Sermon 17th May 2015

Today, Honorary Assistant Minister, Ben Hughes, preaches. The reading is from Mark 2: verses 13-22.

Controversy

Many preachers begin their sermons with jokes but today I would like to begin with a question?

I want you to think about - what attracted/attracts you to Christianity – to becoming a Christian in the first place? You might like to chat with the person sitting next to you!

Would anyone be brave enough to shout out their answers? 

Mine was simple it was ‘controversy’ – I was drawn to the controversial nature of Christ and Jesus Christ’s teaching

As a teenager being a rebel and so on and looking for something meaningful – I found reading quite a bit of Grahame Greene useful. Why? – I found his ideas of Christianity and people not only controversial but completely upside down to how I was told Christianity and how Christians should behave. I found in Grahame Greene a way of successfully articulating my feelings at what was difficult time. His characters in his plays and books – based on real people – were deeply flawed but  believable. The settings of his stories bleak and desperate – but in every book – despite all the failures – hope and faith always triumphed – the heroes and victor being God triumphant over all.

Graham Greene was controversial himself – nearly sainted by the Catholic Church and then within  a few years excommunicated by them – he was Mcarthyised and banned from the US – he was put up for a knighthood and then dropped like a brick – he proved Hollywood wrong – writing and part-directing one of the world’s all-time greatest films. He was accused of spying and was closely monitored by M15. Despite this he remained a devout Christian and like Jesus – knew that if you had faith and believed you would be unlikely to sit comfortably in this world.

And in a similar way was his characters – the violent Pinkie, promiscuous Kate, interfering Ida, treacherous Scobie, evil Harry Lime and the alcoholic Mexican Whiskey priest are rolled out like the tax collectors, prostitutes and sinners of our Gospels. And all the characters that we meet in the Gospel of Mark are the similar if not the same – just like us – all deeply flawed in some way. 

And it is verse 17 that Jesus makes this position clear:

Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

So when you ‘feed’ this point of Jesus’ into the context of the question of Why did you choose to become a Christian – then it has to be an acknowledgment that we are ‘sick’ in some way -  in need to be made right with God – we are saying God I am unwell – things are not right in my life – come and help me put things right. And so by choosing to be Christians we are firstly admit that we need help!

And who does the Doctor Jesus choose to help?

As we have been learning throughout this series in Mark – God chooses to help everyone and anyone  who asks!  That means you and me – absolutely anyone!

And in our story today  it is Levi the tax collector who is in the spotlight.  Jesus chooses calls him then visits his house for a meal. And why is this controversial? – Well then as now – people do not really like paying tax! We know that from recent news. It was far worse in Jesus time because the tax was being paid to the Romans who were an unwelcomed occupying force. It was like the French having to pay the Germans in WW2. And like then - it was at an extortionate rate. And in this case, the Romans used local Jewish people to do this ‘dirty work’. The Jewish tax collectors such as Levi - were happy to do so as it was very profitable for them. Jewish tax collectors such as Levi would take a hefty percentage cut. So levi as all tax collectors at that time were hated people - despised as traitors to Judaism and considered mean and money grubbing. The Pharisees actively despised such people and encouraged others to do the same  because the Pharisees were also tax collectors collecting temple tax in return for sacrifices – They were in direct financial competition with Roman tax collectors .such as Levi

So When Jesus chose eat at Levi’s house with other tax collectors and sinners he was really mixing with the most despised scum of that society. Imagine the worst people in our society now –Jesus would be partying with them eating with them. Imagine the modern media reaction – the tabloid headlines: Son of God in restaurant scandal with Mafia bosses – Miracle worker in drinking party with arms dealers... and so on

You could get quite political here but that is to miss the point – Jesus was not making any political point in eating with such people but he was making a profound point about God’s love and acceptance extending to all regardless of their crimes and sins! And in that he is saying do not judge - but do the opposite – accept and share – do not exclude but include. And most importantly – the message to Levi was change you way- come and follow me! Out with the old in with the new. 

And by this he is saying People not religion  and so try to look at people from God’s point of view – and allow and help them change.

