That They May be One

May 19, 2020 / admin / 2020, Sermons

A sermon by the Reverend Trevor Jamison, based on one preached to a United Reformed Church congregation in Essex in 2008.

John 17: 1-11

The world needs praying for. Every day our attention is caught by aspects of this world’s life that cry out for prayer. We see injustice and greed at work; hunger and starvation stalk the earth. On a more intimate scale we see, or even experience family and neighbourly feuds, personal disappointments and sadness. No doubt about it, the world needs praying for.

And it’s not as though God does not care for the world. God made this world, producing mighty mountains and wide oceans. This God attends to the tiniest details of creation, even the angle at which petals of a flower relate to each other. God’s sustaining work work goes on in things invisible to human eye – the interplay of cells and atoms, quarks and electrons. Yes, God thinks the world is worthy of attention. As John’s Gospel tells us elsewhere, , that God loved the world so much that he sent his Son to it, to live in it, to teach in it and, as we have heard from John’s Gospel today, to pray in it.

On this occasion, however, Jesus goes declares that he is not praying for the world (no matter how deserving the world may be as the object of his prayers, or anyone else’s prayers). In John 17, we hear Jesus praying, addressing his Father, saying, “I pray for them” i.e. I pray for these disciples, these ones who are with me now: “I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me, for they are yours.” (17: 9)

A general prayer, a prayer for the whole of the world, for the cosmos, is acceptable. It is not always necessary to name in great detail the thing for which we are praying. Sometimes, if we are to pray at all that we pray without knowledge of all of the circumstances. We might not have an intimate understanding of the politics of Zimbabwe; we might not be able to suggest a credible answer to the social and economic difficulties brought about by the ‘credit crunch’ but none of this prevents us expressing our concerns to God in prayer: ‘Lord I don’t know what to pray for today, please hear my prayer’ is quite acceptable as far as God is concerned.

For all of that, there comes a point when our knowledge of or involvement in something pushes us in the direction of specific prayer for that specific situation. Jesus is at that point. He is not praying for the world in general because what is on his mind is the situation of his disciples, the men and women he is going to leave behind when he goes to the cross. In the knowledge that he is very soon to face that cross, in the urgency of that moment he prays, “I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world … protect them … so that they may be one as we are one.” (17: 11)

Just think of all the things Jesus might have asked for at this point. He might pray that the disciples, in the form of the Church that is just about to come into being, might flourish numerically. He might choose to ask that certain individuals – Peter, James, John, Martha, Mary or Lazarus – remain faithful and have mighty ministries in future days. He might express the hope that one day the Church spreads around the world, that the gospel is known in every land and heard in every language. Jesus, given the opportunity, asks for none of these things. Instead, he asks that the Father protect his followers “so that they may be one as we are one”.

Jesus is asking that his disciples, though the way they lead their life together, model or mirror the relationship that Jesus, the Son, has with the Father – “so that they may be one as we are one”. To put it another way Jesus is praying that the Church should be a reflection or an image of God.

Once we begin using a phrase like “image of God”, for those of us who remember the story of creation as it is told in the OT book of Genesis, we begin hearing echoes of the description of human beings, men and women, being “made in the image of God”. It turns out that Jesus is praying for the world, for the kosmos, for the creation after all. He is praying that in the way they lead their lives together his disciples, the Church, will show to the rest of the world how things would be had things never gone wrong in the first place; had sin never entered in.

No wonder Jesus feels that his disciples need praying for! Their track record up to this point has been less than good. They have argued amongst themselves about who should be the greatest. Some have asked Jesus for special favours; to be his right- and left-hand men. When the others have found out about this, they have been very angry. And things will not get better after Jesus has departed.

Arguments will continue. What the requirements are for becoming a Christian – do you need to be circumcised (if you are a man) and do all have to keep the Jewish dietary laws? What authority does the church in Jerusalem have over the others? What is the status of Paul, Peter, and James, the brother of Jesus, in all of this? Let’s not fool ourselves that there was some golden age of unity in the early Church in comparison to the arguments and divisions we have today.

All the more important then for us to hear this prayer of Jesus and to attempt to act upon it even if the goal – Christian being one as Jesus and the Father are one – seems far beyond anything we are liable to achieve. So what should we do about it, this dream of Christians being a light to the world because the oneness they display models the oneness of God? Well the first thing we should do here is celebrate the oneness that we have now.

