Tag: hope

Love Takes Root in the Little We Are Left With

David HerbertLeave a comment

This week’s readings (Romans 8:26-end and Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52) ask one of the most searching questions in the New Testament: Can anything separate us from the love of God? Paul answers with a resounding “No.” Jesus then invites us to discover why—not in the spectacular or the powerful, but in the smallest, most easily overlooked signs of God’s kingdom. Perhaps the first step in following Jesus is simply learning to see what he sees.

Can anything separate us from the love of God?

There could hardly be a greater contrast than the contrast between ourselves and the people Paul was addressing in his letter to the church in Rome.

Just imagine what they were going through.

Paul gives us a glimpse:

hardship,
distress,
persecution,
famine,
nakedness,
peril
and sword.

This is no rhetorical exaggeration.
Paul is writing to communities living under the shadow of the Roman Empire,
where persecution, imprisonment, poverty and execution were genuine possibilities.
These are the lived realities of many of the Christians to whom he writes.

Over the years I have become increasingly aware that much of Scripture comes to us through the experience of people who were oppressed, enslaved, exiled or hated.

We read Scripture, as it were, over their shoulders.

Not that we do not know suffering ourselves.
We face other hardships.
Other powers can seem overwhelming.
Other fears can drain the life from us.

And so we, too, may hear this letter as though it were addressed to us.

We hear Paul insist that nothing in all creation—
not hardship or distress,
persecution or famine,
nakedness, peril or sword
—can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.

Neither death nor life.
Neither angels nor rulers.
Neither things present nor things to come.
Nor powers.
Neither height nor depth.
Nor anything else in all creation.

It is one of the boldest claims in the New Testament.
Paul doesn’t merely hope this is true.
He is utterly convinced of it.

And if Paul tells us that nothing can separate us from the love of God,
Jesus tells us why.

The answer comes in what Jesus sees, and who he sees.

Who he sees first are the least, the last and the lost in the ways of the world.
And he sees the little they are left with,
and the little we have.

He sees in the little people have all the signs of the kingdom,
the love of God, the presence of God, the rule of God.
And he wants us to see what he sees in the things he points out.

There’s the tiny seed – the tiniest of seeds.
There’s the yeast in the bread.

There’s all the things overlooked by the powers that be
with their attention preoccupied with what is bigger and better in their own eyes.

Jesus looks at the ordinary world and sees the kingdom of God.

A seed.
Some yeast.
A field.

Where others see almost nothing, Jesus sees everything.

He sees the tiny mustard seed growing to the huge shelter for the birds of the field.
He sees the yeast folded into the dough for the daily bread that keeps us going.
He sees a field and sees the treasure hidden within it that is never going to be found by those looking for bigger and better things.

He is always asking “What have you got – let me see?”
“What have you got?” Jesus asked
“Five loaves and two fish – what’s the good in that?”, the disciples replied.

“Just wait and see” Jesus said

The disciples see five loaves and Jesus sees a feast.

That’s the miracle.

Jesus sees the ways of God in the little people have,
and he points them out for the world to see:
the love of God,
the presence of God,
the kingdom of God,
hidden in the little things of their lives,

not in the big things.

The kingdom of God is revealed in such little things
and we are captivated by what Jesus sees.

To follow Jesus is to follow his finger –
to look where he is looking,
To notice who he notices,
to treasure what he treasures,

until, little by little,
we begin to see the world through his eyes.

And that is why Paul can say,
with such astonishing confidence,

that nothing can separate us from the love of God.

It is true: the powers can destroy bodies,
they can imprison us,
they can persecute us and hate us for all sorts of reasons,
they can starve us, they can threaten us
but none of that can separate us from the love of God
because God’s love is always finding somewhere to take root

in a seed
in some yeast
in a field
in five loaves and two fish
in a child
in the poor in spirit
in the meek
in those who hunger and thirst for righteousness
in those who mourn
in those who are persecuted
in a cross
in an empty tomb

Nothing can separate us from the love of God
because God’s love is always finding somewhere to take root
in the little we are left with.

After hardship,
after grief,
after disappointment
after persecution,
after loss.
what are we left with?

We don’t always come to Christ with abundance.
Sometimes we come with the little we are left with.

And Jesus says, “let me see”.

“Let me see what you have,
not what you haven’t,
nor what you wish you had.”

His love takes root in the little we have.

In the little faith.
In the little hope.
In this little church.
In this little time

he plants a tiny seed

pointing us to the way of the kingdom,
showing us that this is what the kingdom of God is like.

Nothing can separate us from the love of God

because God’s love is always finding somewhere to take root
in the little we are left with.

Finding the Way to Be Ourselves

David HerbertLeave a comment

We all know the feeling of becoming someone we never intended to be. This sermon, based in Romans 7:15-25 and Matthew 11:16-19, 25-end, explores how Paul and Jesus invite us not simply to try harder, but to discover another way of being human.

This is what I don’t understand.
The things I want to do, I don’t do.
I keep making plans
but something always seems to get in the way.
I don’t do the good I want to do

I keep becoming someone I never intended to be.

I wanted to be patient, but then I got tired.
I should have spent more time with my children when they were growing up,
but, you know, the pressures to always be working,
to make a good impression, to get on.
I didn’t want to worry so much, but those credit card bills kept coming.
I wanted to be generous, but never had anything left.
I wanted to be kinder, but ….

That’s what I don’t understand.

I’ve never quite become the person I wanted to be.

Do you get that?
Do you feel that?
Or am I on my own?

I know I’m not on my own because Paul felt it as well
and wrote about it in his letter to the Romans.
I don’t understand what I do.
What I want to do I do not do.
I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.

He knew what all of us know
that there is this sad fact of life
that we are never quite as free to be ourselves as we imagine.

