Holy Trinity Winchester Podcast
Jamie Franklin
Sermons and Messages from Holy Trinity Winchester holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
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Rejoice! How?
I would like to begin today by making some comments about that wonderful New Testament passage, Philippians chapter 4, in which the Apostle Paul says: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.”Rejoicing in a Hard WorldIt is interesting that Paul says this in that letter. All the way through the book of Philippians he is constantly speaking about rejoicing and telling the Christians he was writing to—and through them, us as well—to rejoice. At that point in his life he was languishing in a prison cell, facing possible death in the arena, being torn apart by wild beasts. So it is an interesting thing for him to say to the Philippian Christians: “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, Rejoice.”And of course it raises the question for us: How can we rejoice? How can we rejoice when the world is so filled with pain, with injustice, with anxiety, with difficulties, and of course with the inevitability of death? All of these things are a reality for us.We can ignore them, of course—or at least we can try to—but it is not particularly easy, and it is not really a long-term solution, because they will all catch up with us eventually, in one way or another. We can allow the problems, the difficulties, the pain of life to destroy us, to overcome us, and we can simply yield to them—but then, of course, we are destroyed; we are overcome.Personally, I am yet to come across a better answer to this question than the one the Apostle Paul provides in the book of Philippians—and what we might call, broadly speaking, the Christian answer. This is because I think that Christianity acknowledges the problems we face in this life. It does not try to minimise them, it does not try to say that they do not exist, and it does not give answers which are too easy. The Christian answer provides us with an ultimate hope in God—ultimately in Christ—and it gives us peace and joy in our relationship with God as we wait for that hope to be realised.Again, I would like to be emphatic: this answer acknowledges the fact that there are serious, painful, difficult problems that we face in life, as we suffer, as we die. Even if we have come here this morning and are feeling very happy in our lives at the moment—if we are in a good moment personally—there will still be anxieties and difficulties that surround us of which we are aware.As I have reflected upon this passage this week, I notice that I am anxious about different things now than I used to be. When I was younger, things which seemed incredibly significant to me—insurmountable, maybe—were anxieties about my personal future, about questions of identity, what I was to do, who I was to do it with, and so on. As I have grown up a bit (I hope, anyway—at least as I have got older), my anxieties are now more around fulfilling my personal responsibilities to other people, to people who are dependent upon me in one way or another, and also concern for those around me who are growing older, perhaps less well, and are drawing closer to their inevitable ends.Of course your anxieties will be different from mine, but you will all have them. This is the world that we live in. As I say, the Christian view does not deny any of it, but takes it seriously. These things are real, and they are significant. But the Christian view does not give suffering and death the last word. Rather, the Christian Scriptures and the Christian gospel hold out hope to us in Christ.The Kingdom as a Wedding FeastWe see something of this today in Christ’s description of the kingdom of heaven in that marvellous parable we have just heard. He says that the kingdom of heaven is like a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. The kingdom of heaven is like a king who gave a wedding feast for his son.That comparison between the kingdom of heaven on the one hand and a wedding feast on the other is repeated in various different places and in various different ways in the Scriptures. For example, in the book of Ephesians Paul says that the natural union of a husband and a wife is a mystery that refers to Christ and the Church—Christ as the groom, the Church as the bride. And we see the fulfilment, if you like, of this image in the book of Revelation, at the very end of Scripture, in which that relationship between Christ and the Church is once again compared to a groom and a bride in the context of a wedding feast.I would like us just to think about that for a moment. Consider what a wedding feast is like. I would say there is actually nothing more joyful than a very well-organised and happy wedding day. They are not all like that, but many of them are. And a joyful wedding followed by a feast—well, it is hard to imagine anything happier in this world.When that happy day arrives, the bride is never lovelier; the guests deck themselves in their finest clothes; and then the bride and groom are sacramentally united in the presence of God, and a great celebration with eating, with drinking, with talking and fellowship and dancing follows. And of course no expense is spared for that day, because it is the most special day. You would not spend that sort of money usually, but you do on your wedding, because it is so special. And as I say, there is nothing happier than a day like that.We recently went to a very good wedding, I would say. The food was lovely, there was wonderful dancing, and everybody was incredibly happy. I am sure we have all had experiences like that.Scripture compares this sort of thing to the kingdom of God. Scripture says that the new world that God is preparing for us is something like that. What we have to look forward to is filled with life and laughter and joy and happiness. The end is not destruction and death and inevitable nothingness, but the end is like a wedding feast, with Christ as the groom and the Church as the bride.Death Swallowed UpIn our reading from Isaiah chapter 25 we see this spelled out in another way. Isaiah sees this mystical vision of a mountain on which the Lord of hosts makes for all peoples a feast of rich food and of well-aged wine. And he even goes so far as to say that on this mountain he will swallow up the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. The Lord will swallow up death forever, and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces.So, friends, in that text we see another aspect of our ultimate hope: that life will reign eternally. And of course this side of the resurrection we know this is because of Christ and of what he has done for us.That is something about our ultimate hope in God. But again, that raises a question in itself, does it not? Because we have to live in the world now. We have to live in this world. We may have hope, but we also have a life, and we have to live it now. So what should we do? How should we live now?How Then Shall We Live?I would like here to turn back to the Apostle Paul in that chapter of Philippians, Philippians chapter 4. Again, remember the context: Paul in prison, facing death in the arena, with all the horror that that would entail—or may have entailed. It did not actually happen that way for him, but it could have done. And yet he says over and over again: Rejoice. Rejoice in the Lord always. So he thought it was a possibility.What does he say next? He says: “Let your reasonableness”—that word could also be translated as gentleness—“be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.”Notice here that the Apostle Paul does not simply say “Do not be anxious”—that would be a very, very difficult thing to hear. Rather, he says, in effect: turn those anxieties over to God in prayer. Do not be anxious, but turn those anxieties over to God in prayer. Pray; supplicate (which means ask for things); give thanks for the good things that God has given to you; and let your requests be made known to him.In everything—in all things—God has opened up for us a channel of communication whereby he offers to share our burdens with us. It is not to say that he will take all of our burdens away. But it is to say that he will be present in them and through them and with us, and we can share them with him. Do this in everything, the Apostle Paul says.So then the question for us today is: How are we going to do that? Do we do that? And could we take more advantage of the fact that this wonderful resource of prayer is open to us?The Peace That Surpasses UnderstandingAnd then there is this beautiful phrase, which is so famous: “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding.I remember my mother saying that phrase to me as a child, and it having an impression upon me. What does it mean? Well, surely it implies that there are some things that we will simply not understand in this life. Of course there are. There are many things that we will not understand: why we suffer as we do, in the way that we do; why there is so much pain and difficulty in our world. God does not promise to explain everything to us so that we can comprehensively grasp it, but he does promise us peace in and through it—a peace that surpasses understanding, a peace that will be present even when we do not understand.Whatever Is True, Whatever Is HonourableAnd finally: “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things… and the God of peace will be with you.”I think these words are in some ways more relevant—more challenging, let’s say—to modern people than perhaps even to those who lived in the first century. And I think this is because there are simply so many options for us in terms of what we turn our minds to. Those of u
The Stone the Builders Rejected
“The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.This was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes.”May I speak now in the name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.Amen.Friends, we have wonderful and interesting readings this morning. I am going to begin with Isaiah chapter 5.The Song of the Vineyard“Let me sing for my beloved my love song concerning his vineyard:My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill.He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines;he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it;and he looked for it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes.”This great passage from the book of Isaiah is speaking about the relationship between Yahweh, the God of Israel, and his people. You will know, of course, that Yahweh brought his people out of bondage in Egypt, that they wandered in the wilderness, and that they were brought into the promised land and given the land of Israel. God desired a covenant relationship with his people—pictured here as a love song. It was to be a relationship of covenant obedience and faithfulness. Yet his people time and time again broke that covenant with their God.This is, in many ways, the story of the Old Testament: God’s calling to his people to be faithful to him and to his covenant, and their decision time and time again to turn away from him, to sin against him, and to commit idolatry—unfaithfulness with other gods. That is what this parable is about. He looked for it to yield grapes—the grapes of faithfulness, of covenant faithfulness, of obedience—and yet it yielded wild grapes.“And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What more was there to do for my vineyard that I have not done in it? … And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down.”By this point in their history the nation was divided. There was the northern kingdom (somewhat confusingly called Israel) and the southern kingdom, Judah. The northern kingdom had already been invaded by the Assyrian empire, the superpower of the day. This was considered God’s judgement on the northern kingdom. Here in Isaiah 5 there is a warning to the southern kingdom that the same fate could befall them.A Different Kind of UnfaithfulnessWhat was the situation at the time of the Gospels? How does it differ from the situation implied in Isaiah?We do see a number of differences. Take the religious class, for example—the religious elite, the ruling class we encounter time and time again in the Gospels: the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the scribes, the elders, the lawyers. Their attitude is very different.In the Old Testament we see covenant unfaithfulness, sin, idolatry, and the breaking of the law again and again. The attitude here is quite different. The religious rulers had become fastidious about keeping the law. They had become so zealous that they invented many other laws to protect the law given by God. Why? Surely, in large part, because they had learned the lesson of the past. They did not want another judgement as there had been before. They wanted to keep their land. They did not want to incur the judgement of God or another national disaster. In a sense they were reformers; in a sense they were arch-conservatives looking to enact a kind of national repentance by returning to the law and being zealous for it. That is, of course, a good thing as far as it goes—to want to be faithful to the God of Israel.But it did not seem to be working in the way it should have been. That is what we see in the Gospels time and time again.The Parable of the TenantsSo when we read Matthew 21, Christ tells a parable that is, in many ways, very shocking, because it is a reiteration of the song of the vineyard from Isaiah 5.Christ says: “Hear another parable. There was a master of a house who planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a winepress in it and built a tower and leased it to tenants, and went into another country.” There is the introduction of the tenants. It is all the same, except now there are tenants in the story.“When the season for fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the tenants to get his fruit.” These are, of course, the prophets of the Old Testament, who came and prophesied in the name of God, calling the nation of Israel back to repentance. But the tenants took his servants and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. That is the story of the Old Testament: prophets sent by God to the people and to the religious rulers, calling them back to repentance, and time and time again that message being rejected.In many ways the audience Christ was speaking to would have accepted what was being said. They would have agreed: that was bad, and we should not have done that. But Christ continues.“Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and have his inheritance.’ And they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.”Christ asks them: “When therefore the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” They reply: “He will put those wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons.”Jumping to the end of the parable, we see that Christ is applying this, of course, to the people who are listening—to the Pharisees and the religious class of the time. He ends by saying: “I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits.”The Shocking IronyThe shocking irony for the original audience is that they would have considered themselves completely different from the audience of Isaiah 5. That passage was addressed to those who were breaking the covenant, committing idolatry, and breaking the law. As far as the Pharisees were concerned, they were not law-breakers. They were the ones who kept the law. They were the guardians of the law. And yet Christ is telling a parable taken from Isaiah 5 that applies directly to them and to their behaviour.On the one hand, in the Old Testament, you have people breaking the law. At this later time you have people who are fastidious for the law—and yet Christ is critiquing the latter alongside the former. What is going on here is somewhat paradoxical.I think we might put it this way: on the surface these attitudes and sensibilities look different, but when we look slightly deeper they are simply two ways of rejecting the purposes of God. Ultimately they are two manifestations of a certain type of self-reliance.Think back to the Old Testament. God essentially says to the people, “Do one thing,” and they do another. Why? Because they prefer their way to the way of God. Moses goes up the mountain, receives the Ten Commandments—one of which is “Do not make any graven images”—and comes down to find someone making a golden calf. It is fairly straightforward. The people prefer their way to the way of their God.In the New Testament, what is going on? It is not that people are flagrantly breaking the law. Rather, they have become obsessed with the letter of the law. They have become reliant on the law and on their religious status in regard to the law, and they have forgotten what the whole purpose of the law is: to maintain a covenant relationship with God. They have become proud, hard-hearted, and as a result condescending and critical of other people. Their religion had become something that took them away from God. In many ways they were in a worse spiritual condition than the tax collectors, the prostitutes, and the sinners. We see that dynamic time and time again in Scripture.The Same Dynamic in UsThis dynamic can, of course, be applied to our own lives. Often we sin; often we break the law; often we distance ourselves from God in ways that are very obvious. The answer is simple (it may not be easy, but it is simple): repentance—coming back to God.But there is a subtle, insidious pride that can creep in when we are making an effort to walk with the Lord and to be faithful: a religious pride, a hard-heartedness, something that can eventually end with us looking down on other people and considering ourselves superior to them.Something like this had happened to the Apostle Paul. We read about it in the great passage from Philippians today, where Paul goes through all the reasons he had for confidence in the flesh: “circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.”Of course, persecuting the church is not a good thing. But all those other things are, in many ways, good things. He was of the tribe of Benjamin, of the people of Israel, a Hebrew, a Pharisee as to the law (at the time a religious reform movement—a good thing). He was zealous; he was righteous under the law. But something was not right with Paul. Something was not right with his heart. He was self-sufficient; he was self-reliant. Ultimately his heart was closed to the purposes of God. That is why he rejected Christ and persecuted the church—until, of course, Christ appeared to him, and everything changed.But the sensibility is the same: self-reliance, hardness of heart, an unwillingness to open oneself to the purposes of God—specifically because of his religious inheritance, his status in the religious establishment of the time, his knowledge of the Scriptures, and the righteousness he perceived he had as a result of all these things.From Self-Reliance to Trust in ChristIn this passage Paul contrasts this self-sufficiency, this trusting in himself, with faith in Christ. Faith does, of course, mean belief—believing in Christ—but it also means trusting in Christ: findin
Who Is Like God?
Opening“You will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”Creation Is More Than What We Can SeeI would like to start this evening with a small bugbear about the modern Church of England. There is a lot of talk about creation in the modern Church of England. There is Creationtide, a season to do with creation. There is even a Festival of Creation now, which I think has already occurred this year. I must have missed it.The bugbear I have with these festivals and seasons is that a lot of the time, when the word “creation” is used in the modern Church, what is meant is only the natural and visible world: the world we perceive with our eyes, the world we interact with through our senses. That is actually quite a reductive way of thinking about creation.Of course, creation does consist of the natural world, the visible realm that we can see. But Scripture reveals to us also the invisible world of God and the angels—an awesome reality which, in many ways, is hardly imaginable for us. Even as Christians, particularly living in the modern secularised West, we can be unaware of this invisible world. We can be unmindful of this spiritual reality.Feast days like today—the Feast of St Michael and All Angels—exist to help us remember: to open our eyes to the reality that underlies the reality we see every day with our eyes and hear with our ears.“O Lord, Open His Eyes”I was reading this morning in my Book of Common Prayer lectionary a wonderful story from 2 Kings 6. Elisha and his servant are surrounded by the horses and armies of the king of Syria. Elisha’s servant is dismayed, lacking spiritual vision, and he says, “Alas, my master! What shall we do?” Elisha replies, “Do not be afraid, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them.” Then he prays, “O Lord, please open his eyes that he may see.” And his eyes were opened, and he saw: the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire.So, friends, as we gather together this evening, let us pray that God may open our spiritual eyes—that we would be like Jacob at the end of that reading from Genesis, and say: “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not.”Conflict in HeavenBut we also read in the Book of Revelation, our New Testament reading, not only about the invisible world, but about a disturbing element of that reality: there is conflict in the heavenly realm. There is conflict between angels who are loyal to the purposes of God and angels who are in rebellion against him.Those loyal angels are headed by the archangel Michael, whose feast we celebrate today. The name Michael is a beautiful name. It means “Who is like unto God?”—rhetorically meant: nobody is like God. That is the meaning of that great name.Against Michael we are told that the dragon—Satan, the devil, the accuser of the brethren, the deceiver of the whole world—and his angels fight, and are in rebellion against God.Scripture says various things about this being—Satan, the accuser, the devil—and we can piece a good deal of it together. But I think the heart of the issue is this: the great sin of this angel who rebelled against God was pride, and the desire to usurp the place of God.The great medieval theologian St Bonaventure said that the devil and his angels, being so great, so luminous, so lofty and exalted, became so dazzled by contemplation of their own perfections that they refused to worship God and worshipped themselves instead. They refused the purposes of God. They refused to be obedient, and so were puffed up with pride in themselves—Satan most of all.The Same Battle on EarthWhat that reading in Revelation reveals to us is that this cosmic battle between Satan and St Michael, which takes place in the heavenly realms, is also taking place in our world today. There is an interplay between the invisible world and the world we inhabit. And that great sin of Satan—the sin of pride, the desire to put ourselves in the place of God—is the same story we live with in our lives and in our world today.If you have ever wondered what the true essence of Satanism is, it is not very complicated. It is simply putting myself at the centre instead of God: my purposes, my way, my view of things, my self. Not God’s way, not obedience to him, not humility, but my way. This is the way of God’s enemy, and this is the way God’s enemy would have us live today.So one of the things we are called to do as followers of Christ—especially as we remember it on this feast day—is to fight on the side of St Michael and his angels.How do we do that? Mostly it is not flashy. It is everyday obedience to God; holiness; growing in the fruit of the Holy Spirit; humility before God and one another; and, of course, a growing desire to worship God, to give him our praise, to put him at the centre of reality—and not ourselves.We Have an EnemyThese readings also call us to recognise that we have an enemy: that the world we live in is not neutral, but that we are engaged in spiritual warfare. As the sixth chapter of Ephesians tells us: we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.Consider the names of the devil in Revelation 12: the deceiver of the whole world; the accuser of the brethren; full of wrath because he knows that his time is short. The Apostle Peter tells us: “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith.”Friends, we have an enemy. We have an enemy who wants to deceive us, to tell us lies and have us believe them. We have an enemy who wants to accuse us as Christians—that we are not worthy of coming to know God and of having communion with him. The devil will attack us in the places where we are most vulnerable.Let us ask ourselves this evening how the devil is seeking to wreak havoc in our own lives—and resist him. When I hear people’s confessions, I often say to them that in the same way God has a plan for your life, so the devil has a plan for your life. The devil has got plans for you—make no mistake. See to it that those plans do not come to fruition.So let us pray above all this evening for humility, for the grace of obedience, and for the ability to fight with St Michael against the devil.We Do Not Fight AloneBut we might ask ourselves: how do we do this? How do we engage in this cosmic battle?Here I say the most important thing I can say this evening: we do not do these things alone. We do not do them in our own strength. We do them with the help of our brethren. We do them with the assistance of the angels of heaven. But above all, we fight through and in and with Christ, and because of the gospel.This is what we are reminded of in John chapter 1 today. Jesus impresses Nathanael with a prophetic insight, and Nathanael is overwhelmed: “Rabbi, you are the King of Israel.” But Jesus, I think with a smirk, reminds him that this is the least of what is about to happen. He says to him: “You will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”This is, of course, a reference back to that reading from Genesis—to Jacob’s dream, when Jacob saw a ladder extending up to heaven and angels ascending and descending upon it. Jesus is saying, in effect, that he is the bridge between heaven and earth; that he is the gateway to heaven.Friends, Jesus Christ has rent the curtain of the temple in two and made a way for us to enter into the presence of God.By the Blood of the LambThe Book of Revelation tells us how this is the case: “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony.”You see, friends: Satan does accuse us. He accuses us of sin, and sometimes he may be correct in his accusations. But the thing we must remember is that we do not come into God’s presence through our own righteousness, pleading our innocence. We come through Christ and through his sacrifice, made on our behalf, so that we might enter into God’s presence forgiven and cleansed of all our sin.The power of Christ’s blood, the power of Christ’s broken body, is something we cannot possibly imagine. But we do know that it has power to overcome all the assaults of the enemy, all the power of the hosts of darkness, all the wickedness that besets us, all of Satan’s accusations, all of his lies. The power of Christ’s blood is greater. This is how we approach.And supremely, this is how we approach as we come to the Holy Eucharist. We approach through the grace of God, and we approach by the sacrifice of Christ. In the Book of Romans the Apostle Paul says that through Jesus we have obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.Jesus Christ is the bridge between heaven and earth. He is the ladder upon which angels ascend and descend. He is the gate of heaven. He is the one who has made a way for us. Friends, put your trust in him.So let us avail ourselves of the means of grace, supremely as we come in faith to the Holy Eucharist this evening. Let us take our stand in the ranks of the holy angels. Let us offer Christ our worship above all.In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
Practice What You Preach
Two Kinds of AuthorityToday I would like to talk about the Gospel reading we have just heard from Matthew, and also that great text from Philippians chapter 2. I will come to the latter in a little while. First, the Gospel.The chief priests and elders, as they often do, challenge Jesus. They ask him, “By what authority are you doing these things?” Where do you get the authority to carry out this ministry, these signs, these miracles, to say the things you have been saying?It becomes clear over the course of the narrative that the religious officials have a very different idea of authority from Christ. They believe authority comes from status, from title, from position. Of course, in our world there is a certain type of authority that comes from these things. But Jesus possessed a different kind of authority altogether—an authority that ultimately came from above, from God. That is where Christ’s influence lay.In that situation it did not really matter that the scribes, the elders, the chief priests and the Pharisees had a badge, as it were—a title, a position. The important thing was where true authority lay, and it lay in Christ, because it came from God. The problem, of course, was that they would not acknowledge this authority that Jesus possessed.The Parable of the Two SonsSo, in the course of this narrative, Jesus tells them a rather incendiary parable. A man has two sons. He says to the first, “Son, go and work in the vineyard today.” The son answers, “I will not.” But afterwards he changes his mind and goes. The second answers, “I go, sir.” He even says “sir”—sounding very pious and respectful—but he does not go. He says he will; he says all the right things; yet he does not go and work in his father’s vineyard.Jesus asks, “Which of the two did the will of the father?” They reply, of course, “The first.”The point Christ is making is that it is worse to say you will do something and then not do it, than to refuse at first and later obey. And of course he is applying this directly to the chief priests, the elders, and the religious officials: “You are like those who say, ‘Yes, yes, yes—look at me, I follow God, I have a position in the religious infrastructure of the time, I keep the law, I do all these things’—but then you do not actually live in line with your profession.” In the context, this is evident in their rejection of the authority of John the Baptist and of Christ himself.Meanwhile the sinners—the tax collectors and the prostitutes—the ones who at first said no, but then repented, changed their minds and went—it is they who will inherit the kingdom of heaven. Those who said no, but then went and did.The Real Problem: Pride and HypocrisyThe issue with the religious officials was not that they were making this profession and trying their best to live up to it and simply failing. That would be more forgivable; that would be far more understandable. It was rather—and we see this again and again throughout the Gospels—their arrogance, their high-handedness, and their constant criticism of other people. “Why do you eat with sinners and tax collectors?” In other words: “We are godly people; we keep to ourselves; we keep the law—unlike those people over there.” They were proud, they were hypocritical, and they looked down on others.This is given to us in the Gospels time and time again so that we might examine ourselves—so that we might recognise this sensibility, this temptation, as Christians, as followers of Christ, as those who come to church on a Sunday morning. It is a temptation to think ourselves respectable, to think ourselves good, to think ourselves holy, and then to become proud and critical of other people who we think do not match up to our standards.Work Out Your Own SalvationIn that beautiful reading from the New Testament, Philippians chapter 2, Paul says, “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” He does not say, “Work out somebody else’s salvation with fear and trembling.” This is repeated in various ways time and time again in the New Testament: look first at yourself and not at other people. Remove the log from your own eye before you look at the speck in your brother’s.Friends, it is not for us to go around speculating about who is a good Christian and who is not, who might be saved and who might not. The parable and others like it are given for us—so that we might examine our own profession of faith and whether we are living in line with it.This is also a warning for those who are in positions of religious authority—those who have been given positions of responsibility and power over other people. Unfortunately, the same question Christ was asking the religious leaders of his time still needs to be asked today by all who hold positions of responsibility in the Church. Across every denomination we see this pattern reoccur time and time again: people saying one thing and doing another; making a profession of faith; purporting to be persons of influence and importance in the Church—and then something comes out: some scandal, some hidden sin. The pattern is well established, and it happens again and again, unfortunately.So the point is that all Christians need to ask themselves whether this is true of them, but it is especially true of those who hold positions of responsibility in the Church.If I were to summarise the point, I think you could say: it is not just what we say; it is what we do. This is what Christ is getting at. What we say is actually less important than what we end up doing in our lives. We come here on a Sunday morning, we say certain things, we appear to be Christians—but do these things we say match our lives? Do they match the way we live during the week?Life and Liturgy as OneWe participate here in the liturgy of the Church. The liturgy is given to us—why? Not so that we might just say it on Sunday morning, but so that we might live it the rest of the time. This prevents the liturgy from being a dead work—something we just say that makes no difference. If we say the liturgy in a meaningful way, and if we intend to carry it out in our lives during the week, then the liturgy becomes more alive for us. It becomes more meaningful—not something fake, not something put on for Sunday, but something that permeates the rest of our lives and engages our wills.There is a beautiful line from a twentieth-century Anglican systematic theologian, a great man called E. L. Mascall. In one of his books he has this wonderful phrase: the ideal is that our life and our liturgy may be one—that our life and our liturgy may be one thing. We might broaden that out and say that our life and our speech become one thing: the way we act, what we do, what we say, and who we say we are—that these become the same thing, and that we are people of integrity.Avoiding Hypocrisy—and Going DeeperWe could look at this reading in at least a couple of ways. One of them I have already spoken about: avoiding the hypocrisy that Christ highlights in this parable. We do not want to go around boasting, talking about how great we are, preaching one thing and practising another.Again I repeat an important distinction. We are not talking here about those who are struggling with sin, struggling with difficulties in the Christian life, whilst honestly seeking to be faithful. That is a different thing, and it is a normal thing. That is a situation we are probably all in if we are seeking to live the Christian life in a serious way. That is very different from knowingly professing what we have no intention—or no real or serious intention—of living out. That was the problem with the religious officials of the day. We do not want to be like that. We want to avoid that.But there is also a more positive thing to say. The spiritual life, the Christian life, is not simply about not sinning. Of course, not sinning and not being hypocritical is a good start. We should aim for that as much as we can. But that is not all there is. Our lives in Christ are a journey into a deeper and deeper knowledge of God and communion with God. And of course God is eternal, so we can never come to an end in the depth of that relationship—knowing him, growing close to him, growing in holiness, and growing in communion with Christ.So the question is not just “How can I not sin? How can I not be a hypocrite?” but “How can I live in a way that is more and more congruent with my profession of faith?” And as we understand our profession of faith more fully, this calls us into an ever deeper commitment to Christ and relationship with him.The Mind of ChristHere I come to that great Christological hymn in Philippians chapter 2—surely one of the high points of all Scripture. The Apostle Paul, probably repeating a hymn that was sung in the early Church, says:Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant… And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.Christ, who was in the form of God, did not have to do this—yet he did. He divested himself of the glory of heaven; he gave up equality with God, we are told. Why? In order to save us, in order to serve us. He emptied himself and became obedient to the Father, even to the point of death.It is striking when you look at what Paul says immediately before that hymn. He says a number of things, and then: “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus.” In other words, Christ laid down a pattern for us to follow—and then there follows that great hymn. Christ became a servant; Christ emptied himself; Christ became obedient to God the Father—and that is the pattern you are to follow in your lives.Specifically here Paul is talking about relationships in the Church: be of one mind, agree with one another, humble yourselves before one another, seek to meet the needs of other people before you meet the needs of yo
