Thanksgiving for the return of the Lindisfarne Gospels

Liturgy for a Service of Thanksgiving for the return of the Lindisfarne Gospels to the North East Region, Summer 2013

Submitted by Ray Anglesea, St Andrew's Dawson Street, Crook

Please find set out below a liturgy which you may wish to use/adapt in the coming weeks whilst the Lindisfarne Gospels Exhibition is held in Durham. I am very happy to forward to you my power-point presentation which I used for this service. I am grateful for the office of the Dean of Durham for permission to use the hymn written by Dean The Very Reverend Michael Sadgrove “We praise you God, great Lord of time and space,” and a special thank you to the Cathedral’s Education Service for use of Children’s Props for the children’s address.   -   Ray Anglesea

Call to worship: Blessed are those that are undefiled in the way: and walk in the law of the Lord. Blessed are they that keep his testimonies: and seek him with their whole heart. Psalm 119

Introduction: We come together to welcome the visit of the Lindisfarne Gospels to Durham, their earliest home, to celebrate the Christian Heritage of North-East England, and to rejoice in St Cuthbert, in honour of whom the Lindisfarne Gospels were created and the Cathedral Church of Durham was built. We ask for God’s blessing on the Gospel Exhibition and all who visit it.

Hymn:  R&S 38 Thou whose almighty word.

Prayers As an open bible is brought forward to rest on the communion table, candles are lit beside the bible in thanksgiving for God’s word and the following prayers are said:-

Your word is a lantern to our feet

And a light upon our path

 

Blessed are you, Lord our God

How sweet are your words to our taste,
Sweeter than honey to the mouth.
How precious are your commands for our life,
More than the finest gold in our hands.

Enlighten our darkness by the light of your Christ.

May his word be a lamp to our feet and a light to our path;
for you are full of loving kindness for your whole creation,
And we your creatures glorify you.

 

A Collect for St Cuthbert: Almighty God, who called your servant Cuthbert from following the flock to follow your Son and to be a shepherd of your people: in your mercy, grant that we, following his example, may bring those who are lost home to your fold; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

 

Music: The Lord is my shepherd (Goodall) with Bryn Terfel.

Powerpoint Presentation: A collection of sights and sounds of the Lindisfarne Gospels, local attractions, theatre, music, talks and merchandise

Children’s Address: Cuthbert’s Story: This short story of the life of St Cuthbert was made into a short play, children dressed in monks habits with soft cuddly toys – lambs and otters, one dressed as a bishop with mitre, ring, and Cuthbert necklace/cross who later walked around the church stopping off at various city signposts held by members of the congregation. 

Cuthbert was probably born in the Scottish Lowlands around the year 640. At the age of 8 a prophetic remark from a playmate turned his mind to sober and godly thoughts, and his upbringing as a shepherd gave him ample time for prayer. One night he saw in the sky a dazzling light and angels carrying a soul up to heaven, and resolved to dedicate his life to God. Some years later Cuthbert came to Melrose Abbey asking to be admitted as a monk. It was from here that he began his missionary work, which he continued from Lindisfarne when he became abbot there. Once when he was at Coldingham Abbey (a special monastery that contained monks and nuns) he was spied on in the middle of the night praying in the cold North Sea. The story is told of two sea otters that came out of the sea to dry Cuthbert’s feet.  Consecrated Bishop in 685, he remained an indefatigable traveller and preacher, walking all over his diocese and spending time as a hermit on Farne Island in between. After only a year, however he felt his end coming and resigned his office dying on the Farne in the company of a few of his monks.

The Monks of Lindisfarne following Viking Raids set off on a journey with Cuthbert’s body and left Lindisfarne walking to to Whithorn, Carlisle, Ripon, York, Chester le Street, eventually arriving at Durham where he was later buried in Durham Priory, later to be called Durham Cathedral.

Props for children’s address provided by the Durham Cathedral Education Service.

Offertory, Offertory Prayer

Hymn: We praise you God, great Lord of time and space (Tune Engelberg STF 731)

           (Produced with kind permission, office of the Dean of Durham Cathedral)

1.We praise you God, great Lord of time and space
For all the saints of this and every place
Whose stories tell of light and truth and grace:
Alleluia!

2. We sing of Cuthbert, old Northumbria’s pride
The island saint who trod these landscapes wide
As humble teacher, healer, friend and guide:
Alleluia!

3. Your Spirit called the boy from keeping sheep
To guard your people and to rouse from sleep
All those a shepherd’s care would find and keep:
Alleluia!

4. He cherished all that lives and moves on earth,
The birds and beasts, your creatures brought to birth,
In whom he saw your presence, gift and worth:
Alleluia!

5. You made him bishop, gave him gifts to lead;
He told the news of grace in word and deed,
Restored your church and bound the wounds of need
Alleluia!

6. The lonely hermit, holy man of prayer
Went forth to fight the demons of despair,
With strength divine to struggle, risk and dare:
Alleluia!

7. Teach us, good Lord to serve with heart and soul;
Like Cuthbert, make us sound and whole;
And bring us with your saints to heaven’s goal:
Alleluia!

