Brushstrokes

Posted on August 11, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

Leaded clouds filter

light to the lake;

deep calls to deep.

The layered air is

painted on;

brushstrokes of the wind,

movements of the Spirit,

fade into the canvas

of the storm.

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A sustaining hope

Posted on August 8, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

A sermon for August 8th, 2021, at the Church of the Epiphany, Euclid. The Delta variant of the continuing COVID pandemic is on the rise locally and nationally as schools prepare for their new year. In today’s readings, Elijah sits under a broom tree in the desert and prays to God to take him home; Jesus is the Bread of Life.

There must have been some small part of Elijah that still held out hope. Even in his despair, he sought out the shade of the broom tree – the only respite from the scorching desert to be seen. Before he placed himself at God’s mercy, to take or to leave, Elijah placed himself under the shelter of its shrubbery.

It’s worth remembering how Elijah got to where we find him, exhausted and exasperated, under the broom. 

In the days of Ahab, king over Israel but corrupt at his job, God called the prophet Elijah out of Tishbe in Gilead to pronounce a drought upon the land because of the king’s unfaithfulness. You may remember that Elijah waited out the drought in the home of a widow in Zarephath. His time was not without emotional upheaval and uncertainty, but Elijah waited upon God, and eventually, God sent Elijah back to Ahab to bring back the rain (1 Kings 16:29-18:2).

The toll was heavy. Elijah ended up in a duel against the prophets of Baal, the idol with whom Ahab and his household had been unfaithful. Many lost their lives that day before the rains came. Elijah had won out against them, but at a terrible human cost (1 Kings 18:22-45).

Now, Ahab’s wife, Jezebel, was seeking to avenge the prophets of Baal with Elijah’s own blood: violence has forever bred violence. It was a frightened, traumatized, and demoralized man who dismissed his servant and companion, and set out alone into the desert, trailed by death (1 Kings 19:1-5).

Even so, Elijah retained just enough hope within his body and his spirit to find the solitary broom bush, a cool patch of sandy earth in which to curl up and pray for the oblivion of sleep (1 Kings 19:3-9; today’s lesson).

What he thought when the angel woke him with food and drink, and the instruction to eat so that he would have strength to journey still further is not recorded. Perhaps it wasn’t printable. But the hope that resided somewhere deep within Elijah’s spirit and the sustenance with which God provided him were enough somehow to get him to the holy mountain, where Moses had once communed with the divine presence, and where Elijah would now witness God’s power and glory wrapped up in a still, small, almost silent voice (1 Kings 19:9-13).

I don’t know but that this is an apt metaphor for the stage of life that we are in right now. As a community, we are wearied by repeated waves of pandemic disease and anxiety. Our children are being called back into school just as things are heating back up, and without the protection of vaccination for the younger ones. We who have survived so far bear witness to tremendous losses sustained over the past several months: not only the loss of life, but loss of ways of life, of company, of confidence.

Add to that pandemic toll the news that gun violence has now become the leading cause of death in children and teens up to the age of 19 in the US, and that at a time when gun purchases are also rising. Make no mistake, there is a correlation.

In our personal and individual lives, many of us I am sure have things going on that could drive us into the desert to sit beneath and broom tree and wonder whether we have what it takes to stand back up.

And still, we are here, reaching forth our hands for the bread of heaven, expecting the intervention of God, to send us on our way.

We are here – whether in person or online, staying distant, staying safe; in the midst of it all, we have hope, because we have Jesus. He is our bread for the journey.

The interventions of God come in many forms. For Moses and his generation, there was manna from heaven. For Elijah, there was bread baked by an angel on hot stones.

Presiding Bishop Michael Curry told a story this week via video that some of us have heard him tell before: the story of a sugar cube. Many of us remember receiving those pink drops of polio vaccine on a sugar cube at school. Strength for the journey – Bishop Curry told how pleased and relieved his father was to know that his son would not bear the ravages of polio in his body, as his father did, because vaccination had defeated it here.

