Knowing Christ… as the True Vine

Reading: John 15: 1-8, 16

Over the last few months I have been picking up on the theme of Knowing Christ. The central purpose of the Christian life is to be drawn into closer personal relationship with God through Jesus.

I have and will continue to approach the subject from a number of different angles. Those who were here on Sunday might remember I spoke on one of the images Jesus uses to describe himself in John, the light of the world. Tonight I want to look at another one – Jesus the true vine.

It’s an appropriate image to turn to, perhaps particularly at something like an AGM, when we pause to reflect on a year which has just gone and look forward to what God has for us in the future.

There is much that could be said on this, but there are just two or three quick things I want to draw out of the passage this evening. None of them are new, or particularly spectacular, but they all bear repeating.

In the passage Jesus describes a 3 way relationship. The three parties are Jesus, his Father and, us, his followers.

The first thing to note is that Jesus says he is the true vine and His Father is the Gardener. It is worth reminding ourselves that the work and the mission in which we are involved is God’s work and about his ongoing love for the world.

That can take a wide variety of forms. The various organisations listed and the various events and activities listed in my report will bear testimony to that. But ultimately it all belongs to God.

It is possible to lose sight of that. There are times when we have to fulfil legal obligations. For example, we are a charity and must observe charity law. We’re subject to all manner of laws, regulations, guidelines etc.

Sometimes that can even help bring us back to our core reason for existence. For example our trustee report reminds us that we exist for the advancement of the Christian faith according to the principles of the Baptist denomination.

It is good that we do all that we can to comply with these things, so far as we are capable. I am really grateful to all those who help us do that.

However at the root of it all, we must not forget that what we are about is God’s ongoing work of reconciling God’s world to himself. God loves the world so much and longs to rescue it, and everything we do should have that as its ultimate aim.

For example, we don’t practice safeguarding because the law expects us to, or even because it is good to. But because part of loving the children who have been entrusted to us by God involves keeping them safe. All of it contributes to God’s wider mission.

But God hasn’t just set us a task and left us to get on with it. Vines were a prized plant but they were high maintenance. Left to themselves, vines can grow tangled and messy. They needed constant attention. And Jesus presents the picture of God doing just that. Of God with the pruning scissors in his hand, tending the vine. God seeks to be actively involved in the life of our church.

Pruning can come in all sorts of forms. Perhaps attitudes or behaviours need to be challenged, stretched, or changed. It might be negative thought patterns we’ve developed. Sometimes we need to lay things down to create space for new life to blossom.

There is no point in denying it. None of that is easy. It requires trust that in the hands of the vinedresser we are safe. But those who know more about caring for plants than I do will appreciate that the vinedresser is never closer to the vine, never caring for it better than when the knife is in hand.

But the passage also highlights the source of strength God has given us. We do not do all that God calls us to alone. Jesus says he is the vine and we are the branches. All the branches of the vine get their life from one central source. If individual branches do not stay connected to the vine they will lose their life. If anything was to happen to the central vine, all the branches would wither. Jesus says to the disciples, without me you can do nothing.

Do we invite Jesus in to be part of all that we do? So often we struggle because we try to do stuff in our own strength. And it can all be really, really good stuff. But in this we need to learn from Jesus. He regularly took time out to recharge. And if he needed to do that, we can be pretty sure we do too.

There really are no short cuts to spiritual development. Spending time in prayer, in the scriptures, in the various spiritual disciplines, are all ways in which we can cultivate and nurture that life.

We will each have different ways in which we do that. Those of you who were at the Sunday Plus will know that we did a questionnaire which helped to identify different spiritual types, and there were some suggestions as to how to cultivate that. If you missed it and want to investigate that further I have some copies of the questionnaire here, you can take away.

But we do need to cultivate our relationship with Christ, to ensure we stay connected to him. For he is the source of any life we have. Without him any achievements we make will be at best short term.

That’s not just true for us as people. It is true of us as a faith community. All that we do we should be surrounded by prayer, for that is the life source of all that we do. By his Spirit we invite Jesus into what we are doing, because without him we can do nothing.

That’s why the main focus of tonight’s AGM will be to cover all we do in prayer. To give thanks

for what is gone and to ask for guidance for all that is to come.

But that doesn’t mean that we leave it all to him. Just as the garden is God and the our life support is Jesus, so we are to work with him. He has called us to bear fruit. 

At times we will feel like we’re getting nowhere and bearing no, or little fruit. Despite what we might believe from permanently stocked supermarkets, fruit doesn’t come in every season. Good fruit, fruit that will make it, takes time.

Thankfully we are in the hands of a master gardener, who has loads of patience.

And he has more faith in us that we have in him or ourselves. All he asks is that we stay in touch from him, for he is the one from whom we draw the new life God offers. He’s the one who provides the staying power when bearing fruit becomes difficult. The only barrier is to refuse to be open to his leading and teaching.

 

It’s not always easy and it’s not without it struggles But if we’ll allow him to work in us he has promised it’ll be worth it. We’re in the hands of an expert vinderesser who loves us, who longs for us to know him more and more and loves our area and our world so much that he wants to use us, so that more and more people will be drawn into that lifegiving relationship with him.

This was a talk given at our Church AGM on Wednesday March 22.

 

Knowing Christ… As the Bread of Life

Reading: John 6: 22-59

Over the last few months , I have been reflecting on the theme of ‘Knowing Christ.’ At the heart of the Christian life is the invitation into a loving, intimate relationship with God, who has revealed himself to us most completely in Jesus Christ.

