What’s in a Name?

December 24, 2019 / admin / 2019, Sermons

A sermon preached by the Reverend Trevor Jamison at

Saint Columba’s United Reformed Church, North Shields, 22^nd December 2019

What’s in a name? Whenever a baby is born one of the first things that people want to know is the child’s name. Legally, in England, I believe you have forty-two days in which register a birth, so you don’t have to name the child until then. Leave it more than a couple of days, however, and tongues begin to wag. These days, people think that names are important, though probably not as much as they did in ancient times. Nowadays, someone may be named for someone else or for somewhere or something that is important to a child’s parents. That was also true a couple of thousand years ago, but in addition, people also named a child with their future in mind.

Today’s reading from Matthew’s Gospel introduces us to two names about a baby Mary was soon to have. One name was designed to tell people who this child was, and the other was designed to tell people what he would do. And these names were ‘Emmanuel’ and ‘Jesus’. Since we are almost at Christmas, and since the whole Christmas thing first got going as a celebration of the birth of Jesus, I think it would be good to remind ourselves who Jesus is and what Jesus does, and why that’s worth all the fuss.

Who is Jesus? ‘All this took place to fulfil what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: ‘Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call him Emmanuel,’ which means, ‘God is with us.’ (1:23) So, there you have it: Joseph is engaged to Mary. She’s pregnant and he knows he’s not the father. In previous times, legally, he could have had her stoned to death for this but in his times a public writ of divorce was the accepted way to go. We’re told that Joseph was a ‘righteous man’ (1:19), which means that he was law abiding. His decision not to have a public divorce which would, ‘expose her to public disgrace … [but that he] planned to dismiss her quietly,’ (1:19) shows he was a righteous man who interpreted the law in the sense of it being a command of love.

Then came Joseph’s first dream in Matthew’s Gospel. Like his Old Testament namesake, the one with a technicolour dream coat, this Joseph was a bit of a dreamer. And in his dream God’s messenger tells him not to be afraid to stay with Mary, for this pregnancy is a special work of God. Matthew then comments, ‘All this took place to fulfil what has been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means, ‘God is with us.’’

Now, you don’t need me to tell you that claiming that a young woman who was a virgin had a child, is, to say the least, controversial. Arguments have raged over this, though mostly only since the nineteenth century. Some people, seeing that Matthew points back to our reading from the Old Testament prophet, Isaiah, claim that not only did it happen, it was predicted. Others argue that the child referred to in Isaiah is a different one, perhaps a son of the prophet himself; that what was said in Isaiah was that a child was coming who would be a sign that God was still with his people even at a difficult time. Then, they would argue, Matthew picked up the reference and applied it to Jesus because he was the one who, more than anyone else, truly was Emmanuel: God with us. Others still, they just dismiss the whole thing as an impossibility.

Was Mary a virgin when her child was conceived? I’ve got to say that my view on that tends to bounce back and forward in a way that’s a bit like the arguments I have just described. I don’t lose too much sleep over that or devote much time to it, though, because, the question about whether Mary was a virgin when Jesus was conceived and born is actually pretty small beer in comparison to the magnitude of the assertion that he was born at all.

‘And they shall name him Emmanuel, which means, God is with us.’ The claim in the Gospels – in the books of New Testament as a whole – is that God was born into the world in the person of a human being; it’s known as the doctrine of the incarnation. In a specific place, at a specific time, carried by and born to a specific mother; named by, and so legally accepted into the family of a specific father, God came into the world, a human being. Not, as some argued in the early centuries of the Church, God coming to earth, just appearing to be a human being; nor, according to the arguments of some others, an outstanding human being who was god-like, or promoted to godly status; but God/human, in some way we can’t explain but only witness and experience.

And that’s what Matthew signals for us: ‘and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means, God with us.’ That’s who he is. But why go to the bother? Why should God take the trouble to ‘be with us’ in or as a human being in first century Bethlehem and beyond? Well, the clue’s in the other name that Matthew reports in his Gospel. The angelic messenger in Joseph’s dream tells him, ‘She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.’ (1:21)

The name Jesus, or Yeshua, or Hosea, or Joshua, means something like, “God saves.” And the message for Joseph is that you will call him “God saves” because ‘he will save his people from their sins.’ Being saved from our sins is traditionalist in-house Christian language that I wouldn’t rush to use when talking with others about the meaning of Christmas. In fact, it seems a little odd to be doing so in a sermon today. And yet, we blithely sing about it at Christmas time:

‘Yet with the woes of sin and strife the world has suffered long’: verse 3 of ‘It Came Upon a Midnight Clear.

