Merton's Church

There’s a lovely passage in the diary of Thomas Merton, the Trappist monk and mystic, where he describes an experience he once had of suddenly seeing the divine in people. He writes:

I was in Louisville, Kentucky, in the shopping precinct, when I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all these people around me, even though they were complete strangers. It felt like waking from a dream. It was as if I could see the secret beauty in their hearts, the deep self where sin and ego can't reach, the core of their reality, the person that each is in God's eyes. Of course I couldn't say it. You can’t go up to people and tell them they’re walking around shining like the sun. But if only they could see themselves as they truly are … If only we could all see each other that way all the time. I suppose the problem would be that we'd fall down and worship each other.

Jesus’ Ascension, that we remembered on Thursday, assures us that our destiny too is to become divine.  The difficulty is that most of the time we see ourselves as the German philosopher Frederick Nietzsche did as ‘human all too human‘, broken, weak and failing.  Yet, as Christ disappears from sight, returning to be with God, he returns as Jesus fully human.  For Jesus’ Ascension is about seeing humanity from God’s perspective of history - humanity that is human, gloriously human!

In the Eastern Orthodox tradition this is one of the normal ways of talking about faith -  as St Athanasius put it ‘God became man so man can become God.’  Divinity is what humanity is for. It’s our destiny, and we needn’t be shy of saying so.  It is the point of this living relationship with God that we’re called into.

The trouble is not that we are too human, it’s that we are not human enough. If we were fully human, as God made us to be, then by definition we’d be divine as well, just as Jesus was - Son of Man and Son of God. Because God made us in his image, it's when we are most human, most truly ourselves, that we are most truly like him. It's a sign of the church's failure that to many people outside, Christianity doesn't seem to make you more human but less. Jesus talked about faith ‘giving you life more abundantly’, but it often doesn’t look that way. If anything, people suspect that Christianity narrows life down, takes the fun out of it, and de-humanizes you with a lot of unnecessary hang-ups and hypocrisies.

In the Gospels it's clear that the humanity of Jesus was rich and full. He was open to every kind and class of person, and he allowed others to be themselves. He didn’t call people to asceticism - a way of life so heavenly minded that it’s of no earthly use - He didn't narrow life down; he enriched it and enhanced it. His kind of holiness didn't raise barriers.

This morning as we hear our Lord pray that disciples would be sanctified, he did not pray for us to be rarified or sanctimonious. Otherworldly. Set appart. Doors closed to keep the wrong sort at arms length. Hatches battened to weather the storm.  As He prays for us to be sanctified, to be made holy. The sort of holiness He calls us to is the sort that breaks the barriers down that we build between each other just as He did, to the extent that he was accused of being a womaniser and a drunkard. He managed to make people feel at home who would feel completely out of place in our churches today: all the people on the margins, all the disreputable people gathered around him, because he saw past the labels and simply took them for what they were: human beings, brothers and sisters made in the image of God but then He called those bearing God’s image into relationship with Him.

And that is our call still. As this morning’s Acts reading reminds us. Being a disciple, following Jesus, coming to church is not about being good or true, it’s not about respectability, it’s not about being Church of England - about being a witness to the Resurrection of Jesus Christ - letting others see and hear of the transforming life of Christ at work in me, in you, taking that which is broken and failing in us, and it being restored, renewed, healed, loved and forgiven...  To be sanctified is to be a work in progress.  That’s the sort of church I want to be part of.

A real Christian church is one that shares that vision and does what Jesus did: accepts us as we are, but sees the potential in each of us, and helps us grow into that divine self that we already are in God’s sight. Karl Marx, of all people, once remarked that the Church ought to be the ‘heart of a heartless world’, a place where we can discover and accept one another as real human beings, with all our wounds and complications, and can then begin to grow together into something more.

The real Church of Christ is not an exclusive club for the religiously and morally respectable that you must qualify to enter. On the contrary, the one qualification for entry is knowing you can’t qualify.

The real Church is a free hospital for damaged souls, looking to be healed by love, and growing by love to become more human, not less - being sanctified by Christ - in the process becoming more and more divine. Amen.

Where Are You God?