8. We sing of Cuthbert, saint, companion, friend;
To you our God all thanks and praise ascend
Now at this feast, and till all ages end.
Alleluia! Amen

Michael Sadgrove, Dean of Durham                            

 

 

Gospel Reading: Matthew 5. v1-12

Sermon

Prayers of Intercession

We remember with thanksgiving the life of St. Cuthbert and the making of the Lindisfarne Gospels in honour of him. We pray for our County and region, the cathedral church of Durham and its university, that rejoicing in our heritage, we may work together for the common good. We remember for all who will visit the Lindisfarne Gospels exhibition and all who will visit his shrine. We pray that we may all be inspired to seek those good things which belong to our flourishing and to which the gospels bear witness.

Creator God, help us to read into the minds of those who write. May we glimpse their insights as we rejoice in their words. Let the things we read and learn inform our thinking and lead us to balanced views and deeper thoughts as well as enjoyable moments. Let your love shine through the prism of the printed page and the magic of the screen.

Lord of spirit and truth, surround our thoughts and hopes with meditation and contemplation. As we seek to make sense of the word through poetry and prayer, through word and deed, through music and song, may your spirit spark exploration of the gift of imagination, in writer, reader and viewer alike.

And finally - Loving Father, help us to follow the example of Cuthbert, by the simplicity of our lives and by the power of our witness, through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen

Communion Hymn: R&S 373 Lord Jesus Christ you have come to us

The Communion

Hymn: R&S 661 How shall I sing that Majesty (Tune Coe Fen STF 667)

Benediction: May God, who kindled the fire of his love in the hearts of the saints, pour upon you the riches of his grace. May he strengthen you to walk in the way of holiness and to come to the full radiance of glory.  And the blessing of God almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, be among you and remain with you always.   Amen

 

 

Action for Children Sunday 2013

 Sermon preached by Ray Anglesea at Ferryhill Methodist Church, 4-August-2013

For many Christians the command to be a Good Samaritan is central to their way of life; the parable of the Good Samaritan is, after all, one of the most often repeated and much loved parables of our faith. These parables of Jesus are like open ended puzzles; they force the hearer to appropriate the story for themselves; they live with us, continuing to shock, and engage.  A parable asks us: ‘Where do you stand – with the priest?’ ‘Whose side do you take – the side of the Levi?’ ‘Which one of these characters is you – or are you all three?’ The stories engage with our own powers of empathy and imagination; they are ultimately meant to change not reassure us.  And yes parables still have the power to speak to us and the Christian church today. The independent, non-partisan public policy think-tank ResPublica created in 2009 by Phillip Blond found that in a recent report 90% of church congregations undertake some kind of voluntary activity, encouraged and prompted I suspect by the parable of the Good Samaritan. That compares with only 54% for the population as a whole.

But a willingness to serve in some voluntary capacity prompted by the story of the Good Samaritan isn’t the only social asset possessed by the Church. From the running of youth clubs to visiting the elderly, providing food and shelter to the homeless and raising money for the poorest people of the world, churches like the one here in Ferryhill and mine at Crook are determined to prove that there isn’t a social problem that isn’t being solved by someone, somewhere, modelled on the story of the Good Samaritan. It was reported in The Times last week, 27^th July, that the Trussell Trust has been named “Britain most admired charity.” It runs 360 food-banks across the UK, offering emergency rations to those in need. In 2012/13 the numbers of those helped by the food-banks increased by 170%.

 “Who is my neighbour?” asks the lawyer in the parable trying to test and trick Jesus. Jesus would know well the Hebrew Scriptures. Leviticus defines neighbour in terms of family, kin, and close friends. But would Jesus argue for a broader concept of neighbour? Would he dare to be ‘inclusive’? – an inclusiveness which was already causing scandal for this pale Galilean. ‘Is any Jew a neighbour, even a sinful one, a tax-collector, a prostitute, a woman, a person of questionable sexual history?’ Or, ‘what about non-Jews, those outside the covenant, the uncircumcised, the Roman occupier, the despised Samaritan, the unclean and immoral Gentile?” Jesus was for sure getting a name for himself.

Notice the way Jesus answers the lawyers question – he does not fall into the trap of answering the question. Instead, he reframes it – his parable turns the question from ‘who is my neighbour?’ to ‘To whom am I myself a neighbour?’ - it is a subtle shift from the question of ‘who can I choose to be my neighbour to a completely different emphasis which is fundamental to the Gospel: ‘how do I become neighbour, how do I stop pointing the finger and condemning and start becoming the Gospel myself?’ This is the means by which we do not seek to define neighbour but are ourselves defined by Christ’s call to love neighbour as we love ourselves.

