Harvest Festival and the Harvest of our Lives

 Sermon. 7 September 2025. St John the Evangelist’s, Ovington.

Harvest Festival.

Reading: Philemon 1.1-21

 

When was the last time you sat down and read through a whole book of the Bible?...

 

I have some news for you: in a sense, you just did it.

 

This morning’s first reading is the whole of the book of Philemon (there are diverse pronunciations of that word). We heard verses 1-21 of Philemon, but there is no verse zero (of course), and there is no verse 22. What we have is the whole of the book – by which we mean of course the whole of the letter – of Philemon. And by the letter of Philemon we of course mean Paul’s letter to Philemon. Philemon is the recipient; Paul is the writer. (And scholars do tend to agree that this is a letter than genuinely goes back to Paul, by the way.)

 

So, one thing you can harvest today, right away, is a certain satisfaction for having completed a whole book of the Bible. (But just a gentle note, if you ae tempted to move from satisfaction to smugness: there are at least – at least! - another 65 to go.)

 

The letter is short, but profoundly moving. Paul is writing to Philemon, because Philemon’s slave, Onesimus, has run away and ended up with Paul somehow, and Paul wants – no he really, really wants – he really wants Philemon to receive Onesimus back, not as a slave, but as a friend. So Paul tries to use all he has, to make the argument. He commands; but no, he resists commanding; he pleads; he reminds Philemon that he could command but doesn’t. So Paul is torn, but torn only about how to make the best case for his dear friend, Onesimus.

 

I suggest what we can harvest here is some real insight into Paul, Paul the man. Paul is often thought of as a “cold fish” (and worse than that). Yet here, here he pours he heart out. He does not hide his passionate, warm friendship, both with Philemon and with Onesimus.

 

As is typical, Paul begins with thanksgiving:

“When I remember you in my prayers, I always thank my God because I hear of your love…”

I always thank my God.

What better harvest theme!

It is time to give thanks, it is time for thanksgiving, for, indeed, all good gifts around us, and for hard work by so many to bring us those gifts, and (frankly) for our peace and ease, freeing us to enjoy those gifts.

I always thank my God.

 

I have said it before and I will say it again: if you want the royal road to God, the swiftest road to God, the most direct, it is not hidden; it is the route that comes from thanksgiving.

I always thank my God.

 

There is something we need to note about how Paul describes Onesimus.

First a language lesson, for those who like such.

 

Onésimos [sic] is one word for “useful” in Greek. It comes from ónesis, meaning profit or gain. Paul hints at this, when he says that before The-One-Called-Useful (Onésimos) was useless, but now he is useful. Here he is using different words, it is true. He uses words related to chrestos which means “useful” yes, but “useful” already with a tendency moving towards more than that, towards meaning “good”. “Good and useful” we might say, in English.

 

Now Paul says that

Onesimos was a-chrestos, which means “useless”, “not fit for purpose”,

but has become eu-chrestos, which is stronger even than chrestos.

So we have a hierarchy:

onesimos - useful

chrestos – better than useful, actually good

euchrestos - better than that something or someone who is really good at whatever it is: “just the thing!” “just the person!”

 

Note, then, that

Onesimus was use-less when he was a slave,

and is profoundly use-full as a free man.

And that might seem the wrong way round.

If you could, just for a moment, bracket out all ethical concerns, if you could just think it terms of how it would help you – be honest now – wouldn’t a slave be useful for you?...

After all, they have to do exactly what you tell them to do, when you want them to do it.

Surely a friend is less useful, in that you have to encourage or persuade them to do what you’d like them to do, and even then they may not?

 

The wrong way round.

As a slave, useless;

as a free person, a freed person, useful

(more than useful, more than more than useful, very good, just right).

 

Brothers and sisters, there are harvest themes here.

 

How are we to sow the seed of the love of God, so that we reap the harvest?

 

Today we learn that we can only do it – as Christians, we can only do it – by accepting that we are not God’s slaves, to be bossed around, but God’s friends, God’s free friends, God’s freed friends. It is not that we deserve to be God’s friends. It is not that we have done good deed after good deed after good deed for so long that we cross some line, and God finally relents and says: You have earned your reward; I bestow on you the title of friend. Not that. It is that God has decided, by God’s own inscrutable will, to call us his friends, and to call us as his friends.

 

Not slaves, but friends.

As slaves, frankly useless; as friends, much better than useful.    

 

What kind of harvest are we letting grow to maturity in our own lives?

What kind of harvest are we?

I want to insist it is all right not to know!

Most of the time, we don’t know what harvest we are making possible in the people we meet.

And why should we know what harvest we are making possible in our own lives?

 

You know, from Psalm 23:

“Surely goodness and mercy will follow me, all the days of my life”?

I have a friend who insisted strongly on this. He said: That is the point: the goodness and mercy follow you;

you don’t get to see them!

It is meant to be that way.