Having reached the pinnacle of his career, in the mid 90‘s, Bono the Irish rock star and singer with U2, decided to take some time out with his wife to go and live and work in an AIDS orphanage in Ethiopia for 6 weeks. He had been deeply affected by the plight of millions in Africa, during the Band Aid appeal in the mid 80‘s, and coming here to work, was sure to be the best way to bring his rock-star self back down to earth.  But in this orphanage something else and more profound happened.

Later he spoke about how day after day there, he found his sense of life and his faith questioned and he would yell at God - why Lord are you not doing anything about these children! Why is no-one noticing and acting for the good for these! It’s like a a third of the children in our local primary schools were AIDS orphans, 13 million children wake each day with no parents to care for them. Where are you God? God do you care?

It was over this time that Bono sensed God say to him - yes I do care - through you.  From that six week stay Bono began to work, raising awareness and money for AIDS orphans and treatment and care for sufferers, mostly by sitting and waiting.

He began by going to see the arch-conservative US senator Jese Helms. He was the least likely person to support the work that Bono was feeling increasingly called to, but if he could be convinced, so could others. Bono sat outside his office for weeks. No appointment. Not hassling him. What was this rock star doing here?  Bono just sat and waited till the Senator was ready to hear him.  When Helmes did agree to hear Bono, he sympathized with his description of  "the pain [that AIDS] is bringing to infants and children and their families.”  Helmes insisted that Bono brought others from the international community on board - so Bono did the same waiting game with Bill Gates, Tony Blair and others, eventually Barak Obama.  It seemed like God had withdrawn from the plight of these orphans, yet through this quiet work of waiting, Bono ultimately has raised awareness of the AIDS plight and has raised in excess of $15 billion to fighting the AIDS pandemic.

The Ascension of Jesus is part of the unfolding drama of the God who loves and made the world, withdrawing from it. The God of the Old Testament, frightening and other, withdrew to to welcome Jesus Christ.  Jesus withdraws in anticipation of the work of the Holy Spirit in the world.  Why does God withdraw?  Firstly, God has nothing to prove - He is Almighty God after all. He can be here or not be here. He can intervene or not. But secondly, and perhaps more importantly, it gives God immense pleasure if people freely seek Him out for themselves and to follow Him. God is, as Mother Theresa once said, thirsty for our love. He doesn’t need it, but He delights in it.

The Ascension is to a degree about Jesus.  The it does clearly mark the end of his earthly ministry, but Jesus as he rises spectacularly into the heavens, is not the focus of the story.  The focus of the story is the disciples.

 

Jesus is clearly up to something as he leads his disciples out from this city as far as Betheny.  He has constantly had to teach them clearly about what following Him means.  What becomes clear is that they are to have a new role - they have been followers and listeners, and learners, but after Jesus is taken from them they are to be witnesses, speakers, and teachers of all that they have seen and heard, to tell others, to testify to the truth of these events.  He must withdraw for that to happen.

As Jesus withdraws, he is clear where the disciples’ new work is to begin - Jerusalem - the focal point of religious activity - the central place of worship for the Jews and the place to where all nations would come to meet with and be with God at the end of time.  True to form right up till the end, Jesus turns this on it’s head - Jerusalem is the place from which mission must happen - it is not a finishing point where people will come to but a starting point, the centre from which they are sent out.

The Ascension of Jesus is mostly to do with the disciples. As Jesus withdraws, their new ministry begins and so does ours.  The disciples were eventually sent out from Jerusalem, filled with the Holy Spirit and empowered to carry out the task that Jesus gave them, to witness.  These disciples eventually reached Chipperfield, Sarrat, Croxley Green, Chorleywood, Rickmansworth...  Faithful men and women came teaching that Jesus is the Messiah and that he had to suffer and die, that he rose from the dead, and that as a result forgiveness of sins, a new relationship with God and each other is possible.

There is a saying, Christ called the disciples and the church came - implying that the church’s arrival is almost in some way second best, yet in our Gospel reading tonight we are reminded that the Church springs to life as Jesus withdraws.  It marks not and ending but a beginning, as the Ascension is really about the disciples as the ministry of Jesus feeds directly into their ministry, the ministry of  the Church in witnessing in a way that only an empowering of the Holy Spirit  can make possible.