The interventions of God, strength for the journey, can come from humans sweating over laboratory test tubes as easily and as often as angels baking on hot stones.

We live with the uncertainty of Elijah, and some of his exhaustion. We live with his hope. We know that God is with us – Emmanuel – we have seen God in the person and the passion of Jesus. We believe him when he tells us that he is our bread, and that he will not leave us hungry (John 6:35). We listen for the still, small voice of silence, the presence of God in the midst of trouble.

We pray, in the words of the prayer book, “Deliver us from the presumption of coming to this Table for solace only, and not for strength; for pardon only, and not for renewal.” (Eucharistic Prayer C, Book of Common Prayer)

We are here, not only because we have hope for ourselves, but because we carry hope for the world. We who know the promises of God, not to leave us helpless, not to leave us hungry, we pray for strength to counter fear with wisdom, to turn aside violence with the way of the cross, to defeat death with the promise of resurrection, in this life as well as the next; in our communities, as well as in ourselves. To listen for the quiet interventions of God and to share them with our neighbours: “Look, here is help. Here is bread for the journey. Here is hope.”

In a sugar cube, or in a pharmacist’s needle; in a friend, or in a stranger; in the bread of angels and in the Body of Christ, God is with us.

Psalm 34:7 The angel of the Lord encompasses those who fear God, and God will deliver them.
8 Taste and see that the Lord is good; happy are they who trust in the Lord!

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Vaccines, masks, love, and religion

Posted on August 4, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

Back in the early months of 2020, we were introduced to a novel coronavirus. We knew quickly that it would make history. We did not understand that far from witnessing history in the making, we would be the ones making and shaping it. 

Nearly a year and a half later, we are older, wiser, and weary of this pandemic. Still, it has not tired of trying us. So here we are, trying once more to turn back the tide of novel variants, with the help of vaccinations, masks, and physical distancing. Handwashing is the order of the day, but we cannot wash our hands of this virus or our responsibility to love our neighbours by looking out for their safety as well as our own.

2 Thessalonians 3:13: “Brothers and sisters [and siblings], do not be weary in doing what is right.”

Yes, this has gone on longer than any of us imagined. No, it is not over yet. Yes, we are still responsible, each of us, for playing our part, moving history toward better health.

If you do become sick, do not despair. The prayers of angels surround you, and the love and mercy of God, God’s rod and staff will be faithful to you, in sickness and in health, to the end of the ages.

1 Peter 5:8-9: “Discipline yourselves, keep alert. Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour. Resist him, steadfast in your faith, for you know that your brothers and sisters [and siblings] in all the world are undergoing the same kinds of suffering.”

Like a demon, this virus prowls around looking for someone to devour. Deny it houseroom, as far as you can help it; keep alert, practice good mask discipline, protect yourself and in doing so help protect others from catching it from you.

Matthew 4:5-7: “Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written, “He will command his angels concerning you,” 
and “On their hands they will bear you up, 
so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.”’ 
Jesus said to him, ‘Again it is written, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”’”

We have safety nets in place to help guard against this disease. Do not side with temptation. Vaccines prevent an impressive proportion of infections, and protect even those who do fall ill from the most serious consequences, in most cases.

These vaccines have been tested and approved in the midst of a public health emergency. They have been successfully and safely taken up by millions of people so far. Including me.

The vaccines are distributed for free – no small miracle itself in this cynically capitalist society. “Yes, your vaccination is free. The federal government is providing the vaccine free of charge to all people living in the United States, regardless of their immigration or health insurance status,” says the CDC (emphasis added).

Matthew 18:5-7 “[Jesus said] ‘Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me. If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened around your neck and you were drowned in the depth of the sea. Woe to the world because of stumbling blocks! Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, but woe to the one by whom the stumbling block comes!’”

