A story is told of a young boy who treasured the globe of the world in his bedroom. One morning when his mother was cleaning the room, she accidently knocked the globe and it fell to the ground, breaking into many pieces. The boy heard the crashing sound and ran to his room. Seeing the smashed up globe, the boy wept bitterly, only able to get out the words, “You’ve broken my world!” In our present day with ever more destructive weapons and environmental vandalism, I cannot but wonder if God doesn’t look at us and utter those words - “You’ve broken my world!”


Today, we are focused on the beauty of the world as a result of the floral arrangements in this church. We are aware that there is much beauty in the world. And whilst, we appreciate the efforts of those whose creative skills have been exercised in these arrangements, we can also be aware that the ultimate source of such beauty is God. After all, this is God’s world. It is as the Psalmist says;

“The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it.”

Of course, we do not know how the earth and its beauty came into being in a scientific way. In some circles, there has been dispute between faith and science. Such dispute is particularly vigorous in parts of the United States. Every so often we find Genesis being set against scientific discoveries such as evolution. Such a debate is inevitably arid. After all, the Bible does not claim to be a scientific handbook. If you want the science, you buy a good scientific book. But if you want to find reason for our being, then it is eminently reasonable to look at God’s revelation, especially as found in the Holy Scriptures. To get the fullest of pictures, we will take both seriously so that science and faith might enrich each other. For what matters most is an appreciation that God is behind the process of creation, God is still involved in the ongoing development of that creation and God is revealed to us in creation.

So how does the beauty of creation reveal God to us?

Firstly, as we look at the beauty of the world and see it as well as we who are creatures, owing our being to God, we can appreciate that our relationship with God is one of depending on God. We owe all to God and in a sense our dependence on God is as Martin Luther once put it, as total as is the beggar’s dependence on those from whom he begs. Creation reveals God to be the most generous of givers.

Secondly, in the brightness, colour and diversity of creation, the nature of God is revealed. God is dynamic and certainly not dull. Just as Jesus turned water into wine, through creation God offers to us the most vibrant of pictures. Of course, there have been times when a puritanical spirit within the church, has dulled the brightness of life. Yet creation reminds us that God is about a putting of fizz into our lives just as Jesus once commented that he had come into the world that we might have “life with abundance.”

Thirdly, in creation, God reminds us to value the physical side of life. This is in contrast to those who would say that only the spiritual side of life matters. God has made us physical being who can be enriched by physical activity and the material things around us. Nowhere does the Holy Scriptures suggest that Christians should not enjoy the material world. On the contrary, Genesis records God as looking at the unfolding of creation and seeing that “it was good.”

But fourthly, in creation, God calls us into partnership. The Genesis 1 account of creation has the arrival of humanity as the high point of the story. Humankind is to have a special role. And that role is to exercise dominion over creation. The significance of this is that human beings are given a major role in the tending and development of creation. In short, God calls us to share with God in the ongoing work of creation. This is a permission for human being who are in the image of God, to themselves be creative. And of course, what we see around this church today is God’s creation enriched by human creativity. As such we are able to share in the very work of God.

But and it’s a big but, there is a serious question as to how we should exercise dominion. After all, Christians have often used the language of “dominion” to excuse rampant pillaging of God’s world. At times, people have assumed that God will always make up for our destruction of the earth’s resources. No wonder that a number of commentators have come to the conclusion that Christianity bears a huge share of the burden for the ecological crisis that now confronts the world.

So perhaps as global warming with potentially catastrophic consequences for so much of the planet, becomes a very real threat, we need to reassess what is meant by dominion. I think “stewardship” is probably a better word to understand what the writer of Genesis 1 had in mind. This means accepting God’s gifts and using them responsibly so that future generations can share in the benefit. The nature of God fits this image. For when we look at power, the supreme picture we find of Divine power is Jesus Christ. And the power of Jesus is certainly never used for immediate self gratification or for the putting of his needs above those of others. On the contrary, Jesus uses his power to serve the needs of others especially those who are at the bottom of the pile. What this means for us today is that as the Bishop of London has recently suggested regarding air transport, we need to make the decisions that treat the gifts of God’s creation with respect and take seriously our responsibility to those in other parts of the world and those of future generations. A green Christianity is not just one of many options. It is a necessity for God’s world and represents true gratitude to God for the many generous gifts we receive.

