Sermon St E Sunday 8am, 9.45 12 June 2022          Trinity Sunday
Psalm 8(Responsory)            Proverbs 8v1-4, 22-31                        John 16v12-15                        Romans 5v1-5

Let us pray:- Father, Son and Holy Spirit open our hearts and minds this morning to the great mystery of your Trinity.         Amen

Can we ever expect to understand the mystery of the Trinity? I guess that most people would reply “probably not, or not in this life”, but that has not stopped some Christians from at least trying to explore the depths of this holy mystery in one form or another. So do not expect too much from me this morning for it is the one topic many hope never to preach upon.

You will have noticed that in our two readings this morning from the New Testament there was a common link, that of mentioning the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. From John’s gospel we read, “When the Spirit of truth comes, He will guide you into all truth, and will declare to you the things that are to come.”
It is said that the Holy Spirit glorifies God the Son, our Lord Jesus, who in turn owes all to God his Father and lives to glorify Him.

Saint Peter in his second epistle (2Pt1v4) declares to us a great mystery. A mystery that God has drawn us believers into the same unity of love that is present within the Holy Trinity. Peter gives to us who believe in the one true and living God the amazing promise of becoming ‘partakers in that divine nature’. Now that is a life transforming thought if ever there was one, and deserves of our time to seriously meditate upon.

At the last supper Jesus told his disciples that when the promised Holy Spirit was to come later at Pentecost, the event we celebrated last week, he would guide the disciples, (John 16v13) and I believe that also means us, ‘into all truth’. Even so the nature of the truth of the Holy Trinity still remains a tantalising mystery.

Yet the promise from Jesus of the Holy Spirit declaring to the disciples ‘the things to come’ was also shared in the experience of the Old Testament prophets, and one that the prophet Zachariah experienced many years earlier. He spoke an interesting prophetic word upon his return to Jerusalem from exile in Babylon around the year 520 BC, and one which I see as referring to this holy mystery of the Trinity. Speaking of a time yet to come, Zachariah wrote some very Trinitarian lines, (14v9 NRSV) “And the Lord-Yahweh-shall become king over all the earth; on that day the Lord will be one and His name one”, or as an alternative translation taken from the Hebrew bible, the Tanakh says, “The Lord alone shall be worshipped and shall be invoked by His true name.”
I am sure we all appreciate just how much of a person’s character is meant to be revealed within their given name, and this is seen so many times throughout the Bible. If we look at the name Mary, the mother of our Lord, her name originated in Egypt to become the Hebrew Miriam, meaning ‘beloved of God’. And that seems to me a most appropriate name for the one who was to become the mother of God’s Son.
Or the name Jesus. When we use his true Hebrew name of ‘Yeshua’ it is of no coincidence that the meaning is ‘Salvation’.

So what is that prophecy of Zachariah telling us? It is that when the time comes God will be invoked by His true name. At that time I believe we shall then receive a revelation as to the deepest and fullest nature of our Triune God through the revealing of the meaning of His true name.
In the meantime what may we say on this Trinity Sunday?

When we introduce the start of our communion service, we use the two commandments upon which ‘hang all the law and the prophets’. The first  is a quote of the Hebrew Shema, the Jewish statement of faith taken from the book of Deuteronomy (6v4).
This statement seems most fitting for today’s Trinity celebration. “Hear O Israel, Yahweh is our God, Yahweh is One.”
So you will want to ask the age old question, how can there be three persons within One God? Just what is the Trinity all about? That of course is the conundrum, and it is what has divided Christians and Jews for nearly two millennia. One God yet three persons, how can that possibly compute?

I am sure you have heard many people try to explain this mystery using various very inadequate analogies. Water, H2O, one substance can be in three forms, solid as ice, then as liquid and also as gas or vapour, but that, together with any other example, to my mind does not really help us. Why? For we are looking for a simplistic explanation of a holy mystery, and so coming at it from a completely wrong perspective.

