Sunday Sermon: John 10. 22-30 - “My sheep hear my voice."

 

 

 

John 10.22-30

At that time the festival of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon. So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.” Jesus answered, “I have told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me; but you do not believe, because you do not belong to my sheep. My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.”

How should we approach this passage? As a general principle I try to imagine my way into Gospel stories. I try to see myself as an anonymous member of the crowd as I try to walk through the story. Who do I most identify with? Who do I sympathise with? Who irritates me? What if I stood here or over by him? What if I couldn’t hear properly because of the crowd? What if I didn’t actually trust this man Jesus? What if I was a Pharisee or a Roman?

I have to try to imagine my way into the stories because I am almost always disappointed by the brevity of the gospel accounts and their lack of background detail. I want to know that there was someone there who kept coughing, or that there were children playing nearby, or that there were cooking smells or that it had just rained.

Of course, to what extent can someone like me, a product of my own times truly enter into the experience, the sights, the sounds, the smells and, most importantly, the theological and social conventions of the first century? I can’t. But that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t try.

So, this morning’s text: the occasion was the festival of the rededication of the temple in Jerusalem commemorating when Greek invaders had been vanquished and the temple had been cleansed of the blasphemy – the statue of Zeus. As a consequence those around Jesus were thinking about freedom: freedom from the invader; freedom to live without fear; freedom from foreign domination and freedom from political musclemen and their taxes.

The air at the time of our narrative for today was thus filled with thoughts of victory, freedom, and the return of Jewish leadership, but while the temple was now fully dedicated to God, the land had been lost again, this time to the Romans, with their brutal, heathen practices which again came all too close to this holy place, this magnificent temple of God.

So this is the basic context for my imaginary walking through of the story. I am in awe of the architecture and the history of this place and all the religious and historical symbolism that is associated with it. I am conscious of the occupying army and the problem of the daily compromises we have to make as we try not to cross the fine line between Roman Imperial theology and the faith of our upbringing. And the sense of something about to happen is palpable as my people yearn for religious and political self-determination: a theme that resonates here today as we watch the on-going outworkings of the Arab Spring. Am I unaware in all of this of the role this Rabbi from Nazareth might play in the unfolding events? Well, I’m here and I’m listening closely to the exchange between Jesus and the crowd, possibly looking over my shoulder: this is the home of religious orthodoxy after all, with its religious leaders and its guards – and its informers and, I can’t help but note that this is the point where Jesus appears to berate his listeners: he tells them they don’t understand what he's saying because they’re in the wrong team.

Jesus tells his listeners “You do not belong to my sheep.” I think we can assume, given the setting of the temple, that he was surrounded by the pious and faithful and we might be in danger of buying into the standard stereotype of the Pharisee as some sort of self-satisfied, self-promoting religious thought-police.

No - they were the good guys in Jewish society: yes they upheld exacting standards and yes they were literalists as far as the Law of Moses was concerned and yes, they were on the look-out for heresy, but there were those among them for whom Jesus’ message resonated. Jesus had sympathisers in this group, men who were theological thinkers so we mustn’t assume that Jesus’ encounters with the Orthodox were always encounters of conflict. Sometimes there were genuine seekers of the truth and sometimes there was a meeting of minds.

Nevertheless, we read that things turned nasty.

“And they took up stones again to stone him.” the issue being blasphemy and the fact that Jesus had said “The Father and I are one”, which provokes a fresh but failed attempt to arrest Jesus. Why failed? Because there were people in that crowd who were open to hearing and considering a new perspective. Let’s not assume that every time we hear of conflict it is as simple as Jesus verses all the rest.

Is it too fanciful to assume that some of these people had been following Jesus since he arrived in Jerusalem? Is it reasonable to assume that some present in the Temple with Jesus here had already been present when Jesus had made some other pretty startling claims?  We’ve already heard Jesus proclaim to the crowds “I am the bread of life: he who comes to Me shall not hunger”, “I am the light of the world: he who follows Me shall not walk in the darkness, but shall have the light of life.”, “I am the gate; if anyone enters through Me, he shall be saved” and “I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down His life for His sheep.” So we can easily see the question posed by the crowd at the start of today’s Gospel segment, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.” as part of that on-going dialogue.

So what then? Why does any of this matter? Why has the Lectionary designated this passage as worthy of our analysis this morning? Just a point to consider: when we read the Gospel stories we would do well to consider who Jesus’ target audience was and then to consider whether today we might be the implied audience. Can we hear in Jesus’ words to this group, his words to us?

I think it’s right that we try; otherwise this story will remain on that level: merely a story; an interesting piece of religious history which therefore doesn’t have the power to touch us or challenge us.

Well, I’d like to pursue the theme of discipleship and link that to today’s theme of the identity of Jesus. “The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me” says Jesus, or to put it another way, “Come on folks, you’ve seen me and what I do for long enough surely to know that what I do is from God”, followed in pretty short order by, “The Father and I are one.” As disciples, how do we present Jesus by our works and by our words?