A Denarius for Everyone
The Madman in the MarketplaceThe great nineteenth-century philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche told a story about a madman running into a crowded marketplace and anxiously announcing the death of God. Everyone in the marketplace was going about their normal business—buying and selling things—and they thought he was insane (hence the title “The Madman”). But the irony of the story is that the madman was really the only one who saw things clearly.What Nietzsche meant by this is that belief in the Christian God was dying out at the time, and therefore everything that people’s lives and their society had been built upon was about to change drastically in radically unforeseeable ways. One of the questions this story asks, then, is: What happens when the story that tells us who we are and why we live the way we live disappears? What do we found our lives on then?These themes are relevant to our Gospel reading this morning.The Master Who Keeps CallingChrist says the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house who went out into the marketplace to hire labourers. The master of the house several times calls these labourers throughout the course of the day to fruitful service in his vineyard. As we have just heard, some came right at the beginning of the day, some came part of the way through, and some came right at the end of the day.All of this represents, of course, the way that God calls us—calls men and women to himself. He calls us into the Church, and he calls us into a life of fruitful labour in his service. Some people respond at one time; some people respond at another.The Same Wage for AllIn the story, the master pays the workers a denarius for their service. This has often been taken to represent the reward that God offers to those who respond to his calling: everlasting life, eternity, the promise of an eternal life with God.I’m sure you all noticed the interesting twist in the parable: although people responded to the master’s calling at different times, and therefore did more or less work, at the end of the day he gave everyone the same amount. He gave everyone a denarius—even those who had laboured only for a few minutes.What can this mean? How are we to understand it?I think it must mean that the so-called “payment” we receive from God is not a payment in the normal sense. At the very least, it does not correspond to the number of hours worked, or to the moment at which we respond to God, or to the amount of things we do for him. We might go further and say that this is not really a payment at all, but a gift of God’s grace.Another way of thinking about it is to say that God gives us our lives, he gives us a calling, he gives us the ability to respond to that calling, he gives us the capacity to labour for him, and he gives us our reward. God gives us everything, and so we cannot put him in our debt. Everything is a gift from him—our lives, our very existence, everything.The Danger of Comparison and EnvyWhen we return to the parable and put it in this context, the response of those first workers becomes inappropriate. On receiving their denarius and seeing that others were paid the same, they grumbled at the master of the house and said, “We have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.” They were implying, of course, that they deserved more than those others.In a sense the master does not really enter into their quarrelling. He simply says: We agreed. I do as I choose with what is mine. Do not begrudge my generosity.Friends, I think here we are to see a warning against comparison with other people and what they receive—and particularly against the sin of envy, especially in the context of the Church. It is a very human thing to think—in many ways a very natural thing—that because I have been a Christian for a long time, because I have done so much for God or for the Church, I am actually a far more significant person in his kingdom, and therefore I deserve a lot more than these newcomers who have done so little and know so much less than I do. It is a very human way to respond.But this envy that we are sometimes tempted towards can take our joy and our happiness away from us. The workers who laboured longer still received a denarius; they still received payment. In spiritual terms we might say we still receive eternal life from God. But those workers took less pleasure from it than they might have done. They enjoyed it less because they were so focused on what other people were getting rather than on what they themselves possessed.Similarly, God gives us so much in our lives. He gives us so many gifts. He promises us eternal life in Christ. If we compare ourselves to other people, that takes away the enjoyment of God’s gifts and his goodness to us.So we are invited by this parable to consider the point that Christ is making: not to compare ourselves with other people and what they have; not to struggle with—or at least not to give in to—envy. Envying other people, and maybe even feeling bitter towards them and towards God because of what they have, robs us.Friends, let us ask ourselves whether we are perhaps preoccupied with the gifts, the position, the status, or the opportunities that somebody else has—perhaps in the Church, perhaps elsewhere. We have an opportunity as we gather together for Mass this morning to name that struggle before God, to ask him to give us grace to repent, and to cultivate gratitude in our hearts instead of envy. Gratitude is, in this sense, the antidote to envy: saying thanks to God rather than being bitter and angry that he has given gifts to others that we wish to possess.For Those Who Arrive LaterThere is, of course, another category that is relevant: the workers who come later on, or perhaps even at the last minute. We might take these to represent people who have spent much of their lives outside the Church. Perhaps they have responded to the calling of God later in their lives—perhaps in middle age, perhaps even later than that. Some of us here this morning may be in that category.With people in that kind of situation there may be a sense of wasted time, a sense of regret, a sense of unworthiness—and all of that, again, is very understandable.One of the things I would say about this is that it is for us who have been in the Church for many years to provide a place of welcome and help to those who are only just entering. And I must say I think this church is a very welcoming place. I would like to commend the congregation for that sense of welcome, and to encourage you in it.But there is also something valuable to say to those who are struggling with regret, or perhaps even shame, about wasted years, about lost time, about a refusal to respond to the voice of God. I put it like this:In a sense the earlier workers—the ones who worked all day long and are angry—are saying to God, “Look at everything I have done. Look at my works, look at my achievements, look at my sacrifice.” They are essentially saying, “You owe me more. You owe me more than them.”But those later workers, perhaps struggling with shame or regret—those who have been in the Church only a short time—might be saying something like this: “I have not done enough. I have wasted my life. I am not worthy. I don’t deserve as much—or perhaps I don’t deserve anything at all.”Notice, friends, that in both those responses everything is about me. It is all focused on me: what I deserve or what I don’t deserve. The position of envy says, “Look what I have done.” The position of shame says, “I have not done enough.” But God’s grace says to us: not “Look at what I have done or what I haven’t done,” but “Look at what God has done. Look at what God has done in Christ.” It is all his grace to us. Don’t look at yourself, don’t look at your achievements, don’t look at your lack of achievements—rather look to God and his grace in Christ for everything that he has done for you.Always CallingAnd so this is my encouragement to you this morning. Don’t look at your many works and be proud. Nor look at your wasted years and be ashamed. Look to God. Understand also that he has always been calling you. Do you notice that in the parable? The master is always calling. He comes several times. He has always been calling us, whether we have responded to it or not. Some heard earlier than others in the parable, but all of it ultimately came from him. His calling was constant.A significant person who responded to God’s call slightly later in his life was the great theologian Saint Augustine of Hippo. In his Confessions, his story of his life, Saint Augustine looked back and summed it up in a way that I think is quite perfect. He said in a prayer to God: “You were with me, and I was not with you.” You were with me, and I was not with you.That would be true for many of us here in this place today. In fact, it is true for me for many years of my life. You may have arrived later on in this place, but God has always been with you. He has always been calling you. It’s just that you’ve only just realised it—just recently, perhaps, or a short while ago.But in either case, it is all his grace, and we still have time to respond. We still have time to make the best of the time that is left available to us.The Eucharist: Thanksgiving, Not AchievementAnd so, friends, in a moment we come to the Mass, as we call it here—what is often called the Holy Eucharist. Some of us may know the origin of the word “Eucharist.” In Greek it is eucharistia, which means thanksgiving.In the Eucharist we do exactly what I have been suggesting we do in general: specifically in our liturgy we take our eyes away from ourselves and fix them on Christ, giving thanks for all that God has done for us in him. We do not present our works, our experience, or our track record in exchange for God’s reward or his favour. Rather, we come to receive. We come to receive Christ’s broken body and his shed blood, and we receive that as a gift that exceeds every debt we have incurred be
Seventy-Seven Times
Peter’s Question and Jesus’ Radical ReplyLast week we considered Christ’s teaching on what to do if a brother sins against you. “Go and tell him his fault,” Christ says, “and if he listens to you, you have gained your brother.”In our passage this morning, Peter— as he often does— has a question about this. As we might, because it rather implies that we accept our brother’s apology and therefore want to be reconciled with him. “Lord,” says Peter, “how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?”The biblical number seven implies wholeness, completion, fullness. So Peter believes he is saying something very great and magnanimous. Others may forgive once or twice, but I am going so far as to suggest that we may forgive up to seven times.Jesus’ response, though, is far more radical than he was anticipating: “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.”Lamech’s Vengeance and Christ’s AlternativeWe should be cautious about taking Jesus too literally here, because to Peter and the observant Jews who were present and listening, they would most probably have recognised the reference to the Book of Genesis— what we would call Genesis 4— and a particular character called Lamech, who comes after Cain in his line.Lamech is said to have taken two wives, and he boasted to them:“Ada and Zillah, hear my voice; you wives of Lamech, listen to what I say:I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for striking me.If Cain’s revenge is sevenfold, then Lamech’s is seventy-sevenfold.”In other words, if Cain wreaked a certain amount of destruction in killing Abel, Lamech says he will wreak far more. Notice also that Lamech’s violence is taken in vengeance for wrongs done to him. “If I am wounded, I will kill. If I am struck, I will destroy.”And that, of course, friends, is the normal way of humanity. It is the instinct that we all recognise, that we all to some extent possess: to hurt, to wound, even to kill, when somebody hurts us. This is vengeance.Many of you will have seen the film in the cinemas at the moment— Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of Homer’s Odyssey. Homer’s story, his epic poem, culminates in an act of brutal and pitiless vengeance, which is depicted as just and heroic. The evil and wicked suitors got what they deserved.However, it seems that Christ came to show us a different way, and that this is what those numbers— seven and seventy-seven— point to. Christ is comparing his way to the way of Lamech, and to a certain extent with the way of the rest of humanity. If Lamech is saying vengeance and destruction without limit, then Christ is saying forgiveness and reconciliation without limit. He is not saying “count to seventy-seven and then stop.” He is actually saying: stop counting. Don’t count. Don’t keep a record. Just forgive— and go on forgiving.The Parable of the Unforgiving ServantThen Jesus tells a story. He says there was a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. One servant owed a huge amount of money— a colossal, extraordinary amount. In our day we might say he owed billions of pounds. It was a debt he could not possibly pay.So he begs the king for mercy, knowing that he and his family are about to be sold into slavery. And amazingly— amazingly— the king has pity on him and forgives this enormous debt.Then that servant, forgiven so much and so lavishly, so easily, goes and finds a fellow servant. That second servant owes something a lot less— still significant, but a lot less: ten thousand or something like that. Still a lot of money, but nowhere near billions. The first servant starts choking him, will not listen to his pleas for mercy, and throws him into prison until he should pay every penny.Then comes the twist. Some other servants see all this happening. They are greatly distressed and go and tell the king. The king summons the first servant and says: “I forgave you all that debt, and yet you would not forgive your fellow servant something so much less than you owed me.” And he casts him into prison.Jesus concludes: “So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.”The Point of the StoryThe point of the story is of course that the king is like God, and that we all owe God an immeasurable debt which we cannot possibly pay. God has pity upon us and forgives us for all our sins against him. And yet when our fellow servants sin against us— even though they owe us much less— we do not offer forgiveness to them.The fellow servants in the story who see all this are greatly distressed, and rightly so. The reason is that the mercy shown to the first servant should have changed his heart, should have changed his perspective. For us also, the mercy that God has shown to us in Christ ought to change our hearts, our perspective, our attitudes.The great patristic father John Chrysostom said on this passage that even forgiving your brother continually is like a drop of water compared with the boundless sea of God’s mercy. The point is not even that God has forgiven us a certain amount; it is that God calls us to repentance and offers us forgiveness continually, constantly, regardless of how many times we have fallen in the past and without limits. He offers that to us all the time, and he calls us to have the same attitude towards others— to show the same mercy that we have been shown.The Seriousness of UnforgivenessNotice also the seriousness of what Christ says. If you do not forgive your brother from your heart— in other words, in a deep and serious way— then you will not be forgiven. After teaching the Lord’s Prayer in the Sermon on the Mount, he says the same: “If you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”I have to say, in my experience, this is a single piece of teaching that Christians find hardest to obey— and in many ways it is understandable. It is very hard to forgive somebody who has seriously wounded us. It is a process that most of the time takes time, and it is even harder to forgive somebody who continually hurts us and is going on hurting us.Feeling Hurt vs. Holding a GrudgeIt might be helpful here to introduce a distinction. On the one hand, we may feel hurt and anger, and we may need to wrestle with those feelings as we seek to forgive. Even if the hurt and the anger remain, we are still doing our best before God and by his grace to obey the teaching of Christ. It is not a sin to feel wounded and hurt.On the other hand, however, we may simply choose to hold on to those feelings, to hold a grudge, to justify it in all sorts of ways— and those ways can have a veneer of Christian spirituality. “He hasn’t been a very good Christian… He hasn’t fulfilled these duties and expectations… She’s been so callous, and her attitude is evil…” There are all sorts of things we can say to ourselves. But at the end of the day, if there is no effort to forgive, then we are being disobedient to the teaching of Christ, and we risk what Christ says here: if you do not forgive, you will not be forgiven.The simple lesson, then— simple but not easy— is this: regardless of how many times a person has wronged you, or how seriously, forgive and go on forgiving without limits. Stop counting how many times.Forgiveness and Reconciliation: An Important DistinctionIn all of this there is, however, a challenging question that has to be answered. What about when people do not ask for forgiveness? And what about when there is no possibility of reconciliation?If you were here last week, you will remember the previous passage. Christ speaks of a brother who will not repent and is put out of fellowship with the Church. So this must be a possibility. What about situations like that? There are many situations in life also in which a person has wronged us and not asked for forgiveness, or the person may have died, or may not be contactable. What are we to do?The answer, it seems to me, is that as Christ says here, we must forgive always— but we cannot always be reconciled. There is a very important difference, a distinction, between forgiveness and reconciliation. Forgiveness is commanded by Christ in all circumstances. Reconciliation, however, although it may be a good thing, is not always possible.There are plenty of times in the New Testament when we are told to forgive if somebody repents— the story we have heard today is like that. But there are other times when we are told to forgive without any mention of somebody repenting. Christ says in the Gospel of Mark, for example: “Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.” And we might also think of the example of Christ when he died upon the cross, praying for those who were crucifying him: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” In these instances there is not necessarily a mention of repentance or the possibility of reconciliation— just a straightforward command, and in the case of Christ’s death, an example to forgive.What then can this mean? It must mean that whether we are able to be reconciled or not, we let go of bitterness, of hatred, and of the desire for vengeance. We are to love even the one who has hurt us. And love, friends, is not some vague sense of emotional warmth, but— to use the words of the great Thomas Aquinas— that we will the good of the other person. That we want good for the other person, even if it is a desire that that person repents, turns from their evil, and is reconciled to Christ. So we pray for the person who has sinned against us, and we will the good of that person, even if that is only something we can do in our hearts personally.Again, we may be entirely right— a hundred per cent in the right— and the other person may be a hundred per cent in the wrong. Even so, we are commanded to let this go, to love, and to forgive.As John Chrysostom says: “Nothing makes
Where Two or Three Are Gathered
A sermon on Matthew 18:15–20Opening“For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I among them.”In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.Amen.The Church as the Place of Christ’s PresenceI think the reason I am where I am and do what I do is at least partly because I love the Church. What I am about to say may sound slightly extreme, but I do believe that the Church holds out the only real hope for this world. I do not believe this because of the greatness of the Church as we see it here on earth—far from it—but because of the presence of Christ in the Church.Christ seeks to bring healing, joy, reconciliation, and peace: between God and humanity, and between men and women and children. The Church is the principal place, the principal forum, in which Christ has promised to manifest his grace in this world.Of course we get it wrong so much of the time. Of course we do. Yet it remains the promise we have from Christ, as we heard in our reading today. The Apostle Paul says elsewhere in the New Testament: “We have this treasure in jars of clay.” It is a very powerful image—jars of clay. We are fragile, feeble, sinful, vulnerable, and easily broken. And yet, in a very real way, Christ entrusts the message to us; and in a very real way he also entrusts himself and his presence to us.Christ’s Teaching on ReconciliationOur Gospel reading begins with advice from Christ about reconciliation in the Church. How do we bring about reconciliation when relationships are broken? The point of the whole passage is that the unity we share together as a Church has heavenly significance. The unity of prayer and concord that we share is a manifestation of Christ in the world—and that is why it is so important. That is why Christ gives us this advice for trying to win back someone who has sinned.“Go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone,” says Christ—presumably because it is easier to persuade someone when it is just the two of you rather than when many people are present. If this does not work, Christ says, bring some others along and see if he listens then. If he still does not listen, tell it to the Church—the assembled congregation. That is a fearful proposition. And if he still does not listen, let him be to you as a tax collector and a Gentile—not meaning someone completely cut off (Christ himself spent time with tax collectors and Gentiles), but someone outside the fellowship of the Church and therefore in need of further calling to repentance.This is Christ’s teaching on bringing about restoration. It is worth pointing out that the explicit aim of what he says is to bring about healing in relationships and therefore unity in the Church. Even the treating of someone as a tax collector or Gentile is spoken of by Saint Augustine as a kind of medicine to cure the soul—to cure the one who will not listen to rebuke.Honesty, Humility, and Personal ResponsibilityThe teaching of Christ reveals that there is something healthy and right about being open and honest with other people, especially when they have hurt us or done something wrong to us. It is of course easier to internalise our anger; it is easier sometimes to speak behind people’s backs instead of confronting them honestly. We gossip and slander to others—perhaps simply to offload our grievances, or perhaps to get others on side in a kind of campaign against the person who has hurt us. This is the temptation when things go wrong. All of it is toxic: toxic in the Church, toxic in any organisation, toxic among any group of human beings.So Christ tells us: if someone has sinned against you, go to that person (if it is appropriate to do so) and speak honestly. If you need advice about how to do this, I was once told that the best approach is first to state the effect the other person’s behaviour has had upon you, rather than making a direct accusation about their personality or patterns of behaviour. “When you said or did that, I felt concerned… I felt upset… I felt anxious… I felt annoyed.” Something to that effect. It stops the conversation from becoming a personal insult.Equally, what do you do if someone comes to you with a legitimate grievance? The implication of the passage is clear: have humility, listen, and if the grievance is legitimate—as it may very well be—apologise. Why be defensive? We all feel like being defensive, but why? As Christians we believe that Christ died for our sins. Christ would not have had to do that if our sins were not serious. And if Christ had to go that far for us, why would we assume that we do not still make mistakes, get things wrong, and even do bad things?I would also point out the emphasis in this passage on personal responsibility, which is clearly implied in what Christ says. It is very easy to make excuses and to blame other people even for our own behaviour. We can blame the way we were raised, the disadvantages we have faced, or all sorts of other factors. There may sometimes be some truth in these things; there may be some degree of excuse. But we cannot blame other people and external factors all the time, and we cannot blame them for things we have actually chosen to do ourselves. Choices entail responsibility. All of us are under certain kinds of pressure. The measure of our virtue is the extent to which, by God’s grace, we are able to make godly decisions even given the pressures and difficulties we face in our lives and environments.If I may offer a further word: I think one of the difficulties we face a good deal of the time is a certain sense-of-humour failure. We ought to learn to laugh at ourselves a little more. We take ourselves too seriously and are unwilling to admit that a lot of the time we simply do stupid things, make mistakes, and need to say sorry for them. I remember my grandfather saying to me on a number of occasions that there are five magic words in a marriage: “I’m sorry, I was wrong.” I do not know why he said that to me so often, but it is a piece of advice I remember. We would do well to remember the words of Proverbs 30:2: “Surely I am too stupid to be a man.” It is a good thing to say to ourselves from time to time—or a woman, of course. When we do stupid things, we ought to admit them, and admit them without shame. Why would I expect to be perfect? Would I not expect to make mistakes from time to time? Friends, let us humble ourselves and say sorry when we have done what is wrong.The Authority of the Church and the Presence of ChristWhen Christ says, “Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven,” this must mean that when the Church is acting in line with the will and purposes of God, the judgement of the Church is ratified by the judgement of God. If the Church puts someone out of fellowship, this has implications for that person’s relationship with God. It is a very real authority which Christ has given to the Church.The significance of this is spelled out in what Christ says next: “If two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” This verse is often taken out of context. The point is that this is what is at stake in the Church. This is why the unity of Christians and of the Christian Church is so important: that unity of fellowship and of prayer calls down the blessing of God and is itself a manifestation of the presence of Christ. This is true even—and especially—in the difficult context of repentance, forgiveness, and reconciliation.What does it mean when Christ says that the Father in heaven will do anything we ask if we agree on it? Clearly this cannot mean that we can ask God for literally anything, regardless of what it is, and he will do it as long as we agree. How nice that would be! We have already noticed that the Father is said to respond when we ask in agreement with one another. But we must also heed the further words of Christ: “when two or three are gathered together in my name.” I think we must take this to mean something like “when we ask in accordance with the will of Christ.”The Church as It Is Called to BePutting all of this together, we gain a picture of the Church as we are called to be: together in unity and love, in mutual reconciliation and forgiveness, with all of us living in holiness and obedience to Christ. When the Church is like this, Christ is present in her midst. It is worth repeating: Christ is present when we live together in unity, in love, in mutual reconciliation and forgiveness; when we live together in holiness and obedience, Christ is present in the Church.That is why it is so important that we seek to bring about healing in our relationships when sin has brought brokenness and division—because it is the very presence of Christ in the Church that is at stake.A Practical CallThere is a practical outcome to this sermon. I encourage you to ask yourself whether there is something you need to say to someone: perhaps to tell a brother or sister his or her fault, so that you can bring about reconciliation and healing. Maybe that person simply does not know that he or she has done something to offend or hurt you. Or it may be that you need to say sorry for something you have said or done: “I’m sorry, I was wrong.”As the song says, “Sorry” always seems to be the hardest word—but “sorry” is also the word that can bring healing and life when it is spoken. It can bring about the restoration of relationships that have been broken for years or even decades. It is such a powerful word. So, friends, if you need to say this word to somebody, keep short accounts and say it quickly while you have the chance.Remember the words of the Apostle Paul in Romans 13, our New Testament reading today: “The one who loves another has fulfilled the law.” In other words, there is no point keeping all the commandments of God to the letter if we fail to love our neighbour—for this is the point of the law an
