Author: St Mary's

Wrestling with God – Genesis 32:22-31 (14th October, 21st Sunday after Trinity)

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May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart
be pleasing in your sight,
Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.

 

Tonight’s reading from Genesis reminds us of a time when God’s relationships with his people were very definitely ‘hands on’ – you can’t get much more hands on than a wrestling match, after all! So, how do we get to this situation?

Jacob is returning to Canaan after 20 years away, and he knows that he and his extended family will be met by his brother, Esau, who’s lining up with several hundred men to meet him.  The ‘family argument’, you may remember, stemmed from Jacob deceiving his father, Isaac, in to giving him a blessing that was intended for Esau.

This isn’t a welcoming party; Jacob is concerned that his brother is out for blood, and splits his party for safety. He’s also sorted out a gift of livestock for Esau, and has spent time praying. He sends the gifts ahead of him, and tells those taking them that they should say to Esau that ‘His servant Jacob is following’.

At the start of tonight’s reading we see Jacob and his immediate family crossing the Jabbok, a small river running in to the Jordan, by a ford. He sends on his possessions, and stays alone to ponder his fate.

In this anxious and worried state, I think it likely that Jacob did some serious praying – maybe he prayed for a miracle to save him and his family, or maybe he prayed that God would somehow change Esau’s mind about fighting him. We don’t know; all we’re told is that he suddenly finds himself in a wrestling match with a strange man.  Jacob struggles with this stranger all night, and in doing so he realises that this isn’t a man; this is God himself wrestling with him.

Jacob isn’t a stranger to struggle; with his brother, then with Laban, and now, as he’s about to re-enter the promised land of Canaan, he finds himself doing hand to hand combat with God.

There’s a little word play here in the original Hebrew text. ‘God wrestled’ is ‘ye’abeq, Jacob is ‘ya’aqob’ and Jabbok is ‘yabboq’.  Whoever wrote this part of the Genesis story clearly loved to play with words as they told this intriguing story of how God came to Jacob in a form that Jacob could wrestle with – not in a dream, or a vision, or with words – but as a physical form that Jacob could hold his own against – perhaps as a physical manifestation of Jacob’s own struggles with faith at the moment in his life. He is wrestling with God, who holds Jacob’s destiny in his hands.

Jacob holds his own and the night progresses, and eventually the stranger touches Jacob’s hip and in an instant disables him.  God has shown his power in a subtle, meaningful way. He’s not destroyed Jacob, but has inflicted pain on him, and certainly in the short term has lamed him in such a way that makes Jacob more reliant on God to get through the coming struggle with Esau.  In case you’re wondering, there’s no indication in scripture that the injury was permanent.

Even in pain, Jacob still hangs on, demanding a blessing, and is given one; he will henceforth be called Israel – ‘one who has struggled with God and who has prevailed’. When Jacob asks the man’s name, he’s not given an answer, but is blessed. Jacob realises that, he has seen God and lived.

Verse 32 refers to a dietary requirement still in place today.  The ‘sinew’ is believed to be the sciatic nerve and associated ‘bits’ and is called the gid hanasheh. The hind-quarters of an animal are not allowed to be eaten – i.e. is not Kosher – without the removal of all of this sinew (as well as removal of fats).  This process – Nikkur – is possible but complicated – learning to do it takes at least 5 months and the process itself is incredibly difficult and labour intensive, so the hindquarters of animals tend to go to the ‘non-Kosher’ meat trade.

What happens next? Well, Esau comes to meet Jacob, and Jacob goes  out to attempt to appease Esau, by throwing himself to the ground in front of Esau in submission.  Whereupon Esau greets Jacob as his brother – God has removed the thirst for revenge from Esau’s heart – and Jacob tells Esau that God has been gracious to him, referring to the blessing that he received from God after the wrestling.

Do we wrestle with God? I know I do; in my life I’ve gone through times of trial when I begin to wonder what can go pear-shaped next. It doesn’t mean I’m fighting with God in a sense of trying to defeat or work against him, or doubt him. It means that I’m wrestling with what God wants to do with me and, if he so wills it, for me.  It might not be what I think I need at that time.  I think that Jacob probably wanted a peaceful night’s sleep to build his strength for what he saw as the coming fight with Esau, and that wrestling God was the last thing he wanted to do.

But God’s blessings on us come in unusual ways; God could have simply softened Esau’s heart (as he did) and no more. But he wished more for Jacob – and that extra came Jacob’s way only through intimate contact with God.

When we wrestle:

Our persistence will be rewarded. Jacob finds himself suddenly set upon and fights back; we may find ourselves praying and encountering issues we’d not thought of before.  Do we ignore them? Do we deny them? If we’re reading and struggling with scripture, do we gloss over the bits we’re uncomfortable with? Or do we persist and work through them?  When God challenges us through prayer or scripture, hang on in there. Jacob hung on in pain to ensure he got that blessing – sometime, we need to do the same.

We may be injured.  We may not walk away nursing a physical injury, but we may find that we carry a spiritual wound away from our match.  We may not physically limp, but we might well find that wrestling with God leaves us feeling a little less smart and a lot more humble as well as blessed.

Our identity may be changed; we’re not the same after a close encounter with God. We know of the faith that we’re baptised in to, just like Jacob knew the faith of his father and grandfather. But for that faith to become HIS faith, he had to fight for it.  And after this struggle, he was no longer Jacob, the deceiver, but Israel, who has struggled and prevailed with God.

