When Churches Argue (Listening for God in a divided church)

There is a particular kind of argument that happens in families. You will recognise it instantly. It usually begins with a sentence that sounds perfectly calm and reasonable. The sentence is this: “I’m not arguing…but”. Which is normally a reliable indicator that an argument has already begun.

The remarkable thing about family arguments is that everyone involved is absolutely convinced that they are the one person in the room who is being perfectly reasonable. Everyone else, obviously, has gone quite mad.

If you have ever sat through a PCC meeting, you will recognise the phenomenon immediately. One person is explaining the obvious solution, another person is explaining why that solution will destroy the parish forever, and a third person is quietly wondering whether this might be the moment to put the kettle on.

The Gospel this morning begins with an argument. Jesus has just cast a demon out of someone. Which you might think would be the sort of thing everyone could agree is good news. A person is healed. A life is restored. A burden is lifted.

But instead it triggers a theological dispute. Some people say, “This must be the work of God.” Others say, “No, clearly he’s in league with the devil.” And a few stand at the back asking for another miracle, just to be absolutely certain.

At which point Jesus says the rather famous line: “Every kingdom divided against itself becomes a desert, and house falls on house.” In another Gospel account of the same story, he says: “a house divided against itself cannot stand.”

It is one of those sentences that sounds very clear… until you start applying it to real life. Because if unity were easy, the Church would have managed it by now.

Christians sometimes talk as though division is a modern tragedy. But if you read the New Testament carefully, you discover that Christians have been disagreeing with each other since about half past Easter. Paul argues with Peter. Churches argue about circumcision. Entire congregations fall out over food, worship, and leadership. If there had been parish magazines in the first century, the letters page would have been unprintable.

By the time John writes his Gospel, he remembers Jesus praying, “that they may all be one.” Which is a beautiful prayer. But the fact that Jesus prayed it, and especially that John included it around 70 years later, suggests something important: unity was already fragile.

Human beings are extraordinarily good at disagreement.

Which brings us to Jeremiah. Jeremiah is speaking to people who are very sure they know what God wants. They have the Temple. They have the traditions. They have the religious system. Everything is tidy and well organised. And then Jeremiah, annoying, interfering, meddling Jeremiah, stands up and says something deeply inconvenient.

“Listen up,” says Jeremiah. “God says this: listen to my voice.”

Not my archive.

Not my carefully preserved system of dusty writings.

My voice.

And that is interesting, because a voice is something living. A voice moves. A voice interrupts you halfway through explaining why you are right. A voice sometimes calls you into places you had no intention of going.

Jeremiah says the people refused to listen. Instead, he says, they “went backward and not forward.” Which is a wonderfully human description of religious life.

Because the great temptation in religion is not wickedness. It is certainty: the comforting belief that we already know everything God is ever going to say — about everything, to every society, and in every new situation humanity encounters.

The Gospel story pushes that even further. Jesus tells a strange little parable about a strong man guarding his house. Everything is secure. Everything is locked down. The system works perfectly. Until someone stronger turns up and rearranges the furniture.

The Kingdom of God, it seems, has a habit of doing that: just when we think the house is tidy, God moves the chairs.

Now Christians today disagree about many things. Some of those disagreements are currently very visible in the Anglican world. At the moment, there are people in different parts of our Communion trying to decide what faithfulness looks like — and in some cases even building new structures in order to guard what they believe is the truth.

And it would be very easy — and very satisfying — to stand here and declare that our side has understood God perfectly while everyone else has tragically missed the point. But history makes that rather difficult.

Because Christians have been absolutely certain before. The Church was once absolutely certain about slavery. Absolutely certain about the role of women. Absolutely certain about many things which, over time, the Church slowly — and sometimes painfully — reconsidered. That does not mean truth changes with fashion. But it might mean that God’s voice is sometimes still speaking.

And sometimes — rather inconveniently — that voice sounds like someone we disagree with.

So perhaps the deeper question behind today’s Gospel is not simply “Who is right?” Perhaps the question is: where do we see the work of God bringing life?

Because Jesus says something very interesting in the middle of the argument. “If it is by the finger of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.”

In other words: look at the fruit. Look at the healing. Look at the freedom. Look at the life appearing where there used to be fear. And then ask yourself: could God be at work here?

Let me finish with a small parable.

