France was a mighty extension of his living room. The D-Day landings were very much about the allied forces breaking and entering the strong man’s house, getting a foothold in his door on the beaches of Normandy, to tie up the strong man and free France.

Those who break into the houses of the strong man are brave – some, as we see in today’s gospel, think them foolish.

Mark wants us to know the ins and outs of his gospel.

Mark’s gospel is a journey. It starts in the wilderness, then working its way through Galilee (land of the poor and weakened) and then onto Jerusalem, the capital, the heartland of the STRONG MAN, with its fine buildings, its temple and its palace. Mark’s gospel follows Jesus all the way into the house of the strong and oppressive man.

These are the ins and outs of our gospel reading for today.

On the inside is Satan
and his demons
and Jesus
and those around Jesus.

On the outside
are the demons cast out by Jesus
and Jesus’ family – his mother, brothers and sisters.

The scene is set inside a house.
It’s the strong man’s house that somehow Jesus has got into.

Satan is a mythic figure who stands for actual people.
The demons too are mythic figures, and we know them in real life too. We often have to fight them.
The house too is metaphorical – just a domain name.

The actual people Satan stands for according to Mark is the STRONG MAN – who needs tying up and binding. 

Our popular imagination easily goes to the likes of Putin when casting for the villainous strong man.
But if we cast our search wider

The strong man is the cruel man,
the ruthless man,
the exploitative, oppressive, abusive man.
The strong man is the boss man.
He takes over our lives,

our opportunities and freedoms.
He grooms us, traps us,
and uses us
to build his empire
his power, his glory.
The strong man is the human trafficker,

with his demons his agents.
He is the scammer, the bully, the tyrant.
He’s the media mogul who hides the truth.
He’s the guarded.
He’s the first, the entitled,
and the one who puts himself first.
He’s the one we’re afraid of
in all his guises, the liar,
the master of disguise.

He’s the one
who sets his people onto people,
or against people.

But if truth be known
he’s also you and me,
no longer pronoun HE,
but you, me, she, we
whenever we are cruel like him

whenever we speak like him,
act like him, profit like him.
He’s #metoo, #wetoo,
with our power and strength
crying out for love’s binding.

This is how Mark portrays Jesus – as breaking and entering the house of the strong man, to bind him and tie him.

This is what God does.
This is what our scripture witnesses –
the binding of the strong man:
the Pharoah,
the Emperor,
the Dictator,
the Tyrant,
the High Priest,
the Devil incarnate,
the ones who come first
and the ones
who put themselves first.
This is what God does:
Father, Son and Holy Spirit
in perfect unity
they break into the house
the strong man has made
his strong hold
and makes it their kingdom,
the kingdom of God.

It reminds me of the way Jesus speaks in John’s gospel of the house he prepares for us. You know, “the house with many rooms”, the house with enough room even for us – with all our differences and diversity.

Mark takes us inside the house.
We’re his readers on the inside, the inside of the house seized from the strong man and Satan.
(I’d call it “the house of Israel” were it not for the cruelty that has taken over the strong men acting in Israel’s name in Gaza.)

Mark takes us inside the house.
We’re with Jesus, on the inside.
There’s an air of celebration.
We can sense victory.
We can see the end of the strong man.

But then comes an incoming call,
from the outside.

Outside the house are Jesus’s mother,
his brothers and sisters.
They want to see Jesus.
They call him OUT.
They think he’s gone out of his mind,
breaking into the house of the strong man
like that. They’re worried for him.
They’re worried for themselves,
and their reputations
and what the strong men
will do to them and their village.

They don’t hear Jesus’ response because they’re outside and Jesus is inside.
Inside, Jesus looks at those sitting around him, in the room he has prepared for them by binding the strong man.
Looking at those sitting round him he says: “Here are my mother and brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”

With all its “ins and outs”, Mark’s gospel begs the question of where “the strong man” is now, and whether we are insiders or outsiders.
Are we on the inside? Are we among those doing the will of God, in that place of bravery with Jesus, binding the strong man – even the strong man in us – with Jesus?
Or, are we outsiders, along with the outcast demons, amongst the scoffers and accusers of Jesus?

Mark 3:20-end
and the crowd came together again, so that they could not even eat. When his family heard it, they went out to restrain him, for people were saying, ‘He has gone out of his mind.’ And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, ‘He has Beelzebul, and by the ruler of the demons he casts out demons’.
And he called them to him and spoke to them in parables, “How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but his end has come. But no one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his property without first tying up the strong man; then indeed the house can be plundered.
Truly I tell you, people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin’ – for they had said, ‘He has an unclean spirit.’
Then his mother and his brothers came; and standing outside, they sent to him and called him. A crowd was sitting around him; and they said to him, “Your mother and your brothers and sisters are outside, asking for you.’ And he replied, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’
And looking at those who sat around him, he said, “Here are my mother and brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.’

A fierce gospel for savage times – reflecting on the Good Shepherd

David HerbertLeave a comment

A sermon for two rural churches without a “pastor”. The gospel for the day is John 10:11-18 (text below).

I am, I am, I am.

This is the name that rolls round the mind of the beloved community.
I AM, the very being of God as disclosed to Moses. Simply, I AM who I AM.
I AM, I AM, the name given even to Jesus by the community of beloved disciples as they explore the meaning of the God they find in Jesus.
I AM
This is what being is all about.

I am, I am, I am.
There are seven I AM sayings of the beloved community in John’s gospel.
Seven, as in the days of the week, as in the sign of perfection and completion.
This is how they loved Jesus. This is how they found God. This is how they saw salvation.
I am, I am, I am.

I am the bread of life,
the light of the world I am.
I am the door,
the good shepherd I am.
I am the resurrection,

the way, the truth and the life I am.
I am the vine.
I am.

This is how the beloved community singles Jesus out, in these seven sayings. Jesus is who we say he is. Jesus is who he says “I am”. This is who Jesus is to the beloved disciple – incidentally ruling out who he is not. 

Today is the fourth Sunday of Easter, known as Good Shepherd Sunday. These are the words ringing in the ears of the beloved community this morning. “I am the good shepherd”.