I am been approaching this question from a variety of different angles:-

I’ve talked about where we are to know Christ.

          In our minds

          In our imaginations

          In our hearts

          In our memory

I then went on to talk about a range of challenging circumstances in which God wants us to know Christ:

          In loneliness

          In anxiety

          In (self) doubt

Then yesterday I looked at Knowing Christ in Suffering

Another way Jesus invitees us to come to know him and God is through his images.

I mean, how do you describe what God is like? God is way beyond our understanding. The basic, propositional language of systematic theologies,  all too often falls short. Instead Jesus dealt in word pictures or parables, partly because they stretch our imaginations. They always leave us with more to explore.

How is the Kingdom like a seed growing in different types of soil or a king settling his accounts?

He never tells us. We need  to think it through.

But there was another series of images which Jesus used to describe himself, and what he had come to be for us. We find them in John, in the I Am Sayings. Jesus says I am the bread of life, or the light of the world, or the door, or the vine.

Jesus was born in the first century Jewish culture, so it’s not massively surprising that this is the environment from which he would draw his references. These statements may have had a certain resonance with first century Jews, but can they mean anything to us? Or can we find ourselves thinking ‘so what?’

Tonight I’m going to look at the first of these I am sayings. I am the bread of life.

What’s so special about bread?

Well, then, as for many parts of our world today, bread was part of the staple diet.

Then again in the Galilee regions so was fish, and this saying comes right after Jesus feeds them with bread and fish.

So why is it I am the bread of life, not the fish of life?

In our world wars are often fought over access to resources like oil. It is reckoned a primary cause of war this century in some parts of our world is likely to be access to water. In this case it was food, more precisely bread. Control the bread and you have the power.

Bread was the instrument of control.

We have a saying an army marches on its stomach: to be successful they need plentiful and good food. Romans knew this too. But they were a bit belt and braces in their approach. When they conquered someone, they made certain that they were not about to be conquered back.

They didn’t just disarm potential enemies. They kept them too weak to fight back. They rationed their food supply to 1600 calories per adult male. By contrast their own troops had a minimum calorie intake. In a battle situation it’s estimated a Roman solider burned up 6000 calories a day. In a more stable climate to keep their strength up, it was estimated to be at least 3500 calories.

The vast majority of their intake was bread.

Given that background, you can see how, in the wilderness, as Jesus considered how to fulfil what God had placed him here to do, using his power to turn stones to bread must have been a very real temptation.

It’s easy why being able to produce masses of bread on demand would have led to people wanting to make him king.

Yet Jesus doesn’t make that choice in the wilderness and in John Jesus’ tells them that is precisely what he is not offering. Something deeper is going on as Jesus describes himself as the bread of life. Something that can speak to our own situations.

How often do we feel that things are getting out of control?

We might be ‘free’ in the ways we traditionally understand the word. I live in Britain a country that has lasted almost a millennium without a successful invasion, which prides itself on stability and declares it ‘never, never, never shall be slaves.’

But how many of us are truly free in the sense of not having anything controlling us?

Do we never feel that there is something which has us in its grip controls us? Something that leaves us feeling powerless and  weak?

I am an ex-smoker. I haven’t smoked in years. But I sill remember the control nicotine had over me. It. Even now, sometimes I would really love a cigar, and would not consider it sinful. However I know me. It wouldn’t stop with one. It may well be permissible, but to me it is not beneficial and would almost certainly master me very quickly.

It needn’t be an addiction. I grew up in a country where so many were gripped by hatred. It drove them to do some horrendous things.

Others are gripped by irrational hatreds based on the colour of another’s skin or their sexuality.

Others are controlled by their hatred of an individual who hurt them to the point where they make their world ever smaller not just by cutting themselves off from the person who hurt them, but from anyone remotely connected with that person.

Some are gripped by guilt about their past,

others by loss,

still others by fear.

Some are held captive by lies they’ve been telling themselves for too long ‘you’re worthless, you’re stupid, you’re talentless.’

All of these things become the narrative which defines who we are.

All of them are things from which, if we are ever to live the full life God intends for us, we need to be freed.

When Jesus describes himself as the bread of life, the first thing he is telling us is that there is nothing that controls us, from which he cannot set us free. He can not only liberate us, but sustain us for the new life.

That doesn’t mean it’s easy to accept. When something or someone has you in its grip it can feel a deceptively safe place to be. When Jesus met the man who has been lying on a mat by the pool of Bethsaida for 38 years, he asks him ‘do you want to get well?’

For a long time he has been defined by this condition. Getting up involves the risk of starting over anew.

It’s possible to be like that, even for a seeming position of faith. Although, had you asked that crowd that day, I’m sure they would have said what they wanted was freedom, but did they really. As you read the story, they seemed willing to simply transfer their servitude from Rome to Jesus, provided he kept the food coming.

Sometimes we can present Jesus as a lifestyle choice. Come to Jesus, he’ll make everything so much better.

Sometimes when we can make God only as good as the last thing he did for us.

We can try to use faith and prayer and God and all the while our focus is quite earthy.

We want things under our control.

That’s what the crowd wanted – Jesus to produce on demand.

Thing is life never works out as you planned it. Life isn’t ours to control and if the kind of freedom we want involves having everything under control, it’s an illusion. It’s unattainable.

The question is what can you rely on to sustain you when things do get out of control?

