Against Pelagius (probably)

Preached Remembrance Sunday (12th November) 2023, St Michael's Stockwell

Amos 5.18-24
Psalm 70
1 Thessalonians 4.13–end
Matthew 25.1–13

There is a lot of about justice in the readings today, and in context of today, today’s war, indeed any war, justice is hard to locate:

• Where was the justice on the 7th October when Hamas killed women and children.
• Where was the justice yesterday, and plenty of others, when Israeli forces bombed hospitals where children are under care.
• Where indeed is the justice when this conflict has been on the headline of every bulletin for a month, yet there are twenty other conflicts running that killed over a thousand people last year.

These positions are complex, and murky, and need a better political analysis than I am capable of, or than I am intending to give. They, and every war, are the backdrop to our thinking about justice, and about remembrance. It throws our readings into sharp relief.

And they made me think of two distinctly unbiblical quotations. The first is from the 1970s US comedy MASH, set in the Korean war, where there’s an argument about whether war is hell. No, ‘War is war, and Hell is Hell. And … war is a lot worse.’ Sinners go to Hell, but “There are no innocent bystanders in Hell, but war is chock full of them.” Divine justice is simpler than human justice. You know who the baddies are. And we long for the simplicity of divine justice: here is Paul who tells us that living and dead will receive their reward; here the Psalmist who talks of the coming of the Lord. They are waiting for divine justice.

The other quotation that came to me while I was preparing for today I first encountered in an Agatha Christie murder mystery (Hercule Poirot’s Christmas - an excellent seasonal read). It’s actually 2000 years older, about the time of Jesus: the mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceedingly fine. That’s the justice people think they they are looking for. In the Second World War, both Churchill and Roosevelt quoted that line when promising retribution for the extermination of the Jews. Divine justice is transmuted into human vengeance.

But they are rather assuming that they, we, will be on the right side. And I think we all should be reading the book of Amos more closely. Amos is one of my favourite prophets. Not that he thinks he is a prophet. He is a shepherd – he tells people this several times in the book. He is an outsider. He stands apart from the establishment.

And he hates everyone: he hates the leadership of Israel, the pre-Christian northern Kingdom, not this one; he hates the priests; he hates the people: 'I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies …. I will not listen to the melody of your harps.' He hates the complacency of the Psalmist: 'Alas for you who desire the day of the Lord! Why do you want the day of the Lord? It is darkness, not light.'  The standard of divine justice may be simpler, but it's much much higher than human justice, and everyone fails.

It’s the same in the gospel. The bridesmaids who fail are not enemies. They do not face the bridegroom across a fortified border. They are part of the wedding party. They’re us. And they have failed. And they are locked out. We long for justice, but we will not be ready when it comes. Slightly annoyingly, the very next verse of Thessalonians is the famous one that says that the ‘the day of the Lord comes like a thief in the night.’ It seems a missed opportunity. We should prepare, we will try to prepare, but we will not be ready. We will fail.

Where does that leave justice? And where does that leave remembrance?

Firstly, this doesn’t negate the striving. There are bridesmaids with flasks of oil. People should and will do the right thing. The Nazis were wrong. We should remember those who faced war and didn’t come back, and those who did and were marked by it forever. Every year, every news headline, I am conscious of my vast privilege of living away from war for my whole life – not the case for everyone here. I honour that. We should not be putting our judgement aside.

But we should also remember the limits of human justice and human action. We should think of those who were just in the wrong place, which at times is everyone. The fourth century heretic Pelagius is felt to have argued that humanity has autonomy enough to choose not to sin. Amos would say otherwise. When we think of war, we must recognise that human justice, however effective, has its limits. People cannot do the right thing all the time. We are remembering people who tried, not people who were perfect. People will fail.

Amos believes in justice. He believes it’s going to come. He just doesn’t think we’re going to pass. But listen to how he describes it: let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. He does not reach for the metaphor of the refiner’s fire – that’s Malachi – but water. Justice is broad, not narrow, replenished, not spent, cleansing, not destructive, and life giving, not deadly. It is not just retribution, but bounty.

So, knowing we will fall short. But also knowing that righteousness will come. We remember. And we hope for the ever-flowing stream of the love of God.

A college sermon (against justification by works)

Preached third Sunday of Epiphany (22nd January) 2023, Balliol chapel, Oxford, Evensong

Ecclesiastes 3.1-11

1 Peter 1.3-12
Psalm 33.1-12

It is a great pleasure to be asked to preach here. I did not go to Balliol while I was at Oxford, but I hold it in great affection. I have lots of good friends at Balliol, through them I met my wife. I’ve visited plenty of times. I have never set foot in this chapel.

I am delighted to rectify this this today, though less delighted with the circumstances. It’s always cold in Oxford, and it’s freezing today. It is also potentially difficult to be doing the sermon in a week where the bishops of the church have failed, once again, to reach the right answer on same sex relationships. And lastly, it is daunting to be asked to preach on one the most famous passages of the Old Testament, though it is now two generation since the Byrds took it to top of the US chart, so the resonance may have faded. As we are in Oxford, one never knows.

Still, no matter what place it occupies in the popular imagination, the Book of Ecclesiastes occupies a strange place in the Bible. Plenty of people have thought it shouldn’t be in the bible, and this is because throughout, instead of the golden thread of God who chooses, judges and redeems, this one doesn’t. The author of Ecclesiastes is resigned; God is remote.

And there appears to be little ambiguity about this. There are sections of the bible where the metaphor clouds the meaning, and the message is obscure. Not here, not least because the superscript literally tell us: ‘There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens.’ The message is not subtle one: everything happens, no-one understands God, and then you die. A few verses later we have that the ‘fate of the songs of man and the fate of the beast is a single fate’.

In fact, all our texts lack ambiguity as well, though the others are more upbeat, at least. But, if we can escape the blinding obviousness of the metaphor, the text is less clear. What is the time for? What does the author of Ecclesiastes think we are doing with our lives?

Because despite the opener, every activity under the sun is not listed: there are twenty-eight of them, in fourteen opposed pairs. One of which doesn’t count because you can’t allocate much time to being born or dying. Fairly essential tasks are not included - no eating, no drinking, no sex at all, no studying, no writing, no entertainment, no travel. Some of these do pop up in other parts of the book.

So actually, Ecclesiastes thinks thirteen types of activity are what fill a life:

• Two about violence (fighting, healing war)
• Two are about the getting of things, either the finding or the putting off. This may include another about the gathering of stones.
• Three are about building or making: planting/uprooting, building, mending.
• Five are about feelings: Embracing, speaking, mourning, weeping, love

I’d like to talk about the last two.

What binds all the building and the making is that it’s for the future. Even the negatives. You obviously build a house or plant a seed for the future, but you also don’t tear down a house if there’s no tomorrow, you tear down a house because you don’t want someone in it or you want to put something there.

When we have later that God has put eternity in the human heart, this is what he means. And in the epistle. ‘the prophets … trying to find out the time and circumstances [of the] the sufferings of the Messiah …. they were not serving themselves but you’.

