Hope in the Cesspit - Easter 4

Revelation 7: 9 - 17

I cannot claim to be a regular preacher on the Revelation to John. I have often thought of this book which concludes the Bible as being something of a happy hunting ground for cranks, the sort of people who see it as telling us exactly what the future holds - those who see it as some see the writings of Nostradamus.

I am not helped by the fact that it is a type of literature which is somewhat alien to me. It is part of a type of literature that is often described as “apocalyptic.” Such is a type of literature that was popular a couple of centuries either side of Jesus amongst Jewish people - a type of literature that is full of visions, beasts and symbols. It is not the sort of communication with which I am familiar although I have to confess that when several years ago at the time of the 1992 General Election, my wife and myself were staying at my in law’s home whilst I was doing teacher training, Revelation provided me with a moment of joy. You see, my mother in law’s polling card number was 666 which is the anti Christ in Revelation. Needless to say, as we arrived at the polling station, I ensured that the matter caused her maximum embarassment. What a rotter I was!

Anyhow, these things tend to cause me to draw back from Revelation. And in that I am not alone. For even Martin Luther with his emphasis of Scripture alone, made an exception for Revelation about which he wrote;

“My spirit cannot accommodate itself to this book. I stick to the books which present Christ to me clearly and purely.”

And yet, I think Luther was wrong. My reason is one of the things concerning which Revelation is often criticised, namely its allegedly excessively negative view of the world. Now please don’t get me wrong. There is much that is good in the world and sometimes Christians are far to slow to recognise the many good things in life. But at the same time, I shiver when I hear that hymn which proclaims;

“And now I am happy all the day.”

Every time I hear it, I want to ask what those singing it are on. For the reality is that there is a shadow side of life, a side of life in which there is great suffering. Only a few weeks ago, I did a google search on a woman who had been a fellow student with me at Southampton University over a quarter of a century ago. I remember as a vibrant personality whose friendship was very precious to me. She had gone on to have a distinguished academic career. Yet as I looked her up on the internet wondering how she was doing, I met a story that shocked me. For having reached great pinnacles in her career, she had struggled to cope with certain things, had got stressed out. And so this woman, beautiful on both the inside and outside had hanged herself. And I don’t suppose that story is particularly unique for our country and doubtless many others has an epidemic of people who struggle to cope with forces they feel to be beyond their control. And I suspect that much of the increasing dependencies on addictive substances is about trying to cope, to hold on to a sense of worth.

And then if we look to a bigger scale, we see in our world so many places where life is revealed in allits tragic reality. Look to the ethnic cleansing of Darfur, or the wretched violence that continues to afflict Iraq turning lives upside down so that one young woman who writes from that land says of her families decision to leave;

“It's difficult to decide which is more frightening- car bombs and militias, or having to leave everything you know and love, to some unspecified place for a future where nothing is certain”

And then there is Zimbabwe where a tyrant’s rule has savagely reduced life expectancy and ensure that life is lived against a backdrop of fear.

Such stories could go on and on. All manner of human rights abuses and the continued toleration of extreme poverty in so many corners of the world can draw our attention. So much so that ultimately, we find ourselves crying out;

“When will God do something about it? When will God put an end to the night of wrong?”

And that is precisely the sort of questions that were being asked in the world which first saw the Revelation of John. For this was a world of cruel emperors who were devoid of justice, who practised cruelty as routine and who were terrorising the early Christian communities. No wonder John’s Revelation is filled with anger towards the powers of Rome whom he describes as “Babylon the great, mother of whores and of earth’s abominations” - language stronger than this preacher would dare to use in the pulpit!

And yet despite the dark and deathly terrors around him, John’s Revelation is a message of hope. Because scandalous as it would have seemed to many of his contemporaries, John dares to offer a vision of a Kingdom that is much greater than the decadent Empire that had and expected to go on dominating the world. John points instead to the Kingdom of God and for him just as for Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, this Kingdom transforms that which we see in our world. For here he sees those who have suffered now experiencing a joy in the presence of God. God is healing the sores and humiliations that have been heaped upon people in this world.

And the extent of this change is absolutely breathtaking Oh what a change! Hunger and thirst shall be no more. The extremities of climate will no more destroy. For after the great sufferings, there is the great healing in which;

“God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

And the scale of it! John, the Jew, sees that the presence of God is on such a wide scale. It is for the outsiders, those who have not grown up with Israel’s history. For here in the multitude are people of every nation, tribe and language. And their numbers - so great! For here is a number so great that it cannot be counted. So often we have tended to put limitations on the scope of God’s grace but here comes the message to prepare to be blown away in wonder at the sheer scale of God’s amazing grace.

