Christingle 2014

Well, this year I went to another Christingle service on 7^th December.  The 7^th! That felt so strange, because for me Advent is all about preparing ourselves and the Christingle service means that Advent is over and Christmas has started.  It means that the presents are bought, most of them are wrapped, the advent calendars are all but finished, the food is ready to prepare for Christmas dinner, and the excitement level has been turned up to 11.

And it means that the message of Jesus is here amongst us.  We’ll talk a bit about the Christingle later, but for now let’s talk about the message.

The reading we’ve just heard is all about the Angels announcing Jesus’s birth to some shepherds, and it’s very important that it was shepherds. Now I wanted to take you through the reading step by step, but I can’t really do that without having some shepherds. If only we had some shepherds.

Anyway, there were some shepherds living out in the fields not, as we have all probably sung, washing their socks but watching their flocks.  That means that they were looking after sheep, at night. They probably should have washed their socks because hanging out with sheep is a bit of a sweaty and smelly job. They’d be a pretty grubby, grotty lot.

And it was probably quite cold out in the fields, maybe even raining, so the shepherds would’ve been chilly, possibly shivering…

[…]

When suddenly an angel appeared and scared the shepherds…

[…]

Now it’s not every day you see and angel so you can imagine the surprise and fear they felt. The angel said, don’t be afraid, I’ve got good news for you, and not just for you, but for everyone.  In Bethlehem, the town where King David was from you’ll find a baby wrapped in cloth in a manger. This baby has been chosen by God to come and free everyone from fear and captivity.

Next thing there were huge numbers of angels in the sky singing about God’s greatness. It would have been more spectacular than the X Factor and Strictly finals combined.

The angels then went up to heaven and the shepherds set off to find this chosen one, the Messiah.

But the angel had said where to go exactly and Bethlehem was pretty full that night. So the shepherds put their heads together and had a think.

[…]

They knew that the baby would be in a manger — that’s a feeding trough for animals, a bit like a big dog bowl.  So this baby was probably in a place where they kept animals — a barn or a cave (they didn’t really do stables in those days) — but which barn, which cave?  So the shepherds would no doubt have to go knocking on doors, asking if anyone had a baby in their barn.

[…]

Probably leaving someone behind to look after the sheep.

[…]

When they finally found Jesus and Mary and Joseph they would’ve bowed down to worship the Messiah,

[…]

And then go and tell everybody what they’d seen, probably knocking on doors on the way back to their sheep, all the time saying how amazing God was.

[…]

So why shepherds, why not the priests of that time, why not the writers, or the silversmiths?

I think God chose the shepherds for two reasons: firstly because their job was to look after sheep, and that’s important.  David was a shepherd before he became king, (probably in the same area where these shepherds had been huddled together for warmth), before that Moses was a shepherd before leading the Israelites to the promised land. Some of the prophets were shepherds too. Later, Jesus would call himself the ‘good shepherd’, meaning that he looked after the people.

The thing about shepherds is that they learned to care, and if they could care about sheep, they could care about people.

The other thing about shepherds is that they were pretty poor.  They hired themselves out and were treated like peasants: so even though they had a very important job to do, people saw them as being pretty grotty types.

But when Jesus grew up, he used to hang out with all the grotty types, thieves, beggars, lepers.  If he were to come to earth today who do you think he would spend his time with?  People on benefits, disabled people, people in trouble with the police, people who take drugs and drink too much, that’s who.

God picked the shepherds as the first ones to see Jesus because he wanted us to know that he loves everyone, it doesn’t matter what job you do (or don’t do), it doesn’t matter how good or bad, how clever or stupid, how busy or lazy you are. He loves everyone.  That means you and you and you and you….

So when we get our Christingles in a bit I want us to remember that the things represent are there for every single one of us. Even the smelly shepherds.

Harvest

13 Someone in the crowd said to him, ‘Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.’ ¹⁴But he said to him, ‘Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?’ ¹⁵And he said to them, ‘Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.’ ¹⁶Then he told them a parable: ‘The land of a rich man produced abundantly. ¹⁷And he thought to himself, “What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?” ¹⁸Then he said, “I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. ¹⁹And I will say to my soul, Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.” ²⁰But God said to him, “You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?” ²¹So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich towards God.’