Effectively what Jesus says to the crowd is ‘look, I know the story you are talking about. I’ve read exodus too. But you’re focussing on the wrong thing and you’re missing the point. You’re caught up the with manna side of the story. You’re blinkered into looking at the pile of food I provided for you. But you’re not looking at what those events and those stories were supposed to tell you.’

In Deuteronomy Moses reflected on the Children of Israel’s wandering in the wilderness, and how God miraculously fed them with manna. The lesson they were supposed to learn was that we do not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes out of the mouth of God.

To believe we have life under control is an illusion. Our very breath is a gift from God.

Every morning they got up, collected and ate the manna, but at no point thought ‘God’s keeping us going here.’ When the next piece of trouble came along, they forgot they only got this far because God was helping them. They took the manna, but it did not generate the trust.

That story of wilderness wandering towards a Promised Land, at the mercy of the terrain is so powerful because it evokes images of so much of life. There are times when we can feel completely at the mercy of what life has to throw at us. We can spend forever trying to get life under control.

Jesus says that whatever else we place our trust in, whatever else we use to sustain us, it will falter, it can’t keep us going forever. It was never designed to.

But if we place our trust in him he can give us life over which not even death can speak the final word.

Drawing to a close, Jesus describe that kind of reliance on him in what might seem to us quite gruesome language. Jesus uses quite blatant sacrificial language to describe himself. Jesus tells them to eat his flesh and drink his blood. Jesus is predicting what’s going to happen to him, but he invites us somehow to benefit from it.

And it is open to everyone. Whoever will take him up on the offer, he will never drive away. He’s not the caviar, truffles, or whatever other food we can dream of that is out of reach for so many – he is bread of life, accessible to all.

And the word Jesus uses is to munch, or to chew over, his flesh. I’m aware that so many meals I eat are rushed. I’m on my way to the next thing, food becomes quite functional. I don’t really savour it.

That’s what Jesus encourages us to do with him.

There’s a line in the gospels which speaks of things happening in the early days of Jesus life and Mary ponders on the events and stores them up in her heart.

It’s cos whilst she may not know the detail, she knows that tough times are right around the corner, and these are the things that will sustain her, that will stop the darkness ahead having the final word.

We’re invited to recognise that the freedom God offers to us is not about having every under our control, but recognising that all things are under the control of one who love us and is committed to us. Who can sustain us, whatever we face, if we place our trust in him for those questions of control and freedom.

He invites us to look to a Christ who took on the frailty of human flesh which could be broken, but who described himself as the bread of life – but whose victory over death shows there is nothing in this life which controls us, from which he cannot free us.

Whatever has defined us, need not have the final word for that final word will be spoken by him and will be a word of love.

This was a reflection, presented at our deacons’ meeting on 13 March. A fuller version of this talk was presented as a sermon, which can be located here.

 

Knowing Christ… as the Light of the World

Readings: John 8: 1-12; John 9: 1-7

About 8 years ago a somewhat awkward, unemployed, middle-aged woman from a largely unheard of village in West Lothian walked onto the stage at the auditions for Britain’s Got Talent and told Simon Cowell that she dreamed of being a professional singer.

The cameras panned round the audience as she said she wanted to be like Elaine Page. To say they looked sceptical would have been a massive understatement. As they backing tape began, they were all, including judge Piers Morgan, expecting to have a giggle at her expense and move along to the real hopefuls.

Then she started singing…

I dreamed a dream in times gone by; when hope was high and life worth living

By the time she had reached the end of those couple of lines, the crowd were wowed into silence. The camera went backstage where Ant (or was it Dec? Does anyone know which is which?) said ‘youse didn’t expect that now, did ya? Did ya? No!’

The crowd were on their feet cheering her on, long before she got to the finish. When it came to the judging Piers Morgan said ‘when you stood on that stage, with your cheeky grin and told everyone you wanted to be like Elaine Page, everyone was laughing at you. No-one is laughing now!’

Amanda Holden added ‘I know that everyone was against you and we were all so cynical but that was the biggest wake-up call.’ Before she had opened her mouth they had all been ready to judge her. But she had proved them all wrong.

By the end of that year, that unemployed, middle-aged woman from a largely unheard of village in West Lothian had reached number one in album charts right round the world. Her album was the fastest selling first album by a new artist in over a decade in the United States and the fastest selling ever in the UK. Most of you will know who I was talking about. Susan Boyle.

SuBo.

Over the course of this year so far I have been focussing on the theme of Knowing Christ. The whole point of the Christian life is that we are invited into an intimate, loving relationship with God, through Jesus. Jesus calls us to follow him, to come to know him, to live in relationship with him.

I’ve explored this from number of angles.

We’ve spoke of where we are to know him. I’ve touched on the idea of knowing Christ in your mind, allowing him to shape our worldview. I spoke of using our imaginations, then I spoke of knowing him in our hearts and memories.

I’ve also spoken about circumstances of life in which it can help us to live in relationship with Jesus. In loneliness, in anxiety, in doubt, or self-doubt. Last week I spoke about Knowing Christ in suffering.

Another way to come to know Christ more deeply is to reflect on the images he uses to describe himself. In John’s Gospel Jesus has seven different word pictures, or ways in which he describes himself, all beginning with the words I Am. This morning I want us to focus on just one of those images, which occurred in both parts of our reading.

Jesus said I am the Light of the World.

But what does this mean?

And what on earth has it got to do with SuBo?