I’m talking firstly about oneness within the congregation. Like all congregations we will have our disagreements. At one time or another we will fail to show to the world the oneness of God, Father, Son and Spirit. But take a moment to reflect on the group of people who make up this URC congregation. Can you think of another group of people, apart from a Church, who come together on a regular basis for shared activity despite the fact that we are so different to one another?

If you think about yourself and look around today, I’m sure you can find more than one person with whom you would be unlikely to spend time if you were not united by the desire to be a follower of Jesus! This is a cause for celebration. No matter how imperfect our relationships, our unity is something which is truly God-given, inspired by Jesus, hinting at something of what God is like. Even as we celebrate, however, let’s not be complacent. We should take this as an opportunity to re-dedicate ourselves to being one body, united around a table with bread and wine, working together to live our lives as we believe God wishes us to lead them, and to share that conviction with others.

Of course the question of Christians being one stretches beyond this congregation. Once again, a measure of celebration is appropriate. We are part of our local Churches Together. We know, those of us who have long enough memories, that the situation of sharing and mutual recognition between denominations in this country has moved forward a lot in recent years. Perhaps our reduction in numbers has a part to play in this development: we are no longer so confident, and we cling together in our shared troubles. If that is true, perhaps God has taken an opportunity in these circumstances to remind us of the call to be one as Jesus and the Father are one.

Since Jesus chooses to be specific in his prayer let’s be specific in our celebration of improved relationships: celebrate when people from the churches gather to worship and learn together; celebrate when ministers from the different churches meet regularly to talk and share plans together; celebrate when, as recently, one local church can run a children’s club and seek input from the other churches, and we provide a valued worker for their event.

Now, you don’t need me to tell you that it is not all plain sailing. The events we plan together with other churches do not always attract large numbers. Sometimes URC members are more noticeable by their absence than their presence. Not all churches are equally enthusiastic about ideas put forward by other churches. We all of us, Anglican, Catholic, Elim, URC also have our own individual agendas as congregations, which makes us reluctant to take on something new, especially if it means giving up something that we are already doing and with which we are comfortable. To be truthful, there are times we just can’t understand why they (whoever ‘they’ is on that particular occasion) want to do things in such a strange way, rather than in a normal fashion ,which just happens to be the way we do it here.

Jesus’s prayer challenges to us, both within the congregation and in our relationships with other congregations. These are challenges we must not duck. Unity between followers of Jesus reflects the unity that is found between Father and Son. To reflect or to be an image of God is to remind us of God’s will for all of humanity. No wonder this unity is the subject of Jesus’s prayer, specifically for his disciples, but in truth for the world: “I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world … protect them … so that they may be one as we are one.” (17: 11)

ecumenism, John 17: 1-11, unity

I Will Not Leave You Bereft

May 11, 2020 / admin / 2020, Sermons

Sermon by The Reverend Trevor Jamison

Saint Columba’s United Reformed Church, North Shields

John 14: 15-21; Acts 17: 22-31

Based upon a sermon preached at

Brentwood United Reformed Church, April 27^th 2008

A poem, written in 1971 by an eleven-year-old boy, looking back at his first day at school in the mid-1960s:

The first half hour

Seemed to be a

Crying match.

One girl launched

Herself at the window

When she saw

Her mother walk down the drive.

I felt the rattle of the

Window pane,

While I was leaning against

Another window.

I was alright,

My mother had assured me

She’d come back,

I only had a vague uneasiness.

TREVOR JAMISON (11)

They seem to manage things more smoothly these days, or is just that it is now much harder to identify one’s first day at school. Many children who appear for the first time at infant school already have a substantial education and childcare career under their belts, courtesy of attendance at nurseries, play groups and spending time with child minders. Perhaps they are spared that sudden feeling of being left behind by a loved one, that terror of being left bereft by someone you trust and love. Or perhaps the experience just comes to them a little earlier in life, or it builds up gradually rather than being experience of one traumatic moment.

Like a wise parent, Jesus is preparing his disciples for his departure. In this Gospel passage he is preparing them for his death on the cross. But John’s Gospel looks beyond the cross – crucifixion and resurrection – anticipating Jesus’s return to God, the Father. Unsurprisingly the disciples are worried about what all this might mean and so Jesus reassures them, “I will not leave you bereft; I am coming back to you.” (14: 18)

Now Jesus anticipates Pentecost, speaking of his presence with the disciples in terms of an advocate who will be with the disciples for ever – the Spirit of Truth. (14: 17) How important for us today, disciples of Jesus, to feel the presence of the Spirit, a comfort, advocate and guide, in difficult times that leave many of us feeling bereft.

