On Rivers in the Desert

 5 September 2021, Trinity 14, Year of Mark

Isaiah 35:4-7a

James 2:1-10, 14-17

Mark 7:24-37

Excerpt from Reflection (Sermon)

When Isaiah says “waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water”, he is referring to something that does occur in real life, naturally. While for most of the year, the desert in the Holy Land seems pure desert, as dry as a bone, when the rain comes, it can happen that suddenly, as if from out of nowhere, whole rivers can appear. It’s shocking, and it can be a torrent. What is happening is that, all the time, there are little, feeble, underground streams. Normally they are invisible, buried, and, of course, useless. But the rains “get in touch with them” (you might say), and then they flood their own little hollows, and appear. It’s impressive. It’s dramatic.

 

I want to say that this is telling us something. It is telling us that the desert is never only desert. Even the desert can – suddenly – become a place of gushing water, and fertility, of growth, of life.

 

It seems that in our spiritual lives (our lives of prayer) it can happen from time to time, and maybe for long stretches of time, that our prayer life itself feels like a desert, or a wilderness. Either totally dry and deadening, or wild and uncomfortable. But the desert is never only desert. The desert of our lives is never only desert. In our spirit too, there can appear, and suddenly, streams, or torrents, or even stately rivers of life, of new life, of newness, of health. We can look for these. We can be sure that, given time, they will come.

 

I’ll say more: all the heroes of our faith are actually clear that there is something we can do to bring at least a few drops of healing to our dried-out spirits. The something we can do is: say thank you to God, give thanks to God, express gratitude, in our own words, or in set prayers, or psalms or whatsoever. Be just a little bit more ready to give thanks to God. Then the rains of God’s spirit will be eased upon you.

 

If the idea of a desert-become-a-torrent-of-water doesn’t fit, for you, as you can’t imagine it, well, one thing I know for sure you can imagine is rain. It’s September now, and it will rain, and soon enough. So here’s a different image. I’ll finish with this. It comes from a modern saint, Thomas Merton, who speaks about noticing rain (really, noticing, attending to rain) in a new way. Here he is.

 

“What a thing it is to sit absolutely alone, in the forest, at night, cherished by this wonderful, unintelligible, perfectly innocent speech, the most comforting speech in the world, the talk that rain makes by itself all over the ridges, and the talk of the watercourses everywhere in the hollows! Nobody started it, nobody is going to stop it. It will talk as long as it wants this rain. As long as it talks I am going to listen.”

 

Amen.

 

Prayers for the World and Our Needs (Intercessions)

Lord God, you are our water in the wilderness,

bring the waters of new life to your Church.

Bless Bishop N, 

and all who bear the burden of leadership in our Churches. 

Give them vision and compassion.

 

Lord God, you are our water in the wilderness,

bring the waters of new life to your world.

Bless all leaders and people of influence with wisdom.

May there be peace with justice with freedom with forgiveness.

 

Lord God, you are our water in the wilderness,

bring the waters of new life to this place.

Bless and be close to any

who are facing despair, or pain, of ways of living which are not working.

 

Lord God, you are our water in the wilderness,

bring the waters of new life to all who are unwell,

or know dislocation of any kind.

Bless those we now name in the stillness of our own hearts…

 

Lord God, you are our water in the wilderness,

bring the waters of new life to all who will die today,

and all who have shaped us and who have died,

whom we name now in the stillness of our own hearts…

 

Lord God, you are our water in the wilderness,

bring the waters of new life to each one of us,

as your unique and irreplaceable disciple.

One Sent From Gd...

 

Sermon. St Michael and All Angels, Little Ilford. 13.12.20

Advent 3: Gaudete (Year B)

John 1.6-8, 19-28

Today’s Gospel is full of negatives and absences. What a way to begin! I really don’t wish to lower the mood – the Gaudete mood. I know we all need comfort and hope, and a reliable supply of both and more, in these days. And there are, of course, good things in today’s Gospel. But, at a rather technical level, today’s Gospel is full of negatives and absences.

Negatives.

Let’s recall John’s dialogue with those sent from Jerusalem to Bethany, across the Jordan:

J: “I am not the Messiah!”

