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| Teach me, O God not to torture myself, not to make a martyr out of myself through trifling reflection, but rather teach me to breathe deeply in faith. |
| Soren Kierkegaard |
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SERMON LIBRARY |
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· Deacon Debbie Wesseloo (2)
· Deacon Phillip Laurings (3)
· Dean William Mosert (1)
· Reverend Angus Paterson (0)
· Reverend Graham Alexander (1)
· Reverend Joe Thompson (2)
· Reverend Lindy Rookyard (4)
· Visiting Clergy (0)
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| Date | 2006-07-16 | | Preacher | Gillian Rookyard | | Title | Sermon | | Sermon Details | As I stand here this morning I’m extremely grateful that you’re only able to see the top half of my body, and not able to see what my knees are doing, or know how my tummy is feeling! I feel privileged and humbled to be able to share with you today, that which I will always remember as my first sermon. It is the beginning of a brand new journey for me, and so from the outset I need to ask for your forgiveness – just in case I read the map incorrectly, take a wrong turn, or mistakenly take a detour along the way!
The two weeks since my ordination have been filled with new experiences, special moments, many smiles and some joyful tears as well. It has been such a blessing to be welcomed so lovingly into this parish family as a Deacon, and I’d like to thank each of you for your love, support and prayers during this time. The school family have been superb as well, and it has been questions like – Miss Rookyard, what’s it like being married to God? – that will remain etched in my heart forever. I could never have imagined what God, as the author of the story of my life, had planned for me, and I look forward to experiencing each new chapter as He reveals it!
Today we begin our 8-week sermon series based on the new multi-media project called Heart-lines. We know that capturing the minds of people through story telling is not new to the African Continent, and has proved to be a highly effective way to get a message across. Heart-lines is an initiative which will use television, radio and print media to tell stories aimed at getting the nation talking and thinking about values. Based on the premise that South Africans – regardless of race, colour or creed, share many of the same core values, this project aims to use multi media to create debate about, and reinforce these core values, hopefully resulting in values – driven transformation! The vision of the project is to challenge people to live out Godly values, such as acceptance, honesty, tolerance and compassion, resulting in a transformed society, firstly in South Africa, and then the rest of the continent.
The film being screened tonight on SABC 2 at 20:00 embraces the value of acceptance. Acceptance is a multi-storied concept, and as such can be explored on so many different levels. Each of our readings today teaches us something different about acceptance, and how it can enrich our lives if embraced with an open heart.
The Old Testament lesson, and re-iterated in the Psalm, reveals how God’s plan for David was made known, and then fulfilled, through David’s humble acceptance of God’s promise, a promise to extend his dynasty. Through David’s acceptance, God was able to fulfil His promise and purpose for Israel, and bring great blessings to them as a nation. Since the God of Israel is the God of our lives too, surely we can rest in the confident assurance that if we accept the plan which God reveals to each of us for our own lives, an overflowing of abundant blessings will come forth.
Paul’s letter to the Ephesians in the New Testament is one of my favourite portions of Scripture, as it describes so beautifully God’s unconditional acceptance of us. Paul writes that God chose us in Him before the creation of the world, and that He predestined us to be adopted as His children through Jesus. A more awesome privilege I’m yet to encounter! The mystery of our salvation originated in the timeless mind of God long before we existed. It is often difficult to understand how God could possibly accept us, but because of Christ, we are holy and blameless in His sight. God chose us, He accepted us, and we belong to Him. In His infinite love, God has adopted us as His own children, and through Jesus’ sacrifice, He brought us into His family, and made us heirs along with His Son. Paul uses the term ‘adoption’, because under Roman law adopted children had the same rights and privileges as biological children, even if they had been slaves. Thus, through the wonder freely given to us in the One He loves, each of us, once slave to sin, are now fully reconciled to God and completely accepted by Him. As a result, the riches of His grace are lavished upon us.
The Gospel reading once again shows God’s plan being fulfilled through acceptance – this time through the disciples’ acceptance of the mission assigned to them by Jesus, and their belief that He would equip them with all that they needed to fulfil their task. Each of us have a mission assigned to us by God, and through our acceptance of that mission and the action which results, God is able to use us as instruments of His grace, and His plan can be fulfilled.
What does all of this in fact mean for each of us in our daily lives, as SA citizens, as members of a particular ethnic and cultural group, as husbands, wives, children, co-workers … What is it that makes “Acceptance” a Christian value, a value which requires our conscious awareness? Surely, if God grants each of us acceptance in our diversity, we are called to do the same. We are called to love one another, and isn’t acceptance an under-girding pre-requisite of love?
The Genesis accounts of Creation reveal God’s satisfaction in creating man and woman in His image, the image of the Triune God, the Trinity, in relationship, and in communion, with One another. We were created out of that perfect set of relationships. He created us in an act of relationship within Himself, and then immediately puts us into relationship with one another, to abide with one another in that same sense of a loving community. C.S. Lewis once wrote: “Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour, he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ, the glorifier and the glorified, glory Himself, is actually hidden”. Yet how often does the frailty of our humanity mutilate this image, as it becomes tarnished and twisted by sin? God’s intention, however, has always been to restore us fully to being his royal sons and daughters – princes and princesses of the King of the Universe. He came and showed us how to be human, and he gave us a way to become fully human again. Paul, in many of his letters, describes this state of restored humanity so beautifully. To the Colossians he writes that “God has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation”; and to the Corinthians, “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”
Yesterday I attended a monthly meeting of the Siyalalela counsellors in our diocese. Bishop David was the speaker, and he re-iterated this point so beautifully. He reminded us how so often in the common culture of our day, the trend is to focus on the brokenness, the frailty, the ‘yuk stuff’ in the lives of the people we meet, instead of first seeing the fullness of their humanity in Christ, and then acknowledging the brokenness within that context. And that, it is when the Christ within is blurred, that brokenness such as abuse, oppression, marginalisation, prejudice and discrimination, come to the fore.
That is why the Church is such a blessing. The Church is God’s community of redeemed people – people whose image is being repaired – and as such is meant to be the primary place where acceptance and reconciliation are practised. In the early church, this was seen in the fact that Jewish and Gentile Christians could be in full community with one another, instead of remaining divided along ethnic lines. This reconciliation was all pervasive, since within the church of the New Testament we see reconciliation of male and female, and of ethnic and culture groups. To one local church Paul said, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus”.
The Bible closes with a vision of the future that goes beyond the magnificence of God’s creation in Genesis. Here we see the glorious conclusion to history, where men and women are in “a great multitude that no-one could count”, and who come “from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb, worshipping the One who died on the cross in order to remake them in His image”.
Our challenge as Christians embraces the value of acceptance. An appreciation of diversity enriches our lives and opens us up to looking at life differently. As we approach the Lord’s Table, I encourage you to recall C.S. Lewis’ quote that says, “Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses”, and as you consume this most precious gift, to re-dedicate your life to accepting all those placed along your journey through life, just as Christ did.
Amen!
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| Date | 2007-01-08 | | Preacher | Rev Gill Rookyard | | Title | Baptism of our lord (c) | | Sermon Details | We all know the old familiar nursery rhyme "Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. All the Kings horses and all the kings men. Couldn’t put Humpty together again”. Probably not a subject you thought you would hear on Sunday from a pulpit. Humpty Dumpty was this egg who lived in a kingdom. He was cheerful and chipper sitting high upon a wall. Never had the fear of being poached, boiled, or fried. Never had the concern of becoming an omelet or a meringue. Humpty Dumpty lived a good life. But one day as he sat up on top of his wall, something happened. Now the story doesn’t tell us the reason for his falling, but simply tells us that he fell, and lay shattered. Somebody called the king of the town to come and try to put this egg’s life back together. The king and his footmen gave up and left Humpty Dumpty in a heap. What in the world does this have to do with anything? How is it that Humpty Dumpty is scriptural? Well, look at the fate of these children of Israel! Broke down and beaten. Scattered, shattered, battered, and tattered by life. Their lives appeared to go from victor to victim as their lives lay in ruins. The local officials unable to rectify the situation just like the king in Mother Goose land. But Isaiah wanted them to look to the almighty King. The one who could raise up what has been beaten down. Release what has been held captive. Bind up what has been broken. Repair what has been ruined. Deliver what has been devastated. And what the local yokels couldn’t put together again, the Almighty King would do and do so using the very ones that tore it down! This was Isaiah’s prophesy!
Isaiah knew who God was. He knew his father up close and personal. He understood his ability. He was certain that he could repair and restore. Isaiah was confident that God didn’t need any horses or any large group of men to put their life together again.
These words are quoted again by Christ with reference to his mission. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom to the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour”. Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, and he began saying to them, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing”.
And the Scripture had been fulfilled because Christ had received the gift of the Holy Spirit at his baptism, the feast we’re celebrating today, and being empowered by that gift initiated His time of public ministry, the time when that prophesy would be fulfilled.
Isaiah speaks, in quite a detailed fashion, of the Spirit led ministry that the Messiah was set apart to do. In our Gospel reading, we hear that the people were waiting expectantly, as there had not been a prophet in Israel for more than 400 years. It was widely believed that when the Messiah came, prophesy would reappear. When John burst onto the scene, the people were excited. He was obviously a great prophet, and they were sure that the eagerly awaited age of the Messiah had come. Some, in fact, thought that John himself was the Messiah, but John had come to prepare people for the coming of the Messiah. And we know, that the Messiah, is Christ!
Just as in Isaiah’s prophesy, Jesus – the Messiah, came to set spiritually captive people free. He came to give relief to the downtrodden, the hurting, those who are in mourning, and the oppressed. Jesus came to reach out to those whom the rest of society had rejected or denigrated –the poor, the widows, the lepers, beggars, and blind people, children, women
Jesus came to counteract the works of Satan: slavery to sin, poorness of spirit, broken heartedness, spirit of heaviness, mourning. Jesus came to change all that and ultimately to once and for all triumph over Satan upon the cross. It is for freedom, and to freedom, that Christ has called us… he came to heal a broken world; he came to mend and restore the shattered eggs!
In our New Testament reading, we see how the disciples – Peter and John - themselves empowered by the Holy Spirit, went to Samaria, and prayed for the people there to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, to empower them in their new Christian journey. These disciples were following Christ’s example, by taking God’s presence and Gospel of love into the world.
The baptism of Jesus as recorded in Luke’s Gospel, was the first public declaration of Jesus’ ministry. Instead of going to Jerusalem and identifying with the established religious leaders, Jesus went to the Jordan River and identified with those who were repenting of sin, those cracked, shattered and scrambled eggs. While Jesus prayed, Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased”. God was breaking into human history through Jesus the Christ! As baptized Christians, I believe each of us has received that same gift of the Holy Spirit and that same message – You are my son, my daughter, my beloved, with you I am well pleased. In baptism, the promise of God’s presence is real. We experience God’s presence in our lives here today as we gather for worship. In word and sacrament we are touched by the presence of God. God in Jesus Christ comes to us in the reading of the Scriptures, the preaching of the sermon, the liturgy, the music. God in Christ Jesus comes to us again in His body and blood, the bread and wine of the Eucharist, as Jesus says to us, this is my body given for you, this is my blood shed for you. Also, as we are gathered here today, we come as God’s people, together. In our midst God is here. Dr. Eugene Brand, a medical doctor and missionary, once wrote, “Jesus departed, leaving no body on earth to exhibit the Spirit of God to an unbelieving world — except the faltering, bumbling community of followers who had largely forsaken Him at His death. We are what Jesus left on earth. He did not leave a book or a doctrinal statement or a system of thought; He left a visible community to embody Him and represent Him to the world....we are the body of Christ. The Spirit has come and dwelt among us, and the world knows an invisible God mainly by our representation, our enfleshment of Him. We form God’s presence in the world through the indwelling of His Spirit.”
Wow — what a gift — what a promise. All of us, we are the promise of God’s presence to one another. For we are the arms, the feet, the voice of Christ in the world. When someone is walking a road that is painful or difficult, we as the body of Christ can be there with a touch of assurance, a word of encouragement, a caring ear, and be the egg menders that Christ has called us to be!
As we stand at the dawn of a new year, God in Jesus Christ has promised to be with us. No matter what our journey may be in the year ahead -- we go forward knowing that God in Jesus Christ goes with us. We experience the promise of His presence through word and sacrament, through our prayers, through each other. Yet knowing that God walks alongside of us no matter what lies ahead is a promise that makes it possible for us to journey into the unforeseen future ahead of us. We go because we know God goes with us. And even if we fall off the wall, just as Humpty Dumpty did, we can get put back together again, by allowing the real King to do the mending. Some of our walls are higher than others and some of us are clumsy and we appear to fall more frequently. Some of us have new pieces because the old shell was just too battered. But the bottom line, those who believe in the true King, get put together again. You see it doesn’t matter how large or how small your fall. God has got the best super glue on the market and that is the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit fills in the crevices of our broken shell and replenishes our inner being where we have lost some of our substance. The Holy Spirit is the rectifier and the fortifier. It sustains and it maintains. It corrects and it amends. And when we have a personal relationship with the King we are able to receive rectifying from the King - He reaches down to pick us up - fix us up - and place our feet on a rock to stand!