St Augustine wrote of Jesus: “You ascended from before our eyes. We turned back grieving, only to find you in our hearts.” In other words, if we’re continuing to look for Jesus in the sky, wondering why He is no longer acting in the world, then maybe we have missed the point of His Ascension.  God the Son who loves the world so much that He is willing to come and be part of it, transform it and withdraw from it never really leaves. For in this Eucharist we rediscover the Ascended Christ reigning from our hearts.  Bono discovered, we discover, that God withdrawing from the world does not leave the world hopeless and helpless, but full of His presence, His life, His love through the people He loves beyond measure.

The first disciples took the words and blessing of Jesus to heart and so must we.  There is no sadness at his absence only worship and joy.  There is no traumatic farewell.  No tissues needed.  No dazed looking into the sky.  Jesus has left them with too much to do.  No tear-filled farewell here only great joy - of the contagious variety - a joy that called disciples and has led His church till today and beyond into tomorrow, in a work of love and service that He entrusts to us. Amen.

Jesus: I am the WiFI Router...

 

I was at a conference come retreat a couple of weeks ago. It was a moving, refreshing, and rewarding time.  I was particularly looking forward to because I was going to spending 3 days with some people I had become very fond of indeed - people who enrich my life, people I spend time with every single day, people who know me pretty well in some ways, people who care for and support me, and yet aside from 1 person, they were people I had never ever met except through the phenomena of social networking using Twitter.

For growing numbers of people, any place has value or meaning, not just because of it’s beauty, or what one can learn or discover there, but whether it has Wifi or you can get a 3G signal on your smartphone. We have become a generation restless if we can’t only connect with the people we are actually with.

As of December 2011, there are an estimated 51,442,100 internet users in the UK. A staggering 82% of the population. Through the internet information is at our fingertips - we can shop, appreciate art, watch films or tv, study, and even befriend people. The social networking phenomenon sweeping the globe via the likes of Facebook should not be down played - one guestimate says that a billion people will be using Facebook by August this year - a sixth of the global population. Despite our connectedness, ow well do we really know one another? How connected are we really?

Jesus says I am the text message? I am the phone call? I am the email? I am  the facebook status update? I am the wifi router? I am the electricity cable? I am the conference call? I am the skype chat? I am the letter written by hand?  They all hint the sort of connected relationship that Jesus is driving at this morning and yet they simultaneously don’t quite grasp the depth, the fundamental life-giving nature of the relationship that we are called into.

For the vine to grow, it must receive the right amount sunlight and warmth. It’s not a difficult concept. If those conditions are not right, the plant will not flourish, it won’t grow, it won’t flower, it won’t fruit. It may not grow up in a healthy way.  

We may share in all sorts of other relationships and our lives may be all the more rich for them but we will not physically fail without them. Through technology we may be more connected wherever we are, whenever, instantly, constantly with a growing number worldwide, but our own well being does not depend on these relationships.

For the vine to grow, it must be rooted in soil with a plentiful supply of nutrients and water. If those conditions are not right the plant will will not flourish, it won’t grow, it won’t flower, it won’t fruit. It may not grow up in a healthy way.

The relationships that we are part of will, I am sure, enrich our lives.  The love that we receive, the love we give, the memories we make, the experiences we share will make us varied and diverse people. We may be more interconnected with one another than ever before, but do those relationships fundamentally transform us as people in ways that are visible to others?

Jesus invites us to enter into a deep, enriching and life-giving relationship with God in Him.  We are invited to abide in Jesus - a word with strength. It is an imperative like ‘Stop!’ In marriage husband and wife abide in each other. There is something long-term and certain about the nature of that relationship. Something deep, lasting and fulfilling.