On This Rock: Christ, the Church, and Apostolic Ministry
The Revelation of ChristFriends, as we have just heard, we come today to what has at times been a controversial and contested passage in Scripture: Christ’s words, “Thou art Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.” These words are spoken by Jesus to Peter after Peter confesses that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.I will say more about Peter specifically in a moment, but the first thing I wish to observe is the importance of the revelation of Christ as the Messiah and of Peter’s proclamation of him as such.What is the Church?What does it exist to do and to be?On what is its authority founded?What is the purpose of the Scriptures?And what is the purpose of the sacraments?It can all feel confusing and overwhelming at times, yet it can be summed up quite simply: it is all about the revelation of God in Jesus Christ. It is the event of Christ—the Incarnation—God coming among us in the form of Jesus of Nazareth. In the words of the Apostle John in his Gospel: “No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.”It is all about Jesus Christ. In Christ we have the salvation of the world through his perfect life, his death given for the sins of the world, his resurrection for our justification, his ascension, and the hope of his coming again.There is much in the Christian faith to grasp, but if you ever find yourself confused, hold on to this: everything is meant to point to Jesus—his life, his death, his resurrection, and his coming again. This is the authority, the rock, upon which the Church stands, and it is the rock upon which we stand.The Purpose of the ChurchThe Church’s primary purpose is not to solve the world’s social and political problems. It may have something to say about those matters, but that is not its primary purpose. Its primary purpose is to proclaim Christ, to worship Christ, to witness to Christ, and to draw other people to Christ.Christ tells Peter: “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” In other words, at this moment Peter is given the authority to open the door of the kingdom of heaven because he has been entrusted with the revelation of God in Jesus Christ.In this context the phrase “binding and loosing” means simply forbidding or permitting. The authority Christ gives to the Apostle Peter concerns teaching, making judgements, and church discipline. All of this authority is given for the building up of Jesus Christ’s Church.Peter, the Apostles, and Shared AuthoritySpeaking of Peter specifically, it is important to note that in the Gospels and elsewhere Peter is given a certain primacy among the apostles. He is singled out by Christ. The early Church also understood Rome—where Peter eventually became bishop and where he was martyred—as holding a place of particular importance and authority in the Christian Church.Yet it is equally important to note that a similar authority is given to all of Christ’s twelve apostles elsewhere in the Gospels. Shortly after this passage, in Matthew 18, Christ says to all the twelve: “Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”In a related passage in the Gospel of John, chapter 20, after the resurrection, Christ appears to the eleven remaining apostles, breathes on them, and says: “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.”Consider those verses for a moment. Christ gives the apostles, including Peter, the Holy Spirit and tells them they have the authority to forgive or not to forgive sins—or, we might say, to pronounce forgiveness or to withhold it. This is clearly not an independent authority they possess apart from Christ. It is an authority given by Christ and exercised in his name. Nevertheless it is a real authority, and it should not simply be ignored or passed over because the texts are difficult to understand or because they make us feel uncomfortable.To summarise what has been said so far:* Peter is given the keys of the kingdom and the authority to bind and loose.* The other apostles are given a similar authority to bind and loose.* The apostles are given the Holy Spirit and the authority to forgive or not to forgive sins.Apostolic Ministry in the New TestamentWhat does all of this mean? After Christ’s ascension we have the Book of Acts and the many letters that make up the New Testament. Already in the New Testament we see an early form of what we would now call ordination. Those first apostles ordained or appointed elders to minister in the churches. We also find the language of overseers (in Greek, episkopoi—sometimes translated “bishop”) and deacons (in Greek, diakonos).A few examples:In Acts 14:23 Paul and Barnabas are said to have ordained or appointed elders in every church.When Paul writes to Titus he says he left him in Crete to ordain elders in every city.We also have examples of the laying on of hands in similar contexts—when ministerial authority is passed from one person who holds that authority to another—in the Book of Acts, twice in 1 Timothy, and in 2 Timothy.The point is that the New Testament already begins to paint a picture of a continuing apostolic ministry. It is not simply that individual groups of Christians form and that especially gifted teachers or pastors naturally rise up to become leaders. Rather, the apostles establish a continuing ministry in the churches by appointing elders and overseers (or bishops) and entrusting them with the apostolic message and with the authority they themselves received from Christ. This authority is passed on through this pattern.The doctrine we now call apostolic succession is the way the Church came to articulate this pattern. The name was given later, but the reality grows naturally out of the pages of the New Testament and the practice of the early Church. By the beginning of the second century we have strong evidence that the threefold order of bishops, priests, and deacons was firmly established as the basic ministerial structure of the Church.Anglican Inheritance and the Gift of OrderAs Anglicans we are the inheritors of the authority given to the apostles by Christ. We inherit that authority through the line of apostolic succession. Our bishops are those who have been ordained in that line and who therefore possess authority to exercise apostolic ministry in the Church.What are priests—people like me? Put very simply, we are the assistants or deputies of bishops. We are given something of the bishop’s delegated authority, exercised in the context of a local parish or a specific ministry.One of the points I am keen to stress is that this authority always comes from Christ. Christ intended, by his actions as we see them in Scripture, that his Church should be ordered in a certain way. The Church is not something we create or imagine for ourselves. It is something we inherit; it is therefore a gift. It is a historical reality. It is not merely an abstract idea, and we must wrestle with it as both a historical and a present-day reality.Yes, believe me, I know as well as anyone how frustrating and difficult dealing with the actual reality of the Church can be—it is my everyday reality. Yet it is a real entity, a real historical reality given to us by Christ, and therefore we must engage with it as it is. We cannot simply leave the Church and set up our own. From the Scriptures we can conclude that this is not the way Christ intended things to be.Ministry for the Whole People of GodThere are many other things that could be said, and if you have not heard these ideas laid out in this way before, you may have all sorts of questions. I hope the handout I have prepared will be helpful for further reflection.I want to end by saying two things.First: the apostolic ministry I have been speaking about is given to empower the people of God to participate in the mission of the Church. The ministry of bishops, priests, and deacons is given for all of us—for all of you—to empower you in your participation in the mission of the Church and in your growth in holiness.The mission of the Church is the proclamation of Christ, so that all people may come to worship him, be made obedient to him, and grow towards God and towards one another in holy love. Bishops and priests are here to teach and proclaim this message. We are here to celebrate the sacraments, which are given for the supernatural assistance of God’s people. We baptise people for the forgiveness of sins, and we celebrate the Holy Eucharist so that God’s people are fed with the heavenly flesh and blood of Christ and thereby sustained and nourished for their Christian lives.We are not clericalists. The ordained ministry is a gift to the Church—to all of you—to equip you for mission. Priests and bishops do not stand between you and Christ or between you and God; we are called to help you grow into deeper communion with Christ. And you also have a specific and unique role to play in the building up of the Church, as we heard earlier from the reading from the Letter to the Romans. You too are called to proclaim the message, to worship Christ, and to point people towards him.The Gates of Hell Shall Not PrevailFinally, the words of Christ: “I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.” Why is this? Why will the gates of hell not prevail against Christ’s Church? Because the Church is founded upon Christ and upon the revelation of Christ, which is given to the Church by the Holy Spirit. As Christ says to the Apostle Peter: “Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.”It is a simple reality that when we cease to proclaim Christ, the Church is critically weakened. If we continue to proclaim something other than Christ, our part of the Church may di
Mary’s Fiat: Saying "Yes" to God
The Reality of MotherhoodI know from observation—not experience—that motherhood is difficult. When a woman conceives a child, things change in almost every conceivable way. Her body changes. She may become sick. She will suffer physical aches and extreme fatigue. Psychologically, she suffers, perhaps because of the strange sense that a new life is growing within her. And at the end of this long nine-month period, there is of course birth, and after that, joy that a child is born.But of course, the mother then has these awesome new responsibilities to reckon with: care for a baby, for an infant, for a toddler, for a child, for an adolescent—and on and on it goes. This is a deeply sacrificial process. The mother sacrifices her own physical wellbeing; in a sense, she sacrifices her youth, she sacrifices her comfort, she sacrifices her time, her energy, her strength, her life, to take care of a child that can offer nothing to her except its complete dependence, and in time, its love.I mention all of this because I want, in some way, to help us imagine what real motherhood actually looks like, and to think about the Blessed Virgin Mary’s life in this context of reality. It is very easy to spiritualise Mary’s story and to skip over the very real sense of what happened to her. She was called by God, primarily and fundamentally, to become a mother. Yes, it was in extremely strange and indeed unique circumstances, and she would be the mother of the most important person who ever lived—but she was still a mother. And crucially, when she was called by God to be a mother, she said yes to Him.Mary’s Fiat: The First Great Human YesMary’s yes to God is the first great human yes of the New Testament. The angel Gabriel said to her, “You will conceive and you will bear a son, and you will call his name Jesus.” And of course, Mary asked the entirely reasonable question, “How can that be, since I am a virgin?” And the angel replied, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.” And after these words came the crucial response: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be according to thy word.”That phrase, “let it be,” is translated into the Latin in the ancient text with one word—Fiat—which means “let it be.” And friends, I ask you this morning to consider the greatness of this Fiat. Mary was told that she would remain a virgin and yet conceive. Not very much information was given apart from that. What would that have meant to her at the time for her relationship with Joseph, her betrothed? How would she live given the social stigma that would certainly attend such a bizarre occurrence? Who would this child really be? What would he do, and what would this entail? Again, not much of this was clear at the time. Mary didn’t have all the answers, but she said yes anyway—and she had to keep on saying yes throughout her life.Later on, when Jesus was presented at the temple, the old man Simeon blessed the holy family, but he prophesied that their child would be a sign that is opposed, and he told Mary specifically that a sword would pierce through her own soul also. And yet she continued to say yes. She continued to be a faithful mother and, in time, to be the disciple of her own son. And the sword did indeed pass through her soul when, at the end, she relinquished all to God as she watched Jesus—her own son—suffer and die upon the cross.Consider the greatness of Mary as she continued to say yes through all of this. Is there any greater suffering than that of parents for their children? Is there any greater grief than to watch one’s own child suffer and die? And yet this is what Mary did out of her obedience and love for God. Friends, consider her greatness, consider her Fiat, consider her yes to God.Mary as Prototype of Our DiscipleshipAnd yet the question we might ask is: What does that mean for me? How does it relate to me? I’m going to suggest two things, but these two things are really the same thing, which is that we seek communion with the Blessed Virgin Mary—with the Blessed Mother, the Mother of God.The first is that Mary was a human woman and, in a very real sense, the first disciple of Jesus. She is therefore a prototype of our discipleship. She goes first before us, and her perfect yes to God inspires us because it shows us that we too can say yes to Him even when He calls us to things that will entail great suffering and loss. Indeed, her yes shows us that there is nothing strange in suffering for God.It is crucial also to notice that Mary’s yes isn’t given out of sheer willpower alone. It is a response to God’s grace, and it is carried out in the power of God, as Mary sang in the Magnificat, which was our gospel reading today: “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour… He has shown strength with His arm.” Mary doesn’t celebrate herself; she doesn’t exult in her own strength, in her own spiritual accomplishments and achievements, but she exults in the power of God. And herein lies the secret of her greatness.When we say yes to God, we are participating in the yes that Mary spoke at the beginning of the story. Her yes meant that God would enter into the world in Christ through Mary’s body and with her free and willing cooperation with the grace of God. And when we say yes to God, we enable a similar thing to happen. We make ourselves available to the purposes of God in the world, and we respond like Mary to His grace. We are saying that we will cooperate with that grace in presenting Christ in our own way to the world.Living the YesFriends, in some ways it is not so hard to say yes once to God. Mary was young when she said it that first time. I’m sure it became much harder as she grew older and as she realised more and more of what it meant. The greatness isn’t so much in saying yes; the greatness is in, by God’s grace, living it.I remember a moment in my life some years ago now, when I was unsure what to do, had significant decisions to make, and I heard a sermon about Mary and about her response to God. I knew personally at that moment that I had to take a path that would eventually lead to me becoming ordained—although I didn’t know that specifically at the time. That was a moment when I was called to say yes in a particular way, and it is a yes that I have to keep on saying. There have been many wrong turns. There have been many times when I failed, when I’ve sinned, when I’ve needed to repent and come back and renew that sense of saying yes to God. But it is something that, by God’s grace, has brought me this far—and I’m sure many people here can relate to that.And so I ask you today: What is it that God is calling you to say yes to? That thing doesn’t have to be something public, like being ordained. It doesn’t have to be spectacular; it doesn’t even have to be impressive—but it does have to be faithful. And that faithfulness, at the end of the day, at the end of our lives, is what God calls us to: being faithful to what He asks us to do.It may be that you are simply called to bear the weight of suffering, of sickness, of old age, with holiness, with patience, with prayer. It may be that you are called to do your job with integrity whilst others around you aren’t. It may be that you are called to faithfully provide for your family. It may be that you, like Mary, are called to be a wife and a mother to your children. Whatever your yes might be, friends, say it to God with all your might and by the power of His grace, as Mary did: “Let it be according to thy word.”Seeking Communion with MaryThe other thing I’d like to mention is Mary’s presence in our lives as Christians now. The doctrine of the communion of the saints tells us that the saints in heaven are still in communion with us here on earth. They aren’t gone and separated from us completely; we still have communion or connection with them. As we might ask for the prayers of the living to assist us, so we ask for the prayers of the faithful departed who are in heaven with God.Because of her closeness with Jesus, we believe that Mary is in heaven with her Son. They are reunited in glory and love, because the strength of their love cannot be broken by death. Mary has gone before us. She has reached her destination. We, all of us, are still on the way there. We therefore ask Mary to pray for us because we believe that she is in the presence of her Son, and that He hears her requests on our behalf.In the book of James in the New Testament, it says, “The prayer of a righteous person has great power in its working.” If this is the case for a righteous person here on earth, then isn’t it also natural to seek the prayers of the very bearer of God herself—the Theotokos—who is in heaven, in the presence of Jesus?I’m aware that there are quite a lot of people here who perhaps have come from a different church background in which this sort of devotion might not have been practised, or who simply haven’t been introduced to these concepts yet. Many years ago, I would have shared a view that might be a bit sceptical about this sort of thing, and I would have had some questions about the kinds of things that I have just said in this sermon. But if you are unsure about Mary’s presence in our lives today as Christians, or if you simply haven’t come across these ideas before, I would issue a gentle challenge: try and ask Mary to pray for you. Ask her to pray for you.What I’m about to say is of course subjective, but it is also supported by the tradition and the experience of the Church. Personally, I find that when I ask for Mary’s prayers, I feel a deep sense of communion with her and a conviction that she hears me and that she is indeed in heaven praying for me. And as I say, I believe—and the Church has taught—that that is true for all Christians. That offer is there for all Christians to have communion with the Blessed Virgin Mary by asking her to pray for us. And so maybe that could be true of you also
When Jesus Chose Quiet: Learning to Pray Like Him
The Pattern in Christ’s LifeIt interests me that the devotional life of Christ is not described in much detail in the Gospels. What did He do when He was out praying? What was He doing in His devotions? Yet we can see a clear pattern in the Gospels, and I want to suggest that this pattern is an encouragement to us.After the Feeding of the Five ThousandIn Matthew chapter 14, the Gospel reading we have just heard, Jesus has performed a significant miracle: the feeding of the five thousand. Before that miracle, Jesus had been trying to get away for some peace, rest, and prayer, but the crowds followed him even into the desolate place—or the wilderness—that he sought.After the feeding of the five thousand, Jesus dismissed both his disciples and the crowds and went up on a mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone. It was in the fourth watch of the night—between three and six in the morning—that he came down from that mountain. Jesus was there on the mountaintop for a long time, alone, praying.Jesus as Our ExampleJesus was fully God, but he was also fully a man. Being a man, his life can be seen as a pattern laid down for us to follow in our own way and in our own time. It is right to say that Christ suffered and was worn out, just as we suffer and are sometimes worn out. By this point in Matthew 14, Jesus was extremely tired. Feeding five thousand people takes a great deal of energy, even when it is a miracle.This is the sort of tiredness we have all known: the kind that tells us we simply cannot go on until we have had rest. Jesus had given himself, body and soul, to the people who followed him and to his disciples, and he was spent. Yet observe what he does. He goes up on a mountainside by himself to pray. He sought the emptiness of a desolate place so that he could have quiet and dedicate himself to prayer.This is not an isolated incident. It happens time and again in the Gospels. We see the pattern: after a period of activity, solitude, silence, and prayer. He did this because it was through prayer that he renewed his communion with the Father, and in that quiet place he could hear the Father’s voice once again. We might even say that all of Christ’s actions in this world began and ended with prayer—often the prayer of solitude and silence.Different Gifts of PrayerWe do not know exactly what Christ was doing during those times—what prayers he was praying or what scriptures he was reading. God, in His wisdom, has made us all different; there is no single blueprint we are all to follow. If we knew precisely what Jesus was doing, we would probably all try to copy Him. We have different gifts of prayer, some still waiting to be discovered.What we do learn is the importance of withdrawing from the world of activity to pray, so that we might be strengthened to fulfil our callings before God and keep our focus on Him. Life has a habit of taking our focus off God. We lose sight of Him. He no longer seems as real, as near, or as relevant. Christ’s example challenges us to return often to Him in the silence of our hearts, in a quiet place, so that we might discover His presence once again.Pray Without CeasingWe might think of the well-known words of the apostle Paul in 1 Thessalonians 5:17: “Pray without ceasing.” This phrase has been interpreted in different ways. It can mean pray very frequently, at intervals, and make a habit of it. It can also mean pray constantly—pray all the time in whatever you are doing.The Eastern Orthodox, in particular, promote the Jesus Prayer for this reason: the repeated phrase, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy upon me, a sinner.” Used so often, it becomes the self-acting prayer of the heart, so that prayer is a constant companion even in the busyness of ordinary life.I offer this not to prescribe any particular method, but to invite you to consider what it would mean to imitate the example of Christ in your own life and how it might help you.Carrying Everything to God in PrayerI have been reminded this week of the well-known hymn:What a friend we have in Jesus,all our sins and griefs to bear.What a privilege to carryeverything to God in prayer.And especially this verse:Oh, what peace we often forfeit,oh, what needless pain we bear,all because we do not carryeverything to God in prayer.There is a great deal of truth in those words.As a priest, especially in this tradition, it is easy to think that prayer must be formal, liturgical, and carefully thought through—otherwise it might seem pedestrian and not worth doing. Nothing could be further from the truth. We ought always to pray, at all times, in all places, and in every way. Prayer can be formal and planned, and sometimes it should be. But that should never put us off sending our prayers and requests to God as they arise in the course of daily life, as troubles or anxieties arise in our hearts. We can use our own words and share our own thoughts with God. We ought also to remember the words of the apostle Peter, who tells us to cast all our anxieties upon God, because He cares for us.A Personal ChallengeI have asked myself: do I do these things? As a priest I am meant to pray Morning and Evening Prayer, and I try my best and manage it most of the time. But do I pray at all times and in all ways? Do I pray when I sit down to write a sermon, or when I feel overwhelmed by tiredness, or when I am troubled by the thought of a difficult conversation, or when I face an unwanted task? If the answer is no, then could I not try to do them a little more? Not because I am trying to earn God’s favour or because I feel guilty, but because I know I will find strength and restoration of soul if I do. I wonder how that might apply to you also.A Simple ExampleMany of you will know Father Christopher from the Cheriton benefice near here. He is a colleague of mine, and I occasionally have lunch with him. Sometimes it is a very full lunch, and by the end I am tired and ready for a nap—as many of you can identify. Yet Father Christopher always insists on going afterwards to one of his churches to say a prayer. Last time we did this at Hinton Ampner, a very fine church. There were many tourists and visitors in the building, but Father Christopher led us to the altar, turned on the lights, knelt, and we said a brief prayer together. I do not remember exactly what we said—probably thanks for the time together and for our lunch, and a prayer for the churches we serve. It took perhaps two minutes.Prayer can be just as simple as that: thanks to God for His blessings, whether recent, historic, or constant, and requests for blessing and help. If it can be that simple for two priests, it can be that simple for you also.Strength in the Midst of BusynessMy own life is sometimes quite busy. I feel as though I am rushing from one thing to another without time to respond adequately to the needs of the church or the people around me. Sometimes life feels as though there is no space to breathe. Yet I have realised something of a paradox: if I stop and pray, I find something there. It does not make everything easy or suddenly make everything all right. But it is a sense of having shared one’s burden with God and having invoked His power and help. It is the assurance that He will give enough to face whatever needs to be faced, and that one need not be filled with foreboding, dread, depression, or anxiety.How might these examples relate to you? Your struggles are different from mine. The pain and grief you bear are your own. But what we all have in common is the example of Christ: His withdrawal for silence, solitude, and prayer, and His desire to be strengthened in the power of God.I ask you to consider how your life might be different if you sought to put this example into practice in your own way, and how you might follow the example of Christ in this regard.Peter Walking on the WaterFinally, a word about Peter’s story. Peter saw Christ walking on the water and desired to walk towards Him. He got out of the boat and even walked on the water some way. Yet when he took his eyes from Christ, he began to sink.That is a powerful illustration of what I have been saying. When we look to Christ in prayer and with faith, we make progress towards God. It is not that the winds and the waves are not there—they are, and they always will be in this life. Crucially, our focus is on something else: on Christ. Although those things remain, they do not have the same power over us, because we have peace, consolation, and help in God.Even if we begin to sink, as Peter did, look at Christ’s saving compassion. Jesus immediately reached out His hand and took hold of him. Here we see the grace of God—how willing God is to help us, even when we take our focus away from Him, even when we neglect prayer or fail in some other way. He reaches out so that we might take hold of Him. Christ grasped the hand of Peter as he sank beneath the waves.Strengthened in the EucharistIn a similar way, in the Holy Eucharist, Christ offers Himself to us. He literally reaches out to us with His body, given that we might truly take hold of Him. In eating of His heavenly flesh we receive His very self into our bodies, and so we are strengthened and become one with Him.Friends, in faith, let us approach and be strengthened now through this holy sacrament, and let us always continue in prayer—at all times, in all places, and in every way.In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
The Light of Tabor and the Glory of Golgotha
