tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-72793114434520791972024-03-13T21:13:14.101-07:00Opening the Lid on the Old Testament at HighburyUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger59125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-54800959915000478492012-07-15T15:49:00.002-07:002012-07-15T15:49:11.789-07:00The Old Testament<br />
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;">It was the then Bishop of Gloucester who came up with the
words.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;">And they were the
inspiration for our celebration of the Bible at the start of the year of the
Bible.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt;">"Translation it is that openeth the window, to let in the light, <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt;">that breaketh the shell, that we may eat the kernel,<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt;"> that putteth aside the curtain,
that we may look into the most Holy place,; <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt;">that removeth the cover of the well, that we may come by the
water." <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #222222; font-size: 12pt;">Miles Smith in the Preface to the Authorised Version 1611<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></i><i><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Taking that last
analogy we have been taking the lid off the Old Testament and reading it
through the eyes of Jesus.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;">My inspiration for the
enterprise was taken from one of my favourite stories, the story of Jesus on
the Road to Emmaus.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="vv"><i><span style="color: #777777;">13</span></i></span><i><span style="color: #010000;"> Now on
that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven
miles<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/The%20Old%20Testament.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>from
Jerusalem,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">14</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">and talking
with each other about all these things that had happened.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">15</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">While they were <b>talking
and discussing</b>, Jesus himself came near and went with them,</span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">16</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">but their eyes
were kept from recognizing him.<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
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<span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000;">How good it is to talk
and discuss when things go wrong. And
for these two the bottom had fallen out of their world.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<i><sup><span style="color: #777777;">17</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">And he said to them, ‘What are you discussing with each
other while you walk along?’ They stood still, looking sad.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/The%20Old%20Testament.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">18</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">Then one of
them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, ‘Are you the only stranger in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> who does not
know the things that have taken place there in these days?’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">19</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">He asked them, ‘What things?’ <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Their reply is a wonderful summary of all that Jesus
did. They had recognized something in
him. What was it? That he was a prophet. They knew their Hebrew Scriptures, or at
least they thought they did. And they
recognized in Jesus one Moses had anticipated, one who stood in the line of
prophets from the earliest of days right through to John the Baptist.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<i><span style="color: #010000;">They replied,
‘The things about Jesus of Nazareth, <a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/The%20Old%20Testament.doc"></a>who was
a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">20</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to
be condemned to death and crucified him.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">21</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">But we had
hoped that he was the one to redeem <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/The%20Old%20Testament.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Yes, and besides all this, it is now
the third day since these things took place.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">22</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">Moreover, some
women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">23</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">and when they did not find his body there, they came back
and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was
alive.</span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">24</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found
it just as the women had said; but they did not see him.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">25<o:p></o:p></span></sup></i></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Classic, isn’t it that the men should not believe the
women!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #010000;">Then he said to
them, ‘Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the
prophets have declared!<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">26</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">Was it not
necessary that the Messiah<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/The%20Old%20Testament.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>should suffer these things and then
enter into his glory?<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Jesus was Prophet but more than a prophet. Messiah, but not the kind of Messiah these
two mistakenly were still looking for.
His was a path that would take him through suffering to glory.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Then it is that Jesus does something so very special.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #010000;">’</span><sup><span style="color: #777777;">27</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;">Then beginning
with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about
himself in all the scriptures.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Wouldn’t it have been wonderful to have had a microphone
hidden in the clothing of one of those travelers and to have recorded what
Jesus would have said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Jesus takes them on a whistlestop tour of the Hebrew
Scriptures interpreting to them the things about himself in all those
Scriptures.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">It’s seven miles we are told. What’s that, a couple of hours. Not long.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">The point I take from this is that the Old Testament
needs interpreting. And it needs
interpreting by Jesus.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Microphones weren’t invented in those days.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">But the hunch I have been working on is that Jesus’s way
of reading the Scriptures really shaped the way those two read the Scriptures
afterwards. When they get back to
Jersualem, having met with the risen Christ, they share the joy of resurrection
with the other disciples, only to discover that Jesus has appeared to them as
well.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Then it is that Jesus appears to them again, with those
wonderful words, Peace be with you.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">And what does he do?
Has something to eat – broiled fish, and bread.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">And then he gets down to it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="background: white; color: #010000;">‘These
are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you—that everything
written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be
fulfilled.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="background: white; color: #777777;">45</span></sup><span style="background: white; color: #010000;">Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">He does precisely the same thing.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Not just the two, but the others found the way they read
the Scriptures we think of as the Old Testament was shaped by Jesus.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">The way they preached the message of Jesus in those
sermons that are recorded in Acts is shaped by the way the risen Jesus helped
them to see how the Scriptures should be read.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">The way they came to write down the story of Jesus was
shaped by that very approach he had opened up for them to the Scriptures.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">That means that if we carefully read the Gospels, and
listen out for the way the Gospel writers see Jesus drawing on the Hebrew
Scriptures we shall have a strategy for reading these sometimes very difficult
books of our Bible.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">And we should be able to see a wonderful over-arching
story.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Those books of the law do give us an understanding of
God’s ways for the world.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Larger than life stories of the beginning give us
insights into the world of every generation – that is the world of God’s
creation, and we’re to look after that world just as a gardener looks after the
garden.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">But there’s something that gets into each of us,
individually, as a family, as a community, as nations of the world – that draws
us away from God, into disobedience of God … and yet God is always there giving
people, families, nations the opportunity to make a fresh beginning.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Those true to life stories of Abraham and Sarah, of Isaac
and Rebekkah, of Jacob and Rachel of Joseph and ultimately of Moses and Aaron
are stories of great faith – but also show the way maps out a way of life for
all to follow and the way God’s blessing reaches out through his people to give
blessing to all the nations of the world.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">What’s at the heart of God’s way for the world? The ten commandments are reduced by that
teacher of the law that put Jesus on the spot, and by Jesus himself in true
rabbinic fassion to two – Love God, Love your neighbour.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">And in his parting words to the disciples Jesus reduces
the two to one … a new commandment I give to you that you love one another as I
have loved you for by this shall everyone know you are my disciples.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Love is the measure of the law.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">There’s a general principle that emerges in Deuteronomy –
obey God,. Things will go well, disobey God and things fall apart.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">When things did fall apart when <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> was destroyed and the people taken
into exile the Babylonians went off with the
Gold, the bronze, the silver, while the Jewish people took off the law
codes, the state archives.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">While experts in the law put the law codes together into
something very close to the five books of the Torah, the books of the Law that
open our Bibles, there were prophetic historians who were piecing together the
story of Joshua and the settlement in the land of promise, of Deborah, Gideon,
Samson and the Judges, of Samuel, Saul and David and the people’s longing for a
king like the nations. Of the power and
glory, blemished as it was, of Solomon and then in subsequent generations of
the division of the kingdom into two – the Northern Kingdom of Israel, and the
Southern Kingdom of Judah.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Samuel spoke God’s word of challenge at the very first,
Nathan spoke God’s word of truth to David – you are the man – who has destroyed
not just the marriage of another but his life as well! What anguish.
And then came those prophets – Isaiah speaking truth to power in the 8<sup>th</sup> Century BC with Amos, Hosea and Micah. In the wake of the collapse of the northern
kingdom Jeremiah speaking truth to power as the threat of the Babylonian power
emerges together with Nahum, Habakkuk and Zephaniah. And then those powerful words of Ezekiel with
Haggai, Zecharian and Malachi as exile unfolds.
There’s hope in the words of Joel, and of Jonah and of Obadiah.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Prophets who hold the powers that be to account and seek
Justice and righteousness. They give
shape to what it takes to be ‘King’ in God’s kingdom’ – the anointed one of God
– the messiah<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">A shoot shall come out from the stock of
Jesse,<br />
and a branch shall grow out of his roots.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">2</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The spirit of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>shall rest on him,<br />
the spirit of wisdom and understanding,<br />
the spirit of counsel and might,<br />
the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">3</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">His delight shall be in the fear of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
He shall not judge by what his eyes see,<br />
or decide by what his ears hear;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">4</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">but with righteousness he shall judge the poor,<br />
and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;<br />
he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth,<br />
and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">5</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Righteousness shall be the belt around his waist,<br />
and faithfulness the belt around his loins.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Oh, if only it were so simple.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Obey God and all goes well.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">A good general principle.
How it is worked out in the former prophets, how those writing prophets
stand for what is good and right and all that is of God. But the world is a more complex place than
that.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">In poetry and prayer, in praise and lament, in words of
agony and in words of timeless wisdom, the third section of the Hebrew Scriptures opens with Psalms,
Job and Proverbs. How Jesus treasured
the insights of the psalms echoing that Psalm 22 on the cross in his agony – My
God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
And yet reaching the glory o fPsalm 24 in resurrection – Who is the King
of glory? The Lord of hosts he is the
King of Glory.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">And how do you get from the agony of Psalm 22 to the
glory of Psalm 24 – Jesus knew it so well.
I am the good shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep. The Lord is my shepherd I’ll not want – yea
though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil for
thou art with me, thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">How precious those words to Jesus!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">How he valued sharing in the great festivals – it gave a
rhythm to his year. And that rhythm is
echoed in our Christian year too.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">The five little scrolls of the Megilloth<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Song of Solomon at the festival of Passover<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Ruth at the festival of Weeks or Pentecost<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Lamentations on the Ninth of Av commemorating the
destruction of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Ecclesiastes at the festival of booths<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Esther at the
festival of Purim<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">One thing you cannot get away from in the Hebrew
Scriptures or in the life and teaching of Jesus and that is that life can be a
struggle. An awful struggle.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Not least because all too often those of faith, find
themselves up against the powers that be.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">What courage and hope there is in the apocalyptic writing
of Daniel! How Jesus valued that sense
of courage and hope in the face of devastation as he contemplated living out
our faith in the face of the powers that be.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">For Jesus law and prophets were so important – the
reading of he law Ezra was so committed to was at the heart of what Jesus was
about – what’s written in the law are all the words from Genesis 1 to Deuteronomy
34. Buyt much more important is to ask ‘how do you read the law’. And that boils down to love for God and love
for neighbour. Ezra and Nehemiah, I and
II Chronicles too are concerned to identify exactly who my neighbour is and
limit it to my people.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">But Jesus sees a much bigger picture. The time is coming and now is when God is
spirit and those who worship him will worship him in spirit and in truth not in
a temple located in a far off city but in every place and in every heart. How do you read the law – well think of a
story – not just any story but the story of the
Good Samaritan and realize that all are our neighbours no matter who
they are!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">What does it all boil down to?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">In the sermon on the mount … Jesus is quite sure …<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘In
everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law
and the prophets.</span><span style="color: #010000;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Back to Jesus …<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<sup><span style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">45</span></sup><span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Then
he opened their minds to understand the scriptures,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">46</span></sup><span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">and he said to them,
‘Thus it is written, that the Messiah</span><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/The%20Old%20Testament.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">is to suffer and to
rise from the dead on the third day,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">47</span></sup><span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">and
that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all
nations, beginning from Jerusalem.</span><sup><span style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">48</span></sup><span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">You are witnesses</span><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/The%20Old%20Testament.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">of
these things.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">We can be witnesses to these things as we read the
Scriptures through the eyes of Jesus and as we do that the Hebrew Scrripures we
think of as the Old Testament will come alive in new and wonderful ways.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">To read the Scriptures we need to sense Jesus walking the
road with us and as we do that we shall find our </span><span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">hearts burning
within us </span><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/The%20Old%20Testament.doc"></a><span style="color: #010000;">as
he opens the Scriptures to us.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-80454993849303434412012-07-08T13:32:00.001-07:002012-07-08T13:32:14.296-07:00The Climax to the Old Testament - 2 Chronicles<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was to have taken us a year.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How appropriate that was the year of the
Bible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s actually taken us 19 months.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But at last we have arrived!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We have read through the whole of the Old
Testament in the order of the Hebrew Scriptures … and it’s all online, just
waiting to be re-ordered into a user friendly format.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And occasionally one or two people have
actually had a peep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And that in a very exciting sense is a
point we have reached in our journey.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we come to an end of the Hebrew
Scriptures we are reaching that moment when the task of compiling all this
wonderful array of writings of all sorts of shapes and sizes and writing styles
into a manageable collection is well under way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
The final set of four books, Ezra, Nehemiah, I and II Chronicles coming as they
do at the end of the third section of the Hebrew Scriptures, the Writings,
centre around the importance of having a written record of the law and
manageable records of the narrative of the people of Israel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You learn a lot from endings about the
people who were writing these books. You
learn a lot about the world Jesus came into.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the ending of the Book of II Chronicles comes as a bit of a shock to our
system as Christian readers. After all
II Chronicles ends in a very different place from the ending we are accustomed
to as English readers in the way our Old Testament is ordered in our Christian
Bibles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That different ending place has a
significance for us as we look on to the story of Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Our Christian Old Testament finishes in the
Prophets, specifically with the Prophet Malachi and with Malachi chapter 4.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Christian Old Testament ends on a note
of expectation as it looks to the coming day of the Lord when ‘the sun of
righteousness will rise with healing in its wings.” When people will go out leaping like calves
from the stall. And the wicked will be
overcome.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s a time to remember the teaching of the
books of the Torah, the law.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And it’s a time finally to look to the
coming of the prophet Elijah who will herald the coming of that great and
awesome day of the Lord. He will turn
the hearts of parents to their children, and the hearts of children to their
parents, so that I will not come and
strike the land with a curse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That reading of the Old Testament finishes
with an expectation of the coming of a great Prophet and is full of Messianic
expectation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mark takes up that story. Luke takes up that story … and it’s a
powerful story. And we tell our
Christian story with an emphasis on the fulfilment of prophecy, with an emphasis
on the identify of Jesus as the Messiah.
With the coming of the day of the Lord.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But interestingly, that’s not quite where
the New Testament actually starts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Our New Testament starts with Matthew’s
gospel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And somehow there’s the feel of a continuation
not so much from the end point of Malachi, as from the end point of II
Chronicles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Just as the Chronicler uses genealogies to
sum up and recapitulate the whole story of the Jewish people, so too Matthew
opens with a genealogy that summarises that whole story … and leads us
wonderfully to Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus enters a Jewish world and is very
much part of that Jewish world. One of
the worst things that has ever happened in the history of the church is the
neglect of that truth. As soon as
followers of Jesus started to think of Christianity as another religion over
against Judaism they began to see Jesus as someone distinct from ‘the Jews’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s already beginning by the end of the 1<sup>st</sup>
century, but it really only becomes tragically hard and fast with the seeds of
anti-semitism in the wake of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Constantine</st1:place></st1:city>’s
conversion and particularly with Augustine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is really on since the holocaust that
Christian interpreters of the Bible have drawn out the Jewishness of Jesus, the
Jewishness of Paul and the Jewishness of their whole world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s something that becomes very apparent
if we pay careful attention to the way the Jewish Hebrew Scritpures come to an
end.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
There is, first of all a wonderful symmetry in the start and finish of the
final four books of the writings. It is
the very thing that prompted the oh-so logical Greek translators of the Hebrew
Scriptures to rearrange the order. In
our English Bibles the end of II Chronicles leads beautifully into the beginning of Esra.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the way these four books are ordered in
the Hebrew Scriptures they begin in Ezra in exactly the way they finish in II
Chronicles 36. It is as if there is a
wonderful over-arching theme. We finish
II Chronicels as we began Ezra. With the
edict of The Persian Emperor Cyrus allowing the return of the exiles to their
homeland and allowing the rebuilding of their temple.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">II Chronicles starts with Solomon and tells
the story of the divided Kingdoms without including any of the damaging bits
about Solomon, with little reference to the turbulent times faced by the
Northern Kingdom and with a critical account of the Davidic dynasty in the
Southern Kingdom of Judah.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then the Hebrew Scriptures reach their
climax with the fall of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city></st1:place>
and then Cyrus’s proclamation of liberty for the emiles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="vv"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">22</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> In the first year of King Cyrus of Persia, in
fulfilment of the word of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>spoken by Jeremiah, the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>stirred
up the spirit of King Cyrus of Persia so that he sent a herald throughout all
his kingdom and also declared in a written edict:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">23</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘Thus says King Cyrus of Persia: The<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>, the God of heaven, has given me all the
kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem,
which is in Judah. Whoever is among you of all his people, may the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>his
God be with him! Let him go up.’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Notice three things here for us as
Christian readers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">First, the Emperor of the then world Power,
<st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Persia</st1:place></st1:country-region>,
lays claim to ‘all the kingdoms of the earth’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The emperor is used by God to enable a
house to be built for God – that’s to say, a temple.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And that temple will be in a specific
location – <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Judah</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">God will then be with his people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the people of God will go up to the
temple in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
and so into the presence of God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This gives us a tremendous insight into
what is central for Jewish people. This
is what their Jewishness is all about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">From this moment on Jewish people have had
to live with an often hostile non-Jewish power.
And this gives Jewish people a way of coping with that situation. You will see it on the wall of the Synagogue
in <st1:place w:st="on">Cheltenham</st1:place>.
You will hear it read at every Sabbath gathering of Jewish people
throughout the land.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A plaque giving allegiance to the monarch –
even though not Jewish, and a prayer of loyal allegiance to the monarch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That finds its roots in the indebtedness at
this moment to a non-Jewish ruler in Cyrus who was so generous to the Jewish
people. This is the climax of the Hebrew
Scriptures, this is at the heart of Jewishness – and we must respect them for
it. And you see it in Jesus’ approach to
the God-fearing Centurion, in Paul’s words in Romans 13 about obeying the
Emperor and in Peter’s words in I Peter too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then there is the focus on the temple in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>, and on the
land, on the promise of God’s presence and the final words – Let him go
up. The longing to return to <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city></st1:place>. The wonderful ‘next year in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city></st1:place>’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">These few words go a long, long way towards
an understanding of the Jewish people in the state of <st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region>, their willingness to work with Western
Powers that are non-Jewish, their focus on temple, on <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>, on the land. And that wonderful
sense that God is with us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But these are the strands that are
uppermost for us as Christians as we come to hear the Gospel of Jesus in a
Jewish setting.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In Jesus’ day there is a world power. The Roman Emperor. And there is a half-Jewish, half-Idumean,
would be King of the Jewis exercising massive power in Judea and <st1:place w:st="on">Galilee</st1:place> – Herod the Great and the Herodian Dynasty.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Matthew opens as non-Jewish magi come
seeking a king and they go to Herod the Great expecting him to be in a
palace. Luke opens in the temple, in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> and dates the
beginning of the ministry of Jesus in the time of the Emperor Tiberias. And Matthew, Mark and John make a great deal
of the clash between Jesus and the Herodians.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And then at the climax to the sequence of
temptations Jesus is taken to a high mountain top and offered by Satan the
kingdoms of the world. This is the
satanic temptation Jesus resists to seize human power and be a world-emperor
power.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s in John’s gospel right at the outset
that the minisry begins in Jersualem and in the temple</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Destroy this temple and in three days I
will rebuild it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He was speaking of his own body.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And by John 4 Jesus is suggesting God is
neither located in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city></st1:place>
nor in any other place but God is spirit and those who worship him must worship
him in spirit and in truth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus’ ministry opens with each of these
three strands right to the fore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus is all about the Kingdom coming – but
not in thrall to a human power, not located in a particular location, and not
in a temple made of stone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But it is in his presence that all these
things find their fulfilment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is thrilling and something wonderful
to hold on to.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And there is one more thing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Where do the Hebrew Scriptures finish? It is with a wonderful promise that God will
be with his people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And where does our Christian new Testament
begin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We have an echo of The Chronicler as the
Christian NT opens in Matthew 1 with a genealogy that serves exactly the
purpose of the genealogies that I Chronicles opens with – it serves to sum up
the story so far – from Abraham to David, from David to Exile from Exile to the
coming of Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
Then Matthew goes on to tell us who this Jesus is.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Who is Jesus?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">21</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">She will bear a son, and
you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">22</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">All this took place to fulfil what had been spoken by the
Lord through the prophet:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">23</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘Look, the virgin shall
conceive and bear a son,</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and they shall name him
Emmanuel’,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">which means, ‘God is with us.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">God is with us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The whole story of the Hebrew Scriptures is
finding its fulfilment in Jesus –</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Whoever is among you of all his people, may
the Lord his God be with him</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus.
Emmanuel. God with us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let him go up!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">If the first book of our Christian New
Testament starts where the Hebrew Scriprtures in II Chronicles left off, so too
does its ending!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The promise is still there – Whoever is
among you of all his people, may the Lord his God be with him. But the challenge is no longer Let him go up
to the temple in <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Judah</st1:country-region></st1:place>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Now the challenge is to go into all the
world and know that Jesus is with us always.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Jesus who fulfils all the Scriptures,
Law, Prophets and Writings says not just to his disciples but to us …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority
in heaven and on earth has been given to me.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Go
therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and
teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am
with you always, to the end of the age.’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-49200184577794388452012-07-01T15:23:00.000-07:002012-07-01T15:23:42.130-07:00Who are we? 1 Chronicles<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Endings are fascinating – they tell you a
lot!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As the first part of the Hebrew Scriptures
comes to an end the Book of Deuteronomy runs through the heart of the law once
again – as the very title given to the book in Greek suggests it is as it were
a second reading of the law.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Fascinating that as the third section of
the Hebrew Scriptures comes to an end, the Writings, they reach their climax
with one last re-telling of the history of the people <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Hebrew Scriptures finish with I and II
Chronicles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The history of the first generations of the
people from the beginnings of humanity to Saul, the first of the Kings, are
encapsulated in the first nine chapters of 1 Chronicles in a sequence of
genealogies.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">One massive summary.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And then the remainder of I Chronicles
tells briefly of Saul and at length of David.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The writer of I Chronicles is quiet open
about using sources – the same kind of sources as are drawn on by the writers
of I and II Samuel that are part of the former prophets in the second section
of the Hebrew Scriptures the Prophets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As the collection of books that make up the
Hebrew Scriptures come to a climax it is as if a number of things need to be
stressed and a number of questions are uppermost.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">They are an entirely different set of
questions from the ones asked by the writers of Joshua, Judges, Samuel and
Kings.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Those prophetic writers were perplexed by
the disaster that had befallen the people of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region> in the exile. How could this have happened? They tell the story of their nation in order
to try to respond to that question. They
see just how far the people and particularly their rulers had departed from the
word of God and the way God wanted them to follow – and in large measure that accounted
for the collapse of the people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">IT was a stirring call to return to the
ways of God, to shape the lives of individuals and of society by the values of
God’s way of ruling. These are very much
prophetic books that challenge the people and their rulers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I and II Chronicles come from that period
when under Persian rule the people of <st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region>
return to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>,
set about rebuilding the city, the temple and the nation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The question now is quite different. It’s not … what’s gone wrong?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is rather a question of identify. Who are we?
Where do we find our identify?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Hence the genealogies.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We are the people who belong to the
extended families that made up the tribes of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region> and became the Kingdoms of
Israel. This is who we are. Our identity as the people of God is secured
by our belonging to this particular people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Where do we find our identify?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We are the people who were shaped into a <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place>’s people supremely by David?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Where do we find our identify? In the temple that is in the process of being
rebuilt and taking shape again – and it is the temple that the whole story of
David leads up to.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What is important about that identity is
the allegiance we have to the ways of God – just as our ancestors did before
us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is powerful stuff.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And it is good.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is important in understanding the nature
of the Jewishness of Jesus and of his times.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But something is very different here in I
Chronicles from the story that unfolds in I and II Samuel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What is it?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Read I and II Samuel and you are aware of
all the tensions between the people and Samuel over the big question of whether
or not you should have a king, of tensions between Saul and David. David’s life is very blemished. His adultery with Bathsheba – his complicity
in the murder of her husband.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">None of that is present in I Chronicles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The focus is different.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It really is a temple focus – a large part
of the story has to do with the way David brings the ark into <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>, establishes a covenant once again
with the people, then draws up plans for the temple – and whole chapters are
devoted to lists of temple officials, priestly families and others.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">AS the New Testament opens, Jesus is part
of this story.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The first of the Gospel writers, Matthew, opens
with a genealogy that could have been taken straight from I Chronicles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s interesting how the genealogy does the
same thing as it does in I Chronicles.
It is effectively a summary of the history that goes behind the start of
Matthew’s gospel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is stylised and ordered – shaped into
three lots of fourteen – from Abraham to David, from David to the exile, from
the exile to the birth of Christ.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is in itself a powerful commentary on
the Old Testament story and gives us an insight into the key turning points
that are so significant for this writer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Abraham up to David. David up to the exile. The exile up to the coming of the Christ.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is as if this writer owns the story told
through the genealogies of I Chronicles.
But at the same time he stirs things.
Jesus is fully Jewish … but also Jesus now again shapes the story of
Jewishness and gives it a new perspective.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Nowhere is that difference more apparent
than when you put together I Chronicles 2:10-15 and 16.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You can see how this is genealogy but also
a prompt that reminds you of the history. Of David the youngest of the sons.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Come over into Matthew and two things are
added in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">4-6.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Do you notice the tiny additions that are
so telling. And they anticipate the story
that will go to the heart of the story of Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mention of Rahab – who is a prostitute</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And of Ruth – who is of course a Moabitess.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Two things happen there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus is fully part of this story. But Jesus is going to move the story on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus is going to be the one who will mix
with those who are rejected, who are not ‘so-called’ pure, who are marginalised
and left out of the reckoning. This is
anticipating the stories of Jesus mixing with prostitutes and the marginalised.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This also anticipates Jesus breaking
barriers down between Jew and Gentile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus ushers in something new again – no
longer a focus on the location of the temple and its rebuilding – but on the
presence of God in Christ and the presence of God in Christ in the people who
hear his word and act on it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">Kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place>
is a fulfilment of all the prophets stood for – how important to take into
account the challenges, the critique – and not simply the idealisation of
things here.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is exciting stuff.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">One of the things that is so exciting is
the affirmation of individuals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">9:28ff – the cooks</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Chapter 25 – the temple musicians.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Wonderful gifts to affirm and share.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The gifts we each of us have are to be
treasured and affirmed too.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-78481631267895367642012-06-17T12:45:00.001-07:002012-06-17T12:45:03.884-07:00Ezra - breaking barriers down<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It has to be one of the finest treasures in
the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">British</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">Museum</st1:placetype></st1:place>.
But when I put it into a Google search trying to track down a good
picture I was surprised where google took me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">II Chronicles finishes and Ezra opens with
a quotation from a Decree of King Cyrus of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Persia</st1:place></st1:country-region>. When the Babylonian world power crumbled and
Persia and Cyrus were in the ascendancy Cyrus took the decision to allow all
those peoples who had been taken away from their homeland and cast into exile
by the Babylonians to return home. What’s
more throughout the <st1:place w:st="on">Persian empire</st1:place> returning
exiles would be permitted to rebuild their temples and places of worship.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For the people of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region> that
meant a return from exile and the re-building of the temple. And that’s what the books of Ezra and Nehemiah are all about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What’s remarkable is that in the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">British</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">Museum</st1:placetype></st1:place> is a very small cylinder with a
tightly packed text inscribed on it – and it is one of presumably many edicts
written by Cyrus and sent out throughout the empire setting out this decree. It is so close to the edict recorded in the
Bible - it’s a thrill to see it and to see from the Persian side a record of
this very same edict.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When I googled it what surprised me was
that the search engine did not take me to the British Museum as I had expected
but to many exiled Persian groups around the world and in particular to a
presentation American groups had arranged when they presented the then General
Secretary of the United Nations, Kofi Anan, with a replica of the Cyrus
Cylinder. It was the occasion of the
fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Universal Human Rights – and those
groups were celebrating what they considered to be the earliest known
declaration of human rights in the Cyrus Cylinder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We are entering the last lap of our read
through the Old Testament. I and II
Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah are grouped with the other historical books in
our English Bible Old Testament. They
re-tell the history of the other books and push it beyond the exile to the
return. And the inspiration of the Greek
translators of the Hebrew Scriptures was to put them into chronological order.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s intriguing that in the Hebrew
Scriptures these four books are placed at the very end of the third section of
the Hebrew Scriptures, the Writings.
Ezra and Nehemiah come first, and then the Hebrew Scriptures come to a
climax with a re-telling of the story of the people of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region></st1:place> in I and II Chronicles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">If II Chronicles finishes with the Cyrus
edict and Ezra begins with it, the way of arranging the books in the Hebrew
Sctipures is telling. This last set of
books opens and closes with the Cyrus edict.
What frames the final set of books we are going to look at is the edict
that enables the people to return from exile and once again be a nation with a
land, a temple and a faith to share.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The first six chapters of the book of Ezra
set the scene for the second half of the book that describes the work Ezra
himself did.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">After listing the returning exiles Ezra
tells of the way worship is restored in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
and the foundations of the temple are laid.
The book ties in with the Prophets Haggai and Zechariah and tells of the
way the building of the temple is delayed until finally the temple is re-built
and dedicated to the glory of God – and the Passover is celebrated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As that celebration is described two things
emerge that are to play a really important part in the thinking of the people
as they return from exile, build their temple and establish themselves once
again as the People of God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As the returned exiles keep the Passover we
read that ‘both the Priests and the Levites had purified themselves; all of
them were clean.” As the Passover lambs
are killed the Passover is eaten by the people who had returned from exile and
also by all wh9o had joined them and, [and this is the key phrase] separated
themselves from the pollutions of the nations of the land to worship the Lord
the God of Israel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What’s of paramount importance for the
returning exiles is to establish their identity. That’s done in two ways – they are true to
the God of Israel and they are different from all other peoples around them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Into this situation comes Ezra. He comes from a family that traces its roots
back through the family of High Priests.
It was one of his ancestors, Hilkiah who had been High Priest when in
the reign of the young King Josiah the book of the Law had been discovered
during a refurbishment of the <st1:city w:st="on">Temple</st1:city> in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> just before the
rise of the Babylonian power that had resulted in exile. It was a family that traced its roots back to
Aaron.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ezra had been exiled in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Babylon</st1:place></st1:city>.
He is described as ‘a scribe skilled in the law of Moses (7;6)’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I think that’s a very telling sentence. It was in the period of the exile that
scribes and experts in the law had pored over all the law codes, and documents
that had been rescued from the ruins of the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Temple</st1:city></st1:place> and in all likelihood they had
assembled them into the kind of shape that we would recognise in the
Pentateuch. They ensured that the Law,
the Torah, could be contained on scrolls
that could be easily copied out so that there was no longer any danger they
would be lost in some cataclysmic event.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The hand of the Lord was upon Ezra.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ezra has the support of King Artaxarxes to
restore the people and to lead a group of people who will be servants of the
temple and play a key role in the restoration of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city>,
the <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Temple</st1:place></st1:city> and
the people of God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s moving to read in chapter 8 of the
trust Ezra has in God as he makes his return.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When he arrives in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> one thing in particular disturbs
Ezra. And that is the way so many people
priests included have inter-married with women of other nations.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ezra takes his stand on the need for purity
of race. And so in 9 and 10 is an
account of the removal of all foreign wives and their children.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is a theme that emerges as the Hebrew
Scriptures come to an end. It is a very
powerful theme in these books. And it is
one that we have to address.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is something that you can trace through
among the Jewish people. The identity of
the Jewish people is preserved by avoiding marriage outside the Jewish
people. Purity of race is tied up with
identify of faith.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That notion comes across into
Christianity. The importance of keeping
personal identity – not mixing with others is instinctively there … and often
made explicit. It is taken to extreme in
the closed brethren community whose meeting house is being demolished opposite
the manse – it’s not just inter-marriage that is not allowed, but you must not
mix with others. You must keep yourself
separate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s there in some measure in all sorts of
settings – you see it played out in all sorts of different contexts. It ties in with a very basic kind of human
instinct that wants us to stay with our own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What do we make of this? Should we be building up our own identity to
the exclusion of others? Or is there
another way/</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But there is even within the Hebrew
Scriptures a conversation going on. Is
this the only way? It is not without
significance that the book of Ruth is in the way the Hebrew Scriptures are
arranged in the same section of the Writings as Ezra and Nehemiah – if you are
steeped in the approach of Ezra and you read the story of Ruth it comes as a
great shock when at the end of the Book you discover that Ruth, the Moabitess
Woman, is the Great Grandmother of none other than King David. David the product of a mixed marriage. That’s shock and horror to the reader of the
book of Ezra.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">By the time Jesus comes on the scene this
conversation is very much to the fore.