A quick scan of my records tells me I have already spoken on this saying twice in the few years I’ve been with you. Add to that the passage in the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus says You are the Light of the World. So part of me was tempted just to move on, do another image or whatever. What was I going to add?

But as I read the passages side by side, something struck me. It’s probably blatantly obvious, but I’d never noticed. Partly because of how modern Bibles break things down into smaller chunks.

On previous occasions I have spoken to you about the power of light to overcome fear and help give us direction. This morning I want to explore a slightly different angle. Both these are passages about true and false judgment, and who has the right to judge.

Both events appear to take place in the temple area, during the Jewish feast of Tabernacles. According to a collection of rabbinic literature called the Mishnah, light played a prominent part of the celebrations. There was a ceremony called The Illumination of the Temple. Within the temple, in the court of the women they placed four giant candelabra, each about 75 feet tall, each with four branches. On top of each branch was a large bowl. That’s 16 bowls in all. There was a ladder up to the top of each of the candelabra.

They made wicks for these lamps out of the old worn out underwear of the priests. Then four young priests would climb the ladders, carrying 10 gallon pitchers of oil and set light to the wicks in the 16 bowls. The light given off from the flaming candelabra was said to fill not just the temple complex but the whole surrounding area.

It was during that festival that Jesus declares himself to be the Light of the World twice in the space of two chapters. But, as I’ve said, there is something else which both passages share – about true and false judgement.

But how is that connected with light?

In the first episode some teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery and made her stand before them all. They said to Jesus, In our Law, the Torah, Moses commanded that a woman who is caught committing adultery must be stoned to death. Now, what do you say?

They were at least partly right. There was such a law. It was a very specific set of circumstances. It referred to a woman who was betrothed, or engaged, to another man. The penalty only applied if they were caught in the act. The eye-witnesses were supposed to be the ones who cast the first stone…

… but the penalty applied to both parties.

Which begs one very important question…

…if they had been ‘caught in the very act’, where was the bloke?

We’re told they were trying to trap Jesus. What does that mean?

They were trying to put Jesus into a position where whatever answer he gave he would be in trouble with someone.

Jesus had a reputation as a ‘friend of sinners.’ His audience largely wasn’t made up of the usual sorts. It was the fact that he mixed with those whom the Pharisee’s considered wrong ‘uns that caused him so much trouble with his critics. Occasionally even his closest friends were surprised at the people Jesus befriended. If Jesus had said it was fine to stone her that reputation would be shattered. It would turn out he’s just like all the others after all. Would they ever trust him again?

However, chances are they knew Jesus wouldn’t say that. But they were ready for that too. For if Jesus told them to let her go, he could be accused of setting himself against Moses. That really wouldn’t look good for a rabbi.

Then again if he said stone her he was setting himself against the Romans who didn’t like anyone but them passing the death sentence.

Back and forward it went. Whatever answer he gave would be wrong.

Jesus refuses to be rushed. Instead he bends down and starts writing on the ground. We’re not told what. It might have been something relevant, he might simply have been doodling, stalling for time, giving himself a moment’s thinking time before he responds.

They keep pushing him for an answer. Then he stands up and says Whichever one of you has committed no sin may throw the first stone and went back to his doodling. One by one, from elders to the younger ones, they leave, until there is just her and Jesus.

Jesus looks up as the last ones leave and says where have they all gone? No-one left to condemn you?

She says no sir

Jesus responds I don’t condemn you either. Go and don’t repeat your mistakes.

Then Jesus says I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will have the light of life and never walk in darkness.

 

In the second passage Jesus was walking along, presumably with his disciples, when he sees a man who had been born blind. We’re not told how they knew he had been born blind. They just know.

His disciples ask him whose fault is it, that this man was born blind? Was it his sin or his parents’ sin that caused it? They have a ready- made explanation of this man’s condition. In their mind, sin and sickness were intimately connected. It’s not a worldview that’s entirely gone away. Sadly I’ve known far too many hurtful situations caused in church settings, when people of faith, who have suffered serious illness, have been told by others in their faith community that they must have some unconfessed sin in their life.

It’s not just people of faith who might think that way though. Just last week, when I spoke about suffering we talked about how when we suffer one of the first things we do is ask why. People will say things like what have I or what have they done to deserve this? At the back of it all there’s this thought that there is some god or other who has got annoyed with them and decided to get revenge.

Jesus dismisses both explanations his disciples offer. It was neither him, nor his parents.

At first glance, Jesus seems to offer an alternative explanation. Some translations have Jesus say something like ‘It was neither this man nor his parents who sinned. He was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him. We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming when no one can work.’

Which kind of suggests that this guy is born blind so that one day Jesus can come along and heal him and show how great God is.

Which I must confess is not an idea I’m entirely comfortable with.

Before anyone else says it, I know Jesus need not be in the business of making a middle class, white, Western man comfortable.

But there is another reasonable way of translating this. Our New Testament was originally written in Greek. Greek did not use full stops and commas as we do in English. Sometimes it’s not obvious where one sentence ends and another begins.

This is one of those occasions. If the first sentence ends a few words later the sentence can be translated slightly differently: It was neither this man nor his parents that sinned that he was born blind. But so that God’s work might be revealed in him, we must work the works of him who sent me while it is day. Night is coming when no-one can work.

 This way Jesus effectively says We could spend all day debating why the poor guy is blind… or we could just do what God would want and help him. The opportunity to help won’t be last forever.

