Lent is not about chocolate

March 21, 2015

Lent 5 – 2015

John 12:22-30

Marian Free

In the name of God who raises the dead to new life, and who raises us from our daily deaths to newness of life. Amen.

Some time in recent weeks, I was shown a column in The Courier Mail. It was written by a young man who was making comments about Lent that demonstrated that he not only did his misunderstand the purpose of Lent, but that he had completely missed the point. I don’t have a copy of the article to hand, but as I remember the writer was pointing out how foolish, even meaningless, it was to give up things for Lent. He urged readers to go out and indulge themselves and to ask themselves what made them feel better – going without or indulging?

The article was a stark reminder that a sad reality of today’s world is that the Christian faith has been transmitted in such a way that the faith and its practices are not only misunderstood, but are also, at times, a source of ridicule. I am not precious about my faith and I have no problem with people making fun of it, or of us, when that humour is properly informed. What does disturb me is that sometimes humour slides into misinformed derision. One only has to listen to some of the radio stations favoured by our youth to hear that misconceptions about, and negative attitudes towards, Christianity abound. Worse still, it appears that for a large number of people, such misconceptions are a result of their experiences of the church and its teaching.

This means that if the faith is misunderstood, if a whole generation does not understand what we are on about, and if there are many people in the world who do not respect the Christian faith, then the fault, broadly speaking, lies with us. I would contend that for decades, if not centuries we have failed to share the good news, reducing it to rules and regulations that can deaden rather than enliven. The season of Lent is a good example. There are people who give up something for Lent who then spent the whole of Lent either complaining or boasting about it? Such people give the impression that the discipline of Lent is something that has been imposed rather than freely chosen or implied that it is a burden rather than a form of liberation.

The problem with this is that Lent is NOT about self-abnegation or self-mortification, it is not – I repeat, not- about being miserable or imposed upon. Rather Lent, like all forms of spiritual practice, is a God-given opportunity to grow, to examine our lives, to stop and see whether there are areas in which we can improve, ways in which we can better live out our Christian vocation. If we chose to give up something for Lent it is to facilitate, not hinder, our spiritual development.

Traditionally Anglicans have given up a luxury item for Lent, something that is enjoyable but not essential – chocolate or wine. We might like chocolate or a glass or two of wine, but neither are absolutely necessary to our well-being. Ideally over the course of Lent we learn that we don’t need whatever it is that we have given up, that our lives are not determined by it and that we can live happily and well without it.

It could be argued that chocolate and wine are easy to give up. Other things, those that have the potential to stunt our spiritual growth are much harder to let go of. Such things can be material, emotional or even psychological. They will be different according to the individual. For example, in the gospels, the thing that was holding back the rich young man was his possessions, for the man who wanted to follow Jesus it was his desire to farewell his family and for the man who had been sick for thirty eight years it was his inability to give up his self-identity as someone who was sick.

Through each of these examples, Jesus challenges each of us to consider what it is that is constraining us, what it is that is preventing us from reaching spiritual maturity. So for example, it is possible that some of us are overly concerned with financial security, or that we are in the grip of unhealthy relationships or that we are allowing a long-standing grudge to define who we are in relation to God and to others. These and many other things prevent us from developing fully as human beings and they certainly prevent us from realizing our divine natures.

In today’s gospel Jesus says: “Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” The language of love and hate is strong to be sure but Jesus uses it to underline his point. We can be so focused the things of this world that we lose the opportunity to be engaged with the world to come. We can be so obsessed with material things that we do not pay enough attention to spiritual things. We can be so wrapped up with the trivia of the everyday that we overlook the bigger picture of a full and happy life.

Jesus says that those who love their life will lose it. He is claiming that those who are bound up with their own issues are not really living. Those who hate their life he says will keep it for eternal life. Jesus is pointing out that those who are dissatisfied with the chains that hold them back, will allow themselves to be changed, transformed and set free to grow. This is the promise – that if we die to ourselves, especially those parts of ourselves that hold us to worldly values and ideals – we will be raised to newness of life – again, and again and again.

What is extraordinary is that iff we have the courage to let go of the things that bind us, we will discover that we lose nothing and gain everything.

When we allow ourselves to be liberated from concerns about wealth, liberated from false sense of responsibility to other and liberated from the emotional baggage that ties us down we are free to grow and to life life to the full. To live as God has always intended us to live – free and happy and content. To live a life that not only gives us everything, but demonstrates to the world how much we have as a consequence of faith. Unless a seed dies …. unless we allow God to change and transform us, the world will never see the privilege and joy that it is to have and to live out our faith.

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Victory of the cross

March 14, 2015
Cruciform woman - Emmanuel United College Toronto

Cruciform woman – Emmanuel United College Toronto

A more sentimental image

A more sentimental image

Nikolai Ge Crucifixion

Nikolai Ge Crucifixion

Lent 4 – 2015

John 3:14-21

Marian Free

 God of contradiction, open our hearts and minds to understand that your ways are not our ways and your thoughts are not our thoughts. Amen.

The crucifixion of Jesus has been portrayed in a wide variety of ways from the pious and sentimental to the violent and grotesque. Many are confronting (if for different reasons). For example I feel some disquiet when I see an image of Jesus fully dressed (in Bishop’s regalia) and exhibiting no signs of pain. Equally confronting is one from South America that depicts what looks like a charred body arched in pain and screaming in agony. For centuries the crucified Jesus was depicted as white (often blond). During the twentieth century new and original images emerged that more accurately reflected Jesus as a representative of all humanity – or example a Jesus with Chinese, Maori or African features. Sidney Nolan portrayed Jesus as a woman as did the artist whose sculpture was placed in a United Church in Toronto. Such imagery enables women and those whose skin colour is not white to fully grasp the notion that Jesus died for all people – including them – and not just for white (middle class) males.

New and confronting images of the crucifixion can help to make real the horror of the crucifixion. They can enable us to peel back the layers of piety that have, over the centuries, stripped the cross of its meaning. Our churches have crosses in all kinds of shapes and designs. There are wooden crosses, brass crosses, crosses made of silver or gold and crosses that are encrusted with jewels. Crosses in a number of different designs are worn as jewellery – even by those who do not profess the Christian faith. In many cases, the image of cross even when it is adorned with a crucified Christ has become so familiar that it has lost its power to confront and to challenge.