Our own wrestling matches with God will be those moments that help define us as a Christian, and allow us to take our faith in Jesus Christ closer to our hearts in a more personal way. We may limp at the end of the bout, but if we do, we can be sure that, like Jacob, God has seen fit to be bountiful in his blessing.

Joe Pritchard – Reader

Another Perspective – Exodus 32:7-14 (16th Sunday after Trinity)

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Last week we were reminded that some of the passages in the Bible are very hard to listen to and challenging to say the least. They can seem harsh or cruel or unforgiving, lacking in compassion or understanding for mere human beings who from time to time get things wrong. It can be tempting to gloss over such passages or leave them out altogether but as was said we shouldn’t neglect them because they make us uncomfortable. I used to find it very difficult to listen to many of the Old Testament stories for all the reasons I’ve just mentioned. I couldn’t equate the loving God I believed in with the angry, judgemental one I was hearing about who always seemed to be punishing people for doing what humans do, i.e. getting things wrong. I mentioned this to our then vicar and he said that he found the Old Testament stories very honest because they didn’t shy away from the harsh realities of life as it was for many of the people at the time it records. Over the years I too have gained a greater appreciation of this and find that there is a great deal to learn from its pages.

Having slowly worked my way through the Bible and I’ve now started on the Apocrypha, I’ve noticed patterns of human behaviour which repeat throughout history again and again and again. Particularly when it comes to the bad stuff, it seems we never learn so no wonder God sometimes loses patience with us and there is punishment or the threat of it. Even when we are trying our best we often get things wrong, we misunderstand or don’t listen, we go flying off in some misguided direction because we think we know best or we want our own way. I don’t mean to make us sound like petulant children because we are adults capable of thought and reason and self discipline but I can’t help but see a comparison between how God responds to us and how we respond to our own children, especially when they are being difficult. Sometimes we get frustrated by their behaviour and lose our patience; perhaps we even lose our temper and occasionally we might punish more harshly than we intended. If only we weren’t so angry we might be a bit more understanding and forgiving. When the anger abates we probably hope that eventually our children will understand our actions and see that we had their best interests at heart because we love them. We want them to see things from our point of view and to know that we are not just being mean when we deny them what they want.

I love and adore my children, I always have and thankfully I’ve had very little trouble from either of them but I have to confess that when they were younger there were times when I lost my temper with them. The other day my beautiful little granddaughter, who looks so angelic it’s untrue, had screaming abdabs because she wanted her own way and my daughter was equally determined that she wasn’t going to get it. I kept out of the ensuing battle of wills as I didn’t want to make matters worse but I was impressed by my daughter’s calm efforts to explain why she was saying no; not that it made much difference! As we all know, you can’t reason with someone when they won’t hear you which is quite often the case with small children but I can’t help wondering, how often are we like that with God when we don’t like what we get in life?

I suppose part of the problem is that God’s perspective and ours are very different and we can’t always see or comprehend his plans for us. We are told that vast periods of time are like the blink of an eye to him whereas we can’t really grasp such a timescale in relation to ourselves. We are human beings and most of us only last between 60 to 100 years and we have needs to be taken care of regularly within that span. Just as waiting 5 minutes is like an eternity to a child, so waiting years or decades can seem to us.

The passage we heard from Exodus is from a part of the story of the Golden Calf and I think it demonstrates the difference between how God and people see time and how this leads to trouble. The people have been travelling through the wilderness for a very long time and the promises they were given about a wonderful land of their own seem very far off. Moses, who is supposed to be leading them, has disappeared onto Mount Sinai and has been gone a long time and they don’t know when or even if he is coming back. They are getting impatient and want some direction, some plans, some certainty, some results for all their struggles and sacrifices. I have to say I have some sympathy for them on that score although not for how they chose to behave by demanding that Aaron make a Golden Calf for them to worship instead of God. I can even see why Aaron chose to placate them by going along with this even though it was a huge mistake. Because we are human beings we see things from a human perspective but when we try to view this situation from God’s perspective perhaps we can see why he finally loses patience and gets so angry that he wants to destroy his chosen people. Time and again they have turned away from him and then said they were sorry and he has forgiven them but they go on to do the same thing again and again and again. He describes them as “stiff necked”. It is easy, especially in the Old Testament, to see God as an angry, judgemental punisher but how often is he blamed for what we bring on ourselves. In this instance, Moses intercedes with him not to destroy his people and disaster is averted. We get to see another side of God, that he does listen and is open to persuasion that we are not a hopeless case. He is persuaded not to give up on us.

Going back to our perspective, we need to understand that living our faith is a lifetime’s work and commitment and that the timescale is long, longer than our earthly span. We need to learn from our mistakes and those of others if we are to avoid just repeating history with its patterns of disaster. Above all we need to understand that we are loved and nurtured by God and to trust him, especially when the going is tough and, like the children of Israel, we are not getting the results for our efforts that we’d expected. Hopefully, next time we are feeling frustrated or disappointed or even angry about this, we will look beyond our own perspective and try to see things from God’s. Perhaps then we will realise just how much we are loved.
This was where my sermon was going to end, and it having passed muster with my sermon vetting committee (aka my sister Jan & my mum), I thought my job was done, apart for the preaching bit of course. But then as I was watching television last night I saw a documentary called “The Falling Man”. Everything has been so busy lately that I hadn’t connected with the significance of the date, September 11th, the anniversary of the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Centre in New York. The documentary wasn’t easy to watch as it was about the people who had jumped from these colossal buildings before they collapsed and about how their part in the story had been “airbrushed out of history” because it was too uncomfortable and painful to look at. Understandably people were horrified. Sadly since then we as a world have continued to produce stories and images that are equally hard to look at. But pretending to ourselves that they will go away if we don’t acknowledge them is not only denying recognition of the suffering of the people involved but also enabling us to go on failing to learn from the mistakes which pattern our history.
Again let us try to look beyond our flawed human perspective and attempt to see things from God’s and to rise to the challenge this sets by building a peaceful and compassionate world for all his people.