There are a whole range of responses to this question evident at the
time of Jesus. There were two schools of
thought among the Pharisees – one very much more hardline in separation and
purity than the other. But at every turn
inside the Jewishness of Jesus’ day is a commitment to identity of race.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Nowhere is that more apparent than in the
way the Samaritans were treated. The
Samaritans trace their roots to the people who stayed behind in and around <st1:place w:st="on">Judea</st1:place> when most were exiled. They kept their own Torah –
but they didn’t include the prophets or the writings in their Scriptures. They worshipped on their own mountain at
their own shrine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Take seriously Ezra and you will reject the
Samaritans.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is not insignificant that when we arrive
at John 4 the narrative begins in the middle of the controversies there are in
different ways of being Jewish. The
Pharisees, some of whom are more hard-line than others, are concerned that
Jesus has taken on the mantle of John the Baptist who has positioned himself in
the line of the prophets who speak truth to power … and they are scandalised
that Jesus has gained more popularity than John in the number of baptisms his
disciples have been carrying out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">So it is that Jesus leaves Judea in the
south to head for Galilee in the north – But, John tells us, he had to go
through <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Samaria</st1:place></st1:city>. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He arrives at Sychar, near Jacob’s well,
and it’s about noon when a Samaritan woman came to draw water and Jesus said to
her, Give me a drink.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That elicits a shocked response from the
Samaritan woman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of
me, a woman of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Samaria</st1:place></st1:city>?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then comes the explanation in brackets
(Jewis do not share things in common with Samaritans). That explanation is a direct allusion to all
that Ezra stands for in chapters 9 and 10 of Ezra.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There then follows a conversation about
living water … the subject moves on to the question of the woman’s five
husbands and the man she is with now.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then the Samaritan woman it is who
recognises that Jesus is ‘a prophet’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">She sums up the theological divide.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Verse 20</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Our ancestors worshipped on this mountain,
but you say that the place where people must worship is in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That is the classic position spelled out in
Ezra.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As Jesus responds he is convinced that the
days the prophets spoke of, not least in the final chapters of Isaiah were
breaking in – when Gentiles would stream into the kingdom as well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when
you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city></st1:place>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus locates himself within the Jewish
traditions. He affirms the tradition
that includes Ezra You worship what you
do not know; we worship what we know; for salvation is from the Jews.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But then he goes on to suggest that ‘the
hour is coming … and what is more ‘is now here’ when something else comes into
play.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But the hour is coming, and is now here,
when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the
Father seeks such as these to worship him.
God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and
truth.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s it – something new has broken
in. A new way of being.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How we worship is important – but its
identity is preserved in how we worship and how we live our lives – it is not
in the exclusion of some. There is a
move towards embrace and inclusion in what Jesus stands for that is worked out
in his relationship with the Samaritans.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There is much that we can treasure in Ezra
… but much from which we must move on.
If we don’t we are in great danger of the kind of exclusivity that in
Bosnia, in Rwanda and in so many places leads to ethnic cleansing and even to
genocide.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Out of the maelstrom of the Bosnian
conflicts Miroslav Volf wrote a powerful book called Exclusion and
Embrace. In it he explores the challenge
we have as Christians to keep our identity and in some way learn from Ezra,
while at the same time being true to Jesus in reaching out and embracing ‘the
other’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">“If we, the communal selves, are called into
eternal communion with the triune God, then <u>true justice will always be on
the way to embrace</u>- to a place where we will belong together with our
personal and cultural identities both preserved and transformed, but certainly
enriched by the other.”<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ezra%20Hebrew%20Scriptures.doc#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><b><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: black; font-size: 12pt;">[1]</span></b></span><!--[endif]--></span></a><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div>
<!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><br clear="all" />
<hr align="left" size="1" width="33%" />
<!--[endif]-->
<div id="ftn1">
<div class="MsoFootnoteText">
<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ezra%20Hebrew%20Scriptures.doc#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-GB"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 10pt;">[1]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a><span lang="EN-GB"> Volf, 225</span></div>
</div>
</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-86405459878496118942012-06-03T12:32:00.002-07:002012-06-03T12:32:56.240-07:00Daniel - a vision for a jubilee<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Don’t we do things well!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I think there are occasions when you can
take a real pride in what we do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And this was one of them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was basically such a simple idea. A Jubilee New Testament using the latest
edition of the New International Version.
Sue recalled how each member of the Sunday School on 31<sup>st</sup>
May, 1953 was given a little Coronation Testament and so Sue ordered fifty of
the Jubilee New Testaments. It was great
handing them out this morning. And if
anyone wants one we can order more!!!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Do you know more than 650,000 have been
sold for this weekend making it the best selling paperback so far this year!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And then the lunch. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Such a simple idea. Everyone
having lunch at the same time – just a Sunday lunch with invitations
from around the country.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Nothing elaborate – just a lunch. And to think people all over the country were
sitting down to lunch with friends and neighbours. And we had more than 80 including half a dozen
of the households from the houses immediately around the church! What a simple yet thrilling thing to do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And then there was the flotilla. One of our neighbours wanted to be back for
the start at 2-30 as their sister was rowing.
Someone else had someone in the family sailing. I visited Raymond and Brenda who took a great
pride in the Evesham mayor’s narrow boat that had sailed the canals all the way
from Evesham to be part of the procession.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A wonderful gift of a book.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A wonderful meal together in the community.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Wonderful pageantry!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">One thing is without a doubt this weekend –
for an 86 year old to have been doing their work for 60 years … and still to be
going strong is simply remarkable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And one of the things that keeps her going
is simply the faith that has meant the world to her down through those
years. Wasn’t it interesting hearing the
Archbishop of Canterbury speaking of her wonderful sense of humour, her
willingness to tease and to be teased,
and the deep and profound faith she is all too willing to share.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Good to read the statement issued jointly
by the Presidents of CTE – our own Michael Heaney included.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.0pt;">
<em><span lang="EN-GB">'We join the nation in its rejoicing at Her
Majesty The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. As we celebrate, we give thanks to God
that her personal commitment to her role as monarch, and her service to the
people of the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">United
Kingdom</st1:place></st1:country-region>, are grounded in a deep faith in
Jesus Christ which is an inspiration to countless citizens of nation and
Commonwealth. Her understanding of the wholeness and harmony of the
nation is a crucial factor in strengthening our commitment to one another. <o:p></o:p></span></em></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.0pt;">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">There can be no better way for the
Christian Churches to celebrate the Jubilee than to take the opportunity
to dedicate themselves anew to the service of God, and to seek the common good
through love for their neighbours near and far.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.0pt;">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">We acknowledge gratefully Her Majesty’s faith
and her dedication to service, and assure her of the prayers and good wishes of
her fellow Christians for the years of her reign yet to come. We pray that all
may be inspired by Her Majesty's service: that together we may create a nation
where all know they have the dignity and value of the children of God.'<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On the threshold of the Year what a
Christmas message she gave – so straightforwardly and simply a Christian
message.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In a funny kind of way the three elements
of today come together in our reflections this evening.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I start with the gift of a Bible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are many powerful passages that speak
in the Bible. One of the strengths of
the particular New Testament we had to share this morning was the couple of
pages at the outset that have suggested verses to read at times of difficulty
and anguish.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Addicted? Afraid of dying? Angry?
Anxious? Depressed?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Verses to turn to.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Overwhelmed by a sense of the world falling
apart about your ears? Be it personal
circumstances, national calamity or world-wide problems? Again the Bible has something for all
occasions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Book of Daniel is one of those books
for such occasions as that. The first
half is a powerful antidote to the fear that can be so destructive when the
world seems against you. Stand up for
what you believe! Dare to be a
Daniel! And in the fiery furnace there
will be another presence with you, alongside you, to comfort and protect
you. In the Lions’ Den there will be the
angels of God watching over you to shield and defend you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And faced with a world that falls apart –
hold on to those visions that speak of an ultimate victory through so much that
is destructive.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Those visions spoke volumes to people who
had come through so much oppression. As
the Babylonians gave way to the Persians, the Persians to the Greeks, the
Greeks to the Syrians and Egyptians, and then all to the Romans – there was a power
that seemed to have the last word.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But the vision of Daniel go beyond
that. The powers that be won’t have the
last word.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the vision seems to be inspired by
something grand and full of pomp and ceremony.
Make no mistake about it the Babylonians could do it, the Persians could
do it, the Greeks, the Syrians, the Egyptians and the Romans – they could all
do it. They could stage pageantry at its
finest and at its most splendid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s as if Daniel asks you to imagine in
your mind’s eye the most regal and splendid of all the greatest royalty
imaginable. And today we can do just
that. It’s a coronation in 1953, a state
opening of parliament, and a flotilla of boast such as has not been witnessed
on the <st1:place w:st="on">Thames</st1:place> for 500 years all rolled into
one. Imagine the splendour. And then magnify it ten fold and a hundred
fold and a thousand fold.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
This is the vision Daniel has </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white;">
<span class="textdan-7-9"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">“As I looked,</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="line" style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span class="textdan-7-9"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">“thrones were
set in place,</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
</span><span class="indent-1-breaks"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New'; font-size: 5pt;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-9"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">and the Ancient
of Days</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-9"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">took his seat.</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
<span class="textdan-7-9">His clothing was as white as snow;</span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><span class="indent-1-breaks"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New'; font-size: 5pt;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-9"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">the hair of his
head was white like wool.</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
<span class="textdan-7-9">His throne was flaming with fire,</span><br />
</span><span class="indent-1-breaks"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New'; font-size: 5pt;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-9"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">and its wheels</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-9"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">were all
ablaze.</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
</span><span class="textdan-7-10"><b><sup><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;">10 </span></sup></b></span><span class="textdan-7-10"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">A river of
fire</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-10"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">was flowing,</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
</span><span class="indent-1-breaks"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New'; font-size: 5pt;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-10"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">coming out
from before him.</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
<span class="textdan-7-10">Thousands upon thousands attended him;</span><br />
</span><span class="indent-1-breaks"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New'; font-size: 5pt;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-10"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">ten thousand
times ten thousand stood before him.</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
<span class="textdan-7-10">The court was seated,</span><br />
</span><span class="indent-1-breaks"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New'; font-size: 5pt;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-10"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">and the books</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-10"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">were opened.</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And this Ancient of Days won the victory
over all that was going wrong.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And then comes the crowning vision …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Beyond all human majesty … one came in that
vision to the Ancient of Days … and he was one ‘like a Son of Man’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="textdan-7-13"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">“In my vision at night I looked, and
there before me was one like a son of man,</span></span><span class="textdan-7-13"><b><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">[<a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Daniel+7&version=NIV#fen-NIV-21947a" title="See footnote a"><span style="color: #b37162;">a</span></a>]</span></sup></b></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-13"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">coming</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-13"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">with the
clouds of heaven.</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-13"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his
presence.</span></span><span class="textdan-7-14"><b><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;">14 </span></sup></b></span><span class="textdan-7-14"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">He was given authority,</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-14"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">glory and
sovereign power; all nations and peoples of every language worshiped him.</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-14"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">His
dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textdan-7-14"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">is one that
will never be destroyed.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus faced the oppression of a mighty
power and as he approached his death this was exactly the vision he drew
on. Hold on to this vision he urged his
followers and God will be with you … you will share in the victory.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Through death and resurrection those
followers of Jesus sensed a remarkable victory Jesus had won … and they looked
to him as the one who reigned supreme in the power of his kingdom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
That’s the vision to hold on to – those wonderful words in Revelation 5!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="line" style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span class="textrev-5-12"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">“Worthy is the
Lamb,</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textrev-5-12"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">who was slain,</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
</span><span class="indent-1-breaks"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New'; font-size: 5pt;"> </span></span><span class="textrev-5-12"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">to receive
power and wealth and wisdom and strength</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
</span><span class="indent-1-breaks"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New'; font-size: 5pt;"> </span></span><span class="textrev-5-12"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">and honor and
glory and praise!”</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="top-05" style="background: white; margin-top: 0cm;">
<span class="textrev-5-13"><b><sup><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;">13 </span></sup></b></span><span class="textrev-5-13"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">Then I heard every creature in heaven
and on earth and under the earth</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textrev-5-13"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">and on the
sea, and all that is in them, saying:</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="line" style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span class="textrev-5-13"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">“To him who
sits on the throne</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span class="textrev-5-13"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">and to the
Lamb</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
</span><span class="indent-1-breaks"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New'; font-size: 5pt;"> </span></span><span class="textrev-5-13"><span style="font-family: Verdana;">be praise and
honor and glory and power,</span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;"><br />
<span class="textrev-5-13">for ever and ever!”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is a remarkable vision to hold on to.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And where do we sense the reality of the
conviction contained in this book? Where
can we sense the wonder of that vision of ultimate glory?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is as we gather round to eat the
simplest of meals and anticipate a heavenly banquet beyond all our imagining.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And here at this table in the breaking of
bread and the sharing of a cup we can sense the wonder of that love of God that
nothing can separate us from.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-86985336850011210652012-05-27T12:42:00.002-07:002012-05-27T12:42:44.936-07:00Dare to be a Daniel<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s not only football games that can have
two halves.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Books sometimes come in halves too. And Daniel is very much a book of two halves.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We have worked our way through the Law and
the Prophets and we are well on our way through the Writings of the Hebrew
Scriptures, the Old Testament. We are
coming towards the climax to the books of the Old Testament. But we are not quite there yet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Book of Daniel stands on the threshold
of the final set sequence of books and it stands out very much alone in the Old
Testament.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The book is actually written in two
languages. After an initial chapter
written in Hebrew chapters 2-7 are written in Aramaic before the final chapters
revert to Hebrew.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The first half of the book – chapters 1-6
are a sequence of stories that alternate – all tell about the stand Daniel and
three other Jewish leaders take in the face of the devastating power of the
Babylonian state Nebuchadnezzar and his successors.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The second part of the book from 7 to the
end is a sequence of apocalyptic visions that I want to come back to next week.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There is a strange appropriateness to
arrive at the book of Daniel on Pentecost Sunday. Pentecost is a moment of utter
transformation in the story of the first followers of Jesus. It is the point at which they are galvanised
into action. And the action they take
goes in the face of the powers that be, be it the Jewish leaders and
officialdom in <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> or the Gentile powers
that be in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Rome</st1:place></st1:city>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus knew they were going to be up against
it. After all, he knew how much he
himself was up against it in everything he did.
Just as he had come with a messasge to share and healing to bring,
that’s exactly the task he set his followers as he sent out the twelve like
sheep into the midst of wolves. What
Jesus envisaged was an immense amount of opposition. Opposition that would
amount to persecution.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This was a scary venture.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">At the moment when all was lost, that was
the point for Jesus when his followers would have a strength to rise above
themselves – and strength was nothing less than the Spirit of God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When they hand you over do not worry about
how you are to speak or what you are to say; for what you are to say will be
given to you at that time, for it is not you who speak but the Spirit of y our
Father speaking through you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are echoes in what Jesus says of the
story of Daniel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus goes on to speak of the untold
hostility his followers will have … but they are to keep going in spite of the
fact they won’t make it round all the towns of the Jewish people before ‘the
Son of Man comes’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And that is no coincidence that there
should be such references and allusions to Daniel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In a sense that’s the whole point of the
book.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s set in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar as
the destruction of the Babylonian power is at its worst. But the book speaks into subsequent
generations. Indeed when we look at the
visions of next week we shall see that it seems to be written against the backdrop
of the awful events that gave rise to the Maccabean revolt.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the first half of the book there is a
rhythm – Daniel is an interpreter of dreams and summoned to the court of the
tyrant king to interpret his dreams. As
he does so it becomes apparent that the God of the Jewish people, the God YHWH
is the God of the Universe and he is all powerful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Alongside the dreams and their
interpretation come moments when Daniel and the three others are challenged in
their faith. But they hold firm.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The dreams interpreted in vividly dramatic
stories Daniel confronts the demands of the tyrant stays true to this faith and
is protected and saved by the unseen yet very real power of God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego defy king
Nebuchad nezzar and refuse to fall down at the feet of an enormous gold
appearing statue the Emperor has made from gold. Other Babylonians are out to entrap
them. But they stand firm in the face of
everything.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then it is the turn of Daniel to stand up
to those who plot against him. He is
thrown into the Lions Den but again the stand he takes is vindicated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the fiery furnace there is another
figure present with the three in the furnace.
And they are saved.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the Lions den it is the angels of God
who shut up the mouths of the lions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The story told it then is a story that
comes to life in subsequent generations.
The vicious power of the Babylonians is replaced by the more benign
power of the Persians, but still the people are not free. The Egyptians rise momentarily and then the
Greeks under Alexander the Great. There
are moments of Egyptian power and Syrian power but then it is the Romans that arise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In turn as the Jewish people face untold
opposition, oppression and repression the stories of Daniel figure large n the
memory they hand on. They are an
inspiration to them as they too are called to take a stand in each generation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The followers of Jesus were facing the same
challenge.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But the promise of Jesus is that they will
not be alone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">They go out as twelve together, they come
back and find they have received just the strength Jesus spoke about. Luke tells us 72 then go out and return finding they too have received
just the strength Jesus spoke about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus himself is arrested, tried and
crucified. And the confidence of the
followers of Jesus deserts them. But
they are not alone. Jesus appears to them
and although that is only momentary, they stand firm. Then it is on the Day of Pentecost that that
moment of turning that transformation comes.
For they become aware they are not alone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is as if there is another presence with
them – as there had been in the fiery furnace.
It is as if there is a protection from God just as Daniel experienced in
the Lions Den.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
The story of Acts … and the story of the church is a story then of people
taking a stand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">At times the state seeks to take
Christianity and bring it to heel. But
the followers of Jesus stand over against the powers that be to challenge, to
question, to cajole and to transform.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
That too is the task we share as we follow in the footsteps of Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This Pentecost Sunday we share in our prayers
for those who are facing persecution. We
think specially of the descendants of those Jewish people exiled in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Babylon</st1:place></st1:city> – and the
followers of Jesus among their midst.
They are facing persecution as ever as they have fled <st1:country-region w:st="on">Iraq</st1:country-region>, sought refuge in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Syria</st1:place></st1:country-region> and face
the devastation of all that is happening there.
Not easy times. Need for
strengthening, the strengthening of the Spirit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Egypt</st1:place></st1:country-region> with the uncertainties of the
outcome of the elections. Again strength
for those facing persecution.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And we will face those who criticise, those
whose apathy drains our strength. And we
too need to take our stand. And claim
the strength promised in anticipation of Pentecost by Christ, the strength that
is unseen and yet so very strong.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A strength we are to take to heart
ourselves.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is a year of anniversaries. It has been the 40<sup>th</sup> anniversary
of our Congregational Fedeartion. It was
moving at the annual meeting a fortnight ago to see how so many of the wounds
that were caused at the times of the dividing of the way for many churches,
have been healed in friendships and mutual respect. My thought went to the first President of the
CF, Margaret Stansgate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A fiery person if ever there was one whose
life spanned every decade of the twentieth century and a life of campaigning
for social justice with a member of her family in the commons in each of those
decades and still to this day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">An old <st1:personname w:st="on">Salvation
Army</st1:personname> hymn was one of her husband’s favourites. You may know it …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Standing by a purpose ture</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Heeding God’s command</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Honour them, the faithful few!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">All hail to Daniel’s band.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to be a Daniel,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to stand alone!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to have a purpose firm!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to make it known.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Interestingly, Tony Benn took that as the
title of an autobiographical memoir he wrote and he told of the moment he saw a
picture of Daniel in the lion’s den in the YMCA in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Nagasaki</st1:place></st1:city> of all places.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That made me think in turn of the story of
one of the great Christians of the twentieth Century. Nagai.
A radiologist and part of the Christian community in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Japan</st1:place></st1:country-region> that
stood their ground against the dictates of the empire and suffered
extensively. Passionate in his
commitment to peace he was outside the city of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Nagasaki</st1:place></st1:city> when the second nuclear bomb was
detonated in 1945.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He rushed to aid the victims – in the charred
remains of the city at the very epi-centre of the blast one of the few
buildings to have any part of it still standing was the Christian cathedral. Ironic that the city to be bombed should have
been the centre of the Christian community.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">It strengthened his faith. He worked for peace and for justice in the
wake of the war before dying an early death from radiation sickness within ten
years of the ending of the war.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">He is another of whom it could be said he
was a Dnaiel</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Many mighty men are lost</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Darning not to stand</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Who for God had been a host</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">By joining Daniel’s band</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to be a Daniel</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to stand alone!</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">That too is the heritage we have as this
year we mark the 350<sup>th</sup> anniversary of the day in August 1662 when
the state once again asserted control over the church in this country and
insisted only the prescribed readings be read, only state approved preachers
should preach – and 2000 ministers were ejected from their churches.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">It is a heritage of dissent that we stand
in.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Many giants, great and tall,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Stalking through the land,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Headlong to the earth would fall</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">If met by Daniel’s band.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to be a Daniel</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to stand alone!</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to have a purpose firm!</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">But that tradition doesn’t just go back to
the stand taken by the likes of Margaret Stansgate on all sorts of issues, of
Nagai in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Japan</st1:place></st1:country-region>,
or of our forebears down through the ages.</span></div>
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It goes back to the very beginnings of the church that we mark today on the Day
of Pentecost.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Empowered, strengthened by that presence,
that presence of the very spirit of God, Peter and the others had the courage
of their convictions to pass on the message of Christ and seek to make a
difference in changing the lives of many, many people.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Hold the Gospel banner high!</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">On to victory grand!</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Satan and his hosts defy,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And shout for Daniel’s band.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to be a Daniel,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to stand alone;</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to have a purpose firm!</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Dare to make it known!</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-66417675474957112632012-05-20T12:17:00.001-07:002012-05-20T12:17:52.587-07:00Reading the Gospels as a whole ... and the Sermon on the Mount<br />
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<span lang="EN-GB">Reading through the Old Testament we’ve just come to the end of the Five Little Scrolls. The Megilloth. I want to pause a moment and reflect on the way Jewish people read the Scriptures. At each of the five main festivals of their year they read the whole of each of the five books of the Megilloth. How different that is from our experience of reading the Bible. We tend to read small passages, be it in church or in our daily devotions. What’s it like when you read a book as a whole?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Try reading a Gospel through from beginning to end. Each Gospel has within it an indication of the way the book as a whole works.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Look to the very end of Matthew’s gospel and Jesus commands the disciples to ‘teach people to obey everything I have commanded you’. He puts the teaching of Jesus into five blocks – read his gospel and find out what Jesus has commanded you to do.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">There is a breathlessness to Mark’s Gospel as he quickly builds up to the climax in the Passion Narrative and then at the resurrection leaves you hanging in mid-air. It’s as if this just the beginning of something that’s only just started and is continuing to this day!</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The beginning of the good news</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Reading%20the%20Gospels%20in%20the%20light%20of%20the%20Megilloth.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Luke is systematic – he describes how he has sifted the evidence and put it together to make sense of the words and actions of Jesus.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Since many have undertaken to set down an orderly account of the events that have been fulfilled among us,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>just as they were handed on to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>I too decided, after investigating everything carefully from the very first,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Reading%20the%20Gospels%20in%20the%20light%20of%20the%20Megilloth.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>so that you may know the truth concerning the things about which you have been instructed.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And John’s Gospel is written so that people come to believe in Christ and so find a new lease of life …</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But these are written so that you may come to believe</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Reading%20the%20Gospels%20in%20the%20light%20of%20the%20Megilloth.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">that Jesus is the Messiah,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Reading%20the%20Gospels%20in%20the%20light%20of%20the%20Megilloth.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">What happens when you read substantially more than a brief passage. In a moment I am going to take one classic passage that we all pay lip-service to, the Sermon on the Mount. And I am going to share the whole of the Sermon on the Mount. It is a good ‘sermon’ length. It starts with a powerful opening, it goes on to explore what it really means to love your neighbour and goes on to explore what it takes to love God, before finishing by setting in front of us three stark choices.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB"><b>The Sermon on the Mount</b></span></div>
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<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">The Beatitudes<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Jesus went throughout <st1:place w:st="on">Galilee</st1:place>, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #010000;">What’s it like belonging to God’s Kingdom?<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>on my account.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Salt and Light<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hidden.No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">The Law and the Prophets<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Therefore, whoever breaks <a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a>one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #010000;">So, first of all, what does it mean to love your neighbour?<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Anger<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, “You shall not murder”; and “whoever murders shall be liable to judgement.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>you will be liable to judgement; and if you insult<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>a brother or sister,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>you will be liable to the council; and if you say, “You fool”, you will be liable to the hell<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of fire.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>has something against you,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and then come and offer your gift.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are on the way to court<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>with him, or your accuser may hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Truly I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Adultery<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall not commit adultery.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Divorce<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘It was also said, “Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Oaths<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Again, you have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, “You shall not swear falsely, but carry out the vows you have made to the Lord.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But I say to you, Do not swear at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city></st1:place>, for it is the city of the great King.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”; anything more than this comes from the evil one.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Retaliation<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘You have heard that it was said, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Love for Enemies<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
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<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax-collectors do the same?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, <a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a>what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #010000;">Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="color: #010000;">As far as loving your neighbour is concerned keep at it and don’t give up until you get to the point at which you can say, It is accomplished!<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<i><span style="color: #010000;">The second thing that’s all-important is loving God. What does it take to love God with all your heart and with all your mind and with all your soul and with all your strength?<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Almsgiving<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">‘Beware of practising your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Prayer<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘When you are praying, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do; for they think that they will be heard because of their many words.Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Pray then in this way:<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Our Father in heaven,<br /> hallowed be your name.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> Your kingdom come.<br /> Your will be done,<br /> on earth as it is in heaven.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> Give us this day our daily bread.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> And forgive us our debts,<br /> as we also have forgiven our debtors.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /> And do not bring us to the time of trial,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><br /> but rescue us from the evil one.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Fasting<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>so that your fasting may be seen not by others but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Treasures<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>consume and where thieves break in and steal;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">The Sound Eye<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>but if your eye is unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Serving Two Masters<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘No one can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Do Not Worry<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Therefore do not worry, saying, “What will we eat?” or “What will we drink?” or “What will we wear?”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But strive first for the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and his<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Judging Others<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">‘Do not judge, so that you may not be judged.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>For with the judgement you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Why do you see the speck in your neighbour’s<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Or how can you say to your neighbour,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>“Let me take the speck out of your eye”, while the log is in your own eye?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbour’s<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>eye.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Profaning the Holy<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Do not give what is holy to dogs; and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under foot and turn and maul you.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Ask, Search, Knock<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<i><span style="color: #010000;">How can we sum it all up?<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">The Golden Rule<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
‘In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.</div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<i>If we are going to take all this seriously we need to make choices</i>.<span style="color: #010000;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">The Narrow Gate<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is easy<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Matthew%205-7.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>that leads to destruction, and there are many who take it.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">A Tree and Its Fruit<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Thus you will know them by their fruits.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Concerning Self-Deception<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Not everyone who says to me, “Lord, Lord”, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only one who does the will of my Father in heaven.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>On that day many will say to me, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Then I will declare to them, “I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></h2>
<h2 style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-size: 12pt;">Hearers and Doers<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"> ‘Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on rock.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell—and great was its fall!</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">[from the New Revised Standard Version]</span></div>
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline" />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-80955915290042703282012-05-20T12:15:00.000-07:002012-05-20T12:15:24.081-07:00Ruth - a story of courage and determination<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The calendar year has a rhythm to it as one
season follows to the next. How
wonderful, today of all days, to see the daffodils blooming all over the town!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Christian year has a rhythm to it too. In what way that relates to the rhythm of the
calendar year will differ all over the world.
But for me there is a rhythm that pulses with the calendar year. That’s partly because in true nonconformist
fashion I see the Christian year unfold a little differently from the
traditional liturgical calendar that our Congregational forebears reacted
against.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Maybe it’s because I come from a family of
teachers!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What’s interesting then is to notice how, even
though we do not stick to a strict liturgical set of lectionary readings, the
passages of Scripture we read at each of the great festivals are basically the
same from one year to the next.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For me the year starts in September with a
harvest festival that celebrates the goodness of God in creation and the
challenge God gives to us to be stewards of the whole environment of God’s
creation. And with that festival I
associate readings from Genesis about creation, Deuteronomy about ancient
harvest offerings that always remember the poor, the widow and the foreigner,
the seed-time and harvest parables of Jesus and the psalms of creation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then, having celebrated the God of creation,
we move on to Christmas and celebrate the way this God of all creation comes
alongside us and shares in our humanity in the birth of the Christ child. And with Christmas there are all the
Christmas readings from the Prophets and the Gospels.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then it’s on to Holy Week, the Passion and
Easter. And the readings are the
readings of the Passion. On Maundy
Thursday we often have prolonged readings, in many churches the whole of the
Passion story is read at great length, sometimes set to music. At the 3-00 service on Good Friday afternoon
the whole of the passion story from one of the Gospels will be chanted, taking
20 minutes while the whole congregation stands.
That musical tradition comes into its own with the St John Passion and
the St Matthew Passion of Bach. How
powerful the whole story is, read or sung at length, simply from the biblical
text.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And at Easter the Easter, resurrection
stories, and for me how precious the Road to Emmaus has become.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then, six weeks later the climax to the
year. The Risen Christ no longer to be
seen, an unseen power, a strength from beyond ourselves is let loose into our
lives at Pentecost and there is the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, with that
passage from Acts 2, and passages about the fruit of the Spirit, the Gifts of
the Spirit coming to the fore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A wonderful cycle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus and the first followers of Christ knew
the rhythm of a year of festivals. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">John 8 sees Jesus in the temple for the
festival of Booths when he declares I am the light of the world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On the Thursday of that great week in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> it is the feast
of Passover that the disciples prepare in that upper room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And six weeks later as they gather again in
that same upper room, <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
is packed with people of all nationalities at what the Jewish people know as
the Festival of Weeks, and which we think of far more with the Greek word of
Pentecost.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is interesting that the Jews associate
biblical texts with their major festivals too.
After the Law and the Prophets, the third section of the Hebrew
Scriptures the writings opens with Psalms, Job and Proverbs celebrating God,
agonising over where God is in a world of horrible suffering, and mapping out
the choices we need to take to live in that horrible world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then comes the Megilloth, the Five
Scrolls. It’s not until four or five
hundred years after the time of Christ that each of these five scrolls becomes
linked with a particularly significant Jewish festival. Since that time each of these books has
become a prominent part of the Jewish liturgy associated with those five
festivals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Book of Ruth is associated with the
Festival of Weeks, Pentecost.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Song of Songs with Passover</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Book of Ecclesiastes with the Festival
of Booths</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Book of Lamentations with the Ninth of
Av – that is the anniversary date of the fall of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city>
in BC 587 and in one of those quirks of
history the very day on which the <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Temple</st1:place></st1:city>
was destroyed again in AD 70.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Book of Esther is associated with the
Festival of Purim.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is interesting that around the time those
links are made in the Jewish world, Jerome’s Latin translation of what for
Christians has become the Old Testament follows the very much more western,
logical, chronological mindset of the Greek translators and orders the books
entirely differently.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That comes over into the English
translations, even though the English translations have gone back to the Hebrew
text.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It means for us Christians the grouping
together of these five books, and the link with a particular festival has been
lost.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And that’s a great pity. In the bible Jesus would have used these
books would, if not actually a set of Five Scrolls, would have been grouped
together somewhere in this third section of the Scriptures. Different Hebrew texts actually order them
slightly differently. Over the next few
weeks we’ll see what happens when we read the next five books in the order they
appear in Hebrew copies of the Tanak, the Hebrew Scriptures. And let’s keep an eye out for the link with
those festivals. Though that link was
formally made later, it’s just possible the link was made then because in the
remembered history, traditions had sprung up associating these books with those
festivals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In a very 21<sup>st</sup> century version
of the age old custom of pressing flowers I put the ears of corn I plucked
walking down from the hill of beatitudes towards the shore of the Sea of
Galilee through a laminator and have stuck them inside the cover of the Bible I
had with me then and have used ever since.
I did the walk and re-visited that site a year later half way between
Easter and Pentecost. And the grain was
nearly ripe for harvest.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Festival of Weeks, Pentecost is the
first harvest festival of Jewish year that started back at the beginning of
winter. This is a time of new beginnings
when the first produce of the year is ready to be harvested and communities are
given once more a new lease of life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And what’s at the heart of the Book of Ruth
but a story of gleaning in the fields of the harvest? A natural link to make this the book to read
at the first of the harvest festivals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It may be set in the days when the judges
ruled (and located in our English bibles between Judges and 1 Samuel), but it
speaks each year into that moment when communities breathe a sigh of relief,
gather the first produce of the year and rejoice in that new lease of life they
have been given.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let’s consider what the story has to say
into that situation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The story begins when there was a famine in
the land, and a certain man of <st1:city w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:city> in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Judah</st1:country-region> journeyed the seventeen miles down through
the wilderness, across the <st1:country-region w:st="on">Jordan</st1:country-region>
up into the hill country beyond and went to live in the country of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Moab</st1:place></st1:country-region>, he and
his wife and his two sons.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s brilliant story telling as it lulls
you into a false sense of security that we are going to be told the story of
this man and his sons. Their names are
virtually forgotten, and certainly aren’t everyday names in our culture! Elimelech and the two sons Mahlon and
Chilion. Their names are forgotten
because they don’t figure in the story.
Tragically they die. Not before the
two sons have taken Moabite wives.
One of those wives remains home
in the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">land</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">Moab</st1:placename></st1:place> and so the name of Orpah is not one
we come across in our culture.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But the widow and the daughter-in-law have
names that are as familiar as any to our ears because this is a book about
them, where they are centre stage. The
widow, Naomi and her daughter-in-law Ruth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Hearing that the famine has ended Naomi
decides it’s better for her to go back to <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Judah</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s touching to see the love and concern
Naomi has for her two daughters in law as she makes her way down towards the <st1:country-region w:st="on">Jordan</st1:country-region> and the journey back through the
wilderness to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:place></st1:city>. She prays God’s blessing on them, bids them
return to their own land and their own people.