That said, I’m not at all sure that we would wish to be confronted with the horror of the crucifixion on a daily basis. We are told that crucifixion was an awful way in which to die. Whether a person was nailed or tied to a cross, they died slowly and of suffocation – pushing down on their nailed (or bound) feet so that they could take a breath[1]. It could take as long as three days to die. Crucifixion was also a very public death. Those who were condemned to die were generally put to death by the side of a well-travelled road so that their deaths could serve as an example to as many people as possible. It was a cruel, inhumane and humiliating way in which to die and, one would think, the most unlikely image to become an object of veneration.

This contradiction – that an image of torture and death could become a symbol representative of life and hope – is captured by the author of John’s gospel. In 3:14-15 Jesus says: “the Son of Man must be lifted up so that whomever believes in him will have eternal life.” In this passage and other places in which Jesus uses the expression “lifted up”, he is referring to his crucifixion. (“And I, when I am lifted up from the earth will draw all people to myself.” (12:32)) For the author of John’s gospel the cross, the crucifixion is the high point of Jesus’ ministry, the moment towards which the whole gospel is moving and the point at which it Jesus’ mission reaches not only its climax, but its fulfillment. The cross is a victory, not a defeat.

Lindars points out that Jesus’ victory on the cross is at least two-fold[2]. By laying dow his life for others, Jesus is demonstrating not only his deep love, but what is really God’s love for the world. In freely offering this gift, Jesus shows his readiness to do as the Father wills and demonstrates that he and the Father are one. Lindars refers to this as his “moral union with God”.

By overcoming the natural human resistance to pain and death and by conquering the human will to live, Jesus shows that human nature’s propensity to resist God and goodness can in fact be overcome and that humanity does not have to submit to selfish desires or to the propensity to gratify one’s own needs and desires before all else. Through his submission to the cross Jesus, Lindars suggests, wins the “supreme moral victory” (which is also a cosmic victory for “in his own person the devil’s grip on humanity is broken” (12:31)).

“Lifting up” in John’s gospel several layers of meaning. It can refer to the cross as the place of victory but it also suggestive of Jesus’ exaltation to the right hand of the Father. At the same time, because as we have seen, crucifixion was a very public event and because the cross lifted the victim above the level of the crowds the condemned men were very visible to those who gathered and to those who passed by. On the cross, Jesus is visibly and publicly displayed for all to see. Thank goodness we do not have to witness the physical event, but through the images that are available and those in our mind’s eye, we see Jesus’ lifted up and through John’s gospel comprehend that in this instance defeat is in fact victory, that death is a door to life and that even the worst of human excesses can be overcome.

We come to understand that on the cross, Jesus bore all the suffering of the world, experienced the baseness and cruelty of humankind at its worst and identified with the victims of cruelty and torture, the victims of domestic violence and bullying, the victims of oppression and injustice and all who have suffered at the hands of others. Those who have experienced unbearable pain and suffering can look at the cross and know that God shared/shares their pain. This understanding is best captured by a poem written by a woman who had experienced abuse at the hands of a man. The poem is written in response to a cruciform image of a woman that was hung below a cross in a United Church Chapel in Toronto.

May we all see in Jesus “lifted up” the victory of the cross, Jesus union with the Father, the triumph over evil and the possibility of resurrection.

By his wounds you have been healed

1 Peter 2:24

 

O God,

through the image of a woman

crucified on the cross

I understand at last.

 

For over hold my life

I have been ashamed

of the scars I bear.

These scars tell an ugly story,

a common story,

about a girl who is the victim

when a man acts out his fantasies.

 

In the warmth, peace and sunlight of your presence

I was able to uncurl my tightly clenched fists.

for the first time

I felt your suffering presence with me

in that event.

I have known you as a vulnerable baby,

as a brother and as a father.

Now I know you as a woman.

You we’re there with me as the violated girl

caught in helpless suffering.

 

The chains of shame and fear

no longer bind my heart and body.

A slow fire of compassion and forgiveness

is kindled.

my tears fall now

for man as well as woman.

 

You, God,

can make our violated bodies

vessels of love and comfort

to such a desperate man.

I am honored

to carry this womanly power

within my body and soul.

 

You were not ashamed of your wounds.

You showed them to Thomas

as marks of your ordeal and death.

I will no longer hide these wounds of mine.

I will bear them gracefully.

They tell a resurrection story.

 

Anonymous. Written after seeing a figure of a woman, arms outstretched as if crucified, hung below the cross in the Chapel of the Bloor St United Church in Toronto. The statue is now in a courtyard of Emmanuel United College in Toronto.[3]

 

 

[1] A Google search of images of the crucifixion provides some sketches which demonstrate what crucifixion was like.

[2] Lindars, Barnabas, SSF in The Johannine Literature. Ed Lindars, Barnabas, Edwards, Ruth B. and Court, John. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000, 91-93.

[3] The poem is anonymous. I read it in a Newsletter published by The World Council of Churches in 1988 as a part of the Ecumenical Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women (1988-1998).

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Breaking down the barriers

March 7, 2015

Lent 3 -2015
John 2:13-21
Marian Free

In the name of God, whom we access through Jesus – not through buildings or rituals. Amen.

John 2:13 The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” The Jews then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Jews then said, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?” But he was speaking of the temple of his body.

I wonder what, if anything, surprised you in today’s gospel? For myself, three things are immediately obvious. The first is that Jesus’ cleansing of the Temple occurs at the beginning of his ministry; the second is that Jesus compares the Temple precincts to a marketplace and not to a “den of thieves” and the third is the reference to Jesus’ body as a temple. These stand out because they are not found in the other accounts of the same event. If you were to put John’s account of the cleansing of the Temple side by side with the accounts found in the other three gospels you would notice other significant differences in the retelling. These include Jesus making a whip of cords, pouring out the coins of the money-changers, the disciples’ remembering the Psalm (“zeal for your house”) and suggesting that if the Temple were destroyed, he Jesus, could raise it up in three days.

These distinctions are significant and important if we are to understand John’s gospel and the differences between John’s gospel and Matthew, Mark and Luke. Among other things, the Synoptic Gospels place the majority of Jesus’ ministry in Galilee. Jesus makes only one visit to Jerusalem and that is for less than a week – the week in which he dies. The author of John’s gospel suggests that there were three occasions on which Jesus visited Jerusalem and that his first visit – this one, occurred immediately after the wedding at Cana (which is in Galilee). Jesus performs the first of his signs – changing water into wine – and immediately makes the long trip to Jerusalem for the Passover.

