Ash Wednesday
A Christian view of the day is quite simple.
We are made from dust and to dust we return is something that has been at the heart of human thought for a lot longer than the Christian faith has existed. It was part of the idea at the root of the Jewish faith from which Christ, the Messiah emerged and is in the Islamic teachings too. But it goes further back than that and is almost universal, existing in religions that have no direct or rational connection with those mentioned.
Why?
Perhaps it is about how we see ourselves as human beings? As creatures who are quite unique on this world of ours it is difficult to imagine that it is not something that might be, as our scientific community would argue, is hardwired in us. A logical conclusion when we examine the whole cosmology of life itself. We are all, after all, built from the same building blocks as the rest of the universe. We are human, and we are part of the whole universe. Part of what the universe is made of. If we contemplate this we are led to a simple answer – life itself is made up of what the whole universe is made up of.
The simple beauty of this is at once both mundane and overwhelming.
Our uniqueness is set within the pattern of the universe itself.
Acceptance of this is what we reach when we examine the things we have learnt. Every new idea, concept, fact and system we discern lead us to a glorious pattern that expands as we learn more. From the sub-atomic to the grand scale of things we find that the universe is more complex, and more elegant than we might have imagined.
And as people with faith this does not challenge what we believe. Instead we glory in this knowledge and wish to seek more.
Ash Wednesday is a celebration of what we are, what we can be and what we should seek. From dust we came and to dust we go is not a negative message. It is a celebration of our connection with all creation. We are not separated from it but part of it and we seek to be more closely connected with it. The continuity of the universe, its processes and its path are good.
What ever we eventually find will not be the end of things.
Christ did not tell us when the end would be. In fact he warned us that we would not know the end. Not because we are restricted by our knowledge but because who we are, what we are, is part of the pattern he showed us.
So, lets not be negative on this special day. Let us look towards our future. Let us celebrate creation and diversity. Let us open our hearts to all the new possibilities we reveal and find ways of answering them positively. Nothing stops as we grow. All that we do needs to have the faith we realise. Creation is good and we need to act positively in our world.
The message of love does not restrict us but it does guide us. Let that guidance of love rule our path. Do not let selfishness, greed and hate dominate as we live our lives.
From dust we came, to dust we go but in between those points we have a role to play
Wednesday, 6 February 2008
Thursday, 13 December 2007
Christmas will soon be here
Just thinking about Christmas and the idea of what could take place now with a new Christ Child. Where would Christ reveal himself and to whom?
Christ will not come how we expect him to. God’s actions cannot be anticipated. The second coming could be heralded by a woman just as easily as a man – most likely in the third world but possibly not, may be poor, a refugee, perhaps disabled, from a dubious background. What ever and how ever it happens, we will be taken by surprise, challenged and not everyone will find it easy, acceptable or understandable.
So, while reflecting on this I put down the following…. You have the benefit and misfortune of reading the first draft.
OK?
Urban tunes
We thought it was a radio
you know, what we used to call a ghetto blaster
far too loud for this time in the morning
and as it was the start of the shift
we were still thinking too fondly of our beds
to appreciate such a racket this early
so our section leader trotted off
to do the decent thing.
when he came back we all thought it was odd
he looked like he was on something
like he was really excited and happy
two emotions you seldom experience in our line of work
and the music seemed even louder
It was getting to me, that music,
like I wanted to dance and laugh
but I called over and asked
“What’s happening, man?
Why didn’t you switch off the damn music?”
but he just laughed and waved us towards him
we followed and as we did, the music seemed to fill us
like a burning light, too hot to bare
yet too good to think about letting go.
It was an old garage with corrugated sides
pitted with holes and littered with junk.
we had passed this place many times
without considering it in any way
but as we looked in
it was like some huge rush of joy and excitement
was pouring over us
making us feel both in awe of what we were seeing
and full of a special importance
that we had been chosen to come here
to see this miracle take place
Resting on the base of an old trailer
wrapped in sleeping bags and an old coat
was a young woman
drawn with exhaustion but overflowing with joy
as she held a baby in her arms
an older man stood beside her
wrapping her in his coat
looking relieved and so happy
it made us want to dance.