And does not the transformation fill you with wonder. For now the rejects, the nobodies, the victims of cruelty are caught up in the incredible dynamic of God’s unending circle of love. And now all their pains real as they have been, are diminished by the breathtaking of wonder of the presence of God. And for John at the heart of the transformation is the blood of the lamb. For whilst, we can quibble about theories of how the death of Jesus brings us to God, we can rejoice that bring us to God it most certainly does.

Several years ago I visited Coventry for a wedding. It turned into a pretty miserable weekend for reasons that have long ceased to matter. Yet I do regret that I failed to visit the inside of its beautiful modern cathedral. Built in the aftermath of the bombing by the German luftwaffe in 1940 which devastated the cathedral, the new cathedral emphasised the message of “resurrection through sacrifice.” In it is a glass wall with happy pictures of Saints and angels upon it having quite a party time. The joy is unmistakable. And at first it might seem quite unrealistic. And yet if one looks through the glass, one can see the sad ruins of the old cathedral. So in a moment, the visitor encounters a vision of the sorrows that are all too prevalent in the world and at the same time, the glorious hope for the future which we owe to the sacrifice of Christ.

But as we look at this vision of hope, a vision that reminds us that this world is not all that there is, we need to beware of a temptation to speak only of, to borrow a trite phrase, pie in the sky. The awareness of the greatness of God and the offer of grace in a sense helps to set us free from being dragged down by the happenings of this world. But our learning of these things surely tells us of a higher vision that offers “abundance of life” so that we can not be content with the violence and injustices of this world. For surely as we gaze at the loving wonder that is God, we can be content with nothing less than the signs of God’s Kingdom. And so we dare to look and to participate in the signs of God’s city being built upon the ruins of our present day Babylons.


This sermons was preached at Gammaton on Sunday April 29th 2007

God hates the world - not! Easter 3

LUKE 21: 1-19

A few weeks ago, I watched a documentary entitled “The most hated family in America.” In the documentary, Louis Theroux spent some time living with the Westboro Baptist Church, a one church denomination, who are dominated by the Phelps family, especially the ageing patriarch, Pastor Fred Phelps.

This church had for some time been infamous for its militant anti gay position and this has led it to a position of stating that the US is under God’s judgement which they see being exercised in events such as 9/11 and the quagmire of Iraq.

Not surprisingly, the have attracted considerable detestation for their picketing the firstly the funerals of gay people and more recently servicemen killed in Iraq and Afghanistan and they have just revealed their intention to picket the funerals of students killed in the Virginia Tech massacre.

Now, they have put a video on the net in which they parody Band Aid USA’s song, “We are the world” which was aimed at helping a humanitarian disaster in East Africa with their own warped religious understanding, “God hates the world”

So it is no big surprise to see them described as “the most hated family in America.” And just as they are swift to condemn and picket other churches, I am relieved to be able to say that I have never heard a word in support of this cult by any of my American Christian friends.

Now of course, these people are an easy target. Nobody with intelligence or compassion could conceivably endorse their stuff of nonsense. And yet, I have a concern that dates back into my childhood that sometimes Christians can give the impression not so much that God hates the world but that God sees the world with some reservations.

A more optimistic understanding of our relationship with God comes from Desmond Tutu who continues to radiate joy despite a battle with prostate cancer. Not so long ago, a book was written to celebrate his seventy fifth birthday. In it there were essays by quite a range of mostly distinguished people. But possibly, the most interesting of these essays is one written by Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury. In it he refers to an evening when he was at birthday party of a mutual friend at which Tutu was speaking. Reflecting on how his mind couldn’t wander in Tutu’s company, Williams goes on to write of “an unprompted insight that Desmond Tutu enjoys being Desmond Tutu.”

Now, I guess that this might seem like something of a barbed compliment for people who enjoy being themselves can be egotists who lack feeling for others and all too often manipulate them. But Rowan Williams is not making such an accusation against Desmond Tutu but is instead suggesting that Tutu being glad actually makes space for other people to enjoy being themselves.

But how is Desmond Tutu so delighted to be Desmond Tutu. I like what Rowan Williams suggests as to how we can be delighted to be ourselves. Listen to this gem.

“ I suspect Desmond’s answer would be that you have to be utterly convinced that you exist because God wanted you to exist. And that because God wanted you to exist and God wanted you to exist at your creation God liked the thought of you. In which case there is not much alternative really but to go along with what God wanted - to give thanks for being yourself and to rejoice in it. When we delight in ourselves we are not passing an uncritical approving judgement on all we do suggesting that we need no improvement and that we need not face any radical challenge in life to stretch us. We are acknowledging with joy the fact of our unique existence, a delightful unique existence willed by God.”

