Into death

Image: Peter's Denial by Robert Leinweber

Sermon for St Catharine's Gloucester on 29th March 2020 based on the Bible readings: Luke 22.31-34 (Jesus foretells Peter's denial) and John 11.17-35 (Raising of Lazarus)

When I was praying back in November about the Lent course and what we would be looking at each week, I felt like God gave me the outline for the course and readings, and in week 6 – which is today’s sermon – I felt God was giving me the title ‘Into death’.  I mulled that over for a while, and when I realised that today was going to be the best date for the APCM, I slightly chickened out, and decided that rather than speaking on ‘into death’ at the APCM I would speak on ‘living as the church’, and so that is what went into the Lent booklets.  The strange thing was that I have kept that original scrap of paper on my desk for the last four months, and kept looking again at that title: ‘Into death’ and wondering what it meant.  Well, that has become very clear in the last couple of weeks!  And I have felt strangely comforted that God already knew that we would be facing this situation with coronavirus way before we did.  So today we will be looking at what it means to journey into death and how Jesus is with us even in that.  After Easter we will return to the Lent course and what it means to ‘live as the church’, and I expect our answer on the other side of coronavirus is going to look rather different to what we imagined before.

In our readings we see Jesus present in two forms of death: the death of our hopes and expectations about our own faith, and the physical death experienced by Lazarus.  In Peter we see the death of his own expectations about himself, and what he is able to do for Jesus: ‘Lord I am ready to go with you to prison and to death’.  But Jesus knows Peter better than Peter knows himself, and He knows that Peter will deny Him three times.  I wonder where you find yourself this week.  For those of you who have had the physical reality of the church as an anchor point in your weeks, there will be a deep grief at the loss of that, alongside the loss of so many other things.  Like Peter, facing the death of Jesus and the loss of all that was familiar, you might find facing the reality of these changes too painful and demanding.  We are being pushed out of the familiar, out of our comfort zones. And we see in these few short verses, that the test Peter will go through, like the test we are facing will be severe.  Jesus in fact makes it clear that Peter will be unable to come through it by himself.  But here is the amazing promise, that Peter will not face it alone.  At his side stands Jesus, who promises to be praying for Peter and for his faith.  As we will hear again today in the words of the eucharistic prayer, Jesus is still praying for us today, interceding for us at the right hand of our Father.  And Jesus promises that Peter will turn back, and when he does Jesus encourages him to strengthen those around him.  

Over these weeks ahead, we are all going to face tests of our faith and trust in God but hold on to this promise from our faithful God, Jesus is praying for you and is with you through this.  You may well turn away, you may well realise that you are not the Christian you thought you were, you may well come face-to-face with the reality that you can’t do for Jesus all that you hoped you could.  And what do we do when that happens?  I think that is where the gift of confession comes in.  Because how do we know that Peter did indeed go on to deny Jesus three times?  We know because Peter himself must have told others the story.  And this is the true gift that God gives us, because the truth is that we can’t hold on to God by our sheer willpower - even Jesus on the cross thought His Father had forsaken Him - but God is the One who holds us and prays for us.   And so our testimony on the other side of this, if we are willing to acknowledge we have been unable to make the journey alone, will be a humble testimony of the faithfulness of God towards us.  Confessing our weakness and receiving God’s mercy and strength.

In our reading from John, we begin to get a glimpse of the hope that we have in Jesus as we face the death of all that is familiar, and face the reality of physical death more acutely.  Lazarus has been dead for four days before Jesus comes.  For Jews this was a sign that the spirit had left the body, and hope was gone.  Martha shows great trust in Jesus, that Jesus still could make a difference.  And we learn that resurrection hope does have a name, and that name is Jesus.  Jesus is the resurrection and the life.  To be bound to Jesus by faith is to be able to share now the life which is beyond physical death.   