‘No ear may hear his coming; but in this world of sin, where meek souls will receive him, still the dear Christ enters in’: verse 3 of ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem.

‘When sin departs before his grace, then life and health come in its place’: verse 3 of On Christmas Night All Christians Sing.

And although it doesn’t mention the “S” word itself the sentiment is certainly there in,

God rest ye merry gentlemen
Let nothing you dismay
Remember Christ our Saviour
Was born on Christmas Day
To save us all from Satan’s pow’r
When we were gone astray.

So, if Jesus was born to save us from our sins why don’t we talk about it more at Christmas time? Perhaps I could devote my three-minute reflection at our Christmas Eve carol service to the topic of sin. How do you think that might go down? Maybe not, then.

I suspect that we don’t want to talk about being saved from sin at Christmas time for at least three reasons. First, it might spoil people’s enjoyment of Christmas, and we have thoroughly bought into the idea that Christmas is about enjoying ourselves. No one loves a sin-obsessed party pooper. Second, we are too accepting of an inadequate understanding of sin that sees it simply in terms of breaking rules that are impossible to keep anyway, but that churches have been over eager to police all the same. Third, we don’t like to think of ourselves as sinners in the wider sense of the term that reflects the reality of life in this world.

Sin is not just about rule keeping, though that’s part of it; God’s rules about loving God, loving your neighbour and loving yourself. Sin is a condition from which we suffer. Its signs and symptoms are seen in our failure to love others as we would be loved, in failing to do what we know is the right thing, in failing to avoid doing things we know are harmful; it’s a falling short of what we know we should be, and what we believe God desires us to be. It’s a broader, deeper, bigger thing than keeping some rules (or at least appearing to do so).

And if you want to see sin at work, consider how, as a society, we celebrate Christmas. Personally, I love all the Christmas razzmatazz – lights, trees, get-togethers, food, drink … and getting presents! It is all human, joyful stuff, the sort of thing that our creator likes to see; people enjoying life. We know, however, that we fall short of the ideal in celebrating Christmas. Relationships can come under immense strain, especially if we feel we have to fake it for Christmas. Our Accident and Emergency departments will be awash with those who have overindulged, especially on the drink, And the decorations and the trees and the illuminated reindeers, and the food and drink, and the perfect gifts, come at a financial price that those with little can least afford; people driven deep into debt by unrealistic expectations heaped upon them. And don’t get me started in television advertising …. The human race: trapped into being less than God wants us to be, and suffering consequences at Christmas.

BUT! That’s not the whole story. This condition, this societal sin-sickness does not have the last word. The last word, the good news, is that rather than reject us for such shortcomings God instead chooses to be with us. The good news is that God, in Jesus, is at work to save us from this situation: ‘you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.’ From his birth and throughout his life of Jesus, God was with and is with us: ‘where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them,’ says Jesus elsewhere in Matthew’s Gospel. (18:20) And this Gospel of Matthew, whose opening verse proclaims ‘Jesus the Messiah’ (1:1) concludes with, ‘And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’ (28:29)

So, what’s in a name? Quite a lot, when Emmanuel tells us that God is with us, wherever we are, and whoever we are, and that in Jesus this God is here to save us, whatever we have done or whatever has been done to us. And that’s the good news that the cause for our Christmas celebration.

christmas, Emmanuel, Isaiah 7: 10-16, Jesus, Matthew 1: 18-25, sin

Jesus: Successful Failure as King

November 25, 2019 / admin / 2019, Sermons

A sermon preached by the Reverend Trevor Jamison at

Saint Columba’s United Reformed Church, November 24^th 2019

The Feast of Christ the King

Jeremiah 23:1-6; Colossians 1:15-20; Luke 23:33-43

‘’One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him [Jesus] and saying, “are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? … Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”’ (23:39, 40, 42)

‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’ Or, on this Sunday where we celebrate the Reign of Christ as King, to put it the other way around:

Your kingdom come;

Remember me;

Jesus.

