Author: theelvesareheadingwest

An Anglican Priest of Northern English extraction Discovering Home Learning to be a Friend, father and husband - but above all, and indeed radically redfining all of this, a Disciple of the Risen One

Through the Bible in a Year – June 3rd

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The scheme for May – June can be found here

2 Sa 11-12; 2&3 Jn; Psalm 42

This passage from 2 Samuel is as we know the hinge on which the David narrative turns. In a sense as some have suggested, David now begins to live out the second half of his life, beginning with the theft of Bathsheba and the murder of Uriah.

Women and wives were seen as chattels in David’s time – indeed perhaps in his remark about his love for Jonathan [2 Sam 1:27], there is a disdain of women implicit – but they still did belong to their husband, not to another. So Adultery was then more than a sexual misdemeanour, it was also theft as Uriah so describes it. David is a sheep stealer. And then of course he murders Uriah to complete the theft. Like it or not, in the story of David, there are deep resonances with the story of the most wicked of all the kings, Ahab.

But whatever is going on, David now finds himself in  set of circumstances where the tenor of his faith changes. Previously he bestrides the landscape – we are told the LORD granted him victory – but from hereon in he will find that as under Saul, he is a fugitive once more. His faith now takes on a most different hue. He is now a sinner, hunted in the wilderness. It is perhaps now that David begins the most important lesson of all, that Truly he is dependent upon God and not the might of his own arm.

He is in this regard a perfect mirror for Israel – who are chosen and saved by the Lord, just as he chose and preserved David. Who then entered the promised land of his inheritance, but acted as if everything he had was his – as King it was all his to do with as he would. So too Israel in their pride and conceit acted as if they were Lords. NO man is a Lord, not in his own home, not anywhere, only Christ. David’s story reminds us of this powerfully. From hereon, the David story continues down and down.

 

 

Sermon for 2 after Pentecost – Sunday June 2nd 2013 – 9th Sunday in Ordinary Time

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Sermon for Sunday 2nd June – 2nd after Pentecost

1 Kings 18:20-21, 30-39
Psalm 96
Galatians 1:1-12
Luke 7:1-10

‘you’ve gotta serve somebody’
Bob Dylan

Last weekend, as Jo reminded us last Sunday, we offered our hospitality to the Diocesan Hui on Marriage. Certainly for any number of reasons, being here in New Zealand has caused me to reflect at far greater depth on these matters than I had done whilst in England. And in particular I have been drawn over and again to the words of Jesus concerning marriage – which for the far greater part reveal that he does not think as we do on these matters, whether we are Conservatives or Liberals, both of whom seem to see in marriage the Summum bonum, the highest Good.

Jesus sees marriage as relatively unimportant – and I choose my words carefully. Relatively Unimportant. Relative to what you might well ask? Relative to the Kingdom of God, and thus Relative to the life of a Disciple of Jesus.

In one of the parables of the Kingdom, someone uses as an excuse ‘I have just got married’ – and we all know what is the outcome for those who excuse themselves from the invitation of the King. Again Jesus over and again points out that devotion to Him far far outweighs all others relationships. Just the other week I was on retreat with other clergy and lay ministers and we heard these words from the gospel of Luke ‘Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.’ Yes, as we all know, or at least as I hope we all know, Jesus is engaging in hyperbole here, but the point is clear – without a devotion to the person of Jesus that dwarfs all other allegiances, including marriage and family life – we cannot be his disciples. St Paul sees marriage as a hindrance to discipleship. It is only because we view Marriage through the distorting lens of Christendom that we think otherwise.

Jesus says marriage is not important enough to be part of the Age that is to come, where ‘they neither marry nor are given in marriage’. As the church, we are an eschatalogical community, a foretaste of the age to come, Marriage is not of much significance to the church.

At the end of the Hui, Bishop Kelvin speaking of his episcopal ministry used the metaphor of a lumberjack, trying to keep a great raft of logs together on a river. The image that came to mind was that the raft of logs has got stuck up a creek. Perhaps our lack of progress on this issue is precisely its insignificance in terms of the Kingdom of God.

We are now in what the church calls Ordinary time. From Advent to Ascension – we focus on the coming, the incarnation, the revealing, the passion and the resurrection of Jesus. Now the focus shifts onto the church and its faithfulness to Jesus – The Kingdom of God and discipleship, that is our obedience to Jesus, which is the essence of the Kingdom.

The heart of discipleship is obedience to Jesus. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer puts it, ‘only the one who obeys believes, and only the one who believes obeys’. Believing in Jesus and Obeying Jesus are one and the same. There is no distinction between faith and works. To believe is to be living out this Salvation Life.