 We know the parable well. To cut the long story short, a Samaritan comes to the rescue. The traditional hated enemy becomes the one who saves. We are not told who the victim on the road is. So this victim could be a Jew saved by a Palestinian, or in a different context the Tutsi saved by the Hutu, the evangelical saved by the gay person, the member of the Taliban saved by the British soldier, or the other way round. And the Samaritan does not just save. He goes radically beyond saving. He risks his own life and reputation in order to help, and he offers radical generosity, not just a little bit of help, but finance enough to pay for three months of care, with the promise of more on his return. The only motive we are given is that he sees him and has compassion for him. Yes, compassion – that goes beyond, race, or tribe, or religion, or sexuality, or ideology, minority group, or scape-goating, and sees not the categorisation, or the prejudice, or the learnt fear, but sees the human being. That’s it; that’s our Gospel, the Good News of the compassion of Christ which has the power and the healing to overcome the wrong done to the victim.

Today we celebrate Action for Children – children like Sean whom we heard about in our story and the wonderful work done by Action for Children, particularly in the field of neglect. Reading their annual report a few weeks ago it reminded me of a talk given by the Bishop of Jarrow recently to his diocesan synod. The Bishop found himself reading a book on the theology of homelessness. “The author talks about somebody called Caroline and he says “Caroline begins her story at the age of 7, recalling a dysfunctional family, divorced parents, her mother always out at the pub and sexual abuse;” at the age of 13 Caroline was shoplifting to buy food and at 15 she left home and moved in with a friend. After a number of unsuccessful relationships she was married at 18. Her husband assaulted her badly. She became addicted to Valium and attempted to kill herself. She was made homeless, she was evicted for non-payment of rent on the flat she was sharing with another boyfriend and so it goes on. The author tells of a number of similar stories of homeless people whom he has met.

 “My initial reaction to hearing the story of Caroline and telling Sean’s story this morning is to admit that in a way these sort of life experiences are something right outside my experience. I simply do not know people whose experience of life is like that. Yes, I’ve met people like that as part of the work I do but there somehow seems a really very big gap between those people’s experience of life and mine. “And yet my theology and Christian understanding of the world expressed in this parable this morning tells me that Caroline and this young man Sean is my sister and brother in Christ, somebody for whom Christ died, a member like me of the human family; Caroline or Sean  is my neighbour, a victim lying on the Jericho road. The sad fact is (and I am sure you know this more than me) that within our own circuit many people whose life experiences are unbelievably different from mine are living cheek by jowl with each other. We also need to acknowledge that often our congregations have very different life experiences from the bulk of those who live in the area in which they are called by God to serve.

The Parable of the Good Samaritan, therefore, challenges us to look at our own approach to life and to our involvement with people to see if we, like the lawyer ask unprofitable questions that stifle compassion, and also to go and be a neighbour to those in need. The words of Deuteronomy echo down the centuries (Chapter 30 v 11+14), “Surely this commandment that I am commanding you is not too hard for you, nor is it too far away. The word is very near you......in your heart to observe.” To which may be added, and where your heart is, there will your treasure be also.

God’s call on us in this situation is I believe is to put ourselves into each other’s shoes. Of course there is room for challenge not only about how we live our lives – including often why we are so ignorant in our churches about what is going on in wider society – but there needs first of all to be real attempt to put ourselves into the shoes of others as Jesus did. And Jesus was certainly willing to challenge – mainly of course the religious people! A society that rushes to judge and dismiss members of its communities is unlikely to be a healthy or Christ-like society.

 “I am struck by Pope Francis who, when he was Archbishop of Buenos Aires, washed and kissed the feet of homosexuals with Aids in his home city  - a move as controversial then as washing the feet of Muslims and women after he became Pope. Here are some words of Pope Francis when he was a Cardinal in Argentina -

he said “The poor must not be perpetually marginalised. We cannot accept the underlying idea that ‘we who are doing well give something to those who are doing badly, but they should stay that way far from us’ That is not Christian. It’s indispensable that we integrate them into our community as soon as possible…

“And he goes on: A poor man must not be looked at with disgust: he must be looked at in the eyes. “God’s vision is for a vision of a human family.” We as churches are invited in this part of our nation to start to discover what it means to be part of that human family where so many of our lives are so radically different from so many other people.

 “I am very struck by something Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury wrote about discipleship a few years ago “Being where Jesus is means finding yourself in the company of the people whose company Jesus seeks and keeps. So, when Jesus goes to be in the company of the excluded, the wretched, the self-hating, the poor, the diseased, that's where you're going to find yourself. If you are going to be where Jesus is, if your discipleship is not intermittent but a way of being, that's where you are going to find yourself, in the same sort of human company that he is in. This is once again an important reminder that our discipleship is not about choosing our company beyond choosing the company of Jesus “So that is indeed why so many great disciples across the history of the Christian Church, and indeed now, find themselves in the company of people they would never have imagined being with, had they not been seeking to be where Jesus is.

 And who is your neighbour? Or to whom could you become a neighbour? Perhaps a neighbour to the one you find most difficult to accept. How can we go beyond our own barriers to live Jesus’ radical compassion and be changed by it?