We imagine we’re free to be ourselves,
we imagine we’re self-made
but all the time we are being formed by the powers that be:


by advertising – (why would that be a multi-billion industry if it had no effect on persuading us to be and do differently?)
by social media
by our work place – and its politics and expectations
by our families
by our friends
by the news we consume
even by our churches
and the company we keep

All these things form us.
They have power over us.

Some of it works for our benefit, but
some of it teaches us to live by fear,
scarcity, competition and status.

Some of it wields a power over us
so that we don’t do the good we want to do
and finish up doing the things we hate doing.
Paul put it all down to sin.
I don’t understand what I do.
Why do I do what I hate doing?
We hear his conclusion:
“It’s not me. It’s sin living in me that does it.”

Paul speaks of sin as an occupying power
and he has been “taken prisoner”.
Paul isn’t describing a weak will
so much as humanity living under an oppressive regime.
It’s a regime larger than individual acts of wrongdoing.
It’s everything that enslaves us:
Systems of domination,
fear, violence, exploitation,
and the internalised habits they create.

Paul calls this Sin.
We might recognise it today in what we call
“the powers that be”
those forces, systems and habits
that shape us
until we no longer
know whose voice we’re listening to.

It’s the powers that be that diminish us
and steal our freedom to be
the people we would love to be.

The powers that be aren’t just them.
They’re more pervasive than that.
The powers that be are also inside us.

Their voices have become our inner voice.
We’ve learned their language,
They’re our self-talk
persuading us to measure ourselves by their standards
till we finish up cooperating with the very powers that diminish us.

This is what we don’t understand
because we are confused by the powers that be.

And so we turn to Christ.

He does understand.

He doesn’t begin by blaming us.
He begins by understanding us.

His understanding comes from experience.
The wise and learned have scoffed at him.
The powers that be have laughed him to scorn.

He praises his Father for hiding “these things” from the wise and learned
and revealing them only to “little children”

That’s always been the way with God.
Pharoah cannot see
Herod cannot see
Pilate cannot see
The chief priests cannot see.

The so-called “wise and learned”,
the so-called grown ups,
the so-called leaders
are looking in the wrong places,
with the wrong expectations
using the wrong measures.

They cannot see.
That’s why Jesus insisted
that we have to become as little children
to enter the kingdom of heaven.

But why children?

It’s not because children are innocent.
They’re not.
They can be devious and manipulative.
It’s not because children know less,

but because children are still teachable.

The “wise and learned” have already graduated.
They’ve stopped learning.
They think they know how the world works.
They know what success looks like,
who matters, who wins, who loses.
They think they know it all.
They think they’re experts.

Children are still learning.
“Learn from me.”

That may be the most important sentence in today’s gospel reading.
Jesus says,
Come to me.
Take my yoke.
Learn from me.

He’s inviting people into another school,
another imagination, another kingdom,
another way for being human
for those who become as little children,
vulnerable to all sorts of abuse
in the ways of the world and the powers that be,
and teachable …..

and for the weary.
The invitation is for those who become as little children
and the weary and burdened by modern life
which teaches us to desire things we don’t actually want:

to work more, to work harder,
to consume more, compete more, fear more,
leaving us less able to do the good we want to do.

The ones Jesus was inviting
were wearied and burdened
by the religious establishment
the social hierarchy,
the endless demands of honour and shame,
the burden of purity laws
as well as the crushing demands of empire.

Jesus understands
how we are bound to do what we don’t want to do,

and with mercy and compassion
he invites us
to come to him,
to join him
as our teacher.

Every kingdom forms people in its own image.
Every kingdom has its own idea of what a successful human being looks like.

The powers that be produce anxious people,
competitive people,
frightened people,
striving people,
people who never quite believe
there is enough, or
they are enough.

Jesus doesn’t simply forgive those people.
Those people who come to him,
who turn to him
he patiently teaches,
forms
and reshapes 
into the people
God intended them to be
from the very beginning:

gentle,
humble in heart,
and finally able
to rest.

Thy Kingdom Come

David HerbertLeave a comment

Today is the 7th Sunday of Easter, the 7th Sunday of the 50 day season of joy.

I just mention that because we always have to watch out for the number 7.
It is, if you like, our lucky number.
It is the number of completion and fulfilment.
It’s the days of the week,
the measure of our time,
the time of creation,
the span from start to finish.
It’s the number written into our rhythm of life –
the six day week, the day of rest, the gift of God.

So, we’ve had 7 Sundays inhabiting the Easter message,
letting the hope of resurrection work in our hearts and minds.

But the season isn’t quite over.
We are left with a question.
It is a question asked of the apostles, and by the apostles.
And it’s been left hanging for all who have followed them.

They gathered round Jesus and asked him:
“Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?”

As far as we can see, they don’t get an answer.
They were asking him – are you the Messiah we were expecting?
Are you the one to restore the fortunes of Israel?

There is no answer because it’s the wrong question they’re asking.

The question is a reflection of one of the great temptations of human nature –
the tendency towards nostalgia and restoration.

The temptation is still with us.

We long for restoration.
We dream of returning to some imagined greatness,
some remembered certainty,
some lost golden age.

Nations do it.
Churches do it.
We do it ourselves.

There are men in white suits in today’s readings.
They catch the apostles watching Jesus disappear from sight.
They see their grief and their pining for the past,

and then they tell them to stop looking that way,
and they redirect the gaze of their longing

They redirect the gaze of their longing –
away from nostalgia,
away from heaven as escape,
back toward Jerusalem,
back into the world,
back into prayer,
back towards one another.

They stop staring into heaven.

They turn around.

And they walk back to Jerusalem.

A sabbath walk.
Day seven.

And Day Seven becomes Day One:
not completion as an ending,
but completion opening into a beginning.

Easter gives its people a new body clock,
a new sense of time,
a life no longer ordered by nostalgia for the past
but by longing for what God is yet to do.

The time of our lives.

And what do they do,
these people learning resurrection time?

They pray.

They return to Jerusalem,
and gather in an upstairs room.

Men and women together.
Mary.
The brothers of Jesus.
The Church before it knows what the Church will become.