I know how important sheep and lambs are in your lives round here – how much you care for them and how you’ve worried for their welfare through these months of exceptionally wet weather. You know what good shepherding is all about.

I also know that you are waiting patiently for good shepherds to pastor you, and that you are praying that those the diocese appoints to these parishes will be good shepherds who will themselves have ruled out what the beloved community know Jesus isn’t – the opposite of the hired hand, the opposite of the one who leaves the sheep and runs away as soon as he sees the wolves coming, thinking only of themselves and abandoning the  sheep.

That’s not the Lord, our shepherd, who stays with his people even while they walk through the valley overshadowed by death, spreading a table before us so we can eat even while others trouble us.

I am the good shepherd. The Lord is my shepherd. These are the words at the heart of the people God makes his beloved community. And we, the beloved community know the truth of what makes a good shepherd. 

The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep he owns and knows.

Have you thought about this? The good shepherd lost his life to the wolves. The wolves circled and he didn’t run.
The wolves licked their lips and he didn’t budge.
The wolves scented blood and he gave them his own.

These are metaphorical wolves. Actual wolves have virtues and they have their rightful place in our animal kingdom. Metaphorical wolves have none. They are devious and deceitful. They are around us and they are savage.

They can eat your grandma and then disguise themselves as grandma to little Red Riding Hood. “Grandma, what a deep voice you have!” “All the better to greet you with”. “Grandma, what big eyes you have!” “All the better to see you with.” “And what big hands you’ve got!” “All the better to embrace you with.” “Grandma, what a big mouth you have!” “All the better to eat you with.”

These metaphorical wolves are masters of disguise. The good shepherd sees their danger. He knows wolves come in sheep’s clothing and infiltrate his beloved community. Sometimes the wolf even takes on the shepherd’s clothing and grooms the metaphorical sheep, (beloved disciples) for his wicked ways. (I believe that is a storyline currently being explored in Eastenders.)

The wolves are around us in their many disguises. I don’t know where you’re at in your personal journeys. Some of you may be enjoying  a relatively easy path in your lives. Others may be on rockier roads, in the pits, even walking the valley in the shadow of death. 

For some, their road is very dangerous. They are particularly vulnerable to attack from those who would groom them, harm them, ridicule them, profit from them, even kill them. 

We must never forget the long and really difficult journeys refugees from around the world are having to take. Hounded from their homes by metaphorical wolves, they are prey to wolves in every twist and turn of their journey as they put their lives into the hands of one agent after another – each wanting their cut and their piece of flesh. And there are those living in the crossfire of wolves in warzones, such as Gaza and Ukraine.

I’m reading a book set in England in the middle of the 14th century – the time of the plague. Is plague one of the wolf’s disguises? Was Covid?

Good shepherds stand with their sheep. They don’t run away when they see the wolf coming. They sound the alarm. They take precautions. They stand firm.They take the front line. They absorb the shocks. They become shelter. And sometimes they lose their life.

Like Jesus. The wolves savaged him. They were disguised as religious leaders and political leaders. The following he was getting (the sheep and the size of the flock) frightened them. They came for him, so that they could get at them. They took him away. They accused him. They mocked him. They stripped him. They slashed him. They crucified him.

by David Hayward at http://www.Nakedpastor.com

The Naked Pastor draws many gospel cartoons. His name is David Hayward. This cartoon by the Naked Pastor is of the naked pastor. Pastor means shepherd, and here we see the good shepherd, the pastor stripped naked on the cross. In the foreground we see the wolves. They are taunting Jesus, making fun of him. They’re laughing at him, gritting their teeth at him, flexing their muscle against him, and raising their arms, their weapons of war, showing their killing teeth.

This is Jesus being savaged by a pack of wolves.

Over and over again we marvel. The good shepherd does not run away when the wolves come. He lays down his life for the sheep so that the wolves can’t scatter and snatch the sheep. I dare say we have sweetened this gospel over time – but what John is describing here is fierce. The opposition to the beloved community is fierce, but the attachment of the good shepherd to the flock is just as fierce. Blood is spilled and life is lost. But just as the good shepherd has the power to lay down his life, so he has the power to take it up again. And that places this gospel in our Easter liturgy – this fourth Sunday of Easter.

It’s a fierce gospel for savage times when metaphorical wolves roam our streets in their many disguises. It’s a gospel for our times – our mean time in which we need the protection of good shepherds – the sort who will give their lives for the sheep – the sort you wait to be pastor in your community.

At the moment, wolves and sheep remain enemies. The wolf continues to prey on the  sheep who rely on the protection of good shepherds – the sort who will give their lives for the sheep – the sort you wait for to be pastor in this community. But the time will come when there will be a peace way beyond our understanding and way beyond our imagination when the wolf will lie with the sheep. That’s what God lives for. The time will come when the wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf, the lion and the yearling together, and instead of tyrants and empire builders, a little child will be the leader. (Isaiah 11:9) Until that time we follow the call of the good shepherd as he leads us through the valleys and low points overshadowed by wolves and our fear of them.

John 10:11-18
‘I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away – and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep who do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.’

Being Believed we Become Beloved – on seeing our wounds

David Herbert1 Comment

A sermon for the 2nd Sunday of Easter for a lively congregation in a Warwickshire village. The gospel for the day is John 20:19-end (text below)

 ‘Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.’ So says Thomas – who is not really “the doubter” but the scientist who needs to see the evidence.

Nail Mark by Li Wei San.

Jesus showed him. He said: ‘Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side”. Normally we read Thomas’s response as a confession of faith – “My Lord and my God!” with a sense of joy. We could read it very differently – again with Thomas, the forensic scientist examining the body, probing Jesus, talking to to Jesus, as if a patient sufferer, while processing what he is seeing. “They did this to you?” “How deep that wound goes.” “This is what you put yourself through?” “You did this for me?” 

The realisation this examination evoked would have  a very different tone to the one we are used to. Read it differently. Instead of the tone of triumphant joy – as in “My Lord and my God” there may have been the tone of “Myyyyyy Looooord!” “Myyyyyyy God, what have they done to you?”