 

Amen

 

Readings: Deuteronomy v9-14, Luke 10.25-37

 

Martha and Mary

Sermon preached by Revd Ray Anglesea at Howden le Wear Methodist Chapel, 21^st July 2013

 On the wall above my dining room table is this copy of a painting painted by the Spanish artist Diego Velazquez in1618. It was painted when the painter was 19 years old. The painting is called “Kitchen Maid with the Supper at Emmaus.”  Here we see not simply a kitchen maid, but a young African woman who is in all probability a slave, in a kitchen - the kitchen of the inn where two disciples and Christ have stopped for their evening meal. The painting depicts a moment in the Emmaus house before the disciples have recognized Christ; the maid looks to be in a state of arrested attention, does she have any idea who the guest is?
       

What I didn’t know is that Velazquez painted, in the same year, another painting where a kitchen maid is the subject of his painting. This second painting is entitled Kitchen Scene with Christ in the House of Mary and Martha, the subject of today’s gospel reading. Velazquez realistically depicts a 17th century Seville kitchen; the foreground is dominated by the face and demeanor of a woman who we take to be a cook; she is about her tasks, hands busy beating or whisking; sea bass lie on a plate, garlic on the table, eggs and red chilies, a flagon of water or wine on the table nearby; the foods are shown prepared in ways typical of Spanish cookery at the time.
 

In the background of the painting is a biblical scene, generally accepted to be the story of Martha and Mary. In it, as we discovered in our Gospel reading Christ goes to the house of a woman named Martha. Her sister, Mary, sat at his feet and listened to him speak. Martha, on the other hand, went to "make all the preparations that had to be made."Upset that Mary did not help her, she complained to Christ to which he responded: "Martha, Martha, ... you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.^” In the painting, Christ is shown as a bearded man in a blue tunic. He gesticulates at Martha, the woman standing behind Mary, rebuking her for her frustration.
 

The plight of Martha, worried and upset, clearly relates to that of the maid in the foreground. She has just prepared a large amount of food and, from the redness of her creased puffy cheeks, we can see that she is also upset. Emotion scuds across the woman’s face. Resentment, anger, tearfulness, so near to the surface that in the next moment we imagine she might throw to the ground the bowl she holds, turn to the old woman behind her and just let rip. To comfort her (or perhaps even to rebuke her), the elderly woman behind the maid seems to point out the scene in the background reminding the maid that she cannot expect to gain fulfillment from work alone. The maid, who cannot bring herself to look directly at the biblical scene and instead looks out of the painting towards us, meditates on the implications of the story.
 

Some scholars suggest that the whole painting is set in Christ’s time; the National Gallery say that following cleaning and restoration in 1964, it is now clear that the smaller biblical scene in the background is framed by a hatch or aperture through the wall, one looks into a dining room from the kitchen’s serving hatch. Some scholars suggest that the maid in the foreground is actually Martha herself and the lady standing in the background is just an incidental character.
 

But for me the moment captured in the painting is of the kitchen maid pondering on the words of Jesus to Martha that she has heard, reflecting on their implication in and for her own life. I have every sympathy for the Martha’s of this world – who like me, I suspect, have Type A  personalities –proactive people, always on the go, impatient, can multi-task, we push ourselves with deadlines, hate delays and ambivalence, we are organised and ambitious – compared to Type B personalities, rather like the Mary’s of this world  who generally live at a lower stress level and typically work steadily, who are in the main reflective and think about the outer and inner worlds, enjoy exploring ideas and concepts.
 

And so if like me you have a Type A personality what is it like to hear the words of Jesus when you are up to your eyes with work, e-mails to respond too, gardening to do, friends to visit, visits to the gym, soup to make, minutes to write, a rota to be filled and the many household tasks  that have to get done, when what is really needed if we are to understand the gospel story is stillness and focus and attention on Jesus? Being and doing, contemplation and action. It’s a very present tension in the lives of many people, both in the church and outside, whether we lived in17th century Seville, or 21st century Howden. The problem of where our focus lies  - the balance between actively doing and waiting and stillness doesn’t go away. We are distracted by our many tasks. No time to dwell on the word – the written word, and the word that God speaks to us in the life of his Son.
 

 

In the Gospel story that comes immediately before the story of Mary and Martha we heard how the lawyer was told by Jesus to model the actions of the Samaritan who helped his neighbour. ‘Go and do likewise’ he is told.  Almost in the next breath we hear Jesus telling Martha that Mary’s choice to ‘stay and be and listen’ is the best path. Jesus himself models this tension throughout his ministry. Times of activity and engagement with crowds, healing and teaching, are contrasted with time set aside alone or with his closest followers; to listen to his father, to contemplate and pray.
 

I think it is rather comforting to reflect that the early church struggled to find this balance too. In Acts we hear the disciples voice this dissonance, ‘It is not right that we should neglect the word of God to serve at tables’. As a solution they re-structured the community, choosing some to serve at tables, while we hear, they devoted themselves to prayer and serving the word. It is interesting that those chosen to serve were chosen because they were full of the spirit and wisdom and that the decision made to create this balance in the church pleased the whole community. They knew their need for both forms of ministry.
 