And we do, many of us, to some extent feel bereft, living in this land in this time. If you were been born here or grown up here you have experienced the acceleration in the pace of change that marks so many aspects of life in twenty-first century Western countries – technological, economic, and social. The older you are the more challenging it is to keep up. Each generation enters into world different from that experienced by their parents.

For others here today the shock of the new comes from having moved from our native land to a new country. People seem to have a different outlook, different practices, different beliefs to those of the land from which we have come. Change can be stimulating. Diversity can be exciting and enriching. Too much, too quickly, though, and we feel overwhelmed, bereft of the customs and rules that provided the framework which guided they ways we lived the old life.

The additional twist to these experiences is to be part of the Christian Church whose status and numbers have declined, whose standing in society has diminished. No wonder some Christians feel they have been left bereft. Either the church they have known has declined or disappeared, or the new church they have encountered in a new land seems a strange institution in comparison to the one they have left behind.

How important then to look beyond the discomfort of the present situation, comforted by the belief that wherever we are and in whatever situation, Jesus promises that he, that God, will be with us: “I will not leave you bereft; I am coming back to you.” (14: 18) Comforting words, fine words, but can they inspire us to deal with the situations we face? How helpful it is also to have a reading from the Acts of the Apostles where St Paul is having to find his way in an unfamiliar setting, relying on God’s guidance, relying on the presence of Jesus. Paul is relying on the Spirit of truth to enable able him to speak to the people around him concerning the hope that is within him.

The method that Paul employs is to make connections with Athenian society whilst at the same time remaining confident in Jesus. Paul takes a look around him and observes what is important to the Athenians – the gods. He makes this the starting point for what he has to say. He remarks that they are scrupulous, even to the point of leaving space for gods that they have not yet heard about. He takes care to speak their language, quoting their poets and philosophers in support of what he has to say. Even as he connects with others, however, Paul retains confidence in Jesus, staying true to the “God who created the world and everything in it, and who is Lord of heaven and earth, [who] does not live in shrines made by human hands.” (Acts 17: 24)

Paul’s confidence is not in the church but in Jesus. There’s not actually much of a church around to be confident in at that point in the Christian story, and what there is seems to be in a state of flux and conflict. That’s a lesson for us: in a time of change and upheaval we will be best able to weather the storm if we place our ultimate confidence not in church, but in Jesus. It’s not that I think the church is unimportant, but it’s a matter of priorities.

One saying that has stayed with me and I’ve found useful in this regard comes, I think, from the 20^th century English Congregationalist, C J Cadoux. It concerns ministers and churches. He said, you can have as high a view of the ordained ministry as you like as long as you have a higher view of the church; and you can have as high a view of the church as you like as long as you have a higher view of Christ. In a time when society, the United Reformed Church, its ministry and congregations are in flux, that’s a helpful saying to remember.

Such is Paul’s confidence in Jesus that, whilst remaining aware of the need to connect with others, he is prepared to be contentious, even if it loses him part of his audience: “God has overlooked the age of ignorance”, he tells these Athenians, “but now he commands men and women everywhere to repent, because he has fixed the day on which he will have the world judged, and justly judged, by a man whom he has designated; of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.” (17: 30-31)

For the majority of a Greek audience, understanding the soul to be distinct from and superior to the body, this talk of bodily resurrection is the breaking point. Most depart, some scoffing, some prepared to talk again. Only a few become believers – Dionysius, Damaris and “others besides”, so at least four of them. Some people today read this passage and say, “this is where Paul went wrong”. If he had stuck to making connections rather than being contentious the speech would not have been a failure. I know Paul’s preaching will be held to a higher standard than mine (which is a considerable relief to me) but if I ever preached a sermon that resulted in four or more people coming to faith I’d regard that as an unprecedented, rip-roaring success and that I had got something right for once, not wrong.

For our time we really need to share Paul’s conviction about the continued presence of Jesus as the basis of our confidence, both to connect to the concerns of this society and to confront some of its values. In one sense our task is easier than that of Paul and in another it is harder. On the one hand this society is not completely strange to us because we live in it and are, in some sense, a part of it. On the other hand Paul spoke from one religious perspective to another one; talking of God to a religiously observant people who talked about ‘the gods’. We inhabit a society which may have its gods or idols, but these take a very different form to what we would call God and they are not part of any organised religion, so there is a greater gap to be bridged.

