Uncategorised | St Baldred's, North Berwick

WEEKLY PRAYER LETTER

We have decided to make this, Easter 4, the last week of putting together the prayer letter. Thank you to everyone who has read it and for all the encouraging feedback we have received from people over the last year or so.

We will still e-mail round the pew-leaflet each week to those on e-mail and, if wanted, we will arrange for a pew leaflet to be put through the letter-box of those who can’t get to church and don’t use e-mail. We also hope to soon be able to offer home-communions to those who can’t get to church and are of course very happy to still be contacted.

We started sending out these letters on Mothering Sunday in 2020 little knowing that we would still be sending them out over a year later.

We cannot know the future but we can know the Good Shepherd!

May God bless you and your loved ones. Simon.

Sunday 20th September

Simon’s Reflection for the 16th Sunday after Pentecost

An American entrepreneur called Dan Price built up a very successful company with his brother. Over the years he became very concerned about how the poorer members of his work-force would make ends meet. He was a more considerate employer than some but there were still big disparities of income in his work-force.

In 2015, he made an extraordinarily bold move. He had been deeply influenced by the struggles of some of his poorer employees and also by a piece of research by a Princeton Team which argued that core emotional well-being rises with income but only to a point; a point they defined as around $75,000 per year.

The average pay of Gravity employees was around $48,000 per year. Dan Price announced that he would increase the wages of his employees to at least $70,000 per year no matter what their work was. He cut his own salary from around $2 million per annum to $70,000 per annum to pay for it. He also ate into company profits to help finance the pay increases.

The move was life-changing for some and deeply controversial for others. He was sued by his brother and a couple of long-standing employees left the firm. I wonder how you would have felt about it if you had been one of his employees. How would you have felt if you had been among the lower-paid? How would you have felt if you had been among the higher paid? While some lauded the move, others thought it unfair. Critics are looking at his firm and hoping it will go under but during the Covid crisis, over 90% of his employees offered to take substantial pay cuts so that he didn’t have to lay people off.

The story illustrates a different way of thinking to the norm. Actually, it is rather like, the attitude of the great Quaker families to their employees in the nineteenth century and perhaps has resonances for us this year when we think about the ways in which some of the poorest paid workers in our society proved to be among the most essential to us during the lockdown.

I think it’s a helpful way into today’s parable, not that Jesus is talking primarily here about economic justice, though Jesus does talk about that, but Jesus’ parable challenges the way we normally think about things with the way that things are in God’s kingdom. Although the parable seems to be about wages, it is really about grace.

What we wrestle with, is the sense that the employer has cheated the workers that he hired first and who work for him through the long day and at the end are paid the same amount that he pays the people he hired at the eleventh hour. This is understandable and the grievance is voiced in the parable and in one sense of fairness, this seems unfair.

Yet, the wage they are paid is not unfair. It is only the comparison that makes them feel cheated. It seems that this employer is giving everyone what they need to put food on the table at the end of the day for their family rather than giving extra benefits to those who have worked the longest. At least those who were hired first had the security of knowing they would be paid. Those hanging around at the market-place had the worry through the day of where the next meal was coming from.

For me, the key sentence in understanding the parable is when the employer says “are you envious because I am generous?” Last week, we thought about how it should help us to be more forgiving if we concentrate on the forgiveness that we receive from God rather than the wrong that an individual has done to us. Here, we are perhaps being asked to be grateful for the good things God has done for us, rather than being envious of the good things God has done for others.

Envy of God’s goodness to others is Jonah’s problem too. If I preached a sermon that converted 120,000 people and brought them to repentance, I think I would be celebrating rather than going into a huge sulk! Jonah of course, doesn’t think the people of Nineveh deserve God’s goodness, though it would be hardly fair for God to destroy them without giving them the chance to repent. Jonah seems to forget the mercy he has received too. God forgave him for refusing to do his bidding. He cares for Jonah despite Jonah’s rejection of his ways.

None of us really earns our way into God’s Kingdom. We receive God’s love and his mercy rather than earning a reward from him for the good works we have done. There is an onus upon us to join in with what God is doing but once we do, we should know that we receive from him far more than we give. Yet, I think we still struggle with grace and living with God’s generosity and we still think of the kingdom as something we have to earn rather than receive.

Thankfully, God is so much more generous than we give Him credit for. Amen.