This Baptism of our Lord Sunday is a time for us to celebrate God’s love and promise that He will be with us always and to give thanks for the gift of His presence in the Holy Spirit. How we live out that gift is up to us – we could choose to sit on top of the world and watch the world go by, we could lie at the bottom of the wall in a scrambled heap, or can get out there and fulfil the example of ministry which Christ, the prophesied Messiah, has set before us to do. |
| Date | 2006-12-03 | | Preacher | Gill Rookyard | | Title | Advent 1 (C) | | Sermon Details | Jer 33: 14 – 16; Ps 25: 1 – 10; 1 Thess 3: 9 – 13 and Luke 21:25 - 36
Today is the first Sunday of the Church year. It is also the first Sunday in Advent, the dawn of our preparation for the joyous celebration of Christmas. But before we begin to explore exactly what this season of Advent means for each of us in our own lives, may I pose a seemingly unrelated question to you …
What is the single question hated most by moms and dads?
What is the single question hated most by moms and dads?
Not being a mom myself, I guess I’m not really qualified to answer, but having been a child who asked this question on far too many occasions, I think I am! I’d like to suggest that its not the “Where do I come from?” question, nor the “What happens when I die?” question, and not even the “But who made God?” question, but rather the “How much further?” question, repeated umpteen times from the outskirts of Benoni all the way to a holiday destination, or wherever you happen to be travelling to!
“How much further?” – It’s an impossible question! How do you speak of time and distance to someone who doesn’t understand time and distance? The world of a child is delightfully free of distance markers and alarm clocks. You can speak of minutes and kilometres, but a child has no way of assimilating them and allowing them to make sense in their life experience! So what do you do? Most parents get creative and come up with fancy ideas, but sooner or later the question is asked again, and again – until eventually you decide to start your next trip in the wee hours of the morning so that you only have to face the dreaded question as the sun appears on the horizon and the smell of the sea wafts in the air.
Advent, like a car trip, presents us with the “How much further?” question, asked this time by both children and adults alike. For children, the answer is easy, and solved for us by the genius inventor of the Advent calendar, with a little window to open for each day leading up to Christmas! For adults though, it’s a little bit more complicated than that. Now don’t get me wrong, I too count down the sleeps to Christmas Day – a day filled with friends, family, fun, food, pressies, and the occasional church service (or 3)! But as adults we acknowledge that within Advent there is a two-fold expectation, and preparation, that needs our attention. Advent looks firstly to our being attentive to the preparation to celebrate the birth of Christ, and secondly, our being attentive to an uncertain, and seemingly distant future, when Christ will come again to our world to bring His kingdom to perfection. The two are not unrelated – we have sure faith in Christ’s second coming because we accept His first coming with firm faith. What God promised was fulfilled in the first coming of Christ, and what God still promises will be fulfilled in the second coming. Because we believe that Christ came once, we believe that He will come again. One promise fulfilled is a pledge of a promise to be fulfilled.
God taught His people through the prophets to hope for salvation despite their sinfulness. He so loved the world that in the fullness of time He sent His only Son, born of the Virgin Mary, to be our Saviour. In fulfilment of God’s will, the Son gave Himself up to death, but by rising from the dead He destroyed death and restored life. This wonderful story of our faith is meant to engender within us a great confidence about our ultimate future.
Jesus’ own description of His second coming, in our Gospel reading today, with “the roaring of the seas” and “the heaven shaking”, might indeed be fascinating to some, but frightening to many!, and was something that I chose not to think about for a long time, as I too found it quite a frightening idea. However, Jesus spoke about the end of the world not to scare us – although a good scare it is and at times worth more to us than good advice – but Jesus, who always said “Fear not! Believe” cannot speak of the end time to frighten us. He knew too well that fear imprisons, but faith liberates; fear paralyses but faith empowers; and fear sickens but faith heals. Hence, Christ’s purpose of describing the end was not to instil fear, but to inspire us with the urgency of the gospel message: A gospel message for the people of today, living on the bridge of life between the joy of the Incarnation, and the expectation of the second coming. It is impossible to choose to live solely on either side of the bridge, and as such we are called to embrace the “now” – because the “now” is the only certain moment we can be sure of.
There are 4 “NOWS” that I’d like us to consider this morning:
The time is NOW, to organise our lives with right priorities.
If I were to ask you, “If you had been on the Titanic when it sunk, would you have re-arranged the deck chairs?”, surely your response would be that it is a ridiculous question, for who in their right minds would ignore the wailing sirens of a sinking ship and rearrange the deck chairs instead! But then, we know that our life on earth is so brief that in the midst of life, we are in death; that our world with all its display of pomp and glory is dissolving. And yet it is possible that some of us are so busy making a living, that we forget the purpose of living, “allowing our spirits to become bloated with indulgence and worldly cares” (Lk 21:34). Is it not like re-arranging deck chairs on a sinking ship?
The time is NOW, to “watch and pray” (Lk 21: 36)
Prayer opens our eyes to the presence of God, helping us to see everything in proper perspective, and implants in our hearts peace, even in the midst of problems and pain. Prayer is also listening to God’s Word. How eager are we to listen to the news? Suppose we turn on the TV tonight and see God reading the news! Surely, it would lift us out of our seats. And yet, it is God who speaks in the Scriptures. In the days to come, before Christmas, we will feel the powerful presence of God in His Word, provided we believe as Jeremiah did, that the Lord says “See, the days are coming, when I am going to fulfil the promise” (Jer 33:14).
The time is NOW, to love and share in a true Christian way.
The lonely are lonely today. The HIV / AIDS sufferers are suffering today. The hungry are hungry today. When God became a human being, he brought all of us into a grand relationship not only with Himself, but with our fellow human beings. Paul, in his letter to the Thessalonians, prays for the Lord to make them “increase and abound in love for one another and for all” (1 Thes 3: 12). It encourages us to lift our spirit of sharing, since sharing does not impoverish us, but rather enriches us with a deep sense of satisfaction.
The time is NOW, to wait on the Lord and hope.
I’m sure we can each recall an occasion when we’ve stood in the international arrival terminal of the airport, waiting for a loved one to walk through those doors, and how thrilled we were to see them emerging, to complete the joy of our reunion. Likewise, during Advent, we await the celebration of the coming of the Lord into our lives, and the expectation of His coming again, when our reunion with Him will complete our joy.
The time is now, and in the present moment of now, and the present moment in our journey of life, to the celebration of Christmas, and to the expectation once more of Christ’s return, we each have a choice: We could choose to become so fixated on the “How much further?” question that we lose sight of the beauty and delight which our journey through life has to offer as we focus on the technical details, or we could sleep through this wondrous journey and only awake as the Son appears on the horizon, or we could choose to live our lives as children live through the Advent season – each day opening a new window, revealing new wonders, new opportunities, new experiences, and new encounters of love.
THE TIME IS NOW…
Amen. |
| Date | 2006-08-20 | | Preacher | Gill Rookyard | | Title | 20 August 2006 (Twentieth Sunday – Year B) | | Sermon Details | 20 August 2006 (Twentieth Sunday – Year B) 07:00 and 09:00 – St Dunstan’s Cathedral
THEME: Honesty
A very distinguished lady was on a plane arriving from Switzerland. She found herself seated next to a nice priest whom she talked with then asked, "Excuse me, Father, could I ask a favour?"
"Of course, my child. What can I do for you?"
"Here's the problem; I bought myself a new sophisticated electronic hair remover for which I paid an enormous sum of money. I have really gone over the declaration limits and I am worried that they will confiscate it at customs. Do you think you could hide it under your cassock?"
"Of course I could, my child, but you must realize that I cannot lie."
"You have such an honest face, Father, I am sure they will not ask you any questions," and with that handed him the 'hair remover.'
The aircraft arrived at its destination. When the priest presented himself to customs he was asked, "Father, do you have anything to declare?"
"From the top of my head to my waist, I have nothing to declare, my son," he replied.
Finding this reply strange, the customs officer asked, "And from the waist down, what do you have?"
The priest replied, "I have there a marvellous little instrument destined for use by women, but which has never been used."
Breaking out in laughter, the customs officer said, "Go ahead, Father ... Next!"
The Bible is full of stories of deception and dishonesty. Right from the start the snake tries to deceive Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve try to deceive God, Cain deceives Abel, murders him, and then tries to deceive God, Jacob and Rebeccah deceive Esau and Isaac, Joseph’s brothers deceive him and sell him into slavery, King David deceives Uriah, arranges his murder, and takes his wife Bathsheba for himself, Herod attempts to deceive the Magi, Satan tries to deceive Jesus in the wilderness, and Judas deceives Jesus, reminding us that ultimately deceit always ends in tragedy. It seems that we may be hard-wired for deception and dishonesty.
The opposite of this vice is the value of honesty and truth. The Greek word for honesty is "kalos." It means that which is "good" and "admirable" and "becoming." It also carries with it the ethical meaning of what is fair, right, honourable, and of such conduct as deserves esteem. Jesus Christ is the supreme example of honesty. In Jesus, there was no deceit, no dishonesty - just the purest heart that ever beat and the truest love that was ever given.
We don’t typically think about honesty as a mark of discipleship. But there’s no question that this journey towards honesty is a spiritual journey, as the greater our capacity to live without deceit, the closer we can find ourselves to the one we call God. We have to be able to get to the point in our journey when we can declare with young Samuel, “Here I am, Lord, here I am”.
George Orwell tells of sitting outside one morning eating breakfast, when a wasp settled on his table and began sucking jam from his plate. Orwell took his knife and cruelly cut the wasp in half. But, to his amazement, the wasp paid no attention and “merely went on with his meal, while a tiny stream of jam trickled out of his severed esophagus. Only when the wasp tried to fly away did it grasp the dreadful thing that had happened to him.”
Orwell went on to remark: “I’m so busy eating my jam I don’t even realize that I’m broken, either.”
You may have heard before of the severed wasp, and you can read more in Orwell’s essay of that name. And lest your mind wander thinking of chickens with their heads cut off, let me just say that insects have a ganglionic nervous system, in contrast to the central nervous system of mammals like us. Groups of neurons are so localized and specialized that a wasp can carry on mindlessly—literally—and keep eating even after losing the place to put the food.
“I’m so busy eating my jam I don’t even realize that I’m broken, either.”
We live in a society plagued by, what I’d like to call, a “severed wasp syndrome”, because often we’re so busy eating our jam, that we don’t realise we’re broken! Dishonesty is endemic, and has unconsciously become an accepted norm. I don’t think anyone of us here are able to declare that we live a life of 100% honesty and truth, 100% of the time. So often, it appears that dishonest responses to questions, and dishonest encounters in personal and work relationships, far outweigh reactions which contain the truth! This is when the whole picture gets blurred, because ARE there in fact instances when a dishonest answer is more favourable than an honest one, or is it perhaps alright to skirt an issue or withhold certain information if we believe it will be in the other person’s best interest? I’m not sure of the answer to this myself. I do however believe that each moment of dishonesty allows the knife which cuts the wasp in half to penetrate deeper and deeper into our being.
God desires to shower us with jam in abundance, blessings in abundance, but if dishonesty has severed us, that jam just trickles out, usually without us even knowing!
Honesty should permeate every aspect of our lives, and begins with a heart that trusts God. For the sake of structure, three levels of honesty can be distinguished, although naturally all three co-exist.
(1) Internal honesty is the kind we practice within ourselves. The biblical statement, "The truth will set you free", by default implies the opposite: Lies will imprison you. In my experience, this is especially true in the lies we tell ourselves!
Hedging on the truth often begins by not being honest with ourselves. Often, we hide behind masks, even unconsciously hiding from ourselves, because of the fear of exposure, embarrassment or weakness. Living this way always leads to loss of integrity and personal disintegration. When we do not tell ourselves the truth we slowly give life to an "integrity gap." It's like the first crack in a sheet of ice or that small stone chip in a windshield. If left unto its own, it grows and grows and eventually destabilizes the structure and integrity of the ice or glass. The same begins to happen to our mind and character. The lies grow, the ice begins to crack and, well, we all know the story, and often we begin to believe it too! Part of our spiritual journey involves peeling back the layers of self-deceit in order to find the true “me”.
George Carlin said, "Honesty may be the best policy, but it's important to remember that apparently, by elimination, dishonesty is the second-best policy." And dishonesty can so easily seem the easier route in the moment.
Honesty with oneself is a gift that we can give ourselves everyday. And the truth will indeed set us free.
(2) Horizontal honesty is the kind we exercise towards one other in our personal relationships. The foundations of marriage, family life, friendships and corporate associations are built on it. More often than not, it is when dishonesty is given space and freedom to reign, that the foundations of these relationships begin to crack, and the outcome, as we all well know, can be disastrous, bringing with it much heartache and pain. Honesty is deeply embedded in commitment, and in a society where commitment is no longer upheld and respected, honesty dissipates.
(3) Vertical honesty is that which we exercise toward God. While nothing is hidden from him, we still frequently try to do so. The reasons for this are as numerous as the number of people that make up the world, although feelings of unworthiness, shame, guilt and pain are often the guises we attempt to sell ourselves, in the hope that they will shield the truth from God. God understands this, but intimately knows our innermost parts anyway. Total honesty before God is the deepest expression of faith in Him and is the only way to be authentically human in God’s world. It is the only path to spiritual wholeness.
