Exodus 32: More questions than answers

Since Jesus death, resurrection and ascension we have been on a pilgrimage as the church, a journey towards the coming return of Jesus.  The Basis of Union of the Uniting Church describes the Church as a Pilgrim People.  As people on such a journey we need to understand that on this journey the landscape changes and we change.  The Church as we know it now is radically different to 50 years, monumentally different to 500 years ago and almost unrecognisable from the church 1500 years ago.

As we meet as a congregation this morning I believe that we need to seek to listen to where God is leading us now and to make the necessary adjustments.

Reflecting on the Old Testament passage that we heard this morning we encountered the Israelites as God’s people on a journey.  As I reflected on their pilgrimage a few issues stood out for me to share with you this morning.  Issues that I want to simply raise and encourage you to think upon and pray about in the days ahead.

First, to say the Israelites were people who were encountering great change.  They had moved from slavery to freedom, they had effectively become refugees as they fled Egypt, and they were being transformed in their relationship with God.  Change was upon them spiritual; physical; personal.  And without Moses there to guide them they kind of went off the rails. 

So here is the first issue for you, ‘How do you adjust to times of change in your life, in the world and in the Church?’

Second, that in Aaron responding to what the people wanted the difficult nature of the relationship between leaders God sets apart and God’s people is played out.  It raises a couple of issues for us: 

‘Do we give our gold (metaphorically or literally) only we know we are going to see the results?’

And, ‘Do we simply want our leaders to tickle our spiritual and theological fancies or do we actually want them to be faithful to God?’ 

As an aside sometimes when we discuss change people uses the expression ‘you can’t please all of the people all of the time”. 

I think this misses the point - the role of leaders in the church is not to please people but to listen for and be faithful to God even when it upsets the people! 

Third, that in God’s relationship with human beings God is also changed.  This is another of those uncomfortable passages where we see God change God’s mind.  For many of us the notion that God changes is disturbing but Moses pleads his case and God shifts his response away from wreaking havoc and disaster on God’s people. 

Once again, two issues: 

‘How do we live in a dynamic relationship with a living God?’

And, ‘What does it mean for your prayer life knowing that God changed his mind in this story?’

It would be nice to think that we could wrap ourselves in what we have always done and the way things have always been as a congregation.  Yet, I suspect if we really think about it and are honest with ourselves we have not always done things the way we do them now and things have not always been this way. 

To be a Pilgrim people means moving on and not stagnating.  In our journey with God now we ask together God to guide us and lead us so that we might be faithful.

Take a few moments of silence to listen for God speaking to you.

Seeking a Better Country

by Rev Peter Lockhart 

A sermon on Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16

Chapter 11 of the letter to the Hebrews begins with that well known definition of ‘faith’.

“Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” 

This definition of faith is a definition that reminds that having faith does not mean that we have arrived but I think unfortunately, especially in Churches like ours in the West, we have fallen into the trap of thinking exactly just that.

Our lives are very comfortable, we have great freedom in our culture, we can come to this property that we own and sit in our regular pews week by week to worship God.  All of these things point to the idea that we have settled down, we have made our home.  And to be frank the sentimentalism and over attachment that we have to our properties and bank balances is a sign of exactly this problem.

But when the author of the letter invites the Hebrews to reflect on Abraham he reminds them that these early proponents of faith “confessed they were strangers and foreigners on the earth” who were “seeking a homeland” and desired “a better country”.  These people were on a journey and so are we are.  As faith takes hold of us we are not being encouraged to settle down but to join the pilgrimage!

The question is then ‘what does it mean to be on this pilgrimage of faith?’  I want to address three aspects of this question for us to consider as a congregation that arise from the readings this morning.  The first is to do with the timing of our arrival.  The second and third are to do with what we are to be doing on the way.

In the readings that we heard from Luke’s gospel this morning spoke to us about our destination which is less about our destination and more about God’s will.  Jesus reminded his listeners that ‘the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.’ 

Our destination as Christians is not so much a place that we reach but the timing of the fulfilment of God’s coming kingdom and we won’t know when that is going to occur. 

It’s like we are a bunch of kids whose parents have gone out.  Left with the responsibility of looking after the house while mum and dad are out we have choices to make.

Will we order pizzas and get a video; will we break into the drinks cupboard and invite some friends around for a party; will we do the chores we were asked to do?  What are we going to get up to and what will happen when we hear the crunch of our parent’s tyres in the driveway?

Jesus’ challenge is there for people to contemplate because he is inviting people to be prepared for his return.  We don’t know when we will arrive at our destination so the imperative is to live as people who do what we were asked to do while we wait for Jesus return, for our waiting is an active waiting not a passive thing.

The brings me to speak about the second point I wanted to raise from the readings and it has to do with the church in the Western world in general and so specifically our congregation as well. 

Between the Psalm and Isaiah there was some tension about the life and worship practices of the Israelites.  In the Psalm God declares “Not for your sacrifices do I rebuke you,” but then in Isaiah the Lord declares “What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices?... I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams… I do not delight in the blood of bulls, or of lambs, or of goats… bringing offerings is futile; incense is an abomination.”

There is no doubt that we are called as God’s people to gather and offer worship to God, to offer our sacrifice of praise.  So why does God mount this tirade against the cultic practices of the Israelites.  The answer is that despite the worship practices there seems to be a disconnection between the worship and the daily life of the people.

Now I would point out that Christian worship is distinct in a number of ways to the worship that we find in the Old Testament.  Primarily in as much as we are now participants in God’s coming kingdom achieved in Jesus Christ. Despite this it is no less important that there is a connection between what we express in our gathered worship and our lived faith journey day by day.

So how the connection is going?  A few years ago I was at a breakfast with Tim Costello and Steve Chalke an English Baptist Pastor.  One of the things that Chalke said has stuck with me.

He told the gathered group that around 60 to 70 years ago in England the Church was very much the centre of the community.  The Church ran hospitals and schools and orphanages and helped the poor and basically provided much of the social infrastructure of the society.  Things changed though and the government started to develop welfare systems and provide the social infrastructure that had once been provided by the Church.  The consequence of which was that this task of the church in the community became either regulated or lost completely. Many Christians became detached from their sense of service.

The end result in Chalke’s opinion has been that Church people have become a bit like shut-ins who get together and sing songs that are largely irrelevant to most of the culture around them (modern ones or ancient ones!) and argue among themselves about things that no one else cares about.  Why? Because, he says, they have become bored.  Now whilst I think Chalke is probably overly harsh I believe he does have a bit of a point. 

When we lose the other out workings of our faith and disconnect the relationship with God that we celebrate on Sunday with our day to day life and the problems of the world we are missing the point.  What Chalke describes is not simply the problem that as congregations we have settled down but that in settling down we have ceased being interested in going out.

As congregations like ours struggle harder and harder to transform our worshipping life and make it more relevant, it has to be said that unless this is accompanied by a closer engagement with the world around us then I suspect we won’t get very far at all.  When we think about following Jesus and being the church and serving I believe we are called to think of our Christian service as far broader than greeting at the door or doing the readings or even leading a prayer.  Our pilgrimage of faith is a day by day thing and we are called to live our faith in every setting we find ourselves.

This brings me to make a third point about how we are to live on this pilgrimage of faith.  I want to raise for us a couple of issues here.

Firstly to say that at the beginning of Isaiah we hear that Isaiah saw the vision in the days of the kings Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah.  Isaiah then speaks the word of the Lord to the rulers.  In other words religion and politics do mix.