Imagine a large, old house. The sort of house that has been lived in for centuries. Every generation has added something: a room here, a staircase there, a slightly puzzling cupboard that nobody quite remembers building.

Now imagine the family living in that house. They love it deeply. They know every corner of it. They have strong opinions about how the furniture should be arranged. And every so often, someone says, “I think the house needs to change a little.”

At which point half the family say, “Yes, because the house must keep growing.” And the other half say, “Absolutely not, because the house must be preserved.”

And the interesting thing is this. Both groups love the same house. Both believe they are protecting it. The real danger comes when they decide the other half are not family anymore. Because once that happens, the house stops being a home.

Jesus does not promise us a Church without disagreement. But he does keep reminding us that the Kingdom of God is bigger than our arguments.

And if God still has a voice, then none of us has the final paragraph yet. Which may be slightly unsettling. But it is also hopeful. Because the God who keeps speaking is also the God who keeps gathering people together — even people who occasionally argue like family.

And if the Kingdom of God can survive two thousand years of bishops and people arguing (and the occasional PCC meeting)…

…it may yet survive us Anglicans. Amen.

The problem with buckets

Reading:  John 4 - The Samaritan woman at the well.

There are some conversations you expect to have in life, and some you really don’t.

You expect to talk to the person behind the checkout. You expect to talk to the neighbour over the fence.  You expect, occasionally, to talk to someone who wants to tell you at length about their new knee.  Every congregation contains at least eight people with a knee story. Sometimes they travel in threes and compare them.

But there are also conversations that catch you completely off guard.  And the Gospel this morning begins with one of those.

Jesus is tired. That’s how the story begins. Not preaching. Not walking on water. Not performing miracles. Just tired. Sitting down by a well in the heat of the day.  Which is already encouraging for those of us who occasionally arrive at church feeling slightly underpowered.  If you’ve ever sat down in a pew thinking, Honestly Lord, I’m running on about forty per cent this morning, take comfort: our Lord once began a significant moment of evangelism by sitting down because he needed a rest.

Then a woman arrives to draw water.  Now to us that may sound fairly ordinary. People meeting at wells, chatting about hydration. But in the social world of the time this was about as awkward as it gets. 

First problem: Jesus is a Jew. She is a Samaritan. And Jews and Samaritans did not get along.  Second problem: she is a woman, and men didn’t normally strike up conversations with women they didn’t know.  Third problem: she has, shall we say, a complicated reputation.

So when Jesus opens with “Give me a drink,” the woman is basically saying what everyone listening to the story is already thinking. “Hang on… why are you talking to me?”  And Jesus replies with something mysterious.

“If you knew the gift of God… you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.”  And the woman replies with what must surely be one of the most gloriously practical lines in the whole of scripture:

“Sir… you have no bucket.”  It’s magnificent.  Jesus is speaking in sweeping spiritual poetry about eternal life.  And she’s essentially saying, “Yes, dear, lovely idea — but logistically you appear extremely under-equipped.  You have no bucket. The well is deep.”

Which is the Bible’s gentle reminder that whenever God starts talking about eternal life, at least one human being will immediately start worrying about the exact equipment required.  Church history is basically the story of that continuing.

God speaks about life. We start worrying about buckets. And to be fair, churches have always been quite good at buckets. Committees for buckets. Policies about buckets. Possibly even a subcommittee for the appropriate storage of buckets.

Somewhere in every church cupboard there is a mysterious bucket whose purpose nobody remembers but nobody dares throw away. You know the cupboard I mean. Three flower vases, half a banner pole, something left over from a harvest display in 1998, and a plastic bucket that looks faintly reproachful.

Nobody knows what it’s for. But nobody throws it away either. Because the moment you do someone, usually called Sandra, will say, “That was for Maundy Thursday. You idiot”

But Jesus isn’t talking about equipment.  He’s talking about thirst.  The deep human thirst that sits inside all of us.  The thirst for meaning.  The thirst for forgiveness. The thirst to be known and not rejected.

And here is the astonishing thing.  Jesus offers this living water not to the respectable religious insiders. He offers it to someone on the edge. A Samaritan. A woman. Someone with a complicated story.

In other words — exactly the sort of person religion sometimes quietly hopes will slip in at the back and leave before the notices; preferably without messing up our nice tidy liturgy. 