May those who have died rest in his peace.
Amen.

Kath Boyd – Reader

All is Vanity & what is of real value – Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12-14 & 2:18-23 (10th Sunday after Trinity)

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Today I’m going to focus on the reading from Ecclesiastes; with an opening line like “Vanity of vanities! All is vanity” how could I not? In the chosen verses which follow we are presented with some very forthright questions and observations which are as pertinent to us today as they were to the people who were around at the time they were written. What do we work for when we strive to acquire things be they material, intellectual or status? We can’t take them with us when we die! Others will inherit all that we have worked for! Will they use it wisely or unwisely? These last two questions are ones we cannot answer because we cannot know or control what happens after we die, even with the best ”Will” in the world. What they should do is make us really consider the first question, what are we working for? Is it to become wealthy and have a lot of possessions? Is it to become very knowledgeable in some sphere which may give us authority, influence and power? Does all this make us feel safer or more worthy of respect and admiration?
The intention of asking these questions is not to knock the understandable desire to benefit from our work and to provide for ourselves and our families or to suggest that we shouldn’t seek knowledge; without it how could we act wisely or organise the societies in which we live? I think what we being asked to do is consider what is really of value and work for that rather than wasting our efforts and our time on things that are not really of value. If we spend all our lives working to the point of exhaustion or worrying so much that we are constantly distracted or unable to sleep at night shouldn’t we ask ourselves what is it really for and just as importantly what is the price we and perhaps others are paying for it? What are we missing out on in order to gain this prize that we can’t take with us? What would God think of our actions and motivations?
I don’t know if any of you have seen the film “Hook” which was made in 1991. It is a re-telling of the Peter Pan story. I saw it lots of times because it was one of my son’s favourites. In it the brilliant actor, Robin Williams, plays a high flying lawyer who is so immersed in his corporate world that he can’t see how his wife and children need him and want his attention. He always means to pay attention to them but somehow work always comes first and it is only when he starts to lose them and has to revert to his childhood character of Peter Pan that he is able to realise what he has done and what he has almost thrown away. Fortunately the story has a happy ending and he not only gets his family back but he learns how to enjoy his own life again. Just in time he learns that what he already had was the real prize, not the things he was chasing after.
Losing what is of real value because we stop noticing it or fail to pay attention to it when we should is a trap any of us can easily fall into if we are not mindful and I would include our relationship with God here. Don’t keep putting off what is really important for stuff that isn’t! This is especially true of our relationships with children. We might not think so at the time but they aren’t little for very long. An added bonus of being around them is a chance to enjoy being silly all over again and we can learn a lot from them.
Sadly I have been to too many funerals recently. One was for a friend’s husband who died far too young and with very little warning and it definitely wasn’t fair. He was a nice man, a good man and what came across loud and clear at the service was that he had known what was of true value and he had paid attention and cherished it. His sons spoke of what a loving husband and dad he had been and how they hoped to follow his example in their own relationships. I think all of us were moved to tears by what they said. The sentiment that sticks in my mind from them was this “We didn’t have much money. We don’t remember what was bought for us but we remember was what was done for us. We couldn’t wait for six o’clock when we’d hear dad’s car pull in and he’d take us on an adventure such as walking in Rivelin Valley or finding frog spawn or making a Tarzan swing”. In later years he was both professionally and financially successful and this was rightly acknowledged but what he is remembered for by a huge number of people is the kind of man he was. Perhaps we should ask ourselves what we would hope to be remembered for and if necessary adjust our lives accordingly. I have definitely wasted too much of mine worrying, often about things that I couldn’t do anything about or that weren’t worth it in the first place. This has got in the way of appreciating what was around me and even spoiled times I should have enjoyed being with the people I love. As the saying goes, can anyone by worrying add an inch to their height or an hour to their span! I think I am finally learning my lesson with this, and enjoying the simple pleasures of what I have is now far more important than worrying about what I haven’t done or got or achieved.
If you have never read the book of Ecclesiastes I would recommend that you do; probably the Good News version which is easier to understand, at least it was for me, although it doesn’t have the great “All is Vanity” opening line! It’s not a jolly or cheerful book, in fact the writer, who at first sounds like King Solomon but wasn’t apparently, often seems like a bit of a misery guts. He is however, a very good observer and commentator on the human condition and there is a great deal of wisdom in what he says which is worth at least considering.
God gives us life and an incredibly beautiful world in which to live it. Yes bad things happen to us, we all go through testing times, truly terrible things happen in the world and we lose people we love and none of this has anything to do with fairness. But at the same time there is much that is good and wonderful and incredible and worthwhile. I think the message from the writer of Ecclesiastes, whoever he was, is that we should work sensibly to provide for our needs and those of others when we can, try to think and act wisely for everyone’s sake but also enjoy the simple pleasures of our lives as much as we can for as long as we can and that this is alright with God. If I can add a thought of my own, I think it would be ungrateful and ungracious not to.
Amen.