And they pray.

They do not launch a strategy.
They do not reclaim power.
They do not “make Israel great again”.

They pray:
waiting not for the restoration of the past,
but for the coming of the kingdom of God.

This is Day One of the prayer of the Church,
not longing for the past glory,
but longing for a glory like no other glory we have known,
not longing for the past
but longing for the future.

Thy kingdom come,
that’s the way to pray.

When we introduce the Lord’s prayer,
we casually say
“as our Saviour has taught us,
so we pray”.

But let’s be definite.
This is the way Jesus taught his followers to pray. To pray for the kingdom to come,
on earth as it is in heaven.

So we could say in introducing our prayer:

this is the way we pray
because this is the way Jesus prayed,

looking to our Father in heaven,
giving him the power and glory
instead of seeing power and glory
in wealth, or celebrity, or control.

This is looking the other way.

Looking away from power as domination,
and discovering power as compassion.

Looking away from glory as status,
and discovering glory as love poured out.

Because when Jesus speaks about glory,
he does not mean celebrity,
spectacle,
or triumph.

In John’s Gospel,
Glory means the cross.

Glory is love poured out.
Glory is love that gives itself away
for the life of the world.

Glory is love that gives itself away for the life of the world.

And that is why our Collect today dares to hold together two words usually kept apart:

power
and compassion.

Heaven’s power is compassionate power.
Worldly power is anything but.

Risen, ascended Lord,
as we rejoice at your triumph,
fill your Church on earth with power and compassion …….

that’s the way to pray,
for the sake of the future,
for those who suffer
under the world as it is,
and under the ways we have learned to look at one another,
for those “estranged by sin”,
by the wrongs of the world,
for those estranged,
disconnected, alienated, turned inward, turned backward.

For their sake,
that they may find forgiveness,
that they may know peace

that’s why we pray,
It’s for their sake,
for the sake of the lost, the last and the least,
that the glory of heaven
may be seen on earth,
in the troughs of human experience,
in the valleys overshadowed by death.

And so this week,
in churches,
halls,
homes,
and quiet corners,
Christians will gather again,
just as they did in that upstairs room.

Not looking backward,
not staring into the sky,
but praying toward the future:

Thy kingdom come.

When we pray the Jesus way,
Jesus prays alongside us still:

for the world,
for the estranged, the wronged,
for peace,
for glory shaped like love.

Passion That Stays

David HerbertLeave a comment

Ezekiel stands in a valley of dry bones. Jesus stands at a tomb that smells of death. Neither turns away. This sermon explores a quieter, deeper meaning of passion—not as feeling, but as staying. And what might happen when we remain present in the places where hope seems lost.

Perhaps I should not ask what comes to mind when we hear the word passion.

We often hear the word passion and think of strong feelings.
Intensity. Emotion.

But the scriptures speak of something deeper.
Our scriptures give meaning to the word.

Passion is engagement.
Passion makes you stay with something,
with someone,
refusing to walk away.

It is remaining present
even where everything feels lost.

Our scriptures are not lifeless words on a page.
They are not dry bones,
or dead leaves,
pages in a book.

They have a life of their own.

It is passion that brings them to life,
and it is their life that inspires passion.

These scriptures have been carried through the generations:
people who have known defeat, exile, grief, and despair.

They belong to such people.

They cling passionately
to our experiences of devastation and annihilation.

They will not let us go.

Such is the character of our scripture,
such is the passion of scripture
for those who feel abandoned, lost.

They cling to them,
and they belong
to the people
in those places
at those times
when hope seems lost.

They’re not nice reading.
They’re not polite texts.

They are full of grit,
full of determination,
full of passion,

because they come from the valley—
the metaphorical valley
that stands in the shadow of death.

They belong to those who have stood in the valley
and wondered if anything could live again.

The vision Ezekiel shares with us this morning
comes straight from that valley,

a bleak valley
of bleached bone,
dried and scattered,

in a scene so devastating
that we’ve hardly been able to contemplate it
without making light of it—
turning it to comedy:
dem bones, dem bones, dem dry bones.

From the devastation
comes the question:

Can these bones live?

It’s a question Ezekiel hears from heaven.

How else could he have heard it?

It’s a question none of us would ever think to ask,
because the evidence of an ending
is so overwhelming.

We can almost feel him hesitate.

“What a question…”

“I don’t know.”

“Can these bones live?”

“I don’t know.”

And yet—he stays with it.

He does not turn away.

He remains.

“O Lord God, you know.”

And the wind begins to stir.

From all directions,
through all times,

the breath moves—

clinging to dry bones,
wrapping them in a love that will not let go,
stirring hope
where everything seemed lost.

We stay in the valley in the gospel reading.

The valley in the shadow of death.

As John tells us about Lazarus,
and the passion of Jesus for his friend,
and the passionate mourning of his sisters.

Lazarus has been dead four days.

John does not soften it.

The grief is real.
The loss is final.

This is a passage that stinks.

“Lord, already there is a stench.”

And again, there is no hurry to escape.

Jesus stands there—
overwhelmed in all his senses by loss,
in the midst of wailing,
with the stench of death.

And he weeps.

That is passion.

Before anything is changed,
before anything is restored,

passion is remaining—
particularly at the point
when all seems lost.

And it is there—
in that place—

that something happens.

Not an explanation.
Not an answer.

A call.

“Lazarus, come out.”

No one expects this.

No one is ready for this.

Because nothing in that place
suggests that life is possible.

And yet—

life does not wait
for another time,
or another place.

It comes here.

Into the tomb.
Into what has already been given up for lost.

And then—almost quietly—

“Unbind him, and let him go.”

The life is given.

But the unbinding—
the restoring, the freeing—
is given to others.

To those who stayed.

That call of Jesus—
“Lazarus, come out”…
and, “Unbind him, let him go”—

has echoed far beyond that tomb,
into every place
where people feel bound:

by grief,
by fear,
by the weight
of what others have said about them.

