Inspired, Nourished and Well Fed

Today is Bible Sunday, a day in our church calendar set aside to celebrate our scriptures and perhaps reflect a little upon their importance in our own lives. We’ve had two examples in our readings this morning of how and why this collection of writings is still important when so many say otherwise.

In Isaiah we have this wonderful invitation to the abundant life God has to offer us, an invitation which lets us know that everyone has a seat at the table, that God’s deepest wish is to feed and nourish us in such a way that we live the most fulfilling lives we can.

In the reading from John, Jesus reminds us that by reading and understanding scripture we know God by understanding God’s relationship with humanity and woven throughout them is the knowledge of who Jesus is, the living and breathing Word of God.

Rev. Janet Morely writes “There’s a well-known saying whose author I haven’t succeeded in tracking down. The internet claims it is by either Karl Barth or an anonymous African woman. ‘There are plenty of other books I can read – but the bible is the only book that reads me.’ …the bible can pose questions it is going to take a lifetime for me to answer, if I ever do. [the Isaiah reading asks of us] What exactly does nourish and satisfy my heart?”

What I find most remarkable about the bible is the sheer breadth of the writings it contains. I truly believe is reflects almost all of human experience: love, betrayal, politics, spirituality, poetry, sexuality, family life, nature, law, wisdom, myth, lament, correspondence…and all bridging about 1000 years of human history- that’s truly remarkable.

So I feel the worst, most disrespectful thing we can ever do is take these writings at face value. We say at the end of our readings “this is the word of the Lord” but that’s never sat well with me. We can’t ignore the human factor; scripture can be God inspired and Spirit breathed but was still written by men- almost exclusively male- at a particular point in time for a particular purpose. It’s the humanity of the bible that I believe makes it come to life.

It contradicts itself in places as we do, lets us know its ok to debate these things and that we can see things from many angles- why else include a gospel narrative from four perspectives? Or include lament psalms where the writer is raging at God’s perceived abandonment?

The bible shows us even chosen people are flawed and get it wrong- David, Solomon, Moses, the disciples…they all show us their worst, warts and all traits but God chooses and uses them anyway, again showing that we each have a place at the table.

Taking scripture at face value, as inerrant and literal truth is a very modern concept, born out of a backlash to enlightenment thinking in the 19th century and pushing this agenda has led to what I feel is the rejection of The Bible as a source of wisdom and nourishment. 

When something is peddled as literal truth it’s the agenda of those setting what those absolute truths are which get taught. The Isaiah reading reminds us that God’s thoughts are not our thoughts and God’s ways are not our ways, but as humans we repeatedly fall into the trap of forgetting we’re the ones made in God’s image, not the other way round. If we are preaching the bible literally and have fixed an idea of God made in our own image we preach a narrow gospel and a narrow God.

And indeed the bible has inexcusably been used to control, punish and traumatise. And this still goes on today.

Whilst we aren’t innocent of this, the joy of our Anglican tradition is allowing scripture to live and breathe and take its place in relationship with our tradition and with our ever-changing world. 

Whilst training for ministry I spent several months on placement at St Peter’s House, the Manchester University chaplaincy and church. At the end of bible readings instead of “this is the word of the Lord” they posed the question “what does this mean for us today?”. This has become my own question whenever I’m preparing a sermon or trying to discern the value of any portion of scripture, and I guess it’s a question that today we might ask of the whole Bible; what does this mean for us today?

Is it something that will entice us to pull up a seat at the table, something that can nourish and satisfy us?

For me, as with so many matters of faith, it becomes about relationship. I see the Old Testament as the documentation of humanity’s relationship with God in all it’s up and downs, our repeated turning away from God and God’s constancy, never abandoning us no matter how many times we fail, mess up or turn away. God always loves us through whatever we throw God’s way.

The New Testament documents God living amongst us in the person of Jesus in order to help us better understand who God is; to enable us to deepen and continue that relationship of love. It’s a record of how we tried to interpret what we learned from that experience.

