Sermon - Advent Sunday, 29 November 2020

 'AWAIT THE COMING’ 
Mark 1.1-8 

May the Word of God redeem all our speaking, and may the Wisdom of God inform our listening – that we may hear, pray and act.

Today, Advent Sunday – the Day of Coming - marks the birthday of the church. Today is a new beginning – the start of a month’s preparation, reflection and waiting before we celebrate the coming of light into our world’s darkness, the birth of Jesus Christ the Word of God.

We wait - but waiting can be hard. We are not encouraged to wait by a consumer-led free market in a fast and noisy world. Yet over the past 8 months we have had to get used to waiting – waiting with uncertainty, with anxiety and frustration, grief for some, having to watch our every step … waiting for news of loved ones, waiting for a vaccine … waiting in hope & faith that there is indeed light at the end of a dark tunnel - and that this is not yet another onrushing train heading directly for us!

Today is Sunday – yet we continue to wait in a seemingly endless

Saturday Time.  For Saturday is that longest of days between the dark desolate tragedy of Good Friday and the liberating light of Easter. This day has to date been a 2,000 year long day – a continuing time between the decisive drama of that first Good Friday and the final glorious flowering of Easter – that time when God will come in Christ to bring all things together  through inclusive Judgment and liberating Redemption.

So “All is ready - but not yet”. Meanwhile, in an ever more crisis-torn world, we might well often cry “When O Lord – when – WHEN?” But be sure of this, resolution will come. The time will come when ‘the crooked places shall be made straight’ and ‘justice will roll down like waters’. It will be so in God’s good and right time . But until that time comes, it is our part to wait and act in faith and hope.

Today also signals a time to wake up! “Sleepers wake, a voice is calling”. For, as the writer Franz Kafka said, we humans all, collectively, tend to be ‘sleepwalkers’!

Are we, then, ‘woke’? Are we awake, alert, aware of what is going on here in our community and in the world around us? Can we read the signs of the times, can we see and hear what God, with an ever more  urgent voice, calls out to us through all this? Do we heed these messages of warning, but also of hope?

We certainly hear warning about peoples, communities and a world in crisis.  Crisis of pandemic, crisis of economy, of civil war, crisis of countless refugees, of poverty, crisis of climate emergency.

But we also know hope. Hope as young people spearhead the Black Lives Matter movement. Hope as they come out, speak and act on our pressing need to tackle Global Warming now. Hope through the deep care, compassion and love shown by health workers and so many others during this pandemic – together with so very many unknown, unrecognised acts of kindness. Hope too after the election of Joe Biden, with a promise of some decency, humanity, & truth returning to American life – and who knows, the life of the world!

Above all we keep hope - but also heed warning – because Jesus Christ comes. He comes into our life, and so God comes – not just then, 2000 years back, not just at some future Judgment time, but here and now, every day!

So on this Advent Day we wait, we wake and we watch – and take in, as we must, today’s prophetic Gospel warning of global chaos if we fail to follow the way of justice, mercy and peace. And let there be no doubt that we have our part to play in this work. We begin again today, here and into the future, watching and praying with active hope. Today we affirm that the ever-spreading flood of light and love released in the birth of Jesus means that God-in-Christ does indeed come into our lives daily - and that when the Son of Man, the man Jesus Christ who is God, comes in that final Judgment where all things on earth become at-one with all things heavenly, then all our long and active waiting, and waking, our watching and praying, our working and keeping faith, will surely be vindicated. Because when Christ comes, his Judgment will be thorough, searching and tough – but in the end it will be marked by forgiveness, mercy and liberation.

For this, you see, is the abiding reality and truth, the foundation of all that life - that God is, God is as he is in Jesus, and so there is hope!

What is more, as surely as day follows night, God comes, God is most truly God as he comes in Christ Jesus, and so most comes the divine promise that we, with all those who have opened themselves in penitence to the redemptive forgiveness of God, will be as children of God. And so will we, together with all creation, become free – oh yes, free – free at last – when the time shall most surely come – that final Easter Resurrection time, “the time that will surely be, when the earth shall be filled with the Glory of God as the waters cover the sea.”  AMEN                                                                          

Rev Paul Fisher

Sermon - 22 November 2020

Out with the old and in with the new
Matthew 25:31-45

Today is the final Sunday of the Church’s liturgical year. For those of you who don’t know, we follow a three-year cycle of readings…years A, B and C.