But this woman becomes the first evangelist in the story. She runs back to the town and says, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done!”  Which, when you think about it, is quite a risky marketing strategy.  Most of us would prefer that Jesus remain politely unaware of several chapters of our life.

If Jesus stood up after coffee and said, “Right then — shall we just have a quick review of everybody’s search history?” the congregation would empty faster than the biscuit plate at a committee meeting.

But the woman has experienced something extraordinary. She has been fully seen… and still welcomed. Fully known… and still loved. And that changes everything.

Because the problem in this story isn’t really the bucket. The problem is the container.  Jesus says the water he gives will become “a spring… gushing up to eternal life.” It doesn’t stay politely in the bucket.  The woman is thinking about drawing water. Jesus is talking about becoming a source of life. God offers living water. And we say, “Yes, but will it fit in the bucket I brought with me?”

Will it fit into my preconceptions, my traditions, the things I’m quite sure about even without evidence.  And the answer, of course, is no. 

Because buckets hold a fixed amount.  The life of God does not. It flows.  Which, if we are honest, is both wonderful and slightly alarming.  Because we rather like containers in church life. We like things organised. Contained. Predictable. Preferably with a rota.  But the life of God has a habit of spilling over the edges. And perhaps that is why this story ends the way it does. 

The woman speaks.  The townspeople come. They listen. And they say, “We know that this is truly the Saviour of the world.” And it all began with a tired man sitting by a well and asking for a drink.

Which tells us something important about the way God works. Not always through grand speeches. Not always through dramatic miracles. Very often through ordinary conversations.  Conversations at wells, or in our case, around urns and washing up bowls.  Through moments of honesty. Through people discovering that they are known — completely — and still loved.  And perhaps that is the invitation of Lent. To recognise our own thirst. Because the truth is we all carry buckets.  Buckets of worry. Buckets of regret. Buckets of trying to prove that we are good enough.

And Jesus says, very gently, “You don’t have to keep hauling those forever.”  There is another kind of water. A deeper life. A spring that does not run dry. And it very often begins exactly where this story began. With an unexpected conversation at the well.

Amen.

 

Dragons, daffodils, and doing the little things

Reading:  John 3.1-17

If you ever want to feel slightly inadequate as a preacher, just schedule St David’s Day in Lent and then put Cwm Rhondda at the end of the service. There is simply no competing with “Bread of Heaven” sung at full volume by people who secretly wish they’d been born in the valleys. 

It is, however, a good reminder that the 40 days of Lent do not, technically, include Sundays.  Tradition gives us permission to rejoice, amid our Lenten fasts.  So, when the time comes…sing!  Don’t hold back!  Today is for St David — Dewi Sant — patron saint of Wales. A man whose most famous recorded sermon ended with the words: “Be joyful. Keep the faith. Do the little things.”

Do the little things.

Which is faintly disappointing, isn’t it? We expect a Celtic superhero. Flaming sermons. He’s the only British-born patron saint in Britain. So I expected him to say ‘plant daffodils on every hillside!  I want a sea of daffodils!  A custard lake of daffodils!.  Or dragons.  Get out there and slay those dragons of anger and greed! And…for God’s sake, win the Six Nations, for once…!

Instead what do we get…we get… “Do the little things.”

Though, if you’ve been following Welsh rugby recently, “do the little things” might actually be excellent advice.  Because the little things matter. The missed tackle. The forward pass. The dropped ball two metres from the line. Entire matches have been lost on the small stuff.

And Lent is the season where God gently says to us: the small stuff matters.  In Genesis this morning, Abram hears God say: “Go.” Leave your country. Your security. Your father’s house. Go to the land I will show you. And what does Abram do? He goes. There is no committee. No feasibility study. No laminated vision document. Just: God says go. Abram goes.

It’s such a small sentence. “So Abram went.”  But that small obedience changes the history of the world.

Then we meet Nicodemus. Poor Nicodemus. He comes to Jesus by night — which is John’s polite way of saying he doesn’t want to be seen. He is cautious. Curious. Slightly anxious. A religious professional who realises that something is happening that he cannot quite control.

And Jesus says to him, “You must be born from above.”  Or, in other translations, ‘born again by the Spirit’.  But what Nicodemus hears is this: “You must climb back into the womb.”

Jesus, of course, means: “You must allow God to begin again in you.” And Nicodemus — very humanly — says: “How can these things be?”