The prophets may have been laying the foundations of heavenly salvation, but throughout the Old and Testament, and again here, the earthly future matters.

And how is that earthly future going?

It may not feel like it, but it’s going pretty well. Several centuries of material progress, dramatic increases in global wealth and global health has meant a vast improvement in lifestyles. The gap between the time to be born and to die has expanded in length and in quality.

In my own field, nearly two billion people have gained access to clean water in the last two decades. Ukraine’s day of national unity, which is today, is just over 100 years old. You can’t tell them it’s not important.

But, just as with Ukraine, that earthly future is being denied to too many people because of the lack of sound foundations. Think of the basics. Think of Ecclesiastes.

• To plant: over 700m people are suffering from hunger, half of the countries in the world have food insecurity
• To build and create: over 600m live in extreme poverty
• I would add my own field, the foundational gift of water, essential for physical and our spiritual life. 800m people still do not have access to clean water nearby

And, right now, those foundations look shaky. Because of COVID those numbers have gotten worse; undermining the huge gains made. And the drumbeat of climate change gets ever louder threatening it all.

Where is God?

Our first instinct is to look for a God who judges. Is this a test we are failing? What works should we do to get this right, to secure salvation?

The Psalm is clear about the greatness of the Lord, but Ecclesiastes reminds us of the fundamental chasm between man and God, the gap only bridged by Christ. And the tolls of that bridge are not a tariff of good works.

The world matters not because we’re commanded to care, but because of those last set of activities in Ecclesiastes. Those feelings. They aren’t inner feelings, but social ones. For example, keeping silent is normal alone, it’s only an act when you’re with someone.

Faced with the vastness of divine power, an unknowable, unreachable, uninfluenceable God, where all is ‘mere breath’, Ecclesiastes points to people, to the crown of God’s creation. Now, this is no blandly pious ‘God is Love’ message, he’s not saying you can’t hate them, just that a full life engages with them in all their complexity, their diversity , and their messiness. It requires us to engage with the world as it is. And it allows for change. Some might say – I would say – that this week’s position from the college of bishops isn’t changing enough. That it’s not engaging with the world as it is.

But the point is that we must do this, not because these works to be done for a test, but because this is life to be lived to its fullness, this is what we have the time for. Ecclesiastes isn’t telling you how; it’s certainly not telling you when, it’s just telling us that creation, not heaven alone is our mission. Nothing can be left to God alone, when we can act ourselves.

Keep your eyes fixed on the heavens, sure, but lay those foundations, plant those seeds. There is a time for everything. Let us act in the world. Eternity is coming, God has placed it in our hearts, but not yet.

Against the puritans

Preached Remembrance Sunday (13th November) 2022, St Michael's Church, Stockwell

Malachi 4:1-2
Psalm 98
2 Thessalonians 3:6-13
Luke 21:5-19

Now the Vicar isn’t here, I can admit that I really don’t want to give this sermon. I like giving sermons in general, just not this one, the Remembrance day sermon.

And I have three main problems with it:

• Firstly, the cricket is on, so I’m missing England’s batting in the final – this may be a blessing in disguise.
• Secondly, the timing is highly stressful. Up and down the country preachers are having their sermons timed carefully to ensure that we hit 11am. There is no time for improvisations.
• Most importantly, the tone is very difficult to get right. This is a national, secular, day of solemn remembrance, which sometimes makes preachers give half-baked political opinions and neglect the theology.

You can judge me later on how I do.

That tone issue is particularly relevant when we look at the readings that we have. The Old Testament does not appear to have been chosen for solemn remembrance. Malachi is all about retribution, the Psalm is a celebration: we are invited to make a joyful noise to the Lord. And we are promised the whole earth will resound with joy and celebration – the seas roar, the hills sing.

We are a long way from the Cenotaph.

It made me think of the places where the war still sits heavily. 104 years after the end of the First World War, there remain places in France where the earth has never recovered. In the ‘zone rouge’ in north east France, contamination from the battlefield means that the water remains poisoned, almost all plants die, and locals are still at risk from unexploded shells. There may be noises in the hills, but not singing. They are uninhabitable.

I could not ask for a less subtle metaphor: the scars from wars are deep and long. And that is why today we remember the Great War, and subsequent ones of course. But the First World War was a global war, with soldiers from every continent, and battles across the globe. For the remembrance of what was meant to be the war to end all wars, it is poignant that we do so in a Europe that is once again at war. In Ukraine, nation has once again risen against nation.

We in Europe rightly are gripped by this new, rare, war, but war itself is not new, it is certainly not news. Many of you will have first hand knowledge of it.

In first century Palestine, it was very present. In the century before the crucifixion, Jerusalem itself had been the scene of several wars and rebellions and control of Judea had changed hands several times. When Luke records Christ talking about war and hardship: ‘kingdom against kingdom … great earthquakes, … famines and plagues’ he could be talking about their recent history. By the time the gospel was written, later in the first century, the Romans had crushed the Jewish revolt and destroyed the temple.

The first audience of the gospels didn’t need warning about the future where nation fought nation, their nation had fought, and it had lost. What they needed to be told was what happens next. And the gospel gives them – and us – the answer. And it gets worse before it gets better:

• This isn’t just a normal war: ‘there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven’
• Nor will you face it with your compatriots and allies: ‘they will persecute you… you will be hated by all.’

This, rhetorically at least, is not like the wars we remember today. It requires much greater bravery than that. You will be alone.

But, in the end: you will gain your souls.

And this is why our readings on Remembrance Sunday start with jubilation. Not because there is no danger. There is. Not because the it will not hurt. It will. Not because sacrifice is not needed. Not because some sacrifices were misguided. They were. But because in the end, you will gain your souls. And we will rejoice.

This has always been the promise, but there are two dangers embedded in this:

• Firstly, that knowing one is saved, it is easy to stop trying. The writer of our epistle (possible Paul) has little time for this: Anyone unwilling to work should not eat … do not be weary in doing what is right. This danger lurks in the Calvinist theology of predestination, but for another time.
• But there is also a second risk. Not addressed directly, and that is that by fixing upon the future rejoicing, the church becomes miserable, dour, and joyless - a puritan Christianity that drives out all enjoyment. Calvin’s Geneva banned art, music with instruments, dancing, and theatre. We must not be so fixed on the narrowness of the path that we forget to laugh along the way.

For Remembrance must be tempered with laughter, just as the sacrifices of the war years were also tempered with joy. The pubs did not shut in either World War. And I wrote the last parts of this sermon last night, after Martin Kenyon’s memorial service in this church yesterday. Like all good funerals, while of course it was sad as we said goodbye to Martin, it also had jokes. Sorrow must be mingled with laughter. Afterwards, we debated about what to do with the flowers and I promised Wendy that it would be fitting to keep them. Remembrance should be solemn, but it need not be joyless.