According to John, Jesus goes to Jerusalem on several occasions during his ministry and he appears to spend a great deal of time there – more time there than in Galilee. The Synoptic gospels tell the story quite differently, Jesus visits only once and that just before his death. The differences in the accounts means that it is difficult to tell just how long Jesus’ public ministry was. Was it only one year as implied by the Synoptics, or was it three as implied in John’s account?

Of course each author retells the story in a different way according to the point they want to make. In the case of John’s gospel, one of the author’s intentions is to demonstrate that in his person, Jesus replaces the Temple, its festivals and its rituals. Through Jesus, in other words, John claims that believers have a direct access to God. There is no longer any need for an intermediary – whether that be the priests or the rituals associated with the Temple. In Jesus is all that a believer needs for healing, rest, and life-giving sustenance. This is most evident in what we know as the “I am” statements some of which occur specifically in the context of the Jewish festivals. When Jesus says: “I am the light of the world”, “I am the living water”, “I am the bread of life”, he is implying that in his person he represents the symbols of the cult. As the light of the world, Jesus makes Hanukkah redundant, as the bread of life he implies that he replaces the Passover festival and as the water of life, he becomes the primary symbol associated with the Feast of the Tabernacles.

All of this goes to explain why the author of John’s gospel places Jesus’ clearing of the Temple at the very beginning of Jesus ministry. It sets the scene for what is to come. In other words, John is using this event in Jesus’ life to introduce the idea that Jesus replaces the Temple and all that it represents. This theme is not unique to John, but is found, albeit in a very different way in the Book of Hebrews, which is much more explicit about Jesus’ replacement of the Temple, the priesthood and the sanctuary as the primary means by which believers access or enter into relationship with God.

To us this all seems self-evident – it is a theme with which we have lived our whole lives. It is important to remember that John is writing in a completely different context – one in which the Temple had played a role for centuries and in which there were temples were central to the worship of the vast array of Greek and Roman gods. Worshipping a god without a Temple was almost inconceivable if for no other resaon than that there needed to be somewhere to offer sacrifices.

John is writing at the end of the first century. At the time Jerusalem (and therefore the Temple) had been destroyed – the focus of the Jewish cult no longer existed. Even had it survived, those who believed in Jesus would not have been welcome because they had not supported the Jews in the uprising against Rome If the Temple no longer existed, it would have raised the questions: Where and how might the cult be practiced if there is no longer a Temple, no longer a Holy of Holies? If there was no longer a Temple how and where would believers express their relationship with God? Without the Temple how could the people communicate with God.

John’s gospel provides the answer – all these things are possible in and through Jesus. The Temple is no longer necessary. Through Jesus believers have direct access to God. They do not need cult or ritual to express their relationship with or to communicate with God. Everything that the Temple cult had provided – reconciliation with God, purity rituals, opportunities to give thanks to God and so on – is now to be found in and expressed through the person of Jesus. This is the point that John is making in his retelling of the “cleansing of the Temple”. Jesus claims that should the Temple itself be destroyed, he could raise it up – not in the 46 years it had taken Herod to bring it to its current state, but in just three days. This is an extraordinary claim. It would be impossible to rebuild the bricks and mortar of the building, but as John explains for the benefits of his readers, Jesus is not referring to the physical Temple, but to himself. Through his death and resurrection, Jesus will become the means of communication with God. All that the Temple has been, all the functions that the Temple has served, will be available through faith in Jesus. If there is a need for a Temple, Jesus is that Temple.

It is important to understand that the Church is not a substitute for the Temple, that the clergy are not intermediaries between the faithful and God, that our rites and rituals might express our faith but they do not stand between God and us. Thanks to Jesus, the relationship between each individual and God is direct and immediate. Those who believe in Jesus don’t need someone else to pray for on their behalf, to ask forgiveness on their behalf or to offer sacrifices on their behalf. No one needs another person to act as God’s interpreter because God is accessible to each and every one of us.

God has broken all the barriers, between himself and humankind. Such barriers as there are of our own making and our own design.

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Reimagine the Divine

March 3, 2015

Imagining the Divine – God in the 21st Century

Evensong – March 1, St John’s Cathedral

Marian Free

 

May my spoken word, lead us through the written Word, to encounter the Living Word, even Jesus Christ our Saviour. Amen.

 

If you were in church this morning you would have heard a reading from Genesis 16: 1-7, 15-16. Unless you were at Hamilton, you will not have heard how the story continues. Verse 17 says: “Abraham fell on his face and laughed.” He fell on his face and laughed. God tells Abraham that he will have a son and this is Abraham’s response. He doesn’t show his disbelief by rolling his eyes or snickering behind his hand. He doesn’t wait till God is out of earshot and share the joke with his friend. There is nothing subtle or discreet about Abraham’s incredulity. This is a laugh from the depths of his being, he is so overcome by the ridiculous nature of God’s promise that he laughs out right out loud, he guffaws. Abraham is so overcome with mirth that he bends over double, falls to the ground. This is rib-tickling, thigh slapping, laugh until you are ill amusement – and it is directed at God.

Perhaps you are thinking that this is an odd place to begin a discussion on God in the 21st century – to choose a story, which if it is historical is something like 4,000 years old. You are right – what do miracles and Hebrew characters have to do with imagining the divine today. Haven’t we moved past the view of God presented in what we know as the Old Testament? Don’t we need a new and refreshing vision?

Obviously, I’m not sure. We neglect the Old Testament at our peril. Our best imaginings cannot imagine the God depicted here. In fact, I would go so far as to say that our imaginations have been severely limited, even impoverished by our distrust of the God of the Old Testament. God, as envisioned by the writers of the Old Testament is at once approachable and remote, passionate and compassionate, loving and firm, constant and unpredictable. There is almost no limit to the imagery that is called into use to try to capture something of the experience of God. God is described and imagined as breasts, as a mother bear, as an eagle, a fortress, a rock, a tree, a king and a shepherd. In order to try to capture something of the nature of God imagery from the real world – both animate and inanimate are used.

Unfortunately, the New Testament does not provide us with such a wealth of imagery. Apart from the Gospel of John which provides us with images such as light and life, the predominant way of thinking about and addressing God in the New Testament was Father. This, until the feminist objections of the 1980’s is, with some notable exceptions how God has been addressed and imagined ever since.