Thomas is the one who sees the wounds of Jesus, and the truth is in what he sees.

I want to explore what it is to see the wounds of others and our responses. It’s a growing question because there seems to be a battleground developing between those who want their wounds to be seen and those who very intentionally refuse to look, dismissing people for their whining. The battle has been fought down the ages, but is now being fought with a renewed intensity in the forefront of our politics.

The battle lines have been drawn between those who are “woke” and those who are “anti-woke”. The word “woke” made its way into our vocabulary through its usage in the African-American communities where it means staying “alert” to the wounds of racial discrimination. Its use spread through the Black Lives Matter movement and  the word was added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2017. Being woke is being alert to the woundedness of others. But, most recently, woke has been turned into an offensive word and a term of abuse by those who are anti-woke who accuse the wounded and their sympathisers of being “snowflakes”.

“Unless I see your wounds” – that’s what this is about. The inspiration is Thomas and the wounds he sees, and the wounds Jesus carries. They take us to the heart of the battle.

Can we see one another’s wounds and the pain we bear. 

Can I see your wounds? Can I see how hurt you are? Can you tell us what hurts you?

We can only believe when we see the wounds and understand the back story to those wounds.

Gareth Malone has recently done a series where he put together a choir of eight singers to perform St John’s Passion by Johann Sebastian Bach. Some of you may have seen it. What made it so interesting was getting to know the eight people who formed their choir, hearing their stories and seeing their wounds. 

For example, a close relative of one of them, a niece, had been killed in a road traffic accident the previous week – and there Simon, her uncle, was there rehearsing, finding the rehearsing something that helped with the wounds.

Another of them, Joy, was one of the few who knew the passion story. She grew up in the church. Her wounds were wounds of rejection. She carried the scars of having been rejected by her parents when she was a baby, and then again felt rejected by her church at the age of 12 when it became clear to her that she was gay. (Incidentally, that has been thought to be an appropriate age for the Holy Spirit to confirm faith in a service of Confirmation.) Here we have a rejection, not a confirmation – with all the wounds and scarring that go with it. Her faith is still important to her. She was wearing a prominent cross of another rejected one.

Already, in two of them, we see their wounds. The wounds we were shown were fairly typical – the wounds of sudden loss and the wounds inflicted on some who are gay. It was only the surface we were touching. We obviously weren’t shown the complications which are personal to each wounding.

Bach himself was sore wounded. By the age of 10 he had lost both his parents. His first wife died after they’d been married 13 years. 12 of his 20 children died before they were 3. Research by John Eliot Gardiner reveals the violent, thuggish world of the young Bach. Gang warfare and bullying typified his schooling with inspection reports showing that boys were brutalised. They were “rowdy, subversive, thuggish, beer and wine loving, girl-chasing, breaking windows, brandishing daggers”. He missed 258 days of schooling in 3 years – kept at home, like many for fear of what went on in school. Do we understand his music more, do we see his musical score better for seeing the scarring and scale of his wounds?

Can we see the woundedness in others? The wounds of those who are gay. The wounds of those who have grown old and tired. The wounds of those who have had to fight through war. Can we see the woundedness of those who have had to flee – the refugee, the jilted. The wounds of those who are black those who are disabled. So many of their wounds have been inflicted by those who haven’t cared for them/us as they should

These wounds matter. The wounded don’t want to hide their wounds. Their wounds are who they are. Our wounds are who we are. They have made us who we are. As I said, it’s the Black Lives Matter movement which has encouraged wokeness. Members of the Black Lives Matter movement insist the wounds are part of who they are. Their history matters – their wounds matter.

With our own loved ones it is important to see their wounds. When a child is upset we want to know where it hurts. With a partner, we want to understand the story of their scars and the wounds they carry.

And all of us want to be believed for the stories we tell about ourselves, our battles, challenges and wounds. That is what is so important about a community like this. Our best chance of being believed is being amongst people who trust one another – who we can trust with our very lives – sheltered from the indifference and cynicism of those too wrapped up in themselves to see the gaping wounds so many have to hide because they fear they’d never be believed.

Some of our wounds are self-inflicted – maybe a relationship breakdown which was my fault, or the wounds may be the result of personal neglect, or the way we’ve misused our bodies. Our sense of shame covers up the wounds. 

Through prayer and encouragement
we may begin to open up
to the one who wants to see,
to the one who says “let me see”,
to the one we can trust
with the shame we are showing them,
to the one we trust will believe us,
even God who wants to see, to heal
what matters to us matters to him
what’s wounded us, wounded him,
crowned with agony.

It’s not “wokeness” that alerts us to the pain and wounds of others. It’s our passion for the other which we call compassion. We mustn’t let the anti-woke brigade prevent us seeing the pain and suffering of others. Not seeing why, how and what is hurting rubs salt into the wounds and isolates them from us.

When we are trusted enough for people to show themselves to us, and when we truly see them, we believe. Seeing is believing – and our hearts go out to those who have so trusted us to believe in them. They are believed and beloved. They are known.

Thomas said: “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.” Nor will we believe people unless we also see the marks of the nails, the cuts in their bodies, the scarring of their minds. Unless his/her/their/our nail marks are seen and his/her/their/our wounds felt he/she/they/we will not be believed and will not be beloved.

John 20:19-end

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’ When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.’
But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, ‘We have seen the Lord’. But he said to them, ‘Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.’
A week later the disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ Then he said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.’ Thomas answered him, ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him, ‘Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.’
Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

The young man in white linen – and the first Easter sermon

David Herbert2 Comments

This sermon was prepared for a group of churches coming together to celebrate Easter. The gospel is the ending of Mark’s gospel (16:1-8 (printed below))- the last spoken words being the first Easter sermon.

March 31st 2024

This is how Mark’s gospel ends – with three women (call them the spice girls!) fleeing from the tomb, seized by terror and amazement, saying nothing to anyone because they were afraid. There is nothing else. 