Today being the final week means that next week, which is the first Sunday of Advent, we will begin a new church year using the readings from year B. On the final Sunday of the church’s year, we always celebrate the feast of Christ the King. And today, the gospel reading from Matthew paints for us, a picture of Jesus appearing on clouds at the end of time…as a king sitting in judgement on those who stand before him. He talks about two groups, one side going through the pearly gates to eternal bliss, the others, the unrighteous are sent off to eternal damnation.

Scary – or what?

We often try to ignore this story or try to water it down because the thought of a last judgement makes us feel uncomfortable because the consequences of being rejected by Christ don’t bear thinking about. But God thinks that the lives we lead here on earth are of consequence, and so our behaviour has serious penalties. The way in which we treat others has importance to God, he takes note and there is judgement.

We love parables like the Lost Sheep and the Good Samaritan, but this parable about the sheep and the goats is a bit close to home. We can see the truth in it and the truth is painful. It makes us feel uncomfortable.

Did you notice that in Jesus’ words, both the righteous and the unrighteous are surprised by how they’re judged….both groups say:

‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?’

Jesus refers to them as sheep and goats and whether we like it or not, we have the capacity to be both. The righteous (those classed as sheep) had no idea that their good deeds meant that they were inheriting the Kingdom prepared for them. They weren’t trying to earn God’s favour. They were just living their lives of faith in the way that they always did. This is what loving our neighbour as ourselves is about. Loving our neighbour just to get ourselves to heaven wouldn’t be real love.

It’s easy, isn’t it, to show love and compassion to those we like or love? But what about loving those who do things that repulse us or things we don’t believe in? What about muggers or murderers, sex offenders, thieves, liars…I could go on.We might even find ourselves judging others by their appearance, or we make assumptions about how people think or feel. Most of the time we are unaware that we are even doing it.

Our Christian calling is to be Christ like and we are faced by many opportunities to help the needy. These acts of kindness can be provided by anybody, we don’t need any special qualifications or lots of money. To visit, to care, to offer our time …such things all are well within reach of everybody.

Everything we know about Jesus from the Bible tells us that he befriended outcasts and helped the poor and needy. He came to earth to help us to find God. And that happens in the most unexpected places, and in the most unexpected ways.

We are judged not on the dramatic moments in our lives, but by the ordinary, mundane ones. We are judged by God and by our neighbours on the smallest actions, the throw-away remarks, the routines of our lives.

So…do we care about the hungry and thirsty or do we turn to another channel when the Water Aid adverts come on? Do we cross the road when we see someone hungry and homeless? Do we even notice when we hear a cry for help? There is a lot of need in the world, and because of the pandemic it is only going to get worse. I wonder whether that will mean that we will begin to notice more, or respond more readily, or even that we begin to switch off if the demand is too great?

We might be able to kid ourselves, or even others if our thoughts and actions are not very Christ-like. But there is no hiding things from God. He knows what is in our innermost thoughts and if we are to take today’s reading seriously, then there are consequences.

Not a good thought, is it?

But there is good news as well as bad news, and however seriously we take today’s gospel reading, we need to hold it in balance with other things that Jesus taught… about the Father in the story of the Prodigal Son for instance…who ran...ran…to meet his irresponsible, lazy, greedy younger son to welcome him home with a great celebration….or Jesus’ emphasis on forgiveness ...even when he was dying on the cross.

The good news is that God’s judgement is very different from human judgement. And God judges us with perfect understanding of why we avoid some types of loving and are ignorant of others. But God sees and knows everyone with the same perfect understanding.

God knows when we have crushed someone’s confidence or withheld encouragement, or avoided thinking of them….and he loves our neighbour just as perfectly as he loves us. Maybe the judgement we need to fear is that sometime, somewhere, we will see ourselves as God sees us.

Better get ready, better be more alert, better practise for that day…

Oh yes, of course, that is what Advent is all about…and it starts next Sunday!! 
Amen.

Rev Julie Clarkson

Sermon - Remembrance Sunday

Remembrance Sunday

Matthew 25:1-13

Today is a Remembrance Sunday to remember!

In a normal year, there seem to be boxes of  poppies in every shop you go into. Not this year. In fact, I really struggled to buy a poppy this year. Normally we’re falling over poppy sellers but this year… I haven’t seen one.

