sermon – Grits and Grains

A sermon on Matthew 10:24-39 exploring what Jesus meant when he said he came not to bring peace but a sword, and why the peace of God’s kingdom is deeper, costlier, and more transformative than any uneasy truce.

What is whispered in your ear?
What is whispered in your ear, proclaim from the rooftop.

You know the image John paints for us of the beloved disciple,
the one Jesus loved,
reclining with him at table.

John chose not to name that “beloved disciple”.
I prefer to name the beloved disciple as “anyone”,
anyone who chooses to stay so close to Jesus
that they can hear his heart beating,
can feel his breath
and catch the whisper of his words in the ear.

What is whispered in your ear?

What is whispered in your ear
proclaim from the rooftop,
in this wounded world.

For the world is wounded

Our Collect today recognises that reality.
It does not pretend otherwise.

God our saviour,
look on this wounded world
in pity and in power;
hold us fast to your promises of peace
won for us by your Son,
our Saviour Jesus Christ.

And so we pray that God our Saviour
will look upon this wounded world
in pity and in power,
and hold fast to his promises of peace.

Deep peace.
A peace beyond all human understanding,
A peace won at enormous cost.

Not the shallow peace
that merely papers over the cracks.

Not the fragile peace
declared with cynical calculation,
while old wounds fester beneath the surface.

Not the peace that can be shattered
by the next angry word,
the next act of violence,
the next grasp for power.

That is a peace that has no love for its enemy,
that’s always ready to flare with hatred,
a peace that is defended at great cost,
with arsenals of weapons of destruction,
even tongues at the ready for lashing out.

That is a momentary peace,
a temporary ceasefire of hostility,
but the peace of God’s kingdom
is different.

In the peace of God’s kingdom,
justice and mercy embrace
and all things are made new.

Jesus breaks the uneasy peace
thank God.

Because the peace we so often settle for
is not peace at all.

It is avoidance.
It is silence.
It is looking away.
It is learning to live comfortably
with somebody else’s suffering.

And that is why Jesus speaks of a sword.
Which is difficult to hear.

Especially on a day when many of us are giving thanks for fathers,
when we are celebrating the love and care that family can give.

Yet Jesus says:
“I have come to set a man against his father.”

Not because fathers do not matter.
Not because families do not matter.

But because the kingdom of God reaches deeper
than every other loyalty we possess.

Not because he delights in conflict.
Not because he blesses violence.

But because truth has a way of disturbing lies,
justice has a way of disturbing privilege,
and love has a way of disturbing anything
that treats God’s children as less than human.

When Jesus stands with the excluded,
the rejected,
the last and the least,
those who benefit from their exclusion
rarely applaud.

The sword is the division that comes
when God’s kingdom collides
with the kingdoms we have built for ourselves.

It is the cost of proclaiming from the rooftops
what has been whispered in the ear.

For when you stay close enough to Jesus
to hear his heartbeat,
You begin to hear what he hears.

The cry of the hungry.
The grief of the forgotten.
The anger of the humiliated.

The longing of those denied dignity,
bread,
or hope.

And once you have heard those voices
beating in the heart of Christ,
it becomes impossible to pretend
that everything is fine.

The old peace begins to crack.

And through those cracks,
the kingdom begins to appear.

Which sounds wonderful.

Until we realise what it asks of us.

Because Jesus is not inviting us
merely to admire the kingdom.

He is inviting us to live for it.
To spend our lives for it.

And that may be a better way to hear
what Jesus says next:
“Whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.”

Perhaps better:
“Whoever spends their life for my sake,
for the sake of the kingdom,
will find it.”

Every one of us spends our life somehow.

Sometimes it can be trivial.
Spending our lives accumulating things.
Spending our lives to make a name for ourselves
(a name that will be so soon forgotten when we’re gone).

Or, we can spend our lives
on the pearl of great price,
spending ourselves on truth
spending ourselves on mercy,
spending ourselves on reconciliation,
spending ourselves on the hard work of God’s peace.

And if we spend our lives this way
we shouldn’t expect everyone to approve.

After all, they called Jesus Beelzebul,
a name which means the lord of filth,
lord of the dung heap,
and the sort of name we might be branded with
if we follow Jesus.

Those who expose what is rotten
are rarely thanked by those who benefit from the smell.
Those who expose wounds
are rarely thanked by those who profit from them.
Those who challenge exclusion
are often accused of causing division.
Those who stand with the last and least
are frequently labelled troublemakers.
Those who dare to believe in a peace
that goes deeper, beyond human imagining,
will be misunderstood,
criticised,
caricatured,
and even crucified.

This is what we are getting into when we become followers of Jesus,
when we become his beloved disciples,
close to the breath of God
whispering the words
that save us from the shallow peace
with its consequences of entrenched privilege,
deepening division and forgotten neighbours.

Jesus tells his beloved disciples:

Do not be afraid.
Do not be afraid of those who misunderstand you.
Do not be afraid of those who mock you.
Do not be afraid of those who call good evil
and evil good.
Do not be afraid of losing your reputation.
Do not be afraid of spending your life this way.

For the kingdom of God
is worth a life.

The kingdom where justice and mercy embrace.
The kingdom where the last are welcomed first.
The kingdom where wounds are healed.
The kingdom where all things are made new.

