Heavenly Mother

This sermon was written for yesterday, but never preached due to covid finally paying a visit to our household 

I’m always keenly aware that today isn’t a joyful day for everyone and always hope that I can find something to say which honours mothers, mother figures and our mother church, without disrespecting those for whom today is difficult. 

Whilst I was doing the reading I always do to prepare for a sermon, I came across a phrase I don’t think I’ve heard before- “fictive families”. A Fictive Family isn’t brought together by shared DNA or marriage but shared experience or community. Shared lives can cause individuals or groups to become emotionally bonded to each other and form pairings or groups which have many of the same characteristics or functions as kinship. 

We see an example of this in our Old Testament reading where Pharoah’s daughter chooses to make a Hebrew child a member of her family. We also see it throughout the New Testament as Jesus, though he has his blood family with him, also calls others to help him, and builds a community around himself so close that after his death his mother Mary and disciple John become their own family unit. 

We would probably see our church community as a fictive family; I think faith communities are about the only place we form meaningful inter-generational friendships outside of our families and many of us help each other in similar ways to that which families do. 

In our gospel reading Mary hears the words from Simeon which at first must have amazed her- to be reminded of how important her son was going to be, to be told by a complete stranger the significance Jesus’ future holds, but then comes the sting in the tail “and a sword will pierce your own soul too”. Was this the first inkling that Mary had that her sweet baby boy, although he had a great destiny ahead of him, might be destined to suffer and that seeing his pain would in turn lead to her own suffering? 

I’m often very relived that we can’t see into the future, I think knowing the difficult things that lie ahead would stop us from living our lives fully, as God intends us to, so it amazes me that Mary is able to let Jesus go ahead and do the things he needs to, knowing it will probably end with his suffering. 

What really struck me on studying this morning’s readings together is that our readings involve people, indeed mothers, who are either living in occupied lands or suffering under racial oppression, the Hebrew family Moses was born into lived as slaves under Pharaoh and Jesus’ family lived in an occupied Judea. Both Miriam and Mary have to make difficult decisions for the future of their children. Miriam knows she has to give up her son if he’s to survive and Mary knows Jesus must follow the path set before him even though it may be painful for them both. 

It brings me back to the stark reality of what the people of Ukraine are facing right now, how families and communities are torn apart, how parents are suffering seeing their children go to fight and are themselves caught up in the war. We’ve seen the emotive pictures of maternity hospitals and newborn babies caught up in the destruction. I cannot imagine the decisions parents of small children are having to make right now, both in Ukraine and other areas of occupation, war or oppression. 

Do they wish they had known what was to come and what is yet to come? Would it have been better or worse to know what lay ahead? I’m sure we all wish we could see how or when this might end. I also wonder with what communities are being formed through this horror, among those fighting together and those trying to survive together? We also see people in other countries reaching out to make Ukrainian refugees part of their own families and it reminds me that not everything feels hopeless right now. 

It could almost make it seem frivolous that today is a day of joyful celebration here in the UK, a pause from our Lenten fasting, and at a time when we so needed something to celebrate after two years of postponed-Mother’s Day activities. 

And yet maybe this sadness in our world and all the uncertainties are just the reason why we should be marking today; to respect and honour the maternal figures in our families and communities and as a reminder that the mother church herself should be a place of safety, nurture and teaching to all who need it, that at times like this the church needs to be a place of mothering to all. As a nurturing, loving community it’s our place to see how we can meet the needs we see in the world and come together as the fictive family we are to figure out together how can help. 

Mothering Sunday in the church calendar is always something much bigger than celebrating mums, but that is important too. We can have a nurturing spirit for our world and celebrate the maternal figures who have meant so much to us- our mums, grans, aunts, sister, friends and nieces, mums who are safe with God, mums who couldn’t fulfil what was asked of them, the men being both mum and dad, the amazing strong women who have taught, led, guided, hugged and healed us, those who let us down and those who chose us. We pray for each and every one of them. 

And it’s a reminder that as well as Heavenly Father God is our Heavenly Mother. In the words of Julian of Norwich: "As truly as God is our father, so just as truly is God our mother. In our father, God Almighty, we have our being; in our merciful mother we are re-made and restored. Our fragmented lives are knit together and made perfect. And by giving and yielding ourselves, through grace, to the Holy Spirit we are made whole." 