Language is a powerful tool, it describes our reality and defines our reality. For good and for ill our language for God determines the way in which we understand and relate to God. I would contend that for two thousand years, with some notable exceptions there has been a failure of imagination, a limit to the ways in which the institution speaks of God and therefore in the way that many people think of God. Just to give one example, the stereotype of God that is rejected by the new atheists, is a God whom we might recognise from our Sunday School days, but that is a God whom most of us (along with them) have firmly renounced and rejected.

Where to go then in the twenty-first century? How might we imagine God anew? Why are we imagining God – for ourselves or for others? Imagining the divine in the twenty-first century is a much more profound issue than I had realised when I agreed to preach this evening and has given me much pause for thought – not least that a response to the topic required a great deal more research than I allowed for. What language could begin to express the extraordinary, miraculous, ever-present nature of God? If I/we were going to try to find images to which the twenty-first century mind could relate, what would they be? Some of the biblical language might be able to be put to good use, but a great deal has become obsolete. Few of us have direct experience of a shepherd, let alone a mother bear. In today’s language of kingship conjures up ideas of, at best paternalism and at worst oppression and rocks are simply that – geological formations.

I found myself wondering what, in terms of modern experience, would be the most amazing, most indescribable, the most pervasive and the most impossible reality of today’s world? What in today’s world knows all about me, and knows where I am at any one time?

In other words, apart from God what is it about the twenty-first century that absolutely astounds me. My answer – the mobile phone. With this phone I can speak to anyone at anytime. I can even speak face-to-face with someone in another country. I can check my emails and read my bible (in whatever language I choose). I can get directions to anywhere that I wish to go and ask the phone to take me there. I can book air tickets. I can take photos and look at photos, find out what the weather is going to be – here, in Hamburg, in London or anywhere else that I choose. I can point it at the night sky and it will tell me what I am looking at. I can buy books or borrow books from the library and read them. I can draw, write, play games, listen to music, make music, watch TV. I can write my sermons and upload them to my website. If the screen is too small, I can attach a device to my television and use it as the screen. If the sound is too poor I can connect to my amplifier and my fancy speakers. AND because my devices are synched, all of this is possible on my iPad and my computer. In fact, I can do almost anything that I would wish to do – the limit is only someone else’s imagination.

All this is possible because of something that is diffuse and incomprehensible and completely invisible to me – the internet and “the cloud”.

The world is changing so rapidly that most of us cannot keep up. WE are living in a world of radical change and radical personal transformation. In fact, Prof Anthony Elliott [1] in a lecture aired on Big Ideas during the week, suggests that as a result of what he calls the “reinvention revolution” there is an increasing cultural anxiety. Women and men, he says, feel that they need to undertake a process of recalibration in order to confront the challenges of everyday living, to keep up with the latest changes. The problem is that there is always the worry that that won’t be enough for them to face the challenges of tomorrow. It is no wonder that the transformation industry is a multi-billion dollar industry.

While men and women are anxious about change and the need to keep up, they also seem to find it strangely liberating. Elliott, reporting on the work of Thrift, a British sociologist, says “women and men today are no longer blindly just following customs and traditions and pre-ordained ways of doing things. They are trying things out and trying things on as never before. They are not waiting for permission in either their personal or professional life as to how to get on to what they need to do. They are embracing reinvention societies in such a way as to engage in ongoing, incessant experimentation. These are not random, but are associated with various socio-technical systems – touch screens, virtual landscapes, location tagging, augmented realities and so on. iPhones and other things we carry strapped to our bodies are rearranging the whole social cartography.”

Reimagining God in this ever changing, inter-connected, over-anxious, app driven world is no easy task. The story of Abraham with which I began suggests that we can afford to lighten up. As we begin to explore the divine in the twenty first century, perhaps one of the things we can do is to take ourselves less seriously, stop over-thinking things. Maybe it is time to relax a bit, to allow images to form and re-form, to give ourselves some freedom to listen to and engage with the world around us and, instead of thinking so much, simply open ourselves to what is utterly other and see how that otherness is being revealed in the world today.

In a world that embraces change and yet finds the need to do so a source of anxiety, perhaps we can help women and men imagine a God who is both stable and ever-changing, both at the centre and at the periphery, who loves us as we are and yet challenges to be all that we can be. In a world driven by socio-technology it may be that we need to imagine God as personal and relational, as always present and accessible, as a source of strength and a well-spring of creativity. A God who extends us and enables us to do more than we thought possible.

In the final analysis, God simply is, and as such God always has and always will define all our attempts to reimagine.

[1] Lecture presented at ANU, aired on Big Ideas (Radio National) Tuesday 24th February, 2015.

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Living Dangerously

February 28, 2015

Lent 2 – 2015

Mark 8:31-38

Marian Free

 

In the name of God who invites us to take risks, to live dangerously and to have fun. Amen.

Over the past week or so I have been reading an interesting book entitled: “Why Men Hate Church” by David Murrow. The book addresses the obvious – the fact that in most Christian denominations women outnumber men, often by a considerable number (something which is not entirely accounted for by the reality that, on the whole, men die at a younger age than women). Admittedly I have only had a cursory look at the book[1], but from what I have gleaned it is something of a “Men are from Mars, and Women are from Venus” sort of thesis. Murrow argues that men and women think differently, act differently and want different things. He suggests that even though until recently men dominated the leadership of the church; for the last 1300 – 1400 years, the church has been increasing feminised. Murrow contends that around the year 700 the church lost its edge. At that time, he claims, the church gave up the emphasis on struggle and sacrifice and replaced it with a call to passivity and weakness. The image of Jesus changed from someone who was strong and courageous to someone who was meek and submissive. This in turn, he suggests, has led vast numbers of men and some women to feel at best uncomfortable and at worst unwelcome in many churches.

Assuming Murrow’s thesis to be true, we can of course document exceptions to the rule. As ill-conceived as they were, the crusades provided an opportunity for displays of courage and self-sacrifice, as no doubt did the two world wars. Throughout the ages, Saints such as Joan of Arc, missionaries such as Graham Staines and his sons Phillip and Timothy, clergy such as Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Bishops such as Oscar Romero have been willing to take greats risks and lay down their lives for the faith.

By and large though, the institutional church has settled down, become a part of the surrounding landscape and played it safe. It could not be argued that we at St Augustine’s live dangerously or that we take risks that might cost us our place in the community, let alone cost us our lives. Murrow suggests that this is one of the reasons why some people do not come to church – they don’t want to be safe. They want to be dangerous. Risk-takers, fun-lovers and builders he claims, do not find enough in our liturgy or our community life that is challenging or that takes them to the edge and so they stay away.

