Well this has certainly been some week on the Stock Markets and Banking sector hasn’t it? I cannot claim to understand it – perhaps see Fred who is a banker for more details later if you wish for an explanation (but please bear in mind Freed works on product development and not lending, so please do not blame him too much for the current situation!) What are we to make of it? We could shrug our shoulders and say well, I have not got over £50000 invested in an account, I have not got an account with the Icelandic banks, I am Ok, but that is short-sighted. Anyone with a job that depends on the stock market for finance, those who work for local councils and firms with bank accounts with Iceland – which I am told includes Colchester Borough Council- anyone with a pension, those of you with mortgages, and those of you with any debt, or who have houses affected by the property price crash, anyone whose livelihood or spending pattern will be affected by the predicted worldwide recession. I think that includes all of us. Economists are harking back to the great crash on Wall street stock market in 1929 that led to a decade of world recession and fuelled the political uncertainty that contributed to the rise of totalitarianism in Germany Italy and elsewhere. So we all are or will be affected by this, and we are right to be concerned – if not for ourselves, for our families, for our children, for those around us in much worse position than ourselves. What are we to do?

We could of course resort to the traditional British way of coping and apply the British self-deprecating sense of humour. Humour is a good way of coping with things. According to a leading psychologist Dr Lowis, Jokes can have a psychological benefit for those who tell them. He says “By joking, you use a mental process, so you feel you’ve done something about the situation,” According to the theory of a “just world”, he says, we need to believe, at a subconscious level, that the world is basically an ordered place. But if something happens to challenge that belief “we cope with humour, by joking about what is interfering with that basic belief”.

Here are some of the jokes about the markets going around these days:

Q: What do you say to a banker who can’t lend anything?
A:  a Quarter pounder with fries please
Mcdonalds is the only job they can get!

Q: What is the difference between a pigeon and a merchant banker?
A: A pigeon can still put a deposit on a Ferrari

Q: What is the definition of optimism?
A: An investment banker ironing five shirts on a Sunday night

Q: What is the one thing the Stock Market and the Olympics have in common?
A: Synchronised diving

But humour, great though it is, is a way of saying “ really, the situation should be as it was” – as the psychologist says it is still an ordered world, let’s joke about it and hope it all returns to normal soon.”

Who is responsible for all this? Well I believe this is not the time for recriminations against bankers – please do not give Fred a hard time! History will tell us in due course, but I believe it is the recklessness of lending money to people who could not afford it which is at least one of the main contributing factors. It all seemed Ok on the surface, but when the troubles came, the situation was revealed for what it truly was – houses built on sand like the parable Jesus told about the wise and the foolish builders – when the storms and waves came the house on the sand fell flat, and only those built on the rock stood firm. This is exactly what has happened in the banking markets – banks which have had a conservative lending policy and are backed up with sufficient assets will tend to whether this storm – those who lent recklessly will not. The storm of this crisis will sort out banks whose foundations are weak.

It is so easy, isn’t it, to point the finger and say “it is obvious now”.  But let us for a moment turn our attention away from the storms in the financial markets and look at the storms in the moral climate of this country and the world, for in my view they are related. There is an increasing disregard for the message of the Christian faith – anyone who stands up for it is called a bigot, narrow minded and exclusive. There is an increasing level of selfishness and consumerism, what I want matters, wrapped up in plausible terms of individual choice, binge drinking, internet pornography, I could go on and on. In the passage just before our epistle reading from Philippians Paul writes as follows:
Php 3:17 ¶ Brothers and sisters, join in imitating me, and observe those who live according to the example you have in us.
18 For many live as enemies of the cross of Christ; I have often told you of them, and now I tell you even with tears.
19 Their end is destruction; their god is the belly; and their glory is in their shame; their minds are set on earthly things.

Earthly things; themselves; the god of selfish consumerism. Things have not changed have they? Human nature does not change. But God has brought about a change in those who have put their faith in Jesus Christ.

20 But our citizenship is in heaven, and it is from there that we are expecting a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Our rock, our security is in God himself, who has made us his children through what Jesus has done, and now, we those who have faith in Christ are now no longer citizens of the earth, with all its problems and weakness; our citizenship is in heaven.

What is your address?  I have two addresses – one is the Vicarage 88 Chignal Road, Chelmsford, the other is heaven! My home is in heaven, with Jesus. “This world is not my home, I’m just passin through” as the negro spiritual goes.
What is the consequence of that? Anything that happens to me on earth is ultimately of little importance compared with that. Sickness, financial ruin, loss of friends, family livelihood, anything is now of secondary importance because my security is in heaven, being with Jesus. Not because of what I have done, but because of what Jesus has done for me on the cross.

Listen to this story which will be in next month’s magazine by Chuck Colson.
‘When I arrived at the reception desk, I was greeted by a nurse—a lovely woman—who had an enormous smile on her face. A fellow believer, she told me she had been waiting at the desk to meet me. As we talked, I asked her how she was handling things. She said her husband had been heavily invested in property. When the housing market melted down, they lost everything they had—their home, cars, retirement, everything. And she—she appeared to be her 40s—had to go back to work to support the family. When she finished, she looked at me with a radiant smile and said, “It’s been tough, but I have no fear. The Lord has a plan for me. I am totally at peace.” … Nobody who encounters this woman’s trust in God would ever deny the power of faith. While many are walking around wringing their hands, she is living with “unutterable and exalted joy.” That kind of faith changes a person, convinces the sceptic, and provides a stunning witness to God’s love in Christ—even in tough times.’

That is the faith that Paul is talking about in Philippians, absolute trust in Jesus – the storms can come and go, but their house of faith, built on the rock of Jesus’ word stands firm.

So then, with our faith in God secure, with faith that our citizenship is in heaven,
how then should we live?
Paul answers this with our reading from Philippians 4 which follows on.
1 Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved.

Stand firm in faith. When troubles come, when worry starts to get hold of you or your family, stand firm in the faith. Stand firm. Encourage each other, tell each other your stories of faith. Tell of answered prayer, of anxieties lifted, of consolation in difficult times. Stand firm in your prayers, even when you do not feel like it. Keep going. Have the same kind of faith that Churchill did when facing the ordeal of the early days of the Second World War. Churchill had an unconquerable belief that he would save his country, it was his destiny. That was rock solid faith

Here is an extract from a speech he gave to Harrow school pupils in 1941.
Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never--in nothing, great or small, large or petty--never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.

We however, have a rock solid belief in our destiny – as citizens of heaven in Christ Jesus.

How then shall we stand firm?

1. Unity
2 I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord.
3 Yes, and I ask you also, my loyal companion, help these women, for they have struggled beside me in the work of the gospel, together with Clement and the rest of my co-workers, whose names are in the book of life.
These two ladies Eudia and Syntche had fallen out, but were committed Christians.
Paul seeks to remind them if their unity in Christ.
Are we together as a church? Are we of the same mind? Do we really all have the same hope of heaven in Jesus Christ? If we have, then the petty disagreements and niggles that we sometimes have pale into insignificance when we consider what Christ has done for us, and the nature of the task ahead of us together as a church. We must be united in faith – not just a soggy, fluffy unity of let’s all be jolly nice to one another. No our unity is because we are not nice, it is because we are sinners who have been saved by the grace of Jesus and it is in Him, and in Him alone that our unity depends. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus Paul writes elsewhere. These two ladies Eudia and Syntche had fallen out, but were committed Christians.
What is the result of that Unity? Peace with each other

2. Thankful prayer
4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.
5 Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near.
6 Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.

Praise and rejoicing in God, in what he has done for us, in who he is, and then let Him into your life – let his love change and transform you. Rest in that love, and because of that do not worry, be secure in Him, make your requests known to God,
What is the result of thankful prayer?
7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

3 Discipline in thought and action
8 Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
9 Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me,
How many of you are troubled by thoughts which are unpure and untrue, not honourable. We all have them – it is part of human nature. But we do not have to dwell on them – we can choose to think on things that are good instead. To do so requires a certain discipline on mind, that we will think right thoughts. Martin Luther – we cannot stop birds flying around our head, but we can stop them building nests in our hair. Discipline in doing what is right
9 Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me,

What is the result of this discipline in thought and action?
and the God of peace will be with you.

Are you worried about world events, are you concerned – we all should be concerned, but let us not worry. Let us put our faith in Jesus, the one who is in heaven, who has made us citizens of heaven. Let us not worry about money- remember Jesus command Lu 12:33 Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.

Our citizenship is in heaven, therefore we are to stand firm in the faith in Jesus. How should we live?
We stand firm in unity with each other
We stand firm in thankful prayer
We stand firm in our thoughts
And the result is peace with God – peace the world cannot give – peace that others will want and will ask how can you have peace when all around is chaos, credit crunch, recession. We can say, because we belong to Jesus, heaven is our home, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, we now stand firm in Jesus, on the solid rock of his word. As Churchill said
Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never--in nothing, great or small, large or petty--never give in, never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.

1 Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved.

My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly trust in Jesus’ Name.

On Christ the solid Rock I stand,
All other ground is sinking sand;

Well this has certainly been some week on the Stock Markets and Banking sector hasn’t it? I cannot claim to understand it – perhaps see Fred who is a banker for more details later if you wish for an explanation (but please bear in mind Freed works on product development and not lending, so please do not blame him too much for the current situation!) What are we to make of it? We could shrug our shoulders and say well, I have not got over £50000 invested in an account, I have not got an account with the Icelandic banks, I am Ok, but that is short-sighted. Anyone with a job that depends on the stock market for finance, those who work for local councils and firms with bank accounts with Iceland – which I am told includes Colchester Borough Council- anyone with a pension, those of you with mortgages, and those of you with any debt, or who have houses affected by the property price crash, anyone whose livelihood or spending pattern will be affected by the predicted worldwide recession. I think that includes all of us. Economists are harking back to the great crash on Wall street stock market in 1929 that led to a decade of world recession and fuelled the political uncertainty that contributed to the rise of totalitarianism in Germany Italy and elsewhere. So we all are or will be affected by this, and we are right to be concerned – if not for ourselves, for our families, for our children, for those around us in much worse position than ourselves. What are we to do?