That abiding though has an obvious outworking - we are called to bear much fruit. Notice - much fruit. The image here implies a vine full of full, plump grapes, so many grapes that the vine strains under their weight.  The reality of us abiding in Christ and Christ in us needs to be visible says Jesus.  Sometimes we can miss entirely the fruit that is growing up among us. If we are expecting large bunches of dark red grapes but instead see only small collections of fine white grapes we may miss the fruit entirely. - sometimes that fruit might be ‘internal’, in the spiritual life - growth in faith, sometimes it will be ‘external’ in loving service to others. Jesus says ‘My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.’  It is only in bearing much visible fruit though that we are truly disciples of Christ.

It is of course also possible for vines to grow wild and unruly but for them to reach their full potential they need to be tended by the gardener - and pruning is part of that tending.  Many Christians struggle with this image of pruning away the dead unfruitful branches of our lives, habits and lifestyles. It is not a sign of failure but it is about God ensuring that our lives, our churches our communities have the chance to grow more visible fruit of His presence in the world.

Vines, as with other plant can only grow to their full potential if they have enough nutrients in them from the water and the soil.  The same is true of us.  If we are abiding in Him, Jesus’ resurrection life courses through us, fills us, inside us and gives us new life but living this life is not something we do alone.

Jesus says I am the vine, you plural, are the branches. We are part of the same plant, living and growing together. In a moment we will share in the fruit of the vine and drink wine as part of this communion. As we do, we remind ourselves of His call for us to grow and bear fruit, to rediscover Resurrection life coursing through us as we share life together in Him - the one true Vine. Amen.

Easter Joy!

One of our favourite family films is ‘Madagascar.’  Some of you might have seen it.  Alex the Lion, Marty the Zebra, Melman the Giraffe and Gloria the Hippo get shipped out of the zoo and whilst being transported they are swept off deck into the sea.  They wash up on the island of Madagascar.  Once there they eventually meet the island’s population of Leemars and their King who has an announcer called  Maurice who clearly doesn’t like his job or have much respect for the King either!  (Cue fed up look and dead-pan voice) ‘...Presenting your royal highness, our illustrious King Julian the XIII, self-proclaimed lord of the lemurs, et cetera, et cetera, hooray, everybody...’  I think that Christians think Easter is a bit like that...  ‘Jesus has risen from the dead, so what, it happened a long time ago, et cetera, et cetera, alleluia, everybody...’  But, if it really happened all those years ago, then that’s worth shouting about and telling other people.

I think that we can get swept up in the activity and joy of the Easter story - the grief-stricken, awe-struck women, dazzling bright angelic messengers, doubting disciples, curious Peter who goes home amazed... can distract from us focussing on really what’s going on here - the presence and activity of God.

Today, Christians celebrate that God has raised Jesus from the dead.  As contemporary Christians distanced by some 2000 years from this pivotal event in history, you might be hard pressed to distinguish us from those who do not share our faith.  I guess my point is ‘... et cetera, et cetera, whatever, alleluia, everybody...’ is not an option.  For, if what we celebrate during the Easter season and always is true, we cannot be ambivalent about it.

If the events of that first Easter are true and God has raised Jesus from the dead then he has shown all that Jesus did and said throughout his life and ministry, must be true.  Namely, that Jesus really is God’s son, that he was crucified because of our sin (the things we all do and say that let ourselves, others and God down)  and rose again, that he is alive now and we can know him for ourselves.  It also shows that, death is no longer something to be afraid of. It shows us that Jesus has gone before us to prepare a place for us and that (through faith in him) we shall all be raised to life.  It shows that Eternal life begins now, not when we die, that Jesus gave his life for us and that we must give our lives back to him in love and service, and that like the first disciples, the resurrection calls us to be witnesses to the power of the resurrection.  All of this is good news - literally what the bible calls Gospel.

Do we really believe it though?  I think all too often Christians treat what we remember at Easter a bit like Peter did.  We hear the story again, sing the hymns again and at best we stare amazed at all that we hear, and then we go home.  

My friends, I believe the miracle God performed that we recall at Easter was not raising Jesus from the dead, but that we have heard the events of that day at all for ourselves!  Friends, in hearing the story again for yourselves as we stand at the empty tomb, I invite you with Peter, to make up your own minds if it is true...