If you are thinking ‘that sounds a bit much for the likes of me’; if you are afraid to tackle the big evangelistic challenge that faces us, well think back to the first day of school. For some of us, that was frightening, for many a little worrying. Yet it was also the gateway to learning, exploration, imagination and being equipped to live in today’s world. Jesus tells his followers that they are not alone when facing the challenge of being faithful in a strange world; the Spirit of Truth is with us. As Paul put it on another occasion:

There are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.

There are varieties of service, but the same Lord.

There are varieties of activity but in all of them

and in every one the same God is active.

1 Corinthians 12: 4-6

Acts 17: 22-31, evangelism, John 14: 15-21, pentecost

Living Stones

May 6, 2020 / admin / 2020, Sermons

Sermon

1 Peter 2: 2-10; John 14: 1-14

(Based upon a sermon first preached at Ingatestone United Reformed Church, Essex, May 22^nd 2011)

“Come to him, the living Stone – rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him – you also [are] like living stones.” (2:4, 5) Stones – chosen and precious, yet living; what a surprising image. I don’t mean the idea of precious stones. We all have images that come to mind when we hear the phrase, ‘precious stone’. As Marilyn Monroe puts it, in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,

“The French are glad to die for love.
They delight in fighting duels.
But I prefer a man who lives
And gives expensive jewels.

A kiss on the hand
May be quite continental,
But diamonds are a girl’s best friend.”

Stones, however, whether precious or otherwise, are not ‘living’. Many of our sayings that feature stones emphasise lack of life: stony silence, drop like a stone, stone-cold sober, ideas that fall on stony ground. This first letter of Peter, however, written to encourage a congregation in its Christian faith, speaks of living stones. It speaks of Jesus as a living stone. It speaks of his followers as living stones. The image of stones used in this scripture is not of pebbles you find on the beach or stones you view in a jewelry shop. The stones in this picture are the stonework that builds up and holds together a great building.

In Jesus’s day, the great building built with fine stones was the Jerusalem temple. It was the place where people flocked in order to ‘do business’ with God through prayer and sacrifices. This was overseen by cohorts of priests, helping people to connect with God and God with them. The temple was seen as the place where God was present in a special way, where God dwelt so to speak; God’s house: “I rejoiced with those who said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’ Our feet are standing in your gates, O Jerusalem.” (Psalm 122: 1)

When Jesus was in Jerusalem, visiting the Temple in the days just prior to his crucifixion, death and resurrection, the disciples draw his attention to the Temple building: “Look Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!” (Mark 13: 1) Only a remnant of that Temple stonework remains today. As Jesus indicated in his reply to the disciples on that occasion, they would come crashing to the ground, and they did so in AD70 when the Roman army destroyed Jerusalem.

The original recipients of this letter would have got that allusion to the temple stones. Whether or not the temple was still standing when the letter was written, they were being encouraged to see in Jesus the original purpose of the temple fulfilled, not just for Jerusalem, not just for the Jewish people, not just for their Samaritan cousins but for all the peoples of the world. Jesus, we hear is the living Stone and we also are living stones; living stones “being built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” (2: 5) So what does it mean for Jesus to be the living Stone today and what does it mean for us to be living stones being built into a spiritual house?

“See”, says the prophet Isaiah, quoted in Peter’s letter as a reference to Jesus, “I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame.” (Isaiah 28: 16 / 1 Peter 2: 6) (Incidentally, Isaiah’s call to the prophetic task came to him when worshipping in the temple.) As a living stone, Jesus represents all that the temple was intended to achieve. He provides a way for people to meet with God and be reconciled to God.

In the Jerusalem temple this was achieved through people going on a journey, a pilgrimage, and then offering a sacrifice. Think for example, of Jesus’ parents, Mary and Joseph, going up to the temple to sacrifice in order to give thanks to God for the birth of a child. Think of the small industry of money-changing and animal sales this generated, to the point that Jesus drove moneychangers from the temple because trade had become the central concern, rather than providing people with the means of making connect with God.

Now, we are told in Peter’s letter, Jesus is available to us as the means to make our connection with God. Instead of going to a temple we come to a person when we need to meet with God. As one hymn writer puts it, “What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear! What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer!” As Christians our focus is always on Jesus. All that effort that once went into the building of a temple with great stones can now be directed towards Jesus, who is described as the cornerstone of a new, spiritual building. All our learning about Jesus through the Bible stories, all our pondering on the stories Jesus told, all our emotional response to his death and resurrection, all our practical response through trying to love our neighbour, as instructed by Jesus; these things are our equivalent of the love lavished on the Jerusalem temple as a means, a way to being a people who are in a right relationship with God.