With a kiss she and the two younger women break down in tears.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Naomi insists – and there is a logic to her
reasoning. The two Moabite women will
have no security in Naomi’s homeland of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Judah</st1:place></st1:country-region>, Naomi can offer no security
in her home. They must return. Orpah
kissed her mother in law but Ruth clung to her.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The scene is poignant and touching as Orpah
begins to walk away. Naomi turns to Ruth
and insists.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘See, your sister-in-law has gone back to her
people and to her gods; return after your sister-in-law.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">16</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">But Ruth said,</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">‘Do not press me to leave you</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> or to turn back from following
you!</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">Where you go, I will go;</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> where you lodge, I will lodge;</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">your people shall be my people,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> and your God my God.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">17</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Where
you die, I will die—</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> there will I be buried.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">May the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> do
thus and so to me,</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> and more as well,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">if even death parts me from you!’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There’s then the wonderful silence of
companionship.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When Naomi saw that she was determined to
go with her, she said no more to her.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s so easy to read this as a lovely
romance. It’s more like a story of
daring and courage. Notice that word ‘determined’. Ruth’s decision took great courage and
determination. This is the story of a
determined woman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And you immediately see why it took courage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The two cross the <st1:country-region w:st="on">Jordan</st1:country-region> make that seventeen mile journey up
through the wilderness and arrive in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:place></st1:city>
– the whole town was stirred because of them and you recognise the courage and
determination Ruth needs in the question the women ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">They see the two women approach and they
say, Is this Naomi? The younger woman is
ignored.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The bitterness and the anger of Naomi wells
up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘Call me no longer Naomi,</span> [the name
means ‘Pleasant’]<span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ruth%20and%20Pentecost.doc"></a></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> call me Mara, [the name
means ‘Bitter’]</span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ruth%20and%20Pentecost.doc"></a></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> for the Almighty</span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ruth%20and%20Pentecost.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">has dealt bitterly with me.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">I went away full,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> but the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> has
brought me back empty;</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">why call me Naomi</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> when the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> has
dealt harshly with</span></span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ruth%20and%20Pentecost.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">me,</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> and the Almighty</span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ruth%20and%20Pentecost.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">has brought calamity upon
me?’</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Just notice the tone of Naomi’s
homecoming. There’s no sense of relief
in her voice. There’s no joy in what she says.
There’s bitterness. I detect an
anger too. Is there also fear,
apprehension, uncertainty?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Notice in the skilful way the story is told
there is no response. No one says, it’s
going to be all right.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What is the response of the people of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:place></st1:city>?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We’ve already been told in verse 19 ‘the
whole town was stirred’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s a very ambiguous word. It could be positive as in the modern Jewish
Tanak Translation</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i>the whole
city buzzed with excitement over them.<span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<st1:place w:st="on"><span lang="EN-GB">Holladay</span></st1:place><span lang="EN-GB">’s Hebrew Lexicon of the Old Testament suggests two quite negative
ways of translating this word …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">‘thrown into confusion’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">‘be in an uproar’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Maybe the reaction of the people is not all
welcoming. May be there is something that stands in the way of an over-effusive
warm welcome.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let’s take the text as it stands. Seeing the two women, the city are thrown
into confusion, the women ask, Is this Naomi, ignoring the other younger
woman. Naomi responds with
bitterness. And there is no response.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Verse 22 maybe explains the coolness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">One word is repeated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It reminds us, twice, where Ruth is from.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">So Naomi returned together with Ruth the
Moabite, her daughter-in-law, who came back with her from the country of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Moab</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s maybe why there is such
confusion. Naomi has brought with her a
younger woman who is a Moabite, from the country of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Moab</st1:place></st1:country-region>. A foreigner.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then comes a lovely sign-off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">And
they come to Bethlehem at the beginning of the Barley Harvest</span></b><span lang="EN-GB">.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s the time for new beginnings, it’s the
time when the community to breathe a sigh of relief – there’s going to be food
on the table! There’s a new lease of
life … how wonderful for the people of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:place></st1:city>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We’re pretty sure that it will turn out to
be wonderful for Naomi as she returns to her home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But for Ruth?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Will it be a new lease of life for Ruth?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I had thought to continue the story. But it’s his bi-centenary year, and so I am
going to take a leaf out of one of Charles Dickens’ serialised books and leave
us with a bit of a cliff-hanger. What will become of this very determined young
woman, Ruth?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What does this story do for us, reading it
at Pentecost?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Pentecost is a time of new beginning, when
the community breathes a sigh of relief – a new start to be made.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s what we do with the out pouring of
the Holy Spirit. We can see it as an
event – we can also see it as something we need after the dark days are
done. The Spirit is a new lease of life
that ushers in a new harvest, the fruit of love, joy and peace and patience.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s easy to overlook, but Luke goes out of
his way to draw our attention to the fact that among those who are ‘all
together’ on the Day of Pentecost are women as well as men. It’s sometimes tempting to see it as the
twelve. But the opening chapter of Acts
is about the 120. Among them ‘certain
women, including Mary the mother of Jesus as well as his brothers.’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">These are determined women as well as men who
have stuck with Jesus to the end and beyond to resurrection. These are courageous women as well as men who
have been prepared to make a commitment to Jesus and say,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Do not press me to leave you</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> or to turn back from following
you!</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">Where you go, I will go;</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> where you lodge, I will lodge;</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And as the Spirit is poured upon those
determined women as well as men Peter is absolutely certain, </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">this is what was spoken through the prophet
Joel:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">17</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">“In
the last days it will be, God declares,</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> and your sons <b><i>and
your daughters</i></b> shall prophesy,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">and your young men shall see visions,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> and your old men shall
dream dreams.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">18</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-color: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Even
upon my slaves, both men <b><i>and women</i></b>,</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> in those days I will pour out
my Spirit;</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> and they shall
prophesy.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Not once, but twice, comes that word of
Peter that it is the task now of these determined courageous women as well as
men to prophesy, speak the truth of God’s Word to the powers that be and to all
no matter who they are.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This indeed is exciting, challenging stuff. It is as we come together women and men in
the body of Christ the church, with determination and courage that is
strengthened by the Spirit of God that we can sense a new beginning, a new lease
of life once more bearing fruit in the love of God.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-26196258077257670852012-05-06T12:28:00.002-07:002012-05-06T12:29:45.625-07:00For such a time as this - Esther's Story<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was a special day on Friday, sharing
with Anne’s family as we remembered Richard.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There was something special in our service
as Richard’s daughter Joanna brought the Judaism she has adopted as her faith
into the service. Her son Josh read a
lovely prayer remembering his granddad in Hebrew, a prayer that had been
prepared by the Rabbi of their reformed synagogue.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Joanna’s husband, Jeremy, drew the service
to a close reading the Kaddish, that prayer that is said by a family member at
every funeral service, a prayer I was familiar with from our Holocaust Memorial
services in the synagogue and latterly in the town hall here.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jeremy’s parents belong to an orthodox
synagogue. After the service, it was
lovely to have an all too brief conversation with them. Within moments we were talking of the tragedy
of intolerance that has swept through the extremes of Islam, Christianity and
of Judaism. And of the need for
tolerance. Jeremy’s parents reflected on
the way they lived in a neighbourhood with Jewish people, Muslims and
Christians, all of whom were friendly with each other. They went on to comment that even in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Palestine and Israel</st1:place></st1:city> down through
the years, Jew, Christian and Muslim have lived peaceably together. We bemoaned the current state of affairs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We spoke momentarily of the synagogue here
in Cheltenham – I recalled how moving it was to be in the congregation at the
160<sup>th</sup> anniversary celebrations when a Jewish historian and raconteur
had spoken of the tragic history of Jewish people in these islands, and honoured
Oliver Cromwell who was the one to permit Jewish people to return to these
islands after hundreds of years of exile.
I commented on that strand of tolerance that was part of our
Congregational heritage. We firmly
believe what we believe, but we respect your right to believe what you believe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We were of a mind, how vital it is to seek
out that toleration.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I told the tale of the two plaques of
allegiance to Queen <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Victoria</st1:place></st1:state>
that had been taken down to be re-furbished.
The restorers discovered the names of at least two earlier monarchs
under the name of Queen <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Victoria</st1:place></st1:state>
showing that the plaques were very much older than the Cheltenham Synagogue
itself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
Then it was Jeremy’s father who said what I
had read and heard. But it was
strangely moving to hear it come from him … that they read a prayer of
allegiance to the monarch in every Sabbath day service at their synagogue.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What’s interesting about that is the way
Jewish people have down through the centuries had to learn how to live in an
alien culture, tracing a fine line between maintaining their own faith and
religious practices within a culture that is very, very different.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In some ways that Jewish experience is
something that we too as Christians need also to learn from. After all there is a very strong Jewishness
to Jesus, to Paul and to the whole of the New
Testament which we lose sight of at our peril.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Nowhere is the art of juggling that
commitment to your own faith and need to live within an alien culture more
apparent than in the book of Esther.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is set in a very particular period. The Babylonian empire that had taken the
Jewish people into exile had fallen to the Persian Empire of Cyrus. The Persians allowed the peoples conquered by
the Babylonians not only to return to their homelands but also to rebuild their
religious institutions. For the Jewish
people that meant that the Persian empire supported their return to <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city></st1:place>,, and their
re-building of the temple.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
The Jewish people remained under Persian domination until that empire fell and
a Greek empire under Alexander the Great took its place, to be followed by the
power of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Rome</st1:place></st1:city>. And along the way there were moments of
Egyptian and Syiran domination too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
The Book of Esther is set in the time of Persian Domination. The political, cultural, feel of the book is
at the time of this empire. Events are
recounted as a wonderful story and tale.
And it has a particular power. As
the book comes to an end an annual festival is set up, the Feast of Purim,
which is specifically to commemorate the events recounted in the Book of Esther.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Esther now is the fifth of those little
scrolls each of which is read at a particular feast in the Jewish liturgical
year. The Book of Esther is read at the
feast of Purim.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is a wonderful tale of courage and
conviction in the face of the powers that be and a prevailing culture that is
hostile to the faith. It is a tale to
inspire us too as we seek to live out our faith in a culture that can so often
be alien and hostile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Esther begins in the court of King Ahasuerus
who rules over 127 provinces from <st1:country-region w:st="on">India</st1:country-region>
to <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Ethiopia</st1:place></st1:country-region>. The <st1:place w:st="on">Persian empire</st1:place>
is a major world power. It opens as the
king throws a party, a lavish banquet lasting seven days where the drinking
goes on ‘without restraint’. And at the
same time his Queen, Vahshti throws another banquet for the women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On the seventh day of banqueting the King
in his drunkenness demands that Queen Vashti be brought to the men’s banquet so
he can show off her beauty. She refuses
to come. He is incensed, deposes Queen Vashti
and writes a decree to every province decrying her defiance and demanding by
the Law of the Medes and Persians, a law that could not be broken, that every
man should be master in his own house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When he sobered up and came to his senses
King Ahasuerus began to regret losing such a beautiful consort as Queen
Vashti. He instructs his courtiers and
particularly the Eunuchs, to seek out a beautiful woman worthy to take her
place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the citadel of <st1:city w:st="on">Susa</st1:city>
was a Jewish man, Mordecai, from the tribe of Benjamin who had been dragged from his home in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Judah</st1:country-region> by King Nebuchadnezzar of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Babylon</st1:city></st1:place>. He had brought up a cousin following the
death of her parents, whose name was Esther.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mordecai arranged for Esthe to join the
harem of the king so she could catch his attention, but he was careful to make
sure her identity as a Jewish woman should be concealed. The beauticians set to work and in due
course, after cosmetic treatment for six months with myrrh and another six
months with other expensive perfumes and cosmetics, her turn came to be paraded
in front of King Ahasuerus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">She it was who won the king’s favour. She it was who was crowned Queen in Vashit’s
place. Great was the rejoicing as a
public holiday was proclaime in all 127 provinces.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mordecai kept the secret of her identiy,
and kept an eye on his adopted daughter now Queen Esther. One day, he heard two of the eunuchs of the
court of King Ahasuerus plotting to assassinate the king. He managed to get a message of warning to
Esther who warned the king and the plot was thwarted. The king and his queen were saved.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There was a power struggle going on in the
court of King Ahasuerus. The one who
came to power and gained promotion was as ever happens, someone not worthy of
the power he craved.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Haman it was who gained power.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mordecai had no respect for his underhanded
dealings. And when in his arrogance a
decree went out that everyone should fall down and do obeisance to Haman,
Mordecai refused. Haman was incensed and
determined to have him executed. When he
learned that Mordecai was Jew he was not
satisfied to execute Mordecai alone but determined to destroy all the Jews, the
people of Mordecai, throughout the whole <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">Ahasuerus</st1:placename></st1:place>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Can you see why the Jewish people should be
so passionate about this story? It’s one
that has resonated with them down through the centuries. The tragedy of the Jewish people is that this
is a decree that has been made on their heads down through the centuries. The tragedy of us Christian people is that
too often from the Christendom especially from the time of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Constantine</st1:place></st1:city> onwards has been complicit in
this anti-semitism.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How vital we stand with Jewish people in
honouring this story, not just because of the way it helps us as Christians to
have the courage of our convictions against a sometimes hostile culture, but
also because it challenges us always to reject anti-semitism and be shoulder to
shoulder with Jewish people as they together with us are drawn to that kind of
insight and tolerance that our new-found friends on Friday were speaking
of. I would consider it entirely
appropriate, however, in standing shoulder to shoulder with Jewish people who
speak out against a particular political party or government in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>. Never let that kind of stand be confused with
anti-semitism!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Haman determined on the destruction of all
Jewish people in all 127 provinces of the whole <st1:place w:st="on">Persian
empire</st1:place>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
in the first month, which is the month of Nisan, in the twelfth year of King
Ahasuerus, they cast Pur – which means ‘the lot’ – before Haman for the day and
for the month. And the lot fell on the
thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Well in advance of that day Haman makes his
move.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">“There is a certain people scattered and
separated among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom; their laswsa
are different from those of every other people, and they do not keep the king’s
laws, so that it is not appropriate for the king to tolerate them.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What a dark and sinister thing to say. It is the justification for the state
persecution of Jewish people down through the centuries. But it is also the justification for the
persecution of Christians in places like <st1:country-region w:st="on">Iraq</st1:country-region>,
<st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Syria</st1:country-region></st1:place>,
Egpyt this very day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The order goes out all over the <st1:place w:st="on">Persian empire</st1:place> - on that 13<sup>th</sup> day of the
twelfth month the day of Purim all Jewish people are to be annihilated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mordecai hears of the plan and is
mortified. He decides to do something
about it and does just what his forebears the prophets of not that long ago had
done. He demonstrates his abhorrence of
the plan in the streets wearking sackcloth and ashes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Esther sees him and secretly finds out what
he is up to and why he is making such a show of himself. In an exchange of secret messages, she
reassures Mordecai that she will be safe. Mordecai is adamant, she will not be safe, and in any case it is not about
her safety.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">“If you keep silence at such a time as
this, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another quarter but
you and your father’s family will perish.
Who knows? Perhaps you have come
to royal dignity for such a time as this.”
4:14</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Wow!
What a statement.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Keeping silence is the worst indictment of
all. That powerful statement of Martin
Niemoeller comes to mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">They
came for the communists and I kept silent because I was not a communist<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">They
came for the Jews and I kept silent because I was not a Jew<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">They
came for the trade unionists and I kept silent because I was not a trade
unionist<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">They came
for the gypsies, the homosexuals, the Catholics and I kept silent because I was
not a gypsy, a homosexual or a Catholic<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">They came
for me and there was no one left to speak up for me.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Martin Luther King Jr</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Our
lives begin to end when we become silent about things that matter.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">History
will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social
transition was not the strident clamour of bad people but the silence of good
people.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The tragedy of silence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">“If you keep silence at such a time as this
…”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">No, Queen Esther’s time has come. She has something she needs to do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Queen Esther holds a banquet. King Ahasuerus is so taken with her beauty
that he holds out his sceptre – and Queen Esther touches it with her sceptre
and he makes her a promise, “”What is it Queen Esther? What is your request? It shall be given you, even to the half of my
kingdom.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Aren’t we familiar with such a promise as
that from somewhere else. Isn’t it was
Herod Antipas promises his daughter – only to end up having to execute John the
Baptist? The echoes in that story of
this story, make that story of Herod all the more contemptible and reflect how
awful that Herodian regime actually was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Queen Esther insists Haman and the King attends a private
banquet just for the three of them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Haman brags to his family that he is to
attend a private banquet with the King and
Queen, but at the same time is incensed at the continuing protests of
Mordecai. Haman’s wife comes up with the
solution. Prepare a gallows fifty feet
high and tell the King to have Mordecai executed on your way to the banquet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Unknown to Haman that very night King
Ahauerus cannot sleep. He too is
unsettled by Mordecai’s protests, but half remembers that Mordecai had thwarted
an assassination attempt on hi. He
summoned trusted courtiers to bring the minute books of his court, the annals
of the king. There he reads for himself
once again of Mordecai’s warning. He
concludes that giving Mordecai an honour is long overdue and that might stop
his protests.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When morning comes King Ahasuerus is set to
instruct Haman to honour Mordecai just at the very moment Haman is getting
ready to ask the king to decree Mordecai’s execution on a fifty foot high
gallows.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A head on clash between these two
conflicting positions is inevitable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What happens is that Mordecai is given the
honour of a royal parade through the streets of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Susa</st1:place></st1:city>.
Haman’s wife is fearful for his future.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The parade over, the Banquet begins. Esther
makes her request known to the King. “O
king, if it pleases the king, let my life be given me – that is my petition –
the the lives of my people - that is my request. For we have been sold, I and my people , to
be destroyed, to be killed and to be annihilated.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The king grants her request – Haman throws
himself at the feet of Esther begging for clemency., The king thinks he is attacking his Queen,
and, you’ve guessed it, Haman ends up on the gallows he had prepared fo r
Mordecai.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">So it is that Queen Esther saves the Jewish
people. Not only that but she secures
their future by turning the tables on those who under Haman had been out to
destroy them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mordecai is given a place of standing in
the court. A decree goes out from the
King permitting Jewish people throughout the empire to defend themselves and
giving them protection.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mordecai went out from the presence of the
King wearing royal robes of blue and white with a golden crown and a mantle of
fine linen and purpoe while the city of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Susa</st1:place></st1:city>
shouted and rejoiced.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
For the Jews there was light and glands, joy and honour.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Things came to a head on the very day that
Haman had conspired to make the day when the Jewish people would be
assassinated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On that day the 13<sup>th</sup> day of the
month of Adar the Jewish people gained their freedom, and on the fourteenth day
they rested and made that a day of feating and gladness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And that day has become the day of the
Feast of Purim ever since.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<h2 style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 14.5pt;">The Feast of Purim Inaugurated<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span class="vv"><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">18</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> But the Jews
who were in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Susa</st1:place></st1:city>
gathered on the thirteenth day and on the fourteenth, and rested on the
fifteenth day, making that a day of feasting and gladness.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">19</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Therefore the Jews
of the villages, who live in the open towns, hold the fourteenth day of the
month of Adar as a day for gladness and feasting, a holiday on which they send
gifts of food to one another.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span class="vv"><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">20</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> Mordecai
recorded these things, and sent letters to all the Jews who were in all the
provinces of King Ahasuerus, both near and far,</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">21</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">enjoining them that
they should keep the fourteenth day of the month Adar and also the fifteenth
day of the same month, year by year,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">22</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">as the days on which
the Jews gained relief from their enemies, and as the month that had been
turned for them from sorrow into gladness and from mourning into a holiday;
that they should make them days of feasting and gladness, days for sending
gifts of food to one another and presents to the poor.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">23</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">So the Jews adopted
as a custom what they had begun to do, as Mordecai had written to them.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span class="vv"><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">24</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> Haman son of
Hammedatha the Agagite, the enemy of all the Jews, had plotted against the Jews
to destroy them, and had cast Pur—that is, ‘the lot’—to crush and destroy them;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">25</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">but when Esther came
before the king, he gave orders in writing that the wicked plot that he had
devised against the Jews should come upon his own head, and that he and his
sons should be hanged on the gallows.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">26</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Therefore these days
are called Purim, from the word Pur. Thus because of all that was written in
this letter, and of what they had faced in this matter, and of what had
happened to them,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">27</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">the Jews established
and accepted as a custom for themselves and their descendants and all who
joined them, that without fail they would continue to observe these two days
every year, as it was written and at the time appointed.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">28</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">These days should be
remembered and kept throughout every generation, in every family, province, and
city; and these days of Purim should never fall into disuse among the Jews, nor
should the commemoration of these days cease among their descendants.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span class="vv"><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">29</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> Queen Esther
daughter of Abihail, along with the Jew Mordecai, gave full written authority,
confirming this second letter about Purim.</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">30</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Letters were sent
wishing peace and security to all the Jews, to the one hundred and twenty-seven
provinces of the kingdom of Ahasuerus,</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">31</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">and giving orders that these days of Purim
should be observed at their appointed seasons, as the Jew Mordecai and Queen
Esther enjoined on the Jews, just as they had laid down for themselves and for
their descendants regulations concerning their fasts and their lamentations.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">32</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The command of Queen
Esther fixed these practices of Purim, and it was recorded in writing.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We need to take to hear the call to courage
and conviction. The courage to take a
stand, to stand up for what is right.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But it is from this kind of story too that
Jewish people have also learned to live with another culture.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The final three verses of a very short
chapter 10 tell us what happened to Mordecai.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The ability to take your stand, stand up
for what you believe and walk with a culture this is a message for us to take
to heart.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="cc"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #666666; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 24pt;">10</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">King Ahasuerus laid tribute on the land and on the islands of
the sea.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">2</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">All the acts of his power and might, and the full account of
the high honour of Mordecai, to which the king advanced him, are they not
written in the annals of the kings of Media and <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Persia</st1:place></st1:country-region>?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">3</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">For Mordecai the Jew was next in rank to King
Ahasuerus, and he was powerful among the Jews and popular with his many
kindred, for he sought the good of his people and interceded for the welfare of
all his descendants.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Where are we in our society?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Some would have us believe – among them
George Carey, that we face this kind of persecution in our society.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I do not believe that to be the case.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are societies where Christian people
face this kind of persecution. We need
to be supportive of them and not keep silent but speak out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But this is not a society where there is
such persecution. We must speak out, we
must have the courage of our convictions.
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As Mordecai ‘sought out the good of his
people and interceded for their welfare’ so too must we.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But we need also to work with what can be
an alien and even a hostile culture and make it work for what is right and for
what is just.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You could also argue that we have the
opportunity often in our society to be as Mordecai ended up – and play our part
within that society to shape it in the way it should be. In a month when the Government has promised
matched funding for all we raise in Christian Aid week as a way of using
development aid we should rejoice at that and make the most of the opportunity
it presents. While at the same time
taking a stand for the justice that is at the heart of our faith in our society
too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We must look to the Jesus who said,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">46</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I have come as light into the world, so that
everyone who believes in me should not remain in the darkness.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">47</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I do not judge anyone who hears my words and does
not keep them, for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-28069320763973812912012-04-29T12:45:00.002-07:002012-04-29T12:45:27.783-07:00Dawn breaks only for another night to follow - Lamentations<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is one of those
quirks of history.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One that continues to
have the power to disturb.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was on the 9<sup>th</sup>
of Av in 587BC that what had begun three weeks before was completed. The temple and the city of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> were finally destroyed by the
Babylonians.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Talmudic tradition has
it that in AD 70 on that very day, the 9<sup>th</sup> of Av the Romans
destroyed the temple and the city of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city>
once again.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The 9<sup>th</sup> Av
is this year 29<sup>th</sup> July. For
the three weeks from 8<sup>th</sup> July Jewish people will observe a period of
fasting – Tisha B’Av and the three weeks – destruction and renewal.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
On the eve of the 9<sup>th</sup>
Av people will gather in their synagogue.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">In the
synagogue, the curtain is removed from the <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Ark</st1:place></st1:state> and the lights are dimmed. After the
evening prayers, the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="http://www.chabad.org/library/bible_cdo/aid/16457/jewish/Chapter-1.htm" title="Chapter 1"><span style="background: white; color: #935955;">Book of
Lamentations</span></a><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"> </span></span><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">(<span class="glossaryitem"><i>Eichah</i></span>)
is read. The leader reads aloud and the congregation reads along in an
undertone. </span><a href="http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/144576/jewish/Order-of-the-Day.htm">http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/144576/jewish/Order-of-the-Day.htm</a></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Prophet who more
than any other was caught up in the destruction of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> and the destruction of the temple
in 587 BC was Jeremiah. He determined to
remain in the city when all seemed lost, he had, after all, purchased property
in the city as a statement of hope against hope.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But in 2 Chronicles
35:25 we read what Jeremiah did.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Jeremiah also uttered a lament for Josiah, and
all the singing-men and singing-women have spoken of Josiah in their laments to
this day. They made these a custom in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>; they are recorded in the
Laments.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was perhaps with
good reason that those Greek translators of the Hebrew Scriptures placed
Lamentations immediately after Jeremiah.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But in the Jewish
Scriptures Lamentations is the fourth book of the Megilloth, the five little
scrolls each of which is associated with a festival in the Jewish liturgical
calendar.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Lamentations is the
bleakest of books.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is a collection of
five poems that are beautifully crafted.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Chapter 1 has 22
verses.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Chapter 2 has 22
verses<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Chapter 3 has 22 x 3 =
66 verses<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Chapter 4 has 22
verses<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Chapter 5 has 22
verses<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What is the
significance of the number 22?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There are 22 letters
in the Hebrew Alphabet.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In chapters 1, 2 and 4
each verse begins with the succeeding letter of the Hebrew alphabet.. In chapter 3 the first three verses begin
with the first letter of the alphabet, the second 3 with the second letter and
so on.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The final chapter has
22 verses, but no longer an acrostic
pattern.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Hebrew poetry as is
the poetry in any language, wonderfully skillfully crafted.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Is it that the
destruction, the lament, is unremitting – from start to finish, from beginning
to end, from A to Z – there is a totality to it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It begins in utter
dejection …<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<h2 style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #880000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 14.5pt;">The Deserted City<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<div style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 16.5pt;">
<span class="cc"><span style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 27.0pt;">1</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">How lonely sits the
city<br />
that once was full of people!<br />
How like a widow she has become,<br />
she that was great among the nations!<br />
She that was a princess among the provinces<br />
has become a vassal.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">2</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">She weeps bitterly in the night,<br />
with tears on her cheeks;<br />
among all her lovers<br />
she has no one to comfort her;<br />
all her friends have dealt treacherously with her,<br />
they have become her enemies.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At its end there is a
glimmer of hope … but it is as if the light is extinguished as the book
finishes with a question that haunts …<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">19</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">But you, O <span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>, reign for
ever;</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> your throne endures to all
generations.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">20</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Why have you forgotten us
completely?</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> Why have you forsaken us these
many days?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">21</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Restore us to yourself,
O <span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>,
that we may be restored;</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> renew our days as of old—<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">22</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">unless you have utterly
rejected us,</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and are angry with us beyond
measure.</span></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Why should the last
chapter not have the sequence? An
oversight, no time? Or maybe a sense of
even greater fragmentation. Things
falling apart that cannot be put together again.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This is a book that
works for the Jewish people lamenting the loss of the temple and the
destruction of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city>.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is a collection of
poems that works in any place where a city is destroyed and its peoples laid
waste.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
News that comes from <st1:city w:st="on">Homs</st1:city> is so disturbing …
and so many cities like it. What is
doubly disturbing in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Syria</st1:country-region>
is that it is a country hundreds of thousands of Christians have fled to as
refugees from the destruction of their cities and their homes in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Iraq</st1:country-region> and
elsewhere in the middle east.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There is an
unremitting bleakness to these words.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Tears, lament at the
fate of a city is something that Jesus shared.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As he approached
Jerusalem Jesus too wept bitter tears.
The tears he wept echoed the tears of Jeremiah at the destruction of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> long ago … but they anticipated a destruction that was
to come.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="vv"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">41</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">42</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">saying, ‘If you, even you, had only recognized on this day
the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">43</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Indeed, the days will come upon you, when your enemies will
set up ramparts around you and surround you, and hem you in on every side.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">44</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">They will crush you to the ground, you and your children
within you, and they will not leave within you one stone upon another; because
you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God.’</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Coming back to
Lamentations, the very construction of the poetry invites us to ask another
question.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Why should the middle
chapter, the third chapter have 66 verses.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For sixty years from
1935 to 1995 Kenneth Bailey’s home was in the <st1:place w:st="on">Middle East</st1:place>. Growing up in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Egypt</st1:country-region>
and spending 40 years teaching New Testament in seminaries and institutes in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Egypt</st1:country-region>, <st1:country-region w:st="on">Lebanon</st1:country-region>,
<st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> and <st1:place w:st="on">Cyprus</st1:place>. His book Jesus through Middle Eastern Eyes
draws on ancient, medieval and modern books written in Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac
and Arabic.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One thing he observes.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Middle Eastern writing
follows different customs from western literature. In western writing an argument is developed
in stages – from a beginning through a development to a conclusion.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you want to know
the message – look to the conclusion.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Do that in Lamentations
and it is pretty bleak.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But Middle Easter
writing is fond of a different kind of structure. And the key to that structure lies in the
very layout of the Book of Lamentations.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There is a sequence A
– B – C – B – A.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The argument reaches
its climax not at the end but in the middle.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
See how that works in
Lamentations and something remarkable happens.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Our attention is drawn
to the middle chapter simply because it is three times the length.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It begins intensely
personally.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This is the feeling of
devastation of someone at their lowest.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It not only resonates
for those caught up in the destruction of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city>,
this is a chapter that resonates for anyone who senses their world has fallen
apart.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In a powerful book on
depression this was a chapter that for some described the abject awfulness of
depressive illness.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 16.5pt;">
<span class="cc"><span style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 27.0pt;">3</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I am one who has
seen affliction<br />
under the rod of God’s<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Lamentations.doc"></a>wrath;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">2</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">he has driven and brought me<br />
into darkness without any light;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">3</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">against me alone he turns his hand,<br />
again and again, all day long.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">4</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">He has made my flesh and my skin waste away,<br />
and broken my bones;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">5</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">he has besieged and enveloped me<br />
with bitterness and tribulation;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">6</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">he has made me sit in darkness<br />
like the dead of long ago.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">7</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">He has walled me about so that I cannot escape;<br />
he has put heavy chains on me;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">8</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">though I call and cry for help,<br />
he shuts out my prayer;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">9</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">he has blocked my ways with hewn stones,<br />
he has made my paths crooked.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This is the cry of the
person whose prayers are not heeded.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is devastating.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And then something
remarkable happens.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the whole bible,
this has to be the bleakest book.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the middle of this
the bleakest book it is as if a light is shone into the darkness, a light that
has the capacity to pierce the gloom.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">19</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The thought of my affliction and my homelessness<br />
is wormwood and gall!<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">20</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">My soul continually thinks of it<br />
and is bowed down within me.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">21</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">But this I call to mind,<br />
and therefore I have hope:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">22</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The steadfast love of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>never
ceases,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Lamentations.doc"></a><br />
his mercies never come to an end;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">23</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">they are new every morning;<br />
great is your faithfulness.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">24</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘The<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>is my portion,’ says my soul,<br />
‘therefore I will hope in him.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the most unexpected
of places we get to the heart of the Good News of our Faith.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is when things are
at their worst that light shines into the darkness.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Notice what happens
here.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This I call to
mind. It is a deliberate focusing. A turning of the mind. It is something that gives hope.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is the steadfast
love of the Lord that never ceases.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All may seem to have
collapsed but God’s love prevails.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This enters our psyche
through a hymn I remember singing so often at school, <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
New Every morning is
the love our wakening and uprising prove.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
New mercies each
returning day surround your people as they pray.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is in the writing
of Thomas Chisholm, plagued through his life by ill health that resulted in the
ending of his ministry after only a year, that these words come so powerfully
to life.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Great is your
faithfulness<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Great is your
faithfulness<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Morning by morning new
mercies I see<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All I have needed your
hand has provided<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Great is your
faithfulness Father to me.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is a powerful
passage to share. I well remember
sharing it with someone in moments of deep depression. Much, much later, they recalled the comments
we had shared. It wasn’t these verses
that stuck in their memory. But the ones
that followed.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After speaking of the
need to wait, and to wait some more, the writer has a much more oblique word to
share …<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is a promise to
hold on to when things are not readily coming back together again.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">31</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">For the Lord will not</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> reject for ever.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">32</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Although he causes grief,
he will have compassion</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> according to the abundance of
his steadfast love;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">33</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">for he does not willingly
afflict</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> or grieve anyone.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There is something
special about Lamentations. And in its
very structure.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Steeped as we are in
western ways of thinking, we can give the impression that the journey of faith
is linear. From despair to hope. And if we can follow through the logical
sequence from the start through its development to its conclusion all will be
well.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There is something in
Lamentations to hold on to. It is more
true to life, to the experience I have shared, and to experiences others have
shared with me.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We glimpse the grounds
for hope – but then we have to return to the awfulness of the world.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Lamentations is true
to that pattern. For after the hope in
the middle of the book, the lament returns, as devastating as ever.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In a life where we
might on occasions reach the mountain top we have to return to the valley – but
let’s bring to mind what we have glimpsed.
And hold on to that promise.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The ninth of Av in
that Jewish calendar I looked up on the Internet is described as a day of
mourning, a day of hope.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the midst of all
that gives rise to the despair of lament let us find hope in just the way the
writer of these words did<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">21</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">But this I call to mind,<br />
and therefore I have hope:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">22</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The steadfast love of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>never
ceases,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Lamentations.doc"></a><br />
his mercies never come to an end;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">23</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">they are new every morning;<br />
great is your faithfulness.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">24</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘The<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>is my portion,’ says my soul,<br />
‘therefore I will hope in him.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-66341496031567597152012-04-22T11:48:00.002-07:002012-04-22T11:48:51.428-07:00The once irredeemable dark - Ecclesiastes<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It has to be one of the all-time great
passages of the Bible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ecclesiastes 3.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s one I grew up with at school. It’s one rolled out for the big
occasion. Founders Day.