Your kingdom come: if Jesus has a kingdom then it follows that Jesus is a king, but what sort of king is Jesus? Well, he’s the most spectacular failure of a king that there has ever been.

In Luke’s Gospel there are people who are eager to label Jesus as king, but they don’t mean it as a compliment; they say it scoffingly, with scorn and derision. Luke tells us, ‘there was also an inscription over him, “This is the King of the Jews.”’ (23:38) And who put that placard, that sign, with this inscription at the top of the cross? Pontius Pilate, the representative of the Roman empire. It was he who had it nailed up there, along with Jesus. And he had it – and Jesus – put there as a statement of what a failure he considered Jesus to be. He also put it and Jesus on the cross as a reminder to everyone of what happened to people who claimed kingship without getting Roman imperial consent first: the horrible, horrible death of crucifixion.

And it was the same with his soldiers. Roman soldiers, for only they were authorised to carry out crucifixions, who ‘also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine, and saying, “if you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!”’ (23:37) And in making this mockery of Jesus as a failed king, Pilate and his troops were also mocking the Jewish people: “look everyone, this is the nearest thing to a king that the Jews can manage: no political authority, no military power, with an instrument of execution for his royal throne.” What a failure as king Jesus appears to be, hung on his cross, numbered among the criminals, at ‘the place which is called The Skull.’ (23:33) As the Brian Wren hymn puts it:

Here hangs a man discarded,
A scarecrow hoisted high,
A nonsense pointing nowhere
To all who hurry by.

Brian Wren (1936 – ) (R&S 225)

And by the political standards of his day (and our day) as far as being a King or any sort of ruler is concerned, Jesus is indeed, ‘a nonsense pointing nowhere’. He is not rich, he is not powerful, he has no palace, no retinue, no army. What sort of kingship is that?

Remember me: those with power and their representatives might mock Jesus but a criminal on a cross seems to think that Jesus is some sort of king: Jesus, when you come into your kingdom, remember me. This man is at the agonised end of a life that might not have been much to write home about in the first place: ‘we are getting what we deserve for our deeds,’ he tells his companion on the other side of Jesus. (23:41) Yet, at a moment when things are as bad as bad can be for any human being, he is hopeful that Jesus is the sort of king who might remember him. He is hopeful that Jesus is a good-shepherd king, one like those envisaged by the prophet Jeremiah. He hopes Jesus is a good-shepherd king who will seek out and rescue those like him, one who like sheep, have wondered far astray from life as it should be lived. ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’

How amazing would it be if God remembered you and me? In one of the funeral services in the United Reformed Church’s Worship Book we pray ‘while we live, they will not be forgotten among us,’ and also, ‘may the good things of their life leave a trace on earth.’ Humanist funerals, which are increasingly popular these days, work on the basis that any continued existence that we have after death comes by “living on” in the memories of others. Of course, once the others who remember us have died, then … Seen in this light, maybe that’s why so many people nowadays hunger after being a celebrity. Being known and remembered by so many others is the best way we humans can achieve a sort of eternal life … at least, until our show is cancelled.

With God, however, we hope that things are different. To quote again from the URC Worship Book: ‘in your eternal love [O God], they will never be lost.’ Anyone who believes in God probably doesn’t have too much of a problem with seeing God as King of the universe, as the eternal ruler of the ceaseless round of circling planets singing on their way,’ as another hymn writer puts it. (Eternal Ruler of the Ceaseless Round by J. W. Chadwick (1840-1904) R&S 623) What really blows my mind, however, is the idea that the maker and sustainer not only of the singing planets, but the solar systems and the galaxies, which are beyond number, has the time and the inclination, to remember me.

Yet here’s the king of the universe, nailed to the cross in the guise of a failed king, remembering the sort of people to whom most other people wouldn’t give a thought. The image of the invisible God,’ as it says in Colossians, ‘the first born of all creation,’ in or by whom, ‘all things in heaven and earth were created,’ (1:15, 16) expresses forgiveness – ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing’ (23:34) – and offers salvation: ‘truly, I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.’ (23:43) It rewrites human ideas of what constitutes kingship. From the perspective how human beings have understood and practised kingship, it’s a nonsense and failure, but Jesus’s brand of kingship has long outlived Pontius Pilate, Herod Antipas and a whole host of other kings, rulers, emperors and presidents, so Jesus a very successful failure as King.

