SERMON 61 - SUNDAY 26 JULY 2015

Sermon delivered St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Chapel, Whaddon  – Sunday 26th July 2015

Job 19:1-27a; Psalm 74; Hebrews 8

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

In my recent sermons, which I have preached during the last month or so within the Clarendon Team area, my theme has been one of hope through times of despair and destruction – the need to keep our Faith when all around seems to be disintegrating.  Whether in our personal lives, work lives or in the life of the church we face many challenges and trials which being a Christian will not prevent but which, with our faith we can overcome.  This has followed a study of Job from the Lectionary readings for this last month – a book in which many lives can be reflected – we have good times and we have bad ones, but by continuing to keep our Faith in the one who was sent to redeem us we can weather the storms which we do have to face from time to time.

On a first hearing, tonight’s reading all seem quite depressing. Tonight’s Psalm, also, is a lament and begins in a very negative manner –

“O God, why have you utterly disowned us? •
Why does your anger burn
against the sheep of your pasture?”

As I continued to read Psalm 74, I was reminded of my recent trip to France and in particular to the preserved ruins of the small town of Oradour-sur-Glane near Limoges and in particular the verses which read:-

3          Hasten your steps towards the endless ruins, •
where the enemy has laid waste all your sanctuary.

4          Your adversaries roared in the place of your worship; •
they set up their banners as tokens of victory.

5          Like men brandishing axes on high in a thicket of trees, •
all her carved work they smashed down with hatchet and hammer.

6          They set fire to your holy place; •
they defiled the dwelling place of your name
and razed it to the ground.

7          They said in their heart, 'Let us make havoc of them altogether,' •
and they burned down all the sanctuaries of God in the land.

These verses were written at a time nearly 3,000 years ago but as the ruins of Oradour testify today, they equally could have applied to a Saturday afternoon in June 1944 when a detachment of elite German Nazi-SS soldiers arrived shortly after lunchtime, rounded up 642 of the inhabitants, men women and children, and separating them into two groups – men and women and children, marched the men to various barns where they were shot and their bodies burned and marched the women and children into the previous sanctuary of the local church where after hearing the gunfire of their menfolk being killed were then locked in the church and burned alive – in the words of the psalm –

“They set fire to your holy place, they defiled the dwelling place of your name and razed it to the ground”.

Oradour features at the beginning and end of that epic series “The World at War” narrated by Sir Laurence Olivier.  Oradour, he says, stands and a monument and reminder for the many who lost their lives during the great conflict which was the Second World War - which ended just under 70 years ago - and which we will celebrate next month.

Oradour was a peaceful little town before the soldiers came.  The local mayor had been chosen because he supported the Vichy regime and had advocated a peaceful co-existence with the German occupiers.  Not a collaborator as such but someone who felt it better for the villagers to “bide their time” until things became better. In fact, the German soldiers chose the wrong village – their intended target was another Oradour to the south of Limoges. Just as with Job, he was a peaceful God-fearing man who was put to a trial in order to test his Faith in an extra-terrestrial contest. And like Job, our Faith will be tested from time to time – not, hopefully in the manner experienced by Job or the inhabitants of Oradour-sur-Glane, but in our everyday lives. We can choose to do one of two things, when our Faith is tested, either give in to the temptations which surround us and which seek to weaken our Faith, or stand up to them and reject them just in the same way Christ was tempted by Satan in the wilderness and stood up against him. Jesus knows what it is to be tempted, to be faced with the prospect of giving in to those forces which would seek to knock us off the pathway of our Christian journey.

The theolgian Jeff Lucas often quips in his frequent sermons and addresses to Christian groups how, when he first became a Christian he preached something along these lines:

“If you are a Christian you will not have any problems  – but

If you are a Christian, and you pray to Jesus the problems will go away – but

If you are a Christian and you pray and the problems don’t go away then perhaps you are not really a Christian at all and you now have a bigger problem then when you first started!”