We know that, as of just now, children younger than 12 are not eligible for COVID vaccinations, even as they head back to school. Likewise, people with certain health conditions may not receive the full benefits of vaccination, either because they cannot take it, or because of diminished uptake by their own immune systems.

Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, Jesus reminds us; the risk of illness remains for anyone breathing during these dangerous times. No one should be blamed or shamed for falling sick. But we should all be doing what we can to interrupt this invidious disease, not only for our own sakes but in order not to become a vector for another’s illness. I got vaccinated in no small part because I would not want to become a stumbling block to a child’s or another’s health and safety.

1 Corinthians 12:14,18-22,26-27: “Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. … But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many members, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I have no need of you,’ nor again the head to the feet, ‘I have no need of you.’ One the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable … If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.”

For the love of Christ, let’s take care of this body, with tenderness, respect, selflessness, wisdom, and love, so that in good time and good health, we may rejoice together.

Scriptures referenced from the NRSV

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Some people are never satisfied

Posted on August 1, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

A sermon for Sunday, August 1st 2021, at the Church of the Epiphany, Euclid. In the news, billionaires race to the edge of space; at the Olympics, Simone Biles chooses health and teamwork over personal triumph; the moratorium on evictions extended through earlier seasons of the pandemic is allowed to expire. In the Gospel, the people fed by the thousands want more from Jesus.

Some people are never satisfied.

Jesus had fed five thousand people with a few fish and some bread, and now they wanted more. “What will you do for us?” they asked. “Moses gave us manna in the wilderness and it came morning after morning. Where is our bread and fish for today?” (John 6:31)

They had witnessed, they had consumed what Jesus could provide, and now they wanted him to dance to their tune. They wanted to own him.

In the wilderness, the people grumbled about Moses, and whether he was doing enough for them now that they were free, now that he had saved them from Pharaoh’s army and from the Red Sea. “Where is today’s bread?” they demanded. And God provided (Exodus 16:2-15).

God rained down quail in the evening and manna in the morning, and the people ate – but were they satisfied?

Jesus told the people, “Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life. … For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. … I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry.” (John 6:27-35)

When he called the fishermen, James and John, Andrew and Simon Peter, he told them that from now on they would be catching people instead of fish. Their appetite for satisfaction would no longer be bound by the sea but would be caught up in the imagination of God, the revelation of God’s grace to God’s people (Matthew 4:18-22).

From the hillside, he told them, “Blessed are you when you hunger and thirst after righteousness, for you will be filled.” (Matthew 5:6)

Some people are never satisfied. But that’s the kind of hunger that comes not from want but from envy. 

Envy sees a young woman full of grace and power, and demands that she perform for them, as though she owes them her vitality, which is the life of God within us all.

Envy can twist our appetites and our priorities in awful ways.

Envy sees the heavens and instead of being humbled seeks to conquer, to dominate, to crown themselves among the stars.

While down below, hundreds of thousands and more suffer the consequences of climate change, pandemic disease, and the kind of envious and unmitigated capitalism that seeks to profit from everything, at any expense, from peoples’ homes to their health, life-giving water to the air that we breathe.

I wonder how many evictions one trip into the atmosphere could offset.

Yes, there is real hunger here, in this life, in this world; some of you perhaps have known it. Jesus has instructed his disciples already by their resources and their resourcefulness and with their faith, by all means to feed the hungry. And then there are those who are full, but who are never satisfied.

“Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life,” Jesus advised them, as they tore into the baskets of bread and fish left over from the night before. (John 6:27; imaginatively, John 6:13)

“I am the bread of life.” (John 6:35)

In her 1939 retelling of Exodus, Moses, Man of the Mountain, Zora Neale Hurston had Moses tell the people,

“This freedom is a funny thing,” … “It ain’t something permanent like rocks and hills. It’s like manna; you just got to keep on gathering it fresh every day. If you don’t, one day you’re going to find you ain’t got none no more.”