Admitting dishonesty to ourselves, others and God is something we all resist. Yet, therein lies the great truth of the gospel. To resist the pain and remain dishonest shuts us off from the wonderful grace-filled benefit of being pardoned (by God, others, and ourselves). Accepting the pain, and honestly confessing, brings a new dawn of pardon, hope and release. That is the precious gift given to each of us by Jesus on the cross, a gift given with arms stretched wide, inviting us to stretch out our arms and open our hearts to receive His grace Through forgiveness, our severed beings are made whole, and we are able to enjoy the glorious sweetness of the jam, just as God intended it to be! |
| Date | 2006-09-24 | | Preacher | Gill Rookyard | | Title | 24th September 2006 | | Sermon Details | Let us pray –
O God, light of the minds that know you, life of the souls that love you, and strength of the hearts that seek you - bless the words of my lips and the meditations of our hearts.
We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen
Now about that priest who managed to smuggle the hair remover gadget through customs, I don’t know anymore about him, or any more of those kinds of stories, but what I do know, is that we all have embarrassing moments in our lives. I suspect we have all had one of those moments when someone has overheard us saying something which was intended only for particular ears! You know what I mean? Times like these always leave us with the dilemma of ‘now what?’ – should I try to explain what I meant; should I try to convince them that what they heard was really not what they heard; or should I just keep quiet in the hope that the whole situation will diffuse itself?
That’s what happened to the disciples one day in the presence in Jesus. The opening scene of today’s Gospel reading pertains to the Glory of the Cross at Calvary but failing to discern the Way of the Cross, the apostles foolishly argue instead on who amongst themselves is the greatest. Remarkably, however, having discerned the thoughts of their hearts, Jesus does not rebuke their ambition! Instead of showing disapproval, our Blessed Teacher teaches them the way to greatness.
Our Divine Master says that greatness is attained, not by being first but by being the very last and servant of all. Honour and prestige are not to those who sit at the head of the table, but to those who gird themselves with the towel of humility and wash their servants’ feet. Therefore, in response to the disciples’ aspiration to be masters, the Prince of Peace instructs them to be servants. For their aspiration to be great, our Wonderful Counsellor instructs them to be humble. The disciples’ failed to understand Jesus’ words, and so He resorted to an example which was a favourite for Him. In a very touching scene, He took a child and placed it in their midst, and putting His arms around it He said to them, “Whoever receives one child such as this in My Name, receives Me; and whoever receives Me, receives not Me but the One Who sent Me". Here, our Glorious Saviour identifies Himself with a child, who, at such a tender age, does not have the slightest notion about ambition. Someone once said that the Gates of Heaven are quite low, and only children enter without any struggle. How then do adults enter? The reply: Only on bended knees; only in humility shall we enter. Hearts not filled with selfish and extravagant ambitions are clearly vessels of wisdom and righteousness.
To understand the power of Jesus’ prophetic and symbolic action, we should not think of children simply as loving and innocent. At the time of Jesus children were “non-persons,” without any power and often unprotected, and they function here as a symbol of powerlessness and vulnerability. Contrary to the disciples’ desire for positions of power in God’s kingdom, Jesus says they should be more concerned with welcoming into their midst the poor and vulnerable and by so doing receive both Jesus and the One who sent him.
Who are the children today --
who are those people who are not highly regarded?
who are those without a place of their own?
those whose voices are heard not because they have a right to be heard, but only because the more powerful indulge them from time to time?
Who is seen as less important, by us, and by our society?
“Whoever welcomes one of these in my name, welcomes Me; and whoever welcomes Me, does not welcome Me, but the One who sent Me”.
In God’s Kingdom, one rises by sinking; one increases by decreasing. Those who are most humble and self-denying most resemble the very character of our Beloved Redeemer. For they have renewed their minds and patterned them after the Mind of Christ, and thus possess that spirit of discernment, of knowing and welcoming intently, justly, carefully and humbly God’s eternal Word.
I guess the challenge posed to each of us today is to establish the relationship between Jesus’ teaching about children in the Gospel, and the notion of wisdom as portrayed in both the book of Job and the epistle of St. James , and then to embrace it into our lives.
But how do we do this? How do we uncover the secret of this relationship, and then embrace it and make it our own?
A probable answer is that we could begin by seeking God, and finding Him, but where does the search begin? We could search for God in an exhilarating journey through the realms of outer space, knowing that the whole universe is held in the eye of the Master, but what if, instead, we courageously plunge into a most fascinating journey through inner space - a journey which would take us to the very core of who we are? Thomas Merton writes that when we find our true self we find God, and when we find God we find our true self.
I believe that, as Christians, we allow God to make His home in our hearts, the same hearts which are home to our inner child. In a mystical sort of way, we can build on Merton’s understanding by saying that when we find our inner child we find God, and we find God when we find our inner child.
Who is our inner child and how does our inner child respond to life? This is the part of us with which we were born – trusting, wondering individuals. The natural child of our very young days took great delight in life, discovering everything for the first time, being full of awe at the most ordinary things of life. The natural inner child responds spontaneously to people and emotions. Emotions come forth easily. This trusting, enthusiastic child is always amazed at life and greets the world with a clear gaze of utmost integrity. As we grow older, this part of ourselves gets lost. Often adults lose a part of themselves, when they allow their inner child to be forgotten or pushed aside for adult business and busyness. Sometimes, too, this inner child has been terribly wounded early in life, crushed by adults who abused the spirit or body. The child may have gone into hiding or fled into responsibility. When we lose sight of our inner child, we lose a beautiful and essential part of our self. We become serious and competitive. We focus on obeying and agreeing and being accepted. We get our applause by working hard or by living up to others’ expectations, and strive to get ahead, to reach the top.
But, by taking a child into His arms, Jesus He embraces their vulnerability. He welcomed children into His life, altered His schedule for them and taught the disciples that their own spirits needed to be like children’s to enter the kingdom of God. Jesus was insisting that it is in receiving societies most vulnerable, and that’s all of us really for we all have a vulnerable child within, that we receive Jesus himself, and in receiving Him, we receive God. This is the epitome of true wisdom!
Jesus came among us not as a Lord, not as a boss, not as an important person, but as servant.
He came to touch, to embrace, to heal, to forgive, to help, to love, and this even when he knew it would take him to the cross.
Our prayer should not be "make me someone important", nor should it be "give me wealth and success".
Rather, knowing that God is fully able and fully willing to give us what we need in life, and that our God is found in those whom we meet, our prayer should be like that of St. Francis:
Make me a channel of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me bring your love; where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith; where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
Master, grant that I may never seek so much to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love with all my soul.
Make me a channel of your peace for it is in pardoning that I am pardoned;
in giving that I receive; and in dying that I am born to eternal life.
Let us go out this week in search of our inner child. Take time to feel Jesus’ arms embracing us, and hear Him saying, come, trust, I am with you always. Let’s strive to give up the world's standards of success and turn as humble children to our Father in Heaven and learn from him.
Blessed be God, who shows us the way in Christ Jesus, day by day. Amen |
| Date | 2006-12-24 | | Preacher | Gill Rookyard | | Title | ADVENT 4 (C) HOPE | | Sermon Details | Title: The four voices of Christmas – the voice of H.O.P.E.
I love our Gospel reading today – It is the prayer of Mary, often called the Magnificat. Mary, carrying in her womb the Christ-Child, praises God with all of her being.
Christmas proclaims a mystery, because the God who created the universe has now come to be born into the world. The Creator who made Mary is now carried in the womb of Mary. The One who inhabited the universe, will be confined to a stall. He who owns the world will not find any room in the Inn.
The Gospel of John also proclaims this mystery as it describes Jesus as the Word of God. Part of the mystery is that the world did not recognize God or what he was doing. John writes: “He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him” (John 1:10).
Mary, however, not only recognised the mystery … she embraced it.
We’ve all heard the Christmas so many times, and we love the story … but do we embrace the story as Mary did? Today I’d like to share with you what I call the “4 voices of Christmas”, and in listening to those voices, perhaps our celebration of the spirit of Christmas can be made even more radiant and soul encompassing.
The message of Christmas is hope…hope for a world in darkness. It is in the very word HOPE, that I name the 4 voices of Christmas …
H. THE VOICE OF HEAVEN –
It is the Voice of Heaven that first announces the hope of the world in the Hope of Christmas.
The angel Gabrielle said to Mary, "Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High”
AND
An angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, "Joseph, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins."
And so, it was the voice of heaven that announced the first Christmas!
O. THE VOICE OF OBEDIENCE –
In Her response to the angel, she acknowledges God’s right to use her as he desires.
"I am the Lord’s servant," Mary answered. "May it be to me as you have said."
This is one of those accounts that we must really give consideration to – Mary receives a visit from an angel telling her that she is going to be with child, and she responds by saying “I am the Lord’s servant.” There was no haste, no questioning – just the quiet voice of obedience.
Notice she did not tell the Lord that she first wanted to get married so as to avoid any potential shame on her or her betrothed. She simply trusted, and obeyed, and put her hope in the promises of God. She had heard the stories passed down through the family about a God who had promised a Saviour – a Messiah. She knew that God was faithful. Mary knew the promise that had been passed down from generation to generation: that one would be born of the seed of Abraham who would save people from their sins. She realized that she had been chosen – of all the women who had ever lived – to be the mother of that Child.
There is no evidence of Mary thinking that she was any different, or any better, than anyone else. In fact she speaks of being a servant of the Lord and how she lived in a lowly state. She realized that among all women she was fortunate to be the one to bear the Christ child.
In Mary, God found a humble vessel that He could use for His glory. God is not looking for rank, wealth or power. He is looking for people who have a humble heart. He is looking for one who displays true humility – just as Mary did!
Mary’s example challenges us to be open-minded and obedient to God’s call to service. In agreeing to bear God’s Son, Mary accepted a very difficult, demanding and risky area of service. Mary was a virgin pledged to be married to Joseph. She knew that according to first century Jewish law when Joseph learned of her pregnancy he could have her stoned to death for being unfaithful to him. Embedded in her decision to be fully submissive to God’s call was the willingness to suffer whatever consequences may have come her way.
P. THE VOICE OF PRAISE –
I find in Mary’s example a challenge to keep ourselves off the pedestal and to magnify and lift up the name of Jesus; the challenge to remain humble servants whose hearts and mouths are filled with God’s praises. When Mary entered the home of Elizabeth, the baby in Elizabeth’s womb jumped for joy. Elizabeth then began to pay Mary all kinds of compliments. But Mary didn’t want Elizabeth or anyone else to put her on a pedestal. After all, the baby she was giving birth to was going to be her Saviour. So instead of making a big deal about being specially chosen from among all the other women and being blessed beyond others, Mary turned the focus back on God. She began recalling a number of things God had done in the past, and she praised Him. Mary, in reaction to Elizabeth’s glowing comments, seemed to be saying---keep me off the pedestal. Exalt the Lord. Don’t praise me, praise Him!
Mary’s response is a song of praise to God. It was a verbal offering from her heart – through her words to a Holy God. The focus lies, not on Mary, but on God. In this Gospel text we see nothing less then a song of praise to God. We see adoration – we see exaltation – and pure praise to the Father. This is truly a song of worship. This is truly a song of praise.
On one occasion an orchestra presented Handel’s “Messiah” so beautifully that the applause was thunderous, and everyone turned toward the composer. Handel stood up and with his finger pointing upward, silently indicated that the glory should be given to God rather than to himself. That is exactly what Mary did. It is as if she were saying, “Don’t praise me, but magnify the Lord who is my savior.”
E. THE VOICE OF EVANGELISM –
Mary was the first person to carry the Gospel – literally! And she was the first to share the Good News, as she quickly set off to the home of her cousin Elizabeth and her husband Zechariah. This makes Mary the first evangelist and an example for each of us to follow. Hers is the simple reaction of one who has truly encountered the Hope of the World – she had to tell someone! She had to share the Good News.
In the book of the prophet Isaiah, we read …
[Isaiah 9:6-7a]
For a child is born to us, a son is given to us. And the government will rest on his shoulders. These will be his royal titles: Wonderful Counselor,* Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. His ever expanding, peaceful government will never end.”
The Redemption of Israel had come and she was going to tell all who were looking for it. This unrighteous, godless government was going to be replaced with the government of the Messiah and its establishment would begin in our hearts.
The most exciting part of this for us, is that to those who know Him, who have experienced Him, He still calls… [Isaiah 6:8]
Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?"
And I said, "Here am I. Send me!"
You and I have also been called to carry the gospel, only for us carrying the gospel has nothing to do with pregnancy; rather it has everything to do with telling others about Jesus. What a shame it is that many people carry the gospel grudgingly and reluctantly rather than willingly and joyfully as Mary did. The truth is God is still calling people into service today. The question is not---will God call on me to serve Him, but rather, when God calls, will I be open-minded to whatever it is He wants me to do?