So today, we thank God for the world in which we are stewards. We look to share with God in the work of creativity. But as we enjoy the world, we know that it is not ours to break. So today we do well to take heed of the words of the Psalmist;


“The earth is the Lord’s”

Don’t forget it!

Amen!

The story comes from the United States. An old man living rough had become ill and was taken to hospital. The doctors soon surmised that he would not live long. In vain they sought to find the old man’s name but all the man would say was “Son! Son!”. In looking through his clothing for identification, they came across a news clipping about a marine stationed in Korea. The Red Cross were contacted and they managed to locate the marine and to fly him back to the United States and to take him to the hospital.

As the young marine walked into the hospital room, the old man smiled and called out, “Son! Son!” For several hours, the marine held the old man’s hand until he died peacefully.

After the old man’s death, one of the nurses approached the marine and gently said, “We need to know your father’s full name.” To her great surprise, the marine answered, “He wasn’t my father. I never saw the man before in my life.”

Amazed, the nurse asked, “Then why did you stay?”

The marine simply replied, “Because he needed me.”


A story of compassion. And just so the story of the feeding of the 5,000 is a story of compassion. Too often, people look at this story and become obsessed with such matters as to whether Jesus produced food from nowhere or inspired a miracle of generosity amongst the crowd that followed him. But surely, what really matters and what causes this event to be one of the few events in the life of Jesus, are what it reveals about Jesus, the All Compassionate One and that it draws us nearer to him.

This story shows that the compassion of Jesus is not something that we earn but it is a matter of his generous care for us. The crowd on that day was not a particularly worthy crowd. John is clear that they were coming after Jesus because they had seen him do great healings. He was where the action was. But their understanding was clearly lacking. Later when we see them trying to take him by force to be made King, we see just how far away from him they really were. And yet, Jesus has compassion for this mixed up gathering. And it is worth our taking time to appreciate that Jesus’ compassion is for all of us, however messed up we might be. For in Jesus, we encounter not what we earn or deserve, but we encounter gift upon gift.

Still a part of the charm of this story, is the unnamed boy about whose packed lunch, Andrew tells Jesus. The five barley loaves and two fish would according to scholars, have been meagre morsels indeed. A boy's packed lunch - maybe! But enough for a crowd of that size - no way! And it is surely the use of so little to such great affect, that is the charm of this story. Surely, it is a story that gives hope to all of us, that when we feel we are unable to make a difference, with God’s help we can make all the difference.

Let me for a moment tell you the story of a Mr and Mrs Sharma, a Hindu couple, who moved from India to the city of New York. After some rather menial jobs, Mr Sharma, got a job as a taxi driver. Eventually he earned enough money to buy his own cab and so he no longer had to give away half of his fare money to use someone else’s cab. With their fortunes looking good from his income as well as that of his wife as an oncology nurse, they decided to share their good fortune with their village of Doobher Hishanpur where Mr Sharma had grown up. So with 3,000 dollars, they paid for the first girls’ school in the village to be opened in the brick house where Mr Sharma had been raised. In no time, there were 200 girls attending the school. Now back in New York, the Sharmas are seen as struggling immigrants but back in India it is very different. As Mr Sharma puts it, “ I’m worthless in New York but in India I am everything.”

Yes, what might be seen to be little, becomes the stuff that changes lives!

Too often, we fall into the trap of being overwhelmed by the shadow side of our world. We see life’s tragedies unfold before us on our televisions as well as at times meeting it in our conversations on the street. Like Philip in our Gospel Reading, we feel powerless as we look to the need. And yet, the story reminds us that we are not powerless. We might not solve all the problems of the world but we can make our own contribution to making the world a better place. And our means of doing so, is through compassion in action. The Dalai Lama, exiled from his native Tibet, was once asked what the answer was to our present day problems. His answer was “Compassion!” And in a world in which so many die from want, a world in which so many are deprived of meaningful aspiration, a world in which resources are often in short supply for the life saving and life enhancing, yet readily available for the demonic instruments of war, is not the Dalai Lama right? For our limited offerings can make a difference. They may be the spending of time with the sick, bringing hope to the depressed, encouraging those who have fallen to start again, giving to a good cause or even texting 87099 with the word CEASEFIRE to encourage our leaders to use their power to get a pause in the current Middle east fighting. You can make a difference. We can make a difference.