And that is what Jesus proceeds to do. But before he does he says ‘whilst I am in the world. I am the light of the world.’

So what is it that these two passages have in common?

And what has it got to do with light?

And what has it got to do with the SuBo story with which I started?

Well they are both accounts of situations where Jesus warns against rushing to judgment on another. The Pharisees and religious leaders were prepared to stand in judgment over the woman they brought before Jesus caught in adultery. The disciples were prepared to judge the man who was blind. Just as the crowd were ready, too ready and too quick to judge whether SuBo had any chance of impressing the judges on Britain’s Got Talent.

 Light is often used in the Bible and indeed as John’s Gospel as an image of judgement. It’s amongst the most famous verses in the Bible, John 3: 16: For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in him, should not perish but have eternal life.

But if you read a few verses on we get this is the judgement, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.  For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed.  But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.’

We use ideas of judgment and light in the same way. We talk about the facts ‘coming to light’ and because of that we can make better choices or understand a situation better. Jesus warns us about rushing to judgment because chances are we’re stumbling around in the dark.

We don’t see clearly. We don’t have all the facts.

Jesus says we prefer darkness rather than light. It seems an odd statement. We do what we can to get rid of darkness.

But light is not always welcome. On winter mornings the alarm goes off at some terrible hour of the morning. It looks like it’s still the middle of the night, we turn on the bedside light, and our first instinct is to screw up our eyes against the light.

Jesus as the flames of the temple candelabra brought light to the whole temple area, including the darkest corners, so Jesus says he is the light of the world who can bring light even to the darkest corners of our lives.

Light can be challenging. It can reveal the stuff we’d prefer to keep hidden, the stuff we’d prefer to bury and keep hidden. Sometimes we’d prefer to stay in the dark, or stay in the shadows. And all too often it’s from that position we judge others.

There’s a story told of a bishop who was going on a cruise, but when he boarded he found he was to share his cabin with another man. On seeing his cabin and meeting his roommate, he went to the ship’s office. He asked if he could leave his gold watch and other valuables in the ship’s safe. He added ‘I wouldn’t normally do this, but I have just met the man with whom I am to share the cabin, and I’m afraid he might not be very trustworthy.’ The person behind the desk said ‘no problem at all bishop. Don’t worry about it. Your roommate’s already been up and said exactly the same.’

One of the reasons that the almost karma-like idea of linking sin with suffering can seem so attractive, particularly from a position of health, is it allows us to live with the idea that we’re ok and not face up to any of the darker, broken stuff within us.

But another way it can emerge is that we are likely to judge others for stuff we’d rather not face in ourselves. Jesus says let the one without guilt cast the first stone. If we do find ourselves quick and ready to judge someone, it is worth searching our own hearts to see if there is something we’re hiding from.

And we become like the gods we truly believe in…

…or perhaps more accurately the gods we truly believe in become like us.

We don’t just often judge others for things we fear about ourselves. Very often those who are judgemental of others, also think of God as vengeful and violent God, ever ready to smite and punish.

Which, in turn, is a very good reason to stay in the shadows.

I mean, why come out and be judged?

We judge others by their actions, but want to be judged by our intentions, or longings. What we can’t see in others. That’s why ultimately judgment belongs to God and God alone. he alone knows the darkest and brightest secrets and longings of our hearts.

But  the only one who is equipped to judge is remarkably slow and reluctant to do so. The light of the world hasn’t come to condemn but to save, to rescue.

One of the other things with which we associate light is hope. We speak of new dawns. We speak of light at the end of the tunnel (and hope it’s not an oncoming train!!)

When you get a diagnosis from the doctor, even when it’s not good, it’s not given to condemn you, it’s to help you get better.

That’s how Jesus acts in each of the stories. To those around him the woman caught in adultery and the man born blind might have been moral, philosophical or theological case studies. But to Jesus they were individuals, loved and cherished by his Heavenly Father, to whom Jesus wanted to extend grace and mercy.

Those bringing the woman caught in adultery to Jesus may be interested in what she deserves. Jesus is more interested in what she can become. The disciples may be interested in why a man was born blind. Jesus was more interested in what he could do.

But both needed to choose their ways forward. Both needed to choose to step into the light.

For the woman caught in adultery, there was hope and forgiveness. But forgiveness wasn’t the same as tolerance. It’s sad that Jesus’ words ‘let the one without guilt cast the first stone’ have all too readily been used as self-justification by those who know full well they are in the wrong. Jesus response to the ones who would stone her is not designed to absolve the woman. It’s designed to force the others to face their own guilt.

Jesus held out hope to her. That there was a light to step into. Her wrong didn’t have to be the end of the matter. But the choice of whether she would leave her sin behind was up to her. To that extent the story is left open-ended. We don’t know what she did.

The man born blind had a choice to make too. There is no mention of him asking Jesus to heal him; no mention that he is aware Jesus could heal him. Jesus mixes some mud and spittle, rubs it on the guy’s eyes and sends him to the pool of Siloam. It’s when he does that he steps into the light.

He could have stayed precisely where he was. It’s when he does what Jesus tells him that he comes to see.

The passages present us with a challenge. How easy it can be to spend more time trying to explain something that to help. How easy it can be to rush to judgment without being aware of the facts.

But Jesus hasn’t just come to be the Light of the world. He’s come to be our light. Light to each one of us. We are amongst those to whom he longs to bring light.