Amen.

Faithful Servant

Today marks the 70th anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II’s accession to the throne. Later this year we’ll celebrate with a Platinum Jubilee- an event never seen before in this country- only 3 monarchs in world history have reigned longer.

At the beginning of June, around the anniversary of her coronation, we’ll celebrate with a 4 day bank holiday, but today we remember the actual day that, at the age of 26, a young mum of 2 and at the time far from home, she learned her father, the King, had died and she was now the monarch.

I can’t even imagine how that must have felt, the combination of the grief and the weight of her new role. Whilst she knew the day would one day come, and George VI had suffered with poor health, he’d seemed well when he’d waved her and Prince Philip off for their tour of Australia; they’d stopped off in Kenya which was where she heard the news.

Now I’m sure there’s a wide breadth of opinions within our congregation about the nature of monarchy and its place within our society but I’m not going to touch on that today, we are The Church of England, we choose to be a part of it, and as such supporting and praying for the Monarch is built into who we are. 

On the 60th Jubilee of the accession, the then Archbishop of Canterbury (Rowan Williams) has this to say about her role within the established church: 

Since the 16th century, every English monarch has been Supreme Governor of the Church of England, which doesn't mean that the Queen or the King is the head of the Church of England. It simply means they're the final court of appeal. They're the person who makes the final decision about what the Church can do and can't do in law. One of The Queen's other titles is Defender of the Faith…It's tied up with The Queen's role as the senior layperson of the Church of England. But I think that The Queen has made something quite fresh of it. She has, in effect, said that by being the guardian of the Christian faith as held by the Church of England, she establishes a real place for faith in public life...

This is such a unique position for a monarch to have compared to other nations and one which I believe our queen takes incredibly seriously. On her 21st birthday the then Princess Elizabeth said: ‘“There is a motto which has been borne by many of my ancestors – a noble motto, ‘I serve.’” She went on to say “I declare before you all that my whole life whether it be long or short shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.’"

Jesus tells the disciples in our gospel reading “the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves.” And I truly believe that our queen has tried to embody her understanding of servant leadership and to live this out, throughout her life, and that this is fuelled by her own understanding of Christian faith. In her Christmas 2000 message she said “For me the teachings of Christ and personal accountability before God provide a framework in which I try to lead my life.” 

And if we return to her 21st birthday message, Elizabeth asked something of us; “I shall not have strength to carry out this resolution [to serve] alone unless you join in with me, as I now invite you to do: I know that your support will be unfailingly given. God help me to make good my vow, and God bless all of you who are willing to share in it.”

What I guess I’m interested in exploring, whether you believe in our system of monarchy or not, is as a community of people who choose to worship in the Established church, with The Queen as the Supreme Governor, what is our role within this invitation? Our role in supporting a very public faith?

Now I love our country but I also believe that under God there are no nations, we all are one people who belong to God, that we were created for God’s own delight and that this love and delight in God’s creation of us is revealed in Jesus Christ, and Jesus was pretty clear that we have responsibilities to each other. 

As God’s creation we’re all equal, despite nationality or status, and those with power, authority or influence have the obligation to serve, and be a voice for, those who don’t.

In the Queen’s own service, which now extends to 2.4 billion commonwealth citizens of the most diverse backgrounds, she’s spoken up for tolerance, inclusiveness and mutual respect. In her 2001 Christmas message she declared we need to “overcome differences and misunderstandings by reducing prejudice, ignorance and fear. We all have something to learn from one another, whatever our faith–be it Christian or Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu or Sikh–whatever our background…”

That was 21 years ago and after 2 years of living in the shadow of covid and before that having seen so many countries, including our own, divided by the rhetoric created by elected officials- what can we learn from one who though not elected feels called, as many of us do, by God to fulfil a role of service directed by our faith?

In the words of a sermon preached on the occasion of the Queen’s 90th birthday, "servant leadership is about influence, about shaping the discussion, touching the heart, stretching the mind, motivating action and compassion and engagement in public life. Servant leadership is about the ability to bring people together in common purpose and shared values and a hopeful future. Servant leadership is much like love: the more you give to others, the more flows back to you naturally. This is how to understand the servant leadership of our Queen: her power is in her influence, and this has more to do with service than status. She is a voice that harmonizes the cacophony of voices… a symbol of a common heritage that binds a multitude of nations and peoples into one communion, an authority figure without being authoritarian."