Today is, in some churches, the feast of St John Chrysostom. He was THE superstar preacher of the late fourth century, later poached by the Emperor to become bishop of Constantinople, the biggest job in the church. It went terribly badly: John preaches against the excesses of the court, falls out with everybody and dies on the way to exile.

John did die alone, persecuted, I assume, the promise of his soul sustained him.

But I raise John not because of what he did, but because of what he wrote. This is his paschal homily, given every Easter in the Orthodox church:

Let us all enter into the joy of the Lord! First and last alike receive your reward; rich and poor, rejoice together! Sober and slothful, celebrate the day! You that have kept the fast, and you that have not, rejoice today for the Table is richly laden! Feast royally on it, the calf is a fatted one. Let no one go away hungry; partake, all, of the cup of faith. Enjoy all the riches of His goodness! Let no one grieve at his poverty, for the universal kingdom has been revealed.

Remembrance is solemn. The sacrifices made are real, and we should, must and will honour them, but let us do so with our eyes fixed on the light that is coming and they joy. They all – and we all – will gain our souls.

Amen.

Against the Nazarenes

Preached the 6th Sunday of Easter (9th May) 2021, St Michael's, Stockwell
Christian Aid week

Acts 10:44-48
Psalm 98
1 John 5:1-6
John 15:9-17

I want to start today with our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles. Our short reading here comes at the end of a chapter about St Peter’s visit to Caesarea. Caesarea was a city in Judea, in modern Israel. It’s ruined now, but then it was the capital of Roman Judea, where the conquering Empire was based. As a result, it wasn’t very Jewish. The clue is in the name; it’s named for the Caesars, the Roman Emperors.

That’s important, because it is there St Peter encounters Cornelius, a gentile official, and this passage comes at the end of Peter’s evangelisation to him. In fact, this whole part of Acts (chapters 9-11) is about the mission to the gentiles led by Peter.

Just before this section, talking to Cornelius, Peter states very clearly that ‘God knows no partiality.’ (Acts 10.35), and he then tells the story of Jesus, his death and resurrection to them, and – for the first time since Pentecost – the Spirit descends on them all, Jew and non-Jew alike. And Peter calls out:

Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have at the presence of the Lord.

It’s a rhetorical question. Peter isn’t expecting anyone to say ‘Yes, actually we can and should withhold the water for baptism,’ though if you persevere with Acts, they do have this exact discussion in the next chapter. There was a fight within the early church between those who would limit the gospel of Jesus to Jews alone, the Nazarenes, and those who, like Peter – and Paul, preached universality.

Peter won.

It is one of the most radical parts of the promise of the New Testament. Unlike the Old Testament, which hammers home, as the psalmist today says, God’s ‘steadfast love and faithfulness to the house of Israel.’ Peter here reveals the universal message of Christ. The resurrection is not the salvation for the Jews, but for everyone.

Can anyone withhold that water for baptism?

Water isn’t just special for us as Christians. It’s sacred to many religions, be it the river festivals of the Hindus or the ritual purification in Islam.  And there’s no surprise why. Water is one of the important things of all. We can imagine no life without water, no food, and without clean water that life can be pretty short.

We here in this congregation have the historical luxury of clean water universally available. Pretty much every rickety tap gives us access to drinkable water. Our water is absurdly clean, far in excess of what we need. We flush toilets with water cleaner than millions of people drink. Many of you will know first hand that’s not the case everywhere. Globally, 800m people still do not have access to clean water nearby, three times that don’t have it in their houses. And it kills: 1.5m people die every year from diarrhoeal disease, mostly caused by dirty water.

Millions suffer from the effects of drought. Climate change means that millions more will suffer over the next few years as new unstable conditions means that traditional agriculture patterns no longer work. And people will go hungry. And people will starve.

Who withholds the water from them?

Because water is being withheld from communities and people across the world: by poverty, by climate change, by corrupt and incompetent governments, by unjust western powers, by a lack of generosity of spirit and lack of action. It means people go hungry, it means people are sick, it means women (and it’s almost always women) have to walk further and make harder journeys to get the water they and their children need.

But it doesn’t have to be like this. 1.5m people die of diarrheal disease every year. In 2000, that figure was 2.6m. Since 2000, nearly 2 billion have people gained access to clean water. Here, at the time of the building of St Andrew’s, tens of thousands of Londoners died from cholera, a disease caused by dirty water. We built the sewers, and they didn’t. Not just the rich, but everyone.

We have the ability to change the world.

• The psalmist says: ‘Let 'the floods clap their hands; let the hills sing together for joy.'
• And from the letter of John: ‘whatever is born of God conquers the world.’

This Christian Aid Week we can be part of the solution and the answer to Peter’s question. Through our generosity, we can help ensure the much-needed water is not withheld from communities that need it. In practical terms, there are, at the back of church envelopes for making contributions, however small, to the work of Christian Aid in delivering water, resilient to climate change; and a leaflet to think about what else we can do.

I don’t think we have a choice about this. John’s gospel today is clear: Jesus says: ‘You did not choose me but I chose you.’ It is not simply that we can, but we must.

That’s the heart of our gospel today. This section of John’s gospel is a long parting speech from Jesus to his disciples, with his final commands. They’re all about love. That’s why we should help others; because we’re enjoined to love them. And you help those you love. The English translation is slightly unhelpful here as it talks about his disciples being friends, but the Greek is philoi, those beloved. They aren’t just friends; this isn’t a casual alliance, but a deep commitment.

And we can see this in John’s letter, which talks about the water and the blood. Blood lasts. Baptism lasts. It does not dry off with the water. Help for those without water lasts. In accepting the appointment by Christ, we accept that we are members of a universal, global church, with universal global ambition. The messiah came not for the Jews alone, but for the world. And this means our commission to love is global. I had planned here to make a point about water not being static or recognising no borders, but this week the French have decided to go to war with Jersey over fishing. But the water of baptism knows no boundary. There is one baptism for all.

So can anyone withhold the water? No, they can’t withhold the water of baptism. And we must share it with the world and act to make that real. The Psalmist today says ‘For he is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world with righteousness, and the peoples with equity.’

So let us never withhold the water. And let us work to share it with the world.

In the name of Christ,

Amen

Against the heretics (and their enablers)

Preached 4th Sunday of Easter (3rd May ) 2020, St Michael's, Stockwell (remotely)
Video (at 15:00)

Genesis 7
John 10.1-10
Good morning, it’s a great pleasure to speak to you, and this format has the huge advantage that I am not trying to control my children at the same time as give this sermon. On the other hand, it is a sight cruelty to ask me to preach about life, abundantly, as we have in the gospel, at a time when no-one is living life, abundantly.

In fact, by coincidence, yesterday marked forty days of not living it, though some will have had longer. And, much like Noah during his forty days of rain, we have endured forty days of isolation. Unlike Noah, we have access to the shops, in my case the Internet, and – hopefully - not the prospect of 150 more days to go. Noah, on the other hand did not have to, fairly badly, teach my children their maths.