O: “Are you Elijah?” J: “I am not.”

O: “Are you the prophet?” J: “No.”

This ever-more brutal exchange is consistent with what the Evangelist has already told us:

“He was not the Light.”

We are being led to see who John the Baptist is not, and thus already being nudged to think that there is one for whom all these negatives will fall away.

And, on cue, the Baptist says as much:

“I baptise with water. Among you stands one whom you do not know, the one who is coming after me. I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandal.”

I think this is carefully crafted. I think the hearers of this tale are meant to feel intrigue, excitement. Who is this one? This one we know not, but who is already among us?

Do we feel that excitement? I think it’s unlikely. For most of us, we’ve heard – we’ve read – the story many times, from start to finish. And let me add, that is fine. The Gospels were written to be heard, over and over. If we are comfortable with the story, all is well.

Yet, where we cannot necessarily feel intrigue or excitement, we may yet wonder - wonder if there isn’t here an invitation to hear the story anew. We know the name of the one who is already among us. His name is Jesus. We know him, know aspects of him. He is no stranger. We need not pretend he is. And yet, do we know him as well as we could? Is he not in many ways still strange to us? Might we as-it-were start again: begin a new journey of getting to know

·        the one who changes everything, who is already among us;

·        the one who is already among us, who changes everything?  

*

And so, from the negative to the absence. I suspect you have already sensed that today’s Gospel reading is a real cut-and-paste-and-cut-and-paste job. If you look at the chapter and verses, this is confirmed, What we have are two separate excerpts taken out of the opening of John’s Gospel. And we may well have at the back of our minds the texts in that opening which are absent today. Here are some of them:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with Gd, and the Word was Gd…

In [this one] was life, and the life was the light of the world. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it…

The Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory…”

That’s all rather different from the tale of intrigue. This isn’t a story of people pointing to people. This is a grander-scale narrative, a panorama, a view of everything, of all that this. The themes are creation, and the nature of Gd. And it is not prose, but poetry.  

How then does it all fit together? Is it meant to? Or did the writer, or some later scribe, make a mistake? I am confident that they are meant to fit together. We hear of the origins of the universe and the nature of Gd. But before we have any chance to fool ourselves we’ve taken it seriously in, we change focus. And this too is carefully crafted. Intentionally, we are led from the telescope to the microscope.

“There came a person, sent from Gd; John, his name.”

What do we learn from this? I will put it slightly challengingly: we learn that Gd does not care about humanity! I mean: Gd does not care about “humanity” in the abstract. Gd cares only for human beings in particular.

·        For you.

·        For me.

·        For the person next to you.

·        For the person impossibly distant from you, in all possible ways.

·        For the ones you love.

·        And… for the ones you can’t stand.

We human beings cannot sustain that loving attention for literally billions of people. But, then, we are not Gd. Gd is Gd. And Gd does not care for “humanity”, but for human beings. From the absence, we learn this.

“There came a person, sent from Gd, John, his name.” And, being sent from Gd, his presence makes all the difference. This one is the very herald who says the Word-made-flesh is already among us, sometimes known, sometimes (more often, perhaps) not known.

So, indeed, today is Gaudete Sunday. Today is a day of rejoicing, albeit it of gentle rejoicing. Today is our pink (or, as we are perhaps learning to say, our “Rose” day). We are in the middle of our Advent “fast” (how’s that going, brothers and sisters?)! Better put: we are in the middle of our Advent reflections and preparations, leading up to Christmas. And here we relax any restraint we’ve put ourselves under. We, in a gentle and understated way, anticipate Christmas.

“There came a person, sent from Gd, John, his name.” And, being sent from Gd, his presence makes all the difference.

Sisters and brothers, I repeat a theme I have brought before. And I make not the slightest apology for the repetition. (You may chide me, but I will not budge.) What is said of John, can be said of you. You may think of your name; I invite you to.

“There came a person, sent from Gd, their name was [Name]. And, being sent from Gd, their presence makes all the difference.”