So for me, one way I understand her invitation to join and support her in her public service and public faith, is to ask ourselves: where do I have influence? In what areas of my life can I share the values that my faith and Christ’s teachings instil in me? Where can I show what a living faith in action can do?

Whether this is a wide public platform like this pulpit or a small circle of friends, we each have a place and a space within our lives to spread the values of love, tolerance, listening to each other, inviting conversation rather than division and looking to how, again whether large or small, we can serve those who don’t have any voice or influence or ability to be seen. 

I’m sure we can each agree that whilst on the surface we aren’t that different from each other, within this building today there’s going to be a huge variance in our political affiliations, sporting affiliations, theology and so much more, we’re different in so many ways, but love, respect, compassion and the shared values of our shared faith bind us together. And we choose to gather publicly to share in that.

The Queen has achieved something remarkable by the length of her reign; 70 years of service built upon faith. May we share in her resilience and her sense of duty to use our influence in the best way be can, to be leaders in serving our communities and to place Christ at the centre of all things.

The Gift of Being Ordinary

Happy new year to you all! Does Christmas seem like a distant memory? Did you get some lovely gifts? Everything you wanted? As we’re celebrating Epiphany today it seems appropriate to think about our gifts- the ones we gave and the ones we received- and the thought behind them. 

I spend ages choosing presents but somehow I feel I’ve never quite got it right, whilst there’s always a lot of thought and care behind the gift I always worry about how it will be received.

We can see the meaning and symbolism behind the gifts the Magi bring to Jesus, but I wonder what Mary and Joseph actually thought when they opened them? I’m sure the gold would have come in handy, particularly when it came to organising their safe passage to Egypt, and I’m sure they appreciated the depth of symbolism in regard to the Frankincense and Myrrh, but I secretly imagine Mary in particular wishing they’d have turned up with something a bit more practical for the care of a new born, son of God or not.

I don’t want to lean towards gender stereotypes but I’m sure you’ve heard that if it had been three wise women that had turned up they’d have brought a casserole, cleaned up the stable and organised a nappy laundering service.

Now I’ve preached a lot on Epiphany, maybe more than any of the other festivals, and I’ve always looked for a different angle than talking about the gifts, I don’t know if I’ve ever even mentioned them on epiphany before so I made a conscious decision this year to reflect upon the gift aspect of this festival as it inspires our own gift giving, which if you were to take an objective look at Christmas, away from our lens of faith, it would seem to be one of the most central things about the season.

The predictability of a gift sermon is it ends up being about our own gifts and what we bring to the manger and therefore to the body of Christ, and this sermon was going to look very different to how it turned out, the themes were the same when I was planning it in my head but then….my family became obsessed with the new Disney film Encanto which came onto the Disney channel on Christmas Eve…I think we’ve watched it 7 or 8 times now.

So what is Encanto about? Well it’s about a very special family who each have, I’m sure you can guess…magical gifts…that is all except one. The central character, Mirabel has no gift. She’s completely ordinary and the whole town knows it. The family matriarch, their Abuela (the film is set in Columbia so there’s lots of Spanish names and references, Abuela is grandma), Abuela sees this lack of gift as a failure, something which will damage the family.

I’m sure I’ve mentioned before that I’m a film nerd, and it’s these ordinary characters like Mirabel that I always find the most relatable and interesting. Not the special, magical or superhero characters. 

I think a huge part of that is because I myself have always felt completely ordinary- don’t worry it’s not a self esteem or self-worth thing, I know I’m fabulous, but very ordinary, which is perfectly ok, because most people are it’s what keeps the world turning. 

Imagine how exhausting it would be if our lives were full of extraordinary people! And yes, we are all special and unique and extraordinary and uniquely loved my god…but in an everyday kind of a way.

What I mean is that we’re not all destined to be a top concert pianist, Olympic swimmer, noble prize winner or Prime minister (although the bar for that one is quite low).

What we see in Encanto is the weight and burden of the gifts upon those who’re labelled as special. Luisa has super strength but feels the weight of the entire town upon her, she feels she would be worthless if she couldn’t fulfil everyone’s expectations, that her only worth is in service. 