There is evidence for the resurrection of Jesus.  Firstly and most obviously The empty tomb - Jesus’ tomb was empty on Easter Day, despite the guard on the grave.  If Jesus did not rise from the dead, where did his body go?  If the authorities had taken it, they would have produced it when claims about the resurrection were made later.  The disciples were as surprised as anyone by the resurrection. But later, most of them were killed because of their faith in the resurrection of Jesus. Therefore, I think it is impossible to believe that they took the body and told lies.

Secondly, then there are the witnesses.  In the New Testament we have accounts of more than 500 people claiming to have seen Jesus alive.  Their encounter with the risen Jesus changed their lives and they were prepared to die for their belief.   The witnesses not only saw him, they talked with him, walked with him, learned from him, ate with him and touched him.

Thirdly, the Church began.  After Jesus was crucified, the disciples were demoralized and defeated.  They were afraid and denied that they had ever known Jesus.  Only a few days later they were risking their lives to proclaim Jesus as the Messiah.  Their witness was to turn the world upside down.  What event (other than the resurrection) could have so transformed the disciples?

That’s good news!  Friends, whether you like it or not, whether you believe it or not, life is different because of what we remember today.  The angels did not try to convince the women of what they saw and experienced.  They reminded them that Jesus had said it would happen, and told them to go and tell others.  Since that moment, for over 2000 years it has done that.  In every culture, men and women talk not only of having heard the story but of knowing the risen Christ for themselves, today, and in knowing Jesus their lives are made sense of, changed for the better offering peace, joy, love, and freedom from worry and fear.

The miracle we recall today in some senses is not the empty tomb, it’s not even that we have heard the story for ourselves today, but that God offers us changed lives full of peace, love freedom and joy and a relationship with the power behind the Big Bang.  In the face of war, poverty, suffering, injustice, stress, unemployment, the school run - and so on this is still still the church’s message today, it is our churches’ message today - yes even in Mill End and Heronsgate, West Hyde and Maple Cross - interested?

God is greater than our hearts

Jaime Cardinal Sin, the Catholic archbishop of Manila who played a key role in the People Power revolution there, liked to tell the story of a woman who attended his weekly audience to inform him she had a been having visions and conversations with the Virgin Mary. He brushed her off several times, but she kept coming back. Finally he said, ‘We Catholics have strict rules governing visions and message from God. I need to test your authenticity. I want you to go back and ask the Virgin Mother to ask her son Jesus about a particular sin I recently confessed in private. If you ask Our Lady and she tells you the answer, I’ll know your vision is genuine.’

“The next week she returned and he quizzed her, a bit nervously, ‘Well, did you ask Our Lady to as her Son about my sin?’ ‘I did’ she replied. ‘And did she answer?’ he asked.  ‘Yes’ she responded. ‘What did she say?’ ‘She said that Jesus said that he couldn’t remember.’

St John writes: ‘...We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action. And by this we will know that we are from the truth and will reassure our hearts before him whenever our hearts condemn us; for God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything...’

If we step outside the the life of love God calls us to, the good news is that God loves us back. If your heart condemns you, God is greater than your heart. If something we said offends someone, God is greater than that offense. If something we did hurts someone, God is greater than that hurt. If we let someone down, God is greater that that let down.

This morning’s Gospel reading reminds us of the close relationship that the Good Shepherd has with His sheep.  God loves us each intimately.  The whole of the scripture is part of a love duet that God tries to sing with humanity over millennia. The words are very simple - God sings to us again and again, ‘I love you, I want to be with you, will you be with with me?’  If your heart condemns you, God is greater than your heart.  Such is God’s love for us that He does not hold sin against us, but forgives, forgets and renews relationships with His people.

Friends, you probably know that there are 3 sorts of love mentioned in New Testament - philio, love for fellow men and women, brotherly love if you will. It is love that builds community.  Eros, erotic love, sexual love. Love that builds families.  Agapé - self sacrifical love, love in action, love that goes thee extra mile. It is the love that takes off outer garments, wraps a towel around their waist and washes feet, even those of the one who betrays...

If your heart condemns you, God is greater than your heart.  It is this transforming love that flows from an uncondemned, a forgiven heart transformed by God’s love for us and presence in us.