Why are we here this morning? Well, at the heart of our presence here is surely some affirmation that we, unlike Jesus’ listeners in the Gospel extract, are in the right team. “My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand”, he tells the crowd. Well, the “them” and the “they” he refers to here includes us. Like the crowd, we’ve been following Jesus for some time. We are the sheep of this shepherd and our presence here this morning is evidence of that.

What about tomorrow morning when we aren’t here? What’s the evidence of belonging to Jesus then?

That’s a bit challenging isn’t it?

We do not live in a time of persecution. Our discipleship does not need to be hidden. Indeed, I think Jesus provides us with a model of discipleship in this passage. “The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me” says Jesus and “The Father and I are one.” It’s as if he’s saying “Look, I’ve shown you and now I’ve told you.”

“The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me.” The works that we do in the Father’s name testify to him. “The Father and I are one” becomes “The Father and Jesus are one.” To put it another way: what we do and what we say reveals our discipleship. That seems to be the pattern Jesus gives us here.

So, what we do: there’s no list here as if there were some simplistic formulae: we’re mature adults and most of us are mature in the faith, so beyond the principle of being a role model what are we talking about?

Some years ago, when I was at vicar school – not a million miles from here as it happens, I was privileged to meet Desmond Tutu. One of the things he said to us as he looked around the room was “God has chosen you for who you are. Do not let others change you.” And at that point he made eye contact with me. Now that was a general injunction but it hit me very personally and really made me stop and think. God has chosen me for who I am and that’s as true for all of us here as much it was for all of us sat in that room at Mirfield. We have a God given personality – and we can talk about the Gifts of the Spirit as part of that general conversation – but the point is you are who you are and God has called that person to discipleship.

Who are your religious role models? Who are the Christians out there who inspire us and who we would love to emulate in our own discipleship?

I love Desmond Tutu. I love him for his enthusiasm and his love of life. I love him for his humanity and his compassion for the underdog. I love him for his bravery. Could I have some of that please Lord?

I love Giles Fraser. I love him for his prophetic voice, for his approachability and his everyday blokishness and I love him because he’s a bit gobby. Gobby in the name of the Lord. Could I have some of that please Lord?

And I love American Bishop John Shelby Spong. I love him because he’s a thorn in the side of the established church. I love him because he’s a theological thinker and I love him because in a very real way he is the conscience of American Christianity.

What a dinner party: Desmond Tutu, Giles Fraser, John Shelby Spong  …  and Joanna Lumley obviously.

What do these Christians have in common? They are men of God, compassionate, well informed, outspoken and without an ounce of piety between them. That’s the model of discipleship I aspire to, but there is more than one model. Of all the passages of scripture that the Holy Spirit might have laid on my heart, the one that stays with me is, “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” from Philippians. Put that together with your own personality type and the things you admire from your Christian role models and you have your model of discipleship. What did Jesus say? “The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me” and as the implied audience of this discussion between Jesus and the crowd, we turned that into “The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to him.” Active discipleship: it’s the life we lead.

So let’s turn to the second part of Jesus’ template for discipleship: the things we say. “The Father and Jesus are one” is pretty much the foundation for our conversations about God. And again, we can wriggle uncomfortably here can’t we. Does anyone here find it easy to talk to others about your faith? If you do, you’re really blessed because it’s something the rest of us struggle with. I suppose for those of us who are “professionally” religious that comes with the territory.

“Sir, are you religious?” Well it’s all about perceptions isn’t it? I don’t tend to think I am, but the question isn’t asking me for my philosophy on pietism. It demands a clear answer.

“Sir, are you a vicar?” “Do you go to church?” I wish I had a fiver for every time, but I have a public profile of being a person of faith. How does that work for you? How do you deal with such approaches? My wife Rachel often finds herself in that Monday morning conversation: you know, the work recap on what you did at the weekend and I remember her saying once: “Well, I found myself making cotton wool sheep for children’s church.” This was followed by some anecdote about four year olds and the perils of unsupervised glue. But it led into a conversation which has subsequently led into others. I have a colleague who is a Muslim and he said to me once, “Christianity, Islam – it’s all the same.”

That’s a conversation which has gone on, on and off, for months.

What those two examples have got in common is that we found common ground and actually now that I think about it we both responded to someone else’s approach, much as we found Jesus responding in the Gospel extract, and that’s why, earlier, I suggested we needed to be careful about the voice tone we ascribed to Jesus in this passage. Confrontational or conciliatory? A judgemental statement or part of an on-going dialogue? Judgemental attitudes close down conversations: conciliatory attitudes keep them open. Confrontational wins us no friends. Conciliatory does, but by conciliatory, I don’t mean compromising. Listening respectfully and entering into discussion is always good but defending the basis of our beliefs remains an essential part of that.