Kingdom, remembering … Jesus: ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’ Today’s the last Sunday of the Church’s liturgical year. Next Sunday, Advent begins another year of re-telling the story of God’s dealings with God’s creation, including with you and me. It’s a story that ends with a reminder that God is king, but in a way that sets the standard for what constitutes good human kingship, not the other way around. God is mighty, in ways beyond our greatest imaginings, for God is the creator of all that is, all that has been, and all that is to come. Yet, at the same time – and this is the good news – no matter how tiny and insignificant we are, no matter how good or bad we are, God remembers and loves each one of us, now and for ever.

And the way we know that and are able to respond to God’s love is through Jesus Christ. In today’s Gospel reading we’re confronted with that pivotal moment where God’s remembers us even to the point of dying for us. Earlier in the sermon, I said that Jesus was a king without a retinue, but that’s not quite right. We, and the millions of his followers form his retinue. It’s different though, because a king’s retinue follows where the king goes, and King Jesus goes places that earthly kings do not. That’s why it’s appropriate that next week the story starts all over again, and we get to follow in our King’s footsteps from birth onwards.

During the next year it will be Matthew’s Gospel that we hear from the most of the four biblical Gospels. With a spoiler alert here for anyone who has never heard the story of Jesus’s birth, I can tell you that it is Matthew’s Gospel that has visitors come from the east, asking, ‘where is the child who has been born King of the Jews?’ (2:2) And so, we’ll be members of the retinue of that king who teaches us how to live, a king who heals, a king who remembers everyone, the weak and powerful, the good-living and those who have gone astray. He’s a king who forgives and saves; a most spectacular failure as far as normal ideas of kingship go, but just the sort of king that’s needed in this world.

Yes, ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’

Christ the King, Colossians 1: 15-20, Jeremiah 23: 1-6, Luke 23: 33-43

Remembrance

November 11, 2019 / admin / 2019, Sermons

Sermon on Remembrance Sunday 2019

Preached by the Reverend Trevor Jamison at

Saint Columba’s United Reformed Church

Micah 4: 1-4; Matthew 5: 38-48

Remembrance has been making a comeback in recent decades. Thirty years ago if November 11^th fell on a weekday, it might have gone largely unmarked, people just carrying on with their busy lives. Nowadays 11.00 a.m. on the 11^th day of the 11^th month, whatever day it falls on, gets a much greater public response. Even supermarkets, a major power in the land, choose to observe two minutes silence in remembrance of those killed in war.

Perhaps the realisation in the mid-1990s, that we would soon lose the last of the generation that fought in the First World War, was an impetus to re-emphasise the practice of remembering. In 2009 this came to pass, with the death of Harry Patch, the last living UK resident to have fought in the trenches. Today, in 2019, the ranks of those who fought in the Second World War are also thinning; something that hits close to home for the shared identity of this nation. Now, as people across the nation gather for remembrance, some do so with personal memories of a later war or wars; some are remembering friends or family members who died; some of us simply remember in general those who lost their lives in terrible circumstances.

So, what does Christian faith have to say concerning this remembering? What is the appropriate Christian stance towards remembering those who have died in war? To answer questions like that we need to listen carefully to the voice of Jesus; recognising where we are today and asking ourselves where we should be travelling to tomorrow.

The problem with listening for the voice of Jesus is that Jesus is liable to tell you something inconvenient or unwelcome. The excerpt from the Sermon Mount we have just listened to is an outstanding example:

39 “Do not resist those who wrong you”
41 “If someone in [the occupying] authority presses you into service for one mile, go with him two.” The “authority” here is the Roman imperial authority or those who cooperated with it. In time it would press Jesus into service to carry a piece of timber a mile or two, to the place of his execution.

And, of course, let’s not forget …

v.44 “Love your enemies and pray for your persecutors”

On first listening the message to Jesus’ followers seems to be clear: a proper remembering for Christians involves a rejection of any involvement in warfare. Jesus’s message goes further than many a pacifist would, with his demand not for non-violent resistance, but for total non-resistance: “If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn and offer him the other also.” (v.39) It’s not even as if Jesus’ followers can claim such behaviour would reduce the volume of violence that occurs. The treatment the non-resistant Jesus received at his ‘trials’ and execution gives the lie to that suggestion.