And, today, I am not even going to set you (to set us) the task of thinking about all the ways we might be sent from Gd into the world. There is of course a time for that. Of course, being sent from Gd implicates us in a task. Yes, vocation is a task,  a burden even. Yes, further: hardship and risk and danger and sacrifice are all involved. But! But, today (anticipating Christmas) I say: even before and outside of that task, if we are in the world (and here we are), we are sent from Gd. Our very being is sent-from-Gd.

“There came a person, sent from Gd, their name was [Name]. And, being sent from Gd, their presence makes all the difference.”

Gaudete! Let us rejoice! Amen.   

Sermon. How Creation Groans! How We Groan!

Sermon. St Michael and All Angels, Little Ilford. 19.07.20.

First Sunday with a real-life congregation since lockdown.

Trinity 6 (Year A)

Romans 8.12-25

We spent some time with Paul last week. Let us see what happens if we stick with him.

He tells us: “We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labour pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves… groan inwardly.”

We can relate.

I feel we can relate in many ways.

We sense that all is not well with ourselves, 
or within creation itself.

We don’t have to be an “eco-warrior” to sense this.

Bluntly, it’s long been part of the modern urban experience.

The noises and smells and sights of our life 
are often overwhelmingly human-made, 
and not infrequently harm us.

And we are aware that all is not well with our climate, 
the world’s climate. 
We do pay serious attention to, in this parish, 
and we need to do more.

And, then, yes, of course, there is the virus, 
Coronavirus, Covid-19, which has had such an impact on us,

kept us apart,

kept us (with a couple of exceptions) away from the sacraments,

kept us away from our coffee and toast and chat and ordinary human interaction, through which we care for each other,

still keeps us apart in so many ways.

Is the virus a sign that all is not well within creation itself?

Difficult one.

From the virus’s point of view, all is well, of course.

But from our human perspective, and remembering our duty of care to creation and to one another, especially our vulnerable brothers and sisters,we can only see the virus as another sign of the disorder which is embedded in creation.

Some people on the extreme wing of the politics of this have seen the virus as nature fighting back, clearing out excess human lives to restore balance.

This is a nonsense and that needs saying.

Nature as such does not have a controlling mind, 
does not have a plan, is not playing a strategic game.

Gd, we believe, is a 
mind ultimately in charge, with a plan, over time.

But it’s evident – has always been evident - that Gd gives over some real powers to the natural order, to grow and develop, as, well… as comes naturally.

So we should not say that nature intended Covid-19,

and we are not obliged to say that Gd intended Covid-19.

Really, my point here is that when Paul says all creation is groaning, we feel it.

We get it.

Today of all days.  

*

“We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labour pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves… groan inwardly.”

How we have groaned! How we groan!

We have spoken of a time of exile. And we have felt it.

We have spoken of our time in the desert, confined to our own personal cell (the cell that will teach us everything). And we have felt it.

We have spoken of being overwhelmed by our almost total ignorance about what’s really ahead. And we have felt it.

We have spoken of some frustrations with the powers-that-be, in government and Church. I mean: even when we have agreed with their decision-making, we know we have been at the mercy of others’ best guesses. And we have felt it.

We have spoken of our enormous sadness, 

as people we have known have suffered, and even died,

and as we have come to see ourselves - our own little, Little Ilford, as, for a time, the epicentre of the epicentre of the epicentre.

The sorrow - we have felt it.

We have sought to support each other, through emails and phone calls and parcels left. We (I mean: you) have done well in all that (no question about it), and yet we still feel we offer something meagre, weak, and failing.

Inadequacy - we have felt it.  

How we have groaned! How we groan!

“[N]ot only the creation, but we ourselves… groan inwardly while we wait…”

Yes, present tense. Yes, we are still waiting.

Has there ever been such a bittersweet gathering for us than this one?

It can only be - and we can only feel it to be - a partial gathering.

Some will have no access to this service, either physically or virtually.

We want to invite those livestreaming to participate fully, but there remain all manner of barriers (most obviously to the sacrament itself).

For those who are here in person, we cannot touch.

No tactile peace (not a handshake, let alone the kisses than some of you steal at that point in the service – oh yes, you were always seen!).

No touch at communion, or at the blessing at communion.

And no reassuring hand on the shoulder when difficult - or delightful - news is shared.

For most of us, not even a chance simply to lean over to the person in the next seat just to check what verse we are on in the hymn.