Kath Boyd – Reader

Difference – Luke 8:26-39 (The 4th Sunday after Trinity)

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The thing about the modern world is that you have to learn how to live with people who are different from yourself. Different by race, by religion, by sex, by gender, by age, by belief, by culture…. We could go on. We live in a world of difference.

The days are long gone when we and our children and grandchildren would spend our entire lives in the same village or part of town, mixing with people who dressed like us, spoke like us, wanted the same things as us, believed what we believed, thought the same thoughts, wanted the same things, even ate the same food as we ate.

If I think of my own family and that of my wife, we see the modern world in microcosm. We have children who live in France and Australia. We have grandchildren whose first language is not English. We have two grandchildren who are part Jewish and one grandson whose girlfriend is Bangladeshi and Muslim. The firms two of our children work for are international and their next promotion could take them to America or the Far East. They eat curries and pizzas and bamboo shoots and rice… and very rarely fish and chips This is what globalisation means.

So, we have to learn to live with difference. But it doesn’t come easily to us.

The tendency of all human groups is to be suspicious of anyone who looks different, acts different, thinks different, eats different. Our instinct is to avoid, shut out or shun them.

It was like it in the days of Jesus and it has been like it ever since.

If you think back to what we have just heard read for the gospel you can see this human mechanism at work. In the days of Jesus, anyone who didn’t fit in, anyone who was very different, was avoided.

The idea was that a community could only hang together if everyone was the same. Difference, they thought, threatened harmony.

So people with skin diseases – they are called lepers in the bible – or people with various difficult personalities or psychological illnesses were pushed out of the village. They had to exist as best they could on the fringes of society. The man in the gospel just now seems to have made his home the local cemetery.

We don’t know what the objection to him is exactly, but he seems to have fits or seizures from time to time, as if many demons have got hold of him – and he’s had to be restrained sometimes. Perhaps its some form of epilepsy. Whatever it is, he is different and this disturbs people. So they force him to live outside the village.

Jesus wont have it. He doesn’t avoid the man, but makes time for him, speaks to him, and cures him.

If you think about it, there are many incidents like this throughout all the gospels. Jesus forms a relationship with all sorts of people who are different and who, because of their difference, are shunned or shut out.

He makes time and space for so-called fallen women, for small children, for a foreign soldier, for different sorts of Jews – called Samaritans – for Jews who collect taxes for the Romans, for sick people, for poor people…. we could go on and on. The gospel is full of stories about people who are different in one respect or another being made to feel welcome when all their experiences up to the time of meeting Jesus were that they were made unwelcome.

This idea that before God we are all welcome and our differences are not a reason for some being excluded was enshrined by Jesus in this sacrament of Holy Communion.

Think of the symbolism we enact every time we come to this service. The highpoint of the service is when we come to the altar to receive the consecrated bread and wine. In this church the point is made even more dramatically, and theologically, because we kneel together round the altar, as equals. Whatever our differences, we set them aside here. They count for nothing here. Because before God they count for nothing.

So we kneel as equals whether we are rich or poor, male or female, homosexual or heterosexual, fit or frail, wacky or sane – whatever our differences, they don’t count here. What counts is what we have in common, not what divides. And what we have in common is that we are all equally sinners, all equally in need of God’s grace.

That’s the important lesson we learn here and take with us out there.

The human tendency is to react badly to difference. We have seen this tragically and starkly demonstrated this week with the murder of Jo Cox MP by a man who, whatever else was going on in his head, clearly disliked the ways in which she was so different from him.

There may be some deep evolutionary reason for this discomfort even detestation we have for  people who are different from us, I don’t know. But if we indulge it, we not only make the lives of some people very miserable, in the end we also make it impossible for any of us to live well – because in some respects we all have our differences and who knows when our difference might make someone else suspicious or angry.

Learning to live with difference is the great challenge of our times. We learn how to do it.

Dr Alan Billings – Priest

Mothering Sunday – Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32 (4th Sunday in Lent)