Through all of this collection of writings, I think the overall purpose or meaning or intention is to have a document which, in a messy and human way because the human factor makes it messy, because we’re messy, a document which is hoping to teach us how to love as God loves, that asks the big questions of us – reads us – in order to draw us to the invitation of abundant life and help us take our seat at the table.

Inspired, nourished and well fed.

Based upon:

Isaiah 55:1-11

An Invitation to Abundant Life

Ho, everyone who thirsts,
   come to the waters;
and you that have no money,
   come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
   without money and without price.
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,
   and your labour for that which does not satisfy?
Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good,
   and delight yourselves in rich food.
Incline your ear, and come to me;
   listen, so that you may live.
I will make with you an everlasting covenant,
   my steadfast, sure love for David.
See, I made him a witness to the peoples,
   a leader and commander for the peoples.
See, you shall call nations that you do not know,
   and nations that do not know you shall run to you,
because of the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel,
   for he has glorified you.

Seek the Lord while he may be found,
   call upon him while he is near;
let the wicked forsake their way,
   and the unrighteous their thoughts;
let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on them,
   and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
   nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
   so are my ways higher than your ways
   and my thoughts than your thoughts.

For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
   and do not return there until they have watered the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
   giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
   it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
   and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

John 5.36b-end

But I have a testimony greater than John’s. The works that the Father has given me to complete, the very works that I am doing, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me. And the Father who sent me has himself testified on my behalf. You have never heard his voice or seen his form, and you do not have his word abiding in you, because you do not believe him whom he has sent.

‘You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that testify on my behalf. Yet you refuse to come to me to have life. I do not accept glory from human beings. But I know that you do not have the love of God in you. I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not accept me; if another comes in his own name, you will accept him. How can you believe when you accept glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the one who alone is God? Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; your accuser is Moses, on whom you have set your hope. If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But if you do not believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?’

Sticks and Stones

Sermon preached on Bible Sunday, 28th October 2018 based upon
Isaiah 55.1-11, 2 Timothy 3.14-4.5 and John 5.36b-end

“Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me”; who was told that as a kid? How many of you actually believe it? We like to pretend that words don’t hurt us but very often words can leave deeper and more permanent wounds than any physical injury. I’m going to come back to this idea but first I’m going to tell you a story, the story of my relationship with the Bible, this being Bible Sunday.

When I was little I went to Sunday school, so I knew a lot of bible stories, especially the ones we like to tell children and we had a Children’s Illustrated Bible that I think was my brothers which I would flick through, sometimes read bits of but mostly look at the pictures. At some point I was given the story of “the baby in the rushes” which I read dozens of times, but like most kids I never actually read the bible.

When I reached high school I realised that most other children didn’t have bible stories inside them like I did, so much learned from the osmosis of being around church at a young age. In that first year we were all given a Gideon New Testament, an easy to read Good News Bible and I read the gospels but not much else. At Uni I saw the film The Prince of Egypt and decided to read Exodus whilst staying at a Christian friend’s house.

In 2002 I started to attend St Michael’s and decided I’d better buy one of those bible things- a big one with the old AND the new bits. I went along to Wesley Owen on Deansgate, when it still existed, and bought a lovely midnight blue New King James bible. I opened it up and didn’t understand a word of it.

By this point I was getting quite serious about this Christianity business and WANTED to read and understand scripture, so I headed back to Wesley Owen and picked up a more modern translation, the “New Living Translation”, after someone I spoke to was sniffy about the Good News bible. This bible was great- I understood it! Sort of. I also picked up a copy of The Message and The Street Bible. I’m a simple girl.

Later on I was told the NLT was a bad translation as it had been translated by a group of people with a particular theological leaning so I should get myself a New Revised Standard Version which is the translation we use here. I spent 10 years of my adult life utterly confused about WHICH bible I should be reading whilst trying to get my head around what it actually MEANS at the same time. Its amazing I ever ended up in this pulpit at all.

Surely the bible is the bible?? And of course there was that other bombshell; it’s not a book but a library. Super.