There are a few other three in one similarities that we can also find in our natural physical environment. As a Physicist I particularly like the example of the atom. Generally regarded as constituted from three entities electrons, protons and neutrons, and those protons and neutrons also themselves composed of three fundamental particles called quarks.
But I do not see these as trying to explain the nature of the Trinity, I see them rather as crying out to us that our Triune God has written His very nature into the imprint, into the very fabric, of His created universe.
It seems to me God is crying out to us, “I am there for you to see me, just look, you cannot miss me, look at the way I have created things.”
Perhaps king David could see that when he wrote in psalm 19, “The heavens declare the glory of God, the sky above proclaims His handiwork which goes out through all the earth.” Just go and stand on Dartmoor on a cloudless night and see how the sky declares the beauty of our created universe.

So as we await that revelation of the true nature of our one God Yahweh, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, let us not spend our energies on trying to fathom out the depths of the Trinity. Rather may we let God’s nature of transforming love transform our lives as we seek to live for Him, and live to build His kingdom as we await his revelation, the coming return of Jesus our Messiah and King.

As God the Father has gone to the extreme cost of sending His Son our Lord Jesus to reconcile us to himself, and through our trust and belief in him has given to us His indwelling Holy Spirit, it behoves us to ask, ’how are we to walk our pilgrim lives here below?’

I would suggest it is in the way that we live out our lives as the ‘salt and light’ (Mtt 5v13) that Jesus has asked us to be to our world. We do that by taking responsibility within our present society for this our hurting world. Since God has redeemed us, how may we help in redeeming our environment, working for peace and goodwill between all? Be that locally, nationally or even on an international scale, all are part of God’s creation.

One thing we certainly cannot escape from at present is the dire need for our prayers during this time of international uncertainty, and for our prayers for deliverance from the increasing persecution of our brothers and sisters from unholy regimens. Prayer is one thing we are all called to participate in, but search your hearts as to other ways that you may also serve God, and we have a great opportunity ahead of us to build God’s kingdom here as we support Matt and his family when they join us.

Our hope is to be with God the Father when the kingdom is finally realised so let him now continue to transform our lives by his Holy Spirit in us.
It is God’s desire, and another mystery, that we may become like his Son our Lord Jesus. And that transformation is to be a sign to all around of God’s great love and mercy for them as well as us. In holding fast to that knowledge and hope in God’s transforming grace, Paul assures us that God is not going to disappoint us, there is far more ahead which exceeds anything that you and I can possibly imagine for those of us who love him.

I end with a this little story from Alice in wonderland that I have told before, but it fits so appropriately with the mystery of the Holy Trinity, and to what God has promised for us.

“Alice laughed: “There’s no use trying,” she said; “one can’t believe impossible things.” “I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was younger, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”

So have I given you this morning a number of impossible things for you to try and imagine before lunch? Not just ‘the mystery of the Trinity’, but what awaits us in God’s promised new creation. One thing is for sure, as Paul said to those Roman Christians, ‘we shall not be disappointed’.

Let us pray:- the shorter Collect for Trinity
Holy God, faithful and unchanging:
enlarge our minds with the knowledge of your truth,
and draw us more deeply into the mystery of your love,
that we may truly serve and worship you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, one God, now and for evermore.          Amen

Sermon St E 8am 15 May 2022          Easter 5 Year C
Acts 11vs1-18                  Revelation 21v1-6                           John 13vs31-35
I am sure you have noticed that there will always be those who criticise the work we do as Christians, and that was just what St Peter found in the primitive Church. Our reading from Acts shows how the early Jewish believers in Jerusalem seemed rather reluctant to accept that the gospel message of freedom and forgiveness, was meant for all of humanity. The Gentiles were as much a part of God’s plan of reconciliation as were they.

So Peter describes to them the vision he had from God when staying in Joppa, present day Jaffa just south of Tel Aviv. Peter himself had been reluctant to broaden his practice of strict adherence to the Jewish purity laws, but God showed him the broader picture, and fortunately for us Peter accepted that, and so he took the Gospel to the Gentile Roman centurion Cornelius.

When those back in Jerusalem heard how God had also given the Holy Spirit to Cornelius, and to his household who believed, just as he had to the 3000 at Pentecost, they could only accept like Peter, “that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him”. So they were silenced, praised God, and rejoiced saying “Then God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life”. And is that not good news for all of us here?

