Recently one of my sisters went into hospital for surgery. Over the last few months she has frequently been in excruciating pain following ‘accidental’ over exertion. Now the day had come when the surgeon would wield his knife to put right the damage she’d inadvertently done to herself. She had been longing for this day through many long days and dark hours in the night, and she faced it with a sense not of fear but of relief.
Today is Ash Wednesday. It is the first day of the 40 day appointment with the Divine surgeon, whose knife pierces to ‘the division of soul and spirit’, before whose light all are naked and exposed.
To be in the Desert with Jesus is to open ourselves to his healing gaze, his Scalpel of Love.
I wonder how we face it?
Sometimes I wonder if we have yet heard the Good News? If we have encountered The Living One?
In terms of the parable of the Prodigal Son, Ash Wednesday is the day we once more turn for home. But for us there should be a difference. The prodigal, who like his elder brother is a stranger to his Father, creates a story which he thinks will win him favour. He imagines he will have to try and strike some kind of deal just to get a square meal. His speech ‘I have sinned before heaven and men and am no more worthy to be called your son’ is born out of his estrangement, not his knowledge of his Father.
His ‘repentance’ has no echo of the joy of the angels, it is rather his attempt to save himself from his estrangement.
Our repentance is of a different order. We recognise we have strayed – better, we are sin sick – like my friend we feel the pain of our self inflicted injuries and we long for our appointment with Grace.
Today we set our face towards home, and find the divine surgeon running to meet us. It is interesting to note that in the parable, the prodigal is not home when the Father encounters him. The reconciliation takes place in a ‘between’ space – nameless and empty.
We call this space the Desert. It is the place of our healing. It is a place of a Rich Joy only those who know their predicament and their need can comprehend.
Sermon for The Feast of the Presentation – 2014
Malachi 3:1-4
Luke 2:22-40
St Hilda’s
Holy Baptism
Surprise!!
‘Why do you think you are here today?’
Picture the scene, perhaps a familiar one? – it is a house not very far from here and someone shouts up the stairs – ‘You need to get out of bed, Now!!’ – ‘I don’t want to get out of bed!’ comes the reply – ‘You need to get out of bed. It’s Sunday. It’s Church’ – ‘I don’t want to go to Church’ – ‘You’ve Got to go to Church – It’s good for you!’ – ‘I don’t care!’ – And there’s a baptism this morning – ‘I’m already baptised’ – Well you’ve go to go anyway – you have no choice – ‘Why??!!” Because you’re the Vicar!!
Well that explains why I’m here 🙂 But Why do you think You are here? Because you were told you had to? Perhaps you’ve come along as part of Freya’s family for her baptism? Perhaps we’re here because we think people will miss us if we’re not – because it never occurred to us not to be, or like me, because it’s my job 🙂
Well, today is a special day in the Church’s year, an Important Festival – The Feast of the Presentation. We always call our festivals Feasts – indeed its the same word. When we celebrate, we eat! Food is at the heart of our Christian faith – so we always come to celebrate at the Lord’s table.
And The Feast of the Presentation is an important festival because if you like, it is all about coming to church, Jesus’ first visit to church! Well not quite but it gives you the idea. Our Gospel reading today finds Mary and Joseph taking Jesus to the Temple in Jerusalem. Jesus is only 40 days old at this point – today February 2nd is when we celebrate this – 40 days after Christmas day – you see, it all fits together 🙂
And like you and like me, Mary and Joseph have THEIR idea about why they are going to the Temple. They were devout Jews and went for the rite of Purification and dedication to God. Jesus as their first born technically belonged to God, so they in a sense went to ‘buy him back’ – to redeem him. And as they were poor they offered a gift of either a pair of turtle doves or two young pigeons. And there was nothing at all unusual in that – but they were in for a Surprise!!
‘The Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his Temple’
I wonder if anyone has ever thrown a surprise party for you? Last year as a church we threw one for Sarah on her 50th birthday. The idea had been around for several months – invitations had been sent out – but most important of all, we needed a cover story. She needed to think she was coming to something else. We had to get her into the church hall without her realising what was happening. She thought that she was coming to someone else’s party 🙂 – indeed to allow last minute preparations we even sent her to collect the birthday cake – her own 🙂
She thought she was coming to the church hall for one reason, but there was something very different going on! And she got a Big surprise.
