Where your trasure is...

 

I often use the phrase Seekers after Truth when I’m leading worship because I think it’s an honest description of where most of us find ourselves on the Journey of Faith. 

There are some Christians, and they are usually very sincere, who would view themselves rather differently as Guardians of Truth. They believe in a prescribed orthodoxy which has various ‘tests’ and ‘benchmarks’ used to determine if you are in or out.

I sometimes think of faith in terms of a wonderful box of treasure.  Guardians of Truth want to keep it secure and under lock and key. Yet, to me at least, that feels as if we are putting God in a box.  Of course, we cannot do that because God is bigger than us!  Instead, I find it more helpful to think that Seekers after Truth delight in opening the box and exploring all that is good, helpful and inspiring within.  A treasure box that, however many times opened, always has something new.

Perhaps my picture is too simplistic, yet it does reflect some basic differences in the way we Christians face contemporary ethics.  Whist some enthusiastically quote proof texts (they never actually show absolute proof, by the way) I prefer to search for core principles from the Bible and then apply them to modern day contexts in a less literal approach.  For example, the Bible actually encourages slaves to obey their masters and for women to keep silent in church.  Yet no Christian today would approve of slavery and most value that God speaks just as much through women as men.  These passages of scripture cannot just be read literally, they need to be understood contextually.

All of that demands a fair bit of work.  It’s the sort of work we all need to do in seeking to address many ethical issues today, such as sexuality and marriage.

There is a wonderful line from an Iona hymn that asks for God’s help as we use the faith we’ve found, to reshape the world around.

Using faith demands much thought and prayer and lots and lots of seeking.

Othering

 

I belong to a couple of book discussion groups, and both have looked at the former Chief Rabbi’s brilliant tome entitled Not in God’s Name.  It’s a masterpiece in analysing conflict, both personal, national and international, especially with reference to religion.

The late Lord Sacks was keen to start from a position of empathy and treat that as our norm.  We don’t like to see another person hurt because we know what it feels like to be hurt ourselves.  We have a natural in-built empathy.  Yet, we have to discard that when we hurt people, either one to one or in a state of war.  And the way we often enable that violence to take place is to make our enemies something ‘other’ than ourselves.  If they are not really like us, but are ‘other’ from us because of their religion, history or location, then we accept that we can hurt them and we don’t feel their pain in the same way. And I find this a compelling analysis. 

Whether it’s those Europeans, Boat People or the people on the ‘other’ side of all the 30 wars currently being waged in our world, violence and rejection flourish most if we think of them as fundamentally different from us.

Yet, they are not.

The tragedy is that whilst technology enables us to live in a world that has never been more interconnected, we find ourselves in one which is so tragically divided. 

We long and pray for voices that will speak up for dialogue as the only way forward.  Hard, uncomfortable, exhausting dialogue instead of violence against our enemies that simply creates a whole new generation of hatred and militancy.

In this season of resurrection and new life we long for a glimpse that the pointless violence will stop, and the talking begin.

Easter Meals

 

Meals figure a great deal in the Easter narratives.

The one in the upper room is full of companionship, although tense at times.  And the remembrance of that night has become the most important meal of The Church. 

The Emmaus meal, although almost finished before it began, holds a treasured place in the Easter sequence.  This enigmatic encounter, culminating in a single gesture of breaking the bread, an action that said a thousand words, warms our hearts today as much as it did Cleopas and his friend’s two thousand years ago.

And post Easter Sunday there was that breakfast meal by the lake as Jesus meets his disciples and reinstates a dejected, yet still faithful Peter. 

I’m thinking of meals because yesterday I felt I had one of those ‘God moments’ that touched my heart.  It was the Tuesday of Holy Week and at Tea at Three, in our church hall, I was in conversation with a church member over some delicious chocolate Brownies.  She may live in a care home and is faithfully brought to services and events by a wonderfully loving husband, yet she has great and often insightful theology!  For she said, unprompted: When we sit here at Tea at Three, we are in the presence of Jesus just as much as when we sit in church.