As we go from this place today, in our preparation for our Christmas celebrations tomorrow, may the voice of the HOPE of Christmas enfold us:
As we celebrate the Hope of Christmas, we can be attentive to the voice of heaven,
we can give to the Lord the gift of our obedience,
we can praise and magnify the Name of Jesus, and
we can embrace the gift of the Christ-Child, and share the wonder of that most precious gift with all whom we meet.
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| Date | 2007-04-05 | | Preacher | Rev. Gill Rookyard | | Title | MAUNDY THURSDAY – Year C | | Sermon Details | St Dunstan’s Cathedral
Exodus 12: 1 – 14 - The Passover
Psalm 116: 11 – 18
1 Cor 11: 23 – 26 - The Last Supper
John 13: 1 – 15 - Jesus washes his disciples’ feet
O Lord, take my lips and speak through them; take our minds and think through them; take our hearts and set them on fire. Amen.
If your life has been anything like mine, I’m certain you must have had those experiences and encounters which have left you dumbstruck, bewildered, perplexed, anxious, confused. Those ‘why me?’, ‘why now?’ ‘what’s this all about?’, ‘what’s going on, God?’. So often, in the midst of the intensity of the moment, those questions remain unanswered, and it is only in hindsight, once the intensity has dissipated and the moment has passed, that we’re able to see through the clouds, and understand all the whys, and whats and hows.
The joy we share in being resurrection people, is that we’re granted a privilege those disciples never had. For the disciples in the upper room, the events of that most Holy Thursday surely must have left them feeling dumbstruck, bewildered, perplexed, anxious, confused, with all the what, why and how questions racing through their minds. For us, however, we’re able to look back on the events leading up to our Lord’s passion, and reflect on them with meaning and intent.
Sandwiched between Judas' act of treachery when he went to the chief priests and offered to hand Jesus over to them for thirty pieces of silver, and then Judas' act of betrayal in the Garden of Gethsemane, are the two intertwining realities, the two gifts that come to us as one, that we gather to reflect upon tonight. We celebrate the humble act of Jesus, the Master, taking the role of a servant, and washing the feet of his students. Also, we celebrate the divine love of Jesus who took the form of a convicted outcast and died on the cross for our redemption, and who gave his resurrection body and blood to us in the sacrament of bread and wine.
Jesus asks his disciples, “Do you understand what I have done for you?”, Do we - even now - understand? Do we understand our Lord's meaning in this encounter?
I think we try to understand - we hope to understand, and we strive toward understanding, but as St. Augustine observed, “If you can understand it, then it is not God.” The full import of this remarkable act eludes us. Love was his meaning - but, as the words in that beautiful hymn remind us, “My song is love unknown”.
Christ Jesus, though He was in the form of God, emptied himself - and being found in human form, humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death. The fullness of God's Love is poured into the life of Jesus Christ. This earth-shaking act of Divine Humility is simply beyond our full comprehension - and here at the Last Supper we see it enacted before our very eyes. The God-become-Man is the Master who becomes Servant, Friend, and Sustenance.
Jesus tells Peter something that Peter could only understand in hindsight after the death of his Lord. Peter objects to Jesus’ stooping down to wash his feet. And Jesus says, “Unless I wash you, you have no share in me.”
Clearly, this washing of feet is more than merely washing of feet. Indeed, to allow Christ to love him, to allow that love to take the form of a slave, to allow that love to pour over his feet, means entering more fully the mystery of Christ. So for us, this foot washing we are about to do for each other is one means of being drawn more fully into the mystery of God’s love for us. And there in the sharing of this act of humility and love, we come to know more concretely that God has already given all things into our hands through Christ, and that we have come from God, and that we are going to God as we pass through the gate of self-emptying service.
Could it be that the proclamation of Christ’s death in the sharing of His risen Body and Blood, cannot take place until we’ve shared in his crucifixion, symbolized by this powerful act of humility? The New Commandment means that we love one another as he loved us. Obviously his loving us has more to do than this humble act of washing feet. For John, washing another’s feet means giving up oneself for another. Jesus washing his disciples’ feet anticipates and foreshadows his dying for them on the cross, and the meaning of the foot washing can only be grasped in hindsight, after the crucifixion. “You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.”
The water poured out of the clay pitchers at the Last Supper, the water that flows over the disciples’ feet, is linked to the water that pours out his pierced side on the cross. And it is that water that will pour over your feet tonight. That water, the water of God’s emptying, sacrificial love, is that which we’re called to pour over the feet of our brothers and sisters.
Tonight we begin the observance of the Great Three Days - and Jesus sets the tone for the entire observance with this astonishing and intimate act of love, through which He points to His supreme sacrifice - the sacrifice of His life on the Cross. “Do you understand what I have done for you?”
God is trying to break through to us with this outrageous and incomprehensible love. As He washes His disciples' feet, Jesus tries to break through our minds to our hearts - to touch us deep within with the full import of this Divine Gift.
This act is an intimate sign which embodies the full meaning of His life, His teaching, and His entire ministry among us. This encounter, this gift, shows us Love that overturns all our expectations of order - all our expectations of first and last - of domination or servitude - of “Master,” “Lord,” and “disciple.” He shows us a love that is complete, the fulfillment of Love. He not only loves us “to the end” in a temporal sense - He loves us entirely - as much as it is possible to love - which is more than we can understand or imagine.
And His mandate to us is to love and serve each other - as He has loved us -
“If I, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you”. “Love one another as I have loved you.”
My brothers & sisters - can we love that much? Can we love as God loves?
Jesus reveals to us a love that requires patience and courage - because such complete love makes one vulnerable - such love makes us woundable. In the Christian tradition we speak of “compunction,” a term that indicates the puncture of a surgeon's knife, a wound that initiates our healing, and suggests to us the piercing-through of God's love into our hearts, into the depths of the soul.
Through sharing in this astonishing gift, may our hearts be “wounded at the deepest center” - and opened to receive this amazing “Love unknown” - so that we, too, can love as God loves - love each other and all people and all of creation as Christ has loved us.
“Wouldst thou know thy Lord's meaning in this thing?” “Do you understand what I have done for you?”
His meaning is revealed this night in this breath-taking act of loving service, and in the gift of the Eucharist.
Christ's supreme gift of Love - is pre-figured in this intimate, self-giving act
of service, washing the feet of His disciples, His beloved friends - This Divine Love is finally consummated in the gift of His Body and Blood: His sacred Body nailed to the Cross - His sacred Body and Blood so intimately shared with us in the Eucharist, in holy communion.
At the threshold of deep suffering for our sake, Jesus Christ delivered to us the gift of the Holy Eucharist. Tonight, in the midst of a deeply suffering world, you and I celebrate this great gift, we “give thanks,” we receive the Blessed Body and Blood again. And as Brothers and Sisters in the Body of Christ we share each other's life - each other's joy and pain - as we share in the sacrament of His dear Body and Blood, just as Jesus did with his disciples on the night of His institution of the Holy Eucharist.
As we kneel at the altar rail tonight, may that song of love unknown be revealed more deeply and more profoundly to each of us.
“My song is love unknown, My Saviour's love to me, Love to the loveless shown, That they might lovely be. O who am I, That for my sake, My Lord should take Frail flesh and die?”
Amen
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| Date | 2007-05-13 | | Preacher | Rev. Gill Rookyard | | Title | FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EASTER | | Sermon Details | FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EASTER – 13 May 2007 (Year C)
Deut 34: 1 – 12 (Death of Moses)
Ps 109: 21 – 31
Acts 15: 1 – 2, 22 – 29 (The Council at Jerusalem)
John 14: 23 – 29 (Jesus promises the Holy Spirit)
Preacher : Rev. Gill Rookyard
An unchanging God in our changing world!
May the Spirit of God which dwells in our hearts direct my words, and our thoughts, to the Truth which is found only in You, Lord Jesus. Amen.
I’m sure we would all agree that the presence of loved ones brings wholeness and joy into our lives – in a sense, those nearest and dearest to us are the ones who make us who we are, and their absence from us brings about a void, an emptiness, a space longing to be filled. As I struggled to gather my thoughts to prepare this sermon, I felt consumed by the void which has been left in the lives of my family and friends, as just last week we lost a dear friend in a tragic car accident. Jocelyn, age 28, had only been married for two short years. Eight months ago, she was blessed by the birth of her precious daughter, a daughter who sadly will never know her mommy. On this Mother’s Day, it makes me think of all the children, young and old, who have lost their beloved mommies, and all the mommies who have lost their precious children, as today we remember and celebrate and honour that special love shared between a mother and her child.
At school I often hear people saying that children are growing far too quickly, but is this not just part of the fast-tracked world we live in. We are all witnesses to the fact that we are living in a rapidly changing world – science and technology are moving at such a rapid rate that it is virtually impossible to keep up with the latest and greatest innovations. A young person’s philosophy of life, their mind-set, is not being driven by reason and that which is rational, but instead by the worldview of postmodernism – that assumption which says that truth is relative, and that even if what is true for you and true for me differs, it’s ok, because an absolute truth cannot exist. Death, however, is a truth that cannot be dismissed, and Jocelyn’s death, for me, once more brought to light the reality of the fragility of life, and how, in an instant, ones life and the lives of those around you can be changed forever. Each of our readings today witness to this fact, as they play out the dialogue between presence and absence:
Our reading from Deut records the death of Moses – that great prophet of Israel – whose obedience to God allowed the power of God to manifest in his life, as he developed from a stuttering shepherd into a national leader and powerful orator. His courage, humility and wisdom moulded the Hebrew slaves into a powerful nation, and it is therefore in the natural course of events, as Scripture tells us, that the Israelites grieved for Moses, and that there was a time of weeping and mourning. Their lives had been changed, but their God, was unchanging. And so, for the Israelites, life eventually had to go on, and Joshua – who had been filled with the spirit of wisdom because Moses had laid hands on him – was the one to whom the Israelites gave their obedience, thus carrying out the Lord’s command to Moses.
The Acts reading reveals how the customs taught by Moses had been passed on through the centuries, and were now being debated in the early church. With the absence of Jesus’ physical presence to lead and direct them, disputes began to arise. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, Paul, Barnabus, and other church leaders, were able to guide and direct the church in Antioch into a place of understanding; to the acknowledgement that although the Old Testament laws were important, they cannot save, since it is only by grace through faith in Jesus Christ that a person can be saved. While the world the Jewish Christians had known for centuries was changing, they needed assurance that their God, was unchanging.
The reading from John’s Gospel is part of a long love-letter, in which Jesus speaks of this absence and departure, and in which he promises his disciples the gift of the Spirit. His absence will leave an empty space in their lives, but this space will be filled with the divine presence, as the Spirit will show them. “Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.” (John 14:23). John sees the presence of Jesus and his Father through the work of the Spirit as the source of peace for his disciples. “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you. (John 14:27]). Underneath this picture, is the incomparable richness of the Hebrew word shalom, resonant with the multiple meanings of peace, safety, fulfilment, and joy.
We are poised today on the threshold of the Ascension which we remember on Thursday, and Pentecost rising on the horizon. In the structure of the Gospel this love-letter is a prelude to Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection, so it pushes us back before Easter; but in the structure of the church year it is the prelude to Ascension and Pentecost, so it pushes us forward to a place we haven’t yet been. In either case, whether we are looking backwards or forwards, what matters is that Jesus is about to go away.
Life, once more, was about to radically change for the disciples. For months they had sat at the feet of Jesus as he opened up God's truth in a new and thrilling way. They had witnessed miracles that are still talked about 21 centuries later. Now Jesus was preparing them for another change in their lives. He was very conscious that his time with them was about to come to an end, and that everything that his friends and disciples know of him and do in his Name will shortly be done in the absence of their beloved Rabbi, and in the quite different presence of God the Holy Spirit.
The other Gospels record Jesus taking the bread and cup from the table to be his body and blood. John adds the scene where he washes the feet of the disciples to demonstrate his love and care for each of them. Now he begins to give his final instructions. His words are to prepare the disciples, and the rest of those who believe, for the time when they would live without the physical presence of Jesus. He knew that for them it would be a shattering experience, one that would shake the very foundations of their lives, and so he gave them the keys they would need to move on.
Jesus makes the promise, that if the disciples would hold true to the word, He and His Father will come to them and make their home with them. God would be with them in the journey ahead. Whatever major changes the future held, the one thing not changeable was that God was with them. Their world was changing, but their God was unchangeable.
The same applies to us: God is not going to abandon us when everything else changes. He is our unchanging God in our changing world. We are called to walk on in trust, knowing that we are not alone but that he is with us.
In the face of uncertainty and change, and in those times when we our lives are filled with fear, loss, stress and pain, Jesus gives us the gift of peace, just as he did for those disciples: "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.” – all we need to do, is to open our hearts and our lives, and allow ourselves to be vulnerable enough to let him in. If we do, our sense of restlessness, that interior empty space, is replaced with the divine presence, as the promise of a new kind of holiness, peace, and safety comes into our lives.
And with that promise of peace, hold the words of assurance that have spoken to countless souls through the ages, "Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid”, for He is our unchanging God, in our changing world.