[Luke 12.13-21]

It’s harvest festival. When I was a kid that meant going to church with whatever we found at the back of the cupboard that we were unlikely to eat, and I know we weren’t alone in that.  The altar was frequently strewn with tins of Marrowfat peas, pink salmon, sweetcorn, fruit cocktail, and Tiptop.

I always felt sorry for the poor buggers that were gonna get the fruit cocktail, it always had those weird white grapes in it. I swear we only ever bought tins of that stuff in for harvest festivals or carnival day.

The Jewish people had several, and there were three major ones: the Feast of First Fruits, which was the start of the barley harvest; the Festival of Weeks (Pentecost) celebrated fifty days after the Passover, and recognised the start of the wheat harvest; and the Festival of Tabernacles, or Booths, when they spent a week living in tents at the very end of the harvest period.

In preparation for this service, in Sunday School last week we made barns, well silos. Well actually we coloured in some toilet roll tubes and stuck a cardboard cone on the top, but you get the idea.

In the reading Jesus tells the story of a rich man who doesn’t do the right thing with his wealth, he tries to store it all away. So our activity was to fill our silos with things that really do matter.

First we asked the question: what’s important to you, and the answers were: Mum, friends, family, happiness, class at school, after school clubs, job, blanket, and Doctor Who. 

Would anybody like to add to the list?

Then we asked which ones will last forever, let’s go through the list…

Happiness lasts forever, and relationships (it might feel like Dr Who does, but I think that’s unlikely).

What should the rich man have done, do we think?

He could’ve used the extras that he had to help people less fortunate than himself.  He certainly shouldn’t have stored it all away, because I don’t know much about farming, but I’m pretty sure that things that grow from the land start to rot after a while, so even if he had more than he needed, it wouldn’t keep him, it wouldn’t last.

So our task last week was to fill our silos with treasures that would last: we drew pictures of the things that mattered most to us and the idea was to keep them inside the silo, instead of material things.

The thing I found most interesting was Faith’s reaction… Can you remember what she did?

Faith drew a picture of herself with her mum and Mayson.  But when it came time to put it in the silo, she had a complete meltdown, she wanted to keep that picture for ever.  I’m not sure where that picture ended up, but I know that by the time we got home last Sunday, it wasn’t the most important thing in the world anymore.

I know, you’re all thinking, oh how cute, she’s six.

The truth is, it doesn’t matter if you’re six or eighty-six, we all get our priorities wrong. Whether it’s the new car, or the replacement slippers, the set of pans, the cuddly toy, whatever.  We think that if only we had… then things would be better. We give material things far more value than they actually deserve, and she’s six so at least she has an excuse.

The rich man in this parable was exactly the same. Instead of just enjoying what he had, thanking God for the abundant harvest, and sharing the produce, he decided “if only I had a bigger silo (a bigger toilet roll tube with a cardboard cone on it), then I would be happy. Wrong.

The idea of harvest festival is that we give a sample of our harvest as thanksgiving for all that God does for us. The rich man should have given his surplus to help people around him and to further God’s work on earth. 

Meanwhile we should give enough so that we notice the difference to our lives.  At the very least we should give more than fruit cocktail and Tiptop. 

The Unforgiving Servant

²¹ Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?”

²² Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times. 

²³ “Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. ²⁴ As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. ²⁵ Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.

²⁶ “At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ ²⁷ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.

²⁸ “But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.

²⁹ “His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’

³⁰ “But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. ³¹ When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened.

³² “Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. ³³ Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ ³⁴ In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.

³⁵ “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

[Matthew 18.21-35]

Today’s Gospel reading is all about forgiveness, and it’s an interesting subject to talk about because we think we know what we mean by forgiveness, but I’m not sure we get it right.

When you think about it, humans aren’t very good at forgiveness, and I want to illustrate my point with four words: Diego Maradona, Margaret Thatcher.