When Mary and Joseph arrived at the Temple – all of a sudden They were the focus of attention – or rather their baby was.
For all THEY thought they knew what their visit to the Temple was about, something else was going on, something Much bigger than a simple religious rite. As with a surprise party, people had been getting ready for this moment for quite a while – there had been a sense of expectation . . . but not for a few weeks, or months, or even a few years. People had been waiting for this moment for Four hundred years!!
If we are familiar with the story of God’s people then we know that things have gone from bad to worse – they have been taken away from the Promised land into exile – they have returned but things are not the same, and one foreign nation after another has stamped all over their land. They are waiting, waiting, waiting for God to come to rescue them and restore to them their Life and their Land.
Can you imagine what it is to wait for Four hundred years? Of course not, this is a waiting that is not about ‘you’ or ‘you’ or ‘you’. It is the Waiting of a people. Something which in our lonely age of individusalism we cannot imagine. Our family got some wonderful news this week, one of our daughters and her husband are coming to visit us in August. It’s fair to say ‘we cannot wait’, but of course we will have to. But I wonder if we can even begin to imagine what it would be like to wait as a people? Something which our comfortable and isolated lives (and the two are closely connected) can scarce apprehend. Waiting for someone to come without knowing When they would come – for Four hundred years. A whole people, a nation waiting – the waiting passed on through the fifteen, sixteen generations. Four hundred years ago the prophet Malachi had said ‘The LORD whom you seek will suddenly come to his Temple’ – But When?
Today we celebrate that day.
Mary and Joseph turn up at the Temple to go through the required rituals and suddenly two very old people come up to them. We know their names – they were called Simeon and Anna. Two old folk who symbolise the waiting of the people.
Simeon we are told is guided by the Spirit of God, to go to the Temple and seeing Mary and Joseph, he takes the baby Jesus in his arms and says the most extraordinary things. For some of us these are very familiar words – those of the Nunc Dimittis – but take a moment to think of their meaning – Lord, now let your servant depart in peace, according to your word, for my eyes have seen your salvation.
Lord, you are letting your servant depart in peace. Simeon has waited for this moment all his life – seeing this child he knows he can die at peace. Often when I am with those who are dying, there is something or someone they are waiting for. Simeon is very old – he has been waiting for God’s promise to Come to his people to be fulfilled – and now the waiting is over. His life has been all about waiting. It is as if this is the entire meaning of his life. He knows it is complete. He can depart in peace – Peace is the sign of fulfillment. He has waited – he knows that his Life’s work is Complete. Imagine the significance of saying – ‘Now I have seen this, Now I can die’
Imagine the young parents.This old man sees his Life’s work, his waiting fulfilled in their child. They need an explanation and they are given one – summed up in Prophetic Words. It is announced Who this child is.
Now when we are born, our parents have all sorts of hopes and dreams for us. We live in an immensely privileged culture, and we should not forget that. For many many children their parents might merely cling to the hope that the child will live long enough to look after them in their old age. Mary and Joseph are poor, they live in a country under the domination of a harsh Empire who thinks nothing of taking their money in taxes and killing the people almost on a whim. Their hopes for Jesus?? Yet Simeon doesn’t speak of hopes and dream, he Speaks a word of Prophecy – ‘This child is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed—and a sword will pierce your own soul too.’ The Life of this child will affect the lives of all with whom he comes into contact changing their lives in ways you cannot imagine – their rise, their fall – and for you Mary their will be great sorrow – a sword will pierce your own soul . . . and that wasn’t all. There was also old Anna – a widow – she had been praying in the Temple night and Day – Waiting – Waiting – And now he has come and she rushes out and told all who would listen – the one we were waiting for has come . . .
Mary and Joseph just thought that they were going to the Temple for the necessary rituals – they did not know that they were going to fulfill an Ancient promise of God. . . . and it was all to do with their Son . . .