Remembrance Sunday.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s one of the few pop records I actually
got round to buying. The flip side of
Mary Hopkin singing ‘those were the days’ was that wonderful to everything
there is a season, turn, turn turn. And
a time for every purpose under heaven. I
could almost sing it. But I won’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">For everything there is a season, and a time
for every matter under heaven:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to be born, and a time to die;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is
planted;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to kill, and a time to heal;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to break down, and a time to build up;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to weep, and a time to laugh;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to mourn, and a time to dance;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to throw away stones, and a time to
gather stones together;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from
embracing;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to seek, and a time to lose;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to keep, and a time to throw away;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to tear, and a time to sew;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time to love, and a time to hate;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">a time for war, and a time for peace.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What do you make of that great passage?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Is it an indication of how things ought to
be?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Or is it a description of the way things
are?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How you answer that question will shape the
way you read Ecclesiastes. And it will
go a long way towards shaping the way you look at life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Take it as an indication of how things
ought to be and you can see it as a statement of what God wants for his world,
a statement of what God wants for our lives.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">If that is what this passage is saying then
there are some major difficulties for us as Christian readers. Is there really a time for us to hate as well
as a time for us to love. Jesus sees
things very differently in those memorable words from the Sermon on the Mount
that seem to have an echo of Ecclesiastes in them, almost as if Jesus, the
Teacher is in conversation with
Ecclesiastes, Qohelet the preacher.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="vv"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">43</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> ‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your
neighbour and hate your enemy.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">44</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who
persecute you,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">45</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he
makes his sun rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and
on the unrighteous.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Read it very differently, however, and this
passage takes on a very different feel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">One of the things that appeals to me about
my Christian faith and indeed about the bible is that it is down to earth. It is realistic. Sometimes brutally so.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let’s see these words not as an indication
of what God wants for his world, but a description of the way things are. Whether we like it or not, this is what the
world is like, this is life as we know it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There’s no value judgement here. There is nothing to say that this is how
things SHOULD be. This is simply a
description of the way things are.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A great deal of the Bible is to do with
what God wants for his world. The books
of the law set a framework for living in the world, that’s taken up and brought
to fulfilment by Jesus, not least in the Sermon on the Mount.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The prophets tell the story of the kings
and rulers of the people <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>
and the way they are continually challenged to turn away from injustices and to
seek justice for all the people in the name of God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s powerful stuff. It’s about setting things right. It’s about putting an end to wrong. But on more than one occasion, people have
come out of church on a Sunday evening saying but the real world isn’t like
that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ecclesiastes is the book for those
moments. It is a book that speaks into
those times when things are not going well.
When things are not as they ought to be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There is a despair about the writing of the
Preacher, or as the NRSV has it, the Teacher, Qoheleth</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">1:2</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Vanity of vanities, says
the Teacher,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ecclesiastes%20through%20Jesus's%20eyes.doc"></a></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> vanity of vanities! All is
vanity.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">3</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">What do people gain from
all the toil</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> at which they toil under the
sun?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ecclesiastes is associated with Solomon and
in our very logically ordered English bibles comes between Proverbs and Song of
Solomon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Whereas Proverbs is a book full of
confidence in the wisdom that comes from God, Ecclesiastes has a despair to
it. After devoting a life to the pursuit
of wisdom, still the world remains a perturbing place where it is difficult to
discern any meaning to life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I, the Teacher,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ecclesiastes%20through%20Jesus's%20eyes.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>when king over Israel in Jerusalem,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">13</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">applied my mind to
seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven; it is an
unhappy business that God has given to human beings to be busy with.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">14</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I saw all the deeds
that are done under the sun; and see, all is vanity and a chasing after wind.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ecclesiastes%20through%20Jesus's%20eyes.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">15</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">What is crooked cannot be made straight,<br />
and what is lacking cannot be counted.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span class="vv"><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">16</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> I said to
myself, ‘I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> before me; and
my mind has had great experience of wisdom and knowledge.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">17</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">And I applied my
mind to know wisdom and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also
is but a chasing after wind.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ecclesiastes%20through%20Jesus's%20eyes.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">18</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">For in much wisdom is much vexation,<br />
and those who increase knowledge increase sorrow.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is bleak stuff!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And yet it is how one can feel. It’s almost like the Footballer who reaches
the pinnacle of their career only to find there is no satisfaction. Still there is an emptiness. An unrelenting emptiness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="cc"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #666666; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 24.0pt;">2</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I said to myself, ‘Come now, I will make a test of pleasure;
enjoy yourself.’ But again, this also was vanity.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">2</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I said of laughter, ‘It is mad’, and of pleasure, ‘What use
is it?’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That leads on to the passage we read …
there’s a glimmer of hope. God is in
this. But only a glimmer of hope. Maybe this is just the world the way it
is. But it’s a pretty grim place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Moreover, I saw under the sun that in the place
of justice, wickedness was there, and in the place of righteousness, wickedness
was there as well.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>I said in my
heart, God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for he has appointed a time
for every matter, and for every work.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>I
said in my heart with regard to human beings that God is testing them to show
that they are but animals.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>For
the fate of humans and the fate of animals is the same; as one dies, so dies
the other. They all have the same breath, and humans have no advantage over the
animals; for all is vanity.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>All
go to one place; all are from the dust, and all turn to dust again.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Who knows whether the human spirit
goes upwards and the spirit of animals goes downwards to the earth?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>So I saw that there is nothing better
than that all should enjoy their work, for that is their lot; who can bring
them to see what will be after them?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is bleak indeed. So what do you do? Take life as it comes? Eat, drink and be merry. 9.7.
Maybe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Yet, yet, yet. There is something. A glimmer.
Something to hold on to.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Maybe wisdom is important. A lovely momentary parable …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And yet even that glimmer of hope seems to
be snuffed out …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">9:13ff</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="vv"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">13</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> I have also seen this example of wisdom under the sun,
and it seemed important to me.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">14</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">There was a little city with few people in it. A great king
came against it and besieged it, building great siege-works against it.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">15</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Now there was found in it a poor, wise man, and he by his
wisdom delivered the city. Yet no one remembered that poor man.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">16</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">So I said, ‘Wisdom is better than might; yet the poor man’s
wisdom is despised, and his words are not heeded.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And yet even that glimmer of hope seems to
be snuffed out</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Come towards the end and there are more
wise words of wisdom. Seize the
day. Make the most of your youth. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then comes an ending.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="vv"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">13</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God,
and keep his commandments; for that is the whole duty of everyone.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">14</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">For God will bring every deed into judgement, including</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ecclesiastes%20through%20Jesus's%20eyes.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">every secret thing, whether good or evil.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What do we make of such a bleak book?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I for one am glad it’s in the bible. It’s how people feel. It is brutally down to earth in its realistic
assessment of what this grim world too often can be like.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the point is that that feeling of
desolation is within the experience of faith.
Faith is not something that eliminates all bleakness, however much we
might like it to do just that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The whole point of our series on the Old
Testament is to suggest ways of reading what can be difficult books. Two things are important to my mind. First, never take a text or even a book in
isolation from the whole of the Bible.
What is fascinating is that the writers of the Old Testament are often
in conversation with each other. The
wonderful faith of so many of the Psalms, the confidence of the Book of
Proverbs with its recipe for living, the exuberance of the Song of Solomon –
they are all in a kind of counterpoint with the bleakness of this book.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You want to say at the very end … yes, but
read on. And in our English bibles we
read on into the Song of Solomon with its joyous celebration of humanity.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">By Jewish people Ecclesiastes is read as
part of the Autumnal festival of Tabernacles which leads up to the last of the
harvest festivals before winter. There
is something autumnal in the bleakness of this book. On each of the seven days of that festival
the Jewish people build a make-shift shelter in the garden and spend some time
in it. It is a remembrance of the yearst
they spent in the wilderness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s a thought.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Wilderness experiences are part of the
Jewish experience. And not to be
forgotten. It is in remembering them
that something can be brought into the future.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks on Thought for the Day on Yom Hashoah, marking the
Jewish remembrance of The Holocaust commented,
<i><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">We can’t change the past, but by remembering it, we might
just change the future.</span><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus too had wilderness experiences. Those 40 days and nights in the
wilderness. The wilderness figures large
in John the Baptists’ ministry. Jesus can
only reach his baptism by spending those bleak 40 days and nights in the
wilderness. He has to get through <st1:place w:st="on">Gethsemane</st1:place>, he has to get through that feeling of
abandonment by God on the cross to reach resurrection.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Maybe this kind of experience is part of
our experience … what some have described as the dark night of the soul.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus takes the spirit of Ecclesiastes seriously
… but he does not go with what it sets out.
Eat, drink and be merry is the philosophy of the rich fool who stores up
treasures on earth only to meet an untimely end and have everything taken from
him. Seek ye first the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place>
and his righteousness, then all these things shall be added unto you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">All through the Sermon on the Mount you can
trace echoes of Ecclesistes – but the bleakness is not accepted. There is a confidence that through the valley
of the shadow is a presence that will not let us go</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span class="vv"><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">25</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> ‘Therefore I
tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will
drink,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ecclesiastes%20through%20Jesus's%20eyes.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>or
about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body
more than clothing?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">26</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Look at the birds of
the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly
Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">27</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">And can any of you
by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ecclesiastes%20through%20Jesus's%20eyes.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">28</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">And why do you worry
about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither
toil nor spin,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">29</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">yet I tell you, even
Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">30</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">But if God so
clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown
into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">31</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Therefore do not
worry, saying, “What will we eat?” or “What will we drink?” or “What will we
wear?”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">32</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">For it is the
Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows
that you need all these things.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">33</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">But strive first for
the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ecclesiastes%20through%20Jesus's%20eyes.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and his<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ecclesiastes%20through%20Jesus's%20eyes.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>righteousness, and all these things
will be given to you as well. </span><span class="vv"><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">34</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> ‘So do not
worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s
trouble is enough for today.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">
Take no thought for the morrow, sufficient unto the day is the evil
thereof.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
Echoes of this way of thinking … and yet
it is not bleak. There is hope. There is warmth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This was precisely what we explored in our
poetry evening on Wednesday. Out of the
Depths. Judi Marsh and friends from the
Poetry Society read some of the great poets in the first half of the
evening. But in a strange way the
evening for me really came alive in the second half when they read their own
poems.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In conversation after I learned how it was
people’s own experience of plumbing the depths in very difficult circumstances
had often turned them to poetry. And
through their poetry they found a way out of the depths.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let me finish with a poem of Judi Marsh’s
which I found particularly moving. It
starts where Ecclesiastes is – in a pretty bleak place. Vanity of vanities! All is vanity! Vanity not in the sense of pride. But in the sense of emptiness. Emptiness, emptiness all is emptiness. It is as if then in her poem Judi comes to
the place where Jesus is in those words of calm and reassurance in the Sermon
on the Mount. And it is in that place
that she finds the presence of God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i><u><span lang="EN-GB">Soul Seeker
by Judi Marsh<o:p></o:p></span></u></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Down
miles of unlit corridors<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">And
through all the sunless rooms<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">The
air – stuffy and dust-speckled –<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Swells
in the silent emptiness.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">I am
at home in this emptiness;<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">This
quiet place of quiet shadows<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Is my
hiding-place.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">My
friends do not come here;<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Their
voices have yet to echo<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Through
this darkness.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">But
Your voice is different<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Although
small and still<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">I
hear it clearly.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">When
You call out my real name<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">It
doesn’t bounce off the bare walls.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">It is
warm and Your words are arms<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">That
reach out to save, love, protect.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Somehow,<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Beyond
dare and dream,<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">You
take delight in me.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">You
sing of Your love for me<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">And
even these silent dusty rooms<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Reverberate
with sung love.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">And
now that I know<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">What
my treasure is <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">And
where my heart is,<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Sunlight
and song sweep through<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Strong
as an avalanche, to bury deep<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">The
once irredeemable dark.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-39435569857333791542012-04-15T12:08:00.001-07:002012-04-15T12:08:11.137-07:00Song of Songs - I am my beloved's and he is mine<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Last weekend was special in three ways at
least.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was of course the weekend of the Boat
Race. And this year Highbury had a stake
in the Boar Race. Highbury’s
longest-standing family is the Jeffreys family who trace their belonging here
at Highbury back to the late nineteenth century. Quite some record. And that’s the connection with the Boat Race.
It was with great excitement that I tuned in to shout for <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Oxford</st1:place></st1:city> and the Highbury connection.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Anne’s brother’s daughter’s husband’s
sister’s daughter was the Oxford Cox.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Wow, what a connection.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was interesting meeting up with Joanne,
Richard’s daughter on a day that was particularly special for her and her
husband and their family and for us an our church family here at Highbury. Special for the same reason and yet for quite
different reasons.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For Joanne the day was special because it
was Passover. He ten year old son,
Joshua, would be taking centre-stage at the family celebration on the evening I
met her at her in-laws house. He it is
who would be asking the key questions as the youngest member of the family as
the meal unfolded. Joanne would miss
that evening’s meal but catch up the next evening. She explained that outside of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> and <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region> the custom has developed to
have Passover on two days as it was difficult to work out which was the actual
day to have it on. It was fascinating
hearing her speak of the Passover customs her family followed, with the top to
toe clean of the house, the kosher food, the unleavened bread and the
excitement of the family celebration.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That same day for us was Good Friday. And just as special as we too mark the
anniversary of Passover even as we date Easter in such a way as to follow
Passover, parting only from the date of Passover when the Jewish way of accommodating
the solar and lunar calendars results in them adding in an extra month in a
leap year.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Passover is all about the freedom the
people gained from oppression as God delivered the people to liberty from
bondage in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Egypt</st1:place></st1:country-region>. It’s about the depth of love God has for his
people who, as Joanne said, feel the warmth of being special in God’s sight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Maybe it’s the depth and the closeness and
the warmth of the love between God and his people that is special at
Passover. Maybe that’s why it is at
Passover that the Jewish people read the second in the Megilloth, that set of five little scrolls in the third
section of the Hebrew Scriptures known as the Writings.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">At Passover the Jewish people read through
the Song of Solomon or the Song of Songs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is the most intensely personal of all
the books of the Bible and it is a remarkable celebration of the intensity of
personal love. At one level that’s
exactly what it is.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It has been said that there are three types
of love.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Agape love is that deep down love God has
for us and he wants us to share.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Philos love is that binding love that
friends have for one another and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Eros love is that intense love a couple
have for each other that finds its expression in the physical act of making
love.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is that third level of love, eros love,
that is celebrated here. As a lover and
his beloved exchange words of intense love with each other. Janet Wootton used to quip that she
encouraged a couple to read the Song of Songs to each other on their wedding
night. The imagery becomes very
powerful, very evocative. It is the
nearest in Christian holy writ we get to the Kama Sutra.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A remarkable piece of writing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How wrong people are to suggest Christians
are po-faced about sex. This is proof
positive that Christians celebrate sex and find for it a place of security and
fulfilment in the marriage of a man and a woman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Sometimes you will hear it said that
Christians consider sex and sexuality to be something that’s part of the
fallenness of human nature. The Song of
Songs knocks that one on its head and is in Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s words the
finest celebration of the sheer goodness of God’s creation at the most personal
of levels.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When the Greek translations of the Hebrew
Scriptures applied their logical
approach to the ordering of the books they noted that the Song of Songs
was associated with Solomon. And so they
put it as part of a trilogy of books associated with Solomon hard on the heels
of the Book of Psalms we associate with David.
Proverbs and Ecclesiastes are linked with Solomon because of his
wisdom. The Song of Songs is linked with
Solomon and in many Bibles headed the Song of Solomon because of the Don Juan
side of Solomon’s nature, having as he did a love for a thousand women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Some can say it’s a cop out when the Jewish
people arranged this book quite differently and set it in the Canon in that set
of five books they associate with the major festivals of the liturgical year.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">By linking the Song of songs with the
Festival of Passover you might say they are reneging on the wonder of physical
love and ‘spiritualising’ these very erotic words by applying them to the love
God has for his people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Another way of looking at it is to think
that for the Jewish people at Passover this was more than a doctrinal
statement, or a historical commemoration.
Eating together in the most intimate of settings as a family was to be
reminded of the intimacy of God’s love for each family and for each person in
that family.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Maybe we can take a leaf out of that Jewish
book in coming to the Song of Songs in this Easter season as we still are
celebrating the death and resurrection of Christ in the Easter season.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Passion and Easter are not just at the
heart of our Christian faith and doctrine, they are not something to explore
historically, they are an expression of the intimacy of God’s love for each one
of us and for us all as a family of his people bound together in this place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s interesting that it is in Holy Week,
on one of those days between Palm Sunday and Maundy Thursday, on one of the
days leading up to the Passover Festival that Jesus tells a story about a
Wedding Banquet. The feasting is a
celebration of the love God has for his people – many turn down the invitation,
and yet all are drawn in. And in
enigmatic fashion Jesus speaks challengingly of the need to join in the spirit
of celebration, the spirit of joy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I wonder whether that prompted a train of
thought that then finds its culmination in those words from Revelation 21 we
began our service with.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for
the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>And I saw the holy city, the new
Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for
her husband.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>A</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the Christian tradition the Song of
Songs has been spiritualised of the relationship between God and the
church. The church has been seen as the
bride of Christ. Is this a cop-out
because the church is unwilling to affirm the beauty of that eros love that is
celebrated in the Song of Songs. Or is
it also an insight into the intensity of that love God has for us and we may
have of God in return.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In contemplation and prayer maybe we can
draw on the imagery of the Song of Songs and rejoice in the closeness of the
love bond that binds us together with God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For to belong to the church is to be bride
of Christ and in the closest of bonds with Christ.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When my father came to preach the last of
his sermons and come to the last point he would make in a long preaching
ministry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He said with conviction. One more thing I cannot give up on. I cannot give up on the love of the lover of
souls.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s the love God has for us we may share
with him. That’s the love captured in
the wonderful poetry of the Song of Songs.</span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The voice of my beloved!<br />
Look, he comes,<br />
leaping upon the mountains,<br />
bounding over the hills.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
My beloved is like a gazelle<br />
or a young stag.<br />
Look, there he stands<br />
behind our wall,<br />
gazing in at the windows,<br />
looking through the lattice.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
My beloved speaks and says to me:<br />
‘Arise, my love, my fair one,<br />
and come away;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
for now the winter is past,<br />
the rain is over and gone.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
The flowers appear on the earth;<br />
the time of singing has come,<br />
and the voice of the turtle-dove<br />
is heard in our land.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
The fig tree puts forth its figs,<br />
and the vines are in blossom;<br />
they give forth fragrance.<br />
Arise, my love, my fair one,<br />
and come away.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
O my dove, in the clefts of the rock,<br />
in the covert of the cliff,<br />
let me see your face,<br />
let me hear your voice;<br />
for your voice is sweet,<br />
and your face is lovely.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Catch us the foxes,<br />
the little foxes,<br />
that ruin the vineyards—<br />
for our vineyards are in blossom.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
My beloved is mine and I am his;<br />
he pastures his flock among the lilies.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Until the day breathes<br />
and the shadows flee,<br />
turn, my beloved, be like a gazelle<br />
or a young stag on the cleft mountains.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Song%20of%20Songs.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">One final thought.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">To think of the intimacy of God’s love is
something that prompts us to go into the world and face the world and know that
we are not alone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Three times that phrase is repeated </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I am my beloved’s and he is mine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I am my beoloved’s and he is mine (6:3)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I am my beloved’s and he is mine (7:10)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And on that last occasion – comes the
invitation to go out into the world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I am my beloved’s,</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and his desire is for me.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">Come, my beloved,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> let us go forth into the
fields,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and lodge in the villages;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">let us go out early to the vineyards,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and see whether the vines have
budded,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">whether the grape blossoms have opened</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and the pomegranates are
in bloom.</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">There I will give you my love.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is as we go out into God’s world
immersed in the love of the lover of souls that we have the strength to do what
on our own we could not.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-70965106986037604542012-04-08T12:47:00.002-07:002012-04-08T12:47:29.031-07:00Eyes Opened Wide - on the Road to Emmaus<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Meanwhile, standing near the cross of
Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and
Mary Magdalene.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">We
were coming towards the end of our Good Friday sequence of services that had
led us from the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">Garden</st1:placetype>
of <st1:placename w:st="on">Gethsemane</st1:placename></st1:place> to the foot
of the cross. Here, on the walk of
witness and at St Mary’s Church we had simply drawn on the biblical text. It was as I was reading those words aloud and
then waiting in silence for the next reader to approach the microphone, that
one name caught my eye.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Mary,
the wife of Clopas.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">No
one knows who the two on the Road to Emmaus were.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">But
one of them is named. Richard Bauckham,
in a fascinating book, Jesus and the Eye Witnesses suggests that people whose
name is given and whose story is not known in the Gospels may well have been
the people whose personal memories shaped the telling of the Gospel story of
Jesus. The Eye-Witnesses who, he
suggests, were honoured by the early church and referred to right at the outset
in Luke’s Gospel.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">The
one who is named is Cleopas.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Could
it be the same person?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Some
traditions have it that the two on the Road to Emmaus were husband and
wife. An intriguing thought I want to
hold on to for a moment.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Each
month we support a local charity through our communion collections and at
coffee on a Sunday morning. We
occasionally invite a representative of the charity to speak. In March we supported the work of Cheltneham
Youth for Christ and invited the Director of CYFC to speak. So it was that Paul Bennett preached on 18<sup>th</sup>
March.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">He
was very apologetic to me personally for stealing my thunder. As his sermon unfolded I felt I wanted him to
retract his apology. I, for one, found
it challenging and full of insight. One
thing in particular caught my attention.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">He
preached on the Road to Emmaus story and apologised lest he was jumping the gun
and anticipating my Easter sermon. I
didn’t let on about my custom of preaching on that theme each Sunday
evening. I waited to hear what he would
have to say, thinking, as you do, I will have heard it all before.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Not
a bit of it. He made two observations
that really set my mind thinking.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">First,
he told a story that, I guess could only happen in a Sat Nav age. He described how a car drew up to the
pavement near Boots Corner, mum and dad were in the front seats, an agitated
teenager in the back. Can you tell us
how to get to the Hanger roundabout? Was
the question asked as the window was wound down.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Now,
as it happened Paul knew where the Hanger Roundabout was. He asked whether anyone else knew. Ian Wallington knew instantly, Richard Newton
as well and Sheila Grimes. They all knew
their <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">London</st1:place></st1:city>. It’s a major junction not far from
Twickenham. The family had tickets for a
U2 concert and their Sat Nav had led them astray.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">As the
window was wound up and the family set off forlornly for the M4 Paul didn’t
like to imagine the conversation going on in the car.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">He
then went on to reflect how much we make of life as ‘a journey’ and how much we
make of our Christian faith as ‘a journey’.
But he suggested that most people go on a journey in order to get
somewhere. It’s not enough to say we are
all on the journey, but we also need to feel we are going towards our
destination and we’ll get there.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">An
interesting and challenging thought.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">So
where are we heading for in our journey?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">That
brings me back to the other of Paul’s observations.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">He
suggested that anyone who knew their Bibles and in particular their Old
Testament well would immediately spot an allusion towards the end of the story
of the two on the Road to Emmaus.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">It
comes in verse 31.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">“Then
their eyes were opened, and they recognised him.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">When
I set about the task of taking the lid off the Old Testament and reading it
through the eyes of Jesus I started out on the Road to Emmaus, and as we have
read through the Law, the Prophets and now the Writings I have found myself
coming back to it. The conversations
between the two friends and the unrecognised Christ are for me the key to a Christian
reading of the Hebrew Scriptures.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">So I
thought I ought to know the allusion.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">But
I couldn’t for the life of me think what it was.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">And
the Paul explained it. It goes right
back to the beginning of the Bible and to Genesis chapter 3. It is that moment in the Garden of Eden when
The Man and the Woman have both eaten of the forbidden fruit. Genesis 3:7<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">“Then
the eyes of both were opened, and they knew they were naked.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">This
suggested Paul is what the story of the Road to Emmaus is about. It amounts to the reversal of the calamity
that is the fall. The tragedy of the
fall is reversed in the encounter with Christ.
Where once ‘eyes were opened, and they knew they were naked’, now ‘eyes
are opened and the recognise the risen, living Christ.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">This,
suggested Paul, is what it’s all about. One story arrives at devastation, the other
story arrives at a glorious, liberating meeting with the risen Christ that
transforms and renews the whole of life.
That’s the destination for the journey we are invited to take.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">I’ve
always felt that the opening chapters of Genesis set the scene for the whole
Bible and contain in microcosm the message of the whole Bible. They are a wonderful prologue to the whole
thing.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">I
reject the view that they contain as it were ‘scientific’ accounts that explain
‘how’ the world began. In Genesis 1-11 I
believe there is every indication we are in the realm of poetry and story
telling that has to do with the truths of human existence. These stories are larger than life stories
about the beginnings of things that contain timeless truths for every
generation.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">As
such those stories touch real, human stories and help us to understand what’s
going on in them.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">The
accounts of the resurrection are different. They have the feel to me of
narratives that are written by people who have experienced the remarkable
transformation of resurrection and have found that the encounter with the risen
Christ has renewed their whole lives and given them renewed hope and confidence
in God and a renewed sense of purpose and direction as human beings travelling
the journey of life. They are written in
order to help those who were not eye-witnesses to get it and to believe that
the resurrection of Christ is the life-changing thing that will make the world
of difference to us all.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">What’s
interesting is the way those larger-than-life stories about beginnings can then
speak into the real-life situation these people find themselves in.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Those
larger than life stories of Genesis 2 and 3 are about the Man and the
Woman. They speak into every man’s and
every woman’s experience, not least Cleopas and his wife.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">The
Man and the Woman are set in a world of God’s making. Cleopas and his wife were convinced of
that. It is a world to delight in where
The Man and the Woman are simply a part of creation to play their part in
it. But in that age-old story the Man
and the Woman are not content simply to be a part of the world of God’s
creation, they want to take their own destiny into their own hands.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">That
is the human instinct down through the ages – the key to having your own
destiny in your own hands is knowledge – that’s what’s driven humanity. The knowledge of good … and of evil.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">How
devastatingly dangerous that is God knows, which is why in that age old story
God wants to protect humanity from the journeying that will result from that
knowledge.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Knowledge
is attractive. It is an attractive
thought that we each hold our own destiny in our own hands.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">There
is that whisper in the ear – surely God wants you to go down that route. God
knows that when you take your own destiny in your own hands and gain
this remarkable knowledge of good and of evil you will be like God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">That’s
attractive. And it is the story of
humanity. Humanity’s quest is to take
their destiny into your own hands and through knowledge of good and of evil
become the GOD of all the world, in charge in mastery over it all.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Cleopas
and, dare we say, wife Mary are in that position. As the stranger joins them ‘their eyes were
kept from recognizing him’ (verse 16).
The description they give of all the events in Jerusalem of the last few
days suggests that actually in following Jesus they were doing just as the Man
and the Woman had been doing in that story.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">They
hadn’t got it. They had been following
Jesus for very human reasons. They had
supposed he was the one to overthrow the Romans and enable them to take their
own destiny in their own hands. As far
as they were concerned Jesus had given them knowledge that excited them and
they thought they could use to take control themselves. “We had supposed he was the one to set <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region> free”
9verse 21)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">No
wonder Jesus was exasperated. Oh how
foolish you are and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have
declared.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">What
Jesus then does is to go right the way back to the beginning “The beginning
with the books of the Torah and with all the prophets, he gives them a way of
reading those Hebrew Scriptures that makes sense of all he had come to do and
of all he had come to say, that makes sense of everything about himself.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Already
this was beginning to be a life-changing experience. This really was an eye-OPENING experience for
them. Their hearts were burning as he
talked to them on the road, while he was OPENING up the scriptures to them.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Then
it is as they eat that their eyes are opened.
They recognise him. They see him
for who he is.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Now
it is not that they are going to take their own destiny into their own
hands. But Christ has opened up a way
for them to follow so that the destiny of humanity is once more in God’s hands.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">And
what of us?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Our
humanity so often gets the better of us.
We want to take our destiny into our own hands. And we buy into a way of life that puts
humanity in the place of God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">Resurrection
opens up for us something entirely different – we are to become as Christ,
embracing a suffering world in order to share in the glory of God’s
resurrection victory. We know where we
are going – it is the way Christ Jesus has opened up for us. It is the way of resurrection and of life
eternal.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">And
we are called to be the Christ figure willing to enter into the journeys other
people are making so that they too can find the way.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000;">That’s
exactly how Paul described his task in Youth for Christ. It’s all about coming
alongside people in the journey they are making and being Christ for them so that they can
discover the destination the risen Christ opens up for them in the life
eternal, a life that begins here and now and nothing, not even death, can
defeat.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-26813015621207393012012-03-25T13:06:00.000-07:002012-03-25T13:11:55.232-07:00The story of Ruth ... a fresh perspective from Malawi<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Since preparing this evening’s sermon on
Friday evening much has happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">So much, that the sermon I preached was
quite different from the sermon I prepared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Last Sunday I found I could not cover the
wonderful story of Ruth in one evening … and so I left the story on a
cliff-hanger of an ending at the end of chapter 1 wondering what kind of a
reception Ruth, the Moabite widow would have when she arrived with the widowed
Naomi back in Bethlehem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I intended to tell the remainder of the
story, focusing a number of things as you will see by looking below at the
script I prepared on Friday evening.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0cm;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The provision made for the poor, the widow, the orphan and the
family at harvest in Leviticus 19 and Deuteronomy 24 is carried out in the
story and models for us a care for the pooer, the widow, the orphan and
the foreigner today.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">The image of Boaz as a ‘kinsman-redeemer’, a ‘go-el’ who is the
family member who will ensure that a widow or indeed others who are facing
oppression and are very vulnerable will be given a new lease of life, is a
wonderful image to have in mind as Easter approaches and we think of
Christ as ‘redeemer’.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Ruth’s association in the Jewish liturgical calendar with the
festival of Pentecost, the spring harvest festival, prompted reflections
on the way the Spirit’s coming is to people of all nationalities in Acts 2
and that chapter culminates in the believers sharing everything together. As we are given a new lease of life by
Christ the redeemer, whoever we may be, so that new life is sealed by the
Spirit’s presence deep within.</span></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01dmzcz" target="_blank">I finished my preparation and watched theBBC 2 progamme, Reverse Missionaries. </a> A
century and a half ago David Livingstone had gone from <st1:city w:st="on">Blantyre</st1:city>
in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Scotland</st1:country-region> to central <st1:place w:st="on">Africa</st1:place>. By now we
think very little of Livingstone, but in those central countries of Africa he
is greatly honoured, not least in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>, where 80% of the population
are Christian. The programme makers
arranged for Pastor John to come from <st1:city w:st="on">Blantyre</st1:city>
in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Malawi</st1:country-region> to <st1:city w:st="on">Blantyre</st1:city> in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Scotland</st1:place></st1:country-region> and spend a fortnight with
our Congregational Federation church there. IT was a church Felicity had
visited in her year as President of the Congregational Federation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What he saw of our secular society saddened
him and moved him to tears. It was
moving then to see how he took a leaf our of David Livingstone’s book and went
along with the culture in order to seek to share the good news of the Christian
faith over here.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was a powerful, challenging, humbling
programme.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Not least because this is a weekend when we
have been marking our partnership through the Congregational Federation with
churches in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On Saturday a group of us from church went
to our Area Assembly at <st1:placename w:st="on">Stapleton</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">Road</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">Church</st1:placetype>
in <st1:city w:st="on">Bristol</st1:city> where we were joined by people from
our area who had joined others from CF churches to visit some of our partner
churches in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This morning we had a parade service and
welcomed Candi, her husband Andrew and their family to Highbury. Candi had been to <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region> and shared her experience.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Only recently becoming a Christian and
joining church Candi had been immensely moved by what she experienced in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>. With everyone else in the group she went
expecting to give and came back realising she had received so much more.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">After the service I asked Candi to share
some of her thoughts for our evening congregation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">At our Parade Service we looked forward to
developing more links with <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>
by the time of our next Parade when we
hope to be joined by members of the Malawi Olympic Team. Thanks to links the <st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype>
of <st1:placename w:st="on">Gloucestershire</st1:placename> have built up in
the last three or four years Gloucestershire is hosting the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region> team for
the Olympics.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This afternoon I turned to my final
preparations for this evening’s service.
I turned to two special commentaries I have.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">About ten years ago <st1:personname w:st="on">Goodwin
Zainga</st1:personname> from the Churches of Christ in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region> had
studied with us on our course. As he
left with Gloria and his family to return to <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region> we exchanged copies of <a href="http://paulinespublicationsafrica.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/african-bible.html" target="_blank">theAfrican Bible.</a> My copy bears a lovely
inscription from Goodwin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br /><a href="http://www.zondervan.com/media/samples/pdf/0310264731_samptxt.pdf" target="_blank">More recently, a couple of years ago I acquired the Africa Bible Commentary, aone-volume commentary written 70 African scholars. An evangelical protestant commentary, Iturned up the commentary on Ruth.</a></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was one of those special moments in
preparing worship when everything comes together in a way that simply hadn’t
been planned, and yet has something of God in it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The commentary on Ruth had been written by Isabel Apawo Phiri. A Malawian, she had a B.Ed. from <st1:placename w:st="on">Chancellor</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">College</st1:placetype>,
<st1:city w:st="on">University of Malawi</st1:city>, <st1:state w:st="on">MA</st1:state>
in Religious Education from <st1:city w:st="on">Lancaster University</st1:city>,
<st1:country-region w:st="on">England</st1:country-region>, a PhD from the <st1:placetype w:st="on">University</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">Capet</st1:placename>
town <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">South Africa</st1:place></st1:country-region>. A former lecturer at the universities of
Malawi and Namibia, she is currently Head of the School of Religion and
Theology at the University of KwaZulu-Natal,
South Africa and Co-ordinator of the Circle of Concerned African Women
Theologians. She had not only written
the commentary on Ruth but also helped to edit the Africa Bible Commentary.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was wonderful reading her commentary.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">She splices her commentary with wonderful
Malawian proverbs in Chewa, her language.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">“In order to see a story in its context, it
is important to consider whey it was written.