No hymns at all, no song.  

How we groan! We groan while we wait, for we are waiting still!

*

We groan, only we may not groan too loudly.

We are not permitted to project our voices as we’d like to. The ban on singing is the hardest part of this, I know, but it is only part of it. We are to use moderate pitch only, to speak softly and quietly. Again, for our own life-saving safety, and the life-saving safety of others.

It happens that there are religious and spiritual precedents for this. Jewish prayer is often said in a soft, hushed voice. For some Jewish prayer, you should hear what you are saying, but your neighbour should not hear you. And of course in normal circumstances, that means the person immediately to the side of you. The idea may be that this is the best way to concentrate on the words themselves, to attend to the prayer, to intend the content of the prayer. Is that right? Well, now we can test it. We can treat this, then, as an opportunity to pray differently.

The model for this way of praying is Hannah in the Old Testament [1 Sam 1.12ff]. You may remember she prayed in the temple at Shiloh in such a way as to make the priest – the judgemental priest – Eli think she was drunk. He could not make out the words she was mouthing, and so assumed the worst. But she – faithful, confident laywoman – told the priest off. 
She made it clear she was pouring out her deepest longings, her pain and her hope, her hope-against-hope, only in a whispered tone, knowing that a whispered prayer is not less a prayer than a shouted or a chanted prayer.

*

We groan. We speak sotto voce.

And what do we say? 
We too speak of our deepest longings, our pain and our hope, be it hope-against-hope.

And we do more. We may do more. 
We are free to do more.

We are free to place all our longings and pain and hope in a broader context, 
as tear-drops given a home in an ocean.

That ocean can be our confidence that

Gd has not abandoned us;

Gd does not abandon us;

Gd will not abandon us;

Gd is sharing with us in precisely this bittersweet experience.

What makes us have this confidence (or be drawn towards this confidence)?

It is not a philosophy, nor a set of rules, nor an idle tale.

The confidence can be said to rest on one claim.

This is the claim that Gd by Gd’s Spirit has raised Jesus from the dead,

and Jesus Christ remains with us for all time,

in Word and Sacrament and mystical encounter,

as sign and reality of the very presence of Gd.

I’m saying our old friend St Seraphim (who, as you know, greeted everyone, whenever he met them, with: “My joy! Christ is risen!") wasn’t really an eccentric in his core point. 
Every second, minute, hour, day – and most certainly every Sunday – is the Feast of Resurrection.  

So what is to be done?

We go on groaning, with all creation.

We go on all-but-whispering our words, like Hannah.

And (“and” not “but”) we may articulate a heart-felt  [signed] Alleluia.

Like many an alleluia sung in praise, this alleluia does not mean our lives our overflowing with success or comfort or triumph or the resolution of our problems. 
Of course not.

But neither was the first Easter a simple story 
of success or comfort or triumph or resolution 
(think about it).

So, sisters and brothers, let us, here and now, “easter”.

[Signed and then said]

Alleluia. Christ is risen!

He is risen indeed. Alleluia!

Amen.

Sermon: Let Gd Arise - Even As We Wait

Sermon. St Michael and All Angels, Little Ilford, 22.05.20 

Easter 7 

• Acts 1.6-14; 
• John 17.1-11 

I have an Ascensiontide story (don’t think I have shared it). It didn’t happen in Ascensiontide, but the theme shines through.  

It was late-ish in the evening, in North London. I’d just moved into a place, and was getting to know the area. If you know me, you know that means I was lost. I was walking by a library. A man came out of the library, and called me over. He was an Asian gentleman, in a Muslim prayer hat. The matter was urgent.  

He pulled out of his bag a book. He showed it to me. He asked me, in very broken English, what the title meant. Now, as he seemed to be a Muslim, I did not suppose that Arabic was his first language, but maybe it might be as close as we got to a shared language. I know perhaps as many as thirty words in Arabic, mainly religious. I thought this, on seeing the title of the book. You see, it was Let God Arise. I know the Arabic word for God. Well, you do too. Allah. And I happen to know the Arabic verb to rise. How do I know the Arabic verb to rise? Because I know the Arabic Easter greeting. “Christ is risen! He is risen indeed!” in Arabic, enjoyed by Arab Christians, is “Al Masih qam! Haqqan qam!” So I brought the two words together. Allah. Qam. I also, as you can imagine, added a lot of British Sign Language.  