And we can fear that. From our most primal stories, we have chosen to hide from God and try to avoid stepping into the light. We think he’s come to judge us. But Jesus invites us to bring him all that we are. To step into his light.

For the light of the world has not primarily come to bring judgment but to be hope and salvation. In Jesus we see that God in far less interested in what we deserve and more interested in what we can be. In Jesus we see a God who seeks not to understand the darkness, but to bring light and hope to us. He comes full of grace and truth. So yes, when we step into the light, it may mean we need to acknowledge our wrong and our sin. But he invites us to do it, not to condemn us, but to be our healing.

 

Knowing Christ… In Suffering

Readings: Isaiah 52: 13 – 53: 12; II Corinthians 1: 1-7

During the Second World War, particularly in that period early in the War, which became known as the Blitz, the Queen Mother (she was actually Queen then) won the affection of large parts of the nation, which lasted right up to her death, 60+ years later, at the age of 101.

She had been given the opportunity to evacuate to Canada, but she refused. She thought her proper place was with the people. She even learned to use a revolver in case the enemy ever tried to kidnap her.

But she is probably most fondly remembered for her regular visits to the East End, which bore the brunt of the German bombing. There was always the danger from unexploded devices lying beneath the rubble, but she considered it her duty to be there with the people, keeping up the nation’s morale.

Her sense of solidarity with them deepened when Buckingham Palace itself was bombed. Because the Royal family chose to stay in London, the palace was naturally a lucrative target. In fact, during the Blitz, Buckingham Palace was bombed 16 times, suffering 9 direct hits. The first raid involved a particularly narrow escape for the King and Queen. But after that she said she could now “look the East End in the face”.

She knew what they were going through.

She knew something of their experience.

That deepened her connection with those who were suffering, as she was right there alongside them.

They were truly in it together.

My overarching theme in the preaching so far this year has been this idea of Knowing Christ. We are invited into a loving, intimate relationship with God, who has revealed himself to us most completely in Jesus Christ.

I began by speaking of knowing Christ in our minds, our imaginations, our heart. I spoke of the importance of memory in developing our relationship with Jesus.

More recently I have been looking at circumstances in which we are invited to come to know Christ. In loneliness, in anxiety…

At the Sunday Plus gathering a couple of weeks ago, I spoke of Knowing Christ in our doubts, particularly our self-doubts.

Today I turn our attention to perhaps one of the most difficult subjects…

Knowing Christ… in suffering.

I say difficult because all too often the experience of suffering drives people away from God. It is one of, if not the top question people ask of those who claim to have faith. If you’re God is all powerful and all loving, how come the world is as it is?

Let’s front up and be honest.

A few weeks ago I spoke of God’s hesed: a steadfast, committed, reliable love, which never fails, never gives up on us, never quits. I spoke of that hesed running through all things like the wording on a stick of rock.

If anything should cause us to question that view of the world, it’s suffering. It is one of the biggest mysteries we face. I’m not saying believers experience it more acutely, nor that we are alone in fighting it. But it is a bigger challenge to how we see the world than for many other people.

I mean, if there is no God, there will still be pain…

…but you don’t have to explain it. It’s just how the world is. It’s an inevitable part of the evolutionary process.

But if there is a God, and if we are supposed to discern anything about this God by looking at God’s creation, it need not be obvious that God is good and loving. Yes, our world contains such beauty. But there is also so much suffering. If we only considered the worst experiences of life, you might come to the opposite conclusion.

There have been lots of attempts to resolve the tension between believing in a good, all loving creator and the suffering of the world. I’m not going to go into them this morning. There are plenty of places you can find that. Such arguments have their merits. Some are better than others.

But let’s be honest enough to admit that none of them answers it completely. We live with far more unknowing and mystery than we care to admit.

How then do we deal it? How do we resolve the contradiction between a cruel world and a loving God? Well, as Francis Spufford says in his fantastic book Unapologetic…

‘the short answer is that we don’t. We don’t even try to, mostly…. Cataclysmic experiences can pitch us back into it, but mostly they don’t… We take the cruelties of the world as a given… Instead of anguishing about why the world is at it is, we look for comfort in coping with it as it is.’ (Pages 104-5)

That doesn’t mean we don’t take it seriously, or dismiss it by saying ‘yes, it’s difficult now, but one fine day, in the sweet by and by, it’ll be ok.’

Quite the opposite. What kind of group takes an instrument of torture as its main symbol?

Only one which takes suffering very seriously indeed.

But we take it seriously by asking a slightly different set of questions. There’s a reason attempts to resolve the question of suffering never quite work.

When we suffer, we want answers because we think they will help us make sense of suffering. But they resolve far less than we think. No reason can ease sorrow.

There is one circumstance where it proves truly helpful.

When it tells us how we can stop it happening again.

But that gives us a clue to the deeper questions we face in the midst of suffering. More meaningful questions…

What now?

How do I go on?

Nothing is ever going to be the same, so how do I put one foot in front of the other and take the next step?

 Life consists of taking that next step, then the next, then the one after that. ‘Why’ questions have limited power to help us do that.

That’s why we move forward, not by asking for a creator to explain Himself. Instead, as Spufford says ‘We ask for a friend in time of grief, a true judge in time of perplexity, a wider hope than we can manage in time of despair… the only comfort that can do anything… is the comfort of feeling loved. Given the cruel world, it’s the love song that we need, to help us bear what we must; and if we can, to go on loving.’ (Page 105)

We want to know we’re not alone.