People have wondered about this ending. Some have said that we’ve lost the ending. Some have tried to change the ending: we can see when we look in the print versions of our Bibles. Those false endings attempt to correct what they see missing but are so out of character of Mark’s gospel that they have been dismissed by one commentator as “betrayals”. 

They’re also misleading – they take our eye off the ending of Mark’s gospel. Instead of seeing a line drawn under the fear of those three women, our eye is taken elsewhere. If only we could take scissors to those false endings, then our eyes would be taken by what’s there in Mark’s ending, not by what is missing.

What’s there for us to see? There are three women. Mark names them. They are Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of James and Salome. And there’s a young man. He plays the lead part. I’ve never paid any attention to him before – my apologies to him. There is no one else.

(There is the usual power dynamic with the young mansplaining to the women – but let’s not get distracted by that, I say mansplainingly!). Mark wants us to see the interplay between them to finish the gospel. 

So, the young man. He’s wearing white linen. Seeing that gives us a smell. There is a perfume called White Linen – a costly fragrance. According to the Estee Lauder website, White Linen captures the very essence of a perfect day: early Spring breezes tinged with the fragrance of fresh flowers and endless blue sky. Blissful. It smells like Easter!

In my mind I’ve called this sermon White Linen because the threads of that white linen weave themselves through Mark’s gospel and on into our own lives. 

We’re going in deep this morning – we have to to bring this gospel to life. I hope you will bear with me in following the threads of this white linen worn by the young man.

The young man is the last person with anything to say in Mark’s gospel. (The women are too afraid to speak.) We’ll look at those words later.

I wonder where he got the linen from. Could it be the grave clothes left behind by Jesus? And where did Jesus get the white linen from? 

Mark tells us that Joseph of Aramathea (one of the ruling council and authorities responsible for Jesus’ crucifixion) bound Jesus’ body in linen refusing him the proper burial rites so that they could bury him in a hurry before the sabbath. Is the young man wearing the linen cloth abandoned by the risen Jesus who was no longer there?

And where did Joseph of Aramathea get the cloth from? Well, Mark tells us that when Jesus was arrested all his followers “deserted him and fled”. Mark singles out from among  them “a certain young man”. “A certain young man was following him, wearing nothing but a linen cloth. They caught hold of him, but he left the linen cloth and ran off naked.”

Is this the same young man to whom Mark gives the last words of his gospel? Is this the same young man the women find? And if so, what happened to the linen cloth that he ran off naked without? Was that what the crowd, with their swords and clubs got hold of? And is that what they gave Joseph to bind Jesus in death when they sealed him in the tomb?

You might think rightly that this linen cloth would be anything but white. It would have been dirty with  dust and sweat – and it passed into the grubby hands of the authorities. But Mark tells us about Jesus’ transfiguration earlier in his gospel, when his own clothes became dazzling white such as noone on earth could bleach them. (9:3)

Do you see the connection? If Jesus’s clothes became dazzling white at his transfiguration, why not at his resurrection? 

So we see the young man in white linen in the intentional ending of Mark’s gospel. 

He is sat at the right hand of the empty tomb. That’s where Mark places him for our imagination to feast on – the seat at the right hand being the seat of power. He’s become the person of power for the church Mark is writing his gospel for. Even though, (even if), this is the same young man who three days earlier was last seen fleeing – deserting Jesus along with all the others, in this last scene of Mark’s gospel, he is highlighted as seated in the seat of power at the scene of glory.

He stands for all those who flee, including those who leave everything behind, even going naked. He stands for the disciples who failed and betrayed Jesus. He stands for those too frightened to speak. 

Mark gives his last spoken words to the young man. They are a challenge and invitation to the frightened, fleeing, failing friends of Jesus to follow again. He says: “Do not be alarmed: you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.”

And after that there is not a single word spoken. In spite of the young man’s instruction, “Go, tell”, all there is is a telling silence, and the only sound is the sound of fear. The women, “they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”

The ending of Mark’s gospel is abrupt. The other gospel writers detail resurrection appearances in contrast to Mark, who in just a few words, the last words of the young man, promises his followers that they will see him if they follow him. He says “He is going ahead of you to Galilee, there you will see him.” He is going ahead of those who follow. They will see him in Galilee – down to earth, not pie in the sky.

I wonder who the young man is. I wonder if the young man also stands for the church. When the church shares the young man’s words, identifying Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified, who has been raised and who goes before us, who we follow and often fail. Is Mark picturing the church, in the form of the young man, at the right hand of the tomb as the power of God for as long as we say to one another, “Go. Tell. Follow.”

Is that the white linen churches are bedecked with? Is the dazzling white linen on the altar the cloth that draped the young man, that was first snatched from him when he fled naked, that was picked up by the powers that be and used to bind the body of Jesus?

Is what the young man said to the women also intended for us? Surely so. “He is going ahead of you to Galilee, there you will see him.” Galilee was their home. Galilee was where they had come from. Galilee was the place they were troubled, impoverished, exploited and where life was never easy. According to the young man that’s where Jesus headed – to their homes, to their work, to their villages, to their neighbours, to their enemies.  There they would see him if they followed him – not anywhere else.

Galilee isn’t our home. But if we trust the gospel which is Mark’s, we can surely trust that the risen Jesus goes before us to the places where we are troubled, impoverished and exploited, to our workplaces, to our street corners, to our shelters. We will see him there, only ever there, only ever down to earth.

The ending of Mark’s gospel raises so many questions. They’re glorious questions.

But one thing is for sure. That is that Jesus won’t be wearing white linen. He shed that at the tomb for the young man who had failed and fled, and for the women who failed to tell, for all of us who fail and yet still want to follow – and for the church – to pick up the threads. Jerusalem and the tomb was never Jesus’ final destination. He went ahead to Galilee inviting followers. His destination is our everyday. We will find him there, in the rest of our lives, if we follow. Promise.

Mark 16:1-8

When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. They had been saying to one another, ‘Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?’ When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. But he said to them, ‘Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.’ So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.