That voice still calls.

Jesus calls—
but leaves the unbinding
to others.

And perhaps we recognise this.

On a Radio 5 phone in,
I heard a cancer survivor—
speaking about what brought her through.

She spoke about treatment.

But more than that, she spoke about people.

The doctors who cared for her.
The nurses who stayed with her.
Those who sat alongside her.
Those who did the small, unnoticed things—
even making tea.

And she spoke about someone
whose vision and determination
had built that place of care over time.

They weren’t speaking about religion.

They simply spoke about people
who did not walk away.

People who remained
in a place most of us would rather avoid.

People through whom, slowly, patiently,
life was given back.

And perhaps this is what begins to happen
when we stay.

When we do not turn away.

When we remain present
in the places that feel like the end.

Something of that same passion
begins to take hold of us.

Not a loud passion.
Not a dramatic one.

But a steady, quiet refusal
to let go of life.

It becomes a passion for people—
for their dignity, their healing, their wellbeing.

A passion for the fragile life of this world—
for all that can so easily be lost.

A passion for justice—
that what is broken might be made right.

A passion to take our place
in the work of restoring life.

And perhaps we do not need
to name it too quickly.

Perhaps it is enough
to recognise it—

in the valley,
at the tomb,
in those who stay,
in those who serve,
in those who help unbind
what has been bound.

Because this is where the scriptures live.

Not far from us.
Not above us.

But here.

In the places where hope feels thin,
where loss is real,
where the ending seems certain.

And here—
not somewhere else, not later, but here—

breath begins to stir.

A voice is heard.

And where people will not walk away,
where they stay, and serve, and love,

even now,

the dead begin to live.

The Genesis of Gentleness and the Gentleness of Genesis

David HerbertLeave a comment

Read gently my friend.

Facebook friend, Josh Askwith, has just heard the book of Genesis read straight through. What struck him was not the violence, nor the intrigue, nor the strangeness. It was something else. He posted this:

“I was struck by how gently it ends.”

And that’s got me thinking. Gently. That is not the adjective most people reach for when describing the Old Testament.

His comment landed on top of a conversation I had recently with someone who confessed that she “struggles” with the Old Testament. She is not alone. Many Christians speak of it as though it were a necessary preface to the real story — darker, harsher, spiritually inferior. The implication is often unspoken but clear: the Old Testament is something Jesus saves us from.

I wonder how much of that instinct has been formed not simply by careful reading, but by centuries of misreading — by a habit of exaggerating the discontinuity between Old and New, of distancing Jesus from his Jewish roots, of quietly rendering Israel’s scriptures obsolete. When we treat the Old Testament as primitive or problematic, are we inheriting interpretative habits shaped, at least in part, by anti-Jewish assumptions?

And then Genesis ends — not with thunder, but with tenderness.

Joseph forgives his brothers. Revenge is refused. Fear is met with reassurance. “You meant it for harm,” he says, “but God meant it for good.” The story closes not in triumph but in trust — a coffin in Egypt, waiting for promise. It is strangely, stubbornly gentle.

But the gentleness is not softness. It is shaped by a deeper pattern running all the way through the book.

Near the end, in Genesis 48, we are given an image that feels almost like a summary of everything that has gone before. Jacob — old now, frail, nearing death — is brought Joseph’s two sons to bless. Manasseh, the firstborn, is positioned at Jacob’s right hand. Ephraim, the younger, at his left. Everything is arranged according to custom, according to entitlement, according to the straight lines of inheritance – so that Manasseh will be blessed first and Ephraim last. That is the way of the world.

But then Jacob crosses his hands.

The right hand rests on the younger boy. The left on the elder.

Joseph tries to correct him. It must be a mistake. But Jacob refuses. The crossing is deliberate.

Jacob Blessing Ephraim and Manasseh, miniature on vellum from the Golden Haggadah, Catalonia, early 14th century, at the British Library, London

It is hard not to smile at the irony. The name Jacob is bound up with grasping and twisting — the heel-grabber, the supplanter. The one who once twisted his way into stealing a blessing from his brother Esau, now twists his own arms to give one. The old twister twists again — but this time not to steal, not to secure advantage for himself, but to bend the future toward the overlooked.

Genesis has been rehearsing this pattern from the beginning. Abel over Cain. Isaac over Ishmael. Jacob over Esau. Joseph over his brothers. And now Ephraim over Manasseh.

This is not randomness. It is theology.

God’s blessing does not run along the straight lines of primacy, status, or expectation. It bends. It crosses. It interrupts the obvious.

For those who are first, secure, established, this is unsettling. For those who are second, small, despised, or displaced, it is life.

Read this way, Genesis is not primitive folklore. It is dangerous scripture.

It belongs to the Torah — to a people who would know slavery, exile, homelessness; who would know what it is to be second best. It is instruction for living under empire. It is a memory bank for those whose lives do not follow the straight lines of power. Again and again it whispers: the story is not over when you are overlooked. The blessing may yet cross in your direction.

No wonder such texts can be domesticated. If the Old Testament can be caricatured as angry, obsolete, or morally inferior, its critique of hierarchy is neutralised. If it is reduced to a foil for a gentler New Testament, its radical edge is blunted.

But Jesus does not stand over against this story. He stands within it.

When he speaks of the last being first and the first last, he is not inventing a new moral universe. He is speaking Torah-deep truth. When Mary sings of the proud scattered and the lowly lifted, she is echoing the long music of Israel. When the kingdom is announced as good news to the poor, it is not a departure from Genesis but its flowering.

The rule of the kingdom of God crosses old hierarchies. It must – if the second best, the left out and despised are to find favour.

That does not mean the first are hated or the strong despised. The point is not revenge. The crossing of hands is not retaliation; it is freedom. God is not bound by our ranking systems. Blessing is not the private property of the powerful.