We could of course resort to the traditional British way of coping and apply the British self-deprecating sense of humour. Humour is a good way of coping with things. According to a leading psychologist Dr Lowis, Jokes can have a psychological benefit for those who tell them. He says “By joking, you use a mental process, so you feel you’ve done something about the situation,” According to the theory of a “just world”, he says, we need to believe, at a subconscious level, that the world is basically an ordered place. But if something happens to challenge that belief “we cope with humour, by joking about what is interfering with that basic belief”.

Here are some of the jokes about the markets going around these days:

Q: What do you say to a banker who can’t lend anything?
A:  a Quarter pounder with fries please
Mcdonalds is the only job they can get!

Q: What is the difference between a pigeon and a merchant banker?
A: A pigeon can still put a deposit on a Ferrari

Q: What is the definition of optimism?
A: An investment banker ironing five shirts on a Sunday night

Q: What is the one thing the Stock Market and the Olympics have in common?
A: Synchronised diving

But humour, great though it is, is a way of saying “ really, the situation should be as it was” – as the psychologist says it is still an ordered world, let’s joke about it and hope it all returns to normal soon.”

Who is responsible for all this? Well I believe this is not the time for recriminations against bankers – please do not give Fred a hard time! History will tell us in due course, but I believe it is the recklessness of lending money to people who could not afford it which is at least one of the main contributing factors. It all seemed Ok on the surface, but when the troubles came, the situation was revealed for what it truly was – houses built on sand like the parable Jesus told about the wise and the foolish builders – when the storms and waves came the house on the sand fell flat, and only those built on the rock stood firm. This is exactly what has happened in the banking markets – banks which have had a conservative lending policy and are backed up with sufficient assets will tend to whether this storm – those who lent recklessly will not. The storm of this crisis will sort out banks whose foundations are weak.

It is so easy, isn’t it, to point the finger and say “it is obvious now”.  But let us for a moment turn our attention away from the storms in the financial markets and look at the storms in the moral climate of this country and the world, for in my view they are related. There is an increasing disregard for the message of the Christian faith – anyone who stands up for it is called a bigot, narrow minded and exclusive. There is an increasing level of selfishness and consumerism, what I want matters, wrapped up in plausible terms of individual choice, binge drinking, internet pornography, I could go on and on. In the passage just before our epistle reading from Philippians Paul writes as follows:
Php 3:17 ¶ Brothers and sisters, join in imitating me, and observe those who live according to the example you have in us.
18 For many live as enemies of the cross of Christ; I have often told you of them, and now I tell you even with tears.
19 Their end is destruction; their god is the belly; and their glory is in their shame; their minds are set on earthly things.

Earthly things; themselves; the god of selfish consumerism. Things have not changed have they? Human nature does not change. But God has brought about a change in those who have put their faith in Jesus Christ.

20 But our citizenship is in heaven, and it is from there that we are expecting a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Our rock, our security is in God himself, who has made us his children through what Jesus has done, and now, we those who have faith in Christ are now no longer citizens of the earth, with all its problems and weakness; our citizenship is in heaven.

What is your address?  I have two addresses – one is the Vicarage 88 Chignal Road, Chelmsford, the other is heaven! My home is in heaven, with Jesus. “This world is not my home, I’m just passin through” as the negro spiritual goes.
What is the consequence of that? Anything that happens to me on earth is ultimately of little importance compared with that. Sickness, financial ruin, loss of friends, family livelihood, anything is now of secondary importance because my security is in heaven, being with Jesus. Not because of what I have done, but because of what Jesus has done for me on the cross.

Listen to this story which will be in next month’s magazine by Chuck Colson.
‘When I arrived at the reception desk, I was greeted by a nurse—a lovely woman—who had an enormous smile on her face. A fellow believer, she told me she had been waiting at the desk to meet me. As we talked, I asked her how she was handling things. She said her husband had been heavily invested in property. When the housing market melted down, they lost everything they had—their home, cars, retirement, everything. And she—she appeared to be her 40s—had to go back to work to support the family. When she finished, she looked at me with a radiant smile and said, “It’s been tough, but I have no fear. The Lord has a plan for me. I am totally at peace.” … Nobody who encounters this woman’s trust in God would ever deny the power of faith. While many are walking around wringing their hands, she is living with “unutterable and exalted joy.” That kind of faith changes a person, convinces the sceptic, and provides a stunning witness to God’s love in Christ—even in tough times.’

That is the faith that Paul is talking about in Philippians, absolute trust in Jesus – the storms can come and go, but their house of faith, built on the rock of Jesus’ word stands firm.

So then, with our faith in God secure, with faith that our citizenship is in heaven,
how then should we live?
Paul answers this with our reading from Philippians 4 which follows on.
1 Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved.

Stand firm in faith. When troubles come, when worry starts to get hold of you or your family, stand firm in the faith. Stand firm. Encourage each other, tell each other your stories of faith. Tell of answered prayer, of anxieties lifted, of consolation in difficult times. Stand firm in your prayers, even when you do not feel like it. Keep going. Have the same kind of faith that Churchill did when facing the ordeal of the early days of the Second World War. Churchill had an unconquerable belief that he would save his country, it was his destiny. That was rock solid faith

Here is an extract from a speech he gave to Harrow school pupils in 1941.
Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never--in nothing, great or small, large or petty--never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.

We however, have a rock solid belief in our destiny – as citizens of heaven in Christ Jesus.

How then shall we stand firm?

1. Unity
2 I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord.
3 Yes, and I ask you also, my loyal companion, help these women, for they have struggled beside me in the work of the gospel, together with Clement and the rest of my co-workers, whose names are in the book of life.
These two ladies Eudia and Syntche had fallen out, but were committed Christians.
Paul seeks to remind them if their unity in Christ.
Are we together as a church? Are we of the same mind? Do we really all have the same hope of heaven in Jesus Christ? If we have, then the petty disagreements and niggles that we sometimes have pale into insignificance when we consider what Christ has done for us, and the nature of the task ahead of us together as a church. We must be united in faith – not just a soggy, fluffy unity of let’s all be jolly nice to one another. No our unity is because we are not nice, it is because we are sinners who have been saved by the grace of Jesus and it is in Him, and in Him alone that our unity depends. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus Paul writes elsewhere. These two ladies Eudia and Syntche had fallen out, but were committed Christians.
What is the result of that Unity? Peace with each other

2. Thankful prayer
4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.
5 Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near.
6 Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.

Praise and rejoicing in God, in what he has done for us, in who he is, and then let Him into your life – let his love change and transform you. Rest in that love, and because of that do not worry, be secure in Him, make your requests known to God,
What is the result of thankful prayer?
7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

3 Discipline in thought and action
8 Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
9 Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me,
How many of you are troubled by thoughts which are unpure and untrue, not honourable. We all have them – it is part of human nature. But we do not have to dwell on them – we can choose to think on things that are good instead. To do so requires a certain discipline on mind, that we will think right thoughts. Martin Luther – we cannot stop birds flying around our head, but we can stop them building nests in our hair. Discipline in doing what is right
9 Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me,

What is the result of this discipline in thought and action?
and the God of peace will be with you.

Are you worried about world events, are you concerned – we all should be concerned, but let us not worry. Let us put our faith in Jesus, the one who is in heaven, who has made us citizens of heaven. Let us not worry about money- remember Jesus command Lu 12:33 Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.

Our citizenship is in heaven, therefore we are to stand firm in the faith in Jesus. How should we live?
We stand firm in unity with each other
We stand firm in thankful prayer
We stand firm in our thoughts
And the result is peace with God – peace the world cannot give – peace that others will want and will ask how can you have peace when all around is chaos, credit crunch, recession. We can say, because we belong to Jesus, heaven is our home, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, we now stand firm in Jesus, on the solid rock of his word. As Churchill said
Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never--in nothing, great or small, large or petty--never give in, never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.

1 Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved.

My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly trust in Jesus’ Name.

On Christ the solid Rock I stand,
All other ground is sinking sand;

KISS

Whenever I ask my mother about one of my sermons, she also replies with the following word: K.I.S.S.
KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID
KEEP IT SIMPLE
We try to make the Christian faith so complicated sometimes, as if there are many things we have to learn, and sometimes when we have our communion service there are three bits of paper and a hymn book, and we go back and forth from these – to those who know what they are doing it is easy, but it seems very complicated to those who have just come. And yet the Christian faith, at its heart is very simple – When the disciples came to Jesus and asked him who the greatest in the kingdom of heaven was, Jesus took a young child and stood it among them and then Jesus said
"Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.  Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.” ( Matt 18:3-5)

The Christian faith is something that has taxed the greatest minds in its depth, and profundity, however it is very simple at heart. There is the story of one of the greatest Christian thinkers of the 20th Century, the Swiss theologian called Karl Barth. He was once asked by a journalist what his most profound thought on the Christian faith had been. He replied “ it is this:
‘Jesus loves me this I know, for the bible tells me so.”

The simple truth is that “God loves you” He loves you. He loves you. He loves you so much that he brought you into being – your parents had a part to play in it, but you were in the mind of God even before you were thought of by them. God wanted you in the world. He loves you, and he wants you to know Him and love Him too. We however do not do what we should – we go wrong, we make mistakes, we disobey, we behave wrongly and selfishly. But God loves us so much that he gave his own son Jesus to die for us – we could do nothing about making ourselves good – God did it with Jesus

As the song ‘There is a green hill far away goes, ‘
there was no other good enough to pay the price of sin, he only could unlock the gates of heaven and let us in.