So, what about ourselves? Jesus, as this letter puts it, is a living stone, chosen and precious to God. Additionally, we learn “you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house”. What sort of house are we supposed to be? When people think of church, believers and non-believers alike tend to think of the church building. Now, I love this church building. It is an elegant worship space, not over-ornate, but well-maintained (at some effort) and a very useful space both for worship and other activities. Church buildings, made of bricks, mortar, and fine stone, provide a visible presence, a reminder to one and all there have been and are a people concerned with following Jesus.

The physical building is not what the Bible is on about today. After all, the lesson is about Jesus as alternative to a physical building (the temple) and about us being built into a spiritual house, not a bricks and mortar one. The ancient word ‘ekklesia’, which is often translated as ‘church’ was a word that simply meant ‘gathering’ or ‘assembly’; any group, sacred or secular that assembled or congregated together was an ‘ekklesia’. What mattered both then and now is the purpose for the gathering and what is done when people gather. What matters, in other words, is to be a Jesus people; what matters is to be a worshipping people; what matter is to be a sharing and welcoming people.

We are a Jesus people. We are an ekklesia, because God chose to meet with us in his Son Jesus. Take away Jesus from a Christian ekklesia and the whole structure comes tumbling down. If you take Jesus out of the Church, there is no hope because you take away the cross which is the means of our salvation. If you take Jesus out of the Church there is no Church because it was Jesus in the first place who gathered the makings of the first Christian Church around him, a group called the disciples. If you take Jesus out of the Church what remains is a completely different being because there is no longer a command to love one another, and there is no longer his call to love your neighbour as you love yourself. If we are ever tempted to have a church that functions simply as a social gathering, that forgets about Jesus, then the whole spiritual structure comes crashing down upon our ears. We will have removed cornerstone that sustains the spiritual structure. We are and must remain a Jesus people.

We are a Jesus people and we are a worshipping people. In verse nine we are urged to “declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” We don’t worship simply because we see ourselves as a replacement for the temple. We worship because we want to respond appropriately to a loving God who, seeing the mess we make of life, responds with love, sending Jesus to us to call us and lead us out of lives of darkness into lives lived as God intends them to be. Our worship is a part of that. It is the appropriate response of creatures to their Creator. It is the right way to respond to God who has given us the precious gift of life and who holds out to us the prospect of eternal life. We are a Jesus people, and because we are a Jesus people, we gather to worship God.

We are a Jesus people. We are a people which gathers to worship God who has given us life. We are also, if we are a spiritual house, a welcoming and sharing people. What could be more natural? You receive a piece of good news, so you wish to share it with others. Those getting married send out invitations. Parents of the newborn are on the phone letting people know what time he arrived, what weight she was at birth, and what name they have foisted upon the child. Or someone gives you a huge box of chocolates and it’s only natural to share them around (though I struggle with that as far as the strawberry crèmes are concerned). As Peter puts it, “Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” (2: 10) What could, should be more natural than to share that with others? As God has welcomed us so we seek to be welcoming to others. As God has shared his Son with us so we seek to share what we have with others, in both spiritual and material ways.

So, we are reminded that Jesus, the living Stone, the cornerstone is foundational to all that we are as a Church. As a Church, an ekklesia, a gathering, an assembly, we are a Jesus people, a worshipping people, and a welcoming, sharing people. We welcome others because God has made us welcome. We share with others because God has shared Jesus with us. We are called to be living stones, showing in our lives that we are followers of Jesus Christ, the living stone who holds everything together, for us and for the world.

church, I Peter 2: 2-10

The Meal at Emmaus

April 20, 2020 / admin / 2020, News, Sermons

Sermon

Luke 24:13-49

‘When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened, and they recognised him; and he vanished from their sight.’ (24:30-31)

What was it about Jesus taking bread, blessing it, breaking it, and giving it to these two travellers to Emmaus that opened their eyes so that, at last, after a couple of hours of walking and talking together, they finally recognised him? Though it must have been rather galling, I think, that just as they finally put a name and identity to the person whose explanation of scripture had made their hearts burn within them, he upped and vanished!

I don’t have any problem believing that Jesus could walk up to Cleopas and his unnamed companion (I wonder if it was his wife) without them recognising him. I know how often I struggle to recognise someone if I see them out of context. I once failed to notice or recognise a church member as we sat opposite each other in a dentist’s waiting room. The church was in a different town and this was a different sort setting. I just wasn’t expecting to see them. How much more so, then, for these two; never expecting to meet Jesus in the flesh, because their understanding was that Jesus’s flesh – his body – was dead and buried.