In the face of suffering, the Christian hope is not in ‘having an argument that solves the cruel world’ but in the belief that in Christ we have a God who is not out there, remote, distant, detached, unfeeling, but our God is somehow or other present, right here with us, in the midst of whatever we face.

We don’t say ‘God is in his heaven and all is well with the world.’ Instead we can say ‘all is not well with the world, but at least God is here in it, with us.’ (Page 107)

That was the central theme of the passage Phil read for us from II Corinthians. It’s one of those passages that the main point is not that difficult to find. One word crops up again and again in the passage. The church (Good News) Bibles uses the word ‘help’.

All our help comes from God, who helps us in all our troubles, so we are able to help others, with the same help…

On and on it goes. That same word appears 10 times in the space of 5 verses (vv3-7). It sits alongside 3 mentions of trouble and another 4 of suffering. So it’s fairly easy to see what’s on Paul’s mind.

The word ‘help’ is a bit general. A better translation is comfort or consolation.’ But even that can sound a little weak, a bit touchy-feely, like a pat on the back saying ‘there, there.’

The word is much stronger than a translation like comfort might suggest. In fact we encountered it before. Just a few weeks ago. Jesus told his disciples he would not leave them as orphans, or like pupils without a master. He would send another ‘helper’ or ‘comforter.’ I mentioned a Greek word Παράκλητον. Parakletov, or Parakletos. The word translated ‘comfort’ or ‘help’ 10 times in that passage is a series of variations on that word. With the same range of meanings.

It can mean someone you call on to be with you, someone who will sit with you, someone who knows the right thing to say which can change the mood. It’s someone who encourages us, someone who cheers us on, reminds us that despite all the evidence to the contrary we can get through this, it doesn’t have to define us, whatever we’re facing doesn’t have to speak the final word. Someone who can offer a bit of direction, a bit of insight which can help you know what the next step to take might be. Someone who helps you see that there even is a possible next step.

I’m reminded of a particular instance from my time in another ministry. Because of the semi-rural nature of the area in which we were based, we were quite a long way from a number of the services like the council, citizens advice, benefits, support services and the like. But we were also in an area where a lot of people needed to access those services. At the church we had a coffee morning, which had a credit union collection point attached to it. We approached a number of different groups and said you want to come and use the church as a drop in you during that time, you would be welcome. We’d be open anyway, so there’d be no charge. A number accepted the offer.

In one of the first weeks a lady came in who had a number of different issues that needed to be sorted. She was very nervous, she wasn’t sure who to ask for, and I got chatting to her. Even from my layman’s perspective, I was able to identify a number of distinct situations, which would require her to speak to different people.

As I started to explain that to her I could see the tension rising in her. How was she going to get round all those people? She was envisaging all the journey’s she would have to take, all the buses, the cost…

Then I said ‘but all those people are here.. You can speak to them all before you leave here.

Her whole demeanour changed. The situations were exactly the same. Nothing had been resolved. But suddenly there was a glint of hope. There were steps she could take. In that moment I was acting as a parakletos.

That’s the kind of thing Paul is talking about here.

That’s the role the Spirit plays.

The God with whom we are invited to come into relationship through knowing Jesus is not an out there, distant, detached God, but one who is here in the midst of the mess with us. Paul describes him as a God of compassion. Compassion literally means suffers alongside us. This God shares the pain and the anguish. As The Message puts it… He’s the God who comes alongside us when we go through hard times.

Thing is, we might not instantly recognise him doing it. Because most of the time, it’s not in blinding flashes, but in the ordinary, like conversations over a cup of coffee in a small country chapel.

Paul highlights two ways in which God does it. But they both have something in common. They involve someone who has been there before us…

… and come out the other side.

In a sense I could be some to that woman . But it gains a whole new dimension if you’re the one who says ‘yes, I’ve been there too… and I’m still here.’

It might happen indirectly. You witness someone in the midst of pain and suffering drawing all sorts of comfort and it offers you encouragement. There is hope.

But more often, certainly more powerfully, is when someone who has been there before us is the one who draws alongside us. That experience qualifies us to deal sympathetically with others. It’s gives what you bring so much more authority. Sometimes it can be that moment when someone recognises your experience. That moment when they say ‘yes, that’s exactly how it feels’; or ‘yes, I remember that’; or even ‘yes, that’s a perfectly normal reaction.’

They’re the ones who can really encourage us we can get through this.

They’re the ones who can help us believe that there is life after this.

They’re the ones who through insight and experience help us find the next step and the next.

That’s how so often God brings his comfort to us. Through those who have been there before us.

But that’s not where God wants it to end. The Message translation is really helpful at this point. He comes alongside us when we go through hard times, and before you know it, he brings us alongside someone else who is going through hard times so that we can be there for that person just as God was there for us.

God doesn’t comfort us purely for its own sake. Ultimately he longs for us to extend that comfort to others.

So often that’s how God works in the Bible. He tells Abraham he will bless him so that Abraham can be a blessing to others. Jesus speaks of forgiving others as we have been forgiven. What we experience from God, he wants us to hand on. And one of those things we experience is his comfort. However it comes to us.

I don’t believe for a moment that God brings suffering into our lives just so we can help others further down the line. Nor does it make what we experience any more ‘ok’ or even any less painful.

But that doesn’t mean God can’t use us to be the one by which he brings comfort to others. God so often does his best, most powerful and perhaps most surprising work through a particular kind of people.

The wounded healers.

