Sermon
delivered at St. Lawrence’s Parish Church, Stratford-sub-Castle, Wiltshire and
St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Chapel, Whaddon – Sunday 22nd March 2015
Hebrews 5:5-10; John
12:20-33; Romans 5:12-end
May
I speak in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and may these words be a
blessing to all who hear them. Amen
Did any of you get to witness the partial eclipse of
the Sun on Friday morning? Here in Salisbury it was most disappointing with
heavy cloud covering the sky until the eclipse was over – then glorious
sunshine! Ah Well! What a wonderful sight such eclipses are
though, a huge bite out of the solar disc by the Moon’s shadow - but nothing
quite surpasses a total eclipse when the light from the Sun is completely
blotted out and the land returns to complete darkness as happened on the Faroes
this time. I was privileged enough to see this event back in 1999 when I
journeyed with my then wife and two and a half year old son to Newquay in
Cornwall. I remember that day well – we
journeyed through the night of the previous day to make sure we got there in
good time and could book into our hotel on the bay headland. I remember watching the Sun set in a
beautifully cloudless sky over the sea the evening before thinking we were
going to have a glorious day for the eclipse.
But this is England! We woke up
to the wind pounding the rain against our hotel room window. Typical we thought. The eclipse was due to start at 11.11 a.m. on
the 11 August. After breakfast we
decided we would walk out on the headland in the lashing rain armed with a
telescope and cameras in order to capture this once-in-a-lifetime event but it
seemed hopeless. At 11 a.m. the sky was
overcast but the rain had stopped. At
11.09 a.m. the clouds parted as though a divine hand had opened the celestial
curtains and we saw the total eclipse of the Sun in all its glory. Street lights came on, seabirds returned to
the land to roost, dogs howled, the temperature dropped dramatically and
shivering people shouted, screamed and hugged each other and cries of “Oh My God” rang out! As we stood there, looking up at the Sun’s
corona and all the stars and planets, now visible in the mid-morning, my
thoughts went to how this must have been viewed by ancient people who had no
knowledge of the continuous celestial dance of the Sun, Moon and planets. A
shiver ran down my spine and I could see how ancient people had worshipped the
Sun at Stonehenge and how dreadful it must have been for it suddenly to appear
to have been blotted out – perhaps never to return. We, of course now know that by an ingenious
stroke of Creation – the Moon is 400 times closer to us than the sun and just
happens to be 400 times smaller – hence its shadow perfectly fits across the
Sun’s disc for the limited period it passes in front of the Sun on its monthly
lunar orbit.
Today is Passiontide Sunday, when we ponder on the
whole Easter story as it begins to unfold
and we read in the bible of the occurrence of a total eclipse of the Sun
on a very important day and time – the moment Jesus Christ died on the
Cross. We read that darkness descended
over the whole land and another event occurred – the renting of the curtain in
the Temple’s Holy of Holy’s. Not rent
from bottom to top as would be the case if a human being had torn it, but from
top to bottom – a sign of divine intervention.
As darkness descended and the light of the world was snuffed out, a
channel was made between us and God – a direct line of communication as though
God was suddenly encouraging us to be his Facebook
friend! His chosen people could
communicate by prayer directly with him – they no longer needed to go through
the contortions associated with the complex Temple system with all its convolutions
and corruptness (we heard about the moneylenders in the Temple recently). In Romans 5, Paul is saying to the
Church in Rome, that by this one act of Jesus, his death for our sins, God has
given us much grace and this grace from God is totally free.
I don’t know about you but I am a bit of a sucker for
the BOGF – “Buy one get one free”.
Whether I really want a second item or not – it’s free after all! We all like to think that we are getting a
bargain. I remember hearing once of
somebody wanting to get rid of a bicycle.
They advertised it as free to a good home on their front. There were no takers. People were
suspicious. The moment the owners put a sign on it saying it was for sale for
£10 it was taken, nicked, the following day. Says a lot about human nature does
that! So, when God says I am giving you
a free gift – salvation for your soul, righteousness, repentance – he is
actually putting a price on it – obedience to him.