Our gospel reading today focusses on the associated issue of Authority – the Authority of Christ. Obedience to Jesus comes from a recognition of who he is – to see who he is is of course to believe in Him and believing He is who he Is, obedience is of course only natural.

And Jesus in this encounter with the Centurion is staggered – he is ‘amazed’ at the faith which is evidenced before him. But whose faith is he talking about? We might think that self evidently that of the Centurion, but I suggest that is not all. The story is worth looking at in some detail.

After Jesus had finished all his sayings in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. ‘After Jesus had finished all these sayings . . . Luke clearly intends us to link the gospel incident with what Jesus has just been saying ‘in the hearing of the people’. We are as it were encouraged to be ‘the people’ who have heard him speak, and who now follow Him to Capernaum. But what was it Jesus has just said?

Actually, he has just completed what we might call Luke’s version of The Sermon on the Mount. Like that in Matthew – Luke has Jesus conclude the sermon with the words about the house on the rock and that built on sand. And as in Matthew there are words about the importance of Obedience. In Matthew Jesus says ‘‘Not everyone who says to me, “Lord, Lord”, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” In Luke we hear Jesus perhaps in exasperation saying this, ‘ ‘Why do you call me “Lord, Lord”, and do not do what I tell you?’

Put another way, they call him Lord, but do not treat him as such – they do not recognise his Authority. And so with those words as the background, Jesus comes to Capernaum. A centurion there had a slave whom he valued highly, and who was ill and close to death. When he heard about Jesus, he sent some Jewish elders to him, asking him to come and heal his slave. Note, the gentile Centurion sends the Jewish elders to Jesus, They don’t offer to go. Perhaps a sign that whilst he recognises Jesus, they do not.  Well we know what happens next. The Centurion, hearing that Jesus is en route, sends some of his friends to Jesus, and tells them ‘Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; therefore I did not presume to come to you. The honour the Centurion holds Jesus in is such that he would not presume to come to him . . . But only speak the word, and let my servant be healed. Words of great faith which we sometimes echo in our words of invitation to the Eucharist ‘Lord, I am not worthy to receive you, but only say the word, and I shall be healed.’ The Centurion recognises the Authority of the Words of Jesus – How?

For I also am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, “Go”, and he goes, and to another, “Come”, and he comes, and to my slave, “Do this”, and the slave does it.’ The Centurion exercises authority – and he recognises authority. When Jesus heard this he was amazed at him. He has just been expressing his frustration with his hearers ‘Why do you call me Lord! Lord! and do not DO what I say???’ And then this Gentile Centurion describes how he orders his soldiers and his slaves and they do what he tells them. ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’ Who has the higher Authority?? Jesus, or the Centurion? The answer is so obvious. But who commands the respect of obedience? The Centurion. Jesus as it were sees the ‘faith’ of the soldiers and the slaves of the Centurion, who obey him. He sees their response and compares it with the failure of those he is teaching to ‘Do what I say’, their ‘lack of faith’

But of course this Is the story of those who presume to call themselves the people of God.
In our Old Testament lesson – what is at stake is also the matter of Authority. In Elijah’s famous face off with the prophets of Ba’al – the issue precisely is ‘Who is God?’ Ba’al or Yahweh, The LORD. And following the dramatic encounter, all the people declare ‘the LORD is God, The LORD is God’. But for all that recognition, as the prophets declare – the people do not acknowledge him as such in their lives. They cry out to him when things go badly, but do not obey him as Lord and God. ‘Why do you call me Lord, Lord and do not DO what I say?’ And so it is when the LORD stands amongst us in the flesh. Many see his acts, even more hear his words, but few obey. Their own agendas are all so much more pressing. As Jesus says ‘they hear the word, but the cares of the world, and the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things come in and choke the word, and it yields nothing.’

I wonder if that was going on last weekend, certainly it yielded little if anything. Our thinking about marriage is so skewed – we see it of such distorted importance, that when we hear Jesus say ‘whoever has left his . . . wife . . . for my sake and the kingdom . . .’ we assume he must have got it wrong . . . but that is quite plainly what he says. To be a disciple is to be devoted to Jesus, to recognise his authority, like the soldiers and the slaves of the Centurion, to Act immediately in accordance with his command. Put another way, to have faith

To tie up there is something which needs to be said about Obedience to Jesus. For it is a mark of our wayward hearts that we find such a thought onerous. And so we must insist on two things. Firstly that obedience is the fruit of faith – it is not an attempt to curry favour with God.