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The parable in our Gospel Reading (“The Prodigal Son”, Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32) is probably one of the best known of Jesus’s parables – possibly because the family situation, and the characters seem so believable even in our own times. The Saturday advice column in our paper seems to deal with some variation on the themes of this parable quite often. Just last week there was a follow up piece referring to a lady who had been offered advice several years ago. She had written again to say that her wayward son has now got his life back on track and has started his own family. Bel Mooney summed up “It gives me the chance to repeat something I often say – You never know what will happen, so hang in there, with hope.”
But to go back to the parable – I would like to say a few words about each of the three main players using my imagination to sketch in a slightly fuller picture of each. I’ll start with the elder son who is probably usually the least considered of the characters.
I can imagine he had always had a bit of a problem with his younger brother. Family situations like the departure of the younger brother rarely come out of the blue – there has usually been some history of family friction. Possibly the younger son had always seemed a “bit of a lad”, maybe a bit workshy, always looking for a bit of adventure, never really settled at home on the family farm. There had probably always been a bit of sibling rivalry and disagreement. When the father yielded to the younger son’s request and let him have his inheritance the older brother doubtless felt that his kid brother had “got away with it” again – and had then disappeared, leaving him to shoulder the whole workload at the farm. The older, more dutiful, son’s sense of resentment towards his younger, more carefree brother had now become more fixed.
When the younger brother eventually came home, the elder was working in the fields and, it would appear, no-one went to tell him the news and that there was to be a celebration. He found out only when he came in from work and heard the noise of the party. It’s the last straw – his resentment boiled over and he refused to join in welcoming his brother back. He said to his father “My brother’s wasted his inheritance on prostitutes – and you give him a party! I’ve never had a party, you’ve never done anything for me!” He said, “ For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command”. And the father tried to explain , saying his son could have had a party any time. All the father had was his to use! And that was true. The younger son had made off with his portion but the father had divided the property between the sons so the elder could have enjoyed his own portion.
Instead the older son had in effect continued to work for his father and had not grown into a mature relationship of working with his father and enjoying the wealth of the farm. It’s as if he had for all this time been working to try and gain his father’s good will and had not enjoyed being his father’s son. He had bottled up resentment against his brother and not enjoyed his own position as oldest son. The younger son came home saying “treat me as a hired hand” and in some ways his older brother had always behaved as if he was a hired hand, not a son. He had his own growing up still to do to learn to appreciate his father’s love and gift, to be reconciled with his brother and to be a mature member of the family.
The younger son we feel we are familiar with – the cheeky one who asked for his inheritance, left home and spent all his money on dissolute living in a faraway place (I can see him in Las Vegas!) But when hard times came he did not immediately head home. He tried to work but gradually came to realise that his position was worse than that of his father’s hired hands. So he admitted his mistakes, swallowed his pride, and went home – chastened and seeking forgiveness for his behaviour and saying “I am not worthy to be called you son. Treat me as a hired hand.” This young man had made quite a journey from arrogance, pride and self indulgence to repentance and humility.
And lastly we consider the father. He took a big risk in giving in to his younger son’s request and dividing the property even though he must have known the young man’s wayward tendencies. As his younger son disappeared off to a distant land and frittered away his inheritance, did the father wonder where he’d gone wrong in bringing him up? Did he think he’d made a mistake in giving him money and freedom? He grieved for his son while he was away – but when he came home he welcomed him with love. Even before he knew how changed his son was he was filled with compassion and went out to meet him welcoming him with compassion and rejoicing and feted him as a son restored. He still had to face the older son’s resentment which had probably been barely concealed under the surface for years. The father had to try to met the older son’s hardened heart to enable all the family to be reunited and restored.
The father in Jesus’s story is God who gives all his children free will and autonomy and longs for each to find their own way to mature loving relationship with himself and with each other. The family themes of the parable continue to play out in all walks of life in every generation. Reflecting on Jesus’s story can give us much to think about regarding our own families and can help us understand more of God and our relationship with him.
Jesus’s story is of a father and his sons. Today we celebrate Mother’s Day and the maternal side of parenting. Mother’s Day is one of those days when we seem to be bombarded with images of happy families with mums being showered with love, flowers, presents and treats by grateful children – and that is great, fantastic and wonderful. It is good to celebrate all that mothers do and mean to us.
But as we reflect on our Gospel story we are reminded that not everything in families is always easy and happy and I’d like us to spare a thought for all the mums who are grieving today for broken relationships with the children or grandchildren, for all those whose hearts ache today and whose sorrow seems magnified by all the images of “happy families”.
And let us spare a thought for all those who for whatever reason have been unable to be mothers even though they may have longed to be.
And also for those mothers who have endured the agony of losing a child or children to death and who grieve today for their lost sons or daughters.
Mother’s Day gives us a chance to reflect on the joys and sorrows of family life. We can be thankful for love, compassion, generosity, sacrifice and joy in families. We also need to acknowledge the heartaches and feelings of emptiness that can also be part of family life.
But most of all let us remember that God’s love enfolds us all. God’s understanding encompasses all people and all complex circumstances. God’s maternal side reaches out to all and draws all who are willing into her arms. And when times are hard – “hang in there with hope” for you never know what can happen next and how good things can, in the long term, come from difficult situations.
Happy Mother’s Day.

Anne Grant – Reader

Transformation

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The Second Sunday of Lent

Sermon preached by Kath Boyd – Reader

Well here we are on the second Sunday in Lent already. I hope it’s going well for you so far, especially those of you have decided to give something up, it’s hard and there is a long way left to go so I take my hat off to you and wish you all the best. I’m afraid I have to confess that I haven’t given anything up. As Melanie mentioned in her sermon last week, Lent is upon us quite quickly this year and in spite of giving it some thought beforehand I was finding it rather difficult to get into, in any meaningful way. I considered giving up chocolate or alcohol or Radio 4, all of which I enjoy but I didn’t feel that would do anything apart from test my will power and as I’ve been on the 5:2 diet for about four years now I think my will power gets tested quite regularly as it is. In the past I have heard suggestions that instead of giving something up it might be good to take something on and this can indeed have merit, especially if it is something that broadens our horizons or deepens our understanding or benefits others as well as ourselves. However, I’m already struggling to fit in all the things I need to do and as nothing of any great merit came to mind I haven’t gone down that path either. But I didn’t want to not mark Lent so the question remained “what to do”? Again as Melanie suggested, sometimes we just have to get on as best we can and hope that a way forward will become clear. So that is basically what I’ve been doing since Ash Wednesday and in a quiet, unspectacular fashion I am finding a meaningful way forward.

