Northern Synod Worship

Crook Churches Together

2012-01-28T08:52:00.000-08:00

Week of Prayer for Christian Unity 2012 -

Day 7: Changed by Feeding -

John 21:15-17 Feed my sheep

An address by Revd Ray Anglesea

This year in the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity we have been looking atsome words of St Paul who proclaimed “We shall be changed,” (by the victorythrough our Lord Jesus Christ -1 Corinthians 15 v57). The victory envisaged isnot the result of force but achieved by the Son of Man who came not to serve,but to serve, as St. Mark tells us, was prepared to suffer for those whom heserved, as we read in the letter of Peter. Victory is not to be expectedlyimmediately. Those who seek must wait patiently as Revd Vince Fenton remindedus on Wednesday, it is to be a victory of good overcome by evil with good, asCapt Mark Adamson reminded us on Wednesday, it is brought about by the peace ofthe risen Lord and established by God’s steadfast love as Sister Lucy remindedus yesterday. And it bears fruit in care for those in need, feed my lambs, feedmy sheep as I shall be reflecting today. This vision of Christ’s victory is notbrutal and coercive. There is no need to fear it as arrogant or threatening. Onthe contrary it is rooted in service and the readiness to suffer, and inpatience, peace and love.

To feed. We can read that verb on various levels. There is some truth in theEnglish proverb that a way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. I married abeautiful wife who loves cooking, the kitchen is my wife’s province, now semiretired I tread carefully in her territory, her roast beef and Yorkshirepuddings, trifles, Christmas puddings and chocolate cakes are beyond compare,her sea food pasta, profiteroles and sticky toffee pudding make my mouth water.With such a large and extended family, daily meals were prepared as for anarmy, friends, family and student neighbours would gather around the table forbirthdays, celebrations and anniversaries, 19 I think we had in one famoussitting. 30 or so years of married bliss tired of sitting on an assortment ofchairs and stools we have just acquired a new dining room table – it came with10 matching chairs. My third son, Tom, has taken up cooking as a career, preparingfancy meals in a variety of restaurants around the world, London, New York,Toronto, Sydney, for such well known chefs, Heston Blumenthal, Gordon Ramsey,Thomas Kellar. Last year he worked in the restaurant voted the best restaurantin the world, Noma, Copenhagen. Pete my fourth son has too joined the cateringworld, opening a cafe Flat White in Durham. When the Lord prepares a tablebefore me as we heard in that well loved psalm 23, I like to imagine that itwill be groaning with luscious and extravagant food, the heavenly banquet, likethe Harvest teas we had at St Andrew’s many years ago, but perhaps without awhiff of autumnal Chrysanthemums.

Jesus instructs his disciples to feed and care for the world’s poor andhungry, this we do in a variety of ways through many relief organisations. Butwe can read this passage at a more profound and deeper level.

Three times at the lakeside Jesus asks the question ‘Simon, son of John, doyou love me?' There's a memory of the first time Peter set eyes on Jesus; howhe looked at him and said: ‘you are Simon, son of John'. Three times Peterreplies in the affirmative. Three times Jesus charges him to care for hisflock. Three times, for each of the three times Peter had denied him on thenight of the passion. Jesus in his gracious forgiveness gave Peter the chanceto wipe out the memory of the threefold denial by a threefold declaration oflove. Jesus reinstated Peter. If you love me, Jesus said, then give your lifeto shepherding the sheep and the lambs of my flock. We can only prove that welove Jesus by loving others. Love is the greatest privilege in the world, butlove also brings the greatest responsibility in the world. Love brought Peter across – later Jesus goes on to predict that Peter too will lay down his lifefor the sake of the Good Shepherd whom he follows. For where Jesus has gone is preciselywhere Peter must also go for love of him. It will be the cost of discipleshipfor Peter, of saying yes to the summons of the risen Lord, ‘follow me'.

‘Simon, son of John, do you love me?' ‘Yes, Lord, you know that I am yourfriend'. To be a friend of Jesus means loving him personally, passionately, andpublicly, because that is the way he loves us. It means embracing the price offriendship, not caring about my life so much that I wouldn't be prepared togive it up for him. It means imitating the Good Shepherd not only in caring forhis people, feeding his flock, but in laying down his life for them.

In the power of the resurrection Peter can now put Maundy Thursday behindhim, when he so dismally failed the test of friendship. Easter has transformedand changed the coward of the courtyard into the loving friend of the lakeside.And I dare say that of all the disciples, his journey is most like ours, for wetoo need constantly to be enticed from the twilight of half-commitment into thefull day of loyal love, ‘out of darkness into his marvellous light' as a Letterof Peter says. We need to be able to say: ‘yes Lord, we are your friends'. Weneed conversion of life, we need to be transformed, turned round, not once buteach day we live.

Jesus asks us to live and die for him, just as he died and lives for us,even if it takes us where we do not wish to go. Perhaps on good days we canbegin to wish to go there for his sake, for where the Master is, there will hisservant be. And whatever awaits us on that road, we know that we must embodyand express our love of Jesus by feeding his sheep. For Peter and for us, thatincludes living within the circle of love we call the Christian community. Butlove always looks beyond itself. To be friends of Jesus means being friends tothose he especially cherishes: the vulnerable and voiceless and poor, thosewhom he calls his brothers and sisters, those to whom we are instructed tofeed.

Once Peter said, when Jesus asked if the disciples would abandon him: ‘Lord,to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life'. Perhaps the words cametoo easily. Sometimes they do in a fit of enthusiasm. ‘I will lay down my lifefor you' he'd exclaimed in that moment of heightened intensity in the upperroom, hardly knowing what he was saying. But he knows now. At the lakesideJesus puts the test once more, and this time he rises to the challenge. ‘Lord,you know that I am your friend. You know I could not love you more.' On theother side of the passion he understands what this means, what it will costhim. It is his greatest moment. I ask myself, and I ask you, whether ours isyet to come, and how passionate we shall be when it does.

Paul may have been the great orator who voyaged and adventured far in themission of the gospel, John, theologian and writer it appears had great insightinto the mind of God, but it was to Peter who was given the role of the GreatShepherd of Christ’s people. It was Peter who had the honour and the lovelytask of being the shepherd of the sheep of Christ. And here is where we too canfollow in the steps of Peter. We may not be able to think like John or go tothe ends of the earth like Paul. But each of us can guard someone from goingastray, and each one of us can feed the lambs of Christ with spiritual andphysical food.

Amen

A Tyrant's Lair

2012-01-09T05:47:00.000-08:00

A sermon preached by Revd Ray Anglesea at St Andrew's Dawson Street, Crookand at Trinity Methodist Church, Spennymoor, Sunday 8th January 2012

Accordingly to church historians the pro-Roman King, Herod the Great, was anasty piece of work. King of a small Jewish state he was by all accounts aninsecure tyrant; he employed mercenaries and secret police to enforce order; amadman he trusted no one, not even his wives (of which he had ten) or his manysons – he executed one spouse and three of his boys because he feared they wereplotting against him. Encouraged by his Roman masters, Herod believed insingling out individuals for public execution as well as the mass slaughter ofopponents; any threat of an uprising was put down with brutal and bloodyferocity, so much so that his excessive brutality was condemned by therabbinical court of judges, the Sanhedrin. Herod's paranoia about keeping powerand his ruthless suppression of dissent earned him a well deserved placealongside the great dictators of history. Not a name you would find in theJerusalem New Year’s Honours List. But like Herod the world is not immune orunaffected by political tyrants.

The death of Kim Jon II of North Korea last month, self-styled superior anddearest leader, great man who descended from heaven, saviour, HighestIncarnation of the Revolutionary Comrades, Great Defender, Guiding Star of the21st Century, just a few of his many titles, ended a dismal year for theworld’s tyrants and dictators. His 17 years of grotesque tyrannical misruleensured him the top place in most rankings of the word’s autocratic despots.Combining absolute rule Kin Jon II achieved even greater catastrophe for NorthKoreans than suppression and mass starvation; he has left a population of some24 million people physically stunted owing to malnutrition, and emotionally andintellectually impoverished. Close behind came another tyrant and oppressor, Gaddafiof Libya, who was ousted in August and killed in October. Murbarak of Egypt wasousted in February after 30 years in power and is on trial with his son, Gamal.In January last year Tunisia’s President ben Ali fled to Saudi Arabia after amere 24 years of plundering and repression. Syria’s revolution is expected totopple President Assad in the next 12 months ending four decades of tyrannysince 1971. It is estimated that three dozen dictatorial regimes still ensurethat nearly two billion people around the world are denied their basic humanrights. While Putin, the prime minister in Moscow has yet to earn the title ofdictator the phrase Russian democracy is in danger of becoming an oxymoron ashe prepares to return to the presidency next year.

And just when Herod the Great felt his great building projects were undercontrol, the temple in Jerusalem, his military fortifications at Herodias andthe construction of the port at Caesarea Maritima news arrives of the coming ofa rival king who heralds a different kind of political reality. Wise men withostentatious and extravagant gifts led by a star come to his lavish fortresspalace at Herodium, they are Gentile astrologists/astronomers from outside theJewish tradition, clever, devious, complicated, nervous learned men, they arelate arrivals at the scene. They do not bring this year’s apple merchandise,iPad 2, iphone 4S, iPad touch, but gold frankincense and myrrh. These wise onescome with their scientific enquiry and enquiring minds and announce to Herodthat a new King is to be born; telling Herod about the Christ child theyprovoke the massacre of the children in Bethlehem.

What Matthew is at pains to tell us is in the opening chapters of his gospelis a story not written to satisfy astronomical curiosity or a kind of cosypicture-book story we have created for ourselves; what he is telling us ispolitical dynamite. Jesus, Matthew is saying is the true King of the Jews.Herod is the false one, a usurper, an impostor. Matthew introduces us to somethingwhich Matthew wants us to be clear about from the start. If Jesus is in somesense King of the Jews that doesn’t mean that his rule is limited to the Jewishpeople. At the heart of many prophecies about the coming king, the Messiah,there were predictions that his rule would bring God’s justice and peace to thewhole world.

But what is it about the resourceful and clever wise men with their supposedwisdom, that they arrive at the wrong door and in so doing create confusion andmayhem, havoc and destruction – the slaughter of the innocents. It’s as if thewise, the devious, the resourceful, the political strategists can’t help makingthe most immense mistakes of all. Here we are with our modern 21st centuryminds and with our technology, knowing more and more, yet stepping deeper anddeeper into military, economic and political tragedy. Communications are moreeffective than ever in human history, analysis of national internationalsituations become ever more subtle; intelligence and surveillance providestheoretical perspectives on human behaviour, individual and collective. Andstill the innocence are killed, in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in Egypt, Libya,Congo.

And yet – here is the miracle – Christ is born in a country occupied by atyrant and a ruthless confused dictator, born in a humble feeding trough insome Jewish backwater of a village. And here is another miracle - the threewise men with their massive foolishness and thoughtlessness are welcomed at themanger door. They are not turned away. Here amongst the tyrannies of theworld’s wise men, wise people are to be found, they do not turn away. They are,as Matthew tells us, part of God’s justice and peace plan for the world. In thesuffering and political struggles, peaceful demonstrations one day and violentsuppression the next, and the massacres that we see daily on our screens, therewe find wise people who in their struggles against tyrannies search for thetruth, for liberation and freedom; in Lybia, in Syria, America and London whereour times are not quiet times of contentment and shared prosperity; there is adeep sense that something has gone tragically wrong as we ponder with theOccupy London protests the gross inequality and injustice throughout our world.