From the Daily Express, June 23, 2014, after Gary Lineker met with Maradona in an interview in Brazil:

Goalkeeper Peter Shilton refused to appear on the show after the Argentine said he wouldn't apologise for using his hand.

Last year Shilton admitted: "It riled me that a player of his stature couldn't openly admit his guilt. I blame the officials though. They failed to spot a few keys decisions that went against us in that quarter-final and it cost us dearly.

On the 25th anniversary of Maradona's cheat goal, former England star Chris Waddle said he also understood why the nation still hated the Argentine.

This from the Daily Telegraph on April 17, 2013:

While protesters in London encouraged demonstrators to turn out with whistles, banners and horns to disrupt the funeral in London, across the country banners and effigies of the former Prime Minister were hung in celebration.

In former mining communities in the north, where hatred of Lady Thatcher is still strongly felt, there were a number of parties to mark her death.

In Goldthorpe, South Yorkshire, pubs were decorated with banners and former miners gathered to hang an effigy of Lady Thatcher outside the Union Jack pub, with signs reading “Thatcher the milk snatcher”.

People dressed in National Coal Board clothing gathered outside the pub and several National Union of Mineworkers banners were displayed.

A coffin was also brought out to parade through the street before being set alight, and one house displayed a sign which read: “The Lady’s not for turning but tonight she’ll be for burning.”

I have my own experiences of failing to forgive.  I’m still aggrieved about being passed over for promotion, twice.

I know all the reasons for it happening: the guy in charge was young, inexperienced, and tended to let their emotions cloud their decisions; his family disliked my family, and he’d taken a personal dislike to me. So, someone else got the job, and then when they left another someone took over.

Now some people would say that it’s in the past and that I should forgive and forget, and that might be true, but I still feel the sting of rejection.

Other people might point out that I’ve gone on to bigger and better things, and I have, it was about six months after that second rejection that I left the Cubs and I’ve never looked back, but I know I would have made an excellent sixer.

So, with these three people in our minds, Maradona, Margaret Thatcher, and my Cub Scout leader, I want us to really look at forgiveness.

And there are two questions to answer: how and why?

First the how?

We all know the phrase “forgive and forget”, but is it Biblical?

Who thinks it’s in the Bible?

I checked the King James Version, the New Revised Standard Version (that’s the one we use every week), the New International, God’s Word, English Standard and the New American Standard Bible.  None of them use the phrase forgive and forget.

William Shakespeare uses the phrase in a couple of his plays, Miguel Cervantes uses it in Don Quixote, but the two earliest uses that I can find are in the Odyssey by Homer, and in

in Aesop’s fable, the Man and the Serpent.

 “A Countryman's son by accident trod upon a Serpent's tail, which turned and bit him so that he died. The father in a rage got his axe, and pursuing the Serpent, cut off part of its tail. So the Serpent in revenge began stinging several of the Farmer's cattle and caused him severe loss. Well, the Farmer thought it best to make it up with the Serpent, and brought food and honey to the mouth of its lair, and said to it: "Let's forget and forgive; perhaps you were right to punish my son, and take vengeance on my cattle, but surely I was right in trying to revenge him; now that we are both satisfied why should not we be friends again?"

"No, no," said the Serpent; "take away your gifts; you can never forget the death of your son, nor I the loss of my tail."

Injuries may be forgiven, but not forgotten.”

So you can see here that Aesop basically tells us that you don’t forgive and forget.

And when you really think about it, that makes sense, we aren’t in charge of the things that we remember, or the things that we forget. If we were we’d never forget loved one’s birthdays, and we would all forget Timmy Mallett singing Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini.

Forgetting is something that happens outside of our control, but forgiving, that’s a conscious decision to let go of our hate and anger.

And here’s the important point: if we really, truly forgive, we don’t need to forget, because the memory of whatever grievance we held has no more power over us.

The second question is why?

Why should we forgive?

Well the simple answer is because we’re commanded to forgive. But that’s a bit of a cop out really, why are we commanded to forgive?