I suppose the other observation I would make is a cautionary one: what is it that we view as an essential part of our faith? How much of what we perceive to be Christian is actually essential to the defence of Christianity. How easily are we sidetracked into more cultural or political issues such as abortion and gay rights? So perhaps my specific challenge to all of us this morning is to spend some time in thought, prayer and discussion with friends about what the essence of our faith is: what needs to be on that list and what doesn’t? I think being clear about that will increase our confidence as we seek to talk to others of our faith.

Of course, this is about mission, the Missio Dei – the Mission of God. I remember sitting through a lecture series on mission. As someone who has participated in various parish or diocesan missions – often having strong reservations which I found hard to rationalise, I was brought up short and challenged by one model of mission. We were asked to consider to what extent mission is a human initiative or a divine initiative? And the answer was, it’s a divine initiative so rather than wasting hours in committees and discussion groups about mission perhaps we should seek instead to discern where God is already at work … and join in. I think that’s a pretty good approach for our own witness and evangelism: let the Holy Spirit take the initiate and lead us to where we can respond to the needs of others where we might be able to say, “The Father and Jesus are one.” In the meantime, may “The works we do in our father’s name testify to him.”

Amen.

Teaching Holy Week to 12 year olds

 

 

For the past few weeks here at the Knowledge College, we have been looking at Easter Themes with Yr 8. The lack of background knowledge is gobsmacking.

"What do you mean Lent? What did he lend?"

My one Asian student in this class has a better grasp of the events of Holy Week than any of the indigenous kids. (There's probably an M.Phil in there somewhere.)

My Maths pal Karl has been winding my kids up as they come into the room. "Do you believe in God?" he asks them in turn.

The general consensus is that they don't.

"There you go then" he says looking at me as if he has just won the Oxford Union debate.

What? WHAT?

We begin the lesson.

"But I thought Jesus was a Christian." Donna is trying to brush her hair.

Let's think about that for a minute.

We spend a little time discussing Jesus' Jewishness and the theory that he wasn't setting out to found a new religion so much as to reform the one he was born into. This is clearly a new idea.

"So where did Christianity come from then?"

We discuss - or perhaps more to the point I spell out - how the Disciples were turned away from the synagogues for their heresy and how this little Jewish sect began to take on its own identity which ultimately led to a recognisably new set-up.

"Was Jesus an epileptic?"

I'm sorry?

"You know: epileptics can have this huge strength so he could of (sic) moved the stone."

This is the point at which the relentless and totally illogical 12 year old imagination runs riot.

"Yeah and he could've escaped and bribed the soldiers and crossed the border and lived in witness protection for the rest of his life."

You've been watching too much Law and Order. Just remind me what sort of state Jesus would have been in after the crucifixion. In an earlier lesson we had been watching the scourging and crucifixion scenes from The Passion of The Christ.

By which I mean dead.  (If, dear Reader, you have seen those scenes, and managed to sit through them, you'll know just what an excoriatingly appalling set of circumstances Mel Gibson portrays.)

"But he could of recovered."

So hang on. With shock, blood-loss, dehydration, sun-stroke, a severe beating, nails through his hands and feet and a spear in his side, he's going to revive, find the strength to move the stone and leg it?

"Yeah."

With Roman Soldiers on guard?

"They were in on it."

"They felt sorry for him."

"The Disciples helped him."

Hang on. Where did we last see the Disciples?

"They were running away from the garden."

As in frightened?

"Yeah."

And....?

"Well they got brave again."

Brave enough to take on the disciplined soldiers of the greatest fighting machine then known to man?

"But they were in on it."

"No. The disciples killed them and put on their uniforms."

And, what? Lived the rest of their lives pretending to be Roman soldiers?

"Yeah. Why not?"

So, just remind me. Why did the Disciples steal the body?

"Because they wanted it to have a decent burial."

He already had a decent burial. He was buried in a rich man's tomb rather than left to rot in a communal ditch to be eaten by scavenging dogs which often happened. All he needed was for the women to complete the funeral rites.

"No, right. He was in a cave. Maybe a bear or rats ate him."

And left no bones?

"They were hungry."

Of course.

We go on to Google and look at pictures of First Century tombs, interior and exterior.

So not a cave, then? Now, where were we? Ah yes, the Disciples rebury the body secretly and within the next thirty five years most of them go to their deaths for preaching the Resurrection? I can't see it.

"No, no. Don't kill me. I was only joking. He didn't really rise from the dead. I was only messing about. We buried him outside Nazareth. April fool. Ha ha ha."

No. Not seeing it.

"Well you come up with a better idea."

Could I suggest we consider the Resurrection?

No. This is clearly not a welcome idea.

All I'm suggesting is that if God exists and he is capable of doing what religious people claim, then anything is possible.

"And what" triumphantly "If God doesn't exist. Ha?"

Then we still have a mystery and you still have to come up with a better explanation.

"The Romans stole the body."

Why?

"I dunno."

You need to think about it.

"Why?"

Look, that's not good enough. The onus is on you to explain what happened.