Going back to the reading from Hebrews if we are seeking a better country or if we are seeking to bring signs of the coming kingdom into reality in the world this means engaging seriously with the social and political issues.  This is particularly pertinent as e weigh up how to vote.  Whilst different church groups and individuals may have different agendas in their engagement with politicians the idea that our faith is lived politically is an important one.

Now as we are aware we are approaching a federal election and I am aware that many of you have particular political allegiances.  I do not believe it is the place of the church to support a particular party, despite some comments to the contrary, I do not believe that the Uniting Church has a particular political allegiance.  What we are called to do though is to weigh up what we are being told by any party with the good news of our faith.  This means remembering that our first allegiance as Christians is to Jesus Christ not the political party to which we may belong.  More than that as we listen for the prophets in our midst we should listen for what they might be saying to those in power.  Just as Isaiah spoke to the kings long ago so too there are people who bring the Christian message in confronting ways before our political leaders.

The second issue I want to raise here is that our pilgrimage of faith calls us to do what the Lord challenges the people with in Isaiah.  In the prophecy God is less concerned about sacrifices and more concerned that the people “learn to do good, seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, and plead for the widow.”  These groupings come up often in the scripture and they represent to us all those in society who are disadvantaged and ostracised.  This is where the rubber hits the road – being the people of God means helping these people and this as Jesus points out is a personal thing.  Jesus said to his audience “See your possessions and give alms.”  The call to serve those who have less than us is a gospel imperative and just as much an expression of our faith as coming to worship on a Sunday.

As a congregation we do this in small ways and I am aware that many of you as individuals also engage in issues of social justice and serving others.  The question remains before us constantly as to how we might continually connect in relevant and real ways with the community around us and the world at large in our faith journey.

Ultimately we cannot see the fullness of God’s kingdom yet, we hope for something that is yet to come, this is what drives and inspires us.  As you consider God’s goodness in giving you a foretaste and share in the coming kingdom I want to invite you to think about your own faith and our faith as a congregation.  Are you feeling that you have arrived?  Have you settled in and become too comfortable in this building and in your favourite pew?  How is God calling us to be his people here and now and how will respond?

I think that there are exciting signs of God’s faithfulness in our midst and that rather than slowing down we are being challenged and called to do more. 

In the silence I want to invite you to listen for Gods challenging Word to you on this day.

Devouring widows houses

Peter Lockhart

“They devour the widows’ houses...”


Jesus’ critique of the behaviour of the temple authorities of his time ran deep. A couple of days earlier Jesus had overturned the tables in the temple declaring that it had been made a den of robbers and thieves.

Now his comments are scathing of the temple leaders in their pomp and misunderstanding of who they are called to be.

So offensive is their behaviour that “They devour the widows’ houses...”

As if to underline his point Jesus sits opposite the treasury watching the crowd put their money in and who should appear but a widow.

This widow bearing her two small copper coins, all that she had to live on, gives to the point of impoverishment.

“They devour the widows’ houses...”

Reading between the lines you can almost hear Jesus declaring, “See what I mean!”

This poor widow has given beyond her means and whilst through church history this widow’s giving has at times been held up as an example, Jesus’ attitude appears more one of sorrow and despair.

How has the system gone so wrong?

The Old Testament is replete with the theme of God’s concern for the widow and the poor and the responsibility of the people of God to care for not only the widow and the poor but the alien residents in their midst.

In Deuteronomy 10 Israel was reminded:

For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who is not partial and takes no bribe, 18who executes justice for the orphan and the widow, and who loves the strangers, providing them with food and clothing. 19You shall also love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.

The prophet’s thunder against Israel’s failure in this matter; for example as Isaiah declares:

Your princes are rebels
and companions of thieves.
Everyone loves a bribe
and runs after gifts.
They do not defend the orphan,
and the widow’s cause does not come before them.

As if to further underscore the futility of the widow’s giving the next story in the scriptures sees the disciples get excited at the large stones and buildings which Jesus tells them will be thrown down.

By Jesus’ pointing out the widow I do not believe he is celebrating her giving rather he is emphasising that the Temple authorities, and then Israelites at large, had completely missed the point of being God’s people.

The giving was in the wrong direction. It was not the widow who needed to give to the Temple as if somehow this would validate her relationship with God. No: the Temple had a responsibility to the widow as one for whom God had specific concern.
His challenge here ties directly to the point made by the scribe in verse 33 that loving God and neighbour is central and “much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”

The size of the gift, the enormity of the sacrifice, the amount of our offering does not buy relationship with God, for this comes to us freely as a gift.

The good news declared so poignantly in Hebrews 9 is that Jesus “has appeared once for all at the end of the age to remove sin by the sacrifice of himself.”

God has given to us the gift of Jesus freely, unconditionally. It is a gift that continually surprises us with God’s generosity. As we tear away the ribbon and paper we find the gift of life itself; we find eternal life, life in all its fullness; life shared with God and with others. This is what we receive each day and each moment of our lives and God’s challenge to us is that all should share in this joyful gift of life.

Which brings us to the question of our stewardship; what do we give in response to the generous gift that we have received? How does how we live our lives? How do we exist in mission as a congregation? Are we simply developing mini temple systems in our congregations or is what we are do life giving and life sharing, not just with ourselves but the community in which we give our witness.

The bread of anxious toil

Peter Lockhart

I want you to pause for a moment and think about the things that you worry about. What is it that really keeps you up at nights? Maybe you are one of the lucky ones who is able to sequester your fears and anxieties and sing cheerfully along to Bobby McFerren’s classic, “Don’t worry be happy” but in general we in the west live in a world driven by anxiety.

We worry about the future of our children;
we worry about whether we have enough for our retirement;

we worry about our personal health;
we worry about the impending results of the latest test;
we worry about diseases in society and the emerging super bugs;
we worry about pollution –
in our rivers, in the seas, in the air and in our ears;
we worry about climate change;
we worry about terrorism;
we worry about peak oil;
we worry about the danger of stepping out our door at night;
we worry about the number of people sitting in our pews;
and, so we worry about the future of this congregation;
we worry about rainfall and dam levels and floods;
we worry about who we have to please;
and, we worry about who we are going to offend;
we worry about big things;
and, we worry little things.
We worry and we worry and we worry.

With all this worry it should come as little surprise that more than one in ten of us suffer from a serious anxiety disorder and a further one in ten suffer from depression.

Now I am not going to say that many of our concerns are invalid, they are we face some incredible challenges in life personal and as a human race. Rather I would draw our attention to the words of Psalm 127.

It is in vain that you rise up early
and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil;
for he gives sleep to his beloved.

The bread of anxious toil is a wonderful metaphor for the things that consume us. The bigger issues of the globe and the small day by day things that get into our psyche to cause us insecurity are drawn into perspective by the Psalm.

If we consider why we who live in such an affluent society who have so much and who can do so much instead of finding contentment with all our labour saving devices and wonderful opportunities then maybe part of the answer is that we have forgotten that despite our best efforts we are not in total control.

As a teacher I can clearly remember that one of the things that was said to many students was that they could be anything they wanted to be. Not only is this a poor understanding of the simple diversity of human beings it is also poor theology. I worked out somewhere in the midst of my teaching that at best this attitude is a misunderstanding and at worst it is a lie that leads children into delusions of who they are and what they can do, which when they go unfulfilled leads to depression and disappointment.

What this kind of philosophy reflects is the all pervasive attitude of control that permeates Western Society. Timothy Radcilffe, who was the head of the world Dominican Order, reflected on the connection between anxiety and control saying:

“I suspect that this pervasive anxiety derives from the fact that we have a culture of control. We can control so many things: fertility and birth, so much disease can be cured; we can control the forces of nature; we mine the earth and dam the rivers. And we westerners control most of humanity. But control is never complete. We are increasingly aware that our planet may be careering towards disaster… We are afraid, above all, of death which unmasks our lack of control.”