It was something about the taking, blessing, breaking and giving of bread that opened their eyes to the identity of this stranger and companion on the road. Now lots of people do one or more of these actions – taking, blessing, breaking, giving – not just Jesus. So maybe it was something about this combination of actions, all happening in one go. Perhaps it was something about Jesus’s style in performing them – it ain’t what you do, it’s the way that you do it.

What was it then that led these two people to recognise Jesus because of these particular actions? Was it because they were at the last Supper? Maybe the unnamed disciple who was walking to Emmaus was a man and was also one of that temperamental group of twelve disciples who joined Jesus for the meal we call “The Last Supper”. Or maybe one or both of them were servants serving that meal. Or perhaps, whilst disciples, they were not members of the core group, but were part of the second tier of followers going around with Jesus, and so they got to peek into the room just as it all happened? I suggest these possibilities because in all four Gospel accounts of the Last Supper Jesus takes, blesses, breaks and gives, just like he was now doing at Emmaus.

And the same is true in Saint Paul’s account of the tradition he received about the Last Supper; his words in 1 Corinthians 12 are the ones that are often quoted or referenced as part of what we often call Holy Communion or The Lord’s Supper: ‘For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks [or blessed it], he broke it and said, “this is my body that is for you,”’ thus giving it to them.

If these two Emmaus travellers were inside or peering into the upstairs room in Jerusalem on Maundy Thursday, this action of Jesus – taking, blessing, breaking, giving – was that distinctive combination whereby the stranger at this table revealed himself – betrayed himself you might almost say – as the Jesus they had thought was dead but was now very much alive and in their midst. Just imagine their shock.

Or maybe it was not the Last Supper that they were remembering, or perhaps not only the Last Supper. There was another event, or events, where larger crowds got to see Jesus taking these characteristic actions: ‘Taking the five loaves and two fish, he [Jesus] looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds’: the feeding of the five thousand. (14:19).

There are actually six gospel accounts of Jesus feeding crowds of people; maybe six accounts of the one event, or perhaps descriptions of two separate occasions. And what do you know, all six accounts include these four elements of performance; took, blessed, broke, gave. I wonder if these two at Emmaus had been part of a Galilee crowd on an occasion like that?

At Emmaus, though, it’s the risen Jesus Christ who takes, blesses, breaks and gives the bread to the two disciples. The hands that take the bread on this occasion are the same hands that took the bread to feed the crowd, and to share that last meal with his disciples. This tells me that the life and ministry of Jesus can’t be prised apart from the experience of meeting the resurrected Jesus. Jesus’s teaching and ministry are both consistent with what happened to Jesus at the cross and what God achieved at the cross.

These common actions in different situations – taking, blessing, breaking and giving – are more than just an interesting coincidence. They are more than simply our means of knowing how the Emmaus travellers came to recognise the risen Lord Jesus. They also tell us something important about life and ministry, about death and resurrection, and their place in the plans of God for the salvation of the world. This characteristic set of actions, shared both before and after the death and resurrection of Jesus, reminds us that we can’t divide up the Gospel to suit ourselves. We can’t cherry-pick the bits of God’s good-news-story that most appeal to us.

Many of us have favourite parts of the Gospel, and that’s fine, that’s human, just as long as it does not lead us quietly drop other bits of the Gospel all together. For some Christians the core of the Gospel is found in the teaching, the ministry of Jesus in his time upon earth. For them he is the supreme teacher, setting out the path we should follow in our lives. Frankly, they don’t feel too comfortable with all this talk about the cross as the means of our salvation; our way of being reconciled with a God who is just and who can’t abide our failings and wrongdoings.

For some other Christians, though, the cross is the central reality of their faith. Through the death of Jesus upon the cross all has been made right between God and the world, and Christ’s resurrection is the sign and first occasion of the renewed life that now awaits all believers. For them, what Jesus got up to in the thirty or so years before his death and resurrection is only a secondary feature in the story of our salvation.

Well, I agree with everything both those groups affirm: the importance of Jesus’s teaching and the centrality of the cross to the gospel. I disagree with both of them in what they try to lay aside or put into the background of the Gospel story. And this occasion at Emmaus supports me in doing that. It reminds us that it was the things that Jesus said and did which brought him to the cross in the first place. The cross, by itself, does not have much to say to us about how we should lead our lives today. For that to happen there needs to a link between what Jesus said and did in his ministry and his going to the cross.