Isabella is beautiful and can create flowers and plants out of nothing, she makes everything around her beautiful. She feels the need to be perfect in all things and all times- this includes nearly marrying a man she doesn’t love because it’s expected of her. She never makes anything for herself and when she does she’s surprised and amazed to see it’s a spikey little cactus.

And poor Bruno, he follows the fate of so many biblical characters. He’s the family prophet who sees the future and is rejected for telling people difficult stuff they don’t want to hear.

And who is it that saves the day, the family and the town – fingers in your ears if you don’t want spoilers – but it’s Mirabel, of course it is. Ordinary, gift-less and in no way special. Or is she?

Because I see our ordinariness as a gift. How many magi were wandering around Bethlehem? Not many. How many shepherds? Dozens, maybe even 100s dotted around the outskirts of the city. Beyond ordinary, the lowest rung on the social ladder, and whilst the magi’s visit rounds off our manger story, let’s not forget that the shepherds received a personal invite from God’s holy messengers. They knew they had nothing to bring, utterly gift-less, and yet they came.

Now this is part of a gift sermon when we’re asked to contemplate our own gifts and what we can bring to the manger to lay before the Christ child, and how we can use our gifts to contribute to the body of Christ, but I’m not going to ask you to do that.

We have amazing, gifted, glorious people in this room but what I want you to do is contemplate and celebrate your ordinariness, because God does. The special, the exalted, the lifted up…are these the people Jesus chooses to spend his life with when grown? Is that the family and community God incarnate chose to be born into? Nope. Ordinary. The most extraordinary being chose ordinary because ordinary matters. 

Ordinary is what keeps the world turning, keeps us going, feeds families, cares for the sick, runs towns and cities, operates valuable services, puts kids to bed…and continues the cycles of love and living that God put into the world when God chose to create earth and life and humankind. Our extraordinary ordinariness. 

And as we contemplate our beautiful, ordinary lives, remember that this is what God chose that first Christmas, yes Jesus was for from ordinary, but his choice of an ordinary life, to begin with, is all the proof we need of how much God values us and what we bring to the world. And go and watch Encanto, it’s got some banging tunes. Amen.

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?’

Childlike Vulnerability

How many of us have day-dreamed about being great? Imagined that at the end of our lives- or preferably during it- someone might say “that Fiona Jenkinson, she was great”. Greatness means different things to different people I guess, so what might that mean to you?

It might be lifting the FA cup as the captain of your beloved football team, taking the chequered flag at Silverstone and being crowned F1 world champion, could be winning an Olympic gold medal or a Nobel prize in your chosen field. It might mean being Prime Minister or Archbishop of Canterbury. It could be heading up a charity that’s able to support a huge number of people in need. 

This kind of greatness is all to do with achievement and it’s usually something you can see reflected through other people’s eyes, that external validation boosts our own ego and helps us to confirm to ourselves, yes I am pretty great. 

It’s probably the case that as Christians we believe greatness to be something very different from these achievement based factors, that it might be something closer to the teaching in the reading from James this morning, that to be truly great we might possess the wisdom of God, first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. 

This makes me curious as to how the disciples were defining greatness in our gospel reading, and what led them to be having that discussion is the first place.

We find them with Jesus on the road, on a long and lonely journey. Jesus thinks this might be the right time to try and explain to them something that’s going to be really hard for them to hear- they’re soon going to be leaderless. He tries to explain to them that he’s going to die, that it has to happen, and that most importantly he’ll rise again. 

Sadly they’re not ready to hear it, they don’t understand and are scared by what Jesus is telling them, but rather than ask questions or ask for more explanation they stick their heads in the sand and fall into the kind of petty squabble we’ve seen them have before- who’s the best.

Maybe something of what Jesus has said has sunk in, maybe their banter about which of them is greatest is in part due to the fact that one of them will soon need to step into the leadership role that opens up when Jesus is arrested and killed.

I’m sure Jesus could hear what was going on behind him because when they reach Capernaum he gathers them together and asks “right lads, what was all that chat on the road about”. They fall silent, he’s talked to them about this kind of thing before and they probably know he’s got a few opinions to share.

He tells them what we’ve heard him say before- if you want to be lead, first you have to serve and serve everyone- be last of all and servant of all. Then he takes a child and tells them if you welcome a child like this you welcome him, and even more than that you welcome God.

Jesus completely flips the idea of greatness on it’s head and places the most vulnerable in society into the conversation.