Ain’t that great? Does it not make us want to shout out Hallelujah? For what Rowan Williams is telling us is that we are just so incredibly special in the sight of God. We are each as it were the apple of God’s eye. And if we’re special to God, then surely it follows that so are others and it is our task to help enable others to be delighted to be themselves because they too are so so special to God!

Now some of you may by now have picked up that I haven’t as yet mentioned the Bible. And so, I turn to our Gospel Reading. Jesus has been raised from the dead, God’s Yes to all that Jesus has said and done, God’s Yes to a ministry that has given value to those who were on the margins.

But those disciples who had been closest to Jesus are not sure what the future holds. And so they go back to old ways, to the trade that had sustained them before they met Jesus and quite possibly they revisited from time to time during the time they were with Jesus. They quite simply go fishing. And at first it goes all wrong. That is until, Jesus turns up with some advice. And John tells us that in a mighty catch, they land one hundred and fifty three large fish. One hundred and fifty three! But why should we be interested in a precise number? Well this has long had the scholars speculating. The two most interesting theories are the one that dates back to St Jerome that suggests that there were one hundred and fifty three different types of fish in the sea and another theory that at this time there were thought to be one hundred and fifty three ethnic groups in the world. Either of these understandings would suggest an understanding that Christ if for all the people of the world. He does not belong to one nation, one race, one type of person. No! He is the One who delights in all of us. Sure, Jesus may want each of us to grow in grace but ultimately in him we see God, far from hating the world, loving the world and all peoples with a passionate love.

But then, we see the essential good news of the Gospel, that God who we see in Jesus, loves us when we are least deserving. We saw it on the cross when in the face of torture and abuse, Jesus cried out:

“Father, forgive them: for they do not know what they are doing.”

And now, just as he forgave those guilty of violence, he offers forgiveness and restoration to the one who had been so close to him but who had let him down at the crucial time. You see, Peter had always thought he was up to the challenge. Even at the Last Supper, he had said to Jesus;

“Though all become deserters because of you, I will never desert you.”

And yet as Jesus endured the agony of the Garden of Gethsemane, Peter fell asleep. And soon afterwards in a courtyard, out of fear he denied knowing Jesus on three occasions. He had failed. He had fallen short. And he knew the pain of this all too well. His sense of worth was now in tatters. No wonder he is uncomfortable when on three occasions, Jesus asks him that penetrating question;

“Simon son of John, do you love me?”

And yet as struggles to answer, on three occasions comes the call to be one who feeds the people of God. For where so often, people are discarded at their points of failure, the way of Christ is to lift up the life that has been shattered for failure and to equip that life to move on and to learn from past errors. What a contrast to the culture of shame that so often permeates our society.

And please take note of how this Christ calls us to be in communion with others. As our lives are mended, so are we called to be the means by which other lives are put together, that all Gods children might delight in being who they are.
And this means that wherever people are marginalized, demeaned or intimidated, the voice of Christ says and bids us to shout out loud;

“Enough!”

When men, women and children fear a visitation of the scars of warfare, the voice of Christ says and bids us to shout out loud;

“Enough!”

When people are treated cruelly on grounds of race, faith or sexuality, the voice of Christ says and bids us to shout out loud;

“Enough!”

When people run from one land to another in search of safety and find not a welcome but a deportation to a place of danger, the voice of Christ says and bids us to shout out loud;

“Enough!”

When people are cynically exploited by those who would use their weakness to hoist the means of addiction upon them the voice of Christ says and bids us to shout out loud;

“Enough!”

And when gang culture stalks the streets creating fear, and when the medication that would save life or give life a new quality is denied, the voice of Christ says and bids us to shout out loud;

“Enough!”

For the Risen Christ bids us to see all people as somebodies. The Risen Christ bids us to see in each person the presence of the image of God that all may be drawn into the Divine circle of love and celebration, each delighting in being precious to the God who is the author of our very lives. Who we are and what we have been, cannot block this Divine miracle of grace

Oh Yes, Easter is a time when we celebrate something that the folk at Westboro have missed out on, that God has loved the world so much that he has sent his Son not to condemn the world but to save it. As we celebrate
The good news that Christ is alive and unleashed on our world, we rejoice in our share of that love and our delight at sharing with others in such delight.

For as Desmond Tutu so beautifully puts it;

“All belong. All, all are meant to be held in that incredible embrace that will not let us go. All!”

This sermon is for Bideford Methodist Church on Sunday April 22nd 2007

From doubt to Easter faith Easter 2

Luke 20: 19 - 31

Happy Easter!