Last month two modern leaders died: Vaclav Havel, former president of theCzech republic and Kim Jong II, the leader of North Korea. Kim Jong ruled byfear, suppressed freedom, murdered dissidents and encouraged a cult ofpersonality. Vaclav Havel on the other hand inspired his contemporaries tofight against totalitarian rule, against tyrants and though he too faced aseemingly impregnable enemy, soviet communism, he knew that freedom is not wonby numbers but by courage, physical, intellectual and ultimately spiritual. Heonce said: “As soon as man began considering himself the source of the highestmeaning in the world and the measure of everything, the world began to lose itshuman dimension, and man began to lose control of it.” In other words we haveto live for something greater than ourselves if we are to win the freedom to beourselves. Havel called his most famous essay “The Power of thePowerless,”......... freedom can defeat ruthless power. It needs a fewdedicated people with the inextinguishable courage to light a candle of hope inother people’s lives and together we can change the world.

And it was Mohamed Bouazizi, the humble Tunisian fruit seller whose fightfor justice created history and was named the 2011 Times Person of the Year.His courage inspired the oppressed masses of the Arab world the right todetermine their own destiny. His self lit

oppressed masses of the Arab world the right to determine their own destiny.His self lit candle of hope, his own body, burning himself to death, triggeredan Arab uprising. 2011 turned out to be a year of a million heroes of Arab menand women who took to the streets demanding their liberty, dignity, economicopportunity and the right to choose their own lives. Thousands paid for theirtemerity with their lives, but with enormous courage these nameless andfaceless heroes have toppled some of the world’s dictators and autocrats, theHerod’s of the world. Does the nature of Bouzazi’s immolation remind you ofanother martyr?

As the wise men discovered on their long journey, coming to the Christ childisn’t always simple. I guess we might share the same experience. For somepeople, faith is difficult, hard, often God is remote, God appears on mute,most of the time we live in dry deserts, we run out of spiritual fuel. Manywould admit they no longer have a vivid experience of God. What was bright andshiny is now tarnished and dull. What gave life and purpose has been reduced todisappointment and play acting. Christian people later in life quietly confidethat they have lost the fire of their faith, and even sophisticated believerscan lose their balance when faced with serious ill health. People journey lateand arrive by roundabout routes to the stable door, with complex histories, sinand muddle, false expectations and perceptions and wrong starts. It’s no goodsaying to them, “You must become simple and wholehearted,” as this could bedone just by wishing. The real question is “Can you take all your complicatedhistory with you on your journey to the manger? Can you stop hanging on to thecomplex and the devious for their own sake, as a theatre for your own skillsand recognise where the map of heavens points.

In a world in turmoil, the economic forecast for the New Year looks bleak,uncertain and frightening; particularly here in the North East which isprobably back in recession where an embittering growing class of have-nots isbeginning to emerge. Just look around the many private and public housingestates in Crook and Willington where there is now severe unemployment. One ofmy dreams this year is to set a soup kitchen here in church. On my daily walkto the cathedral I pass men sleeping rough in cold wet shop door fronts,graduates with 1st class honours degrees prepare sandwiches and serve at tablesat my son’s cafe because there are no jobs for them, qualified planningstudents are returning to planning school because there has been no planningjobs advertised in the North East for the last two years; I too know the traumaand anger of being made redundant from a profession I loved. Journeying for mefor such people as I have mentioned may be a tedious, dreary, dull anddifficult journey to the truth. But on the way we must not deny the tangle andthe talents, the varied web of what has made us, what has happened to us and whowe are. Every step is part of the journey, even the false starts which move uson towards the truth. But we come as we are; room is made for us, healing ispromised, even usefulness given to us if we are ready to make an offering ofwhat W H Auden called “our crooked heart.”

In the straw of the stable, the humble and the complicated are able to kneeltogether, he is there in naked spirituality for the sophisticated and thetroubled, those who had long and journeys, cold comings, to the stable. Letnone think they are too tangled, too late and messy to be welcomed. Space hasbeen made in this world for the Christ child, who comes amongst us in the realworld of tyrants and dictators, politics and struggle, for God to make himselfat home and to welcome all of us and use whatever we bring to him.

Ray Anglesea is a self supporting minister working in St Andrew’s DawsonStreet LEP, Crook and in the wider West Durham Methodist Circuit

Sharing Salvation

2011-12-18T09:14:00.000-08:00

A sermon preached by Revd Ray Anglesea at St Andrew's Dawson Street, Crook
Sunday December 18th 2011

A few years ago I had the privilege of conducting the funeral service of my wife’s midwife. Marie had attended my wife throughout her pregnancies; some of the children were born at home, some in the local hospital. Marie’s no- nonsense approach, her support and care, her professionalism was excellent in every respect. Having held my wife’s hand during the birth of our children I often wondered who whose hands Mary squeezed? Who helped Mary with her breathing exercises 2,000 years ago, who fetched the water, the towels and swaddling clothes? In an age when 1in 3 babies and 1in 4 mothers died in childbirth, giving birth must have been a frightening and dangerous procedure in 1st century Palestine (what a risk God must have taken!)

Early theologians of course were quick to defend the virgin birth - as well as conception – it was so easy. Alas for some conception is far from easy as Alex Smallbone, the longsuffering wife played brilliantly by Olivia Coleman from the BBC2 sitcom Rev is experiencing. Will St Saviour’s in the Marsh be blessed by a new baby this Christmas I wonder?

Early theologians, generally the fathers of the Church were less sure about whether Mary, or Jesus, really needed any help conceiving of giving birth. In classic Christian thinking, iconography and paintings, which we have looked at this morning, it is normal to see the infant Jesus as the saviour-in-waiting, with Mary as a worshipping witness rather than a woman who has just given birth. No one is there to really aid the mother and child. A midwife is not mentioned in the birth narratives, unlike the Hebrew midwifes at the time of the birth of Moses, who feared God and as a result “the people multiplied” says the bible and “became strong.” A Christmas card sent a couple of years ago from the synod moderator showing 1st century Palestinian midwifes attending the birth of Jesus created quite a discussion amongst synod ministers – it was a beautiful card from the collection of Barbara Marian’s Nativity Project - where in the birth narratives is a midwife mentioned? rather like the other presumed characters who appear at this time of the year......the innkeeper, soldiers, donkey, Little Drummer Boy, ox and ass, Cliff Richard, robins and Santa Claus. This year the synod moderator has sent to synod staff her Christmas card showing three wise women attending the birth of Jesus. I guess that will provoke comment too.

In the recently critically acclaimed exhibition at the National Gallery “Leonardo da Vinci: Painter at the Court of Milan,” the 15th century exquisite portraits of the Virgin, painted to convey a sense of awe-inspiring mystery gives no hint that Mary ever had a contraction, required gas and air......... the epidural must have been a knock out - literally! There she is in her classic blue gown, radiant with motherly bliss, baby Jesus sleeping peacefully, no crying he makes.

Well if childbirth as recorded in the gospel appeared a pretty easy and straightforward affair then at face value the complicated business of Jesus’ growing up appears equally uncomplicated. It must have appeared a doddle to the daily rollercoaster life of the Brockman family and their children Jake, Ben and Karen from the comedy sitcom Outrnumbered. The gospel stories inform us that Jesus' path and destiny from stable to cross is already marked out. The more spiritually alert folk - his mother, the wise men, Simeon and the shepherds - all seem to know what is happening. Salvation is coming through this one child sleeping tenderly in the manger: it will cost God everything, and you nothing. You cannot help God but he has come to help you.

But looking at the gospels closer they paint a more subtle picture. The bringing of salvation to the world, the title of another major exhibition some years ago at the National Gallery, London turns out to be a work in which the cost of salvation is shared amongst many. Other people are involved in the process. It’s not just all down to baby Jesus, sweetly sleep, do not stir. Mary the teenage mother must say "yes", the Annunciation is her sacrifice. Jesus escapes the wrath of Herod, but thousands of infants do not. Others, such as John the Baptist, lose their lives for Jesus before He can sacrifice his. God's salvation incurs sacrifice on behalf of other, it incurs cost.

And I say the cost deliberately. You may remember the Sunday School pneumonic – what does Grace mean – answer - God's Riches At Christ's Expense – well older and wiser now the pneumonic is not actually quite right. In bringing heaven to earth, light into the darkness, joy to the world – the Lord has come - Jesus' is not the only sacrifice. In short, God cannot do it alone; Mary's "yes" is of course needed, but help is needed too from the unknown helpers on the refugee trail to Egypt, the shepherd, the innkeeper, the wise men. God, in coming as a child, invites the many people who were around at the time, to help from the very first in the bringing of salvation.

And it is these people that the children so loving portray in their nativity plays every year, shepherds with tea towels, wise men in dressing gowns, Mary in her blue dress. The nativity players to be sure are characters and studies in Christian virtue, discipline and generosity which we may wish to look at during the Christmas season. (I always like Mary to have started her contractions on the 24th December before the church enjoys its nativity plays and the singing of Christmas carols). Some of the characters like the presumed innkeeper extends his boundaries to find one more room; very like the mansions of God, there is room. The wise men – or as the synod moderator would have it on her Christmas card – the Wise ones - bring extravagant gifts, speaking of the foolish generosity so rarely found in kingly power, but especially bestowed in God's kingdom now coming to birth.
People like the lowly shepherds, irregular temple worshippers who mirror the spontaneity and searching of Christ; you may find him, but he will come looking for you anyway. And the people of Egypt, this great ancient civilisation, too often unsung, are also part of the salvation adventure, they sustain the asylum seekers the holy family on their journey into their country. Small wonder that, as an adult, Christ preached on the importance of welcoming the stranger.

So, looking at this big complex word salvation in terms of God solely bearing the cost and not needing our help, is by no means simple and clear cut. The complicated Christmas salvation story is far richer in depth and meaning. Grace should really be seen as something that is expansive as it is expensive rather than costly. God involves many people in that work of "gathering up all things in Christ", as St Paul’s puts it, that great ambassador for the Gentiles, and allows all sorts of folk to participate in his saving work. Remember last year’s sermons from Matthew’s gospel. The birds of the air that make their nests in the mustard tree, the eagles, the wrens, the robins, people of all shapes and sizes, cultures, diverse backgrounds including the stranger - He invites his followers to share in the expenditure of salvation, and to distribute the rewards. We are partners in this extraordinary business, in which everyone can receive a full and equal share of God's riches. This is generosity defined.

The wonderful thing to remember on this the 4th Sunday of Advent, before Mary goes into labour and Joseph begins to panic is that in coming to save us, God reaches out to us, because God is partly dependent upon us to bring salvation to the world too, to bring his love for all humanity to share. In so doing we may not only receive the message but can begin to live it, even before we have understood it. This is God's true wisdom, coming to us as a helpless child who reaches out to us. The Christmas story is ultimately one of midwifery as it is the sharing of salvation.