For quite a number of years now I have been using the Lent Extra publication and this year, as ever, it contains a lot of interesting and thought provoking articles, suggestions for daily readings and comments and observations on them followed by a little prayer, all of which I’m finding of great worth. On the third day of using the suggested readings there was one from Isaiah chapter 58 which particularly spoke to me. In it we hear God challenging the people about the way they conduct their worship, saying and doing all the things they think are going to get his attention and favour such as fasting and performing rituals, whilst in their daily lives they completely fail to follow what he asks of them. Perhaps they were fooling themselves into thinking they were doing all the right things but God is not fooled by empty words and actions and he spells this out to the people and tells them what he really wants.

“Is this not the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked to cover them, and not hide yourself from your own kin?

As the notes in my Bible say “The fast that God wants involves saving other people from oppression and satisfying their needs.” In other words He wants people to actually do what they pay lip service to rather than making a big show of ritual observance which doesn’t really do much for anyone. The comment offered on the passage in Lent Extra reiterates this and goes on to suggest that as well as giving up foods or other pleasures and comforts we can fast in other ways too such as “abstaining from judging others and from gossip, letting go of anger, jealousy, resentment and a reluctance to forgive by opening our hearts to the action of God’s grace”. This is all good advice, good for us and for the others who benefit from us becoming better people. I like to think that I am a fair minded person and that I try to see things from other people’s points of view but when I read this it has made me look a bit harder at my own thoughts and attitudes and I’m now trying to take a little longer to consider matters before coming to conclusions. I’m trying to let go of the thoughts and feelings that hold me in bad places and to genuinely forgive as I hope I will be forgiven.

The little prayer at the end of piece said,
“Lord, help me to live and love like you. Amen”

On the sixth day in Lent Extra came a piece entitled “Standards of love” which references a parable in Matthew’s Gospel chapter 25 about the separating of the sheep from the goats, you know, the one where the sheep have done all the right things in caring for others and the goats haven’t. Again it challenges people to examine the potential differences in what they profess to believe and how they actually behave. Do we always treat others with dignity, kindness, care and love and in so doing do the same for Jesus? I suspect that most of us try to but there are times when we fall a little short, especially when we feel threatened, uncomfortable or under pressure because we are short of time or we don’t know what to say or do. I used to avoid Big Issue sellers because I couldn’t always afford to buy a copy from them and I didn’t like saying no but then a friend told me that one of the sellers he had talked to said the worst thing is when people blank them and don’t acknowledge that they are even there. I thought about this and tried to see it from his point of view so now when I bump into a Big Issue seller I always reply yes OK or sorry, not today. Either way, most of them say thanks and wish me a good day anyway and I dare say both of us feel better about the encounter. They don’t feel ignored and I don’t feel bad for avoiding them. Perhaps we can use Lent to think about how we view and treat and value others and again try to become better people for their sake and our own.

“Lord, help me to see you in others and love you in them. Amen”

I started writing this sermon on Tuesday and I’d like to read the Lent Extra offering for that day for you because the writer, Barbara Mary Hopper puts her message across so well.

“The prophet Isaiah tells us that God sends out his word with a mission. God’s word comes to us through the scriptures. As we ponder the message in prayerful silence, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the word will make its home in us and gradually transform our lives. God’s presence in the word is as real and life giving as in the Eucharist. Daily, as we respond to the voice of the Lord, especially in the Gospels, our lives will witness to the richness of God’s merciful love for all. For many people, the only Gospel they will ever read is the one written in our Lives!”

For me that last line really stood out and it certainly makes me think hard about what kind of an ambassador I am for God and his church. It should make us all think. Not in a way which just makes us feel like failures because we do all get things wrong at times but in a way that gives us the courage to examine what we think and believe and how we actually live our lives. Do we practice what we preach? How can we do better? It’s a practical question and it needs practical answers and actions!

Just after the service today we will be holding our APCM, Annual Parochial Church Meeting. I know that for many people it’s not one of the highlights of the church year that you look forward to or perhaps you don’t think it involves you because you are not on any of the rotas or committees or in any of the groups or maybe you feel you haven’t got anything to contribute so there isn’t much point in sticking around for it. I’d like to politely ask you to reconsider. A moment ago I said that how we find ways to do things better is a practical question and how we collectively run this church is a practical matter which we all have something to contribute to just by being here. It’s not about getting roped into doing things you don’t want to do or having to stand up and speak if that’s not your thing. Think of it more as an opportunity to consider what St Mary’s means to you, to look back over the past year’s activities and achievements, to show your appreciation and support for the people who have put in a lot of effort to keep the church going not just for those of us who come here regularly but as God’s house which is here for the whole community and beyond when they want or need it. Hear about the plans and aspirations for the coming year to build on what we have already achieved and I have to say that over the years we have steadily accomplished a great deal. You might have ideas on how we could do better.

I know that sometimes it can seem that we get bogged down with a lot of bureaucratic procedural stuff or we are forever struggling to hold the place together or even that we expend a lot of time, money and effort trying to respect the heritage of the building or add to it but all these things are what make St Mary’s the unique place that it is. It is part of how we reach out to people and connect with them. Ultimately the church is about people and our relationship to God. Together, as a church we can help each other to become the people he wants us to be.

Each and every one of us and what we say and do makes a difference so whatever you are giving up or taking on or pondering, Remember that line “For many people, the only Gospel they will ever read is the one written in our Lives!” and hopefully it will help to encourage you on your journey through Lent. We really can be transformed along the way. Amen.