Listening hard to Jesus, however, also involves questioning what we first hear. Do these words of Jesus really form the basis for how whole peoples and nations in our modern setting should live their lives in time of war? Jesus’s teaching took place in the context of a post-war occupation, not war itself. Also, both Jesus and the church that first published Matthew’s Gospel lived with a lively expectation that the end of all things was near. Twenty-first century westerners have a different perspective. Two thousand years have passed and still the end has not yet come. On the other hand, we find nothing in Jesus’s words consistent with the practice of Christian warfare. The Church during the first three centuries of its life understood that when on the night of his arrest Jesus told Peter to put away his sword, he disarmed all Christians for all time.

So how did we get to where we are today? What do we think when we see pictures of British service personnel facing deadly dangers abroad? What’s your opinion about the huge amount of money ploughed into equipment such as the Royal Navy’s two new aircraft carriers, to say nothing of the multi-million-pound jets that will fly from them? How do you feel about the fact that all of this comes accompanied by Christian military chaplains?

Incidentally, these include two URC ministers alongside whom I trained for ministry. One has accompanied soldiers on active service in Afghanistan, the other was the first chaplain onboard the new aircraft carrier, HMS Elizabeth. Today’s reality is that many Christian men and women of good conscience do serve in our armed forces. You may know some of them.

In the Frank MacGuiness’s play, Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching Towards the Somme Northern Irish Protestant soldiers, about to go over the top to their annihilation in July 1916, pause to sing the hymn, “I’m But a Stranger Here, Heaven is my Home”. I sort of understand what the hymn is getting at (based as it is around biblical calls to be “in the world but not of it”), but after two thousand years of Christian history it is difficult to always sustain that sentiment.

After all, from the reign of the Roman Emperor Constantine onwards the Christian Church has been at the centre of Western society. Christian identity was envisaged less as being a stranger on earth and more as a good citizen of the state. And we want to be, and claim to be, good citizens. Sometimes, Christians will even be heard publicly demanding that this country recognise and acknowledge the significance of its Christian heritage in forming our national identity today.

Yet, there are difficulties and dangers here. Certainly, there is no reason why Christians should expect second-class treatment because of our faith, but there is no gospel mandate for seeking preferential treatment for Christians, or demanding conformity to Christian views and norms as a basis for acceptance as a citizen.

With this in mind, what should Christian remembrance look like in the days ahead? Well, we will be realistic, recognise that involvement in warfare is a price that many Christians are prepared to pay, not as some great glorious adventure, but as an integral part of the duties of good citizenship.

Many Christians would be happy to have a Prime Minister who is also a Christian, though I’m not aware that in this general Election campaign this option is currently on offer. Weighing up party manifestos, offers and promises, we want a Christian perspective to inform policies on education, on health, and on eradicating poverty. But a Christian Prime Minister who presides over the departments of Education, Health, and Work and Pensions also, inescapably, must preside over the Ministry of Defence. To have a Christian PM making the decisions about allocation of resources for the NHS means that same Christian has to make decisions about the allocation of military resources also. And decisions made in one area may well have significant implications in the other.

So, we Christians may have to “realistic”, but we are never allowed to cease listening to an alternative voice. One such was George Zabelka (1915-1992). Father George Zabelka, a Catholic priest was chaplain for the American airmen who dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. He gave them his blessing. Over the next twenty years, he gradually came to believe that he had been terribly wrong. Here are some words from a speech he gave on the 40th anniversary of the bombings.

“Those who have seen real war will bear me out. I assure you, it is not of Christ. It is not Christ’s way. There is no way to conduct real war in conformity with the teachings of Jesus … The ethics of mass butchery cannot be found in the teachings of Jesus. In Just War ethics, Jesus Christ, who is supposed to be all in the Christian life, is irrelevant. He might as well never have existed. In Just War ethics, no appeal is made to him or his teaching, because no appeal can be made to him or his teaching, for neither he nor his teaching gives standards for Christians to follow in order to determine what level of slaughter is acceptable.