Fortunately, he seemed satisfied with this. I wondered what would happen next. I thought perhaps he would try to sell me the book. He seemed to have little need for it, after all. Or he might use the book as a hook to hang a defence of Islam on. Such as this has happened to me in North London. What he actually did... was thank me warmly and walk off. That was the end of our encounter. Two strangers meet, discuss how God arises, and walk off.  

Two strangers meet, discuss how God arises, and walk off. This of course should not have happened in London in the 21st century. Back in the 1960s many, really most commentators were convinced that the world, or at least Europe was becoming simply more secular, atheist, and the engines for the secularisation process were the great cities, where science and technology dominate. It hasn’t worked out like that. London is – I have to speak as I find – London is a religious city, where happenings such as the one I’ve mentioned can happen, any day.   

Two strangers meet, discuss how God arises, and walk off. It is a strange tale, I don’t deny that. But, then, life is strange. It has never been more obvious to all of us that life is strange. And... this. We don’t say this as often as we should: the Bible is strange; the story of Jesus is strange; the story of the emergence of the Church after Easter is strange.  

Let us think about the strangeness of today’s readings. In our first reading, we revisit the Ascension. Jesus is raised from the dead. He is asked whether we are on the cusp of fulfilment of all things. He says he can or will say nothing about that. Rather, you are to receive the Holy Spirit, and be sent out, not to conquer the world, but to bear witness. No fulfilment, but the Holy Spirit, and a never-ending task. And then? Then Jesus disappears. He is taken up. He is taken from us. And we wait. Before the Holy Spirit, before our new task, our sending-out, there is... a wait.  

Isn’t that strange? I mean: why? Why is there a wait? Why must we wait? We are not told. There is no hint of a rationale in the story. I am not sure the Church has ever really supplied a rationale. It is just that the disciples had to wait. It is just that we have to wait.  

Life is strange. The life of faith is strange. Sometimes, God requires us to wait. Sometimes, there is nothing to do but wait.  

Look, believe me, I am boring myself in saying this. I am scarcely saying anything that you do not know. You know it. You feel it in your bones. We all do. This is us. In the strangeness, in the waiting. At the heart of our faith, just at the moment, is the strange waiting, the waiting strangeness.  

Of course, we need not be bored by the meeting of themes, then and now. We can be moved. Because what this means is that we have the Bible’s own assurance that this can be done, that this can be borne, that we can wait, wait in Gd, wait for the gift of Gd which is to come, which comes, because Gd is faithful.  

Let us not be in any doubt that the disciples were as fearful as we are. They have, between them, spent 40 days with the Risen Christ, and now he is taken from them. And they, of course, do not – cannot - know for sure how the story is to continue. Imagine their sense of grief. Let’s name it! As we are grieving, missing our meetings, missing our churches, missing our fellowship, our toast, our cake, our lunch club, our chats with others using the Froud Centre – and all the rest of it... as we are grieving, so they were grieving.  

Certainly, as the Church reflected on the Ascension, it saw it as a cause for celebration, and rightly so. Jesus Christ takes his place at the right hand of Gd. All is glory. The glory that Jesus in our Gospel speaks of. But, at the human level, all is loss. All is the blankness, the bleakness of waiting. And that can be borne.  

Brothers and sisters, is that enough? Have I said enough? Should I be saying more of hope, joy, positivity, and the great scheme of things? Perhaps I should. Certainly, if we look for hope, joy, positivity, and the great scheme of things in our texts, we will find them. The texts are rich enough, we know that.  

But I want more to bring us back to where we are, in our reading and in our lives. The strangeness of waiting. The waiting strangeness. The knowledge – the confidence – that it can be borne. We can see this through.  

We can pray, for ourselves.  

We can pray for one another.  

We can pray for our parish and borough and city.  

can pray for the people we have determined to pray for in these days.  

And I add just this: in these and other quiet, unremarkable ways, 

let God arise! 

Amen.