Hurston, Zora Neale. Moses, Man of the Mountain (p. 252). Amistad. Kindle Edition.

Like manna, God provides for us the food of eternal life: the kind of love and justice, selflessness and peace; the healing mercies that Jesus shed like manna wherever he trod – but we have to gather it fresh every day, and to share it, if we are to sustain it and be sustained by it. 

We have to wake up with our faces set to follow Jesus – not for breadcrumbs but for full satisfaction, thy kingdom come; not to own him, nor to bend him to our will, but for thy will be done.

Not for the love of our own bellies, but for the love of God, and of our neighbours.

“No, if your enemies are hungry, feed them,” wrote Paul; “if they are thirsty, give them something to drink.” (Romans 12:20)

Only then will everyone be fed. And if the envious are still not satisfied, maybe they just need some more Jesus. “I am the bread of life,” he said. (John 6:35)

And they said, “Sir, give us this bread always.” (John 6:34)

Amen.

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The faithful shepherd

Posted on July 18, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

A sermon for the eighth Sunday after Pentecost, July 18, 2021

God does not ever leave God’s people comfortless.

Our Bible study group read through many a minor prophet during the spring, and we found that no matter how dire the situation, how judgmental the oracle, how angry the prophet, there was always a counterpoint: the promise of God’s faithfulness, God’s undying love for God’s people. 

Jeremiah, a major prophet who majored in dismay, is no exception. Unflinching in his condemnation of faithless and uncaring leaders, Jeremiah is just as certain that God is a faithful and compassionate shepherd to God’s people, and will not abandon them to wickedness and its ways.[I]

Jesus, who was no one if not the Son of his Father, follows suit. When he saw the people lost and scattered, he had compassion upon them, and became their shepherd.

Notice the witness of the psalmist that this does not mean that we, God’s flock, will not encounter valleys full of shadows and the shades of death. As many have observed, to be human is to suffer.[ii]  Jesus himself suffered doubt and despair in the Garden of Gethsemane, physical pain and the torture of dying on the cross, the bereavement of friends and family. Even here in the introduction to this passage, he is divided and depleted by so many demands that he doesn’t have time even to eat. 

The Incarnation of Christ is the certainty that God has experienced and undergone all that drags us down into that valley. God is with us in its depths, with rod and staff, the faithful shepherd.

I am reminded of the parable that Jesus told about leaving ninety-nine perfectly content sheep to seek after the one who was lost, whether through straying willfully, or through injury, or through abandonment by its flock we are not told; regardless of cause, the good shepherd will not leave the lost lamb to suffer alone.

C.S. Lewis famously wrote in his book of tears, 

“Talk to me about the truth of religion and I’ll listen gladly. Talk to me about the duty of religion and I’ll listen submissively. But don’t come talking to me about the consolations of religion or I shall suspect that you don’t understand.”[iii]

I do not want to fall under that suspicion. I have some experience of grief, and of depression. I know that there are valleys so deep and so cold that it feels as though we have reached the bowels of the earth, have been buried alive. In those places, those powerful prisons of time, the idea of consolation seems laughable.

And yet Jesus has been there, even there, too, sealed in a stone-cold, unfeeling, unlabeled tomb. Even if we cannot see him, he is there. Even though we cannot hear his breathing in the darkness, resurrection is coming. Somewhere on the surface, green pastures still grow, and water still pools to cool our thirst.

I suppose that what I am saying is that if and when we find ourselves in those valleys, we are not as alone as we think. God promises through the prophet to send help: whether friends or pharmacists, physicians or therapists, or simply prayerful companions, “who will shepherd [us], and [we] shall not fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the Lord.” 

If we have the capacity to turn our faces to the sun, we will find our way back to the green, to the flock, to Jesus. If we have the strength, we can carry a weary lamb along with us, or even just keep company for a time. And if we are simply too exhausted, broken, sad, know that the good and faithful shepherd has already set out to find us. He is never too busy for us, never too far from us. They have not forgotten us. Trust in God’s faithfulness.