Simon’s Reflection for Sunday 13th September

In an imperfect world we need to be ready to forgive and we need to be ready to receive forgiveness. Both things can sometimes be hard. It can sometimes be hard to give forgiveness and to give it completely. It can also sometimes be hard to receive forgiveness and to accept that we are forgiven. Jesus tells us in all these issues to take as our reference point the forgiving nature of God.

Peter asks Jesus how often he must be ready to forgive someone who is sorry. He no doubt thinks his offer is generous… seven times he offers. Jesus’ answer is basically that he should not limit his forgiveness. The passage which our translation has as seventy seven times could also be translated “seventy times seven times” so the point is times without number.

Jesus’s point is that we are in receipt time and time again of the mercy of God. Would we want to place a limit on God’s mercy towards us. If we have received mercy and depend upon God’s mercy we must be merciful too. The poet, George Herbert, put the point of today’s parable succinctly:

“He who cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself.”

Jesus’ parable illustrates the teaching from the Lord’s Prayer: forgive our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. The king in the story forgives an enormous debt. Just to give you an idea of that ten thousand talents would be about the equivalent of 100,000 days wages or 274 years of wages. A debt which could not be repaid. The unjust servant in turn will not forgive his fellow the equivalent of 100 days wages. That is a significant sum but nothing compared to the forgiveness that he has received.

The forgiven servant’s lack of forgiveness for his fellow is shameful and has terrible consequences for him. A refusal to forgive can have hard consequences for us too.

In Great Expectations by Charles Dickens the grotesque character, Miss Haversham, is a lady wasted by time who wears a faded yellowing wedding dress, holding on to the grudge against the man who jilted her at the altar many years before. She lives in a bubble of grudge which leads her to behave cruelly to those around her.

Holding on to an injustice can eat at us and make us bitter; a sense of grievance can be a powerful and overbearing thing even if it is a justified sense of grievance.

But should we always forgive? Peter’s question in today’s gospel is about forgiving someone who is repentant. What about forgiving the unrepentant? What about forgiving abusers or people who have destroyed our lives? People who have done us enormous wrong? To say to someone who has been badly abused by someone, someone who is unrepentant perhaps, “you must forgive” could be rather like compounding the abuse and saying to the person: “you are a bad person because you cannot forgive.”

I’m not suggesting though that we should only forgive the repentant. It certainly helps if someone is repentant but thankfully Jesus did not limit his forgiveness to the repentant. He said from the cross: “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.” If we love much we can forgive much and not just for our own sakes but we can rise above the wrong that someone else has done and still see them as someone to understand and even love.

Our Old Testament reading today is interesting. Joseph’s brothers say “sorry” but their motivation does not seem to be sorrow but a desire to save their own skins. It reminds me of the story of the prodigal son in St Luke’s gospel. The Son when he comes to his senses does not seem at first to be motivated by sorrow but by self-preservation. He knows he will be better off in his father’s house. (Luke 15.17-18).

You could imagine Joseph saying: “well you’re not really sorry are you? You just want to save your own skins!” He doesn’t though. His reference point is not what his brothers have done, it is what God has done. After all, no-one “deserves” forgiveness as such. If it was deserved, it wouldn’t be forgiveness. Forgiveness is always a gift. But if we remember that we have received much, we should be prepared to give much.

And perhaps the idea of referring things to God may even be able to help in the extreme cases where people struggle with the pain of great wrongs, unrepented. If there are situations where we cannot forgive, perhaps we can still find ways to “Let go and let God” and try to work through the pain of the wrong-doing and leave judgement to God.

Amen.

SIMON’S REFLECTION for the 13th SUNDAY after PENTECOST

People often say “we all have our crosses to bear” and by those words, they are usually referring to the fact that no-one is exempt from suffering in some form.

“Into each life some rain must fall” as they say. Fairy-tales may end with the words “happily ever after” but we need to realise that “happily ever after” is in reality for the hereafter. We all face problems in life from time to time, from sickness of ourselves or loved ones and for many other reasons and of course, how could we be entirely happy when we look at the suffering and injustice in the wider world around us. At the moment living through these difficult times, these things are even more apparent to us perhaps than normally.

There are no short cuts to a “happy ever after” in this life. That doesn’t mean that this aspect of life should overshadow everything else. There is still joy and happiness in this life but we can’t expect to feel that all the time.

But important as all that is, it is not what Jesus is talking about in his words to Peter and the disciples in today’s gospel. Jesus is not talking about the general unhappiness that comes to everyone at times through life, he is talking about the suffering and sacrifices that will come to those who choose to follow him.