So we just have to accept that God loves us, and Jesus died for us, and then with that in mind, humbly live the Christian life, and trust God to lead us and guide us.

As the hymn goes on
So dearly, dearly has he loved and we must love him too, and trust in his redeeming blood and try his works to do.

It really is that simple, believe in the love of God who created you and sent Jesus to die for you, believe that in his love he wants you to know Him and be guided by him in your life, to live the life that God wants for you, loving him and loving those around you. It is really that simple.

I wonder if we could try something here now. Could you all just sit still for a minute – get comfortable, hands by your sides or on your laps, relax, now, close your eyes for a bit – just for a minute. Trust me. Think of God’s love for you and for others, and just for 30 seconds, say quietly to yourself “God loves me”

Now open your eyes, look around you, at the people next to you, then close your eyes again and say to your self God loves Fred, or Mary – two people either side of you

Now open your eyes, and look at the cross up there, think of God’s love for you in Jesus, and now close your eyes and try to say a prayer for yourself and for the persons next to you, or for someone you are concerned about.

Now, open your eyes, look at all the harvest gifts, think of God’s love for you, for others, think of where the gifts are going, close your eyes, and thank God for these gifts and thank God for the people they are going to – the children in orphanages, old people’s homes. Handicapped people, thank God you have had a part to play in sharing God’s love with them. Thank God that his love for them is just the same as His love for you

Now just thank God again and say to yourself – God loves me.
Now open your eyes Look around you and come back
How does that feel? What were you thinking about when we were doing that?
How easy was it to pray for others, how easy was it to thank God for his love?

If you found that helpful, please try that in your own prayer times – think of God’s love and just surround yourself with it, and then in that love think of others and pray for them.

Does that not make prayer a bit easier – now I am not for a moment claiming that this is the be all and end all of prayer – there is much more to it than that, but at its heart it is very simple. This is what Jesus is talking about in our reading, teaching on the Lord’s prayer

Our father, God our loving father, start with this, have this in your mind as you pray. Do you really think that as you pray you are trying to get the attention of a God who is only too eager to trick you or be angry with you?

How many of you are parents? X if Y came to you and asked you for an egg for tea would you give him/her a snake? NO? You would do your best for him/her. Are you a perfect father? No? But if you who are imperfect know how to give good gifts, how much more would God, who is perfect give to you. So just trust him as your heavenly father. In that trust pray, and in that trust, be thankful for all he gives to you.

In the Christian faith, prayer is not like a magic Harry Potter wand – we sometimes do not get what we want, sometimes things do not work out as we wish, sometimes we go through difficult and sad times. But God’s love is with us at all times. We must simply trust and be thankful for what we do know, and not worry so much about what we do not know.
We must simply trust and be thankful for what we do know, and not worry so much about what we do not know.

Today is harvest, and today we come in thankfulness for all God gives us, and we come wanting to make that known by giving something to those in need in Bulgaria. It is not everything that these people need. It will not solve the problems of the world’s hunger. But it makes a difference, God sees it and is pleased.

There is the old story of the man walking on a beach where thousands of starfish had been washed up by the tide – and these starfish would die if they were not returned to the water. The man started picking one up and throwing it back into the water. Someone asked him, what are you doing that for – you will never manage to throw all of these starfish back, The man said , no that is true, but I can make a difference to this starfish, and to this one and to this one. That is like what we are doing here – in our own small simple way, we are saying thank you to God for his love for us, thank you to God for those, and saying that we want to make a difference in our world.

The problems of the global economy at the moment, with the credit crunch are immense and I do not pretend to understand it. We can look at that and say, it is all too big, I cannot do anything. But that is wrong. We must just say to ourselves. Let us keep it simple . Let us just rejoice in God’s love, and trust in him for our lives, and then in that love pray for our world, in thankfulness and hope.

I want to end with a story I heard from a Roman Catholic priest who was called to the bedside of a parishioner who was dying. She said to the priest. What is the most important thing about the faith. The priest replied “God loves you”. What else is there. The priest replied “ You love Him”, “I know that” said the woman, “but is there anything else?” “No” said the priest, “ that is about it.” “Yes,” said the woman “ I thought so” and she died in peace.

Keep it simple, stupid.

God loves you, God loves all people, thank Him for that love, and then do what you can to share that love
Jesus loves me this I know, for the bible tells me so.

Prayer
We thank Thee, then, O Father,
For all things bright and good;
The seedtime and the harvest,
Our life, our health, our food.
No gifts have we to offer
For all Thy love imparts,
But that which Thou desirest,
Our humble, thankful hearts.

All good gifts around us
Are sent from heaven above;
Then thank the Lord, O thank the Lord,
For all His love.

SI Paul?

P Yes

SI Is that it?

P Is “what” it?

SI Is that all there is for a sermon?

P I don’t feel like preaching today

SI But we are all expecting you to speak.

P I don’t feel it is my place to speak, after all, some of you might not agree with what I am saying, and so I think I just keep my thoughts to myself. After all you might not love me if I have to say things you do not like.
SI Paul, you are the vicar and we need you to speak to us, whether we agree with it or not. It is much more unloving to refuse to speak to us than to keep quiet. Now get into that pulpit and start speaking to us!

I suppose I had better start speaking to you all hadn’t I? After all, I am your vicar and to be silent with you would not be right – after all I should have something to say. Last Monday was the fifth anniversary of my licensing here at St Andrew’s and we have been through a lot together over those five years. We have got to know each other – we have travelled together on the journey of faith, with some ups and downs. Some of you have seen the joys and some have seen some of the sorrows as well. And we have established a relationship with each other.

In some relationships, there are times when our love and knowledge of each other is so deep that we do not need to use words, we can be silent with each other. We can sometimes have that sort of feeling in church with a very deep silence before God and it is wonderful when it happens like that. It shows a great depth of understanding. There is the story of the Cure D’ars who sees a peasant going into church for half an hour each day. He asks the peasant what do you say to God when you go into church. The peasant replied. Oh nothing, I look at him on the cross, and he looks at me, and we are happy together! That is a wonderful depth of relationship in which we can be silent together. Sometimes in prayer we use too many words, that is what Jesus called vain repetition, thinking that the more we say the more God will listen. We should not use too many words in a relationship. My Mum had a friend called Marjorie who when she came to stay, never stopped talking- and talking at you. I hope my Mum won’t mind me saying this, but once Mum and Marjorie was out for a day trip, and Marjorie was really talking at her for all her worth, and then Mum went into a public toilet and thought, at last a bit of peace, and then Marjorie took the stall next to her and continued the conversation where she left off! It is nice sometimes to be silent and have a bit of peace! So I am not knocking silence.

However in most relationships silences are not a sign of peace or deep love – they are a sign of a problem with a relationship. I remember a car journey once which took five hours and I was giving someone a lift back, and we had gone out with each other very briefly, then split up, and at the time of the car she was going out with someone else. The journey was agony, with very little we could say to each other – have you ever been in a situation like that. I am a great fan of Father Ted, and one of the episodes is of a Father Stone who comes to stay with Ted, Dougal and Jack every August. He hardly says a word, answers in monosyllabic grunts and conversation or relationship is virtually impossible. It is a very funny story because all of us, I am sure have been in situations like that where we just cannot find the right words to say and the silences are desperately painful and embarrassing. It can happen in relationships – even sometimes in marriages or families where the members have just grown apart – there is a famous example of Margaret Thatcher who as many of you know was a grocers daughter who went to Oxford, became a chemist then a barrister, married a successful businessman, then became an MP and then a minister and then Prime minister. She tellingly said once. “After a while, my mother and I ran out of things to say to one another.” Perhaps it was because her mother- a grocer’s wife in Grantham, Lincolnshire- just could not relate to the world Margaret Thatcher moved in – whatever the problem it showed that the relationship of mother and daughter was not in a good state. The silences between them were not a sign of strength but of weakness. Neither of them perhaps could make the effort to bridge the gap so their conversations were stilted and not very real.

I wonder what our conversations and our silences tell about the quality of our relationships – with our spouses, our families, our friends our fellow believers in the church. Is our conversation superficial or is it real. When we share the peace and say “the peace of the Lord be always with you” do we really mean it? Now God is not asking us to be best friends with everyone and be outgoing and jolly to all. Some of you, I know find that part of the service difficult. I understand that. We are all different temperaments, some more reserved, some more outgoing. There are some people we get on with better than others, that is normal and right. There is a famous saying which is very true “The gospel does not call us to like everyone, but to love everyone” To like is dependent on our character, our tastes and that is a legitimate part of us. We may have views- they may disagree with our views - that is fine. But we must love everyone, wanting the best for them, seeing the best in them forgiving as we would want to be forgiven, treating them the way they would like to be treated. The gospel calls us to love everyone, not to like them.

This is what Paul is writing about in our epistle from Romans
8 Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.  The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet”; and any other commandment, are summed up in this word, “Love your neighbour as yourself.”
Love does no wrong to a neighbour; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.

This is what Paul commands – love, not a great feeling of emotion, but practical outworking of what is called agape love, selfless giving, thinking of the other person before yourself – as one Red Indian writer put it, do not judge a man until you have walked a mile in his moccasins. Even if we do not like a person, we can still be civil to them, take an interest in what they are saying, encourage them, speak to them. But sadly so often we avoid people we do not like, perhaps they bring up in us feelings we would rather not admit to. One day a man called John was praying to God
“ Lord, please do something about Roger. He brings out the worst in me.” The Lord replied, “ Yes that what he is there for, to get the worst out of you!” You see the Lord did not like John’s judgemental attitude and that was what really had to change, not Roger!