I don’t think too many of you are convinced. You may well be thinking that I have my dates mixed up. Surely even a preacher who comes from Cornwall would know that Easter has come and gone.

But, I am not sure that I am wrong. To Christians, every Sunday is an Easter Day in which we celebrate that Christ is raised from the dead and is a living Lord. After all, surely that is why we gather on Sundays as the people of God.

But of course, this Sunday is often referred to as Low Sunday. The excitement of last week - when re responded to the good news that “Christ is risen” with a thunderous, “He is risen indeed!” - all seems so far away. In a sense, we may feel that the world is as it was before and nothing has changed.

Still before we go on a Guilt Trip, I want to put it to you that we are in good company if that is how we feel. You see, those disciples who were closest to Jesus are not what we would call a shining example. Oh, I know that we have those great stories of how the women had gone to the tomb and there has their world transformed. But it was not quite the same for that motley group of men whom we remember as “The Disciples.” Look at Luke’s Gospel and we find that their immediate response to the message that Christ was alive, was to dismiss it as “an idle tale.”

And things are not that much better later in the day when they meet face to face the risen Christ. Despite the witness of the women, their immediate reaction according to Luke’s Gospel was that they were seeing ghost. It is ultimately only through both hearing him and seeing him that their hearts began to fill with joy.

Now on this occasion, we learn from John’s Gospel that they were one person short. Thomas was for some reason or other absent. And like the other disciples, he feels a need to have physical proof of the resurrection before he can believe. Now, all of this has caused him to go down in the annals of history as Doubting Thomas. But before we castigate Thomas too strongly, we need to arrive at a balanced understanding of this man. Not only was his need to be convinced in line with that of the other disciples, but this was a man who felt deeply his loyalty to Jesus. After all in the narrative of Jesus going to Bethany to restore the life of Lazarus, Thomas possibly as a man who sees a glass half empty rather than half full, is overcome by foreboding that Jesus is on the path to death. But whilst his foreboding reminds be of Godfrey in Dad’s Army who forever warned that all were doomed, it brings out something heroic in Thomas who turns to his fellow disciples and says;

“Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

I hope you get the picture. This Thomas is a man who is deeply devoted to Jesus. On Good Friday, his world has fallen in. His hopes have been smashed to smithereens. No wonder, he finds it hard to take the risk of daring to believe again. Hurt so deeply once, he is not a man in a hurry to carelessly embrace good news. After all, how would he recover if he turned out to have got it wrong. A future of heartbreak with all around him pointing at his gullibility, would hardly be a prospect to delight him.

But for a moment, let’s just pause to consider the matter of doubt. I guess that many of us have experienced something of the “dark night of the soul.” As one who has a deeply pessimistic depressive streak, I have on occasions been there. Never more so than when a quarter of a century ago, my father had to undergo two operations for cancer. I needed to know if what I had before that believed with some comfort, was true. Was I deluded? It was a painful period, make no mistake. But what was happening to my family and all our lives, was of such magnitude that a faith which could not connect with such matters, could only be escapism, utterly useless!

On that occasion, although I am not sure it has always been the case, a time of struggling with doubt became ultimately a fruitful experience. For me there was some truth in the observation of one nineteenth century writer who observed;

“Doubt is the vestibule through which all must pass before they can enter into the temple of wisdom.”

Now, I know from experience of people of faith who seem to have rarely been troubled with doubt. Good for them! However, I ask you this morning to also appreciate that for some of us faith has been forged in the very struggle with doubts.

But what is healthy doubt? We have all met people who wallow in doubt and never move beyond it. Such doubt is paralysing to the individual. But the doubt which we find exhibited by Thomas is very different. This is the healthy doubt which seeks to find answers and is prepared to move on when those answers are found. And boy does Thomas move on. For as he meets with the risen Christ, the need to see and touch cease to matter. Thomas has his answers. He knows the truth of the Resurrection and through it he sees the significance of Jesus more profoundly than any of his colleagues. For this Thomas whom we have fossilised as a Mavis Riley type figure of twittering doubts, brings the Gospel narratives to a great climax as he speaks those words that have resounded down through two millennia;

“ My Lord and my God.”

Now we see that this is far from being a man of indecision. For these words tells us that Jesus is not simply a great teacher or example although he is these things. He is more than that. He stands revealed as the Godman, the one who is as truly Divine as he is human. And as Lord, this Jesus stands before us with a mighty claim upon our lives and our world. For as the Kingship of Roman Emperors will dissolve with a few centuries, here is a Lordship for all eternity.