I don’t know when we realised the flood didn’t literally happen, I imagine it was sometime in the nineteenth century. Perhaps doing the maths about the volume of water helped establish that clearly. As it’s a story we know so well though, it is worth thinking again about what it does mean. And listening to whole of Genesis 7 makes it even more obvious: this is about judgement. And it doesn’t get more judgemental than this. Almost all life is blotted out. The survivors number eight people; they alone are righteous. Though right now, I question the reward part of a story that requires you to spend the best part of 200 days with your sons.

Our gospel passage is about judgement too, though the context and the message are very different.

This passage in John follows a section where Jesus heals a blind man, who the Pharisees then question and criticise, saying ‘you were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us.’ And then they drive the blind man out.

Here, Jesus here is attacking them. And one of the great things about this passage is that even Jesus seems to get impatient with his own parables. I am reminded of my second favourite allegory* of the Trinity, which occurs in Gavin and Stacey, where the Welsh vicar attempts to explain the role of the three persons by means of a comparison with sandwiches and fillings. He then shouts furiously at Gavin, the English interloper, who he feels has ruined his metaphor by not understanding the point.

I imagine Jesus here very much like that vicar. Faced with the clear incomprehension of his listeners he tries again, and tries to make it as simple as possible. It’s worth repeating:

I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.

This is judgement flipped on its head: it is not the people who are judged and found wanting. They are the ones who did not listen to the false prophets. Nor is it judgement like an inundation or a sifting out of those who have failed, It is a promise: I came that you may have life in abundance. It is hard right now not to think of the sheep as being like us in our current isolation – safe, but hardly living our most fulfilled life. Christ is come to promise something more than the necessity of life: abundance. What is that abundance? It is life with God, in this world and the next. John Chrysostom, the fourth century theologian, when he preached on this exact gospel passage, simply says, what is more than life? it is the Kingdom of Heaven. His commentary on other passages is much longer.

And so to the thieves. Who are they? What are they stealing? In the gospel, they are clearly the Pharisees, but this isn’t just about the false prophets of Israel, or even false prophets generally, though it is about both of them. It’s also about heresy. Talking about heresy is unfashionable, and no-one should be seeking to condemn other Christians over technicalities. But this passage does tell you why it matters: it’s because it’s a waste. There’s no hellfire; no flood; no test to fail. But the nature of our belief matters. That is why we study, and argue, and indeed preach on doctrine – to secure that promise. Heresy takes us away from the gate, away from God, away from abundant life, and robs us of the promise of the Kingdom. Not for nothing do we sing the hymn that ends ‘one church, one faith, one Lord.’

In the Old Testament, the symbol of the promise of God is the rainbow, shown to Noah after the flood subsides. Today, the country is using the same rainbow as a symbol of their hope and their promise of the future – one of a more abundant life than this lockdown. For us today, it is important we remember as Christians that the promise to us is of a more abundant life still, and that Jesus is the gate through which we find it.

* Graham Greene wrote my favourite

Against Millenarians (and for Charles, King and Martyr)

Preached Candlemas (2nd February) 2020, St Michael's, Stockwell.
Family service

Malachi 3.1-5

Psalm 24.1-10

Hebrews 2.14-18

Luke 2.22-40

Good morning; some short words from me, not least because the children were brilliant and the vicar has stolen all my jokes. I will be brief, though – unlike the vicar – I will be covering Charles King and Martyr properly.

Now, as it’s Candlemas, I’d like to ask how many of you took down your Christmas decorations? 150 years ago, you would definitely have kept them up till now, because the whole time running from Christmas was seen a single season, up to when Jesus was presented in the temple, which we read in the gospel.

And it’s today because 40 days after the birth of a child, according to the Jewish law, mothers come to the temple to be purified. And while Mary is there, we read that she also dedicates her firstborn to God. When we talked about waiting earlier, this is one of the most significant – waiting for a child to be born. It certainly was for me, and I imagine for Mary and Joseph. They, overjoyed, give thanks to God and make sacrifices. But their waiting is nothing compared to that of Symeon and Anna. All we know of them is that they are old, exceptionally old for the time. And they have been waiting and hoping for many years. For them, that waiting has been fulfilled in their lifetimes. They have seen the light come into the world.

I want to remember today the years before. Not about the hope fulfilled in their lifetime, but the uncertainty and the years without it. Because for many, the Hollywood ending does not come in our lifetime. That’s the theme of our reading from Malachi. This is the last book of the Old Testament, written in exile, promising that God will come to bring justice, to purify and to refine. These are hopes you write down when you have nothing, not when you have power.

And so to Charles I, King and Martyr. King of England, pious Christian, crowned on Candlemas 395 years ago, the most powerful man in England. Twenty four years later, stripped of all his power, after a sham trial, he was murdered, at the behest of a dictator, backed by the army (other historical interpretations are available). Why is he a saint? Not because he died, plenty of people get killed, especially by military dictators. But because the church holds that he had been offered peace and to be spared if he abandoned his principles, his church and, in his view – and mine – legitimate government. He didn’t take it. My children tell me that he was the worst king ever and really boring, but it’s certainly the case that his actions shaped the Church of England, and it’s certainly the case that he died, alone; his family fled; his supporters in hiding. All he had left is hope.

What did he hope for? Was it fulfilled? He did not receive anything in his lifetime. They cut his head off. Was it for justice or revenge? He had that I suppose. Eleven years later, his son returned, his killers were punished, and their leader’s dead body dug up and his head displayed on a spike as a warning. I hope my sons are listening.

But I don’t think that is what he hoped for. As Christians, we do not hope for impossible, radical transformation in this world. That is millenarianism. Symeon will probably have read Malachi, but he does not live to see judgement, but a baby. He knows the psalms, but he doesn’t see victory in battle, but the light to the gentiles. Our hope is wider and greater, and more certain, than those stories. It’s right there in our reading from Hebrews: Christ will destroy the one who has power over death. Charles knew that. Among his last words we read: ‘I go from a corruptible to an incorruptible crown’. He was aware of his own weakness, the fallibility of the world and the perfection of heaven.

This is not an excuse for not hoping or acting in the world. I preached on that earlier this year and I wouldn’t want you to think I am inconsistent. But it is the knowledge that in the end we rest our hopes, in the words of the BCP, on ‘the sure and certain hope of the resurrection.’ Whatever the wait, whatever the test, whether or not it is shown to you.

I end with those words in Hebrews: because Christ himself was tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested.

Amen.

Against the Gnostics

Preached Septuagesima (17th February) 2019. St Michael's, Stockwell.

Jeremiah 17:5-10

1 Corinthians 15:12-20

Luke 6:17-26

It’s a great pleasure to be speaking today. I don’t often hear the sermon in church at all because of the children. And they don’t want to listen to anyone for 10 minutes, certainly not me. I asked Jamie what I should talk about today and he asked if I was going to talk about poo. I fear he would be disappointed. 