We eat the bread of anxious toil because we have forgotten a fundamental theological belief that God is in control, that God offers to us a future and that even in midst of our sleeping God is at work.

Radcliffe notes a friend who has on his wall a poster with the saying “Don’t worry. It might not happen.” Radcliffe offers a different approach. “Don’t worry. It probably will happen. But it won’t be the end of the world.”

Here is the hope of a man of hope; whatever will be God is with us.

While we rest God creates and recreates; God refreshes and renews. This is revealed so clearly in the coming of Jesus Christ who descends into the dead and then rises to new life to find the true purpose of our creation life with God.

The imagery from the author Hebrews hits home – Jesus has entered the heavenly sanctuary and lives there life with God and shares his grace with us out of love for those for whom he dies. It is Jesus offering that renews and refreshes us in our life, in our living and in our death. This is why the bread that we eat on this day is not the bread of anxious toil but is the bread of life. Here we partake of the true bread of heaven and food of eternal life – not because we deserve it in any way but because God offers it so freely in Jesus.

Whilst we scurry around with our anxieties and worries eating the bread of anxious toil Jesus, the Christ, is in the presence of God the Father reconciling and renewing us that we too might join in his homecoming. It is this bread of new life that we offered, bread for our journey, the bread of eternity.

What can we offer but thanks and praise for this great grace of God which not so much requires anything of us but rather invites us into community with God and one another now. The contrast of the offering of the proud rich compared to the widow reminds us that it is not how much we give nor I would argue even the proportion but the understanding that what we offer comes from our poverty.

In some ways we do not have anything to offer God which will please God and make God love us any more than God already does, yet our giving which comes from the acknowledgement of our poverty – spiritual and fiscal – it acknowledges that we rely on grace and that we are not in control.

The contrast between the proud pietist full of his or her own religiosity and the person who comes humbly offering out of their poverty is strong. We are saved by grace through faith.

When all is said and done the bread of anxious toil which we consume day by day indicates that we have forgotten that unless the Lord builds the house those who labour build in vain. So, it is that when we come here to this place and eat the bread of life we are grounded again in the sure hope of God’s love and control over those things which we are so anxious about and that whatever will happen God is, and God is with us.

Take a moment to consider God’s Word to you on this day.

More on the Widow and the Scribes & Pharisees http://revplockhart.blogspot.com.au/2012/11/devouring-widows-houses.html

Stormy Seas!

Peter Lockhart

Mark 4:35-41

The disciples may have been afraid in the storm but after Jesus calms the storm the disciples are terrified: “Who is this guy?”

They have cast their lot in with this teacher called Jesus and now before their very eyes and with a single word he calms a storm in which they thought they might perish.

He has such power and authority that even the wind and the waves obey him.

If the disciples were worried about the storm and its power now they have a man standing before them who has even greater power an authority.

“Who is this man?”

Of course this question is the central question of Mark’s gospel and the very first verse of Mark’s gospel tells us the answer to the question: “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.”

Jesus is the Son of God.

But the disciples in the boat are yet to find this out and in Jesus admonishment of the disciples he questions them, “Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?”

In the story Jesus might be questioning their lack of faith both in the face of the storm and their safe passage but also their lack of faith in understanding who Jesus is. They lacked faith when they faced the storm and they lacked faith when they faced Jesus power and authority.

This is a question that will follow the disciples all they way through their journey in Mark’s gospel they travel with Jesus and as they witness to all he does and ultimately who he is. The good news though is that he is with them through it all.

Now this story of Jesus claming the storm is one of those stories that is not simply a great miracle story but is layered with meaning for us as the church as well as for our personal spiritual journey. So let us dig a little deeper.

First off it is pertinent to note that the image of the boat, the metaphor as it were, is often used as a symbol of the church and has been an image of the church since the earliest times. The idea that we get on board the boat to travel through the seas of life together with Jesus is one which we might find quite appealing.

But just as the disciples soon discovered that being in the boat with Jesus does not mean that the waters are always calm so too our spiritual journey together is not all smooth sailing.

There is a storm that surrounds us. For many of us it feels as if the winds and waves of life batter our fragile hull whilst Jesus apparently takes a doze in the corner.

Despite the idea that there is a storm raging around us I suspect that often we as Christians are suffering the delusion that it is fair weather out there and things a going along nicely. We make our faith comfortable and avoid risks, especially the risk of waking Jesus, something I will come back to in a moment.

But then again sometimes the storm crashed in and we are awoken from our delusion that things are OK.

A few years back I went to a leadership training night in which a group of ministers invited people who are in leadership in business and the community to speak with us.

Towards the end of the evening a bloke around my age, who works with disadvantage and troubled youth, got up and when asked, ‘What is one thing that you would want to say to the church?’ he said forcefully and simply, “You are irrelevant and you are inconsistent”

I do not think this is news we want to hear. It implies that the storm that rages around us, our Western culture, can toss us wherever it wants because we are meaningless to it. This is news we may not want to hear but it should wake all of us up from our comfortable slumber. Even more importantly it should us to remember who we have dozing in the back of the boat, but as I said waking Jesus up can be risky too.

As the American Biblical scholar Fred Craddock once pointed out being in God’s presence is what everybody wants and is what nobody wants. You see if we wake Jesus he is going to ask us about our faith and why we are afraid and these are questions we may just not want to answer.

The disciples were afraid of Jesus, his power his authority, who is this guy? And as much as there is the compassion and love and mercy of an encounter with Jesus there is also the questioning and confronting with who we are, where we are going and what we believe.

I remember reading once that prayer is like entering the lions den. In God’s presence we hear the good news and we know Jesus is with us, but that’s also a bit scary, Jesus is with us!

When woken from his slumber Jesus power and authority calms storms and confronts us with whether or not we have been heading the right direction, “Have you no faith?”

This is a question about what we are up to in the boat while we think Jesus is sleeping because there is a storm raging around us and we run the risk of allowing ourselves to be overcome by the storm.

One of the other leaders who came to the night asked the ministers, “When do you know that your congregation is doing the right thing?”

One of my colleagues responded with the words, “When we are being persecuted.” That’s a pretty confronting idea!

In Jesus own ministry he upset people; he challenged existing power structures in the society and the religion; he called people to live differently, to different personal and communal behaviours. Jesus shakes the tree; he rattles the cage; he knocks over the money changers tables.

We are called to share in his work, not just make padded seats for the boat so the ride can remain smooth.

The good news of the story for us is that whether he is awake or asleep Jesus is with us and he cares. As a congregation we face the storm together knowing Jesus is with us. This is a source of hope and I am often buoyed by the care and love shared by other Christians.

But the challenge to us, the call of faith, in the story is Jesus question “What are you afraid of? Have you no faith?”

Whatever our answer to these questions we know that Jesus will continue to walk beside us just as he did with the disciples.

Take a moment to consider have you left Jesus sleeping in the back of the boat? Are you prepared to wake him? Or is he already standing in your midst asking, “Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?”

Jesus Baptism

by Peter Lockhart

(My last sermon with Kairos Uniting Church: Clayfield Hamilton Congregation)

It is entirely appropriate that on this last occasion that I preach here that my last words to you are about the eternal Word. The baptism of Jesus, the eternal word of God, focuses our attention on what is important for this day just as it has been through my 8 years here, Jesus. And so, this is also a sermon about beginnings, not endings, for the baptism of Jesus signalled the beginning of his ministry and so reveals God’s purposes in him.