But that Lordship is so very different to what the world has known before. On Palm Sunday, we recalled the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem, riding on a donkey. Such was a symbol that he came to that city on a message of peace. And in the appearances of which we have heard this morning, peace is still at the heart of his coming. That peace is God’s will for nations. It is also God’s will for troubled hearts. It is the peace that will enable us to cope through the most difficult of storms, that which we talk of as the peace which passeth understanding.

How can it be explained. It is like a story of two painters who were invited to paint pictures illustrating peace. One painted a picture of an idyllic evening scene with lakes, trees, cattle and a little cottage. With a setting sun, it spoke of perfect tranquillity.

The second painter produced a stormy scene with heavy black clouds and a ferocious waterfall pouring out great volumes of foam. But amidst the dark oppressive conditions could be found a small bird perched in a cleft of a huge rock, sheltered from all danger singing its song.

And it is that latter picture which reflected what Christ meant by peace. For make no mistake about it, Christ does not offer us an exemption from the storms of life. But what he does offer is his living presence to enable us confidently sail the stormy sees.

You see, we come to the Risen Christ in a manner of different ways. As diverse people, we come through diverse journeys. Ultimately the story of Thomas reminds us that we like him are invited into God’s dance of life. He offers us peace. He still breathes his life upon us. And so today, by like Thomas being in his presence, we too can be set free from fear and enabled to share in his Resurrection life. And from the story of Thomas, we can see that the presence of the risen Christ is for even we who have not seen or touched.

Back at the end of the Second World War, allied soldiers found in a house in which Jews had been hidden, written on the walls of a cellar;

“I believe,
I believe in the sun even when it is not shining.
I believe in love even when feeling it not.
I believe in God even when God is silent.”

Though we may doubt for a season, may we be open to the good news that Christ is alive even at the times when such belief is hardest to sustain.


This sermon is being preached at Appledore and Alwington Methodist Churches on April 15th 2007

Easter comes with a calling - Easter Day

Mark 16: 1-8

“Behind the monastery, down by the road,
There is a cemetery of worn out things,
There lie smashed china, rusty metal,
Cracked pipes and rusty bits of wire,
Empty cigarette packets, sawdust,
Corrugated iron, old plastics, tyres beyond repair:
All waiting for the Resurrection like ourselves.”

Those words by Ernesto Cardenal Martinez the Nicaraguan poet/priest who served in the Sandinista government of the 1980s, witness powerfully to the power of resurrection to change lives. For Resurrection is not just an event of two millenia ago but it is a reality that contains the power to bring hope to smashed up lives in the here and now. It is the message of Christ in his risen power, reaching out with an unending passion that however marred the Divine image might be in peoples’ lives, they might once more be enabled to shine with the image of his likeness.

Certainly, the women who came to the tomb, knew what it was to have smashed up lives. They had loved Jesus. They had placed great hopes in him. But now it was all gone! Destroyed! For they had witnessed his violent, humiliating death. Their hopes and dreams lay ruined in the ignominious death of Jesus. And all that was left to them was a dream that they might pay a final debt of honour. After all his burial had been rushed and so the women took upon themselves to undertake the gruesome task of anointing a body that had been dead for some 36 hours, a risky enough undertaking given that the authorities would hardly feel kindly to those who chose to demonstrate solidarity with such a dissident.

But even that awful task seemed to be beyond them. The tomb was closed. It was too late. Bursting into closed tombs was and is the stuff of ghouls. And more than that, how could they physically achieve their ill thought through objective? Here is a picture of tragedy and impotence. What more is there to do but to despair and to weep?

And yet, the story does not end on this despondent note. For Mark goes on to tell us that suddenly the sealing of the tomb becomes reversed. Through Divine action, the women find that they are granted access to the tomb. Reality has been completely transformed. And as the women enter, they find that the purpose for which they have come is now unnecessary. For inside the tomb, they meet a young man who has for them a message that reverberates down through the years;

“Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here.”

And in those words, we grasp the essential truth about Jesus. He is not just another of the ten a penny jumped up characters with Messianic claims who can be silenced by the power of the state. On the contrary, he is the one that they cannot silence. For whips and crosses cannot silence him. For this is the Godman, the one who God favours, the one who will go on troubling the centres of power for generation after generation. Oh I know that within three centuries a bloodstained Emperor of Rome will co opt Jesus. At times, it will seem as if the men of power and violence have subverted his message with their perverted doctrines of domination. BUT, time and again when it seems that the authentic Jesus has been silenced, he will break out again and again with a liberating power.