Which is the question of Lent.

How can these things be?  How can a comfortable life be left behind? How can a grown adult be born again? How can water and Spirit make a new heart?  How can God love the world this much?

“God so loved the world…”  Not God so tolerated the world. Not God so rolled his eyes at the world.  God so loved the world…that he…what?  Sent an army of avenging angels to clear up the place?  No.  Did he send lightning bolts to blow up the Roman senate?  No.  Did he send earthquakes, fire, floods, to punish the evil doers.  No.  He sent a baby…a little thing.  And through that little thing, he changed everything.

And here’s the thing. When St David said, “Do the little things,” he was not advocating small ambition. He was pointing to daily faithfulness.

The small choices.  The quiet prayer before you answer that email that has enraged you. The generosity given, without counting cost.  The gift of time to a person who just needs someone to listen, for five minutes.  The courage to say, “I don’t understand — but I’m willing to be taught.”

Abram’s obedience was a little thing.  Nicodemus’ night-time visit was a little thing.  A baby born in Bethlehem was, outwardly, a very little thing.  But, as that famous poem reminds us, all the Kings that ever ruled, all the navies that ever sailed; none have had the impact on the world of that one, solitary life – lifted up, as Jesus says, like the serpent in the wilderness.  Lifted up, on his cross of sacrifice, that all may look to him and draw inspiration.

Here’s another thing…from that little conversation with Nicodemus, in the dark of the night.  Jesus says “the wind blows where it chooses. You hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes.”  The Holy Spirit is like Welsh weather. You think you’ve understood it, and then it shifts entirely.

You cannot manage the Spirit. You cannot scrum it into submission. You cannot put it on a spreadsheet. You can only open yourself to it.  And that is deeply uncomfortable for respectable church people. 

We would quite like to stay as we are, thank you. Mildly improved, perhaps. A little more spiritual. Slightly kinder. But fundamentally the same.  But Jesus says: No. You have to be born again. Born from above. Let God re-make you.  Which sounds ever so dramatic. It implies, to some ears, dramatic experiences of being filled up with God, of speaking in strange tongues. And that may happen, for some.  But, really, for most people, it begins with little things.

Turning up to worship when it would be easier to settle in with the Sunday papers.

Lighting a candle with a child and remembering that God’s love is real.

Praying for people on the prayer list — even the ones whose names we struggle to pronounce.

Singing a Welsh hymn with gusto even if we are from Hampshire.

Little things.

And here is the deep encouragement of St David’s Day in Lent: You do not have to save the world. That’s God’s job.  You just have to look for where God is already at work, and join in.

You do not have to fix the Church. Christ is already building it. Patiently.  And inviting you to take part.

You do not have to win every match.  Though if anyone from the Welsh Rugby Union is listening, prayer is available after the service.

What you are invited to do — what I am invited to do — is this:

Go, when God says go.
Listen, when God prompts you to listen.
Give, when holding on to your money would be safer.

Ask your questions, like Nicodemus.
Allow yourself to be re-made.
And do the little things.

Because the kingdom of God does not usually arrive with dragons or seas of daffodils.  It arrives in obedience.  In the small things.  In baptismal water. In bread and wine. In daily faithfulness.

And one day — perhaps when the roof nearly lifts during Cwm Rhondda — we glimpse that Kingdom.  Not because we have been magnificent.  But because God so loved the world. And still does. Amen.

Knocking on heaven's door (without the password)

Readings:  Isaiah 55.6-9 and Matthew 7.7-12 (Seeking the Lord)

There is a version of Christianity — we’ve met it — where prayer is essentially a customer feedback form sent to heaven.

“Dear God, I note that my current circumstances are suboptimal.
Please amend.
In Jeeeesus’ name.”

And if nothing changes, we assume either a technical glitch or insufficient spiritual enthusiasm.

But then Jesus says something that sounds beautifully simple:

If your child asks for bread, will you give them a stone?

It’s a tender image. God as Father. You as child. Bread, not gravel.

And let’s just pause there — because that image has done enormous good in the world.

For many people, the idea that ultimate reality is not indifferent, not mechanical, not cold — but somehow personal and good — has been life-saving. In its day, this was a radically different picture of God than one who brooded on a mountain, or dwelt in a Holy of Holies, presumably peering out from behind the Temple curtain to check on humanity once in a while.