Such a thing is not possible – God in Christ has reconciled the world to himself – We are made right through faith in Jesus. We do not obey Jesus in order that we might be put right with God. We do not obey, like perhaps the soldiers and slaves obey, out of fear. We obey because we Recognise him, we recognise his authority – Calling him Lord is not merely the word of our lips, it is the deepest recognition of our hearts and wills. It is a sign that in truth we do Know Him, we recognise that He Is Lord. To obey him is to recognise Him for who he is, the one who fills everything in every way, the eternal Logos of God.  It is to align ourselves with all that is good and true and beautiful – it is to align ourselves with the Light and Life of the World. Not to do so is to say that there is some other greater source of authority in the world, there is some other, some higher truth.

And this brings us to the second and final point.  That knowing Jesus, we Love him, and obedience is the natural fruit of that Love. Nothing delights us more than to obey the one we love. For we know that in obedience to the one who loves us so much that he died for us, we will truly find our deepest Joy. We recognise deep within ourselves the Life giving nature of his command, that at first declared all things Good, like a spring of water welling up to eternal life. To know that in obedience to Him we know our true freedom, that for which we were made, the fulness of all we were created to be – truly children of the most high God.

May we all know the true and perfect freedom that is Loving obedience to Christ

I close with a prayer of St Augustine: Let us pray
O thou, who art the light of the minds that know thee,
the life of the souls that love thee,
and the strength of the wills that serve thee;
help us so to know thee that we may truly love thee;
so to love thee that we may fully serve thee,
whom to serve is perfect freedom.
Amen

Prayer for the day

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O most merciful God and Father, we commend ourselves and all that we have to Thine Almighty hands, and pray Thee to preserve us by Thy good Spirit from all sin, misfortune and grief of heart.
Give us the Spirit of grace and prayer, that we may have a consoling trust in Thy love, and that our sighs and petitions may be acceptable in Thy sight.
Give us the Spirit of faith to kindle a bright flame of true and blessed faith in our hearts, that we may have a living knowledge of salvation, and our whole life may be a thankoffering for the mercies we have received. A give us the Spirit of live, that we may experience the sweetness of Thy love towards us, and also love Thee in return; and render our obedience not from constraint like slaves, but with the willing and joyful hearts of children. Amen

Gottrfried Arnold, 1697

Through the Bible in a Year – June 2nd

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The scheme for May – June can be found here

2 Sa 8-10; 1 Jn 4-5; Psalm 41

John in is letter as we have already seen makes much of the incarnation. He begins by declaring that which the Apostles had seen and touched.

He goes on to make this the touchstone of discernment – ‘every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God’

So much of what passes for faith nowadays, amongst both conservative and liberal Christians – teeters dangerously in this regard. For many ‘Jesus’ is reduced to a principle, a set of doctrines or beliefs – such that if you take but a moment to consider what is said, the Incarnation is sidelined, and so is Christ. The gospel becomes a set of words and Jesus largely disappears from the picture.

Through the Bible in a Year – June 1

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The scheme for May – June can be found here

2 Sa 5-7; 1 Jn 3; Psalm 40

In this next chapter of John’s first epistle – almost every verse commands us to sit in silence before it – to hear deep within ourselves this Word of life.

Although the chapter and verse divisions as we know are not original – the opening verse of what is such a powerful chapter is well selected as the opening verse. ‘See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God’.

We tend to think of the love of God in terms of the Crucifixion of Jesus, and it is right that we do – but here we see the Love of God expressed through the Resurrection of Jesus, that first fruit of the new Life, the Divine Life that now dwells in us through faith. ‘God’s seed abides in them’, says John later on . . . in verse 9 where we read that those who ‘have been born of God do not sin’

Apart from the Life of God in us, the Life of the Vine who abides in us, this makes no sense. We are left thinking we must be children of the devil, for we wrestle with sin. Yet the New Life in us needs to grow. Moment by moment our hearts and minds are turned more and more towards Our Father in heaven, the one who has given us new birth, as St Peter reminded us. When our hearts are thus turned, when we beging not only to hear but to truly believe that we are children of God, so then we find that we turn away from sin.

This then is carried on into action – this life bears life. Again John’s words strike deep into one who is not anchored in their new identity in Christ, that Life which is hid with Christ in God. ‘How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?’ It is the plainest of truths. We stand before it, and only unflinchingly if we know ourselves to be GOd’s children and that our hearts are not only turned away from those things which we ought not to do, but also towards those which as children of God is only natural.

This turning of course we call repentance. It is repentance that faces us to God that we might receive his life. And as the forerunner says, the fruit of repentance is clear. We begin to live in the generosity of our heavenly parent. Our brother has no coat – we have two – we give him one. Our brother has no food, we have enough for two. We feed him.

The Life that is in us is evidenced in the good works he prepared for us to do in advance. Faith is not a mental contract that keeps us from God’s wrath, rather it is a new life which is revealed to be the life of God in us in the simplest and yet seemingly for so many of us, so demanding ways. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked etc. etc. For this is what our Father does, and we bear his likeness.