It is such good news that St John, when writing his revelation many years later, could describe for us what Jesus showed to him concerning the new heaven and the new earth, that coming abode that we shall eventually share with our Lord Jesus.
It will be a place that we are only given a brief glimpse of, but a place where we are promised there will be no more death, no more mourning and crying, no more pain, and where we are promised elsewhere that we shall have new bodies. The place God intended for humanity from the beginning of creation where we shall have dominion over the earth and reign with the Lord.
But did you notice anything else substantial in our reading? John says that “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them”.
Have you ever considered that before, it seems so important to John that twice in these few verses John says, ‘God will be with us’.

Does that remind you of another time when that situation prevailed?
It was when God walked with Adam and Eve in the garden in the cool of the evening. We seem to have forgotten the amazing position that we human beings hold in the eternal plan of God and that was lost through our disobedience.

We also read that the Lord himself called those disciples with him at the last supper, ‘Little children’. Yes, we are God’s children, we are part of God’s intimate family, we have been reconciled to our Holy Father through the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus. Through his obedience to the will of God, and through the precious blood Jesus shed on Calvary’s tree, we have been reconciled and brought back to Father God. Our disobedience, our sin, no longer proves a barrier to our close and personal relationship with God. We can again, metaphorically, walk with God in the cool of the evening.

And that relationship should show in our lives. Jesus plainly said to those disciples with him at supper, “I give you a new commandment. That you love one another, by this everyone will know that you are my disciples”.
We may say we ‘love God’, but God’s will is also that we ‘love one another’.

If you have ever asked, ‘why people do not accept the gospel’, perhaps one reason is that they see the divisions and disharmony between those of us in the universal church. How it must grieve the heart of Jesus that his prayer that they-his church may be one, just as he and the Father are one, is so far from being the reality it was meant to be.
So as our Eastertide draws to its close, and we await the deluge of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, let us work to bring joy to our Saviour’s heart as we love one another and work to further his kingdom.

Let us pray, the shorter Collect for this 5th Sunday of Easter
Risen Christ, your wounds declare your love for the world and the wonder of your risen life; give us compassion and courage to risk ourselves for those we serve, to the glory of God the Father. Amen

Sermon St Mary 8 May 2022 Easter 4 Year C
Acts 9v36-43 (Psalm 23) Revelation 7v9-17 John 10v22-31
Let us pray Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.

Have you ever asked the question, “Why do people not believe in the Christian message?” Or perhaps an even deeper question than that would be, “Why do people not believe in God?” Yet both of these questions are so essential if we are to accept that this present life is not just all that there is, there is something far more extensive in store for us all, and for us who do believe we know that is eternal life with our God and Father, with our Lord Jesus Christ, and with all the saints and believers who have gone before us.

Well that is rather like the situation that Jesus found himself in described in our Gospel reading. We read that it was winter, around November to December time, when the Jews, as they still do today, celebrate Hanukkah, the festival of light. It remembers the re dedication of the Temple some 100 years before after it had been desecrated by the pagan Greek king Antiochus IV.

Jesus was walking in the Temple, and the sceptical people were pestering Jesus to tell them plainly if he was the true Messiah. They may have been remembering that Antiochus had made a ‘blasphemous’ claim in the Temple during his time in Jerusalem so was this just another imposter?

As Jesus pointed out in his reply to their question, He had told them and the very works that He had been performing for the previous two years testified to that truth. But they really did not want to believe, and why? Probably for the very same reason as today, they would have to acknowledge that their ways fell short of what God required and they were not prepared to make the significant but life transforming change of submission to God.

They were not of his sheep, they had not learnt to hear God’s voice and to follow after God as their shepherd. Not only is that so true for much of today’s people in our wider society, but sadly it can be also true for us within the Church. Do we know the voice of our shepherd, of Jesus, and do we truly follow after Him as committed disciples?

But there is great joy, and that so comforting a promise ahead for those of us who do. What did Jesus say? If we hear His voice, and if we choose to follow after Him, then we shall indeed inherit eternal life, and that life is guaranteed, we shall never perish.
Jesus then really gets himself into some very hot water as he further explains to the people that not only was he their true Messiah, but that He and God the Father were one. For that presumed blasphemous identification the people took up stone to throw at Jesus.