In his reply to Martha, is Jesus exalting contemplation over action, or saying that true disciples leave menial tasks to others? If Martha and Mary are both being hospitable in their own way it may be better to see different kinds of hospitality competing with each other for the limited resources. Jesus commends Mary for her desire to be hospitable to his teaching. By comparison, Martha’s anxious preparation of the meal is a distraction that falls short of what, in this instance, is her sister’s “better part.”
 

Earlier in the Gospel when Jesus sent off the seventy disciples he told them to receive the hospitality they are offered as they entered people’s homes; to eat and take what is given. He also tells the disciples to cure the sick and to say that the Kingdom of God has come near.  As he comes to this home of Mary and Martha, Jesus does the same. Jesus is a guest in their home, the Kingdom of God, in the form of Jesus is beside Mary and Martha, talking to them. But Martha is restless. Jesus repeats her name, as if to get her attention and steady her. We get the impression that she is working too hard, doing too much, so much so that her resentment, like the kitchen maid’s face in our painting is overflowing, consumed by what she is doing. There is no space around or within her; so that her activity is a barrier to the kingdom of God coming close, she cannot hear, she cannot respond, she sets us barriers to Christ’s love and to ways of receiving the kingdom at that moment – she thanks that these gifts will be given to her when everything else is done.
 

So what happens when we Martha’s of the world with our varied active personalities eventually stop and listen for God’s word? How can we achieve a balance of doing and being, of being active and submissive, still and attentive. How can we make space in our daily lives to be with God? Well, if you are like me, all sorts of distractions cross our minds and generally we would not wish to be in that place because we know we will be in unchartered waters and somewhat out of control and out of our comfort zone.
 

But to ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind’ is not submissive or passive, it is an active process; listening and stilling oneself requires attention and focus and desire. If we are able to still our souls, centred and listening then out of that listening and stillness and being known before God for who we are and not for what we do, then out of that will flow the deep concern for the well-being of other people and for all that is around us. That place of listening then becomes the wellspring from which we find life, not the place where we hide from it, which is good news for the Martha’s of the world. That space may be the source of great activity. But whatever comes from it, if we live from that place, we won’t be skimming through life, living at the surface but engaging deeply, with what we are about, with what is around us, and with who is around us. What you notice if you look at the original of the Velazquez painting, which is in room 30 at the National Gallery is that it is the product of a deep contemplation on life. Fish, garlic, eggs, the reflection off the glaze on the jug, as well as emotions on a woman’s troubled face, are an engagement with what is real, in that moment. If we take time to sit before God, listen to his word and gaze upon him, in the person and actions of Christ, we will find that when we pick up the ordinary things with which we have to do, engage with the people whose faces we contemplate, the activities that are on our lists, it will be with a sense that Christ is there, at the heart of it all.

Vision 720?

Last Sunday I conducted the third of Jesmond URC's services based on their Northumbrian Saints Windows, on Aiden By way of introduction I offered this little reflection, raising the question of how far our mission-orientated agenda pursued through Vision 2020 would have been understood by the Church of the Lindisfarne Gospels.

John Durell

 

Stop at the crossroads, says the prophet, and look back at the ancient ways (Jeremiah 6). Which I take it is part of what is involved in this series of  services looking through these four windows at some of the individuals who have walked the Christian way long before us.
But as we stand at the crossroads we also need to discern where the path ahead may be leading, and how we are to prepare ourselves for the way that we shall be taking. Again, I know that you are doing plenty of that here at Jesmond – and on the wider scale, all of us in the United Reformed Church are of course being encouraged to mould our church programmes into the framework provided by Visision2020.

But I’ve been wondering if we were to go back to the Church of the Lindisfarne Gospels, how our ten framework subjects might fit in with Vision720 (or thereabouts)......

1. Our first subject is Spirituality and Prayer: the Church of Aidan, Oswald and their successors would I’m sure be happy to start there too.

2.  Identity. We’ve been hung up on this one for the 40 years since we came together from our different traditions. For them, the differences between Celtic Christianity from the north and Augustine’s mission from the south had had to be resolved – and of course there had to be a winner and a loser.

3. Christian ecumenical partnerships. What I’ve just said suggests this would have been meaningless.

4. Community partnerships. Yes – but at a different level: the whole business of conversion of the king leading to conversion of his subjects suggests an essential partnership between church and palace – and no doubt with some of the tensions experienced in our community partnerships today.

5.  Hospitality and diversity. The Celtic Church was great at hospitality, but I suspect our affirmation of the value of diversity would have made little sense to them.

6. Evangelism. Yes – but they never agonised as we do over how to set about it.

7.  Church growth. Yes – though I sense they were more bothered about individuals becoming believers than they were about filling buildings on Sunday.

8.  Global partnerships. Yes, our world is more extensive – but Bede tells us amazing stories of the gospel crossing rivers, forests, seas and mountains. And as we’ll hear this evening, one nation depended on the resources of another for the gospel to be proclaimed.

9.  Justice and peace: Vision 650 was equally concerned with the needs of the poor and the freeing of slaves, and all that Jesus’s Nazareth sermon continues to demand of his hearers.

10.  Finally, the integrity of creation: and the Church that produced Cuthbert and his concern for the cuddy ducks has plenty to teach us still today – and the ubiquitous cat on the Durham Park and Ride buses (and everywhere else) says it all really.