But back to our story of the feeding of the 5,000, we find it made quite an effect. The crowd wanted to make Jesus, a King. It is so easy to see things in worldly ways and Jesus was the hero of the moment. But Jesus wants nothing to do with it. You see, Jesus is not the sort of King that we read about in our history books and even see around the world. He is not interested in wealth or pomp for instead we find him amongst the poor and outcasts. He is not interested in dominating others for instead he is the One who came to serve rather than to be served. He is not interested in ruling by force for instead he is the One who shows us the way of non violence and talks of loving enemies rather than of killing them. Do you get it? Jesus is not to be squeezed into the perverse ways of power that act to destroy. He is the One who has no need of climbing any greasy pole for he turns the accepted norms of this world upside down.

But let us never see what he offers as inadequate. In the story we have heard, there was enough food left over to fill up a dozen baskets. And so it is with Jesus. His love and his grace are never used up. There is always more to come. So it is that we need not be hemmed in by the inadequacies of what we have to offer but to see the great potential for good when we with all our shortcomings join in the work of the God who can use our little to such great effect.

A story is told of Franklin Roosevelt who was President of the USA from 1933 until his death in 1945. One of the things which he found tiresome about holding his office, was having to greet lines of people at receptions. He was utterly convinced that no one really listened to what he said. So one day he decided upon an experiment. To each person who passed down the line and shook his hand, he would murmur, “I murdered my grandmother this morning.” The result was totally in line with his expectations as guests responded with phrases such as, “Marvellous! Keep up the good work. We are proud of you. God bless you, sir.” Well it was like this until at the end of the line when the ambassador from Bolivia actually heard what Roosevelt had said. Totally unfazed by what he had heard, the ambassador leaned forward and whispered back to the President, “I’m sure she had it coming.”

Just as Roosevelt and his guests were short on expectancy, so too were the gathering in Nazareth as they awaited the words of the local boy. In part, this can be put down to a tendency that we know all too well today, to be suspicious of greatness within our own midst. After all, the people in that synagogue had known Jesus for some time. They knew his family and were all too well aware of the whiff of scandal that surrounded his birth. The mention of him being the son of Mary without mention of Joseph, would seem to indicate a dig as to his background. Now they saw him as one who looked elsewhere and was leaving his family behind to fend for themselves. Truly a case of no honour in his home town!

But the true reason for hostility, probably lay in their growing awareness that Jesus was a threat to the status quo. Already the stories of Jesus’ power were circulating. Already he was being associated with might deeds. But in his use of power there was something that many found unsettling. For Jesus was using his power, not to reinforce the social structure of his time, but to liberate those who were living on the margins of society. The people, whose diseases or social standing shut them out of community life, found in Jesus one who set them free, one who affirmed them as people of worth who could be a part of community life.

Ever since the conversion of the Roman Emperor, Constantine in the year 312 AD, there has been a temptation in the church to seek a warm relationship with the centres of power. That temptation has all too often led the church in to compromises that have dulled its witness. How different from the path of Jesus. For Jesus passed every bit of honour and power that he had to those who existed on the margins. And in so doing, he opened up an understanding of responsibilities to others that goes well beyond our traditional understandings of kinship and the nuclear family.

And of course now as well as then, the path of radical inclusiveness had its enemies. For it is a demanding path and a path that threatens the places of privilege and status. But, we do well to notice that where radical inclusiveness is opposed, so to is the way of Christ. In Nazareth, mark tells us, Jesus could do no deeds of power.

Today, we live with the reality of being excluded due to social background, mistakes in their pasts, sexuality, religious beliefs and race to name but a few of the reasons for exclusion. Surely, we need to appreciate that the path of exclusion is a path that involves putting up a wall against Christ. If we wish the Church of Christ to be taken seriously, then surely we need to practice radical inclusion as Christ himself did. For if we fail to follow the way of Christ, then we forfeit the right to claim the blessings of Christ.