The right and proper response would have been for the people to ponder the works that the Lord had been doing. He had been healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, making the deaf and dumb to hear and speak, and even raising the dead. Who but God’s anointed, the Christ, the Messiah had such authority?

Well, it was an authority that Jesus clearly passed onto his apostles in the early church, as we read that Peter raised up Tabitha in Joppa, modern day Jaffa just south of Tel Aviv, just a short time after Jesus resurrection.

So what did Jesus do as the people picked up those stones to throw at him? He left Jerusalem, not to return again until Holy week and his crucifixion, and he went back to the North, to Bethany beyond the Jordan from where he had called his first five disciples two years earlier. There, feeling safe from the Jewish authorities Jesus could continue his remaining ministry, and during those few months early of AD 30, we read that many came to believe in him.

But we cannot stop there without some quick reflection upon the wonderful words from John’s revelation. We really do not have much of a picture of what our new life with the Lord in Paradise will be like, although John, and some other scriptures do give us brief glimpses.

Despite any prejudices’ that some of us may hold, there will be a great multitude drawn from every nation, tribe, peoples and languages, standing before our Lord Jesus and worshiping Him.
All of us there will acknowledge that it is to Jesus and to God our Father that we awe our salvation. And with us will be angels and others from the host of heaven also declaring God’s praises.

There is more that we could say especially of that time relating to the coming new creation that God has in store for us when all shall be made new, but not now. May we just be encouraged once again in our most ‘holy faith’, and in the great and eternal promises that God has made to us who do believe.

Let us pray: The shorter Collect for this fourth Sunday of Easter. Risen Christ, faithful shepherd of your Father’s sheep: teach us to hear your voice and follow your commands, that all your people may be gathered into one flock, to the glory of God the Father. Amen

Sermon St Mary 3rd April 2022          Passiontide begins                  Anointing at Bethany
Isaiah 43v16-21         Psalm126 Responsory         Philippians 3v4b-14         John 12v1-8
Let us Pray:

Today, in the Church calendar, it is the start of Passiontide, that time when we follow the events in the life of our Lord Jesus that build up to his crucifixion and resurrection, that pivotal turning point in all of history. This morning we shall focus on that most lovely of stories, the anointing of Jesus by Mary in the house of Simon the Leper at Bethany.

Bethany is located about 2 miles from Jerusalem and I have walked that short distance when visiting friends. Bethany seems to have been a very special place for Jesus as he welcomed the friendship of Mary, Martha and Lazarus, as well as their hospitality. I guess Jesus used to stay with them on many occasions when he visited Jerusalem. We know how fond Jesus was of the family, and how he shared in the sister’s grief when their brother Lazarus died, when we read those heartfelt words “Jesus wept”.

Mary and Martha must have been very thankful to the Lord for raising their dead brother, so no wonder they wanted to give him a meal and show their devotion to him. When Mary anointed Jesus’ head and feet, she became the first of his followers to acknowledge his impending death. When some criticised her Jesus says, “leave her alone for she bought it-the anointing oil-so that she might keep it for the day of my burial (Jn 12v6 NRSV). And for this beautiful and costly act Jesus recognised that Mary would always be remembered for it.

Have you ever asked yourself what was that costly Nard that Mary used?

It is a hardy herb of the Valerian family that grows in the foothills of the Himalayas from which an aromatic amber-coloured essential oil is derived. It would have reached Jerusalem via Persia, either as a dried root or as an oil extract. It would have taken a long time to extract the volume of nard that Mary  had in her alabaster flask, so no wonder it was very costly. Some estimates equate the cost to a years wages for a working man, such was Mary’s great love for Jesus as she symbolically anointed him for his impending burial.

It has been said that “you can sacrifice and not love, but you cannot love and not sacrifice”. Within just a few days Jesus was to make the most costly sacrifice that the world has ever, or will ever, see. He was to shed his most precious blood on Calvary’s tree so that, as the psalmist puts it (ps103), “as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us”. That is the ‘gospel’ and that is indeed ‘good news’ for each one of us.