And despite the old stack of cardboard boxes
and the rusting metal littering the floor,
despite the door stuck permanently two thirds open
this scene was as perfect and as true
as anything we had ever encountered
then the music filled our heads with bright lights
made us want to shout for joy
got us dancing around
like the mad idiots we surely were
crazy dustbin men
dancing a wild jig
in a back alley
early on a winter morning
Christ will not come how we expect him to. God’s actions cannot be anticipated. The second coming could be heralded by a woman just as easily as a man – most likely in the third world but possibly not, may be poor, a refugee, perhaps disabled, from a dubious background. What ever and how ever it happens, we will be taken by surprise, challenged and not everyone will find it easy, acceptable or understandable.
So, while reflecting on this I put down the following…. You have the benefit and misfortune of reading the first draft.
OK?
Urban tunes
We thought it was a radio
you know, what we used to call a ghetto blaster
far too loud for this time in the morning
and as it was the start of the shift
we were still thinking too fondly of our beds
to appreciate such a racket this early
so our section leader trotted off
to do the decent thing.
when he came back we all thought it was odd
he looked like he was on something
like he was really excited and happy
two emotions you seldom experience in our line of work
and the music seemed even louder
It was getting to me, that music,
like I wanted to dance and laugh
but I called over and asked
“What’s happening, man?
Why didn’t you switch off the damn music?”
but he just laughed and waved us towards him
we followed and as we did, the music seemed to fill us
like a burning light, too hot to bare
yet too good to think about letting go.
It was an old garage with corrugated sides
pitted with holes and littered with junk.
we had passed this place many times
without considering it in any way
but as we looked in
it was like some huge rush of joy and excitement
was pouring over us
making us feel both in awe of what we were seeing
and full of a special importance
that we had been chosen to come here
to see this miracle take place
Resting on the base of an old trailer
wrapped in sleeping bags and an old coat
was a young woman
drawn with exhaustion but overflowing with joy
as she held a baby in her arms
an older man stood beside her
wrapping her in his coat
looking relieved and so happy
it made us want to dance.
And despite the old stack of cardboard boxes
and the rusting metal littering the floor,
despite the door stuck permanently two thirds open
this scene was as perfect and as true
as anything we had ever encountered
then the music filled our heads with bright lights
made us want to shout for joy
got us dancing around
like the mad idiots we surely were
crazy dustbin men
dancing a wild jig
in a back alley
early on a winter morning
Thursday, 8 November 2007
reflecting on today's readings
Today’s readings are Romans 14:7-12 and Luke 15:1-10.
In Romans, Paul is pointing out that we will all have to account for ourselves in front of God when we die.
As I grow older I think I become more and more aware of the implications of this fact. What am I going to say? “Sorry God, I messed it up somewhat, hope you don’t mind…. It could have been worse!”
I start to think about all the things I should/could/need to do and wonder where I should start. Time to make an effort before it is too late?
And then I look at the Second Reading from Luke. Such a familiar section just before the “prodigal son” which Jesus used to emphasise the message held in this text. He actually says, “there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.” And I can’t help thinking that Christ is a very generous and loving Saviour.
I wonder to whom Jesus is referring when he mentions those who do not need to repent? Is it another little dig at the Pharisees and an echo of the challenge “Let the one with no sin cast the first stone”? I suspect there is something of both aspects in this passage and again it is echoed in Paul’s words when he tells people not to judge others.
So, while I am trying to avoid judging others and trying to live more like the way God wants me to I will keep examining my life and confessing my sins so that I will be ready to look God in the face and hope that what I have done with my life is not too bad.
Tell me, is there anything more awesome than that thought – looking God in the face….
And then I must admit that I cannot stop imagining the effect that repenting must have on the normal life of heaven. One thing Jesus, if he was talking to us today, might have said is that the Kingdom is like a huge football stadium located very near a church near you. Every time someone repents and asks forgiveness the whole stadium erupts in a great, sustained cheer and yet another party begins.