There is a beautiful Evening Collect with which I’d like to end. It reads: Be present, merciful God, and protect us through the hours of this night: that we, who are wearied by the changes and chances of this fleeting world, may rest on your eternal changelessness; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
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| Date | 2007-06-10 | | Preacher | Rev. Gill Rookyard | | Title | 10th Sunday in Ordinary Time (+ Corpus Christi) St Dunstan’s Cathedral | | Sermon Details | Old Testament: 1 Kings 17: 17 – 24 (Elijah prays for God to raise the son of the widow at Zarephath)
Psalm: 113 (The scope of God’s care / mercy)
New Testament: Gal 1: 11 - 24 (Paul called by God)
Gospel: Luke 7: 11 – 17 (Jesus raises a widow’s son from the dead)
Today I am preaching through a specific set of lenses, and against a particular backdrop:
There are lenses which are dominating my spirituality at the moment. The lenses of DIVINE ENCOUNTER and DIVINE EXCHANGE, and so allow me to indulge in them a little as I share with you today. They are going to become the lenses through which today’s readings are viewed, and through which feast of Corpus Christi is explored.
Teilard de Chardin, a famous Christian mystic, once wrote: “We are not so much human beings having a spiritual experience as spiritual beings have a human experience” – this is the backdrop against which this sermon is poised.
Thus lenses plus backdrop!
But before we get into today’s readings, I must share with you a little titbit of what happened in our home group on Wed evening – new couple in parish – from PE? – absolutely fabulous having them in our group – he shared with me that he couldn’t understand why people were calling me ‘Mtr Gill’. After a few sermons, he thought it may have something to do with ‘Mtr Goose’ because I always have a story of some sort to tell. So in preserving my ‘Mtr Goose’ status, I would like to read to you an email which has done the rounds. You may have read it before. It’s landed in my inbox a few times, but nevertheless always leaves a smile on my face. And remember – lenses … backdrop …
A little boy wanted to meet God. He knew it was a long trip to where God lived, so he packed his suitcase with a bag of potato chips and a six-pack of root beer and started his journey. When he had gone about three blocks, he met an old lady. She was sitting in the park, just staring at some pigeons. The boy sat down next to her and opened his suitcase. He was about to take a drink from his root beer when he noticed that the old lady looked hungry, so he offered her some chips. She gratefully accepted it and smiled at him. Her smile was so pretty that the boy wanted to see it again, so he offered her a root beer. Again, she smiled at him. The boy was delighted! They sat there all afternoon eating and smiling, but they never said a word. As twilight approached, the boy realized how tired he was and he got up to leave; but before he had gone more than a few steps, he turned around, ran back to the old lady, and gave her a hug. She gave him her biggest smile ever. When the boy opened the door to his own house a short time later, his mother was surprised by the look of joy on his face. She asked him, "What did you do today that made you so happy?" He replied, "I had lunch with God." But before his mother could respond, he added, "You know what? She's got the most beautiful smile I've ever seen!" Meanwhile, the old lady, also radiant with joy, returned to her home. Her son was stunned by the look of peace on her face and he asked, "Mother, what did you do today that made you so happy?" She replied! "I ate potato chips in the park with God." However, before her son responded, she added, "You know, he's much younger than I expected."
For me, it’s a simple example of a divine encounter, a divine exchange … but let’s dig a little deeper.
In his letter to the Galatians, Paul’s tells of how he received the gospel by direct revelation through Jesus Christ, and although he doesn’t furnish the details of this revelation, it is obvious to assume it must have been an awesome divine encounter, a divine exchange. Paul’s conversion experience, as we know, took place on the road to Damascus. As he was travelling to Damascus, God chose to break into his life in a spectacular manner, a spectacular divine encounter. Paul did not see a vision; he saw the risen Christ himself. Paul acknowledged Jesus as Lord, confessed his own sin, surrendered his life to Christ, and resolved to obey him. True conversion comes from a personal encounter with Jesus Christ and leads to a new life in relationship with him. The exchange which took place was a darkness to light, death-in-sin to life-in-Christ exchange. Paul’s divine encounters led to a divine exchange!
The OLD TESTAMENT lesson and GOSPEL both speak of a widows sons being raised to life.
Elijah calls out to God and prays that he would restore life to the widow’s son. He knows that in his own strength he is incapable of such a feat, but trusts and has faith in the power of God to heal, and restore life and light out of death and darkness. It was a divine encounter, and a divine exchange.
Jesus, in restoring the women’s son to life in our Gospel reading, is manifested as the Lord of life. It is easy for us to be drawn to this miraculous event in this story, but in St Luke’s mind the story is incomplete without us focussing clearly on the widow. Therein lies the emphasis Luke places on Jesus’ compassion.
The widow’s situation was serious: she had lost her husband, and here her son – her last means of support – was dead. St Luke lovingly observes that when Jesus came upon the funeral cortege in today’s gospel he was moved with pity upon seeing her. His sympathy went out mainly to the woman, not primarily to her son who had passed away. Jesus understood that this widow’s most difficult time was not now, but later when after the burial she would have to return alone to an empty house. He realised that her sorrow would be deepened by fear about her future and how she could possibly survive. Perhaps, in his mind’s eye, he could see another weeping mother in a year or so, after a crucifixion, following the lifeless body of her son to the tomb. He said to the widow, “Do not weep”. From us these words would have sounded hollow, but from him they gave both comfort and hope. Unlike Elijah, Jesus spoke in his own name and in his own authority raised the boy to life, before returning him to his mother. Surely this is the epitome of a divine encounter and divine exchange.
This story is an illustration of our salvation. The whole world was dead in sin, sin as the widow’s son was dead. Being dead, we could do nothing to help ourselves – we couldn’t even ask for help. But God had compassion for us, and he sent Jesus to raise us to life with him. The dead man did not earn his second chance at life, and we cannot earn our new life in Christ. The cross was the epitome of our divine encounter and divine exchange
Remember our backdrop: “We are not so much human beings having a spiritual experience as spiritual beings have a human experience”
George Maloney, another Christian mystic, writes about experiencing the indwelling God, the indwelling Trinity. As human beings, I guess it’s far easier for us to acknowledge a transcendent God – a God out there, but, as spiritual beings, we need to acknowledge that God dwells within us too – an immanent God.
It is, as Margaret Silf writes, when the transcendent God connects with the immanent God, or the God-seed within us, that – like the lighting of a match – there is a divine encounter, a divine exchange. For Paul, and the two widows in our readings, this was a dramatic encounter, with a dramatic exchange – a huge darkness to light experience. We may be tempted to think that ‘this doesn’t happen to anyone anymore’; or ‘this dramatic God encounter and God exchange has never happened in my life’ – but its not the dramatic-ness that matters. Perhaps your encounter and exchange has been more gentle – like having lunch with God on the park bench – but, on this feast of Corpus Christi, let’s think for a moment of the divine encounter, the divine exchange we experience each time we kneel at this altar rail to receive the blessed sacrament, to receive the tangible reality of God’s infinite love for us? Do we allow that most sacred moment to become a divine encounter, a divine exchange? Do we always acknowledge the ‘hugeness’ of the moment? Do we always understand that in that moment we are renewing our promised passage from death to life?
Just as Paul remarked on how favoured he was to have God reveal his Son to him that he might spread the Good News, so we are favoured too. Through the Gospels we have had revealed to us the good news of the love of the Lord. This Lord raised us from the death of sin and presented us to our spiritual mother, the Church, who now nourishes us through the word of Sacred Scripture and the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. It is our divine encounter, and divine exchange, and it’s in the offering for each of us.
“We are not so much human beings having a spiritual experience as spiritual beings have a human experience”, and so as we leave today, hopefully having experienced anew a divine encounter and divine exchange, and go to prepare lunch … let’s not forget to bring chips!
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| Date | 2007-07-15 | | Preacher | Mtr. Gill Rookyard | | Title | Servanthood in the Community | | Sermon Details | 15 July 2007 – 15th Sunday of the Year
THEME: Servanthood in the Community
NT: Col 1: 1 – 14
Gospel: Luke 10: 25 - 37
Today marks the concluding sermon in our series on Servanthood – we’ve looked at the servant-heart of Jesus, and explored the call to servanthood in our families, in the Church and at work. As each preacher has mentioned, none of these aspects are in reality compartmentalized entities; instead, they function interdependently, with each occurring optimally when together they are in harmony.
The Dean encouraged us to be subject to one another out of our reverence for Christ. Fr Joe exhorted us to analyze our conduct: “Since we are living by the Spirit, let our behaviour be guided by the Spirit”, and Fr Angus challenged us to seek deeply what God is calling us to do. All deeply profound insights …
This week we focus on servanthood in our community. In one sense, this has been covered already, as our families, our Church and our workplace are all communities to which we belong, communities which are an intimate part of our lives. But as we all know, community extends beyond this, and is a rather multi-storied concept. For beyond these personal boundaries lies the wider community in which we live, beyond that the national community of which are citizens, and then the global community to which we belong. And while we could quite possibly prepare a complete sermon series just on community, I think it wise to focus on things a little closer to home!
In reflecting on our Gospel today, it was interesting to explore the different attitudes portrayed by the characters Jesus included in the parable, attitudes not isolated to different individuals, but attitudes that I believe we have all reflected at different times to those in need:
To the expert in the law – the wounded man was a subject to discuss;
To the robbers – the wounded man was someone to use and exploit;
To the religious men – the wounded man was a problem to be avoided;
To the inn-keeper – the wounded man was a customer to serve for a fee;
To the Samaritan – the wounded man was a human being worth being cared for and loved.
While I am absolutely certain that we have all cared for and loved someone in need, I’m convinced that if we are completely honest, there are times when we have all discussed, used, exploited, avoided and charged those in need, instead of caring for them and loving them!
But if we are subject to one another out of our reverence for Christ, if we allow our behaviour to be guided by the Spirit, and if we seek deeply what God is calling us to do, then surely we will realise that those attitudes will not lead us to inherit eternal life!
Instead, following the command of the Law, we need to love and show compassion just as the Samaritan did. Jesus calls us to an expansive love – to love without limit. We are called to love the alienated, the marginalised, the oppressed, and the disenfranchised. We are called to love those who have fallen among ‘robbers’ – those who take away peoples’ basic human rights and leave them to live, and die, in subhuman conditions.
We need to ask ourselves: Are our eyes open to see the pain in other people’s eyes? Are our ears open to hear the cry in other people’s voices? Are our hearts open to become involved in other people’s hurts? Perhaps we often pass by our needy neighbours because of some dislike, mistrust or prejudice; if so, we need to search our hearts and see how wounded we are ourselves, how broken we are ourselves, so that we can see in the wounded, in the broken and in the weak our own reflection, and love them.
This parable does not command us to go out, risk our lives and become heroes – it invites us to reach out, risk our pride, and become compassionate human beings. We are called not to an expensive love, but to an expansive love.
Servanthood in the community requires of us an acknowledgement of Christ in those we meet, an acknowledgement of Christ in the members of our community, and having made that acknowledgement, we need to be subject to one another out of our reverence for Christ. As Christians living by the Spirit, we need to allow our behaviour to those in our community to be guided by the Spirit, and as we strive to emulate Christ’s example by displaying a servant-heart to our community, we need to seek deeply what God is calling us to do.
That little word ‘DO’ is so important – once the expert in the law had recognized that the neighbour was the person who had mercy, Jesus commanded him to go and DO likewise.
One group of people in our parish who do this is our Social Outreach team. They have asked to do a presentation for you today on the work they are doing. But before I hand over to Con, I would like to – on your behalf - commend them for all they do, thank them for loving expansively, and acknowledge within each of them the servant-heart of Jesus.
Con …. Presentation by Social Outreach.
Following the example of Paul and Timothy in our New Testament reading, know that “We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all your saints. … We ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. And we pray this in order that you may [continue] to live a life worthy of the Lord and [continue] to please him in every way”.
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| Date | 2007-08-19 | | Preacher | Mtr. Gill Rookyard | | Title | Stewardship of the Body | | Sermon Details | 20th Sunday of the Year
THEME: Stewardship of the Body
READINGS: Ezekiel 37: 1 – 14 Dry Bones
Psalm 139
Romans 8: 9 – 13 Our bodies – temple of the Holy Spirit
John 4: 1 – 26 The Samaritan woman at the well
I honestly believe that as the Dean sat and pondered who would preach on each of these stewardship topics, he was aided by some divine inspiration and God’s sense of humour! Fr Angus began his sermon on the stewardship of time by saying that he felt quite hypocritical with the topic, and my task of looking at stewardship of the body … well, lets just say it speaks for itself … a bigger hypocrite than I – I challenge you to find! For I’m known to enjoy left over apple-pie for breakfast (just in case there is none left when I get home from work), I always have a stack of chocolates somewhere in my home, I’m the queen of fad dieting, and exercise is a simply luxury for people who have way too much time on their hands!
I must admit, though, that during the course of this week as I was challenged to prepare this sermon, I found myself being increasingly aware of my eating, sleeping and exercise habits. You’ll be pleased to know that I only had one chocolate this week (even if it was on my way home from gym), and speaking of gym, I’ve renewed my contract – which had ended because it wasn’t being used.