Martha realising this tenderly draws her sister Mary aside, and relays the news that Jesus wants to speak to her, Jesus is calling her to come, and a spark of faith perhaps arises in Mary and she goes quickly to Jesus, or perhaps she is ready to take her anger out on him? She falls at Jesus' feet bringing no request, just her tears. And I'm not sure whether she is (angry) Lord if you had been here my brother would not have died, is (bitter) Lord if you had been here my brother would not have died, or is (in grief) Lord if you had been here my brother would not have died. Whatever it was she showed no obvious faith in Jesus, and as she and the crowd of Jews weep, Jesus shows extreme emotion too, which ends with him crying alongside them.  God weeps over our loss, suffering and trauma.  God promises to be our comforter, the one who draws alongside us, even in death.

It may be at the moment, you don’t know how to answer the question ‘where is God in all of this?’ for yourself or for those around you.  And there is no easy answer when we might want God to click fingers and make this alright.  But that is not the Christian faith.  The Bible tells us that the world is broken and messed up, and the Christian faith is not one that offers an easy fix.  It is a faith that says that God enters the brokenness and the mess, and journeys with us through it, praying for us, and strengthening us.  Recognising that things are not as they should be and offering to work with us to make things right again.  It is of a deeper hope than a quick fix.  It is hope of the healing of all things.  We have an opportunity in the midst of this to truly face ourselves, realise we just cannot to this life alone, throw ourselves on the mercy of God, and work with God to reset our lives, to value the things that are really important.  We already see it happening all around us as life is simplified.  I cried on my doorstep on Friday evening hearing the clapping and cheers and fireworks at 8pm.  People coming together and valuing the NHS and others who are sacrificing themselves for others. 

The Christian story is one of journeying into death and out the other side into new life.  Of giving up our need for control and learning to trust God.  It is not an easy journey but God is with us all, God loves us all, and is faithful to us all.  Amen.

Some questions to think about this week:

·       What hopes and expectations about yourself and God are you having to give up?  Can you offer those to God?  What is God giving you in exchange?

·       Are you able to face and confess your fears to God?  What happens when you do?  Can you receive God’s comfort and mercy and peace? 

·       Jesus says that he is the resurrection and the life.  What does that promise mean for you right now?

hallelujah

Hallelujah or Alleluia...it's that time of year when Christians say it a lot! It means 'praise ye the Lord' or 'Dudes! Let's praise God!'.  We say it to encourage one another to recognise how awesome God is.  It feels a particularly powerful word just after Easter in the Church of England because we have tried to avoid saying it in Lent during the six weeks that run up to Easter.  Why?  Because we are waiting for Jesus to be fully revealed as a different sort of Lord and King.  A King who was enthroned on a cross, killed by those he chose to forgive as he showed that through him - Jesus - nothing can separate us from the love of God.


Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8.38-9).


After Easter I went off to Spring Harvest with my church.  Spring Harvest is a big Christian conference with thousands of people gathered together to study the bible, pray and sing to God, and learn more about how to live the Christian life.  Whilst I was there we had the privilege to hear from someone who had spent many years in prison in North Korea for being a Christian.  It was a distressing and powerful story to hear which involved the killing of family members, brutal torture, hard labour, and unbearable living conditions.  In this place of sleeping on cold concrete, rat and insect infected, piled up in small rooms with people who died in the night and whose bodies were often not removed for days...in this place the whispered gatherings of a handful of people kept faith and hope alive.


As Christian believers passed each other they would whisper to each other 'hallelujah'.  What an extraordinary word to whisper into the face of unbelievable oppression. Hallelujah.  What is it about Jesus that draws praise from the lips of someone in the midst of such intense suffering?  Hallelujah.  I think it is this truth that there is no place to which God is not prepared to go to with you so that it can be healed and redeemed.  And in that truth is hope. 


Leonard Cohen sings of hallelujahs that are cold, hallelujahs that are broken, hallelujahs that are holy.  Choosing to praise the Lord does not always come from a place of joy and peace. Sometimes it may not even come from a place of hope.  But the hallelujah that emerges as a trailing whisper from the very end of ourselves will always connect us to the One who knows our end from our beginning, who holds our lives together. 