I think I will be eternally grateful to my systematic theology teacher Gordon Watson who encouraged me to write a paper about Jesus called “Christ, the Spirit & Worship”. Although, it’s subtitle has more bearing on what I will be saying today: “The accommodation of the Spirit in Christ's obedience with reference to the relationship to doxology, as understood in John 17:19.”

Now whilst this may sound like another language to some of your ears this phrase for me heralds us into the presence of the mystery of the idea that God became a human being and the doctrine of the Trinity: the incarnation. On one level there is nothing that may appear practical about this theology yet for me it is the heart of our faith.

The concepts to which I am referring can be explored in Mark’s description of Jesus baptism.

If we were to stop and think for a moment the whole notion of Jesus baptism by John should jar against our senses. The Baptist was in the wilderness baptising people with a baptism of repentance and of forgiveness of sins. The word repentance means “turning back to God” – it as if we are facing away from God and the act of repentance is changing our position from having our backs to turned, to looking towards the one who made us.

The offence of Jesus baptism by John is that here is one who Mark has already described as the Son of God acting as if he is out of step with God – facing away.

Anyone reading this story must wonder where this story is going. How incomprehensible is it that Jesus, who is God’s Son and therefore must be facing God, needed a baptism of repentance?
The answer purely and simply must be that Jesus did not need such a baptism for himself but through his actions was symbolising the divine action that was occurring in and through his life.

Jesus presence in the world, the presence of God’s eternal Word enfleshed, involves the full identification of God with what it means to be human. God in himself is offering his own life to us by sharing in our life.

Jesus baptism of repentance is not a baptism for his sake but for ours, on our behalf, for our sake. Jesus does need to turn back to God, we do, and because as Paul later wrote, our lives are hidden in Christ’s, it his repentance not ours that opens up eternal life and right relationship with God and each other.

This is why our own baptisms as Christian people are so important: because they signify that our lives are drawn into Jesus own baptism and our lives are now shaped by being baptised people – people who in Christ and by God’s grace are turned back to God, not through our action of turning towards God but Jesus.

The mystery of Jesus baptism is further convoluted by the descent of the Holy Spirit on Jesus. For those who understood Jesus to be the Son of God in Mark’s era the idea that Jesus did not already have the Spirit of God upon would have been strange. And, later hearers of the scripture, who had come to a Trinitarian understanding of God’s life, would think that this was even more bizarre.

Jesus the eternal Word of God had existed eternally with the Father and the Spirit and this unity of the Godhead, Father, Son and Spirit could not logically cease through the incarnation – the inviolable unity of the Trinity must have remained. So why does the Spirit appear?

Once again it is not for Jesus own sake that the Spirit is seen descending like a dove but for those who witnessed the event and ultimately for God’s purposes in salvation. The Holy Spirit shares in the life of the incarnate Word as Jesus the Christ accommodates the Spirit into his fleshly life. It is in the sharing of this life that the Spirit of God is then poured out after Jesus’ death into his disciples and then among all peoples in order that people might be drawn in Jesus and by the Spirit into sharing in God’s own life.

What is occurring in and through Jesus is no less than the re-creation of the world! This morning we heard the beginning of the creation story from Genesis and so just as the Spirit hovered over the waters at the moment of creation so too the Spirit hovered over Mary’s womb and now at the beginning of Jesus’ earthly ministry – his baptism.

This is the heart of the Christian story – a story not about my repentance or yours, a story not about mysterious encounters with the divine, a story not about my personal relationship with Jesus or decision to follow him. It is the story of God’s decision and action in and through Jesus Christ to renew the creation. It is a story bigger than any of personal stories and experiences of God yet compassionate and aware enough to draw our personal stories into that grand narrative of God’s love for the world.

In this sense I have no words to give other than to reaffirm Jesus, the eternal Word made flesh. He is God’s gift to the world and to know God means to know Jesus and to know Jesus means to know God. In him we see God in the world and we know and have our hope fulfilled that God loves, God gives, God makes new, God forgives, God heals, ultimately that God is!

Jesus baptism and descent of the Holy Spirit point at this reality of God. It is a sign and symbol of God’s intention not simply for those witnessed that gathered and saw John baptise Jesus but for we and the whole creation.

The act of Jesus baptism is a symbol of God’s love and grace, and so also is it that which it symbolises. In the same way that Jesus baptism is a symbol of God’s love and action in the world so too is our gathering as baptised people here today.

In a world which continues to join lustily in the refrain that “God is dead” our gathering and the gathering of congregations everywhere declare Jesus repentance and celebrate in hope a promise for all creation. Everything will be made new! Our feast at the table reminds us that we are people of this new creation as we have a foretaste of the banquet of all nations at peace with Gdo and one another.

In this, the church is that which it signifies, it is the beginning of the new creation. We do not make the new creation; we cannot offer any word to the world; nor any other salvation to the world, other than one already given in Jesus life, death, resurrection and ascension. We are to be a light to the nations not because we behave or live as people turned back to God but because we live acknowledging the one who turned back to God on our behalf and in whose life we share by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Our purpose in being the church is none other this to point away from ourselves and at the author of our salvation who has made us to a light among the nations, just as the Israelites were to be a light among the nations. We exist as the church not for our own ends, not to make nice social gatherings, or little Holy clubs but to remind the world that God is and God has a future for the whole creation even when all we can see is death and despair.
So my last word to you in my preaching here is I believe as it should be simply the Word: Jesus. He is the only message that the church really has because in him God has redeemed the world and has begun a new creation which by grace and through the Holy Spirit you and I already have encountered. May God bless you all with wisdom and the Spirit to continue to share and celebrate this message in your lives.

The Chore of Church

Readings Ex 12:1-14, Ps 149, Rom 13:8-14, Mt 18:15-20

There is a Simpson’s which begins with the family going to church. When they arrive home, as soon as the front door opened, Homer, (the dad), and the two older children, Lisa and Bart, raced inside stripping their clothes off as they went.

The mother, Marge, reacted saying, “Hey, calm down. You're wrinkling your church clothes.”

To which Homer responded, “Who cares? This is the best part of the week.”

Lisa added, “It's the longest possible time before more church!”

Marge replied, “Church shouldn't be a chore; it should help you in your daily life.”

To which Homer declared, “It should but it doesn't.”

This little interaction raises for you and I the question of what we are doing here in church and what our attitude about being here actually is.

I would want to suggest that the final interaction about whether or not church helps us in our daily life is a pretty common question concerning church for many people. It is kind of the ‘what’s in it for me” question.

Now I would not want to suggest that we don’t get anything out of church and in fact it is my hope and prayer that you don’t walk out the door after Sunday saying to yourself, “thank goodness that’s over, now I can get back to the real world.” But I would want to say that if the primary question we are asking is “what’s in it for me” then we have either lost sight of the object of our worship or have never really realised what the object is.

Our gathering together doesn’t primarily revolve around getting something more out of God but is a response to God’s goodness and grace in Jesus Christ. To shift the focus to what we are getting out of it is to shift the focus away from worshipping and giving thanks to God and onto ourselves. In other words like Marge and Homer indicate many of us want Church to help us in our daily lives or at least think that’s what it should be about.

Now I would emphasise that it can help us in our daily lives, but this help arises not out of treating Church like a self help group but through our encounters with the living Lord.

Of course the problem for the Simpson’s, particularly Homer, and Bart and Lisa, and for us is how to make sense of the Christian story and even more so how to make sense of what we have been given as the primary text to guide our faith – the Bible.

For example, today’s Psalm, 149, is not exactly that well balanced. In fact one commentator suggests that Psalm 149 is somewhat schizophrenic. It begins with these wonderful images of praising God, praising God with the tambourine and lyre and with dancing but then it moves into the somewhat bizarre imagery, “Let the high praises of God be in their throats and two-edged swords in their hands.”