Perhaps that is why Genesis ends gently. Because beneath its betrayals and famines and rivalries runs a deeper current of mercy — a God who keeps bending history toward life.

A God who crosses his hands.

And for those who have lived too long on the left side of the room – left behind, left out – that is not merely interesting theology. It is hope. It is radical gentleness.

Going Home After Christmas – another way

David Herbert3 Comments

Here is a sermon for Epiphany, about getting home after Christmas — about what it means to return to ordinary life once the magic of Christmas has done its work.
(Readings: Isaiah 60:1–6; Matthew 2:1–12)

This morning I want to take up the star of wonder
and see how far we have come this Christmas,
exploring the way to the manger,
and how on earth we get home.

Our readings cover many miles —
the miles in the reading from Isaiah,
the miles nations will come
to the light of the glory of God,
the miles rulers will travel
to the brightness of the dawn
of a new day, a new time, a new year.

The miles the children of Israel will travel:
sons coming from afar,
daughters carried on the hip.

The miles wealth will cross the seas,
and the camels… the camels —
from Midian and Ephah,
even from Sheba,
bearing gold and incense,
proclaiming the praise of the Lord
when he comes.

And in the gospel for today
there are the Magi from the east —
the Magi who believe in the magic of life,
who follow the star of wonder,
always wondering what kind of magic
can turn hatred into love
and a world at war into a world at peace.

Our readings cover miles of wonder.

The magic the travellers trusted
was not illusion or trickery,
but the stubborn hope
that the world could be other than it is.

It is a hope as old as time.
It is God’s hope we join.

The Magi are ones who travelled so far,
going first one way,
and then finding a better way.

First they went the usual way,
the old way, the well-trodden wrong way.
They found themselves in Jerusalem,
in the twisted streets of the medina,
the religious capital,
the political and social capital.

Everyone said they would find
what they were looking for there,
because that’s where we always expect God to be —
close to influence, respectability, and control.

There’s no doubt that Google Maps
had led them to a king.
But Herod wasn’t who they were looking for.

There was no magic in his palace —
just the same old rules,
the same old rule of oppression,
ruling out the magic
of the least, the lost, and the last.

They stayed awhile — long enough
for the priests and lawyers
to consult the ancient books of magic,
the scriptures that had forgotten
just how dangerous they really are,
to remind themselves
that the place of magic
is the smallest of places,
never Jerusalem.

They’d got it so wrong.

Nine miles wide, one theologian says —
the distance between Jerusalem and Bethlehem,
the distance between power and promise,
the distance between knowing the words
and recognising the child.

Nine miles on, they saw the star
stop over the place where Jesus was.
Overwhelming joy brought them to their knees.

They bowed from their lofty heights.
They opened up their gifts —
all their power and glory:
their gold, their frankincense, their myrrh.

Gifts laden with meaning —
the gold of their wealth,
the incense of their power,
the myrrh of their mortality.

They handed them all over.

They do not leave Bethlehem lightly.

They have loved this place.
They have loved the silence,
the smallness,
the nearness of God in a child.

They have lingered long enough
to be changed by what they have seen.

And then they went home another way,
considerably lighter.

We are in the same room as the Magi.
We are with them in Bethlehem.
We too have travelled far this Christmas.
We too have knelt at the place of wonder.

But no one can stay in Bethlehem.
It was too dangerous for Joseph, Mary, and Jesus.
They had to flee from Herod’s terror
and his slaughter of the innocent.

Nor could the Magi stay.
They had to return to their own country.

They had two choices.
They could go back the way they came —
through Jerusalem,
through Herod,
through the centres of religious, social, and political power.

Or they could take the road less travelled.
They chose to follow their dream,
to heed the warning,
to go home another way —
refusing the way of fear and exclusion,
the way that protects power
by crushing the vulnerable.

And nor can we stay at the manger.
Christmas does not ask us to linger,
but to return.

There are just twelve days of Christmas,
and we are nearly at the end of them.
The road home opens before us.

We go back to the same people,
the same work,
the same complications and demands —
just as the Magi did.

The question is not whether we go home,
but how we go home.

Will we go back the way we came —
shaped by fear, habit, and power?
Or will we go home another way —
refusing fear,
trusting the stubborn magic of love,
seeing God not in the centres of control
but in the smallest of places,
among the least, the last, and the lost?

Home calls us —
the place that knows us,
the place we know,
the place whose joys and wounds
we carry in our bones.

The Magi return to their own country —
to their villages,
their households,
their responsibilities and loves.

They go back to the same world,
but not by the same road.

And so do we.

We go home
not because Bethlehem has nothing left to give,
but because it has given us enough.

Enough light
to see differently.
Enough love
to travel lighter.
Enough hope
to believe the world can be other than it is.

That is the road less taken —
and it is the way
into a new year of grace.

God on the night shift

David HerbertLeave a comment

We’ve stayed up!
We’ve stayed awake
to make this night,
this night above all nights, holy.

And we’ve sung praise to this holy night.
Perhaps for the first time tonight in this church
have we sung congregationally the lovely carol, Cantique de Noel.

Noel is a word from Anglo-Norman French. It means birthday.
So when we sing Noel, we are singing a birthday song to the world –
a new beginning sung into the night.

This holy night we see God
as light, forever a-light in our darkness,
a light in our fears, aloneness and confusion.
Tonight we see night as the time God acts.
God’s creation begins in darkness.
That’s our Genesis.
The Exodus began in the dark.
The resurrection begins “while it was still dark”.
God works the night shift.

Tonight we see God –
the very nature of God,
seen and worshipped
as the smallest,
the most vulnerable of life.
This is how we see God,
in a stable, in the busyness
of a crowd of people, in a state
preoccupied by the presence of enemy power.

We see God in that darkness,
and we begin to love the name of that baby,
Jesus, the one who saves us
by joining our darkness with the lightness of love.
As night follows day, he is with us
in the darkness of hurt and disappointment,
rejection, betrayal, the loss of loved ones,
the anxiety of making ends meet,
in a world of war, and a world in flight –
he is with us, our boy, Emmanuel.