For a relationship to be real, there needs to be communication- not stilted, not forced, but communication that comes from a heart of love, a love that wants to see then best in someone, that wants to engage with them. Silence is sometimes an enemy of this. It can sometimes be a sign of a broken relationship. Who among you has ever had to deal with a stroppy child who when being told off, is silent and glares at you. Listen to this poem by Adrian Mitchell

I am big for ten years old, maybe that is why they get at me
Teachers, Parents cops, Always getting at me.
When they get at me
I don’t hit ‘em, They can do you for that
I don’t swear at ‘em, They can do you for that
I stick my hands in my pockets and stare at them
And while I stare at them, I think about vomit.
They call it dumb insolence
They don’t like it, But they can’t do you for it.

The silence there is actually an act of aggression – psychologists call it passive aggression. Have you ever known someone like that. All smiles on the surface, but underneath they are boiling angry, but they never actually tell you they are angry – if they did explode, then that would be nasty, unchristian. So they keep silent instead. Is that silence an act of love? No it is not. It is actually saying, I do not want to have to explain myself to you, even if you are hurting or upsetting me, I will be the martyr, the really Christian one, so very humble and take it as my burden in life. Is that true Christian humility – not a bit of it, it is a form of pride, the sort Uriah Heep in David Copperfield had – so very ‘umble.

It does not lead to reality in our relationships with one another, and I would go as far to say that it corrodes the sort of relationships that God wants us to have in the church, the body of Christ. Silence here is a weapon, saying I will not engage with you and that sort of silence is wrong, as it leads to resentment and bitterness which if unexpressed, can go on for years, lead to feuds. One of our friends has not spoken to a member of her family for years because of an incident where there was a misunderstanding, and I am sure you know of incidents like this. The silence between them is not a healthy silence.

There will always be things we do not agree with, people who rub us up the wrong way, this is life. It is comforting in some way to realise that Jesus’ own disciples fell out from time to time. This is why Jesus has to give some of his strongest, and I would say most ignored teaching here in our gospel reading Matthew 18:15-20. I would say most ignored because if Matthew 18:15-20 were applied by Christians I doubt whether we would have seen a half or a quarter of the splits and factions that have taken place in the last 2000 years of church history. Most church splits are not about doctrine or about religious practice, they are about personality clashes, and the consequent fall-outs with people not speaking to one another. They are about problems being stored up for years and not addressed, then suddenly there is the eruption and the split happens. It happened in my home church in Shrewsbury 11 years ago so I do know what I am talking about. The relationships were not good, but nothing was done about the issues then an incident happened which exposed the split that had been there for ages. If Matthew 18 had been followed, there would never had been anything like the problem that we had. What do the scriptures teach us?
15 “If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one.
16 But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses.
17 If the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.

If a member sins against you, go to them on your own. Do not keep silent. Go to them. But is that not unchristian to accuse and point the finger at them. NO, if you do it right. If you accuse and say you are in the wrong, then maybe that shuts down discussion. How about saying. “You may not realise this, but when you did this, I was Upset, because I felt hurt and left out” That is courteous, it takes responsibility for your own feelings and gives the other person the opportunity to respond. It is on your own, privately, so there is no embarrassment or humiliation. Hopefully if initiates a conversation and clears the air so you can have a proper relationship again. If the person does not listen, then that is the time to share it with another trusted friend, perhaps myself or a member of the leadership team, and then you go again with them to speak, if that does not work, then it is a matter of church discipline, because the other person is not behaving in a way that is conducive to church harmony and fellowship. The aim of the conversation is always to be reconciled. Sometimes it is not possible – the other person will not listen, Scripture says, as far as it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with one another.

This reconciling love is an active love – go to the other person, do not wait for them to come to you. Do not keep silent, go and talk to them. Pray about it first, remember the God of reconciliation of forgiveness who has reconciled and forgiven you is with you. It can be very scary at first, but after you have done it a few times it becomes much easier and gives us confidence in ourselves.

Silence can be a wonderful thing, so deep with groans and cries too deep for words as Paul puts it. But it can also be a sign of something being very wrong in our relationships.

Even if I did not feel like preaching to you today, it was my duty as your vicar to do so. I must communicate with you, even if you disagree with what I have to say. I hope if you do disagree with me you will actually come and talk to me, and not just pass me at the door and say lovely word vicar! If we are truly to be the people God wants, then we must talk to one another, even if we do not like each other. We must communicate with one another. And I have to say this, If we have something against someone else – because of something they have said and done and it is bothering us, then we must go and talk to them. This is a command of the Lord Jesus himself. He says this because he knows the price of silence is too high – resentment and stilted relationships, dumb insolence, and eventually this stops the body of Christ from functioning as it should. God wants us to grow in our love for Him and for each other. So let us make the effort and try to talk to one another, sort out any problems we have in love and learn to really love each other, seeing the best in each other, encouraging each other in our walk with God.

Silence is golden, but as the BT advert once said. “It is good to talk”

Responding to God’s grace

I know that some of the children here are in the middle of their GCSE’s Grace and Rebecca, and we hope that they do their best I think Linda has said that by this week the worst is over. I am sure it has been a stressful time in their households, for parents and for those who are teachers too. I remember taking my exams, and some fo you will remember your children going through them too. It is great to think that the children have reached this level of maturity to take GCSE’s – learning things that we never could understand – I remember the day when my Dad said – I cannot help you with your Maths, it is beyond me. Dad worked with statistics all his life, and could help at first, but got to the point where all he could do was stand back and encourage – I am sure that is how many parent’s feel, and I know that there is a certain pride in what the children have achieved. Some children will achieve very good grades and go on to further education, some may not do so, all that matters is that they make the best of what they have.

Now cast your mind back to the day you first either went to school, or took your children to school, how did you feel – a great sense of apprehension – you had to leave your child in the hands of others – you had to admit that their education is better served by others teaching them. It is a hard thing to do, but it is necessary. Education is a process of many steps, lots of foundation work, then lots of building blocks, building upon building, until at last the children are ready (hopefully) to take GCSE’s A levels degrees and beyond. Now, suppose that I turned up at your child’s first day at school and presented them with the GCSE paper in English and Mathematics that Grace and Rebecca have just been sitting. Suppose I said, this is the sort of thing that your child will be aiming at in 11 years time. You would be scared, and very worried – how on earth is my child going to learn all that? Thankfully that is not the way that Education works. You get told what you need to know – every term now we get a summary of the learning goals for Matthew and Hannah – what they will be learning, what the school expects at the end of the term – one stage at a time, but it is very clear that the school is working to a plan, albeit that the plan is not revealed to the children or the parents until they need to know it – it is a matter of trust – trust that the school knows what it is doing, the education process will work, they will take account of the individual needs of a child, and that over time, the child will learn to the best of their ability, if they co-operate with the process.

How are children chosen for education – on their merits at 4? I know we do have testing in schools and that is quite a controversial subject at the moment, but testing is only to provide benchmarks and guidance as to how it is going. There is no testing of ability at 4, all have a right to free education up to the age of 16 or beyond. It is not even that you are tested at 11 to see whether you can go on to senior school, there may be tests to see which school, or streaming into different ability sets to aid the education process when you are there, but you have a right to go forward in education at least until 16.
You are not chosen for education up to the age of 16 on the basis of merit, or on what you have done, or on how well you respond to education, you are just chosen because of who you are – a child living in this country. Here is nothing a child has to do to earn the right to education – that right has already been won for you by campaigners and politicians and it is now enshrined in Law – the 1944 Education Act, and other legislation. Education is in one sense a gift that comes to all, not something we have to earn by our own efforts.

Now let us think for a moment about our lives – did we ask to be born? No. Did we do anything to deserve to be born. No. Did we have to earn our parent’s love? No. Of course we have to try to learn from pour parents and do what they say, as they guide us, but their love is not conditional upon our obedience is it? No. Love and acceptance as part of the family is the parents’ gift to their children.
Now we are children of God. God has loved us from the beginning, we are created in love for relationship with Him. As the psalmist says,
Ps 139:14-15
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; that I know very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes beheld my unformed substance. In your book were written all the days that were formed for me, when none of them as yet existed.

The love of God freely given before we were born – do we earn that love? No. Is that love ever going to be dependent on what we do? No. It is just there. It is God’s choice of us based on his love. As Paul writes in Ephesians 1:4 he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love.

God’s love and his choice of us, purely on his love that comes before anything we do. This choice of us can be summed up in one word – what is that word? It’s Grace

Grace; grace means God’s acceptance of us, purely on his unmerited favour, just as a child is accepted by its parents on its unmerited favour. It is loved because it is one of the family. Our response to that love and grace is one of joyful obedience, but discussion of that response is perhaps for another day. What I want you all to realise and get hold of today is that you are accepted and loved by God by grace. He loves you – he loves you- he loves you. You are special to God, you are unique, and there will never be another like you, and you have been created for a purpose and a plan that God has just for you. We’ll come to the plan a bit later, but for the moment, just hold on to the fact of God’s grace.

Maybe you are saying to yourself, but I’m not good enough for that. You are in one sense right – you are not, neither am I, neither is anyone. The bible makes that clear – In Romans (3:23) Paul writes
For there is no distinction, since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; That is what sin means – missing the mark, missing the target – we all have every one of us, there is no hope for us if we are to be accepted on our merits. But thanks be to God, we are not accepted by God on our merits, but on the merits of Jesus Christ who has died for us – the passage goes on “they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,”
Accepted by grace as a gift, God takes the initiative – he makes our acceptance his problem not ours – we are accepted because of all that Jesus Christ ahs done for us on the cross – in dying in our place for our sins, by his resurrection from the dead, showing the victory over sin, we are accepted by the unmerited favour of God in Christ. The technical term is prevenient grace – in Latin pre means before, venio means to come- prevenient grace is grace that comes before anything we can do to deserve it.