There are so many definitions of the term ‘stewardship’, but one that I really like says that “Stewardship is everything I do after I say I believe” – this includes taking care of our time, talents, possessions, finances, and yes, our bodies.
Our gracious Creator endowed each of us with an amazingly complex, yet a simply wonderfully working collection of limbs, organs, and brain cells, and all the other little bits, for which we are to exercise responsible care. This is not just for the extrinsic value of physical perfection which society regards so highly, but also has intrinsic value, as we are exercising care over what Paul calls “the temple of the living God”.
In practical terms, this means that we have a scripturally-based, God-given responsibility to take the best care possible of our bodies. If we don’t, we mistreat one of God’s greatest and most personal gifts to us.
Speaking about gifts, I came across this text. It reads:
“Imagine that for Christmas you gave your minister a new leather briefcase. You wanted to show your love and appreciation for the ministry of the church. Your marriage was saved through counselling. Your kids’ lives were changed on a youth camp. You grew in faith as the Word of God was preached each week. With thanks, the minister expressed his appreciation by inviting you and your spouse over for dinner. You enjoyed a knock-out meal. The fellowship was encouraging. The kids were well behaved. To your amazement, the minister cleared the table; he actually did what he preached from the pulpit. While clearing the table, the minister began to dump food and trash into the new leather briefcase you had given. You were shocked, horrified! You expressed that it wasn’t meant to be used as a rubbish bin. Friend, how often do we do the same thing with our body, our gift, by using it as a rubbish bin instead of a temple?” – an interesting thought …
I’d like to suggest that healthy stewardship of the body starts with commitment stands on convictions and is steadfast in consistency.
STARTS WITH COMMITMENT:
Trying to change our behaviour without first changing our thought is a fruitless task. Our attitudes determine our actions, and it all starts with commitment to a cause. And so, it is the way that we think of our bodies, and what we think about them, that will determine our actions and behaviours toward it. If we believe that are merely ‘dry bones’, made up of a foot bone connecting to a leg bone, and a leg bone connecting to a knee bone, and so, then there would be no need to make much of a commitment to it. However, if we believe that the Spirit of God has breathed life into our bodies, just as Ezekiel prophesied, and if we believe that that same Spirit has made a home in you, as Paul frequently writes, then surely the nature of our commitment needs to be different. It will be a commitment to a cause, a cause that acknowledges that God created our bodies for His dwelling and for His glory. By surrendering them to Him, and exercising faithful stewardship over them, He can use us to further His Kingdom and help us grow in our faith. Stewardship of the body starts with commitment!
STANDS ON CONVICTIONS:
Having made our commitment, having acknowledged our cause, it stands to reason that our commitment needs go deep into our souls and become our conviction, our passion, something that we’re willing to die for.
In my life, I claim that verse that Christ came that we may have life, and have it abundantly. And an abundant life is grounded in passion, in motivation, in conviction - something that we believe in so deeply, that is becomes in a sense the very essence of who we are. Paul writes that “if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your Spirit is alive because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who lives in you”. Our mortal bodies are given life through the breath of the Living God, through the indwelling of the Spirit, and just as we thirst for water, so too do we thirst for the living water that only Christ can give. And so we see our physical needs parallel our spiritual needs, and while the Samaritan woman confused the two kinds of water, it stands to reason that if we do not take optimum care and responsibility for our physical selves, there is no way that we can satisfy our spiritual hunger and our spiritual thirst. I understand that the optimum care and responsibility will mean different things to different people at different times in their lives, but the principle remains unchanged – regardless of our age, our health, our capabilities. As we exercise faithful stewardship over our bodies we’ll better show our thankfulness to God for them. And we’ll more fully realise the wholeness and abundance God intends for our life on earth, wholeness and abundance that stands on the conviction that our bodies and our souls, our physical and spiritual are brought to life, through Christ. Stewardship of the body stands on conviction!
STEADFAST IN CONSISTENCY:
Finally, stewardship of the body is steadfast in consistency, consistency which is empowered by the Holy Spirit. While I acknowledge that some problems, such as certain diseases and genetic influences, are beyond our control, I think that the greatest threat to stewardship of the body lies in temptation, those things which may please temporarily, but ultimately may cause deep pain and guilt – these occur in varying degrees – over-indulgence (both with food and alcohol), addictions, toxic substances, sexual gratification – but Paul exhorts us to put to death the misdeeds of the body, to regard as dead the power of sin over our body, for when we regard sin’s appeal as dead and lifeless, we can overcome temptation when it comes. If we are to be consistent in our bodily stewardship, we need to immerse ourselves in the empowering of the Holy Spirit that we may remain true to our commitment and our conviction.
But how do we pull this off? Commitment – Conviction – Consistency?
I’m not here to preach today about nutrition, exercise, proper sleep … I’m just here to encourage you to re-examine your thoughts about your body; to make a commitment to your body, believing that it is the temple of the Living God; having made that commitment, to be convicted in it, to be passionate about it; and then to offer you the opportunity to allow the Holy Spirit to empower you as you strive to be the best body you can be, and in being that best body, you’re being the most worthy and the most beautiful dwelling place of the Living God. |
| Date | 2007-09-23 | | Preacher | Mtr. Gill Rookyard | | Title | The Christian and Negativity | | Sermon Details | 23 September 2007
Theme: The Christian and Negativity
Readings: Eccl 1: 1 – 11
Psalm 121
Romans 12: 1 – 2
Matthew 5: 1 - 16
Today we begin a new sermon series – one that is at the same time delightfully simple, yet inextricably complex. I think from the outset it is important for me to say that the topics covered over the next six weeks reflect only the thoughts of each preacher, and are by no means in exhaustible. At the same time, it is very seldom that any of these topics would be experienced in isolation, and so I’m certain that there will be some overlap in our reflections. It is our hope that they will serve as a kind of springboard for deeper reflection and discussion within families, home-groups and indeed beyond.
Before I begin to explore our topics for today, perhaps a little introduction to the series is needed to place it in context:
St. John exhorts us to be in the world, not of the world – yet it is this very world that we have to contend with as we strive to live out our Christian faith. It is a world engulfed so often by negativity, anger, stress, grief, and so on, and as Christians we are not exempt from experiencing these ‘dark’ feelings. We do, however, have the joy and privilege of being led through this darkness by the light of God’s love, to a place of hope – a hope which is not separate from this darkness, but rather a hope which is above it, beside it, beneath it, all around it.
I guess the question we have to ask ourselves, is whether we’re living in submission to the darkness, or whether we’re allowing the darkness to be placed in a position of submission to the Light? Are we living in submission to the darkness, or are we allowing the darkness to be placed in a position of submission to the Light? I think the answer to this depends on whether we see ourselves as thermometers or as thermostats. Hang on Gill – you were speaking of darkness, and light, and submission – now you’re on about thermometers and thermostats??? What are you on about???
You see, while both almost sound the same and while both are concerned with temperature, there is a difference between them. While thermometers merely register and record the surrounding temperature, thermostats serve to control, to regulate the temperature, either raising or lowering it to the desired level. The common denominator is that both are subject to temperature – the difference lies in their reaction to it!
Some Christians are like thermometers – they blindly follow and reflect what is going on around them. If the people around them are negative, they are negative. If the people around them are angry, they are angry. When the world pursues things and money; so do they. The world puts self first: so do they. Like all the worldly and godless people around them, these Christians pursue a materialistic and hedonistic vision of life. They are but thermometers.
Other Christians, however, are like thermostats. These believers do not blindly follow or reflect what is going on in the godless world around them. Instead, while being exposed to the same temperatures as the thermometers, the same negativity and anger and all the darkness, they dare to be different, they dare to stand out and be counted. They set the control, and they hold fast to their belief. They dare to impact the world around them for Christ.
In our reading from Paul’s letter to the Romans, he says: “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind”. The question – are we being conforming thermometer, or a transforming thermostat? Do we merely register and reflect the ways of the world or do we dare to stand out and be different?
I felt deeply challenged as I typed these words yesterday, and my prayer is that you not allow them to challenge you, as you reflect on the sermons in this series.
Today we begin with ‘NEGATIVITY’, that darkness which is echoed in the words of the writer of Ecclesiastes – “Meaningless! Meaningless! Utter meaningless! Everything is meaningless!”
He writes of the meaninglessness of labour (vv 3 – 4, 8), the meaningless in nature (vv 5 – 7), the meaninglessness of sameness (vv 9 – 10), and the meaninglessness of being forgotten (v 11). It is classical thermometer behaviour - a reflection of a futility which exudes negativity. And yet, if we choose rather to function as thermostats, we realise that to labour in the Lord is not in vain, in nature there will be a new heaven and a new earth, with regard to sameness we find hope in the unchangeable Christ, and we shall never be forgotten because we shall appear before Him, and become like Him! And so, it is only Jesus Christ who can bring meaning to the meaningless and the transformation from negative futility to positive hopefulness. It all depends, as Paul says, on whether we adhere to conformity, or allow transformation by the renewing of our minds – a shift in our thinking, an alteration of our attitude.
Jesus speaks of this very transformation in the beatitudes. His words seem contradictory, but then, God’s way of living usually does contradict the ways of the world. When others take, hate and abuse – all of which are negative and can therefore rightfully afford a negative reaction – we are called to give, love and help. Scholars have interpreted the beatitudes in many ways, but all agree that they contrast eternal kingdom values, with temporary worldly values, and provide a code of ethics for the disciples and a standard of conduct for all believers.
Each beatitude tells of how to be ‘blessed’. ‘Blessed’ means more than just happiness – it is the experience of hope and joy independent of human circumstances, independent of the immense negativity which so often attempts to permeate our very existence. Being blessed requires us not to become carbon copies of the world’s values and negativity, not to thermometer[ise] the world’s darkness, but rather to reflect the humility and self-sacrifice of Jesus, our King by thermostat[ing] Light and hope.
Often, though, this is the more difficult option – the one that requires more energy, discipline, and self-sacrifice. It requires stepping out in faith, and being willing to step out of line that the world is travelling along. Apparently, there was once an experiment done with “processional caterpillars”. He lined them up so that the leader was head-to-tail with the last caterpillar. The tiny creatures circled the rim of the pot for a full week. Not once did any one of them break away to go over to the plant and eat. Eventually, all the caterpillars died from exhaustion and starvation.
This is a parable of human behaviour. Too many people are reluctant to break away from the pattern of this world. They don’t want to be different. The only result: their own misery and destruction.
But how do change this? How do we move from a state of conformity to a place of transformation? Only the work of the Spirit can bring about renewal of hearts and minds. But the Spirit does not work in a vacuum. To bring about renewal, the Spirit uses the principal of garbage in, garbage out. If we feed our minds with negative thoughts, feelings, attitudes – our lives will be marked with, and manifest, negativity. Instead, our minds must be fed and nourished on the right kinds of material, on the will of God, for the Spirit to bring about the renewal which allows us to be transformed rather than conformed. Thank God this is not a task we undertake on our own, for as the Palmist writes: “I lift my eyes to the hills – where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth”.
This help from God needs to be translated into courage – courage to take a stand , courage to be a thermostat instead of a thermometer, courage to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world! If we as Christians make not effort to affect the world around us, we are of little use to God. We are not called to blend in with everyone else. We are called to flavour the earth, and to allow Christ’s Light to shine through us into a world of darkness. We have Christ! We have hope!
In closing, I’d like to share with you the J.B. Phillips translation of our reading from Romans. It says: “Don’t let the world squeeze you into its own mould; but let God re-mould your minds from within so hat you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all His demands, and moves towards the goal of true maturity”.
And so, let all the thermostats say… Amen.
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| Date | 2007-10-28 | | Preacher | Mtr. Gill Rookyard | | Title | The Christian and … Hope! | | Sermon Details | Sermon Series: The Christian and …
Theme: Hope!
OT: Isaiah 40: 25 – 31
Ps: 62: 5 – 8
NT: Romans 15: 1 – 6; 13
Gospel: Mark 5: 21 - 36
Five weeks ago we began a sermon series which has dealt with those everyday issues and experiences which we all encounter – negativity, anger, loss, stress, gender stress – and how we, as Christians, are encouraged to respond to them.
I began the first sermon in the series by saying that St John exhorts us to be in the world, not of the world - yet it is this very world that we have to contend with as we strive to live out our Christian faith. It is a world engulfed so often by these issues and experiences, and as Christians we are by no means exempt from encountering them. We do, however, have the joy and privilege of being led through this darkness by the light of God’s love, to a place of hope – a hope which is not separate from this darkness, but rather a hope which is above it, beside it, beneath it, all around it; and it is this very hope that we explore today, as together we draw this series to a close.
I posed the question of whether we’re living in submission to the darkness, or whether we’re allowing the darkness to be placed in submission to the Light, the light of God’s love which leads us to a place of hope. There is a wonderful quote by an unknown author which says: "Hope is like a bird that senses the dawn and carefully starts to sing while it is still dark". Are you able to sense the dawn when you’re in the midst of the darkness, and sing?
It’s tough, isn’t it? When our world’s come crashing down around us; when there are pressures and stresses and obligations everywhere we turn; when we’ve lost that which makes us whole – we don’t feel much like singing, do we? I believe God understands that, and yet as those verses from Psalm 62 say: “Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress; he is my refuge, I will not be shaken”.