For we know that if we cannot accept others such as Levi and friends then  how can God accept us for who we are  – or in other words – if you cannot accept and  forgive others how can God forgive you  – and the conclusion is simple and is illustrated time and time again not just in Mark’s gospel but all the gospels ; That it is faith and grace in Christ that will save you nothing else - you cannot earn your way into heaven through doing things!

In the same way Jesus feasted in Levis’ house Jesus invites us to feast  with him. Eternal life is for those that admit their need for God and we do so by saying yes to that invitation – saying sorry, accepting grace and love of self and others. This simple process is known as being born again in Christ.

So with such a simple invitation as this – why do people such as the Pharisees find it so difficult to accept ?

Jesus’ invitation – rooted in  love and acceptance of sinners such as Levi and is an invitation for all so why is that so controversial? – it is quite normal – love inclusion and wanting to be accepted and loved is not what we all need?

– John Lennon called love  common sense –  Nelson Mandela said that God loves everyone equally so there should be no division between people regardless of race colour rich or poor – inclusion not exclusion! Invitation not rejection

But people seem to prefer being unpleasant to one another – they did so in Jesus time and they do so now – just read the newspaper headlines!

So the controversy is ours, you see. The controversy is our  reaction to this invitation of love. The fault and controversy lies within us. Like the Pharisee  we cannot accept the message of love because we have invested too much in other things!  So we look from the outside in frustration and anger and we  lash out!  We find reasons not to believe – The controversy is that we and others do not want to accept love or be loved – neither do we want to love others and like the Pharisee we want to stop others from being invited.

People say the great controversies of Christian faith are the virgin birth, the resurrection, the miracles and so on -

Yes they can be difficult to accept on face value and are often convenient tools for the cynical to deny belief – but they are not the real reason for unbelief and controversy – the real controversial reason why people do not believe in Jesus is that the message of grace and love can  much too and too inconvenient to bear!

but for us – who believe – accepted Christ in fauth - miracles become normal things and the stories in Gospel make more and more sense through our faith  – and so the more we believe – the controversies fade to be replaced by love and grace.

So for example Jesus ‘resurrection’ becomes as normal as breathing.  When you are around Jesus – special things just seem to happen don’t they? – we know that – it is how we grow in faith. The impossible becomes possible as things fall into place. So in our story you have a busy tax collector in the middle of work – collecting and counting the money he loves – in two words of Jesus:  ‘follow me’  - that hold and spell of money has over Levi is broken –  instantly  just like that – Levi leaves his booth and follows Jesus into the unkown and into History!

In verse 14 ⁴ As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.

It’s a fantastic story and it is ours too – like Levi let’s be part of the story– live it for real – But God can and does do fantastic things.  If God wants to send his son into the womb of a virgin teenage girl then He does because He can! Likewise, to put flesh on the withered hand, or make the blind see with mud or heal the lame or just comfort us in loss. This is what God does it’s His way; it is how He rolls! “Follow me” –  that is  not controversial – its how God works. Neither are miracles – prayer or anything else - for those who believe such as us - they normal ways of faith!

What about me today!

So this story of Levi  – and I am going to say that you not allowed to place yourself as narrator or Jesus in the story – so you are therefore - either the Pharisee or you’re the tax collector or both!

That is alright – if you admit that you are the tax collector and sinner – that is fine it is the ‘Grahame Greene Controversy’ – which is – that God prefers the company of sinners to the company of the self-righteous.  All good - when you realize that you are on your way!

If you are the Pharisee – and I admit that it’s an easy role to slip into – especially when you have been a Christian for a while perhaps?

So  you have to check yourself a bit more!

Jesus says to Pharisee do not tangle yourself  up in rules and regulations – remember love trumps all – because under law you have  no chance but under grace we are set free

This is Jesus’ point he says the old has gone, the new has come. Pour the new wine of the gospel into the old wineskins of the Law.

Why are we reluctant to give up the old?

The problem is we as people tend to like laws such  as fasting – why?   because they provide a way of measuring where we stand with God. And in that a way that we can measure and judge others!  Fasting is not wrong – Jesus does not say that – he says it’s about time and place – and doing so with the right intention and preferably in secret (Matthew 5)

But  when you have only law first grace tends to go out of the window!