Which brings us back to our opening question, or rather a variant of it
‘Why Are we here today?’
Mary and Joseph had Their ideas as to why they went to the Temple that day – but that wasn’t why they were their
We may have a hundred and one answers to the question – Why do you think you are here today? But like Mary and Josephs visit to the Temple, our agendas, our reasons aren’t The Reason. We like them are being caught up into the Word and Works of God in Jesus Christ.
Quite simply we are not here for ourselves or our reasons. Like Simeon and Anna, Like Mary and Joseph, we are here today for Him – For Jesus Christ. He is the focus of our Life together. The meaning of all we do – in prayer and listening to the Bible, and of course in the Holy Communion – where He comes to us in bread and wine, in flesh and blood, as he came to the Temple.
We are here for Him. As Simeon’s life is summed up in hopeful expectation of the arrival of Christ Jesus, He IS our Life.
In a few moments we will baptise Freya – when we baptise someone this is no mere symbol – we are doing no less than including them in the Life, the Death and the Resurrection of Jesus – Freya will become part with us of the Work that God is doing in Jesus Christ by becoming part of the Church. As I said in the parish magazine, yes we are welcoming Andrew as our new curate today, but FAR FAR FAR more important, we are baptising Freya. Andrew is already part of the church by baptism, and his significance amongst us is merely as a symbol, a reminder of who we all are. Freya is starting out on a new life – a Life in Jesus, With Jesus and through Jesus as a member of His Body, Here and indeed throughout the world.
It is interesting that this is published at a time when there have been a flood of articles re concern over pornography on the internet. +Nick wonders about the possibility of a Doctorate exploring Narcissm and conversion based on fear of hell. I wonder if there might be one in exploring the link between the rampant self disclosure of much social media and what we term ‘darker’ aspects of internet freedom? Are they at base too closely related for comfort?
Hiddenness, an oft and blatantly ignored aspect of The Kingdom of God is not a dominant characteristic of contemporary life in liberal democracies – the internet is one of the most powerful symbols of our age.
(And yes, I am not unaware of the irony of thus ‘thinking out loud’)
Naomi Wolf, writing in the NY Times addresses the link between pornography and the disappearance of mystery, which is a significant correlate of ‘Hiddenness’
The first day of my sabbatical. Thirty books to start on – two months to read as much as possible. I am afraid there's going to be an awful lot of book stuff on this blog in the next few weeks. (Enjoying Lucy Hughes-Hallett's The Pike today.)
Then there's the closing of the January transfer window with Liverpool having bought nobody to strengthen an inadequately broad enough squad. Oh dear.
But, what has grabbed my attention is an article I picked up yesterday on the Die Zeit website. Written by Ulrich Greiner (publisher of Zeitliteratur magazine) and sparked by the announcement that novelist Henning Mankell has decided to record in print his 'journey with cancer', the piece is headed “Man sollte diskret sterben” – one should die discreetly. His point? This sort of description of suffering is essentially narcissistic.
Apparently, Mankell has decided to record his “fight against cancer” (a…
The Vicar Writes . . .
If we haven’t already met, since Christmas, then a Happy New Year to you! I must admit that Christmas and the New Year all seem rather a long way away now, as January turned into a rather busy month, but Sarah, the family and I did manage to ‘get away’ for 12 days, exploring more of our beautiful land. [For those who are interested, we travelled up the West Coast (in good weather!!) and on to Abel Tasman. Many many Km travelled and Too much to take it all in!]
Whilst we were away though, you have never been far from our thoughts as is right. Being part of the church is being part of God’s new family. It is not that being part of church is ‘like being part of a family’, rather the other way round. Our human families, with all their joys and sorrows point us to the fundamental Family that we are part of through our baptism into Christ. So that you were on our hearts and minds is entirely natural.
Being this New Family of faith, with our friend, brother and Lord, Jesus will be the focus of our teaching and thinking in the year to come as together we seek ‘to build up our common life’ in the Peace that only Christ can bring. This Lent (which begins on Ash Wednesday, March 5th) we will be thinking together about how we might move deeper into the reality of our shared life. We will explore how we might grow deeper into praying and worshiping, sharing in hospitality and mission, and revealing the Life of God amongst us. As before there will be opportunities to do this either on a Tuesday afternoon, or a Sunday evening. I would encourage you all to make this a priority in your diaries for what I hope will be a time of mutual growth and envisioning for our future life together.
