Tag: rejoice

Simon’s Reflection for the Third Sunday of Advent

As I read that passage from St John’s gospel, I’m struck by two ideas that come from John the Baptist’s message. On the one hand, there is a sense of preparation for something that will happen in the future. Then, on the other hand, there is a sense that that something is already here. In Advent, as we prepare for the future coming of Jesus, how do we recognise the ways in which he is already among us? These two things must, I think, be linked. If we are living lives in which we are prepared for the future coming of Jesus, we will at the same time notice that he is already here among us.

There’s a lovely and profound story of St Francis of Assisi; one of many of course. St Francis was busy hoeing a garden when a pilgrim came up to him and asked him: “If you became aware that you were going to die a few hours from now, what would you do?” St Francis replied: “I would finish hoeing this garden.” St Francis was already with his Lord in the present and experiencing time as a gift and his work as co-working with Jesus. So he was ready.

What are the things that we need to do to be ready to meet Christ in the future and to recognise that he is among us?

Well, prayer is one thing. On this Gaudete Sunday, with its theme of rejoicing, we may not feel that rejoicing is very close to us. We may also think that St Paul was rather tactless in telling the Thessalonian Christians in the middle of a time of persecution to rejoice, just as I might be rather tactless telling everyone simply to rejoice in my sermon on Sunday with all that is happening at the moment.

Rejoicing was not particularly easy for St Paul, though, with all that he was going through; imprisonments, opposition, failure, physical ailments. It doesn’t come easily but is something to be worked at. It doesn’t come so much from externals but from finding Christ within and without. That is why Paul links it to prayer and to prayerful thanksgiving which are, again, things which have to be worked at.

The former Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Basil Hume, wrote a lot of good, grounded and realistic things about prayer and he was particularly good in talking about the need to keep going when it was difficult. He said that while prayer brought moments of peace and inner joy to all of us, it could also be hard work. At such times, he said, it is important to keep going because we pray to please God and because God wants us to and not just to make ourselves happy so he writes: “Carrying on when we seem to be getting nowhere is a proof of our faithfulness to God, and it shows that we are selfless and generous in our service of him. We are prepared to do the right thing for his sake, and not for ours.”

There are two ideas here which link to the themes of today’s readings for me; being ready for Christ by praying and being ready for Christ by living for others. When we do those things, we will reflect something of his light to others and we will reflect Christ’s light through who we are and in our own particular way. It is a light that is given not a light we have to generate.

We see these themes in our reading from St John’s gospel about John the Baptist. John the Evangelist is very clear about who John the Baptist is. “He is not the light. He is a witness to the light.” Nonetheless, like all of us, he has been given something important to do. He occupies a special place that God has given him to prepare the hearts of the people of Israel to receive their Saviour. But that role is self-effacing. It is to live for others to be a person who lives for others.

It must have been very tempting for him, with all those voices urging him, “Are you the Messiah?”, to say “Well, yes I am actually!” If he had been thinking about his own ego or his own glory, perhaps he would have succumbed but John knew that the loving thing to do was to point people to Jesus not to himself.

We sometimes think of Christians as having a “messiah” complex in the way they approach being a Christian. That may or may not be egotistical. Sometimes it can be about having an over-extended sense of responsibility or thinking that we have to do it all on our own or that we need to know all the answers. We don’t. Like John the Baptist we are pointing people to Christ not to ourselves.

Our Isaiah reading today is of course the passage that Jesus chose to read out in the synagogue in Nazareth (Luke 4:17 – 21). It gives the manifesto of a Messiah who Himself came to live for others and maybe in a sense we could read that list of actions as a list of places where we can find him.

It is by being more aware of the opportunities in our own lives to live for others and by rising to them, that we will find and bring joy and that we will be both ready for the Lord who is to come and we will also meet the Lord who is here among us. We will be more prepared for him and we will also know how much he loves us for who we are.

 Amen.

Sunday 11th October 2020

Simon’s Reflection for the 19th Sunday after Pentecost

“Rejoice in the Lord always!” says St Paul. We might feel that that’s easier said than done with all that is going on nowadays but we can’t very well say to St Paul: “that’s easy for you to say!” St Paul is saying those words from prison. He is on lockdown. He probably doesn’t know how long he will be in prison. He lives under the shadow of a possible flogging or perhaps even death. He doesn’t, on the face of it, seem to have much to rejoice about.

So what sustains his rejoicing? Are there things in this that can help us or is this just positive thinking taken to insane extremes?

The kind of rejoicing in the Lord and the prayerful renunciation of anxiety that goes with it is not something that comes naturally to the situation that Paul is in nor to ours at the present. It is easy not to be anxious when things are going well. But not so when things are a struggle.

Paul’s peace comes out of loving and trusting God. It comes out of prioritising the things of God. In the other readings we read of the classic image of the fullness of the Kingdom of God as a great feast. St Paul knows he has an invitation to that feast. We have an invitation too. We have to make sure the invitation is a priority in our lives and not let the distractions of life help us forget it.

But as well as the future hope of the results of what God is doing in the world, Paul knows he has present help from God as well. He is immersed in prayer. In the beautiful letter to the Philippians, he invites people to ponder what is good. Actually, this is a great antidote to anxiety for all of us. We have to work at putting into our minds all the positive things of God’s good world. All good things come from God, if we dwell on those good things, then they can help us and hopefully lead us into thanksgiving from God. We have to work at it but there is help in that direction and a favourable wind that will carry us if we turn into it.

So Paul is rooted in trust of God and prayer but also in action to join in with building this wonderful future kingdom which is God’s plan for the world. Paul, for all his troubles, has a purpose. He is active in mission. He turns his sufferings and his imprisonment into something to help others. He urges the Philippians to see their adversity as something that brings them closer to Christ who suffered for them. He urges them to be united and not to argue among themselves. He urges them to “let their gentleness be known” to everyone.

This Sunday is kept by many churches as “Homeless Sunday.” I know in the past year, there have been times when I’ve felt a bit restricted about being confined to home but at least I have a home to be confined to and rather a nice one, with a garden.

In Scotland in 2019 5300 adults slept rough at least once a year and those sleeping rough regularly are 17 times more likely to be a victim of violence and die 30 years younger on average than the rest of us. While the Governments have made efforts to put people into temporary accommodation during the COVID crisis the nature of that accommodation with small bedsits, shared toilets made it more difficult for people to keep safe and to bear with the restrictions earlier in the year than the rest of us. There are also worries about what will happen in the coming months and church night shelters will not be able to help the homeless in the way they normally do this winter because of the hygiene restrictions. For many of us, it’s quite a leap if imagination to imagine what it’s like to have to live in these ways.

I have only occasionally heard of people sleeping rough in North Berwick, Gullane, Aberlady and Dirleton, but we do of course have many people struggling to pay their rents or their mortgages. We have many young people who can’t afford a home of their own and have to stay in their parental home and a lack of affordable housing for those on low incomes.

So how can we as Christians “let our gentleness be known”? Well, perhaps we can be more aware of the situation that others may be in.  We can pray. We can speak out and campaign more for housing justice on our committees and our forums. We can give.

Our two churches have traditionally supported the Bethany Christian Trust, which has an excellent video on their website, and Scottish Churches Housing Action. We had also started collecting items for HomeStart Edinburgh but they have had to suspend their operations in the present crisis. There are many other housing charities, of course, that we might want to support like Shelter Scotland.

Jesus said: “Foxes have their holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” As we think of the homeless today, may we be drawn closer to Our Lord who was homeless: May we find that in trusting God, in prayer, in giving thanks and in helping others we find the gift that God gives of his peace that passes all understanding. Amen.