So, perhaps the question for us this morning is:
What is whispered in your ear?

What is Christ saying to you
when you stay close enough
to hear his heart beat,

close enough to hear in his heart
the cry of the earth,
the forgotten,
the humiliated,
the excluded?

And what is whispered in your ear,

proclaim from the rooftops,
whatever the cost.

The first Easter began with people who weren’t sure of anything. They were running, confused, and grieving… until they noticed that what they thought was sealed had been opened.
This sermon explores how resurrection begins not with certainty, but with the slow, surprising discovery that God is already at work — breaking open the boundaries we thought were final.

There’s a quiet pressure around Easter …
that this is the day you’re meant to be sure.
Sure about what happened.
Sure about what it means.
Sure what you believe.

But the strange thing is –
in the very first Easter story …
nobody is sure of anything.

John paints a picture of that first Easter morning.
Everyone seems to be rushing around.
They’re all running.

First there is Mary Magdalen,
then the so-called “beloved disciple”,
then slow-coach Peter.

All running around like headless chickens,
not quite knowing what they’re looking for,
or what they’re going to find.

That’s the risk for the preacher
and for all of us,
running around Easter Day
pretending we’re sure,
pretending we know what we’re talking about …

when the truth is,
the first Easter began
with people who didn’t.

The first thing they didn’t understand
wasn’t an idea, or a belief, or a theory.

It was something much more concrete than that.

It was a stone.

The stone was supposed to settle things.

To close the story down,
To seal it.
To make it final.

This is how the world works:

when something is over,
it is over.

We know about stones like that.
Moments that feel sealed.
Doors that don’t reopen.
Relationships that don’t come back.
Hopes that have run their course.

And Mary arrives …
not expecting a miracle,
not looking for resurrection …
just coming to a place that would have been closed.

And the first thing she sees is this:
the stone has been moved.

The very first sign of Easter
is not that Jesus appears,
nor that anyone understands

but that what they thought was sealed
isn’t sealed anymore.

And they don’t know what it means.
They don’t suddenly become certain.
They just know this:
something they thought was final …
has been opened.

And that is how resurrection begins.
Not with explanations,
but with boundaries giving way.

The boundary between life and death.
The boundary between what we think is possible
and what God is doing.
The boundary between who we think belongs to God
and who God is already calling.

It will take Peter a long time to understand that.
Years in fact.

Before this moment, he had been confronted with strange visions.
Voices telling him to let go
of what he had always been sure about.
An invitation to enter the house of people
he never imagined God could use.

Step by another stone step, another stone was being moved.
Not at a tomb this time …
but in Peter’s own heart.

And finally he says:
“Now I understand …
God shows no favourites.”

And what he realises is this:

that Gd has been moving stones
that he, Peter, didn’t even know were there.

Stones he had lived with all his life.

Stones that had quietly built walls –
about who belongs
and who doesn’t.

Because Peter had grown up in a world
where there were very clear boundaries.

Between Jew and Gentile.
Clean and unclean.
Inside and Outside.

Lines you didn’t cross.

People you didn’t eat with.
People you didn’t enter the house of.

People you certainly didn’t imagine
were part of what God was doing.

And it’s as if, step by step,
another stone is being moved …
not at the tomb this time,
But in Peter’s own heart.

Peter’s world is not so very different from ours.

We have our own ways of sorting people.

Our own quiet lines
about who fits …
and who doesn’t.

Our own assumptions about
where God is likely to be at work …
and where God couldn’t possibly be.

Isn’t it funny that Jesus called Peter the rock?
The solid one, the dependable one,
the one we might think would always have it together.
And yet here he is, confused, unsure and learning
that God’s work doesn’t obey the walls he’s built.

The rock … is still learning to listen.
And in that, he becomes truly solid –
not because he knows everything,
but because he has learned where God is really at work.

Just as Mary had to learn
that resurrection wasn’t where she expected it …
Peter had to learn
that God wasn’t limited
to where he expected.

This morning, Gary and Brittany were confirmed in Coventry Cathedral.
Not because they’ve worked it all out,
not because they are completely certain,
but because, like Mary, like Peter
they are learning to listen for a voice that calls them by name.

And that’s what Easter invites us to do:
to pay attention, to listen,
to notice where God is already at work
in ways we didn’t expect.

The stone at the tomb
was only the beginning.
Because once that stone moves
all the other stones
we’ve built around us –
and within us –
begin to shift as well.

Just as they had to for Peter.

The stones we place between ourselves and others.
The quiet assumptions about
who belongs,
who counts,
who could possibly be part of God’s life.

Easter begins not with certainty,
but with a stone that refuses to stay in place,

with confusion,
with running,
with not quite understanding what we’re looking at.

And then – slowly –
with learning to listen.

Because in that garden,
everything changes
not when Mary works it out
but when she hears her name.

“Mary.”

And that is perhaps where Easter begins for us.

Not when we are finally sure.
Not when we have all the answers.

But when, somehow,
in the middle of everything that feels closed

we hear God calling our name.

And we begin – slowly,
sometimes hesitantly,
to realise
that what we thought was sealed …
including our fate …

is already being opened.

It turns out –
God has always been in the business
of moving stones.

You might even say
God put the Rolling Stones on the map.

Tag: sermon

Jesus Breaks the Uneasy Truce

What We Thought Was Sealed