Miracles of Love

Baptismal sermon preached by Ray Anglesea at St Andrew's Dawson Street, Crook - Sunday July 7th

 

Congratulations to Bryan and Stephanie on Joey’s baptism, and Robert and Charmaine on Damian’s baptism.  It is lovely to see you all in church together with your family and friends.

 

It was reported on the BBC and in the newspapers last week that Britain is poised to become the first country to allow babies to be born with three biological parents. The historic proposal would lift a ban on IVF treatments that can eliminate incurable genetic diseases. We thank God for such groundbreaking new procedures, pioneered in one of our own University’s - that of Newcastle.  Such cutting edge practices will give fresh hope to scores of mothers, many of whom live with extremely cruel, unpredictable and devastating medical conditions. Two friends of mine have recently undergone IVF treatment after many disappointments and setbacks. Mother 1 has passed through her 12 week barrier and is doing well, mother number 2 is not quite there yet, but there are optimistic signs that all will be well. We have come a long way since Louise Brown the first test tube baby was born in 1978 and for which her doctor, Dr Edwards, received the 2010 Nobel Prize for Medicine. Louise was later to conceive a son, Cameron, by natural methods. Miracle babies indeed. Praise God for the wonders of medical science and research!

 

But all babies, whether conceived naturally or by other means are born in love and for love – as my mother would say babies bring a lot of love with them - infant baptism expresses the ultimate primacy of God’s love. God say’s to Jeremiah “before I formed you in the womb I knew you and before you were born I consecrated you.” The very existence of a baby, of Joey and Damian is a gift from God, a precious person, to be loved and cherished. And just as my two IVF mothers have said yes to this gift of cherishing the unborn baby in the womb and preparing for its birth so Joey and Damian’s parents have said yes to bringing their child for baptism for no other reason but for this child to be loved by God, to be called one of his own and that it might share in eternal life. And today that love has a human face in Joey and Jack. And to these very young lives we bring our own memories of those who have loved us into life, whose lives are interwoven with ours and made us who and what we are.

 

Bryan and Stephanie, Robert and Charmaine, take this promise home with you today - God unconditionally loves you – we do not have to thrash around like that great musician and song writer Freddie Mercury in his soul-searching piece - Somebody to love – please anybody find me somebody to love! God loves you. Faith is our response to the astonishing discovery that God loves us. God’s choice of us precedes our choice of God.

 

And here is the good news. God today has committed himself to Joey and Damian – for ever and for all time “and lo I am with you always to the end of time,” as St Matthew puts it at the end of his very Jewish gospel. That’s God’s part of the bargain, that’s what’s God has promised today as part of the deal. Bryan and Stephanie, Robert and Charmaine, in the months and years ahead you will be able to draw upon more than just your own strength, your own capacity to love each other, today you have opened yourselves up to a relationship of God's love, in the hope that when you face difficulties you will be able to offer one another more than simply your own individual words and feelings.

In this relationship as in every serious relationship there will be ups and downs, moments of tension, discord. In human terms there will be nights with a crying child, falling out, tears, naughty children may have to be disciplined and sat on  the naughty step - my grandson sometimes finds himself there. There will be frustration about the lack of employment opportunities, insufficient funds and days when we just feel down, tired and bored. And with all the pressures of family life it is often difficult to make headway. But Bryan and Stephanie, Robert and Charmaine, you are surrounded by loving families with offers of help and support, sleep-overs, shopping, grandparents love giving their grandchildren back to parents. Use them. We as a church are here to help you too, our doors are always open, you have our telephone numbers, we too can provide help and support, education and teenage training. Alas human beings live in a world of good and bad and that makes our lives and relationships painful and complicated but not so with God. God will never give up on you, even if you run away from him. Bryan and Stephanie, Robert and Charmaine, never stop loving each other  - you will be Joey and Damian’s role models of what human love and family life is like and can be for the rest of their lives – they will learn 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 and support you.

So before we complain too loudly about a world of disposable relationships, Egyptian riots, violence and the brutal murders of April Jones and Drummer Lee Rigby, dodgy banking phone deals and the decline of political trust, we should remember today that we have cause for thanksgiving – God has committed himself yet again to two more human families, the Crossley and Carr families here in Crook, and in the lives of these lovely families with whom today we join in celebration, we see that embracing, renewing and hopeful vision of God’s faithful love, a God who will never let you go. 

May God bless you on your journey, and may your child’s baptism open your eyes to live the faith more fully. Amen

 

Colours of Pentecost

Ray Anglesea outlines the worship theme followed at Howden Methodist Chapel in Weardale on Pentecost Sunday May 19th

“Colours of Pentecost” was the theme of this year’s chapel celebration as friends and members gathered for their annual Pentecost Service which included a Service of Holy Communion.  During a colourful ceremony and power-point presentation candles were lit under the Pentecost Flame tree, the congregation wore Flame hats and waved fiery red Pentecost sticks to the sound effects of wind. The Lord’s Prayer was said in several different languages, the music of Thomas Tallis’s “If you love me; keep my commandments,” provided an introit and John Rutter “I will sing with the Spirit” the anthem.