"Well the Romans were just mean and it was a nasty trick."

Hmm. I quite like that but it still doesn't work.

"Why not?"

Surely when the Disciples had been fooled into believing that Jesus had risen from the dead all the Romans had to do was to produce the remains to prove them wrong.

"THIS IS TOO HARD!!!"

"Sir, were Jesus' followers on Twitter."

Yes. @Jesus' Crew.

"Really?"

"I don't believe in God."

That's fine. It still doesn't explain where the body went.

"I know, right. The guy whose tomb it was, right? He had a set of secret tunnels at the back of the tomb."

And where did Jesus go?

"Dewsbury Hospital. Ha ha ha."

"Shut up Tom. You're a div!"

Why would the tomb owner do that?

"Because he wanted Jesus' body."

But no-one knew in advance he would offer them his tomb. What? So he kept the body?

"Yeah."

What? Like people do? Anyway, do you not think the Romans would have scoured that tomb?

"No"

Really?

"I don't believe in God."

Yes, I think we've established that.

I look around at their expectant little faces and wonder what Dan Brown must have looked like when he was twelve.

"I don't see why we have to do this."

“Still,” says Karl after the event, “It could’ve been worse. While you were doing that I had set seven. I wan’t you to draw this hexagon at a scale of two to one. What does that mean to you?”

Well, I venture, You want it twice as big.

“Exactly. And at any stage did I say draw it five times bigger and add in two extra sides?”

Oh well, maybe R.S. isn’t so bad after all.

John The Mad Scientist

It is the school half term. I went out with my dear friend and colleague John (I'm terribly sorry, he's from Wakefield) for a few beers and lunch. We have been mates for twenty seight years. You may remember John from the novelty socks birthday present episode. It was his turn to decide where lunch would be. I suggest the Norman Bar. John says no.

Where are we off to then?

"This way". John sets off in a random direction.

What's this way?

"We'll find somewhere."

We pass half a dozen or so places but for whatever reason they don't appeal. We arrive at a promising trattoria. "Sorry, we're shut for lunch."

Really? REALLY?

 

We end up at the Norman Bar. This has now become John's idea.

John is half a decade younger than me and yet I caught a glimpse of how we will be in our old age.

John has long spoken his own version of West-Yorkshire English, which I have become adept at translating.

* Giffer: as in "What do you mean you've locked yourself out of your house and in mine, you silly old giffer?" This to his elderly dad who had rung him on his mobile.

* Bint: female form of Giffer as in "The old Bint's coming round for her tea tonight." This refers to his Auntie.

* Numb-nut: as in "That were a right crowd of numb-nuts I taught before break."

* Keks, or possibly kecks: as in "I can barely get my fat-arse in these keks these days. I may need a bigger size."

* Snap: as in "I'm famished. I'm ready for me snap."

In addition - and I realise this has been creeping up on him - his conversation is peppered with words such as "wotsit", "thingumybob" and "watdyacallit?" One part of todays conversation went "You know, I've left the thingumyjig behind and so I can't get the whatsit." I have become the master of the non-commital non-verbal cue: a smile of encouragement, a nod, an "Oh, right" or "Shame" (depending on how I have interpreted the emotion behind the comment). This is a departure from a previous stage of our friendship when I regularly told him that he had thirty seconds to get to the point or I would stop listening. (He is a scientist, say no more!) His language is also peppered with rich Anglo Saxon as in "I'm such a arsewhipe, I've left the b*****d thingumyjig behind so I can't get the f*****g whatsit." This adds little to my understanding but a great deal to the entertainment value of the exchange and it made our discussion in the cafe on the science of climate change something of a challenge. "It would help if those old giffs (pl) would shut the f*****g door." I wasn't entirely sure whether that was in relation to his own comfort levels or a more oblique statement on the unneccessary loss of heat that contributes to the generation of more electricity and therefore the burning of fossil fuels. I have learnt that it doesn't really matter because a request for clarification is likely to lead to more complications or a long pause followed by "What was I saying?"

Also he gets to practice all his prejudices.

"That whats-his-face: he's so ugly. I know he can't help it but he could've stayed at home!"

Today John told me a hot piece of news...only it wasn't so hot as I had told it to him several days earlier. "I knew I'd heard it from somewhere!" unabashed.

In twenty years time John and I will continue to meet. The scenario I have in my head is that I'll turn up on the wrong day but it won't matter because he will have forgotten. When we do meet we will endlessly tell each other the same news, perhaps five times in a day but it won't matter because we will have forgotten what we said. Our conversations will re-enforce the importance of our news because we will both have a sense of having heard it somewhere before only, believing this news to be widely disseminated, we will be the only two who have actually heard it. There is also the possibility that one of us will have made it up. "Those f*****g whatdyacall'ems.......you know....the whatsits. They've started believing in global warming."

You mean Republicans?

"Aye, them, b******s"

That's because New York's been flooded, but it's O.K. It's only a natural cycle.