I loved hearing that!  Some may call it The Real Presence, but my friend just called it the presence of Jesus.  And I believe she’s spot on.  Just as our Lord was present in the upper room, at Emmaus and by a beach barbeque, his living and life sustaining presence is with us still, whether singing hymns of faith in church or eating chocolate brownies with good friends around a table in a church hall on a Tuesday afternoon.  And in a sense, that’s what resurrection is all about – those daily encounters with our living Lord. 

May God’s blessing be yours this Holy Week and, come Sunday, let’s join together wherever we are and proclaim Christ is Risen, He is Risen indeed, Alleluia!

Blog returns in two weeks.

Palm Sunday -from the donkey's point of view

 

We, that is mum and I, are usually tethered at a village just outside of Jerusalem called Bethphage.  We are beasts of burden, so Mum tells me; she’s the donkey and I’m her foal, the colt.  I’m getting used to it, all the carrying, sometimes people more often hessian bags of grain or paniers of olives from the groves just below our master’s house. 

I’d seen this Jesus before, he’d been a guest of my master a few times and I saw his coming and going and lots of laughter and then serious silence indoors as they had a meal.  I think it’s because he’d seen me and mum a few times that he sent word that day that he needed us to take him into the city.

It was a bit out of the blue.  The day before, a Sabbath, we’d stayed tethered up from sunrise to sunset enjoying the warm spring air.  Today, Sunday, was meant to be a working day, the first day of our working week and I know we were needed down at the olive grove because the pickers were already there and soon there would be baskets to carry up to the barn.  But then we heard the voices, something about Jesus needing us and without a moments hesitation my master gave the go ahead and mum and I were led away.

We met up with Jesus and he sat astride me with mum walking alongside. Without a second thought we were off.  I could see the twisty road leading from just outside Bethphage up to the city.  His disciple friends, one or two had been to my master’s house with Jesus, followed on.  I thought it would be a quiet, sedate journey up to Jerusalem.  Pilgrims had been passing our farm for days now, all going up for Passover.  So, I thought nothing of it – Jesus needed a lift and I had been chosen to take him.

And then we turned the first corner and people stood by the track smiling.  Some waved and one person put down their shawl and I walked over it.  This was strange and like no carrying I’d ever done before.

Jesus patted me on my neck and calmly said walk on.  Round the next bend we met a couple of family groups, and these had cut some palm branches and were waving them as we passed.  They shouted Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. And someone called out hosanna and then everyone joined in calling it out too.

Halfway to Jerusalem and the momentum had picked up. More and more people stood by the trackside, they threw their shawls on the pathway, waved branches and shouted words of greeting.  Mum had developed a slow and steady pace, so I followed her lead.  It was exciting and I felt important.  No one ever takes notice of donkeys, but today we led the procession, and the cheering made us feel proud.

All the time my passenger, Jesus, calmly patted me and spoke words of gentle reassurance, so I never once felt scared. And I saw our owner out of the corner of my eye, he’d joined the procession and was even waving a palm branch as he went.

Once at the city wall we stopped.  There was now quite a crowd behind us, for some hadn’t just cheered from the roadside but joined in with the procession.

Jesus took mum and I and handed us back to our master, shaking his hand before entering the city.  And so, we were taken home, but this time the journey was quiet and predictable, no cheering and waving, and once again we became invisible beasts of burden, just part of the scenery, always there but never noticed.

Later that week I heard my master talk to some of Jesus’ friends, they now looked so worried and I wondered if something bad had happened to the one who sat astride me that Sunday.

Mum told me yesterday that Donkey folk lore has it that some years ago one of us took a lady who was expecting a baby to Bethlehem, a town not too far from here. Apparently, that donkey said, the night of the birth there was a bright star, angels singing and the strangest visit of some shepherds.

Seems to me us donkeys sometimes play a part in events that are important.  There’s more to us than simply pinning a tail on!  Because twice in history we had a walk on part in what, I sense, has become the greatest story ever told.