Do you understand this – because it is very important that you do. We can look at our Christian lives, rather like the child at their first day at school, wondering how we are ever going to pass our GCSE Maths paper. I’ll never be able to do it, I will just fail, and then we can think, my teacher won’t like me if I do not succeed, If I do not try, then I cannot fail. We are sometimes put off trying by the fear of failure, the fear of rejection. We can be like that in our Christian lives can’t we when we encounter something we do not quite understand, or know about, or we see someone doing something and we say, well I could never do that, pray in public, preach, what happens if I failed? We have to be very clear that our acceptance in the Christian life is not on what we do, but on who we are in Christ, beloved children of God. We are called to a life of growing in the Christian faith, to a life of maturity as Paul puts it, or fruitfulness – you are the vine we are the branches – then we’ll grow in your love then we’ll go in your name. Our growth is all of grace, and in cooperating with our teacher – Jesus, through the Holy Spirit.

How were you called into a life of faith? Was it on your merits? On your intellectual gifts? On your good works? NO, it was on God’s grace wasn’t it?
Look at our bible readings today – Abraham called to a life of faith, of obedience, and God makes a covenant with him.
1 Now the LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.
2 I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed."

Where is the part of this passage that Says that Abraham deserved this? It is not there. It was God’s grace. This what Paul is writing about in our second reading
13 For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith.
14 If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void.
15 For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.
16 For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us,

Do you believe in God – do you deserve this faith, do deserve the love of God? Yes or No? No. Then you and I are descendants of Abraham who did not deserve his faith, but responded in faith to God’s love and grace. The promise rests on grace

Now what does this mean for us? Does this mean that because it is all of grace that we can just sit back and rest? No it does not – to use our schools analogy again, your have the right to a free education, but to get the best out of it you have to engage with the process. Everyone has that right, but only those who co-operate with it will benefit. If you decide that having learned to read and write and add up, ( 3 R’s) that is all you are ever going to learn, then there is very little any teacher can do with you. They can say to you – there is a whole world of learning out there for you, if only you can apply yourself to it, but they cannot make a child learn. Little by little as a child grows up and goes through school, there will be lots of lessons and experiences which give the child confidence to go on to the next step, until eventually they are ready to take their GCSE’s, A levels, degrees, or whatever. And from there of course, enter the world of work to make the best use of the talents and gifts that they have. It is the same in the Christian life too. We are all learners. We have all been accepted and loved by grace, but God then wants us to co-operate with Him in learning how to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, to grow in our relationship with Him. This is a gradual process, of learning, of receiving the teaching, with the Holy Spirit our guide , helping us to understand the bible, leading us in prayer, guiding us in our choices in life. We have other teachers too – in the church, our brothers and sisters in Christ, and dare I say it, your vicar and the preachers in our church. We in leadership are here to serve you, but we are also here to teach – this is what God has placed us here to do, as well as pastor, and all the other things. Your growth in the Christian life will depend on how well you co-operate with the process, just as a child’s process in education will depend on how well they co-operate with the process. We can at any time say – I do not want to grow any more, just as a child has the right to leave school at 16 and come out of education, but as many are saying now, this is a tragedy for some- the Government are trying to make it illegal to leave education before 18 – whether or not this is right in practice, we can only applaud the sentiments behind it. We should never stop learning or growing in our Christian lives. We are accepted and loved by grace, but our growth depends on our response- our co-operation with the Holy Spirit in our relationship with Jesus. In our gospel reading Matthew the tax collector was chosen by grace, not on merit – but he was then called to respond as a disciple of Jesus – come follow me.

What does this mean for us now here today? I believe it means that as Christians we have to hold these two matters of grace and response in tension. We have to be fully committed to the understanding of grace – God’s choice of us, purely on his love. But then we have to be committed to our response to that grace – a commitment to a life of discipleship, a life of learning, a life of obedience and trust, a life of service. Paul puts it like this, “we love, because He first loved us.”

We can look at the life of Jesus, the life of the great saints, the lives of Christians we know about and think_ wow, I’ll never be like that. And you are right, you won’t. But that is not what God wants for you, He has called you by grace to be you. And he want you as you, to grow and become the Christian he wants you to be. We could remain as children – like the 4 year old who looks at a GCSE paper and says this is not for me, I’ll never get to this level. This is of course not the right attitude – we must instead commit ourselves to the process of learning and discipleship and trust that God will enable us and teach us to do the work He has called us to do. His gift is grace – our response is co-operation and trust

So how will you respond to God’s grace in Jesus. Thanksgiving, yes for his glorious grace, unmerited favour, but then think on our response- the call to discipleship.

YOU ARE THE VINE, We are the branches, Keep us abiding in You.
You are the Vine, We are the branches, Keep us abiding in You.
Then we’ll grow in Your love, Then we’ll go in Your name,
That the world will surely know That You have power to heal and to save.

O dearly, dearly has He loved!
And we must love Him too,
And trust in His redeeming blood,
And try His works to do.

Good morning,
Yesterday evening, we heard the news that Hillary Clinton has bowed out of the Democratic Primary Race in the USA that she has now endorsed Barack Obama. She said to her supporters “The Democratic Party is a family, and now it is time to restore the ties that bind us together.” So that’s alright then – all smiles and a gracious sporting concession to the victor? Well, no- it’s not that simple is it. Deep divisions have arisen during the campaign and a great deal of healing has to happen in the Democratic Party between now and November for Barack Obama to stand a chance in the Presidential elections.

This situation has reminded me of the words of Jesus -“ a house divided against itself will not stand” Now I have no experience of party politics, but as a Parish Priest, I do have some experience of dealing with families that have fallen out with one another, and sadly, this is sometimes very evident at some of the funerals I conduct, where people who are not on speaking terms sit on opposite sides of a chapel or church.

What should we do therefore when we encounter division among those we love? How do we bring about the healing of relationships that is needed? Can we do something about it? How can we be, as the hymn puts it, a “Channel of your peace”.

The first step, as I see it, is that we need to admit that there is a real problem and not run away from it - like ostriches putting their heads in the sand.  The most difficult people to deal with are those who deny that there is a problem. We have to be honest with ourselves and with others and admit that there is division.

Secondly, we have to reach out to others and try to bring people together. How many times have I heard the words “It’s him who should apologise first, after all he was the one who did something wrong”. No, we should make the first move and seek to be reconciled.

Thirdly, we have to listen and be listened to. We need to give space and time to each other, making sure we fully understand each other’s point of view, even if we disagree with it.

And lastly we must be willing to forgive and truly let the past be the past, and be willing to move on. It is hard and it will take time, but it is necessary.

The Democratic Party is divided and is need of healing. I wonder if there is division and hurt in your life, or the life of your family, organisation or church? If so, don’t ignore it - if you do, it will end up corroding the relationships you cherish. Do something about it, -bring it out into the open and reach out to the other person, or bring two sides together. As the saying goes, united we stand but divided we fall, or as Jesus said “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”

I am a great fan of The Apprentice, the reality show on BBC where 16 candidates vie for a one year job with Sir Alan Sugar – they compete by being on teams and completing business tasks, the team that loses has to defend itself in the boardroom , and one of the losing team gets fired, until eventually there is a clear winner. Having been in business myself, I find the programme fascinating – although it is unreal in its intensity – no-one ever launches a product like a greeting card for a new event in just two days as they tried to do last week – it does involve a lot of business skills of marketing presentation, accounting and teamwork – anyway that is my excuse that I am hooked. But my problem is, I am often out or busy with meetings on Wednesday evenings, but now, as have broadband at home for my computer, I have discovered BBC IPlayer – a programme that enables me to watch programmes digitally over my computer that have been broadcast in the last 7 days rather- like a digital video recorder– so I can now watch The Apprentice any time I want in the week following. But there is a problem about this; it is just not the same as watching the programme as it is being put out on Wednesday evenings – this is because all the newspaper websites I watch have the result, and so when I watch the programme I already know who is going to be fired – it takes the excitement out of it – maybe some of you feel like that when watching the football and you know the result. And yet there is a part of me that just cannot wait to the end of the programme to see who is fired, I have to know the result first.

I wonder if you are like that sometimes with events – you want to know the result before you start out on it – perhaps there is that sense of security in knowing that things are going to work out, that you are going to be on the winning side. We sometimes do not want the agony of watching and waiting. If we could know the result before we started, we would have a much easier time, not to mention make a fortune in betting if we were that way inclined, but the reality of the world is such that we simply cannot know the result before we start – life does not work that way. Should we have to know how things will work out before we get married, have children, take on a new job? And yet this desire to know what will happen often produces in us a sense of inertia – I will not start anything new until I know I can see it working out – perhaps produced from a fear of failure, fear of being found out, fear of consequences of things going wrong. Of course we should weigh things up and plan – after all that was part of my previous job as an accountant – we are cautious in nature – but eventually we need to step out in faith and take the plunge. That is what faith is all about. Faith is not just leaping in the dark, but making a step outwards based on what you know or can reasonably expect. How many of us men knew what would happen when we proposed to our wives – of course we did not know exactly, but we knew enough about marriage and about our wives character to take a step of faith. This week I asked a person who is a Christian in a job where there has been considerable upheaval over 5 years, if you had known how difficult it was going to be, would you still have come here? Looking back, yes he said, “but I have only had the faith to continue day by day”

There is in all of us that desire to know what is going to happen next, and that sometimes keeps us from making the necessary steps of faith, the steps of change which will allow God to work powerfully in our lives and through our lives out to others as well. It could be fear, inertia, unwillingness to embrace anything that we do not directly know about, or perhaps just tiredness and getting older, when we just want the quiet life. But this attitude is not one of faith, it is actually closed off to faith, it is saying in effect, no God, I just want what I have now, and I do not want anything more. I have my life just how I want it now thank you very much. I know how I want things to work out. We can be like this in our practice of faith, always wanting things to be as they have been, as it was in our childhood. It is a risk free life, it may well be religious in character, but I would venture to say, it is not the sort of faith that pleases God.