Those who have been there, who have been wounded, and through their wounds they help others find healing.

And very often it helps with their own healing.

And that should not surprise us.

For it is how we encounter God in Christ. It’s how we are drawn into relationship with Christ through suffering. Because in Christ himself we have a wounded healer. In fact Christ as the wounded healer is probably the most important way in which those who first followed Jesus understood him.

It certainly resonated with the first Christians. Isaiah 53 wasn’t particularly written about Jesus. However that passage about the suffering servant is the Old Testament passage most frequently quoted in the New Testament to describe Jesus.

And it presents a picture of a God who understands what we go through because he has gone there ahead of us. In Christ are invited into a trusting relationship with One who can ‘look his creation in the face’ because he is in it with us. He has been there, he has lived our lives, he knows the experience, the good, the joyful…

…and the hell of it.

When God came amongst us, he didn’t come with the trappings of royalty. He came from humble beginnings, was easily overlooked, he could be easily dismissed. We could look on him and say God does not look like that.

There’s a series of novels called the Starbridge Novels by Susan Howatch. In the last of the novels, Absolute Truths, a bishop called Charles Ashworth loses everything that’s important to him, and in the midst of despair he finds himself in an odd, drunken conversation with someone whom he has never liked. The guy remarks that it’s an odd conversation to be having with a bishop. It feels like a dream. ‘It’s no dream,’ says Ashworth, ‘good to meet someone else who’s gone through hell lately.’

Isn’t it wonderful? the man responds. It makes all the difference to know there’s someone else screaming alongside you. And that’s the point of the incarnation. I can see that so clearly now. God came into the world and screamed alongside us.

 

That God’s surprising, though still mysterious answer, to the problem of evil. In Jesus God confronts the contradiction of the cruel world and the loving God.

In Jesus God comes into the world and screams alongside us.

This is God revealed at his most powerful. You might think that an odd thing to say.  I typed ‘God’s power’ into a picture search engine and it was a long way down before I came to any of the cross.

Yes, we believe this is the one through whom all things are created. It makes perfect sense to be wowed by that. But the Bible says ‘that? The work of his fingers. This is the work of his mighty arm.’

Who would have believed that?

As Rodney so rightly reminded us last week, ours is not a God who came into the world to condemn it, but to be its saviour.

And this is how he did it. It may not be the answer we expect or even necessarily want, but he hasn’t come to be either of those. He comes to be the answer we need.

He comes to us as a wounded healer, who knows what is necessary to deal with all our pain, all our sorrow and does not flinch from the path laid before him. His rescue was done vulnerably, caringly, at great cost and risk, in hurt and pain. He experiences the havoc that sin brings to human life. He voluntarily identifies with the worst of us, right to the end, as he hangs on the cross between two thieves in a manner of execution reserved for the lowest and the worst. He faces sorrow and rejection, and screams alongside us. He says ‘yes, I’ve been there.’

Yet in that broken body he carries the capacity to heal and restore. He becomes the channel by which our world begins to be healed, and by which we are brought back into relationship with God.

When in the midst of suffering we ask does God know what we go through, the cross is God’s way of looking us in the face and saying ‘I know how you feel. You are not alone.’

When we suffer, yes, we instinctively want answers. We want to make sense of it, to find meaning, cos we think it’ll bring us healing. But explanation has very limited healing power. Much more powerful at helping us begin to heal is the loving presence of someone. Someone standing in solidarity. Someone to say you are not alone. The power of the one who has been there.

That’s good as far as it goes. But if it ends there suffering still has the final word. Those whose presence will ultimately prove most powerful are those who have been there…

… and come out the other side.

But the story doesn’t end there. Not for Isaiah’s servant and not for Jesus. After suffering says Isaiah, he will again have joy. He will know that he did not suffer in vain.

And so with Jesus. A few days after the cross some women go to the tomb to find it empty, with the grave clothes carefully folded. Some run off, but Mary lingers by the tomb weeping. Then she hears her name.

Mary.

In that moment she learns… as Francis Spufford brilliantly puts it ‘far more can be mended than you know.’

In the cross we see the love of God. In the cross that God’s love will stop at nothing to reach us. There is no depth to which Jesus is not prepared to descend. There is none too wicked that Jesus will not identify with him. Nowhere are we outside the love of God.

But in the resurrection we see that there is nowhere we can go that he will not be able to reach us. We can trust that there is nothing we can face that God cannot bring us through because in Jesus we have one who has gone there before us.

Whoever we have been, need not define us.

Whatever we’ve done, has been done to us, need not speak the final world.

There is life after suffering.

That’s not to say suffering is not real, or can be ignored. We are invited to be part of God’s plan to bring an end to suffering in all its forms. Be it locally through the work of Foodbank, Firm Foundation, Street Pastors, and the quiet, loving, supportive conversations and kindnesses we experience or get involved with. We are invited to be the ones who bring God’s comfort, encouragement, and offer direction.

Suffering is real, but so are God’s promises.

However the resurrection declares our present sufferings are not worthy to be compared with what God has prepared for us. In Christ we have one who has gone before us, has emerged through it all, and promises to do the same for us… if we’ll just let him. He is God’s surprising, mysterious response to the suffering of the world.

And with him, even where there seems to be no grounds for hope, he will not agree that hope is gone beyond recall. Wreckage may be written into the logic of the world, but he will not agree that it is all there is.

He says more can be mended that you fear.

Far more can be mended than you know.