Grace doesn’t come with a sword
to overcome the darkness with a spectacular blow.
Instead God illuminates the darkness
with everlasting companionship.

And in this new light, we see ourselves again
as the very image of God.
This holy night, God appears small,
and that smallness reveals what God is always like.
The manger isn’t camouflage, it is revelation.
The manger is our mirror image.
We are made in the image of God,
not born to be high and mighty, first and foremost,
but born into smallness – humble at heart.

And this is the best possible light,
this night, to see one another.
Even though we are in the dark
God helps us see his work begin in smallness,
even with the least, the last and the lost.
God imagines us all worth visiting,
all worth illuminating, all worth saving.

And perhaps, finally,
this holy night invites us
not only to consider how we see God,
or how we see ourselves,
or how we see one another –
but how God sees us.

God does not look for the impressive,
the sorted, the strong.
God looks with delight
upon those awake in the night,
those keeping watch,
those doing their best to get through.

This is the light God shines upon us:
not a searching light,
not a judging light,
but a warming one.
A light that says,
You are worth visiting.
You are worth staying with.
You are worth saving.

This holy night,
God sees us as beloved.
And that is blessing enough
to carry us back into the dark,
Unafraid.
Good night.

Hope Before Dawn: An Advent Imagination

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Live for that day when God’s peace is all in all.
Love for that day when God’s light leaves no shadows.

These are the darkest days of our lives.
December draws a long shadow,
and we find ourselves longing for light.

These days seem to go on without end.

These are the days Isaiah fought through and hoped through
3000 years ago:
the same old, the same old.
the dark ages all over again.
This is the mean time.

This is the time to cherish those who’ve kindled hope,
those we’ve bound in scripture
who hoped in God when the world felt just as heavy as ours.
This is the time to pray.
This is the time to keep watch.
This is the time to live for another day,
to love towards another day
when the times will finally be a-changing.

These are very mean days
when nations make war on nations,
There may be no world war,
But there are too many wars
for us to call this peace.
The world is at war,
and we are all caught up
in a global propaganda war.

These are very mean days when dark forces
create a hostile environment for those seeking asylum and sanctuary,
days which leave so many children hungry
and too many families poor, 

when budget after budget
miss the opportunity to make things better.

These days, however bright the weather may be,
are dark days to too many people.

And so –
these are the very days to keep hope alive,
to pray for the day when God’s kingdom comes on earth, as it is in heaven,
to live for the day when God’s word settles disputes;
to love for the day when nation will not take up sword against nation,
and nor will we need to train for war any more.

Imagine that.
Imagine the difference
when the weapons of war,
the resources of war,
become tools for farming and feeding and healing.

Imagine the difference
if the resources of war were turned to farming.
Not just in the fields of our own villages,
but in Gaza’s broken orchards,
in Ukraine’s shelled wheatlands,
in every place where the soil has been scorched,
and the hands that sow can no longer harvest.

Isaiah’s dream has dirt under its nails.
It is a farmer’s dream,
a peacemaker’s dream –
swords hammered into ploughshares,
spears repurposed as pruning hooks,
the earth tended again.

And here’s another theme none of us can avoid,
if we care about justice and peace:
we need to be prepared in these days of darkness.
Advent comes with a wake up call.
The time has come for us to wake up, says Paul, (Romans 13)
and be ready for the Day of the Lord –
the day we live for,
the day we pray for,
the day we love for.

For Advent I’ve downloaded an app which notifies me of Fajr –
the prayer Muslims offer from dawn to sunrise.
So, this morning, at 6.05,
my phone buzzed to tell me it was time to pray,
and I was reminded of all those
who rise while the world is still dark
to end the night and hope for the day.

First they wash,
then raise their hands to acknowledge the greatness of God.
They then recite the Surah:

In the name of Allah – the Most Compassionate, Most Merciful.
All praise is for Allah – Lord of all worlds.
the Most Compassionate, Most Merciful,
Master of the Day of Judgment.
You ‘alone’ we worship and You ‘alone’ we ask for help.
Guide us along the Straight Path
the Path of those you have blessed
– not those You are displeased with, or those who are astray.

Then they bow
They stand and say, “God hears the one who praises him.”
They prostrate themselves, grounding their forehead, palms, knees and toes on the earth –
and from the ground they praise God.
They finish by turning their head
to the right and to the left
with a prayer of peace in both directions.
Then they are ready for the day
(and, dare I say, they’ve given themselves a good work out!).

There is something holy about any people
who pray before the sun comes up.
They remind us what Advent is for:
ending the night,
and hoping for the day.

And we are among those holy people
imagining that day which will end all days of wrongdoing,
when God’s word is truly heard.

That is why our time of prayer
is taken up with praying for the coming of God’s kingdom,
on earth, as it is in heaven.
Christians will always use their prayer time for that –
It’s what Jesus taught us.

It is a prayer of imagination.
It is a prayer for dawn in the dark.
It is a prayer for the day when ….
the day God’s peace is all in all,
the day God’s light leaves no shadows.

And so we live for that day —
when, as Revelation imagines,
there will be no more mourning, crying or pain,
the day that will see an end to night.

Until that day
we keep watch,
keep warm,
and keep hope alive
these dark days.

Hope Has Hooves: Keeping Faith When the World Feels Mean

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This sermon was preached for the Second Sunday before Advent — sometimes called Kingdom Sunday, and this year also marked as Safeguarding Sunday.
It begins with the prophet Malachi’s vision of a day when “the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings,” and when God’s people “will go out and frolic like well-fed calves.”
It’s a vivid, earthy picture of freedom — hope that doesn’t float above the world but thunders joyfully across it.
Hope, as it turns out, has hooves.