But — and here’s where we go gently — it is still an image.

Jesus did not hand out a metaphysics textbook. He told stories.

When he says “Father,” he is not offering a biological description of God. He is offering relational language. Poetry. Analogy.

Because how exactly do you describe the source and sustainer of all being?

“Ground of Being” doesn’t quite work in the Lord’s Prayer.

“Our Ground of Being, who art…”

It lacks… warmth.

And yet, theologians like Paul Tillich have been absolutely right to say that God is not a large invisible man in the sky rearranging parking spaces for the benefit of the faithful.

And thinkers like John D. Caputo remind us that God may be less a cosmic puppeteer and more an insistent call — a deep, instinctive summons toward justice, mercy, love.

Which sounds terribly abstract — until you realise you’ve felt it.

That tug toward forgiveness you didn’t want to offer.
That nudge toward generosity that made no financial sense.
That uncomfortable pull toward truth.

If that is “God,” then God is not pushing pieces around a chessboard. God – or what we mean when we speak of God - is drawing something out of you.

Now — before anyone’s pulse quickens — this does not mean Jesus was wrong.

It means he was speaking in the only language human beings can understand instinctively: the language of relationship. He speaks of Father not because God has elbows and a beard, but because love is the closest word we have to what God may actually be like.

And here’s the key: whether you imagine God as loving Father… or as Ground of Being… or an ethical insistence pressing on the edges of your conscience… the vending machine model of God still doesn’t work. Because in none of those visions is God a mechanism. In none of them is prayer a lever you pull to release snacks. That was what the Greek and Roman gods were like. You had to appease them, impress them, sacrifice to them, beg them. And if you were lucky, they might deign to answer your request with a wave of a divine digit.

Ask. Seek. Knock.

In a “Father” framework, that is the child learning trust.

In a “Ground of Being” framework, that is the creature aligning with reality.

In a Caputo-style framework, that is the human heart responding to the insistence of love.

Different metaphors. Same surrender. And this, perhaps, is the real shift.

The question is not, “Can I get God to do what I want?” The question is, “What is God doing in me?” Because if God is a loving Father, then perhaps unanswered prayer is not neglect but formation.

If God is the Ground of Being, then perhaps prayer is not persuasion but participation in deeper reality.

If God is ethical, holy insistence within us all, then perhaps prayer is how we become more fully human.

And suddenly “in the name of Jesus” (or, as it is often pronounced, desperately, passionately, “Jeeesus”), well that becomes less a password, less of a magic word, a divine abracadabra… and more a direction.

The direction towards self-giving love.
The direction of trust.
The direction that says, “Not my will” — not because I am crushed, but because I am being widened.

Now, I realise these are big thoughts. Some of you are thinking, “I only came for bread and wine, not metaphysics.”

Fair enough.

But even if you hold tightly to the image of God as Father who knows your needs — and many of you do — notice what Jesus actually emphasises.

Not control.
Not technique.
But trust.

Ask.

Which means you are not self-sufficient. You need others, you need God. God and neighbour are both essential for us.

Seek.

Which means you have not arrived. You’re still looking, still on a journey, never quite ‘there’.

Knock.

Which means the door is not yours to command. However we conceive of God — Father, Ground, Insistence — prayer is not about getting the universe to rearrange itself on our timetable. It is about becoming people who can live within - and live with - a love deeper than our preferences.

And that, frankly, is far more radical than getting the job, the healing, or the parking space.

Though I still pray about parking spaces.

In the name of Jeeeesus.

Amen.

 

Chocolate Isn’t the Problem

A sermon for Choral Evensong, on the 1st Sunday of Lent 
 
Readings:  Psalm 50.1–15, Deuteronomy 6.4–9, 16–end, Luke 15.1–10

I have a small confession to make. Every year, without fail, on the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday, I find myself in the same spiritual crisis. What shall I give up?  Chocolate? Heroic, but foolish. The clergy should not be making themselves irritable in March. Social media? Possibly virtuous, but awkward when one’s parish life seems to happen there. Beer after Evensong? Now we are into dangerous ecclesiology.

Lent, for many of us, becomes a sort of holy self-improvement scheme. A sanctified New Year’s resolution. We give up something trivial, feel faintly proud for a fortnight, forget on day sixteen, and console ourselves with a hot cross bun.  And yet Psalm 50 arrives tonight like a bucket of cold water.