Then, to look at it the other way around. We can’t stop the story with Jesus’s actions and teachings in his ministry in Galilee and Jerusalem. Here, in Luke 24, with its account of this meeting on the way to Emmaus, it’s the after-the-cross risen, resurrected Christ we are dealing with. He is still teaching about the significance of the scriptures, including the Messiah should suffer … and then enter into his glory, (24:26), and he is still in the business of taking, blessing, breaking and giving the bread.

It’s only appropriate, then, that every time we gather at a communion table, we celebrate Jesus’s life on earth, including his teaching. It’s only appropriate that we do so alongside celebrating his death and resurrection, with all of what that says about God’s salvation for the world. We are all invited to join with the two Emmaus disciples, with the Twelve (and others?) at the meal in the upstairs room, and with the hungry crowds in Galilee.

At communions, bread is taken, blessed, broken and given. All of us receive from Jesus, whether we are looking back to his ministry in Galilee, among crowds; his meal with close friends and disciples in Jerusalem, in the shadow of the cross; or doing so in the light of the resurrection, along with two disciples on a journey. And in eating and drinking together we not only step back into past events but bringing the life-giving effects of Jesus’s life, ministry, death and resurrection into the present.

Yes, this meal sustains us because in re-performing Jesus’s actions of taking, blessing, breaking and giving – and in the receiving and eating – we are drawn back to Jesus, being reminded of how he brings life. He brings life through the teachings and actions of his ministry in Galilee, including when he is among great crowds. He brings life through his death on the cross – a profound shedding of blood, but in a purposeful, life-giving way, not in a needless suffering, or through some unneeded, unhealthy attraction or addiction to pain or violence. And he brings us resurrection life when, like the two on the road to Emmaus, we discover that for him death has not been the end, and so nor need it be for us either.

communion, Emmaus, Luke 24: 13-49

On the Re-Birth Journey

March 9, 2020 / admin / 2020, Sermons

A sermon preached by the Reverend Trevor Jamison at

Saint Columba’s United Reformed Church, March 8^th 2020

Genesis 12:1-4^a; Romans 4:1-5, 13-17; John 3:1-17

I was going to start by asking how much you like travelling but realised that that’s the wrong question. What I really wanted to ask was how you feel about the prospect of going on a journey. Travelling is about the process and experience of going to different places, which, in general, I enjoy. Going on a journey, which involves travel, always has a destination in view. We say, “I’m going on a journey to …”

Yes, in Genesis, Abram goes travelling, but it’s travelling on a journey, for, ‘the LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country … to the land that I will show you”.’ (12:1) That’s pretty vague, and I suppose that at times Abram must have felt he was just travelling rather than being on a journey. Still, as Saint Paul points out, Abram set out because he ‘believed God’ (4:3). Such belief, such faith, that God provides the destination, turns just travelling through life into a purposeful journey.

Lent – of which this is the second Sunday – is often described as a spiritual journey because it follows in the footsteps of Jesus’s journey. For Jesus, the destination for his journey was Jerusalem, with the prospect of rejection and crucifixion, though along with crucifixion there was to be resurrection. In this Lenten period we are encouraged to reflect upon our own spiritual journey, made in the footsteps of Jesus, who went to Jerusalem. So let’s do that by thinking about someone else who made a journey: Nicodemus.

‘Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. He came to Jesus.’ (3:1) Nicodemus was somewhere else and went on an intentional journey to meet Jesus. He did so in response to the things that Jesus had said and done: ‘Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.’ (3:2) Nicodemus’s journey was a faith journey (a spiritual journey some might say). He was a religious person – a person of faith. As a Pharisee he taught about how the law might be interpreted by people in everyday life so as to be pleasing to God. Not only was a teacher, but we are told that he was also a Jewish leader. Going on a faith journey to meet with Jesus may have been a controversial thing for a Pharisee and leader to do, however, because we’re also told that he ‘came to Jesus by night.’ (3:2)

Nicodemus doesn’t ask a question: ‘‘Rabbi, we know you are a teacher …’ He makes a statement about Jesus being a teacher who has come from God, one whose teachings are confirmed by the signs that he has performed. As Nicodemus then finds out, though, just because you don’t ask a question of Jesus doesn’t mean he won’t provide an answer anyway! ‘Jesus answered him, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above”.’ (3:3) Being born from above? That’s not how most of us normally remember this phrase from John’s Gospel.