‘Surely the day is coming; it will burn like a furnace.
All the arrogant and every evildoer will be stubble,
and that day that is coming will set them on fire,’ says the Lord Almighty.
‘Not a root or a branch will be left to them.
But for you who revere my name,
the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its rays.
And you will go out and frolic like well-fed calves.’ (Malachi 4:1-2a)

I thought I’d let Malachi do the talking this morning. 

He did his talking 450 years before Christ after the Jewish community had returned from exile.
They thought everything was going to be hunky-dory.
The Temple had been restored, the worship re-established,
and people hoped – and expected – that Israel would be great again.

But the glorious renewal never materialised. It rarely does.

The community Malachi is speaking to is one that had expected to be spared the ways of the arrogant and the evildoers.
Instead they found themselves small, struggling and disillusioned.
They are weary. They are disappointed. They’ve had enough.

And into that discouragement, Malachi tells them not to give up.

In my last parish we lived next door to a dairy farm.
The farmer knew how much we loved the moment when the cows were released into the fields after winter – those first few minutes when they leap and dance and frolic before settling down to graze away their days.
On our final day there, as a goodbye, he freed the cows (earlier than he normally would) just so we could watch them. A little gesture of joy and encouragement.

Watch the moment when these animals are released and leap into life.
This is the kind of hope we’re talking about — wild, earthy, triumphant (From the Funky Farmer)

That’s the image Malachi gives us: “You will go out and frolic like well-fed calves.”
Imagine that, he implies.
Feel it.
Let that joy into your bones.

The day is coming,
the day to end all days,
the day we’ve prayed for,
the end of wrongdoing, the end of misery, the end of oppression,
the end of the arrogant, the end of the evildoer.

But between the promise and its fulfilment, they still had to live through some very tough times indeed.
They still lived between a rock and a hard place.

He’s speaking to a community who’ve given up waiting for times to change,
who’ve lost hope.
And he may as well be speaking to us.

Things haven’t changed that much. His times are still our times.
The arrogant and the evildoers still seem to carry the day,
and we too can feel like a struggling and disillusioned generation.
We get weary. We get disappointed.

This is one of the readings appointed for today.
And its words speak, with beautiful conciseness and clarity, of the day we all pray for –
the day when everything broken will finally be set right.

And what Malachi offers is not a vague or floaty hope.
Not a “pie in the sky when you die” kind of hope.
Not the sort of hope that shrugs and says,
“Well, it won’t happen in my lifetime—maybe someday, somewhere else.”

No.
Malachi’s hope is earthed.
It has muscle and movement.
It has sun-warmed skin and strong legs.
It leaps. It runs. It frolics.

Hope, in Malachi’s vision, is not an idea.
It’s an animal set free.

Hope has hooves.

And because hope has hooves, it doesn’t wait politely for the world to improve.
It doesn’t sit still until things get better.
It doesn’t retreat into a dream or escape into the clouds.

Hope is not about leaving this world behind;
it’s about this world being set right.

The freedom Malachi imagines does not happen “up there” or “somewhere else”
but here—in the fields of our own lives,
in the soil beneath our feet,
in the communities that have grown tired and heavy with disappointment.

Hope is grounded.
Hope is embodied.
Hope is movement.

And that is why those who have given up hope
so often spiritualise it, soften it, postpone it.
They make it so distant that it no longer touches the earth.
They reduce it to wishful thinking or to a future reward
instead of a promise that breaks into the present.

But real biblical hope always has dirt on its feet.
It always has skin in the game.
It always demands something of us.

It is a hope with hooves—
a hope that will not stand still
because God will not stand still.

And so we pray for that day.
Every time we say the Lord’s Prayer — “your kingdom come” — we are praying Malachi’s prayer.
We’re praying for the day when wrong is ended, when justice rises,
when the oppressed stand tall,
when the broken are made whole,
when healing breaks out like sunlight over a cold field.

But praying for that day is not passive.
It is not waiting-room spirituality.
It is preparation.
It is participation.
It is permission for God to rearrange our lives as well as the world.

Paul, writing to the Thessalonians, puts it plainly:
“Never tire of doing good.”

Never tire.
Not when we get weary.
Not when hope feels heavy.
Not when the world seems to resist every effort toward kindness, justice, truth.

Because if hope has hooves, we need to keep ours moving.

Doing good is not an extra.
It is not the garnish on Christian faith.
It is the shape of hope lived out.
It is the daily, steady work of aligning our lives with the world God is bringing into being.

And Jesus, in the Gospel reading, speaks of upheaval—
nations in uproar,
wars and rumours of wars,
the ground trembling beneath our certainties.

But then he says something deeply strengthening:
“Do not be afraid.”

Not because everything is fine — it isn’t.
Not because everything will suddenly get better — it may not.
But because God is with us in the meantime,
and it is precisely in these mean times
that our hope matters most.

The world being turned the right way up is bound to be unsettling.
Those who profit from cruelty won’t like it.
Those who cling to power will resist it.
Those who prefer darkness will fear the light.

But discipleship has always been lived with courage.
Courage to do good when others give up.
Courage to tell the truth when lying is easier.
Courage to protect the vulnerable when it costs something.
Courage to embody hope when cynicism is fashionable.

And that brings us to Safeguarding Sunday.

We haven’t mentioned it until now —
and that’s intentional —
because safeguarding isn’t a special theme for one Sunday,
or a box to tick,
or a duty we dust off once a year.

Safeguarding is simply hope in practice.
It is the grounded hope Malachi speaks of,
the persevering hope Paul commends,
the courageous hope Jesus prepares us for.

Safeguarding says:
in this community,
in this place,
every person matters.
The vulnerable are protected.
The wounded are listened to.
The frightened are safe.
This is a place where harm is named, not hidden,
and where healing is made possible.

Safeguarding is part of the way we pray “your kingdom come.”
It is part of the way we “never tire of doing good.”
It is part of the way we “do not be afraid.”

It is hope with hooves —
hope that moves,
hope that watches over,
hope that makes room,
hope that keeps all God’s people safe
until that promised day dawns
and we go out and frolic like well-fed calves.

