SERMON AT ALDERBURY ST. MARY’S CHURCH, ALL AGE WORSHIP
– SUNDAY 15
JANUARY 2023 – EPIPHANY 2
Isaiah
49:1-7; 1 Corinthians 1:1-9; John 1:29-42
May I speak
in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and may these words be yours and
bless all who hear them. Amen.
When I was
practising the law and, especially when preparing to take a case in court, the
one thing which I would remind my clients, time and time again, was that under
our adversarial system of justice in this country, it was imperative that their
story or narrative as a witness hung together well. I called it the “stick of rock theory” which
had been conjured up by my principal – the lawyer who had first engaged me in
my first legal job. He had told me, and I passed this on to my clients or
witnesses, that their story or recollection would be challenged by the other
side and, like a stick of seaside rock, if it had the words “Skegness” in it at
the first lick it must have “Skegness” in it at the last. Should “Brighton” or “Scarborough”, or
“Blackpool” suddenly appear halfway through then the whole stick of rock – or
narrative – was imperfect and open to challenge. I can honestly say, that
during my career, sometimes “Brighton” or “Scarborough” might appear in our
apparently wholesome “stick” of a case and we invariably lost those cases.
Looks can
also often deceive. Let me give you
another example from my past. Back in
the 1980s I was intent on climbing the greasy pole of politics and stood for
Parliament in South Wales. When I tell you that I stood in the Welsh coaling
mining valleys as a Conservative you will understand why I, and my fellow
candidates, were labelled in the press as the “Tory Kamikaze Squadron”. I was quite young and naïve back then and
when, calling upon a terrace house in the town of Maesteg (an arch typical
mining town straight out of the novel “How Green was my Valley” by
Richard Llewellyn) I had clear pre-conceived ideas that we might be wasting our
time and my thoughts seemed to be confirmed when a resident, wearing a rather dirty
string vest, ran after me crying “I’ve been waiting for you to call” in what I
took to be a rather menacing manner. Expecting a fist being lunged in my
direction (the Conservative Government had, after all, closed most of the coal
mines in the vicinity) I was completely surprised when he thrust some grubby
bank notes in my hand asking me to accept this as a donation towards our
fighting fund. He went on to explain
that he had been unhappy about his membership of his Trade Union and their
political stance which had been supported by the local incumbent MP which he
blamed primarily for the closure of the mines.
The essence
of these stories, both examples from my own life’s experience, is that we can
sometimes have pre-conceived ideas which prove to be totally wrong and we can
also retell stories or narratives differently or with embellishment. I am sure I have probably rather
overembellished the Maesteg story over time – it might even have been a
different Welsh village in the constituency but the message remains the same.
In examining
our Gospel reading this morning – John’s account of the calling of Simon Peter
as one of Jesus’s disciples, differs somewhat from that of the synoptic gospels
of Matthew, Mark and Luke who each have Jesus walking along the edge of the Sea
of Galilee and calling Simon Peter away
from his labours as a fisherman. John
seems to have inserted “Scarborough” into our Skegness rock. To what extent does that matter to the
essential message of the narrative?
When I was
young my mother taught me that first impressions counted for much – the way you
dressed and spoke in particular. It is
the reason that today, although I was brought up in a northern fishing town on
the Humber Estuary, I do not speak with a guttural Grimbarian accent. When I was on the circuit looking for a
Parliamentary seat to fight I recall one member of the selection committee in
Brighton telling me that she didn’t take into account much of the content of
the speeches made – her choice would be largely based on whether the candidate
had nicely polished shoes! After that I
would always ensure that I could see my face in my own shoes!
John the
Baptist based his pronouncement that Jesus was the Messiah by his observation
of of “a dove descending and remaining” on a man who had come to be baptised with
the strong belief that the dove represented the Holy Spirit. On the basis of
this first impression he proclaimed that Jesus is the one on who is the Messiah
– the one who will go on to baptize with the Holy Spirit. That Jesus is indeed
the Son of God.
Jesus was
from that moment a marked individual and it was two of John’s own disciples
who, with John, saw Jesus pass by when John exclaimed “Look here is the Lamb of
God” and we read that immediately the two disciples left John and followed
Jesus to his lodgings. Such must have
been the strength of John’s claim for them to leave being one of his disciples
and following Jesus to find out more.
When then
have one of the most interesting and I think important phrases in the New
Testament. John’s disciples having
attracted Jesus’s attention ask him where he is staying and Jesus gives that
wonderful phrase “Come and See”. An
invitation to come, of their own volition and spend some time with Jesus.
Indeed, from the passage we learn that they spent the rest of the day with him
no doubt trying to find out whether those first impressions of their late
master John were indeed accurate.
Towards the
end of the passage we learn from the gospeller that one of the two erstwhile
disciples of John was Andrew, a fisherman himself, and that he went afterwards
to his brother, Simon Peter, to tell him that they had found the Messiah. When then read that when Simon was brought
into the presence of Jesus he was told by Jesus that he would thereafter be
known Cephas or Peter meaning rock.
So, let’s
analyse the sequence of events and see how they fit in with our own faith. Essentially there are four stages in this
story which, I think, we are meant to follow in our own Faith. As Christians, we are meant to be evangelical
whenever we can and our Church missional.
I am a firm believer in that.
The four
stages are “Come, See, tell, repeat”.
The gospel passage is one of witness – John’s witnessing of the dove
descending on Jesus as the Holy Spirit and the disciples witnessing what Jesus
has to tell them during their hours together. Clearly what was said impressed
Andrew sufficient to bring his brother Simon Peter to see him. And so, the first stage of “come” is about
taking the first step in answering Jesus’s invitation to spend time with him.
He calls us, today, to do just that. It
is an invitation, not an order, and we can choose whether to answer that call
or not but if we do not then we can be missing out on something really good and
powerful. The second stage, after having
come into the presence of Jesus, is to see what he has to offer. We do not know specifically what was spoken
about in those hours in Jesus’s lodgings, or what they saw, but it had a
powerful influence on their decision to leave John and become disciples of
Christ.
The third
stage, is to tell others as accurately as we can. To recount that first
impression of Jesus which those two disciples had during that first meeting.
Likewise, when we have been in the presence of Jesus we need to have the
courage to tell others how we felt and what impressions we had when we felt
ourselves in the presence of Jesus.
Finally, to
impress on others the importance of repeating the narrative just as we should
ourselves repeat it to as many people as possible.
Now we know,
from the examples I gave earlier, that the narrative can vary depending upon
memory and recollections. Indeed, quite
recently, an important institution in this country used the term “It has to
be accepted that people’s recollections of events may not always be the same”
but we should try, always, to do our best to be as accurate as possible – our
stick of rock.
The
important thing here is, though, like Andrew, we are expected to spread the
good news and not keep it to ourselves.
Jesus later on in his ministry at the Sermon on the Mount asked his
congregation “what good is there in having a bright light and then hiding it
under a bowl” (Matthew 5:14-16). He was
alluding to this very point.
So to
conclude – we can take away three important points from this passage:
First of all, first impressions can
count and we should accept our emotions and feelings when Jesus calls us
Secondly, we should obey his invitation to
“come and see” for ourselves what he has to offer
Thirdly, we should tell and repeat our
experiences of the good news to others.
We can then
be part of a truly missional church of God.
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