But to truly understand this teaching I think it’s important to have an understanding of what children meant in this society because Jesus isn’t necessarily talking about welcoming the innocent and sinless, or children as we understand them now. The idea of children as angelic and innocent started in around the 18th century. Children weren’t revered as a symbol of innocence as they are now. 

When we’re talking about children in 1st century Palestine we’re talking about someone with no place and little value to the wider system. Infant mortality is estimated to have been around 30%, and although it’s difficult to know it’s thought that a further 30% died by the age of 9. If a child lived long enough to be useful the boys would be replacing the workforce and the girls married off to make more children to keep the cycle going.

Now we know children were loved by their families, of course they were, we see this in the story of Jairus’ daughter, but to society it was a different matter. How many children had Jairus and his wife already lost before the age of 9? Was that why their daughter was so precious? Yet with limited birth control how many families were welcoming children that were unwanted and seen as a burden until they were old enough to work or be married- if they lived that long.

There was no sentimentality about childhood. It was scary and it was messy. By telling the disciples the most important act of leadership is service, and the most important act of service is to welcome a child, Jesus is telling them that greatness is to be hospitable to a worthless, financially unviable human who has a high chance of dying on them. In short to serve those who can offer them nothing in return and might actually end up costing them something, financially and emotionally.

Now the easiest place to see ourselves in this gospel story is in the disciples, the community of Jesus followers trying to figure out how to serve, live and lead with Christ’s teachings, but something struck me after our church planning day last Saturday when Huw remined us of our need to be open with each other in our broken stories and vulnerabilities.

What if we’re the child? Hiding our broken stories and vulnerabilities is something we learn as we grow, we see the world’s response to them and the need to have an outward show of being OK, when we’re far from OK. What if our call as a community, our way to engender the gentleness born from the wisdom from above as James puts it, is to present ourselves childlike before each other, without those acquired ways of hiding our true selves. 

To be here, fully ourselves, vulnerable in whatever way we’re vulnerable, but knowing 100% that we’ll be fully loved, fully accepted and served by each other? Not scared of the cost of that service to our sisters and brothers? If we’re to serve the most vulnerable as if we’re serving Jesus himself surely it’s also part of our Christian calling when we’re the one who’s most vulnerable, to let our community care for us as if were letting Jesus himself care for us?

What if someone thought we were great because we were able to open ourselves up to them, present our truly authentic and vulnerable self, and by doing so gave them permission to do the same? And how might a community look who joined together without masks, without affectation, to be a place of welcome and service? Pure, peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. 

I feel this is the community we’re evolving into and from our planning day, having been apprehensive about the path ahead, I’m now excited about what might be possible and about what we can do as a people called to serve the world round them.

Based on James 3.13-4.3,7-8a 

And Mark 9.30-37

Me or We?

Today is the feast day of St James the Great, and we heard a little bit about him in our readings this morning. We heard about his death from St Paul, and in our gospel reading we had a little snapshot of one incident that may tell us a little of who he was, or at least who he was before Jesus’ death and resurrection.

So what do we know about him? Despite his and his brother’s aspirations to be at Jesus’ side in God’s kingdom, James the Great’s name probably came from his height, the other James probably being a bit shorter. He was the brother of Gospel writer John and with John, Simon Peter and Andrew, was one of the first to be called by Jesus. He was a fisherman but a man of means, his dad, Zebedee, employing several other men.

He's witness to key gospel events such as the Transfiguration and the healing of Jairus’ daughter. He also calls for hellfire to be called down upon a Samaritan town, only to be rebuked by Jesus and along with his brother gets the nickname the “sons of thunder”.

He is of course the patron saint of Spain and, according to legend, his remains are held in Santiago de Compostela in Galicia. When the 25th July falls on a Sunday like this year it’s considered to be a particularly holy year in the Spanish, Catholic tradition.

And this rather fiery sounding character actually inspires the most popular Christian pilgrimage of the modern age, the Camino de Santiago, having attracted over 300,000 travellers over the years. The popularity of this act of pilgrimage, discovery and faith is an interesting parallel to the character we see in todays gospel reading; maybe his own pilgrimage began here as he reflected upon Jesus’ response to his mother’s request, not fully understanding it until he had journeyed with Jesus through his death and resurrection and then met his own death as a follower of Christ.