Did you catch that? Two-edged swords in their hands! The explicit overtones of violence and judgement and vengeance are disturbing to say the least. How do we reconcile our visions of a God of love with this kind of imagery?

This confusion in trying to make sense of our faith is further exacerbated when we consider our reading from Exodus this morning in which God establishes the festival of the Passover. Now it is not the festival itself that is troubling to us but the events that surround it. What does the Passover remember?

It remembers that God spared the Israelites from the infanticide God commits on the Egyptians. God kills the first born child of every house and the first born among all the animals of the Egyptians. God, the God of love to whom you and I ascribe our belief, kills the first born children and animals of an entire nation so that there was “a loud cry in Egypt, for there was not a house without someone dead.”

Is it any wonder that Homer struggles to make sense of the archaic and confusing stories found in the Bible? Is it any wonder that we are often left asking how do we understand this God? And moreover how do we understand this Bible through which we have been given to know God?

How do we deal with the Bible when it speaks in the language of violence and bloodshed? I want to suggest to you this morning that there are a number of ways.

The first is to read the Bible as literally and historically true seeing God’s hand acting in all situations and even as condoning violence. Thinking about more recent history next Sunday we will commemorate the terrorist attacks of September 11. This week our own high court is handing down its verdict on refugees. This is a stark reminder of the poverty and oppression from which many people in this world flee as refugees, whilst others endure drought and political atrocities.

Some Christians interpret these events as acts of God and in the case of September 11 have lead people like Franklin Graham, son of Billy, to describe Islam as "an evil and wicked religion." The Biblical history of violence and judgement for many opens the door to such violence and judgement, and so some interpret the war in Iraq as a Holy War.

This becomes more disturbing when we hear that tragedies like the drought in Africa or Hurricane Irene are God punishing people. The problem is that the Biblical precedent for such acts of God has already been set. The Passover was the last in a line of plagues and afflictions God had sent to torment Pharaoh and the Egyptians – locusts, hail and lightning, frogs, water to blood and so on.

Now that is one approach to the Bible, to see it as literally true and to see it condoning, justifying or explaining the violence and destruction that can occur in our world and in our own lives.

This is not an approach to which I subscribe.

The other end of the spectrum is to do what I wanted to do with the Psalm which was to take out my scissors and cut out the bits that disturb me. In doing this people pick and choose which bits of the Bible they will listen to and which they won’t.

Of course if I cut out all of the bits of the Bible that confused or challenged me I would probably end up with just a few pages left over. Sometimes we do this subtly by treating these kinds of stories as children’s stories or myths, so that we teach them in Sunday School but rarely preach on them or deal with them as adults.

The problem with this is that we are inventing our own religion and not taking seriously the Bible as the book in which we hear God speaking to us. And, as much as I would like to do this myself sometimes, I do not think that this is a valid way of dealing with the bits that make us feel uncomfortable. We are either part of this religion or we are not.

Another approach is to take the text seriously but to read it through the lens of the wider whole and the story of God’s grace in salvation history, especially the cross. If we understand that the wider theme of the Bible is that God is a faithful God who brings salvation and mercy because God loves then this shapes our reading of any text. It means that the overriding truth is the kind of truth that Paul encouraged the Romans to consider. “Owe no one anything, except to love one another.”

This means we are still left with stories that can be uncomfortable but if we apply these themes they can begin to bring greater meaning to the text and sense for our lives.

For example, in terms of the Passover story we remember the history that precedes God’s act of infanticide. God had chosen Abraham and Jacob and Joseph and his brothers and been faithful to them but the Egyptians had enslaved the Israelites. In fact they had been slaves for nearly 400 years when Moses turned up. You might also stop to remember the much romanticised story about Moses birth and his mum chucking him in a basket in the Nile River. Why? Because at that time Pharaoh had been killing off all the male children of the Israelites because they were becoming too numerous!

I am not trying to justify God’s actions, nor do I find all this violence a savoury topic, but it begins to build a bigger picture – God was saving the Israelite people from oppression and hardship. So the Passover celebrates the salvation and liberation which comes from God.

Whilst there is much that could be said about the Passover and what we might learn from it I will restrict myself to a two brief points.

First, the Passover is celebrated by families, not simply in the Temple, but by family groups. It is good for us to be reminded that our faith is something to be lived at home with our families.

Second, that in re-enacting the events families are reminded not only of their past but that God continues to liberate and save people.

In other words the Passover looks back to the historical events it remembers as well forwards to new acts of liberation and salvation being done by God. The Eucharist, or communion, encourages us to do the same to remember God’s salvation in Christ and look forward to the consummation of that salvation.

So in looking at the wider theme of salvation and liberation and grace we can begin to build a picture of God which is more positive and in tune with the notion of unconditional love expressed by Paul.

The same is true of the Matthew reading in which Jesus outlines a way of conflict management for communities of faith. Once again I could build an entire sermon around this but will simply point out a couple of things.

Jesus’ will is for communities to live in love with one another and to seek reconciliation when conflict arises. The process begins with going to the person who has caused you the problems. Reading between the lines this says, don’t gossip! If you have an issue with someone speak to them, not behind their back. If this doesn’t work get a couple of other people to help you try to sort it out. If this doesn’t work bring it before the whole community.

Now in all my experience of being a Christian and of being a minister I have rarely seen this kind of thing in action in a church group, or any kind of community for that matter. We don’t like airing the dirty laundry for others to see. I think we have a greater tendency to keep things to ourselves or maybe to speak behind a person’s back than approach them in a pastorally sensitive way to resolve the issue. But we should remember that the goal in these processes is reconciliation and rebuilding of relationships so that we might live our lives more fully. But what happens when reconciliation doesn’t work.

Jesus says treat those who won’t be reconciled like a tax collector or gentile. This, however, does not mean what we might think it means. What does Jesus do with tax collectors and gentiles? He finds room for them! He accepts them and he forgives them!

In Matthew 21, Jesus said to the chief priests, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the Kingdom of God ahead of you.”

To treat people as tax collectors and Gentiles is not to exclude but is to forgive and even to share at the same table with them as Jesus is often seen to do. The prevailing message is one of love and grace – owe no one anything, except to love one another, for this is how God has loved us – without conditions!

Maybe as we grow to understand this we will grow into a faith like the German Pastor Martin Niemoeller who said after living through Hitler’s reign, "It took me a long time to learn that God is not the enemy of my enemies. He is not even the enemy of His enemies."

To conclude I wish to return to the Simpson’s. The image prior to the Simpson’s arriving home from Church was Reverend Lovejoy preaching whilst the congregation dozed. Paul encourages us, “you know what time it is, how it is now the moment for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near.”

Are you dozing? Is church more of social club than a spiritual encounter? Hear again Paul’s encouragement to be awake to the good news of God’s grace, to be awake to God’s ongoing work of love and mercy in our midst.

The alternative is to be self-centred, thinking that who we are and what we have is somehow due to our own efforts or because we simply deserve it. In which case we might pray, like Bart Simpson, “Dear Lord, we paid for all this stuff ourselves, so thanks for nothing.”

Take a moment to consider God’s word to you this day.

Jesus terrifies!

I think that like the disciples there is a part of us that is terrified of Jesus.

Most of the time we like to think of Jesus as a friend or comforter, maybe a guide or teacher. Yet in some stories, like this one, the idea of Jesus, a man walking across a stormy sea, is utterly strange and confronting. The disciple’s terror may not simply be the strangeness of the situation by the fear that can be generated from within when confronted by something we don’t understand and cannot control.