I don’t know if that would make me more or less likely to want to go to heaven! But it is quite a thought.
Repent today and make the whole of heaven rejoice – how’s that for a slogan? No doubt someone, somewhere has already used it!
In Romans, Paul is pointing out that we will all have to account for ourselves in front of God when we die.
As I grow older I think I become more and more aware of the implications of this fact. What am I going to say? “Sorry God, I messed it up somewhat, hope you don’t mind…. It could have been worse!”
I start to think about all the things I should/could/need to do and wonder where I should start. Time to make an effort before it is too late?
And then I look at the Second Reading from Luke. Such a familiar section just before the “prodigal son” which Jesus used to emphasise the message held in this text. He actually says, “there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.” And I can’t help thinking that Christ is a very generous and loving Saviour.
I wonder to whom Jesus is referring when he mentions those who do not need to repent? Is it another little dig at the Pharisees and an echo of the challenge “Let the one with no sin cast the first stone”? I suspect there is something of both aspects in this passage and again it is echoed in Paul’s words when he tells people not to judge others.
So, while I am trying to avoid judging others and trying to live more like the way God wants me to I will keep examining my life and confessing my sins so that I will be ready to look God in the face and hope that what I have done with my life is not too bad.
Tell me, is there anything more awesome than that thought – looking God in the face….
And then I must admit that I cannot stop imagining the effect that repenting must have on the normal life of heaven. One thing Jesus, if he was talking to us today, might have said is that the Kingdom is like a huge football stadium located very near a church near you. Every time someone repents and asks forgiveness the whole stadium erupts in a great, sustained cheer and yet another party begins.
I don’t know if that would make me more or less likely to want to go to heaven! But it is quite a thought.
Repent today and make the whole of heaven rejoice – how’s that for a slogan? No doubt someone, somewhere has already used it!
Monday, 29 October 2007
Thinking about today's Gospel reading...
Today’s Gospel Reading (Luke 13: 10 – 17) tells us about Christ Healing a woman in the Synagogue on the Sabbath. The people in charge are affronted by this “work” on the Sabbath and reproach him.
It is the subtext to this story which interests me. For example, the complaint regarding the healing act is not directed at Jesus but at the people in the synagogue. The ruler of the synagogue says, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be healed, and not on the Sabbath day." Does this mean that people are attending the synagogue specifically to be healed by Jesus?
Jesus answers in an interesting way, too. He says, "You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his ass from the manger, and lead it away to water it? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day?"
The “work” Jesus refers to is essential stuff you have to do regardless of what else is going on. They are not special activities or major undertakings. They are also about providing necessary care and acting in a responsible manner, perhaps even carrying out an essential duty expected of you.
The final sentence is also curious; “As he said this, all his adversaries were put to shame; and all the people rejoiced at all the glorious things that were done by him.”
What does this story say about what it was like to be in that synagogue with Christ teaching? It suggests quite a lively event. Perhaps the whole thing seemed to be getting out of hand in the eyes of the ruler and his fellow senior members? It sounds like the whole place was charged with a vibrancy, an expectation that anything could and would happen and that people were going to be healed and perhaps it felt like everyone was going to have a great time and come out excited and amazed by the experience. The people in the synagogue would not have normally rejoiced openly when the authority of the rulers of the synagogue was being so openly and brashly challenged.
If you try to put it in context you get quite a different feel to the one you get when you read it as a “Gospel” reading where the synagogue is a foreign and distant place and your whole view is from that of our Christian understanding of Christ as the Saviour. Things were not so obvious then. Try replacing synagogue with “Church”, etc… and see how less acceptable the activities might seem to the people in charge of your place of worship.
Jesus was a truly challenging teacher and activist and he would have been a very unsettling figure to all those in authority and with strict religious views.
There are also echoes between this and the story in the Acts (13: 42-52) where Paul and Barnabas teach in the synagogue and end up with much of the town turning up to hear them, which upsets the people in charge of the synagogue who do not want non-Jews and non-converts in their place of worship.