Women

During our time in Tanzania we met so many amazing women.  Women who were bringing up large families, women with important jobs, women walking miles with heavy loads on their heads, women doing hard manual labour with babies strapped to them, women who were overlooked despite their skills because of their gender, women who were studying hard, women who exuded joy, women who seemed crushed.  It was a privilege whilst there to have a week as a group teaching and spending time with the students at Lake Tanganyika Theological College. This college runs to train priests and evangelists and anyone who wants to undertake, and can afford to undertake, theological training within the Diocese of Western Tanganyika.

 

At the moment in the diocese, women cannot be ordained priest, and because four of us in the visiting group were ordained women, this generated some great conversations.  Everywhere we went people were very gracious and accepting of our ministry.  The principal of the theological college is keen to encourage women to study and train for ordination in the hope that the diocese will approve the ordination of women in the near future, and one of the things we did during the visit was to lay a foundation stone for a new women's dormitory at the college. Money that has been raised through offerings in Gloucester Diocese, including at my own ordination, have been sent as a gift to help with this building project.  It was a joyous moment to see the building emerging from the mud, and we prayed for the women who would study there.  £25 a month will cover their tuition fees, and sponsorship is needed as it is harder for women to get funded than for men at the moment.

During our time teaching at the college, we looked at several different biblical characters, and the leadership lessons that we could learn from them.  It was a really good learning experience for us and for the students as we looked at the Bible from very different perspectives.  At the end of the week the students gave feedback to the whole college, and it was really encouraging to hear a shift in the perspective of the (all male) students.  I wrote down a couple of things they said:

 

"I learnt from studying Deborah in the book of Judges that the service of God is not just for men but for women. We can support them to become brave. We can empower them to become good leaders."

 

"We learnt women can do everything a man can do. They can be brave strong leaders."

If we did nothing else during our trip, it was worth it to hear these things, and we pray that it has opened the door a little wider for the women God is calling to serve in the church in that diocese.

Ugly bulbs

For the first time in a few years I have been growing an amaryllis lily.  When I planted the huge ugly bulb 5 weeks ago in a pot that was almost as big as the bulb I had forgotten what an extraordinary process it is watching the stem, bud and flowers emerge.  The stems are now 72cm!  And the flowers that have been opening in the last few days are quite beautiful. Who would have imagined all that life and beauty was waiting to burst free?  Certainly the look on my little nephews face when I showed him the bulb at Christmas said something along the lines of 'you must be mad, that is like the worst and weirdest Christmas present in the world!'


A couple of weeks ago my sermon was on 2 Corinthians 5.11-21.  In that passage, we are reminded that Jesus looked like nothing special, but turned out to be God, and so we should learn from this not to judge people by what we see.  God is at work in people bringing new life (new acts of creation the verse says). It can be pretty discouraging sometimes looking around at the world, wondering if things are going to change or whether they will stay ugly and broken.  And then I look at myself, and think about the changes that God has helped bring about in me, sometimes in the blink of an eye and sometimes in the imperceptible process of reflection, repentance and forgiveness.  We all look pretty ugly inside from certain angles, maybe in places so hidden from others that only God sees.  But watching my lily grow reminds me that God is not fazed by the ugly and the broken, because God sees the potential of life and beauty held within that and always wants to call it forth.

Manchester

View of Manchester from the Cathedral © Robert Watson



This morning I put on my dog collar with a heavy heart and a sense of trepidation. What does it mean to wake up in the morning, as a vicar, to hear the news of an attack like the suicide bombing in Manchester? After initial prayers for those caught up in the bombing, thoughts turn to your own community. What effect will it have on people here? And what words can I offer into that? The swirl of your own distress about what has happened somehow needs to be oriented towards God. Within an hour, the first conversation, a man walking home with his paper, feeling like nowhere is safe now. Also not knowing how to respond. I urge him to do good and believe in the goodness of others. Because that is apparent too. One bomber versus thousands of people helping because they were there, or it is their job, or they could do something small to help another. Twitter full of offers of beds, tea and phones. A narrative of hate, some would say evil, juxtaposed with a narrative of love, care and compassion.