His words are a corrective to the over-excitement of Peter. I’m sure the other disciples probably felt the same over-excitement. Today’s conversation follows on from the conversation we read about last week in which Peter recognised that Jesus was the messiah. Jesus confirmed Peter’s insight but he then tried to take the disciples a step further to understand what it means to be God’s messiah and to warn them that the opposition already building against him will lead, in the end, to his death.

Peter’s horror at Jesus’ words shows that this is not the picture of what was going to happen next that he had in his head. Peter, no doubt, had a triumphalist vision of what it meant that Jesus was the Messiah. That vision was in line with the popular imagination of the time. Peter pictured a King David figure, who would restore Israel and then usher in a “happily ever after.”

The prophet Jeremiah could have told him differently. In our Old Testament reading we heard one of Jeremiah’s laments which reflect his struggles with what God has asked him to do. Jeremiah, called as a young man, had to tell his people that their sins were so great that God was going to send a punishment upon them. They would be sent into Exile. It was a message that would bring him persecution and that would be rejected.

The joy Jeremiah initially felt at his call has turned to distress and a feeling of abandonment. Yet he knows that in the end, God will vindicate him. It is a vivid picture of the cost of true service.

In morning prayer last week, the readings focussed on Acts chapter 7, the account of the stoning of St Stephen, the first Christian martyr. Stephen’s speech illustrates the early churches understanding of the fate of the prophet s in the Old Testament; an understanding which may well have come from Jesus.

Throughout the Old Testament, the prophets are themselves rejected by the generation they are speaking to, even if their message may later be revered and accepted by subsequent generations. The early church saw all of this history of the rejection of God’s messengers as pointing to the ultimate rejection of the Son of God who was put on a cross.

Jesus then is warning his disciples that that they too will face troubles and rejection and some of them will face literal martyrdom if they truly follow him.

Elsewhere, Jesus says that if our following of Him, brings us trouble that actually may be a sign that we actually are following him. “Blessed are you when people revile you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” So when the troubles come our way that may come from being true to our calling and genuinely serving others whether that is easy, as with friends, or difficult, as with enemies, we should rejoice!

So what are the costs of our discipleship? What are the crosses that we bear through following Jesus? They may be everyday things that come out of our helping with the task of looking after a church or helping to look after each other as the people of God. Sometimes they can just be the boredom of doing seemingly thankless tasks. Someone once said that the test of a vocation is our acceptance of the drudgery it involves! Sometimes, it could be the difficulties that will come our way by trying to reach out with the love of God into our community.

St Paul gives a concrete example of what it means to follow Jesus in the way that we behave. He exhorts his Roman readers to practise a genuine love which is more than just words; a love, moreover, which is more than the world expects and which even extends to forgiving enemies. The whole of this reading could be summed up with the words “overcome evil with good” which is what Jesus did on the cross. All these are difficult teachings to follow and remind us how hard it can be to follow Jesus.

So we are called to be realistic about the cost of discipleship but that should not put us off. There are deep, deep rewards to discipleship too though they come to us unsought. Sometimes the most difficult things in life are also the most rewarding. If we are really passionate about a cause we will not let the cost put us off.

If we look back to the days when the pandemic we are going through was at its height earlier in the year, among the most exposed to danger for obvious reasons were doctors, nurses and those working in the medical profession. It’s very touching then that that experience has not put off young people putting themselves forward in record numbers for medical careers.

If a course of action matters to us enough we will accept the sacrifices which may accompany it. Whatever sacrifices we accept for Jesus are as nothing compared with the sacrifices he has made for us. Christ’s sacrifices show us that we are a cause that is very, very dear to him. Amen.

Simon’s reflection for the 12th Sunday after Pentecost

Readings: Isaiah 51-1-6; Romans 12.1-8; Matthew 16.13-20

Peter, as he is presented in the gospels, sometimes gets things spectacularly wrong but in today’s gospel, he gets something spectacularly right. Jesus is asking the disciples who the crowds think that he is. The crowds show a limited understanding of Jesus. In one way or another, all the responses indicate that Jesus is seen simply as a prophet. The crowds are looking beyond Jesus for someone who is yet to come. But Peter is spot on. He sees that Jesus is the one and there is no need to look further. “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”

Peter’s comment shows great faith, insight and openness to God. In response, Jesus tells Peter who he is in God’s eyes and gives him a new name. Perhaps you could call this Jesus’ faith in Peter! “You are Peter, “Jesus says and “on this rock, I will build my church.” There is a pun here of course for the name Peter comes from the Greek “petrus” meaning “rock.”