The disciples were in this sort of place – they had been brought up with the view that the Messiah would come in power and restore the kingdom of David – the political kingdom where the king ruled in power under God’s direction and all the enemies of the kingdom were subjugated. Therefore the Messiah’s disciples would be very important people in this new Kingdom – hence all the backbiting and arguments among the disciples as to who was the greatest. But Jesus did not fit their expectations – he did not want the political role, he spoke of the kingdom of God – a spiritual kingdom - he said my kingdom is not of this world, and ultimately Jesus was crucified in disgrace on a cross. But then he was brought back to life, and yet still the disciples did not understand – they wanted it all worked out again, they wanted to know the result before they started. If we follow you Lord, is it all going to work out, are we going to win, So they ask Jesus
6 So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”
Are we now going to see the Kingdom ( the Davidic kingdom of Israel’s superiority to the other nations restored)

You can almost hear Jesus sigh with frustration, “ how many times have I told you that the kingdom is not of this world – it is just not like that – you must be people of faith, you will not know the result from the start. Ultimately yes the kingdom will triumph, but you cannot know the result,

This is why Jesus said "It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority.

Mind your own business – you cannot know this it is God’s business. How many times have we heard the speculation about when the Lord will come again, or some event supposed to herald in the coming of the new Millennium, it is futile to speculate like this, God himself knows, not even Jesus, so do not look for the end result, you must go out in faith.

8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

So now go into the world and do the work – I will empower you – I will enable you to do the work of testifying to me by your words and actions, by the love you have for others, by your good works, these will speak to others about me and draw others. But do it in my strength-in the power of the Holy Spirit who will live in you, speak my words. Go out in faith.

So then Jesus is ascended into heaven at the Father’s right hand where he is praying for us – there are a whole load of sermons on that issue, but for the moment I just want to say that this is the completion of His father’s work, now he has offered up his blood for us once and for all, now atonement has been made, now our sins are forgiven once and for all, now the Father can have an unbroken relationship with us, and importantly for this sermon and for next week, now the Holy Spirit can be given – the barrier of sin between us and God has been taken away, now the Holy God can dwell in our hearts. – this is what Ascension is all about – and it prepares us for Pentecost. So Jesus says wait for the power to come and then go out.

So he is taken up to heaven, and what do the disciples do? They end up gazing into heaven, perhaps trying to recapture the spiritual experience? Longing for heaven, where Jesus is.  And they have to be told to stop this and get on with the job.

9 When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.
10 While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them.
11 They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven."

One day Jesus will return, but you must get on with what he has told you to do. This is the error of what is called pietism, being too heavenly minded and no earthly use. Always wanting the spiritual experiences, and not the hard work of engaging with the world in all its messiness – the temptation to withdraw from the world, - I am not knocking going on retreats or conferences – I go to retreats and I have just come back from a conference and it was great, but it is not the reality of life. The church is not a haven from the world. Sometimes I hear people say that the church is like a hospital for those who have been wounded by it, and we in the church should take care of those vulnerable hurting people. There is some truth in this yes, that is a possible analogy, but if it is a hospital, then it more like a Military field hospital, whose job is to get people back on the field of battle as soon as possible. I remember someone once saying that he so enjoyed formal traditional cathedral style worship, because he worked in the city of London and going to church was like going into a different world of peace and calm. Fine if that means that you were enabled to meet the challenges of the world when you left it, but not fine if by that you think that church should be so divorced from the concerns of the world, as if Christianity cannot cope with the demands of the modern world and church is a bastion against change. We are not to retreat from the world, Jesus’ commission is to go out to the world. The Jewish thinking was that all the world would come to mount Zion for wisdom

In days to come the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised above the hills; all the nations shall stream to it.(Isaiah 2:2)

Jesus however says this
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:19-20)
So inspired by this what do the disciples do?
12 Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a sabbath day’s journey away.
13 When they had entered the city, they went to the room upstairs where they were staying, Peter, and John, and James, and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James son of Alphaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James.
14 All these were constantly devoting themselves to prayer, together with certain women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, as well as his brothers.

Devoted themselves to prayer – and then what happened – well- watch this space next week when Lee will be preaching on the day of Pentecost. They did something radical – they prayed- they knew God was calling them to act, but they knew they needed God’s direction and God’s power, and that came with Pentecost 10 days later. Prayer is the key to renewal, it is why I feel God has called St Andrew’s to prayer –as you can see from my magazine article this month – I believe that we as a church need to pray and seek God’s face for what he wants us to do. This is not a cop-out – let’s just pray and withdraw, far from it – we are still as involved as ever and perhaps need to be more so- but it is an acknowledgement that we cannot do it without God’s power and direction. Will you as individuals and as a church pray – please see me afterwards if you want to be part of this – either 7 a.m. on Wednesdays, or Lee is looking to set up an new group or just in prayer partnerships or triplets. It is my conviction that as we do this, God will reveal more and more of his will for us, and then when we do go out in action, it is action that is guided and led by the Holy Spirit.

Are there any guarantees that it will work in the way we want it to? No sadly there is no spiritual I-player where we can replay things and see the result in advance. We have to go out in faith, as the disciples did. They made mistakes - so will we. But they committed those mistakes to the Lord, learned from them and then kept going – and so must we.

We must let go of the inertia that keeps us back, the hold of the past that makes us think things always have to be exactly as they were in the past, there is a lot of good from the past, but I believe that God sometimes wants to do a new thing. Sometimes the dwelling on the past is an excuse for not doing what God wants now in the present. We must let go of trying to have everything worked out – we must walk by faith not by sight. We must not just dwell in pietism, withdrawing from the world in all its problems – no we must be right in the middle of the world
As the great Missionary CT Studd once said
"Some wish to live within the sound of Church or Chapel bell;I want to run a Rescue Shop within a yard of hell."
We must be involved in our world; God has placed us here in Melbourne strategically in the middle of three estates to be a living witness to those around us, we have no right to withdraw into holy huddles and keep the good news for ourselves. We must be witnesses to those around us.
And we must seek God earnestly in prayer, seek him for the power to witness
As Jesus said
8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

My prayer is that we will seek Jesus and ask him for the power to witness, power to serve, power to go out in faith.

We cannot know the results, we cannot look back we must just trust that God will be with us each step of the way- that is true faith. And if we do not feel we have that sort of faith then we must pray until we do.
Let us make this week a special week of prayer, praying that God will enable and envision us for the work he has for us, and then come expectantly to Church next Sunday, to celebrate with our candidates receiving communion for the first time, and also asking God for a special touch of His Holy Spirit, to give us power to witness and power to serve.

As I said earlier, I am a great fan of the Apprentice and at the end of it Sir Alan Sugar says to the hapless candidate “ You’re fired”. But at the end of the process, he says to the winner “You’re hired”, and the winner is then expected to get on with the job for which he has been chosen.

I believe God is saying to all of us.”You’re Hired” Get on with the job for which you have been chosen

Thank you O my Father for giving us your son
And leaving your spirit till the work on earth is done.

John 14.15-21

Jesus said to his disciples: 15‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you for ever. 17This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you. 18I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. 19In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. 20On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. 21They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.’

Introduction
I would like you to cast your mind back to your school days, for some longer ago than others. Many of us some still have some involvement with schools. Do you remember when you had your books marked?  When they were handed back, hopefully there would be lots of red ticks and not too many crosses. There usually used to be a mark out of ten and a few words, either good, very good or could do better, or if you were in trouble see me. The approach to marking has developed a bit, I think teachers still use red pens, but children are given a bit more feedback on how well or not they have done and some guidance on how to improve. This is called assessment for learning, and helps children to know what their next steps in learning might be, with personal goals and targets.

For children to learn they need to be affirmed and encouraged, but also challenged to take another step forward in their learning. The same for us in our Christian faith we need to be challenged and encouraged. As I looked at today’s Gospel reading I saw both a message of challenge and of encouragement.

Context Of Passage
Our reading from John comes from what is often called the Farewell Teaching or Discourse of Jesus, which starts in chapter 13 and ends in chapter 16. Jesus and his disciples have celebrated the Passover meal together, the last supper and Jesus has a lot to share with his disciples. He is trying to prepare them for what is to come.  Trying to show them what it all means for their future. These chapters also have great relevance for us full of comfort, challenge and hope, full of the deep relationship that Jesus longs to have with each of his followers. Today’s passage needs to be read not on its own but in relation to all of the farewell teaching and the whole Gospel.

Challenge
Let us firstly consider the challenge.  In verse 15 Jesus says:-
“If you love me, you will keep my commandments”.

So what was it that Jesus commanded the disciples to do?  What has Jesus commanded us to do? Only need to look back to the previous chapter 13 to find out:-
“ A new commandment I give you, that you love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love one for another.”

Then in chapter 14, verse 12:-

“Very truly I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and in fact will do greater works”
We are called to bear fruit and abide in Jesus. To be a disciple of Jesus is not just to nod and agree with his teaching, but to follow his teaching and example, to allow it to make a difference to our lives. Jesus said “no one has greater love than this to lay down one life for one’s friends.” Our response to the love of Jesus is to love others as he loves us. A love that is giving, costly painful, sacrificial. A love that allows you to see yourself as a slave and wash the feet of others. That is a challenge isn’t it?

We are starting to think about worship. Worship is of course much more than what happens in church on a Sunday.  However good or rich our music and liturgy is, it will not be real or glorifying to God if what we sing and proclaim in church is not reflected in the reality of our daily lives. In our relationships, with each other and the community. It is no use singing “Jesus we love you we worship and adore you”, if we do not show it in our lives by keeping his commandments.

