In your prayers please hold Susan, Liz's sister; Edna; my friend Clive Hayward, who has Covid19; Sue, an ex-colleague, who has cancer; Ann Gramlich, another ex-colleague, who has cancer and dementia; Jean Constable from Tillington, who has died and her husband Vic; all those in hospital or care homes and those who nurse and care for them.
The Feast of the Presentation (“Candlemas”)
2nd February marks the end of the forty days since the birth of Jesus. Mary and Joseph bring the baby to the Temple in Jerusalem The Law said that Mary should be ‘cleansed’ to complete her purification following the birth of a male child. I can remember my mother going to church after my younger brother’s birth in 1950. It was called the ‘churching’ of a woman. We don’t do it any more. It is a simple service of thanksgiving for safe delivery of a child; it includes the saying of a psalm, perhaps psalm 127 “Except the Lord build the house..”; the Lord’s Prayer is said and there is a short dialogue with the priest and the woman, which includes the Minister saying: ‘Be thou to her a strong tower,’ which was very appropriate for my mother who was called Barbara, whose symbol is a tower. After that my mother was allowed to go back to church, just as Mary would have been allowed into the Temple in Jerusalem after her purification. You can imagine the scene - the couple and their baby, perhaps overawed by the grandeur of Herod’s Temple and staring at the decoration. They are met by an old man Simeon, who takes the child in his arms, blesses him and says the words that we know as the Nunc Dimittis: ‘Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word. For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people. To be a light to lighten the Gentiles and to be the glory of thy people Israel.’ This sets out clearly Jesus’ mission - to bring light and glory to a darkened world - but Simeon then goes on to warn Mary that this will not be without cost to her personally. They are then joined by an even older figure, the prophet Anna. She rushes around the Temple telling everyone about this wonderful baby. This is yet another ‘manifestation’ of the baby Jesus. In this way the Feast of the Presentation acts as a bridge between Christmas and Holy Week. It is a celebration that is bitter-sweet, a flavour that is even stronger this year, as we look towards Holy Week and Easter and wonder what sort of Easter we shall have this year. We all need the light that streams from the face of the Christ child. Perhaps we might light a candle before we watch the video on our website or when we say our daily prayers. 2nd February was also called ‘Candlemas’, as the year’s supply of new candles was blessed on this day and indeed still is in some churches. May the light of Christ shine in our hearts now and always. Lord Jesus Christ, light of the nations and glory of Israel, make your home among us, and present us pure and holy to your heavenly Father, your God and our God. Amen.
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ANOTHER REVELATION
Today’s Gospel is very familiar. There is a danger in that - we overlook what it is telling us about how we respond to this revelation of Jesus’ glory, this cause to believe in him. Jesus chooses to reveal himself to his new disciples at a wedding. Throughout the Hebrew Scriptures and in many of the sayings and parables of Jesus the wedding feast features as the setting, with Jesus often as the bridegroom. It is quite natural that he would launch himself on his mission at such a feast. Heaven, the Jews had been told, was like a wedding feast, a place of joy and happiness, of closeness to your loved ones and to God. What happens at Cana is a foretaste of the heavenly banquet and Jesus is the source of the joy. There are lots of incidental details that it is hard to ignore, even though we don’t fully understand why they are there. Why are we told this is ‘after three days’? Is this a pre-echo of our Lord’s resurrection? Then there are the water jars. Why are there six? Is this an incomplete number? They are empty. Why? Are they waiting for their real function, to change water into wine? Are we like those jars? Waiting for Jesus to fill us with his Spirit, like new wine? That is one thing I take away from this story. Or are we like the servants? They do whatever Jesus wants, and they keep their knowledge to themselves. Are we being called upon to be like them, ready to do whatever Jesus instructs us to do? That is certainly one thing that I take away from this passage. I should be ready at all times to follow our Lord’s commands. That is one message that comes from some of the ‘bridegroom’ sayings of Jesus in Luke’s Gospel. We are called on to be ready to receive our Lord at any time of the day or the night. Why so much wine? Six jars of twenty or thirty gallons each! This is going to be some party, and it is the best wine too. Of course it is! Clearly the rules of heavenly feasts are different from those of earthly feasts. Never give God less than the best - is that what this is saying? There are so many questions in what is, on the surface, a simple story of one neighbour helping another out in a very embarrassing situation, even if neither the steward or the bridegroom actually know the source of the new wine. Then there is the role of Jesus’ mother Mary. She doesn’t occur much in John’s Gospel, but here she is at the start of Jesus’ ministry and she nudges the action forward, even if she gets a dusty answer for her pains. She is there again at the foot of the cross in John’s Gospel, and some of Jesus’ last words are reserved for her - ‘Woman, behold your son.’ As is typical with this Gospel writer, there is a lot going on under the surface of a simple incident. It is called a ‘sign’, not a ‘miracle’, and I think that is because it reveals something about our Lord, it shows his ‘glory’ and, as a result, his disciples believe in him. So should we. Almighty Father, whose Son our Saviour Jesus Christ is the light of the world: may your people, illumined by your word and sacraments, shine with the radiance of his glory, that he may be known, worshipped, and obeyed to the ends of the earth; for he is alive and reigns now and for ever. Amen
For a change we have two readings this Sunday, one from John’s Gospel and the Old Testament reading from the Book of Genesis. They are linked most obviously by the vision of angels, ascending and descending, and also by the acknowledgements both Jesus and Joseph receive.