Ray Anglesea

Advent: The coming of the Kingdom of God

2011-11-27T10:49:00.001-08:00

An Advent Sunday illustrated sermon preached by Ray Anglesea at SedgefieldMethodist Church, Sedgefield, 27^th November 2011

For those who commute regularly on the Eastcoast mainline to Kings Cross you will swiftly pass some of England’s great churches. Thesespectacular historic buildings look like haunting and majestic apparitions astheir towers and spires emerge out of the thick mist on dark November mornings.York Minster with its Saxon foundations and Benedictine community now a 15^thcentury architectural masterpiece; StGeorge’s, Doncaster rebuilt by George Gilbert Scott in the 19^thcentury; the parish church of St Mary Magdalene at Newark which has one of thetallest spires in England; the large medieval 13^th century parishchurch of St Wulfram, Grantham, built of Lincolnshire limestone and finally to PeterboroughCathedral, another Benedictine Abbey dedicated to St Peter, St Paul and StAndrew - the cathedral will shortly be celebrating its 900^th anniversary. These historicand architectural significant buildings with vast spaces, filled withmusic reveal the human imagination at work on glass, stone, and other fabrics. The buildings are perfect stages for the contemplation ofthe ordered universe and the transcendent beauty of traditional holiness.

Thebest church I kept till last. Durham Cathedral, where I work and much admiredby passengers – views from Durham railway viaduct reveal one of thephotographic icons of north-east England. “Grey towers of Durham, how well I love thy mixed and massive piles, halfchurch of God, half castle 'gainst the Scot, to quote Sir Walter Scott.” But ofcourse, the view is not just admired by train passengers with Cannon cameras, itis well-liked by people across the world, many of whom see it as the greatestRomanesque building in Europe. The celebrated vista of Cathedral and Castle seton the acropolis of their wooded peninsular is unforgettable, as is theinterior of this wonderful church. For this reason the UNESCO World HeritageSite, of which the cathedral and its environs are a major part, was one of thefirst to be inscribed. Epithets like “Britain’s best loved building” try tocapture what it is that gives the Cathedral its unique place in the affectionsof so many. Its beautiful setting and its architectural purity, thespirituality imparted by the long history of prayer and worship certainly playa part.

These mainline churches were built as if tolast for ever. They remind me of Ken Follett’s popular novel The Pillars of the Earth, set in themiddle of the 12^th century. The novel traces the development ofGothic design out of the preceding Romanesque architecture and tells thefortunes of the Kingsbridge priory, Priory Philip and his master builder, Tom. But do these buildings last forever? KingHenry VIII set the administrative and legal processes in the sixteenth centuryby which he disbanded England’s monasteries, priories, convents and friaries – onlythe local ruins of Fountains Abbey, Finchale and Tynemouth Priories now remain.Many of our nonconformist chapels have been demolished or converted tofurniture warehouse, carpet shops, antique sale rooms and restaurants. And ifthey haven’t been demolished or converted to other uses they may well have beenrobbed of their lead - payouts from metal theft from places of worship haveincreased by 70% nationally and are expected to reach £5.5 million by the endof the year. One of the Durham cathedral community members, the widow of thelate Bishop of Peterborough, was in Christ Church Cathedral New Zealand inFebruary this year when the earthquake destroyed the spire and part of thetower – and severely damaged the structure of the remaining building. She wasshaken by the event but mercifully not hurt. The Cathedral in New Zealand wasdeconsecrated on Wednesday November 9th in an emotional ceremony as it wasreturned to secular use while long term options are considered.

Listen again to the opening words of today’sAdvent Sunday gospel from Mark. The disciples are admiring the splendour ofHerod’s temple: ‘Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!’ AndJesus says to them: ‘Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will beleft here upon another: all will be thrown down’.

It’s as a consequence of this alarming prediction that they question himfurther: ‘Lord, when will these things be, and what will be the signs of theend?’ The warning of this ‘little apocalypse’ is clear: be ready, for you donot know the day or the hour’. Taken at face value, these Scriptural images in this tense and edgygospel with which we begin Advent - traditionally a time that reflects on thefour last things: death, judgment, hell and heaven, make little sense to the 21stcentury mind. They are profoundly disturbing ones - signs in the sun and themoon; stars falling from the sky; the powers of heaven shaken and the Son ofMan coming on clouds with power and glory. For most modern day Christians theybring us face to face with uncomfortable questions. How do we live with allthis talk of judgement and the second coming? How can we relate to the call ofthe prophets that God might tear open the heavens and come down and cause thenations to tremble at God’s presence?

It’s tempting todismiss or ignore these images, or to moderate that language into something more palatable tomodern thinking. But to do so is to lose sight of the difficult but vitaltruths those images convey.Paula Gooder, in the Advent book “The Meaning is in the Waiting” a line takefrom the Welsh poet R S Thomas poem “Kneeling,” which we read ealier in theservice comments that only by engaging with what she calls the “end-time” theologyof readings such as those we’ve just heard can we begin to understand the big Biblicalthemes of salvation, resurrection and the Kingdom of God. The big cosmic feelof Advent invites us into a world of unpredicted time and place which isunfamiliar and uncomfortable but which ultimately speaks across the centuriesto those common human experiences of questioning and puzzlement in which faithis challenged and honed and brought to new realities and new understanding.

As we look back over the last Christian yearno-one could accuse 2011 of being a slow news year.Some of a more radical disposition with end-time thoughts in mind might say ithas been a year of disaster, catastrophe, a day of reckoning, judgement day. Wehave had protests and regime change in Tunisia, in Egypt, in Libya - not tomention political demonstrations in Jordan, Yemen, Morocco, and Palestine. Weare beset with the on-going massive Eurozone debt crisis, with a bailout inIreland, a bailout in Portugal - a second bailout in Greece, which appears tohave been as inadequate as the first – and rumours of bailouts in Spain andItaly abound.

Turning closer to home we have had - the slow and painful unfolding of amedia phone-hacking scandal that not only beggars moral belief –but also hasheralded the extraordinary spectacle of two of the most powerful media men inthe world appearing before a Parliamentary Select Committee. There has been theexplosion of rioting in numerous UK cities, motivated by little more thanviolence and greed. You might want to add to this potent mix - rape chargesmade and then dropped against the head of the IMF- a massive tsunami and fearsof a nuclear meltdown in Japan - massive famine in the horn of Africa - amassacre in Norway- the killing of the world’s most wanted terrorist. And yesthe church in the form of St Paul’s Cathedral has hit the headlines, built as it is on a deep theological fault line where thetwo powerful tectonic plates, God and mammon, meet right under Wren'smagnificent baroque masterpiece." If cathedrals are seen as monuments totranscendent beauty and traditional holiness, then in the life of Jesus,holiness is redefined as justice. Rowan Williams in a speech to the Lord MayorsBanquet, London last week drew attention to the “alarming instability beingplayed out in the cities across the world as the economic crises deepens andcalled for repentance as a way to restore trust or credibility.”

But whateverwe think of recent global events and the fear and uncertainty that they provide, this dark and difficult passage is, letme remind you, about a building. Even the temple, says Jesus, will not lastforever. When you visit Jerusalem, as I have done, and place your hands in thecrevices of the western wall which is all that is left of Solomon’s magnificentand beautiful temple, and pray, you cannot help being reminded that man’sgrandest designs are subject to the same law as everything else: earth toearth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

Advent is the timein the Christian year when we come to terms with the facts of our humancondition. Mortality is a fact not only of our personal social and economic livesbut also of our institutions. And that includes church buildings. To take ourGospel reading literally this morning would imply that one day, inevitably, buthopefully not soon, not one stone of our great buildings will be left standingupon another? I think that the monks who put up Durham cathedral 900 years agoknew that while they built as if forever, it was not forever. They built forGod and his kingdom; they knew from the rule they followed that his kingdom wasnot of this world. In this, it stood in sharp contrast to the earthly kingdomto whose ruthless power this cathedral was also a monument: the Normanconquerors. Like Herod’s temple, even the buildings that stand most powerfullyfor spiritual aspiration can also represent ambition, power and hubris.

I think thisambivalence is good for us. Listen to the voice of the New Testament. ‘Thethings that are seen are transient; the things that are unseen are eternal.’‘We have here no abiding city, but we seek that which is to come.’ In today’spassage from St Mark, we are faced with the stark realisation of howprovisional everything is: our possessions, our relationships, our institutions,our achievements, our lives. All this, says the apocalyptic Jesus, will beswept away at the coming of God that will wind up history and bring in thereign of his kingdom. And even if we step back from the imagery and ascribe it,as we must, to the feverish, end-of-the-world milieu in which 1st centuryChristians believed they were living in, we can’t escape the vividness ofJesus’ teaching, its urgent summons to look afresh at things and consider whatwe rate as truly important in this life.

It is verygood and sobering for people like me, a former URC synod Listed BuildingsAdvisory officer as well as Methodist property stewards and custodians ofmagnificent church buildings to be reminded every so often that there will comea time when not one stone will be left standing upon another. I pray that youand I never see it. And yet, doesn’t that prayer betray the possibility that Imight love these stones too much, the symbol rather than what it points to, thecreature rather than the creator?

The coming ofGod’s kingdom exposes to his just yet loving scrutiny all our fears andlongings. Advent is our opportunity to cultivate what the gospel calls ‘purityof heart’. This means willing the one thing necessary for our happiness, forthe salvation of our race, for the healing of our world. That one thing isGod’s kingdom. It is the only hope we have. If we are true to the One who isnot only in all things but above and beyond all things, then we shall haveunderstood our great building aright, and shall cherish our stones all the morebecause of him for whose glory and kingdom they, and we, exist. And if one daytower and temple fall to dust, it is to make way for something greater, whendeath and hell have fled before the presence of Light and Love, and the holycity, the new Jerusalem has come, of which it is foretold: ‘I saw no temple inthe city, for its temple is the Lord God the almighty and the Lamb. And thecity has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God is itslight.’

Isaiah 64:1-9; Mark13: 1-8, 24-end

Ray Anglesea is a self supporting minister workingin St Andrew’s Dawson Street LEP, Crook and in the wider West Durham MethodistCircuit

At the Cenotaph

2011-11-13T00:26:00.001-08:00

A sermon preached by Ray Anglesea at aCivic Remembrance Day Service, St Catherine’s Parish Church, Crook. Sunday 13th November 2011.

Remembrance Sunday is a symbolic day in the life ofour nation. We remember and honour the lives of service man and women who, forour freedom, fell in the trenches and wastelands the length of the Westernfront; we remember and pay tribute to the memory of those who fell in thesecond global conflict that took such a terrible toll on humanity; we remember thosewho fought in more recent campaigns, Korea, the Falklands, Bosnia, Iraq andAfghanistan. And finally we remember those drawn into the maw of war from theEmpire; we are proud to honour their citizen’s sacrifice for Britain. Today inthis service and later, we honour and pay tribute to the memory of all thefallen and particularly those who fell in the line of duty from this town. Thebest tribute to those who died and are still dying for their country comestoday around the town’s cenotaph. It will take the form of silent, reverentialhomage. In the words of Lawrence Binyon’s poem “For the fallen”.....we shall remember them.