Jesus understands fully the ‘fluidity of Grace’ – because he knows the the importance of putting the needs of people over the rules and laws of  religion – he says the same about fasting to the Pharisee as he later says about the Sabbath, about healing people, about Samaritan women, forbidden food and so on  -  Religion is made of people not people for Religion!

That is why grace and love are difficult to accept – you cannot measure grace  or hold it to yourself – it’s like mercury – it runs free – it is fluid and moves here and there - you think you have it and it is gone! Grace means being accepted for who you are – love means accepting  others for who they are and understanding that both proceeds from God and from nowhere else – For love is grace and grace is love and both are freely given!

I could be cheesy now and say – turn to the person next to you and say ‘God loves you’ which would be frightfully un-British – but that is the truth – and you are the vehicle of that love, the means by which God loves the world. And that is what we should be thinking when we all shake hands and smile and say hi and stuff during the peace for example

The Pharisees were successful in behaving well on the outside, but it was the inside that they hid and so the deeper problem of their illness remained un-fixed

So the question for us is - does love proceed from within me! Does Grace reside within me

Being a good person in itself solves nothing – we need to be merciful, kind and loving at all times – love is an activity – more than words and quid pro quo!

Here is a picture that I think combines the message of all three illustrations that Jesus uses at the nd of the passage - summarised as – feasting instead of fasting, new cloth and new wine –

These NEW wineskins – you and me and the person next to you – when we as wineskins are filled with God’s grace and love – they will swell up and be filled to bursting point ready to be served as the ‘best wine till last’ (John 2. 1-12) at the feast of the bridegroom in heaven where all those deeds in love, faith and are fulfilled in Christ. (Revelation 19)  And those who expect to be at the feast  (Luke 14. 15-24) – might not be there and those that are least expected - will be told to come up here and take your place at the top table next to me. (Luke 14 – 10)

New wine, new cloth, feasting for eternity

Amen

Sunday 10th May 2015 St. Paul's Annual General Meeting

Today, our Vicar, Cameron Barker, preaches.  

The reading is from John 15: verses 5-10. 

On this Sunday absolutely everything must be pared down, to make decent room for the AGM. So all I can offer you now are these famous words of William Shakespeare, to ponder at your leisure. As The Bard once said: “The trouble with quotes on the Internet is that you can never know whether or not they’re genuine”!

Be that as it may, even on this day we do need a few words of introduction on John. We’re following the Lectionary in stepping aside from our series Mark’s gospel for today. Mind you, these words of Jesus could hardly be more appropriate for this particular occasion. But it’s the occasion which also means that we must put them into their proper context. It’s helpful to begin that by saying John is both simplest, and the most complex, of the 4 gospels. It all depends on what level we are willing to engage with him at – and that very much applies today. But what matters most of all for today is that we know both when, and why, Jesus spoke those words that I’ve just read.

To jump straight to that, then: Jesus said all this (and lots more!) on the night before he died. He had a special supper with his closest friends, which included all sorts of conversations. Central to it all was Jesus trying to prepare the disciples for what lay ahead. He knew that his imminent death made way for a whole new dimension of God’s kingdom to come. The disciples, naturally, couldn’t see past the disaster that they were convinced Jesus’ loss would be. Even though it would take them ages to understand the how of it, Jesus was here telling them in advance what he wanted them to know when he wouldn’t be there to tell them in person.

“I am the vine; you are the branches”, Jesus said. It’s the simplest of pictures if you want it to be; or one of the deepest, if you start to dig into it even a little. There’s no time for that sort of digging today, of course; but plenty of resources are easily available if you ever want to. Either way, at whatever level, we need to engage with this idea today – because it sums up what we are, or should be, about. Jesus’ point back then was again very simple, and/or very deep. His disciples were to bear fruit: lot of it! That’s what vines exist to do; it’s what Jesus came to do. He is the vine; his disciples – then and now – are ‘only’ the branches through which he does that. It’s what they exist for too, then: to produce the fruit of Jesus.

Now even if you’re only visiting today you should know that this is what we want, and are trying to be, about. As it says on the front of the service sheet, “Our Aim is, in God’s strength, to bring Jesus to the centre of our lives, and to the heart of our community”. Yes, as I’ve said before it is strange to be doing this in May; but today’s about asking ourselves how fruitful we were for Jesus in 2014. What kind of branch have we been? He is the vine: apart from him we can’t do anything at all. So how have we done in staying connected to – or remaining in – him, then? What did that look (or taste) like in the year we’re reviewing? And how should it look (or taste) in the rest of this year that we are now into?