I am not at all sure that I agree with Murrow’s overall argument (among other things he is writing from a North American perspective) but his book does provide some food for thought and leads to a number of questions. Have we created a kind of mono-culture which leaves some people feeling as though there is no place for them in the church? More importantly it forces us to ask – what are we really about? Have we forgotten that the gospel is all about living dangerously, not about building a secure and comfortable place in which we can now (and forever) feel at home? Worshipping in our beautiful churches, using a liturgy with roots that are ancient, gathering with our friends week by week, have we lost sight of the fact that the Son of Man had nowhere to lay his head and that the early disciples were called away from all that was familiar and secure to a life in which almost nothing was certain except for uncertainty and risk. In our efforts to be part of the world around us, do we allow injustices to go unchallenged? In other words, are we really living gospel lives?

I suspect that we all suffer from a form of collective amnesia and that for the most part we put our efforts into keeping the institution of the church alive, rather than worrying about the survival of the gospel. That said, that model has served us well for centuries. As long as the community around us was predominantly Christian, the church has served the purpose of building up the community of faith. Through worship and prayer we have supported one another through difficult times and been challenged to grow in faith and faithfulness. Our faith has enabled many of us to take risks of sorts, to trust God when we have had to make difficult decisions or to step out in faith when we had no idea what the future held for us.

Times have changed. We can no longer assume that members of our local community hold the faith or that those who do will join our worshipping community. This being the case, how can we ensure the continuity of the gospel? How, in this changing world can we share with others this amazing gift of faith?

One answer is this – if people don’t come to us, we must go to them. We must ask those who do believe in Jesus Christ why they don’t join us. Is it because our culture and practice make them feel unwelcome? For those who do not believe we must explore new ways of making conversation, new ways of letting them into our secret. If the Christian church is to survive, we must be bold and courageous. We must seek out builders, risk-takers and those who are prepared to live dangerously and we must allow them to make us feel uncomfortable for a change. We must step out of our comfort zones and do things differently for a change.

Whether we like it or not, we must change or die. Or, perhaps as today’s gospel puts it, we must die to all that we are and all that we have known so that God’s purpose can be worked out through us. Jesus didn’t call us to be safe – anything but. His call to follow is an invitation to live on the edge, to let go of the past and to begin each day as if it were our first. We are not invited to be comfortable or complacent, but to be adventurous and daring, open to change and to challenge. We are only here because twenty centuries ago there were those who were brave enough to step out of their comfort zones and leave everything behind in order to answer Jesus’ call. Their courage and willingness to take risks ensured that the gospel message, not only survived but spread throughout the world?

In the twenty-first century, do we have the courage to answer the call? What are we prepared to leave behind to enter the future God is preparing for us?

[1] If you are interested, I suggest you read it for yourselves. Murrow, David. Why Men Hate Going to Church.

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Alone with ourselves

February 21, 2015

Lent 1 – 2015

Mark 1:9-14

Marian Free

In the name of God who loves us as we are and invites us to do the same. Amen.

During a recent visit to Hobart we visited both Port Arthur and the Female Factory[1]. The latter was particularly shocking. At both prisons there was provision for solitary confinement. An Englishman John Howard promoted the idea as a more effective means of reform than prison. His belief was, that in isolation from others a convicted person would be forced to reflect on and repent of their crimes. His idea was first put into practice in the United States, then England and from there to Van Dieman’s Land. Prisoners would be locked in a cell for twenty-three hours of every day and allowed one hour only to exercise and even then they wore masks to prevent them from communicating with each other. The walls of the cells were thick to ensure that the convicts couldn’t hear each other. To maintain an atmosphere of silence, the guards wore slippers and “spoke” to each other through sign language. Even during the compulsory Chapel Service the prisoners wore masks and were separated from each other in separate stalls.

The cells were so small that the hammocks on which the men slept had to be rolled up during the day. They had a small table and a chair so that they could work and a bucket for personal needs. In the United States both the Chaplains and Doctors noticed that an abnormally high number of prisoners developed what today we would call “mental illness” and advocated that the practice be abandoned. In Van Dieman’s Land, the Comptroller of Convicts, John Hampton, supported by the Commandant at Port Arthur was a fervent supporter of the system.

A particularly abhorrent part of the practice of solitary confinement was that known as the ‘the dumb cell’ or punishment cell. This cell lay behind four thick doors and was completely light and sound proof. (It is possible to go inside a cell today and if you draw the door to, there is absolutely no light. The cell was so small that anyone taller than myself (5’3”) would have found it impossible to lie down, let alone move around.) The practice was abandoned when Port Arthur closed, but it is still used today both as a form of punishment and as a means of torture.

It is difficult for us to imagine just how demoralising and isolating such a situation can be. Being alone without any distraction allows self-doubt to surface and depression to follow. In the 1800’s a Danish prisoner who experienced solitary confinement wrote: “one was ‘instantly overpowered’ by a ‘depressing’ and ‘poignant solitude’ that went against the natural desire of ‘both men of nature and men of culture’ for a social life. A perpetual emptiness grinds away and throws the prisoner into a condition which borders on insanity’.[2]

This is depressing stuff, but it illustrates the disorienting affect of silence and isolation. A person is left with only their own resources to keep them from madness. Every fear, every anxiety is given an opportunity to come to the surface and there are no distractions. Such an extreme form of isolation, isolation imposed, rather than chosen is beyond cruelty.

Isolation and silence that is freely chosen is quite different, though the lack of distraction and conversation has a similar effect – albeit to a much lesser extent. Our work, our families and our social life all have the benefit of taking our minds off our troubles, of giving our lives meaning and helping us to identify our place in the world. In the midst of everyday life we can see where we “fit”. We are able to balance our troubles and problems against the good things in life and recognise that so many others are much worse off than ourselves. Without these identifies, we are like a boat that has come lose from its moorings, we are cast adrift, with nothing to hold on to. We are forced to depend on our own resources, or to place our trust firmly in God.

For many in religious orders, isolation and silence are a lifestyle choice. Away from the world practitioners are able to come to a fuller understanding of themselves – their resources and their strengths, their poverty of spirit and their weaknesses. Unfettered by the concerns of everyday life, they are able to make themselves totally available to God. On a much smaller scale, a Religious Retreat (especially if it is silent) provides a similar sort of experience. The Retreatant comes to a deeper awareness of their true nature and a deeper relationship with God.