A Loaf of Bread

 

My wife got a bit cross with me the other day for buying a bread more expensive than our usual.  Apparently, there are now 200 different sorts of bread available in the UK.  Well, I purchased one that didn’t cost the usual £1.20, but £2.20.  Trouble is my wife is a maths teacher so she can quickly shame me by working out the cost of each slice!  Rather takes away the fun.

Well, it got me interested to do a bit of research into bread and I learnt that 99.8% of us eat it, that’s no less than 11 million loaves baked every day in Britain.  Typically, every individual eats 60 loaves a year, and of that 50% will be consumed in sandwiches.

In Jesus’ time most bread was wholegrain – not the refined white bread we often have today, and the Jewish law allowed for 10% of a loaf to be gritty!  Archaeologists often discover that people’s teeth from this period have been ground down because of the bread they ate!

The poor had the cheapest form of bread which is Barley bread – as featured in the story of the Feeding of the 5000.

I have a small rock at home that I often bring out in Lent which I think looks remarkably like a bread roll – it wouldn’t do your teeth any good at all as it’s 100% grit!

 It’s a rock that reminds me of Jesus time in the desert, during his temptations which we remember during these days of Lent, when our Lord refused to turn the stones into bread just to satisfy his own hunger.

 Interesting that, because later on at the Feeding of the 5000 that’s exactly what he did with the 5 loaves of barley – so what’s the difference?

 Well, in the wilderness Jesus would have been using his powers just to serve himself and at the Feeding of the 5000 he was using them to serve others.

I think he was teaching us a great lesson there, that serving God is essentially about serving others, being generous with our time and helpful to others with our talents.

During these days of Lent, we recall that Jesus once said he did not come to be served but to serve.  And we give thanks for all those who serve us with their generosity, love and kindness everyday.

A warm welcome from Harlesden

 

On Sunday we travelled into north London for the annual Harlesden exchange between AFC and St Margaret’s and St George’s URC and Moravian Church.  Whilst I went there, The Revd Edwin Quildan came over to Amersham and led the service with The Revd Heather McIntyre.

As on all the other occasions I’ve been to Harlesden we were welcomed with great warmth.

The congregation is predominantly of Jamaican origin, and it was so interesting sitting with folk afterwards in the church hall as the conversation turned to Windrush.  Some of them were comparing notes on whether they came to Britain on board the ship or, because of school scholarships, flew over.  ‘History’ is so different when it is personal.

Alas the organist was ill on Sunday, so we had an acapella service.  It was never a problem, for someone from any part of the congregation gave us a lead, and the singing was strong.

Harlesden is such a blend of traditions.  The building itself has a Presbyterian past and, in its own way, is quite magnificent.  The service mixed together URC and Moravian tradition (the later was particularly felt in the set liturgy used for Communion) alongside just a touch of Pentecostalism with ‘testimony’ time and much extemporary prayer.

We might have started off with twenty worshippers at 11am but within fifteen minutes the congregation had doubled to forty.

After the service we decamped to the coffee hall for bananas, cinnamon biscuits and doughnuts and lots and lots of laughter.  We lingered so long that I even had the opportunity to meet up with Edwin who called in on his way back from Amersham – all made possibly by clear roads and the fact that AFC’s service is 30 mins earlier than Harlesden’s.

We came away so pleased to have shared worship with our sisters and brothers there, we were blessed by their smiles and sincerity and our prayers stay with them as they continue to serve God with great faithfulness in that part of north London.

Happy St David's Day!

 

We don’t know too much about St Dewi, yet he is alleged to have encouraged his students to do the little things for God.  Not bad advice, especially when so much in today’s world seems so very overwhelming. 

Today is also the World Day of Prayer and this year the service has been prepared by the women of Palestine. A part of the world that has been much in our thoughts and prayers these last five months.

It’s hard for any of us to see a way forward and for that reason I was especially glad to hear from a neighbouring priest a few years ago of the three months he spent with the World Council of Churches ecumenical accompaniment programme in Israel and Palestine.

This brilliant scheme has, over the years, given some 1800 people a real experience of living and working alongside both Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank. At any one time there are about 25 people engaged in these three-month placements, many will be based in Jerusalem and supported by the international church centre there, making regular, even daily visits, to the West Bank.  As they sit alongside both traditions their understanding grows, so when they return home, they can share what they have learnt and experienced with others. 