Epiphany

Posted on by St Mary's

The Feast of the Epiphany

Sermon preached by Anne Grant – Reader

2015 seemed to be a year of stargazing – of fascination with the night sky’s moon and stars. From the first fly-by of Pluto bringing back amazing pictures, more data on conditions on Mars, pictures from a comet, a planetary conjunction, a super moon, a blood moon, meteor showers, amazing aurora sightings to the most recent the launch of Tim Peake to the International Space Station brining us even more insights into Space,  it has been an amazing year of Space.
But the night sky has always fascinated people. Until we all used electric light so abundantly any clear night was an opportunity to contemplate the vastness of space.  In urban areas we can go months hardly noticing the stars, but in less built up areas, even now, the night sky is an ever present marvel in the dark hours.

Humans have always been fascinated with stargazing and from ancient times people have tried to track and interpret the mysteries of the moon and stars finding patters and meaning. The Wise Men of our Christmas story were astrologers – they stargazed, they studied the night sky – and it was as they did this that they became aware of a special star that they interpreted as meaning the birth of a king.  They were so moved by this that they packed up precious gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh and left home to find and honour this king.  They were not just interested, not just curious but moved to set out into the unknown to follow this star, journeying to a foreign country to a people of a different religion.  Initially they enquired at the obvious place – the royal palace, but ended up following the star to a humble stable where they presented their precious gifts.  Then they obeyed the message they received in a dream and did not return to Herod but returned home by a different route.

Some people have put much effort into trying to identify what star/comet/cosmic event these men might have seen but without any real result. For me though the point is that these students of the night sky, these people who were so familiar with the stars and their movements, saw something that amazed them, inspired them and motivated them to leave home on a great journey to follow, to seek, to worship.  God’s revelation to these star gazers came through a star! God spoke to them through the subject they studied. Epiphany is about God revealing himself to the gentiles, these non-Jews who come to honour the baby Jesus. God uses the familiar to reveal the unfamiliar.

The whole Christmas story in Matthew and Luke’s gospels is about God’s revelation to people going about their everyday tasks.

Zechariah, John the Baptist’s father, was “on the rota”, doing his turn of duty in the temple when the angel Gabriel came to him to say that his ageing wife would bear a son.
Mary was a young village girl preparing for marriage when Gabriel came to her to announce that she had been chosen to be mother to Jesus.
Joseph was a carpenter suddenly faced with the potentially awful shaming revelation that his fiancée was pregnant before their marriage.  He believed the message brought to him in a dream that he should not be afraid to stand by Mary and become the earthly father to Jesus.
The shepherds were working men doing their job minding the sheep on the hillside when the angels suddenly surprised them with an announcement about the baby in the manger.  They did the unthinkable and left their flocks to go to Bethlehem to worship the new born.
And now these astrologers from the East – these learned men – have seen something so unusual in  the night sky that they have journeyed to follow the amazing star to worship a new born king.
The whole Christmas story abounds with people doing their ordinary daily round and being surprised by God, finding themselves chosen to hear the Good News: unexpected people being invited by angels or the revelation of God and being moved to action to do something challenging, new, life changing.

On Christmas Day Tim Peake tried to phone home from the International Space Station (surely a miracle in itself!). He said “Is that planet earth?” only to find that he was speaking to a baffled stranger.  He’d got a wrong number!  I guess that person now has a great story to tell the grandchildren – “I got a call from space on Christmas Day and it was a wrong number!”.

God does not get wrong numbers! God calls on all sorts of people and opens their eyes; he shows them new possibilities; he calls them to new realities and may offer glimpses of heaven.
Before Christmas as part of our Advent reflections we heard a sermon about how we often moan “Why me?” especially when times are challenging.  I’d like to suggest that we need to avoid another negative mind set – “It’ll never be me”. We think ourselves too obscure, too young, too old, too unexciting, too unskilled, too unlikely, too much an “outsider” ever to have something amazing happen to us.

The New Years Honours list was published this week and apart from the headline names contained many people who were surprised to find themselves and their achievements honoured.  Many of these would previously have said of themselves “It’ll never be me”.
Likewise, I am sure, quite a few of those honoured to receive Maundy money from the Queen at Sheffield Cathedral last Easter would have said to themselves before “It’ll never be me”.
The Christmas story shows that God does come to all sorts of people – old, young, men, women, learned and unschooled, local or foreigner, rich or poor, devout or not particularly religious – ordinary people in ordinary places. God comes to them as they are doing their ordinary everyday tasks and brings them new insights and transformation.
This year as we go about our daily tasks and routines may we be open to possibilities: not in a way that we are disappointed if nothing spectacular happens but open to new things happening.  May we not be so absorbed in the mundane that we cannot perceive the special.  May we take the joy, love and peace of Christmas out into the world and never stop believing that God can do amazing things through ordinary people. Amen

Why Me?

Posted on by St Mary's

The Fourth Sunday of Advent

Sermon preached by Kath Boyd – Reader

Have you ever asked yourself the question “why me”? I know I have. It’s usually in a sort of tone that says “why me, how come I’m the one who got stuck with this rotten job, why am I the one who got lumbered with this, why am I the one who missed out, or something similar, why me??? Have you noticed that we seldom ask “why me?” When something good happens? Most likely we just think that’s great or think that we probably deserved our good fortune. When we ask the “why me?” sort of question we are usually feeling a bit hard done to and perhaps a little sorry for ourselves. It isn’t fair! Or so we think.