Of course talking of families reminds us of two significant new additions to our family here at St Johns this month. As in our thinking about families and the family of the church, we tend to get our thinking back to front on this. It would be understandable, but wrong!! ( 🙂 ), to think that the arrival of our new curate The Revd Andrew Barlow and his family as the most significant arrival. Certainly it is wonderful to be able to welcome them all more fully into our midst, but THE most important arrival in our family will probably have happened by the time you read this, as we baptise Freya Beaton as a member of the Body of Christ. (As our human families are only signs of the deeper reality of the family of faith, so the ordained are merely signs pointing us to the deeper reality of the life of the baptised!!)
Two final brief items. 2014 is the 200th anniversary of the arrival of the gospel on these shores. In response to this 1) During Lent we will welcome a brother from Kenya, one of a team of evangelists spending two weeks with us here in Dunedin. I will give more details through all the channels available as soon as I have them. He will be with us from 27th March until Palm Sunday, April 13. Help will be needed with hosting etc. etc. etc. but more anon!!
. . . and 2) and just as important, Bishop Kelvin will through Lent be walking the length and breadth of the Diocese on a Hikoi of Joy, as part of our Diocesan Celebrations. There will be many ways we can join together in this reminder of our Life Together, from shared prayers, to walking a leg of the hikoi ourselves (indeed one leg is a journey on the Taieri Gorge Railway – the train is booked and we can take 600!!). We will start this with a renewal of our Baptismal vows, across the Diocese, early in Lent. Reminding ourselves that ‘we are the Body of Christ, and individually members of it’ 1 Corinthians 12:27
With Much Love, Eric
Sermon for Christmas 2 – Sunday January 5th, 2014, Year A
Ephesians 1:1-14 John 1:1-18
“Of Heaven and the Children of God”
As a resident of Dunedin, you are without excuse if you haven’t seen one of the great natural wonders of the world, that is an Albatross in flight. After all this is the ONLY place in the world where these mythical wanderers of the Southern Ocean wastes nest on the mainland. I remember when I first saw one. I was on interview here back in 2010 and Jo and David Fielding kindly drove me out along the Peninsula to the colony. And we stood in the car park for some considerable time watching the flocks of birds. Occasionally a ‘much larger than usual’ gull of some description flew into sight and I thought ‘Ah! That must be an Albatross!’, but it wasn’t. For when the Albatross came into sight across the headland, there was NO doubt! Whilst it didn’t exactly block out the daylight, it was just on a Completely different scale to all the other birds. There was No mistaking it. And that is God’s intention for His children – when you meet one you will Know that there is something Very different. Their lives are on a different scale – related but not the same.
Every now and again, something in the news catches your eye which reminds you of the difference Christians make in the world. How the world would be a Very different place if it weren’t for Christians. Such talk I must say can make some of us uncomfortable, but it is true. Just the other day I was reading an article about Food Banks in the UK, and how the main Nationally recognised food bank operation, The Trussell Trust, was established and continues to be run almost entirely by Christian volunteers. And it is at present supplying food to somewhere in the region of 500,000 people. Of course here we are very aware of how Christian social agencies, our own AFC and Presbyterian Support, along of course with the work Andrew does at Brockville, sees Christians providing a huge percentage of such support here in Dunedin.
It may be something of which the wider world is unaware, indeed in some places, especially in the UK at present it is a highly politically inconvenient fact, but Christians make a difference . . . Why? Because Christians ARE different . . . and that perhaps is even more difficult for us to swallow. Like viewing an Albatross, meeting a Christian should be something which leaves folk in little or no doubt that they have encountered someone who Is like them, but also in a way that affects Everything, is not. But we are trained Not to accept this and that is a terrible thing for reasons I shall unpack a little at the end.