You’ll be pleased to know that shaky start did lead me to developing a much deeper love and understanding of scripture. But what is the bible, and how should we read, use and understand it? Is it even relevant is this modern world? If we’re lucky we might be finished by this time next week!

Let’s start with the basics, and at its most basic the Bible is a collection of ancient poems, letters and stories. Who wrote it? A whole bunch of people. Most of the older parts began as the stories of the Hebrew people, retold from generation to generation, until someone thought “hey, let’s write this all down”, can you imagine how different those early stories of creation, exodos, and the patriarchs were before being retold and retold, each retelling altering a word here or there, before they were set into a more constant form when written down?

Even the newer bits of the bible have origins shrouded in mystery, we don’t really know about their authors but a lot of mythology surrounding them makes us think we do- and what of the bits that weren’t included? The biblical canon we know was pretty much established in the 5th century but loads of other stuff could have ended up included or excluded.

What purpose does the bible have today? There is so much that is wonderful and beautiful about scripture. You may have the belief that The Bible is the inerrant spirit-breathed Word of God, and we say that after our readings don’t we? “This is the word of the Lord”.  I believe it to be inspired by divinity but very much have its place in humanity. The bible, for me, is all about what it means to be human.

Rob Bell in his recent book, “What is The Bible” says the bible is this; “a library of books dealing with loss and anger and transcendence and worry and empire and money and fear and stress and joy and doubt and grace and healing”. These things are the human experience, and all contained within these pages.

It’s about how we relate our human experience to the divine being who created us, it’s where we search for purpose and meaning in the complex mess of everyday life.

But the words of the bible have also been used to harm, to wound, to supress and to oppress. Words have power and words can hurt, especially when those wielding them as weapons have the certainty of their interpretation of God’s will. Slavery, subjugation of women, colonisation, war, persecution of the LGBT community. In some countries the words of the bible are still used to punish and even put to death thieves, adulterers and LGBT people. Words can indeed hurt us.

Recently I read Vicky Beeching’s book “Undivided” about her life spent supressing her sexuality and the ongoing damage done to her psychologically and physically by growing up within a form of evangelical Christianity which was obsessed with sexual sin and in particular homosexuality.

We all have parts of scripture which speak to our very souls of what our experiences of being human are, and those parts which cause us discomfort or are more obviously of a particular time or context. I find it mind-blowing that we can focus so much of the churches time and debate on the relatively tiny passages on sexuality whilst ignoring the constantly recurring themes of social justice, community, wealth distribution and caring for those in need.

St Paul tells us “All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness”. Do we believe this? Is it an all or nothing deal? A more accurate translation of inspired by God is God-breathed. All scripture is God-breathed. The Greek word here for breathed can also mean spirit. The scriptures are spirit-filled, but so are we and we aren’t inerrant.

The only lens I have for interpreting the bible is Jesus. Does it fit with Jesus’ teaching or not? If it doesn’t there’s probably something else going on there. Jesus is how we know God’s character and is the truest reflection of The divine we can ever know.

I want to leave you with two questions from Rob Bell’s book, which I really recommend, for your ongoing adventures and struggles with the bible. When reading a passage ask yourself; firstly, why did someone write this down in the first place? And secondly, why did this passage endure?

Very often the answer to the second question is “it speaks to our human experience.” If, as Jesus accuses his listeners we “search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life” then we are missing so much. The bible at it’s very heart signposts how we live in the here and now, what an amazing gift our human lives are, and how best we can use this grace-filled gift.

Loss anger transcendence worry empire money fear stress joy doubt grace healing. The Bible speaks to us across the centuries, it’s a central to our struggle to know where we fit and who we are. The bible is a collection of ancient poems, letters and stories but most of all its our story, each and ever one of us. It didn’t matter which Bible I was reading all those years ago, it just mattered that I was reading it, grappling with it and eventually falling in love with it.

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?

