Who Then is This?

Playing catch up on homilies I haven't posted!

Based on Mark 4.35-end

“Who then is this?”. How would the disciples have answered that question before what happened on the boat? And what would their answer be after it? How could they even begin to fathom what they’d just witnessed?

We might wonder when Jesus says to his disciples “why are you afraid?” if they’re scared of the storm they’ve just encountered, or scared because of what they’ve just witnessed Jesus do; who then is this? Any abstract ideas or beliefs, or any theories they may have had have now stopped being theoretical, they’re confronted with an overwhelming display of power that can’t be reasoned or rationalised. 

This man who looks like them, is from a background like theirs, has a family like theirs, just rebuked the wind and sea, and the wind and sea listened. I think that might cause the disciples to maybe be a bit fearful of Jesus, and even more than that- to fear what this means, to generate more questions, because as they try to fathom “who then is this” they also have to confront “who then am I?” and “what then does this mean for my life?”

When any of us is confronted with the reality of who Jesus is, that he is from God and is God, it has to change us. We can’t know and believe that and then be left unchanged; because if we believe Jesus is who he demonstrates he is, we have to believe in the things that he said and did, and if we believe in those things we have to start living them; and that’s hard. And it’s scary. It can involve a total deconstruction and reconstruction of our lives, motivations and principles. 

In this passage we see Jesus’ place in the created order- his place over the created order as he commands it and it responds. 

We can often feel like the disciples in the storm, overwhelmed by chaos, waiting for God’s intervention. Sometimes it feels like everything is out of control around us, and we look to see where God can be in this, and hope that he will calm the storm. Sometimes this passage is called the gospel for the overwhelmed, but there’s also a message there that God’s presence and intervention can be unnerving, as can the times when it feels God is napping during our own storms and crises. 

Jesus asks “Have you still no faith?” after the disciples witness his power. When we’re waiting out our own storms sometimes faith is all we have, and the knowledge that the gospel stories don’t end with “my God, why have you forsaken me?” but with God overcoming the very worst that humanity could do, and the disciples finally knowing, really knowing “who then is this”, and as we must be when we come to that truth, forever being changed by it. 

Mary Magdalene

They Have Taken My Lord Away – Janet Morley

It was unfinished.

We stayed there, fixed, until the end,

women waiting for the body that we loved;

and then it was unfinished.

There was no time to cherish, cleanse, anoint;

no time to handle him with love,

no farewell.

Since then, my hands have waited,

aching to touch even his deadness,

smooth oil into bruises that no longer hurt,

offer his silent flesh my finished act of love.

I came early, as the darkness lifted,

to find the grave ripped open and his body gone;

container of my grief smashed, looted,

leaving my hands still empty.

I turned on the man who came:

"They have taken my Lord - where is his corpse?

Where is the body that is mine to greet?

He is not gone

I am not ready yet, I am not finished -

I cannot let him go I am not whole."

And then he spoke, no corpse,

and breathed,

and offered me my name.

My hands rushed to grasp him;

to hold and hug

and grip his body close;

to give myself again, to cling to him,

and lose myself in love.

"Don't touch me now"

I stopped and waited, my rejected passion

hovering between us like some dying thing.

I, Mary, stood and grieved and then departed.

I have a gospel to proclaim. 

WWJD?

Short homiley based upon Mark 2.23-3.6 and 2 Corinthians 4.5-12

WWJD; what would Jesus do? I'm sure you're familiar with the phrase and the wristbands...and the t-shirts. It’s become a cheesy slogan, the butt of many jokes -  but there is merit in it! There’s a joke amongst clergy and I’m sure elsewhere, that when asking “what would Jesus do?” cracking a whip and kicking over tables is always an option, as is breaking the rules.

In today's gospel we see again Jesus the rule-breaker, the Jesus who riles up the authorities in the name of doing not only what's right but what makes sense. 

I married a couple on Friday and the evening before I told them that the rehearsal was to try and ensure that things went smoothly, and whilst there were some things that should be done in a certain way, and things that tradition dictates, that they shouldn't get hung up on the details, to do what felt right for them. The only thing that mattered for that wedding was yes, getting the legal bits right, but mainly it was about the reason they were here, the very deep love they share and the commitment they were making because of that.

I think we see this in churches a lot- and in other institutions- we do things because it’s the way they're done, the way they've always been done, the way the rules say they should be done, and I’ve been guilty of this myself. We should always be examining why we’re doing what we're doing, if it makes sense, what sort of message it gives out and what it says about the God we worship if we believe he's more interested in rules than people.

In the reading Jesus believes It’s more important to feed people than obey the rules and he believes the right thing to do is heal someone rather than leave them and by doing so break the Sabbath rules. Both these acts could be interpreted as work, forbidden on the Sabbath. I know what makes the most sense to me. 

When we have rules for the sake of the rule itself, and when keeping that rule means people suffer, we become Pharisees. The ability to change and evolve is the wonderful thing about the Church of England; we’re able to examine our rules and practices and change them if needed. Giving equal weight to scripture, tradition and reason means we can grow and change for the better by examining what we do through these lenses. 