“The Lord, the most mighty God, has spoken…

Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving…

Call upon me in the day of trouble.’”

It was a surprise to some of the Temple crowd to learn that God is not short of goats. God is not pacing heaven saying, “If only they would give up chocolate, I could finally redeem the world.” The Psalm is almost comical in its divine exasperation. “If I were hungry, I would not tell you.” The cattle on a thousand hills are already God’s. The ritual is not the point.

And that is where Lent becomes dangerous. Because it is far easier to adjust our diet than to adjust our heart. It is far easier to give up Instagram than to give up resentment. Far easier to renounce sugar than to renounce superiority. Much easier to “rend our garments” than to rend our hearts.

Then we hear Moses in Deuteronomy: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.” Not with your occasional dietary tweak. With all your heart.

And then the instruction to bind these words on your hand, fix them on your forehead, write them on your doorposts. In other words, let this love soak into your habits, your conversations, your domestic life. Let it be so woven into you that you don’t perform religion — you breathe it.

But even here we are warned: “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.” Which is what we subtly do when we treat Lent as a spiritual transaction. “Right, God. I’ll give up crisps. In return, could you make my life tidier?” It becomes a bargain. A contract. A small religious bribe.

Psalm 50 will have none of it. God does not need our offerings. God desires our trust. “Call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall honour me.” Not “Perform for me.” Not “Impress me.” Trust me.

And then — beautifully — Luke 15.

Tax collectors and sinners are coming near to listen to Jesus. Which tells you something already. They are not frightened of him. They are drawn. Meanwhile the respectable religious professionals are muttering. “This fellow welcomes sinners.”

And Jesus responds, not with a lecture on self-denial, but with a story. A shepherd who leaves ninety-nine sheep to find one. A woman who turns her house upside down for a single coin. And when they find what was lost? They throw a party.

Notice what is not in the story. The sheep does not say, “I promise to give up grass for Lent.” The coin does not pledge moral reform. The movement begins with God’s searching love. With divine initiative. With grace that goes out into the dark.  If Lent is anything, it is an invitation to stop pretending that we are the shepherd. We are not the ones orchestrating our own salvation through well-chosen deprivations. We are the ones who get lost. We are the coin under the sofa. We are the sheep who wander off because something shiny caught our attention.  And the good news — the genuinely destabilising news — is that God comes looking.

So perhaps this Lent the question is not “What shall I give up?” but “Where am I hiding?”

Where have I drifted into self-sufficiency? Where have I become performative in my faith? Where have I been content with the garment rather than the heart?  Because when the Psalm says, “Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving,” it is not prescribing a liturgical flourish. It is pointing to a posture. Gratitude instead of bargaining. Trust instead of transaction. Love instead of performance.

And in a parish like ours — with choirs gathered tonight to sing, with music filling stone and timber — there is something especially pointed here. The beauty of worship is not a display piece for God. God is not sitting in the stalls with a clipboard marking our intonation. Worship is our response to being found.   We sing because we have been searched for. We pray because we have been addressed. We gather because we have been gathered.

So by all means, if you wish, give up chocolate. Or take up prayer. Or log off something noisy. But do not imagine that these are the currency of heaven.  The real work of Lent is quieter and braver. To allow God to turn the house upside down in us. To allow old assumptions to be shifted, dusty corners exposed, small lost parts of ourselves recovered. To let the Shepherd carry us, rather than insisting we know the way.  Rend your hearts, not your garments.

Because the God who speaks in Psalm 50, who commands love in Deuteronomy, who searches in Luke 15 — that God is not hungry for your sacrifice.  He is searching for you.  And when he finds you — and he will — there will be singing.  Which, on a Come and Sing Sunday, feels exactly right. Amen.

 

The Stone in our Hand - A sermon for the beginning of Lent

Readings: Joel 2.1-2, 12-17, Psalm 51, and John 8.1-11

There is something very bracing about this liturgy.  We have sung, “Have mercy on us, Lord, for we have sinned.” We have prayed, “We have wounded your love and marred your image in us.” Shortly, we shall hear the words, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Ash Wednesday – or in our case, Ash Thursday – does not flatter us. It strips us down. It takes away our pretensions. It reminds us that without God we are dust and ashes.  And yet, if we are not careful, we can hear all of this in a very narrow way. As though sin were simply a matter of my private moral failures. My impatience. My sharp tongue. My envy. My laziness.