We are still in the season of Christmas, and part of our discomfort with the idea about our being different rests I think in the phrase which I spoke briefly about last week in reference to modern carols – ‘God is With Us’. As I suggested it can leave folk feeling either ‘that’s nice’, or ‘So What’. Like ‘We have Electricity!!’ it’s somehow significant but not something we pay any attention to. As we prepare to host our reverse Mission partners here later in the year, it is worth asking, What is the message, What is the Gospel which is to be proclaimed? ‘God is with us’ is not perhaps a message that will cause people’s lives to be radically changed. I know this from my own experience in my early years when I heard over and over God loves everyone, God is with us all, and I thought, what then is the point of making Any effort with regard to faith. Certainly getting out of bed on a Sunday as a student for church was Way too much of an effort, and ‘God loves me anyway’
Like the message – ‘everyone is a child of God’. We teach people ‘Everyone in a child of God’. But Like the phrase God is With Us – we have to ask – what does it mean??? What difference does it make
The temptation, as with ‘God is With Us’ is to reduce it to an idea, a helpful metaphor. As if Faith was just a list of self help tips to get you through another day – but what if we were to take it with full seriousness? As I have said before, I wonder what would happen if we awoke to the reality of The Eucharist and what was happening when the Priest declares ‘The Lord is Here’ – so too, what might happen were Christians in general, and we gathered here at St John’s woke up to the reality of being children of God?
We conclude each Eucharist in Christmas with the following Blessing – a blessing which takes this with Full seriousness – ‘May Christ, who by his incarnation has drawn into one things earthly and heavenly, bestow upon you the fullness of inward peace and joy and make you partakers in the divine nature’
Let’s just take a moment to ponder that blessing – ‘May Christ, who by his incarnation has drawn into one things earthly and heavenly . . .’ We are Very used to the language of Christ in his humility coming down FROM heaven . . . but the language of this blessing is that once more he reconnects Earth with Heaven. We are given the sense that Christ leaves somewhere to come here, but the deeper reality and the truth which the scriptures point to is that by his birth, Heaven and Earth are once more interwoven. Jesus who is at once the Divine Son of God and the human Son of Mary, in himself becomes the meeting place of heaven and Earth, the meeting place of God and Humankind, the Way by which we may Know God. As John says in his gospel, God the only Son has made the Father known. At once we see that this language of ‘God is with us’, if used in the common contemporary way as if God were some divine chaplain come to help us out with our life, is somewhat undone. Indeed John puts it very differently in his prologue – The Word [that Is God and With God in the beginning] became Flesh and dwelt amongst us. Now literally here the word dwelt should be read tabernacled – that is In Jesus we See the restoration of God’s presence at the heart of His people. The Tabernacle of old in the desert and the first Temple, were the place where God’s presence was to be known on earth – put another way – the tabernacle, the Temple WAS Heaven. So In Jesus now we encounter Heaven, Not just a remote God sending his son from Somewhere else, but in the birth of Jesus, Heaven and Earth rewoven together . . . and in fulfilment of the words of the prophet ‘God is with us’ – that reconnection finds its home HERE, in the heart of his gathered people.
Which leads us to our second point, that is with regard to what it means to be a child of God. Access to the Father is through Jesus, the Word made flesh . . . now here perhaps as much as anywhere we Must See why the language of Father Son and Spirit is Vital and Life Giving.
