Sermons

Sunday 15th December 2013, Advent 3, morning

Isaiah 35; Matthew 11:2-11

by Revd Chris Palmer

The first reading talks about a world of contradictions. The blind see; the deaf hear; the lame leap; the speechless sing; the weak find strength; the fearful are not afraid; the desert blossoms; the wilderness flows with water. It’s a motif that is found elsewhere in Isaiah: those who mourn rejoice; light in the darkness; and so on.

It gives us a spirit-lifting vision of God’s kingdom, of God’s new world. Most of Isaiah 35 is used as a canticle, a song, at Morning Prayer throughout Advent. And it works like that, as a hymn of hope for the topsy turvy world that God promises. Or maybe it’s our present world that’s topsy turvy, and God’s promised world that's the right way up. In any case celebrating this vision raises the spirits.

But at the same time rhapsodic pieces of prophecy like this can also discourage us, at least in my experience. Because they remind us that, despite our trust in God, despite the era of Jesus now being 2000 years old, we are still burdened by disability, poverty, and fear. Far from always wanting to rejoice in hope, I just as often want to ask God, ‘How long, O Lord? How long?’ – which is also a prayer from the bible.

It seems that as people of faith we are called to encounter two worlds: a world in which pain, isolation, suspicion, violence, and need still rule, and a world in which healing, fellowship, trust, peace, and abundance are made real.

But that seems to me to be the real point of being a Christian, and deeply the point of Advent: the struggle to keep with these two realities, the fallen world and the world of God’s kingdom. Because the alternative is either to forget God’s kingdom and just join in the competitive world we see around us, the world where people are trying to acquire more and more possessions, or are power-hungry, or frightened – which at its worst leads to the kind of brutal purge we’ve seen in North Korea in the last two days. Or of course we can forget the world around us and try to live as if God’ kingdom is already here in all its fullness, which will probably lead us into a separatist commune or psychological unreality.

But if neither of these will do, the only alternative is hold the vision of God’s kingdom in the world of pain. And this isn’t just about entertaining a pipe dream, but making a conscious decision to live differently – that is to live for God’s kingdom in the present. And I want to spend the rest of this sermon talking about what this might actually look like. And I’ve got four points – that kind of overlap and merge with each other.

First we should accept uncertainty. This has been an important thing I’ve been learning in recent weeks whilst I’ve been ill. Faced with uncertainty as I waited for appointments and test results, I could have hankered after knowing what would happen, and been eaten up with worry – and at moments I was like that. But I soon realised that if I chose to say that living with uncertainty - not knowing - is OK, then I could feel much more at ease. And it seemed that every question that got answered raised two more that still needed an answer in the future. But I also realised that life’s like this really all the time. Just as I got ill, there was news of six cyclists killed on London’s roads in a fortnight. I cycle a lot, and I know that there’s an uncertainty about getting on a bike. In fact there’s uncertainty in just getting out of bed. In fact even staying in bed leaves you unhealthy – and there’s uncertainty in that too. Our tendency to want to know what will happen, to need certainty, leads us away from God, from the reality of living in the tension between the broken world and God’s kingdom.

Second we should choose gratitude. There is a discipline in saying thank you. When children are young we give them something, and then hold onto it until they say thank you – and so they learn the response. But God’s not like that with us. He gives and doesn’t have a mechanism for getting a 'thank you' from us. So we have to learn gratitude as a spiritual practice, choosing each day to notice and give thanks for the good God gives. And we have to avoid thanks that’s self-congratulatory – you know, like the Pharisee who says ‘Thank you that I’m not like other people; I fast and pray and give...’ True gratitude is acknowledging that the good we have is a gift and not our doing. So today as a church we are saying thank you to God for our church, on its 151st birthday. We’re also saying thank you for our promised giving, in response to our giving campaign. We received seventy replies, including nine new members of the giving scheme. The total in planned giving rose by £4700, or 5%. That still leaves us with a bit of a gap on the deficit – but, for today, it’s a reason for saying thank you. And then there’s the Eucharist itself. The word ‘Eucharist’ means ‘thanksgiving’. So here at God’s altar we say thank you each Sunday for the gift of Christ, of his self-giving love. Thanksgiving is at the heart of Christian worship.

Third we are called to find poise. I’ve stolen this idea from Gerard Hughes, the Jesuit writer, who uses it to explain what St Ignatius means by indifference. Indifference sounds as if we’re not bothered. But really it’s about finding that balance where we are free to accept what life brings. Ignatius particularly mentions being poised between good reputation and bad reputation, between wealth and poverty, between health and sickness, between long life and short life. I’m sure we could think of other things too. This poise is not about emotional detachment and it’s not about suppressing the natural instincts God’s given us for health and life and happiness. I think Jesus praying in Gethsemane is an example of the poise God’s calling us to have. He says what he wants – ‘take this cup from me’ – and does so with tears, but he can also be open to the other possibility – ‘yet not my will but yours be done’. True poise, true balance isn’t about resignation or passivity. Ask a ballet dancer: it takes energy and concentration to keep balance. It takes the energy and focus that God’s spirit brings to keep balance in our world of need.

Finally we are called to live in the present moment. Jesus says this so clearly when he says – in the old translation – ‘Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof’. In other words, today’s problems are enough for today; leave tomorrow’s problem till tomorrow. If we are absorbed with needing to acquire possessions to insure against all future losses, we will miss the gift of now. The Israelites in the desert had to learn this. Each day that had to collect manna for that day. If they collected too much, trying to store it up for tomorrow, it got maggots in it. Enough for today is enough. Today we’re celebrating the final round of grants from Marian Esling’s legacy – which is a testimony to this church choosing not to stock pile for the future. When Marian left the money to the church six years ago, the church could have kept it to offset against budget deficits for years to come. It would have been comfortable, but also made us sluggish and unaware of our daily need for God. Instead the choice to give it away represents the decision to live in the present moment and find our needs met in that moment. What we have and where we are is God’s gift to us now.

So there we are. Four ways to live in the tension between the world with its pain and need and the kingdom God brings in Jesus: accepting uncertainty; choosing gratitude; finding poise; living in the present.

The very fact that Jesus lived this, that John the Baptist lived this, that the prophets lived this way – celebrating, making present the life of God’s kingdom in the here and now – shows that it is possible for us too. We need not wait for some sign, for some proof that it’s time to live God’s way. Now is the moment. John the Baptist wanted to know in the reading today – ‘are you the one to come...?’, and Jesus just offered him what is: the blind see, the deaf hear. If the life of Jesus, if the presence of the Spirit, if the witness of scripture, if the celebration of resurrection, if the fellowship of Christian community, if the presence of Christ in the Eucharist is not enough, then we will never be ready. Now is the moment to live for God’s kingdom. Now is the moment that God is offering to us.

Note

This sermon refers to Gerard Hughes, The God of Surprises, Ch 5, and to the 'First Principle and Foundation' from The Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius Loyola