So the world is watching today. Ethical hairsplitting over the morality of various types of instruments and structures of mass slaughter is not what the world needs from the Church, although it is what the world has come to expect from the followers of Christ. What the world needs is a grouping of Christians that will stand up and pay up with Jesus Christ. What the world needs is Christians who, in language that the simplest soul could understand, will proclaim: the follower of Christ cannot participate in mass slaughter. He or she must love as Christ loved, live as Christ lived, and, if necessary, die as Christ died, loving one’s enemies.”

Powerful words. They are representative of groups and actions that have surfaced and re-surfaced within the Christian Church across the centuries – from medieval Waldensians to Reformation Anabaptists; from the quiet witness of seventeenth century Quakers to the loud call to peaceful protest, found in the preaching of Martin Luther King Jr.

As we move into an era where public indifference pushes the church more and more to the margins of our civil society it might be that one positive outcome of this process is that we feel more able to listen to these alternative voices, and not feel over-beholden to conform to the requirements of the state, in matters-military as well as non-military. A small church, with no institutional ties to the state, such as the United Reformed Church, might be in a good position to do so.

Whether that turns out to be the case or not, true Christian remembrance, such as we attempt today, will never be entirely easy. In fact, it should not be easy. Christians wish to make a positive contribution to society (which always leads to involvement in politics to some extent, and possibly includes even military service). Yet we same Christians are not absolved from the responsibility of listening to the inconvenient voice of Jesus, even though it comes from a different historical era and setting. Ultimately, his is the voice that encourages us not only to remember those who have died in war but also calls us to work and to support all efforts to ensure that others need never do so again.

Matthew 5: 38-48, Micah 4: 1-4, pacifism, remembrance, war

Remembrance Reflection

November 11, 2019 / admin / 2019, Sermons

By The Reverend Trevor Jamison, given at

Saint Columba’s United Reformed Church, 10^th November 2019

Romans 10:8-15

‘For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is the Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him.’ (10:12)

For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, or to put it in another way, according to Saint Paul, there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile.

Today is Remembrance Sunday. This annual observance began in the wake of the First World War; a war of suffering on such a scale that it was hoped that it signalled the end of all wars. Today, we know that such hopes would not be realised. Only in a very small number of occasions since 1918 has there been a year when no member of the British armed forces has been killed on active service. Sadly, this annual act of remembrance, and the war memorials that form a prominent feature of almost every city, town and village of the UK, have not prevented national participation in other conflicts.

In fact, the generation of men that fought in the trenches of the First World War also provided the leaders of governments and armed forces that took part in the Second World War. Additionally, if the first World War (mostly conducted by largely church-going nations) was in part a denial of Paul’s statement that ‘the same Lord of the Lord of all’, then the Second World War, in most horrific terms included an emphatic denial of Paul’s ringing assertion that ‘there is no distinction between Jew and gentile.’

Consider then this memorial plaque. It is located in Westminster College in Cambridge. Westminster was the theological college of the Presbyterian Church of England, training students to be church minsters. Today, it is one of the United Reformed Church’s centres for learning, including training women and men for ordained ministry in our denomination. This plaque remembers the seven former students of the college who died in the Second World War.

War memorials are very political things. History shows fierce local debates in Britain after the First World War over what form such memorials should take, and over which names should be included on or excluded from them. After the Second World War there was similar conversation amongst the leaders of Westminster College over this war memorial.

“In memory of the members of Westminster College who gave their lives in the war, 1939-1945: Arthur Bawtree, William Elsmlie, Herman Hartman, Theodor Hesse, Douglas James, Harold Rogan, and G. W. Vellacott.” The discussion was about whether to include the names of the former students, Herman Hartman and Theodor Hesse, because, as you can probably guess, Hartman and Hesse were German.

It is said that the argument was finally settled when one of the those present commented, “well if they learned together, surely their names can appear together.” Had Saint Paul been present perhaps he would have added, ‘the same Lord is the Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’

Not everyone deserves a place on a war memorial, their deeds being so terrible. And appropriately enough, nations see it as their first duty to remember their own war dead, not those of their wartime opponents. Still, there are variations and exceptions. I remember standing in a Lutheran church in Alsace, a region which has switched back and forward between being within France or Germany, according to the result of wars between the two nations.