Christ spreads a table for us, in the full and clear sight of all that confounds us. The Holy Spirit anoints us with healing mercy. God’s goodness and loving-kindness are for us, and are for ever.

Amen

[I] See also Alicia Hager, “RCL – What is a good shepherd?” at https://revgalblogpals.org/2021/07/12/rcl-what-is-a-good-shepherd/

[ii] A Google search of this phrase will attribute it to Nietzsche, Frankl, and more; its absolute origin is unclear.

[iii] N.W. Clerk [C.S.Lewis], A Grief Observed (Greenwich, CT: The Seabury Press, 1963), p. 23

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Wednesdays

Posted on July 14, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

Anniversaries are strange; the passage of time feels almost arbitrary. Ten years pass in a heartbeat, while an hour drags on for days. The anniversary of joy is marred by bad temper, while grief sneaks up on the calendar secretly, planning an ambush, and is turned aside by a child plucking dandelions.

Still, we mark out our days, commemorating this and them, and by the word of the Bible time is sanctified: three days here, forty there, seven weeks of seven, and a thousand years under God’s unblinking gaze. Sabbaths sigh, and Wednesdays teeter on the hinge of the week; we can look forward or back. Or we could pause here for a moment, recollecting all the Wednesdays that have brought us to this present presence. We could sit for a time and contemplate the timelessness of God, the anniversary of eternity.

July is full of ghosts for me, but Wednesdays are alive. They turn their face toward the sabbaths of yesterday and tomorrow, the resting place of hope, the fulcrum of eternity.

“For behold, … deep gloom enshrouds the peoples. But over you the Lord will rise, and God’s glory will appear upon you.” (Isaiah 60:2-3, which is included in the recommended Canticle for Wednesday Morning Prayer)

This post first appeared last Wednesday at the Episcopal Cafe.

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Who killed JB?

Posted on July 11, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

A sermon for the Seventh Sunday after Pentecost. The Gospel reading recounts the beheading of John the Baptist at Herod’s feast.

Herod regretted killing John. It was a guilt that haunted him, so much so that he convinced himself that Jesus, John’s cousin, was instead his reincarnation, or his repossession, returned to convict Herod of his crime.

It’s a nice question, how people respond to the gospel, to Christ.

There are those moments, rare but profound, when even Peter falls to his knees and begs, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man.” (Luke 5:8) Jesus came to the Galilean countryside proclaiming repentance before the coming kingdom; confession is an appropriate response.

Yet others, desperate in their need, came to him for healing. They had already wrung out before God all that they could imagine could have caused their current suffering, and they had come up short. Now, they looked only for mercy. And Jesus looked upon them with compassion, and he healed them.

Some came searching for wisdom, whether in crowds on the hillside, leaning in to his beatitudes, or sceptically, ironically, looking to poke holes in his gospel in case it might otherwise change their hearts. Jesus heard them all, reiterating to anyone who would listen his gospel of repentance, of mercy, embodying God’s steadfast and forbearing love.

Herod did not come to Jesus.

When he killed John, Jesus’ cousin, Herod did not act alone. Herodias, his former sister-in-law and wife is often cast as the true perpetrator here, putting out a contract on John that Herod had no choice but to fulfill. We do not know the age of her daughter, whether she might bear some blame for failing to recoil in horror at her mother’s suggestion. Then, there were the soldiers who carried out the act in cold blood – do they bear no guilt for executing an innocent man simply because they were so ordered?

But what of the guests at the feast? I am curious about those people. Herod, we are told, was torn about severing John’s head, since he regarded the man as righteous and holy, yet he had made promises in front of his guests and wished not to lose face.