Those things matter. Of course they do. Psalm 51 is deeply personal: “Against you only have I sinned.” The woman in the Gospel is told, “Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.” There is no escaping personal responsibility. But the Gospel reading refuses to let us stop there.

Because when the scribes and Pharisees drag that woman into the Temple courts, what we are seeing is not simply one woman’s moral lapse. We are seeing a system.

For a start…where is the man? Adultery is not a solo activity. The Law of Moses, which they quote so confidently, required both parties to be held accountable. And yet only she is paraded in public, humiliated, weaponised as a theological test case.

This is not just personal sin. It is institutional sin. It is a structure of power in which a group of religious men can imagine that stoning a woman in the street is an act of righteousness.  Jesus does not excuse the woman. He does not say, “Oh well, it doesn’t matter.” But his anger – his challenge – is directed first at the crowd. “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone.”

He exposes not only their hypocrisy, but the machinery of accusation itself.

And that is where Joel speaks with such urgency. “Blow the trumpet in Zion… sanctify a fast… gather the people.” This is not a call to a few individuals to tidy up their private spiritual lives. It is a summons to a nation. “Rend your hearts and not your clothing.” Even the priests are to weep between the vestibule and the altar.

Ashes, then, are not only about my temper or my prayerlessness. They are about the ways in which we participate – knowingly or unknowingly – in systems that diminish others.  If we are honest, that feels uncomfortably close to home.

We live in a nation where foodbanks are no longer an emergency measure but an embedded feature of community life. Where the language used about refugees can make them sound less than human. Where economic decisions made far away ripple down into real anxiety for families here in Havant.

On an international scale, we inhabit a world in which war is once again spoken of casually, almost as background noise. Where whole populations are displaced. Where the climate crisis – which affects the poorest first and worst – is discussed endlessly and addressed hesitantly.

None of us, individually, may have intended any of that. But we are part of it. We vote. We consume. We benefit from structures that advantage some and disadvantage others.

Ash Wednesday asks not only, “What have I done wrong?” It asks, “What are we part of?”  And that can feel overwhelming. Because if sin is structural as well as personal, what can we possibly do?

The answer is not despair. Nor is it self-righteousness. The crowd in the Gospel had plenty of that already.  The answer is repentance – but repentance understood properly. Not grovelling. Not vague guilt. But a turning.  “Return to me with all your heart,” says the Lord in Joel. “Rend your hearts and not your clothing.”

To rend your heart is to allow it to be broken open. To allow the suffering of others to disturb you. To refuse the easy stone.

On a national level, that might mean refusing dehumanising language. It might mean paying attention to policies and priorities. It might mean asking hard questions about where our money goes, what our pensions invest in, how our habits affect the earth.

On a parish level, it certainly means creating a community in which nobody is paraded in shame. Where those who fail are not turned into cautionary tales. Where safeguarding is real, not performative. Where power is handled gently.

And on a deeply personal level, it means looking at the stone in our own hand. The sharp comment. The silent complicity. The convenient blindness.

When Jesus bends down and writes in the dust, we are not told what he writes. Perhaps that is deliberate. Because the dust is where we all begin. “Remember that you are dust.”  But dust, in the Scriptures, is also where God kneels to create. Into dust he breathes his Spirit. From dust he raises new life.

So when we come forward to receive these ashes, we are not simply confessing that we are sinners. We are acknowledging that we are part of something broken – and that we long to be part of something healed.

The crowd walked away, one by one, beginning with the elders. The machinery of accusation fell silent.

And there, in the dust, stood a woman who had encountered mercy.

May our repentance this Lent be large enough to match that mercy. Personal, yes. But also communal. Not only about our private failings, but about the kind of world we are helping to build.

And may the mark of ash upon our foreheads not be a badge of private piety, but a sign that we have laid down our stones.  Amen

It Is Good… But We May Not Remain

Readings: Exodus 24.12-end and Matthew 17.1-9

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There is something deeply reassuring about Peter.  Because whenever something extraordinary happens, Peter says the wrong thing.  Just like me.  I do that. 