Now, whether or not the story happened in the way Matthew describes could be a point of contention but Matthew weaves a marvellous tale for his listeners packed with depth of meaning that reaches to the core of our existence.

I just want to make a three quick points about the story.

The first is to say that the image of the disciples in the boat was adopted by the early Christian community as a symbol for the church.

The disciples facing the storm as experienced fishermen worked together and battle the storm, they were in it together and the believed that they would sink or sail by their own efforts.

Sometimes I suspect that we in the church feel a bit the same. We sail the stormy seas of life, thinking we are guiding the ship, thinking that we are in control and that it is we alone who have the capacity to defeat the elements.

Jesus’ appearance ultimately calms the storm and reminds us that even thought we think we have things in hand there are forces greater than our efforts, powers that can even demonstrate a command over nature: God.

As the church we should take confidence in this, whilst we battle the storm, Jesus comes to us and we are not alone.

This brings me to a second point about Peter. Peter demonstrated more than a little faith, in my opinion, to step out of the boat. If we are going to follow Jesus, going to him can mean taking the risk of stepping out of the boat.

There are times when we see the walls of the church and our gathering as a kind of life vest, a security blanket. We are OK to own our faith in this setting but when we step out into the storms around us we can suppress our journey with God and so hide from others the hope we have found in following Jesus.

Today the footprints (footprints are being to each congregtaion member) that you take with you are a reminder to step out in faith every day. Step out with your little faith and take the confidence that where ever you find yourself Jesus is there ready to reach out and give you a hand.

The third and final point thing is to think a bit about the sea and the storm. If we go back to the story of creation in Genesis the image of the beginning is that of God moving over the waters.

The metaphor that is presented demonstrates God drawing back the waters of chaos to make a space in which to create. There are the waters above and the waters below.

This metaphor carries into this story. Jesus walking on the waters in the midst of the storm – the waters of chaos and uncreation above and below. The deep roiling waters and the lashing storm threaten life.

But Jesus stands in the midst of the storm as a beacon of hope, he is unassailable.

As I consider the waters above and the waters below I was struck by the things which threaten us, things which threaten to unravel the world as we know it.

Above us loom the storms of climate change and rapidly depleting resources, natural disasters and millions of starving people in the horn of Africa.

Below us the churning of the waters are like: plummeting markets and drought and war.

And whilst these mind bending and massive issues rage around us the winds that blow through our own lives distract and we become frightened. Winds of loneliness, of illness, of broken relationships. Winds of unemployment, of depression, of constant change.

Here in the midst of the storm Jesus calls to us come and reaches out to help us in the midst of our fears and our doubts and our questions.

This is the hope we find in this story – God has not left us alone to the ravages of the storm but comes to us in the midst of it.

This is the good news that we celebrate today. The good news we celebrate in being together, to remind each other that God is with us. The good news we celebrate as we baptise and as we share bread and wine. The good news we are not alone that God is with us, that Jesus is here reaching out his hand to lead us through our life’s journey.

By Peter Lockhart
(photo creative commons)

Little Faith.

I found myself in a dilemma this week writing the sermon. My dilemma came from a couple of different angles but primarily it arose out of a question of faith and of preaching to a group of people that I do not know that well.

In the passage that we heard from Matthew’s gospel concerning Jesus’ appearance walking on the water the issue of Peter’s faith is raised. Jesus declares that he has little faith. As I read and reflected and discussed this issue of little faith the question arose when Jesus declares that Peter has little faith is he admonishing Peter or is he affirming Peter or is he simple pointing out a simple reality.

It comes back to how he says it:

“You of little faith, why did you doubt?” (angry tone)

“You of little faith, why did you doubt?” (caring tone)

“You of little faith, why did you doubt?” (neutral tone)

Now which ever you decide on the fact of the matter is that Peter is exposed as having little faith.

This is where my problem kicks in – I think people in general, but especially farmers are people who have great faith. How much faith does it take to sit on the property for year after to year waiting for the rains, buying fodder for the animals and holding off planting the crops until the rains come? And then when the rains finally come and the crop is looking good the mice turn up. What faith will it take to harvest a barely average yield and then plant again? In my mind this is an act of faith, not little faith, but strong faith, strong conviction.

So what does it mean to only have little faith?

How do we view Peter and the disciples in their predicament?

So as I mulled over the passage more and more I refocussed myself away from Peter and onto Jesus and what the passage tells us about him. From very early in the church Jesus ability to walk on water was understood in two ways. First, it demonstrates that he is divine. And second, that in walking on the water he demonstrates his command over the threatening depths that lie below. I just want to unpack those ideas a little more.

Before Jesus ever walked on water, other figures in the ancient world walked on water. For example, the Egyptian god Horus walked on water and Orion the son of Poseidon also had the ability to walk on water. In addition to this in both the Psalms and the book of Job we hear that the God of the Israelites walks on the water. I have sometimes wondered whether Jesus did these things because of the mythology associated or whether the gospel writers added these stories in to make the point that Jesus was the Son of God. Either way the focus of the miracle is to declare Jesus divinity.

So, Jesus is divine, what of the second point. In the mind of Israelites the sea was seen as a threat, and was associated with images of the deep and of chaos and of death. In Jesus walking on the water he demonstrates not simply a command over nature but over the chaos that opposes God.

In this case the story is essential about the disciples declaration concerning Jesus at the end “Truly you are the Son of God” which is then accompanied by the disciples worshipping him. In this response we might then conclude that the disciples, Peter included, have moved from a place of doubt to position of clarity in faith.

Yet if this were the case then you would expect that from this point onwards the disciples would get it as the followed Jesus, that they would be clear about who Jesus was and their commitment to him. This, however, as we know is not the case. Despite their declaration the disciples still struggle to follow Jesus with integrity – the question, the squabble, they doubt, they desert. Have they really moved to a place of great clarity in faith or not?

So we return to where I began what do we with Jesus notion of Peter’s little faith and how do we understand our own faith and relationship with Jesus, regardless of the culture of faithfulness associated with living on the land.

To gain some insights into this involves exploring a little more closely what actually occurs in the story as Matthew tells it.

We hear the disciples are in a boat, it is in the early in the morning and there is a storm buffeting the boat – interestingly we are not told whether or not the disciples are afraid as they had been when Jesus was asleep with them in the boat. It is into this scene – in the darkness of the early morning, in the midst of a howling gale, and a rocky sea that Jesus comes walking across the water to them – this we are told terrifies the disciples.

This raises all sorts of questions for me about how comfortable we really are in Jesus presence and why it might terrify us but I do not want to get side-tracked into that issue – I want us to concentrate on what occurs in the story.

Jesus tells the disciples that it is him and not to be afraid but the disciples doubt. It is at this point that Peter decides to test Jesus identity. If it is really you command me to come to you on the water.

The more I thought about this request the more troubled it made me as I considered the scene of Jesus temptation – “You shall not put God to the test!” But Peter’s testing of Jesus involves Peter taking the risk, not Jesus.

This creates a conundrum as Jesus says ‘come’ and Peter steps out on to the water. Now it is Peter who is at risk and as we know distracted by the wind he begins to sink. Peter has set out to test Jesus but what is exposed is that Peter has little faith and that he doubts.

What does he doubt? Given that the question revolves around Jesus identity I would have to say that Peter doubts Jesus identity. Paradoxically this doubt of Peter concerning Jesus is set over against Peter’s absolute trust in Jesus as he calls out, from within what has as his little faith, “Lord, save me!”