Jesus, St John tells us the Word, living amongst us revealed the Glory, ‘the glory as of a Father’s only Son. Jesus the Son through HIs relationship with the Father draws Us into that relationship also, in the fullest of senses. As He is the eternal Son of the father, eternally begotten, So we might Also become Children of God. He ‘draws into one things earthly and heavenly’. He doesn’t abandon the heavenly aspect of his being and comes to share in our human nature. No he brings his heavenly nature so that our human nature might be once more made heavenly. This to be frank is all but beyond our capacity of speech. St Paul as he wrote to the Ephesians was SO enthralled by the message of what God has done in Jesus, that he writes one of the worst bits of grammatical Greek you will find anywhere!! Almost the entire reading of the Epistle is One sentence, verses 3-14 is One sentance in the Greek – Paul is Just so overflowing with wonder – it just pours out of him. He is thought to have written by dictation, but here the poor transcriber can hardly keep up! And at the heart of it ‘before the foundation of the world . . . he destined us to be adopted as His Children, through Jesus Christ’
Jesus in his Incarnation draws into one things Earthly and heavenly . . . one of the Great flaws of So much Incarnational theology is that it pays NO regard to this juxtaposition. In effect it is written as if Christ abandons his divinity to be with us. Whereas the truth is far more profound – in his Incarnation the Life of Heaven is revealed on Earth – as John puts it ‘And we have seen his Glory’ Glory a word associated with ‘Heaven’, with the very Presence of God. AND this reconnection of Heaven and Earth makes itself known in all who believe in Jesus in the most breathtaking of ways . . . The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. 10He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. 11He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.
to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.
Just for a moment, ponder . . . born of God. What does it mean that we Really Are God’s Offspring. If its more than a nice theological idea, a bumper sticker, or a label we can use to describe humanity humanity in general. What does it that as much if indeed not moreso as we are children of our earthly parents, we are Born of God??? What If God is our True parent?
Through faith in Jesus Christ we are made partakers of the Divine Nature. He becomes One with us, not so that we can continue in the life we once knew, but SO THAT we might become one with Him. The Purpose of the Incarnation, of the Life, Death, Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus is that we might participate in the Divine Life, the Life of Heaven, the Life of the Triune God. Why do we NEED forgiveness of sins?? Not primarily because we are sinners, but because God Desires above all to forgive us SO that we might share in his very life. And thus as St Paul puts it Live for the praise of his Glory. That our LIves are His lives, that He lives in us and therefore In Us, the World encounters Him.
The denial of this is perhaps the very worst thing we can do. So much modern theology seeks in one way or another to do this, and we are often taught that we are no different – but we are. Put another way, like when that Albatross first flew into view, there should be No Doubt in the minds of those we encounter that we are His children
The story of the Prodigal reveals this in utter clarity – the Overwhelming forgiveness of the Father is a Welcome into the Divine Life, symbolised by the Party that is thrown for the Prodigal. The Life is revealed and Then becomes Invitation to the elder Son. A gospel which pronounces forgiveness of sins WITHOUT participation in the Divine Life is no gospel at all, because the Gospel IS the one who comes to us, in whom heaven and Earth hold together. Christ the Lord. The Word made flesh, God with us, that we might be born of God.
Yesterday, my dear brothers and sisters, we celebrated the birth in time of our timeless King; today we celebrate the triumphant sufferings of a soldier. Yesterday our King, clothed in a robe of flesh, came forth from a virginal womb and deigned to visit this earth; today a soldier, leaving the tabernacle of the body, departs as a conqueror for heaven.
Our King, though supreme amongst kings, came to us in lowly estate; nevertheless, he would not come empty-handed. He brought a great largesse for his soldiers, not only to enrich them but to strengthen them to fight without being overcome: he brought the gift of love that leads people to union with God. It was the same love, then, that brought Christ to earth and raised Stephen to heaven.
In earning the crown which his name signifies, Stephen had love for his armour and it won the victory for him. For love made him pray for his neighbours to win forgiveness for them.
Through love he resisted Saul’s cruel persecution and won his earthly persecutor for a heavenly companion. What he could not accomplish by argument, he accomplished by prayer; and love inspired both. With Stephen, Paul now rejoices in the light of Christ, with Stephen he rules. Stephen went before, wounded with stones that Paul threw; Paul followed after, aided by Stephen’s prayers.
Love, then, is the source of all blessings. It is our greatest protection and our road to heaven. Those who walk in love cannot go astray or be overwhelmed by fear. For love directs, probes, and guides.
Christ ahs set up a ladder of love, and every Christian can climb to heaven on it. Hold on to love, then, brothers and sisters; show it to one another; advance and ascend to heaven by it.
‘Love as a weapon of warfare’, from the sermons of St Fulgentius of Ruspe.
Sermon for Christmas – 2013
John 1:1-14
‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God.
All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.’