Perhaps this should wake us up, and especially during this time of Lent, to ask “What have we sacrificed for Jesus?” And further, “what may we still need to sacrifice for our Lord in order to walk as one of his faithful disciples?”
But for many here the sacrifices that you have made over the years out of your love for the Lord Jesus, will have released the beautiful fragrance of Christ to those around you, and that will have touched their lives deeply.

As disciples we are all called to take up our cross, whatever that cross may be, and to follow our Lord and Master, knowing that he will ever be with us along our pilgrim way.

But not all those at supper shared that same deep love that Mary and Martha had for our Lord Jesus. “Why was this ointment wasted?” was the cry from some there with Jesus at supper. Have you noticed that in his gospel, Saint John shows a considerable dislike for Judas who was soon to betray Jesus. Perhaps this strong dislike stemmed from John’s intense love for the Lord, and so he found it difficult to comprehend just how anyone could not share that love. This especially after having spent so much time together with Jesus over the previous two to three years.

Perhaps this reminds us of that time just a few months earlier in Jesus ministry, when at Jerusalem for the feast of dedication-Hanukah, during December of AD 29, Jesus and the disciples had to make a quick escape after Jesus healed the man born blind for some of the ‘religious’ people wished to stone Jesus for blasphemy. Then, sometime later, when Jesus wished to return to Jerusalem to raise Lazarus, and knowing that he could be stoned, Thomas said those wonderful words to the other disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him” (Jn11v16)

A really close fellowship had developed between Jesus and his disciples, and between most of the disciples themselves. We should ask ourselves this Lenten time, “how close is our walk with our Lord?” And “how close is our fellowship with our fellow believers?” Searching and difficult questions I know, but what did Jesus say to the disciples at the last supper? “If you love me you will keep my commandments”. And how did Jesus sum up those commandments? “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and love your neighbour as yourself”. We are to ‘Love God and love neighbour’, and that is not the easiest part of being a Christian, but it is what we are all called to do. Learning the difference between ‘like’ and ‘love’ can help us with this struggle.

But let us praise God, He has not left us to do that on our own, He has given to us believers the comforter, the Holy Spirit. We have to learn to allow the Holy Spirit to fill our lives, and then God enables us to do the seemingly impossible.

Sermon St Eustachius 9.45 6 February 2022 4th b4 Lent Year C P1 Have Faith
Isaiah 6v1-8                  Psalm 138         1Corinthians 15v1-11         Luke 5v1-11
Let us Pray:
It is so lovely to hear how our Lord Jesus calls people to follow after him. I wonder how God spoke to you and called you to start along the path of your Christian life and pilgrimage, a life of change and adventure that never stops. A life of transformation as by his Holy Spirit God is changing each one of us to become like our beloved Lord Jesus. Well, certainly the live of Jesus four friends, Peter and Andrew, James and John were never going to be the same after he called them to ‘follow him’ and to ‘become fishers of men’.
Each of the three Synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke, relate that story, but our reading from Saint Luke today gives much extra detail.

Jesus was just embarking upon his Galilean ministry following his time in Jerusalem and Judea during the spring and summer of AD 28. Peter, Andrew and John had been with him then, but had now clearly returned to their business and occupation of fishing in the lake, when they saw Jesus walking by the shore. I guess John had related all that had previously occurred to his probable elder brother James, who like the other three were prepared to leave all and to follow the Lord immediately when he called.

I wonder what the Lord may have asked you to ‘leave behind’, what changes he may have asked you to encompass, when he called you to follow after him? I trust that in retrospect, and with hindsight, although they may have seemed a struggle at the time, like me you can often look back and see the good hand of the Lord at work in what happened.

As Jesus walked by the lake there was a crowd of people on its shore who were anxious to hear the message of this new young Rabbi. So many in fact that Jesus saw one of the boats Peter and Andrew had left to wash their nets, and jumped in and asked them to push off from the shore a little. Of course Jesus Physics was far better than mine, after all he had spoken the Universe into being, and knew that his words would be very effectively reflected off the water’s surface so that the people would hear his words much more clearly.