Again you read between the lines in the text and there are two different things going on. One is the feeling that the synagogue is being taken over and/or the leaders are loosing control. The synagogue is possibly being used for unusual or “inappropriate” purposes from the point of view of those in charge. The challenge is to authority and to a closed view by the authorities. The message is one of universal welcome – the Good News is for everyone, not just the few. Christ really did come to turn the world upside down.
The second is that complacency is a bad thing. Christ’s message demands something more than just sticking to the rules and enforcing them. You have to re-examine what those rules mean. You have to view everything you do in the light of Christ’s teachings and change where necessary. You have to keep asking “Is this good enough?” and “Does this really answer the challenge that Christ is placing before me?” and perhaps even, “How does the way I live my life fit with the teachings of Christ?”
And, of course, if healing is not work but a basic and essential activity, if caring for others is an essential duty that is not an “extra” or a task that can be treated like “work”, what does that mean to us in our ordinary lives?
What are we doing about it?
It is the subtext to this story which interests me. For example, the complaint regarding the healing act is not directed at Jesus but at the people in the synagogue. The ruler of the synagogue says, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be healed, and not on the Sabbath day." Does this mean that people are attending the synagogue specifically to be healed by Jesus?
Jesus answers in an interesting way, too. He says, "You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his ass from the manger, and lead it away to water it? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day?"
The “work” Jesus refers to is essential stuff you have to do regardless of what else is going on. They are not special activities or major undertakings. They are also about providing necessary care and acting in a responsible manner, perhaps even carrying out an essential duty expected of you.
The final sentence is also curious; “As he said this, all his adversaries were put to shame; and all the people rejoiced at all the glorious things that were done by him.”
What does this story say about what it was like to be in that synagogue with Christ teaching? It suggests quite a lively event. Perhaps the whole thing seemed to be getting out of hand in the eyes of the ruler and his fellow senior members? It sounds like the whole place was charged with a vibrancy, an expectation that anything could and would happen and that people were going to be healed and perhaps it felt like everyone was going to have a great time and come out excited and amazed by the experience. The people in the synagogue would not have normally rejoiced openly when the authority of the rulers of the synagogue was being so openly and brashly challenged.
If you try to put it in context you get quite a different feel to the one you get when you read it as a “Gospel” reading where the synagogue is a foreign and distant place and your whole view is from that of our Christian understanding of Christ as the Saviour. Things were not so obvious then. Try replacing synagogue with “Church”, etc… and see how less acceptable the activities might seem to the people in charge of your place of worship.
Jesus was a truly challenging teacher and activist and he would have been a very unsettling figure to all those in authority and with strict religious views.
There are also echoes between this and the story in the Acts (13: 42-52) where Paul and Barnabas teach in the synagogue and end up with much of the town turning up to hear them, which upsets the people in charge of the synagogue who do not want non-Jews and non-converts in their place of worship.
Again you read between the lines in the text and there are two different things going on. One is the feeling that the synagogue is being taken over and/or the leaders are loosing control. The synagogue is possibly being used for unusual or “inappropriate” purposes from the point of view of those in charge. The challenge is to authority and to a closed view by the authorities. The message is one of universal welcome – the Good News is for everyone, not just the few. Christ really did come to turn the world upside down.
The second is that complacency is a bad thing. Christ’s message demands something more than just sticking to the rules and enforcing them. You have to re-examine what those rules mean. You have to view everything you do in the light of Christ’s teachings and change where necessary. You have to keep asking “Is this good enough?” and “Does this really answer the challenge that Christ is placing before me?” and perhaps even, “How does the way I live my life fit with the teachings of Christ?”
And, of course, if healing is not work but a basic and essential activity, if caring for others is an essential duty that is not an “extra” or a task that can be treated like “work”, what does that mean to us in our ordinary lives?
What are we doing about it?
Wednesday, 24 October 2007
Some thoughts on the nature of God
What does it mean to say that we are made in God’s image?
The Bible is very specific about this. It is said twice in Genesis 1: 26-27. It is also repeated in Genesis 5: 1-2.