But by now, you must be noticing that Mark’s Gospel is unique. Given that the verses after verse 8 are later add ons, Mark is unique in that we do not here from the risen Christ. Instead, the women are given a message, a message to tell the disciples to get themselves to Galilee where they will see Jesus. This is no calling to a place of ecstasy. It is not a calling to a great place of worship or even a mountain top. It is a calling to go back to the place where they first began to Jesus so that they might once more begin the path of discipleship. For this is not to be a story with an ending but a story that will go on. For Resurrection is not something to wallow in but instead it is a serious calling to continue the path of discipleship from our respective Galilees. Note, that for Mark, the story does not end with triumphal but with the news that Christ being alive and accessible, means that we are called to get on with the unromantic reality of being his followers, living out the path of discipleship.

And it is in the living out of discipleship by the people of God that the story continues. Oscar Romero, the great Archbishop of San Salvador, heroically fought for justice for the impoverished poor of his country in the face of the Government’s death squads which were tolerated by the USA. His martyrdom became inevitable. Just days before he was gunned down whilst celebrating the Mass, he told a journalist;

“You can tell the people that if they succeed in killing me,
that I forgive and bless those who do it.
Hopefully, they will realise that they are wasting their time.
A bishop will die, but the church of God
which is the people, will never perish.”

Back to Mark’s Gospel. Not surprisingly, the women fled the tomb with terror. They had encountered a new reality and needed time to adjust to that which they had witnessed. After all, we all struggle when taken beyond the parameters of life with which we are familiar. Did they tell the disciples? The short ending, the other Gospels and the subsequent activities of the community of faith, all suggest that they did.

But today, what matters most is our response. Christ’s call to follow him in proclaiming a message of peace and reconciliation are still highly important especially in our world in which too often we effectively become that to which we say we are opposed to. Christ’s call to affirm the value and dignity of each human life are so important in a world of gross inequalities, in which we tolerate torture and prejudice against people simply for being other than us. Today, we need to live out the message of radical inclusion and grace which values us beyond our deserts. It is an ongoing story but a story in which the good news of Jesus of Nazareth, goes on through those who live out the Easter faith by following the path of discipleship, our Galilees.

So, Easter bids us to embrace Resurrection that the story may go on, the story which is “The Gospel According to You and You and You!


This sermon is to be preached at a Circuit Service on Easter Day April 8th 2007 at Torrington Methodist Church

Alive! Easter Day

Luke 24: 1-12
1 Cor 12: 19 - 26

In that most gloomy of poems, “Funeral Blues”, WH Auden concludes with a dark note of despair;

“The stars are not wanted now, put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.”

The closest friends of Jesus must have felt just like that on Good Friday. Their friend and leader had been well and truly killed. The hopes that they had invested in him, had been completely destroyed. The world as they knew it had caved in. Surely, nothing now would ever come to any good.

Too often, we see the inbetween Saturday as a time of waiting for the resurrection of Easter Day. But too those who were closest to Jesus, there was no expectation or anticipation - only desolation!

And so, the events of Easter Day were to them, absolutely astounding. The women had come to the tomb in order to complete the rites of burial. It was with heavy hearts that they came to that tomb. Yet what happened there, was to turn their lives upside down. Now there are variation of the story in the various Gospels. This is hardly surprising as often we have different memories of earth shattering events in our lives. We know that where there is no variations in the accounts of witnesses, our courts often suspect a degree of collusion between them.

Now in Luke’s account, we find the women ( please note that it women who are consistently the first witnesses to the resurrection) encounter two dazzling figures. Such figures would to Luke’s readers have been seen as angels. But most significant is the message that they offer. It is the message that the Jesus whom they have seen killed, has been raised from the dead. The impossible had happened.

Hear again those words:

“ Why do you look for the living among the dead. He is not here, but he has risen.”

Yes, that is the message of Easter. The Jesus who had been killed is not a dead leader who belongs to the pages of history but he is a living Lord who is as relevant to the present and the future as he is to the past.

Now the disciples seem to have struggled to believe the good news from the women. I can’t help wondering if the church instead of debating whether women are Biblically entitled to share in church leadership, might be seen as being more in touch with the resurrection accounts by questioning whether men are so entitled. But perhaps one of the important things about the resurrection is that if we at times struggle to understand and believe in it, we are following the path of those closest to Christ. For them it was at first too good to be true. Yet ultimately, they came to experience for themselves that it was quite simply the best news ever!

In the next few weeks, we will be seeking to discover something of the meaning of the resurrection. Today is primarily a day for celebration. The reflection can wait. Still here is just a quick taster.

The resurrection is God’s Yes to everything that Jesus said and did. Think of the Jesus who gave hope and meaning to the nobodies. Well, by raising Jesus from the dead, God has declared a thunderous YES to all of that.

The resurrection speaks of a God who can change things. It speaks of a God who can change our sorrow into dancing. It tells of a God who can lift us up from despair and give us hope.