 

Prejudice is about us making the biggest decisions about people with the smallest amount of knowledge.  Accompaniment programmes, like this one run by the World Council of Churches, helps to correct that.

All the geo-political conflicts of our time need a deep understanding of local and cultural issues.  It may seem such a little thing to be part of an accompaniment programme, yet this scheme exemplifies the concept that dialogue and engagement is the only long-term solution.

Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus – Happy St David’s Day – and keep on doing the little things.

What is Lent?

 

Lent is now in its second week, and I wonder what we might make of this long and loosely defined season of the Church Year?

We discussed this at our Life and Faith group yesterday evening.  It soon became apparent, at least with those of us who grew up in non-conformist churches, that Lent hardly figured at all in our youth.

One of my predecessors at AFC, The Revd Neville Clark, helped change all that in Baptist churches.  For he belonged to a somewhat eccentric group of ministers called The Cassock Club, who introduced more liturgical worship into the British Baptist tradition during the 1950’s.  Alas, their impact was rather short lived, yet one of their lasting legacies would be that many Baptist congregations at least give a nod and a wink to Advent and Lent today.

So, over the next six weeks or so I’ll be wearing a purple stole (the liturgical colour for Lent), and we’ll sing hymns from the Holy Week and Passiontide section of the hymn book.  More than that, as we travel with the lectionary, we’ll reflect on the stories of Jesus as he made his way from Galilee to Jerusalem and The Cross.

In recent years there’s been a helpful idea that, rather than simply giving something up for Lent, we might take something up which is positive and helpful to others.

And, as one of our Life and Faith group so helpfully said, Lent is that annual opportunity to do some serious thinking about personal faith.

 For me, the most important question Lent asks is: Who was Jesus?  It’s a crucial question and well worth spending six weeks pondering.

History teaches us...

 

Yesterday it was my privilege to lead the Free Church service at St Alban’s Cathedral.  As I looked around the impressive architecture, I remembered our first visit there as a guide told us that some of the stones from a former pagan temple had been incorporated into the building of the Abbey.

The past always influences the present.  We simply don’t live in chronological
isolation because what happened yesterday, the way we thought and lived back then, has a bearing on what’s going on in our lives today.

As we pour over recent news stories of invasions, conflicts and political upheaval we may indeed have a sense of DeJa’Vu; we’ve surely been here before and, of course, we have.

I’m sometimes surprised to hear people speak of current events as if they were the worst of all time.  Any casual appreciation of history would see that a hundred years ago our world was also struggling after pandemic, stood on the brink of war, and was collapsing under the Great Depression.

Of course, the past doesn’t solve the problems of today.  It may not even offer the right solutions because of the nuisances of every generation.

Yet the past can comfort us, reminding us that we have been here before and survived, and perhaps in some situations even thrived.

The past can inform us as we stand at the fork in the road, yet we must make our own decisions on what way to take.

That’s where the bible stories we hear at church and read at home can be our guide and compass.  For they speak, even thousands of years after first being penned, of issues that are still relevant.  These narratives are both helpful and comforting.  Yet, after reading them we have to make up our own minds about the directions and decisions we take.

Next week we will enter Lent and be reminded of, what we Christians believe is, the greatest story ever told.  The stories of Jesus can be our guide as we stand at all the crossroads of life.

Blog holiday next week.

When small is beautiful

 

The other day I was intrigued to read an article on the internet about a seeming return of interest in small churches.  It was written by a pastor of such a congregation, and he was just wondering if there is something of a sense of renewal in smaller churches since the pandemic?

Congregations often long to be bigger than they are – and nothing wrong in that.  For all sorts of right reasons such aspirations can be applauded.  Yet so too can the idea that small churches have a lot to offer.

Perhaps I should admit here that I’m not exactly sure about the numbers and the maths that makes a congregation thought of as either large or small and, of course, everything is relative!