We are told that after Jesus’ baptism the Spirit “drove him into the wilderness” where for forty days he was alone with himself and with God. Whatever sense of mission Jesus had before this time, it seems that it was crystallised at his baptism. Spirit-driven or not, it would not be surprising that Jesus needed some time out to think, to consider whether he was really up to the task – after all, for all that he was divine he was also fully human. Could the human side of him really be placed at the service of the divine? Could his divinity really be expressed, without his being tempted to compete with God? The time in the wilderness would have shown him what he was really made of. The isolation and the loneliness would have forced him to totally rely on God. It seems that whatever happened in the wilderness, Jesus returned to the world with a clear sense of purpose and a willingness to accept whatever it was that God had in store for him.

During Lent we are invited, in some small way, to share Jesus’ wilderness experience. By “giving up” something for Lent we are given an opportunity to see what we are made of and by allowing God to fill the space that we have created. Compared to forty days alone in the wilderness, or a lifetime of silence in a religious order, forty days of going without in the comfort of our own home, in the company of family and friends is nothing at all.

Lent is a gift, not a chore, an opportunity not an imposition. May your Lenten observance be a fruitful time of self-examination and spiritual growth.

[1] Female prison

[2] http://www.insidetime.org/resources/Publications/Solitary_Confinement_PSJ181.pdf, More recent descriptions of the experience of solitary confinement can be found in the book Evil Cradling that describes the experience of Brian Keenan who was taken hostage in Lebanon in the 1980’s and the diary of Mohamedou Ould Slahi who has been incarcerated in Guantanamo Bay even though several years ago he was found to be innocent.

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We cannot go it alone

February 14, 2015

Transfiguration
 Mark 9:2-9
 Marian Free

In the name of God whose engagement with the world draws us into engagement with God. Amen.

Last week I was struck by the number of similarities between last week’s gospel and this week’s account of the Transfiguration. In both instances Jesus has been pressed in upon by people demanding his attention, seeking healing or simply desiring to be in his presence. After both occasions Jesus withdraws to a mountain to gather his strength and to reconnect with God. After the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law, Jesus wakes early in the morning and goes to a “deserted place” by himself to pray. He gets little peace, because Peter and his companions seek him out. (The Greek is even stronger – it reads “hunted him”). “Everyone is seeking you”, they say. It seems that those who have experienced his ministry and his healing power do not want to let him go. They try to draw him back, to keep him to themselves. That is not possible. Jesus informs them that he doesn’t belong to them or even to their small part of the world. His role, as he understands it, is to spread his teaching to as broad a group of people as possible. His ability to heal, belongs not to a few, but to all the world. He had not come into the world to be a local miracle worker. His mission could not be restricted nor could his healing power be owned by just a few.

There are differences and similarities between this account and today’s account of the Transfiguration. Again, the crowds, recognising what Jesus can offer, have allowed him little respite. “They have been with me three days” – three days with no time to himself, no time to think! Jesus’ personal resources must have been stretched to the limit. He has fed five thousand people with seven loaves and some small fish, he has returned sight to the blind, argued with the Pharisees and had the emotionally draining experience of trying to share with the disciples what the future has in store for him. (A task made even more difficult by Peter’s refusal to understand.) As in the first chapter, Jesus’ response to the pressure is to take time apart, to go to a place where he is unlikely to be disturbed, a place in the wilderness where he can take stock and allow God to minister to him and to restore him to himself. On this occasion Jesus does not go alone. He takes with him his closest friends, those who will share the most intimate parts of his journey – Peter, James and John. In doing this, he exposes them to the nature of his relationship with God and gives them a glimpse into who he really is.

This moment is more dramatic than his quiet prayer in the wilderness. On this occasion his experience of the presence of God is not only tangible, it is transformative. Before the disciples’ eyes, Jesus is physically transfigured – his clothes become dazzling white. Even more amazing, the disciples witness Jesus speaking with those giants of the Israelties’ faith – Moses and Elijah. On this occasion too, Peter wants to hold on to the moment. At the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, Peter and his companions want to keep Jesus to themselves. Now, on the mountain, Peter seeks to capture and contain the experience, to hold on to the moment, he does not want to let go of such a tangible, affirming encounter with the holy. “Let us make three tents” he says. Just as he did not want Jesus to leave his home town, so now he doesn’t want this amazing encounter to come to an end.

One can imagine that Jesus might have been tempted to stay, to take the easy way out, to abdicate his responsibilities, to avoid the demands of the crowds and to evade the eventual consequences of his mission. But the whole point of his being here, the purpose of the incarnation is that he share in the full human experience. So while he takes time apart to replenish his resources and while his intimacy with God is such that he like Peter might have wanted to rest in it forever, Jesus plunges back into the messiness of human existence – (to be greeted at the foot of the mountain, by yet another situation that demands his full d undivided attention, a situation, which Jesus informs us can only be dealt with because his life is sustained by his relationship with God – by prayer.)

In the wilderness and on the mountaintop, Jesus spends time with God. Here he allows God to fill him, here he ensures that he has the strength and resources that are required to meet the demands that will be made upon him, he he gives God the opportunity to strengthen him to face any of the difficulties that he might face in his life’s journey. Empowered by God he can face anything and do anything. It is God’s presence in and with him that gives Jesus the ability to share the good news of the Kingdom, to heal the sick and cast out demons.

If our lives are to be informed by and empowered by God, we too must find time to be with God, we must discover our own place apart, allow God to restore and heal us, give God room to work in and through us.

With Jesus, we must learn that our busyness and our engagement with the world must be fueled by the presence of God and that the presence of God in our lives will in turn send us back into the world to be a sign of God’s presence in the chaos and turmoil of what it means to be human. In the end, we cannot do it alone, but only in the power of God

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Our prayer should inform our lives, our lives should inform our prayer.

February 7, 2015

Epiphany 5 – 2015
Mark 1:29-39
Marian Free

In the name of God who draws us into relationship with Godself, but does not call us to withdraw from the world. Amen.

The 10th of December was the anniversary of the death of the great twentieth century contemplative Thomas Merton. Thomas’s story is well-rehearsed elsewhere (Try http://www.thefamouspeople.com.) In short, he was born in France, the son of artist parents. Sadly, his mother died when he was only six. Then began a life during which he lived in many different places with his grandparents in the United States and then in France with his father. He attended boarding school in both France and England. He was only sixteen when his father died. Already quite independent as a result of being left to his own devices, Merton took himself off to Europe on a walking holiday when he finished school. When in Rome, despite the fact that he considered himself to be an agnostic, Merton felt himself drawn to visit churches. At the same time he bought and read the Vulgate – the Latin New Testament. During this time in Rome, he had a mystical experience of his dead Father. This experience exposed the emptiness that he felt within and he says that for the first time in his life he felt really drawn to prayer.

