Sermon. When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion

Sermon. 25 October 2015.

St Michael and All Angels, Little Ilford

Last Sunday after Trinity (Proper 25)

Jeremiah 31.7-9

Psalm 126

Mark 10.46-end

Here is a piece of information I hope you can do nothing with: one of today's readings I want at my funeral. And that reading is... the psalm. Yes, the psalm, as well as being music, a song, is of course also a Scriptural reading. It typically picks up a theme from the First Reading.

One reason I'd like this psalm, Psalm 126, at my funeral is that it's very popular in Judaism, to observant Jews. (You might have guessed that bit.) It's one of the psalms that is used to introduce Grace - the mealtime prayer of Grace. So it has to do with feasting. And I believe that one vital thing that Jews and Christians have in common is that, because we know Gd creates us as bodies, we look to meals as one of the best places for delight, joy, fellowship, collective remembering, celebration, hospitality, and reconciliation.

You might be thinking: if a psalm (or two) introduces Grace, that Grace must be an awful lot longer than our brief prayer. And you'd be right. It can take 10' or more to say Grace in Judaism. And/but you say it after the meal. (There is a short blessing before the meal too.)

It all goes back to these words from Deuteronomy [8:10]: When you have eaten and are satisfied, you shall bless the LORD your God for the good land which He gave you.

So grace is an extended blessing of Gd, by those who have eaten and are satisfied. And note that the blessing is not just for the food, but 'for the good land which Gd gave you'. You might think this just means we should remember the farmers and farms. But in fact that does not work in context. For the context of the whole of the Book of Deuteronomy is that the People of Israel are on the point of entering 'The Promised Land', the Land of Israel – the Land-with-a-capital-L, as it were. Deuteronomy begins with a recap of the journeys through the wilderness and ends with Moses overlooking the Promised Land he'll never set foot on. You see: they are on the point of entering the Promised Land. So by 'the Land' there is no doubt which is meant.

And sure enough in Jewish Grace after Meals there are extensive prayers for the Land of Israel, with a longing for the People to be gathered there, and for Jerusalem, with a longing for the Messiah to come and rebuild it, including the Temple. Let me give you a flavour:

Have mercy, LORD our God, upon Israel Your people, upon Jerusalem Your city, upon Zion the abode of Your glory, upon the kingship of the house of David Your anointed, and upon the great and holy House over which Your Name was proclaimed, Our God, our Father, our Shepherd...

Remember this is a prayer – or part of a longer prayer – said after every substantial meal.

So, you see, today's psalm, for all it is associated with mealtimes, really is a good fit for today's First Reading. For in that reading the usually miserable Jeremiah manages a cheerful note, and has Gd say this: 'I am going to bring [the People] back... with consolations I will lead them back... they shall not stumble, for I have become a father to Israel'. The Father's love brings the People back to the Land.

We can actually go further. We can say: the book we call the 'Old Testament' is in large part a series of stories of journeys in and out of the Land. Think of Abraham moving from Ur through the Land into Egypt and back to the Land. Think, of course, of the Exodus itself, from Egypt via the wilderness – a huge 'long cut' - to the Land. And then there's the exile of the Northern Kingdom to Assyria, the exile of the Southern Kingdom to Babylon... And, then, crucially (if often forgotten by Christians) the return to the Land.

It makes sense to say the Land is a character in its own right. Some Christian thinkers have put it this way: both within the Old Testament and for later Judaism, the Land of Israel is like a sacrament, is sacramental.

I am not suggesting we have to agree with that. I am suggesting, though, that it is good for us to know of this perspective, and to recognise that people as wise and prayerful and holy as us (or wiser, more prayerful and holier than us) do have this perspective, do believe the Land, and Jerusalem, and the Temple have religious, even divine significance.

All of this of course has contemporary relevance (to put it mildly). And I do appreciate that I am concentrating on Jewish understandings here, and so arguably on the Israeli case for Israel, because that case relates to our Scriptures. But I am emphatically not taking sides. The religious case for the State of Israel is but one of the strands. There are plenty of secular arguments. And it is not straightforward. For in fact the more the case for Israel takes biblical lines, the tougher it is for Israel actually. For the Bible (Leviticus this time [18.28]) promises that if the People are disobedient to Gd, the land will 'vomit' them out. Exile and landlessness are part of the promise.

I am suggesting that the latest horrors in Israel-Palestine are not 'mindless' acts of 'random' violence, in spite of how the media and politicians love such phrases. They've been the result of a clash of ideas of the holiness of the Land and Jerusalem and (in particular) the Temple. Both sides feel (differently, and with different degrees of justification) that both their access to the holy sites, and also their understanding of them were under threat. As people of faith ourselves, we should have – or we should find – some empathy with those who feel hurt and vulnerable. (But don't get me wrong: that's not at all to justify any violence other than self-defence.)

Find empathy. I think we might. Imagine: if the nation-state of the UK or England and our citizenship were both threatened, and on top of that, it looked like this Church, or St Mary's or Bradwell, or St Paul's Cathedral, or all of them and more were at risk of being closed or taken over or destroyed, we would, I think, feel something. We would feel some pain. Would that be rational? Maybe, maybe not. But it's worth remembering that no life-long life-enhancing bond is entirely rational, be it to your partner, to West Ham, to the All Blacks, to a nation, to whatever.

So when our media or politicians present the problem of violence in Israel-Palestine as being about reactionary and irrational religions which should by now have faded into the background as private affairs, I'd say they do us a disservice. They are not taking the relevant human beings seriously. And when Jews, Christians and Muslims trivialise or deny the heart-felt loyalties of the others, they are taking other people less seriously. But worse: they are also pushing peace further away. Many insist that peace, anywhere, can come only when all parties are willing to understand those they call their 'enemies'.

When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion, then were we like dreamers.

It ill behoves any of us to tread on another's dreams, not least but not only when those dreams are embedded in our own Scriptures. But if we – Jews, Christians, Muslims and others - can really imaginatively feel the power of the others' dreams, then it may just become possible that there can be healing, even healing such as the blind beggar Bartimaeus in today's gospel knew.

We have to hope for it. I'd say we are commanded to hope for it. Certainly we are commanded to pray for it. We are commanded to dare to imagine that one united feast, in Israel-Palestine and beyond, with feasting as the best place for delight, joy, fellowship, collective remembering (yes, eventually), celebration, hospitality, and reconciliation. Amen.