The Transfiguration, 2026‘And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.’ 2 Corinthians 3:18In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.Why the Transfiguration?In his second epistle, the Apostle Peter wanted to convince his audience that what he was saying about Christ was not just another cleverly devised myth but that it was, in fact, the truth. He says that the Apostles ‘were eyewitnesses of his majesty’. That is, that they saw his majesty. But what he says after that is a little surprising. He does not mention Christ’s miracles – his feeding the five thousand, his healings and exorcisms, his raising people from the dead, or even his resurrection, as we might expect him to. But instead he mentions the Transfiguration.There was evidently something about the Transfiguration that struck Peter with an unforgettable force. Without overstating the case, we might even say that the Transfiguration revealed something about Christ which not even his miracles – not even his resurrection – did in quite the same way. The Transfiguration was, so Peter says, the moment when Christ ‘received honour and glory from God the Father’ – and this in a very particular way.And we see something of this particular and unique revelation if we look closely at the Scriptural account.The Light of the Vision of GodWe are told that the appearance of Christ’s face was altered and that his clothing became dazzling white. The great Eastern Orthodox father Gregory Palamas says here that this is the moment when the veil of the Incarnation was lifted and when Christ shone with the uncreated light and energy of God himself. Palamas wrote,“He was transfigured, not by assuming what He was not, nor by changing into what He was not, but by revealing to his disciples what He was, opening their eyes and giving sight to those who had been blind.”Palamas linked this with the disciples’ own participation in this vision, teaching that the uncreated light of God with which Christ shone will one day be the light in which all the saints of God share, saying,“The light of Tabor is the light of the Kingdom of God, in which the righteous shall shine forth like the sun.”This is particularly pertinent because only shortly before Peter’s reference to the Transfiguration in 2 Peter, the Apostle described the ultimate end of salvation, which is to become ‘partakers in the divine nature’.This is an often-underemphasised aspect of salvation in Western Theology, but the idea is that, through God’s grace and our participation in the vision of God, we too may be raised to the level of godhood in the Kingdom of Heaven. Our vision of God plays a crucial part in this process because it is by seeing God that we become transformed into his image. We become the vision of God, in this sense.This is very reminiscent of Psalm 36:9: ‘For with thee is the fountain of life; in thy light shall we see light.’And here we may also observe that it is through the light of the vision of God that we are returned to the world to see the world in a new way, with a new illumination. We no longer see with our earthly eyes, but we see with the eyes of God. This is what it is to be transformed by this vision.So, friends, as we come to Mass and as we enter into the Divine Liturgy together, let us open the eyes of our hearts, praying that we may have a vision of God in this place through Word and Sacrament. Let us cherish this vision and allow it to transform our vision, even as we make our way back down the mountain and enter once again into the everyday world.The Fulfilment of the ScripturesWe see also through the Transfiguration that Christ is the fulfilment of the Old Testament Scriptures. This is, of course, what Moses and Elijah represent, the Law and the Prophets. At the time, this was a shorthand way of referring to the whole of the Old Testament and it is literally depicted here in the appearance of Moses and Elijah.Moses and Elijah spoke with Christ and the subject matter is interesting: we are told that they spoke of his ‘departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem’.That word “departure” is an interesting choice because the literal Greek of the passage does not say “departure” but “exodus”. And the allusion to the Exodus of Israel from their bondage to slavery in Egypt is not accidental. The point is, of course, that Christ was about to accomplish the true exodus. What the Exodus from Egypt pointed forward to symbolically was the ultimate and final liberation of humanity from our bondage to slavery: that of slavery to the Devil, to sin and to death. Christ was about to accomplish this final and true exodus at Jerusalem through his death and resurrection. And it is only through Christ and these things that all of humanity can be truly liberated.The Voice of GodThe final point I would like to emphasise concerns what happened after Peter’s somewhat fumbling attempt to accommodate these important people who stood with him on this mountaintop. A cloud came and overshadowed them – this cloud, of course, reminds us of the presence of Yahweh that led Israel through the wilderness and the cloud of the Shekinah glory that signalled the presence of the Lord in the Temple. A voice spoke to them, “This is my Son, my Chosen One – listen to him!”And then…it was all over. Jesus was alone. The veil had, as it were, fallen once again and, to anybody who may have been passing by, everything might have seemed completely normal – just four men on a mountainside.“The Son of Man is about to be Delivered into the hands of men”Our reading this evening takes us only this far but, as soon as these things were over, Jesus said to his disciples, “Let these words sink into your ears: The Son of Man is about to be delivered into the hands of men.” In other words, Christ warned them, immediately after the Transfiguration, of the fact that he was about to be betrayed, arrested and put to death. The timing is no coincidence. Christ wanted to show something of his glory to his closest circle before he went to the cross. He wanted them to know something of who he truly was. He wanted them to see his glory before they saw his humiliation.And we can here draw out at least a couple of reasons as to why:Firstly, Christ perhaps wanted to encourage his disciples. They were about to suffer the loss of their Master and to see his abject humiliation, torture and death. He had shown them so much already and yet this was a final vision, with Moses and Elijah and the voice of God the Father himself bearing witness, to prepare them for the shocking rupture of the cross. It was not as though the Transfiguration would explain everything that would happen next but it could have reassured the disciples that, even though they did not understand, yet they trusted because they knew who Christ really was. And perhaps they may have gone further and recognised the Cross and the Tomb could not have been the final word. Notice also the words of the Father, “Listen to him.” The vision would pass quickly but Christ’s words would remain: “Let these words sink into your ears”. Store them up. Remember them. You are going to need them soon.This is a good word for us. We too have mountaintop experiences with God when we feel his presence especially closely in private prayer, in church, in the Holy Eucharist, in the confessional, or wherever it may be. But in the cut-and-thrust of everyday life, when God seems distant or perhaps even irrelevant, when we suffer our own crosses and feel that we cannot bear the pain, we too can remember the vision that we once had, the words we once heard, and know that this is no fable, no cleverly devised myth.And why does God leave us without this vision? It is surely so that we can grow strong in faith. It is surely so that we can choose to draw closer to God even when we do not have the vision to assist us. And, in this way, our faith is strengthened and our souls are enlarged.The final observation I’d like to share is this: that, in the Gospels there are really two great visions of Christ’s glory: there is the Transfiguration and there is the Cross. Now the Cross does not reveal the uncreated energy of God in the same way as the Transfiguration does but the Cross reveals the very nature of God himself: greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. In Christ, God laid down his life for us. He took a human life up, and he laid it down again.But notice how important the Transfiguration is in all of this: if we did not know who Christ was then the Cross would be of very little significance. A good man crucified perhaps. But, because we have seen his glory, glory as of the only begotten Son of the Father, we know that the one who ascended Golgotha was also the one who ascended the Mount of the Transfiguration and shone with the light of Tabor. We know that the one who was clothed with the uncreated energy of God was covered in the mock purple gown of a king and crowned with a wreath of thorns. We know that the one to whom Moses and Elijah paid tribute was the one who was mocked and spat upon by the Romans and the Jews. We know that the one of whom God the Father said, “This is my Son, my Chosen One,” was also the one about whom the crowds shouted, “Release Barabbas instead and crucify him!”Friends, let us remember this vision of the glory of God always, when we find ourselves on the Mount of Transfiguration and when we find ourselves on the hill of Golgotha. Until that day when we too shine with the uncreated energy and light of God.In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit
The Small and Joyful Things of God
“For while gentle silence enveloped all things, and night in its swift course was now half gone,your all-powerful word leaped from heaven, from the royal throne, into the midst of the land that was doomed.” Wisdom 18:14–15In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.The Mustard Seed and the LeavenOur Gospel reading today consists of four of Jesus’ parables that describe the Kingdom of Heaven. The first section is about a mustard seed that is the smallest of all seeds but which when it grows becomes the largest garden plant and then a tree with branches that prove themselves hospitable to the birds. The second is a woman who hid some leaven in three measures of dough until it was all leavened.What is Jesus’ meaning in these parables? Put simply, I think that here he is telling us that there is a smallness and a hiddenness to the things of God.Consider the mustard seed: small at first. But when it is cast into the ground and dies, it grows up again and becomes something of great significance.The leaven likewise is literally hidden in the flour, invisible to the eyes of the world, and yet it spreads through the flour until the flour is completely permeated with it.About this, the Patristic Father Peter Chrysologus says:“Christ is the kingdom of heaven. Sown like a mustard seed in the garden of the virgin’s womb, he grew up into the tree of the cross whose branches stretch across the world. Crushed in the mortar of the passion, its fruit has produced seasoning enough for the flavoring and preservation of every living creature with which it comes in contact.” Chrysologus, Sermon 98In our catechesis class, we have been reading the letters of St Ignatius of Antioch, a second century bishop who was transported across Asia Minor to Rome where he was eventually martyred. One of the themes that he returns to in these letters is the silence of God. By this he does not mean God’s absence, but that there is a certain way that God acts in the world.In Christ, God’s plan was hidden in the womb of the Virgin. His identity was concealed under the humble guise of a carpenter’s son. Even in his public ministry, when he was performing his miracles, he was careful not to make himself known too soon. Upon the cross, he died the seemingly ignominious death of a common criminal. But all of this was given so that the prince of this world, the Devil, might be thwarted in his schemes. For in Christ’s resurrection and ascension, his glory has finally been revealed. As Ignatius wrote to the church in Ephesus:“The age-old empire of evil was overthrown, for God was now appearing in human form to bring in a new order, even life without end. Now that which had been perfected in Divine counsels began its work; and all creation was thrown into a ferment over this plan for the utter destruction of death.” Ignatius, Epistle to the EphesiansAnd not only this. After his ascension, the Apostles and their companions were left alone, waiting for the promised gift of the Holy Spirit – not that they understood what this meant of course. A small band of seemingly inconsequential people, without power, without resources, fearful about what might happen to them. But then what came to pass? The gift of the Holy Spirit, the fire of Pentecost, the conversion and baptism of thousands and the birth of the Christian Church.Again, as Chrysologus says:“The man Christ received the mustard seed which represents the kingdom of God…He sowed it in his garden, that is in his bride the Church. The Church is a garden extending over the whole world, tilled by the plough of the gospel…fragrant and lovely with perennial flowers; virgins’ lilies, martyrs’ roses set amid the pleasant verdure of all who bear witness to Christ and the tender plants of all who have faith in him.” Chrysologus, Ibid.We might hear that and wonder why God chooses to act in this way. Why the small beginnings? Why the hidden action? It is surely that we might learn the lesson, which is that God delights to show his power by using the weak, the worthless, the small, the despised and the forgotten things of this world. He does not need our resources. He does not need our earthly wisdom. He does not need our strength but makes a strength out of our weakness.As the Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1: “God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God” (1 Cor. 1:27-29)And so here is a call to humility before God: do we desire to see the kingdom and to live it? In which case we must recognise that the kingdom is not found in the things that the world considers precious. The kingdom is not found in a new government. The kingdom was not found at the FIFA World Cup. The kingdom will never be found in the schemes of men (and, dare I say it, it is not found either in the bureaucracy of the institutional church). The kingdom is found through humility, repentance and acts of love in Christ.The kingdom is given in ways that appear to be small. When we come in the silence and privacy of the confessional and lay our sins in humility before God, asking that we might be changed and healed, the kingdom is present there. When we act with integrity and love in small actions that the world does not see, the kingdom is surely present there. When we take the time to pray, even in solitude when we have no one to pray with, the kingdom is also present there. When we visit the sick and the housebound, when we care for the orphan and the widow, when we shun the centre stage and instead choose to be in the background then the kingdom is present in and through us.Friends, let us pursue the kingdom together in this beautiful humility. And let us be confident also in God’s power. It is very easy to despair sometimes and to look at our seeming lack of resources and lack of power and to wonder how anything good can happen. Consider our parish church, for example. We do have wonderful resources but I have no stipend and therefore have less time than other clergy to carry out my duties. We worship in a style that is often considered old fashioned and unattractive to the younger generations. We are part of a national church that is in decline and we see that decline in the falling congregational numbers of the churches around us. And yet, even given these apparent disadvantages and this apparently difficult context, God is clearly at work in this place. Our congregation has grown modestly yet consistently, like a great mustard tree, year-on-year for at least five years now. And I believe that, by the grace of God and by his hidden power, we will continue to grow. And I believe this for the reason that God delights to show his power in our apparent weakness and obscurity if only we will entrust ourselves to him and keep acting in faithfulness. We are not building an empire like those that man builds. But by the grace of God we are participating in a movement of the Holy Spirit that is catching people’s hearts for Christ and for the Gospel. And God be praised for this!Joy and BaptismI have said almost everything. But I want to finish with this:“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy, he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it.”Today, we see the truth of Christ’s words enacted in the Sacramental ritual of baptism. When we turn to Christ, at any age, we do so because we realise that the things for which we were spending our time and labour cannot compare with the treasure that is offered to us in him. We realise that we have been looking for peace and contentment in all the wrong places. We realise that the schemes and philosophies of the world are meaningless without the One in whom all things are held together. In short, we realised that our true and lasting joy is found in him.And so we come to Christ, knowing that in him everything that we have been searching for is here. Like John Newton said, after he had spent his life engaged in the terrible business of slave trading, “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see.”Or again, as the great Charles Wesley wrote, “My chains fell off; my heart was free. I rose, went forth and followed thee”.Friends, for those of us here today who have come to Christ through the Sacrament of Baptism, we have truly been set free from the powers of sin and death. And, more than this, we have recognised the futility of a life without God. Today, we celebrate Daniel’s baptism and we pledge to pray for him and to support him in his new life in Christ. But we also repledge ourselves to God through these baptismal vows, remembering that we too have been brought from death to life, and once again renew our love and our commitment to obey his calling.Let us then live our baptisms and understand that in all of these things we have found the treasure hidden in the field and the pearl of great price and that there is nothing that is not worth selling that to obtain them.In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
How should we think about hell?
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Removing the Obstacles to Growth
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“Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves” - Citizens without Fear
Last week I was speaking about the proclamation given by Christ to his disciples, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand.” And I said that Christ did not come to start a religion called “Christianity” but that he came to found a new kingdom here upon earth: the Kingdom of God.I spoke a little about what it means to be part of that kingdom: namely, that it is to be formed into a people who have God for their king, who are obedient to God, and who call others to be gathered in to this kingdom.I’d like to continue with this theme of what it means to be citizens of the kingdom of heaven. Our gospel reading is simply a continuation of Christ’s charge to the twelve apostles.Persecution will comeSadly the lectionary misses out an important section with a memorable line. Christ warns his disciples, “Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves.” This changes the picture from labourers sent out into the harvest field. The world we are sent into is not passive or ambivalent about the message of the kingdom. It is often hostile to it, even intensely so. And this makes sense because the world outside of the kingdom has other loyalties, other standards, or, as St Augustine would put it, other loves.Notice the words of Christ, “A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master…If they have called the master of the household Beelzebub, how much more will they malign those of his household.”Translation: they called Jesus the Devil. He is the master and we are his servants. If they called him the devil (and, indeed, if they crucified him) what will they do to us?Again, Christ says, “Do not fear those who kill the body…” Meaning, of course, that they may kill the body. And the history of the Christian Church is soaked red with the blood of the martyrs. Christ spoke truly.Christ also says, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth.” Christ does not mean that he has not come to bring his followers peace. He has promised to us the peace of God, which is a peace that the world cannot give. This saying is given specifically in the context of hostile relationships: son against father, daughter against mother, daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.And the crisis point is Christ himself: “whoever loves father or mother or son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” He speaks here of ultimate loyalty: there must be nothing above loyalty to Christ, even the loyalty we owe to members of our own family.We must here confront an error that creeps into the public witness of the church from time to time. Some of you may have heard the following statement from a high-profile Christian figure: “Conflict is always a sign of failure.” Now, of course, there was a context to that remark, but it is an absolute statement. And, as an absolute statement, it cannot be reconciled with the words of Christ or with the witness of Christian history: “Do not think that I have come to bring peace on earth.” Again, Christ says elsewhere, “I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.”“So have no fear of them…”Persecution will come, but have no fear of them, says Christ. And why not? There are several reasons given by the Master:Firstly, there is coming a time when all the secrets of human history will be revealed. No injustice will remain hidden. No lie will not be exposed. The tyrants and persecutors of this age will face the judgement of God. “What I tell you in the dark, say in the light, and what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops.”I take this to mean that Christians, as citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven where nothing is covered or hidden, are to expose the darkness and wickedness of this age now through candid speech and righteous action. As the Apostle Paul says elsewhere, “Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.” (Eph. 5:11)Secondly, there is only so much that can be taken from us by persecution. Already quoted: “Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.” The most that our persecutors can take from us is our lives in this world.“Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both body and soul in hell.”And this is the key point: it is not that our lives in this world are nothing, but that there is something of far more value: our eternal soul.Man has the power to take away our earthly lives. God has the power to take them too, but he also has the power to destroy both soul and body in hell.And this is why Christ tells us to fear God. We might remember the famous Proverb: ‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom’.Fear in this context is about the recognition of God’s power. It is entirely rational and logical to fear God more than man – because God is infinitely more powerful than any human being.I mentioned last week, the martyrdom of Polycarp. Polycarp was a second century bishop of Smyrna who was martyred for the faith when he was an old man. In the account of his martyrdom, he is threatened by the secular power first that he might be torn apart by wild beasts and then, when that did not cause him to renounce loyalty to Christ, with being burned alive. To this, Polycarp answered,“The fire you threaten me with cannot go on burning for very long; after a while it goes out. But what you are unaware of are the flames of future judgement and everlasting torment which are in store for the ungodly.”And, in the prologue to this account, the writer makes this remark: speaking of the Christian martyrs of the second century, ‘So it was that, with all their thoughts absorbed in the grace of Christ, they made light of the cruelties of this world, and at the cost of a single hour purchased for themselves life everlasting.’“…even the hairs of your head are all numbered.”Again, Christ tells us not only that God is powerful but that he cares for us: “…even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore, you are of more value than many sparrows.” And “whoever finds his life with lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”The antidote to the fear of man is the fear and love of God. If, like Polycarp, we can set God before us, we will not fear what man may do.‘…he began to be sorrowful and troubled.’We might ask at this point if fear can be avoided entirely. Is it not a natural and human emotion? We read later on in this Gospel that Christ was sorrowful and troubled in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matt. 26:37).My answer to this question is that we must consider fear in different aspects: we cannot help but feel certain emotions sometimes, fear included. Christ faced the suffering of his passion. We face various fearful trials in this world. And sometimes we can no longer avoid them but we must look them square in the face with all of their terror. This cannot be helped.However, there is then a question of what we do with this fear. We can allow this fear to master us and cause us to change our course. In the early church of the first few centuries, intense pressure was put on Christians to commit an act of idolatry by burning a pinch of incense to Caesar. And many Christians gave in to their fear and did so.But the alternative is that we look to God and, through prayer and perseverance, face our fears in faith: that God will give us the strength and the grace to be faithful to him through whatever it is that faces us – even if that thing is torture, burning, and death. As the witness of Polycarp reminds us, it will only last so long. And that length of time is infinitely eclipsed by eternity.Citizens without FearFriends, this is how citizens of the Kingdom are in this world: we are not afraid because our King is infinitely more powerful than any of the rulers of this age. Their power is fading away – his will last forever. How could we abandon his eternal shelter for that temporary shade?Ask yourself, then: What are you afraid of? Perhaps it is a person or a situation that confronts you. Identify it honestly. As Christ did, commit it to God in prayer, and go on doing so, and act faithfully. And go on acting faithfully, each day of your time here on earth, even unto the death.In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
A New Kingdom
Fr Jamie Franklin says that Christ did not come to found a religion called “Christianity”. Instead, he founded a new and everlasting Kingdom upon earth: the Kingdom of God. And out of his compassion, he calls all of humanity to become its citizens. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
What is the nature of faith?
In this sermon from the First Sunday after Trinity, Fr Jamie Franklin speaks of faith as an inward conviction that is expressed in outward obedience. He exhorts the listener to draw near to God, confident that he will meet the needs of those who seek him. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
There Is No Ordinary Time
Isaiah 40:12-17, 27-end; 2 Corinthians 13:11-end; Matthew 28:16-end This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
Come, Holy Spirit!
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Praying and Waiting for the Holy Spirit
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Christ’s Proclamation to the Spirits in Prison
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Let not your hearts be troubled
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Good and Bad Shepherds
To understand the words of Jesus in John 10, we must observe that John 10 follows immediately after John 9, the story of the man born blind. In that story, Jesus healed a man born blind. And yet the Pharisees, a group of religious rulers, did everything in their power to debunk this miracle and therefore to reject Christ as one sent from God. The blind man was eventually cast out from the Synagogue for not going along with them. At the end of that story, there is an exchange between the blind man and Jesus, overheard by some of the Pharisees in which Jesus tells them two things about themselves: firstly, that they are in fact the ones who are blind, meaning that they have no spiritual insight or understanding. And, secondly, that, although they are blind, they nevertheless say that they see, and so their guilt remains.He follows this saying with what is said in John 10: “…he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber”. In this saying he identifies the Pharisees as those who do not enter the sheepfold by the right way. We might say that he means that they approach the task of shepherding the people inappropriately.What they ought to do is to enter by the door. For, as Christ says, “…he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep and leads them out”.The door, then, is Christ. He will say twice slightly later in verses 7 and 9, “I am the door”. The shepherd represents the good spiritual leader, who enters by Christ. And he enters the sheepfold, which is the Church. The sheep are God’s people. The doorkeeper, who opens the door is surely the Holy Spirit, the one whom Christ said would lead his people into all truth (John 16:13).Some of the Church Fathers believed that the door could represent both Christ and the Scriptures and this seems a good interpretation. John Chrysostom, for example, said, “The Scriptures He calls the door. They call us to the knowledge of God, they protect the sheep, they shut out the wolves, they bar the entrance to heretics. He that useth not the Scriptures but climbeth up some other way, i.e. some self-chosen, some unlawful way, is a thief…Some other way, may refer too to the commandments and traditions of men which the Scribes taught, to the neglect of the Law” (John Chrysostom, Homilies on John).That is a very insightful observation. In Jesus’ time, there were those who shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces by teaching commandments of men that were on the surface meant to help people to live by the Scriptures. But, in fact, they lead people away from the true meaning of the Scriptures, and so separated them from the God. The greatest extent of this, of course, was when they refused to acknowledge that the Scriptures were really all about Jesus, and that they pointed towards him.But the preaching of something else other than Christ and the Scriptures can take many forms. We must heed the message of John 10: there are wolves and they do seek the lead the sheep of God astray. This is part of the reason that we have John 10 in our Bibles: it is to exhort us to listen for the true voice of Christ in the Scriptures, as preached by faithful shepherds, and to listen for and to that voice, and not to follow the voice of another.It is one of the great tragedies of the modern Church that preaching the Scriptures appears to be some kind of novelty! Friends, there is no point in preaching if we do not preach the Scriptures and if we do not preach Christ. The Holy Spirit will not bless such preaching. The sheep will not listen to it. Their hearts will not be stirred to love for God and for Jesus. They will recognise it for the emptiness that it is and they will look elsewhere and go elsewhere to find true nourishment.A quotation from the English Puritan, Richard Baxter, comes to mind: “We speak as dying men to dying men. There is no time for embroidery.”I have no time to say anything else to you – anything that proceeds from my imagination or from my opinion or from my own blessed thoughts. You may be interested to hear about these things in other contexts. But here, as I stand before you, I have only one task, one duty, one burden, which is to deliver the message to you - the message that comes from God himself. Woe to me if I stand in the way! Woe to me if I let my ego or my insecurity eclipse the glory of Christ which is revealed in the Sacred Scriptures. Friends, do not listen to my voice, but listen for the voice of the true and Good Shepherd!Again, there is quite a lot of talk at the moment of revival and a renewal of interest in Christianity. No doubt there are various boardroom meetings in centralised locations, considering how this propitious cultural moment might be seized for the benefit of the Church. Good questions to ask perhaps. But the only answer is Christ and the Scriptures. We do not need think tanks and diocesan strategies and complex vision statements to understand this. Christ tells us plainly. Preach the Gospel! Preach the Scriptures! Christ says to his shepherds: You have orders. Obey them! To the sheep: listen for his voice and follow!The sheep will hear his voice and they will follow because they will know that they will find true spiritual nourishment. So cancel the diocesan think tanks! Cancel the boardroom meetings! Cancel the complex vision statements! Cancel the political virtue-signalling. And let one notion reign supreme and entire: the Gospel, the Scriptures, Christ above all!The Chief ShepherdAnd yet all of this is incomplete without one further recognition: and that is that the true Shepherd, the chief Shepherd of all, is Christ himself. Our reading this morning is curtailed before Christ reveals this to us: “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” And this is contrasted with the previous statement: “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.”God has given the gift of the pastoral ministry to the church: bishops, priests, teachers of the faith. These are essential ministries because the people need to hear the Word of God taught, explained, and proclaimed. And yet we all have to remember – people like me more than anybody else – who and what we are proclaiming. As the Apostle Paul said, ‘We preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord’ (2 Cor. 4:5). This is what it is all for: the Scriptures, the preaching, the Sacraments, the Church itself - it is all meant to point us to Jesus Christ.The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. Yes, the pastor of the people of God must sacrifice for them and for their good. He must protect them and lead them. But ultimately, we all must follow after the Chief Shepherd, who is Christ. And we all must remember that he laid down his life for us, that we might know forgiveness and everlasting life. And it is essential to recognise this about pastors and teachers, so that we avoid the error – prevalent in the first century church as much as it is today – of celebritising and venerating the shepherds of the Church in place of Christ himself. Ultimately, you do not follow me, or another priest or pastor, or a YouTube influencer. You follow Christ, as I do also.Today, we frequently encounter what could be called “The Cult of Leadership”. I do not believe that “leadership” is a biblical word. Use it if you like, but it speaks more of a secular, bureaucratic or even political approach than true pastoral ministry. The true shepherds of the Church do not sit on top of an organisational hierarchy, issuing commands and bossing people around as apparently omnicompetent CEOs. Rather, they preach the Scriptures, sacrifice for the flock, protect them from wolves, and they always remember that they are in fact part of the same flock, the same flock that follows the true Shepherd, Jesus Christ.Abundant Life“If anyone enters by (the door),” says Jesus, “he will be saved and will go in and out and find green pasture”.This is a beautiful image, which reminds us, of course, of Psalm 23:‘The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.’And Christ’s saying here can be interpreted in different ways, but the main point is quite clear: entering through Christ the door and the Scriptures, the sheep will be led out to pasture. They will find food and rest, and they will be lead to a place of peace and restoration.One of my favourite interpretations of this passage comes from St Augustine:‘Going in must refer to inward cogitation (that is meditation; considering the Scriptures, contemplative prayer and so on); going out to outward action’. And then he quotes from Psalm 104:23, ‘Man goes out to his work and to his labour until the evening’.In Augustine’s interpretation, going in represents the spiritual practices of encountering Christ in the preaching of the Church and in meditating upon Christ in prayer and contemplation. Going out represents our daily activities: our work, our labour, our interactions with the world and with other people. In both our meditation and in our action (in prayer and in work), Christ tells us that we will find green pasture in him, that is spiritual food, fruitfulness, and the restoration of our souls.He says this in another way in v.10 of John: “I came that they might have life and have it in abundance.”Again, this can be interpreted in different ways, but the basic point is clear: Christ came to give us something wonderful that is only available in Him. Regular attenders of this Church have probably heard me say before that there are two words for “life” in the Greek New Testament: one, bios, refers to biological life, which we share with the animals and the plants. The other, which is zoe, refers to spiritual life, the life of the heart that is made aliv
Did not our hearts burn within us?