But remembrance isnot static – it’s a constantly growing and evolving action which gives us theopportunity to take hold of the past and transform it. As a result of military conflictand the horrors of war we humans have a choice, we can either generatedestruction through the practice of hate or generate peace through the practiceof love. Many of our fellow country men and women have chosen the latter way, toreach out with grace, understanding and healing, a way not of denial andrevenge, but a way of love, of trying (and I like that humble little world) to loveone’s neighbour. Such is the power of love that our fellow countrymen and womenreach out with ever greater acts of love and compassion. And by their action lifeis regenerated and people miraculously thrive and are healed. So today, I withyou, would wish to salute and remembernot only the fallen but to give thanks for the many individuals, groups andorganisations who as a result of military conflict are making a positive differenceto our world, our country and community, who are finding ways of providing healing,hope and peace.

A way of love shown by the Royal British Legionwhich this year celebrates its 90th anniversary. To celebrate this milestone a new portrait of the Queen producedby Yorkshire artist Darren Baker has been unveiled. Thepainting shows the monarch seated in a blue dress – the Royal British Legion’sofficial colour, her watch set at 11am, she wears a spray of five poppies. TheRoyal British Legion is committed to the welfare, interests and memory ofService families. The current number of potential beneficiaries for the Legion’swelfare services is estimated at £9.5 million, reaching out to the 500,000service personal that are in the greatest need. Over this year, the Legion aim’sto raise £90 million, £1 million for every year of its existence.

A way of love shown by the organisation Help forHeroes, a British Charity launched in October 2007 to help British servicemenand women and founded by Bryn and Emma Parry. To date the charity has raisedover £40 million pounds, £47,000 per day since it was launched. Prince Williamat the opening of the Hedley Court Rehabilitation Centre last year stated “veryoccasionally – perhaps once or twice in a generation – something or someonepops up to change the entire landscape. What has been achieved at Hedley Court,the defence medical rehabilitation centre is in truth the tip of the iceberg.”

Away of love shown by the inhabitants of Wooten Bassett; a royal title has beenbestowed of the small Wiltshire market town. The honour came in recognition ofthe years when the bustle of everyday life stopped on 167 occasions to honourthe repatriated bodies driven through its streets.

Away of love shown by the England football team’s personal response to wearpoppies on their black armbands at yesterdays match against Spain.

Alas our country is still at war. Our nation isbeset with deep uncertainties. Securitypervades our daily lives on an unheard-of scale making us feel even moreinsecure; and if that were not enough, a global economic crisis that isprobably the worst for more than a century and which will take years, maybedecades, to recover from. The world is not the same as it was. We live in precarioustimes which make us very afraid for the safety of our world and the future ofour children.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, a 20th Century RomanCatholic theologian, shifts our focus from why things happen to asking “howwill we respond” to the sadness and destruction of war and to an uncertain andinsecure world. As we all know, enmity,hatred, revenge and bitterness are almost inevitable consequences of violenceand war. Jesus Christ was the first human being in history to make the divinerevelation: ‘Love your enemy, pray for those who persecute you.’ This mightsound unrealistic, almost ridiculous and certainly extremely difficult tofollow. Every one of us has the choice:to surrender our hearts to anger and revenge, or to allow the risen Lord tohelp us fulfil His commandment to love our enemy and to remember always thatlove never falls. That is our choice: to repay evil with evil or to show thehumility to repay evil with an act of love. The Royal British Legion, Help forHeroes, the inhabitants of Royal Wooten Bassett and countless thousands ofindividual members of the British public in their dedication and fund raisingefforts have found another way, a way of love that leads to peace. BelovedArchbishop Desmond Tutu said, “Goodness is stronger than evil, love is strongerthat death; victory is ours, through Him who loves us.”

Toremember, then, is to engage in an activity that reconstitutes us. Byrecollecting and recalling, we make and pledge ourselves anew to each other,and to God. So remembering is not a dry duty. It is a vital and hopeful form ofrecall that reshapes us for the better. Remembering the dead is really allabout facing the task of living anew. It is about hope, and about recommitment.However, there is a world of difference between reminding people of the pastand remembering it. Reminders simply recall, and can all too easily lead, ifone is not careful, to the perpetual contemplation of pain (and the anger thatevokes). The wounds never heal; they are left open, and are prodded and pokedon a regular basis, so that others may participate in the pain afresh.

Butremembrance is different. It is a faithful and engaged act of recollection,which is both constructive for the present and hopeful for the future.

God is love and when we translate this love intoaction, we become rooted in God and God becomes rooted in us. We imitate the one whose words and works werelife-changing for those on whom he turned the light of truth and looked withthe gaze of love. For then we find that as his heart speaks to our hearts webegin to face the future with equanimity, and even with hope. In bewilderingtimes, we are right to be suspicious of easy speeches, grand designs, quickfixes. If we think this is Christianity, we have not been paying attention. Yetwe can be sure of Love’s great ways. We are more than conquerors through himwho loved us. We remember. We do not loose heart.

Asone Jewish sage put it, while dining with his friends and with his betrayer athand: "Do this in remembrance of me."

Amen

Ray Anglesea is a self supporting minister workingin St Andrew’s Dawson Street LEP, Crook and in the wider West Durham MethodistCircuit

Signs of love

2011-10-16T10:50:00.001-07:00

A Baptismal sermon preached by Ray Anglesea at St Andrew’s Dawson Street,Crook, Sunday 16th October 2011.

Paul and Frances, your family and friends, welcometo church today for your darling infant’s son’s baptism. It is lovely to haveyou with us: I and the church here at Crook hope you have a happy and memorableday. Baptism can be a nerve racking experience for the family as well as attimes for the minister – well at least the organist did not play the thememusic from Jaws, I did not have to wear scuba divers outfit and the coast guardwas not involved.

I wonder if you put your Sat Nav on to findthe church this morning or followed directional signs? At my son’s recent weddingthe vicar gave the happy couple the wrong post code for the church so that manyguests arrived in somebody’s private drive. Signs are very much part of ourlives - shopsigns, lighted signs, advertising signs, neon signs, school signs, restaurantsigns, toilet sign, speed limit signs, disabled parking signs, no parking signsas the parking attendant slaps a £30 parking fine on you windscreen. “What doyou mean, sir, you didn’t see the double yellow lines?”

Wetoo have our signs; we wear signs all the time. Perhaps the gentlemen in eithertheir red and white, black and white football shirts might prefer some DavidBeckham lookalike tattoos, a crucifix on the back of the neck perhaps, aguardian angel between the shoulder blades and an angel on the right shoulder.The guardian angel is there to overlook the names of his three children,Brooklyn, Romeo and Cruz. Not quite sure what David will do for Seven hisnewborn daughter – will Prince William be a godfather we wonder. No David theminister will not use a flame thrower – it is not a baptism of fire! Perhapsthe women would prefer signs of Gucci sunglasses, Vivienne Westwood jewellery,a naughty off the shoulder Armani something or other, Jimmy Choos nude shoes, aMulberry designer handbag, why not go for something from the Sarah BurtonAlexander McQueen wedding dress collection. Sorry.... that one is a oneoff.......... already worn!

Aswe look around us the church too is full of signs, a wooden cross on whichJesus died, a sign we say in church speak - a sign of our salvation, a rainbowarch around the organ, symbol of the church’s openness to diversity andinclusion, as well as a sign from a Genesis story, Judy Garland’s theme song, Andof course a font where Jacob was baptised a few moments ago. Baptism is a signtoo, it is also one of the sacraments of the Church; a sacrament is a sign also‘an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace,’ as the oldprayer book stated. In a nutshell, through baptism we’re made children of God’sgrace, we become members of theChurch. Jacob has been baptised as a Christian.This ceremony has obligations foremost of which is to live the Christian life.The sign at Jesus baptism in the River Jordan was a dove descending out of thesky and a voice from heaven which said: “This is my beloved son in whom I amwell pleased, listen to him.”

Paul and Frances just as your wedding rings givenin Cyprus on your wedding day is a sign of your enduring love for one another,so Jacob’s baptism this morning is a sign of God’s promise to Jacob. God willbe with Jacob and his family forever. But more than that. God will love Jacobforever.

Pauland Frances – God is committedto the flourishing, well being and happiness of your family, you haveembarked on this great journey of love, not only of loving each other but ofloving Jacob. As parents you are going to be a sign, an electric spark to Jacobof what human love is like, you are going to be the role models of what God’slove is like. Having five children on my own you I can assure you will be infor some challenging times and experiences. Jacob may not need a media bedsitwhere he will have his own TV, internet, game consoles and a new apple iphone. Buthe will need you to be there for him, to support him, to run the line at thefootball match, to sit at the poolside during swimming lessons, to listen tohim experiment with a drum set, to help with the maths homework, to let himborrow your car for the first time. You are going to be signs of love forJacob. But like the BBC 1’s roller coaster life of Sue and Pete Brockman’sfamily from South London, you may be outnumbered! The Jake, Ben and Karen’s ofthis world will see to that.

Paul andFrances. You are surrounded by loving families with offers of help and support,sleep-over, shopping, and grandparents. Use them. We as a church are here tohelp you too, our doors are open, you have our telephone numbers, we too canprovide help and support, education and teenage training. Alas human beingslive in a world of good and bad and that makes our lives and relationshipspainful and complicated but not so with God. God will never give up on you, even if you run away fromhim. Paul and Frances never stop loving each other - you are for Jacob a signof what human love and family life is like and can be for the rest of his life –he will learn from you, you will be his example. As the late Steve Jobs co-founder,chairman, and chief executive officer of Apple Incsaid, “Have thecourage to follow your heart and intuition, and aswith all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like anygreat relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on.” And so it is with our relationship with God.

And in all this we, as we are able, together, will doeverything possible to keep our promises to love, help and support you.

So before wecomplain too loudly about David Cameron’s Downturn Abbey Britain, a world of KellyRowland’s x factor wannabees, (I wish she could pick me! ), the future ofArsene Wenger, the slow goodbye of Coronation Street’s Becky McDonald, theprice of Apples’ new iPhones, and SiennaMiller’s phone hacking payoff, we should remember today that we have cause forthanksgiving – God has committed himself yet again to one more human family,the Moore family here from Douglas Terrace, Crook, and in the lives of thislovely family with whom today we join in celebration, we see the sign of God’sembracing, renewing vision of God’s faithful love.

Paul andFrances may God bless you on your journey, and may Jacob’s baptism be a sign tolive the faith more fully.

Amen

RayAnglesea is a self supporting minister working in St Andrew’s Dawson StreetLEP, Crook and in the wider West Durham Methodist Circuit

Suffer Little Children

2011-10-02T01:13:00.000-07:00

A Baptismal sermon preached by Ray Anglesea at StAndrew’s Dawson Street, Crook, Sunday 2^nd October 2011

Congratulations to Barrie and Joanne on Emileigh’s baptism. May thewelcome your child has experienced today here in church infuse your family’sfaith life for all time!

Here’s a delightful story. At the recent wedding of Zara Phillips andMike Tindall, the bride’s cousins, Princes William and Harry, read an extractfrom Margery Williams’ classic children’s story, The Velveteen Rabbit. The story is about a boy who receives aVelveteen rabbit for Christmas. TheVelveteen Rabbit is snubbed by other more expensive or mechanical toys; theyfancy themselves as real. One day while talking with the Skin Horse, the rabbit asks thehorse what it means to be “a real person”. The horse replies that it meansbeing loved. “It doesn't happen all at once. You become real. It takes a longtime. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or havesharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept.” “Generally, by the time you areReal, most of your hair has been loved off, your eyes drop out and you getloose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all,because once you are real, you can't be ugly, except to people who don'tunderstand – once you are real, you can’t become unreal again. It lasts foralways.”