As ever, these are the key questions to bear in mind, whether you stay for the AGM or not. All followers of Jesus need to take every opportunity to check how we are doing – not least in case change is needed. It’s the fruit which proves that we are who we say we are, Jesus said. So if it’s not about Jesus, if we’re not producing the kind of fruit that he died to make possible, then we must do something about it; as quickly as possible. This is so for Christians both personally and corporately. Jesus made it very clear what happens to any branch that doesn’t bear fruit for him: it’s fit only for burning in the fire, look!

The positive alternative that Jesus offered, and offers, to his disciples is wonderfully glorious, as I’m sure you spotted. Again that’s something to explore for yourself – in all of its multi-layered splendour – at your leisure. We can ask for whatever we wish, and it will be done for us?! Do be sure not to miss how Jesus said that’s so, though: if we remain in him – because that’s the key to it! It’s key to everything, actually. Hopefully that has already become abundantly clear, even in this briefest of reflections. Unless we remain in Jesus then nothing is possible. So we must ask how we do that, then.

That answer can only be worked out step by step, as we make our way forward through the rest of this year, and on into the next. The question has to be asked of each issue that we face, and of each decision that we take: again, personally and corporately. “How can we remain in Jesus, and bear his fruit, in this?” must be the question that’s at the forefront of our minds. And our doing of that must bring us to the place where Jesus arrived at in verse 10: “Now remain in my love; … and do that by obeying my commands”.

I’ll end with a quote that I’m assured is genuine; from Mother Teresa. It’ll hopefully be practically helpful in us making our way forward from here; remaining in Jesus; being his fruit-bearing branches; remaining in his love. Mother Teresa said: “If you can’t do great things, do little things with great love. If you can’t do them with great love, do them with a little love. If you can’t do them with a little love, do them anyway. Love grows when people serve.” And may that be ever more so, to God’s glory, here in the Parish of Herne Hill, this year and beyond. Amen.

Sermon 3rd May 2015

Today, one of our Lay Readers, Trevor Tayleur, continues our study of the Gospel of Mark. The reading is from Mark 1: verses 35-45.

The Teaching Healer

Doctor, doctor, I've heard that exercise kills germs; is it true?
• Probably, but how do you get the germs to exercise?

Doctor, doctor I've become invisible.
• I'm afraid I can't see you now.

Doctor, doctor, I've swallowed my pocket money.
• Take this and we'll see if there's any change in the morning.

Before you groan any more, I can reassure you that I won’t tell any more doctor doctor jokes this morning. There is a vague connection with today’s sermon title which is ‘Jesus the Teaching Healer’. We continue our series from Mark’s gospel. Two weeks ago Cameron explained the message that the Kingdom of God was very close and about how we need to repent. We also heard that Jesus called to the fishermen: “Follow me” and they did. Last week Adrian talked about about Jesus’ authority and compassion. Adrian told us how he captivated the people with his teaching that really got to the heart of the matter. And he showed us how Jesus reached out to those whom society had excluded. And today’s reading builds on those themes – Jesus’ call to follow him in response to his authority and compassion.

Mark packs a lot of action into a short space, and perhaps the main event in today’s Gospel reading is Jesus’ encounter with the leper. But that’s not all that happens. Today’s reading brings home two key points about Jesus’ ministry –

Firstly the richness of his internal life with God, and secondly the richness of his external ministry to others.

Let’s look at verse 35, the first verse in our reading; “Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed.” Why did he go out to a solitary place? The answer comes two verses later: when the disciples found him, they said to him, “Everyone is looking for you.”

Last Sunday we saw how Jesus healed scores of people. Indeed the heading in our Bibles for part of last Sunday’s reading is, “Jesus Heals Many.” When the people learnt that Jesus had miraculous powers, the power over nature, the response was overwhelming. Everyone wanted to see him. We have an election coming up on Thursday, and if any of the party leaders were experiencing anything remotely like what Jesus was experiencing, they would make the most of it. They would be out there, shaking hands, making the most of the short time left before the general election. They would be making the most of the opportunity. After all, there’s a general election to win!