So today we keep our hope alive,
we keep our feet moving,
and we keep one another safe.

Hope doesn’t just have feathers,
as Emily Dickinson writes in her poetry.
Hope has hooves.

The calling of God’s people in every generation
is to keep faith in these mean times,
to never give up hope in these mean times,
to never stop loving in these mean times.
These are the things we need to keep going forever,
faith, hope and love,
until the day comes which sees the end of the arrogant and the evildoer,
the day the sun of righteousness will rise
with healing in its wings.

Until then, we keep faith.
We keep hope.
We keep love.

Our call is to live for that day.

A motley crew of cheerleaders

David HerbertLeave a comment

Sometimes one sermon leads to another. The focus here is Hebrews 11:29-12:2, very much picking up from last week’s sermon commending those who never give up and never settle for the way things are, always hoping for justice and love. Here we join the author of Hebrews in looking more closely at who these people are because they really are our cheerleaders. The gospel reading is Luke 12:49-56.

This morning I want to bring to your attention the great cloud of witnesses who surround us.
It is such an evocative image that the author of this letter to the Hebrews has brought to the church.
It is a piece of art.

(The authorship of Hebrews has been kept a mystery.
There is a strong case that the author is a woman – perhaps Priscilla, named as a church leader in Paul’s letters.
Her authorship may have been suppressed because she was a woman.
To avoid repeatedly saying “the author” I’ll be using the pronouns, she/her.
I think it’s helpful to picture the hand of the person writing this letter.
It may well be a woman’s hand.)

Last week we heard from her letter the closest the Bible comes to defining faith:
“Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see” (Hebrews 11:1).

She then gave us a list of people who lived faithfully in hope and love, never settling for anything less that what God had promised.
She commends them for their faith.

She lists some by name:
Abel, the first of many victims of resentment and murder,
Enoch, the first of “the disappeared” – those who vanish without a trace,
Noah, the first of many victims of flooding and climate change, and
Abraham, the archetypal migrant, forever moving from place to place, a stranger and foreigner wherever he went, refusing to settle for the world as it was, forever following a call into a future he could not yet see.

They’re the patriarchs of faith.

But she goes on to name others, and, in today’s reading (Hebrews 11:29–12:2),
to hold up a whole host of unnamed witnesses.
These, too, are the people she commends for their faith.

The technology she has at her disposal was words, and she uses them like a camera lens – zooming in so we see them vividly.
She populates the crowd. They are not faceless.
She wants us to see them for who they are.
She has given us a series of close-ups of them.

Here they are.
They faced jeers and flogging, even chains and imprisonment.
They were put to death by stoning, they were sawn in two, they were killed by the sword.
They went about in sheepskins and goatskins,
destitute, persecuted and ill-treated,
They wandered the desert and mountains, living in caves and in holes in the ground.

These are the people commended for their faith.

Have a look at them. They won’t mind you taking their photo.
See the man in the torn sheepskin,
and the woman whose wrists still bear rope marks.
See the exile who carries home only in memory
and the young man with a limp and joy in his eyes.

Take those photos to heart. Treasure them.
None of them are ever going to make the front cover of Vogue.
They are the last people anyone would think of.

But this is the kingdom of God we are talking about,
where there is one rule
that the first shall be last, and the last first.

And this is sacred scripture,
the treasure of those who are last, lost and least in the kingdoms of this world,
whose hope is stubborn, resilient, never-say-die,
and will settle for nothing less
than the justice and mercy of God’s kingdom.

This cloud of witnesses surrounds us:
not a polished gallery of saintly portraits,
but a motley crew — scarred, weathered, unkempt, unruly.

They are our cheerleaders.
Imagine them as the author of Hebrews wants us to.
Imagine each and every one of them cheering you on.
Come on Margaret, Come on Niki.
“Don’t give up”, “Don’t get downhearted”, “Don’t beat yourself up”, “Keep hope alive”.

We look after our grandchildren two days a week.
One of them is soon to be 5, the other is 2.
The days are long and hard.
These days highlight my weaknesses, especially as we all tire towards the end of the day. 
Patience wears thin. I can feel mean, and I hate myself for feeling like that.
But there are other times when I see how good I can be and how helpful I can be to them.
I love that, and they love that.

I suspect many parents, grandparents and carers know what I’m talking about, especially in the long summer holidays.

In moments like those, moments of temptation, weakness and vulnerability we need the right voices in our heads and ears.
We need to hear these cheerleaders who’ve come through their trials.

But there are other cheerleaders too, if we can call them that,
The voices of dog whistlers and fearmongers
egging us on in a different race altogether:
the race to be anxious about everything,
to fear the stranger,
to protect our own at the expense of others,
to trade trust for suspicion and love for self-preservation.

They sound persuasive because they speak the language of fear — and fear is loud.
But it is not the language of the kingdom.

Hope is the language of the kingdom.
Mercy is the language of the kingdom.
Love is the language of the kingdom.

The gospel ends with Jesus asking a question, more or less wondering to himself,
“How is it that you do not know how to interpret this present time?” (Luke 12:56)

It may be that we have got it wrong, that we are seeing things the wrong way,
through the wrong eyes.
The author of Hebrews has given us a different picture,
a picture of the last and least who lived for hope, mercy and love.
They’re the eyes through which we need to see the present time,
the mean time that we are called to live through with faith.

They’re the cheerleaders who love us,
who want us to run well the race that is set before us,
who cry out “Don’t give up! Keep hope alive!”

Don’t give in to those who put themselves first.
Don’t give in to those who want to lose you and confuse you.
Don’t give in to those for whom you matter least.

They are the ones who have come last, been least, and got lost,
who were beaten, broken and jeered,
but who persevered, running their race,
and are commended for their faith.
They never gave up, and they don’t want us to either.
They want us to keep running forward
till mercy, justice and love become the rule of the day.
Theirs are the cheers we need to hear.