Our Gospel reading does not end with Nazareth’s rejection of Christ. From that rejection, we see the beginnings of Christian mission. At Nazareth, Jesus’ followers have seen the possibilities of rejection. It is a reality with which they are going to have to live. In what might seem to be a pertinent word to our success obsessed culture, Jesus makes clear to them that faithfully following Jesus is no guarantee of success. The twelve disciples are sent on a journey to the nearby villages to be the signs of the Kingdom of God. They are sent out to be dependent on the hospitality of those whom they visit. Where they are offered hospitality, they are to graciously accept it. Where they are not offered hospitality, they are to shake the dust off their feet. For the Gospel is something to be offered to people rather than something to be rammed down their throats. Too often in the history of Christendom, we find stories of forced conversion of peoples whether they be those without a recognised faith or those who have followed other monotheistic faiths such as Judaism or Islam. Too often, Christianity has been exported at the point of a gun. Yet, in the marching orders that the disciples are given, they are to go into the mission field in a state of dependence rather than power and the ethos of their mission is to be that of a respectful non violence that treats even those who would be enemies with the utmost respect. Retaliation and force can never be Christian options. They occur at the points where we depart from the Gospel.

Today’s reading draws us to the beginnings of God’s mission in Christ. In human terms, success is certainly not guaranteed. And yet, in God’s mission we are certainly not alone. The Spirit whom Jesus sent to empower us, goes with us and reminds us of what mission is all about. In God’s mission, we do not just accept the unpalatable realities around us without question. Instead, like God’s followers down through the ages, we are led to dream dreams and to see visions. Our vision is of God’s Kingdom where justice, liberation and joy are for all. Our calling is to be means by which Jesus’ imperative of life with abundance for all, can be a reality. In a world of media cynicism, a world in which people are casually and judgementally thrown away, the Gospel of Christ shouts a loud NO to all that destroys the humanity of others. Instead we are called to follow the radical inclusiveness and all embracing love that is found in Jesus’ life and self giving because as Charles Wesley once penned it;

For all. For All my saviour died.
For all my Lord was crucified.!

May Christ’s radical inclusiveness go on surprising us and the world in which we are privileged to live.

“There is more faith in honest doubt,
Believe me, than in half the creeds.”


So wrote Alfred Lord Tennison. And I suspect that the Thomas of the Gospels would offer a hearty “Amen!” to that. For he has gone down in history with the less than complimentary label of “Doubting Thomas.”

Certainly from his three appearances in the Gospels, all of them in John’s Gospel, Thomas comes over as a man with a half empty glass rather than a half full one. His faith was not an easy faith but a faith which was hard won.

Let’s just for a moment touch the other episodes in the life of Thomas that are recorded for us.

The first is in the eleventh chapter of John’s Gospel. Here we find Thomas prepared to be faithful even at great cost. Jesus has gone into Jordan to escape the hostility of the Temple leaders. Now came bad news. His friend Lazarus was sick. Soon the news got worse. Lazarus was dead. Jesus decided to go to Lazarus’ home in Bethany near Jerusalem. Not surprisingly the disciples were hesitant. That is all except for Thomas who seeing the danger of such a visit, turns to the other disciples and says. “ Let us also go so that we can die with him.” Words of a man, devoted to Jesus to such an extent that he was prepared to sacrifice his life for Jesus.

The second occasion in which we meet Thomas is at the Passover meal. Jesus is talking of going to the Father to prepare a place for all of his followers. I cannot believe that the disciples were not perplexed at what they were hearing yet none of them said a word. Perhaps they didn’t want to seem foolish. All silent except for one who is not prepared to listen without comprehending. Thomas blurts out his question;

“Lord we do not know where you are going. So how can we know the way?”

Out of this comes Jesus’ powerful answer;

“I am the way and the truth and the life.”

Thomas, the man who is not prepared to settle for an unquestioning approach, draws a valuable nugget out of Jesus. And today, we need to appreciate the value of questioning. For God does not call us to be gullible but to be a people who are prepared to explore our faith. The places where people are not encouraged to question, are the places in which people are often controlled in a malign manner, the places where the faith espoused is one in which we are denied the possibility to grow up. And if we are denied the opportunity to grow up in our faith, then we are a people who can easily be blown in all manner of directions by deceptive teaching, a people denied a faith that can withstand the times of challenge.