"What is?"

Eh?

"You said York was flooded."

What, again?

"F**k me."

We are determined to be very difficult and awkward old men.

We have started practicing.

Sunday Sermon: A Prophet in your own backyard?

 

Luke 4:21-30

So, here we are in the fourth week of Epiphany and it seems a long time ago that the control freaks amongst us added the Magi to our nativity scenes – that is, assuming we hadn’t already put them away by Jan 6th. It’s hard to see initially in what way today’s Gospel is linked to the Epiphany theme of the revealing of Christ to the nations ie: the Gentiles – non Jews, the other – as represented by those Wise Men.

We meet Jesus here quite early on in his ministry before his own theological thinking has expanded to include the Gentiles. We’ve still to meet the Roman Centurion and the Syrophoenecian woman who do so much to challenge Jesus’ sense of his own ministry as being exclusively to the Jews.

What I'd like us to consider as we think of the Epiphany is a sense in which the greatest gift the world has ever received, Jesus, was the gift of a marginalised community - Nazareth.

 I work in a rather odd place that I’ve become rather fond of over time. I don’t know when exactly this happened, but the sign that you used to see as soon as you left the motorway and which celebrated Cleckheaton as a centre of “Leisure, recreation and industry”, has gone.

There is no new sign. Cleckheaton, it seems, has nothing to celebrate or boast about these days. It is famous for nothing apparently, and has no illustrious sons or daughters. It’s the sort of place people don’t go to. They pass through it on the way to somewhere marginally more interesting like …. Dewsbury.

When I first started working there one of my pupils asked me where I was from, which I misunderstood and assumed she was asking where I lived, so I replied, “I’m from Leeds.” There was a pause while she digested this. “Do they all talk like you in Leeds?” she said.

“Well, surely you’ve been to Leeds?” I ventured.

“I once went to Dewsbury on a Saturday with my mother. It were busy. I don’t think I should like Leeds.”

I think the word that stuck in my mind then was “parochial” - the same word that jumped into my mind when I read today’s gospel story.

I think Nazareth may be the New Testament’s equivalent of Cleckheaton. People passed through it on the way to somewhere marginally more interesting such as Capernaum.

I think it’s probably about the way peoples’ minds work but, having made that connection, I was interested to know a bit more about Nazareth and it certainly seems very likely that had it not been for Jesus, it’s not a place many of us would’ve heard of.

In John’s gospel we hear the story of Nathaniel’s first meeting with Jesus. Philip had met Jesus and in turn went to bring Nathaniel to meet him.

“Nazareth? Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Nathaniel wonders.

Nazareth is barely mentioned in first century documents outside of Scripture. The little we do know is largely speculative and wholly unremarkable. Scholarship suggests that Nazareth was a small community probably located not far from a major East-West trade route that ran from Egypt to Asia: picture it as one of the obscure communities you see exit signs for off the motorway. Nazareth was situated in the rural part of Galilee, a region of fishing and farming that was also known in Scripture for its distinctive regional accent and for having a large population of immigrants, foreigners and resident aliens. Indeed, not unlike Cleckheaton – apart from the fishing, obviously.

And, of course, many of these foreigners were Gentiles: not the religion of the locals. I know we need to be careful with such comparisons, but does it sound to any of you like anywhere else we might know?

Maybe Nathaniel said what he did, not only because of Nazareth’s seeming insignificance, but maybe Nazareth also had something of a reputation. After all, Jesus didn’t always have the easiest time in Nazareth. Mark says that Jesus could do few healings in Nazareth, because of the residents’ unbelief and lack of faith. Matthew suggests the people of Nazareth won’t listen to Jesus because they still just think of him as the carpenter’s son, Joseph’s boy. Or, as in Luke this morning, we consider Jesus’ first sermon in front of his home people. Jesus returns to the synagogue in Nazareth to preach, and he stands up to read and chooses the scroll from the prophet Isaiah, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, the let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.” And then he tells them, “Today, now, this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing: here, in Nazareth.” It’s amazing how much can change in the course of one sermon. Jesus knows his people so well that he knows what message they most need to hear, and he loves them so much he is willing to preach it. He’s said he was anointed to release captives and open the eyes of the blind, so that is what he will do.

Jesus is aware that the people of Nazareth are clamouring for him do the same kind of healings and miraculous cures there as he has done elsewhere. And they probably think that since Jesus is from Nazareth, and that they are his own people, that they’ll receive preferential treatment: after all, they’re from Israel, and believe they are more important than those Gentiles living across the border.

“Doubtless you will quote to me the proverb, ‘Physician, cure thyself,” Jesus says. But what Jesus is referring to is the fact that the people of Nazareth believe Jesus the physician should heal his own people first: them. But Jesus opens the eyes of their blind provincialism and tries to set them free from their captivity to prejudice by reminding them that God’s love extends beyond them, that it was an immigrant widow to whom God sent Elijah, and not a widow in Israel, and that out of all of the lepers in Israel, Elisha only cleansed the foreigner Naaman.