But this is not a normal year and coronavirus has put paid to much of what we have taken for granted in the past. This year, instead of selling poppies, the British Legion have suggested that we should show our support by using a digital poppy on social media sites or by donating online and downloading a picture of a poppy to display in our windows.

In a normal year, the crowds would be gathering in Whitehall, along with royalty, military, veterans and dignitaries, waiting for the Remembrance parade and the laying of wreaths at the cenotaph. The Queen will be at a closed ceremony at the cenotaph and the crowds will have to watch on TV later. For us, instead of attending a civic ceremony, we are being encouraged to stand for the two minutes’ silence on our own doorsteps at 11am.

In a normal year, this church would be packed on Remembrance Sunday. The Settle and Giggleswick brass band, along with our organist Graham, would be leading us in rousing hymn singing. There would be representatives from the local council, scout groups and St John’s Ambulance. Input into the service would be had from other church leaders and the local church school.  Then, at the end of the service we would process to the cenotaph, helped along by the local police to control the traffic.

Instead…in Week One of Lockdown Two,  I am leading our Remembrance service from a very quiet Holy Ascension Church that is closed for public worship. When I leave here this morning, I will be making my way to the cenotaph to lead a short Act of Remembrance. There will be no long streams of crowds, or police needed to  control traffic and the cordoned off area where the service will take place will be attended by approx. 12 people, all of whom will be socially distanced.

Definitely not a normal year! The problem we’ve got is that we don’t know whether this might be the new normal. Will normal ever be normal again…if you know what I mean. We are in uncharted territory.

This morning we have heard the parable about the foolish bridesmaids. Jesus told stories about real life. Weddings, being real community affairs were familiar territory to the people Jesus was speaking to. They knew how weddings worked and the tale he told would have meant something to them. Our parable tells us about ten bridesmaids who were waiting for the bridegroom and the wedding celebration that would follow. As the waiting begins there is no difference between the ten bridesmaids.

The five wise bridesmaids take out their extra oil and trim their lamps. The foolish bridesmaids have no oil and so they are caught unprepared and have to try and get some oil quickly. They are then turned away by the bridegroom and not allowed to join the celebration. It wasn't that the foolish bridesmaids didn't want to be a part of the wedding celebrations or that they did not care for the bridegroom, they just thought that they would have enough time to get the oil they needed or that the procession to the banquet would be during daylight hours.

Are you one of those people who plan for every eventuality? Many of us are often unprepared for what life throws at us, despite doing our best to prepare for the future. We’re probably all in favour of having a few savings, life insurance and probably even a will as none of us wants to be a burden on anyone in the future. We are part of a culture that likes planning and preparation. We do what needs to be done, we put it to the back of our minds and we then get on with our lives.

What we don’t plan for is the unexpected…illness…pandemic…war. It catches us out and it is so easy to let things get on top of us and to look on the black side. The reading from Matthew reminds us that as Christians we live in a world where we draw life and strength from God. God’s grace is a renewable source …a bit like our oil lamp being topped up with new oil and having our wick trimmed so that we can give off more light.

On this Remembrance Sunday, in the midst of a second lockdown and separated from many of our family and friends, we think about all those  who not only left loved ones behind but who fought in wars so that we could live in peace.   Regardless of their sacrifice, we are living through a time where there is a delicate balance between life and death. Where a sudden loss of our sense of smell or a tickly cough fills us with trepidation. On top of that, even a pandemic doesn’t seem to stop war or terrorism and only this week, the Home Secretary Priti Patel raised the UK terrorism level to severe, after the shooting in Vienna.

Now…before we start to feel depressed, the message from Matthew is not bad news.  It talks of the wedding feast…a time of great celebration that awaits those who are ready. Each one of us have been called to live in readiness, to live lives of faithfulness and as people of remembrance. We are called to be people of God whose oil is regularly topped up and whose wicks are trimmed so that we can help light up the way,  not just so that we can see the way but so that we can help light up the way for others too.

You may be worshipping with us today on your own…but you are not alone. All over the world, we are in communion with our brothers and sisters in Christ …and not only that but Jesus is with us too…every step of the way…supporting us, guiding us and loving us.

This is a normal day…a normal Remembrance Sunday
…a Remembrance Sunday to remember.