Were they such a bloodthirsty crowd that they would rather see the letter of Herod’s drunken, excited oath carried out before them than offer some substitute, some way out, for Herod and for John? Was there not one who would stand up, speak up, against this atrocity? Not one who would step in?

Herod was fully responsible for his own decisions and actions; but he was not the only person responsible for the death of John, the cousin of Christ.

We have all known situations where we should have spoken up but didn’t: when a racist or sexist joke was told, or bullying was observed, or worse. We – the world – bore witness to the murder of a man on the streets of Minneapolis last summer, and we saw how afraid anyone must be in the moment to help, how powerless to avert tragedy. And since then, how many of us have shied away from addressing the situation by demanding reforms, still afraid of the ramifications, still relying on the conviction of one person to carry the blame of us all? It is a fearful thing, to confront the king.

It is a fearful thing to confront our own guilt. Herod and Herodias hardened their hearts; by the time Jesus finally appeared before Herod, he was over it. Who knows about the dancer and the soldier, what moral injuries they carried and how they were scarred? 

But the guests at the feast: we can relate to the ordinary people caught up in an extraordinary moment, confronted unexpectedly with the violence of greed, lust, and rage that rule too many of our decisions. From our seats at the table, they have a choice to make: whether to let Herod have his way and live with the horror of John’s beheading, or whether to speak up, speak out, and hope to hell that someone else at the table has their back.

We all have moments we regret, personal words and actions we wish we could take back, flows with which we wish we had not gone; systems of oppression which we have accepted or from which we have benefited; philosophies of greed from which we have failed to protect the poor. Where we have failed and share the guilt of Herod and his guests, we have a path to forgiveness.

Every time we come together we make our confession, and God hears us. If there are particularly poignant sins that plague us, there is in our prayer book a form for personal and private confession with a priest. None of us is alone in our sin, and none need wander alone seeking forgiveness. God has provided for our absolution.

There will be new opportunities to do the right thing, to refrain from doing wrong for the sake of the crowd, to make reparations for the harm that has already happened. God grant us the grace to accept those opportunities. Herod had one when Jesus was sent to him late in his life, and he squandered it; but fed and led by Christ, we need neither harden our hearts against guilt nor wallow in it. Fed and led by Christ, we are free.

Unlike Herod, we need not be haunted or hardened by our guilt. We can, like Peter, fall to our knees and confess our guilt before Christ, our Saviour. We can, as those in need of healing, present ourselves for mercy. We can, like those who heard the call beside the Sea of Galilee and followed without question, repent, and turn our hearts to follow the way of Christ, wherever it may lead us. We can come to Jesus.

Here at Christ’s table we can rest and refresh our bodies and souls and spirits for the love of God. Our confessions are heard, our forgiveness is announced, our frailties are understood, and, we are reminded, Herod is not our host, nor does he rule over us, but only Christ.

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A haiku on Psalm 30:5

Posted on July 9, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

Following tracks of

rain down to the lake for joy

that comes by morning

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A red, white, and blue sermon

Posted on July 4, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

A sermon for July 4, 2021, at the Church of the Epiphany, Euclid. The Gospel lesson is from Mark 6:1-13

Red, white, and blue. There was a day not long before we left the UK to move to these United States when the children’s primary school was celebrating the Queen’s Golden Jubilee, and everyone was encouraged to wear red, white, and blue. On that historic occasion, my youngest child presented herself between the foot of the stairs and the front door, book bag in hand, dressed in her favourite velour sweatsuit, which was a lovely pale purple.[i]

“Isn’t it red, white, and blue day?” I asked her. “Yes,” she said, “and I’m wearing them all mixed together.”

Ezekiel received a word from God, who told him, “Whether they hear or refuse to hear…, they shall know that there has been a prophet among them.”

But Jesus returned to Nazareth, as a teacher and as a prophet, and the people were unimpressed, and he was amazed at their unbelief. 