In that church there are three memorials for the members of the congregation who have died in combat: for the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71), for the First World War, and for the Second World War. In the 1870-71 conflict the church members fought and died in the French army, in 1914-1918 in the German army, and in 1939-45 they were back with the French army. I am not aware of how that congregation deals with the practice of remembrance.

Does it make it more difficult or easier to be a college or a congregation whose members have fought on different sides in conflicts between two nations? Certainly, if remembrance is marked in a political or national setting, as are our acts of remembrance, then things would be less straightforward. On the other hand, there would a constant reminder that, from the divine perspective, all national and ethnic distinctions become as nothing in the light of the fact that all peoples are called to acknowledge the same God as their maker and their Lord. So, one would hope, remembrance would be prevented from ever descending into mere national triumphalism.

Today, here at St Columba’s, we are remembering those who have died in war, particularly those who were associated with this church; those who were connected with our families and friendship networks; those who have died in any number of wars. We would hope that such wars were fought by this nation at least in part, hopefully in the main, so that no one need suffer because they were Jew, Gentile, or from any other identifiable group.

And we are reminded that there is a question for Christians to ask concerning any potential future conflicts where this nation might be asked to take part, so endangering its servicemen and service women. And that question is, “to what extent might this conflict remove or ameliorate self-interested human distinctions and divisions.” For remember, ‘there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile; the same Lord is the Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’

remembrance, Romans 10: 8-15

For All the Saints

November 4, 2019 / admin / 2019, Sermons

A Sermon Preached by the Reverend Trevor Jamison at Saint Columba’s United Reformed Church, North Shields,

on Sunday 3 November 2019

Ephesians 1:11-23; Luke 6:20-31

So, today, on this the Sunday closest to 1^st November, we are celebrating the theme or festival of “All Saints” … so let’s begin with what we think about the clergy.

Some decades ago a Congregationalist writer, C. J. Cadoux, was criticised for a book he wrote. According to his critics, Cadoux had an insufficiently high view of ordination; the “setting aside” of some within the church for specific roles and offices such as priest or minister. Cadoux’s response to this has stayed with me ever since I read it, and I have used it as a “rule of thumb” in my understanding of such matters.

“Actually,” he replied, “I think I do have a high view of ordination. I’m also happy for others to have an even higher view of ordination … as long as their view of the Church is higher than their view of ordination. And also, I’m happy for people to have as high a view of the Church as they like, as long as they have a higher view of Christ.” I like that: as high a view of the ordained – priests and clergy – as you like as long as your view of the Church is higher; as high a view of the Church as you like as long as your view of Christ is higher still. To me, that seems to get things in the right order: ministers are there for the Church (not the other way around), and the Church is there for Jesus Christ.

So now that we’ve dealt with those pesky ordained ministers, let’s get on with the important stuff and talk about the God, the Church and Jesus Christ, or as Paul puts it in this letter to the Ephesians, ‘your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and your love towards all the saints.’ (1:18)

‘All the saints.’ Did you see that Prince Charles was at the Vatican last month? The occasion was the canonisation of John Henry Newman, the first English person born since the 1600s to be declared a saint (canonised) by the Roman Catholic Church. Newman was a nineteenth century Anglican priest who converted to Roman Catholicism. Working in Birmingham (and somewhat unhappily in Ireland for a spell) he was a thinker and writer whose ideas anticipated some of the positions subsequently adopted by the Roman Catholic Church in the second half of the twentieth century. Well, now he’s officially Saint John Henry Newman, according to the Roman Catholic Church.

Of course, there’s a lot to be said for having prominent, widely recognised saints; people whose faith provides outstanding examples of the varieties of Christian faith lived well in this world. And that variety was displayed by the Vatican back in October. In the ceremony where the English John Henry Newman was canonised so were an Indian, a Swiss, an Italian, and a Brazilian – and all of them were women. And, of course, we’re happy to talk about Saint Peter and Saint Paul, Saints Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, to say nothing of Irish saints like Saint Kevin and Saint Columba.