“What do you want” Jesus asks as the family approach him. And this is our question too. What do we want from Jesus? From life? From our church? What motivates us? What matters most to us?

What do we think James and John really want from him? Greatness? Power? Security? Status? This story appears in the gospels of Matthew, Luke and Mark, but only in Matthew is their mum included. Matthew is big on detail, so I’m thinking the detail of her being there matters. Her sons have walked away from a profitable family business to join a religious sect. Even if she herself is a “believer” she’s also looking out for her boys. She wants to know they’re going to be ok, to have the status she believes is fitting.

But the message of God’s equality hasn’t quite sunk in yet and Jesus responds “you do not know what you are asking”. 

He tries to explain what power looks like to God, that whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be your slave; he tells them that ultimately his own pathway will lead to his death and that to truly follow him they must understand that this may be, and for James will be, their fate too.

It doesn’t feel very hopeful does it? it actually feels really sad. Most of these young men do die for their beliefs, with only John that I can think of reaching old age, his fate to recall all that happened and perfect his beautiful and poetic gospel and other writings, but without these men and without his brother.

So what’s the message that we should take from this gospel? That if we truly believe, our fate is to suffer like Jesus? I don’t believe that at all. The message I want to share is about where our motivations come from? Are we “me” centred or “we centred”?

That’s a little bit trite I know but when the Zebedee family come to Jesus their only concern is for their own fate and status, they want to know they’re going to be looked after. Jesus tries to explain that in God’s kingdom no one is first or last because everyone is first and last. That’s true equality. 

We have to think about where we fit in the bigger picture, that we’re each part of something bigger- our church, our town, our city, our country, our world. 

There’s nothing that’s just about us. And following Jesus isn’t going to bring power and status and glory- I would question any form of Christianity that looks like that.

Because I think that to follow Christ means we have to expect nothing but hope for everything. Now what I mean by this is that we can’t expect our lives not to be touched by illness or tragedy, financial problems, stress or difficulty. If we’re truly equal with our fellow humans we have to expect that bad things happen to everyone, regardless of our faith or belief. 

But we can “hope for everything”, by which I don’t mean to hope for greatness, wealth or status but to hope to see the world we believe is possible, to hope to see the world God knows can exist if we each take ourselves out of the centre of things and work towards a world where we put others at the centre, a “we” world not a “me” world.

Now to strive for equality doesn’t mean treating all people equally and it’s taken me a long time to figure this one out. If we think about the words of the Magnificat, Mary states that to achieve equality the rich must be brought down and the poor raised up, this way we meet in the middle.

Stepping out of the centre and looking in gives us a better viewpoint to see where our service is most needed. Who’re the people who need to be lifted up, and who needs to be brought back down- who has placed themselves so far above the ones they’re meant to serve that they’ve completely lost perspective and are only serving themselves? Part of our communal life is to hold them to account.

When we share our eucharist, even as oddly and at times metaphorically as we’ve shared it over the last 18 months, we’re saying to Jesus “I can drink your cup”, I can choose to try to live a communal life, a life of service, a life where I do my best to lift up those who need it and hold to account those who are only serving themselves. 

But there’s a reason why we don’t just have communion once, unlike our baptism it’s not a once only deal, we need to ask ourselves time and time again: can I still do this? Do I still want this? Can I still drink from this cup? We need the cup to be refilled so we can keep drinking from it, we need to be sustained, reaffirmed and reminded. Even Jesus asked if the cup could be taken from him, and if it’s ok for Jesus to ask then it’s OK for us too.

And sometimes we’re the ones who need serving and to be lifted up, at other times we need to brought back down and remined that we’re all servants. Joining together in communion with each other, repeating this act, helps us to refocus and be ready to say “yes, I can still do this” as we continue on our own personal pilgrimages, but are very much a part of something much bigger than just ourselves.

God of the Desperate

I was recently involved in delivering a teaching session for the current ALM module, which is about prayer and spirituality. The session I was asked to be part of was about prayer for wholeness and healing, which I’m very passionate about.

For me the whole ministry around wholeness and healing is a very practical one, it centres around loving people through adversity and empowering them to find peace and make their relationship with God and creation more whole. If physical healing also happens that’s a bonus.

We all know how rare and random healing miracles are, they appear to have very little to do with the strength of someone’s faith or how many people are praying for them, but the question inevitably came up in the teaching session- why aren’t miracles happening now?