Our church bible is the New Revised Standard Version. It translates that phrase of Jesus as saying you must be ‘born from above’. Then they give an alternative translation as a footnote, where Jesus says that Nicodemus (and those whom he represents) must be ‘born anew.’ ‘Born anew’ is closer to what most of us remember, I would guess, but we’re not there yet. I first encountered the Bible through its King James, or Authorised Version translation, in a congregation which then adopted the New International Version translation, so I remember that phrase of Jesus as, you must be ‘born again.’

Born from above, born anew, born again – why the variety or uncertainty? Well, anothen, the Greek word in the Gospel here can mean ‘from above’ or it can mean ‘anew’ or ‘again’. So I guess the poor translators of this into English have to make a choice in the knowledge that not everybody will be happy about it. I guess the translators for our church bibles looked a bit later in the conversation, where there is talk of heaven as “up there”, about the Son of Man descending to earth, and about the Son of Man being lifted up – on the cross and ultimately to heaven – like Moses had once lifted up a statue of the a serpent in the wilderness as a means and symbol of healing: ‘how can you believe,’ John’s Gospel has Jesus ask of Nicodemus: ‘if I tell you about heavenly things. No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.’ (3:12-15) Or to put it in fewer words: ‘you must be born from above.’

So why do other translators prefer ‘you must be born anew’ or ‘you must be born again’? Well, they’re in the same boat as the other Bible translators. Anothen could mean ‘from above’, but it could also mean ‘anew’ or ‘again’. And instead of looking at what Jesus says several verses after ‘you must be born’ in verse 3 they look at what Nicodemus says in response: ‘Nicodemus said to him, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?”’ (3:4) Now the emphasise seems to be on ‘anew’ or ‘again’. It’s about the natural order in time in which things happen. You’re conceived, you’re born, you grow from childhood to adulthood, God willing. It’s about the universal human journey through time, and to be re-born is to be ‘born again’.

So which idea do you prefer? That to see to see God’s kingdom here on earth involves being re-born in a heavenly way – ‘from above’ – or that to see God’s kingdom here on earth involves being ‘born again’ – so changed that you’re a new person, radically different from the one that existed before. Or maybe it’s a question of both/and rather then either/or, as far as your faith journey in following Jesus is concerned. I think that it’s an instance of both/and.

First, our spiritual birth depends totally upon God. Abram’s journey began when God told him to get travelling with the prospect and promise of a land at the end of his journey. No God, no faith journey. That was the case for Abram and that’s the case for us today. Our new birth, our re-birth, begins with, depends upon God; it’s from heaven; to use the understanding of and symbolic language of the time of Jesus, it’s from “above”. Looking back to Abram, Paul puts it this way: ‘it depends on faith, in order that … [God’s] promise may rest on [God’s] grace.’ (4:16) So, to see God’s kingdom, to participate in God’s reign on earth, we need to be born from ‘above’. It’s God who brings about this spiritual birth in us.

Second, though, to follow Jesus, to participate in God’s reign here on earth, means not only that God changes us but also that we are changed. We are different from the people we were before when we become part of God’s people who follow Jesus in Christ in our beliefs and actions. And the way of expressing the difference between who we were before and who we are now is that of being ‘born anew’ or ‘born again’. When we turn to follow Jesus, when we set out on that journey in life, we become new people – ‘new creation’, as Paul said in another of his letters. (2 Corinthians 5:17)

So there you have it. Two sides of the same coin. Two aspects of the same phenomenon. Putting your faith in Jesus as the way of entering into God’s plans for creation, for this world, for your life, in the here and now, is about being re-born through the power of God – from above – and taking on a new identity – Christian – being born again.

This two-sided aspect to things is why the Christian journey in life is sometimes called a pilgrimage. Pilgrimage, which was big in the middle ages in Europe has been making a comeback in the recent years. Now, for example, every year, hundreds of thousands of people walk the Camino, the route through France and Spain to Santiago de Compostela. I know some people that have done that pilgrimage, made that journey. I know others who have followed different routes. Many of them tell me something similar about their experience. They say that there is great joy and satisfaction in reaching your destination, but that equally important is the experience of the journey itself, day by day, mile by mile, or kilometre by kilometre. They say the journey changes them as they walk, and they arrive at the destination as different people to how they set out.

I think that’s a helpful image for our Lenten journey in the light of this conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus. God, our destination, draws us to God’s self, and the divine destination needs to exist our journey to have meaning; we must be born from above. And it’s on setting out on the journey and in the experience of it that we are changed; born anew or again. ‘Very truly,’ Jesus says, ‘no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above/anew/again.’

Genesis 12: 1-4a, John 3: 1-17, lent, pilgrimage, Romans 4: 1-5, Romans 4: 13-17

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