So as we think about the story Peter’s little faith causes him to doubt and question Jesus identity. Yet it is also Peter’s little faith that gives him the strength to step out onto the water but despite this he still fears and begins to doubt. Just when everything is going pear shaped and Peter sinks it is Peter’s little faith that prompts him to cry out for Jesus to save him.

Does Jesus fail Peter’s identity test? No, in fact the whole boatload of disciples shifts in their perception of Jesus as they worship him and declare him to be the Son of God, at least for the moment. But as we know this is not the end game – in the story to come in Matthew’s gospel we still have the complexity of the confusing behaviour of the disciples.

To return to my initial line of questioning is Peter’s little faith a good or bad thing, or is it just what it is. Whatever we might think what we do discover is that Jesus’ love and concern for Peter and the rest of the disciples survives their doubt of his identity. We find that Jesus love and concern is such that he will stretch and save those who are full of doubt and only have little faith. And that in his love and concern Jesus will continue to walk alongside the disciples as they follow him.

Maybe this is the lesson that we are meant to hear most clearly that Jesus love for us reaches out to us in the midst of our own doubts and fears; in the midst our little faith. This is certainly a message of hope especially to those of us who may get distracted by the wind or the buffeting of the waves.

To have little faith or great faith is not the issue so much as is the idea that Jesus has love and concern for us regardless of the strength of our faith. So as we cling to each other in the boat we call the church let us find some solace and comfort in the calm that Jesus offers, let us not fear Jesus presence but rather celebrate it and let us worship God together.

Do you understand?

“Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like the master of a household who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.”

We live in an era where the number of voices that want to claim authority of our lives is as staggering as the media through which they use to speak to us.

Voices heard and seen

Broadcasting on Radio & Television
Blogging, Facebooking, Tweeting
Podcasting
Paperbacks, hardbacks, newspapers, Magazines
eBooks, eZines, chat groups
and the list goes on

To locate and listen to Jesus voices in this cacophony can be a difficult task and one that takes commitment and discernment.

Whose voices shall we listen to as Christians? The vitriolic atheists, the passive progressive, the fervent fundamentalist, the mediating moderate, the sceptic, the scientist?

The diversity and complexity that surrounds us can be daunting and confusing and we can be left pining for a simple faith, a faith built on an encounter with God that we have had in our own lives.

Yet naivety in our approach to faith and reading of scriptures or listening to the voices around us can lead us on pathways away from the God that we have encountered in the coming of Jesus into our lives.

Yes experiences of faith are moments of revelation given to us by God and they are given that we might know and therefore seek the kingdom of heaven.

Now what this kingdom of heaven actually is may seem a little obscure as Jesus speaks in parables – mustard seeds, yeast, fields, pearls and nets.

Yet at the end of listening to Jesus telling these stories the disciples collectively respond to Jesus question “Have you understood all of this?” with a resounding “Yes”.

I have to say given the following stories of Jesus and the disciples and their behaviour in Matthew’s gospel I am not entirely convinced that the disciples “Yes” is as convincing as it sounds.

Jesus goes on from the disciples’ response to get them to consider their roles as scribes.

Now a scribe was a leader and teacher within the Jewish community. In the book of Sirach, which is one of the apocryphal writings, not found in the protestant Bible, a scribe is described in this way, “He memorizes the sayings of famous men and is a skilled interpreter of parables. He studies the hidden meaning of proverbs and is able to discuss the obscure points of parables.”

The memorizing and understanding of scribes involved an engagement with history, with what had gone before and how things had been explained.

Jesus as a teacher and in acting as a scribe himself points that a scribe of the kingdom of heaven “like the master of a household who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.”

So this takes me back to where I started about how we might discern amidst the complexity of voices around us whose voice to listen to.

Ultimately, I believe that the voice we are to listen to is Jesus voice, but which voice of Jesus and how do we listen to it and who is this Jesus anyway.

For me listening to Jesus voice involves a life or prayer and reading the scriptures but also a commitment to listening to those scholars who are able to clearly and rationally articulate what was new about Jesus and how it related to the old. It is also about listening to scholars new and old.

In the Uniting Church in Australia, The Basis of Union points us to scholarly interpreters in every age yet also grounds these scholars in a particular tradition. A tradition of understanding elucidated at the time of the reformation and preserved in the creeds of the ancient church.

What was new about Jesus is found in the tradition which has been handed on to us – the understanding that Jesus was unique in his relationship with God and was God. This unique revelation of God found in the person and work of Jesus, often referred to as the incarnation, is the point in history in and through which reconciles humanity and all things to himself.

The Basis of Union of the Uniting Church in Australia which describes the essence of the Christian faith captures these thoughts about Jesus when it quotes scripture and says, In Jesus Christ "God was reconciling the world to himself" (2 Corinthians 5:19 RSV). In love for the world, God gave the Son to take away the world's sin.”

So the kingdom of heaven is fundamentally about the reconciling work of God that occurs in and through Jesus. He is the mustard seed from which the tree of our faith grows, he is yeast that makes the dough of our lives rise, he is treasure in the field and the pearl to be sought for when we encounter Jesus we encounter the kingdom of heaven.

One of the issues the church and each us face in this complex and diverse world in which we live is whether we believe this message of hope and good news and how we respond to it.

As I personally sift through the options that are being touted I continually return to those scholars of excellence who are able to read the tradition in which we stand, that is to say the old, taking into account contemporary scholarship, that is to say the new.

For me these are the scribes of the kingdom of heaven of our day and whilst I believe none see entirely clearly they offer a witness to Jesus Christ as the one in and through whom we are reconciled with God.

The Basis of Union whilst a product of the mid to late 20th century I believe continues to express for us a way in which to understand and respond to the good news of Jesus Christ as the church.

This is what it says about who we are together as the church:

The Church as the fellowship of the Holy Spirit confesses Jesus as Lord over its own life; it also confesses that Jesus is Head over all things, the beginning of a new creation, of a new humanity. God in Christ has given to all people in the Church the Holy Spirit as a pledge and foretaste of that coming reconciliation and renewal which is the end in view for the whole creation. The Church's call is to serve that end: to be a fellowship of reconciliation, a body within which the diverse gifts of its members are used for the building up of the whole, an instrument through which Christ may work and bear witness to himself. The Church lives between the time of Christ's death and resurrection and the final consummation of all things which Christ will bring; the Church is a pilgrim people, always on the way towards a promised goal; here the Church does not have a continuing city but seeks one to come. On the way Christ feeds the Church with Word and Sacraments, and it has the gift of the Spirit in order that it may not lose the way.

If you and I are seeking the kingdom of heaven and so seeking Jesus and are living as the church then the question for all of us is are we being a fellowship of reconciliation and are we using our gifts for the building up of the whole – is Christ bearing witness through us.

This is not just about what we do for ourselves as a community but how we too live as yeast and seed in the world around us because Christ is witnessing through us, through our very lives.

Jesus finished his parables by asking the disciples “Do you understand all this?” Maybe they did, maybe the problem was not their understanding but their commitment to what it meant for them in how they were to live.

Maybe this is an issue for us as well.

Yet maybe there is in the confusing generation in which we live an issue of understanding, an issue of accepting and following and believing.

Yet the good news is that nothing can separate us from God’s love in Christ and the kingdom of heaven like the mustard seed or yeast will grow and you and I who encounter it will seek it for in seeking it we will live as witnesses to kingdom of heaven which has come near.

Trinity Sunday: An old sermon!

Peter Lockhart

An sermon from 2007 Year A Trinity Sunday... what to do this week?