White was the original colour of a Bank Holiday/ Whitsun weekend; often children in earlier days would wear white during their town’s Whit Walks - based on the practice at one time of newly baptised members being received into the church at Whitsun.  Today the colour has changed, Pentecost is now coloured red, red: red for fire, red for heat, red for the flames hanging over the apostles' heads that first Pentecost, red for the burning bush and pillar of flame, red for the fiery cloud at the giving of the law on the holy mountain and red  for passion and death.  

But there a gentler more cooler language to the Spirit too. St John speaks of the new birth in ‘water and spirit' and of how the Spirit is a spring of water that wells up to eternal life.  In John's account of how the Spirit is given to the disciples, it happens in the upper room where Jesus had washed their feet and taught them the meaning of love and service.  And that in turn recalls how the wind or spirit of God, ruah, hovered over the face of the deep at creation and gave it shape, order and consciousness.   This is the language perhaps of ‘blue' rather than red, Aquarian rather than Arian, watery rather than fiery.

Green too is a colour of Pentecost; 50 days after Passover it was a harvest festival.  In that harvest of the promised land, slaves, orphans, strangers and widows were expressly given a share. St Paul speaks about the fruit of the Spirit, growing in us the harvest of love, joy, peace, kindness, gentleness - the qualities that alone can change the world.  Pentecost is nothing unless it is about a world being renewed.  We proclaim and live out the word and works of God in all the rainbow's colours.

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

Transfiguration: A Tale of Two Stories

A sermon preached by Ray Angelsea at St Andrew's Dawson Street LEP, Crook - 10-Feb-2013

It's only fairly recently that the church has begun to commemorate the transfiguration of Jesus on the Sunday just before Lent. We usually associate it in the calendar with the festival in August. But here we are, before Easter, celebrating, commemorating this story in Luke’s gospel, in a way which, at first, seems rather puzzling. But if you think of it, the effect of hearing and seeing the story of Jesus' transfiguration this morning - just before Lent - has the effect of framing the whole of Lent between two parallel stories, like 2 bookends holding Lent together. The first story is a story of Jesus going into a lonely mountainous place to pray; Luke always adds more detail than Matthew and Mark. He is attended by his three closest friends: Peter; James; and John. It is a story in which Jesus, as he prays in solitude, enters into a mystery so great that His friends shrink from it and have no words for it. So at the beginning of Lent we have Luke’s story of the transfiguration. At the end of Lent there is a second, similar story of Jesus going to pray alone in the garden of Gethsemane. The same story? Yes, but how very different. In both Jesus prays alone; in both there is a revelation of the Father; in both those three friends shrink in terror.

To frame the season of Lent in that way is to tell us that our Christian life, our journey is always, so to speak, lived between those two stories, between those two bookends, those two moments of revelation and prayer. In the first story, on the mountain of transfiguration, as the Gospel tells us, Peter, James and John see the veil lifted. They see, as it were, that behind and within the human flesh and blood of Jesus there is an unbearable light and glory: a radiance better than any light on earth. They see that in His flesh and blood nothing less than Israel's God who had once disclosed himself in another transfiguration moment at a burning bush and spoke his sacred name; they see, that Jesus’ flesh and blood – is soaked through with a glory and brightness which is the work of God. They see that His human nature is shot through with God's own freedom.

And then at the other end of Lent the second story - they see again that radiance, that glory that brightness and liberty, but not on a Mount Tabor where the transfiguration is alleged to have taken place but on another mountain, Golgotha, where this glory and radiance is shot through and made real as Jesus accepts the pain of the cross for the love of humankind. They see that the blinding power of God is exercised not in crushing and controlling, regulating and policing, but in the sacrifice of love. Perhaps it begins to make sense that we live between those two visions, these two stories, between prayer and revelation; it’s popularly called the circle of life if you like, that song from the Lion King says it all – “and it moves us all through despair and hope, through faith and love” – come and listen to my choir sing it at our Sage Spring Concert March 17^th!

We can't understand and make sense of that first story – that glorious brightness of God unless we see that God's power and splendour is entirely focused on that sacrifice of love on the cross on that first Good Friday – a death which sets us free and gives us life. And we can't understand the darkness and the terror at the end of the second story, at the end of Lent, unless we see that in the depths of all that pain and suffering is the glory of God, made visible in the resurrection of our Lord. And that, of course, is why St John, in his Gospel, where there is no story of the transfiguration, refers to the crucifixion as Jesus’ final act of glory –  Jesus’ glory is made visible on the cross – O with what rapture do we gaze  on those glorious wounds, we sing in Charles Wesley’s great hymn.  And therefore these two stories, the dazzling freedom of God, the total weakness of God, are bound together, woven together, in one vision, in one person, in Jesus Christ.