There is a delightful e-mail doing the rounds at the moments which illustrates this so beautifully:
A man went to a barbershop to have his hair cut and his beard trimmed.
As the barber began to work, they began to have a good conversation.
They talked about so many things and various subjects.
When they eventually touched on the subject of God, the barber said:
"I don't believe that God exists."
"Why do you say that?" asked the customer.
"Well, you just have to go out in the street to realize that God doesn't exist.
Tell me, if God exists, would there be so many sick people?
Would there be abandoned children?
If God existed, there would be neither suffering nor pain.
I can't imagine a loving God who would allow all of these things."
The customer thought for a moment, but didn't respond because he didn't want to start an argument.
The barber finished his job and the customer left the shop.
Just after he left the barbershop, he saw a man in the street with long, stringy, dirty hair and an untrimmed beard. He looked dirty and unkempt.
The customer turned back and entered the barber shop again and he said to the barber:
"You know what? Barbers do not exist."
"How can you say that?" asked the surprised barber.
"I am here, and I am a barber. And I just worked on you!"
"No!" the customer exclaimed.
"Barbers don't exist because if they did, there would be no people with dirty long hair and untrimmed beards, like that man outside."
"Ah, but barbers DO exist! That's what happens when people do not come to me."
"Exactly!" affirmed the customer. "That's the point! God, too, DOES exist!
That's what happens when people do not go to Him and don't look to Him for help”.
God is waiting, longing, to be our rock, our salvation, our fortress and our refuge – He desires for us to find HOPE in Him – all we have to do … is go to Him!
It’s precisely what our Gospel reading today is all about. We find two people, both in hopelessly dark situations, both with nowhere else to turn … go to Jesus.
1. The woman had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, a disorder which would have made her ritually unclean and excluded her from most social contact. She knew that Jesus was her only hope, and desperately wanted him to heal her, but understood that if she touched him her bleeding would cause Jesus to be unclean under Jewish law. And yet, her faith was so strong that she believed that by merely touching his cloak that she would be healed. Her faith was accompanied by action, an action that took tremendous courage. Sometimes, we feel that our problems will keep us from God, and we fear going to him, but he is there, and He is waiting, for us to come to Him; to place our HOPE in Him.
2. Jairus was the elected ruler of the synagogue. Many synagogue rulers had close ties to the Pharisees, and so it is likely that he had been pressured not to support Jesus. For Jairus to come to Jesus, to bow before Him, was a significant and daring act. He knew that Jesus was the only hope for his little daughter, and so Jairus went to Jesus. His crisis must have made him feel confused, afraid, without hope – and the words Jesus spoke to Jairus in the midst of his crisis speak to us as well: “Don’t be afraid; just believe”. When we feel hopeless and afraid, Jesus is the source of all hope and promise.
Just as the woman and Jairus were starving for hope in their hopeless world, so too are we!
But everything changed when Jesus entered the picture, when the life-changing love of God, the Eternal Word, broke into the heart of human history, to throw us a lifeline . . . so that we might have life and have it abundantly -- both now and in the world to come!
What was true then is still true today -- everything changes when Jesus Christ enters the picture. And, as Paul writes, we, through the power of his Holy Spirit, are blessed with an overflowing of HOPE!
Charles Colson, the founder of Prison Fellowship Ministries in the United States once wrote: "The hope that each of us has is not in who governs us or what laws are passed or what great things we do as a nation. Our hope is in the power of God working through the hearts of people. That's where our hope is in this country, and that's where our hope is in life."
Hope was born 2,000 years ago in the most humble of circumstances, and the forces of evil and hatred could not kill that Hope, though they tried -- and many still try to do so today.
Max Lucado writes of a story told of a man on an African safari deep in the jungle. The guide before him had a machete and was whacking away the tall weeds and thick underbrush. The traveler, wearied and hot, asked in frustration, “Where are we? Do you know where you are taking me? Where is the path?!” The seasoned guide stopped and looked back at the man and replied, “I am the path”.
I don’t know about you, but I’ve felt at times like that man on the safari – flustered, tired, desperate – not knowing where I was going, or when I was going to get there. Feeling lost; hopeless. Looking back, I realise there was a guide, a path, and I just had to lift up my head, open my eyes, and keep them fixed on Him. That is our hope; that is our path out of the darkness, and the means to place that darkness in submission to the Light. Our home-group will tell you that I have a new passion – I’ve been introduced to the universe – the stars and planets and galaxies – the majesty of it all – and when I think about how the Creator of all of that, the Creator who, as Isaiah writes, “brings out the starry host one by one and calls them each by name”, not only knows me, but is longing to have a personal relationship with me, I cannot help but be filled with a sense of hopefulness, a sense that it’s going to be ok. “Those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary; they will walk and not grow faint”.
Having been renewed in hope, we are called, as Christians, to be beacons of hope in the world in which we live. We are to let Christ’s light shine through us, that others may see the Guide, the Path, and encounter that hope for themselves. Filled with hope, we are to be like a bird that senses the dawn and carefully starts to sing while it is still dark".
JUST IN CASE …
SCRIPTURE REFERENCES WHICH REFER TO HOPE:
ABOUND IN HOPE!
• Romans 15:13. “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.”
WHERE DOES HOPE COME FROM?
• Psalm 39:7. “And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you.”
• Ephesians 2:12. “. . . remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.”
WHAT IS HOPE? JOY AND PEACE, NOT SORROW AND STRESS!
• Proverbs 13:12. “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”
• Romans 8:23-25. “And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.”
• Romans 8:28 “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”
• 1 Peter 3:15-16. ". . . but in your hearts regard Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.”
• 1 Corinthians 15:19. “If in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.”
HOW DO WE GET HOPE?
1. By Believing Patiently.
• Hebrews 6:11-20. “And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises."
2. By the Word.
• Romans 15:4. “. . . through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.”
3. By the Holy Spirit. (5:13 itself)
HOW MUCH HOPE IS ENOUGH?
• Ephesians 3:20. “Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us ...”
WHAT DOES HOPE LOOK LIKE?
• 2 Corinthians 3:12. “Since we have such a hope, we are very bold.” |
| Date | 2007-10-28 | | Preacher | Mtr. Gill Rookyard | | Title | The Christian and.... Hope! | | Sermon Details | OT: Isaiah 40: 25 – 31
Ps: 62: 5 – 8
NT: Romans 15: 1 – 6; 13
Gospel: Mark 5: 21 - 36
Five weeks ago we began a sermon series which has dealt with those everyday issues and experiences which we all encounter – negativity, anger, loss, stress, gender stress – and how we, as Christians, are encouraged to respond to them.
I began the first sermon in the series by saying that St John exhorts us to be in the world, not of the world - yet it is this very world that we have to contend with as we strive to live out our Christian faith. It is a world engulfed so often by these issues and experiences, and as Christians we are by no means exempt from encountering them. We do, however, have the joy and privilege of being led through this darkness by the light of God’s love, to a place of hope – a hope which is not separate from this darkness, but rather a hope which is above it, beside it, beneath it, all around it; and it is this very hope that we explore today, as together we draw this series to a close.
I posed the question of whether we’re living in submission to the darkness, or whether we’re allowing the darkness to be placed in submission to the Light, the light of God’s love which leads us to a place of hope. There is a wonderful quote by an unknown author which says: "Hope is like a bird that senses the dawn and carefully starts to sing while it is still dark". Are you able to sense the dawn when you’re in the midst of the darkness, and sing?
It’s tough, isn’t it? When our world’s come crashing down around us; when there are pressures and stresses and obligations everywhere we turn; when we’ve lost that which makes us whole – we don’t feel much like singing, do we? I believe God understands that, and yet as those verses from Psalm 62 say: “Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress; he is my refuge, I will not be shaken”.
There is a delightful e-mail doing the rounds at the moments which illustrates this so beautifully:
A man went to a barbershop to have his hair cut and his beard trimmed.
As the barber began to work, they began to have a good conversation.
They talked about so many things and various subjects.
When they eventually touched on the subject of God, the barber said:
"I don't believe that God exists."
"Why do you say that?" asked the customer.
"Well, you just have to go out in the street to realize that God doesn't exist.
Tell me, if God exists, would there be so many sick people?
Would there be abandoned children?
If God existed, there would be neither suffering nor pain.
I can't imagine a loving God who would allow all of these things."
The customer thought for a moment, but didn't respond because he didn't want to start an argument.
The barber finished his job and the customer left the shop.
Just after he left the barbershop, he saw a man in the street with long, stringy, dirty hair and an untrimmed beard. He looked dirty and unkempt.
The customer turned back and entered the barber shop again and he said to the barber:
"You know what? Barbers do not exist."
"How can you say that?" asked the surprised barber.
"I am here, and I am a barber. And I just worked on you!"
"No!" the customer exclaimed.
"Barbers don't exist because if they did, there would be no people with dirty long hair and untrimmed beards, like that man outside."
"Ah, but barbers DO exist! That's what happens when people do not come to me."
"Exactly!" affirmed the customer. "That's the point! God, too, DOES exist!
That's what happens when people do not go to Him and don't look to Him for help”.
God is waiting, longing, to be our rock, our salvation, our fortress and our refuge – He desires for us to find HOPE in Him – all we have to do … is go to Him!
It’s precisely what our Gospel reading today is all about. We find two people, both in hopelessly dark situations, both with nowhere else to turn … go to Jesus.
1. The woman had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, a disorder which would have made her ritually unclean and excluded her from most social contact. She knew that Jesus was her only hope, and desperately wanted him to heal her, but understood that if she touched him her bleeding would cause Jesus to be unclean under Jewish law. And yet, her faith was so strong that she believed that by merely touching his cloak that she would be healed. Her faith was accompanied by action, an action that took tremendous courage. Sometimes, we feel that our problems will keep us from God, and we fear going to him, but he is there, and He is waiting, for us to come to Him; to place our HOPE in Him.
2. Jairus was the elected ruler of the synagogue. Many synagogue rulers had close ties to the Pharisees, and so it is likely that he had been pressured not to support Jesus. For Jairus to come to Jesus, to bow before Him, was a significant and daring act. He knew that Jesus was the only hope for his little daughter, and so Jairus went to Jesus. His crisis must have made him feel confused, afraid, without hope – and the words Jesus spoke to Jairus in the midst of his crisis speak to us as well: “Don’t be afraid; just believe”. When we feel hopeless and afraid, Jesus is the source of all hope and promise.
Just as the woman and Jairus were starving for hope in their hopeless world, so too are we!
But everything changed when Jesus entered the picture, when the life-changing love of God, the Eternal Word, broke into the heart of human history, to throw us a lifeline . . . so that we might have life and have it abundantly -- both now and in the world to come!
What was true then is still true today -- everything changes when Jesus Christ enters the picture. And, as Paul writes, we, through the power of his Holy Spirit, are blessed with an overflowing of HOPE!
Charles Colson, the founder of Prison Fellowship Ministries in the United States once wrote: "The hope that each of us has is not in who governs us or what laws are passed or what great things we do as a nation. Our hope is in the power of God working through the hearts of people. That's where our hope is in this country, and that's where our hope is in life."
Hope was born 2,000 years ago in the most humble of circumstances, and the forces of evil and hatred could not kill that Hope, though they tried -- and many still try to do so today.
Max Lucado writes of a story told of a man on an African safari deep in the jungle. The guide before him had a machete and was whacking away the tall weeds and thick underbrush. The traveler, wearied and hot, asked in frustration, “Where are we? Do you know where you are taking me? Where is the path?!” The seasoned guide stopped and looked back at the man and replied, “I am the path”.
I don’t know about you, but I’ve felt at times like that man on the safari – flustered, tired, desperate – not knowing where I was going, or when I was going to get there. Feeling lost; hopeless. Looking back, I realise there was a guide, a path, and I just had to lift up my head, open my eyes, and keep them fixed on Him. That is our hope; that is our path out of the darkness, and the means to place that darkness in submission to the Light. Our home-group will tell you that I have a new passion – I’ve been introduced to the universe – the stars and planets and galaxies – the majesty of it all – and when I think about how the Creator of all of that, the Creator who, as Isaiah writes, “brings out the starry host one by one and calls them each by name”, not only knows me, but is longing to have a personal relationship with me, I cannot help but be filled with a sense of hopefulness, a sense that it’s going to be ok. “Those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary; they will walk and not grow faint”.
Having been renewed in hope, we are called, as Christians, to be beacons of hope in the world in which we live. We are to let Christ’s light shine through us, that others may see the Guide, the Path, and encounter that hope for themselves. Filled with hope, we are to be like a bird that senses the dawn and carefully starts to sing while it is still dark".
JUST IN CASE …
SCRIPTURE REFERENCES WHICH REFER TO HOPE:
ABOUND IN HOPE!
• Romans 15:13. “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.”
WHERE DOES HOPE COME FROM?
• Psalm 39:7. “And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you.”
• Ephesians 2:12. “. . . remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.”
WHAT IS HOPE? JOY AND PEACE, NOT SORROW AND STRESS!
• Proverbs 13:12. “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”
• Romans 8:23-25. “And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.”