The theme of the Season of Epiphany is manifestations of Jesus to the world, hence our first hymn, which lists the different ways that Jesus is shown to the world - first to the Wise Men, then in the Baptism by John, then in the Miracle at Cana in Galilee, then in the healing of the sick and diseased, finally at the end of time. Today’s ‘manifestation’ is to Philip and Nathaniel, who are among his first disciples. They are swept away by his knowledge of them, even though they have never seen him before. This encounter with Jesus spurs the pair on to want to find out more and to follow him. It is hard for us at this distance to experience the magnetism of Jesus to those whom he met, but it is clearly there even in John’s mystical prose. Nathaniel is captivated by Jesus. Somehow we have to recapture that power and strengthen our link to Jesus, the ‘King of Israel’. What Nathaniel sees in Jesus holds him to the end. Some writers have even suggested that Nathaniel is the Beloved Disciple and not John the Evangelist. Who knows? What is important for us is to seek to develop our relationship with Jesus even over the two thousand years the have passed since this meeting took place. The reading from Genesis also shows a chance meeting. This time it is with God and the heavenly host, while Jacob is running away from the consequences of his actions in cheating his brother of his inheritance and his father’s blessing. His story will be a long tale of Jacob learning what it feels like to be cheated himself and to be tricked into marriage with the wrong sister! He learns to find his way through the politics of his extended family to the point where he can face his cheated brother once more and be forgiven. Genesis is a book full of family issues and conflict. Through it all God is there, supporting and encouraging, even though the humans he favours cannot always see it. What we can take away from the story of Jacob is that God uses some pretty poor material to form one of the Patriarchs, one of Jesus’ ancestors. Jacob is a pivotal figure in the history of the Jewish people, Jesus’ people. He is an encouragement to us all, even if he is a pretty slippery character for a lot of the time. Jesus alludes to that when he describes Nathaniel as an ‘Israelite without guile’. In both these readings we have a sense of the supernatural that is just a little way away from us. Jacob sees God in a dream and responds to it. He sets up and altar with the stone he has been using as a pillar. In John’s Gospel, we always have the sense that Jesus sees more than we see, that he is in touch with God in a way that we cannot really understand. God sees into Jacob’s heart and knows that, given time and experience, he will be able to make a Patriarch of him. It is the same with Jesus - he sees into Nathaniel’s heart and sees what he will be able to do with him. Let us pray that Jesus will continue to take our lives and make something beautiful with them for God. Eternal God, our beginning and our end: bring us with the whole creation to your glory, hidden through past ages and made known in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
A baptism is an event for the family, for the baby or young person of course, and for the Christian community. The font is usually near the door to the church, often at the back of the church, in a place where it is difficult for the congregation to see. Why is this? Because the font is the way into the faith, baptism being the pathway to join the Church of God, the Body of Christ.
When I did my first baptism in 1993, I had a training incumbent who saw that I would enjoy doing baptisms more than he did. As a result, in my three years in Tadworth I did more than 100 baptisms, baptisms on a Sunday afternoon, sometimes three in a row; or baptisms for regular church families as part of the morning service. I usually baptised babies or young children. Once I baptised a 90 year old, as a preparation for confirmation. That was a real privilege. They all were. Baptisms have three actions - the marking of the child’s forehead with the sign of the cross, usually using oil - to surround the child with the grace of God. This anointing is similar to what happens to kings and queens at their coronations or confirmands at their confirmation. The ancient Greeks used oil for wrestling - I used to tell families that the oil at baptism meant that the babies would slip through the devil’s grasp! Oil in the Bible signifies rejoicing. The second action is the sprinkling with water, blessed by the Holy Spirit. Water is such a powerful symbol - we are mostly made up of water; water washes, water refreshes, water brings life in desert places; water is so powerful it can drown us - think of the Red Sea! Jesus passes through the waters of death to his resurrection life. So powerful. At Easter we renew our baptism vows and are sprinkled with water to remind us of the event. Alas, we weren’t able to do that last year. Will we this year on 4th April? I pray so. The final act in the service is the giving of a lighted candle, lit of course from the Easter candle. It symbolises the light of the risen Christ we are passing on. Light out of dark is one Easter theme - ‘Shine as a light in the world to the glory of God the Father. Amen.’ In Jesus’ baptism he was anointed with the Holy Spirit, after John had sprinkled him with water - or was he plunged under the waves, as Robert Powell was in ‘Jesus of Nazareth’? We all share baptism with Our Lord. Now that is a thought worth meditating on. Let us all pray that we shall soon be able to celebrate baptisms with all the splashing of water and pouring of oil we are not allowed to do at the moment. Pray for that day, brothers and sisters. Pray fervently and remember the waters of your baptism that bring refreshment and new life in the desert we are going through at the moment. |
AuthorCanon John Green Archives
May 2021
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