Jeff now laughs at his own arrogance and the incorrectness of this simple sermon theme. The truth is, whether we have problems or not we should pray to God through Jesus not only by way of supplication – asking for things, but also in adoration, confession and thanksgiving (ACTS). The Lord’s prayer follows precisely this format:

Adoration  -  “Hallowed be your Name”

Confession – “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us”

Thanksgiving – “Your will be done”, “Yours is the Kingdom”

Supplication – “Give us this day our daily bread”

Our prayers will be answered, but not necessarily in the manner or in the time scale we expect.  It is worth sitting down and reflecting upon some of the prayers you have sent up to God in the past.  Most will have been answered – some are still waiting to be answered. Psalm 74 is a prayer – setting out the events which have caused the petitioner distress and entreating God to look after the poor and distressed who have remained loyal to him.  Many of those prayers which you have previously prayed may have been answered in a completely different manner to what you expected. Some may have been answered in a manner beyond your wildest dreams – but Jesus told us, emphatically, that they would be answered.

Next to the ruins of the old town of Oradour-sur-Glane, rises the new town with it church reminiscent of the interior of Coventry Cathedral – that other great phoenix from the Second World War.  It was built on the basis of a new hope for a better future than the past.  In the book of Job we finally read of the phoenix life of that book’s hero when God restores to him his wealth and fortune several times over. We have been lucky – we have never experienced another terrible war in Europe since 1945 – but we do face other problems – economic, social and religious. We read of the rise of financial strife in European countries, of religious intolerance in some of our own towns and cities.  In the 1920s and early 1930s these problems beset Weimar Germany and a secular regime, built on pandering to the fears of ordinary people using media (far less sophisicated than we have today) and other forms of propaganda, led to the formation of a political system capable of sending those troops to Oradour.

The church throughout the world has a role to play in reducing such fear.  By acting as true Christians, loving one another and helping those in need, we can be a beacon in a society which has lost its way and which is fast become self-obsessed and self-centred and fearful. 

Although I am an Anglican minister I am a great admirer of the present pontiff, Francis, and I daily read his reflections contained in this little book.  Today’s reflection on Jesus’s words in Matthew I think encapsulates what I am trying to convey to you tonight:

“You have heard that it was said “An Eye for an Eye and a Tooth for a Tooth.  But I tell you this, do not oppose Evil with Evil” (Matthew 38-39).

It is for this reason that the writer in Hebrews talks about the old Covenant with Moses having been surpassed by the new Covenant of Jesus Christ.

God created a perfect world but we humans tainted it with sin.  The covenants of the Old Testament didn’t work but we have the blessing of the New Covenant or Testament and its teachings of “love which surpasses all understanding” as the King James version so beautifully puts it. The love of God and our love of each other.

Remember that love is there for each and everyone of us who accept Jesus as our Saviour and redeemer. So let us go forward with the knowledge that the greatest weapon against the evils of this world is the love of our Creator and that we should honour and worship him by the way we lead our lives of Faith.

 

 Amen

 

MFB/61

SERMON 60 - SUNDAY 12 JULY 2015

Sermon delivered at All Saints Church, Whiteparish  – Sunday 12th July 2015

Job 4:1; 5:6-27;  Psalm 66; Romans 15:14-29

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

Although a “dyed in the wool” Anglican, I have been much impressed by the writings and sayings and actions of our current pope, Francis, whose name was well chosen and recently I acquired this little book of daily reflections entitled “A Year with Pope Francis”.  It is full of very wise reflections mainly taken from his much larger works.

Today’s reflection, very much dovetails with the reading we had from Job in its thinking that we, as humans, can easily lose sight of the fact that God is there always and it is by his will and guidance that our lives should be structured.  Today’s reflection reads as follows:-

“Many men and women are experiencing more and more today serious lowliness and neglect as a result of their excessive zeal for autonomy which they inherited from modernity; but mostly they lost the support of something that transcends them”.

In simpler terms, Pope Francis reflects that lowliness (and perhaps a form of loneliness too) and neglect arises when we try and go it alone – to forget our spirtuality and believe that we are able to solve problems and undertake great tasks without the support of the one whom we Christians believe is behind everything – our Creator.  Those who are bereft of his support, because they do not seek it or believe it exists, are missing something wonderful and great.