Well it is a long time since I read that story to my children. Yearslater Hollywood still tells the same tale in children’s movies like ToyStory and Shrek, which is why they speak to parents as well aschildren. Love transforms. It makes us beautiful in the eyes of those who loveus. It makes us real.

That is the great truth at the heart of the Christian faith. God’slove makes us beautiful in His eyes – and in ours when we see ourselvesreflected in His. That is what makes us real: not physical beauty which fadesover time, but spiritual beauty which can grow over time. We allow ourselves tobe made real by God’s love, with all our imperfections, pain and limitations. Itwas the poet W.H. Auden who said:-

Beloved, we arealways in the wrong, handling so clumsily our stupid lives................

One thing that alwaysstrikes me is how little Jesus himself has to say about sin. He seems much moreconcerned with lack of love. Perhaps that is really what sin is ultimately, thefailure of love. It was at Jesus’ baptism in theRiver Jordan that God’s said “This is my son whom I love, listen to him.” Herewas a moment of sheer intense intimacy, a moment in time when God’s heart wasrevealed to his son. God’s greatest command is that we should love one another.Where do we find love? In the tiniest hazelnut, says Mother Julian: itexists because God loves it. In the entire sweep of the universe, says Dante,because it is ‘love that moves the sun and the other stars’. But today love hasa human face in Emiligh. And to her very young life we bring our own memoriesof those who have loved us into life, whose lives are interwoven with ours andmade us what we are.

Barrieand Joanne – God is committed tothe flourishing, well being and happiness of your family, you haveembarked on this great journey of love, not only of loving each other but onloving Emiligh and Jordan. As parents you are going to be their role models ofwhat human love is like, you are going to be the role models of what God’s loveis like. Having five children on my own you I can assure you will be in forsome challenging times and experiences. Let’s face it - recent UNICEF reportson the upbringing of British children are not very encouraging; Britainaccording to this international agency is the worst place in the developedworld to be a child; parents and their children are locked into a consumptioncycle where mothers and fathers rarely say no to their children’s’ demands;children sit in media bedsits where they have their own TV, internet, game consolesand phones. Oh really – is our popular modern British culture as bad as allthat? As couples say in rocky relationships in popular B movies – it’s not usUNICEF; it’s you.

Well whosaid bringing up children would be easy? In every serious relationship therewill be ups and downs, moments of tension, discord, in human terms there willbe nights with a crying child, falling out, tears, naughty children may have tobe disciplined, there will be frustration about the lack of employment opportunities, insufficientfunds and days when we just feel down, tired and bored. And with all thepressures of family life it is often difficult to make headway. But Joanne andBarrie you are surrounded by loving families with offers of help and support,sleep-overs, shopping, grandparents love giving their grandchildren back toparents. Use them. We as a church are here to help you too, our doors are open,you have our telephone numbers, we too can provide help and support, educationand teenage training. Alas human beings live in a world of good and bad andthat makes our lives and relationships painful and complicated but not sowith God. God will never give up on you, even if yourun away from him. Joanne and Barrie never stop loving each other - you are for Emileigh and Jorja what humanlove and family life is like and can be for the rest of their lives – they willlearn from you, you will be there examples. And in all this we, as we are able,together, will do everything possible to keep our promises to love, help andsupport you.

So today I want to give thanks for ourpopular modern culture, children no longer go to work up chimneys or go downmines when they are out of trousers, we do not require children to enlist assoldiers in military campaigns, work in sweat shops making trainers and clothes.I want to say a great yes for children growing up in a free Britain, in our welfare state,the greatest act of communal generosity in history. Here in Crook magnificentSure Start Children's Centres provide a variety of advice andsupport for parents and carers from pregnancy right through to when children gointo reception class. Four/fifthsof children are literate, 40% will go to university and many in Emileigh’s lifetime will live to be a hundred. We are a nation that gives ever more tocharities, we are increasingly tolerant of class, colour, gender, race,religion and sexual preference, advances in medicine and scientific discoveriestake our breath away, just think in Emileigh’s life time men and women may havereached and have set foot on Mars. But our greatest cause of thanksgiving thismorning is that God has committed himself yet again to onemore human family, the Rayner’s here in Crook, and in the lives of this lovelyfamily with whom today we join in celebration, we see that embracing, renewingand hopeful vision of God’s faithful love, a love that like the Velveteenrabbit discovered makes us real.

One reason we find such children’s stories childish is that, in them,things work out the way we hope they will. The good win, the wicked arevanquished and the heroes live happily ever after. Life isn’t like that, wetell ourselves. But it could be less unlike it than it is. Which is why it isnot naive to see the world through the eyes of love, for that is how God seesus.

May God bless you on yourjourney, and may your child’s baptism open your eyes to live the faith morefully.

Amen

Ray Anglesea is a self supporting minister working in St Andrew’s DawsonStreet LEP, Crook and in the wider West Durham Methodist Circuit

Welcome!

2011-09-18T12:56:00.000-07:00

WELCOME to the new Worship Blog

This blog is offered to members and friends of Northern Synod churches as a place to share worship resources. We've tried this once before, and it sort of petered out - but sometimes life gives us second chances, and this is one of them.

You will see that the Worship Blog is linked to the home page of our synod website, and is now differentiated from the synod blog, which is principally a forum for current synod concerns. (Which isn't to say that worship isn't to focus on current matters.)

So please send in your stuff - sermons, prayers, hymns, reflections, whatever.... Send them, like all website material, to Colin Offor or John Durell at our synod addresses - and keep coming back to the Worship Blog. And don't be afraid to post your comments: they will be moderated, but posted asap.

Most of the material that follows has been transferred from the Synod Blog - please start adding some new material now!

John Durell

Trouble at Vineyard

2011-09-18T12:53:00.000-07:00

From a sermon preached at St Andrew’s Dawson Street Methodist Church, Crook, Sunday 18th September 2011 by Ray Anglesea

How many trade union members does it take to change a light bulb? Fourteen. One to screw in the bulb. Two to hold him on the step ladder. Four to hold the step ladder steady. One to flick the switch to test the bulb. One to make sure that the other bulbs in the room will need fixing. One to supervise. Two to take a coffee break, one to eat lunch, and one to sleep!

We may laugh at this Trade Union joke but one of the great inventions of modern Western society according to the theologian and writer, Tom Wright, former Bishop of Durham, has been the trade union. A trade union, as many of you know who, like me, have been paid up rank and file members, is an organization of workers who bargains and negotiates with its employer for better working conditions, wages and benefits. At last week’s annual TUC congress held in London, Union activists discussed calls for co-ordinated industrial action in protest at the Government's controversial policies on pensions and spending cuts. Despite Ed Miliband’s pleas to forego strike action to his union colleagues that helped elect him, disruption is likely this November. Three million state employees are to be balloted about strike action, bringing schools, colleges, universities, courts, ports and job centres to a standstill. It will be the strongest industrial act of defiance yet against the government's cuts programme.

The British Trade Union movement can trace its origins back to the Dorset Tolpuddle martyrs. Five of the six 1834 martyrs who risked the wrath of landowners calling for better wages and conditions were prominent Primitive Methodists, village men of faith.“Their trade unionism grew out of their faith,” said the Rev'd Dr. Leslie Griffiths, The Lord Griffiths of Burry Port, former President of the Methodist Conference and Superintendent Minister at Wesley’s Chapel London. Primitive Methodism has always been marked by a strong tradition of political activism especially for its allegiance to the Labour Movement; it served as a kind of midwife in the birth of English socialism. You will remember the saying that the Labour party owes more to Methodism than it does to Marx.

It was during the industrial revolution that trade unions became popular. Here in Crook the town’s fortunes changed in 1844 when the first pit was opened by Messrs Pease & Partners; by the 1860’s there were a total of 26 mines in and around the Crook area. By the end of the nineteenth century Crook had been transformed into a thriving town. Our own James Robson from West Auckland was a prominent British trade unionist; elected President of the Durham Miners' Association, serving until his death in 1934; he also served as Treasurer of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain and was a member of the Methodist New Connexion. Peter Lee was another. A preacher and a primitive Methodist he gave his name to a new town in County Durham. And here too we pay tribute to the late Geoff Waterfield chair of the Redcar steelworks multi-union committee who spearheaded the campaign to save steel-making in Redcar.

But over the course of the twentieth century trade union activity was set to change. The Conservative government under Margaret Thatcher, rightly or wrongly, was determined to break the power of the trade unions. Even so, trade unions are still the largest voluntary organisation in the country but with declining membership together with the central question of British politics today - the need to reduce the deficit – this has placed the trade union movement in an invidious position. If the trade union movement is to survive it needs to find a way to reinvent itself or else decline will be terminal. The role of the unions has become something quite different from what our Primitive Methodist fathers and mothers envisaged. Today we live in difficult economic times; health service managers who don’t know whether there will be a job next year; employees in welfare charities whose central government and local authority funding is being cut at the very time when demands are increasing; armed service personnel who will gradually be made redundant in the next few years. It can’t be an enviable job to be a government minister who, in coping with the extent of the deficit, has to trim budgets and deal with the backlash from people whose livelihood suddenly comes under threat.

Today’s trade unions would have been horrified at the story Jesus told about the employer we find this morning in Matthew’s gospel and the workers who laboured at various times of the day. I am sure if what we just read in the Gospel took place today, there would be a huge hue and cry. Salaries are linked to hours of work; a skilled worker gets more than an unskilled worker; if workers have the same skills, the same hours of work and similar responsibilities, we expect them to get the same wages.

Matthew sets the parable in the context of the Palestinian September grape harvest. This picture was the kind of thing which could happen in the market place of any Jewish village or town. If the harvest had not been gathered in before the rains broke then it would be ruined. To get the harvest in was a frantic race against time. The kingdom of heaven is likened to how a landowner treated his day labourers during the grape harvest. By agreement they all get the same, one denarius, a subsistence wage for a family for one day; standard pay but not generous. What is surprising is that the landowner does not ensure he has a full workforce at the beginning of the day. He is prepared to accept fresh workers almost up to the end. These get paid first – one denarius – a financial symbol of what is enough to provide food, clothing, and shelter — the basics of human dignity for a worker and the worker’s family. It also gives the others hope that they will get a fat bonus. But no they get what was agreed, one denarius, they have no reason to complain. Some are treated very generously but none are treated unjustly. The story we read this morning asserts the value and worth of human labour. It is good and right that we should work. The story also suggest something more than trade union law, employment law or equal opportunities.

We can of course read the parable on many levels. We can see something of the comfort that God gives. Whether you discover, rediscover God late or soon, in the first flush of youth, the amber years of mid age, or the shadowing of lengthening years, you are equally dear and precious to him. We can see something of the compassion of God – there is an element of human tenderness in the story. The vineyard owner gives the labourers work emphasising the right of every man and woman to work and to expect a living wage.

