Posts Tagged ‘Edith Cavell’

A storm tossed boat – relinquishing control

June 22, 2024

Pentecost 5 -2024

Mark 4:35-41 (thoughts while on leave)

Marian Free

In the name of God who knows our deepest fears, who holds us in the palm of God’s hands and who knows the number of hairs on on head. Amen.

One of my favourite hymns is ‘Abide with me.’ I have always loved it but knowing the role the hymn played in the life (or rather death) of Edith Cavell has given it new power and meaning.

 Abide with me, fast falls the eventide
The darkness deepens Lord, with me abide
When other helpers fail and comforts flee
Help of the helpless, oh, abide with me

Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day
Earth’s joys grow dim, its glories pass away
Change and decay in all around I see
O Thou who changest not, abide with me

I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to bless
Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness
Where is death’s sting?
Where, grave, thy victory?
I triumph still, if Thou abide with me

Hold Thou Thy cross before my closing eyes
Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies
Heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee
In life, in death, o Lord, abide with me
Abide with me, abide with me. (Henry Francis Lyte and Will Henry Monk)

Edith Cavell was a nurse, and an extremely competent and brave woman. During the First World War, Cavell was based in Brussels. Her hospital was taken over by the Red Cross. Working for the Red Cross, Cavell treated all injured soldiers without distinction – friend and foe – and she assisted some 200 hundred Allied soldiers escape German occupied Belgium. For this, she was captured, accused of aiding a hostile power and sentenced to be executed for treason. The daughter of a priest, Cavell had a strong faith. The night before she was to face the firing squad, she was visited by an Anglican priest who was based in Brussels. After she received the Eucharist, she and the Rev’d Gahan sang together ‘Abide with me.’

I don’t know the history of this hymn, but the lyrics express a complete and utter faith in God, especially at the time of death. That Cavell could sing this when the firing squad awaited her fills me with awe as does the fact that she was able to ask the priest to tell her loved ones later on “that my soul, as I believe, is safe, and that I am glad to die for my country”.

To face such a gruesome death with such calm and confidence is surely something all Christians are capable of, but how many of us along the way allow ourselves to be bothered and weighed down by trivial and unimportant anxieties. When it comes down to it, how many of us trust God with every aspect of our existence.

This, I think is what today’s gospel is getting at – the ability (or not) to place our lives, with all their minor irritations and major setbacks, completely in the hands of God.

Mark’s account of the stormy sea crossing has a number of interesting features. In the first instance, according to Mark (and only Mark), the disciples venture on to the sea in the evening – a time when, as anyone knew, the waters could be rough and difficult to manoeuvre. We are not told why they took the risk, but it is clear that Mark places the responsibility for the dangerous journey on them. Secondly, we are told that they took Jesus ‘just as he was’ which supports the notion that not a lot of thought or preparation was put into the journey. Again, the blame for the situation seems to be being laid at the feet of the disciples.

 Despite the lack of preparation and the failure of the disciples to take the conditions into account, Jesus is completely relaxed. Indeed, he is so relaxed that he falls asleep on a cushion.

 As might be expected, a storm blew up in the evening. The boat was tossed about and swamped. Unable to control the boat, and in fear of their lives, the disciples wake Jesus, accusing him of not caring about them: ‘Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’ they shout.

 Jesus wakes, rebukes the wind and chides the disciples. It is important to note that Jesus doesn’t berate the disciples for not believing in his ability to control the elements. He doesn’t ask them: ‘didn’t you believe that I could do this?’  His question to the disciples is: ‘why are you afraid?‘ why are you afraid?

 It is fear not faith in Jesus’ power that is at issue here.

 Jesus, who probably knows the lake as well as any other Galilean, got into the boat and promptly fell asleep. He will have known that the wind was likely to come up. He will have known too, that if he so chose, he could command the wind to stop but he chooses to sleep instead of take control. Unlike the disciples, Jesus trusts in God so completely that he has no fear. Having placed himself in God’s hands Jesus trusts that whatever the outcome of the storm, he is with God and God with him. Sleep is possible because he has chosen not to worry – living or dying he knows that his life is God’s.

 When we read this story, we are often so focussed on the storm and Jesus’ power over the natural elements that we lose sight of what may be the central point of the story – the sleeping Jesus’ utter trust in God, his lack of fear in the face of possible death and his knowledge that God is with him in every circumstance of his life – be it good or evil.

 Like the disciples- who are foolish and uncomprehending in Mark’s gospel we don’t always get it. The disciple’s response says it all. ‘Who then is this that the wind and the sea obey him?’ It has nothing to do with faith and everything to with the miracle – which, when you think about it, completely negates the need for the sort faith that Jesus is modelling and which he will continue to model until the end. Faith that is dependent on miracles, faith that relies on God to get us out of tight corners, faith that believes God will always intervene to protect us from harm, is not the faith that Jesus lives and proclaims.