I offer you three things to think about from this great passage.

First of all, God is personal and we can relate to God on a personal level. Have you ever received or sent one of those round-robin Christmas letters? They are valuable in themselves. We don’t have time to individually write to everyone that we know but we know they are not the same as an individual letter written to an individual with that person in our minds. A hand-written letter can be nicer to read than a typed one; as long as you don’t have illegible hand-writing of course! A phone call can make us feel more connected than an e-mail. There is something about the personal touch which is very important in relationships.

The Christian understanding of God as personal means that God is not some kind of mysterious force who brought the universe into existence with a big bang but who is otherwise impossible for us to relate to. God is personal and therefore has a relationship with each one of us. He is not only the creator of the universe. He is our creator. “O Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from far away!” (psalm 139). “You are Peter”, Jesus says. Jesus knows who Peter is. Actually, he knows who Peter is better than Peter does. God knows who we are. His relationship with us is personal.

Following on from this, the second thing is calling. Jesus has a purpose for Peter. It is a purpose beyond Peter’s wildest imagining. It is a purpose which draws upon his character. Jesus will draw on who Peter is to fulfil that purpose. We remember that passage at the call of Peter and the other fishermen by Lake Galilee. “Come with me and I will make you fish for people.” I wonder whether there were things about who they were as fishermen which Jesus will use as he teaches them to love and serve other people by helping him build his kingdom. I wonder whether Jesus’s nickname for Simon, Son of John; his nickname of “Rocky” was based upon elements of Simon Peter’s character; perhaps a quality of leadership, perhaps a boldness or toughness.

God has a purpose or a ministry for each one of us. We all have particular things to offer which are based on the gifts and the personality God has created us to be and is calling us to be. I love the line from the old hymn “Jesus shall Reign” which goes: “Let every creature rise and bring, peculiar honours to their King.” “Peculiar” here meaning “unique to the giver” rather than “odd”! Christian ministry happens whenever we use our talents, our abilities and who we are to give God glory.

St Paul urges the Romans to live their whole lives as living sacrifices or offerings to the Lord and points out the way in which they all have different things to offer. He uses his great image of the church as the Body of Christ though to remind them, that they offer their lives together with others and that the gifts we have need to be alongside the gifts other people have. Our gifts, if they are properly used bring us together. We need each other and God needs us to work together.

Of course it can be difficult to trust in what God can and will do with us. I said at the beginning that Peter sometimes got things spectacularly wrong and he sometimes got things spectacularly right. We will hear in next week’s gospel how Peter straight away puts his foot in it after his great confession of faith. I wonder how Peter would have felt about Jesus commission to him to be his rock on that Good Friday when he denied Jesus three times.

Peter, as we see him in the gospels, is a work in progress and is not yet fully the rock he would become. So perhaps there is something for us here in trusting in God’s future. We have to live the present in the light of God’s future. The prophet we call second Isaiah gave a message of comfort to a people living in Exile. He told them that God was not finished with them. He had not forgotten his promises. The God who created the world and who made Israel would also rebuild Israel.

“You are Peter and on this rock, I will build my church.” The words are not just a commission they are also a promise. Amen.

Silent Movie Night

On Friday 7th February at 7.30pm St Baldred’s in association with NB Movies presents another silent movie with cinema organ accompaniment. This year’s screening is:

THE GENERAL starring BUSTER KEATON.

One of the most revered comedies of the silent era, this film finds hapless Keaton as a Southern railroad engineer facing off against Union soldiers during the American Civil War.

This thoroughly entertaining classic from 1926 is ranked among film historians as one of the greatest comedies ever – perhaps one of the greatest silent films ever made.

Admission by donation.

CHRISTMAS at ST BALDRED’S & ST ADRIAN’S

Sunday 22nd December Nine Lessons & Carols 5pm at St Baldred’s

A traditional carol service followed by refreshments in the hall.

Tuesday 24th December Children’s Crib Service 5pm at St Adrian’s

Children are invited to come dressed up as shepherds, angels and kings and to join in with acting out the Christmas story. The crib will be blessed.

Tuesday 24th December Midnight Mass 11.30pm at St Baldred’s

Christmas Day Wednesday 25th December

All-Age Eucharist 9.30am St Adrian’s All-Age Eucharist 11.00am St Baldred’s

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