The writer of the internet article has been pleased to see new people, especially over Christmas, come along to his small congregation.  In talking to them he’s become aware that they have enjoyed the more intimate and personal atmosphere of worship they have found and that, for some, it has brought a greater sense of belonging to a church ‘family’ than what they were used to in a bigger, yet more impersonal, context.

It made me recall a comment made at home by an extended family member over Christmas, that she actually enjoyed smaller, rather than larger, family gatherings.  When there were just five or six of us she naturally shares in the conversation, but when there are thirteen she just becomes a passive observer.

Maybe different types and sizes of congregation feel appropriate to folk at different stages of life. 

We rejoice in congregations of all sizes and the internet article reminded me that sometimes small is indeed beautiful.

Praying for those in authority

 

I’ve recently been reading up on Ramsey MacDonald who, a hundred years ago this week, became Britain’s first Labour Prime Minister.  I did this for a LunchBreak talk and afterwards a member of the audience told me that Ramsey MacDonald, whilst an MP, selected Amersham as his weekend home and lived at Chesham Bois just down the road from the church!

He was a Scot and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom on three occasions.  He was also a pacifist and never fully supported the first World War.  This not only lost him his membership of the Moray Gold Club but also made him reviled in some quarters.

 Ramsey MacDonald, along with Keir Hardy, was one of the founders of the Labour Party, popularly thought of as a people’s party after the general public began falling out of love with the Liberals.  He was more at home with philosophy and books than with carrying a placard and marching.  Yet, he rose to become leader of the Labour Party and its first Prime Minister.

When elected much of his time was taken up dealing with the aftermath of the Great War and coping with the financial crisis that caused the Great Depression.

 His personal background was one of poverty.  He was an illegitimate child born to a parlour maid and agricultural worker.  Yet he did well at school in Lossiemouth and eventually moved to London and continued his studies at night school with the Birkbeck Institute.  He had six children but lost his wife early on to blood poisoning.  He was faithfully supported by his children, especially his daughters and historians tell us that he was the favourite Prime Minister of King George V.

Perhaps history teaches us that very little is new in life, and we have probably been here before.  I’ve certainly got that impression reading up on MacDonald’s life.  We may think that war and the economic crisis of 2024 is immense, yet it seems it was equally, if not more so, in 1924 with one war just ten years behind and another a mere 15 years in front.

And if the goings on in parliament exasperate us today, give some thought to Ramsey MacDonald’s fate after heading up a Nation Government with the Conservatives to deal with the financial crisis.  Such collaboration was viewed as treachery by the Labour Party, and they expelled him.  He never quite got over that the party he helped to bring to birth eventually kicked him out and he died something of a broken man.

 So, although we may nostalgically call that decade the Roaring Twenties, the reality was Ramsey MacDonald’s time leading the United Kingdom was a very turbulent and worrying one.

The Bible is clear that one of our responsibilities is for us to pray for those in authority.  Such prayers were needed a century ago, as they most certainly are today.

What shall I call you?

 

Today marks the beginning of The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity 2024, and to mark that we look forward to hosting a united service of Holy Communion with our friends from St Michael’s on Sunday.

A week after my ordination, whilst I was still new to the idea of wearing a clerical collar in public, I was stopped by a young couple in the street and asked if I would christen their baby.  The penny quickly dropped as I realised we were all standing on the pavement beside our local parish church, and they thought I was the (very young!) vicar.  I explained I wasn’t, just a mere Baptist Minister, but I’m sure the real vicar would be delighted to hear from them.

The ’collar’ does provoke a variety of reactions.  Even yesterday, before starting a service in a residential care home, one of the residents asked a question that regularly comes my way: what do we call you: pastor, reverend, father?  I normally answer minister, and then go on to say Ian will do!

Ecumenism has made us aware that our various traditions bring with them different dress codes and forms of address.  Yet, I suspect, the most important thing is not what we are called but how we fill these offices.

A former principal of a Baptist theological college wrote a book a few years ago even conceding the idea that bishops may not be a bad idea, as long as the emphasis is never about the title but the quality of the person who uses it. 

Structures and frameworks are simply that, vessels that need to be filled with leaders who display love, compassion, and integrity.