The third appearance of Thomas is in today’s Gospel reading. The other disciples had met the Risen Christ on Easter Day. They had heard from the women of the Risen Christ but they had hardly been easy believers themselves. Their fear was such that the doors were locked but now Jesus was amongst them. Through their experience, they believed. And they talked about it to Thomas who has been missing from their number that day. Thomas found it hard to believe. He had been devastated by what had happened. His world had been destroyed on Good Friday and he felt that it could never be good again. He wanted to believe the good news but just couldn’t . He was like many who having been propelled into the valley of despair find it hard to hear the words that offer hope. And so Thomas spoke of needing to see and feel the marks of the cross.

Well, we don’t know whether he touched the body of Christ. Certainly Jesus offered him the possibility to do so. All we know is that Thomas is response to the invitation of Christ brings the Gospel of John to what surely is its climactic moment when he utters the ultimate profession of faith;

“My Lord and my God!”

The difficult, questioning Thomas had been the first to see the significance of Christ. Oh Yes, Peter at Caesarea Philippi had recognised that Jesus was the Messaiah, the Annointed One but Thomas lifts that understanding to a whole new plain. For Thomas sees the wonder of Divinity in the man, Jesus of Nazareth. He is the pointer to the Council of Nicaea some three centuries later when the Church will conclude that Jesus is truly Man and truly God!

And what of Thomas thereafter? Tradition tells us that about the year 50 he arrived in India where he founded at least seven ancient churches in the Malabar region before his martyrdom. Certainly, when missionaries from Europe made their way to India in 1289, to their amazement in Madras they found a church already existing which called itself the “Thomas Christians.”

Thomas and the other followers of Christ each experienced a transformation in their vision from a Good Friday world at an Easter Day world. From the pits of raw despair, they now experienced an unspeakable joy. But Easter is not just about our feelings. As Thomas went to India, we are each called to be on a journey of service to the Risen Christ. We are called into a world where the only thing we have to offer is the abundant grace of God as made known in Christ Jesus. Whilst we so easily harbour grudges and struggle with our emotions, Christ’s forgiveness and acceptance is for all.

But on our journey of discipleship, we have markers. The example of Thomas is such a marker pointing the value of devotion, commitment and honest questioning. For surely;

“There is more faith in honest doubt,
Believe me, than in half the creeds.!”

It comes as a shock! Moments earlier, Peter has said that Jesus is the Christ, the one in whom so much hope and expectation has been invested.

It should be a high point. And yet the mood has swiftly changed. Instead of happy talk about a great new future, instead, of learning of their important roles within the Kingdom of Jesus with all the benefits that they could hope for, the disciples hear Jesus talking not of triumph and glory but of rejection and death. No wonder Peter protests. Surely this is not the way that it was meant to be.

And yet, one of the lessons which the disciples have to learn is that this is the way of Christ’s Kingdom. For an essential lesson to learn about Jesus is that Jesus does not enter into the ways of domination by which so much power was in his time and still is in our time exercised, but instead he acts in powerlessness, love and self giving. Whilst domination from strength dehumanises those who get in its way, Jesus offers an alternative vision by being alongside us as one experiences the full vulnerability of human life. And this is what Incarnation is about. Our hope is not based on distant act from a far off place but it is rather based upon a Saviour who comes alongside us and shares in our weaknesses. And of course, it is in dying for us on a Cross that Jesus reveals the immensity of Divine love for each of us.

Today’s reading, however, reminds us of another matter. It reminds us that whatever some of our hymns may say, we are not promised a life of ease. Rather than a promise that we shall be ‘happy all the day’ Jesus is concerned to equip his people for hard times ahead. It is as one of our better hymns puts it;

“Father hear the prayer we offer
Not for ease that prayer shall be
But for strength that we might ever
Live our lives courageously.”