And we must remember people. People have to be at the heart of everything we do and all the decisions we make. If sticking to the rules leads anyone to suffer then the rules need to change. If your response to why we’re doing something is ever “because that’s the way it’s done” or “because that’s the way we’ve always ways done it” I implore you to stop, think, and examine if it’s really the way we should be doing it. I’ve had to do this recently and it’s really eye opening and liberating. 

Going against the crowd or breaking the rules is always worth it if means you’re acting in a more compassionate way. Rules which exclude or harm anyone need pulling apart. To paraphrase St Paul from today’s readings: make Jesus visible in you; in your actions and choices. What would Jesus do?

Easter Day!

You, God, are a fire that always burns without consuming. You are a fire consuming in its heat every compartment of the soul’s self-absorbed love. You are a fire lifting all chill and giving all light. In Your light You show me Your truth. You’re the Light that outshines every light. You, God, give the mind’s eye Your divine light so completely and excellently, You bring lucidity even to the light of faith. In that faith, I see my soul has life, and in that light, I receive You who are Light itself.
Catherine of Siena

Today has felt like a day of moving from the darkness of Lent and Holy Week to the welcome light of the Easter celebration, whether it was the joyful communion this morning, complete with April Fool's silly hats, or being with family, or joining with friends to celebrate a special birthday this evening.
It felt like a long time coming, and I worked a lot of night shifts this Lent. It felt like something which needed to be endured.
Here at the end I feel a sense of contentment and gratitude, especially for anyone who has walked this alongside me and read any of the blog posts- I still find it strange that people do!
I wish you all a blessed Eastertide and hope you feel a sense of the divine in the ordinary and the everyday.

Scripture
Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; 
John 20.18

Celtic Lent Day 40

Encompass me with joy, for weeping gathers all its gloom against me.
Encompass me with love, for the world’s a hating place at times.
Encompass me with summer, for there is too much ice in secularity.
Encompass me with good news, for the days overwhelm the soul with negativity.
Encompass me with foreverness, for I am too temporary to have any kind of future without you.
Amen.
Calvin Miller

This is the final day of Lent, a day spent watching, waiting, praying and not knowing what lies ahead. We don't know the resurrection will happen. We sit with our loss, our grief, and we weep.

Scripture
Was it not you who dried up the sea,
   the waters of the great deep;
who made the depths of the sea a way
   for the redeemed to cross over? 
So the ransomed of the Lord shall return,
   and come to Zion with singing;
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads;
   they shall obtain joy and gladness,
   and sorrow and sighing shall flee away. 
I, I am he who comforts you;
   why then are you afraid of a mere mortal who must die,
   a human being who fades like grass?
Isaiah 51.10-12

Celtic Lent Day 39

To say Your name before I sleep does not guarantee that in the morning I shall wake in that world which held my bed. Still it matters not, for every world in Yours as I am.
Calvin Miller

Death is like the past. We can't change either of them. We have to make friends with them both.
William Brodrick

I feel like Good Friday is a day which gives us permission to think about death and sadness, anyone who's seen the wonderful Pixar film Inside Out knows sadness is as important as joy. Sadness can help us to grow and change, put our lives in context and help us re-evaluate what's important.
On Good Friday we sit with that, although we know the Easter feast is just about tangible. When we're in the middle of grief or difficult times we don't know when there'll be an end to it. We hope the intensity will become less, which eventually it does.
This day, like Ash Wednesday, also gives us a chance to consider our own mortality. We're here just for a season and because of that need to consider carefully what and who we give our one life to. Good Friday is about love. Choose to give your life to love.

Scripture
I say to God, my rock,
   ‘Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I walk about mournfully
   because the enemy oppresses me?’ 
As with a deadly wound in my body,
   my adversaries taunt me,
while they say to me continually,
   ‘Where is your God?’ 
Psalm 42.9-10

Celtic Lent Day 38

The best of the best mystics and saints have always come to this conclusion: that however the pain or the cause of the pain is to be viewed, God can be found in its depths. The confession is that God uses our suffering for good. This does not mean that the suffering was a good thing, not at all, but that God has taken it, ground it up, and used it as soil in which to grow a new seedling.
Joel Mason

The line in the portion of John's gospel from the main Maundy Thursday service which always sticks with me is "You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand." (John 13.7)
When I went forward for ministry selection I had to answer a question on which events out of my entire life had shaped the person I'd become. It was the toughest question of the lot.
What became apparent as I tried to answer is that it's the most challenging and even difficult things we encounter that truly shape us, the times when in the midst of things we had no sense of God or what he was doing in our lives. It's when we look back that we can trace patterns, consequences or a thread through things of how the divine was at work in and around us.

Scripture
Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him. And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, "Lord, are you going to wash my feet?" Jesus answered, "You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand." Peter said to him, "You will never wash my feet." Jesus answered, "Unless I wash you, you have no share with me." Simon Peter said to him, "Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!" Jesus said to him, "One who has bathed does not need to wash, except for the feet, but is entirely clean. And you are clean, though not all of you." For he knew who was to betray him; for this reason he said, "Not all of you are clean."

After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord--and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.

"Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, `Where I am going, you cannot come.' I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."
John 13:1-17, 31b-35