To give you my credentials for preaching, I should add to Erica’s introduction that I’ve just finished my Doctorate on the early church ecclesiastical historian Socrates Scholasticus, who I am confident no-one has ever heard of. I’m not going to talk about him either. 

But he was in my mind when I saw the readings for today. Because they are also obscure. Jeremiah is always obscure. Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians is famous, and includes one of the most read passages in the bible – the one about love that people have at weddings. I had it at my wedding. It’s not that one. The gospel looks more promising – it’s the beatitudes. But it’s not the famous ones. They’re in Matthew. From the Sermon on the Mount.

I want to start today by comparing Luke’s account of the beatitudes with Matthew’s. 

There are a lot of similarities. Both of these are blessings. In both we can hear the echoes of Jeremiah and the psalmist (and lots of other Old Testament prophets): blessed are those who trust in the Lord, not in man’s priorities, but God’s. These blessings are pointing us towards what God’s priorities. 

In both, they occur just after the disciples are called by Jesus and after a crowd gathers. And this crowd has come from a long way away. It a couple of hundred miles between Sidon and Jerusalem. Thereafter they diverge.

In Matthew, Jesus goes up a mountain with them alone and then he launches into a list of blessings that mostly concern spiritual virtue. The poor in spirit, they who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the pure of heart, peacemakers and so on. Each of those has a more or less linked reward: the merciful obtain mercy; the pure in heart see God. 

Luke’s account is different. It’s different in lots of ways – I am always struck by how he blesses and condemns his audience not by talking about what they will do, but what they are. I suspect some of us are pretty uncomfortable with the condemnations of those who are rich and those who are full. I know I am. But I am not going to preach today on the role of the poor or the nature of salvation or the humanity of Christ. 

Instead, I want to talk about the world and Christ’s engagement with it. Because when we listen to Jeremiah and the Psalmist, I think there is a risk of withdrawing from the world and treating this is as a spiritual exercise. From the Psalm: their delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law they meditate day and night. 

But what Luke describes is rooted in the present and the physical reality of who he is speaking to. He doesn’t bless those who will hunger for righteousness, but those who are hungry. He is blessing them for what they are, right now. Literally, two of those blessings have the intensifier ‘now’ in them. The subjects of his blessings are the poor, the hungry, and the weeping. And the rewards are both spiritual and tangible. The hungry are promised food, not a vision of God. Luke’s account does promise the kingdom of God but is stripped of much wishy-washy spiritual allegory that lurks around promises of reward. These ambitions are rooted in the world as well as the kingdom of God 

It may not be obvious, but our section of Paul’s letter to the Corinthians is addressing the same thing. 

Paul argues here that our salvation happens through the resurrection, and this is a real tangible event. The dead are raised. This is so important that Paul writes it out twice and added it to a letter that mostly talks about something else. 

He does this because he is worried about the church in Corinth. They are clearly talking about the resurrection in a different way a milder, more palatable, spiritual experience. This is one of Paul’s earlier letters, written in the early 50s, but that tendency to downplay the concreteness of the resurrection never goes away. In the second century, a series of Christian thinkers we now call the Gnostics (from the Greek, meaning secret knowledge) sought to allegorise away great swathes of Christ’s death and resurrection. Replacing them with ever more elaborate schemes of spiritual hierarchies and supernatural powers. Valentinius, the most well-known of them, argued that Jesus had a supernatural body, and indeed was unable to experience corruption – to digest and excrete food. My son was perhaps right to ask about that. His opponents rejected this, led by Irenaeus of Lyons, one of the great orthodox theologians. And I am very glad they did. Because if we deny the tangibility of Jesus, we rob the mission of Christ of its roots in the world. 

Normally at this stage in my sermons I like to dredge up an ancient saint to make my point. And today is the feast day of Donatus, Romulus, Secundian, and their 86 companions, who died in the year 304 under Emperor Diocletian. But it is also the feast of Janani Luwum, archbishop of Uganda, who protested against Idi Amin and was murdered by him on this day in 1977. It is his statue – and not those of Donatus and his friends – that is outside Westminster Abbey as testament that bearing witness to Christ doesn’t just mean letting pagans execute you. It means fighting the problems of the world. And that is because of the exhortation the Christ made. 

In my favourite novel about American anti-slavery Calvinism, and indeed about Christianity at all, Gilead by Marilynne Robinson, the main character, a preacher, says this about the world: 

I know this is all mere apparition compared to what awaits us, but it is only lovelier for that. … I can't believe that, when we have all been changed and put on incorruptibility, we will forget our fantastic condition of mortality and impermanence, the great bright dream of procreating and perishing that meant the whole world to us. In eternity this world will be Troy, I believe, and all that has passed here will be the epic of the universe, the ballad they sing in the streets.

[M. Robinson, Gilead (2004), 65] 

I think Jesus thought that too. And today’s gospel calls us to root our faith in the hereafter in the condition of the world, right here, right now. 

There’s no social or political blueprint in the bible. No manual on how to do it, which is probably a good thing. But there’s a clear instruction to do it. 

And it is because Jesus did, that he brought humanity to salvation. The concrete reality of Christ’s presence and mission is what makes his resurrection our resurrection. 

I’d like to end by going back to Jeremiah. Let our trust in the Lord make us like a tree planted by water and because of this, let us never cease to bear fruit in the world, right here, right now. 

Amen.

Against Macedonius

Preached Easter 6 (25th May) 2014, St Michael's, Camden Town

Acts 8:5-8,14-17
1 Peter 3:15-18
John 14:15-21

Today is the feast day of Gregory VII, one of the great medieval popes, provided you think greatness is about power. A pope so bold that he forced the most powerful man in Christendom, the Emperor of the West, to come to him to beg his forgiveness. In the snow. On bare feet. So aggressive that when I was taught about him, my tutor compared him to Stalin. Powerful he may have been, but he was not universally loved. By the end of his life, he was no longer in Rome and when he died, on this day in 1085, he cried ‘I have loved justice and hated iniquity, therefore I die in exile.’ We could say he lacks self knowledge.

And I say this because when I think about Philip (not our Fr Philip, he’s nothing like Stalin), but the Philip in our reading today, I can’t help feeling there is a lot of Gregory in him. From the account we have, Philip goes to Samaria to preach the gospel. He does so with what we might call a lack of subtlety. He performs a raft of miracles, they believe, usually because they have seen them. In a passage missed out of the reading today, he runs into a rival miracle worker, who the author of Acts calls a magician, and he beats him by doing better miracles. This is about power, not truth.

But then the next passage is fascinating. If you’re a researcher into the very early church, you get very excited about this because it gives you a hint about what is going on in Jerusalem; for the rest of us, it’s just surprising. The high command send Peter and John to do more. The Samaritans have accepted Christ, but it isn’t enough. They need to hear about the Spirit. Faith in Christ alone is not Christianity.