 

In short, do not worry what kind of harvest you are preparing out there, in the world. Don’t worry what kind of harvest you own life is yielding.

The best way to ask yourself if you are being useless or useful to God is to ask yourself:

Am I living out of a conviction

that I am a slave of God,

or am I living out of a conviction

that I am (I have been made) a friend of God?

 

Blessed harvest to you all.

Amen.  

The Joys of Pentecosts [sic] in the Real World

 

Sermon. 1 June 2025. St John the Evangelist’s, Ovington

Easter 7 (Year of Luke)

 

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

[Reminder about BSL response.]

 

Yes, it is still Eastertide! The tone, or the mood, changes slightly, as we have marked the Ascension on Thursday, and as we must in one way or another be looking towards Pentecost next Sunday., Nevertheless, it is important that we remind ourselves that we are still in the Easter season. That we draw upon the core Christian belief. The one that makes all the rest fall into place. And that core – that heart – is that Christ is risen from the dead. And, remember Mary Magdalene: I have seen the Lord. And so we say:

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

 

All of that said, today I am going to do something I have not done yet, in our time, and something I will do only very rarely (but will do from time to time). I mean I am going to spring from our readings (set for the 7^th Sunday of Easter season), and refer to another calendar. I do this, because there is an interesting conflation of calendars today.

 

You see, this evening, Pentecost begins. “Wait!” I hear you cry, “you’ve just told us that Pentecost is next Sunday. How can it begin this evening!” Well, this evening Pentecost begins, too. Why…

 

Because this evening marks the beginning of the Jewish Pentecost, which goes by the Hebrew name, Shavuot, meaning Sevens, or Weeks. What does the Jewish Feast of Pentecost/Shavuot/Weeks mark? What does it mean? What did it mean to the apostles, in the time before the descent of the Holy Spirit upon them?

 

In the Bible, it is clear. This Feast is harvest festival! More precisely, it marks the wheat harvest. Passover marks the barley harvest, and then the people count 49 days, and on the 50^th day, the wheat will be ripe, ripe for the harvest. It’s really a practical matter, about he agricultural year in the land of Israel.

 

We can already see why this is a good – a fitting – day for the descent of the Holy Spirit, and what at least is often called the Birthday of the Church. In the power, the energy, the liveliness of the Spirit, the apostles are no longer bewildered mourners (bewildered also by their resurrection experiences). They are missionaries. And they go out to bring in the harvest. To bring the harvest home. And that begins on the very day of the Bible’s own wheat harvest.

 

Well and good, but there is perhaps something more. It’s not in the Bible but in later Jewish tradition the Feast of Pentecost/Shavuot/Weeks marks something more. Another meaning comes to take precedence. It is the Feast that marks the Giving of Torah at Sinai.

 

The Giving of Torah. I am using the Hebrew word (Torah). The usual English translation is “Law”. The Giving of the Law, to Moses on Sinai. But, well, it’s not a good translation. And it’s especially not a good translation if we think of “the Law” as a bad thing, a cold thing, a thing which suggests that God is distant, that God is a rule-giver first, that God burdens Israel with apparently countless rules. Have any of us as Christians thought these things about the commandments that came through Moses? It would be surprising if we had not.

 

In Jewish thinking the commandments of the Torah are a burden in the sense that they are tasks. The children of Israel do have a lot to be getting on with. But they are also a great privilege, and so they are also a joy. The giving of Torah – with all its commandments – is something to celebrate. Indeed you mark it by eating dairy products, and sweet things. Why? Because a life ruled by Torah, by the commandments from Sinai is like living in a land flowing with milk and honey. Law, Torah, milk, honey. Sweetness, and life! In other words, more than a burden, it is a great privilege to be shown how to live in ways which please God, by knowing, learning, and practising the ways God Godself shows us. This is why – in Jewish thinking – the children of Israel at that time at Sinai shouted out: “we will do and we will hear” [Exodus 24:7]. They were (on one reading) willing to do them even before they heard them. Law, Torah, milk, honey. Sweetness, and life!  

 

When did this idea that Pentecost marked the Giving of Torah enter into Jewish thinking? We don’t know. I say again: it is nowhere in the Bible. But there is some evidence it might have been around, maybe by the time of Jesus, or at least by the time Luke was writing the Acts of the Apostles.

 

So that would give us another resonance for Christian Pentecost. If this is right, we are meant to feel some of the excitement of Sinai. Let me say again: Law, Torah, milk, honey. Sweetness, and life! A way of life to immerse yourselves in. A way of life that comes with God’s blessing. That first Christian Pentecost wasn’t so much a showy magical event, with strange tongues of fire and strange tongues of speech. No, it was about entering into the way of life which the Spirit teaches, which, yes, the Spirit commands. Like a Sinai, there was a meeting with God, who gave us something to do!

 

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

 

I will say one thing more thing, as a coda. I have learned and reflected on such as the above, because there has been over half a century of Jewish-Christian dialogue, Jewish-Chrisian rapprochement, a coming together of Jews and Christians. This is something to celebrate in its own right. (And it happens that this year is the anniversary of an important milestone in that journey. But more about that anon.)