But look at the last group of workers, the ones who were hired when only one hour of the day was left. The vineyard owner questions them: why haven’t you been working? There answer is revealing: nobody has hired us, nobody has given us a job. Nobody in other words wanted them. In today’s terms these are people who are long-term unemployed. Most frightening of all is the evidence that, in some places, unemployment is a third-generation issue. Work is simply not available. What does this say about the dignity and self-esteem of a household, a family, a neighbourhood? From my own experience of working in the inner cities this life is a social reality, the combined result of shifts in government policy and the forces of global markets. It is not a symptom of local indolence or moral turpitude. There are whole neighbourhoods where, for years, no one has said: “I have a job for you, and it will pay a living wage.” The twist in the parable’s tale is not simply that those who worked the shortest time got the same as the others; it is that these were the people whom no one else wanted, the bottom of the social pile. But they, too, received the living wage, and the dignity of the opportunity to labour for it. As Christians, our voices should be heard asking for an account from those who manage economies in the Eurozone as leaders battle to keep the faith as the Greek rescue descends into chaos amidst bankruptcy fears, as well as nationally, particularly as our jobless total soared to 2.6 million this week as the cuts begin to bite. Our standard of measure is the generosity of God, not the meanness of market forces.

But the thrust of the story in chapter 20 for me is not so much about the nature of God, his compassion, his goodness, his comfort, or the need to manage economic and financial markets and trade union reform. The parable is intended more of a warning to the disciples, that those at the front would end up at the back and those at the back would end up at the front, the last first and the first last. Jesus warns his disciples - just because you’ve been close to me so far, don’t think you are now the favoured few for all time, just because I am in bringing in the kingdom of heaven - don’t think that you are going to become rich and famous. That’s not the sort of thing I am about, that’s not the sort of thing God’s kingdom is about. You may well have set out with me from Galilee from the beginning but others may well come in much later and end up getting paid just the same, the regular daily wage.

There is always the danger that we get cross with God over this. People who work in church circles can easily assume that they are the special ones, God’s inner circle. I see it all the time as I work in the cathedral bookshop, ambitious clergy climbing the candlestick who use their power and influence to promote their own status and a pretty rectory, those who name drop, “when I was speaking to the Archbishop of Canterbury the other day” “Oh Rowan this and Rowan that,” “and yes of course, my dear, I already have an invitation to sit in the choir stalls for the enthronement service for the new Bishop of Durham.” And it is so easy to run the church without God, as if it was our club, in our own strength with our own skills.

The point of the story this morning is that what people get from having served God and his kingdom is not actually a wage at all, it’s not strictly a reward for work done, an honoury title, a seat in the choir stalls. God doesn’t make contracts with us like our trade union stewards as if our Primitive Methodist fathers and mothers in the faith could bargain or negotiate for a better deal. He does make a covenant with us. He promises us everything and asks of us everything in return. When he keeps his promises he is not rewarding us for effort but doing what comes naturally to his overflowing nature. In reality, God is out there in the market place, looking for people everybody else tried to ignore, welcoming them on the same terms and surprising them with his generous grace – all that God gives is grace. We cannot earn what God gives us, we cannot deserve it, we cannot put God in our debt, what God gives us is given out of the goodness of his heart, out of his grace, what God gives us is not pay, but a gift, not a reward but grace.

Psalm 145:1-8; Philippians1:21-30; Matthew 20 v1-16

Ray Anglesea is a self supporting minister working in St Andrew’s Dawson Street LEP, Crook and an authorised Methodist Minister working in the wider West Durham Methodist Circuit.

Mourning after the Riots

2011-09-18T10:46:00.000-07:00

(originally posted on the Synod Blog 5-September-2011)

From an illustrated sermon preached at Stanhope Methodist Church, Stanhope, Sunday 4^th September 2011 by Ray Anglesea

This is a special time of the year in Weardale. A time of beauty; purple heather moorland, harvested golden wheat fields, ripening berries, brambles, rowan and elderflower, the twittering of excited migrating swallows and the cry of the curlews. The annual Stanhope show, now in its 170^th year, is a display case celebrating the best of agricultural and county life, the main ring the hub for the exhibition of local sheep, cattle and industrial produce, show jumping, horse and pony classes. It will rain of course, warm, soft rain that will make the cake stall cover up. Looking out over the fields and River Wear it is difficult to think that we belong, in the Prime Minister’s recent words, to a nation that has lost its way, a broken society, a sick society that is near breakdown, a society in a state of moral collapse. The August disturbances in the nation’s inner cities seem a million miles away from our beautiful dale, the town enclosed and surrounded as it is by the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, quite simply one the most lovely and unspoilt parts of England.

The peace and quiet of this nineteenth century Methodist chapel may seem like another world, but it is not. For here we come to encounter a God not of make-believe but of reality, not of other-worldliness but of this-worldliness. This holy space is a sanctuary of worship where our prayers and praises are not words that signify disengagement but connection.

That violent disorder should break out on the streets of London and other major British cities last month was a profound shock. For three unbelievable days, violent and lawless events ran horribly ahead of the collective ability to control or anticipate them once they erupted. We looked on in horror as we witnessed thuggery, vandalism and theft, murder, and the vicious and ferocious malice shown towards the police. The events and actions revealed the presence of a serious social disease, posing threats to the common good for which society was wholly unprepared. For most of us it was deeply unnerving to realise how fragile the veneer of civilised urban life really is. The Chief Rabbi, Lord Sacks writing in The Times said “What we witnessed was a real deep-seated and frightening failure of morality; rebels with or without a cause - it was a moment when the nation caught a glimpse of its soul – and it was not a pleasant sight.” Whatever the reasons for this violent behaviour, they can never be excuses. For my own part I was relieved that the media did not blame my profession, the planning profession, for urban design solutions that have made the cities crooked places straight and the narrow ways wider to speed police access to trouble spots.

In the wake of these shocking events, it’s important to avoid, knee-jerk reactions and trite answers. Politicians and social policy commentators including Lord Sacks have, nevertheless, thrown in their two pennyworth. Already the analysis and debates have continued about the erosion of public values. Many people realise that the causes of the recent civil unrest and disturbances in our inner cities are complex; the problems have hitherto been politically managed and contained. Deprivation and measures of austerity are likely to have played their part as well as high levels of unemployment, dysfunctional families, ending of education maintenance allowance, the discarding of Sure Start programmes, attacks on social housing tenancies – all of which may have given rise to tension and anxiety - but it would be too simplistic to place sole blame there. But clearly something has gone badly wrong. Whether we talk about an underclass or social exclusion or simply poverty it should be clear that the problem may have been ameliorated, but it was not solved by the Labour government throwing money alone at the inner cities, however well intended their social and economic policies may have been; and credit here must be given to the magnificent success of the Sure Start programmes. But let’s be clear - the tone adopted by Mrs Thatcher following the Faith in the City report in 1985 still continues in this present administration. For Thatcher personal responsibility and wealth creation were the keys to a healthy and peaceful society, and the welfare state was undermining these – hence her famous remark that “there is no such thing as society,” and her memorable reinterpretation of Jesus’ words in which she argued: “No one would remember the Good Samaritan if he’d only had good intentions; he had money as well.” Revd Dr Michael Northcott, Professor of Ethics at Edinburgh recently stated in the religious press “that what we saw on the street of England 3 weeks ago manifested not only a moral crisis, but a spiritual crisis; market and money are the gods of this new religion.”

The Bishop of Manchester, the Rt. Revd Nigel McCulloch, in a recent BBC Radio 4 broadcast suggested that “the disappearance of public values, some would argue, has led to a moral deficit in private and public life that has spawned acquisitiveness and dishonesty. It’s evident at all levels of our society.” To be frank, the riots are not the only recent examples of theft and greed. We are reaping what has been sown over the last 3 decades of creating a grotesquely unequal society, a society of looters created with MPs and their expenses, bankers and their bonuses, tax evading corporations, phone hacking journalists, bribe taking police officers. To create a false division between what we do in public and how we are in private is fraught with problems of credibility. This is not to condone but to understand the new forces of disorder emerging in our communities.

How can faith communities and the Christian churches, in particular, and Matthew’s gospel this morning help to bring light and wisdom to the problem of conflict and unrest? I’m not sure that shrill demands for the Ten Commandments as suggested by some letter writers to The Times are likely to be heeded – even though I have a high regard for that moral code of unsurpassed clarity about not stealing and not coveting what belongs to others. By sheer coincidence as we begin a new month and a new school year, the lectionary begins a series today on teaching skills for practical living. As Christ calls us to live in community we think about how such skills might help us to resolve conflict in our midst.

Matthew wrote his gospel some 80 years after Jesus’ resurrection to small church communities who were struggling to survive in scattered communities separate from the synagogues out of which they grew. Although Paul was the great founder of mixed congregations in Gentile cities, by the ninth decade the Pharisees had successfully banned Jewish Christians from participating in the synagogue for breaking the sacred laws of the

Covenant. It seems that Matthew needed to say something to the members of his own faith community to settle internal conflicts when such open conflicts arose.

Whether this was an internal, specific and isolated problem in the early church we do not know, but history has shown that the church has not heeded Matthew’s instructions. Through the ages the church has not been immune to its own conflict, protest, demonstration, infighting, power and greed. And that is perhaps why we in the church still say on a daily basis ‘forgive us our trespasses,’ only wishing that others would join us in this penitence. For me reading this passage, Matthew 18 is the bedrock for the practical outpouring of basic principles of reconciliation; it is severely practical as well as ruthlessly idealistic. Reconciliation is a huge issue today; we see clearly the results of not doing it: in inner city riots, suicide bombs, campaigns of terror. That’s on the larger scale. On the smaller scale we see not only discord in our soaps, Coronation Street and The Archers, but also in broken marriages, shattered families, feuds between neighbours, divided churches.

Learning to live together whether in the church or city community with a great company of different others is the challenge that faces us more now than it ever has done in the past. Positive interaction and interdependence between peoples whether in Tottenham or Manchester are fundamental to the creation of community. Reconciliation and peacemaking I suggest begins with not blowing social, economic and racial issues out of all proportion; we can have a conversation about whether we think we live in a broken society or a society that is being broken up, but facebook and social media networks prompts us to say what is on our mind which often calls for instant knee jerk reactions and responses. Responsibility for peacemaking begins with the individual – with me - I need to work on my behaviour, my attitude, my heart to help the community to work. Remember G K Chesterton’s famous dictum? – “What is wrong with the world? – I am”. Matthew’s instructions in his gospel to the early church suggest that we should not only be peacemakers but we should tread softly on issues, getting to the root of the problem before it festers. We have to acknowledge that conflict is painful; in recent years restorative justice has been increasingly valued. The encounter between perpetrator and victim is not easy but it may offer a long term solution for both parties if they can face it. One of the most remarkable women in Glasgow is Karyn McCluskey, a single mother, nurse, forensic psychologist, and community campaigner. In response to the damage caused by violent gang warfare in her native city, she “treated violence like a disease and mounted a public health campaign against it”. Her courageous and amazingly successful campaign was essentially about setting up meetings between victims, their families, and perpetrators of bloodshed. From all quarters of the community, members of the most vicious gangs were bombarded with requests to give up their violence and channel their energy into something that enhanced life — theirs and that of others.