There was someone I was at theological college with who had spent quite a bit to time learning with and from the Mennonites. She is called Rita. For those of you who haven’t come across the Mennonites, they have a particular renown for teaching and living lives of non-violence and love. Anyway, after some time at the Mennonite centre in london, Rita and a member of the community were making their way across London on the tube. As they came down one escalator, they saw a man being mugged. As quick as a flash, desperate to put into practice what she had been learning - as the attacked man lay on the floor - Rita loved the mugger hard by beating him with her handbag. Much to everyone’s surprise though, the Mennonite brother she was with, didn’t do that same, but lay down on top of the other man, protecting him and getting a good kicking in the process.

This is the love of Jesus the Good Shepherd in action in the heart and life of another.  The love of the Good Shepherd sticks with us through thick and thin.  It is with this love that He knows and loves each of us individually and intimately. It is this love we are called to love and live. But that’s not good news.

How often are we ready or willing to love like that? To put someone else’s needs before our own? To love the extra mile? I really want that sort of love in my life. I want stories like that to be about me. Don’t you?  When did you last love like that?  Hardly ever? Never??  The good news is that if your heart condemns you, God is greater than your heart.

We need heart transplants. When we cannot love others as we know we should; when we cannot love ourselves as He loves us. It is in those moments of utter failure and brokenness that we literally and metaphorically cry to The Christ the Good Shepherd whose heart is full of agapé, and it is He alone who can lead us from the barren landscape of our hearts into lush and living pasture of His love. Amen.

Come Alive with Jesus!

When Pepsi-Cola was launched in China, its marketing managers wondered why its famous slogan, 'Come alive with Pepsi ' was not achieving the impact that it had achieved elsewhere in the world. It was discovered that the translator had rendered it: 'Pepsi brings your relatives back from the dead.'

This is the shocking claim of this morning’s Gospel - that our brother, Jesus of Nazareth, has come back from the dead. All of us like a happy ending. The girl gets the guy. The guy gets the girl. The bad guys get got and everyone walks off into the sunset to live happily ever after. Yet the implications of the resurrection of Jesus are shocking...  For the man who was once dead now lives - he eats fish and understand the will and purposes of God! But the Easter message is not just one of resuscitation, of a dead man to life again, because then nothing would have changed - only the corpse.  Instead, this morning we hear and experience the power of the Resurrection - what God is up to in a world already changed by the Incarnation.

I have been priest in charge in the parish for some 285 days or so.  In that time I have have seen some very clear signs of what God is up to in this part of His world, already being changed by His presence here among us.

Over the last year there have been 28 baptisms, 10 weddings and 28 funerals, 8 of which were in the churches of the parish.  These are some of the most significant ways through which the Risen Christ is present in the lives of many within the wider community and I expect these numbers to rise as together we engage more with the wider community. We have already held a service of Thanksgiving for Marriage, which sits alongside the In Touch service and a soon to be launched Thanksgiving for Holy Baptism service, and these are crucial as ways to welcome back and to continue to support many within the parish.

These last months have been very much about me learning the lie of the land if you will, getting to know you and beginning to settle into a pattern of working and worshipping life together. You will remember that in the early days of my time in the parish I met around 90 of you in your homes in small groups. This was an opportunity for God to set the agenda of the next few years of ministry here. Out of those meetings three broad brush stroke themes - to renew and review our worship, to provide opportunities for study and spiritual growth, to communicate more effectively. In response to the desire to grow and learn we have run a Lent and Advent study course, both of which have been well attended and well received.  The communications work is a work in progress, but some of the fruit of that is a new parish website which for now is available here.  These 3 themes have become the basis of our Mission Action Plan - a version of which will be available to you in a few weeks - helping us to prioritize the work of God that we are doing together with Him.

These last months haven’t been about us standing still though either. Growing out of the God-given priorities you set in the parish profile, with others, I have been fostering our ecumenical links and have met the local Christian leaders. We worked together with MEB at their Light Party in October and they supported our very successful Good Friday Workshop.  I am hoping to be preaching at MEB later on in the Summer, and together we are working on the opening of a Community café and Food Bank based at the Community Centre here in Mill End.