And indeed by the time that Marks’s Gospel was first being read, his readers knew the reality that those who followed Jesus were often meeting with the hatred, rejection and violence that had been directed at Jesus himself. I think that in his teaching, Jesus is warning his disciples that to follow in his way of love and vulnerability, would expose them to the hatred of those who would be blind to love. Jesus and those who follow him will share in facing the enmity of those who confront the Gospel of love.

The Christian is called to pattern his or her life upon that of Jesus. As such, we have to take Jesus seriously when he tells his disciples that following him means taking up our cross. We know that this is inevitably a tough call for a cross was a particularly gruesome method of killing those whom the Roman held to be of no value. So what does it mean today?

Firstly, I think we need to avoid two common misunderstandings.

The first misunderstanding is one that is based in abusive relationships. Too often one hears the dominated person, often the mistreated woman, talk of the injustice they suffer as being “a cross that I must bear.” Without straying into the very real difficulties of such situations and the question of why people stay in abusive relationships, we need to be clear that this is not a cross in the sense in which Jesus uses the term. Whilst as we shall see in a moment a cross may invite suffering, the cross that Jesus calls us to take up does not deny us our status of beloved children of God or dehumanise us. Christ affirms your value. He does not take it away.

The second misunderstanding that often occurs regarding Jesus’ call to take up our cross, is when difficulties over which we have no control such as family tragedies are seen as a “cross that we must bear.” Be careful with this temptation. We are talking about things which are very painful BUT we do such situations no good if we speak of them as God's will in being the cross that we are called to bear. In such situations, the Cross may be seen in the costs in time or money which are incurred to do God’s work in helping those in such situations.

When Jesus speaks of us taking up our cross, he is speaking about a calling that each of us has, to be about his work even when doing so runs contrary to how most people see as the sensible way to act. At times, this calling involves danger.

Examples of the danger s involved in taking up one’s cross, could include the example of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. In June 1939 he arrived in New York just a short time after he had received his call up papers from the German authorities. In New York, he had a whole range of options from pastoring German refugees to taking up one of a host of lucrative academic appointments which he was well qualified for. But this man who only a few years before had written the Christian classic, “The Cost of Discipleship” quickly realised that he had made a mistake. He realised that his place was in Germany playing a role within the Confessing Church which had been taking the risk of confronting Nazism when so much of the rest of the Church had gone along with the evil. And so after just three weeks against the advice of many of his friends, he began the journey back to Germany fully aware of the risks he would face. And ultimately for Bonhoeffer, the journey back led to imprisonment and in the final weeks of the war to a hangman’s noose.

A more recent story concerns the Christian Peacemaker Teams which in their belief that Christ rejects violence have sought to be peacemakers even if it means putting themselves into extreme danger. For several weeks, we have seen on the television screens the story unfolding of the four members of such a team who were kidnapped in Iraq. Even now, we do not know hat will happen to Norman Kember and his Canadian colleagues but we do know that their American colleague Tom Fox was found murdered with the signs of torture on his body only a couple of weeks ago. Four men determined to take following Christ seriously, four men who took up their cross and who have paid the price.

Bit it needn’t always be about physical danger. It can be about following in the path of a man such as John Profumo. Forced to resign from the MacMillan Government as a result of the sex scandal with which is name will always be linked, he responded by walking into Toynbee Hall, a place of refuge for some of the most destitute people in London to offer help with the washing up, only to devote the remaining forty or so years of his life to helping those who had been consigned to the bottom of the pile. And of course, countless others serve in similar ways, helping those who need is greatest, taking up their cross.

And that is our calling too. C.S. Lewis put it well when he wrote,

“Christ says; give me it all. I don’t want only so much of your time or money or work, I want you. No half measures are good enough. Hand over the whole self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as theories you think wicked - the whole outfit. And I’ll give you a new self instead.”

This morning as we travel on in Lent, we see Christ travelling resolutely on the journey that leads him to rejection and death. He asks us to identify with him by linking our lives to his. He asks you and me to take up our crosses so that we might be a part of his work. But as we do so, he offers us a comfort. In all things, he, who loves us enough to go to the barbarity of an old rugged cross for us, is with us, loving us, valuing us and helping us. For his presence brings the hope and expectations which Peter placed in Christ’s Kingly domination, to fulfilment in humble service.

AMEN