What does Jesus say immediately after teaching the disciples the Lords Prayer?

¹⁴ For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; ¹⁵ but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

So we’re commanded to forgive other people, or else our sins, our trespasses, will be held against us.

Now I want to look at today’s reading, and especially at the numbers: if there are numbers in any Bible passage they usually mean something important.

…

And what about the Old Testament God, the one who gave the Israelites the commandments and the Levitical laws…?

The Old Testament mostly talks about God forgiving the Israelites, although in Proverbs we get an idea of the other side of forgiveness.

⁹       One who forgives an affront fosters friendship,

but one who dwells on disputes will alienate a friend. 

You see, it’s hard to be a Christian while bearing a grudge.  Imagine we see the person (who we haven’t yet forgiven) and they are in trouble, and they need help.  By helping them we could be an excellent witness for Christ, but by not helping them…

Now I know that it’s really easy to talk about forgiveness from the safety of a pulpit, because there’s no painful consequence, and some of you might think it’s okay to try and forgive someone who’s not committed a big sin, but the people I haven’t forgiven have committed some whoppers.

And that’s what I was talking about at the start, how we talk as though we understand forgiveness, but we don’t really get it.

Look at our legal system: there are laws, and if you break a law you get punished. If you steal something you get a fine, if you steal lots of somethings you get a big fine.  If you kill someone you get a prison sentence; if you kill someone by accident you get a shorter prison sentence.

We read in the papers that someone’s committed a crime, been given their punishment and we say, “What, they only got that, for that? Terrible. Where’s the justice?” By our reactions we show that in our heads we have a really clear picture of which crimes are big and which are small.

But God doesn’t see things that way. And he never has.

Look at the Ten Commandments (shortened version)

³ You shall have no other gods before me.

⁴ You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

⁷ You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God.

⁸ Remember the sabbath day, and keep it holy.

¹² Honor your father and your mother.

¹³ You shall not murder.

¹⁴ You shall not commit adultery.

¹⁵ You shall not steal.

¹⁶ You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

¹⁷ You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor. 

But covet basically means want something.

Can you imagine being in court with God as the judge and He says “Right, you: committed murder: 15 years minimum. You, bore false witness and lied in court: 15 years. You, really wanted your neighbours ox: 15 years.”?

There’d be uproar. God’s got it wrong we’d say.

But He hasn’t: we have. We’ve got it wrong.

When Jesus died on the cross, he wiped the slate clean, forever. Past, present and future.  Which is great for us when we do something wrong because we know we’re forgiven.  But it’s not so easy to take when we realise that other people are forgiven too. So long as they repent, so long as they turn away from that sin, no amount of grievance from us will change that. They are forgiven.

I want to finish with part of a letter that a father wrote to his daughter after he found out she had an unplanned pregnancy.

Though I weep inside, I can’t condemn you, because I sin too. Your transgression here is no worse than mine. It’s just different. Even if my heart did not shout out to love and defend and protect you—as it does—the New Testament tells me I can’t take forgiveness myself and withhold it from others.

We think of sin as acts. But sin is a package, an attitude that expresses itself in different ways and to different degrees. But it all comes from the same sin package you inherited through us. Christ is the only difference.

God forgives this sin as well as others—really forgives and cleanses.

Satan has no doubt tried to tell you that this affects your standing before God. It doesn’t, but it will affect your relationship till you bring the whole matter to Him. There will be a coolness, a separation, an estrangement, until you open the problem by confessing and asking forgiveness.

While we can’t say that God causes failures, He does permit them, and I think it’s clear He uses them to build character and beauty that we’d never have without them. Remember, God’s love is in even this, maybe especially in this.

We’re glad that in a measure, at least, we can help the daughter we love so much. This is a day of testing, but hold our ground we must. God will give us the victory. That’s wonderful. We’re looking forward to your being at home. Love, Dad.

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Walking on Water

²² Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd. ²³ After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night, he was there alone, ²⁴ and the boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it.

²⁵ Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. ²⁶ When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost,” they said, and cried out in fear.