• Romans 8:28 “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”
• 1 Peter 3:15-16. ". . . but in your hearts regard Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.”
• 1 Corinthians 15:19. “If in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.”
HOW DO WE GET HOPE?
1. By Believing Patiently.
• Hebrews 6:11-20. “And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises."
2. By the Word.
• Romans 15:4. “. . . through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.”
3. By the Holy Spirit. (5:13 itself)
HOW MUCH HOPE IS ENOUGH?
• Ephesians 3:20. “Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us ...”
WHAT DOES HOPE LOOK LIKE?
• 2 Corinthians 3:12. “Since we have such a hope, we are very bold.” |
| Date | 2007-11-18 | | Preacher | Mtr. Gill Rookyard | | Title | Mission Sunday | | Sermon Details | 2 Thess 3: 6 – 13 (Warning against idleness)
Luke 21: 5 – 19 (Jesus tells about the future)
Prayer for the mission of the Church: (APB pg 83)
Almighty Father
you have made of one blood
all the peoples of the earth
and sent your Son to preach peace
to those who are far off
and to those who are near:
grant that people everywhere
may seek after you and find you;
bring the nations into your fold;
pour out your Spirit upon all flesh
and hasten the coming of your kingdom;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
There were three country churches in a small town – Presbyterian, Methodist and Anglican.
The town was over-run by pesky squirrels. They were causing havoc … people very agitated… decided that something needed to be done about them.
The Presbyterians called their elders together … and after much prayer and consideration they realised that the squirrels were pre-destined to be there … and that they as a church community should not interfere with God’s Divine Will.
The Methodists called together their committee of church leaders, and they too – after much prayer and consultation – decided that the squirrels were in fact part of God’s creation and therefore they could not harm them in any way. They trapped the squirrels and set them free outside the town. Needless to say the squirrels were back after three days!
It was the Anglicans who had the most effective solution.
They baptised the squirrels and registered them as full members of the Church.
Now they only see the squirrels at Christmas and Easter!
You and I are baptised, registered members of the Church. The question I’d like to pose this morning, to each of us, is … “How seriously are we taking the Christian responsibility this brings?”
At the 9am service (later in this service) we will be baptizing four children, and welcoming them as members of the Church. They will receive that “seal” – the invisible sign of the cross - that we each received at our baptism. It is a sign which reveals that we belong to Christ.
If we think about a good piece of silver, or a piece of gold jewellery – it has a hallmark, a symbol, showing that it is genuine. A piece of fine bone china is marked “Royal Doulton” or “Royal Albert”, showing its authenticity.
Does the sign on our forehead reveal our authenticity?
Does it show that we are genuine about our Christianity?
How do you and I reveal that we belong to Christ?
Think about it … How do you and I reveal our Christianity?
Yes, we can be seen in church most Sundays … but does that make us true Christians?
Surely God asks, and deserves, far, far more from us!
The way we conduct our lives from Sunday to Sunday should reveal, without a doubt, that we are Christians.
Have you ever wondered or thought to yourself - “What is my reason for living?” /
“What is the purpose of my life?”
In other words – “What on earth am I here for?” / “Why am I here?”
In his book, The Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren tells of 5 purposes God had in mind when giving the gift of life to each one of us … and our life is a gift from God, isn’t it?
He suggests that one of these purposes is that God made us for MISSION. He says …
“God is at work in the world, and He wants us to join Him. This assignment is called our mission!” Today is Mission Sunday – it is the one Sunday in the year that the Church sets aside to give us an opportunity to reassess our lives: who we are, what we have to offer, our purpose here on earth, and how we can set about fulfilling it.
Once we realise that purpose, we may be able to answer the question I posed right at the beginning – “Are we taking our responsibility as baptised members of the Church seriously?”
You see, Jesus calls us not only to come to Him, but to go for Him.
Our mission is a continuation of Jesus’ mission on earth.
As followers of Jesus, we are called to continue what He started here on earth:
To go out into the world to live and work, to share His love with others, to bring others to Him.
This mission, our assignment, is so important that Jesus is recorded saying it five times, in five different books of the Bible!
Let’s listen to what Jesus said before He left this earth, and what He is still saying to us on this Mission Sunday:
Matt 28: 19 – 20 Go then, to all peoples everywhere and make them my disciples: baptise them in the Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. And teach them to obey everything I commanded you.
Mark 16: 15 Go throughout the whole world and preach the Gospel to the whole human race.
Luke 24: 47 In His Name the message about repentance and the forgiveness of sins must be preached to all nations.
John 20: 21 Jesus said to them, “Peace be with you. As the Father sent me, so I am sending you”.
Acts 1: 8 You will be filled with power, and you will be witnesses for me to the ends of the earth.
Are you and I witnesses for Jesus ... are we allowing His love to be revealed through our lives … do we say “Here I am Lord, send me”?
You and I have been created by God and for God.
You and I were born by His purpose and for His purpose.
We are His delegates in this world.
Through us, His message of salvation can be revealed.
What an enormous privilege! Our mission involves working with God and being representatives for Him here on earth.
We get to partner God in the building of His Kingdom!
Paul, in 2 Cor 5: 20, calls us co-labourers, and says, “we are workers together with God”.
Are you and I allowing that to happen? Are we allowing God to use us as His co-workers?
God gave us the gift of life.
He is our Creator.
He therefore knows our capabilities – He knows our strengths and weaknesses.
He gives to each one of us a unique identity – unique giftedness through the various talents He allocates to each of us.
And ALL He asks - is that we use these blessings to further His Kingdom:
for us who accept God as our Creator, to reach out to fellow human beings, to use our talents to bring other people closer to Him.
By doing so, our lives will reveal that we DO in fact take our Christian responsibility seriously.
This week, I encourage each of us to become conscious of our sign of authenticity - the sign of the cross on our forehead – and then prayerfully to consider what it is that God is asking of US.
What part are we playing in God’s Mission?
Are we fulfilling that which He has called us to do?
Through the power of the Holy Spirit may we always have the courage to answer …
“Here I am Lord, send me” |
| Date | 2007-12-09 | | Preacher | Mtr. Gill Rookyard | | Title | Second Sunday in Advent | | Sermon Details | Advent 2 [A]
Romans 15: 4 – 13
Matthew 3: 1 - 12
Can you believe that there are only 16 days till Christmas?
Let’s take ourselves back to the early years of our childhood – our parents taking us to a shopping centre or into town to stand in a long line to get our picture taken with Father Christmas / Santa Claus, and the opportunity to whisper in his ear what it is that we most wish to receive. Remember that …
But imagine going to the mall, and standing in line,
but when you get to the front of the line, you don’t see a big man with a red suit and a white beard echoing Ho Ho Ho’s, but rather a scrawny man with a leathery face – a long, messy, Middle-Eastern beard.
He’s wearing some type of brown animal skin – later you find out that its camel’s hair.
He’s eating grasshoppers and honey.
You meet … John the Baptist, labeled by Jesus as the greatest of all the prophets,
and instead of whispering something in his ear … he’s shouting something in yours …
“Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is near”.
Sho ... what a Christmas turn-around. What a shift in focus.
From the freneticness of the malls, lists of gifts to be purchased, feuds over who’s coming to dinner, whether to have turkey or gammon or both and all the other things that make Christmas so complex … this is indeed a simple message …
“Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is near” …
or is it so simple …
One commentator has said that the word "repent" is one of the worst translations of the Greek word that we have.
The original word says, "To change one’s thinking or to change one’s mind."
John is preaching:
"Change your thinking, change your mind", for this will change your heart and your life.
"Change your thinking, your mind, your heart, and your life, for the kingdom of heaven is near".
That is why they came.
John was baptizing and preaching a message of repentance for changed minds and changed lives.
There’s an interesting illustration for repentance here.
Matthew tells us that John the Baptist “was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah:
‘A voice of one calling in the desert,
‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him’.”
Make straight paths in our thinking, in our hearts, and in our lives.
Repentance is radical road construction which takes place inside of us.
Our thoughts, our desires, our wants, our feelings – all these things tend to be crooked inside of us.
Spiritual potholes everywhere in our soul!
Our love for God - unpleasantly up and down.
“Repent,” John tells us, “Change” … “Make straight paths for him.”
In Old Testament times, before a king would visit a town,
radical road construction would take place.
If the road had high spots, they would be chopped down.
If the road had low spots, they would be filled in.
If the road was crooked, it would be straightened out.
Once the road was smooth and straight, it was ready for the king.
Do this inside of you, John tells the people –
your thoughts, your desires, your wants, your feelings, your love for God – straighten it out; make it right.
John was encouraging the people to do on the inside what he was showing outwardly by his simple lifestyle:
A plea to abandon worldly desires, an abolishment of pride, and in its place …
encouragement to become someone who is humble,
someone who is focused on spiritual things,
someone who is focused on worshiping God and serving others.
The language John uses in our text for today is very strong.
We read that the Pharisees and the Sadducees had arrived.
They were very pious outwardly, but inwardly, they were proud and materialistic.
John calls them a brood of vipers, and tells them to produce fruit in keeping with repentance.
The Pharisees and Sadducees claimed to be humble and spiritual,
but everything they said and did showed them to be otherwise.
John compares them to a fruit tree, and tells them that
“the axe is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire”.
He condemns the Pharisees and Sadducees, because they would not change.
They would not repent.
They would say and do things to make themselves look pious and spiritual.
But there was no real change in their hearts and lives.
We often struggle with this too.
It’s easy to act humble and spiritual.
It’s easy to show up in church and smile and shake a hand and talk about the real meaning of Christmas.
It’s easy to frown when people talk about pride and materialism.
But let us ask ourselves – what kind of religion are we really looking for?
Most people are looking for a religion that makes them feel good about themselves.
Is that what we’re looking for? Something that makes us feel good?
If it is we’ve got a problem,
because that’s not what Christianity, or John the Baptist, are all about.
John the Baptist isn’t standing out in the desert telling everyone to smile,
because God loves them just the way they are.
And then everyone leaves the desert and goes home and feels good about themselves.
John the Baptist is urging them to change – to stop being themselves – to repent –
to be different from how they normally are.
But often we don’t like that. Change is difficult.
But Christianity has never claimed to be comfortable!
Sometimes – perhaps more often than we’re prepared to acknowledge –
we are the Pharisees and Sadducees that John condemns in the desert,
people who act pious and religious, but deep down inside, we can be quite the contrary.
John condemns us in these verses and warns us that the fire of God’s wrath is coming.
But we can repent, we can change – we can do what those people did in verse 8 – “confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River.”
Those people confessed their sins, and they were forgiven by God.
In the same way, we can confess our sins, and receive God’s forgiveness.
God completely forgives us and truly changes our hearts.
This is the hope of the Christmas message – or should I say the Christian message of Christmas;
it is the hope Paul speaks of in his letter to the Romans, where he outlines
the SOURCE of our Hope,
the SERENITY of our Hope,
the SUFFICIENCY of our Hope and
the SUPPLY of our Hope:
God, through Jesus, is the source of our hope,
joy and peace bring the serenity of this hope,
the superabundance of hope that God desires to pour into our lives provides the sufficiency of hope,
and the power of the Spirit at work in our lives sustains the supply of our hope.
The season of Advent serves as a dual reminder of this hope –
the original waiting that was done by the Hebrews for the coming of the Messiah,
as well as the awaiting of Christians today for the second coming of Jesus Christ.
John preached the message of repentance, of making straight the path.
The message for us today … is no different!
We need to come to God, make ourselves vulnerable before God,
and God forgives us because of the one that would come after John.
It is written,
“After me, will come one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not fit to carry”.
He was powerful, and yet, was humble,
not obsessed with material things, but spiritual things.
This One who is coming produced more fruit than any other person that ever lived.
Yet, was willing to be cut down and thrown into the fire,
even though he had done nothing wrong.
This man was Jesus Christ, a human being, but also the Child of God, God’s very self.
Despite living perfectly, Jesus was crucified on the cross out of love for us,
to take away all our sins.
He was raised from the dead,
and just as John baptized people for the forgiveness of sins,
so also Jesus has baptized you, to forgive you, and wash all your sins away.
And hence it is with great joy that we witness today the baptism of little Dylan,
as he receives this most wonderful gift!
When we walk out of here today,
we walk out of here with the same comfort those people felt who were baptized by John. They walked away knowing that their sins were forgiven.
They walked away empowered to make real changes in their lives,
changes that glorified God, and prepared the way for the coming of Christ.
We have the exact same comfort those people had – perhaps even more,
because we know how Jesus has taken our sins away.
And like those people we have been given strength to make real changes in our lives –
to straighten out what’s in our hearts,
to prepare the way for the coming of Christ,
to show it in our lives,
and to encourage others to do the same. |
Instructions
The above section is made up of two parts, namely:
· List of categories
· Sermon details
The list of categories has been structured by indenting sub categories to show their relationship to the category above. Next to each category is a number surrounded by brackets which indicates the total number of sermons in the category.
When you click on one of these categories, the right hand side of the page will display a list of the sermons within the selected category.
The sermon details are made up of :
· Sermon date
· Preacher
· Title
· Sermon Details
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