PS I am grateful for the insights of Ched Myers in his commentary on Mark’s gospel, Binding the Strong Man, and for insights from Alan, Jeanette, Karen and Lesley.

Seeing the wood for the trees – something for Palm Sunday

David HerbertLeave a comment

Here’s a sermon with donkeys, trees and their glad hosannas for two churches in the heart of Warwickshire countryside. We used Mark 11:1-11 and Philippians 2:5-11 as our readings.

March 24th 2024

The Cubbington Pear, European Tree of the Year 2015

They announced the winner of the European Tree of the Year this week. The winner is a Polish Beech called Heart of the Garden. It’s the third year in a row that a Polish tree has won. The UK Tree of the Year is a Sweet Chestnut in Acton Park in Wrexham. The Cubbington Pear won the award in 2015.

The Heart of the Garden took me all the way back to the tree at the heart of the Garden of Eden to the pomegranate tree we know as the Tree of Life where we made the choice of listening to one another, making our own decisions, breaking free and breaking bad in the same moment. In Holy Week we follow a carpenter to a cross made from a broken tree – a tree they broke to break Jesus. That tree is for us the Tree of Life. That’s the tree we gather round. It is the Tree of the Year all our years. It is where we meet God, hear him, and learn the practice of obedience in following him.

We can trace the roots of the tree broken for Jesus to the tree grown for us, the tree at the heart of the garden. Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem traces that route.

It begins with temptation. When Jesus told his followers that he must go to Jerusalem and will face suffering, Peter took him aside and rebuked him suggesting that there was an easier way of life for Jesus. Jesus dismissed this temptation of Peter in the same way he’d dismissed the temptations he faced in the wilderness. He used the same words to Peter as he had to the other tempter – “get behind me Satan”.

The journey to Jerusalem goes from the tree at the heart of the garden, all the way to the tree that was broken, bruised and cut for the crucifixion of the one they wanted to break, bruise and cut. Trees play their part all the way. Branches from palm trees cheer him on his way to the olives of the Garden of Gethsemane to the greatest of all tests of obedience as he faced up to his betrayal, arrest and murder. The journey to Jerusalem takes us from the first sense of human shame all the way to the final sense of divine glory, when, in the words of Isaiah, the mountains and hills will burst into song and the trees of the field will clap their hands.

The journey to Jerusalem goes from the wilderness of temptation to the heart of power, to the religious and political capital. Jesus moves from the edge, from the margins to the centre. Hosannas ring in his ears. Palms are waving, clapping their hands.

We left last week’s gospel with the promise that “Now is the judgement of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out”. (John 12:20-33) That is what the Hosannas are about. That’s the reason for the palm waving. That’s the point of the donkey.

Hosanna is a cry for help from those who need helping. It means “help, I pray”, or “save us, I pray”. It’s a cry as old as time, reverberating from the tree at the heart of the garden of Eden, that weeping pomegranate. It’s the sound of despair. But it’s also the sound of jubilation for those who realise that the one who is able to help and save is with them. They are seeing the ruler of this world being driven out. They have been the victims of those who have made them struggle, who have made them poor and who have made them suffer. They clap their hands. They wave their palms. Celebration is in the air. Their help is in the name of the one who comes riding a donkey.

How absurd.

How absurd to have a king on a donkey.

Donkeys are known as beasts of burden and carry those burdens with patient determination. This donkey carried the one who himself had burdened himself with the world and was bearing it with patient suffering. Those who waved their palms could see that. They could see in the absurdity a different sort of power – the power of humility which would drive out the ruler of this world.

They had a picture in their minds, drawn for them by Zechariah the prophet. Here’s what Zechariah envisaged:

Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion! Shout, Daughter Jerusalem!
See your king comes to you, righteous and victorious,
lowly and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
I will take away the chariots from Ephraim
and the warhorses from Jerusalem,
and the battle bow will be broken.
He will proclaim peace to the nations.

Zechariah 9:9-10

You get the picture. It’s the one who rides the donkey against the riders of chariots and those who sit on their high horses – and the humble donkey wins. Jesus drew on the faith of the Psalms. He will have known Psalm 147 – where God’s delight is not in the strength of the horse, nor his pleasure in the speed of a runner. The Lord takes pleasure in those who hope in his steadfast love, like those whgo shout “Hosanna!”

Many rulers of this world will have come and gone in Jerusalem invading with their war horses. The people of Jerusalem will have been used to the sight of the chariots used by their Roman occupiers and overrulers. And, here on a donkey, is the peasant teacher who walks alongside the poor as their helper and deliverer, driving out the rulers of their world. The donkey highlights Jesus’ affrontery and the scorn he pours on those who use their power to exploit and oppress others.

We may think that the way our gospel ends this morning is a bit of an anticlimax. Mark says, Jesus went into Jerusalem. He went into the temple, looked around at everything, as it was already late and then went away again. But he comes back later in the week with his disciples. While they are awestruck by the magnificence of the Temple, particularly the wonderful stonework (Mark 13:1-2), Jesus is condemning the Temple and its rulers for turning the house of prayer for all nations into a den of thieves. Not one stone would be left standing on another as the rulers of that world would be driven out.

The rulers Jesus has in his sights are not those who run their affairs with love and compassion. He would have been delighted if he had found the temple was being run so that it was truly of place of prayer for all nations.

The rulers he wants to drive out are the same ones all those who shout “Hosanna” want out. Those who are self-serving, cruel, exploitative and oppressive. They are the tyrants and dictators – not just those in government, or with empires, but all those who abuse their power becoming bullies in the playground, tyrants in the workplace and violent abusers in their homes.

Jesus plodded into Jerusalem, at the same pace as those he walked alongside, their hosannas ringing in his ears. Just being on the back of the donkey was like a parody sketch through which Jesus poured scorn on the rulers of this world. It is an insult to them high and mighty and an assault on their fortifications and defences. Of course, they are going to fight back, and they did get their own back. They were able to turn the weapons of betrayal and the force of empire on Jesus, manipulating the crowd into calling for his crucifixion.