Jesus’s response was the opposite.  Jesus had literally come to change the course of history, to save the world, and in the midst of the busyness, in the midst of all the excitement, what did he do? He went to a solitary place, a place far away from people. This shows the absolute priority that Jesus gave to prayer.

This was actually quite a wakeup call for me this week. During Lent I had been reading some chapters from Celebration of Discipline, our Lent book, I resolved to put some of the book’s ideas about meditation into practice. But since Easter I’ve felt busy – a lot of pressure at work, Action Group meeting, APCM, sermon to prepare and so on. And what gets squeezed out? Spending time with God. I don’t find meditation easy: I’m still very much a beginner, but if we follow Jesus’ example, then spending time with God should be a priority. The busier Jesus got, the more he prayed. Yet I suspect that for some of us at least the busier we get, the less we pray. The first thing that gets squeezed out is quiet and solitude. We are flawed, fallible people. If Jesus needed to spend time with God, how much more do we need to spend time with God? 

The richness of Jesus’ internal life led on to the richness of his external ministry to others. We’ve already seen how Jesus healed the sick and suffering; Jesus ministered to the people in deed, but we also see from our Gospel passage that Jesus also ministered in word. We know from the parallel account in Luke’s Gospel that the people didn’t want Jesus to go, but Jesus said, in verse 38, “Let us go somewhere else – to the nearby villages – so that I can preach there also. That is why I have come.” Jesus had come to preach the word as well – to minister to the whole person.

As we saw earlier in Mark 1 Chapter 1, when Jesus preached the word he said, “Repent!” That was at the heart of his ministry – the call to repent and to follow him.  You need God’s mercy and grace, he was saying to the people. You need to turn away from your sins and follow me.

Yes, Jesus fed the hungry and healed the sick. He met people’s physical needs, but he also came to meet people’s spiritual needs – by calling on them to repent and to follow him. His call to repent still applies today, and it isn’t a popular message, but that’s nothing new. Lady Huntingdon was an aristocrat in the 18^th Century at the time of a great revival. She became a Christian and wanted to share her joy with fellow aristocrats and invited some of them to hear her favourite preacher, George Whitfield, along with John and Charles Wesley one of the founders of Methodism. The Duchess of Buckingham, one of Lady Huntingdon’s friends replied as follows: “It is monstrous to be told you have a heart as sinful as the common wretches that crawl on the earth. This is highly offensive and insulting and I cannot but wonder if your own ladyship should relish any sentiment so much at variance with high rank and good breeding.”

The Duchess of Buckingham had it all, or so she thought. But, unlike her friend Lady Huntingdon, she didn’t realise her deep spiritual need, the need to repent.

Jesus is interested in the whole person. He made it clear that he needed to go and preach God’s word. His mission wasn’t only to heal, although that was a key part of his mission. It was also to preach – to address our spiritual as well as our physical needs.  His mission included calling people to personal conversion – telling them that they needed to repent of their sins and to be saved by God’s grace. And Jesus poured himself out and calls others to do so, to show sacrificial love through words and also through deeds – through word and deed. Jesus’ mission – and our mission – is multi-dimensional, reaching out to people in their social, physical economic and spiritual needs. Jesus has a ministry to everyone – rich, poor and middle-class!

So Jesus travelled all over Galilee – but we also see that we was healing people as well – casting out demons, as the GNB puts it. As well as preaching Jesus was reaching out to those who were excluded from society.

And now on to Jesus’ encounter with a man with leprosy. Here we have a perfect case study of the multi-dimensional nature of Jesus’ salvation. Leprosy in those days was not just a disease; it was a total condition – physical, social and spiritual. Physically leprosy literally meant that you were falling apart in pain and misery. Socially you were a pariah, an outcast. You were contagious and weren’t allowed in inhabited places. You had to stay out in the solitary places, out in the wilderness. Absolute social and emotional isolation. If a leper came near a person, they had to shout out, “Unclean, unclean.”

Spiritually they were also outcasts. At that time most people believed lepers were cursed by God. But be that as it may, they were contagious and excluded from worship. They were also at the receiving end of complex social codes. Lepers were punished if they came into an inhabited place, and ordinary people were punished if they came near a leper.