And so this is where I begin when I think about our world. The truth is that we all carry within us a mixture of love and hate, of good and bad. We all have a choice about which direction we want to move towards, to love more or to hate more, to do good things more often or bad things more often. I wish I was more consistent in my choices, but even the most consistent person does not live a perfect life of love and goodness. And what are we to do about this? In a bomber we might see the magnification of a hate that we sometimes see in ourselves. In a grandfather who swoops down to keep an unknown young girl safe until he can find a way to reunite her with her parents we see a magnification of care and love that we sometimes see in ourselves.

And this is why the Christian story gives me hope. Because it is a story of original goodness. It is a story that both recognises the extraordinary value of every life, and this capability we all have of choosing to do good things and bad things. It is a story of a God who loves and cares so much about people that these good and bad choices are not left hanging, but are gathered up by One who judges justly. And in this gathering up also offers the opportunity of repentance and forgiveness. I cannot give an answer to why bad things happen, but my trust is in a God who can hold all that together and calls us into a story of hope and redemption.

Place and space

Psalm 84 opens with the words 'How lovely is your dwelling place O Lord', the NET Bible translates this as 'How lovely is the place where you live, O Lord who reigns over all!'. Of course the Psalmist is referring to being in the Temple in Jerusalem with God, this was the special place where heaven and earth met in the Holy of Holies.

Since you could only go into the Holy of Holies once a year and then only if you were High Priest, there were not many people who were dwelling with God.  The Psalmist was desperate to even just be in the courts of the Temple and satisfied that God was near. The arrival of Jesus into the world changed the place where God dwelled.  Jesus is God, and so wherever He was there was a meeting of heaven and earth and an opening of the divine.  We often call this the Kingdom of God, and where Jesus was, there the Kingdom started to become a reality on earth. 

This is what makes being a Christian so amazing because when Jesus was killed by us, that was not the end, He broke through death into new life and assures us that by having faith that He is God we can both still be sure of His presence with us always (Matt 28:20) and  that He has opened a connection between heaven and earth (Heb 8-10), a way for us to be in the presence of God.  This is not just a hope for the future, it is a hope for now, that as Christians we can expect the Kingdom of God to be manifest where we are because God is with us there. 

So anyway, all this got me thinking about place and space....

At the moment in the UK, the two areas where people increasingly have a Christian engagement are in cathedrals (attendance up 30% in the last 10 years according to Church of England stats) and in churches with a Pentecostal emphasis (see Christian research stats), i.e. those churches that emphasise direct personal experience of God and the work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers.  I think this should be of no surprise to us.  We live in a culture that is looking for meaning in life, and essentially because God created everything this means that searching for meaning is searching for God. Searching for where He dwells. 

I think this is where place becomes important. When Christians gather, there is God (Matt 18:20). When this happens repeatedly over many years in places that act as memorials to encounter with the living God, in places that proclaim His glory through their beauty, then I think it helps us get caught up in the big story of God that stretches through the past, present and future, anchoring us and giving us hope. I think this is what cathedrals are starting to increasingly be symbols of, that God is present in places, He is not remote from us.

I think this is also why space is important.  Churches (or us in our individual Christian lives) that make space for an encounter with God, will experience an encounter with God. Churches with a Pentecostal emphasis seek to do this and teach this. The book of Ephesians talks about us being a dwelling place for God as individuals (Eph 3:17) and as a corporate body, a community built together by God (Eph 2:22). And because we are known fully by God, making space for an encounter with Him brings meaning, understanding and transformation to our lives.

Back to Psalm 84 then, and the reason for the name of this blog. I want to be where God dwells, my heart and soul yearn for Him. I want to see the places where He is dwelling and at work, and I want to make space for Him to dwell in my life and the lives of people around me.