The Hopelessness of our Earthly JourneyOn the Road to Emmaus, we meet two disciples. One of them was named Cleopas, the other not named. Ancient sources suggest that it was in fact Luke himself, but we simply do not know.The risen Christ drew near to them and yet they were kept from recognising him. We are told that they were downcast and looked sad. From their words, we understand that they had lost hope. And this was because Jesus of Nazareth, a man mighty in word and deed before God, had been delivered over and crucified. And so their hope was gone.In a sense these disciples stand for all of us insofar as we do not have a vision of Christ. Many people simply do not know Christ and have never known him. For those who follow Christ also, we frequently lose sight of him. In fact, might I be so bold as to say that to maintain a vision of Christ in the tumult and difficulties of everyday life in this world is so hard.We may say, of course, that we know Christ and we may call ourselves Christians. But to truly see him, to truly know him, to be aware of his presence and to acknowledge him in all things and in every place and at all times, this is the great challenge of the spiritual life. And we should not underestimate it. It seems that our natural state, even as followers of Christ, is to lose sight of him all the time – to have our attention taken away by a million other things.From about the fourth century of the Church onwards, the Roman Empire began to be Christianised. For many followers of Christ, this presented a challenge as the Christian faith took on a more worldly form. These radical followers of Christ decided that they had to leave the world in order to hold a vision of Christ before them and so they went out into the desert, far from civilisation, to devote themselves to a life of prayer and constant watchfulness.We can still read many of the stories and sayings of the so-called Desert Fathers today. For example, a saying of Abbot Antony:Just as fish die if they remain on dry land, so monks, remaining away from their cells (that is, their individual room in which they would pray and meditate), or dwelling with men of the world, lose their determination to persevere in solitary prayer, so we must return to our cells, lest remaining outside we forget to watch over ourselves interiorly.If we do not pray as Christians, and watch over ourselves, then we are like fish out of water, dying for what truly nourishes us.The Greatest Bible StudyJesus came to these disciples out of love. He sought to change their situation from one of hopelessness and sorrow to joy and love. And he does the same for us today! The risen Christ is alive – not just in our hearts – but in heaven. For he rose from the grave and he sends his Holy Spirit upon the Church and upon the believers within the Church.We see a marvellous illustration of this in our story this morning. In fact, we see in many ways the beginning of the Christian Church and an early version of our liturgy.How does Christ bring these hopeless disciples from sorrow to joy?To begin with, he opens the Scriptures, but in a very particular way. We read from the words of the two disciples that they had misunderstood what Jesus was there to do: they thought he was a political saviour, who would overthrow the Romans. But they had failed to see that God’s plan of redemption in Christ was so much greater than this. Their expectations had to be challenged, shattered even, so that the glory of our redemption could be seen more clearly.Christ said to them: “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?”What followed was the greatest Bible study in history: ‘And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself’.So it was not just that they read the Scriptures (what we call the Old Testament) but that Christ showed them that he truly is the key to understanding what they mean.There is a famous quotation from St Augustine: ‘The New is in the Old concealed; the Old is in the New revealed’. What this means is that, in the Old Testament, Jesus was always truly present but yet unseen. The New Testament and the Gospels show us what the Old Testament was really about: Jesus Christ. And when we look at Jesus, we can understand more about him – who he truly was, what his mission was all about – if we read the Old Testament in light of his life and deeds.Now it seems that these two disciples knew about the Messiah’s glory but not his suffering. They did not understand that the cross had to come first before the resurrection, the humiliation and passion of the Christ before his exaltation and vindication.Perhaps Jesus read to them from the prophet Isaiah, chapter fifty-three, a text we considered on Good Friday: ‘…he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed’.“That was about the Christ,” he may have said. “For our sins, he was punished and wounded. And through his woundedness, we have been healed. This is what the cross was all about. Can you see it now?”Let me jump ahead in this story. Later on, once Christ had vanished from them (more on that in a moment), the disciples said to one another, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?”Friends, do we not yearn to be set on fire with love for Jesus Christ? Here, then, is one of the keys: the Scriptures, but the recognition that, within them, Jesus is truly revealed to us. Christ “opened” the Scriptures to these two disciples. The Scriptures were unlocked by the key that is Christ. He healed their vision. And they saw him. And what was the result? Their hearts burned within them.We may think again here of the great Patristic Father, St Augustine, who frequently spoke of the heart that burns with longing and love for God:‘You called and cried out loud and shattered my deafness. You were radiant and resplendent, you put to flight my blindness. You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after you. I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you. You have touched me, and now my hurt burns for your peace.’St Augustine, Confessions, Book XFriends, let us be satisfied with nothing less than hearts set on fire with love for God. All other loves, all other burning, pales in comparison to this.As the great Patristic Father, Origen, says to us: ‘We must not only employ the sacred literature but also pray to the Lord that (Christ), himself taking “the sealed book,” may deign to open it. For it is he who “opening the Scriptures” kindles the hearts of the disciples so that they say, “Did not our hearts burn within us whilst he opened to us the Scriptures?” (Origen, Homilies on Exodus).The Breaking of the BreadAnd there is one more main part of this story: Christ took bread, blessed it, broke it and gave it to them. And then they saw who he truly was, and he vanished from their sight.Why did he vanish? Because he was establishing the pattern that all his faithful people would follow in the age of the Church: that is, he would be bodily in Heaven but he would be present on earth every time the Eucharist is celebrated. From then on, he would be made known to the disciples in the breaking of bread. This is how he is made known to us still today.But do not buy in to the false choice between Scripture or the Eucharist – Evangelical or Catholic. A true Christianity is both. And we see this illustrated for us in this story.Remember that Christ showed through the Scriptures that the Christ should suffer and afterwards enter into glory. What then is the Holy Eucharist? It is surely the bringing into the present of all of these realities at once: the story of the Messiah written in Bread and Wine, Body and Blood. Remember the words of the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 11, ‘For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes’.In other words, we remember his passion, his death upon the cross, but we also proclaim in the Holy Eucharist that he rose again and that He will come again in glory. The Scriptures open this mystery to us, and without them, we would not understand the deep meaning of the Eucharist. Similarly, the Eucharist brings into the present the story that the Scriptures tell us. They make Christ tangibly present to us and with us in the Incarnation, in his Death, in his Resurrection.The Liturgy of the ChurchAnd to say a final word, this is why the liturgy of the Church is as it is. Christ is not made known to us in a single moment of magical consecration. Nor is he made known simply in the preaching of Scripture. He is made known to us in the entire liturgy of the Mass that we observe on days like today. Our service is in two main sections: the Liturgy of the Word, and the Liturgy of the Eucharist. We are following the pattern of the disciples on the Emmaus Road.If the preaching is any good, it will reveal Christ to the faithful and cause their hearts to burn with passion. And as the Holy Eucharist is celebrated, we take our newly-enlightened understanding with us to that holy table, that holy altar, upon which Christ is made tangibly present to us once again in the forms of bread and wine. We receive Christ through our ears as we listen to the Scriptures proclaimed; we receive Him into our very selves as we feed upon His body and drink His blood in the Sacrament of the Eucharist. This is how we recognise Him. This is how we are built up in our faith.And, from there, from here, we are sent into the world, having encountered the risen Christ. Like those two disciples on the Road to Emmaus, our vision is healed, Christ is revealed, and we make known to the world what has happened to us: we have seen the Lord. And he is rise
The Strangeness of the Resurrection
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A New Dimension
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Making Sense of the Cross
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The Upper Room
A sermon given by Fr Jamie Franklin on Maundy Thursday, 2026. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
The Week of Weeks and the Transformation of Time
The Transformation of TimeThe week of weeks begins today. But what exactly does it mean to be a Catholic Christian who observes the liturgical calendar? And what is the significance of Palm Sunday and Holy Week?To begin with, we must recognise that we have been inculcated into a certain view of time: the time of the secular. Secular time implies that all time is the same and that one event simply follows other. We are cut off from the seasons and their festive observances because of technology and advanced infrastructure and thus we experience our lives as a succession of moments that tragically lead to annihilation and death. We can fill time with pleasure or kill it with distraction, but it can hold no more meaning for us than this.But t’was not always so. The pagan world, into which Christianity was born, knew its own pattern of feasts and festivals as of course did the Jewish religion. This pattern was taken up by the Christian Church and transfigured in the light of the Gospel. We are its heirs. And we can keep the flame alive, even in the darkness of the surrounding culture.But we must recognise that there is no neutral view of time. Nor is there a neutral way to inhabit time. We are faced with a choice: secular time or Christian time.Christian time does not see things as one moment after other with the present slipping into the past and the future leading nowhere. It sees time as transfigured in the light of eternity. This is most obvious when we consider the story of the Incarnation, and of Christ’s death and resurrection. For, in these events, we see the eternal breaking into the midst of ordinary life and giving it an eternal meaning. Our everyday reality is transfigured. Nothing can be the same. Life is not just one thing after other. Rather, it is a journey with Christ through this world and, from this world, into eternity.Palm Sunday and Holy WeekPerhaps that sounds somewhat vague. So let’s consider Palm Sunday and Holy Week. The liturgy that we have already enacted together has taken us from Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem to his trial, condemnation and crucifixion. We have been part of two crowds: one shouting “Hosannah to the Son of David!” and the other demanding that a murderer be set free instead of Christ and crying out, “Let him be crucified! Let him be crucified!”This is a powerful illustration of what I’m talking about. Through the liturgy, we are inhabiting the lives and actions of these characters. We welcome Christ and we praise him. We give him thanks for his goodness to us. But, through our sin and our desire to be free from a life with God, we crucify the Son of God afresh. We would prefer Barabbas to be free than Christ. So, we cry out, “Let him be crucified instead!”As we recognise the fickleness of hearts and how our loves go astray, we are broken inside. We become like Peter who betrayed Christ and denounced him. And we are brought to deep contrition and sorrow for our sin. Our love has faded like the morning mist. How has it come to this? How could we have wandered away from Jesus in this way?Again, we do not just remember these things. We participate in them. They become a reality to us, here and now. And this is supremely true during this week of weeks. Through the liturgy of Holy Week, we stand in the places that Christ and his disciples stood. We are in the Upper Room as he washes his disciples’ feet, and our hearts are moved by his great humility. We are thrilled and perplexed at the institution of the Holy Eucharist. We are cut to the heart as we stand in the shadow of the cross. We kneel before it in sorrow and profound contrition. Our hopes are drowned in agony as Christ is buried in the tomb with death and evil appearing to have the final word.And we stand with Mary Magdalen outside the tomb, perhaps not even sure why we are there. And then we hear the resplendent and happy news (which I will not even utter at this moment). But, suffice to say, that we are made one with this joy. Our hearts are lifted and we are changed.We are changed. Time is changed. The world is changed. And, from this place of transformation, we enter back into the world with a message of a different kind, a different story, a different and better hope. This is the purpose of the liturgy.Have this mind among yourselves…I have probably said enough. I hope you will continue with us on this magnificent journey. Indeed, it is the greatest journey every taken, the greatest story ever told.Above all, let us identify with Christ, if we may be so bold. Let us seek to walk the way of the Incarnation and of the Cross. I close with a brief meditation on the words of the Apostle Paul in Philippians 2:5-11.Whilst they are in the midst of their everyday squabbles, Paul reminds the Philippians of Jesus. “Have this mind among yourselves…” he says. In other words: identify with Jesus. Not only, “Be as Jesus was”, but allow his Spirit to live in your hearts and embody that Spirit in your lives now. Be a living embodiment of Jesus Christ.And what does he remind them of specifically? That Jesus was in the form of God, but that he did not count this equality with God something to be held onto. That he emptied himself by becoming a servant to us and by becoming one of us. This “emptying” of Jesus has been the subject of much speculation. But, suffice to say here, that it does not mean that Jesus ceased to be God. Rather, he retained his Godhood and was still God when he became a man. He emptied himself by taking up a human life and suffering as we do. This suffering he did not know in Heaven, but he accepted it out of love for us.Again, we see this supremely this week, as we remember the rejection of the crowds, the mocking of the soldiers, the agonising pain of the cross, the cry of desolation, the yielding up of his spirit, the tomb. This was the fullest extent of Christ’s self-emptying. It could not have been complete than this.Additionally, this demonstrates Christ’s humility, which he displayed by becoming obedient to the will of the Father, and that to the point of death, even death on a cross.And, due to this, God has exalted him and given him the name that is above every name, that, at his name, all creatures will bow and take his name upon their lips.May you, then, be like this, says the Apostle Paul. May you be united to Christ in his humility, in his obedience, in his love, and, because of all of this, in his exaltation. For, he who humbles himself will be exalted.Friends, let us have all of this in mind, as we journey together through this Holy Week to the Upper Room, to the cross, to the tomb, and to the glory of the resurrection.In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. 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I am the resurrection and the life
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Spiritual Illumination
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Living Water
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Living Faith
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The Temptation of Adam and Eve
Genesis 2: 15-17; 3:1-7 ; Romans 5:12-19 ; Matthew 4:1-11The Temptation of Adam and EveAs is usually the case on the first Sunday of Lent, we are given the story of Christ’s temptation in the wilderness for our Gospel. But, in order to understand the symbolic significance of this story, we must go back to the book of Genesis and to the temptation of Adam and Eve.As the story of Genesis tells us, God created a good and glorious world and, within it, he placed a garden paradise. In that garden, he put a man and a woman, Adam and Eve. The first two people, made in his image and given dominion over all the creatures of the earth, given the commandment to be fruitful and to multiply.At the beginning of our reading, we are told that the Lord God put the man in the Garden of Eden, to work it and to tend it. God gave the man every tree of the garden, except for one, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God said to the man, “Do not eat of this tree, because, in the day that you do so, you shall surely die” (Gen. 2:15-17).We may wonder why the Lord God set up Adam and later Eve in this way: was it a trick or some cruel test of submissiveness? We speak here, of course, of deep mysteries, but it seems reasonable to say that God was seeking a response of obedience from Adam. In other words, he was looking for Adam to exercise his freedom to obey God and therefore to draw closer to him.This is an important observation because it relates to all human experience: God has given us freedom to choose. We can choose how we live. We can live righteous or unrighteous lives. We can be good or evil. Most fundamentally, we can offer our lives to God in faith and obedience or we can ignore God and live as though he were not there and as though he does not demand anything of us.Consider how profound this work of God is: our will – what we decide to do – is most truly the thing that is ours. God has truly given this into our hands. Everything else belongs to him except this. All we can say to God is that we offer ourselves to him. We have nothing else to give.…Or indeed, to withhold. And this is precisely how the story unfolds. The tree is given so that Adam and Eve might obey God. And yet, slightly further on in the story, we hear of a serpent in the Garden speaking to the woman, Eve. The serpent represents the devil, who we meet in the story of Christ in the wilderness. In the Garden of Eden, he begins by contradicting God’s words and saying that by eating of the tree the man and woman shall not die. And then he says something very interesting, “God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Gen. 3:5).The devil is crafty. He is a liar, but he mixes lies and truth together to confuse and attack Eve. For it is true that God’s purpose in creating humanity was to make us like him. And the devil repeats this truth to Eve. Likewise, to have her eyes opened and to know good and evil was, in a sense, what God intended for her.But there is a crucial difference.God’s purpose for the man and woman was to know good and evil by rejecting evil through obedience.The devil’s purpose, on the other hand, was for them to know good and evil by embracing evil through disobedience and therefore knowing through direct experience what it was to disobey and to know evil.There was, in other words, a sense in which Eve would become like God. But it was not the sense that God had in mind – quite the opposite, in fact. For disobedience – then, as now – would separate Adam and Eve from God, whereas obedience would have united them with him.The Christian life is filled with temptation. We want that which is immediately pleasurable or pleasing to us. Through the grace of God, we can often embrace what he gives us as a gift from his hand. But there are many, many times when we must say, “no” to what is placed in front of us.Observe the dynamic: We have some kind of desire in life. Perhaps it is something unfulfilled – a desire for success in one’s career, a desire marriage and family, the fulfilment of some childhood longing. It could simply be a desire for pleasure or gratification of some sort.In order to have these desires fulfilled, we are often presented with a choice: the wrong thing now or to wait until the right thing presents itself.The wrong thing will be instantly gratifying but will lead us away from God and lose the lustre with which is shone in the beginning.The right thing may be difficult but it will lead us towards God and will make us receptive to whatever he has for us in the future.Adam and Eve made the mistake of going for the first option: disobedience, gratification, followed by desolation and spiritual death.Because of their example and the power of their actions, we follow in the same way. And thus we are destined for the same end.This is a sad story but it is not the end of the story.The Obedience of ChristWe turn now to Christ’s temptation in the wilderness.Immediately, we see that it was a work of the Holy Spirit to take Christ to the wilderness to fast forty days and to be tempted by the devil. We see that this is a retelling of the story of the Garden of Eden. Like Adam and Eve, the man, Jesus Christ, was put in an uncultivated place by God to abstain from food and to be tempted by the devil.Christ, then, is re-enacting the story of Adam and Eve, but doing it in the right way. It is like he is another Adam but, instead of disobeying God by the listening to the serpent’s voice, he is obeying God by contradicting it.The Early Fathers of the Church called this concept “recapitulation”. And the point of it is that, whereas Adam and Eve disobeyed God, Jesus uniquely and perfectly obeyed the voice God, living a perfect life and offering it in sacrifice to God upon the cross. In doing so, Jesus thus opened up a new way for humanity to be united with God.In our New Testament reading, Romans 5, the Apostle Paul speaks of Christ’s righteousness which is given to us.The Greek word that lies behind the words “righteousness” and “justification” in the New Testament is vigorously debated by scholars. But the essence of this word is to say that the perfect life of Jesus – and his perfect obedience – are, in some mysterious sense, transferred to us.And thus we are brought to God through Jesus and we are given power to live in a different way. We are given power to be obedient to him and to grow into ever closer union with him.Union with ChristAnd, yet, this gift of righteousness is not simply something static, like a kind of title which means very little and makes no difference to our lives.Rather, the gift of Christ’s righteousness transforms our hearts so that we desire to grow in union with God through Christ. We understand that what is being offered to us – in comparison with the deceit of sin and evil – is true life, true joy, true peace. And so we choose that instead. And we go on choosing that as we grow closer to the one who offers it to us.This is why Lent, really, is such a joyful time – because it gives us an opportunity to make that decision (to prefer God to other things) over and over again. Lent is not just about putting away obvious sin. That is, of course, very important and Lent is a good time to focus on this.But Lent is really an intensification of the entire Christian life, which is a stretching out for God, a desire to grow closer and closer to him, with every act of sacrifice or abstinence offered in petition that this may be the case.And, as we do these things, an unworldly joy emerges within us, a stillness that does not depend on the gratification of the flesh or the lust of the eyes or the pride of life. We glimpse the ultimate reality, our peaceful destination, our true home. And we recognise that we are willing happily to do without anything to arrive there.And so friends, we give thanks for the work of Christ in rejecting the temptation of the devil. We give thanks that he lived a perfect life for us and laid it down in his death. We receive his gift of righteousness. And we stretch out to grow closer to him and to God this Lententide.In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
Make Space for God.