I wonder what the word Christmas summons up for you?
Perhaps you might just like to take a moment to rest and reflect in that.
Christmas. Many years ago, growing up as part of the church in the North of England, I frequently seemed to be in services led by the then Bishop of Carlisle, David Halsey. For some reason I cannot fathom, it seemed that every time I heard him speak he gave the same sermon recounting what had happened to him one Christmas at a midnight service where he’d expected no one to turn up and the church ended up packed. I cannot to this day remember what the point of the story was, but his capacity to summon up images with his words means that the picture is clear in my mind. Words call forth entire worlds, worlds of imagination and worlds of existence.
Words Create worlds. Many years ago whilst at University I shared a room with a young and very troubled man. Stephen was a student of the English language and spent much of his time sending his poetry to every publisher he could think of – apart from the odd encouraging reply, to no avail. But it was He who first taught me in a most graphic way the power of words. In many senses, his troubles were rooted in his fascination with the literature of Occult practices. There was a perpetual and at times impenetrable darkness to him, especially when he had been reading such material, and of an evening and long into the night purely by speaking he would ‘summon up’ worlds of such oppressive darkness that the darkness was tangible and capable of doing no less than creating a cold dead place in my soul.
Of course not all such Creativity with Words is as obviously life denying, but our carelessness with the Creative power of Words still leads us into dark places. What culture can hope to remain humane where Rest homes are termed ‘end of life facilities’, or where in the workplace we have carelessly named ‘Human Resource managers’. Once you call a human being a resource, they become categorised along with coal and oil and gas, with soil, and hammers. Something to be Used – and to Use a human being is Always to Abuse a human being. We should take care with our words – they speak our pasts and they create our futures.
Words Create Cultures. If you want to get to understand a culture, then tourism will do you little good. If you want to truly inhabit a culture, you must learn its Words, its language. For me one of the sharpest lessons of coming to New Zealand has been learning this afresh. As Mark Twain said of the English and the Americans, ‘Two nations divided by a common tongue’, so our two cultures use the same words, but differently. This is even more perplexing than having difficulties with Mandarin Chinese, or Usbek – for we miss the point that the Use of words is what creates a culture – so different cultures may have the same words, but very different languages – as my eternally frustrated American friends realise when they speak with me! Same words, but we are not communicating, for our words mean different things to us.
Words Express a culture – Here in New Zealand, the culture is ‘She’ll be right’, and revealing the roots of our common culture ‘Good as Gold’. But that also reveals that Words Form Us. To grow up a New Zealander, or indeed English or American, is to learn a Way with Words. We tend to think that language is primarily about our self expression, but we fail to see that the self we express has already been shaped by our birth cultures words. For example we see this when we reflect that the ideas about our unique individualism, are passed onto us by our culture – so our thoughts are, I regret to say, mere products of our culture – and should we decide to rebel against this, then they are products of our rebellion against our cilture. Blood as they say, will out.
Of course here we are also ‘gifted’ by being a bicultural nation – We Should be Very wise about Words for we readily use Maori where the paucity of English becomes clear. It surely is Obvious here in New Zealand that Words express cultures? That they crate words of imagination that are more than that, that have a concrete quality to them that profoundly affect our lives together.
And of course, here in church tonight we are awash with Words – most Very familiar – the Carols and the readings – although there is something which for most of us is Not So familiar and that is the words of the liturgy. It is both pertinent and interesting to note that the collapse of congregation sizes in England, and I suspect here also, coincided with changing the liturgy. All of a sudden the words were no longer the common language of worship – it was as if once more we were at the tower of Babel. Without a common tongue, you have no common people, all you have is the primeval formlessness and void, and so the people dispersed . . .
But we ARE gathered here once more tonight – in the middle of the night – and whatever impulse it was that drew us here in large part it is rooted in Words. Imagine for a moment that you knew in advance that all the Carols would be unfamiliar, or the readings . . . that in an effort to be relevant the new Vicar had completely rewritten the service . . . knowing that to be the case . . . would there have been the same Pull to be here?
Formed by words, what Words have as it were drawn us forth?