Another key priority from the parish profile was to continue the growth of work with children, young people, their schools and organisations. We welcomed 4 Baptized Children to receive Holy Communion earlier this year.  I have been leading worship at Maple Cross and St Peter’s schools on a weekly basis for much of the last months, resourcing lessons at Maple X school and welcoming children to worship in our learn about the faith through visiting our church buildings. Behind the scenes my work continues as a governor and proving support and for especially the Heads of both schools.  I am now part of Diocesan team providing support to schools in this Archdeaconary working with schools that need help with bereavement and collective worship.  These school relationships matter as we seek to engage with the wider communities in which we are set.  And in Maple Cross especially those links are key as we begin talking with both the Church Urban Fund and the ASCEND Project based in South Oxhey about partnerships that will engage with the community in very practical ways and see St Thomas’ building used to the benefit of all.

Worship is the heart of what God’s church is called to. A little new liturgy has been introduced to help mark some of the seasons.  I am delighted that Richard Hickson has taken up responsibility as Organist and we are working closely together.  I am also delighted, as I am sure you are, at the growing skill and confidence of all who make music in the parish.  As you all know, we are in the process of discussing prayerfully our pattern of worship, following a parish-wide consultation. Some good progress has been made latterly and the PCC will discuss this again in May.  I was especially pleased that we took part in Back to Church Sunday this last year and will do so again. We have introduced a weekly Wednesday Eucharist at St Peter’s

The growing importance of pastoral care highlighted again this year and the church is indebted to ongoing and invaluable work of the In Touch group and the LMT especially in their ministry to the care and residential homes but also in supporting and caring for particular individuals.

These are only the headlines, for ahead of us with God lies so much more - growing churches, the setting up of a dedicated pastoral care team, new opportunities to deepen our faith through 2 specific things - This Is Our Faith and a Mission Weekend in the late Autumn, the opportunity to receive the ministry of healing for you and others, the launching of new church based toddler groups, a trainee Lay Reader, a new Curate. I could go on.  But, all of this is all only possible with your continued prayer and support and some of these things will only happen if we do them together - I need, the church needs, Christ needs you to give a little of your time and your talent.

The Risen Jesus appeared to those frightened disciples. They knew it was Him as he ate with them and as He opened the scriptures to them to reveal the plans and purposes of God finding fulfillment in Him.

Jesus calls us sometimes frightened disciples to continue bear witness to Him. We know that the Risen Jesus is with us as we see God’s plans and purposes unfolding around us and as we together meet to eat with Him at the Eucharist.  But to be a witness is not just to experience an event, to hear good things in church, but to willingly tell others about it.  Our call friends together is to continue to proclaim the Resurrection, to make known what God is up to in our communities, to help people within them to answer God’s call and to see their lives transformed by Him. Amen

The Gospel According to Abigail Witchells

On 20th April 2005 Abigail Witchells was walking in the village of Little Bookham near her home, with her 2 year old son Joseph.  She was attacked from behind and stabbed in the neck, paralyzing her and leaving her son unhurt but traumatized.

A statement was released on her behalf which read, "The staff here are wonderful and I am making progress every day. I have sensation over most of my body and the pain is less now. I can move my head, but as yet I cannot move my arms and legs. I can breathe and speak on my own for short periods. Please pass on my thanks to everyone for their support and prayers. God is doing beautiful things."

Much has been made of the Witchalls' strong Christian faith, and that of the whole family.  her attacker was publicly forgiven by her, her mother and her husband.  Her mother said,   “Just being with her makes me feel better and I am immensely proud of her and her husband, Benoit, and of how much I have learned from them.  Abigail's life is a triumph of the Cross. Not the world's usual triumph of strength, but rather one of vulnerability and love.