A few weeks ago, some of us attended the Street Pastor commissioning service.  Lee has been involved in the training and is one of the team. I have part of his uniform here. Street Pastors come from a number of churches in Chelmsford who go in to town on a Friday and Saturday night to just be there, to get along side the young people going to and coming from the different pubs and clubs. Street Pastors are there to listen, not to judge but to support and give practical help. More info do have a chat with Lee.

I was challenged by that commissioning service. I don’t think I was challenged to specifically become a street pastor but to think about what it is that I can do to show my love for Jesus by helping and supporting others. Not by preaching at them, but by in a sense washing the feet of others.  In our jobs do we tell others that we are Christians and then demonstrate the reality of that commitment in they way we work and serve others? Do we tell our friends and neighbours that we are Christians and again show that we are by the way that we love and care for others? Here at St Andrew’s I think on the whole we do see ourselves as a family and support one another. But what about our community? Are there things that we can do to serve our community, our world, which demonstrate the reality of our love for Jesus? It is great that that we have Little Fishes, Evergreen and Community Care, but what more might we do to show that we love Jesus? That challenges me to think about my service and Discipleship also challenged to think what we might do in Golden Oldies with or youngsters. There is a sense in which we are all called to be street pastors, maybe not in the town on a Friday or Saturday night but n the places where we are amongst the people we meet. Does that make sense? 

Encouragement
Phew!!!!!!!!!!!! Are you with me?

John chapter 14 starts and ends with words of encouragement “Do not let your heats be troubled…’, Jn 14 v 1; and closes with the passage, ‘Peace I leave with you… …do not be afraid’

The disciples thought that following Jesus was to physically follow him, to live with him, to help him with him there along side telling them what to do. They relied upon him; they had shared a common life with him for three years.  Jesus explains to them that he will no longer be with them in human form in the world, he will be leaving them. But whilst he will be leaving them he will in a sense still be with them a contradiction. How will he still be with them? Through another Advocate that the Father will send. Jesus is promising the Holy Spirit, also described as a comforter, a helper, a counsellor, an encourage, someone who walks along side you, to give comfort, counsel or strength in time of need. It will be as if Jesus is still with them his breath will be in them. They will know his strength and presence and power, leading guiding and supporting them in their future journey and ministry.

The Holy Spirit of course is not just for those first disciples but for us as well. We are not left as orphans, through the Holy Spirit, the presence of God will be with us for ever, whatever our circumstances. A presence of God which offers us love, comfort, peace and support.

We do not serve a dictator God who makes unreasonable demands and leaves us to get on with it. We have a God, who yes, calls us to be faithful servants, but shows us how to live and serve and then stays with us helping, us empowering us, strengthening us to do so. The Holy Spirit helps us to put our faith into action.

Conclusion
What will you do to show Jesus that you love him, to demonstrate the reality of his love for you? How will you keep his commandments? Will you do what he asks and be a loyal faithful servant of Christ and of others? 

God gives us his spirit, but will we make room to be open to receive from him so that he might abide in us?

As we respond to the love of Jesus with love, we will know more of the love of God.

Close by reading the passage again. As you listen as a follower of Jesus hear what Jesus might say to you. Be prepared to be challenged, be prepared to be encouraged.

1 Peter 2 4 - 10.

Introduction
“Thank you.”
These are two very special and important words – Thank You. I very much appreciate it when friends, people at church, my children or parents or children at work take the time and trouble to say thank you. I found some thank you cards in my desk and they really encouraged me.

We have a God who is great and I believe, as we have already heard, has shown his goodness to us at St Andrew’s in many special ways over the last year. It is right and important to take time to stop and say thank you. There often seems to be so much to pray about that we rush in with our shopping lists and forget to thank God for the payers that we have already seen answered. I hope that is what we have captured in our service this morning, that sense of thanksgiving, gratitude and celebration.

I would like you to listen to this talk against that backdrop of thanksgiving.

Building Not Finished
I do normally try and look smart when I am leading or talking but today I wanted to try and look a little bit like a builder.
Why? Because I want to think about building.

Work on this church started almost 50 years ago. Look outside and see if you can find a special stone that will tell you when. St Andrews was planted by the people at Writtle church to reach and serve this area.

I do not know if you have noticed, but the building of the church here is not finished.

The actual building is of course finished. We need to be good stewards and keep the building in good repair and try and ensure that it enables us to worship God and serve the community in an effective way. But that is not the end of the story. Think about our church logo, people seeking God together. We need to be built up together in faith, drawing closer to God and to one another. Sharing together, learning from one another and encouraging one another.
On our logo we have an image of the church without walls, to remind us that that the church exists not just for its members, but exists to serve the whole community. We need to continue building up relationships with our community so that others might come to know the love of God in Christ and join us in seeking God together.

Plans
A builder will not just come along and start building just as he likes. Before the building starts, architects and surveyors will draw up detailed plans of where and how the building should be built and will have pictures of what the finished building will look like.

So more building work needs to be done here at St Andrew’s. I am not quite sure what St Andrew’s will look like in the future, what shape it will take, what we will be doing. But I am sure that the great God who has been faithful and good to us in the past has some very special and good things in store for us. Together, under Paul’s leadership we need to pray and share together and discover where God is leading us.

A verse from Psalm 127 keeps popping up at The Well team and at Leadership:-
“Unless the LORD builds the house,
its builders labour in vain.”

We want the building work here to continue but let us try and ensure that what is built is of God.

Good Foundations
When you build it is important to have good foundations. There is a lot to St Andrews under the floor, that goes down deep, that is there supporting the structure but out of sight.

Do you remember the story that Jesus told about the wise man and the foolish man? Where did they build their houses and what happened to them?  The one on the sand fell flat but the one on the rock stood firm.

In building the church at St Andrew’s we need to build on good foundations. What does the chorus say?

“So build your life on the Lord Jesus Christ, he’s the rock that will never fail.”

At the heart of all that we do, should be a relationship with the living God through the death of Jesus on the cross and his resurrection.  The love and grace and power of God.

In our Lent course and at our parish weekend we though about a verse from Acts:
“They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.”

I would suggest that they are also good foundations on which to build.

Material
As many of you will know, when St Andrew’s was built, people from the community gave money to buy the bricks for the church. Often hear people talk about the brick people. When you go outside have a look and see how many individual bricks have been joined together to make the one church. Wardens know how many? Lots and lots bricks very neat and orderly and cemented together well.

But the church is much more than a physical building; the church is people, God’s people, God’s family. In our reading we the people are described as a different kind of brick people, - living stones.  We are stones in God’s House; with Jesus Christ the chief cornerstone joining us together. We belong to each other as living stones in God’s building.

When this church was built, I am sure that the best material available was used. But God uses imperfect material that does not so easily fit together: he uses ordinary people like you and me. But in his hands the ordinary can be transformed and used in a very special way.

Will we give ourselves to God as living stones and allow God to use us to build a spiritual temple?  We remember that the construction is not finished because there are other stones to be used and added to the church, there are other people who need to come to know Christ and be cemented by his love and grace into His church.

Dangerous
Building sites can be dangerous places, fenced off, builders wear protective clothing. I have a sign for us all this morning, which we should perhaps have by the door as you come in. Danger God at work.  For God to build his church here we need to recognise that it is not our church or Paul’s church but God’s. We must allow God’s spirit to work in our lives, to use the gifts that he gives us and follow God’s guiding and leading. That can be a risky dangerous thing. We may have to change, we may have to do things differently, we may have to try new thing, be prepared to make fools of ourselves for Christ. But we can trust that we have a great God who is faithful, who loves us and wants the best for all his children.

Conclusion
So this morning as we have our APCM, we do celebrate and give thanks for the last year and we look forward to the year ahead. The building of this church is not finished and the challenge is for us to place ourselves into the hands of the master builder and allow his spirit to work in us so that his church might continue to be built in this place, on good solid foundations. Not just doing good things but things that are of God.

Finish with a quote I remember Audrey saying, from Dag Hammerskold, former secretary general of the United Nations:

To all that has been, I say, ‘Thanks’. To all that will be, I say, ‘Yes’.

AMEN

We had a funeral in church on Tuesday, and during the service we sung a subversive nationalistic song – a song so dangerous that it has been banned by the Dean of Southwark Cathedral from being sung at their services – the name of this radical subversive song – of course it is “Jerusalem”. This song is so subversive that it is the national song of the English Women’s Institute, that bastion of radicalism in the English Shires that includes our Queen as a member. The reasons for the furore about this hymn are, of course based on its content – William Blake, its author, was not a Christian in the conventional sense, but a mystic, and this was not a hymn, but a poem – a preface to a work on Milton, and it was set to music by Parry, and the rest, as they say, is history. The poem is based on the legend that as an infant Jesus was brought to England – to Glastonbury, by Joseph of Arimathea- and there a “New Jerusalem” was founded, hence the opening words
– and did those feet in ancient times walk upon England’s mountains green,
and was the holy lamb of God on England’s pleasant pastures seen …
and was Jerusalem builded here among those dark satanic mills.
It then goes on in verse two-
bring me my bow of burning gold, ...
I will not cease from mental fight,
nor shall my sword sleep in my hand
till we have built Jerusalem in England’s green and pleasant land”

What are we as Christians to make of those words, should we singing about a legend? As my old college principal used to say, the answer to verse 1 is “no”, and the answer to verse two is “get them yourself!” But this song has been an inspiration to many who want to bring about a better society in this country, especially in areas of deprivation- our own Prime Minister Gordon Brown lists the hymn as one of his favourites. Many Socialists, including Christian socialists have been inspired with the vision of building a better place here, often also using the vision of the heavenly New Jerusalem in Revelation 21
1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.
2 And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them;
4 he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away."