As I just said, I used to say or think this quite often, particularly if I seemed to be having a run of bad luck. Then one day I asked myself “well, why not me?” And I couldn’t really come up with a reason. Sometimes life just works out that way and in the grand scheme of things there is no special reason why I should not have my share of difficult or unpleasant or anxiety provoking tasks and happenstances than anyone else. So a few years ago I decided to stop saying why me or at least try to and I think this has helped me to have better outlook on life. I certainly don’t waste as much emotional energy on a question that can’t really be answered.

When I was thinking about what I would talk about in this sermon and I read the passage from Luke about Mary visiting Elizabeth I must admit that at first I couldn’t think of anything to add to the story as it stands, but as I looked at the passages either side of it I wondered if Mary had ever thought “why me?” One of the things we have come to believe about Mary is that she was probably quite young when she became Jesus’ mother, possibly around fourteen years of age which is very young indeed to become a mum and I think it would be safe to say that for most young girls or women of that age the prospect of giving birth and motherhood would probably be quite scary even if it was or is culturally more usual than it is for our society. I was just twenty when I had my first child and believe me I was scared.

We hear about the visit of the Angel Gabriel who announces to Mary that she has found favour with God. We are not told that she was scared by this but that she was “perplexed” about what it meant. When the Angel tells her what will happen and about the destiny of her child she asks a very practical question, “How can this be, since I am a virgin?” When she is given the explanation and the news about her relative Elizabeth’s pregnancy she simply accepts everything and says “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” she doesn’t ask “Why me?”

We are not given any information about what she said to her parents or her fiancé Joseph but from a human perspective I can’t help wondering what their responses were when they eventually became aware of her pregnancy. Would she have been believed or would they have thought her untruthful or even deluded? We do later learn that Joseph, who was obviously a kind man, plans to quietly break their engagement to spare her any humiliation until he too is visited by the Angel who makes everything clear. Did Joseph think “Why me, why is this happening to me?”

The first action by Mary that we know of is what happens in the passage from Luke when she goes to visit Elizabeth who is by then six months pregnant. It seems that the response of the child Elizabeth is carrying, to Mary’s arrival must have affirmed the special nature of both babies to both women and they stayed together for three months no doubt sharing their experiences and happiness and supporting one another, not worrying what everyone else might be thinking.

Mary was obviously a young woman of great faith and trust. Instead of saying “why me?” in a negative and complaining way as many of us sometimes do when something unplanned happens she regarded herself as favoured and blessed by God even though what lay ahead of her was going to be incredibly difficult and demanding and the means uncertain, “Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed.” What a mature response and if you go on to read the Magnificat, which follows on from the reading we  heard today, you will get an even greater sense of her maturity and faith.

Perhaps we can learn a valuable lesson from Mary. So often what is asked of us is difficult or we are tired, worn down or overwhelmed by the tasks we face or the impossible timescales involved. Maybe because of our circumstances we feel powerless to change or improve things but instead of asking “why me?” perhaps we could look at the situation differently and see that what is being asked of us is an opportunity or even an honour and a privilege. A small example of this was when I recently delivered my batch of Christmas leaflets for church. I have to admit that it’s not a job I particularly look forward to because I dread the thought of anyone getting confrontational if it’s something they don’t want or regard as junk mail; you see I have this awful tendency to fight battles that haven’t even been declared which really isn’t good for me. However, I said I’d do it and so having psyched myself up (and it wasn’t raining,) I got on with it and wonderfully no one challenged me, a few even said thank you and I found a few flats I’d never seen before so it was a sort of mystery tour experience. I was down to my last two leaflets left when I went to the back door of a neighbour next to our shop. She happened to be in and when she saw me she seemed pleased and signalled for me to wait. When she got the door open she said “would you like to come in for a drink” so I thought that’s really nice of her, why not? I’m not in a particular rush. We had a coffee and quite a long chat. She’d lost her husband a year or so ago and I think she enjoyed having someone to talk to, especially someone who had known him. When I left I couldn’t help thinking that this little encounter had been a gift and something of a privilege which I wouldn’t have had if I’d not helped out with a job I hadn’t much wantrd to do. Thinking back over my life there have been many good things that have come out of not the best of circumstances and it’s only later that I’ve been able to see this. Now I can say thank you for them instead of bemoaning the hand fate dealt me.

A great many things in life are not what we would choose but we can’t always change them. What we can change is our attitude towards them. We can choose to see things differently. Instead of seeing tasks and chores and burdens or drains on our time or other resources we can choose to see opportunities to meet and get to know other people who may turn out to be really interesting and they may even become friends. A task we previously dreaded can be an opportunity for personal growth if we are prepared to challenge ourselves and move out of our comfort zone. We may find we are actually quite good at something we never envisaged being able to do. By changing our attitude to some of the things that we feel trapped by or scared of such as other people’s opinions of us or our social status or wealth or career we can even set ourselves free. After all, it is up to each of us to decide what is important to us and what is not. We shouldn’t always allow others to dictate that for us.
So next time something comes along and you are tempted to ask “Why me?” pause for a moment and consider what you may be being offered and then ask “Why not me?” And if it feels right then take the next step like Mary did and say “Here am I”

Amen.