It seems to me that Abigail Witchells, along with Gee Walker (mother of Anthony murdered in Huyton), Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and Gordon Wilson (who’s daughter Marie died in the Enniskillen bombing) - all of whose stories (or parts at least) we have heard this week, have an Easter faith - a faith that trusts God to do, not just the improbable but the impossible.  Have we?
Easter to many people is about chocolate, hot cross buns, bunny rabbits and two long over due Bank holidays.  Easter is REALLY about Jesus Christ’s passion for a hurting world.  In recent days we have journeyed with Jesus into Jerusalem shouting our hosannas, to the Last Supper, to betrayal by kisses in Gethsemene, to trial and torture by Ciaphas and Pilate, and then standing watching the death of a traitor on a cross, dying the death of a failed man.  As a we stand close to the garden where the tomb is, where we have been waiting since last night, the sun gently pinking the early morning sky, some figures are seen making their way in the half light.

It’s Mary and the others.  These women, have been faithful to Jesus through it all - after desertion and betrayal - and here they are, after the Sabbath coming to the Garden Tomb to anoint his body as is the custom.  Although they are doing what they can to be faithful to Jesus, the women like the other disciples never really heard Jesus latterly, not really.  Here they are, despite talk of resurrection, coming to embalm a decomposing corpse.

They are chattering as they pass us, who will roll the stone away?  The women are clearly expecting to find what you would expect to find at a new grave.  The women are still live in a predictable world.  If you roll a stone in place on Friday it will still be there on Sunday.  These women demonstrate enormous courage and faithfulness coming ot the garden tomb, but they come expecting, despite what Jesus has said, that death still has the final word.

Throughout his ministry Jesus taught and revealed a new order that God was bringing in.  A new order where things are not always necessarily one of cause and effect but one where the topsy turvey values of the Kingdom of God break through.

As they near the corner of the garden, near the small outcrop of trees, where the tomb is located, this new order of things begins to break through.  As we follow them to the tomb, we all notice that the stone has been moved to one side.  Whilst there are many explanations for this, a sense of something just being wrong overcomes us all.

Out of concern?  Out of curiosity?  The women look, we look too - inside there is only a shroud in the tomb and no body.  What is going on?  ‘Do not be alarmed!’ says the young man sitting over to one side of the tomb.  Do not be alarmed?!  They were now terrified - was this the grave robber himself that they have disturbed?  ‘Do not be alarmed, you are looking for Jesus who was crucified - he has been raised, look here is the place where they laid him, ‘ he says as he points to the shroud.  ‘Go and tell the others he is going ahead of you to Galilee, and there you will meet him..’

If something as predictable and inevitable as death is not longer inevitable or predictable then the world has changed dramatically.  Frighteningly so.  The body has not been stolen but the grave clothes are lying there as if Jesus has just stepped out of them...  If stones can be rolled without help, if Jesus is really alive, what other certainties in life are now up for grabs.  Life is suddenly awe-inspiring and terrifying.  What else can and will God do in our lives?

One of the women with Mary said it later - that Jesus is now just loose in the world and coming to meet us, not on our terms, with our expectations, but on his.  We can no longer deal with Jesus compartmentalized as a dead body in a tomb, as a story told by Mary and the other women, but we meet him here as a living reality and there is absolutely no avoiding him in grief, sentimentality, in liturgy.  Business as usual in our day to day or Sunday lives is no longer safe because Jesus is here wherever we are, whatever we are doing calling us to be his disciples again and again and simply to come and follow him.

The women stand, as if suspended in treacle for a second that seems to last an hour, and then Salome screams.  She screams and screams and screams.  Immediately they are off in the directions of the four winds, running like they are being chased, running to who knows where, but not in the direction of Galilee.  Leaving us - at this strange and empty place.  They have seen with their own eyes and heard with their own ears the truth of all that Jesus taught - he has been raised.

This easter story does not have a happy end so that we can all heave a sigh of Lent-is-over-relief.  Jesus’ Easter story ends where it began, in Galilee - back in the ordinariness of the everyday routines.  Our Easter story ends where it began, in this community - back in the ordinariness of everyday.  But it is now the Risen Jesus meets us in the ordinary and everydayness of things - on his terms, whenever and wherever he wants to, calling us to follow him.

The disciples abandoned Jesus to death in the garden as he was arrested and then crucified, and these women abandoned him in as yet unseen new life.  There is only one group of people who can take the news that Jesus is risen, back into the ordinariness of every day life - us.  But will we?