It was while he was in Rome that Merton visited a Trappist monastery. Here he felt both anxiety and also a sense of belonging. It occurred to him that he would like to become a Trappist monk. Returning to the UK he entered Clare College where, by all accounts he lived a dissipated life, to the point that his guardian encouraged him to return to the United States and to his grandparents there. At Columbia University Merton enrolled in a B.A. in English Literature. This period of his life proved to be formative and set the direction for the rest of his life. He began to write, he became politicized and he discovered Roman Catholicism. An introduction to a Hindu monk whose God-centred life impressed him was also to have a lasting effect on his life providing him with a deep desire to understand other faith traditions. To Merton’s surprise, the monk, instead of encouraging Merton to become a Hindu, encouraged him to explore his own faith traditions.

In 1938 at the age of 23 Merton felt a call to the priesthood. As a consequence he was accepte into the Catholic Church and began exploring his vocation. His first point of call was the Franciscan order, who to his great disappointment, did not accept him into the novitiate. His fall back position was to take teaching job at the St Bonaventure University (a Catholic University that provided an opportunity for him to share in the life of the priests who taught there). The position also meant that he was able to go on retreat at the Abbey of Gethsemani. Here among the Cistercians he at last found a home and was able to pursue his vocation. He continued his writing and his interest in Eastern religions.

Even though the Cistercians are a silent order, Merton sought even more space to be apart from the world. He asked for, and was eventually granted, permission to live by himself for extended periods of time. Despite his need to be apart, Merton never abandoned his interest and political action in the real world and through his writing he continued to critique the injustices and the issues of his time – racism, nuclear disarmament, poverty – and to challenge his readers to work for change.

Thomas Merton came to mind when I was pondering the second vignette in today’s gospel. We are told that after Jesus healed Peter’s mother-in-law, “the whole city was gathered around the door”. Jesus cured the sick and cast out demons. The next morning Jesus got up before sunrise
to find some time to be apart to reflect, to pray, to gather his strength before he returns to the demands of the people. The peace he seeks is short-lived. Simon and the other disciples pursue him, hunt for him and he continues with his work, allowing the demands of others to to absorb his time and attention.

Jesus knew that his strength and focus could only be maintained if his relationship with God. He knew that he could only respond to the needs of others if his own reserves were full. He understood too the need to be fully engaged with the world. It must have been tempting to take himself away from the demands of the crowd, to avoid their neediness and constant presence. How easy it would have been to make himself into a “holy person”, separate and alone in constant communication with God, to be available only to a few.

That is not the way of God. The whole point of the incarnation was to demonstrate God’s engagement with the world. In Jesus, God steps in “boots and all” into the messiness of human existence avoiding nothing and no one.

There are times when we might wish to withdraw, to avoid the crowds, to evade our responsibilities. There are times when it all seems too hard, when the problems of our life, or the state of the world threatens to overwhelm us. At such times we might take ourself apart. Jesus’ example reminds us that our times apart are only times to recover ourselves so that we have the strength once more to enter the fray. They are times when we draw on God’s strength so that it is in that strength not our own that we carry on. Both are important – withdrawal and engagement.

Our real life should inform our prayer life and our prayer life should inform our real life. Together they make us whole, together they will contribute to the wholeness of the world.

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Gloria revisited – authenticity exposed

January 31, 2015

Epiphany 4 – 2015

Mark 1:21-28

Marian Free

In the name of God who gives us freedom to stay as we are or to grow into the fullness of life. Amen.

In a different lifetime, I studied Psychology at the University of Queensland. One of my subjects was Counselling Psychology. The course introduced us to the wide variety of techniques and theories that were in vogue at the time. During one of the lectures we were shown a video of three different therapies. The client, Gloria was a real person who was to be rewarded for her participation by being allowed to choose one of the three to be her therapist. The film had such an impact that a Google search shows that the film is still being used and that as recently as 2013 Counselling tutors and others were uploading the video on their blogs.

Of the three techniques explored, by far the most direct and confrontational was that of Fritz Perls, who with his wife developed Gestalt Therapy. This form of therapy aimed to try to get hold of what was obvious, to focus on the surface, the present moment, rather all the client to retreat into the past or worry about the future. The role of the therapist was, among other things, to identify game playing and to assist the client to be authentic.

Perls’ session with Gloria was fascinating. Throughout the half hour he continually drew attention to what Gloria was doing – that fact that she smiled even though she said she was anxious, that she was swinging her feet, rolling her arms and so on. Gloria’s reaction to this was to resist. She became angry and frustrated. Instead of backing off, the therapist kept focusing on her and how she was reacting. Time after time he called her on her attempts to hide her real feelings and time after time he accused her of being phony. Gloria became very uncomfortable, at times fighting back angrily and telling the therapist not only what she thought of him, but how she thought he should behave, how he should treat her. Perls was not deterred. Instead, he encouraged Gloria to express herself, pointing out that it was when she let fly, that she was more truly herself than when she was putting on a face in order to hide her true feelings, or to protect herself from hurt.

Gloria did not appreciate being accused of being a phony, but it was very clear that she did not want Perls to see that she was vulnerable and anxious. It was equally obvious that she did not want to admit that it was her very refusal to be authentic that was the source of the problem that had brought her to therapy. She would have preferred the therapist to be more paternal rather than confronting and challenging her.

Whenever Perls challenged Gloria to recognise that she was putting on an act, Gloria reacted strongly. She didn’t like being seen for who she really was, she didn’t want to believe that she was phony and she didn’t like being exposed. She admitted that it was easier to retreat into her corner where she felt safe and secure. There was a sense that in some way she would rather stay as she was than to do the hard work that it would take to achieve her goal.

In the first century there was nothing like medical science as we know it and certainly nothing like therapy. The explanation for illness or disability of any kind tended to be that it was the result of sin or of demon possession. In today’s gospel, Jesus is teaching in the synagogue when he is confronted by an unclean spirit who calls out: “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.” To our twenty first century ears, it seems like an odd reaction – especially given what we know of Jesus. Why would someone who was sick or possessed repel Jesus? Why would someone who was suffering think that Jesus had come to destroy and not help him?