In Hebrews 5, the writer talks about Jesus as
the Great High Priest. What does he
mean? When the Temple curtain was torn,
as we have already said, there was a direct channel of communication with God –
the need for the Great High Priest to intercede on the Day of Atonement was
negated and as we know, Peter later goes on to talk about the “Priesthood of
all Believers” (1 Peter 2:9 and again in Revelation 5:10) –
something I am very keen to evangelize as a lay minister – I guess I am a
Lutheran at heart – Peter addresses the Hebrews in these terms:
But you are not like
that, for you are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s
very own possession. As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for
he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light. (1 Peter 2)
The
writer of Hebrews talks about Christ being a priest like Melchizedek. What does that mean? Isn’t this all a little confusing? Do we need a Great High Priest or not?
We
must remember that the writer of Hebrews, a much underrated book in my view and
one which I think all Christians should read as a means of understanding and
appreciating the importance of the Jewish heritage of our own Faith, and a link
between the Old and the New Testaments, is writing in a manner which will make
the reader more readily understand Christianity in his/her own age and context.
For example it is a bit like trying to explain the rules of cricket to an
American whose only knowledge of games with bats and balls is American
baseball. You need to explain to him
that a cricket bat is like a baseball bat except….. or the pitcher pitches but the cricketer bowls the ball etc. Therefore in trying
to explain the role of Christ and the relevance of his Passion it is necessary
to compare him to an ancient priest from their own history - Melchizedek. And to do that it was necessary for me to do
a bit of research on good old Wikipedia as
to whom Melchizedek was.
Well
the first thing I learned was that Melchizedek is the name of a 30-litre bottle
of champagne – imagine that a bottle that holds the equivalent of 40 ordinary
bottles of champagne! It would be a
great party that required a Melchizedek!
That’s probably why I’ve never seen one. If nothing else, you’ve learned
the answer to a good pub quiz question!
My
source tells me that Melchizedek was King/Priest of Salem who gave Abram bread
and wine after Abram had defeated King Kedorlaomer.(Genesis 14:18) He is also mentioned in Psalm 110 (v. 4)
when David writes:
And
will not change his mind
You
are a priest for ever
In
the order of Melchezedek”
It
seems therefore that the writer of Hebrews is likening Jesus to a former king
who was both kind and righteous and I think it interesting and not
insignificant that in the quote from Genesis, Abram is refreshed by bread and
wine. This would not have gone unnoticed
by the Hebrew readers – a prophesy of the Last Supper – a remembrance and a
celebration.
Jesus
is there to refresh us today – remember how he tells the woman at the well that
the water he can provide will quench her thirst for ever.
The
importance of all the readings today and of the celebration of the beginning of
Passiontide is to remember and celebrate that it is only through obedience and
belief in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ our Saviour that we can be saved and
have eternal life.
Recently
I heard that 95% of churchgoers (and I know that this does not include you)
never read their bible. What they know
of it is what they hear on Sundays when it is read out to them. More alarmingly, a massive percentage of the
population have absolutely no idea what Easter is about except that it seems to
have a lot to do with rabbits, eggs and chocolate but even then they don’t
really know why. It is simply another
holiday and religion should be kept out of it.
We
who have given our life to Christ are indeed holy priests. The way to eternal life is by following the
teachings of Christ but above all recalling that, in the words of John (John
3:18)
“Whoever believes in him is not
condemned but whoever does not believe in him already stands condemned. Light came into the world but Man loved
darkness because their deeds were evil”.
Paul
says, in Ephesians 5:8 :
“For you were once darkness, but now you
have the light in the Lord. Live as
children of light for the fruit of the light consists of all goodness
righteousness and truth.”
Very
often I look at the world and think we are indeed in darkness. But I remember that the Trinitarian God is
always there. Just as on that August day
in 1999 when darkness descended upon Cornwall, the Sun never left the sky
neither will God abandon us.
Amen
MFB/56