Jesus is transfigured before him. His face shines like the sun. Moses and Elijah appear. The cloud of divine glory overshadows them. The voice of God speaks.  And Peter says, essentially: “Shall I put up some tents?”  It is the spiritual equivalent of standing gazing in awe at the Northern Lights and then someone asking if anyone’s brought sandwiches.

But before we laugh at Peter too quickly, we should admit something uncomfortable: Peter is doing exactly what we would do.  When something is beautiful, we, also try to freeze it.  When something feels holy, we try to contain it.  When something gives us goosebumps, we want it to last.  It’s why certain TV shows last for season after season.  Most of them are pretty run of the mill stuff.  They are Strictly-speaking, a bunch of people dancing round a floor.  Skillfully, beautifully.  But we’ve seen it all before.  But just occasionally, there will be a transcendent moment – when a personal history of struggle is conquered.  A blind dancer who triumphs.  A young woman with Downs Syndrome who shows she’s at least as good as everyone ‘normal’  Or someone who thought they were out gets a 10 from the most critical judge.  That’s what we want to experience.  That’s what keeps us coming back for more.  That’s where we would like to build our tents.

‘Lord, it is good for us to be here.’  Yes, it is.  It is good to be on the mountain. When worship lifts us, when the music carries us. It is good when prayer feels alive, when faith seems dazzling and uncomplicated.  It is good when faces shine.  But here is the problem:  Mountains are not permanent addresses.

The Exodus reading tells us Moses went up into the cloud, into the fire, into the terrifying presence of God. Forty days and forty nights. The glory looked like a devouring fire.   It wasn’t cosy. It wasn’t something you could share on instagram. It was awesome, surreal, magnificent.  But that mountain moment was not the end of the story. Moses had to come down again — to grumbling people, administrative disputes, and the complicated business of living faithfully in the real world.

So Moses discovered that transfiguration is not a holiday brochure for heaven. Rather, it is a kind of strengthening before suffering.   That’s what today’s Collect quietly reminds us: Christ was revealed in majesty before he suffered death upon the cross. The glory is not instead of the cross. It is before the cross.  Which means this Sunday — shining, singing, radiant with transfiguration — sits right on the edge of Lent.  It is good for us to be here.  But we may not remain.

That thought is captured in the second communion hymn we will sing: “‘Tis good, Lord, to be here… Yet we may not remain.”

And why is this.  Why can’t we stay in ecstasy, our hands lifted to heaven, our faces shining.  Listening to one of the Rector’s sermons for eternity!  Because faith is not about building tents around our favourite moments.  It is about following Jesus down the mountain.  And notice this: when the disciples are terrified, when they fall to the ground, when glory overwhelms them — Jesus does not lecture them.  He touches them.  He says, “Get up. Do not be afraid.”

And when they look up, they see no one except Jesus himself alone.  The cloud lifts. Moses and Elijah are gone. The dazzle has faded.  The light show is over.  And what remains? Jesus.  Not the experience. Not the spectacle. Not the spiritual high. Jesus.  That is the point of the mountain.  Not the brightness — but the Beloved.

And perhaps that is what we most need to hear as Lent approaches.  Because Lent will not feel like shining garments.  It will feel like self-examination.  Like ashes.  Like “remember that you are dust.”  Like the slow, unglamorous work of repentance.

But the same voice speaks in both places – to those disciples, and to us:  “This is my Son, the Beloved… listen to him.”  Listen to him when he shines, AND when he suffers.  Listen to him when he says “Follow me,” AND when he says “Take up your cross.” Listen to him when he says “Do not be afraid.”

Peter wanted to build three dwellings.  But God wants to build something far more daring.  Not tents on a mountain.  But transformed people in the valley.  People whose faces, over time, begin — just begin — to reflect what they have seen.  The Offertory hymn – one of Graham Kendrick’s greatest - puts it so well: “As we gaze on your kingly brightness, so our faces display your likeness, ever-changing from glory to glory.” 

That is the real miracle.  Not that Jesus shone.  But that ordinary, muddled, sometimes clueless disciples might slowly begin to shine too.  Not with spectacle. But with love. With courage. With patience. With forgiveness. With hope. With prayer. With that quiet radiance that comes from having been touched by Christ and told not to be afraid.  It is good for us to be here. But we may not remain. 

So when the final hymn ends; when we step back into Havant High Street and the week ahead. We go down the mountain.

Not to escape the glory.  But to carry it…in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.