Exodus 24:12-end; 2 Peter 1:16-end; Matthew 17: 1-9Lent and mystical encounterIt’s hard for me to believe that Lent begins again in only three days from now. Time seems to move so quickly. Once again, the Church gives us the story of a mountaintop experience to reflect upon - that of the Transfiguration of Christ. This is paired with the story of Moses’ encounter with God on Mount Sinai.Now, if you’re anything like me, you might think about Lent with a certain amount of dread. When I mention to my children that Lent is coming up they can see no good in it. For them, it is simply a time when they can’t eat as much sweet stuff as normal.And we can so easily think about things in that way: Lent is just about giving things up and having less fun and so on. Thought about in this way, Lent is very depressing. It can even be life-denying and a kind of rejection of God’s good creation.But what if we reframe this slightly? Let’s say that Lent is not so much about giving stuff up or even doing more but about seeking an encounter with God, seeking a mystical union with the divine presence.I believe that making changes in our regular patterns of behaviour can be very beneficial. The effects can be physical, psychological or spiritual. So, if I said to you, that Lent gives you an opportunity to be united with the divine presence and so to know greater peace, love and joy, might that be a slightly more attractive picture?But the key to all of this is making the decision to prefer God to everything else. It is to recognise the futility of life without God and of pursuing ends which are less than God.To quote the mystical poet Rumi:‘God said,“The world is a play, a children’s game,and you are the children.”God speaks the truth.If you haven’t left the child’s play,how can you be an adult?Without purity of spirit,if you’re still in the middle of lust and greedand other wantings, you’re like children…The same with the fightings of mankind.It’s a squabble with play-swords.No purpose, totally futile…Don’t wait till you die to see this.’Rumi, A Children’s GameWe see something of this reality in the mystical experience of Moses and the disciples in the story of the Transfiguration.Both of these mystical encounters take place on a mountaintop, far away from the civilised world and the concerns of ordinary life. Moses is told to wait upon the mountaintop. He takes Joshua with him and delegates his great responsibilities to Aaron and Hur. The cloud of God’s glory covers the mountain, and Moses waits for six days in that silence until, on the seventh day, the voice of God calls to him out of the midst of the cloud.How does six days of nothing but silence strike you?Again, in Matthew’s account of the Transfiguration, we are told that Jesus took Peter, James and John with him up the mountain “after six days”. Six days before, Peter had confessed that Jesus was the Christ, and Jesus had told his disciples to take up their crosses and follow him.This six day wait links the story of the Transfiguration with the story of Moses on Mount Sinai. The point being that the same glory that was revealed to Moses on Mount Sinai was revealed to the disciples through Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration. Both were manifestations of the divine presence.A point I would like to emphasise is that both encounters involved solitude, quietness, and waiting. In Scripture, these things almost seem a prerequisite for an encounter with the divine presence. Perhaps we can learn from this.Lent is not about doing moreOne of the mantras of the modern world might be “more is more”. We are constantly being told that we do not have enough: money, pleasure, success, leisure. Whatever it might be.And this constant hectoring creates a sense of unrest and anxiety. We imagine that, in some state in the future, we will obtain that which we have been seeking and be at rest. But, of course, we can never get there because there is always more.It is important to see that something like this can apply to the spiritual life also. We can think all we need to do is make more effort: more church, more Bible, more prayer, more devotion. And there may be times of course during which taking up practices can be helpful.But Lent gives us an opportunity to take a kind of spiritual stock take: Is all of this activity really helping me in my search for God? Maybe I need to slow down a bit and think about what might be helpful.Let’s talk about a core discipline of Lent: fasting. There is so much to say. But consider that fasting is about not doing something for a time – not eating. What happens when you stop doing something like eating? Well, you get a bit hungry or very hungry depending on how long you do it for. And you make space and you leave time. And, in this sense, you become a little bit more like Moses on Mount Sinai and Jesus in the wilderness.We need time and space and silence to encounter God. Fasting opens up a space. It opens a space in our diaries. It opens a space in our bodies. And it opens a space in our hearts.Consider one of the other themes of Lent, which is abstinence – “giving things up”.Why might we abstain from something? We could take any example. Say some kind of food or drinks: alcohol, coffee or sweet things. One of the things we find when we decide to abstain from something is that we are quite dependent upon that thing emotionally or psychologically. The very thought of giving it up is painful. And so, when we do give it up, a kind of space opens. And we can allow ourselves to feel that little sense of need. We can take that sense of need to God in simple prayer, asking that he might meet that need, asking, in fact, that he might show us that this need is always for Him anyway. And so, when we open that space for him, he gives us the gift of himself.I would also like to suggest a practice that I am sure will be beneficial for many people, which is an “Information Fast”. I was speaking earlier about silence and quietness. The fact is that we cannot achieve quietness on the inside if we don’t have it on the outside. That goes not just for sound but also for information. I have got no idea of the physio-chemical processes that are at play in the interaction between my body and my smartphone or laptop. But I am certain that, if I have too much of this type of interaction, there is a kind of internal noise and stress which is difficult to negate. Conversely, if I switch off from all of these things – social media, the internet, messages, emails, online news, scrolling, checking things, listening to podcasts – then somehow I also switch off internally, and it’s like a peace emerges from the stillness.It is no exaggeration to say that filling up every space we have with staring at a phone has become a very common practice in our world. Do we ever stop and ask ourselves what we are doing to ourselves and, more importantly, what effect this is having on our internal, spiritual lives? It is like all of us are taking a drug that hasn’t been tested and the long-term effects of which are not known, and that we are doing this all the time.Maybe Lent could involve some radical changes. Maybe it’s no podcasts, no scrolling, no social media. Just for Lent. You can go back to it afterwards. But perhaps you won’t want to.Again, this is not about doing more. It’s about doing less. It’s about stopping and making space for God.What shall I do with this space?You might ask, “What shall I do with this space?”Firstly, please resist the urge to fill the space with more activity and more busyness. See it as an opportunity to refresh your soul. Perhaps you will do nothing but wait in silence, as Moses did on Mount Sinai. Perhaps you will use it to be more attentive to the things of God in prayer or meditation.You may use the time to walk in quietness and open yourself to the presence of the divine in the natural world.You may become aware of somebody who is near to you whose needs are known. And you may have time and energy to attend to that person’s need in some way.Whatever you do, do it calmly and with gentleness. The answer is not more. The answer (and the great challenge) is less.Holy BaptismThis morning, we have the great pleasure of baptising a new member of God’s family. In the Book of Romans, the Apostle Paul tells us that baptism is a kind of symbol of death and rebirth. This is all the more clear when we baptise an adult: it is a turning away from life lived without reference to God and a turning towards a life lived in conscious fellowship with God and obedient to his purposes.It is thus the ultimate way of making a space for God. For as we are baptised we offer God ourselves: our lives, our bodies, our souls. God has set things up so that we can offer ourselves freely – or not – to him. And this is ultimately all that we have to give.When we baptise, we also renew our own baptismal vows, remembering that we were given the gift of faith by our parents or that we were brought into God’s family, the Church, when we were slightly older. But, wherever we find ourselves on this journey, this ritual gives us an opportunity to repledge ourselves to God and to realign our hearts with him.We must always remember that joy is the purpose of God for us. (And this remembering is especially important as we enter the Lenten season.) Everything that we offer to God – our lives, our deaths, our habits bad and good, our pleasures, our pains – are given so that we might draw closer to him and so be deepened in our joy. And so, brothers and sisters, let us rejoice now and always.In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
Do Not Be Anxious
Genesis 1:1-2.3; Romans 8:18-25; Matthew 6: 25-end This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
Candlemas: Seeking the Presence of the Lord
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Repentance First
Isaiah 9:1-4; 1 Corinthians 1:10-18; Matthew 4:12-23In today’s Gospel reading, we hear the essential message of Jesus’ ministry: his command that we repent and turn to God, and his call to follow after him. May you granted grace to turn to God and to know his presence as we worship together this morning. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
Guest Bishop Mountstephen
The Second Sunday of Epiphany; Isaiah 49:1-7, 1 Corinthians 1:1-9, John 1:29-42Today we are very happy to welcome as our guest preacher the Bishop of Winchester, Philip Mounstephen. Bishop Philip is an experienced pastor, teacher and leader and I’m sure that we will benefit from his wisdom and knowledge.In our Gospel reading, we are reminded of Jesus’ baptism and his calling of the first disciples. May you hear his voice this morning as we gather for worship in this place. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
God Gets His Hands Dirty
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A Divine and Unexpected Way
“Do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.”Worldly CrisisThe story of the birth of Jesus Christ begins in a rather odd way, at least from a human perspective. We can see this if we put ourselves in the shoes of Joseph, the man who was betrothed to Mary. Who knows what hopes and dreams they shared together? We know of Joseph that he was the descendent of King David and of Abraham. And we are told in the text that he is a “just man”. Mary is a young woman living in a small and obscure agricultural village in lower Galilee called Nazareth. She was a relative, likely a cousin, of Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist. But really we know very little else. Outside of the New Testament there is little – if any – information about either of them.I think it would be fair to say that both of them were quite ordinary people. They lived in a place that was far from any urban centre. There was no middle class in that time and place, so anyone outside of elite circles was either a peasant or a labourer. We are told that Joseph was a tekton, which probably means he was a carpenter. He was a skilled worker and he worked with his hands.It’s important to take note of this. We are about to see how ordinary people respond to a crisis in faith. This is for all of us, not for a spiritual, economic or aristocratic elite. There is something very simple and everyday at the heart of the Christmas story. Indeed, this is one of the central themes of the Christmas season.And so we are told that before Mary and Joseph came together, Mary was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit (Mt. 1:18). The meaning is clear: Mary and Joseph were not married and had not engaged in marital relations. And yet she became pregnant. Matthew tells us that this was a miracle, an act of God by the Holy Spirit. But, of course, Joseph knew no such thing. Put yourself in his shoes. This would have looked like a straightforward instance of adultery under the terms of Mary and Joseph’s betrothal.The implications would have been bad: although stoning for adultery was rarely if ever carried out during the Roman period, it was nevertheless the legal penalty. And there were social and personal implications, particularly in a small place like Nazareth: Mary would face public shame, disgrace, ostracism and damaged to her reputation. In modern terms, she would be damaged goods and could not expect to be married in the future.It is fair to say that this was a massive crisis for Joseph: a time of great uncertainty, confusion and sadness. We do not know what passed between him and Mary. But we can imagine that there was a period in which Mary was reassuring him of the truth: her virginity, the message from the Angel Gabriel and everything else that she knew. And yet Joseph could not bring himself to believe.And can we blame him? Who could believe such a thing? We are apt to believe that the weary world will just continue in its weary way, with all of its suffering, all of its shattered dreams, all of its disappointments.A Human SolutionAs I mentioned earlier, Mary and Joseph were betrothed to one another. This meant that they were not formally married and would not have had marital relations. But this betrothal was nevertheless a legally binding agreement. If it was true that Mary had committed adultery, as Joseph must have believed it was, then he really had two options. To continue with the marriage was impossible. Option one, therefore, was to expose Mary to public disgrace and to seek the harshest possible penalty. Joseph didn’t go for this. Instead, because he was a just man, he sought to divorce her quietly, to spare his beloved from shame.As I say, this was because he was a just and good man. But, at this point, he was only a just and good man. He had not yet been touched by supernatural grace. He was doing the best he could with the situation as he found it. He was limited by the tragic boundaries that beset us all in this world, the unhappy dilemmas in which we find ourselves, the least worst options.Again, who could blame him? To believe anything else would have been near impossible. But, to quote from the nativity story in the Gospel of Luke, Joseph was about to find out that nothing is impossible with God.A Divine and Unexpected WayAnd so, Joseph considered these things. And perhaps he was still in two minds. Perhaps he continued to be confused by it all. And, Lo, the Lord’s angel appeared in the midst of this darkness and told him the truth, “Joseph, Son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins”.God has something far greater and more wonderful than the bounded and melancholy future that you imagined for yourself. For this is a work of the Holy Spirit and you must receive it in faith and trust. Your options are not as bad as you thought. Not anywhere near.Friends, let’s pause here and consider the wonder of this message, the wonder that we anticipate as we approach the Christmas season. You thought that the world was empty and dark and hopeless and inevitable and, yet, something amazing has happened, something so unexpected and wonderful that nobody could have imagined or predicted it. You thought that things were like this but now…now God has come. And all of your categories and thought and expectations are exploded into nothingness or expanded into infinity. He is able – and willing – to do far more than anything that you could ask or imagine. He turns what looked like a crisis into the greatest adventure imaginable. He transforms the desert into springs of water. He restores the life which appeared to be broken beyond all recognition and hope.This was true for Joseph. Friends, it is true for us also. Take it into your heart. Christmas in the moment when everything changes. Christmas is the moment when God comes to save us all. This is the great and marvellous and wonderful, unexpected and divine way. It is waiting for you also. You can’t see it yet. That’s part of the point. So you have to have faith. But allow that expectation that flows from faith to well up in your heart and do not resign yourself to a sense of sad inevitability. That is not how God works.Godly ActionA further word on the message of the angel, “Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife.”Now it’s already clear why Joseph might be afraid. Word may have got round. There are, indeed, hints later in the Gospel stories that it had. Joseph would have been risking social scandal and ostracization, perhaps worse, for himself, Mary and this child. He was also risking being made a fool by all of this. If he got it wrong, his life and Mary’s and the child’s could be in ruins.And yet the angel told him anyway: don’t be afraid. That is: don’t be afraid in your heart. But, also, don’t be afraid to take action – godly action. The fact is that God calls us to live an adventurous life in which we take action for him. Those actions involve risk and, frequently, suffering. But all to a purpose. We can allow fear to hold us back and keep us from even beginning. But the angel says – and God through him – “Do not fear”. Take action in the sight of God.My question to you: what action is God calling you to do that you are afraid of? What sacrifice are you not yet willing to make? What obstacle are you still afraid to overcome? Ask yourself and think deeply. Is there a risk that God is calling you to take for him? Is there a sacrifice? Is there an action, a task, an adventure? Friends, do not let fear hold you back.And why not allow fear to dominate? Let’s go back to the Christmas message. Have you forgotten? This child has been conceived without an earthly father through the power of the Holy Spirit. God has the power to bring life out of nothingness, without blood, without flesh, without the normal patterns of men and women. If God did that at the first Christmastide, what is he not able to do for you?The new life conceived in Mary’s womb whispers to us all: “There is no need to be afraid. God is making all things new through Jesus. Everything you need will be provided freely in the most extraordinary way. God’s provision is beyond anything you could ask or imagine.”Sins will be forgiven. Even death itself will be overcome. The miraculous life in Mary’s womb will one day be snuffed out by man’s hatred and cruelty and yet raised again through the power of God. And at the very end of the story, that life will illuminate all things in heaven and upon the earth.Such a wonderful miracle. And how unexpected all of this was and continues to be. The Christmas season, so nearly upon us, invites us to believe that that which is impossible for man is possible for God.So please consider this story today and recall the mighty power of God. Recognise that this power is at work in you today and that you too are called to act for the Lord with faith and not fear. What would you do for him if you were not afraid?May we have faith, then, in the miraculous power of God that conceived Jesus in the womb of Mary, which is at work in the hearts and lives of those who believe in him now. May we be freed from fear and strengthened to take godly action, even in the face of risk and loss, in imitation of St Joseph the just man, the husband of Mary and father to Jesus Christ.In the name of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
"Blessed is the one who is not offended by me..."
Today’s Gospel reading is fascinating. If we understand what is being said, it is devastating, addressing some of the deepest questions of life and faith. Let’s open our hearts and listen closely.John’s QuestionIt begins with John the Baptist in prison, hearing about the deeds of Christ. He sends a question through his disciples, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”Pause for a moment and remember last week’s sermon on Matthew 3: John’s passionate invitation to prepare the way of the Lord, his stinging rebuke of the Pharisees, his terrifying prediction that the one to come would yield his winnowing fork, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning the chaff with unquenchable fire. Things seem to have changed. What is going on?Interpreters differ but I like to think that we are seeing a very human side of John – a human side that, to be honest, I recognise through my own experience of life and ministry. Life is filled with mountaintop experiences. Times when we seemed to be filled with the wind of the Holy Spirit. Times when it seems that we understand somehow what life is all about and what we are supposed to do.But then there is the other side: when all of that just seems to slip away. Sometimes it’s just because we’ve woken up on the wrong side of bed. Life seems miserable. God seems distant.And there are, of course, much worse things – the kind of things that John was facing: imprisonment and death. And life is filled with these things too: we stand around the coffins of our loved ones and say our goodbyes; we receive the call from the doctor that tells us the news is not good; the divorce papers come through the door. There are many such things in life. They change us forever. And they may not heal in this world. They may not be redeemable at all. We have to live with them.I believe that John was having one of these dark nights in prison: having once been so powerful in word and deed, now beset with a doubt or, at least a question: Was I right? Have I given my life for the right thing? Did I place my trust in the right person? Or have I made a mistake?Friends, this question reveals to us the human response to a life lived in faith. It is normal to wrestle with doubt and difficulty. In this passage, Jesus tells us that nobody greater has been born among us than John and even he doubted and was beset by challenge and trial.It is part of the life of faith in this world that we must do so too.Jesus’ ResponseLet’s look at Jesus’ response, which is quite stunning: “…the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them”.Jesus is here referencing two prophecies from the book of Isaiah, passages that were taken to describe the Messiah, the coming one and deliverer of Israel of whom John the Baptist spoke.One prophecy is Isaiah 35, our Old Testament reading this morning, which is a vision of an entirely renewed and recreated universe in which the old enemies of sin, suffering and death are done away with forever: “Behold your God will come…He will come and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy”.The other prophecy is Isaiah 61: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour, and the day of the vengeance of our God”.Jesus’ answer would have been straightforward if that was all there was to it. He would have been saying quite clearly, “Yes, I am the Messiah. I am the coming one who was foretold in the prophet Isaiah”. But that is not the way John would have heard these words.This is because Jesus deliberately left out part of the prophecy from Isaiah 35 and 61. He mentioned the blind receiving their sight, lepers being cleansed, the deaf hearing, the dead being raised, and good news being preached to the poor. But he stopped there. He didn’t mention liberty for the captives or the opening of the prison to those who are in chains. Nor indeed did he mention the year of the Lord’s favour or the day of the vengeance or our God. Imagine how John would have heard these words. They described what the Messiah would do, indeed what he was doing: healing, restoring, preaching the kingdom, raising the dead – miracles and proclamations. But no liberty for captives, no opening of the prison. No vengeance upon the occupying Romans who had put him there. Jesus was sending a message to John to be interpreted something like this:“Yes, I am the Messiah. And I am proving it through healing, raising the dead and proclaiming the Kingdom. But the Kingdom of God is coming in my time and in my way. And for you, John, you must follow in the way that I will walk. You must suffer and die, as I must suffer and die. There will be no liberty for you, nor any opening of the prison.”“Blessed is the one who is not offended by me…”And this is why Jesus ends his saying with the words, “Blessed is the one who is not offended by me”. It is a message to John: Don’t allow yourself to be offended by this. The word for “offended” can also be translated to mean tripped up or scandalised. In other words: you must keep faith with me through this trial. You will find true spiritual blessedness if you do.Friends, let’s stop here and consider what is being said to us. One of the things that we can draw from it is that Jesus did not come to deliver everyone from the suffering that we face in this life. If he wanted to do that, he could have done it. He certainly would have done it for the one he described as the greatest person to be born of a woman, John the Baptist. But he didn’t. And in this world, he saves none of us completely from suffering and he does not save us from death. He did not bring heaven to earth totally in his first coming. He did not end all injustice. He did not take away all diseases. He did not make wars cease. He left John in prison. And he leaves us in this world with all of our pain. We watch those around us grow frail and die. We see the healthy become sick. We stand over the graves of our parents and sometimes even our own children.But “blessed is the one who is not offended by me”. Blessed is the one who does not hold up his hands and walk away. Blessed is the one who, with faith in God, accepts this earthly state of affairs.Many people walked away from Jesus in the time of his earthly life because they could not – or would not – accept the things that he said or did. This text is a challenge to us not to do the same: he could prevent you or your loved ones from dying. He does not do so. Do you accept this? Are you willing to accept this without being scandalised by it? Such texts as this also help us to be prepared for suffering when it comes: Christian faith is no insulation from the normal pains we encounter in this world. When we suffer, no strange, unusual or unexpected thing is happening to us. This is just life. Death is a part of life. And it is a life that Jesus allowed to go on in this way.Death and Rebirth – The Pattern of the UniverseAnd yet, how are we to understand this? Why did Jesus not bring an end to all suffering, all sickness, all war, all death when he came? He could have done so. Why didn’t he?Jesus could have simply come to this earth, ended all disease, death, suffering and sin forever by a single word. And yet, instead of doing that, he healed some people and raised a limited number from the dead. But the main and central work with which his ministry climaxed was his death on the cross followed, of course, by the glorious rebirth of the resurrection. The New Testament even speaks of his being made obedient and perfect through what he suffered, as though Jesus himself was made complete in some way through these experiences.As difficult as it sounds, the answer to the question must be that our suffering is producing something in us and through us that is greater that is more important and outweighs even the present experience of pain and grief. Indeed, the Apostle Paul speaks in exactly this way in Romans chapter 8: “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us”. And in 2 Corinthians 4: “This light, momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison”.What do these passages tell us? They reveal to us something of the secret of the universe, something that we already know in a sense. We see it in so many ways: it is through the labour of the farmer or the gardener that the crops or the flowers grow; it is through the hard work of the athlete, that his muscles are made strong and his body enhanced; it is through the diligent and patient study of the scholar that his mind is made knowledge and supple; it is through the suffering of childbirth that new life is born into the world. It is death, always, death to comfort, death to self, death to inactivity and sloth, death to one’s own immediate desires, death to a life free from pain and struggle that leads to something new, that leads to life.And all of this points to one of the greatest truths of all: that our suffering in this world, when united to Christ, will lead to a life so glorious and wonderful that we cannot possibly imagine it now. All of those pictures of death and rebirth that we see in this world are but a mere foreshadowing of that great life, that great joy which is inevitably coming.The writer to the Hebrews tells us to look to Jesus, ‘who, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross’ (Hebrews 12:2). And so there is the link between this day – Gaudete Sunday, a day of rejoicing – and our suffering. If we will unite our suffering to Chr
Change your hearts!