We are all, women and men, made in God’s image.
It does not mean that we are Gods. It also does not mean that we are exactly like God.
To me it is a clue to God’s nature and a very important signpost to what we are and what we can be.
It is as significant a clue as the revelation that God is three in one, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Trinity reveals three aspects of a God that is beyond out abilities to comprehend. Despite our limits, God has decided to engage directly with us, God understands our limits and provides us with the appropriate means with which to engage with God. God becomes accessible to us through this and despite the mind-blowingly complex idea of the Trinity we can encounter and engage with God in these three aspects of God’s nature more easily than we would if we tried to understand God as a completely abstract or overwhelmingly incomprehensibly powerful and all encompassing being.
It was Christ that brought us to this revelation of the Trinity and He also used one aspect of this Trinity to point us towards the nature of God in ourselves.
By specifically teaching us that we should pray intimately to God, and by illustrating this through His prayer to His Father, and by constantly referring to God in this way, Jesus was adding a new insight into this idea that we are all made in God’s image.
Jesus humanises God in a very particular way – as a loving parent – and points towards this as a way of helping us build a more intimate and effective relationship with God. But He is also telling us to look towards ourselves so that we can discover more about both our own nature and that of God’s.
If we are all made in God’s image and Jesus is revealing to us a new understanding of the Old Testament (both of which are true) then Christ’s teaching of the Trinity tells us that it is helpful to understand our God in this way. And if two of the three aspects of God He reveals to us contain human references there must be aspects of the nature of being both a parent and a child in the image of God that is contained within us.
So, we are pointed towards looking at aspects of ourselves as a way of helping us look more closely at the nature of God.
What is it that is valuable, important, good, nourishing and so on about parenthood and being a child?
I have been pondering on this so much! There are so many aspects of ourselves as human beings that are highlighted when we become parents and there are equally valuable aspects of our human nature that are revealed when we see ourselves as children.
I will not list them all here, but they include elements such as unconditional love, a readiness to forgive and to forgive again, trusting in others, the ability to see the best in others, a deep desire to help others become independent and happy and so on.
Consider this; God is so incomprehensibly awesome and powerful that we can never get to grips with what God is. However, every human being that has ever been and will ever be born holds a tiny fragment - a small but completely true aspect of what God is within them. Even when every human being has lived and the new Kingdom comes, the sum of all our parts will not equal the whole, which is God.
But if we live our lives looking for that aspect of God in everyone we meet, how will that change and transform not only our lives but the lives of everyone we meet?
Through revealing this to us and through the rest of His teachings, Christ points us to something wholly new and enriching. Some people say we should look for Christ in everyone we meet. Perhaps we might see a new aspect of the Trinity every time we make the effort to look.
The Bible is very specific about this. It is said twice in Genesis 1: 26-27. It is also repeated in Genesis 5: 1-2.
We are all, women and men, made in God’s image.
It does not mean that we are Gods. It also does not mean that we are exactly like God.
To me it is a clue to God’s nature and a very important signpost to what we are and what we can be.
It is as significant a clue as the revelation that God is three in one, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Trinity reveals three aspects of a God that is beyond out abilities to comprehend. Despite our limits, God has decided to engage directly with us, God understands our limits and provides us with the appropriate means with which to engage with God. God becomes accessible to us through this and despite the mind-blowingly complex idea of the Trinity we can encounter and engage with God in these three aspects of God’s nature more easily than we would if we tried to understand God as a completely abstract or overwhelmingly incomprehensibly powerful and all encompassing being.
It was Christ that brought us to this revelation of the Trinity and He also used one aspect of this Trinity to point us towards the nature of God in ourselves.
By specifically teaching us that we should pray intimately to God, and by illustrating this through His prayer to His Father, and by constantly referring to God in this way, Jesus was adding a new insight into this idea that we are all made in God’s image.
Jesus humanises God in a very particular way – as a loving parent – and points towards this as a way of helping us build a more intimate and effective relationship with God. But He is also telling us to look towards ourselves so that we can discover more about both our own nature and that of God’s.