In our reading from Job, Job’s comforter, Eliphaz, reminds the poor beleaguered hero of that Old Testament book that if he were in Job’s shoes he would appeal to God and and lay his cause before him – in other words, just as Pope Francis is pointing out in his reflection, there is one to whom you can press your suit, one who will listen and to whom your burden can be shared. 

Eliphaz reminds job, also, that God is capable of immense power and can perform wonders which cannot either be counted or comprehended. His power is such that the plans or the craftiest can be thwarted.  Indeed wonderful words from the comforter to the afflicted.

How often have we ourselves felt in a low or desperate place or situation?  Having Faith does not mean that you shouldn’t feel low or dejected at times.  All of us have or will experience great times of despair and wonder what life or death is all about – especially at times of grieving.  What we as Christians can be sure of, though, is that we are never alone at those times. We have a great comforter in Jesus Christ who endured the lowest of times, abandoned by his close friends, falsely accused by the church he grew up in, handed over to a foreign occupying power and horribly put to death after further torture.  As God’s own true Son, God himself understands our pain and suffering at those low times and he hurts along with us. 

Pope Francis is not saying that there will be no bad times but he is saying that more and more people are finding it hard to cope because they do not put their trust and faith in that “which transcends them”.  In other words they have nothing to put their trust and faith in when their earthly colleagues and things let them down.

When I was a boy I remember making a wonky bookcase – largely because I didn’t follow closely the instructions of my woodwork teacher but used a chisel which took off more wood than was needed.  Nevertheless I felt I had achieved something. It worked provided I didn’t stand the books upright!  I was therefore quite upset when my father, a much more skilled woodworker than I ever could be, set about “de-wonkying” it – if there is such a word.  However, it did teach me a lesson, not to be so arrogant or proud as not to listen, learn and watch.  I haven’t attempted any more bookcases – other than those which come in flat packs from IKEA – and they are challenging enough – but I did understand there are times when you just have to hand over a bad situation to your Father (God in this analogy) and he will put it right.  God wants us to prosper and not fail – like my father with the bookcase – he will show us and guide us if we pray about things and ask for his help.  He will then bless us and we should bless him too.

We often say “God Bless” as a matter of course but do we really ever stop and think what it is we are actually asking? It is, in effect, a short prayer for the other person.  Go ahead now and say it to the person next to you.  “God Bless”. You have just said an short open prayer for them.  Everyone here tonight has been prayed for individually that God will sned their blessing on them.

Our Psalm. 66, is all about praising God and thanking him for his blessings. Such rich and wonderful words – as with Job’s comforter, this song is reminding us of the extent and depth of God’s wondrous deeds! The psalmist describes how he came through such dreadful times yet God helped him triumph.  The bible is just so full of such great illustrations of God’s triumphant ways.  Yes, as followers of Christ we are not immune to trials and tribulations but we can weather the storm when we have Jesus on board – just as the disciples weathered the storm on the lake with Jesus in the boat.

In our second reading, from Paul’s letter to the church in Rome, the theme continues with Paul reminding his audience that they are already blessed with the knowledge of God’s good grace and that it extends not just to those of the Jewish faith but to all – the Gentiles as well, as he puts it. Again he refers to signs and wonders performed by Jesus to illustrate the mighty and wondrous power of God which Job’s comforter talks about, and that it is the duty of all followers of Christ to proclaim the good news of the gospel so that those who have not yet heard of God’s wonderful power may have an opportunity to do so. 

In a world so troubled as ours there is so much scope to tell people of the wonderful grace which our Faith teaches us.  This is probably why areas of Africa and China are growing in the Faith to the extent they are in the face of opposition and oppression. There are also so many people here in the United Kingdom who have lost the support of that which transcends them. This week, make a point of saying that short prayer, “God Bless”, to somebody new every day hoping that they will indeed be blessed with the knowledge of God’s good grace through the Holy Spirit.

Amen

 

MFB/60