Living between the tensions of these two stories told before and at the end of Lent might teach us something of the vision that we need to have as Christians. Things in our world are dark, Golgotha events threaten us, they are painful. Tsunamis hit Southeast Asia, earthquakes in New Zealand, fire and floods in Australia, war in Syria and North West Africa, economic uncertainty here in this country, famine and disease in the horn of Africa,. And perhaps at a more personal level, a sudden death, a terminal illness, a pointless tragedy. What do we do, like good Christian human beings in these dark and difficult times? We panic. Or when things are going well, things are successful; a lottery win, a new grandchild, foreign exotic holidays, a promotion - what do we do, like good Christian human beings? We gloat. But if our lives are lived indeed between those two stories, then both panic and gloating should be impossible for us. Things are dark and difficult. Yes. The world is a terrible place, full of the threats of violence. Yes. But somehow living between these two stories, the story of glory and sacrifice we begin to look into the depths and see how the freedom of God is there even in failure, even in crisis, to bring life and love, to overcome evil with good. David Attenborough illustrated it beautifully in his recent Africa series on television when he describes the Resurrection plant. Scorched to death, blown around the Sahara for decades, the plant still carries seeds whose green blade rises again when rain returns. There is hope and possibility. Out of something dormant, parched and withered new life emerges. And like the resurrection plant we start to look for the vision of glory and sacrifice in one another, the quiet transforming revolution that is at the heart of the gospel, of people overcoming despair and sacrifice with positive optimism and good wishes, bringing new sustainable hope and life.

And this freedom to bring life and love into our daily lives is the quiet revolution of God’s grace and forgiveness in action. In this quiet revolution, against all the odds, light begins to shine, glory is revealed. In 1955 Mrs Rosa Parks in Montgomery, Alabama decided she was tired of giving up her seat to a white person on a bus, but her small act of defiance became an important symbol of the civil rights movement. A few days later after her arrest a mostly unknown church minister, Dr Martin Luther King was elected president of the Montgomery Improvement Association and the rest is history. Desmond Tuto says that the biggest defining moment of his life came through an unbelievable simple act of courtesy he witnessed when he was a young boy of nine. “I saw this tall white priest in a black cassock doff his hat to my mother who was a domestic worker.” The priest of course was Trevor Huddleston, a dedicated anti apartheid activist. That pure act of kindness and respect help produce one of our world’s greatest Christian leaders.

More transforming light begins to shine. In May 2008 a sixteen year old school boy Jimmy Mitzen was murdered by another teenager in a bakery in South London. Speaking about the killer, his mother Margaret Mitzen refused to respond with hatred and anger. “I don’t feel anger because I know that it was anger that killed my Jimmy and I won’t let anger ruin my family.” Two years later the Mitzens in 2010 announced that they were buying the shop where his son died to open a Cafe of Good Hope. The cafe, “a community hub,” serves sandwiches and handmade chocolates made by Jimmy’s older brother, who is a trained patissier; two other brothers also run the cafe and the profits go towards charitable projects. In a similar vein, Susan Retik, who was expecting her third child when her husband David was killed in the 9/11 attacks, refused to be eaten up by grief and bitterness, and Susan with another 9/11 widow established a foundation dedicated to transforming the lives of thousands of Afghan widows who are some of the most poorest and destitute women in the world. “Beyond the 11^th” the two women say, is an initiative that transcends acts of hate with acts of humility, acts of despair with acts of ingenuity and acts of fear with acts of self-reliance

These are remarkable stories of love, peace, forgiveness. These stories tell us not only of how glory and sacrifice are blended together, woven together in Jesus. They tell us how to understand His church and His world, how in our discipleship we have to weave together the vision of glory and the call to sacrifice. Black armbands and champagne are equally only a part of the story. The full story is told in the mystery of Jesus Christ when that glory is fully opened up, its depths revealed and, in the very darkest moment of Jesus' self loss and self sacrifice, all of that infinite power which is God's is directed like a laser beam, to the welfare and the healing of you and me and the very weakest and most forgotten of God's children.

I love the specsavers television adverts, the Scottish farmer who shears his sheepdog instead of one of his sheep, the three astronauts who arrive at provincial airport to collect their luggage from the conveyor belt, the couple who arrive on the deck of an aircraft carrier looking for the duty free shop.  I think sometimes we Christians need spectacles to see the Christian life in new ways. And what we need to see, to observe however fleetingly is God's presence at the heart of all human life, enacted in and between these two stories. Christ playing in people like you and me, in ten thousand human faces, a world charged with the grandeur of God as the poet put it.

On Holy Island Lindisfarne which will be in the news later this year, they talk of ‘thin places' where the world is more transparent to the presence of God. This I think is how Luke wants us to read his transfiguration story: as inviting us to see creation as ‘thin', sacramental, alive with the divine, and in all circumstances a vision of beauty and grace open to us all. If you ask me what religion is, I say that it is a new way of seeing, a way of being aware that makes the ordinary extraordinary and the commonplace nothing less than a miracle. And as Luke points out, God knows and cares, because he has walked that way himself. And living between these two stories is a new way of seeing and interpreting suffering, entering into the world's pain as God himself does, entering that circle of life. To see and live and pray like this, that is transfiguration.

Amen