 

The thing about good dialogue is that it makes truth-telling possible. We can be candid with each other. The State of Israel is one thing at the heart of Judaism for many Jews. Christians have to do the hard work of understanding that. Judaism is not Christianity without Christ. No. It has its own energies and focus. And a focus on the Land of Israel, and derivatively on the State of Israel (as what makes living Jewishly in the Land possible) is most certainly one such focus.  

 

But! But that doesn’t ever mean that Jews or Christians must slavishly agree with – still less support – the policies of any particular government of the State of Israel, or any particular Israeli politicians. And among both Jews and Christians many are saying that now is the time when we simply have to speak out about what the Israeli government is doing in Gaza. Denying food to civilians. Killing civilians. Engaging in a war that doesn’t seem to have any goal, any goal, that is, apart from, it seems, removing or wiping out Gazan Palestinians altogether.

 

This sermon is of course not the place even to begin to set out the various arguments on all sides (there are more than two). But I do urge us all to do this. To pray for Israelis and Palestinians. To pray for Gazans. To pray for those in power. To pray for the innocent children. To pray for a solution. And if you are minded to take action and find out more, or protest, do not, as it were, sit on that inclination, squash it down, but live it out.

 

For we live in the excitement of Easter, yes, and in the excitement of Pentecost (Pentecosts!), but also in the agony of a real world not yet put right.

 

Amen.

A Harvest Festival? Really?

 

10 October, 2021, Trinity 19, Year of Mark: Worship

Amos 5:6-7, 10-15

Hebrews 4:12-16

Mark 10:17-31

 

Reflection (Sermon)

Today I’d like us to think about Harvest.

 

We may call this a Harvest Festival, even though – to state the obvious – we are not surrounded by the fruits of the harvest (the grains and the fruits and the nuts and the tins of soup and the bags of pasta), as many churches are, when they have harvest festivals.

 

You may well say that Harvest Festival is not a good theme for us, here and now.

·        You may well say that you know we are in the countryside, but fields don’t really come into view, let alone people harvesting crops in fields.

·        You may well say that, here, you don’t have the resources to bring foodstuffs for those more in need, which is also a Harvest pattern.

·        You may well say there are other themes that are more fitting. And certainly, this is the beginning of Prisons Week, and so people in churches up and down the country will be mindful of us all, and praying for us all.

·        Today is also World Homeless Day, and World Mental Health Day, and it is also Safeguarding Sunday, and more.

·        You may well say that today’s readings point us in a different direction.

·        Amos seems to be speaking of God’s judgement, of God withholding the good things around us, not helping us revel in them.

·        Jesus speaks of giving things away, of going without, of choosing (we may as well say it…) of choosing poverty. He offers this to the rich young man, and he praises his disciples who have actually done it.

 

These objections to Harvest, here and now, are well and good.

The thing is…

I suggest that there is here something

that is not necessarily always stable in Christianity.

 

On the one hand, we are all about joy,

joy in God, and joy in our lives upon earth.

As joyful people, we are meant to give thanks,

give thanks in all circumstances,

and give hearty (full-on) thanks, when we have abundance.

We are not called upon to hate this life,

to hate our life in our bodies, or as bodies.

All good gifts around us are sent from God above.

Then thank the Lord (oh thank the Lord) for all his love.

Nothing (I want to say) nothing is more Christian than this.

 

And yet… and yet…

this is not all that there is to say.

Something more must be said.

That something more… can be set out in different ways.

Let me try one.

That something more says that,

alongside our love for the gifts and joys and pleasures and comforts of this life,

all of us are also called upon to have our own adventure with God.

And adventures are things that require sacrifices.

They cost.

They take us, sometimes, to narrow places,

to places without comfort and pleasures.

Adventures mean risk.

But adventures are good things.

They give meaning.

They make us more fully who we are.

 

For some of us,

the adventure involves us choosing poverty,

choosing going without,

choosing being with those who are poor and go without.

Christianity has always said this may be the case,

has always said you may need to listen to God’s command, taking this form.

But, in truth, that’s only one way of taking on an adventure with God.

 

So the message of the day has two parts.

On the one hand,

it is always good to enjoy good things, and give thanks for good things.

It is always good to treat life as a Harvest Festival.

On the other hand, that is not all, and, alongside that,

it is always good to seek to listen

to how God may be calling you to another adventure,

an adventure for you alone, a you-shaped adventure.

 

Prisons are not always places

where thanksgiving,

or where adventure,

feel easy.

(I am not telling you anything you don’t know.)

But God is God, and is not held back by our limitations.

We heard it in today’s Gospel:

“For God nothing is impossible.”

So I dare to ask the question:

are you listening out for God’s invitation,

·        to give thanks for the harvest you do have

·        to take on the adventure you are called to?

Amen.