At which point the congregation threatens to throw Jesus off a cliff.

Those of us who’ve grown up in a Nazareth, live in one now, or work in one know that it has its challenges. We’ve seen some of the violence that simmers beneath the surface, the willingness the draw hard lines between insider and outsider, them and us, the family identities that can crush true expression of self, the casual prejudice masquerading as a joke. Jesus has had to rescue some of us from that. And it’s not the last time a congregation in a rural community would try to run a preacher out of town who dared to preach the truth of God’s word.

Anyone who keeps their eyes and ears open to the daily news will know that Nazareth has gone through troubling times and continues to do so into the present day. It is a great model for marginalised communities everywhere and the communities it represents can all catalogue times of great change and suffering.

This is a marginalised community – technically an area of social deprivation – just one of many in this city. I remember listening recently to a group of girls in my registration group at school talking about some task they‘d been given in their GCSE Child Development course. They’d clearly been discussing the concept of “failure to thrive” as a diagnosis when a baby or small child fails to grow or mature in the proper way. That may seem an odd comment to throw into the middle of a discussion on the Epiphany theme and marginalised communities but I don’t think it’s too big a jump to apply the same thinking to the spiritual growth of marginalised communities like the one in which this church sits.

Many marginalised communities and churches have failed to thrive because they have been the ones who have borne the changes of the recent decline of our manufacturing industries, and as that industry has disappeared, communities have suffered a double blow with the current economic crisis. It is the poor and the marginalised who suffer as a result for our insatiable appetite for cheap and highly processed food. Marginalised Communities have born much of the brunt of globalization’s impact, as jobs have been lost, and the textile industry has all but disappeared in West Yorkshire. Marginalised communities have often been at the front-lines of the difficult issue of how to welcome the sojourner or foreigner in our midst. Marginalised communities have struggled with plagues of poverty and hunger; and many in these places have tried to address their spiritual emptiness with methamphetamine instead of Methodism. Community leaders, including church leaders, have often lacked courage or proved ill-equipped in facing these challenges in a visionary way. And there seems to be growing evidence that a disproportionate number of the military casualties of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been borne by the people of marginalised areas.

God loves and cares for these communities, and calls upon Christ’s church to respond to these challenges in creative and faithful ways, so that they can thrive in the abundant life that Christ offers, and be what they were created to be.

And yet for all of the current struggles, and for all of the real challenges facing our churches in areas which believe they’ve been forgotten today, the Epiphany message we can take from today’s Gospel is that marginalised communities can be thriving communities because of what they have to offer but may have forgotten to value - gifts of genuine human community, a rich storehouse of practical skills and wisdom: a beautiful image of what Christ’s church can be because isn’t the Gospel message the Epiphany that we still celebrate today? And isn’t that Gospel spread to “the other” through the quiet and often unrecognised work of today’s disciples? “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, the let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.”

I think this takes us back to one of other Gospel themes: not being an effective prophet in your own backyard. I asked the Vicar what initiatives this church is already involved in and some of them would be roundly condemned by some of our evangelical friends: doing the Gospel counts for less in their eyes than speaking the Gospel. In that worldview someone’s material circumstances are less significant than whether or not they’ve heard about the saving grace of Jesus. Those of us here on the liberal wing are only too aware that a holistic approach is needed and that very often actions speak louder than words. I have a friend who works in this area, not a million miles from here in fact. His work brings him into contact with a wide range of local residents and he often talks about spiritual matters. Note that what I didn’t say was that he often talks about Christian things. Many of his customers are Muslim and over a period of time his general lead-in via a conversation about spiritual matters, or current issues in the local community, has led on to a wider ranging discussion that encompasses both Muslim and Christian perspectives. He talks of conversations being picked up from where they left off the last time on each new meeting. I think he has, as a disciple, earned the right to speak of Jesus – a conversation topic, that would probably not have been welcomed as an opening gambit.

If we look at how Jesus approached people we see a pattern: he always seems to deal with people where they are. His dealings with people are responsive.

When I was at Vicar School we spent a lot of time discussing the Missio Dei – God’s mission. There are loads of models of this throughout the history of the church but what always struck me was the fact that most of them seem to be following a human agenda. The model that really struck me – and at a stroke dealt with residual guilt from a previous incarnation as a gauche Evangelical – was the idea of finding where God is already at work and joining in.  That was a revelation to me. But isn’t that what you are doing here? Within a marginalised community and often on behalf of other marginalised communities? Inclusive Churches, Changing Attitude, work with asylum seekers and refugees, the South American Community project, Ecumenism. Plus all the simple acts of neighbourliness and human contact.

Living, working, worshipping in a marginalised society? Working with the modern equivalent of the Gentiles – the other in our society? Want to be an effective prophet in this backyard? Want to “preach good news to the poor… proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, let the oppressed go free, proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour”?  See where God is already at work around here and join in.