If we are all made in God’s image and Jesus is revealing to us a new understanding of the Old Testament (both of which are true) then Christ’s teaching of the Trinity tells us that it is helpful to understand our God in this way. And if two of the three aspects of God He reveals to us contain human references there must be aspects of the nature of being both a parent and a child in the image of God that is contained within us.
So, we are pointed towards looking at aspects of ourselves as a way of helping us look more closely at the nature of God.
What is it that is valuable, important, good, nourishing and so on about parenthood and being a child?
I have been pondering on this so much! There are so many aspects of ourselves as human beings that are highlighted when we become parents and there are equally valuable aspects of our human nature that are revealed when we see ourselves as children.
I will not list them all here, but they include elements such as unconditional love, a readiness to forgive and to forgive again, trusting in others, the ability to see the best in others, a deep desire to help others become independent and happy and so on.
Consider this; God is so incomprehensibly awesome and powerful that we can never get to grips with what God is. However, every human being that has ever been and will ever be born holds a tiny fragment - a small but completely true aspect of what God is within them. Even when every human being has lived and the new Kingdom comes, the sum of all our parts will not equal the whole, which is God.
But if we live our lives looking for that aspect of God in everyone we meet, how will that change and transform not only our lives but the lives of everyone we meet?
Through revealing this to us and through the rest of His teachings, Christ points us to something wholly new and enriching. Some people say we should look for Christ in everyone we meet. Perhaps we might see a new aspect of the Trinity every time we make the effort to look.
Wednesday, 11 April 2007
Just back from pilgrimage and thinking about it.
Most years I write a poem during Easter weekend but this year I have not had time - still working on it. I have a booklet of the best of these poems and reading through them made me think about when it was my turn to lead the whole thing. Seems like a long time ago, now but I was also reminded about this by an old friend, Fabian, during the weekend and he happily recounted the events. I gave him a copy of the poem at the time and he published it in a magazine he was editing then.
The poem was written on Easter Sunday 1988.
Student Cross has an Easter Vigil that starts around 10.30 in the evening and finishes some time between 1 and 2am. Then there is a party which lasts until the last one falls or goes home. On that particular Easter Sunday a few of us walked up to an old railway line above the village and welcomed the dawn. We then drove to the coast and paddled in the sea as the sun began to burn off the sea haze. After than we returned to Walsingham and I treated who ever was left of the group to a cooked breakfast at the Black Lion in Walsingham's Friday Market.
Here is the poem. This and other ones on the theme of Student Cross are in my book, "One more step".
Most years I write a poem during Easter weekend but this year I have not had time - still working on it. I have a booklet of the best of these poems and reading through them made me think about when it was my turn to lead the whole thing. Seems like a long time ago, now but I was also reminded about this by an old friend, Fabian, during the weekend and he happily recounted the events. I gave him a copy of the poem at the time and he published it in a magazine he was editing then.
The poem was written on Easter Sunday 1988.
Student Cross has an Easter Vigil that starts around 10.30 in the evening and finishes some time between 1 and 2am. Then there is a party which lasts until the last one falls or goes home. On that particular Easter Sunday a few of us walked up to an old railway line above the village and welcomed the dawn. We then drove to the coast and paddled in the sea as the sun began to burn off the sea haze. After than we returned to Walsingham and I treated who ever was left of the group to a cooked breakfast at the Black Lion in Walsingham's Friday Market.
Here is the poem. This and other ones on the theme of Student Cross are in my book, "One more step".
Easter 1988
Each moment
had a soft startling beauty
like God’s gentle hand
had stroked the morning
and we watched it purr
The village below us
slept while veils of mist
dressed it in different shades and shapes
perspective kept changing
as we watched the roofs and spires
appear and disappear, appear and disappear
Each tree became itself then merged with grey
and the contours of the land
changed as subtly as a face changes expressions
We were blessed with a sunrise
which added colour constantly
which moved the colours in a gentle drama
working our eyes and hearts
into a chorus of praise
for all that existed on God’s good earth
and especially for this blessed space
called Walsingham.
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