I once served as the Baptist ecumenical officer for Worcestershire and on one occasion, along with fellow ecumenical officers, attended a morning of meetings at Hartlebury Castle, the residence of the Bishop of Worcester.  At lunchtime the bishop invited us to join him in the enormous dining room for a meal.  Perhaps we expected a procession of staff to serve us, but no – it was the bishop’s wife who greeted us with kind hospitality and brought in two humungous shepherds pies which she and her husband then proceeded to serve. 

Whatever our role, our title, or the sort of collar we wear, our prayer is that rather than stand on ceremony we will fulfil the opportunities of service with faithfulness, kindness and love.

It was a splendid shepherds pie by the way!

Still the language of Shakespeare?

 

I read a newspaper article the other week that lamented the standard of English now coming out of the European Commission in Brussels.

It's hardly surprising.  English is still the official language of The Commission, yet since we’ve left very few within its corridors speak it as their mother tongue.  This means official minutes list all those who assisted rather than attended a meeting, because that’s the French way of saying it.  And you don’t talk about current but actual legislation, because that’s the Spanish way of saying it. 

The newspaper said: The British staffers used to protect it, to point out gently that this or that construction might sound fine in French or Spanish, but it wouldn’t do in the language of Shakespeare.  But those days are over!

We can all use the same words yet give them different meanings.

I was dumbfounded when I first realised that members of the younger generation were now using the word wicked to mean that something or someone was good!  To me, and I know I’m sounding like Victor Meldrew here, that’s simply absurd!  But there you are, it’s OK now to say a car or a coat looks wicked and mean it as a compliment.

That said, I do realise that sometimes when someone is either confusing, or dare I say it, boring me during a conversation, I’ll often try to wrap it up by saying that’s interesting when, of course, I mean the exact opposite.

When Peter called Jesus The Christ, he was the first of Jesus’ disciples to use that term.  Yet rather than being congratulated by Jesus he was pulled up by him and challenged to think through if he really understood the sort of Christ he had come to be; a suffering servant rather than a political liberator.

We all use words on different levels, perhaps even playing games with them at times.  No wonder the bible calls for integrity of speech urging us to let our Yes mean Yes and our No mean No.

We are in the season of Epiphany, thinking about how God reveals himself to us, just as he revealed Jesus to the Wise Men by a guiding star.  And we are told he showed us himself in a way we can understand as The Word became Flesh and dwelt among us. 

 

The message and life of Jesus is the language of our faith, and it can be understood in any tongue. 

Follow that Star!

 

Just when you thought you were done with Christmas for another year, along comes the church season of Epiphany, running for five Sundays between 6^th January through to 4^th February.

During these weeks the lectionary asks us to think about the various ways God ‘reveals’ himself to us. It’s a season all about our search for wisdom.  Or, put poetically, what star we are following?

I suspect many of us have embraced Christianity because deep down we sense the Bible offers us ancient, yet relevant truths that bless our lives with wisdom.

So, here are three ‘stars’ I’ll be following in 2024…

The star of prayer.  And by that I don’t just mean the prayers we say, although these are important and helpful, but the sort of ‘prayerful’ attitude we try to foster.  The type of understanding that welcomes the spiritual alongside the material.  The mindset that leaves room for God and something deeper.

Then there’s the star of liturgy, and by this I mean especially the hymns and songs we sing together in church that not only bind us together as a worshipping congregation but also teach us, reassure us and even provoke us with deep truths.  Us preachers know a secret that we don’t often speak about and it’s this…our congregations have probably learnt just as much from the hymns they sing as they do from the sermons they hear. But don’t tell anybody I said that!  As a hymnbook title says, these hymns can be Ancient and Modern, and once again our lives are blessed through us having such a wonderful treasury.

And finally, there’s the star of fellowship.  I’m not called to live out my faith or cope with the challenges of a New Year alone.  God is with us, and his light, love and strength are often made real to us when we come together in worship, counsel and service. We need one another, for where two or three are gathered in the name of God we again find blessing.

So, Happy New Year and keep following that star!