Gloria’s story gives us some clues to the man’s reaction to Jesus. The unclean spirit apparently sensed that Jesus saw straight through him. Knowing his that his weaknesses were exposed, he like our modern day Gloria, came out fighting. The man did not want to be helped by Jesus if it meant that his vulnerabilities and weaknesses had first of all to be identified and exposed. He would rather remain bound by his afflictions than let anyone – especially not Jesus – see who he really was.

Like Gloria and the man with the unclean spirit, many of us try to conceal the aspects of ourselves that we are afraid will expose us to ridicule or disdain. We cover up our vulnerabilities and weaknesses because we worry that people would think less of us if they knew who we really were. Some of us would rather live with pain and discomfort than admit that we need help. We don’t want others to think that we can’t cope or that our families are less than perfect. We hide our uncertainties so that others can’t accuse us of being weak or indecisive.

All this deceit and self-deception is exhausting and futile. In the end, the only person whom we deceive is our self. We waste so much time pretending, when we could be expending that time living.

The gospel assures us that God loves us as and where we are, that we have nothing to hide and nothing to fear. Jesus came to offer wholeness and healing, to give to each and everyone of us the opportunity to live life to the full, unfettered by anxiety, timidity or fear and unconcerned by what others might think.

In the end, we can’t hide from God, so why would we hide from ourselves? God wants to work in our lives. Jesus wants us to experience his dynamic, healing presence in our lives, but we have to want to be changed. We have r allow the Holy Spirit to work in and with us to radically transform and empower us and to bring us to wholeness and peace.

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According to Mark

January 24, 2015

Epiphany 3 – 2015

Mark 1:14-20

Marian Free

In the name of God who will never, ever abandon us. Amen.

It is generally accepted that Mark’s gospel was the first of the four gospels to be written and that Matthew and Luke used Mark account as the model of their own records of the life of Jesus. The author of Mark is writing at the time of the Jewish War – that is some time in the late sixties or the early seventies, around the time of the destruction of Jerusalem. Up until this time the central message of the faith (as is attested by the letters of Paul) had been the death and resurrection of Jesus. Now, those who knew the earthly Jesus have died. There was a need to flesh out the Passion story, to provide the context surrounding Jesus’ execution and to explain to a new generation why the Christ, the Son of God had to die. Jesus’ death and resurrection, though powerful events were no longer enough on their own. They needed to be balanced with stories that illustrated the extraordinary nature of the earthly Jesus. Jesus’ beginning, his teaching and his miracles were important elements in bringing the story to life for future generations.

At the same time it was becoming clear that those who believed in Jesus could expect to suffer. Even if those for whom the gospel was written were not themselves experiencing suffering or persecution themselves, they would have been aware of the plight of believers in Jerusalem and of the persecution of Christians in Rome by Emperor Nero. Members of Mark’s community not only had to come to an understanding of Jesus’ suffering, but they also had to learn that as disciples, they would share in that suffering.

The first gospel is the most honest of the gospels. By that I mean that in Mark’s gospel we see the characters as they really are – nothing is hidden from our gaze. The author doesn’t gloss over either the humanity of Jesus or the foolishness of the disciples.

In Mark’s gospel we meet a Jesus who, among other things, doesn’t know everything (13:32), who can’t do miracles for those who don’t believe (6:5), who at times does not seem to know the will of God and who allows a gentile who is a woman to change his mind (7:24-30). This Jesus expresses every human emotion – pity anger, sadness, wonder, compassion, indignation, love and anguish. His humanity is as evident as the divinity that is stressed from the very first sentence and repeated throughout.

If Jesus’ humanity is evident, the ignorance and fear of those who follow him, is equally clear. Mark’s picture of the disciples is far from flattering. They let Jesus down, they fail to understand, they try to persuade Jesus from his course and at the end they betray and desert him. The disciple’s frailty is particularly obvious when Jesus predicts his suffering and resurrection. In each of the three instances, the disciples’ reaction shows their complete lack of comprehension. On the first occasion, Peter rebukes Jesus, the second is followed by a discussion between the disciples as to who is the greatest and after the third prediction James and John ask Jesus if they can sit at his right and at his left in his kingdom. Unable to accept that the Christ must suffer, they demonstrate their complete lack of understanding by correcting Jesus, by changing the topic and by trying to regain control of things. Their response shows that they can only understand the kingdom in human terms.

According to Mark, Jesus is fallible and the disciples are anything but models for those who come after. (Matthew and Luke rehabilitate both Jesus and the disciples. In Matthew, then Luke and finally John, Jesus becomes more and more like God and the disciples become both wiser and braver.) Of course, there is method in Mark’s apparent madness. Mark is not interested in presenting either Jesus or the disciples as perfect. His purpose is to emphasise what God has done for us in and through the death and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus’ humanity provides the vehicle through which Mark can reveal God’s grace and dependability. The frailty and fearfulness of the disciples reminds readers that it is what God does and not what they do that matters in the end.

This gospel is not a tale of triumph but an account of frailty and suffering. The gospel takes a circuitous and difficult route from the announcement of Jesus as God’s Son in verse 1 to Jesus’ cry of abandonment on the cross. “My God, my God why have you abandoned me?” It is only at the end that everything comes together. After the crucifixion – the apparent failure of Jesus’ mission – it becomes clear that God has been there all along. God’s presence in the rolling away of the stone and God’s messenger in the tomb announcing the resurrection are evidence that despite appearances to the contrary, God did not abandon Jesus. Jesus’ trust and confidence in God has been vindicated by his resurrection. The report that Jesus has gone before the disciples to Galilee is proof that though the disciples had denied and abandoned Jesus, Jesus has not abandoned them.

This year we will be travelling together through the Gospel of Mark, which was written not only for disciples at the end of the first century, but also for those of us in the twenty first century. We will hear how Mark moves the story along, we will see how from the moment he begins his ministry Jesus is always accompanied by those whom he chose to be his disciples, we will understand that the conflict that is evident from the beginning will characterize Jesus’ ministry and lead to his death, and we will be reminded that despite his cry of agony from the cross, God did not abandon him and God will never abandon us.

Faith in Jesus does not guarantee a life of ease. Following Jesus does not lead to perfection. Belief does not always equal understanding. There will be times of pain and suffering in our lives, there will be times when we are only too aware of our imperfections and there will be times when we simply do not understand what God is doing or where God has gone. At such times we can turn once again to Mark’s gospel and remember that whatever life has to throw at us, God will never, ever abandon us and however often we let him down Jesus will never, ever give up on us.

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