This truth is enshrined in the saying umanena chatsitasa dzaye kuti
njobvu ithyoke nyanga (Chewa <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>
– ‘You have to mention what caused the fruit to fall and break the elephant’s
tusk’”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are wonderful, insightful proverbs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But what caught my eye were the emphases
Isabel, a woman, a Malawian, an African, had in her commentary. They challenge us in this country too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the commentary there are two panels
focusing on key themes in Ruth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
The first is on Refugees. It addresses
the refugee crisis in <st1:place w:st="on">Africa</st1:place> and challenges
churches not only to give a cup of cold water but also to enable refugees to
fend for themselves. It also challenges
churches to address the causes of the refugee problems. Above all it appeals for that ‘love and
acceptance of foreigner’ in the story of Ruth to be taken seriously by churches
today.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We all hailed Joanna Lumley’s campaign to
give Ghurka soldiers and their family their due reward for serving in the British
armed servies. It is a remarkable quirk
of British empire history that Ghurkas have fought in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Iraq</st1:country-region> and <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Afghanistan</st1:place></st1:country-region> and still are a key
part of our British army and to our shame that until that campaign they had
little reward.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But this week we read that <st1:place w:st="on">Aldershot</st1:place> have had an influx of 10,000 Ghurka peoples and
family members. I recalled the way
because of another quirk of British empire history the Asians who had been
taken from <st1:country-region w:st="on">India</st1:country-region> and Asia to
<st1:country-region w:st="on">Uganda</st1:country-region> to become key
business people had been expelled by Idi Amin and found a home in <st1:place w:st="on">Leicester</st1:place>. I
recalled my home city of <st1:city w:st="on">Leicester</st1:city>’s tradition
of welcoming refugee populations over more than a century from <st1:place w:st="on">Europe</st1:place> and now from one time Empire. And the way they had succeeded in creating a
society that keeps people together.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What is our attitude to the foreigner? May it be our prayer that <st1:place w:st="on">Aldershot</st1:place>
can learn from that kind of experience and have the support they need.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How much we have to receive from those insights
from <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
The other box focuses on widow inheritance. I had been going to reflect on the wonderful
way Boaz was the ‘kinsman-redeemer’ who looked after Ruth.
But Isabel Phiri’s commentary and that additional panel, made me see the
text differently.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ruth is exposed to potential abuse by the
young men of the village. In <st1:place w:st="on">Africa</st1:place> the custom of a male member of the family marrying
a widow is widespread but open to all sorts of abuse leading to massive hurt to
women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Reading the commentary notes there is a
heartfelt plea for a different approach to the care of widows and a rejection
of the abuse of women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And because of what happened this weekend
that, for me, was not something simply for <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region> with its problems with the
abuse of women and the often related epidemic of HIV.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On Saturday evening I had found myself at a
commissioning service for Street Pastors.
What a shame our Sue Cole was unable to go having gone down with
shingles! Very much for our prayers!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Chief Constable, Tony Melville, spoke
and commended Street Pastors. He was
open about his Christian commitment, but clear that his support for Street
Pastors was a support that was there from the Police in their own right. It was great to see how open he was about his
Christian faith, quoting a wonderful passage in Galatians where we are enjoined
not to give up on doing good but to keep on doing good. Great to hear him pray.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But then he spoke of some of the needs of <st1:place w:st="on">Cheltenham</st1:place> that many are not aware of and of one
particular problem that has happened here over the years. That has to do with prostitution, sex trafficking
and the sex trade. Maybe it was no
coincidence that we were hard on the heels of Race Week.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It came home to me that Isabel’s
reflections on Ruth speak as much to us as they do to people in Africa and <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How wonderful to have received so much and
so many insights into the story of Ruth from the people of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That was something I had not expected when
I originally prepared my sermon notes!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How wonderful that through all the words of
Candi and those who visited <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>,
through all the words of that Afican Bible Commentary and through all the words
of the Book of Ruth there is a challenging Word of God for us to heed and act
on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And how great that there is a wonderful
word of Grace in the love Ruth found with Naomi and with Boaz.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And here are my original notes that were in
the event put to one side. I share them
as my eye had fallen on some lovely phrases in the Book of Ruth that I don’t
want to lose sight of!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ruth and Naomi came to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:place></st1:city> at the beginning of the barley
harvest.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Maybe that’s why in Jewish tradition for
1600 years Ruth has been read at the first of the Jewish harvest festivals, the
festival of weeks, the festival of Pentecost.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s fascinating to see what happens if you
read the Book of Ruth against the backdrop of that festival for us as Christian
readers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It tells us something about harvest and
what harvest is all about. But it tells
us more about the Spirit and the place of the Spirit in our lives too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The wonderful story teller responsible for
this book now introduces to someone very important …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Now Naomi had a kinsman on her husband’s side,
a prominent rich man, of the family of Elimelech, whose name was Boaz.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But the action of the story turns back to
Ruth and to Naomi. We are left in no
doubt for the significance of this story Ruth’s identity and family background
is significant.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">And Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, ‘Let me go
to the field and glean among the ears of grain,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We saw last week how Ruth was a woman of
courage and determination. That courage
and determination is evident straight away.
It is Ruth who takes the initiative.
She doesn’t wait for the older woman to sort her out. She acts.
And she acts in a particular way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">She wants to go to the field and glean
among the ears of corn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">My Bible refers to two passages that are
the kind of passages we often read at harvest time from Leviticus 19:9,10 and
Deuteronomy 24:19-22. On each occasion
at the harvest provision is made for widows and for foreigners. Express instruction is given that gleanings
should be left for the widow and for the foreigner.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ruth is both a widow and a foreigner.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">She is not al passive waiting for someone
to do something for her. She is active
in doing something – but the system gives her something she can do to feed
herself and look after herself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is one of those things that is right
to the fore in our celebration of harvest.
It is an occasion when we remember those in need. Those left on their own and vulnerable. And the foreigner in the midst. A society can be measured by the concern it
shows to its most vulnerable members and to those who are foreigners.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How we cope with ‘the foreigner’ – the
welcome, the need for proper provision. It’s
become an issue this week. It’s a quirk
of our history that among the service people who serve this country most
faithfully even now in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Afghanistan</st1:place></st1:country-region>
are the Ghurkas. It is a shame in this
country the lack of provision and respect we have given to those particular ex
servicement. That was rectified a couple
of years ago thanks to the campaigning of Joanna Lumley. And now we are faced with 10,000 Ghurka
families in <st1:place w:st="on">Aldershot</st1:place>. This is a big issue. How do we respond – a lot has been spoken of
the covenant there is with service men and women who give their lives for this
country – and now too for the Ghurkas.
Difficult – a proper response.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I recall when Idi Amin’s <st1:country-region w:st="on">Uganda</st1:country-region> demanded that the Indian business men who
had been brought across from <st1:country-region w:st="on">India</st1:country-region>
in the days of empire to play key roles in the commerce of <st1:country-region w:st="on">Uganda</st1:country-region> and given British citizenship came to <st1:place w:st="on">Leicester</st1:place> – an influx in the order of many
thousands. Special school – a welcome in
a city that has welcomed refugee populations down through the years. Difficult issues.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But for a woman alone, and especially a
foreign woman alone there is grave danger that she be ‘taken advantage of’ by
the young men of the village. Caution is
called for.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Boaz arrives with a lovely greeting</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">He said to the reapers, ‘The<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>be
with you.’ They answered, ‘The<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>bless you.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"> Boaz
notices Ruth, she is introduced as the Moabite woman who came with Naomi and as
the one who had been gleaning among the sheaves</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">and she has been on her feet from early this
morning until now, without resting even for a moment.’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Boaz is concerned for her well being and
arranges for her to keep close to the young women in his field.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ruth is overcome – and what so moves her is
the very attitude that we have been noticing a moment or two ago …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘Why have I found favour in your sight, that
you should take notice of me, when I am a foreigner?’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Boaz tells her how he has noticed the care
Ruth has taken of Naomi – and he prays for a rich blessing from the God of
Israel under whose wings you have come for refuge.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Wonderful image of God as the one under
whose wings we come for refuge. This is
one of those wonderful images for God that is claimed by Jesus as he laments
over <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
…</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<st1:city w:st="on"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Jerusalem</span></st1:city><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">, <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>,
the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often
have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood
under her wings, and you were not willing!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There is something very special about
Boaz. Ruth acknowledges it … in
wonderful words of commendation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">you have comforted me and spoken kindly to your
servant, even though I am not one of your servants.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You have comforted me and spoken kindly to
your servant …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How vital it is to comfort and speak
kindly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then comes a special moment when Boaz invites
Ruth to share with him in the closest of ways …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">At mealtime Boaz said to her, ‘Come here, and
eat some of this bread, and dip your morsel in the sour wine.’ So she sat
beside the reapers, and he heaped up for her some parched grain. She ate until
she was satisfied, and she had some left over.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">All sorts of resonances there in the story
of Jesus – a relationship is growing between Boaz and Ruth that is going to be
very special. It is moving – it is a
very powerful. And as that relationship
is growing so it is sealed in a meal, the sharing of grain and the sharing of
sour wine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The relationship sealed between Christ and
his people is sealed in bread and wine – there is some left over. Echoes in the feeding of the 5000.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Is there a picture here of the close
relationship between Christ and his people.
Church has been seen as the bride of Christ. As Ruth is to become the bride of Boaz.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But that is to jump ahead in the story.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">At 3:17 is the start of a long story that
plays with ancient customs we catch a glimpse of.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When Naomi gets to hear of Boaz’s interest
in Ruth and this growing relationship she says to her daughter in law,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘The man is a relative of ours, one of our
nearest kin.’</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ruth%20%20part%202.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The word ‘nearest kin’ is an interesting
one. The footnote says that could be
translated ‘one with the right to redeem’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A woman, in this case Ruth, is left a widow
– how is she to be looked after. In the
family one maybe senior member of the family – in this instance the Naomi – Elimelech
family plays the part of the kinsman redeemer.
He can come close to the widow, take her as his bride – and so as it
were redeem the situation, free her from the poverty she would otherwise be in
and give her a new lease of life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Remember that’s what harvest is about. New lease of life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There may be another person in that role –
and the story builds up with a moment when it seems as if Ruth will not get her
man. Then at the last Boaz becomes her
‘kinsman redeemer’ and she is given a new lease of life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Boaz and Ruth marry</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Boaz acquires land as well and Ruth and
Boaz enter into a new life and Ruth, the Moabite woman, is given a new lease of
life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">May you have children in Ephratha and
bestow a name in Betlehem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then at the marriage it is the women who
sing praises and in excitement give praise to God … as they address Naomi …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And then it is in the arrival of a son for
Ruth and a Grandson for Naomi that wonderful blessing comes. This has to be the Grandparents’ wonderful
verse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">14</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Then the women said to
Naomi, ‘Blessed be the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>, who has not
left you this day without next-of-kin;</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ruth%20%20part%202.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">and may his name be
renowned in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region></st1:place>!<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">15</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">He shall be to you a restorer of life and a nourisher of your
old age; for your daughter-in-law who loves you, who is more to you than seven
sons, has borne him.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">1</span></sup></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There is one final kick in the tale …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">17</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The women of the
neighbourhood gave him a name, saying, ‘A son has been born to Naomi.’ They
named him Obed; he became the father of Jesse, the father of David.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000;">Just
in case you didn’t get the point the story teller recaps it. This is amazing. Truly amazing. That Obed is son to Ruth and Boaz and he becamse the father of Jesse and he became the
father of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region></st1:place>’s
greatest King, King David.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span class="vv"><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">18</span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> Now these are
the descendants of Perez: Perez became the father of Hezron,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">19</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Hezron of Ram, Ram
of Amminadab,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">20</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Amminadab of
Nahshon, Nahshon of Salmon,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">21</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Salmon of Boaz, Boaz
of Obed,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">22</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Obed of Jesse, and
Jesse of David.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As Easter approaches Messiah will once
again be sung.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And that remarkable Aria.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I know that my redeemer liveth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And our minds will go to Jesus as Redeemer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But what is redeemer?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The verse is from Job 19.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Somewhere behind the thinking in that
phrase is the story of Ruth and of Boaz.
A redeemer, a go-el is one who gives a new lease of life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we become part of Christ’s people, bound
together with him in the closest of relationships and he is our redeemer. He is the one who gives us a new lease of
life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Welcome to the foreigner</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The one who comforts and speaks kindly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The kinsman redeemer – who gives us a new
lease of life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Great as it is associated with the festival
of Pentecost, the outpouring the Spirit and the new lease of life that comes
with the Spirit’s presence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-60161651726704314522012-03-11T13:25:00.001-07:002012-03-11T13:25:55.146-07:00Proverbs and the ability to cope in the chaos of the world<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I like enthusiastic TV presenters.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Kate Humble and Helen Czerski are most
certainly enthusiastic. And pretty
knowledgable too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The latest blockbuster nature cum science
series is simply called Orbit. And it
follows Planet Earth for one year as it makes its journey round the sun. It’s another of those TV documentaries that
has a very big ‘wow’ factor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">At one moment they took four cameras ten
miles up into the sky in order to get incredible pictures of that thin blue
line that is the atmosphere that encircles the globe. The contraption they used seemed incredibly
Heath Robinson! Four pretty ordinary
cameras fastened securely to a box containing a GPS tracking device. And all suspended from a surprisingly small
balloon filled with helium.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">They let go the balloon and up it went and
we watched as the cameras filmed it all!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The filming went through the atmosphere and
beyond into the blackness of a sky where the sun was still shining. We saw the whole curvature of the earth and
the remarkable thin blue line that is our atmosphere against the blackness of
the sky beyond. We looked up and in
glorious slow motion saw the balloon eventually burst and the film still rolled
as the camera box plummeted to earth to be collected by the crew in a car with
satnav tuned into the GPS tracking device still in its box!!!! Amazing!
Wow!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then with the aid of computer generated
animations they showed how the way the planet earth spins on a tilted axis as
it speeds around the sun affects the currents in the seas and the winds in the
atmosphere. Imagine you are looking from
far above the earth and you can see the beautiful patterns that explain the
movement of the seas, the surge of the tides and the rush of the winds. The patterns are simple to understand and
beautiful to see and have about them an order that is wonderful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Seen from a distance and there is a
beautiful pattern, an order that makes sense of things that happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But down on planet earth, in this location
the pattern disappears – it is not possible to predict exactly when the weather
will change. On the ground there seems
to be a chaos.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the problem is we live on the
ground. We live in the middle of the
chaos.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is good to understand the order there is
and those wonderful patterns. Appreciating
that order helps you to understand what’s going on on the ground. But we still have to live in the middle of
what not just seems like chaos but actually is chaos.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I think that offers us a wonderful analogy
for what’s going on in the Bible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Reading the five books of the Law, the
Torah, is like looking at planet earth from a great, great height. Those larger-than-life stories about the
beginnings of things really do help us to understand the way things are in
every age; those true to life stories of the great ancestors of the faith give
us a glimpse into patterns of living that develop. And the story of the Exodus and the laws that
are given offer a framework for living life individually and collectively
according to that God-given order there is in our world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Reading the Prophets in Joshua, Judges,
Samuel, Kings, in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and the Book of the Twelve is to see how great prophetic voices
speak truth to power and challenge the powers that be to keep to that God given
order and model life along the lines of that God-given order.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In Jesus we find the fulfilment of all the
law and the prophets and he offers us a profound insight into the God-given order
of the world and how we are to live in that world in a way ordered by love to
God, love to neighbour, in a wonderful frame of life, death and resurrection.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s great to draw the big picture,
wonderful to see how that can shape our lives, and an inspiration to live life
to the full knowing that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ
Jesus our Lord.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">All of that is very much part of getting
the bigger picture and understanding what’s actually going on. It’s very much like those animations and
wonderful pictures in Orbit that enable us to see all the wonderful patterns
that show why things are as they are on planet earth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But.
There’s always a but.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Down on the ground there can be and there
is chaos. Weather that is
unpredictable. Events that are seemingly
impossible to make sense of. And we have
to live down on the ground. In the real
world on planet earth as it hurtles around the sun at phenomenal speeds on its
Orbit, all the understanding gleaned from that bigger picture stands us in good
stead as we live our lives on the ground. But we still have to struggle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The first three great books in the third
section of the Hebrew Scriptures, our Old Testament, the Writings are all about
what goes on on the ground. The books of
Psalms, Job and Proverbs offer us aids to living in the middle of the chaos.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">All that material for personal prayer and
collective worship in the Book of Psalms helps in the struggle. The powerful drama of Job and all those words
of wisdom tackle head-on the sheer awfulness of living on the ground where
utter chaos prevails and asks some of the biggest questions of all – why is it
that the innocent suffer so immensely.
And then there’s the Book of Proverbs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Full of words of wisdom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s fascinating to see the way this is not
a Single Book in the Bible. Every so
often there are headings that show that this is a collection of mini-books as
it were. An anthology. [Walter Bruegemann in <i>An Introduction to the Old Testament</i> (<st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Westminster</st1:place></st1:city>, John Knox Press, 2003), 305
quotes Crenshaw’s breakdown of the book …]</span></div>
<ol start="1" style="margin-top: 0cm;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">The proverbs of
Solomon, David’s son, king of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region> (1-9)<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">the proverbs of
Solomon (10:1-22:16)<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">the sayings of the
wise (22:17 – 24:22)<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">more sayings of wise
men (24:23-34)<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">More proverbs of
Solomon transcribed by the men of the Judean king, Hezekiah (chs 25-29)<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">The sayings of Agur,
Jakeh’s son, from Masa (30:1-9<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">Maternal instructrions
to Lemuel, king of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Massa</st1:place></st1:city>
(31:1-9)<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 54.0pt;">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Two other divisions, 30:10-33 and 31:10-31 lack
identification<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 54.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Different ideas have been put forward as to
what these collections were originally for and why they were put together:
Bruegemann suggests three contexts that are frequently suggested</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0cm;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">Family nurture in
which children are socialised into a certain ‘world’ by the reiteration of
folk sayings<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">Schools where
instruction is more formal, though the existence of schools in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region> is
itself a problematic question<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
<li class="MsoNormal"><i><span lang="EN-GB">The royal court
wherein the sons of the politically well-connected were inducted into the
protocols and arts of governance<o:p></o:p></span></i></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In all likelihood the making the anthology
in the book we have as Proverbs <i>is the
work in the post-exilic community of scribes who became important in the
emergence of Judaism.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The whole of Proverbs has to do with wisdom:
it is filled with words of wisdom. Indeed,
together with Job and Ecclesiastes and elements in other books you can speak of
a wisdom literature in the Old Testament.
This is where you encounter words of wisdom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What is ‘wisdom’? In one sense it really is what it claims to
be. Wise words of age old wisdom that
will help you get through day to day in
very confusing, muddling and muddled world. One of the best definitions of biblical wisdom
I have come across is ‘the ability to cope’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Up against it? Struggling in the chaos of the world? Here are some wise words of age old wisdom to
get you through. It will help you cope
with life in a very messy world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The bulk of the book from chapter 10
onwards is made up of two-liners. They
are what they say they are. Proverbs. Wonderful Words of Wisdom. The book fell open for me at chapter 15. There are some pretty wise words of age old
wisdom to help you get through here!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">1) A
soft answer turns away wrath</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But a harsh word stirs up anger</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">2 The
tongue of the wise dispenses knowledge</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But the mouths of fools pour out folly</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">4 A
gentle tongue is a tree of life,</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial;"> but perverseness in it breaks the
spirit.<span class="apple-converted-space"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">7</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The lips of the wise spread
knowledge;</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial;"> not so the minds of fools.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">14</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The mind of one who has
understanding seeks knowledge,</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial;"> but the mouths of fools feed on folly.<span class="apple-converted-space"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">22</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Without counsel, plans go
wrong,</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial;"> but with many advisers they succeed.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mind you, these words were written for a particular
time and a particular place. You have to
be careful … it won’t be long in reading these proverbs that you will find ones
that puzzle, ones that don’t make sense.
Ones that have been superseded by other things.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And of course, as Christians reading the
Scriptures we need to bear in mind the teachings of Christ and read through his
eyes. For he has brought to fulfilment
the Law, the Prophets and the Writings.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What’s fascinating as you read Jesus is
that he is very much a wisdom teacher.
Lots of the sayings in the Sermon on the Mount and throughout his teaching
are pithy two liners, filled with age-old wisdom. The Beatitudes leap off the page as words of
age-old wisdom …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Blessed are those who mourn for they will
be comforted</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Blessed are those who hunger and thirst
after righteousness</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For they will be filled</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And then later in the sermon on the mount …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You are the light of the world</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A city set on a hill cannot be hid</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Do not store up for yourselves treasures on
earth</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But store up for yourselves treasures in
heaven</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The eye is the lamp of the body</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">No one can serve two masters:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You cannot serve God and wealth</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Do not worry about tomorrow</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For tomorrow will being worries of its own</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Today’s trouble is enough for today.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is not that Jesus says, follow to the
letter each one of those Proverbs of old.
Rather, he takes the spirit of those Proverbs and shares ones that as
far as he is concerned are for all his followers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is practical, everyday, life for
getting by in a world that is often difficult to make sense of.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The book of Proverbs begins in a wonderful
way which comes as something of a surprise.
It presents us with two women – who beckon us enticingly. One is the foolish woman, Folly; and
the other is the wise woman, Wisdom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Making sense of life in the midst of its
chaos, we not only have words of age-old wisdom to guide us, but we also need
to realise there is a choice before us.
The word of the way of wisdom or the word of the way of folly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s fascinating how at the climax to the
Sermon on the Mount Jesus echoes that set of choices. He lays out three choices. There’s the narrow gate that leads to Christ’s
way of wisdom over against the wide, easy road of folly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There’s the authentic prophetic voice
articulated by Christ and borne out in the fruits of those who speak it and
there’s the voice of the false prophets who come as wolves in sheep’s
clothing. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And then that most wonderful of choices
that so echoes Proverbs – if as throughout the Wisdom literature of the Old
Testament the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord … then for us as
Christians the key is to hear Christ’s words of wisdom and act on them – for then
we will be like the wise man who built his house on the rock. Woe betide the one who hears those words and
takes no notice of them for they will be like the foolish man who builds his
house on the rock.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Coming back to that analogy – there’s a big
picture that makes sense of Planet Earth in those beautiful patterns seen from
a distance. But down on the ground it’s
chaos.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The thing is, however, that to get through
the chaos it’s important that the little decisions we make are in accordance as
far as possible with the patterns in that bigger picture. The big picture and all its patterns enables
people to predict when the next Severn Bore will be. But precisely how big and how strong is
unpredictable Be in the wrong place on
the bank of the river as the bore rushes in and you will be swept away!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And that’s the most profound of all the
insights in the book of Proverbs. And it
is there in that 8<sup>th</sup> chapter of Proverbs. The woman Wisdom has been speaking words of
wisdom. But then she speaks of her part,
the word of wisdom’s part in the whole creation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">The
Lord created me, the word of wisdom, at the beginning of his work<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">The first
of his acts of long ago.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">Ages
ago, I was set up,<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB">At the
first, before the beginning of the earth …<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The conviction there is that the ordinary
everyday words of wisdom are effective,
and really do help us cope with the messiness of the world, really do help us
to live day by day through its chaos, because Wisdom’s Words touch something
that is part of the bigger picture. Wisdom’s
Word is in accord with the bigger picture of God’s ordering of creation itself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And that’s the point at which Christ really
is seen in the Gospels as the fulfilment of this Wisdom as much as he is the
fulfilment of the Law and the Prophets.
His words truly are words of Wisdom to be heeded and acted on. He is the Word of Wisdom because his words,
his Word, is part of the bigger picture of God’s ordering of creation itself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">John 1 is an exact echo of Proverbs 8</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the beginning was the Word of Wisdom And
the Word of Wisdom was with God and the Word of Wisdom was God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This Word of Wisdom became flesh and
dwelled among us</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And we have seen his glory, the glory as of
the only son of the Father.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Finding it difficult to cope? Impossible to get by in a worrying world of
chaos and seeming meaninglessness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Hear again Christ’s words of wisdom and act
upon them. For this is nothing less than
the wisdom of God’s creation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is Wisdom indeed, a wisdom we would do
well to heed.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-44492165394370638322012-03-04T12:26:00.000-08:002012-03-04T12:26:08.331-08:00Living with unanswered questions - Job's story<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s not a modern problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is an age-old problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is a problem Jesus was all too aware of.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And it was something Jesus DID NOT ACCEPT!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Devout Jewish people who had sat at the
feet of Jesus for some considerable time, the disciples GOT IT WRONG!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The story is told in John chapter 9.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">As he walked along, he saw a man blind from
birth.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>His disciples asked him,
‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Jesus answered, ‘Neither this man nor
his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in
him.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>We</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">must work the works of him
who sent me</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">while it is day; night is coming when no one can work.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>As long as I am in the world, I am the
light of the world.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The disciples look at someone who is blind
from birth and they draw the conclusion that either he or his parents must have
done something wrong in the sight of God for such a thing to have happened,
either he or his parents must have sinned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What Jesus says in reply is absolutely
categorical.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">“Neither this man nor his parents sinned.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Tragically, through the thirty-five years
of my pastoral ministry I have repeatedly met with people who have gone down
with some kind of illness and they have linked what’s happened to them to what
they must have done in the past. Worse
still, over all those years I have come across parents when faced with the
illness of a child whatever form that illness takes who jump to the conclusion
– they must have done something wrong.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">So and so is suffering – therefore they or
their parents must have sinned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The guilt people suffer from as a result of
that insight is immense and deeply troubling.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And it is what Jesus categorically rejects.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Why should it be such a strongly held idea
among people who are often deeply devout Christian people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I have a feeling they have fallen into the
very trap the disciples fell into.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And it has to do with the way you read your
Bible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we have read through the Torah, the
books of the Law, and the books of the Prophets we have encountered a principle
time and again. It is powerfully
enunciated as the Torah comes to a close in the Book of Deuteronomy and it
becomes a recurring refrain throughout the former prophets of Joshua, Judges,
Samuel and Kings and is there implicitly in so many of the latter prophets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Obey God and things will go well for the
people of God</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Disobey God and things will go badly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As those propohetic historians sat in exile
in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Babylon</st1:place></st1:city> and
mulled over what had gone wrong for their people and what had landed them in
this mess, this principle emerged from their study of the story of their
people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As a general principle it helps in seeing
where the nation and its rulers have gone wrong. It serves as a prompt to get people to turn
once again to God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There is a danger in that principle,
however.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There is a temptation to apply the general
principle backwards in specific cases in the life of individuals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Illness or untold suffering comes upon an
individual, everything seems to be going wrong in their lives. They must have sinned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The remedy is gross – but all too readily
applied – and occasionally I have heard a well-meaning but grossly hurtful
Christian believer draw the conclusion – therefore if you repent of your sins
and turn to God once again all will be well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The disciples buy into that way of reading
the Scriptures.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In saying ‘neither this man nor his parents
sinned’ Jesus categorically rejects that way of reading the Scriptures.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And in doing that Jesus is being true to
the Scriptures in a very Jewish way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Notice how the disciples address Jesus in
asking their question. “Rabbi, who
sinned …?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Rabbinic way of teaching involves
asking questions. A Jewish commentator
on the radio only a couple of days ago made the quip, ask a Jew a question and
they will reply with two more questions!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And Jewish rabbinic teaching asks questions
of the Scripture. The Scripitures Jesus
was so steeped in, the Hebrew Scriptures we think of as the Old Testament are
written by many different voices over many, many centuries. Within those Scriptures we need to listen out
for conversations and dialogues that go on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Nowhere is that more apparent than when it
comes to this burning issue in the Book of Job.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Book of Job is the nearest you get to a
full scale drama in the Bible. Having
helped write a musical on the life of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">St
Paul</st1:city></st1:place>, A Brand New Man, and the Passion Play, the next
dramatic production that I sketched out in Open the Book sessions a few years
ago is a drama based on the book of Job.
It’s contemporary with the arrival of Greek drama – and it has much the
same kind of feel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The first couple of chapters are as it were
the prologue that set the scene in a larger-than-life story that I would
present almost in vaudeville fashion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">There was once a man in the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">land</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">Uz</st1:placename></st1:place>
whose name was Job. That man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and
turned away from evil.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">While reading the whole of the Book of Job
you must never lose sight of that verse.
That’s the whole point of the book.
Job is innocent, blameless, upright, God-fearing in every way. There is not an ounce of evil in him. A happy family man with unimaginably large
numbers of livestock</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">this man was the greatest of all the people of
the east.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The action shifts to the heavenly realm
where God is confronted by the Satan Figure – this scene gives rise to a rich
vein of thinking about God, the nature of Satan, do different from our western
almost mediaeval pictures of ‘the devil’.
But play it for fun, don’t ask too many questions – because the purpose
of this is simply to set the scene.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Suffice it to say, testing times come upon
Job. Immensely testing times. He loses his wealth. He loses his home. He loses his family. He loses his health. But in the face of it all he holds the
faith. His wife longs for him to curse
God and die. He refuses. And the final verse of the prologue in Job
2:10 leaves us in no doubt at all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">In all this Job did not sin with his lips.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then it is that the three friends, Job’s
comforters, come on the scene. And my
play suddenly becomes dark, and intensely serious.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then we have the bulk of the book. It works just like Greek drama.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">After a long pause.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Job speaks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He is in abject despair.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘Let the day perish on which I was born,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I have no rest; but trouble comes</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Eliphaz, the first of the friends responds
and the first conversation is under way.
The first conversation happens.
There are, as it were three cycles of conversations and dialogue, three
acts. In each act each friend in turn
engages in conversation with Job.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is a gross over-simplification of those
three acts and of Job’s comforters – but basically they articulate the theology
of the Torah and the Prophets, of Deuteronomy and of Joshua, Judges, Samuel and
Kings. It is the very theology that has
such a grip on the disciples in that conversation with Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
Their mistake is to apply it backwards.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That orthodox theology of the Law and the
Prophets says</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Obey God and all will go well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Disobey God and all will fall apart.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You, Job, are suffering. You must, therefore, have disobeyed God. Eliphaz in chapter 4 puts it powerfully.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘Think now, who that was innocent ever
perished?</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> Or where were the upright cut
off?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">8</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">As I have seen, those who
plough iniquity</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and sow trouble reap the same.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">9</span></sup><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">By the breath of God they
perish,</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and by the blast of his anger
they are consumed.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Throughout the conversations Job plumbs the
depths of despair, is in agonies of anguish – but he searches his soul and is
adamant – he is upright, God fearing, he has not sinned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are wonderful moments of insight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Job 19:25ff</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">O that my words were written down!</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> O that they were
inscribed in a book!<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">O that with an iron pen and with lead</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> they were engraved on a rock
for ever!<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">For I know that my Redeemer</span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">lives,</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and that at the last he</span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">will stand upon the earth;</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;">and after my skin has been thus destroyed,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> then in</span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">my flesh I shall see God,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;">whom I shall see on my side,</span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and my eyes shall behold, and
not another.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 21.0pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 21.0pt; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span lang="EN-GB">–<span style="font-size: 7pt;">
</span></span><!--[endif]--><span lang="EN-GB">I know that my redeemer lives –
and then in Job 28 a wonderful song to God’s presence in all things that is one
of my all-time favourite passages in the Bible celebrating as it does mining
and geology and the wonders of nature.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘Surely there is a mine for silver,<br />
and a place for gold to be refined.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Iron is taken out of the earth,<br />
and copper is smelted from ore.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Miners put<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>an
end to darkness,<br />
and search out to the farthest bound<br />
the ore in gloom and deep darkness.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
They open shafts in a valley away from human habitation;<br />
they are forgotten by travellers,<br />
they sway suspended, remote from people.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
As for the earth, out of it comes bread;<br />
but underneath it is turned up as by fire.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Its stones are the place of sapphires,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a><br />
and its dust contains gold.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
‘That path no bird of prey knows,<br />
and the falcon’s eye has not seen it.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
The proud wild animals have not trodden it;<br />
the lion has not passed over it.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
‘They put their hand to the flinty rock,<br />
and overturn mountains by the roots.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
They cut out channels in the rocks,<br />
and their eyes see every precious thing.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
The sources of the rivers they probe;<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a><br />
hidden things they bring to light.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
‘But where shall wisdom be found?<br />
And where is the place of understanding?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Mortals do not know the way to it,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a><br />
and it is not found in the land of the living.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
The deep says, “It is not in me”,<br />
and the sea says, “It is not with me.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
It cannot be bought for gold,<br />
and silver cannot be weighed out as its price.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
It cannot be valued in the gold of Ophir,<br />
in precious onyx or sapphire.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Gold and glass cannot equal it,<br />
nor can it be exchanged for jewels of fine gold.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
No mention shall be made of coral or of crystal;<br />
the price of wisdom is above pearls.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
The chrysolite of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Ethiopia</st1:place></st1:country-region><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>cannot
compare with it,<br />
nor can it be valued in pure gold.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
‘Where then does wisdom come from?<br />
And where is the place of understanding?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
It is hidden from the eyes of all living,<br />
and concealed from the birds of the air.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Abaddon and Death say,<br />
“We have heard a rumour of it with our ears.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
‘God understands the way to it,<br />
and he knows its place.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
For he looks to the ends of the earth,<br />
and sees everything under the heavens.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
When he gave to the wind its weight,<br />
and apportioned out the waters by measure;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
when he made a decree for the rain,<br />
and a way for the thunderbolt;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
then he saw it and declared it;<br />
he established it, and searched it out.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
And he said to humankind,<br />
“Truly, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom;<br />
and to depart from evil is understanding.”<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">After three sets of questions Job’s
comforters depart – and they have brought him not one ounce of comfort.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A fourth friend appears, Elihu and we
arrive at the fourth Act. The arguments
are nuanced in beautiful ways but remain essentially the same.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then it is that Job is left on his
own. And we reach the climax to the
play. Act 5. Out in the elements Job becomes aware of
God. He encounters God – but God does
not resolve any of the theological dilemmas the book has explored. God plies Job with questions he has no answer
for about the wonder of the world and its immensity. In 38, 39, and 40 Job is brought as it were
face to face with the God who is so much greater than anything any human can
conceive of.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Then the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>answered Job out of the whirlwind:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
‘Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Gird up your loins like a man,<br />
I will question you, and you shall declare to me.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
‘Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?<br />
Tell me, if you have understanding.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Who determined its measurements—surely you know!<br />
Or who stretched the line upon it?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
On what were its bases sunk,<br />
or who laid its cornerstone<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
when the morning stars sang together<br />
and all the heavenly beings<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Job's%20story%20-%20living%20with%20unanswered%20questions.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>shouted for joy?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
‘Or who shut in the sea with doors<br />
when it burst out from the womb?—<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
when I made the clouds its garment,<br />
and thick darkness its swaddling band,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
and prescribed bounds for it,<br />
and set bars and doors,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
and said, “Thus far shall you come, and no farther,<br />
and here shall your proud waves be stopped”?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is not in the orthodox theological
arguments of those comforters that he has any consolation. But it is in an encounter with the God who is
full of mystery and immensity that Job discovers the possibility that it is not
necessary to have all the answers, but possible to live with unanswered
questions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">His attempt to ‘understand’ what’s happened
and happening to him is to no avail.