Can anything good come out of Nazareth? Can anything good come out of Hyde Park?

Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Marlene's contemporary nativity: a salutary tale for Christmas.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now, take my friend Marlene: she's a very artistic type.  You probably know the sort - dangly Trade Craft earrings, pencils and paint brushes pushed into her hair geisha - style: half-moon glasses precariously perched an the end of her nose and a pair of Doc Martens - one red and one green. ('I've another pair like this you know.')

 

She's a leading light in regional amateur dramatics with a name for her radical re-workings.  Her trans-gender 'Phantom of the Opera' is still talked about in hushed tones…… in Dewsbury.  Marlene is also a bit of a committee junkie, an inveterate organiser and with a reputation for not tolerating fools: (i.e. most other people she knows).  So I wasn't particularly surprised when she agreed to the Church Councils' request to stage last year's Nativity, although some concern was expressed: Marlene was the sort of person who had causes. We feared her analysis of Santa’s carbon footprint and her concern that the elves should have a living wage.

 

The committee gathered in her large kitchen, all shaker style furniture and IKEA fittings - very Chappell Allerton. Oh, and she had an agenda. “To bring this story alive it has to be brought into the present.  We must make it relevant!” And so she set about her task with relish - carrying the rest of us, I have to say, rather in the slipstream of her enthusiasm.

 

 Marlene used her contacts at the University to cast the Wise Men who turned out to be Justin, Trevor ... and Brenda … and you probably remember that Marlene and Brenda have not been on civil terms since the unfortunate incident at the Turkish bath.

 

Well it won't matter' said Marlene, all hurt pride and a large gin.  “No one will notice the difference: all they'll see is three moustaches – and that’s before the costumes are on. 

 

Her neighbour's daughter, Sigourney, was cast as Mary, notwithstanding the fact that at 14, she was pushing the boundaries of virginity somewhat.

 

“But she's ethnic.  Don't you see she's perfect for the part: so 21st century marginalized.” and that was that. Marlene brooked no contradiction.

 

“Anyway,” she said, gesturing to an open copy of a book by Walter Bruggerman on the vicar’s desk, “If you knew your Hebrew you’d know that it doesn’t actually say Virgin.”

 

“Oh she thinks she’s a theologian now does she?” muttered Brenda to Justin.

 

The rest of the casting fell into place: the local Imam graciously declined the role of the Angel Gabriel.  "Well you can take multiculturalism to the point of political correctness and then where would we all be?  Answer me that?" observed Brenda.  Terry, the local postman took his place in a stunning piece of symbolism that no one got, even when Marlene, to considerable consternation insisted that he performed in his uniform.

 

“Philistines.” she said, as she explained with elaborate patience for the third time the symbolism of postman as messenger of God.

 

“Actually, Marlene, point of order.  The Philistines were a very cultured people”

 

 “Actually, Trevor, any more points of order and you’ll be the back end of the  donkey."

 

Sigourney's boyfriend Cameron was drafted in as the innkeeper.  (Fortunately the ASBO he had been given for streaking through the synagogue as a bet had just lapsed.) A night-club doorman by trade he had little difficulty with the lines- “You can't come in here, we're full' although he did tend to keep fooling around at rehearsals and ad-libbing: 'You can't come in mate, but you can, love, we're letting in girls for half price”.

 

Now Brenda likes to think of herself as worldly-wise, but she flummoxed us all with her references to Cameron’s musical animal impersonations. Eventually she explained: “Cameron’s hung like a stallion, Sigourney told me.  So, what does that sound like then?  How do you sing like a stallion?”

 

Joseph was to be played by Len, the church caretaker.

 

"But he's about 1000 years old Marlene."

 

"Joseph was older than Mary you know.  Anyway, it says a lot about the exploitation of women in a patriarchal society."

 

Rehearsals came and went.

 

"Marlene, I'm sorry to interrupt but I'm having trouble with my character in this scene. What's my motivation here?"

 

"Piss off Trevor.  You’re a palm tree. Any more of that luvvy-crap and you’ll be the back end of the donkey.

 

"Len, please!  How often have I told you?  Don't smoke during the birth scene - the baby Jesus is inflammable."

 

"Marlene, if I hear another religious person say: 'and Wise Men seek him still . . . .' I may run screaming from the building"

 

"Brenda, they're not religious, they're Church of England."

 

"Sigourney, Darling, no more piercings please - at least not before Christmas.  I'm sorry Cameron ... you've had what pierced?  I see .... well, we shan't need to see that on stage thank you very much"

 

“Point of order, Marlene, technically, its not Christmas, its Advent, which means….”

 

“…or possibly both ends of the donkey, Trevor! Terry.   Drop the line about 'Special Delivery', it's not working-"

 

And so the evening arrived --- and Marlene was proved right.  It was a triumph- dramatic, moving and powerful.  The stable became a bus shelter in front of an old garage, back-lit in moody tones, the manger: the boot of a jacked-up wreck.  Drug paraphernalia littered the floor.  Three local characters shared a bottle around a brazier and stray dogs sniffed around the set.  Everyone delivered their lines perfectly, and on cue it snowed. 