And I think we find that very uncomfortable, even now, perhaps especially now. For two thousand years, we have become very used to using Christ as a shorthand for our belief – that's understandable, we are called Christians. But it’s wrong. Our belief is in God: the Trinity, not just one person in it. In a few minutes, we will all recite what that means in the Creed, and the history of that is instructive.

If you’re uncomfortable with this, you’re not alone. If you’ll cast your mind back to the 350s and 360s, you’ll of course recall that it was a hot topic then too. Macedonius, who was bishop of Constantinople, the capital of the Roman Empire, refused to accept that the Holy Spirit was God. That debate rewrote the creed that at Nicaea itself only said, we believe in the Holy Spirit, and became what you have on your service sheet. We are affirming that the Spirit is God, identifying what he does. Of course Christ is essential, but so is the Father, and so is the Spirit.

Why?

Because a belief in God without the Spirit would change how we think of the world. It would be greatly impoverished. To my mind the most important thing that John records in the Gospel today is that the Spirit will ‘be with you for ever.’ A second, gentler Gregory, Gregory of Nazianzus, one of my all time favourite theologians (like most of my all time favourite theologians them, long dead), was an opponent of Macedonius in the fourth century and wrote a long oration on the Holy Spirit opposing him. He talked about history.

There have been … two conspicuous changes of men’s lives, which are also called two Testaments… : the one from idols to the Law [he means Moses], the other from the Law to the Gospel [he means Jesus]. And we are taught in the Gospel of a third.
(Gregory of Nazianzus, On the Holy Spirit, 25)

For Gregory, the trinity hovers over these changes - as time goes on we have a greater understanding of the nature of the God – we call this progressive revelation. In the Old Testament, it is God the Father that is talked about openly, and the Son hinted at. In the gospel, it is obviously about Jesus, but introduces the Spirit. In the current age, what Gregory calls the third testament (Gregory of Nazianzus, On the Holy Spirit, 8), when Spirit is fully visible, we are moving towards the final age, where Gregory says there will be an Earth that ‘cannot be shaken or moved.’ For Gregory, the Spirit animates our history. In the Creed, we will say the Spirit spoke through the prophets; we could easily say he speaks through the church through the ages.

So what does he say?

Today’s gospel is pretty useful, and I should say, it is the very same text that Gregory used 1600 years ago. It calls the Spirit two things – the Spirit of Truth and then the word parakletos which is translated here as advocate, but elsewhere counsellor, comforter or helper. This Spirit is not a lawyer, but a support. He is there to sustain us and to nudge us gradually towards the truth. My wide may disagree, but this is not always a characteristic of lawyers.

But if the Spirit is not God, then we might be at the mercy of lawyers. Were there no Spirit, it would mean God would have had retreated after his victory on the cross. We would be living an echo of what was important; playing out something that as solely a memorial. Perplexingly, God would have been willing to die for us, but not to stay. God would not be present to support us when we, like the recipients of the epistle, are told to do good, to hold fast. But instead, the Spirit is here: we are sustained and comforted by the Spirit throughout history.

For that letter is old, written before 100 AD. Pentecostals and others like to think of the Spirit as something that gives them licence to kick against the tradition of the church as the voice of the Spirit comes to them. What presumption? what arrogance? What do they think the Spirit has been doing for the last 2,000 years? It is they who deny the divinity of the Spirit by their rejection of the past. The gospel says ‘you know him, because he is with you, he is in you.’ That is not a licence to take create doctrine afresh, but an invitation to the revelation of God, built on 2,000 years of his work, changing, yes, as God is progressively revealed, but built on the same teaching.

Our first Gregory, Gregory VII gave us another famous quotation, also with some difficulties. He said ‘The Lord did not say I am custom, but I am truth.’ Through the Holy Spirit, the supporter and sustainer of all of us in this age, we often do not have to choose. For he is with us forever.

Amen.

Against Abelard

Preached Lent 5 (25th March 2012), St Michael's, Camden Town

Jeremiah 31.27-34
Hebrews 5.7-9
John 12.20-33

I’m not sure how many of you get Fr Philip’s emails about the weekly news. Those who did will know this sermon was written up as there being ‘nothing plain’ about my preaching. I think he meant it as a compliment, but I’m not sure. I have a feeling he thinks I will make it all too complicated, too long and too far from the gospel. Like the clergy often do.

If nothing else, today’s gospel should give you reassurance that they and I are not the only ones. John is the latest of the gospels to be written, but we’re still talking pretty early. And he’s doing it too. Right at the end of today’s gospel, just to make sure we get the message, he adds - ‘He said this to show the kind of death he was going to die.’ Even the gospel writers needed to put in the odd hint in to make sure we draw the right conclusions.

Of course, that doesn’t mean every interpretation is right. The pre-eminent master of biblical scholarship in the first millennium was an Egyptian priest called Origen, whose great work the Hexapla presented the bible in six parallel versions, in order to better understand it. Unfortunately, due to an overly literal interpretation of Matthew 19.12 he castrated himself, and was clearly of the view that this was what all good priests should do. Perhaps that’s something our clergy should consider; I can hear the intake of breath behind me. Luckily for them, this practise was banned relatively soon afterwards as mainstream opinion decided this was undesirable. Tragically for Origen, not soon enough.

I tell this, not just because it’s mildly amusing, though it is – it’s my wife’s favourite early church story - but because textual study of the bible is as old as Christianity, it’s necessary and we’re going to need to do some to make sense of the gospel we have here, even with John’s hint.

For a start, that’s because John’s hint is rubbish. If you read the passage carefully, and look for the account of how Jesus will die, it isn’t there. This passage is doing a number of things, but not one of them tells us how Christ is going to die.

• The first thing Jesus talks about is his glorification
• He does then speak about his death, but only to say what happens next 
• Thirdly, he gives an order to his followers – if any one serves me, he must follow me 
• Then he does glorification again, though in more depth and with more nuance 
• Finally, he speaks about judgement of God, his decision

And it’s at that point, when Christ speaks of glorification and judgement, that the evangelist is keen to point out that Christ is speaking about the kind of death he will face. When we preach on this passage, we focus on the death - because John does. When Philip asked me to preach in fact, he called it preaching the cross. We look at this passage and believe the death is the important thing.

And the death of Christ is obviously important. But what I want to say today is that it’s all important. This kernel of the gospel may well be cobbled together from a variety of sources. In my view you can see the joins; note the unconnected opening section about some Greeks, note some of the message don’t seem to run on from other. But, it’s a passage that contains in a few short lines a recap of most of the Christian confession, and certainly the core message of Easter.

Death plays a central role, but only because it is death followed by life, a better, greater life. A life in glory, with God.

Jeremiah makes the same point, though at considerably greater length. Jeremiah is known as the weeping prophet, because he is so unrelentingly depressing. Fifty two chapters of doom and gloom. Here’s an example from earlier in the book [Jer 5.1], where God speaks to Jeremiah:

Run to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, look around and take note! Search its squares and see if you can find one person who acts justly and seeks truth-- so that I may pardon Jerusalem’

No one is found. Jerusalem falls.