What draws us out of the comfort of our homes tonight? Perhaps it was the gentle cajoling of a Spouse or a parent? Or perhaps indeed the plea of a younger one to come and know what it was to be in church in the middle of the night? Perhaps we were sat alone and it was the memory of all that was in the past – voices seemingly gone, yet not forgotten – summoning us forth
I was speaking recently with someone relatively new to the church and the Deep things of faith, who expressed his journey thus . . . it was as if the words were summoning forth the person I had always wanted to be . . .
And it struck me what a wonderful expression that was of a person coming to faith in Christ. The Word that summons forth those people we were created to be – The Word that spoke to Lazarus, four days dead in the tomb – Lazarus! Come Out!
At the very heart of this Eucharist is this truth expressed in words but which words are in a sense inadequate to contain, that ‘The Word’, the Primeval Word that is the the Creation of all that is, The Word of the Beginning, The source of All Life, ‘And the Word, THIS Word became Flesh’. Going deeper into our memories than children’s nativity plays, than the story of the first Christmas, the words of the gospel of John taking us back, taking us back to something which predates all our cultural separateness, taking us back to our common root, our Creation as the Image of God, Christ THE image of the Living God, The Creative Word from which all creative life giving words flow, steps into human flesh and dwells amongst us
And we beheld his glory, the Glory as of the only begotten of the Father. It is as if that pale flickering light that is God’s image in us, if we trace it back to its source is like the Glory of a thousand Suns – Here in the middle of the night, Inexpressible Light.
I often wonder what might indeed be the impact of our coming to understand the fulness of all we are engaged in when as Christians we gather for the Eucharist – Where the Word made flesh is presented to us in Bread and Wine. The Light, that Inexpressible Glory, which darkness cannot comprehend, which is the Life of all people – reduced to a mortal span and present with us. But perhaps it is only right that we cannot fully understand, that we cannot put it fully into Our Words, for it is not we who create the world. our lives, our selves, our very thoughts the product of so many words of others. The deepest truth about ourselves we encounter in this Holy Night, not that we speak – but that we are Spoken . . . In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. . . . And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a Father’s only son, full of grace and truth.
What is summoned up for you, on this Holy Night? May that Word speak and summon forth in us Light and Life from the forgotten depths of our being, and may we know what it is to be born of God, in Christ the Living Word, to the eternal glory of the Father. Amen
In this Holy Night, let us pray that Christ may be born in us, and fill us with His Light and Peace
Silence is kept as we wait on the One who prays within us
Eternal God, You made this Holy Night shine with the brightness of your one true light. Bring us who have seen the revelation of that light on earth to see the radiance of that heavenly glory, through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, One God, now and forever. Amen
‘When the sun rises in the morning sky, you will see the King of kings coming forth from the Father lioke a radiant bridegroom from the bridal chamber. Alleluia’
Litany
The Word became flesh in order that all of humanity might be revealed as children of God. Let us pray to him and say: Jesus, born of Mary, hear our prayer
That holy Church enjoy a rebirth in this glorious feast and proclaim throughout the world the eternal kingdom of heaven, we pray Jesus, born of Mary . . .
That we show forth the birth of God’s Son by a new way of life, a new love for people and a new regard for the good things of this world, we pray Jesus, born of Mary . . .
That Christian communities celebrate this feats with joy, with all the happiness and delight of the family of God, we pray Jesus, born of Mary . . .
That with simplicity of spirit we stand in wonder to proclaim with the shepherds joy and glory and peace, we pray Jesus, born of Mary . . .
That we all find Christ reborn in our hearts so that together we may show forth his meekness and poverty, we pray Jesus, born of Mary . . .
Concluding prayer
Lord God, whilst all the world lay wrapp’d in deepest silence, and night had reaached its mid-point, your all-powerful Word came down. As year by year the beauty of this night returns, growing old with the aged and renewed in the wonder of children, so may we, grown old in sin but reborn to grace, proclaim with our lives what we chant with our lips:
Glory to you, our God, in the highest heaven, peace on earth and in the depth of every human heart. We ask this through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, God with us. Amen
the elves are heading west 