William Barclay, commenting on this passage, notes that, “There is laid on us the tremendous responsibility that we can either help or hinder the work of Jesus Christ.”[ii]

We can hold ourselves a little apart if we want to, reserving our judgement as to how much he tells us, of God, of life, of mercy really applies in our current circumstances, how much Jesus of Nazareth knows of modern-day America, its unique problems and its preferred solutions; but then we will be like the people of Nazareth, among whom he was amazed and not a little disappointed that only a little healing could happen, and no great deeds of power.

The gospel, with its emphasis on repentance of sins, its insistence on that the love of God means loving our neighbours and even our enemies; this gospel can seem hopelessly naïve in such a world as this, that runs on leverage instead of love. The problem with pride, our stiff-necked and rebellious pride, that keeps Jesus in his place and resists the repentance of the prophets, that insists that we already have the more perfect way – the problem with that, if we choose it, is that we are doing ourselves out of great deeds of power.

Now clearly, since we are gathered here, we are not like those who refuse outright to receive his teaching. We are in little danger of having foot-dust shaken at us – surely?

But might we be just a little afraid of what might happen if we allow ourselves truly to be changed, converted, transformed by the grace of our Saviour, Jesus Christ? Are we just a little concerned about going against the flow of popular culture, painting with a different brush, suggesting that mercy is greater than might and love more lasting than power; that even the great and the wise need repentance? Are we afraid to trade in our red, and blue, and whiteness for something in a soft velour?

After his own rebuff at Nazareth, Jesus sent his disciples out to risk rejection and ridicule, but their reward was to cast out demons and to raise the sick from their deathbeds. Can you imagine how that would feel, to be able to bring life to the most desperate and sorry situations? 

If we were to allow ourselves to be transformed by Jesus and his gospel, what would we do? Who would we heal, if we weren’t counting the cost? Which demons of destruction and division, of hatred and harm would we cast out? What comfort would we bring to the grieving, what confoundments to the proud, what compassion and celebration to the meek, the inheritors of God’s earth?

If we could let ourselves live fully converted lives, as obedient to the gospel and as uncluttered by other claims – possessions, politics, profit, popularity – as his chosen disciples, what could we not accomplish?

A little later, “the disciples came to Jesus and asked, ‘Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?’ He called a child, whom he put among them, and said , ‘Truly, I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever becomes humble like this children is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven’.” (Matthew 18:1-4)

Red, white, and blue. A quick survey of world flags finds that countries as diverse as Chile, Cape Verde, the Czech Republic, Iceland, Liberia, Australia, Mordovia, the Faroe Islands, and more – even Russia and North Korea – fly flags of red, white, and blue, in different configurations, of course.

We are in no danger of dissolving, of losing our identity; we lose nothing if we lean a little further into love, into the understanding of another’s life, into the love of a different neighbour, into the heart of God, who created all people in her image. But we will be transformed, if we allow Christ to lead us and to send us; we will be made new.

And isn’t that something to celebrate?

[i] Permission was sought and granted to tell this story.

[ii] William Barclay, The Gospel according to Mark, The Daily Study Bible, 2nd edition (Westminster Press, 1956) 

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Do not invite death

Posted on June 27, 2021 by Rosalind C Hughes

A sermon for Sunday, June 27, 2021 at the Church of the Epiphany. The readings include extracts from the Wisdom of Solomon (see below) and Mark’s story of the healing of the woman with a haemorrhage and the raising of Jairus’ daughter

On the face of it, Solomon’s wisdom seems to be in contradiction to our creeds, which affirm that nothing came into being without God. God is the creator of all things, seen and unseen; the devil, however we understand that concept, cannot create, but only corrupt. Death is a corruption of life.

God does not delight in the death of the living, writes Solomon, and we agree; death is part of our human condition, but in God we understand it to be incomplete. Death cannot eradicate love, memory, hope. And because we have hope in the Resurrection, death is temporary in its severing, or suspending, of relationships. Death is incomplete because it is the corruption of life, Solomon (and we) might say; not a creation in itself.