This is how hope arrives. It plods alongside the slowest, the weakest, the last and the least. It is as David to Goliath. It is an absurd way. It is the way of the cross. It is the way of love. It is the way the rulers of this world are driven out and the just and gentle rule of God begins. It is the way the “Hosannas” of desparation become the “Hosannas” of joyous celebration. Our help is in the name of the Lord (Psalm 124:8). The Lord is here. His spirit is with us.

The fight goes on – not on horseback, but on donkeyback. With our palms we join the trees of the field as they clap their hands and we sing our hosannas.

Our second reading, Philippians 2:5-11 explains how we believe the just and gentle rule of God begins:

In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

Who, being in very nature God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;

rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.

And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death—
        even death on a cross!

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
    and gave him the name that is above every name,

that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
    in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
    to the glory of God the Father.

Mark 11:1-11

When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples and said to them, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. If anyone says to you, “Why are you doing this?” just say this, “The Lord needs it and will send it back immediately.”’

They went away and found a cold tied near a door, outside in the street. As they were untying it, some of the bystanders said to them, ‘What are you doing, untying the colt?’ They told them what Jesus had said; and they allowed them to take it. Then they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks on it; and he sat on it. 

Many people spread their cloaks on the road, and others spread leafy branches that they had cut in the fields. Then those who went ahead and those who followed were shouting, ‘Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David! Hosanna in the highest heaven!’

Then he entered Jerusalem and went into the temple; and when he had looked around at everything, as it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the twelve.

Inspired by love and anger – a sermon for Passion Sunday

David HerbertLeave a comment

A reflection on our own passion (or lack of passion) for Passion Sunday. The readings (Jeremiah 31:31-34 and John 12:20-33) are below. It’s St Patrick’s Day, 2024, and we’re in two churches in the heart of England, in rural Warwickshire. The quotes from Cole Arthur Riley are from her book, Black Liturgies.

Today is known as Passion Sunday. 

I have given this sermon a title – Inspired by love and anger. They are words of a hymn from two members of the Iona Community, John Bell and Graham Maule. (Hear it sung here)

The author of our first reading, Jeremiah was inspired by love and anger to hope in hopeless times when his people had lost everything – their home, their land, their institutions and their identity. At great cost to himself, he reiterates the promise of God to make himself known in a way that people could relate to. They would know God by heart, not by head and teaching or by law and obedience. He promises to write his law (or rule) in the heart of his people – the rule of God, self-imposed by God, the only rule of God, that he will only love, and that we will only know him in his love – in his passion. From that point the relationship between God and his people becomes an affair of the heart – where all our passions stir.

Jesus has this rule of God in his heart, living his life with this rule, and passionate for this rule of God’s love to be the rule of life on earth, just as it is in heaven. He taught his followers to make that our constant prayer. Thy kingdom come, on earth, as it is in heaven.

And as he resisted the temptations of an easier life so he insisted that we who are his followers should follow him in similar all-consuming passion, resisting the temptations of an easier life, to passionately engage with the rule of God for our lives – that rule being, only love.

Normally, on Passion Sunday, we would focus on Jesus’s passion without questioning our own. Jesus’ passion is well known. 

But what of our own passion? Are we passionate? Are we inspired by love and anger? Are we passionate for the kingdom of God, in the way of Jesus? Are we passionate for, and compassionate with those who are always counted first in the kingdom of God who  as a rule in the world are counted last or least, or not counted at all and get lost and disappear? The rule of God is that they come first.

Or are we too preoccupied and too easily distracted? Or, are our passions just about our selves? Or, has our passion become too domesticated so that our passion stays at home never reaching beyond our front doors?

Or have we been worn down and out by a hopelessness leading us to believe that there is no point in our passion because we can’t make any difference or we can’t change anything? Has our experience embittered our hearts?

Have we become numb? The opposite of passion is apathy. Apathy literally means without feeling, without passion.

Or have we never been helped to direct our passions? Have we ever had friends to help us safely explore the things of our heart – both the love and the anger?

Or have we become too nice for that sort of thing becoming the sort of people who never get angry? I looked up the meaning of nice. Apparently it is from the Latin nescire. Nescire means not knowing or ignorant. Nice became a word in Middle English to mean stupid?

How do we help one another to be more than the nice people we undoubtedly are?

Jesus wasn’t nice. He was fiery, fierce and furious – as we see in what happened when he went to the temple in the last days of his life, turning the tables on the moneychangers and condemning the religious authorities for their exploitation of the poor – the very people who come first in the rule of God.

We only have to listen to what the spirit says to the churches to realise that nice doesn’t even cut the mustard.

Hear the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, to the church of Laodicea (revelation 3:14-22): “I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were either cold or hot. So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I am about to spit you out of my mouth. For you say, “I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing.” You do not realise that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind and naked.”

We need to what what the spirit is saying to the churches.

Nothing good comes from being nice. Nothing changes if we remain apathetic. Nothing comes from being lukewarm, If we aren’t passionate and compassionate.

Passion is never served cold. It is heated by love and anger. Anger, rage and fury are part of our created order. They are very much part of ourselves. And they are very much part of our passionate selves. 

Those counted last and least as a rule, those usually discounted and lost need the anger, rage and fury of those who have taken the rule of God to their heart. They need that encouragement from fresh hearts.

It is anger, rage and fury which wins wars, defends the abused and bullied, defeats fascism, establishes justice, rights wrongs – it is never done cold and it is never done by being nice. It’s how the rulers of this world are driven out.

We have a problem. We are schooled to be nice. In the playground we were told to be nice, particularly to those who weren’t nice. We have demonised anger. Who wants us to be nice? Powers that be do. Controlling people do. They prefer us not to know. They don’t want to hear us. They don’t want our disruptions and protests. They want to keep us in the dark – the very place Jesus doesn’t want to keep us. His whole mission was to shed light in our darkness.

Cole Arthur Riley puts it like this: “Happiness and sadness and even fear are met with tenderness, understanding; they are permitted to speak without constant scrutiny. But anger we require to use the back door – to come and go quietly without attracting too much attention to itself… The oppressors of this world have told you to play nice, be civil. They tell you to control yourself. But by this they only mean they want you easy to be controlled.”