Celtic Lent Day 9

I have never been one to limit God to the scriptures, though the scriptures have nourished me well. My god is not imprisoned anywhere, nor in the bible nor the tabernacle.  Real Presence is everywhere, and those with the hearts if children revel in it. So much that I do not blush to call divine is revealed tome each day. The Word and the Bread! That's all there is. They continue becoming flesh. A crumb at a time!
Macrina Wiederkehr

My tradition has the bible and the Eucharist at the centre, but even more central are people themselves. The divine is in all people and in all places. The words of scripture can nourish faith but do not contain an uncontainable deity. My lived experiences, nourished by the word and sustained by the holy meal, teach me the most about God.

Scripture
While they were eating, Jesus took a loaf of bread, and after blessing it he broke it, gave it to the disciples, and said, ‘Take, eat; this is my body.’
Matthew 26.26

Advent word - trust

Trust terrifies me - not trusting others, I do that quite readily, sometimes to my detriment. It's having the trust of others that scares me, worried that as an imperfect being I'll let them down. My family trusts me, my patients, my colleagues and parishioners. That's a huge responsibility. What helps is having permission to be vulnerable, permission to make mistakes. Scripture is littered with people messing up and God uses them anyway. That's really reassuring!

God’s love, like any love, involves real trust. And in relationships, trust requires mutuality. Sometimes it may require a part of myself that I don’t necessarily want others to see. This same vulnerability, intimacy, and mutuality should characterize our love for and trust in God.

-Br. Robert L'Esperance

Breaking the rules

This sermon was preached this morning at St Michael's Flixton. The readings were Isaiah 58:9b-14, Psalm 103:1-8, Hebrews 12:18-29 & Luke 13:10-17.