Matthew through these instructions is offering not only the church but maybe civil society ways of developing strategies to access the grace needed to be good neighbours under circumstances of great disparity of both wealth and life chances: in modern cities where rich and poor live cheek-by-jowl and in the life of our churches.

Canon Stephen Cherry writing on the Durham Cathedral web site a couple of weeks ago indicated that the August riots were a disgrace - an absolute disgrace; evidence of the lack of the very grace that is needed for people to live together in community. He suggests “that grace becomes a force to be reckoned with when people freely open their hearts to their neighbours and to God, when they look to the interests of others rather than their own”. A society must measure success not simply in terms of material riches, but on its morality, its compassion, its concern for neighbour, its belief that the individual good is inseparably linked with the common good, particularly that of the most vulnerable. Our society will be judged by the values we teach our children and that applies to bankers and politicians as well as parents. And it is precisely that change, this strategy which needs to take place on a scale never previously imagined if our cities are to be good places for people to live in today and tomorrow.

God is not remote from our concerns any more than we are remote from the forces unleashed in our cities. Our faith is that ultimately grace will triumph. Our action must be to do what we can to let grace triumph in our own lives, our churches, in our own communities. The question is ‘how well are we playing our own part in the ongoing spiritual struggle between grace and disgrace?’ Alas we live in a world of good and bad and that makes our lives and relationships painful and complicated. It’s a struggle from which no person or community is ever spared and that is why life is often so painful. But since our faith tells us where true victory lies our own struggle is informed by the confidence that, however deep the pain, however terrible the disturbance and carnage, grace will triumph in the end.

Psalm 119 v33-40;

Romans 13 v8-14;
Matthew 18 v15-20

Ray Anglesea is a self supporting minister working in St Andrew’s Dawson Street LEP, Crook and an authorised Methodist Minister working in the wider West Durham Methodist Circuit.

The Gospel in English

2011-09-18T10:41:00.000-07:00

Sermon preached by John Durell at the inaugural English Language Service in Khovo Church, Maputo 7-August-2011

Perhaps I am the only one here today wholearned English at his mother’s knee. I never had to sit down and study “I am,you are, he/she/it is…” I never had to think about why today I go, butyesterday I went, and not I goed. I admit that when I was a little older andwent to school I struggled just as many of you will have with spelling – but bythat time the English language was a part of me. I had taken it in with mymother’s milk. Wasn’t I lucky?

And yet, if I’m lucky compared withyou, I also feel that I am very poor compared with you. I fear I may be theonly person here who can confidently speak only one language. Hillian, in caseyou are wondering, does not speak English as a first language. But since it’sover forty years since I took her away from her own country and her own Dutchlanguage, she must have spoken more English than anything else in her lifetime. But like you, she had tolearn it. And over the years we have been together I have often envied the wayshe has learned to speak other languages (some fluently, others less so); and Ihave come to see how much richer life is if, like all of you, we can think and expressourselves in a variety of languages. Languages reflect the rich diversity ofour human life.

So it’s bit of a shock to turn to thisancient story of Babel, and to find that this rich variety of languages is seento be not a blessing, but a curse. Here are people who seem very much like us:they are ambitious, they want to progress, they want their society to develop.Just as in our world today, new technologies in Babel mean that things arepossible that could never be achieved before. We know very little about ancientcivilizations that built only in wood, for even in hot climates the wood hasrotted away. But learn to bake bricks, and build high with those bricks – andyou make a name for yourself. You are remembered. Leave the villages behind andmove to the city, and there are enough people to take on big projects. Today, forthe first time in history, there are more people in our world who live incities than in the countryside. For the first time in history, there is moreland, more earth, moved every year by human beings and our machines than ismoved by rivers and seas and all the forces of nature. Like the citizens ofBabel, we, it seems, are set to “make a name for ourselves”.

But in this ancient story, this is the pointat which God intervenes. We are not told exactly why, but clearly there is theidea that the people of Babel are going too far. God reasons to himself that “there will benothing beyond their reach”. It is not a bad thing to have ambition forourselves. It is not a bad thing to seek to develop our society. But of courseif we are listening for what God may be saying to us today, we will want ourschemes and our plans to enrich not just our own lives, but our neighbours’lives as well. The highest towers in our world today are being built in Dubaiand the Gulf States, but they are nothing but the playthings of the rich. Andin our global society there are many many things that are possible that oncewere never dreamed of, but not all of them will help us to be better humanbeings. No doubt God still looks down and thinks “There is nothing now beyondtheir reach.”

But what has this to do withlanguages? Perhaps this confusion of languages is a way of saying that we havegot out of step with God. In all these ancient stories, God is the one whospeaks. His word creates the heavens and the earth and everything in them. Godis the one who speaks to his creatures, t o the man and the woman whom he setsin the paradise garden – and he still speaks to them, even when sin has driventhem out. God speaks to Noah, and gives him boat-building lessons so that heand his family are saved from destruction. And through the sign of the rainbow,God speaks a word of promise, a covenant promise, to all humanity – to you, andto me, and even to the builders of Babel.

But if God speaks, we need to listen.Listening should be easy: ears are not like eyes, which we open and shut. Ourears are open all the time. Yet listening is not always easy – and listeningbecomes harder and harder when other languages are around us. Some people atKhovo kindly talk to me in English, and I listen carefully. But then they starttalking to one another in Portuguese, and I begin to switch off. And becauseI’m no longer part of the conversation, they may even lapse into Ronga orShangana, and because I’m not listening I don’t even notice. The people ofBabel have not been listening to God. They haven’t thought about whether theirbig building schemes suit his eternal purposes of good. But because they forgetto listen to God, they soon discover that they cannot even listen to oneanother. The human story becomes a story of tragedy when communication breaksdown and people go off on their different ways, in different directions.Different languages, which might have reflected the richness of our variedhuman life, instead become a measure of our divisions. We can no longer speakto one another: we no longer hear one another.

Except that in the Bible, of course,the story of the Tower of Babel is balanced by the story of the Day ofPentecost. When the followers of Jesus find the courage to share the good newsof his death and his resurrection, they receive this wonderful gift of theSpirit; and they discover that the streets of Jerusalem, which had previouslybeen a babble of every language under the sun, echo to a single language thatallows everyone to hear the great things God has done. Into this world ofconfusion the Spirit brings understanding. What was confused now becomes clear.And at that moment God makes his people one again.

If only we could recapture thatmoment. But of course there are still other forces at work in the world – andeven in the Church; and if we have experience of petty jealousies and envy andthings that divide us rather than unite us: well Paul knew all about thesethings too, and particularly when he was dealing with this church at Corinth.Here were people who knew all about that wonderful day of Pentecost inJerusalem: you never know, some of them may even have been there. And they now knewthat when they threw themselves into the life of the Spirit, they could talk intongues – they could talk in a language that wasn’t anything like English orPortuguese or any local language that we could ever imagine, but which theyliked to think was the language of God, the language of heaven.

Here in Corinth people were speakingthis language, speaking in tongues, at the Sunday service. Fair enough, saysPaul, if this is a gift that God has given you: but don’t be so proud of it.Don’t think that this is a the greatest gift that there is. It becomes a bitlike the Babel story all over again. Here are people with great ideas, butthey’re not asking themselves what God wants. I’m afraid we can still be likethe Corinthians in our church life today. We make wonderful plans withoutalways asking what it may be that God wants of us. We think we know best whichgifts we should cherish and develop – when sometimes we should listen to whatothers in the church may tell us. Perhaps we have other gifts that we haven’trealised ourselves. Perhaps our pastor or our elder or a valued friend couldhelp us to see which of our gifts would be most useful to God, here in thisplace, here today.

I’m not sure if anyone at Corinth washumble enough to ask Paul, but he tells them anyway. Better than tongues, hesays, is to prophesy. Don’t use a language that no one else can understand, butspeak in a common language – and usethat language to tell one another and the world outside what God has done. Usethat language in the best way you can – and use it as a gift of the Spirit: agift which like every one of the Spirit’s gifts can be used to build up theChurch.

This is the challenge presented to youtoday, as we launch this English language service. God has blessed you with thegift of languages – and now there is opportunity to use and develop that giftso that more and more people may learn about God’s love, and his good purposesfor us all. Every Sunday there are people in this city who are not as gifted asyou. Like me they will need to hear the good news in English if they are fullyto understand it – if it is really to touch their hearts and convert theirlives. So seek these people out: invite them to Khovo, every Sunday afternoon,16.00 hours sharp! And let Paul’s plea to the Church in Corinth be heard byPresbyterians here in Maupto: Aspire to excel in the Spirit’s gifts that buildup the Church.

God bless you in this work: keepbuilding!

A Mustard Seed

2011-09-18T10:35:00.000-07:00

(originally posted on the Synod Blog, 10-August-2011)

Roderick Strange writing in The Times Credo column last week mentioned a priest, Jim Sullivan by name, who lived to be a great age. He died well into his nineties and had been a minister for about 70 years. At his diamond jubilee, he remarked, “I spent the first 30 years of my ministry trying to bring people into the kingdom. I’ve spent the last 30 trying to bring the kingdom into people.”

It’s a phrase worth considering. What does it mean for the kingdom to come into people? What kind of kingdom people would they become? There are various answers available: they would be poor in spirit, for example, or ready to suffer for a just cause.

The kingdom is what Jesus came to proclaim. “The kingdom,” he declared, “is at hand.” And he sent his followers out to proclaim the kingdom, while he also noted that its mysteries are hidden from the wise, but revealed to children.

What kind of kingdom will this be? It will be a kingdom, writes the Roman Catholic theologian Hans Kung, where, in accordance with Jesus’ prayer, God’s name will be truly hallowed, his will is done on earth, men and women will have everything in abundance, all sins will be forgiven and all evil overcome. It will be a kingdom where, in accordance with Jesus’ promise, the poor, the hungry, those who weep and those who are downtrodden will finally come into their own; where pain, suffering and death will have an end. It will be a kingdom that cannot be described but only made known in metaphors: as the new covenant, the seed springing up, the ripe harvest, the great banquet, the royal feast.

St. Matthew’s gospel has recently been telling us something of these kingdom metaphors, parables of the kingdom. Those of you who come regularly to church will have heard some of them over the last couple of weeks. Well here is my favourite metaphor – the parable of the mustard seed.

Jesus compares the kingdom of God to a mustard seed, the kingdom grows from small beginnings. It’s such a small thing in itself - but like the small swine flu virus, it is likely to have global consequences when taken seriously. Some commentators on this passage have got slightly overheated about the fact that the mustard seed isn’t, in fact, the smallest of seeds, as Jesus says it is. For others, in staunch defence of Jesus, it is clear that at the time this was the smallest seed they knew of.

Well, the truth is - Jesus was just using a common expression from his culture: the mustard seed was simply a normal way of referring to a very small amount of something, something that was very little. The metaphor of the kingdom was not meant as a bit of pre-scientific botany. It was also well-known that the mustard seed grows into a very substantial bush, virtually a small tree. And yet, when we can know all there is to know about the genetic structure of that mustard seed and the processes by which it is transformed into a bush of such substance, there is still something miraculous about that transformation. Anyone who has grown anything from seed will know what I mean. So this parable, this metaphor of the kingdom of heaven is not meant to be botany lesson, nor even a demonstration of the divinity of Jesus; it’s just a good form of communication. Jesus listeners knew immediately what he was talking about.