The resurrection tells us that whilst death is very real and not to be trivialised, it is not the final word. The Apostle Paul sees the resurrection as a first fruit. Christ being raised from the dead is a prelude to the resurrection of the dead. His resurrection gives us a confident faith that in love God will raise us to new life when our time in this world is up.

And finally, the resurrection tells us that set free from the fear of death, we are set free to work for God’s loving purposes in this world. We are called to follow the loving path set for us by the living Christ.

Years ago, there was an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to destroy Christianity and other religions in the Soviet Union. An Atheist League was even formed by the ruling Communist party. On one occasion in the 1930s, one of the leaders named Nikolai Bukharin lectured a large crowd on why they should reject Christianity. At great length, he used his formidable oratorical skills to make his case. At the end he invited questions. Amidst the silence, one man stepped forward. Surveying the crowd before him, he shouted out;

“Christ is risen!”

And back as loud as thunder came the response;

“He is risen indeed!”

And that is why the despair of Auden’s poem cannot be the last word.


This sermon is an Easter Day sermon for Bideford Methodist Church preached on April 8th 2007.

Serving to the last - Maundy Thursday

John 13: 1-17, 31-35

And so this afternoon we draw ever closer to the Passion of our Lord. As the time of his death draws near, Jesus shares in one last meal with his followers. One more time, they will experience his acceptance in the sharing of table fellowship.

Yet first there is something else to be done. Jesus and his friends have been on the road in a land in which the roads would have been muddy in wet times and dusty in dry times. The normal footwear gave precious little protection against either of these possibilities. And so, at the door of any house there would be waterpots with a servant to attend to the washing and drying of feet - not the sort of job you dream of at school!

Within a group in which nobody was assigned the role of servant, one might expect this task to be shared. But this night, there are no volunteers amongst the 12. Perhaps, they have become so competitive that they all feel such a role to be beneath them. And yet, a volunteer emerges. But in a radical role reversal, the volunteer is the Rabbi, the leader of the pack, Jesus. Jesus takes on the role of servant. But why?

Well, I guess one reason is that it reveals something about his relationship with humanity. Too often we talk of god in terms of domination. However, Jesus is in this world not to dominate us but to be alongside us, even sharing in the lowliest of acts of service. And as he washes the feet of the disciples, on his knees unable to see their faces, he shows us his commitment to every single person whether we be high and mighty or the down and out. In washing feet, he is in effect whispering a message of acceptance and value to each of us. Truly, he is our Immanuel, God with us. And as he serves us, he institutes a new order of the world in which we are called to share in the path of service.

But this is not any meal it is a last one. Soon, the path of love that Jesus has trod will take him to a cross. For there are those who cannot accept a message of unconditional love for all. After all, it threatens their man made barriers. But Jesus cannot compromise that love and for that love he is prepared to share in the worst of human suffering and pain even to the point of sharing our death, so that he can bring us through death to life in him. It is not about a vengeful God demanding a price to be paid but it is about a God who is so loving that he gives all that we might live.

So this Jesus is the One who draws alongside us in our sufferings. He is God who is truly for us.

And yet, he leaves one more instruction. He, who has loved to the ultimate, tells us to love as he has loved. This means to love without reserve, to love all manner of peoples and to love in a way that tears down walls rather than erect them. What a difference such love can make to our world today! And yet, we have seen such love in the Christ who for us was faithful, even unto death on a cross.

So as we share in the Holy Communion, we encounter the mystery of Divine love shown in he who emptied himself of all but love and bled for Adam’s race. We cannot explain it but this Easter we can experience it.

This sermon was preached on Maundy Thursday 2007 at Bideford

Palm Sunday - a day of subversion

Luke 19: 28 - 40

It is time to be honest. I am absolutely fed up with the sentimental donkey processions that in a sickly sweet way, are dragged out on Palm Sunday. I am fed up with Palm Sunday being constantly turned into a day for nice safe religious thoughts. Why? Because there is nothing safe about Palm Sunday for it is a day when sharply opposing worldviews clash, a day that makes the eventual outcome of a torture, a show trial and public execution become inevitable.

For a moment let us imagine Jerusalem on that day. Passover is drawing near. Over three million pilgrims are to be found within the walled city, packed tightly together. Religious and nationalistic passions are running high for this is occupied land, occupied by a power that cares little for the practices and religious sensitivities of these peoples.

And now into that city comes the latest of a long line of prophets. Many of these prophets have been the cause of great trouble to Rome. For long, a fractious people have hoped for, even longed for an anointed one who would deliver them from their oppressors and set them free.