In the version of the great commission as told in Mark’s gospel Jesus tells the disciples they’ll preach, baptise, cast out demons and heal. My response to this is usually that as we understand the concept of demons very differently to 1^st century Palestine, has our understanding of healing also changed? And yet we’re presented today with 2 very clear examples of physical healing miracles.

Due to the indiscriminate nature of healing miracles, both in the bible and our own lives, I always think they must tell us more about God than they do the individual. But that’s not to say the details don’t matter.

The most important question we should ask ourselves when reading the bible is “why did someone choose to write this down?” Why is it important? What are they trying to tell me? Why these details? And there are some really interesting details in this seemingly familiar but incredibly complex reading.

If we take the healing of Jairus’ daughter it’s interesting that we’re given the father’s name, his status is important. We’re told 3 times that he’s the leader of the Synagogue. As someone of such importance and high standing he’s risking everything by asking for Jesus’ help. We know the leaders of the synagogue were in direct opposition to Jesus, they were seeking his downfall and eventually conspired to bring it about. But none of that matters when your 12 year old child is dying, loyalties and logic go out of the window. Jairus’ love for his daughter was stronger than his pride or politics. He’s willing to try anything to save her, he’s desperate.

As Jesus heads out to heal this 12 year old child he encounter’s the unnamed woman who’s been haemorrhaging for 12 years, it can’t be a coincidence that she’s been suffering for the same time Jairus’ daughter has been alive. This detail fascinates me. It’s a really interesting time span as 12 years as a lifespan is nothing, for anyone to die aged just 12 is horrific. In the context of the family in our reading this girl would have been considered to be on the cusp of adulthood, nearing the transition from a child with all the hope and expectation that brings. But 12 years of life is nothing.

But 12 years suffering a debilitating illness? 12 years bleeding, being ritually unclean, excluded socially, excluded from your faith, spending every bit of money in the hope of a cure yet finding yourself even worse and completely cut off from everyone and everything which you value? In this case 12 years must feel like forever. Those of you who have a chronic illness I’m sure will understand her frustration and desperation. This woman is willing to try anything, she, like Jairus, is desperate.

And here is what I think links these 2 situations more than anything. We interpret these stories as ones of great faith, Jesus declares it, so we don’t examine it further. Yes, these people do have faith that Jesus’ will heal them…but in both cases it’s as a last resort. They’ve literally tried everything else, there’s nowhere else they can go. They turn to Jesus in utter desperation, with nothing else to lose- because the woman has lost everything already and because for Jairus he’d rather put himself in the woman’s position- be cast out socially and from his faith community, than lose his daughter.

This is where we see what these miracles tell us about God, the God of love, the God of the outcasts and marginalised, the God who heals those who are desperate, unloved and have nothing, the God who takes us in when we’ve risked or given up everything.

Jesus restores for Jairus the most important thing in his life, and gives back to the woman the life she’d lost, and even though in the narrative she’s unnamed he calls her “daughter”. God loves us, even the least of us, as much as Jairus loves his daughter, will go to any length to save us, and names us amongst God’s children. There’s something which I find incredibly affirming about these miracles, something which tells me so much about God.

The child who Jairus is prepared to give up everything for is a girl. This isn’t his son who’ll continue the family name and maybe stand alongside him at the temple, his motivation for risking his reputation and standing is purely motivated by love. I’m certain Jesus sees this.

Our unnamed and unknown women being healed and then called “daughter” by Jesus tells me that just like the disciples we revere and have sainted this woman is a beloved child of God. She matters to God. Both these people matter to and are loved by God even if they don’t matter to their society. It’s a reminder than God sees us and knows us and loves us even when nobody else does. We all matter to God, no matter other people’s opinions of us, or our opinion of ourselves. And we’re all capable of accessing a healing that yes, may not bring us a physical health but can bring us a spiritual one.

Through God we can see our own worth, and see how we’re seen by God, loved by God and how we matter to God. We can be healed of the things which stop us from loving ourselves and prevent us from being at peace with ourselves, the kind of peace which whilst it can’t protect us from illness or grief or even death, can enable us with the skills to better deal with the difficulties that we encounter, to better relate to God’s creation and ultimately to better see or own place and worth within it.

This sermon is based upon Mark 5:21-end