Through the Bible in a Year – May 31st

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The scheme for May – June can be found here

2 Sa 3-4; 1 Jn 2; Psalm 39

The story of David continues the trail of blood.

John continues to reveal the light. As we we considering a few days ago – Faith and obedience are as it were two sides of the same coin. ‘By this we may be sure that we know him, if we obey his commandments’. Note John does not leave us with the uncertainty of our feelings – they indeed can be our biggest betrayers. How many have ‘felt God close’ as they have ignored the needs of those around them. Concrete acts of Love for our brothers and sisters are evidence that we belong to him – for He is our life. In the fellowship of faith we walk with Christ. ‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments . . .’

As with Peter, and James, John takes us to Jesus as we see him in the gospels. All too often, Christian faith is divorced from the Living Word as revealed in the gospels – either he is turned into a simplistic metaphor for ‘love’, in a way that ignores or denies the difficult words on his lips, or  cipher for ‘salvation’ which does not require us to follow him in obedience and faith.

Through the Bible in a Year – May 30th

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The scheme for May – June can be found here

2 Sa 1-2; 1 Jn 1; Psalm 38

The message of the gospel is announced once more in 1 John 1. What is the Gospel? What is the Good News? OF course we have many formulae for this – but John is not announcing a formula. He proclaims Christ. We declare to you . . .the Life we have seen and heard and touched. It is in union with Christ, the Light, that we know light.

As St Paul puts it – we are baptised into his death, that we might be raised.

He is our life – He is the Good News

Through the Bible in a Year – May 29th

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The scheme for May – June can be found here

1 Sa 29-31; 2 Pet 2-3; Psalm 37:20-40

Certainly the last two chapters of the second letter of Peter are sobering, to say the least.

Yesterday we considered David’s apprehension of that which is Holy. Today we read of those who have no such discernment – those ‘Bold and wilful . . . [who] are not afraid to slander the glorious ones, whereas angels . . .’ fear to tread there. Foolishness as the proverbs point out time and again causes us to trample on the holy. They give no life – they are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm.

Against this picture of darkness, we hear the word of Grace. “The Lord is not slow about his promise . . . but is patient with you (remember here that Peter is not speaking to those outside of the church!), not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance”

Thus . . . ‘strive to be found by him at peace without spot or blemish and regard the patience of the Lord as salvation.’

As our Lord tells us – ‘strive to enter in at the narrow door’. [This echo of Jesus in 2 Peter suggesting that it is indeed the apostle who writes these things, contrary to some scholarship.The same may also be said of the authenticity of the letter of James. Here is clearly someone who knows the Lord]

Through the Bible in a Year – May 28th

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The scheme for May – June can be found here

1 Sa 26-28; 2 Pet 1; Psalm 37:1-19

For all the violence associated with David, and there is much – it is this which makes him an unsuitable candidate to build a temple [1 Ch 28:1-3] – he is profoundly aware of the holiness of God. So he risks his life in sparing the life of Saul – who is the LORD’s annointed. It is this reverence for God which sets David apart – his heart for God, his awareness of that which is Holy.

We live in an age where The Holy, and holiness are off the agenda. This is perhaps the hallmark of the secular age in which we live and of course it is just as evident in our churches as anywhere else, so much are we children of this present age. There is no fear and trembling – there is no awe. Jesus is our pal – God is benevolent and harmless grandfather figure. Even David would have trouble identifying us as people after the heart of God.

Through the Bible in a Year – May 27th

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The scheme for May – June can be found here

1 Sa 24-25; 1 Pet 4-5; Psalm 36

The two themes in Peter to which I have alluded come together in Chapter 4 – that now as God’s children we live for the rest of our earthly life no longer by human desires, but by the will of God. What use is it to pray ‘Your Kingdom Come, your will be done on earth as in heaven’ if we do not enact the will of God and live in sole obedience to him? ‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments’ says Jesus.

As one of the Saints of the church puts it, ‘only the one who believes, obeys. And only the one who obeys, believes’. Faith and Obedience to God’s will are inextricably linked. Only the one who Hears, obeys. Faith comes through hearing and is evidenced in obedience. It is the child of God who delights to obey.

But this is a hard and narrow path – so Peter reminds us, as he must, that we are to walk together. We are known as Christians by our love for one another. There is no mark apart from that that we are given. ‘Maintain constant love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins’. This Love which comes from above is full of mercy, for we know how much mercy we have been shown and out of Love for God and one another, forgive as he has forgiven us.

‘Greet one another with a kiss of love. Peace to all of you who are in Christ’