What is important is simply to sense the presence of God and put all
into God’s hands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I first encountered the Book of Job in the
New English Bible and love that translation of the final moments when Job
reaches that point …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">42</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><b>Then Job answered the Lord:</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><b>I know that thou canst do all things</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><b>And that no purpose is beyond thee.</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><b>But I have spoken of great things which I
have not understood,</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><b>Things too wonderful for me to know.</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><b>I knew of thee then only by report,</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><b>But now I see thee with my own eyes.</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><b>Therefore I melt away,</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><b>I repent in dust and ashes.</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The drama done – there is an epilogue. You need it in such great drama. And at the very end in my dramatisation the
vaudeville returns as Job is restored, his livestock and family come back to
life and he lives happily ever after.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Happy ever after endings don’t by any means
work out in the real world. And that is
the point of the Book of Job.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">With the book of Job and with Jesus let’s
reject the mistaken orthodoxy of those three friends and those disciples.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In its place Jesus offers us his
presence. At his parting he offered his
friends, and he offers us another Comforter, even the Spirit of truth who will
be with us forever. And that offer of
another comforter was made at his last Supper, as it were the first in that
chain of suppers that have been shared by Christian believers down through the
centuries, that Lord’s Supper we are about to share.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Here we seek once more that presence of God
in Christ that in the face of sometimes untold suffering enables us to live
with unanswered questions.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-41531340154321815892012-02-26T12:36:00.001-08:002012-02-26T12:36:58.510-08:00The Psalms through the eyes of Jesus<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">They think it’s all over … but it isn’t!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are three parts to the Old Testament
in the Hebrew Scriptures Jesus knew.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Law – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus,
Numbers, Deuteronomy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Prophets – Joshua, Judges, Samuel,
Kings</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"> Isaiah,
Jeremiah, Ezekiel and the Book of the Twelve</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">So when we reached Malachi and stood on the
threshold of the New Testament, we were only two thirds of the way through the
Old Testament.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Old Testament is a challenging read.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For us as Christians our way into the Old
Testament has been to use Jesus as our guide.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In doing that we have good precedence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When John Barnes took time out to write
notes outlining his instructions for his funeral service, drawing on the hymns
and music he and Joan had had at their wedding, outlining not only biographical
notes detailing the death from TB of his mother and two sisters by the time he
was nine making him a life-long socialist, but also his philosophy of life
built on the principle ‘I am my brother’s keeper’, he also pointed us to two
readings. One verses from Psalm 118 that
included the words, This is the day which the Lord hath made I will rejoice and
be glad in it. And the other the story
of the Two on the Road to Emmaus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That story is not only a wonderful story of
resurrection, the welcome of the stranger, and of Christ known in the breaking
of bread … it is also a wonderful insight into the way we as Christians are to
read the Hebrew Scriptures we think of as the Old Testament.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Faced with two distraught travelling
companions at their wits end because the one they had hoped would redeem <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region> had been
cruelly killed, Jesus’ response was to despair and then to respond to the bit
they had missed</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart
to believe all that the prophets have declared!<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Was it not necessary that the Messiah</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Psalms.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Then beginning with Moses and all the
prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus is not in the business of seeking
proof texts – those occasional passages where so-called predictions seem to be
made that find their fulfilment in him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He begins with Moses and the Law, and goes
on to ‘all the prophets’, and interprets to them the things about himself in
‘all the scriptures’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How wonderful to have eaves dropped on
their conversation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Later in the Upper Room when those two
return filled with excitement Jesus appears again with those wonderful words
‘Peace be with you’. We are not told how
late into the night the conversation went but again it would have been
wonderful to have been a fly on the wall.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then he said to them, </span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">‘These are my words that I
spoke to you while I was still with you—that everything written about me in the
law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Then he opened their minds to
understand the scriptures,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">While we do not have a record of his
teaching, I believe in the Gospels and the Epistles we have the fruit of that
teaching. And we can see how the first
Christians read their Old Testament in the light of the insights Jesus had
shared with them. Our task as Christian
readers of the Old Testament, it seems to me, is to draw as much as we can from
what the insights of those New Testament
writers, and in particular as much as we can from the way they imply that Jesus
handled not just the Law and the Prophets but all the Scriptures too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And so we turn to the third part of the
Hebrew Scripture – the so-called Writings.
We are going to take a look at this miscellany of writings that for the
most part is put together during the Exile and at the end of the period we have
covered so far in the Law and the Prophets, in the order the books appear in
the Hebrew Bible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Psalms, Job and Proverbs are rich mix of
poetry, prayer, praise, and wisdom writing that reflects on God’s way in the
world often asking the very big question WHY?
Why should there be such suffering in the world of God’s creation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then come the five little scrolls of the Megilloth,
each of which came to be associated after the time of Jesus with the great
religious festivals of the Jewish calendar; Song of songs, Ruth, Lamentations,
Ecclesiastes, Esther</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then we’ll look at Daniel. A book that stands with Revelation in the New
Testatment as a book of Apocalyptic writing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And we will finish with one last look at
the story of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region></st1:place>
that is the backdrop for the story of Jesus in Ezra, Nehemiah and Chronicles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">[I am indebted to this approach to the
Writings to Walter Brueggemann, <i>An
Introduction to the Old Testament – the Canon and Christian Imagination</i> (<st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Westminster</st1:place></st1:city>, John Knox
Press, 2003)]</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And so we begin with the Book of Psalms …
or rather with the Five Books of Psalms.
Can you spot anything significant about our Order of Service?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Each of our five hymns is based on a Psalm
and followed with a doxology or words of blessing. The first hymn is based on a psalm from the
first book of Psalms, the second hymn is based on a psalm from the second and
so on. Each hymn is followed by a doxology, words of
blessing – and those are the final words of each of the books of Psalms. If you are looking for a way of rounding off
a service or you want a blessing from the Old Testament look for the last verse
or verses of each of the books of Psalms.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Some people think of the Psalms as the hymn
book of the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Second</st1:placename>
<st1:placetype w:st="on">Temple</st1:placetype></st1:place>. The superscriptions are added later but lots
of them suggest the kind of music the psalms can be sung to and by whom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">To the choirmaster or the leader is a note
attached to fifty-five psalms, according
to the hind of dawn, according to the lilies, according to the dove on far-off
terebinths. Psalm 45 To the leader, according to the lilies. Of
the Korahites. A Maskil. A love song.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Hymn books are interesting. It cannot be said for some collections of
hymns like Mission Praise and Songs of Fellowship which nowadays are arranged
alphabetically, but a hymn book is a good book to have.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We may not have hymns but we sing the
theology of our church – and you can see that in the way our hymn book is
structured.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Look at the contents of Congregational
Praise. The Eternal Father. The Lord
Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit. The Trinity.
The holy Scriptures. The Church.
The life of Discipleship. Social
and National Times and Seasons Special
Occasions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It has been said that a hymn book is for us
in our tradition much as a prayer book is to those in another tradition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s interesting, because of course you
can see the Psalms not as hymns but as a collection of prayers. There are different categories of prayer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are prayers of Celebration for all
the people collectively and prayers of Celebration for individuals that are
very personal.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are prayers of protest and petition,
communal laments for disasters that have befallen the people, and intensely
personal laments for the ills that have befallen an individual.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Read the Psalms as a collection.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The begin in Psalm 1 with a choice – Happy
are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked but their delight is in
the law of the Lord.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is the choice we have encountered in
the Law. It is the choice worked out in
all the former prophets. It is the
choice Jesus presents to us at the climax to the Sermon on the mount. Choose the narrow gate, beware of false
prophets in sheep’s clothing. Hear my
words and act on them and be like the wise man who build his house on the rock,
not the foolish man who built his house on the sand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Like book-ends keeping books together. The
whole collection of Psalms finishes with a sequence of wonderful celebrations
of God in all his triumphant glory finishing with the greatest of all
celebrations on the tambourine and drum in Psalm 150.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s not long, however, before the
simplicities of that clear choice are brought into question.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Psalm 13 How long O Lord, will you forget
me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s a question that plagues Jesus in the
Garden and on the Cross – and one that has come upon many a believer as the
Dark night of the Soul.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How do you get from the agony of Psalm 22
verse 1 My God, My God, why have you forsaken me. To the confidence of Psalm 24 The earth is
the Lord’s and all that is in it ?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You can only move from the agony to the
glory through Psalm 23 The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Look out for sequences, structures in the
Psalm.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Whether hymns, or psalms, this is Poetry
often at its finest. What Neil Astley
says of poetry in his fine anthology Staying Alive is as true of the Psalms as
it is of the poetry of any language.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">“The best contemporary poetry is life-affirming
and directly relevant to all our lives.”
Staying Alive (Bloodaxe Press, 2002), 19.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He quotes some of the great poets on poetry
– and what they say of poetry can be said of the psalms</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Coleridge:
Poetry: the best words in the best order.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Make no mistake about it there is a craft
about the poetry of the Psalms. Look out
for parallelism where the same thought is expressed in two consecutive lines
but in different words. Or where each
line starts with the each letter of the alphabet in turn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Yeats:
Poetry is truth seen with passion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">By the time we reach the end of the second
book of Psalms in Psalm 72 we have encountered no end of Psalms linked with
moments in David’s life. Think of
David’s adultery with Bathsheba and subsequent murder of her husband and then
the impact of Nathan’s prophecy. And
hear the passion of Psalm 51</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Have mercy on me O God according to your
steadfast love.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">According to your abundant mercy, blot out
my transgressions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Into the third book you cannot help but
feel that the psalms make you think.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">William Cowper, suffering as he did from
depression at its worst knows the value of that prayer of lament in Psalm 77
and what it is like to face the clouds ye so much dread. It is something to get your mind round. And that prayer becomes the most wonderful of
hymns in God moves in a mysterious way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Moving into the fourth book there are
Psalms of national celebration as kings are crowned in the third book of Psalms
around the 90 to 100 mark. Our God our
help in ages past our hope for years to come – is a paraphrase by Isaac Watts
of Psalm 90.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Into the fifth book and there are psalms of
great praise and celebration, associated with the Passover and thought of as
the great hallel psalms, the great hallelujah psalms – from Psalm 111
following. The great acrostic Psalm 119
that is a celebration of God’s Word in Law and Prophets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then the psalms of pilgrimage from 121 to
133 as people together go up to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
and the temple.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And at the last in the last book of Psalms
a sequence of Psalms in the 140’s that celebrate the great themes of the Law
and the Prophets of Justice and Mercy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>sets
the prisoners free;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>opens the eyes of the blind.<br />
The<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>lifts up those who are bowed down;<br />
the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>loves the righteous.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
The<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>watches over the strangers;<br />
he upholds the orphan and the widow,<br />
but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
The<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>will reign for ever,<br />
your God, O Zion, for all generations.<br />
Praise the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The whole of Jesus’s story is seen in the
Psalms. These are words that lived in
him and he drew on in prayer, these are words he sang in the worship of temple
and synagogue.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
How important it is to read these words through the eyes of Jesus. We need to heed his sermon on the mount when
we come to hateful things uttered in the Psalms. And anoint these words with the love of
Christ.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We are going to finish with John Milton’s
paraphrase of Psalm 136. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There is a recurring refrain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">O give thanks to the Lord for he is good,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For his steadfast love endures for ever</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Hymn 44 Let us with a gladsome mind Praise
the Lord for he is kind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For his mercies ay endure, ever faithful
ever sure.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And as we come to the end of that fifth
book of Psalms there is only one Psalm we can use – Psalm 150!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-65074780705137641512012-02-12T12:46:00.001-08:002012-02-12T12:46:27.665-08:00At the end a new beginning - Malachi's story<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus was adamant.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There were no two ways about it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Do not think that I have come to abolish
the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There’s much more to Jesus than at first
meets the eye. Put to one side that very
limiting view that prophecy amounts to prediction. Not a bit of it the prophets of old were in
the business of analysing the ills of the world around them, working out under
God’s guidance, what had resulted in the mess their nation all too often found
itself in … and setting out a route map to set things right.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The story of the prophets of old is told in
the great books of the prophets of what we think of as the Old Testament –
Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and the wonderfully
named, Book of the Twelve.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As the people settled in the Promised land
early on they wanted to depart from the kingship of God and appoint a king over
them – and one of the very first prophets emerges with a parable to tell –
Jotham’s parable warns that the only one of the trees of the forest to be
prepared to be king would be the bramble.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Samuel is very much a prophetic figure who
looks at all that is wrong in the world of his day and is convinced the
people’s desire for a king will not make matters better, but instead will
result in things getting much worse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As Saul became King how right he proved to
be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And so it was the least likely of all the
sons of Jesse became King. You might
have though a wonderful hero figure. But
no, he shamed himself, his people and his God when he not only made the wife of
one of his commanders pregnant, but when he realised what had happened,
arranged for the commander to be killed in battle so that he could take the
woman to be his wife.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He thought he had got away with it and then
Nathan told another parable – about a poverty stricken man abused by a tyrant
who stole the sheep of his flocks. David
was appalled at the story and even more devastated when Nathan the prophet
turned on him and said, you are the man!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then came the first of the great Prophets
to have their story told at any length.
A good part of I Kings tells the story of Elijah and the stand he took
against injustice in the land – the mantle of Elijah fell on Elisha and Elisha carried
on where Elijah had left off. In pointed
teaching, in acted miracle too God’s sovereignty was their message and a
powerful appeal for justice and faithfulness to the ways of God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then as the story of the betrayal of the
nation by all but a handful of the kings of the <st1:place w:st="on">Northern
Kingdom</st1:place> and of the Southern Kingdom is told, we being to encounter
prophets whose writings have helped to shape books that to this day bear their
name. The names of so many of those
kings have been forgotten. The names of
the prophets are still household words.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The great 8<sup>th</sup> Century Prophets,
Isaiah with Amos, Hosea and Micah.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The great Prophet of Jersualem and its
imminent collapse and destruction Jeremiah, with Nahum, favourite of mine,
Habakkuk and Zephaniah .</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And arguably one of the greatest prophets
of old who prompted the great reforms of King Josiah that resulted in the
preservation of the books of the Law, Huldah – whose story gives the lie to
those who would claim women cannot speak the word of God. With her husband looking after the wardrobe
she spoke fiercely to all those in power.
And they listened. And they
changed their ways.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Though the fig tree fail and the flocks be
scattered, yet I will trust in God my saviour.
What a wonderful poem of praise filed with passion in the face of
destructive forces Habakkuk shares.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The great Prophet of the exile in Babylon
Ezekiel with those prophets associated with the return, Haggai, Zechariah and
Malachi.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And then those three prophets who cannot be
located in a specific time frame and yet whose words speak down the ages to
every age facing calamity. Joel, Obadiah
and Jonah.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">These prophets speak truth to power, hold
kings to account. There is in their
writings a rhythm. They confront people
with the reality that consequences follow upon the abandonment of God’s
ways. Disobey God and take the
consequences – ill will follow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But there is also a hope and promise. On the one hand the story of the nation
suggests that obedience to God will lead to things going well – and ultimately
the promise of God will hold.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Most significant of all the Prophets are
not just negative about those kings who
were like the worst kind of shepherds neglecting their sheep. So many of them spelled out what it would
take to be a king worthy of God’s kingdom.
Occasionally kings heeded their vision.
But their vision was never fully fulfilled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And following on from the return of the
people to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
the kingdom was never fully established.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In subjection to Cyrus’s <st1:country-region w:st="on">Persia</st1:country-region>, to Alexander the Great’s <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Greece</st1:place></st1:country-region>, to the
Ptolemies of Egypt and the Syrian kings, the people were in subjugation. Momentarily they broke free under Judas
Maccabaeus and a kingdom of sorts flourished built on violence. But it too foundered with growing power of
the Roman republic. And with Caesar the
subjugation of the peoples once more.
And as the Roman Empire dawned most cruel of all the kings King Herod
reigned with an iron rod content to build temples to the Roman Son of God
Augustus and rebuilding the temple in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
to monstrous proportions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The injustices of his reign cried out for a
voice.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the voice of the prophets was
reawakened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And one emerged in the wilderness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">See I am sending my messenger before me to
prepare the way before me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You recognise it don’t you. Out there in the wilderness. Wearing such basic clothes. Baptising.
And what a powerful message.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s John the Baptist.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Or is it?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The words I have just quoted come from the
Book of the Prophet whose book stands as the last of the Book of the Twelve.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In our Bibles it is the Book of the Prophet
who stands at the very end of the Old Testament.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is as if we arrive at the end of the
story of the Prophets only to find that we are at the beginning of something
very much bigger. And yet the end takes
us back to the beginning and forward to a new beginning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Malachi simply means messenger of the Lord.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As his book opens it is full of foreboding
as he confronts people with the consequences of the wrong doing of the people
and their rulers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But the foreboding gives way to promise as he
looks to the day when things will be restored.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">See, I am sending my messenger to prepare
the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple.
The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight—indeed, he is coming, says
the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of hosts.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">2</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">But who can endure the day of his
coming, and who can stand when he appears?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">For he is like a refiner’s fire and like
fullers’ soap;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">3</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">he will sit as a
refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and
refine them like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the<span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>in righteousness.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Malachi.doc"></a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">4</span></sup><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Then the offering of
<st1:country-region w:st="on">Judah</st1:country-region> and <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> will be pleasing to the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>as
in the days of old and as in former years.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What will this messenger be like?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we reach the final chapter of Malachi it
is as if we are taken back almost to the very beginning of the story of the
prophets. Malachi looks to the time when
arguably the first of the great prophets will come once again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> Lo, I will send you the prophet Elijah
before the great and terrible day of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>comes.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>He will turn the hearts of parents to
their children and the hearts of children to their parents, so that I will not
come and strike the land with a curse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s how the Old Testament ends.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On the threshold of the New.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What we call the beginning is often the
end,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And to make an end is to make a beginning,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The end is where we start from…</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We shall not cease from exploration</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the end of all our exploring</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Will be to arrive where we started</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And know the place for the first time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And John the Baptist comes and he is a new
Elijah.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He acts like an Elijah. He speaks like an Elijah.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Something is on the move.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And he is arrested. Silenced.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But not quite.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
The last thing he does before he is arrested is to take Jesus down into the <st1:country-region w:st="on">Jordan</st1:country-region> and then back up out of the <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jordan</st1:place></st1:country-region>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s just like that moment when Elijah
passes on the mantle to Elisha.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The mantle of the prophets speaking out
God’s word and speaking truth to power has passed from Elijah to Elisha to
Isaiah to Hulda to Jeremiah to Ezekiel to the twelve to Malachi to John the
Baptist and now to Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He teaches challengingly just like the
prophets of old. He carries out healings
just like Elijah and Elisha. Parables
and signs all have the feel of the ancient prophets about them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the crowds know it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He is John the Baptist, they say, he is
Elijah they say. He is Jeremiah they
say. He is one of the prophets they say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And he is pleased to be called such. He calls himself prophet on no end of
occasions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But he is prophet and more than a prophet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Because he also is bringing in the kingdom,
the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place> that has been looked to by all those
prophets in the promise they sensed. And
more than that he has what it takes to be King in the Kingdom. He models all he stands for and all he does
on those great messianic prophecies of all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You are the Christ – the anointed one, the
Messiah – the Hebrew word for the king.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">You are the Son of God – the Hebrew and the
Roman title for the King.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But not an all-conquering king like the
Maccabees and like the Zealots dreamed of.
A suffering servant messiah king who through suffering would open up a
new way for his people to follow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And there on the mountain top the closest
of his inner circle of friends Peter, James and John see it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There is the glow of the divine about Jesus
– and they know the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">Kingdom</st1:placetype>
of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place> has come.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And notice how Mark reports it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses,
who were talking with Jesus.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There in this wonderful symbolic moment it
is as if all the law and the prophets find their fulfilment as Jesus is deep in
conversation with Moses who stands for the law and Elijah who stands for the
prophets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The moment passes the cloud descends and
overshadows them and from the cloud there came a voice. This is my Son, the Beloved, listen to him.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s it</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s what been expected of all the
prophets of old. That people would
listen to them and hear the word of God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Now as we look to Jesus Prophet but so much
more than a Prophet, Son of God we are to listen to him. But listening is not enough. We must listen and put his words into action.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Fanciful telling of the story. No – Jesus confirms it. These are the days of Elijah – these are the
days of fulfilment. It’s happening – the
<st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place> is upon us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">As they were coming down the mountain, he
ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of
Man had risen from the dead.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>So
they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead
could mean.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Then they asked him,
‘Why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>He said to them, ‘Elijah is indeed
coming first to restore all things. How then is it written about the Son of
Man, that he is to go through many sufferings and be treated with contempt?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>But I tell you that Elijah has come,
and they did to him whatever they pleased, as it is written about him.’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we come to the end of the Prophets of
the Old Testament we have a big question to ask each one of us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Are we going to listen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And listening are we going to act on that
word of God we hear.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For Christ calls us to be doers of the word
and not hearers only!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I love those words from TS Eliot’s Four
Quartets</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What we call the beginning is often the
end,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And to make an end is to make a beginning,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The end is where we start from…</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We shall not cease from exploration</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the end of all our exploring</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Will be to arrive where we started</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And know the place for the first time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He goes on to say one thing more …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And all shall be well and</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">All manner of thing shall be well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-58150451072134816842012-02-05T12:48:00.001-08:002012-02-05T12:48:42.518-08:00Jonah and Jesus think the unthinkable<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Thinking the unthinkable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Changing the unchangeable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">An impossible dream!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Or is it?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">At Hy-Way on Wednesday I found myself
sharing my recollections of teachers who had made a difference in my life. I think back and know how much I owe to
inspirational teachers. I have many
vivid memories of school days.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Some are quite vivid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And still disturbing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The kind of memories that send a shiver
down your spine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I would be ten. I can picture myself in the playground at <st1:placename w:st="on">Mayflower</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">Junior</st1:placename>
<st1:placetype w:st="on">School</st1:placetype> in <st1:place w:st="on">Leicester</st1:place>
when the conversation was of the Cuban Missile Crisis. I would have been 9 at the time. We seemed to be standing on the brink of a
third world war and this time it would be nuclear. A moment’s memory.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Eight years later I found myself in the
sixth form – I can picture it now walking home along the <st1:street w:st="on"><st1:address w:st="on">London Road</st1:address></st1:street>, past Duke’s Drive, late in
the evening after a showing of a film banned from broadcast on the BBC – the
War Game. We lived in the shadow of the
nuclear bomb.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">To end the cold was thinking the unthinkable,
it would involve changing the unchangeable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
Then the Berlin Wall came down. And the
unthinkable happened, the unchangeable changed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The death of Basil D’Olivera recently
brought back to me memories of the Anti-apartheid campaign, stop the seventies
tour in the wake of the D’olivera affair when the apartheid regime in <st1:country-region w:st="on">South Africa</st1:country-region> insisted D’olivera be dropped from
the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">England</st1:country-region></st1:place> side.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The end of apartheid was thinking the
unthinkable, changing the unchangeable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then that moment when Nelson Mandela walked
free. And the day of the first elections
in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">South Africa</st1:country-region></st1:place>. The unthinkable was happening before our very
eyes, the unchangeable was changing before our very eyes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus was in the business of raising our
horizons, of getting us to think the unthinkable and change the unchangeable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the world he lived in was just as
troublesome. The massive thing for Jesus
and his people was the massive might of the <st1:place w:st="on">Roman Empire</st1:place>
– the power that ground down the Jewish people and so many peoples the world over.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How the people longed for the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">Kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place> to break in. For the kingdom of heaven to come. For God’s will to be done on earth as in
heaven. But that was to think the
unthinkable it would involve changing the unchangeable and that was not happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Yet, that was the message of Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place>
has come near – repent and believe the Good News.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Tough.
Because it was not very evident.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s the message that runs through the
Gospel accounts of Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">By Luke 11 Jesus is very much on the road
to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>. As he travels sharing that good news in word
and deed he prays. He teaches his
disciples about prayer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Your kingdom come – that’s the prayer –
your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Not possible. Unthinkable.
Keep on prayer he says – a story of the friend at midnight who keeps on
asking, and then the wonderful rhythms</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ask and it will be given you</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Seek and you will find.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Knock and the door will be opened for you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ask seek knock.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Keep at it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And it is a struggle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus recognises the problem. It seems as if people are in thrall to powers
that are beyond their control. There is
a very real sense of evil around. And that gets a hold of people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus in the business of breaking the power
of the demons that get a hold of people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When you read about demons, Beelzebul, the
ruler of the demons. Don’t think
personal devils, don’t think people who now we would think of as ill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Instead think people who are trapped by
powers beyond their control that are so destructive it seems unthinkable that
their power could ever be broken.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And Jesus confronts those powers, jesus
overcomes those powers. And the message
of Jesus breaks even those unbreakable bonds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There’s talk here of breaking the bonds of
the strong man. Setting people free.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Does Jesus have in mind here the powers
that hold people down. There’s no other
way of describing them – they are demonic.
But he breaks those bonds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Olga was telling me how lovely it was to
receive that long service certificate last week because it was the eleventh
anniversary of her mother’s death.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In some ways that seems like yesterday.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In some ways it seems another age.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we approached the millennium we had such
high hopes with the ending of the cold war, the ending of apartheid, even the
down-sizing of GCHQ.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then came 9/11. The Afghan war now in its eleventh year, and
showing little signs of resolution, the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Iraq</st1:country-region></st1:place> war. The rise in terrorism. All that’s happening to Christians and many
others in <st1:country-region w:st="on">Iraq</st1:country-region>,
<st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Egypt</st1:country-region></st1:place>,
the middle East. The hope of new-found
freedoms or the opening of Pandora’s box.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The financial crisis.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It feels as we are in the grip of forces
beyond our control.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">At the heart of our Christian faith is that
not even the most unthinkable, unchangeable of forces for ill can defeat the
goodness of God. That’s to hold on
to. That’s the conviction.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus drives his point home with two
illustrations to a restless crowd.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s not possible to change the situation
the people are in with the Roman powers that be. It’s unthinkable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Just as he had done in that sermon in the
synagogue of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Nazareth</st1:place></st1:city>,
so here Jesus turns to two stories from the prophets that tell of Gentiles who
so it would seem could never be changed … yet who are changed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The first story comes from the former
prophets and is told in I Kings 10 and it is about the Queen of Sheba coming to
Solomon and being changed. The
unthinkable happens.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The second story is much more difficult to
date.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">How sad that we trivialise the story of
Jonah to debates about a whale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">AS far as Jesus was concerned the story of
the whale is in many ways incidental to the story of Jonah.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Unique among the prophets in containing a
single story, complete with prayer.
Jonah has a timelessness about it that speaks into any situation when
people are in the grip of monstrous, unshakeable powers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The monstrous unshakeable power is <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Nineveh</st1:place></st1:city>. The story is a larger than life story. <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Nineveh</st1:place></st1:city>
is the massive power that is massively destructive. It destroys anything to do with God and God’s
people. And it’s quite understandable
that Jonah flees in the opposite direction.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are indications that this is a larger
than life story, the like of which Jesus revelled in. Three days in the belly of the biggest fish
the world has ever seen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then when Jonah eventually gets to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Nineveh</st1:place></st1:city> it is the biggest
city the world has ever seen. It takes
three days to walk from one side of the city to the other. Think of it. Say four miles an hour, ten
hours of walking each day, that’s 120 miles across from side to side. You are talking a city three times the size
of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">London</st1:place></st1:city>. This is a monstrous, larger than life utterly
impossible to destroy city.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And Jonah warns the people of the wrath of
God.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And the story is told wonderfully. The people listen. And they change their ways. And God changes his mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And that makes Jonah incensed. He had wanted God to destroy the city –
instead God has mercy on the city of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Nineveh</st1:place></st1:city>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB"><br />
This is a truly shocking story.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And it is the shocking nature of the story
that Jesus picks up on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Never mind Solomon and the Queen of Sheba –
in Jesus there was someone far greater than Solomon who could make the unthinkable happen, and
change the unchangeable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Never mind Jonah and the way the people of
Ninveh changed, in Jesus was one far greater who could change the unchangeable
and make things happen that even to think about was simply unthinkable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are powers that be around at all
sorts of level that seem to be unvanquiahable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We look to the victory of Christ.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let’s hold on to that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">With that big picture in mind – then we can
do the little things. And each little
thing that is in accord with that big picture will make a difference.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s great to see Maurice back in church
after being in hospital. Maurice had
spent the day in hospital watching TV.
The news. And there were pretty
grim things happening. That day it had
been the deaths at a football match in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Egypt</st1:place></st1:country-region> – horrific in their own right
but somehow symptomatic of the powers that can be unleashed in our dark world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We sat reflecting on the world and the fact
that we cannot make a difference. But
wait a moment we can make a difference.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Think where you are in that hospital
bed. The hospital system is stretched,
some say almost to breaking point.
Nurses we were hearing this week are worked off their feet. Your attitude with the nurses can make a
difference – it you are awkward that absorbs time from the nurses. If you share a smile with them, help them,
what a difference that makes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Interesting thoughts to share. The difference each of us can make, no matter
how small the thing we do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We do it because we are not going to be
defeated by the powers that be for we look to one who wins the victory.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let’s see that bigger picture and echo the
words of Paul …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">in all these things we are more than conquerors
through him who loved us.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>For I
am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things
present, nor things to come, nor powers,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>nor
height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate
us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-70963321784370155322012-01-29T13:17:00.001-08:002012-01-29T13:17:37.584-08:00Obadiah and Joel - dream dreams, see vision ... and prophesy!<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I’m not sure whether I was excited by the
news or perturbed by it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Scientists have made a break through in
understanding why locusts swarm. It has
to do with levels of nitrogen in their food chain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Plagues of locusts plague north Africa to
this day. And are among the most
destructive forces of nature. The havoc
they wreak is nature red in tooth and claw.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The suggestion in the news report was that
scientists think now that by adding nitrogen fertilisers they may be able to
reduce or even eliminate swarms of locust.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In one sense that has to be a great cheer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But in another breath, I wonder. Are such events in nature part of the
world? Do we tinker with such events at
our peril? And yet who are we to
pontificate if people are plagued so destructively by them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Mention a plague of locusts and those who
know their bible stories, not least the bible stories of Sunday school will
think of the ten plagues that came upon the Egyptians as Moses pleaded with
Pharaoh to ‘let my people go’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s fascinating to see how the themes of
the Exodus crop up again and again as the story of the Old Testament
unfolds. Often the prophets pick up on
elements of the Exodus story as people again find themselves facing the
destructive powers that be of what can all too often be a very cruel world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Three of the minor prophets who make up the
Book of the Twelve are difficult to date.