Matthew and Mark tell us that Jesus used this opportunity to start to teach the people in parables although we do not have them recorded from that occasion. There are so many tantalising gaps in our Lord’s teaching that are not recorded by the evangelists, but that gives you an opportunity.
An opportunity to ask the Lord many questions when you finally meet him face to face. I hope you are looking forward to that time with anticipation. I am sure that none of us here are like some in Corinth whom Paul feared may have come to believe in vain, and may no longer have been holding fast to the message of the gospel. Let us all stand firm in the faith as we are being saved for that time when we shall finally be with our Lord.

We also read how Jesus, when he had finished his teaching, asked Simon to push out into the deep and carry on with his business of fishing. I wonder how many times Jesus has asked you, he has certainly asked me, to ‘push out into the deep’, another way of saying ‘trust me’, Jesus does  have our best interests at heart.

Did Jesus not know that Peter had been fishing all night and caught nothing? The evidence was clear, they were washing their nets and not rushing off to market to sell their catch. But clearly Peter had learnt something in the months he had already spent with Jesus at Cana, Jerusalem and on the way back to Galilee. He knew that Jesus word could be trusted. So he replied, “but at your word I will let down my nets”. Peter’s faith in Jesus was beginning to grow stronger.

And to help Peter’s faith grow, we read that, ‘they enclosed a great shoal of fish’. And not just a ‘great shoal’, but so many that their nets began to break, and what does that tell us? Jesus always has an abundance of blessings in store for us if we will but ‘put down our nets at his word’, if we will but put our faith in what Jesus asks us to do.
Obedience is one of the greatest delights we can give to God our Father.

And those blessings, that abundance of fish, is something God looks for us to share with those around us, to make known to them also the blessings he has, not just for us, but for them as well. So Peter and Andrew beckoned to their partners, James and John, to come alongside in their boat, and to share in the catch and to get it safely to shore.

Such was Peter’s realisation of that abundant blessing Jesus had just given to him in response to his obedience to Jesus word, that he fell down at Jesus knees saying. “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord”. And that should be true for us also, when we receive God’s abundant blessings, we are to recognise him and to give him our worship.

The words that Peter used, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man’, very much echo the words of our reading from the Prophet Isaiah. The passage from Isaiah 6 describing the prophet’s vision of God’s presence in the highest heaven, is not just one of my favourite scriptures, it is one of such amazing insight into the very presence of God himself. We have few such passages that describe God in his highest heaven.
But what this passage shows is that in the presence of Almighty God, even such a great prophet like Isaiah, who was given many wonderful revelations from God, we all recognise that, ‘we are lost, we are people of unclean lips’, and so it is for all of those around us. How we like Isaiah need ‘our guilt to be taken away and our sin blotted out’.

Is it not a cause for much rejoicing that we Christians actually know that is true for us, our guilt has been taken away. What other faith or philosophy gives such a hope and assurance? All we have to do is confess our sins and put our faith and trust in Jesus. And in this seventieth jubilee year of our Queen, let us pray for a revival of faith for this our country.

We have the promise that God himself has dealt with the sin of each one of us, just as the seraph dealt with Isaiah’s sin and blotted it out by the fire of the coal taken from the altar. God has removed our sins as far as the east is from the west; God has buried our sins in the deepest sea; because Jesus was obedient to the will of God the Father, and died for us all on Calvary’s tree.

Isaiah responded by answering the call from God to be sent, ‘here I am send me’. How are we to respond to God’s call to us? I trust that we have responded by openly confessing the sin that so easily besets us, and by putting our faith and trust in the same person that Peter did. If we put our trust in Jesus we are promised that he will forgive us all our sins, and will send his Holy Spirit to abide within us and sustain us as his disciples.

What an amazing Gospel of good news we have to tell to all peoples. What an amazing gospel of hope, of eternal joy, that we have as God sends us out to be ‘fishers of people’. It is the same call that all Christians have received since Jesus first called Peter and Andrew, James and John, and to which we respond in the same way by following after him.
Let us pray: God of heaven, you send the gospel to the ends of the earth and your messengers to every nation:
send now your Holy Spirit to transform us by the good news of everlasting life as we put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ our Lord.