²⁷ But Jesus immediately said to them: “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”

²⁸ “Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.”

²⁹ “Come,” he said.

Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. ³⁰ But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!”

³¹ Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” he said, “why did you doubt?”

³² And when they climbed into the boat, the wind died down. ³³ Then those who were in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.”

[Matthew 18.22-33]

Here we have another one of those Bible stories that everyone knows: Jesus walking on the water.

But how well do we really know this story?

As I read through this passage during the week a number of questions occurred to me:

Why did Jesus send the disciples away? He didn’t usually do that, he took Peter, James and John with him when he went on the mountain before the transfiguration, he even took them with him when he went to pray in the garden of Gethsemane, but now he sends them away.

Why did the disciples think that Jesus was a ghost? Okay, they were in the middle of the Sea of Galilee, people didn’t usually come wandering up to boats. But what does it say about these big manly fishermen and tax collectors that they thought ‘ghost’ and were terrified.

Why does Peter get rebuked for lacking faith? Yes, he took his eye off the ball, yes he started to sink; but he was the only one who was brave enough to get out of the boat in the first place.  Why don’t we read Jesus saying, “and you lot needn’t laugh, sitting there in your nice comfy fishing boat, you come out here and see what it’s like.”

Why does the wind stop as soon as Jesus gets into the boat?

All these questions have been swimming around in my brain, and I’ve managed to get some answers to them that I think are pretty sound.  But there’s a bigger question, if the other questions are the trees, this question is the wood.

Did it really happen? Did Jesus really walk on water?

Does anyone want to be brave enough to put their hand in the air and say that they believe it did?

I have tended to be what is called a liberal Christian, that’s someone who believes in God, but needs to make the stuff in the Bible fit with ‘real life’, I look for lessons that make rational sense. It’s probably because I have a background in the social sciences, in psychology.

So with this story I would say, well, the human body is denser than water, therefore you can’t possibly stay on top of the water. So this probably didn’t happen as it’s written, there must be some kind of lesson here that’s buried in the story, like a parable.

That makes more sense, it’s more compatible with science, with the world as we know it. And it makes me feel more comfortable.

Incidentally, some scholars have argued that he probably walked ‘by’ the water, on the shore. But that makes absolutely no sense. What was Peter doing if that’s the case? Is he standing in the boat, sees Jesus on the shore and tries to walk on the water to Jesus? Or is he on the shore too, but starts sinking into the beach?  Either way it’s a stupid argument.

But suggesting that these stories are poetic rather than real is the start of a slippery slope. So Jesus didn’t walk on water. Did he turn water into wine? Did he raise Lazarus from the dead? Did he heal lepers and paralytics?  If science prevents him from having power over water, then surely it prevents him having power over death. So did Jesus really rise from the dead?

For what it’s worth, I’ve come to recognise that my need for things to make sense before I can accept them is just that: it’s my need.  And if I can’t accept these things, that doesn’t make them not true. That is me putting myself, my understanding, above God.

Today’s reading from Romans sums things up pretty well. In it, Paul is arguing that there are two kinds of righteousness, two ways for people to try and get right with God.  One is to obey the law, and do everything that Deuteronomy and Leviticus say to do, the other is to have faith.

The legal way puts the responsibility on you to do the right thing. The faith way gives it all to God. Well I know which I prefer. So verses 9-10 give us the instructions:

If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved.  

That’s the basic rule of salvation and justification, and all it takes is faith.  Which by the way we are given instructions on that too, just two verses after this reading ends Paul says:

Faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes through the word of Christ.

If we want to be made right with God we must read the word of God regularly, not just once a week; we have to get to know God intimately through the Bible, and we absolutely must give up on putting the law above God, whether it’s the Deuteronomic-Levitical law, or the law of physics.

I’ve been getting today’s big question all wrong.  I’ve been asking the world-based question:

How could a 15 stone carpenter from Nazareth walk on water? I have no idea.

I should’ve been asking the faith-based question:

Could a 15 stone carpenter from Nazareth walk on water? If he’s God, yes.