 The faith that allows Jesus to sleep through the storm, is a faith that trusts the God of the universe to get us through (not avoid) life’s difficulties. The faith that Jesus lives is a faith that gives God control over our destiny (rather than trying to control every aspect of our lives by ourselves.) The faith that allowed Jesus to face the cross is a faith that understands that in life, in death, God abides with us.

 This is a story not about Jesus’ taking control, but about Jesus’ willingness to relinquish control.

 When we are tossed and turned about, do we seek to control our circumstances and rage that God doesn’t care? Or, can we like Jesus, remain asleep in a storm tossed boat?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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How do we see Jesus?

March 20, 2021

Lent 5 – 2021

John 12-20-33 (++)

Marian Free

May I speak in the name of God Earth-Maker, Pain-Bearer, Life-Giver. Amen.

On the night before she was due to be executed, Edith Cavell – a British nurse serving during the first world war – had a visit from a chaplain. After they had spoken for a while, they prayed, and Edith asked that they might sing the hymn “Abide with me”. “Hold thou thy cross before my closing eyes, shine through the gloom and point me to the skies. Heav’ns morning breaks and earth’s vain shadows flee. In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.” Cavell had it right – at what was her lowest point she looked – not to Jesus’ resurrection – but to the cross – for it was there that the victory had been won.   

Today’s reading from the gospel of John has been ripped from its context and presented as if it could stand on its own. While the metaphor of the seed falling to the ground makes a certain amount of sense, the surrounding text seems unconnected both to the metaphor and to the request of the Greeks. We are left in the dark as to why the Greeks want to see Jesus in the first place and indeed why the Greeks are in Jerusalem at all. Without the wider context, we are left wondering why Jesus appears to have so rudely ignored their request.

If we lived in the first or perhaps even the second century, we might have expected to hear the story as John told it from beginning to end in one sitting. In so doing we would have seen how the different parts of the story connect with and speak to each other. We would have become aware of the way in which the Johannine author winds back around on himself, reiterating and reinforcing some of the key Johannine concepts as he goes. Light and dark, life and death, joy and the relationship between the Father and the Son are all repeated over and over. By the time the reader had reached this point in the story, we would have understood that the phrase “being lifted up” referred to Jesus’ death on the cross. 

The immediate context of today’s gospel is Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, but in order to truly understand what is happening here and where the story is going, we have to go back a little further – to the raising of Lazarus. Bethany was close to Jerusalem, so it is not surprising that some informants had reported Jesus’ actions to the Pharisees who in turn had called a council with the chief priests to consider what to do about Jesus and the threat that he posed. The raising of Lazarus had greatly increased Jesus’ stature and renown and witnesses to the event could not help but testify to it, which made Jesus even more of an attraction. According to the gospel, people were deserting the Jews and believing in Jesus – which only exacerbated the antagonism of the Pharisees and chief priests. 

It was dangerous for Jesus to come to Jerusalem for the Passover – orders had been given that anyone who knew his whereabouts should inform the chief priests and Pharisees so they could arrest him. Many wondered if Jesus would actually come, but come he did, and when the crowds heard of his arrival, they took branches to greet him, shouting “Hosanna to the King of Israel”.  At this the Pharisees despaired: “You see, you can do nothing. Look, the world has gone after him (12:19).” 

Knowing the context helps us to make better sense of this morning’s gospel. We know that people from every nation, Jew and Greek, flooded to Jerusalem for the Passover. Many of them will have heard of Jesus and will have known that he raised Lazarus from the dead. No doubt they were both amazed and curious – anxious to see the man behind the stories. It may be for this reason that Jesus didn’t respond when he was told that the Greeks wished to see him. He resented being seen as a tourist attraction. He felt that it was important that those who wanted to see him realized that they must learn to see not the miracle worker but the crucified one. In response to the request of the Greeks Jesus reiterated what he had said at the beginning of his ministry (as we heard last week) that the “Son of Man must be lifted up” – on the cross. Those who sought him out must understand that following Jesus had nothing to do with fame and fortune but rather would lead to suffering and to death. They would need to find the courage to lose their lives in order to gain their lives.

Instead of agreeing to see the Greeks, Jesus spoke about the life of discipleship. He reflected on what lay ahead wondered to himself whether he could avoid the pain and agony of the cross. But he knew that it was for the cross that he had come. He understood that it was when he was lifted up, that all who chose to, would be able to see him and would understand that he had sought, not fame and fortune, but to give himself entirely into God’s hands. In this is Jesus’ victory not that he raised someone from the dead but that he faced the worst, confident that God would not abandon him. He submitted his life to God’s will rather than seeking to create a life of his own making. The Greekswould see him but only if they had the courage to see victory in defeat, success in failure, life in death. 

We cannot have the resurrection without the crucifixion. We cannot be truly alive unless we put to death those things that are life-denying. As we draw near to Good Friday we are reminded that we follow a Saviour who was brutally crucified and whose triumph lies not in what he did, but in what he allowed to be done to him. 

Do we have the courage to face the agony and shame of the cross, or do we look past the cross to the victory of Easter Day?

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