She confesses “We have exalted being nice and calm as a pinnacle of character, repressing that which stirs our souls so deeply we must shout” and she prays to God to “release us from the kind of niceness that only serves and protects the oppressor”. 

There is so much wrong, so many things are broken. There’s plenty to be furious about. How are things going to change without our fury, anger and passion? 

We can’t take it all on, but we can let love lead us. (Hatreds can also make us angry – they’re the furies we don’t want. They’re the furies we will fight with a passion).

I suspect that few of us are any good at being angry or furious. It often comes out wrong, doesn’t it? We often finish up only hurting those we love. This isn’t surprising because we have repressed anger. We’ve kept it hidden and not given it voice. We haven’t kept up our practice.

Here we can practice that love, among friends, through our prayer, learning all the time how to be angry better, how to balance anger with love, how to live passionately in the rule of God which is only love, how to live compassionately with those Jesus always counts first.

Can we help one another redirect our passion to join the passion of Jesus for the rule of God, and so that our whole lives are inspired by love and anger?

Jeremiah 31:31-34
The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt – a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord’, for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord, for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.

John 12:20-33
Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus’. Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honour.
‘Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say – “Father, save me from this hour”? No, it is for this very reason that I have come to this hour. Father glorify your name.’ Then a voice came from heaven, ‘I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.’ The crowd standing there heard it and said it was thunder. Others said, ‘An angel has spoken to him.’ Jesus answered, ‘This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. Now is the judgement of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.’ He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.

Righteousness rights wrongs

David Herbert3 Comments

Not for ever in green pastures …….

This simple reflection for the 2nd Sunday in Lent (B) is for a small group who gather once a month for worship following the Book of Common Prayer. Hymn singing is not part of what they do, except today when the focus is on the hymn Father, hear the prayer we offer as a way of a simple exploration of Jesus’s way of suffering in Mark 8:31-end.

We have prayed this morning:

Almighty God,
you show to those who are in error the light of your truth,
that they may return to the way of righteousness:
grant to all those who are admitted into the fellowship of Christ’s religion,
that they may reject those things that are contrary to their profession,
and follow all such things as are agreeable to the same

We have prayed to God who shows to those in error the light of his truth that they may walk in the way of righteousness. God wants his people to walk the way of righteousness, and he gives us the means to do that.

What is the way of righteousness?

Righteousness is the translation of the Greek word in the New Testament which gives us also the word justice. In other words, that Greek word, is translated in two different ways: righteousness and justice – and can be summed up in the word rectification. So the way of righteousness is the way of rectification, the way of setting right what is wrong, the way of rectifying what is unjust. It is the way of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Another word we use is salvation. We, alongside many others, including many non-Christians lovingly long for this rectification and salvation.

And we know it’s not an easy way.

A song from the heart of the church is Father, hear the prayer we offer.
Father, hear the prayer we offer, not for ease that prayer shall be, but for strength that we may ever live our lives courageously.

In today’s gospel Peter again gets it wrong. Jesus was talking openly about how the Son of Man had to undergo great suffering, be reject and be killed, and Peter took him aside to rebuke Jesus about this. To which Jesus said to him what he’d already said to the tempter in the wilderness – “Get behind me Satan”. Peter was suggesting an easier way for Jesus. Father hear the prayer we offer, not for ease that prayer shall be.

We went to see the film about Nicholas Winton this week – One Life. He was a stockbroker who in 1938 went to Prague to witness the plight of refugees there – people fleeing for their lives. He took an enormous risk going there. His mother didn’t want him to go. She knew how dangerous it was. She wanted an easier way for her son. But he insisted, “I have to go”.

He was horrified by what he found in Prague and immediately set about finding a way to rescue some of them. It was the plight of the children which most affected him. He didn’t know how he was going to be able to help them – nor did those who were with him. He just knew that he had to find a way – a way that would need visas, foster homes and money. Gradually he found the way and organised the trains that would rescue 669 children.

Father, hear the prayer we offer:

Not for ever in green pastures do we ask our way to be, but the steep and rugged pathway may we tread rejoicingly.

Esther Rantzen’s programme, That’s Life, featured his story. They invited him as a guest and in great appreciation surprised him with an audience made up of the children he had saved back in 1938. The final credits of the film One Life suggested that over 6000 people owed their life to him – taking account of the families the children he rescued went on to have. He never talked about his work. His wife only discovered what he had done when she found a scrapbook in their home many years later.

He is remembered in Israel and named as one of The Righteous among the Nations – they are non-Jews who saved Jews during the Holocaust. He is one of the righteous who followed the way of righteousness, righting wrongs in his small ways, the only ways he could.

We have heard a lot this week about the former leader of opposition to Vladimir Putin. Alexei Navalny died in his cell in his prison inside the Arctic Circle – most likely he was killed. Alexei Navalny was a Christian. The Beatitudes were his inspiration. He called them his instruction book. He was particularly inspired by the blessing on those who hunger and thirst after righteousness. That is what he did. He hungered and thirsted after righteousness, all the while knowing the risks he was running, undergoing great suffering, getting rejected, and finally being killed ….

We don’t live with the same extremes as Alexei Navalny. We are not victims of Russian imperialism, nor are we Jews facing persecution and extermination, nor are we living in Jesus’ context in Israel, where their life wasn’t their own because of the Roman occupation and the cruelty that went along with that.

We could say that we live in quieter times in this rural setting of Warwickshire – but Christian prayer isn’t about having an easy time. There is a temptation to turn our backs on the suffering world, and we can do that because we might have built up protections. It is a temptation – to turn our back, to close our eyes and to not engage our hearts and minds. We have to resist the temptation to turn our back, to turn away from trouble, and instead we need to turn to face the realities of life and engage with the suffering of those who are the victims of wrongdoing. This is the way of righteousness – making things right, righting wrongs in our own small ways.

Father, hear the prayer we offer:
Not for ever, by still waters, would we idly rest and stay.