Why do we come to church? Is it something you ever think about? Do we come out of a sense of duty- something we feel we should or ought to do? Or do we come out of ritual or habit- it’s what we’ve always done? Do we come for community- to be part of something bigger, to get a sense of belonging? Or do we come because we feel we’ll experience something of God in this place?
Whatever your own reasons are, they probably contain a little bit of each of these, and of course it’s scriptural.
In Hebrews chapter 10 we hear of the importance of meeting together and encouraging each other; Matthew 18 contains Jesus famous words that when 2 or 3 are gathered in his name, there he is; In Acts 2 the apostles gather for prayer, teaching and breaking bread.
It was also scriptural for the Jewish people that Jesus is teaching in front of in today’s gospel to attend structured worship. There were a lot of rules around the Sabbath laid down in Levitical law. We know that Levitical law was and is extensive and contains instruction on every area of life.
Yet in today’s gospel we see Jesus, the same Jesus who said he hadn’t come to abolish the Law, break one of the Sabbath rules. Healing was classed as work, which may seem odd to us. The definitions in Jewish teaching about what is and isn’t work have been pondered and debated by scholars and rabbis for thousands of years. I’ve nursed orthodox Jewish patients who couldn’t press their nurse call button on the Sabbath because using something electrical was forbidden under their understanding of the Law.
The minutiae of these definitions may be baffling- even to Anglicans with our rules and rituals- but there are reasons for it. Keeping the Sabbath, to this people, was all about putting a special time aside to remember and be with God. Even though the extent of the Law reached every part of life, the Sabbath was the time when all other things were put aside and it was about God and only God.
Following the law to the letter stemmed from the exile- The Hebrews believed they were sent into exile as a punishment for not following the rules and so there was a fear of “not getting it right” and being punished again.
This might help frame just how controversial it was for Jesus to break the rules. And it wasn’t the first time. At this point Jesus has already allowed his disciples to pick grain on the Sabbath, because they’re hungry, and has healed a man’s withered hand, also in a synagogue on the Sabbath. In the next chapter he does it again, healing a man with dropsy.
This repeated rule breaking tells us one thing, whatever point Jesus is making here it’s an important one, and it’s not about healing. Those of you who’ve heard me speak about healing miracles before may remember my belief that whenever we see a healing miracle in the gospels it’s never about the healing, it’s always about something Jesus is trying to reveal to us about God.
In the narrative we see a synagogue leader so keen on rules he could very well be part of the CofE! He says:
"There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day."
He’s a proper jobsworth! But Jesus points out the hypocrisy of it, that there are other things, none of which reveal anything of God, which people do on the Sabbath for mere practical reasons- who would deny their animal water because of the Sabbath rules? None of them. Yet Jesus’ revelation of the power of God in healing the women is not condoned.
This is where we find something marvellous to celebrate in our Anglican tradition. It can be a bit fuzzy to define what we, the Anglican communion are. Those who’ve thought about these things have defined it as a triangle, with each side of the triangle having an equal share in what defines us. Those three sides, and you probably will have heard this before, are Scripture, Tradition and Reason.
This trinity, like the eternal trinity, are held in tension together, forever dancing and circling each other, intertwining to help us figure out our beliefs and our theology.
In this story of Jesus healing a woman in the synagogue we have tradition and scripture on one side, telling us that he’s broken the rules, done the wrong thing, but then reason comes in and puts a twist on whole situation.
The reasonable question to ask is what does each situation reveal of God? On one hand we have the rules, set in scripture and carried through tradition, and on the other we have a women healed in a place where people have gathered to learn about God.
The attempted enforcement of the rules here makes God seem small, confined and constricted. The healing reveals a God of power, a God who can’t be confined or defined by us and our institutions. God isn’t defined by the church, we should be defined by God.
It’s built into the DNA of the church of England to give equal weighting to reason, tradition and scripture even when these things are at odds with each. 30 years ago I wouldn’t have been stood here, with this collar on, preaching to you. Tradition and Scripture were quite clear: women lived under the authority of men, and as such were not authorised to be ordained. It wasn’t our place.
Yet reason leads us to re-examine scripture for the time and place we find ourselves. The bible isn’t a holy rule book. It’s the story of humanity’s relationship with God, and revelation of God through Jesus Christ. This revelation isn’t closed off or finished, it’s ongoing, through re-examining scripture in our own context. Through this process has been born liberation theology, black theology, feminist theology, queer theology.
Ongoing revelation means the voiceless have found their voices, and found their place in God’s kingdom.
By accepting that what’s contained in scripture is an ongoing conversation between the text and our context we accept that it’s not about trying to define or restrict God with a set of rules but seeing where he’s at work in the world. This has been brought to the fore in recent years as we’ve seen scripture and tradition under debate in regards to sexuality, which made headlines again recently as a priest from our diocese resigned his position and married his male partner.
Tradition says one thing, reason another, and scripture is interpreted and re-interpreted by those on both sides of the debate. Are we, in these debates, trying to contain God? Make him small, make him conform to our image of him? Or are we looking beyond our beliefs and expectations? Opening our eyes to where God is revealed right before us?
At the end of today’s gospel reading the people who witness Jesus’ miracle aren’t siding with the religious leader, they’re rejoicing at the miracle they’ve witnessed. My challenge to us is to do the same- look for where God is moving in the world and celebrate it!
The writer of Hebrews tells us we’re receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken. Nothing that humankind can say or do can shake God or God’s kingdom- he’s way bigger than that. Rules, Ritual and even the church can’t define God, or know God’s mind or will. He’s not made in our image, we’re made in his, and he is indeed a consuming fire.
A fire of power, a fire of joy and a fire of love.
To go back to my opening question, I come to church to try and catch a bit of that fire, having that Sabbath focus of time just for God. If we can each leave this place with a bit of that fire within us, it lights us up in the world.
When we re-examine scripture we see that the Sabbath isn’t about the rules or traditions, it’s about seeing where God is and shifting our focus to that place, shifting our focus away from all distractions and for a short time delighting in God, celebrating God, worshipping God, and most importantly, expecting to encounter God.

Act 25 - Word Up

A few years back my friend Ellie bought me a notebook and at the bottom of each page was a verse from scripture. One really struck me, it was a verse I'd never paid attention to before:

Psalm 37:24
Though we stumble, we shall not fall headlong, for the Lord holds by the hand.

I love this.
Why do I love it so much? Because it tells me it's ok to mess up and it's ok to get things wrong. None of us can ever be perfect, and that's ok, because no matter what happens God has our back, so things will never be as bad as we think.

I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. (Psalm 119:11 NIV)