So a leper came before Jesus and begged for help; “If you are willing,” he said, “you can make me clean.” He didn’t simply say, “Make me well.” No, he asked to be made clean – clean before God, clean before his community and clean physically. He knew that he needed it all. And Jesus gave it to him. Jesus reached out and touched him.

Did Jesus need to touch him? No, Jesus could have healed him with a word, at a distance. Jesus didn’t touch him because he needed to do so to heal him, but because the man needed it spiritually and emotionally. This man had lived in isolation and had probably not been touched by a loved one for many years. Jesus touched him out of love and compassion. Jesus gave the man the multi-dimensional salvation he needed. Filled with compassion, Jesus made him clean -physically, socially and spiritually.

When you love someone, you want to meet all their needs. I grew up in South Africa, during the time of apartheid, and there was a debate, chiefly among white Christians, about whether the church should get involved in politics. Some argued that the church should be preaching the Gospel, and that politics was for the politicians. Others argued that if the church wanted to follow Jesus’ example, Christians should get involved in the anti-apartheid struggle. Nearly 40 years on from my involvement in those debates, it’s hard to believe there was ever an argument on those lines. Of course Christians should have been fully involved in the struggle against apartheid.  If you love someone, you don’t debate if evangelism is more important than social justice, or vice versa. You meet their needs because of love, because of the richness of Jesus’ love for others. 

And there’s more that we can learn from Jesus’ encounter with the leper. A common perception of religion is that you get to heaven by being good. You have to work very hard and be very pure if you are going to get to heaven. You will have to avoid the sinners, the stained and the soiled. In Jesus’ time you had the clean and the unclean, and whenever the two came together, the clean became unclean. If you came into contact with a leper, you became unclean and had to be ceremonially cleansed. The clean became unclean. But Jesus touched the leper, and it all changed.

Jesus told the man to do all the ceremonial cleansing, which he needed to do in order to return to life in the community. He had to do these things to be reintegrated into society.  But Jesus didn’t do it. Jesus touched the leper, and by every rule and regulation he had become unclean. Jesus should have gone and been ceremonially cleansed. But he didn’t. And by not going to be cleansed, Jesus turned the traditional thinking upside down. He is saying that when the two come together, the clean and unclean, the unclean becomes clean. By not going to the priest, Jesus is saying, “I am cleanliness. I don’t care who you are, how bad it is. I don’t care how inadequate you feel, what you’ve done. If you come into contact with me, you are clean.  It doesn’t matter how stained you are, how tainted you are, I am cleanliness itself. Through me anyone can come into the presence of God.”

Jesus the teaching healer. What does he teach us in today’s Gospel? Last Sunday Adrian challenged us to think about who are the excluded classes in today’s world. As leprosy became less of a problem, the places where lepers were incarcerated emptied and the lepers were replaced by another excluded class, the mentally ill. Robben Island is best known as the prison where Nelson Mandela spent 18 of his 27 years in prison as a result of his fight against apartheid. Before being a prison, it was a leper colony. But as apartheid became more entrenched, it became a place where the apartheid regime sent a different excluded class, black political prisoners. White political prisoners were kept in somewhat better conditions in a different prison.

Thankfully, apartheid is now over. Nelson Mandela was released from prison and became President of South Africa. We live in more enlightened times in the treatment of mental illness. But, as Adrian said last week, as one excluded class went, it was replaced by another.  Are we in danger of creating new excluded classes – the migrants and asylum seekers or some other group?

Jesus ministered to the whole person. He preached the need to repent and to follow him. He healed the sick and the suffering, and he reached out to those excluded from society. He had an amazingly rich external ministry to others. It was a ministry based on the richness of his internal life with God. In the midst of his busyness, Jesus always spent time with God. Through this he gained the strength to preach and teach and heal, to make the unclean clean and to restore those excluded from society. Jesus said to the fishermen, “Follow me.”  And that is what he is saying to us too, here in Herne Hill.

Let’s pray:

 Father, help us not just to follow the example of Jesus but to follow Jesus himself. Help us to be close to you so that we can show your love and compassion to those around us, including those excluded from society. In Jesus’ name. Amen.