There are two ways we can go. We can go the way of the tempter, or we can go the way of Jesus. “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” That’s the way of righteousness. It’s the harder way and the way that those who love us may prefer us not to follow.

Mark 8:31 – end

Then Jesus began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, ‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’

He called the crowd with his disciples and said to them, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? Those who are ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.’

PS I am grateful for Fleming Rutledge’s work. She is the one who has pointed out the meaning of righteousness as rectification in her book The Crucifixion.

We have nothing to prove and everything to love

David HerbertLeave a comment

Here’s a sermon for two rural churches in Warwickshire for the first Sunday in Lent. I’ve wondered whether Jesus only went into the wilderness for 40 days, or was his whole life there? Is wilderness a way to see “life”? The gospel for the day is Mark 1:9-15.

Catching my eye this week were these words of a benediction by Cole Arthur Riley; “May you rest in the immanence of your own worth, knowing you have nothing to prove and everything to love.”

Know you have nothing to prove and everything to love.

It’s the first Sunday of Lent and we’re just getting started. The question is, do we begin with shame, or do we begin with love? When/if we choose to give up chocolate or social media is it because it’s a shame we eat too much chocolate or spend too much time on social media? Do we begin with shame or do we begin with love?

Lent is the opportunity to intensify the awareness in our lives – our behaviours and the life around us. But do we begin with shame, or do we begin with love? Perhaps we begin with shame, and perhaps we begin again with love.

We are fond of thinking that Jesus went into the wilderness for 40 days – to be tempted by Satan. And that is what the gospels tell us. But were those 40 days an intensification of the wilderness experience which was to consume his whole life? The temptations didn’t stop after 40 days. The wild beasts didn’t go away – they bruised him, beat him and crucified him. They were hard times in a harsh and barren landscape – a lifetime in the wilderness. 

His 40 days in the wilderness with the wild beasts were part of his whole life in a wilderness with the wild beasts of empire and religious authority baying for his blood.

Our gospel tells us it began with love, not shame.

Mark gives the sequence of events – and his sequence is his version of “in the beginning”. Beginning the gospel, beginning the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, Mark gives this sequence of events:

  1. First, John appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance, and crowds came out to the wilderness to be baptised by him.
  2. Jesus, from a backwater village in Galilee was one of them. Just as he came out of the water he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him, and a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased.”
  3. Immediately the Spirit drove Jesus deeper into the wilderness
  4. Then John was arrested

The Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness. It began with love. “You are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased.” He was driven into the wilderness by love ringing in his ears, giving him the resilience for devilish temptation and for a life with the beasts. 

And with love he walked the wilderness for the rest of his life, facing the wilder-ness of human nature and the be-wilderment of the victims of that wilder-ness and beastliness.

Resounding above all the voices of that wilder-ness, the beasts baying for his blood, the crowds shouting “crucify him”, the mockery – above all that din is the voice of heaven: “you are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased”, and the sound of the angels who waited on him in the wilderness, whose only sound is the sound of heaven and their lyric, “do not be afraid”.

The wilderness is our world too. We are in serious denial if we ignore the wilder-ness of our human nature and the beastliness that so many suffer: if we ignore the beasts that force themselves on us and the beasts that we entertain. 

Lent is our opportunity to intensify our awareness of the wilderness of our lives, to take stock of the wars around us, the greed that threatens us, the environment we’ve neglected, the injustice that is suffered, the emptiness of so much of life, the distance between us, and the isolation which is so much a feature of life. 

Life is wilderness. The wilderness is so much bigger than any of us can ever imagine – too big for our hearts and minds. We have a problem if we reduce Lent to a personal remedy for our over-use of social media or our over-indulgence of chocolate. Lent will have been a waste of time if all we do at the end is reach out for a Cadbury’s cream egg. The devil will have won big time then.

Just as it was the love shown to Jesus in his baptism that drove him into the wilderness, to love in the wilderness, to do wonders in the wilderness, so it can be the love shown to us in our baptism that drives us into the wilderness, into these 40 days, into the rest of our lives.

We’ve got nothing to prove and everything to love. The wilderness isn’t an easy place to be. Heaven knows we’ve suffered enough there already. The landscape is often bleak and unforgiving. We may be tested to our limits. We will take wrong turns. There will be complicated choices for which there are no easy answers. We will be be-wildered and bothered by the wilder-ness around us and within us

The wilderness isn’t easy. But it’s the only place to be – or, the only place to be is where love drives us, where God’s Spirit takes us. Just don’t make it a guilt trip. Don’t let shame take you there these 40 days, and into the rest of your lives. Let love take you.

From the beginning God brought love to the wilderness. That is clear to us when we open our scriptures. “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep.” In other words there was nothing but wilderness and chaos – and a wind from God swept over the face of the waters, and he did wonders in that wilderness and chaos.

Similarly, at the beginning of Mark’s gospel, there are all the signs of wilderness and chaos – that is why the crowds came to John, for his baptism of repentance as a way through the wilderness and chaos they were facing. It is the Spirit of God which drove Jesus into the wilderness and chaos which has never gone away. It’s our wilderness, our chaos – and he begins with love.

When we are baptised, we are christened – becoming one in Christ, driven by love into wilderness. St Teresa of Avila gave us this blessing which will surely help us follow Jesus in his love into the wilderness, far from the easy life some of us may have been tempted to choose. It is the truth of our christening and being in Christ.

Christ has no body but yours, no hands, no feet on earth but yours.
Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassionately on this world.
Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good.
Yours are the hands, with which he blesses the world.
Yours are the hands.
Yours are the feet.
Yours are his eyes.
You are his body.
Christ has no body now but yours, no hands, no feet on earth but yours.
Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassionately on this world.
Christ has no body now on earth but yours.

Jesus began with love in the wilderness. We don’t need to begin with anything other than love. We don’t have anything to prove but we have everything to love.

Mark 1:9-15

In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptised by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’

And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness for forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.

Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, and saying, ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.’

Cole Arthur Riley’s book from which the opening benediction is taken is Black Liturgies, published in 2024 by Hodder and Stoughton