Jonah, Obadiah and Joel. What
is beyond doubt is that they date from a time when calamity has befallen the
people or threatens to come upon the people of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>. But which calamitous events these words are
set against is difficult to pin down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Obadiah sees destruction coming upon the
enemies of <st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region>, and is
filled with hope at the final triumph of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>. In the face of calamitous destruction ‘on <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">Mount</st1:placetype> <st1:placename w:st="on">Zion</st1:placename></st1:place>
there shall be those that escape, and it shall be holy!’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">These prophets, like all the rest of the
prophetic writings have that rhythm of gathering gloom as the people are
confronted with the consequences of their disobedience of God, followed by a
glimpse of light as hope dawns with the promise of God’s saving grace to look
to.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I guess it is that rhythm that captures my
imagination as I read the Old Testament in today’s world. Ours is a world that at every turn seems to
be falling apart – it seems as if there is an unrelenting gloom as one follows
the news. I don’t envy this young
generation as they face such an uncertain future, is a refrain I hear more and
more frequently in my visiting of all sorts of people. It is a troubling world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That sense of gloom is one that is shared
by Joel as he contemplates the destructive forces that are let loose in his
world. In a sense it doesn’t matter that
it is not possible to pin-point the backdrop against which he is writing. His words have a timeless feel to them as
they speak to any age that has that sense of gathering gloom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The image he uses is stark.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And it is an image that makes great sense
even today in those parts of the world, not least in <st1:place w:st="on">North
Africa</st1:place> plagued by swarming locusts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB"> </span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Hear this, O elders,<br />
give ear, all inhabitants of the land!<br />
Has such a thing happened in your days,<br />
or in the days of your ancestors?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
Tell your children of it,<br />
and let your children tell their children,<br />
and their children another generation.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
What the cutting locust left,<br />
the swarming locust has eaten.<br />
What the swarming locust left,<br />
the hopping locust has eaten,<br />
and what the hopping locust left,<br />
the destroying locust has eaten.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Faced with such destructive forces the
challenge of Joel is to wake up, come to your senses, keep watch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Wake up, you
drunkards, and weep;<br />
and wail, all you wine-drinkers,<br />
over the sweet wine,<br />
for it is cut off from your mouth.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
For a nation has invaded my land,<br />
powerful and innumerable;<br />
vines laid waste,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">its teeth are lions’
teeth,<br />
and it has the fangs of a lioness.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><br />
It has laid waste my vines,<br />
and splintered my fig trees;<br />
it has stripped off their bark and thrown it down;<br />
their branches have turned white.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Powerful
stuff. Even if you haven’t read Joel
recently, I wonder whether you recognize anything here. Is there a hint of something familiar? I wonder.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Do you remember on
the Road to Emmaus those two followers of Jesus look downcast and sad. The stranger who joins them ask why. They stood still, looking sad. Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas
answered him, “Are you the only stranger in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> who does not know the things that
have taken place there in these days? He
asked them, “What things?” They replied,
The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word
before God and all the people …”</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
As far as those
two were concerned Jesus was a prophet mighty in deed and word …”</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
They proceeded to
describe everything that had happened to Jesus, culminating in his death and
the rumours of his resurrection.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
“then Jesus said
to them, “Oh how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe <b>all that the prophets have declared</b>.” Was it not necessary that the Messiah should
suffer these things and then enter into his glory?”</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Then beginning
with Moses and all the prophets he interpreted to them the things about himself
in all the scriptures.”</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
AS Jesus entered <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city></st1:place> he wept over the
city with lament – would that you had known the things that make for peace but
you did not.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
He gathered his
disciples together on the <st1:place w:st="on">Mount of Olives</st1:place> and
he spoke to them of the days of destruction that are going to come upon them
before they have died.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
He cleanses the
temple and speaks of its destruction.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
He urges his
followers to keep awake and watch. He
speaks woe to the religious leaders of the day.
He even curses a fig tree that is destroyed.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
In all those
actions there are echoes of Joel.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
What Jesus does
and in what Jesus says he is in the line of prophets of which Joel is one of
the great ones.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
The people have to
face the consequences of all that they have done and of all that has happened
to them.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
That day in Emmaus
those two recognized in that stranger the risen Jesus. </div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
For forty days
Jesus appears to the disciples at different moments.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Jesus makes it
absolutely plain that everything written about him in the law of Moses and the
prophets and the psalms must be fulfilled.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
His followers are
to take that very message of repentance and forgiveness of sins and proclaim
the name of Jesus to all nations beginning from <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
“You are witnesses
of these things,” Jesus said to them.
“And, see, I am sending upon you what my Father promised, so stay here
in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Stay in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> they did for
ten more days.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Behind closed
doors</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
In prayer.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Until on the
fiftieth day it happened. Hard to put
into words. But they knew that power had
come upon them, useen yet very real power, it was like a mighty rushing wind, they
were tongues as of fire.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
And they tumbled
down the steps from that upper room on to the streets of Jersualem and everyone
could understand their message no matter the language they spoke.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
And then it was
Peter who put his finger on it.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
He knew that the
promise so many of those prophets had spoken of was dawning. Of all the propets it was the vision of Joel
that came to his mind.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">No,
this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;">“In the last days it will be, God declares,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and your sons and your
daughters shall prophesy,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">and your young men shall see visions,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and your old men shall
dream dreams.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">Even upon my slaves, both men and women,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> in those days I will pour out
my Spirit;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and they shall
prophesy.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">And I will show portents in the heaven above</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and signs on the earth below,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> blood, and fire,
and smoky mist.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">The sun shall be turned to darkness</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and the moon to blood,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> before the coming
of the Lord’s great and glorious day.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord
shall be saved.”</span></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
This is not just
something wonderful for then.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
This is what is at
the heart of church for us today.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Yes, the world and
its troubles is pretty overwhelming, but we have a strength from God to help us
live through these days. Not just to
grin and bear it, not just to face the world with gritted teeth.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
I will pour out my
Spirit upon all flesh</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Let’s claim the
power of God’s spirit – we have a strength to give us back-bone.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br />
Then we have a task</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
Your sons and
daughters shall prophesy.</div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;">
What do prophets
do? They speak truth to power. They challenge the powers that be with the
true way of God. We are to do exactly
what Jesus did – declare the truth of God to the powers that be in our world. The whole law reduces to two things for Jesus
– Love God, love your neighbour. But
interestingly it is in the middle of that last week when he is so doing what
Joel had done and echoing Joel’s deeds and words that he puts his finger on
what are the weightiest matters of the law – justice and mercy and faith.</div>
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Just as the
prophets of old did, just as Jesus did, so too must we do – challenge the
powers that be to shape what is done in our society according to those
principles of love for God, love for neighbour, justice, mercy and faith. And as we have seen time and time again
throughout the prophets that involves good news for the poor, sight for the
blind, setting free of those who are oppressed.</div>
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That’s why I for
one wrote to our MP this week giving my support for the stand taken by the
Bishops in the House of Lords, why I went to see Nigel Jones who is our local
person in the House of Lords to put over some of the views I have picked up in
conversation I have had with people working in the NHS expressing concern. It is important for us to engage this is to ‘prophesy’ in the strength of the
Spirit of God.</div>
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We have to see
visions and dream dreams.</div>
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It was subversive
enough in Joel’s time whenever that was to say that this outpouring of the
Spirit would come upon even slaves. But
in Jesus’ day that was dynamite. Roman
society was incredibly hierarchical – the powers that be in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> under the Herodians went along with
that society. And the Spirit comes upon
slaves? These are the bottom of the
pile. How does that translate into the
world of today – who are those at the bottom of the pile in our society. Who are those demonized in the popular press
– that might be a good place to start – and God’s spirit is for them.</div>
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This is powerful
stuff. It’s no wonder Peter should find
himself in prison within a short while of speaking these words. No wonder on the anniversary of Christ’s
execution he should be taken captive by Herod to be executed just as John the
Baptist had been, just as Jesus had been.</div>
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Just in case you
hadn’t got the point. Peter repeats it.</div>
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<span style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Even
upon my slaves, both men and women,</span><span style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> in those days I will pour out
my Spirit;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and they shall
prophesy.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
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Someone at St
Luke’s said to me last week – these are the signs of the times. Yes, we can see them all around us. But the pont of what Joel wrote is that they
could be seen in his day. They could be
seen in Jesus’s day. They could be seen
now by Peter. The portents are all
there.</div>
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The destuctiveness
of the Day of the Lord is all around us – and it can be seen in every
generation. It is not that every
preceding generation got it wrong, but we are right. It is that the signs of the time are to be
seen in every generation. And we are to
take notice of them. Change our ways and
model what we do on what God wants of us – love God, love neighbour and the
weightier matters of the law – justice, mercy, faithfulness.</div>
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Then everyone who
calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.</div>
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What an
interesting word from Joel to finish with.
So easy to think of it simply as a spiritual salvation. But this is the word used of Jesus when he
healed people whose world had fallen apart in physical illness, in illness of
the mind. Saved – healed – made
whole. Put together again.</div>
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In a world that
feels as if it is falling apart the great thing is that God in Christ by the
power of this Holy Spirit keeps restores us and puts us together again when we
have fallen apart. And we have the task
of bearing witness to this wonderful power and be in the business of restoring
and putting together those who have fallen apart in the world around us as
well.</div>
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The rest of his
speech is dynamite for the powers that be in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>.</div>
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When they executed
John the Baptist they thought they had put an end to this troublesome prophet.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Jesus took up the
mantle and was a prophet mighty in deed and word.</div>
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When they executed
Jesus they thought they had put an end to this troublesome prophet.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Now it is not just
that Jesus has been raised from the dead – it is that that resurrection is a
victory over the principalities and powers that shows that vindicates all that
Jesus shared, and now by the power of the Spirit it is let loose in the world
and nothing can prevail against it.</div>
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And we are part of
that movement as we follow in the footsteps of Jesus and in the strength of the
Spirit dream our dreams, see our visions and above all else speak truth to
power as we by the power of the Spirit continue that prophetic work and
prophesy.</div>
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<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-74978901272737098612012-01-22T12:18:00.000-08:002012-01-22T12:18:11.571-08:00Changed by serving - Zechariah's story<i>This sermon was preached in a united service with friends from St Luke's Church to mark the Week of Prayer for Christian unity. It draws on readings and a theme put together by friends from the churches of Poland.</i><br />
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<span lang="EN-GB">I always value slipping into an evening
service at the end of a training weekend in <st1:place w:st="on">Nottingham</st1:place>. Last Sunday was no exception. After a full training weekend with a
wonderful set of people in Nottingham, I went over to Derby to join Cheryl and
Graham for lunch and then go off to see Eric Burton, who had been here in
Highbury in the 60’s and 70’s in hospital.
Though quite poorly after his stroke, Eric was on top form and we had a
great conversation – great to share with him.
I came into church as the service was beginning and it was great to hear
Robert speaking of the partnership we share with St Luke’s and St Micahel’s and
hear him giving his greetings.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">He explained how they have initiated a
youth club at St Michael’s and they will be meeting this evening – they are
very much in our prayers as we meet. In
a sense what he shared last Sunday evening goes with today in this Week of
Prayer for Christian Unity as we shared with him this morning at St Luke’s.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Three things he said in his preaching
touched me. He began and ended with
those wonderful words that mean so much to so many, and have resonated with me
down through the years.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And I said to the man who stood at the gate
of the year: Give me a light that I may
tread safely into the unknown.”</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And he replied:</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">“Go out into the darkness and put your hand
into the hand of God. That shall be to
you better than light and safer than a known way.”</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Those words spoke to me – how good to know
that we may put our hand into the hand of God … no matter the darkness, that
shall be to each one of us better than light and safer than a known way.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">He spoke of the importance of prayer, and
reflected on the wonderful sessions Carolyn had shared with us at Transformers
on the Lord’s Prayer. How precious that
prayer for our lives.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And he spoke of the need for a vision … a
vision to share of the future we look to.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">As I was listening, I felt as if Robert had
set the tone for some thoughts I wanted to take on into this evening’s service
and beyond to the next couple of weeks as well.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">In these opening weeks of the year Carolyn
has prompted us to think about what it means to belong to Highbury, and what is
special about our belonging. She led us
in a very gentle, but very thought provoking time at our Church Meeting to
start the year thinking of words and phrases that sum up for us what it is that
makes Highbury special. We will be
sharing those insights as the year unfolds.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">We need to sense as a church family that we
can put our hands into the hand of God and he will guide us.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">We need to sense as a church family the
vital importance of prayer. This coming
week John and Joan Barnes will be celebrating their Diamond Wedding – on
Thursday. John’s in <st1:place w:st="on">Tewkesbury</st1:place>
hospital and will be there. Joan is in
Dowty House. But they plan to be
together for their Wedding Anniversary.
So Joan will go over to John and in the Day room they will celebrate.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Ten years ago I asked them to share with
our morning congregation their recipe for marriage and relationships. I asked each to share again. Without a hint of a pause John immediately
said, No Secrets. I then went to visit
Joan and without a pause she told me exactly what John had just said. They could have competed in that old quiz
show, Mr and Mrs. But Joan went on to
say another couple of things too. I rely
on prayer, she said. And she spoke of
the importance of prayer to her. And of
the way she prayed for me, for my family for us as a church family I thought that was something very
special. That’s the kind of prayer we
value from the likes of Joan … and the kind of prayer we owe them as their
Diamond Wedding anniversary approaches this week.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">But thirdly we stand in need of a
vision. How vital it is to have a
vision. Without a vision, the Proverb
says, the people die.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">I was going to turn to Joel and the sons
and the pouring out of the spirit on the sons and daughters, on the old men who
dream dreams, on the young men who see visions on the male and the female
slaves on whom the spirit is poured out.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">But then I looked again. And with Robert I
had looked at the prayers that have been published for this year’s Week of
Prayer for Christian Unity. I scanned
through them and I spotted that for one of the days there’s a reading from
Zechariah.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Now as it happens Zechariah was next on my
list of the minor prophets to turn to.
Along with Haggai and Malachi Zechariah is one of the three minor
prophets I link up with Ezekiel and the return from exile.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Zechariah begins with a challenge to the
people to make an about turn and begin all over again. The prayers for this week of prayer for
Christian unity come from <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Poland</st1:place></st1:country-region>
and are built on the theme. We will all
be changed. The prayers invite us to be
people prepared to be changed as we put our faith into action.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Zechariah then shares a sequence of eight
visions that speak of horsemen and candlesticks, of flying scrolls and olive
trees.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Robert invited us to be a people of vision.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">One of those visions sticks in my mind from
long ago. It meant a great deal to
someone called Amy Carmichael. She was a Mother Theresa kind of character
who gave her life to a life of selfless service of the most needy in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">India</st1:place></st1:country-region>. She sustained the incredible work she did by
a life of prayer. In one of those
prayers she drew on the vision Zechariah has of four horns and four, as she
recalled them carpenters. As I recall
the way she shared the vision she suggested that we each face things that knock
us for six. Those are the four
horns. They can at times come from any
direction and every direction. We are
pulled this way and that. In the face of
the things that devastate we must hold on to the other side of Zechariah’s
vision. To each horn there is a
carpenter. For each of the ills that
come up on us there is not just an antidote, not just a response, but one who will
set things right, a carpenter.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">My recollection of Amy Carmichael’s prayer
as it has played on me is the thought in prayer that no matter what may befall
God has a carpenter ready to make things right, to put things right. Did not Jesus grow up as the son of a
carpenter, is he not the carpenter who will set things right for us.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Zechariah’s visions over he has a wonderful
promise he puts into words. The greatest
calamity of all that has befallen the people will be put right. <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
will be restored. There’s a wonderful
vision that echoes that Isaiah vision that comes in Isaiah 65 – Zechariah sees
the streets of the city full of boys and girls playing its streets. What a wonderful vision of restoration he
has.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">The people did return. But there was something missing. They did not regain their fine independence
as a kingdom as they hoped. They were
under the thumb of the Persians, the Greeks, The Egyptians, the Syrians and
worst of all the Romans.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">By the time of John the Baptist and Jesus
the city was in thrall to the Roman power.
And the people longed for freedom.
For one who would deliver them.
Jesus took to heart the climax to Zechariah’s vision for restoration and
took it completely to heart as he made his final triumphant approach to the
city on of all things a donkey.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">He was shaping his kingdom exactly by the
words of Zechariah …</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">We need a vision. We need to look to a carpenter. But we look to a new kind of kingdom – and we
find it in Christ. And what is this
Jesus like …</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Rejoice greatly, O daughter <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Zion</st1:place></st1:city>!</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> Shout aloud, O daughter <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>!</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">Lo, your king comes to you;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> triumphant and victorious is
he,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">humble and riding on a donkey,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> on a colt, the foal of a
donkey.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><br />
<span style="background: white;">He</span></span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Zechariah.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">will cut off the chariot
from Ephraim</span><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and the warhorse from
Jerusalem;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">and the battle-bow shall be cut off,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and he shall command peace to
the nations;</span><br />
<span style="background: white;">his dominion shall be from sea to sea,</span><br />
<span style="background: white;"> and from the River to the ends
of the earth.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">What a wonderful vision. But the Christ who comes to us comes in
humble service to command peace to the nations.
He is not the kind of king the world hankers after who demands
subservience from his subjects. He is a
king who came to serve … </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">For the Son of Man came not to be served but to
serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">This day in our prayers for Christian unity
we are challenged by the churches of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Poland</st1:place></st1:country-region> to be prepared to be changed
by serving.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">If Jesus came not to be served but to
serve. How are we to seek to serve. How can we serve … maybe in the life of the
church, now is the time we invite people to be prepared to put themselves
forward to act as Deacon. I began
talking about my visit to Eric, he liked to use the word ‘servant’ to speak of
‘the Deacons’ It is not that we want
people to take decisions for us .. it is that we seek people ready to serve
God. Do pray about it – if you may be
able to fulfil that calling – do pray for those who may be able to do that work
in your prayers. It is an important part
of our church life.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">The readings are followed by a reflection
that suggest that we shall be open to be changed by serving if we are prepared
to have a time of preparation so that we may be ready to be changed. The reflection is followed by a prayer, the
prayer on the order of service sheet.
Let me share the words of the reflection, then let’s say together the
words on the order of Service sheet.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Preparation is the thing -</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">says the painter – </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">gathering resources,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">sizing the task,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">planning the job;</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB"> then offering effort,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB"> using gifts,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">giving self:</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB"> decorating canvas or </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">conservatory -</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">change comes.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Preparation is the thing –</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">says the athlete –</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">scheduling training,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">eating well,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">warming up;</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB"> then playing hard,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">straining sinew,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">giving self:</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">performing on
pitch or track –</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">change comes.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Preparation is the thing –</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">says the psalmist –</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">eyes not raised too high,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">thoughts not too elevated,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">soul calmed and quieted;</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB"> then service in worship,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB"> giving heart and mind,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB"> giving self:</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">praising in
cottage or </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">cathedral –</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">change comes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Prayer<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Gracious God,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">we gather, united in praise,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">longing for heavenly greatness in our </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">earthly lives:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">serving one another in the way of Jesus,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">finding the overflowing joy of unity,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">and so to scatter, united in </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">service.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-17855641407975434132012-01-08T12:33:00.000-08:002012-01-08T12:33:01.126-08:00Faith in public life - Haggai's story<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We made Tuesday our Bank Holiday day this
week and after a fun morning indoors because of the rain and the winds with
Lake we went off to visit <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Gloucester</st1:place></st1:city>
museum in the afternoon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s ahead of <st1:place w:st="on">Cheltenham</st1:place>,
in having recently been refurbished. Not
having been for quite a while it was good to visit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was great to see the way they tell the
geological story of <st1:city w:st="on">Gloucester</st1:city>’s
countryside and the archaeological story of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Gloucester</st1:place></st1:city>’s ancient history. That part of the exhibition focused on Roman
Gloucester at the north western extremity of the Roman empire – there were
wonderful artefacts illustrating everyday life, and not a few showcasing the
intensely religious nature of Roman life.
What a pity the coin with a Chi Rho on it was not identified as a
Christian coin! Among tombstones and
medical instruments is in pride of place a stretch of the actual Roman wall.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Roman wall, of course, was built
towards the end of the first century AD that makes it for all intents and
purposes contemporary with the great Roman building work that was going on at
the opposite extremity of the Roman empire in <st1:place w:st="on">Judea</st1:place>
on the Easter Frontier. What struck me
as fascinating was the description of the wall itself. The large blocks were shaped and constructed
in a way that was very rare outside of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Rome</st1:place></st1:city>
itself and unique in this country. I
looked down at the base of the wall and thought I have seen a wall not unlike
that not that long ago and right on the other side of the <st1:place w:st="on">Roman
Empire</st1:place>.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was the base of the wall of the Roman
temple built by Herod. Same kind of
limestone rock. Same kind of distinctive
feel to it. Much of Herod’s architecture
was unique outside of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Rome</st1:place></st1:city>
itself. The wall of his temple was even
more special in that many of the rocks were carved with a pattern around the
edge.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Looking down at that Roman wall in
Gloucester there were the same gaps between the rocks as in the temple wall –
now of course at that spot on the Western wall those crevices between the
building blocks are stuffed with the prayers of devout Jews.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Romans were very religious. The first thing they would build as they made
a start on a settlement would be a shrine where the standards of the emperor
could be lodged, a focus for their religious worship. The walls of the city followed afterwards.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Herod was a good Roman. And in his own way very religious. The best way to win over the hearts and minds
of the Jewish people, he decided, was to set about rebuilding their temple in
the middle of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>. He made it his priority. Work started on the temple 16 years and more
before the birth of Christ. It was
taking real shape by the time Jesus was born, one of the finest splendours of
the whole ancient world by the time Jesus’ ministry began and completed 30
years after the death and resurrection of Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In one sense Herod knew his bible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When the exile was over and the people
returned to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
they had had a different priority. Their
priority was to rebuild the walls of the city.
How they did that is described in a couple of books that appear in the
third section of the Hebrew Scriptures, the Writings, and we will come to in
due course, Ezra and Nehemiah. The
priestly Ezra recognised the need once the town walls were built to read the
words of the Law – and a public reading was arranged.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But something was neglected.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">No attempt was made to re-build the temple.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What incensed Haggai was not just that the
temple had been neglected, but that once the walls of the city had been rebuilt
the next priority was a lavish life-style lived in the finest of houses that
were in the process of arising out of the rubble of the destroyed city.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">In the second year of King Darius, in the sixth
month, on the first day of the month, the word of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>came
by the prophet Haggai to Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to
Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Thus
says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of hosts: These people say the time
has not yet come to rebuild the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>’s house.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Then the word of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>came
by the prophet Haggai, saying:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Is
it a time for you yourselves to live in your panelled houses, while this house
lies in ruins?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">To make matters worse the people’s sole
concern on returning from exile was to line their own pockets. No sooner have they returned from exile than
catastrophe falls – the rains fail, the drought comes, and the harvests simply
don’t come.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Now therefore, thus says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of
hosts: Consider how you have fared.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>You
have sown much, and harvested little; you eat, but you never have enough; you
drink, but you never have your fill; you clothe yourselves, but no one is warm;
and you that earn wages earn wages to put them into a bag with holes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What’s gone wrong is the neglect of the
temple and all it stands for. The people
must put the temple and that focus on God back at the centre of their lives.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Thus says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of hosts: Consider how you have fared.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Go up to the hills and bring wood and
build the house, <b>so that I may take
pleasure in it and be honoured, s</b>ays the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>You have looked for much, and, lo, it
came to little; and when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why? says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of
hosts. Because my house lies in ruins, while all of you hurry off to your own
houses.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Therefore the heavens
above you have withheld the dew, and the earth has withheld its produce.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>And I have called for a drought on the
land and the hills, on the grain, the new wine, the oil, on what the soil
produces, on human beings and animals, and on all their labours.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The leaders of the people and the people
themselves heed the word of the Lord.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">So it is the work on the house of the Lord
starts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Haggai’s words are a challenge to every
society that turns its back on God and neglects the things of faith that are so
important.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Haggai like so many others of the prophets
has something to say to our society and to our world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Much is wrong in our society.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">One of the things that is missing is a
focus on God at the heart of our society.
That is something we need to seek again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s good to reflect on the large scale
needs of society. But change starts with
each one of us, wherever we are. What is
in our hearts counts. What is deep within us makes a difference.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s a call to faith in our society.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I can hear a big amen to that all around.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But it is at that point that I want to
notice something rather different emerging.
It is very tempting to say that what is needed is a revival of the
accoutrements of religion. We need to
make sure that church as an institution is at the heart of things. Woe betide us if we lose bishops from the
established church in the House of Lords.
Woe betide us if the County
Council stops saying prayers before its meetings. Let’s work hard to get the trappings of
religion back at the centre of things.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I am not sure that’s the way we should be
going.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s easy to be religious. And it is very easy for worldly powers to
summon religion to their aid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Herod the Great had learned a lesson from
Haggai. He rebuilt the temple – and he
was going to have an official religion right at the heart of his regime.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The problem was it was a brutal regime. He aimed to use religion to bolster up his
power.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Taking seriously all that John the Baptist
had stood for, Jesus was well aware of the Herodion abuse of power and abuse of
religioin. When Jesus saw the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">temple</st1:placetype> <st1:placename w:st="on">Herod</st1:placename></st1:place>
had rebuilt he was incensed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This was not the kind of religion that the
prophets, Haggai, included, had in mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It was not the faith of the prophets,
the God of the Law.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Stop making my father’s house a market
place, was his cry as he drove out people selling cattle, sheep, doves in the
temple precincts and moneychangers extorting hard-earned cash from the poorest
of people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Many people among the Jews were also
incensed. They were looking for
something different. They wanted some
kind of sign.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus offered them a sign.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Listen carefully to what John tells us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Jesus answered them, ‘Destroy this temple, and
in three days I will raise it up.’<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>The
Jews then said, ‘This temple has been under construction for forty-six years,
and will you raise it up in three days?’But he was speaking of the temple of
his body.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>After he was raised
from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they
believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This goes to the heart of what Jesus was
about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Yes, Jesus too wanted God, faith to be at
the heart of everyone’s life. It had to
be at the heart of the nation’s life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But not the God of Herod, not the faith of
the Herodions, not the God of this kind of temple.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">No, Jesus would embody all that the temple
stood for. It was his presence that was
all important. What was important was
not the outward trappings of religion as a means of power, but an inner faith
rooted in him, in his words, and in his way of life, an inner faith that would
be a means of grace.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">So much of Jesus teaching hinges on this
fundamental idea that he embodies all the temple stands for.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Haggai goes on to remonstrate with the
people for leaving the temple in dishonour.
He urges on them a temple worthy of God’s glory. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">In the second year of King Darius,in the
seventh month, on the twenty-first day of the month, the word of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>came
by the prophet Haggai, saying:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Speak
now to Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua son of
Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people, and say,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Who is left among you that saw this
house in its former glory? How does it look to you now? Is it not in your sight
as nothing?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>Yet now take courage,
O Zerubbabel, says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>; take
courage, O Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest; take courage, all
you people of the land, says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span>; work, for I
am with you, says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of hosts,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>according to the promise that I made
you when you came out of Egypt. My spirit abides among you; do not fear.For
thus says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of hosts: Once again, in a little
while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>and I will shake all the nations, so
that the treasure of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with
splendour, says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of hosts.The silver is mine, and the
gold is mine, says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of hosts.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>The latter splendour of this house
shall be greater than the former, says the<span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of hosts; and in this place I will
give prosperity, says the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>of hosts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That is exactly what Jesus has on offer. Listen in those words to the echoes in the
teaching of Jesus. Take courage, take
courage, take courage. My spirit is with
you. Do not fear. The shaking of the heavens and the earth, the
desire of all the nations coming, a house filled with splendour – greater
glory. This is the glory of the presence
of Christ with us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What is needed is not the trappings of
religion. But people in whose hearts the
love of God in Christ is alive in word and action, in thought and prayer. It is not a set of bishops in an established
church that will ensure Christ’s presence at the heart of our nation’s life but
men and women who serve as MP’s and in the House of Lord’s who live out their
faith in Christ in word and action, in thought and prayer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What is needed in our County Council is not
the formality of a set of religious words uttered at the beginning of the
meeting. Let the meeting start with a
quiet, a focus on shared responsibilities – what we need is Councillors for whom
a living faith in Christ is in their every word and action, in their every
thought and prayer who will be thinking their prayers throughout the time of
their business meetings.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let’s put faith at the heart of the
nation’s life not by some specious allegiance to the trappings of religion, but
by seeking so to share our faith in Christ that people put Christ at the heart
of all they do and live out their faith on the streets around us and in the
corridors of power.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-71672958011839023552012-01-01T12:27:00.001-08:002012-01-01T12:27:53.386-08:00Ezekiel - People of Influence<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As the New Year begins what does our world
need?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">People of Power.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Or</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">People of Influence</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It’s good to receive occasionally the
transcript of a particularly good Thought for the Day from organists Frank or
Richard – often ones with some scientific bent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I pricked my ears up when I heard Chief
Rabbi Jonathan Sachs do his thought for the day this week. That’s something for Sunday evening, I
thought. And I’ll email the transcript
to Frank and Richard. You can imagine my
disappointment when I found the BBC website has been on holiday and won’t be
back in operation until next week. So …
no transcript.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jonathan Sachs was asking who are more
important, and indeed who are more needed in the kind of time of crisis that we
are facing in today’s world?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Is it People of Power … or People of
Influence?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">He reflected on the way the Hebrew
Scriptures are actually more to do with People of Influence than with People of
Power.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">A large part of the Hebrew Scriptures are
made up with the Prophets – the former prophets whose writings are contained in
Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings and the latter prophets whose writings are
contained in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and the Book of the Twelve.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The Kings were the People of Power and with
the exception of David and Solomon and one or two others their names have been
forgotten. The Prophets were the People
of Influence – it was their spoken word and their writings that challenged the
People of Power and indeed shaped the way they should exercise their power.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Martin Luther King, Mother Theresa, Desmond
Tutu were not People of Power. They were
People of Influence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">What is needed in our world of crisis now
are people of influence who can use a Prophetic Voice to challenge the People
of Power and then shape the way they exercise their power.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is fascinating that the three great
books of Prophetic writing, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel all focus on THE major
crisis Israel faced – the destruction of Jerusalem.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB"> Whereas Jeremiah stayed put in <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> when the Babylonian power destroyed that city
and its temple, Ezekiel was among those who were carted off to far away <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Babylon</st1:place></st1:city>.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">There is almost a madness in Ezekiel’s
writing as he sees fantastical visions many of which are profoundly
disturbing. But through it all he speaks
out in that challenging way as he looks back on what has gone wrong and brought
<st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>
to this sorry state of affairs, and he seeks to shape the way people in the
future will use their power.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">As people subsequently returned from exile
they could tell that Ezekiel was one of those great People of Influence whose
words were worth taking note of. Indeed
the way he sought to shape those who held power became very much the
inspiration for Jesus and all he stood for.
I want to identify a number of passages and thoughts that Ezekiel shared
that we can see filled out in Jesus and we can see them setting us the agenda
we should seek to follow as this New Year unfolds.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">First, we must come to terms with
individual responsibility. This is one
of the great insights Ezekiel has to share.
Much of the thinking that had gone on before, it is reflected in Exodus
20 in the ten commandments sees that people can be caught up in bad behaviour
from one generation to the next. That is
an insight that we must always remember when responding to the needs of other
people. People can be trapped from one
generation to the next – often those youngsters with massive behavioural
problems that CCP sees in its Education Centre come from family backgrounds
that are immensely difficult with intractable problems that seem to go down
from one generation to the next. That
may be a helpful observation but there is also a need for individual
responsibility – and to recognise that you are responsible for your actions.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">The word of the<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>came
to me:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">2</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">What do you mean by repeating this proverb concerning the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">land</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">Israel</st1:placename></st1:place>, ‘The parents have eaten sour
grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge’?<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">3</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">As I live, says the Lord<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span><span class="sc"><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">God</span></span>, this proverb
shall no more be used by you in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">4</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Know that all lives are mine; the life of the parent as well
as the life of the child is mine: it is only the person who sins that shall
die. 18</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Each person to take responsibility for
their own actions. And each person has
the potential to change and be changed. Ezekiel
has a lovely way of putting that at the end of chapter 18</span></div>
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<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">31</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">Cast away from you all the
transgressions that you have committed against me, and get yourselves a new
heart and a new spirit!<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Just as Jeremiah held out the hope of a new
covenant, so that thought is echoed by Ezekiel – the people may have
experienced calamity as the consequence of all that had gone wrong over many,
many years. But there is a hope they can
look to, a covenant relationship with God that will be renewed and restored …</span></div>
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<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">19</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I will give them one</span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Ezekiel.doc"></a></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">heart, and put a new spirit within them; I will remove the
heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">20</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">so that they may follow my statutes and keep my ordinances
and obey them. Then they shall be my people, and I will be their God.<span class="apple-converted-space"> 11</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">This has to be one of the most thrilling of
all Ezekiel’s visions. Far away in exile
he has that desolate and devastating vision of the valley of dry bones. 37 – Ezekiel prophesies to the bones and
they come together. Then he prophesies
to the breath … and the breath of God is breathed into the dry bones and there
is new life. A wonderful vision of
restoration.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">That will involved the coming together of
the fractured, divided kingdoms of Israel – as he takes two sticks and joins
them together in front of the people’s very eyes. So too the people will be one people. 37:15ff.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">This speaks into our world and into our
situation at the beginning of the New Year.
The need to recognise responsibility.
The potential for a new start as a new heart, a new spirit, a new breath
comes deep within us. That can be for
us. It can encourage us to work with all
people – the capacity for change. And it
gives us grounds for hope collectively as well.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">One of the most powerful of Ezekiel’s
insights as a Person of Influence is the indictment he makes of the People of
Power of many generation. For him the
People of Power were the Kings of the northern Kingdom and the Southern Kingdom
too.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Chapter 34 is a key part of what Ezekiel
has to share.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">It is interesting that Ezekiel addresses
himself as Son of Man. Which in the NRSV
becomes Mortal. Ben Adam – throughout
the whole book of Ezekiel when Ezekiel is addressed. In 2011 to mark the 400<sup>th</sup>
anniversary of the AV the New International Version was completely
revised. They keep this phrase.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">It is not without significance that when
Jesus speaks of himself he calls himself Son of Man. There is an echo there of Ezekiel.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Son of Man</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;"> </span><b><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">1</span></sup></b><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">The word of the LORD
came to me:<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><b><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">2</span></sup></b><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">“Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Ezekiel, prophesy, speak truth to power,
prophesy against the shepherds of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region></st1:place>. That has nothing to do with the shepherds who
were watching their sheep. The kings
were thought of as shepherds of the people.