What we have today is the only positive bit: though the Babylonians are literally at the gates of the city, though it will end badly, God will redeem Israel. Though Christ will die, it will be followed by the resurrection and the raising up of all the people. God’s judgement will overcome the world, including the ruler of the world, but there is a glorious future.

As we prepare for Easter, we should ask how.

The mystery of salvation is just that – a mystery. There is no creed that defines it. But there are some clues:

In the epistle to the Hebrews, we hear that Jesus offered up prayers to the one who could save him from death - He asks that it not be so. Jesus does not wish to die. And Jesus was heard - he could have chosen not to die. He is obedient, he is not compelled. This is a choice, and a dreadful one.

Peter Abelard, who may be obscure to many of you, is mostly famous for his illicit love affair with Heloise, for which he was castrated (though unlike Origen, not voluntarily), but was also one of the great medieval theologians. He preached that the death of Christ could (perhaps should) be understood subjectively.And what he means is that, crudely, the death and resurrection of the Lord are examples. By dying, he shows how to live. There is some truth in this. And it certainly has become increasingly fashionable in more modern times as a corrective to what is seen as a vengeful God. Moral exemplars seem, well, nicer, better.

But it isn’t. Picture the alternative. If it’s an example, it’s just an example. It doesn’t need to happen. And that’s monstrous - it would make the Father ask his own Son to die for nothing; it would mean Christ dies as a trick to con humanity into behaving better. This is not what John says today. I have already glorified my name says the voice from heaven, but I will also glorify it again. That’s the divine judgement, the single decision - there is only one Christ in all of history. One death, one cross, one resurrection, one Lord – and the hour has come.

And it changes the world. We do the death of Christ a disservice if we see it simply as a condemnation. Christ chooses to die, to confront death, he brings life forever.

The Greeks in our gospel ask to see Jesus. Instead they have the whole cosmic drama explained to them. Their job was simply to follow. So is ours.

Against Marcion

I was allowed to give another sermon today (11th December) for Advent 3. Readings here (though we seemed to use a bowlderised version - I was annoyed by they) Here is the text - ish :

Today is a day of rejoicing. It is why the clergy should be in pink, though they have failed me today, with the exception of Fr James. It's why we light a pink candle. In the church’s calendar it is gaudete Sunday. And gaudete simply means rejoice. Traditionally, advent is a season where the four last things are preached. You have come through death and judgement. It’s hell next week, but heaven today. Well done, you’ve chosen the right Sunday, where we rejoice in the anticipation of salvation and of heaven. 

Now heaven itself is pretty difficult to preach on. We don’t know much about it. Writers have struggled to say anything that isn’t a bit mad (think of the book of revelation) or a bit dull - there is a reason why they say the devil has all the best tunes. 

Salvation though is different: it is central to the gospel, where Jesus continually proclaims the coming of the Kingdom of God. It is the abiding pre-occupation of the church. So you’d expect a tight definition to have emerged in the last two thousand years, easy for me to package up for you now. You’d be wrong. The church has been reluctant to define salvation. For example, in a few minutes you’ll say the creed. There’s a long section on God, and a very long section on Jesus. And then buried in the middle, a line about salvation: ‘and for us men and for our salvation he came down from heaven.’ 

I’m not going to cover all of salvation in a short sermon, even if I could, but I want to cover the promise of it, made in the Old Testament, fulfilled in the New. For it is an old promise that it is made by God to Abraham. At this time of year it is more important than ever that we remember the enduring promise of God. For it is that fulfilment what we rejoice in. 

So let’s start with Isaiah. After all, everyone else seems to have done so. 

This part of Isaiah was probably written in the sixth century BC, at a time when the Israelites had returned from their exile in Babylon, and were rebuilding their lives in Palestine. They were in Jerusalem, but a fairly run down version, it was a fairly bleak time. This final part of Isaiah is a set of prophecies about the world to come, about salvation. And it is uplifting stuff. 

From the chapter before our reading: 'all from Sheba shall come bearing gold and shall bring incense, and they shall publish the salvation of the Lord .... For the nations and the kingdoms that shall not serve thee shall perish (Is 60.6, 12). And this is followed by the opening lines from this morning, to proclaim liberty to the captives, freedom to the prisoner and - although this is omitted from the reading today, but should be in if we used the right lectionary - the day of vengeance of our God. 

That seems pretty clear. God’s people shall triumph, their enemies be crushed. The only flaw is it didn’t happen. The next few centuries saw a series of Empires vie for control over Palestine, culminating in the Roman Empire about the time of Christ. There is a distinct lack of enemies being crushed and of gold being delivered to the people of Israel. 

And it’s in this context that we should read the gospel. When the crowd pester John, asking are you the messiah? They’ve read Isaiah. They are expecting a messiah to come and bring them overlordship of the gentiles. They have been promised gold, cedarwood, tribute and authority. And they have waited a long time. So, every time you read about the messiah in the gospels, remember this. They’re not asking for someone who does a few parables and then inconveniently goes and dies, but for a warlord, who will restore Israel to power over the nations, give them perfect justice and a good supply of gold. They’re going to be disappointed. 

John has also read Isaiah: I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness he says, just as we heard last week from Isaiah. I am preparing the way for the messiah to come. He does not mention (if he knew) that the messiah might not be quite what they were expecting. 

Jesus has also read Isaiah. In fact, very specifically, we know he reads this bit of Isaiah. Luke’s gospel tells us he reads the opening lines of our reading on the Sabbath in a synagogue. But he does two important things. Firstly, he misses the bit out about vengeance, just as we did today. He repeats the promise of good news to the poor and of liberty, but not of violence. Secondly, he then says to them, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. The gospel then says they were amazed. I think here there is some poetic licence going on. I think a more accurate description may have been horrified and angry. We’ve read Isaiah, where is the gold they may ask. 

And it gets worse. A generation later, after Jesus has died, proving conclusively that he wouldn’t be the messiah at the head of an army, any hope the Israelites had was snuffed out. In AD70, the Roman legions of Vespasian destroyed Jerusalem, tore down the temple, expelled the Jews. 

Was the promise of the Old Testament wrong? 

Many people have thought so. Marcion, a second century churchman, whose followers converted much of the middle east to Christianity, rejected it entirely. Modern agnostics, who are willing to the give the new testament the benefit of the doubt, can’t face the Old Testament. And the church itself can be a little too prone to talking about Jesus in a flat and simplistic manner, as if everything can be reduced to asking what would Jesus do and a few selective quotations from the New testament. Because the Old is long, and difficult and we don’t like some of the messages. It's noticeable in the compilers of today's lectionary, who have tried to smooth out the difficulties of the Old Testament by omitting some of the difficulties of the text as if it didn't matter.