Today the lectionary gives to us a gift from the church – today is Trinity Sunday. The reason that I say that it is a gift from the church is that the concept of the Trinity does not come to us directly from Scripture because the Bible does not use this language, this word Trinity, to describe God. Rather, in reflecting on the depth of God’s revelation to us in Jesus Christ the early church in its struggle to articulate the truth of God’s existence adopted this language of describing God as Trinity.

This comes to us as gift in the context of the struggle of humanity to know its creator and to understand the creation. In his book The Mind of God the eminent mathematician and physicist Paul Davies declared ‘While we assume there is a design behind the physical reality, science can’t really tell us anything about the designer, the nature of God, or God’s relationship with human beings.’ (end quote)

To seek to understand God and to listen for the story of God does not mean turning away from scientific inquiry and reason but marrying it with the revelation of this very creator in our midst. For, to borrow a phrase from another physicist and theologian John Polkinghorn, to describe God as trinity is not a case of doing some ‘speculative mystical arithmetic’ but is grounded in the very narrative of the revelation of God found in the scriptures.

Jesus’ claims concerning himself and his relation with God and the Holy Spirit give rise for us to speak of God in this way.

John asserts Jesus to be the eternal word of God.

Jesus claimed that he was in the Father and the Father was in him and that those who had seen him had seen the Father.

The promise of the Holy Spirit is the promise of the Spirit sent from the Father, the same Spirit that was seen descending on Jesus at his baptism.

And, Jesus command to go and baptise in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit further makes this description of God appropriate.

Here in these passages and others we encounter God not simply as some monad but that God in Godself is a community of existence – a communion of being.

If we listen to the very first story found in the scriptures this truth of God’s very nature as existing as a communion is found as we hear that we are created in God’s image:

“Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness:

So God created humankind in his image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.”

Here we find that to be made in God’s image is to be made male and female – not male or female, but both together – a community. To be in the image of God is to be one, yet one with distinct entities. The fullness of being human in the image of God is being humans together, just as God is one yet three.

This helps us to make sense of the statement that God is love. To love involves both a lover and an object of that love. If God in God’s very self is love then that love is a love expressed in the mutuality of existence of the Father, the Son and the Spirit.

This gives to us the context of our own existence created to love and be loved by God and by each other – to do less than this would be to deny the reality of our being created in God’s image and thereby to deny what it means to be truly human.

Yet the narrative that unfolds in the pages of the scriptures is that this exactly what human beings do: rather than live in the communion of love whereby we exist as one for each other we as human beings continually seek our personal end, our personal gain.

The story of Adam and Eve is not some isolated event in prehistory but is each of our own stories – we deny the reality of our existence and seek more as if what we have already been given is not enough. And when we are questioned about this we try to blame someone else.

But God’s love for us is so deep that he gives to us himself, his son, the incarnation – Jesus with us to live for us. Here the work of God as Trinity becomes clearer and even yet more confronting. Jesus fully human and fully divine shares our human existence living in communion with God and the creation.

The culmination of Jesus share in our existence as well as our estrangement from God and each other is found in the cross and resurrection. The theologian Jürgen Moltman describes Jesus death as an entirely Trinitarian in which Jesus human cry of abandonment, ‘My God, my God why have you forsaken me?’ is matched by the desolation of God the Father as mourns the estrangement of humanity in the death of his only son.

Here we begin to have an insight into the concern of God at our suffering and of God’s will that this not be the last word for the cross without the resurrection leaves us without much hope. The Spirit descends into the realm of dead to – a place complete oppose and devoid of God’s existence to meet Jesus there and bring him to new life.

To contemplate this is to understand that even in the place of death to which Jesus descends, a place of complete separation from God Jesus is retrieved. The Eastern Orthodox churches speak of the days between Jesus death and resurrection as the time of his descent into hell. There is no place in this life or in our death that God has not been and that God cannot reach us.

This God, who is love, loves us to this point of self sacrificial giving so that we might be with God eternally. The sending of the Holy Spirit to us makes us one with Jesus in his action for us and in the church we are made to be a sign of hope for the world as humans existing as human beings created in God’s image are meant to – as community.

The church is meant to be God’s people living in respect to how we were created and were recreated to live, but it does not take a genius to see that we do not live this way as the church, even though this is the church we believe that God calls us to be. Like those who lived before Jesus death and resurrection our fall into temptation, to live as if we are not in created God’s image and so to seek something other, is continually there.

The rampant individualism of the post enlightenment world, both modernism and post modernism, have so impacted on the belief of the western church that for so many our faith is private or personal matter. Evangelists continually emphasize our personal relationship with Jesus as being the central reality of faith, but unless we understand that as persons we are not drawn into a one on one faith experience but into the community of God’s existence which includes not only other people but the fullness of creation then we have turned away from the truth of the gospel.

To be Christian means to be the church – for the church is the body of Christ, it is the Church in the power of the Spirit. Bound together by God’s love and into God’s existence together we celebrate our risen Lord.

This understanding of the church came up in my lecturing on Thursday when I was quoting a passage from John Calvin’s Institutes written in 1559.

“For when we believe the Church, it is in order that we may be firmly persuaded that we are its members. In this way our salvation rests on a foundation so firm and sure, that though the whole fabric of the world were to give way, it could not be destroyed.”

Half of the students reacted to this understanding of the church expressing that whilst the ideal and imagery is great it had not been their experience of the church. Many had been hurt and burnt within the community of the faithful – a reality for most of us.

Yet within the arms of the church that we believe, the church that God has made through the power of the Spirit, our hope is that we do share in the Trinitarian life of God and we become fully human.

Calvin, being the realist he was, declared:

"But in order to embrace the unity of the Church in this manner, it is not necessary, as I have observed, to see it with our eyes, or feel it with our hands. Nay, rather from its being placed in faith, we are reminded that our thoughts are to dwell upon it, as much when it escapes our perception as when it openly appears."

Being church is as much a matter of faith and an expression of God’s Trinitarian life as our hope in the promise of Jesus that we will find our way home in him.

The depths of the mystery of our faith stand alongside the mystery and wonder that is seen in the creation by the physicists and biologist and ecologists. Our unity with God who is Father, Son and Spirit, our unity with each other, our unity with all living things humbles us and gives to us place in this world, in our lives and with our God.

Giving thanks for this mystery we can echo the wonder of the great Albert Einstein:

One cannot but be in awe when one contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvellous structure of reality. It is enough if one merely tries to comprehend a little of this mystery each day. Never lose a holy curiosity.

So with him and millions before us and millions to come let us pass into silence before the mystery of the Trinity and seek the face of the one who loves us.

Pointing away from ourselves

I was in conversation with a friend recently about running a group associated with the church. Whilst he was interested in what I was proposing he made the comment that if he knew it was a church running it he wouldn’t come. He went on to say that he was not alone in holding such a view, not simply because of the bad things that have been done by the church in history but also because if he came to a church group he would not feel safe to express his own ideas.

This conversation is not unlike many I have had over the years which continually remind me that the church has a bad name in the community and bridging the gap means overcoming not only apathy but sometimes open hostility.

I suspect one of the reasons many of Jesus followers are trying to work outside the institutional churches is that they are trying to disassociate themselves from the stigma of being in ‘the church’. This appears to work to a certain extent but whether we want to acknowledge it or now being Christian means being church with all of the baggage that this brings.

As followers of Jesus owning the hurts and pains and doubts that the church has caused in peoples’ lives is not easy but unless we own our imperfection and continually confess it then we deceive ourselves. We cannot sweep our transgressions under the carpet nor can we point at how much we think we love one another as if we are getting it perfectly right.

As followers of Jesus we can only point away from our imperfect actions and at Jesus and pray that in the midst of our flawed witness God’s grace shines through and the kingdom of God come close.