It is against the kings that Ezekiel speaks out. The Person of Influence, speaking out against
the People of Power.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">prophesy and say to them: ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD
says: Woe to you shepherds of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region></st1:place>
who only take care of yourselves! Should not shepherds take care of the flock?<span class="apple-converted-space"> 4</span> You have not strengthened the weak
or healed the sick or bound up the injured. You have not brought back the
strays or searched for the lost. You have ruled them harshly and brutally.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><b><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">5</span></sup></b><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana;">So they were scattered
because there was no shepherd, </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">What has happened in exile is the
CONSEQUENCE of all the failings that have mounted up as one King has succeed to
another.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">This is powerful stuff. It is an indictment against the shepherds who
have ruled.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Then comes the promise. But the terms of the promise are very
significant.</span></div>
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<b><sup><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">11</span></sup></b><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;">“‘For this is what the Sovereign LORD
says: I myself will search for my sheep and look after them.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><b><sup><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">12</span></sup></b><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;">As a shepherd looks after his scattered
flock when he is with them, so will I look after my sheep. I will rescue them
from all the places where they were scattered on a day of clouds and darkness.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><b><sup><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">14</span></sup></b><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;">I will tend them in a good pasture, and
the mountain heights of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region>
will be their grazing land. There they will lie down in good grazing land, and
there they will feed in a rich pasture on the mountains of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region></st1:place>.<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<b><sup><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">15</span></sup></b><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;">I myself will tend my sheep and have
them lie down, declares the Sovereign LORD.<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><b><sup><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">16</span></sup></b><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana;">I will search for the lost and bring
back the strays. I will bind up the injured and strengthen the weak, but the
sleek and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd the flock with justice. 34<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Accused of eating with tax collectors and
sinners, criticised for eating at the home of Zacchaeus, Jesus was adamant,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">The Son of Man came to seek and to save the
lost. Luke 19:10</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">The twelve had a message they were to take
‘to the lost sheep of the House of Israel’.
It was a proclamation of Good News – the Kingdom of heaven has come
near. And their task was nothing less
than to cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Jesus tells a story of a Good Shepherd who
seeks out the lost sheep. And then in
John 10 there can be no doubting it.</span></div>
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<sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">14</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">I am the good shepherd. I
know my own and my own know me,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">15</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="background: white; color: #010000; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 13.5pt;">just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay
down my life for the sheep.<span class="apple-converted-space"> John 10</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Just as you find in the great 8<sup>th</sup>
century prophets. Just as you find in
the Isaiah vision of Isaiah 65, so here is an agenda. This is what it takes to be worthy of power,
to exercise power properly …</span></div>
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<b><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 8pt;">16</span></sup></b><span class="apple-converted-space"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Verdana;"> </span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Verdana;">I will search for the lost
and bring back the strays. I will bind up the injured and strengthen the weak,
but the sleek and the strong I will destroy. I will shepherd the flock with
justice. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">This is Mary’s song – bringing down the
rich. Raising up the poor.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">This is what Jesus fulfilled.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And it is the task we are called to fulfil.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">The priority must be to those who are weak,
vulnerable in what we do.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">But it is the challenge we give to those in
power – to give a priority to those who are weak, vulnerable, lost and strayed.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">That’s what’s needed in our world as we stand on the threshold of
a new year.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Shot through Ezekiel is a sense of the
presence of God that is real with the people as they seek to put things back
together again. The final chapters are a
remarkable vision of a new temple.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">A river of living water flows out from the
temple to bring new life to the world.
That vision is taken up by Jesus when he speaks of himself as the living
water. When he speaks of the Spirit as
rivers of living water flowing out from the heart of the believer (John 7:37ff)
there are all sorts of echoes of this remarkable imagery of Ezekiel. As we take bread and share in a cup that
presence of Christ is with us and flows through us into a world of need.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-403808741878305512011-12-18T15:37:00.001-08:002011-12-18T15:39:35.398-08:00Bringing Heaven Down to Earth - Carols by Candle Light<br />
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<b><span lang="EN-GB">Sunday, 18<sup>th</sup> December 6-30<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-GB">Carols by Candle Light<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<i>Our carols were chosen and illustrated by Sue Cole and Shirley Fiddimore accompanied on the organ by Richard Sharpe. The prayers were prepared by Janet Partington. The sequence of readings follows recent preaching themes where we have been exploring the Prophets of the Old Testament through the eyes of Jesus.</i><br />
<b><span lang="EN-GB"><br /></span></b><br />
<b><span lang="EN-GB">67 Once in Royal David’s City verses 1,2,4
UNANNOUNCED<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-GB">Richard
- Welcome<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-GB">Prayer<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">In very troubled times 8 centuries before
Christ, four prophets drew word pictures of what it would take for God’s
kingdom to come and God’s will to be done on earth as it is in heaven.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Those word pictures shaped all that Jesus
stood for and all that Jesus did.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Those same word pictures shape all that we
as Christians stand for and all we seek to do as we pray ‘thy kingdom come, thy
will be done on earth as it is in heaven.’ </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">One of those word pictures is in Isaiah
11:1-9</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">It speaks
of the strength that comes through wisdom, knowledge and skill, it comes
through reverence for God. It speaks of
justice and integrity, of a justice that ensures the poor are treated fairly
and the rights of the helpless are defended.
It speaks of the power that lies in the word rather than the sword. And it is built on reconciliation and
peace. </span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-GB">Reading Isaiah 11:1-9 - Peter<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">What the angel said to Mary in that sixth
month in a town in Galilee called <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Nazareth</st1:place></st1:city>
suggests that the one she would bear would be shaped by that very picture Isaiah
and the prophets that followed him had sketched. The one named Jesus she would conceive and
give birth to would be regarded as ‘great, and will bear the name of the kings
of old, he will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give
to him the throne of his ancestor David.
He will reign over the house of Jacob for ever and ever, and of his
kingdom there will be no end.”</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Mary knew in her heart of hearts that all
Jesus stood for would do justice by the hungry and by the oppressed.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">He has scattered the proud in the thoughts
of their hearts.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">He has brought down the powerful from their
thrones</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And lifted up the lowly</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">He has filled the hungry with good things,</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And sent the rich away empty.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Each verse of our next carol takes up one of
those word pictures from the ancient prophets and uses it to speak of the Jesus
who enters into the hell of this world to turn tyranny on its head. O come, Emmanuel, true branch of Jesse,
bright daybreak, key of David, great Lord of might.</span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-GB">Carol 66 O
come, O come Emmanuel<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This was no pie in the sky idealism. It was into a brutal world of oppression that
Jesus was born …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<st1:city w:st="on"><b><span lang="EN-GB">Reading</span></b></st1:city><b><span lang="EN-GB">: Luke 2:1-7 - <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Marion</st1:place></st1:city><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Maybe the next of our carols is not as
sentimental as we might imagine. Stay by
my side until morning is nigh is plea that Christ Jesus stays with us through
the hours of darkness until the dawn comes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Carol
72 Away in a manger<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">It is through the hours of darkness that
the prayer becomes real … Be near me, Lord Jesus, I ask you to stay.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In our candle-lit service we have four
Advent Candles to light. When one of our
members, <st1:personname w:st="on">Janet Partington</st1:personname>, was asked
to prepare Christmas prayers for other people it made her think …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Janet – Prayer 1<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Janet:
As I was considering these prayers of concern it occurred to me that, so
often, it can feel a bit ‘us-and-them’; as if praying for the needs of the
world is somehow separate from myself, something from which I can be detached.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And it struck me that, while my prayers may
be no less heartfelt for being something I do for (or to!) other people, for me
there is something missing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Because we are <b><u>all </u></b>part of the Community of Need. We may be more, or less, aware of this at
different times, but we are all, inescapably, ‘us’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And so I invite you, as we make our prayers
of intercession, to hold in yourminds the thought that we are <b><u>all</u></b> in need, and if any of the
prayers speak to situations or experiences in your own lives, to take comfort
and strength from the fact that, as you are pray8ng for others you are also
praying for yourself and being prayed for in return.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let us pray,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we look forward to a time of feasting,
we remember those for whom there is little or no food because crops have
failed, disasters have destroyed harvests or there is simply not enough money
to provide essential sustenance.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those who seek to provide for
this most basic of needs across our world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And we remember those for whom eating and
drinking can be fraught with practical difficulties, with unseen dangers or for
whom consuming to excess is a way of hiding from problems too painful to face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we look to a time of cosy homes with
family and friends, we remember those who have no home to call their own, who
are forced to rely on the kindness of friends or strangers for shelter or to
sleep rough.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those whose homes lack basic
amenities, and those whose comfortable homes are a cause for anxiety in this
time of economic hardship.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those who are alone in the
world and those who feel isolated even while surrounded by loved ones.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those for whom ‘home’ means
unhappiness, stress or fear.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those who seek to bring
physical, mental and emotional comfort to others, both friend and stranger.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Loving Lord Jesus, we are one Community of
Need:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the need we share, we hold out these
prayers to you. Amen</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Light the first candle</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">600 In
the bleak mid winter CP 1,2,4 -
UNANNOUNCED<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The angels take up another element in that
picture of long ago – Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace …</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Luke
2:8-20 Shirley<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We take up that song of the angels, and
echo the thoughts of that prayer,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">They kingdom come, thy will be done</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On earth as it is in heaven.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">All glory be to God on high</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And to the earth be peace -</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">94 While shepherds watched<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Janet Prayer 2<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let us pray</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we look forward to a time of joyful activity,
we remember those for whom activity is limited, who may feel left out,
frustrated or depressed by their inability to join in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember all those without jobs, or who
are facing redundancy and may find their sense of self-worth and ability to contribute
in a meaningful way as limited as their income.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember, too, those who are slowly
being worn down by the demands of an increasingly pressurised workplace, those
who worry that however much they do, it will
never be enough and those who are concerned about the impact of long
hours and greater pressure on their health and relationships.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we look forward to a time of wishing one
another ‘good health’, we remember those for whom poor health, both long and
short-term, makes life difficult.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those for whom poor health
brings stigma, incomprehension and prejudice, or feelings of anger, sadness or
depression.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember all those who care for the
physically, mentally emotionally or spiritually sick, providing support and
practical help all year round.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And we remember those whose caring is
wearing them out and damaging their own health and well-being.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Loving Lord Jesus, we are on Community of
Need:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the need we share, we hold out these
prayers to you.. Amen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Light the second candle</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">77 Angels from the realms of glory - UNANNOUNCED<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The world Jesus was born into was a world
of brutal oppression. There were so many
echoes of the cruel world of Isaiah’s time.
Jesus shaped all he did according to those word pictures of Isaiah and
his followers. God’s rule is about
justice, equity, commitment to the poor, peace, reconciliation. He did not come to get us to heaven: he
came to bring heaven down to earth. Thy
kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is something for all peoples. So it is that ‘wise men from the east ‘seek
in him the hope of nations;’ Is it had
been in the time of Isaiah and his followers, so it was in Jesus’ day a threat
to the powers that be. Herod the Great
thought nothing of killing members of his own family to get to power and three
of his own sons when they aspired to rule in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>.
His reaction to the quest of the wise men at first seems alluring, but
in reality is brutal in the extreme.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Matthew
2:1-11 – Mary Michael<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">This is not a cosy scene. Make no mistake about it this is a world of
sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Carol: We three kings<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">1 We three kings of Orient are;</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> bearing gifts we traverse
afar</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> field and fountain, moor and
mountain,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> following yonder star:</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> O star of wonder, star
of night,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> star with royal beauty
bright,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> westward leading, still
proceeding,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> guide us to thy perfect
light.</span></i><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">2 Born a king on <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:city></st1:place> plain,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> gold I bring, to crown him
again-</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> King for ever, ceasing never,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> over us all to reign:</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> <i>Chorus</i></span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">3 Frankincense to offer have I;</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> incense owns a deity nigh:</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> prayer and praising, gladly
raising,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> worship him, God most high:</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> <i>Chorus</i></span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">4 Myrrh is mine; its bitter perfume</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> breathes a life of gathering
gloom;</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> sorrowing, sighing, bleeding,
dying,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> sealed in the stone-cold
tomb:</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> <i>Chorus</i></span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">5 Glorious now, behold him arise,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> King and God, and sacrifice!</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> heaven sings alleluia,</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> alleluia the earth replies:</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;"> <i>Chorus</i></span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">John Henry Hopkins (1820-1891)</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">Irregular</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Janet – Prayer 3<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let us pray.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we look forward to a time of peace on
earth, we remember those places in which peace is hard to find; where countries
are at war; where personal relationships have broken down; where what I want is
all-important and having is more important than being.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember the people for whom ‘peace’
means not rocking the boat, avoiding conflict for fear of retribution or not
caring enough to get involved.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those who make it their
business to be peace-makers, whether mediating in the squabbles of children or
getting involved on an international level.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Loving Lord Jesus, we are one Community of
Need:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the needs we share, we hold out these
prayers to you. Amen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Light the third candle</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Thy kingdom come, thy will be done</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On earth as it is in heaven</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Ding dong merrily on high</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In heaven the bells are ringing</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">E’en so here below, below</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let steeple
bells be swungen</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Carol
- Ding dong merrily on high<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">1
Ding! dong! merrily on high<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
In heav'n the bells are ringing;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
Ding! dong! verily the sky<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
Is riv'n with angel singing.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
<i>Gloria! Hosanna in excelsis!<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
<i>Gloria! Hosanna in excelsis!<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">2
E'en so here below, below,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
Let steeple bells be swungen,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
And 'Io, io, io!'<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
By priest and people sungen:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
<i>Chorus<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">3
Pray you, dutifully prime<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
Your matin chime, ye ringers!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
May you beautifully rime<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
Your evetime song, ye singers!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">
<i>Chorus</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">George
Ratcliffe Woodward (1848-1934)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">7
7 7 7 and Refrain<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: 'MS Sans Serif'; font-size: 8pt;">Copied
from HymnQuest 2011: CLUE Version <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: 'MS Sans Serif'; font-size: 8pt;">HymnQuest
ID: 52188<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Matthew
2:12-18 Sue Cole<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">When you see how much of the world’s
conflict is centred on the Middle East and seems to find its focus here in <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> and <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:place></st1:city>
it’s enough to turn people away from religion.
It makes me want to do the opposite and ask what should religion truly
be about. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I notice that Judaism, Christianity and
Islam all look to Isaiah and his followers and revere them as Prophets. In each of those faiths are people working
for that kind of justice, righteousness, commitment to the poor and peace and
reconciliation. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In very troubled times those prophets drew word pictures of what it would
take for God’s kingdom to come and God’s will to be done on earth as it is in
heaven.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Those word pictures shaped all that Jesus
stood for and all that Jesus did.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Those same word pictures shape all that we
as Christians stand for and all we seek to do as we pray ‘thy kingdom come, thy
will be done on earth as it is in heaven.’ </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I don’t believe being a Christian is about
getting people to heaven – I believe it is about bringing heaven and that
pattern of justice, righteousness, commitment to the poor down to earth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">I am no longer comfortable singing one of
my favourite carols – O Little Town of Bethlehem – I cannot sing ‘how still we
see thee lie’. The churches and
Christians we are in contact with there invite us to stand with them in that
very task. We are going to sing the
version of that carol our own Graham Adams wrote after visiting <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:place></st1:city> while he was
training for the ministry. Graham is now
a minister in inner city <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Manchester</st1:place></st1:city>
and with Sheryl his wife will be having an extra special Christmas this year
with their baby daughter, Bethan.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Carol
- O Troubled Town of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:place></st1:city><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">1<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">O troubled town of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:city></st1:place>,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">with conflict still you lie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">Above your deep but restless sleep<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">indifferent stars go by;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">yet in your dark streets may you
find<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">resilient, endless light:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">for hopes and fears of all the years<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">were borne in you one night.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">2<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">For Mary's child was born, and cried,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">unnerving powers-above,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">whilst God of Life who bears our
strife<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">encouraged hope and love.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">O morning stars, now sniper-fire<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">obscures such hopeful births;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">but mothers sing of everything-<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">their prayer still 'peace on earth'.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">3<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">How silently, how violently,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">your wondrous gift was given;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">while God is grace for every race,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">your streets with fear are riven.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">As Jesus came amongst the poor<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">(confronting powers-that-be),<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">through risen will and faith he
still<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: skip;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">invites us 'Set them free.'<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">4<span style="font: normal normal normal 7pt/normal 'Times New Roman';">
</span></span><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">O daring child of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:city></st1:place>,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">empower us all, we pray,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">to work for peace that wars may
cease<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">and love be born today.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">With all the nations' angels<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">proclaiming we shall tell:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">'Heal <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Bethlehem</st1:city></st1:place>, join "us" with
"them"'-<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 19.5pt;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">Amen, Immanuel!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">Graham
Adams (born 1975)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">©
Graham Adams<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">DCM<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">Copied
from HymnQuest 2011: CLUE Version <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 10pt;">HymnQuest
ID: 77760<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Janet – Prayer 4<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let us pray.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we look forward to a time of birth and
giving, we remember those who are feeling the pain of death and loss.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those for whom the taking away
is a pain almost beyond bearing, and those for whom it is a relief; those for
whom it has come suddenly and without warning, and those who have watched loved
ones slip away over months and years.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those for whom the bringing of
new life into the world is an unimaginable joy, and those for whom it is a
long, hard and dangerous process.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those whose gifts of time,
energy, skill and compassion help to bring us into this world and to ease our
passage out of it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">We remember those for whom life will never
be the same again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Loving Lord Jesus, we are one Community of
Need:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">In the need we share we hold out these
prayers to you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Let’s say together the prayer Jesus taught
us to pray</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Our Father who art in heaven</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Hallowed be Thy name.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">On earth as it is in heaven.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Give us this day our daily bread</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And forgive us our trespasses</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we forgive those who trespass against us</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">And lead us not into temptation</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">But deliver us from evil</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">For thine is the kingdom,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The power and the Glory</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Forever and ever.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Amen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">As we sing the next of our carols we shall
make our offering for the work of the church here at Highbury. Our Christmas Day collection next week will
be for County Community Projects and its work throughout Gloucestershire as a
key provider of much needed care services.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">91 See him lying on a bed of straw
[including the offering]<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Along with many churches throughout the
English speaking world we have marked this, the 400<sup>th</sup> anniversary
year of the Authorised Version of the Bible, as the Year of the Bible. Between writing these notes and the time of
our service, our attention has been drawn to the address given by Prime
Minister David Cameron in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Oxford</st1:city></st1:place>
only a day or so ago to mark that anniversary.
He is to be commended for taking his stand on what he called ‘biblical
principles’. These are the ‘biblical
principles’ that are at the heart of the Christmas story. The commitment of the prophets to justice,
righteousness and integrity, their commitment to the poor and to reconciliation
and peace. This is what Jesus took his
stand on and lived his life for. These
are the principles we as Christians are not only committed to ourselves, but
they are the principles to which we are to hold those who rule us to
account. Many a service of lessons and
carols will finish with a reading from John chapter 1. These wonderful words are all about heaven
coming down to earth, about the Word made Flesh.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">John
1:1-14 - <st1:personname w:st="on">Janet
Partington</st1:personname>.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">59 Hark the herald angels sing - UNANNOUNCED<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-GB">Words
of Blessing<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7279311443452079197.post-29997170725880000922011-12-04T12:21:00.001-08:002011-12-04T12:21:32.599-08:00In the face of despair ... hope - Jeremiah's Story<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Some time over the last weekend in October
Felicity and I drove along <st1:street w:st="on"><st1:address w:st="on">Shady
Lane</st1:address></st1:street> on the outskirts of <st1:place w:st="on">Leicester</st1:place>. It looked very different from the <st1:street w:st="on"><st1:address w:st="on">Shady Lane</st1:address></st1:street> we
remember of our youth. I well remember
learning with excitement when I was still at school that they were going to
plant an Arboretum along the side of the already tree-lined <st1:street w:st="on"><st1:address w:st="on">Shady Lane</st1:address></st1:street>. I firmly expected to see something like the
kind of Arboretums I would later love to visit – Westonbirt, Batsford, and best
of all <st1:place w:st="on">Walsall</st1:place> with its illuminations. I can remember the disappointment I felt when
all I could see was a couple of fields planted sparsely with feeble
saplings. Forty years on the Arboretum
is more like the Arboretum of my original imagining, though it has some way to
go yet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">To plant out an arboretum is to make a
statement about a future you will not live to see.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Hold on to that picture for a while as we
turn to the book of Jeremiah. Not an
inappropriate Prophet to turn to at the end of a week when we have learned of
the extent of the economic collapse that is happening the world over and at the
start of a week that could see seismic changes in the structures and future of <st1:place w:st="on">Europe</st1:place>. Not only
is Jeremiah the Prophet of Gloom and Doom but he is more than any other the one
to carry out what seemed like outrageous symbolic, prophetic actions – the kind
of person to be initiating an encampment outside St Paul’s.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Jeremiah is an outsider, not part of the <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
establishment. Son of Hilkiah, he is ‘of
the priests who were in Anathoth in the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">land</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">Benjamin</st1:placename></st1:place>. That’s a reference back to 2 Kings 2:26-27: Anathoth
was the place Solomon banished Abiathar the priest to right at the outset of
his reign, as he severed links with Eli’s family. Jeremiah the outsider speaks truth to power
in one of the most dreadful periods of the history of <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city>
and <st1:country-region w:st="on">Judah</st1:country-region> – from the
thirteenth year of the reign of King Josiah through all his successors, until
the captivity of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>. (Jeremiah 1:1-3)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The account of Jeremiah’s call and
commission in chapter 1 is a wonderful account of call and vocation. Called of God to be a prophetic voice Jeremiah
is all too aware of his own inadequacy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white;">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">‘Do not say, “I am only a boy”;<br />
for you shall go to all to whom I send you,<br />
and you shall speak whatever I command you. <br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">8</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;"> Do not be afraid of them,<br />
for I am with you to deliver you, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="plus-q1" style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="color: #010000;">says the <span class="sc">Lord</span>.’ <br />
</span><sup><span style="color: #777777; display: none; mso-hide: all;">9</span></sup><span style="color: #010000;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">These are words to take to hear whenever it
is that we feel impelled to speak out about our faith – when we are called to
declare God’s word, we can sense here the promise of God – do not be afraid – I
am with you. Those are the words Jesus
echoed to his disciples when he warned them they would be up against the powers
that be – do not be afraid, I am with you.
This is the promise Jesus leaves his followers as he commands them to go
into all the world with the message of Good News to share. I am with you always to the end of the age.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000;">Then the <span class="sc">Lord</span> put out his hand and touched my mouth; and the <span class="sc">Lord</span> said to me,<br />
‘Now I have put my words in your mouth. <br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; mso-hide: all;">10</span></sup></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">That’s a very significant quotation – it is
what is said of Moses, and it is what is said in Numbers 22:38 of the prophet
who would come. Jeremiah stands in that
line of Moses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">Then comes a commission which is the
commission that comes straight from the pages of Deuteronomy, we have seen it
time and again through the pages of the former prophets, Joshua, Judges, Samuel
and Kings, we have seen it in the 8<sup>th</sup> century prophets Isaiah, with
his threesome Amos, Micah and Hosea, we have seen it with Huldah, we have seen
it with the threesome associated with Jeremiah, Habakkuk, Nahum and Zephaniah.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">The pattern that emerges in these prophetic
books is of judgement as the consequences of the Kings’ and the people’s
abandonment of God is worked out, and of hope as the promise of renewal and restoration
comes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000;">Then the <span class="sc">Lord</span> put out his hand and
touched my mouth; and the <span class="sc">Lord</span> said to me,<br />
‘Now I have put my words in your mouth. <br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; mso-hide: all;">10</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000;"> See, today I appoint you over nations and
over kingdoms,<br />
to pluck up and to pull down,<br />
to destroy and to overthrow,<br />
to build and to plant.’ 1:10</span><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-GB">There are all sorts of different strands
running through the Book of Jeremia, and you glimpse them all in chapter
1. Jeremiah gives an analysis of all that is
wrong in the way the Kings and the people have disobeyed God and broken with
God’s way for the world. It is a
devastating critique – an indictment of all that is wrong. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">Run to and fro through the streets of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>,<br />
look around and take note!<br />
Search its squares and see<br />
if you can find one person<br />
who acts justly<br />
and seeks truth—<br />
so that I may pardon <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>.<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Jeremiah.doc"><sup><span style="display: none; mso-hide: all;">*</span></sup></a>
(5:1)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And Jeremiah is in no doubt – the Kings and
the People will have to face the consequences as the world as they know it
falls apart. Jeremiah can read the signs
of the times and knows that the devastation will come from the north</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">Thus
says the <span class="sc">Lord</span>:<br />
See, a people is coming from the land of the north,<br />
a great nation is stirring from the farthest parts of the
earth. <br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">23</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;"> They grasp the bow and the javelin,<br />
they are cruel and have no mercy,<br />
their sound is like the roaring sea;<br />
they ride on horses,<br />
equipped like a warrior for battle,<br />
against you, O daughter <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Zion</st1:place></st1:city>!
(6:22-23)</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">It is the Babylonian power that will be
instrumental bringing to pass the devastation that is the consequence of all
that has gone wrong for the people and particularly in the decisions their
rulers have made. The heading in the
NRSV at chapter 6 says it all – Jeremiah is full of the imminence and horror of
the invasion.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">How do you cope in such a time of
uncertainty? How does Jeremiah cope?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">You need to go beyond the gloom and doom of
Jeremiah to the person of Jeremiah. In
a lot of the poetry he plumbs the depths of his own anxiety and his own
feelings of helplessness. Those feelings
he articulates at the very outset are feeling that return to haunt him. There are moments of hope when he goes down
to the potters house and speaks of God as the potter who can re-mould the clay
that has been initially spoiled. (18) There are moments of utter hopelessness as
he takes a clay pot that has been fired and smashes it irretrievably. (19)</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And it takes its toll on Jeremiah – that reaches
its peak in disturbing, harrowing words in chapter 20 14 ff</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">Cursed
be the day<br />
on which I was born!<br />
The day when my mother bore me,<br />
let it not be blessed! <br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">15</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;"> Cursed be the man<br />
who brought the news to my father, saying,<br />
‘A child is born to you, a son’,<br />
making him very glad. <br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">16</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;"> Let that man be like the cities<br />
that the <span class="sc">Lord</span> overthrew
without pity;<br />
let him hear a cry in the morning<br />
and an alarm at noon, <br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">17</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;"> because he did not kill me in the womb;<br />
so my mother would have been my grave,<br />
and her womb for ever great. <br />
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">18</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;"> Why did I come forth from the womb<br />
to see toil and sorrow,<br />
and spend my days in shame?</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Isn’t it interesting that Jesus is seen as
another Jeremiah. We sometimes miss the
negative side of his preaching – he too gives an analysis of all that is
wrong. The poor, the hungry, those who
weep, those who are hated because they follow Jesus may be blessed, but woe to
those who are rich, those who are full now, those who are laughing now, those
everyone speaks well of. He takes his
stand against the powers that be. And it
too takes his toll as in the Garden of Gethsemane he prays that the cup be
taken from him, and on the cross cries out as if forsaken by God.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And yet Jeremiah holds on to that promise –
do not be afraid. I am with you.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">And so through all the catastrophe there are
grounds for hope – for something will be restored, re-constructed out of the
ruins.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">I want to home in on four strands that are
to do with planting and re-building – with the hope beyond restoration …</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Initially he lays down the challenge to
rulers and people alike – change your ways and there’s still time to put things
together again. He shares the word of
God that there is still hope … if only the people could come to their senses,
if only the rulers could repent, he then speaks of a time when restoration will
come – and he speaks of the rulers as shepherds – Jeremiah declares the word of
God …</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">I
will give you shepherds after my own heart, who will feed you with knowledge
and understanding. </span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">16</span></sup><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; font-family: Verdana;">…</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">. </span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">17</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">At that time <st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city> shall be called the throne of the <span class="sc">Lord</span>, and all nations shall gather to it, to the presence of
the <span class="sc">Lord</span> in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:city></st1:place>,
and they shall no longer stubbornly follow their own evil will. (3:15ff)</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">18</span></sup></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">What it takes are ‘shepherds after my own
heart’ and then ‘all nations shall gather to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>’ which will become a blessing to the nations.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">It’s telling that in the nativity stories
it is shepherds who hear the angels sing, and magi from the east who come. Even more telling is the way Jesus speaks of
the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">Kingdom</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place> coming and of himself as ‘the Good
Shepherd’. In the Kingdom of god as it
should be it takes ‘good shepherds’ – that’s hinted at in Isaiah of Babylon, it
is here in Jeremiah, and we shall find ourselves coming back to it even more
when we come to the Book of Ezekiel as the New Year dawns.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">There’s a second, fascinating strand. Just like the Book of Isaiah, so too the Book
of Jeremiah seems to be made up of different strands. Towads the end – chapters 37 to 44 are a harrowing
narrative of the fall of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>. Chapters 46 – 51 are an indictment of the
surrounding nations which are shifted to the middle of chapter 25 in the Greek
translation of Jeremiah. In and around
those chapters you get a glimpse of how the Prophet Jeremiah’s words were
recorded.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">In chapter 36 Jeremiah is commanded to
write his prophecy in a scroll – so in 36:4 he dictates the scroll to
Baruch. Then the king burns the scroll –
and so Jeremiah in defiance dictates another.
AS the book draws towards a close in the wake of the devastation of <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> and exile the writing
of the scroll and the reading of the scroll becomes all important. When the return from exile comes it is Ezra,
the Scribe and the reading of the scroll that becomes all important.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">The part ‘the scribes’ play in the Gospel
story is fascinating – by then they have become guardians of something almost
set in stone and very much part of the powers that be – and Jesus stands over
against the scribes. But he is seen as ‘the
Word of God’ incarnate – and the writing of the Gospels becomes important so
that the words of Jesus are passed on.
In the face of the difficulties of our time we are to treasure the
Gospels as we treasure our Scriptures.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">In a moment or two we will use the words of
Jesus that more than any other echo the hope or restoration and renewal that is Jeremiah’s hope.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">The
days are surely coming, says the <span class="sc">Lord</span>, when I will make a
new covenant with the house of <st1:country-region w:st="on">Israel</st1:country-region>
and the house of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Judah</st1:place></st1:country-region>.
</span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">32</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">It will not be like the covenant that I made with their
ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">land</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename w:st="on">Egypt</st1:placename></st1:place>—a covenant that they broke, though
I was their husband,<a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Owner/My%20Documents/Current%20Documents/Highbury%20Documents/Sermons/Jeremiah.doc"><sup><span style="display: none; mso-hide: all;">*</span></sup></a> says the <span class="sc">Lord</span>. </span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">33</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">But this is the covenant
that I will make with the house of <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Israel</st1:place></st1:country-region> after those days, says the <span class="sc">Lord</span>: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on
their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. </span><sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #777777; display: none; font-family: Verdana; mso-hide: all;">34</span></sup><span lang="EN-GB" style="color: #010000; font-family: Verdana;">No longer shall they teach
one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the <span class="sc">Lord</span>’, for
they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the <span class="sc">Lord</span>; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin
no more.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">The cup that we shall share is the new
covenant in Christ’s blood – and this new covenant is deep within our hearts –
Jesus is the fulfilment of all the law and the prophets – not replacing the
covenants of old, but ushering in that new covenant – that brings us into the
closest relationship possible with God – the relationship that is deep within
our hearts.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">The chapters around chapter 31 are
sometimes known as the book of comfort.
Early on in chapter 31 is the desolation of the wailing at Ramah that is
taken up by Matthew in chapter 2 almost as if he is saying the world Jesus is
born into is just the same cruel world that Jeremiah experienced. But immediately after that cry of despair
comes a word of hope and renewal that is taken up in that talk of a new
covenant written on the heart.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">There was one more thing that Jeremiah did
as a remarkable statement of hope. And
it comes in chapter 32. By now the world
he has known really is falling apart about his ears as the Babylonian power are
erecting their siege engines and preparing to lay siege to <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city> itself. Jeremiah in a remarkable act of defiance bought
a field in his home town of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Anathoth</st1:city></st1:place>. As <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Jerusalem</st1:place></st1:city>
was collapsing all around him, he bought a field. He would never see the benefit of it – but he
did it as a statement that the renewal, the restoration would come.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-GB">Which brings me back to planting
trees. Just when we were driving along <st1:street w:st="on"><st1:address w:st="on">Shady Lane</st1:address></st1:street> past <st1:place w:st="on">Leicester</st1:place>’s Arboretum Joan Scott’s family were
celebrating what would have been Joan Scott’s 100<sup>th</sup> birthday. On Tuesday afternoon I sat with them in Room
1 having a tea party recalling those 100 years as we had just planted a tree in
the torrential rain in her memory. None
of us there will see that tree in its maturity – but maybe there’s a statement
of hope in the future from someone whose story has spanned the last hundred
years – and maybe that’s a statement of hope very much in the spirit of
Jeremiah.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0