John the BaptistOur reading today is about John the Baptist and his baptism. Let’s begin by observing that John the Baptist would not have come across as a respectable character but as a madman. We do not have time to go into it in detail but, although he was from a priestly line, he was nevertheless a marginal figure – “The voice of one crying in the wilderness” – wearing a camel’s hair garment and a leather belt, eating locusts and honey.And what was his message? “Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven has drawn near”. “Prepare the way of the Lord. Make his paths straight.”God himself is coming. Prepare your souls to receive him. Give him a straight path to your heart.Another way to translate the word for “repent”, metanoia, is “change your heart”. The Kingdom of Heaven is coming, so change your heart. Change your actions, your outlook, your priorities, all in the light of this.The baptism of John was a different baptism to the baptism we receive now as Christians. It was a baptism of water for repentance, a ritual washing related to a Jewish ritual called the mikveh. In other words, it was a personal response to this message, a personal response of a change of heart. It was like they were saying, “I intend to cleanse myself from sin, from the inside out, so that I might be prepared for the coming of the Lord.”This is the kind of change we are to consider in the season of Advent. We are to ask ourselves, “The Lord is coming and how do I want my heart to be when he arrives?”The Pharisees and SadduceesA key part of our text today concerns the Pharisees and Sadducees drawing near for baptism. These people represent the religious authorities of the day. Theological and spiritual experts. Memorisers of the Law. Preachers of sermons. And yet, they receive a stern rebuke from John, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit in line with a change of heart. And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raised up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid at the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire’.What was John rebuking in these people?Let’s observe several things:No repentance – Firstly, they were not repentant. Not willing to change their hearts. They wanted to join in the ritual but they were not willing to be obedient to what the ritual represented.This is religion without transformation. Friends, this is everywhere in our world and it is everywhere in the Christian Church. This is kind of empty religion that inoculates us against the real thing. Sometimes called “nominal” Christianity or something like that. It is the process of going through the motions without really meaning it from the heart.God is not interested in occasional church going or religious observances. He is interested in your heart. He wants a transformation that occurs at the very deepest part of your soul. A transformed life follows from this. That’s why John says, “Bear fruit in line with a change of heart”. The fruit is the outcome of a changed heart. We change first, deep down within, and so we give our lives to Christ.Trust in ethnic or religious status – Again, the Pharisees are rebuked for thinking that their ethnic and religious status will save them. They think, because they are children of Abraham, that they will be fine. But John lays waste to this idea, “God is able to raise up from these stones children of Abraham”.In other words, ethnic and religious descent is ineffectual and irrelevant without a change of heart, without true repentance.Do not presume to say to yourself, “I was baptised as a baby.” Do not presume to say to yourself, “We’ve been involved in this parish church for several generations.” Do not presume to say to yourself, “I give money to the church and serve on the rota”.These are all good things but they have to be accompanied by a genuine change of heart.Religious hypocrisy that leads others astray – Finally, religious hypocrisy that leads other people astray. The phrase used by John to describe the Pharisees is “brood of vipers”. Jesus uses the same phrase to describe them in Matthew 23. There he launches into a tirade against these people.Again, there isn’t time to go into all of it but here is an idea: Jesus rebukes the Pharisees for not practicing what they preach. In other words, they preach a moral life, they preach devotion and obedience to God and yet they do not practice it.Jesus tells the Pharisees that they keep the letter of the law but they neglect the deeper parts of it and so they miss the point. They tithe their spice racks but they do not practice justice, mercy and faithfulness – all of which are a reflection of a changed heart.On the outside they look good – good clothes, good hair, good religious apparel – but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence and they are filled with dead men’s bones. They are pretending to be righteous. They are acting. This is ancient cos-play.“Woe to you Pharisees and Scribes, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.” Matthew 23:13I’m not saying this because I think anyone here in particular is a Pharisee or a Sadducee. I’m saying it because something like this is a temptation for all of us. And I’m saying this because I want to make it clear that is not true religion. It is not what it means to be a follower of Christ.Let me be emphatic and say again: to prepare the way for Christ is not to change some external feature like one’s appearance or activity. It is to change the heart. It is to change not what is outside but what is inside. It is to give one’s heart to Christ in love for him.The Baptism of JesusHaving said this, let’s look at the baptism of Jesus. This was a different baptism to that of John, a new type of baptism.What is different? Well, earlier I said John’s baptism was a sign of repentance and faith. Here, there is something more: “I baptise you with water for repentance, but he who is coming is mightier that I…He will baptise you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.”Faith and repentance are a part of Christian baptism, as they were in John’s baptism. But all throughout the New Testament, we are told that Christian baptism is also linked to the gift of the Holy Spirit.One other example: after Peter’s sermon at Pentecost, those listening responded by asking him what to do, “Repent and be baptised every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:38).When we are baptised into Christ, we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. This means that Christian baptism is not just something that represents our repentance but it is a sacrament through which the power of God works. Indeed, in Christian baptism, God himself comes to live within our hearts.This means something quite wonderful: it means that the power of God lives within us and that he gives us the power to change.This is why we do that strange ritual in which the priest flicks holy water at the people in the church. It is to remind ourselves that the Holy Spirit lives in us and that He was given to us at our baptisms. It reminds us that God’s power is within us and that therefore we can live the Christian life with his help.And if you have not been baptised and would like the Holy Spirit to come and live within your heart, then let nothing hold you back.Jesus came to baptise not only with water, but also with the Holy Spirit.With the Holy Spirit and FireOne further point: when John says, “He comes to baptise with the Holy Spirit and with fire”, what does the fire represent?In my view, the context of the passage makes it clear that John means here the fire of judgement. There are two other references to fire in this passage: “Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire” says John. And, speaking of Christ, “His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire”.Christ will baptise with the Holy Spirit and he will baptise with the fire of judgement.To put it in plain English, John’s message is therefore something like this:“Repent of your sin and start living a life that proves that you are sorry. Be baptised into Christ and receive the gift of the Holy Spirit and this will give you power to live a new life. The alternative is the fire of judgement. No amount of religious observance will save you. Choose.”Maybe this doesn’t some like an uplifting Christmas message. If not, I’d encourage you to remember that the one who holds the winnowing fork in his hand is the one who was laid in the manger as a baby. He is the Word who became flesh and dwelt among us. He is the one who emptied himself of his glory and became obedient to the Father by dying for us. He is the one who rose again to give us the hope of everlasting life with God.And so, may we, by the mercy and the grace of God, in light of his appearing amongst us in Christ, change our hearts, bear fruit in keeping with repentance, and be empowered by the Holy Spirit to heed these words.In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
Get Ready for the Son of Man
“You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”May I speak in God’s name, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.The Coming of the Son of ManThe context for our passage today is the coming of the Son of Man, meaning the return of Christ. This is a basic part of our orthodox profession of faith: ‘He shall come again in glory to judge both the quick and the dead’, as the Nicene Creed puts it.In this passage, Christ tells us some crucial facts about what his return will look like. And if we listen to him and really take him seriously then our mindset and our lives should change. We cannot possibly hear these words and believe that Christ really spoke them and not be shaken to the core.What, then, do we learn about his return from this discourse?Nobody knows when it will beFirstly, nobody knows when the return of Christ will be: not the angels of heaven, not even the Son himself, but only the Father. The precise timing of the return of Christ is a mystery hidden deep within the Godhead. Nobody knows it. (Matt. 24:36)There have been many attempts to predict the return of Christ but such attempts are folly and lead to disaster and distraction. There is a reason that God has kept this a secret. We can speculate that the reason is because God desires us to live the kind of life that Jesus tells us to live: one of spiritual alertness and preparation. We wouldn’t do that quite so readily if we had convinced ourselves that the return of Christ would not happen for, say, ten thousand years.The fact that we do not know and that it could be now or it could be in ten thousand years means that we must always be prepared for it.It will be as in the days of NoahSecondly, the return will be as it was in the days of Noah: “…in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage…they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away” (Matt. 24:38-39).Christ could not be plainer: the ordinary course of the world will be continuing as it usually does and people will not be expecting what is to come.In those days – that is the days of Noah – people were doing all the normal things – eating, drinking, marrying and giving in marriage. In the final days, it will be the same. People will be doing those things. In our day, we might say that people will be binge-watching TV and going to work and taking their children to birthday parties and going on holidays.All of those things will be going on as normal and most people will be oblivious.Again, we might be tempted to soften what Christ is saying here. But he is speaking of Noah’s flood as a literal historical event in which the vast majority of the human race were swept away. It will be like that before I come also, says Christ. Most people will be getting on with things as per normal and they will be taken by surprise.The Greek word from which we get “flood” in this passage is very resonant: kataklusmos. This is where the modern English word “cataclysm” comes from. Kataklusmos means literally a deluge that passes over everything. Nothing is untouched by it. It affects everything in the world.As was Noah’s flood, so will it be when the Son of Man comes.“One will be taken and one left…”“Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left” (Matt. 24:40-41).What does Christ mean by this? There is a very widespread misinterpretation of this passage that has been around for about two-hundred years. That misinterpretation says that the ones who are taken are those who are “raptured” by Christ into Heaven before a period of tribulation through which the rest of the earth’s population will pass. This interpretation did not exist in the Church until about 1830 and it is a misunderstanding.The immediate context helps us to see: “…they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away.” Those who are swept away are the same ones who are taken. They are swept away or taken by the kataklusmos of the Coming of the Son of the Man. And the ones who are left are the ones who are not.The nature of this sweeping away is not entirely clear but we can speculate that it is not positive but constitutes a judgement upon the sin of the world. Like those who were caught in the flood, it is not something that we wish to face ourselves.“Stay Awake…Be Ready”Again, if we take seriously what Christ is saying then we will be shaken by these words. And we will ask ourselves what exactly can be done? Christ tells us, “Therefore, stay awake, for you do not what on what day your Lord is coming” (Matt. 24:42) And, “you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect” (Matt. 24:44).You must stay awake and be ready.Let’s go back to the story of the flood for a moment and draw out another implication: in the days of Noah a flood came and swept away most of the people. But God also provided a means of salvation: a warning and an ark. And everyone who stepped aboard that ark was saved from the coming judgement.As it was in those days, so it is now. God has provided a means for us to be saved from the coming judgment, and the means is Christ, the Gospel and the Church. As the second century Church Father Tertullian said,The ark of Noah was a type of the church, and Christ is the true Noah. Just as the ark, made of wood, carried within it those who were delivered from the flood, so the church, built upon the wood of the cross of Christ, carries safely through the waves of this world those who are washed in the baptism of Christ.Friends, the coming judgement is a hard reality to get our heads around. But I would like to emphasise again two things: firstly, these are the words of Christ and we should take them seriously. And, secondly, God has done everything he can to give us a way to be saved and that way is still available now.Elsewhere, Christ tells us, “I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved” (John 10:9). Christ is the ark of salvation and Christ is the door. The door is open still and he invites all to walk through it.How would I live in this were true?What then is spiritual this awake-ness and preparedness of which Christ speaks? It is keeping the reality of the Gospel before our eyes and living as though it were actually true.Think about this for a moment: if all of this were true – if Christ really were coming back at some point which I did not know and if a flood-like cataclysm would follow in his wake and if the Gospel and the Church were the ark of salvation – how would I live?Speaking for myself personally, I would remind myself of this reality constantly and do everything I could not to allow myself not to be sucked into the ordinary concerns of others who did not share this knowledge.I would stop sinning as much as I possibly could and I would seek to cultivate a love for God above a love for the things of this passing life.I would invest in the things of God every day and lay up my treasures in heaven – my wealth, my energy, my attention, my focus – in the expectation of an eternal reward.I would pray all the time for myself and for others and I would seek for opportunities to share this news with everyone and anyone who would listen. I would also avail myself of the other means of grace.I would turn everything I do towards this one end. I would make all of my activities serve this one purpose: to be awake, to be alert, and to be ready at all times.Let me ask you, then: What would you do, if you believed this were true? If you believed that Christ may return at any moment but that you and others around you might not be ready for such a thing? How might this change your mindset? How might this change your life?Images of Total CommitmentWhen studying this, I was put in mind of a passage from the Apostle Paul. To his young protégé Timothy, he wrote:‘No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him.‘An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules.‘It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops.’2 Timothy 2:4-6Paul uses three images in rapid succession to describe the Christian life: a soldier, an athlete, a farmer.What do all those three lifestyles have in common? Total commitment to the cause.A soldier prepares for the battle. If his preparation is not diligent, he and perhaps his friends will die at the hands of the enemy. He therefore commits himself with total focus to the mastery of his weapons and to the tactics that are most likely to secure the victory.The athlete similarly conditions his life to the greatest degree possible: his food, his drink, his sleeping, his exercise and practice. He diligently learns his craft and gives every day to its mastery. Everything is tailored to this one end: to compete and to win the prize.The farmer rises early to spend all day wracking his body to tend to his animals and his crops. The farm needs constant attention and he can rarely – if ever – leave it. It is his life’s love and his life’s commitment.Similarly, the Christian life is a calling to total commitment, thinking to yourself: What does Christ call me to do? What does Christ call me to be? How does Christ call me to think if these things are really so?Let me be somewhat confrontational (and I ask myself the same question here): Is that how you make decisions? The athlete, when offered a tempting snack, says “No” because he is training for the event. Do you have a similar mindset when you a presented with a choice? Do you think first and foremost of your commitment to Christ or do you instead simply evaluate things according to your own judgment and the spirit of this age?Friends, let’s wake up and recognise that the reality of which Christ speaks is a far greater and more lasting reality than the one we encounter in the everyday. ‘The hour has come for you to wake from sleep,’ says Paul in our New Testame
The Grace of the Crownless King
A King Without a CrownToday, we celebrate the feast of Christ the King of the Universe. Why, then, are we given the text that we have just heard? We have just listened to a story in which this supposed king is taken to a place called The Skull and crucified by the Roman Empire between two criminals. The clothes of this condemned man were stripped and divided between the soldiers: he would not need them anymore.The religious rulers scoffed at him: for all his talk and miracles, he could not save himself. He was not the Messiah, the Christ, the Chosen One of God.The secular authorities, similarly, mocked him. They had heard that he called himself a King to rival Caesar. And, yet, if he had been a king, then surely he would have had the power to save himself. Their leader, Pilate, erected a sign which was put above his head, ironically stating, “The King of the Jews”.We know from elsewhere that his closest followers had abandoned him, that the man he had chosen to lead them had denied him three times out of cowardice.Now, one of the criminals condemned to die next to him joins in the chorus of scorn: “Are you not the Christ?” he asks, “Save yourself and us!”Truly this man appeared forsaken by all the world. How could he be a king? How could he be worshipped? How could he possess any authority, when the manner of his death was thus?The One Who Saw the TruthAnd, yet, that day, there was but one who saw the truth: the other criminal crucified alongside Christ.Speaking to the first criminal who mocked Christ, he asked him, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds.” In other words, he recognised his own sin and guilt before God, and his own need for God’s mercy.“But this man has done nothing wrong,” he said. This man is sinless. This man bears no guilt as we do, but he is dying unjustly at the hands of the Jewish and Roman authorities.But it is really the final saying that ought most to astonish us: “Jesus,” he said, addressing Christ by his first name, intimately, in an act of loyalty and trust, “Remember me when you come into your kingdom.”Think for a moment what he is saying: Did this criminal believe that Jesus would escape the crucifixion and become a successful political revolutionary after all? Of course he did not. He must, therefore, have believed that Jesus was indeed the true Messiah, that he would be vindicated by God by being raised from the dead, and that he would, at some point, inaugurate the Kingdom of God in this world. And so, he asked Christ: When you become King, when your magnificent power and authority is truly revealed, remember me. Accept me as your loyal subject; have mercy upon me, even though I rightly bear the punishment for my sin here upon this cross.The Astonishing Response – Pure GraceAnd Christ’s response is no less astonishing: “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.”What does Christ mean by this? Firstly, let’s observe that this is a moment of pure grace. This dying criminal did not have time to amend his life through good works, to be baptised or receive Holy Communion, to attend church or carry out religious rituals. He could not do anything but throw himself upon the mercy of God in Jesus Christ. And the response was pure grace: an acceptance of his plea, a promise that he would be where Christ was going.Before I say more, let me elaborate on this. It is true that God has given to Christians so-called “means of grace”. These are channels of God’s grace by which he strengthens our faith and blesses us as we seek to live the Christian life. Baptism is a ritual washing of sin and renewal by the Holy Spirit. Holy Communion is our spiritual food for the journey. Prayer is the means by which we commune with God spiritually. The Church is Christ’s body, through which we encounter his presence whenever we meet. And we could name many other things. These are all tools that God gives us to grow in holiness and in our relationship with him. And all are important to live the Christian life.But what we learn from the story of the penitent criminal is that, as the great Prayer of Humble Access puts it, God’s nature is always to have mercy. That is, we are acceptable to him not because we avail ourselves of the means of grace, not because we grow in holiness, or for any other such reason. We are acceptable to him because he chooses to have mercy upon us when we ask for it.Once again, consider this penitent criminal. What does he do? Number one: he acknowledges his sin: “We are receiving the due reward of our deeds”, he cries out. This is the first step towards true repentance: we acknowledge the wrong that we have done to others, to ourselves, and before God. We experience conviction of sin, and we cry out to God for mercy.Notice, again, that we do not, at this point engage in good works to make ourselves acceptable to God. Rather, we follow the pattern of this broken criminal and of others like Blind Bartimeus and the Tax Collector of Jesus’ Parable…We cry out, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of David, Have mercy upon me, a sinner!” And we say with King David, “Have mercy upon me, O God, according to your steadfast love” (Ps. 51:1).He confesses his sin. He asks for mercy. And he receives it.Friends, this is what God desires for all mankind: that we all follow this same pattern. We have all sinned and fallen short of God’s glory. God desires that we be reconciled to him and that we ask for his grace and mercy. Is this truth not supremely demonstrated in the words of Christ as he was being crucified by those who hated him? “Father, forgive them,” he prayed, “for they know not what they do”.Have you come to an end of yourself? Are you in need of God’s forgiveness and mercy? Then come to him. Do you feel spiritual cold and far away from him? Then come to him. Are you fearful or ashamed? Then come to him. Come to him and you will receive the precious ointment of his grace.The Apostle Paul puts this truth beautifully in his letter to the Ephesians, ‘For by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this is not your own doing: it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast’ (Eph. 2:8-9).All of this is embodied, of course, in the Sacrament of Holy Communion, by which we simply come to him and receive him in faith and confidence that he will make his dwelling with us. What could be a simpler act of faith than this? To approach, to believe, to kneel, to receive?The Astonishing Response – The Promise of Life with ChristAnd there is one more part to this which we must mention: “Today, you will be with me in Paradise.”This is clearly a promise that the criminal would be with Jesus, wherever he was going. But where was he going? The word “Paradise” would have been familiar at the time because it was used in a Greek translation of the Old Testament called the Septuagint. It was used specifically to describe the Garden of Eden, from which Adam and Eve were expelled by God when they disobeyed him. In that story, an angel with a flaming sword was placed at the east of the garden to guard the way to the tree of life and to prevent re-entry.Jesus is saying, quite simply, “I will take you back to the Garden of Eden – I will take you back to Paradise and you will be with me there.”Notice also that he says the word, “Today”. Now, in the original Greek, the word “Today” simply means, “Today”. In other words, Jesus is saying, “When you and I die upon these crosses today, we will be together in the Garden Paradise of God.”This is an astonishing statement and should not be passed over lightly. Christ is promising immediate translation into the presence of God upon death.This is an idea that is confirmed in various other places in Scripture. For example, the Apostle Paul said that to be away from the body is to be at home with the Lord (2 Cor. 5:8). In the letter to the Philippians, he tells us that he desires to depart from this life to be with Christ, ‘for that is far better’ (Phil. 1:23).Now, it must be said that the Bible also tells us of a future state in which the dead are raised in glorious new bodies and at which point the whole of the universe will be wonderfully recreated without sin, brokenness, pain or death.This is not the state Jesus speaks of to the condemned criminal. Rather, he speaks of a state in-between our present lives and that final, glorious and resurrected world. This in-between state is the Paradise of God. We do not know exactly the details of that place but it is surely glorious and rich and abundant. For it is a return to the Garden Paradise of Eden where we will walk with God himself in the cool of the morning.Conversely, there is very little evidence upon the lips of Christ or the Apostles that the souls of Christian believers “sleep” upon death until the resurrection. Nor is there really any Scriptural evidence for the doctrine of Purgatory, which was developed after the time of Christ and the Apostles. That doctrine says that most believers, although their sins are forgiven, must still endure a potentially long and painful period of purification before they can enter fully into the presence of God. Our passage today is a notoriously difficult one for theologians who hold this position, since it is very difficult to reconcile with that idea.I have to be honest also and say that I believe that the Doctrine of Purgatory obscures the reality of the Gospel as it was taught by Christ and the Apostles. The Gospel offers us true forgiveness and reconciliation with God now in this life, based upon our repentance and faith. Good works follow but they are not how we obtain forgiveness. And, more to the point, the Gospel tells us that we have a real and tangible hope that we will be with God in Christ as soon as we die: our sins forgiven and removed from us, our souls cleansed by the power of God. No further need for pain and purification but eternal life given to us
It's not the end of the world...yet
“Teacher, when will these things be?”At the beginning of our Gospel passage, some people speak to Jesus of the Temple, saying that it is adorned with stones and votive offerings. Jesus replies in an unexpected way: “As for these things that you see, the days will come when there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.”His disciples ask him when these things will be and what signs will accompany such a monumental event. Jesus then begins a discourse in which he warns of false messiahs, international wars, tumults, earthquakes, famines, pestilences, terrors and great signs from heaven. He also predicts the persecution of his followers: arrests, trials, and ostracization from their own families.What is all this about? Most scholars and theologians have agreed that Jesus is doing two things in this discourse. Firstly, he is predicting the destruction of the Second Temple, which occurred in A.D. 70 at the hands of the Roman Empire.But this alone does not account for the imagery of the passage. In the typical style of the Jewish prophets, it seems that Christ was speaking of events both near and far. He was speaking of the destruction of Jerusalem and using that as a symbol of the very end of history. In Christian theology we call this subject “Eschatology” or we speak of it as the “End Times”.Signs of the EndI have already mentioned that Jesus describes a situation of great global instability, talking of natural disasters on an unprecedented scale: famines, pestilences, earthquakes. He speaks of international wars: kingdoms and nations turned against each other. He implies that people will, at this time, be terrified. And he tells us that many will come in his name, saying, “I am he!” and “The time is at hand!”Let’s think about this for a moment. We can observe a clear dynamic in the text.It starts with a crisis – perhaps something unprecedented - which leads people to be afraid. And, being afraid, they look for solutions that promise hope and deliverance. More than that, they look for people who promise these things.These false messiahs of whom Jesus warns are very interesting. Firstly, they are not purely secular but invoke the name of Jesus Christ, claiming to represent him and his values.Secondly, they exalt themselves: “I am he!” they say, and “The time is at hand!” Meaning, of course, that their rise to prominence is the crucial moment of history and that they will bring deliverance.There is also urgency about these statements: “It must be now. You must do what I say immediately and, if not, we will all be doomed because of your lack of compliance.”This is a psycho-spiritual dynamic that, Christ warns us, has the capacity to deceive and lead astray many. He is telling us so that we might be aware of it and so that we might not suffer this fate.But what is the relevance?You may ask, “What is the relevance of these things if we are not living either in AD 70 or in the final moments of history?”I would answer this question in two ways. The pattern Christ describes is for all of history and not just for the very end. We know this because the pattern is observable not just in AD70 but at all times.These discourses are given to us so that we might recognise the signs of the times. As strange as it might sound, we may very well be getting close to the end of history. It will come at some point and so Christ tells us these things so that we might be prepared.To elaborate on this theme, Christ appears to be describing global crises that affect the majority – if not all – of the world’s population. Indeed, this is confirmed when we look at other relevant texts in the Bible. We might look here at Revelation 13, which describes a diabolical beast given authority over every tribe, people, language and nation. “All who dwell on earth will worship it” (Rev. 13:8) we are told. Later in the chapter, a second beast rises out of the earth and is given similar authority. The beast is said to cause all, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead with the mark of the beast, which is the beast’s name and the number of its name. No one can buy or sell unless he has the mark. The number is six hundred and sixty-six (Rev. 13:11-18).One must be cautious with the symbolic imagery here, but Revelation 13 really does seem to be describing the creation of a worldwide economic system. People will be locked out of this system unless they take the mark of the beast upon themselves. Who knows whether this will be a literal mark upon the body or a mark of some other type. But what is clear is that it will apply to everyone in the world and will constitute some pledge of idolatrous loyalty to the beast who has set himself up in the place of God.I mention all of this because we now live in a world in which this sort of thing is possible for the first time. This is true of many things of which Jesus speaks in this passage: global wars, for example. These have only been possible for about a hundred years or so. Worldwide famines: these are perhaps uniquely possible now because of the interconnected global supply chain that could leave nations starving were some economic, climactic, cyber or technological catastrophe to come about.It is only now that a false messiah could arise and appear on billions of screens simultaneously the world over to proclaim his message of universal deliverance. It was not possible before. It is now.And we’ve seen previews of this dynamic: global crises arise concerning disease, the climate, war, and other things - and voices arise demanding conformity and obedience in exchange for safety and deliverance: “Entrust yourself to us completely and we will save you!” Be wary of these sorts of promises. Remember to be discerning, even in the midst of the tumults of our times.What does Jesus tell us to do?Jesus gives us some clear commandments about what we are to do – not just at the end but always. Let’s listen to him.Firstly, “Do not be led astray” and “Do not go after them” (v.8), that is, the false messiahs. I have already observed that fear may lead us to make unwise decisions. This is why Christ says to us, “Do not be terrified” (v.9). Now this doesn’t mean, “Feel no fear” because we cannot totally control what we feel. But it means, “Don’t allow fear to dominate you. Make your decisions based upon faith in Christ and not fear of disaster”.Observe here also that peer pressure plays a role in all of this. It’s very tempting to go with the crowd, especially at a time of crisis. Later on, Jesus warns us that we may even be rejected by our closest family members. Be prepared for this. It is not always the case that we must be in a minority but as followers of Christ we must be prepared to say “No” to the people who are around us because we are saying “Yes” to Jesus – not always but sometimes.How can we tell when we are being led astray? There is no simple answer to this question. But we might observe that when we are told to disobey the commandments of God - or even to worship another God in some idolatrous fashion - then we are in spiritual danger. The deception will probably be more subtle at first but it will tend in this direction.The guarantee is to know who Jesus is, to know what he says, and to be prepared to follow him come what may.I recall here the words of the Apostle Paul in the Book of Romans, ‘Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect’ (Romans 12:2). We can only know what the will of God is if we attend to the revelation of God in Jesus Christ which we learn about primarily through the Holy Scriptures. If you don’t understand the content of the faith then you will have no defence against the deception that arises from the world. That is true now and it will be increasingly true towards the end.Secondly, we must persevere. Christ warns us that persecution will come. Especially at times of global crises but at other times too, the world will place pressure on us to conform. We will be rejected by those closest to us. We will be delivered up to political authorities for Christ and we will be tried before them. Do not be afraid, Jesus tells us: I will be with you and I will give you a mouth and wisdom which your adversaries will not be able to contradict. “You will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But not a hair of your head will perish” (vv.17-18).These are the promises by which we are to hold fast. Christ tells us elsewhere, “Do not fear those who can kill the body but cannot kill the soul” (Matt. 10:28). Rather, put your trust in God who will sustain both according to his power and his steadfast faithfulness.May God give to us a spirit of discernment, that we may be able to know wisdom from error, truth from lies, and the spirit of Jesus Christ from the spirit of his enemies.In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. 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How Blissful the Destitute!