 

It's hard to believe that it was nearly a year ago now, and here we are again getting ready for this year.  It's going to be different this year though.  After Marlene's triumph the church council members met in emergency session.  Words like uncomfortable, inappropriate, trendy and travesty were bandied about.

 

So we're back to the traditional again- shepherds in tea towels carrying cuddly sheep and angels with tinsel halos.  The relevant and the up-to date, it seems, have no place in the Christmas story.

 

And the meaning of Christmas in all this?

 

The Only Fools and Horses Christmas Special repeat, 8.00 pm, BBC2, Boxing Day, of course.

Advent, exams and the Apocopalypse

 

 

I put my Christmas decorations up in the classroom today. The kids in my form were less than impressed.

“We break up tomorrow Sir. What’s the point?”

I’m making a gesture, a concession.

“But it’s Christmas.”

No. It’s Advent.

As ever, no one gets it. Or as my colleague Matthew noted, “Nobody cares.”

I do.

We do little enough to celebrate the post-Advent season at the Knowledge College as it is. My year group are taking mock exams this week.

A week of exams kids: Happy Christmas. (Happy Christmas too, to all our colleagues – enjoy the marking. In my case 180 scripts.)

Today it rained just to add to the joy of my lot taking their Religious Studies exam this morning. The girls, as ever, organised and sensible all have retractable umbrellas in their bags and scuttle around with a sense of urgency. The boys, on the other hand, refuse to acknowledge the need for any sort of urgency. They slummock about through the rain like snails, arriving with their hair plastered to their heads and their clothes steaming. The room soon smells like hormonal dog.

“Run? Me Sir? I’m not a paramedic.”

This whole exam business is fraught. In the past very few have bothered to take mock exams seriously or to revise but I sense a change in the general culture. Some have admitted to considerable preparation.

I take the register and look at my lot. They aren’t stupid by any means – not all of them anyway – but my fear is that they will approach their exams like they approach the inter-form quiz: by putting down the first thing that comes into their heads without thought or consideration.

On the twelfth day of Christmas, what did my true-love give to me? I had asked.

“A turkey.”

“Syphilis.”

Name three of Snow White’s seven dwarves.

“Sleazy, gropy and horny.”

Hmmmmm. There may be a chance we’ve not been watching the same version of the film.

“Sir, Sir. Is the world going to end?”

Of course.

“Really? Tomorrow?”

I sense we are in a different conversation.

Do you mean the Mayan Apocalypse?

“Yeah.”

Well, they didn’t see the Spanish coming so I doubt they’ll be reliable about the end of the world. Anyway, my cousin Steve is in New Zealand where it’s already tomorrow and he’s just posted on Facebook. He didn’t say anything about Armageddon. I think he may have noticed.

Talking about the apocalypse I saw a day by day weather summary yesterday. Yesterday and today were to be dull and rainy with a high of 4 degrees. Tomorrow, though, we can expect a change to fire and brimstone with a top temperature of 4000 degrees. I wondered whether it had been sponsored by Harold Camping.

Nice and warm for Christmas though.

There are also suggestions that a significant proportion of men are delaying buying Christmas presents on the basis that the end of the world will render the need to do such shopping pointless.

Ah well. Every cloud ….

I escort my form to the exam venue.

“Is this a calculator exam Sir?

Oh Deus Meus!

By coincidence, today is the mad Physicist’s birthday. I slip a card into his pigeonhole.

“In dog years you’re dead.”

I felt it said everything that needed saying.

On arriving back at my classroom I discover my Yr. 8 class has arrived. They are both a delight and as high as kites. Ten minutes into the lesson (arguments for the existence of God – religious experience) a little like a flash mob, they burst into a spontaneous rendition of Jingle Bells followed by Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. I am charmed. I love these younger kids for their total unselfconsciousness.

At break my NBF Wesley from Maths comes into the office and puts the kettle on. Wes loves the R.S. Department but spends virtually no time in the Maths Department unless there is a meeting. Today there was a meeting.

“We had Secret Santa in our meeting this morning.”

What did you get?

“I got called Scrooge.”

I am not teaching as my kids come out of their exam so I go over to the refectory to canvass opinion. The general consensus is cautiously positive. A little later I scan some of their answers.

Budist don’t eet meet. Thay are vegtables.

My heart sinks until I realise that this is Martin’s offering. Martin is a lovely lad cursed with complex learning difficulties. I feel better but decide not to read any more just yet. It’s not good form to be seen running, weeping from the building. Even so, I can’t help but notice that Jordon has drawn me a yacht. It looks like the work of a five year old.

“I asked him if he was having trouble answering the questions.” The invigilator looks flustered. “He said he knew the answers but preferred to draw.”

Tomorrow is the last day of term.

I can hardly wait!