But Jesus didn’t think like this, nor did Paul. And if we reject the Old Testament, then we are on very shaky ground indeed. C.S. Lewis in a famous aphorism attacked those who claimed to follow the moral teachings of Jesus but not the religious. He pointed out that if Jesus was not the son of God, then he was a madman; if he is not the messiah that the prophets spoke of, what is he? And what kind of God is God? The Old Testament contains (albeit sometimes obscurely) our best description of God and of salvation. It needs careful interpretation, it does not need rejection.

Fortunately, just like all our protagonists, we can read Isaiah too. And towards the of our reading, God makes clear his promise: 'I will rejoice in the Lord, says the prophet, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation, he has covered me with the robe of righteousness.' A few lines later, in the next chapter, the same language is used, but this time, it ends not with the prophet rejoicing in the Lord, but the reverse, saying 'so will the Lord rejoice over you.' (Is. 62.5) 

That is the promise of the Old Testament, that God rejoices over us all. He covers us with salvation. And this is a promise, not an offer. There is no ‘if’ or ‘provided that’ in Isaiah. God will cover all people with salvation. And the time is coming when he will show his hand. 

Just as the rhetoric in Revelation isn’t a literal view of heaven, so the rhetoric of war in Isaiah isn’t the essential part of the message. The promise won’t be fulfilled as was expected, but it is fulfilled in a more potent way than the Israelites ever imagined. The coming of Christ does not defeat the enemies of Israel, but death itself. 

The Marcionites and the moderns are wrong. It is God’s promise to Abraham and through him the world that will be fulfilled at the end of Advent. In our epistle this morning, Paul adds a coda to a longer letter to the church in Thessalonica. After the specific advice he gives, he asks them to hold fast and reminds them once again, that 'the one who calls you is faithful.' 

God’s promise of salvation is one that has endured. The Old testament is the witness to the promise of God, the coming (the advent) of Christ is its fulfilment, for the one who calls us is faithful. 

Rejoice, rejoice!

Amen

My first sermon

I gave my first sermon on Sunday. It seemed to go well. Here is the text, give or take. It was stewardship Sunday, hence the reference to giving:

I’ve been waiting a long time to give this sermon: I’ve been coming to St Michael's for eight years; I’ve been treasurer for five years, and I’ve had a theology degree for four. Depending on how you count it, I’ve seen off at least one priest (though it’s a pleasure to have Fr Nicholas here again), and yet there’s been a strange reluctance to let me speak to a captive audience.


And when Philip asked me to do this, I discovered why. He thinks I’ll be incredibly boring. Obviously, he didn’t put it quite like that: instead he used words like ‘short’, ‘concise’, ‘relevant’, which I think translates as don’t talk too much about the fifth century. Nor do I think that I’ve been given the most interesting of topics: broadly, today’s readings are about leprosy. Philip has also spent the last few days dropping hints about what to say. Those of you who are friends with Philip on Facebook will discover that Philip thinks having leprosy is a bit like taking a bike on a train.

No it isn’t.

Leprosy is key to our gospel today so it’s worth us getting it right. I had to look some of the symptoms online – apparently parts of your body don’t drop off, which I thought they did, but it’s generally a fairly unpleasant disease where your flesh becomes diseased; it was thought to be highly infectious (though it isn’t) and thus, in the time of Jesus, those suffering from it were confined outside the town as they were when Jesus meets them. It’s also fatal; and in the first century uncurable, though it is curable now, if only recently. To search for a modern equivalent, we’re better off looking at AIDS than at ‘getting your bike on a train.’

Which is why healing lepers is a big deal. In our first reading, the whole chapter is about by the leprosy of Naaman the Syrian and his search for healing. Naaman is a an important man, captain of the armies of Syria, the great Empire of the time, yet he is forced to go to small kingdom on the edges of his world, to a prophet he has never heard of and be healed by being dipped in the Jordan, not his river. And as a result, he is converted to the worship of God: he gives thanks, makes sacrifice, and does not worship other Gods. It’s a turning point in his life, literally I suppose because otherwise he was going to die, but also spiritually.

The story of the lepers in the gospel is different. It’s still a big deal. For all ten lepers, being healed by Jesus will have been a literal changing round of their lives, they are no longer doomed to death. But it is done in very matter of fact way. There is no crowd, no ritual, no being dipped in the Jordan. Jesus simply says, ‘Go’ and they are healed. The miracle of healing is present, but it is not central.

Instead, what is central is what happens next - or rather doesn’t. Instead of the life-changing conversion of Naaman, nine of them vanish. We neither hear nor see them again. We can speculate on what they are doing, but they’re off. Charitably they may have had a busy appointment to get to, or family to attend to, but more likely they’re just ungrateful. One isn’t though - he comes back. And Jesus blesses him and sends him on his way. His faith has made him whole.

What happens to the nine? It’s not clear. Our other reading today may suggest it may not work out well for them: In verse 12, the epistle writer argues, ‘if we suffer, we shall also reign with him: if we deny him, he also will deny us.’ Not coming back to give thanks feels like denial to me. This doesn’t bode well.

But I don’t think that is what happens. The bible is not shy of cautionary tales. In the later verses in Kings leprosy is visited on an Israelite who follows Naaman, hoping to get the money that Elisha refused. If the lepers had been punished for not returning to give thanks, we would have been told. Nor is the miracle of Jesus made conditional upon returning, he simply sends the lepers on their way, immediately healing them.

In theological jargon, we would talk here about the unlimited grace of God, his unlimited love for us. Hans Urs von Balthasar, my favourite modern theologian speaks of God as an eternal ‘yes’, and what he means by that is that the path to salvation is always open, even in death. For the lepers, and for us, the act itself has already happened, the healing of humanity has already taken place. God’s love has acted on us and continues to do so. Now, we should respond. And this is what we do at church every week. But Church doesn’t get you to heaven, it is our way of saying thanks for no longer being doomed to death.

We do not come back because of some kind of transaction or obligation, but rather because we are freely responding to God’s love. And this can be seen in the epistle, where the author endures all things for the sake of Jesus.

But make no mistake, there is a reproach for not coming back. Jesus asks ‘Were there not ten cleansed? but where [are] the nine?’ But it does not mean that love is withheld.

There are no lepers in Britain, though this is not true in other countries. But there is much we are given by God, not least that there are no lepers in Britain. Like the last leper, we should give thanks joyfully, because we want to give thanks to God, not because we are obliged to. If I am allowed a brief excursus on the fifth century, in the early church people did this in very odd ways. My favourite are the stylites, who stood on top of pillars all the time, through winter and through the Syrian sun, sometimes for over 30 years. Dedicating themselves to God.

I am not asking you to do that, but I am going to ask you to look at the money you give. Giving has a fine and noble tradition in the church, stretching back to the tithe (a tenth of what you earned owed to the church), and the first fruits, where the best of everything goes to the church. We do not ask that now, and we should not give because of an formal obligation like that or some kind of tick-box exercise for salvation, or from fear that God will abandon us. Instead we should give – time, resources, money - because God has given to us. Not in obligation, but in thanks.

All are healed, but not all gave thanks. We should be striving to be the leper that returned, not one of those who stayed away.