How blissful the destitute!“Blessed are you who are poor,” says Christ in the translation we have just heard. I would like to use a slightly different one:“How blissful the destitute!”The word for “blessed” or “blissful” (makarios) has been translated various ways including “happy”, “fortunate” or “prosperous”. But in my view “blissful” is the best because the original word had connotations of divine or heavenly bliss. Our word “blissful” captures this better than the alternatives.“Blissful” also speaks of a present state. Whatever Christ is speaking of is bliss – joy, happiness, heavenly light in this life now.But it is not long before we run into a problem: “How blissful the destitute!”Again, our translation mentions “the poor”. But “the destitute” captures it much better. For destitution is utter emptiness, devastation, ruin, loss.This is not a state of material poverty but the spiritual and existential reality of one who has realised his true standing in his relationship with God.So the question is: How do bliss and spiritual destitution go together? What is Christ talking about?The answer is that it is in the recognition of our radical need for, and dependence upon, God that we encounter bliss or blessedness. For it is in this recognition that the illusion of the world passes away and we come face-to-face which that which truly is.Let’s consider the different types of destitution that we must acknowledge:Firstly, the destitution of repentance. Sin, most simply, is the wandering of a soul far away from God. Like the Prodigal Son in the far away country. Repentance is the return of the soul to God.Why do we sin? On the deepest level it is because we believe that sin can bring us deeper satisfaction than God. Therefore, repentance is the overturning of this belief and the actions that go with it. It is motivated by desire to find true life, joy and happiness in the place where it can really be found.Be encouraged, therefore, friends, if you feel the conviction of the Holy Spirit, calling you to repentance. This is simply a calling back to God, to the source of all life and hope. Yield to this conviction, knowing that God will have mercy as a Father has compassion on his children, and that he desires for you to know him again.Secondly, we speak about the destitution of soul. This is the recognition that, without God, I have nothing.The great mystical theologian Meister Eckhart put it like this: we are all created by God and exist within God. All things are held in being by God and shine with his radiance. God has given us powers – the ability to live, to breathe, to sense, to act. But, somewhere along the line, we have forgotten that these powers come from God and that, at every moment, they are sustained by him. We are alienated from God not because God is separate from us. Indeed, God cannot be separate from us because he is present everywhere and is sustaining all things continually. Rather, we have forgotten him. We have strayed from him in our minds and in our souls. We imagine that our powers and abilities are all that we are without. We are like a reflection in a mirror that has forgotten its original image.Destitution of soul, then, is the recognition of this reality. It is the recognition that we so often look to the things of this world for ultimate life, joy and peace and that, yet, the world can give us none of these things apart from God.I think here of the discipline of fasting, that is, of not eating anything. In my experience, nothing brings about this realisation more quickly and efficiently than the attempt to fast. It is not only that the body feels hungry but that the soul begins to cry out: “I must have food or I will never be satisfied. There is no happiness for me in this life without it.”And this is true of so many other things also: we tell ourselves that, unless we have this or this or this, then we can never know contentment and peace. And, yet, were we ever to obtain those things, then the joy would be passing and often trivial.Recognising this is a kind of devastation. For example, when fasting, I look at my soul and I see how radically dependent it is upon food, how it cannot be happy without it, and I am dismayed by this, particularly if I thought that I was a very spiritual person who really loved God. For I am not.So we see that the world holds no deep satisfaction for us, that we, as it were, inhabit a vast and empty wasteland with no sustenance, no life, no light, no joy. And, as we recognise this, something comes to birth within us: the desire for that which truly brings these things, the desire for God. And this desire for God leads us to seek him, to know him, to find him. And this is bliss.“Yours is the Kingdom of God”And this is why Jesus tells us that destitution leads to bliss. This is why he says, “Yours is the Kingdom of God.” Later on in this passage he will talk about future, but here he speaks of a present reality: yours is the Kingdom of God.This reminds me very much of another saying of Jesus in Luke 17: “The Kingdom (of God) does not come as something one observes, Nor will persons say, ‘Look: Here it is’ or ‘There it is’ for look: The Kingdom of God is within you.” (Luke 17:20-21)The original language makes it abundantly clear here that Jesus is not speaking of the Kingdom of God among you or in your midst, but within you. It could also be translated “inside of (you)”. Whatever you prefer, the meaning is clear: the Kingdom of God is not a visible reality out there in the world. Nor is it arriving in that way. But it is already a present reality within you. All you have to do is to recognise it.Let go of all that hinders you from realising the Kingdom of God within you and you will find it. Turn not only from sin but from the desire for things apart from, and outside of, God. Turn from the illusion that you are, or that the world is, without him, and you will see him in all things. Yours is the Kingdom of God.A Word on HeavenAnd, yet, even with all of this, one must also say that there is something greater to be realised: “How blissful those who are now hungry, for you shall feast; how blissful those now weeping, for you shall laugh; How blissful you when men hate you and when they exclude you and reproach you and reject your name as something wicked, for the Son of Man’s sake: On that day, rejoice and leap about; for look: Your reward in Heaven is great; for their fathers accordingly did the same things to the prophets.” (Luke 7:21-23)Here Christ speaks of a future reward. Again, it seems that some of these phrases should be interpreted in a spiritual sense: those who are hungry are those who hunger and thirst after the righteousness of God. Those who weep are those who mourn over their sin and their distance from God. Those who are persecuted for Christ are those who have preferred him to the things of the world. And the world has hated them for it.If then you hunger, weep and suffer, rejoice and leap about! Why? Because a great reward, an unimaginably great reward, awaits you. Imagine the world and all that is in it, transfigured by eternal glory, and that all of this, after only a short time, will be yours forever.And one final word…And one final word, since this is All Saints Day. In our reading from the book of Ephesians, the Apostle Paul tells us that the Church is the body of Christ, the fullness of the one who fills all in all. What exactly does Paul mean by this phrase?It seems that Paul is saying two things: firstly that Christ is the fullness of God and that he is everywhere present in all of the universe. But, secondly, that the Church (the gathering, the ekklesia) is the fullness of this fullness. This must mean that the Church is the place where the fullness of Christ’s presence is, at it were, fully realised, established and intensified.Think about that for a moment: this place, filled with normal people like us, with all of our brokenness, our sin, our problems, our mess, this place is the place where the fullest fullness of God is realised. This is the place where Christ is, if you like, on display. This is the place where men and women are drawn to him, to know him, to live for him and by him. What an incredible joy and privilege to be in this place.In you, in me, in us together, the Kingdom of God is present and is coming. Rejoice!In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
How can a person be right with God? - The Pharisee and the Tax Collector
How can a person be right with God? This is one of the most central questions to all of human existence. It’s probably true that most religions are an attempt on some level to answer this question.When considered seriously, human beings know that it is not an easy question to answer. Most of us have some awareness of what Christians would call “sin”. That is, that we fall short of the moral standard that is required of us. And that, in some way, this distances us from God in his holiness and purity.How can be right with him? How can we have communion with him?The Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector speaks to this question in such an important way. Let’s consider it.The PhariseeTo begin, Jesus spoke to “certain persons who were confident in themselves that they were righteous whilst despising everyone else”.The word for righteous relates to the question I just mentioned. It comes from a group of words that is used frequently in the New Testament, the root word of which is dikaiosune. This word relates not only to moral uprightness but to being justified in the sight of God.So these people’s answer to the question of how I can be right with God is essentially through my own personal moral goodness.In this story, the Pharisee enters the Temple with great confidence, standing upright and praying about himself. One of the things he says is, “I fast twice a week and tithe from everything whatsoever that I earn.” Now, it’s true that he thanks God for his wonderful situation but really this comes across as a religious gloss on what is essentially pride in his own religious accomplishments: “Look at how great I am.”And the way that this is made clear is in his attitude to other people: “God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of mankind – rapacious, unjust, adulterous – or even like this tax-collector.”Why compare himself to other people in this way? Simply, because it makes him feel good about himself. I am right; they are wrong. I am good; they are bad. I’m committed; they are lazy. And so on and so on.I have to say that I’ve come across a lot of this sort of thing in the Christian world. Christ obviously understood people’s hearts and could foresee this. Whole denominations of the Christian Church become obsessed with comparing themselves favourably to other Christians. “I thank you, God, that I am not like other men. I’ve got my doctrine straight. I do not compromise over moral issues. I am in the right part of the Christian Church. I am upright in every way and will not have any contact with those who are unclean in my sight.”For anyone on the receiving end, it’s a deeply unpleased and ungracious attitude. It’s amazing how easy we find it to take the teaching and example of Christ and to turn it into fractious, ugly, judgemental and without love, charity, or humility.I should say that I think this is a particularly apt word for those people who consider theological orthodoxy and the tradition of the Church to be important, indeed central, to the faith. This can quite easily turn into the kind of self-righteous Pharisaism that Jesus denounced.The Tax CollectorHaving said that, there are some things that we can do to avoid this kind of nasty religion. Let’s think about the Tax Collector. Jesus tells us that he stood some way off and wouldn’t lift his eyes to heaven and that he beat upon his breast. Even his body language spoke of his awareness of his unworthiness before God.He said, quite simply, “God, grant mercy to me, a sinner.”So, firstly, he recognised the problem: I am a sinner.This is perhaps an unfashionable observation today: we are all sinners. What does this mean? It means that there is a moral law which is grounded in the holiness and perfection of God and which is binding on every single human being alive. And it means that we often fall short of what is required of us in this regard and we frequently therefore encounter feelings of guilt and shame.For some people, that description will be more than familiar. Many people’s lives are beset by guilt and shame – for things done in the past, for habits that one can’t shake in the present. Christian or not, we know that we are falling short. We know that we’re not doing what we should be. But we can’t meet the standard for some reason. We just keep failing.For others, they may be less aware of sin. They may be like the Pharisee: self-righteous and upright in comparison with those they find contemptible. But those who have this attitude are self-deceived. They are sinners too. But they choose not to focus on the areas of their lives and character where they fall short.This is a way of testing what I am saying: think about the greatest moral failure you have in your life. It could be a habit that you can’t shake for reason. Or it could be an instinctive or emotional reaction that you have to something that you can’t seem to stop. We can come to church and get ourselves together for a couple of hours. But what about the rest of the time?As I say, this is true for everyone, including me and including all apparently religious or holy people. I, Fr Jamie Franklin, your priest, am a sinner. I don’t need to go into it all here and now but I could certainly do so. I get things wrong on a daily basis. My wife and my children know this about me. Anyone who knows me well know this about me. I want to do certain things. I want to be a certain way. But the things I want to do and the way I want to be somehow don’t come about for some reason. Perhaps I’m making some slow progress, but, on the whole, I am frequently astounded at my lack of holiness, despite my best efforts. And I am meant to be a priest. I am meant to help others in their faith. And yet I can’t do it myself. What use am I?And perhaps it’s the same for you. Perhaps you have the same voice in your mind: I can’t believe I’m still like this. I’m meant to be a Christian. I’m meant to take the name of Christ and yet still I persist in my rebellion and sin. What could I possibly do or be for God when I am like this?Let me encourage you, friends – or rather let the words of Christ encourage you – there is hope. But this hope does not come from ourselves by making more moral effort. It comes from God. It comes from Christ and the Gospel.This is clearly implied in the prayer of the Tax Collector. “God, grant mercy to me, a sinner.”The Greek word for “grant mercy” or “be merciful” is hilaskomai, which is a word that means some thing like, “expiate” or “make atonement for”.To understand this, let’s go back to that original question: How can I be right before God? One of the central answers that people have come up with in many of the world’s culture and religions is “sacrifice”: I am obviously sinful, but I can atone for my sin by making a sacrifice. That sacrifice might be of food – a libation poured out to the gods – It might be an animal, slaughtered and offered up. In many world cultures the sacrifice has even been that of human beings.The Good News that comes to us from the Gospel is that atonement has been made for our sin. A sacrifice has been offered. This sacrifice is not of food or animals or other people. But this sacrifice has been offered by God himself through Jesus Christ. Our sin is such a serious problem that it required the greatest sacrifice imaginable, which is the sacrifice of God’s own Son, given for us upon the cross.Through the cross, God has purchased our souls for himself. Through the cross, our sin has been removed from us and put upon God’s only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. Through the cross, our unrighteousness has been placed upon him and his righteousness – his rightness with God – has been given to us.So, for the Christian, the answer to the question: How can I be right with God? Is that we can be right with God through the blood of Jesus Christ. Only this great, final, complete and perfect sacrifice is sufficient to atone for the sins of the whole world.So, friends, I stand before you a miserable sinner like everyone else. You are the same as me. And, yet, we can be here together, justified by God’s grace, reconciled to God through his Son, Jesus Christ, without shame, without guilt, without fear, without the need to compare ourselves with others – whether favourably or unfavourably. Our atonement is accomplished; the sacrifice is complete. The Tax Collector returned to his house justified.The Beginning and the WayFriends, let the truth change your hearts. Refresh yourselves in the waters of God’s mercy. One of the most amazing things about the Gospel is that it not only gives you a way to begin, so to speak, a way to come into the presence of God. It gives you the desire and the means to continue striving after holiness. It changes you inside to know that God has shown his love in such a sacrificial and lavish and complete way. The only response can surely be a life laid down in love and service for him: Given all of this, how can I keep from singing his praise? How can I keep from giving my love and my life when he has already given so freely and so completely for me? The message of the Gospel is what changes us, from the inside-out.Two different religions: one of pride, self-righteousness, obsession with rules and appearances; one of humility, dependence upon God’s grace in Christ, a transformation of the deepest depths of the heart so that love may motivate, love may inspire, love may endure.“For everyone who exalts himself with be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
A Humble Faith/A Worker Who Has No Need To Be Ashamed
“Behold, I know that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel…”2 Kings 5:15Naaman the SyrianI’ll start with the story of Namaan, commander of the army of Syria.This was a period of peace between historic enemies Israel and Aram. Namaan was commander of Syria’s armies but a man afflicted by leprosy or a similar skin disease. Through apparent chance, an Israelite girl knew of the prophet Elisha who could heal Naaman.So Naaman, with permission of the king goes to Syria. First taking huge gifts of gold and clothing to the king of Israel, who is powerless and melodramatic.This is contrasted with Elisha, confident in God and without fear.Naaman came to Elisha’s house with his horses and chariots but Elisha would not come out. Sending a messenger saying, “Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored, and you shall be clean.”Imagine the wounded pride of Naaman, commander of the armies of Syria, expecting first the king and then the prophet and getting only a message to demean himself by washing in a foreign river.He was angry, saying, “Behold, I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call upon the name of the LORD his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper. Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better that all the water of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?” So he turned and went away in a rage.In other words, “I was expecting something spectacular. Instead I’m being told to demean myself. If I wanted to a bath, I need not have left my home country.”And yet his servants demonstrated greater spiritual insight in their response to him. Our translation – the English Standard Version – falls very short at this point, giving us almost the exact opposite sense to the original Hebrew. It says that the servants said, “My father, it is a great word the prophet has spoken to you; will you not do it?”Compare this with almost any other translation and you will see the difference. Consider the Revised Standard Version, ‘“My father, if the prophet had commanded you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more, then, when he says to you, “Wash, and be clean?”’This captures the point perfectly: if the prophet had said for you to do something really difficult, you would have done it. You were up for the challenge. But he’s told you to do something easy, so why not give it a try? What’s the worst that can happen? What have you got to lose? Not very much, and yet you’ve got everything to gain.As a modern paraphrase says, ‘“Master, if the prophet had asked you to do something hard and heroic, wouldn’t you have done it? So why not this simple “wash and be clean?””’Well, we know what the answer is of course: pride. I am too good for this simple answer. I am too important. There must be something exceptional I am called to because I am exceptional.And so, a moment of clarity for Naaman, who listened to sense and went and washed in the Jordan seven times and was cleansed.‘Then he returned to the man of God, he and all his company, and he came and stood before him. And he said, “Behold, I know there is no God is all the earth but Israel; So accept now a present from you servant.”This humble obedience led to spiritual revelation and thanksgiving.The Story of the Ten LepersWe see a similar dynamic in the Gospel reading, the story of the ten lepers. They came to Jesus asking for healing and he gave them a simple command: “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” As they were doing it, they were healed.And yet, one came back, a Samaritan, a foreigner, to give thanks to Jesus and praise to God. “Were not ten cleansed? Where are the nine? Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” And Jesus said to him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.”A Humble FaithWhat is the point of these stories? Can we not see ourselves so clearly in the figure of Naaman the Syrian who wanted something spectacular but was in fact called to humble obedience?It is hard to accept perhaps that we are called to the same thing: to repentance, faith in Christ, and obedience to God. Much of the world is not interested in this because they are too hard of heart and proud to accept that they are just like everyone else.But this applies to those in the church also. It is very easy to imagine that the basic message of the Christian faith is too simple and easy, that there must be something more to it, that there must be some intellectual or political component that will be more engaging.Before I criticise this, let me say that Christianity is, of course, deeply intellectually robust. I do not criticise anyone for having an intellectual engagement with the faith. This is quite necessary in many contexts.Nor do I criticise anyone for thinking about the political implications of Christianity. These are important questions and, again, are necessary in certain contexts.However, it is a constant temptation for the Church and for individual Christians to become distracted by an overtly intellectual or academic version of the faith or (and to be honest I think this is a much worse temptation) a political version of it.The attitude appears to me to be something like this: Those unsophisticated Christians may speak about repentance, faith, the Scriptures, the Gospel, eternal life, heaven and hell, and things like this. But I speak about relevant political issues that will make me and my Church appear more relevant in the eyes of modern people.This is a terrible spiritual mistake and it can leads to a deadening of lively and real faith.Perhaps I can put it like this: you may have a Christian politics; you should not have a political Christianity.The cart comes before the horses: repentance, humility, faith, obedience, day-to-day walk with God in holy devotion. All of this first. Political implications a distant second and much of the time not at all.“A worker who has no need to be ashamed…”Let’s finish with some words from our reading from 2 Timothy: ‘Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.”‘A worker who has no need to be ashamed’ – This idea crops up in Paul’s letters frequently: don’t be ashamed.Why does he feel the need to keep saying this? Because the world will try to shame you. It’s one of the ways the enemy will try and dampen your faith and ultimately destroy it. If he can’t get you to walk away from the Lord. He will make you feel a bit silly, so that you’ll pipe down a bit.But you, do your best to present yourself to God as one who has no reason to be ashamed. Like Naaman, humble before yourself before God through obedience and faith and you find healing, restoration and peace. Only die to your pride so that the power of God can live in you.In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com
Faith That Moves Mulberry Trees
“Behold, his soul is puffed up; it is not upright within him,but the righteous shall live by faith.”Habakkuk 2:4The Faith that Moves Mulberry TreesToday I’m going to be talking on the subject of faith: a small word with immense importance.We begin with our reading from Luke’s Gospel. The context is that Jesus has just told his disciples that they must continually forgive those who sin against them.“Increase our faith!” they say. In other words: this is extremely hard. We will need more faith in order to be able to do it.Jesus’ response: “If you had faith like the grain of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea’, and it would obey you”.The point is not about moving mulberry trees but that forgiving your enemies is only the very beginning of what faith can accomplish. Think much bigger than that.The disciples will do great things for the Kingdom of God, taking the Gospel all over the world and preaching to all sorts of people. And they would die for the faith eventually.We too can accomplish great things for God if we have faith. But faith is crucial to all of it.So this request – Increase our faith! – is a good one for them and all of us.What is Faith?“What is faith?” Here I look to the words of the Apostle Paul to his young disciple Timothy:‘I am reminded of your sincere faith…For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God…’ 2 Tim. 1:6Firstly, faith is a gift of God. It does not come from us initially but is an invitation to believe. We are invited. He offers the gift and we choose to respond or not.This is important. Paul says that God ‘saved us and called us to a holy calling not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began’ 2 Tim. 1:9.The glory belongs to God because he initiates and he empowers the response. Remember that we are called by grace and not according to our own brilliance – far from it.Secondly, faith is a response to God. There are two parts to this, both reflected in the Greek word used for faith in the New Testament – pistis.Faith is believing and trusting in the promises of God. Hebrews says, ‘Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen’ (Heb. 11:1). There is an intellectual component to faith.We have faith that God is who he says he is and that he will accomplish his word. Specifically, that he will forgive us for our sins, reconcile us to himself and give us eternal life through Jesus.But “pistis” can also be translated “faithfulness”, which indicates an ongoing life of trust and commitment.When we turn from sin we are exercising faith. When we adopt godly habits and obey God’s commandments, we are exercising faith.Paul was telling Timothy: keep preaching, keep pastoring, keep ministering. This was how he exercised faith.Slightly different for each of us: keep demonstrating the love of Christ to your spouse or in your workplace, keep sharing the Gospel with others when you have the chance, keep working for the Kingdom of God. There are many ways we are called to exercise faith.But see how faith is two things: belief and commitment. Without this commitment the belief part doesn’t mean very much. Like saying, “I love my wife” but never doing anything to demonstrate that love. Our commitment is a sign of our faith.What does faith result in?Paul says, ‘God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control. Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord…but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God’ 2 Tim. 1:7The result of faith: freedom from fear. Fear of insult or rejection, loss or the future, failure and disappointment. Why? Because we look to the power of God to accomplish his purposes.Paul often mentions the resurrection in the context of faith: ‘(the power of God)…which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Saviour Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel’ 2 Tim. 1:11In other words: if God has already achieved this for us, then he can and will do everything else necessary.The result of faith: power, love, self-control, the capacity to share in suffering for the Gospel. Faith transforms us. As we look to God through Jesus, we are changed more and more into the image of Christ.An example: when we look to certain people we become like them. Think of YouTube: if we look at fitness influencers, we think about fitness more and take on their values. Same for eg gardeners, beauty stylists, or musicians etc. The thing that look at is the thing that we become like.If we look to Christ, we will become like him, having power, love, self-control and the ability to suffer in obedience to God.How do we get more faith?This leads us back to the disciples’ original request: Increase our faith! How do we get more faith to serve God and accomplish great things?The Apostle Paul uses a lovely image: ‘Fan into flame the gift of God.’ A fire inside that needs to be tended.This is an invitation to the spiritual life, which is varied in its manifestations. But the principles are the same. It begins with looking. It continues with acting. And it is further strengthened through reflection.Looking – Looking is about reflecting upon the things of God and speaking to God in prayer. We do this when we come together and alone and in smaller groups. Each time we pray, meditate on Scripture, spend time in silence, receive Holy Communion, we are looking to God, reminding ourselves of his promises, and communing with him in spirit.This is where you get the petrol in the tank. If you don’t know how, there are people and materials out there from which to learn.Acting – Simply: do what God calls you to do day-by-day in faith. For me, it’s writing sermons and other things, pastoring people, taking services, being a good husband and father, and a few other things. What is it for you? How might doing these things in faith change your perspective on them? Might not be immediately clear. Reflect upon it. Ask God to show you.Reflecting – Something Paul does all the time. Not just acting and seeing God come through, but noting his faithfulness.Later in 2 Tim, at the end of his life: ‘The Lord stood by me and strengthened me, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it. So I was rescued from the lion’s mouth. The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom. To him be the glory for ever and ever. Amen.’ 2 Tim. 4:17-18.Look back on times when you have needed to trust God. See how he has provided for you. Many times like this for me: not knowing next steps, worried about money, worried about challenges. And, yet, I’m here. I’m okay. God has provided thus far and he will do so again until the end.“Lord, increase our faith!” A wonderful prayer. By looking, acting and reflecting, let’s put it into practice.In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit holytrinitywinchester.substack.com