All problems are dealt with. Many good people have been inspired by that vision to work for a better world, better healthcare, and provision for the poor, using the metaphor of a New Jerusalem as a basis for the better society that can be created through human effort – the mental fight that Blake was talking about. It is a vision of an ideal – a utopian vision if you like, and many who have involved themselves in politics and social action have been inspired by such passages and poems and hymns, so is it a bad thing to have Jerusalem sung in a church, especially at funerals?

My own view is no, provided we do not take its message too seriously- I would not be too happy for it to be sung often in main church services, and the reason for this is that it talks about our life as trying to follow an ideal, as if by our own efforts we can achieve things for God – human effort is fine, we need this, but the problem with ideals is that they can take on a life of their own, and then commitment is judged as to that ideal, rather than to the beliefs that inspired it. If you want an example of this, look at the many people who took up politics – either on the left, right or centre, from a Christian commitment, only to find that their Christian commitment waned and their political commitment became all consuming – political beliefs becoming – in effect- another religion. Tony Benn is a case in point for this – a committed Christian in his youth, from a very committed congregational church background, became a Christian socialist, and then socialism took over and he is now, by his own admission, a humanist with no faith, and many others in politics have a similar story of loss of faith because a political ideal took over. I am not in any way knocking Christians being involved in politics; I am, however, trying to point out some of the dangers.

But we do need ideals, don’t we? We need dreams and beliefs that keep us going through difficult times, so we do not give up when times are hard. Have you got a dream, a vision for your life, for your Christian life, for this church? It is important to have something to inspire and motivate us. When I was in accountancy one management saying was this –
“Most people aim at nothing, and then manage to achieve it with remarkable accuracy”

To have an aim, a plan is a good thing especially if is applied in the social sphere – look at the witness of Shaftesbury and Wilberforce, Elizabeth Fry and many, many others, and also on a much smaller scale the world of social action among Christians we know. This is now behind much of the green agenda, hoping to leave a legacy of a better world to the next generation. We need dreams and ideals, and Christians need these- we talk about a sense of vision, of calling of mission- this is why we do what we do- this is what we will be talking about at our APCM next week, looking back and looking forward to the year to come to all that God us calling us to do. 

The bible gives us this sense of vision too – the sermon on the mount, the beatitudes- blessed are the poor in spirit, the magnificat
Luke 1:51-53 He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.

And the bible gives us this sense of the renewed Christian community as well, where all are taken care of, none is in need. Our passage in Acts has been used as well to inspire the creation of Christian communities or that sense of fellowship – koinonia in Greek – that we so long for. Listen to the passage again.
Acts 2:42-47
They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.  Awe came upon everyone, because many wonders and signs were being done by the apostles. All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.

Wow, what a church – who would not want to be part of church like that, and what a witness to a watching world, surely people would say – that is a church I would want to belong to. All needs met, common ownership, a devotion to prayer, fellowship bible teaching and sacraments. And this being such a mighty witness that conversions were happening on a daily basis and the church was growing. I am jealous of a church like that. This is why we used this passage as a basis for our church weekend last year and for our Lent course this year- what an ideal, what a vision of how church should be.

So what is the problem? What is wrong with achieving such a vision, such an ideal of how church should be? What is the problem?
Someone was once asked by a vicar why they did not go to church, and the man said, because of all the hypocrites in church. The vicar said, “OH, don’t worry about that, we have always got room for one more!”

“To live above with the saints we love, ah yes that would be glory,
But to live below with the saints we know, well that’s a different story!”

What is the problem? You and I are – human nature- the flawed nature of human life- capable of the most noblest actions and highest ideals, and also of the most unspeakable cruelty and selfishness. This is what Paul talks about in Romans 7 the battle going on within between our good nature and our baser nature – what I know I should do I do not do, and what I should not do I end up doing. Do you recognise that struggle within? If we are honest we all are like that. The problem with ideals is that we just cannot keep them up. There is something wrong with me and you that prevents the ideals, the visions, the plans, the New Jerusalem from being achieved. This does not mean that we should not have our visions- far from it- but we must be realistic about human nature- especially our own. If we are not fully aware of our own capacity for hypocrisy, pride and arrogance, selfishness, laziness, then if we aim for ideals we will end up being critical of others who do not quite share our commitment – and there can be a real sense of finger pointing, of judgemental attitudes among those with the highest ideals if they do not realise that ideals and visions are tools not masters.

Our visions and ideals are only helpful, if we see them as what God can do among us, if we live our lives in his will. If we aim at a church with ‘ great fellowship” or “great worship” or “great social action” or great missionary endeavour” we will always fail – we will always fail because the object of our ideals is the action itself rather than God – this is how ideals end up taking over and you get what is known as “The tail wagging the dog” History is littered with the story of political activists or churches who started well with a clear vision, following a charismatic leader, for it all to fall apart – the cracks developed, the rose coloured spectacles fell off. Lee and I have had the privilege of living for two years in a Christian community while training for the ministry – it is a privilege – but it was far from ideal. I remember at one service in college chapel looking around and thinking “ Oh no, this is the future of the Church of England, and the other students were no doubt thinking the same about me!” The bible is very clear about the need for ideals, but also very clear about the pitfalls of such ideals -
Ps 127:1 Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labour in vain. Unless the LORD guards the city, the guard keeps watch in vain.

What would you and I have done if we were disciples who had seen the risen Lord – would we not have wanted to go and tell the whole world about it – but Jesus said no.
Acts 1:4-8 While staying with them, he ordered them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait there for the promise of the Father. but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” ..... But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Jesus is saying You cannot do this in your strength, you will go wrong, you need the power of the Holy Spirit, and you will continually need the power of the holy Spirit. Do not go out without the connection to the power. Where in Ephesians Paul says be filled with the spirit the Greek actually means, not a one off thing, but go on being filled continually with the spirit – The trouble with us being filled is that we leak! It is only as we abide in Christ and let the power of the Holy Spirit work in us and through us that we start to be transformed into the liken ess of Christ , and then The spirit leads us into the ideals and visions that God has for us, not that we have chosen for ourselves. It is as we abide in Christ, that God starts to produce the fruits of the spirit that are described in Galatians 5:22-23 the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

It is as we all abide in Christ and let the spirit work in and through us, that the vision of Acts 2:42 - The devotion to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers, having all things in common etc, - that this starts to make some sense. This new community fellowship was the creation of the Holy Spirit, not of human origin.

So what of us, how do we get to that Acts 2:42 position of a New Testament Church- in one sense we cannot – it is all of God – but like the New Testament disciples, we can put ourselves in the way of God and ask Him to do it. We need a living relationship with God through Jesus Christ, we need to come to the cross, repent of our sins, and ask Jesus into our lives as our Saviour and Lord, and if you have not done that please see me afterwards so we can talk about this. This is what our reading from Peter is all about.

v24 He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.

We can have new life in Christ, because of the transforming power of the cross, where the power of our sins, our selfishness was crucified with Christ, and now we have the Holy Spirit living within us leading us into all truth, into all righteousness, into the vision of what God has for us, as individuals and as a church.

We are coming up to our APCM, our annual meeting where we look forward to all that God has for us. We have our plans, but it is God who gives the growth in His way and in His time, for His glory, not ours. It is my view that the moment we start to try to claim the credit for something in our church, is the moment God’s blessing leaves us – His glory he will not share, it must go to Him and Him alone. All we look for is at the end the words “well done good and faithful servant.” We seek God’s glory and His alone in all we do, and if the human element gets in, then that is what stops and sometimes stalls the growth of the church in Gods’s eyes- we may have human success in the eyes of the world, but remember Jesus words about the Pharisees
(John 12:43) for they loved human glory more than the glory that comes from God.

We are in the Easter Season and we are looking forward to Pentecost – the time when the disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit. What does this mean to us? It should mean a renewed longing to receive the power to live the life that Jesus wants for us. Do you yearn for something different in your Christian life – fed up with besetting sins and attitudes that drag you down. We all need to be filled and renewed in the power of the Holy Spirit- otherwise we become like our mobile phones or cameras leaking and running down – my camera had no charge on holiday and I couldn’t use it – great camera, but no power!. That is like us some days isn’t it? Nice people but no power! We need recharging, and continual recharging in the power of the Holy Spirit. It is then, and only then that the visions and ideals of the Beatitudes, Magnificat of the sermon on the Mount, of the vision of Christian community of Acts 2:42 start to make any sense- because it is clear that it is God who is building the house, God working in and through us in the power of the Holy Spirit, to achieve his goals and visions and ideals

What must we do – recognise the truth of our Peter reading He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. We need to come to the cross, confess our sins receive his forgiveness, and then ask for the power of the Holy Spirit to live for righteousness.

Lived outside of a relationship with God, our ideals and dreams are just that – empty dreams- because they depend on human effort which is deeply flawed, and we will end up deeply disillusioned. But if our lives are lived in the power of the Holy Spirit, in relationship with God through Jesus Christ, then we will never be disillusioned- for sure aware of our weakness and inadequacy, but covered by the grace and love and forgiveness of God, trusting in His redeeming blood and trying His works to do.

So I will go on singing “Jerusalem” – it is at best a reminder of what God wants us to do to make the world a better place – however flawed its theology. But I am under no illusions about its ideals -that I can by my own and other’s mental fight build Jerusalem here – it is instead only the work of God through Jesus in the power of the Spirit that can do anything lasting for the Kingdom of God.

As the song says.

Jesus, all for Jesus,
All I am and have and ever hope to be.
Jesus, all for Jesus,
All I am and have and ever hope to be.

For it’s only in Your will that I am free,
For it’s only in Your will that I am free,
Jesus, all for Jesus,
All I am and have and ever hope to be.