Jesus does not love death, nor bloodshed. Although he goes willingly to his own death on the Cross, his doing so throws into sharp relief the inane and arbitrary and thoroughly wrongful nature of that execution. He has done nothing to provoke or punish his tormentors. Jesus would rather stem the flow of blood, raise up the child, restore the family and the woman to her friends than see death and bloodshed hold them hostage. This is our faith: that God does not delight in the death of the living, but rescues us from oblivion, restores us to the life of love, the eternal life which God would prefer for God’s beloved creatures. That we, made in God’s image, are not destroyed by death, since God has the first and final Word over us.

But there is more going on in this piece of Solomon’s wisdom than our brief extract explains. Immediately before the verses we read, Solomon wrote,

“Do not invite death by the error of your life, or bring destruction by the works of your hands” (Wisdom 1:12) And in between, in part, he wrote, “The ungodly by their words and deeds summoned death; considering him a friend, they pined away and made a covenant with him, because they are fit to belong to his company” (Wisdom 1:16)

Do not invite death … or bring destruction by the works of your hands. Do not make covenants with death.

But we do, don’t we?

We have made covenants with death and contracted with the suppliers of works of destruction.

We have passed laws to allow Christian hospitals to deny treatment to many sorts and conditions of people, including the woman with an issue of blood in her time of need; we have allowed all sorts of providers to plough the parents of little girls into debt, or into impossible decisions about how much life one afford, and we have called it freedom.

We have contracted with the suppliers of the means to make poison gas and heart-stopping solutions, and we have called it judgement.

We have invested our security in mutually assured destruction, and where the assurance is not mutual, we have enacted Stand Your Ground laws, which some call Shoot At Will laws; and we have called them justice.

We have armed our police and sent them out in force on our behalf.

We have allowed guns to invade our homes, our children’s bodies, our suicidal imaginations, our streets, our schools, and we have called it [a] right.

God save us from the deadly, grasping greed which is the envy of the devil.

We have not, either, shared the burden evenly, but we have chosen whom we will sacrifice.

By our words and deeds, the works of our hands, we have summoned death, considering him a friend. We have made covenants with him, because we are fit to belong to his company.

And still, God has other plans. “For God does not delight in the death of the living … for God created us for incorruption, and made us the image of [God’s] own eternity” (Wisdom 1:13b, 2:23)

We are not made in anyone’s image but God’s. We are not made for the corruption of death but for the covenant of life. Jesus does not love death or bloodshed – but Jesus loves us. Knowing this, how can we not consider turning from death to life; to pour out healing without counting the cost; to withhold death and restore relationship wherever it is possible; to deny the devil’s envy and replace it with love?

Jesus does not love death or bloodshed – but Jesus loves us. Knowing this, how can we not consider turning from death to life so that we, too, can hear him say, “Your faith has made you well; go in peace” (Mark 5:34)?

Do not make any peace with the corruption of death, the death that corrupts the soul, for you are made in the image of eternity. Choose instead, at every opportunity, the way of life, even if it leads through the Cross.

For, Solomon wisely writes just after the verses we read,

“But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them. In the eyes of the foolish they seemed to have died, and their departure was thought to be a disaster, and their going from us to be their destruction; but they are at peace. For though in the sight of others they were punished, their hope is full of immortality” (Wisdom 3:1-4)

Our hope is in the living God, and we do not hope in vain.

Amen.

Wisdom of Solomon 1:13-15; 2:23-24

God did not make death,
And he does not delight in the death of the living.
For he created all things so that they might exist;
the generative forces of the world are wholesome,
and there is no destructive poison in them,
and the dominion of Hades is not on earth.
For righteousness is immortal.

God created us for incorruption,
and made us in the image of his own eternity,
but through the devil’s envy death entered the world,
and those who belong to his company experience it.

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