And what a reception. The crowd goes crazy. They sing their Hosannas. They cry out;

“Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord.”

And they wave the palm branches that St John tells us that they have taken from the trees.

Now, we often look upon this as well meaning, even if in view of later events shallow, enthusiasm for Jesus. An ever so slightly enthusiastic Praise Service!

Of course there may have been elements of that. But there is so much more! When the people shouted “Hosanna” which means “Save us” they were not looking for a Billy Graham style mission. No, these were words rooted in rebellion. To Rome, the message that they gave was a message that these people longed to be led into destroying the very presence of Rome. These were people who had been the losers under Roman rule and every fibre within them just longed to drive the infidels out. And Rome knew this. For that is why the great religious festivals such as Passover would be accompanied by Roman demonstrations of power with the bodies of the crucified being made all too visible to the visiting pilgrims.

But then the palms referred to in John’s Gospel. Here, the message could not be starker. You see, nearly 200 years before Jesus rode into Jerusalem, there had been a great war of liberation in Palestine. The then occupiers of Palestine, Greeks, had sought to destroy the Jewish way of life. The Temple had been defiled with the erection of a statue of Zeus. Those who would not conform to pagan ways such as those who continued to circumcise their baby boys faced execution. Eventually, a Jewish priest named Mattathias along with his family decided to resist. Many of them were killed but the survivors under Mattathias’ son Simon Maccabeus, formed a guerilla army. Their resistance was bloody but ultimately successful with them regaining the Temple which they repaired, cleansed and reconsecrated, an event celebrated by the annual feast of Hannukah. Even today part of the celebration of Hannukah involves the waving of palm branches for when Simon Maccabeus had entered Jerusalem in triumph, we are told in 1 Maccabees, he was greeted with praise and palm branches. And this was part of the collective Jewish memory and so the crowd that welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem knowingly acted as they did in the hope that Jesus would fulfil the hopes of liberation.

So rebellion and insurrection are in the air and we can sense a tension within the city. John Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg point us to that in their book, “The last Week” in which they offer us a picture of two processions. One is mad up of Jesus and his noisy followers who they suggest were the poor and landless, those desperately wanting and needing hope. The other procession is Pilate on his stallion accompanied by the economic elite and the Temple establishment who owed their power to Rome.

An unequal match you may think, but the scene now takes a comic and ridiculous turn. For this King, Jesus, comes not on a charger but on a donkey. What a mismatch! Where is the power in this? Kings are meant to be powerful but this, this is but a parody. And yet, there is a scriptural warrant for a King riding a donkey. Back in Zechariah, there is a verse which proclaims;

Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!
Lo your King comes to you;
Triumphant and victorious is he,
Humble and riding on a donkey,
On a colt, the foal of a donkey.”

This verse comes against a background of restoration of Israel but more important is what follows it for it is this which points to the true nature of the Kingship of Jesus.

“He will cut off the chariots from Ephraim
And the war horse from Jerusalem;
And the battle bow shall be cut off,
And he shall command peace to the nations.”

Do you get the picture? On Palm Sunday, Jesus stands before us with a transformed picture of Kingship and power. Rather than oppress as is so often the practice of Kings, he will confront injustice as when he turns over the tables in the Temple, the economic and religious centre of Jerusalem, where the powerless are being kept from God. Rather than dominate, he will reveal himself as the servant of all. Rather than fill his boots with the blood of others as was the case with Simon Maccabeus, he will allow his own blood to be shed.

But now, we need to follow him through this most holy of weeks. Time and again, he will amaze us with his passionate inclusive love and his compassion to those who had hitherto been nobodies. And as love is revealed, so to will we see an opposition that brims with hatred. And disappointed that he has failed to meet their aspirations, many of those who rejoiced at his entry into Jerusalem, will have in despair moved from the one procession to the other and now they will be manipulated to a cry of;

“Crucify him! Crucify him!”

And what of today? Will we let this unusual King transform us and our world. Will we allow him to guide us to a new reality in which the forces of domination are broken? Will we seek to institute the sort of community in which all are valued?

And in our own lives, will we recognise what this King offers. For whilst in holy Week we see Jesus wronged by humankind, we see him offering love at precisely those moments when humankind is at its worst. For this Jesus confronts the cycles of hatred and violence with unlimited love for the likes of you and me. Rather than a Kingship that destroys its enemies, Jesus offers to us his Kingship which reconciles us to God and gives to us the Divine forgiveness and acceptance that we so need.

So today, wave your palms with joy! Shout your Hosannas! And most of all rejoice at how Jesus saves us and gives meaning to our lives.


This sermon was preached at Bideford Methodist Church and Lavington URC on Sunday April 1st 2007