There is one more technical matter to look at before we come to the meat of the parable, and that is the reference to the birds of the air. Jesus, and the people to whom he was talking, were not astonished that birds might make their nests in the shade of a fully grown mustard bush. Birds, as we know, will make their nests wherever they want, wherever they can find food, and wherever they feel safe, whether that is in a bush or a tree or the many nooks and crannies of a church building, or on Spring Watch locations. But if we read this figure of speech in another way it is a standard Jewish Rabbinical way of referring to somebody else – and here’s the surprise in this Jewish of all gospels – Matthew is referring to the Gentiles – the Gentile people, people who stand outside the Jewish covenant of God with his chosen people (you may remember the Epiphany wise men were Gentile outsiders, Gentiles from the East, astronomers who lived and worked outside the Jewish nation - so too were the Samaritans, they had no dealings with the Jews at all). So what Matthew is referring to is that as the mustard tree grows, so too will the kingdom of God’s covenant people grow, so the tree will provide shelter for all the peoples and nations of the earth, just as birds will find shelter in the branches of the mustard tree.

Back again to Jim Sullivan’s quote about bringing the kingdom into people. What he is saying is that we are the mustard seed; we are the kingdom, we are kingdom people. As we nurture the kingdom within us by prayer and bible study we begin to grow from small beginnings to a flourishing bush. The kingdom, like the mustard seed, begins to transform us as we work in the world, in the classroom, the shop floor, the committee room, the executive suite, as we seek justice and peace, as we bring help to the poor, the marginalised and the sick, as we begin to transform ourselves and the world into his kingdom. It is we that have to grow from small beginnings, it is we that have to be changed, it is we that have to be transformed, the kingdom in us. We, individually, as small mustard seeds can be more effective in the world than any church committee will ever be, and boy do you we love our committees, as all churches do - gosh how did we become so top heavy? You know one of the saddest reasons for people losing contact with God is that they’ve been involved with the church but have become disillusioned, they have been hurt and damaged – and don’t lets kid ourselves churches can be painful places - what was bright and shiny in now tarnished and dull. What gave life and purpose has been reduced to disappointment and play acting, faith has become a habit without reality.

God so loved the world not the church that he gave his only begotten son. God’s work, his mission is primarily focused on the world, his kingdom and then on the response of those who encounter that work, that kingdom work. By implication, of course “the church” in its broadest sense is completely involved. But the institutions, the organizations, the rules and regulations of “church” – while they are inevitable because human beings always organize themselves – are put in their place as secondary, in the end, to the real work of God which is his work in his world. We constantly have to remind ourselves – as Isaiah repeatedly reminds us - where is God’s glory to be found? not in church buildings or its organisations - but in the world. We are here to change the world, not the church.

It took Jesus a little while and some interesting experiences to come to a realisation that his ministry was for all people and not just for Israel, for those of the household of faith. I think Matthew’s parables and particularly the one about the mustard seed begin to tell us that as Jesus develops his ministry he points more and more to God’s kingdom being for everyone. God’s kingdom was not to be a place from which a small band of chosen people could rule the world, but a broad place of many mansions, where all people can find a home and a welcome, where the birds of the air can nest and make a home.

Taking the seed and tree analogy further St Paul in his letter to the Romans, and that difficult of all chapters – chapter 11 - moves this tree image in a different direction when he writes about the wild Gentiles being ‘grafted’ on to the tree of God’s family, as it were – could it be grafted on in place of an original branch which no longer bears fruit?

Are we too idealistic to suppose that for Jesus, a redeemed and faithful Israel working for the transformation of the world into God’s kingdom is the place where the whole world can be and feel at home? The birds of the air don’t become the bush when they build their nest in it, but they do become a part of its life, and here in the shade of the tree there is not only room for, but a celebration of a diversity of bird types - robins, blackbirds, eagles, doves, - the diversity of male, female, back, white, young, old, straight and gay, the diversity of Muslim, Sikh, Hindu, Jew faiths perhaps? All finding a home in the tree like the birds of the air.

For those who have worked like me outside the church, working for the transformation of the world into God’s kingdom, often with people of different faiths or similar planning and community ideals I am increasingly aware of God being at work in people outside the church, building his kingdom. Jesus would appear to expect and particularly to value such people as these. More than once Jesus comments on how the faith he finds in Gentiles and Samaritans puts the faith he finds in Israel to shame.

In my rereading of this parable Jesus appears to be saying there is a broad welcome to those who will live by the values of the kingdom. There are sheep of his who are not of his fold; there are many mansions in the heavenly home to which he goes; there is room in his view for all people who are building God’s kingdom to find space and a home in the mustard tree, like the birds of the air to nest in its branches.

Jim Sullivan was wise to help people become kingdom. We would be wise to become kingdom ourselves.

Amen

Matthew 13 v31-35: Romans 11 v13-21

Ray Anglesea is a self supporting minister working in St Andrew’s Dawson Street LEP, Crook and in the wider West Durham Methodist Circuit

A Wedding Sermon

2011-09-18T10:31:00.000-07:00

(originally postedon the Synod Blog 28^th July 2011)

A sermon preached at the wedding of Mr JamesAnglesea and Miss Gemma Pope, St Andrew’s Church, Much Hadham, Hertfordshire,Saturday 23 July 2011

Prayer: Come Holy Spirit of God, pourinto our hearts that most excellent gift of love, love in our thinking, love inour speaking, that thinking and speaking in love we may grow more like Jesus.Amen.

During the weddingrehearsal, the groom approached the Bishop with an unusual offer: "Look,I'll give you £1000 if you'll change the wedding vows. When you get to the partwhere I'm supposed to promise to 'love, honour and obey' and 'be faithful toher forever,' I'd appreciate it if you'd just leave that out." He passedthe minister a £1000 cheque and walked away satisfied. On the day of thewedding, when it came time for the groom's vows, the Bishop looked the youngman in the eye and said: "Will you promise to prostrate yourself beforeher, obey her every command and wish, serve her breakfast in bed every morningof your life, and swear eternally before God and your lovely wife that you willnot ever even look at another woman, as long as you both shall live?" The groomgulped and looked around, and said in a tiny voice, "Yes," thenleaned toward the Bishop and hissed: "I thought we had a deal." TheBishop put a £1000 cheque into the groom's hand and whispered: "She mademe a better offer!”

Deal or no deal,offer or no offer - what Jamie and Gemma are offering to us on their weddingday is a picture, a model of truest love. Love for each. Love for God.Something more tangible than perhaps an offertory of love songs from Lady Gagaor the Black Eyed Peas new single; something more authentic and lasting thanthe offer of a glistening goal of a lottery number, a full page spread in Hellomagazine, the fame of an x factor final. Something perhaps even more excitingthan an offer of a stadium tour of Birmingham City’s football ground, somethingmore thrilling than Wes Brown’s signing at The Stadium of Light, something morefragrant than Macey’s New York perfumery store. What they are offering us whohave lived through 10 years of a Harry Potter culture that has somehow losttouch with God, is a God’s who is real, a God who loves us. God is not arepressive deity brandishing a red card. He is a God who is committed to theflourishing, well being and happiness of his people. Where do we find love? In the tiniesthazelnut, says Mother Julian: it exists because God loves it. In the entiresweep of the universe, says Dante, because it is ‘love that moves the sun andthe other stars’. But today love has a human face in Jamie and Gemma. And totheir young memories we bring our own to offer today: memories of those whohave loved us into life, whose lives are interwoven with ours and made us whatwe are.

For what Jamie and Gemma areoffering us today is a picture, a glimpse of who God is and what he is like.The trick of course is to see and hear him. All we need to do is open our eyesto see his joy, to drink in his beauty, to smell the fragrance of love, listento the profound silence of two people in love with all its exhilaration, magicand madness that that implies. Garth Brooks the American country music artistsums it up as Jamie sings in his heart to Gemma – “It was your song that mademe sing It was your voice that gave me wings, it was your light that shinesguiding my heart to find, the place where you belong” - and Gemma echoes a songfrom TakeThat – “Heh! Let me know you, you’re all that matters to me.” To whichJamie responds obediently and lovingly – “Heh! Let me love you, you can have itall, you can have it all.” The love of a new husband and wife is as close as wewill get to understanding the love of God for one another and for humanity. Forthere is something sacred about the joy we feel at a wedding, as we sense thepower of love to bathe human beings in its radiance and make gentle the life ofthis world.

Jamie and Gemmahave said a very positive yes to each other, a very positive yes to life in allit diversity of colour and vibrancy; they have chosen love as a way of life.They give us hope. Jamie and Gemma - your families and friends are overjoyed tobe here, to share in this, one of the happiest days of your lives. DearestGemma you look so beautiful - we warmly welcome you our new daughter-in-law toour family together with Rodney, Sue, Alex, Declan and Freddie.

But if Jamie andGemma are offering us a picture of what human love is like, here comes thebetter offer, the better deal, the golden ball, the good news. God today hascommitted himself to Jamie and Gemma – for ever and for all time “and lo I amwith you always to the end of time,” as St Matthew puts it at the end of hisvery Jewish gospel. That’s God’s part of the bargain, that’s what’s God’s isoffering today as part of the deal, the cash prize. Jamie and Gemma in themonths and years ahead you will be able to draw upon more than just your ownstrength, your own capacity to love - today you have opened yourselves up to arelationship of God's love, in the hope that when you face difficulties youwill be able to offer one another more than simply your own individual wordsand feelings. When a couple get married in the sight of God, they become – inthe church's language – ministers of the gospel to each other.

God’s agreementtoday is a pact, a deal, an offering worth more than a measly £1000, it is thegood news that God considers every moment of Jamie and Gemma’s life worthwhile;that God is committed to their human joy and fulfilment and that he will notdesert them even when they run away from him. When one person promises anotherto be faithful for the rest of their life, it is a sort of echo of God’s divinepromise, his part of the bargain; and when Jamie and Gemma’s promises areexplicitly anchored in an appeal to God's promise, God's faithfulness inoffering new beginnings, it has a special force. It is not only that the promisebecomes more powerful for Jamie and Gemma, the two persons most directlyinvolved; it becomes a more eloquent sign to the rest of us. Here is arelationship which proclaims something profound and exhilarating about ourhumanity: a human being is worth spending a lifetime on, a lifetime of lovingattention; and also a human being is capable of giving a lifetime's attention.

So before we complain tooloudly about a world of disposable relationships, phone deals and short-termpolicies, a world of fracturing and insecure international bonds and thedecline of trust, we should remember today that we have cause for thanksgiving– thanksgiving that God has made human beings capable, against all the odds, ofreflecting his own completely costly and self-giving commitment to his world;that the gift of marriage makes this capacity visible in our world; and that,in the lives of Jamie and Gemma the couple with whom today we join incelebration, we see that bracing, renewing and hopeful vision of faithfulgenerosity.

I pray that all of us present and sharing in your joy today, will doeverything in our power to support and uphold you in your new life. And I praythat God will bless you in the way of life that you have chosen. Amen

Ray Anglesea is a self supporting minister working in St Andrew’s DawsonStreet LEP, Crook and in the wider West Durham Methodist Circuit