On the other hand, there’s a danger in focusing on outstanding individuals in a way that obscures an important truth – that we’re all saints too. This letter to the Ephesians begins, ‘Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, to the saints who are in Ephesus.’ (1:1) Then, as he puts it in today’s reading, ‘I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and your love towards all the saints,’ and ‘I pray … you may know … what are the riches of his glorious inheritance among all the saints.’ (1:15, 17, 18)

As far as I know, as yet, there is no officially Church-recognised Saint Trevor. I’m not going to let that play on my mind, however, because I’m already a saint, whatever else the wider Church wants to say about me. Years back, a Roman Catholic friend informed me that there was a movement within the Church to have me canonised, and once they found a cannon big enough, they’d get on with the job forthwith!

If I was ever proposed for sainthood by the Roman Catholic Church I would be appalled. This would not be because of theological differences but because their process involves a thorough investigation of the life of the one so proposed to make sure that they had lived their life in in such a saintly manner so as to be an example to other Christians. How many of us would sign up to have our lives investigated in such a way and the results published for all to see? As the movie mogul, Sam Goldwyn once said, “include me out”!

But my many various failings in life, which I am not going to share with you in this sermon, don’t disqualify me from being one of the saints. The proof of this is that Paul could write to the members of this Ephesian congregation on the basis that they were all saints, even though, at times, their behaviour was less than saintly. Later in the letter he has to tell them to (4:25-32) to ‘put away’ a whole series of poor behaviours – telling falsehoods, uncontrolled anger, thieving, evil talk, bitterness, wrangling, slander, and malice. What a charming picture of church life! If these Ephesian Christians were all saints, then so are you and me.

So, if being a saint doesn’t depend on being well-behaved all the time, what does it take to be a saint? Well, the simple answer to that is, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ: ‘I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus,’ writes Paul, ‘and your love towards all the saints’ (1:15); ‘In Christ we have also obtained an inheritance, having been destined according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things.’ (1:11) Remember, though, it’s not that saints’ behaviour does not matter. Alongside listing their many failings, Paul also commends the positive alternatives: ‘be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another as God has forgiven you.’ (4:32)

So, saints, whether we are constantly well-behaved or not, are saints because we focus upon Jesus Christ. And why should we focus on Jesus Christ? We focus on Jesus Christ because in and through him we have received what Paul describes as ‘the word of truth’. (1:13) This is the good news of our salvation, that God chooses to redeem us from the consequences of all those bad actions, attitudes and lifestyle that are inappropriate for God’s people; for God’s saints. Jesus, in his teaching, and through his lifestyle, and his life and death and resurrection points to and accomplishes what Paul calls ‘the riches of his [God’s] glorious inheritance among the saints.’ (1:18) In and through Jesus Christ, God accomplishes God’s desire to share abundant life with all people. This is the good news, and that’s why we saints focus on Jesus Christ.

So, we saints focus on Jesus Christ because that’s the best way to understand and respond to God’s love for us, which leads us to a second aspect of being a saint: we also point others to Jesus Christ: ‘I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love towards all the saints,’ Paul writes to the Ephesians. (1:15) Gaining an understanding of the nature of God’s love for us by focusing on Jesus, impels us to love others; it’s the saintly thing to do. It’s the saints’ job to make as much of a reality as possible of Jesus’s declaration that the poor, the hungry, the weeping, the reviled, and the excluded are the ones who will know God’s love.’ (7:22) Imperfect people, like you and me, inspired by Jesus to help vulnerable, downtrodden people today, are being saintly.

Note something, however. We saints point others towards Jesus as the source of the good news, not just towards the Church. I’m not against bringing people to church. That’s not a bad thing in itself, but it’s not a substitute for pointing them towards Jesus. After all, however high our view of the Church, a saint’s view of Jesus must be higher still; he who is, ‘far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but in the age to come,’ as the Letter to the Ephesians puts it. (1:21)

And I think that this is a big challenge for us today. In general, we are much more comfortable in asking, “how can we get people to come to church?” than we are asking, “how can we point people to Jesus so that they too may come to focus their lives upon him?” If we want this church to flourish, we’re going to have to get better at asking (and answering) the question, “how can we point people to Jesus?”

Maybe you feel under qualified or even unqualified for this task. Perhaps you feel that the strength of your belief, or the imperfections of your personal lifestyle, disqualify you. If so, you’re wrong! As long as you are here and as long as you have some interest in Jesus Christ, then you’re a saint. Maybe, like me, you are an imperfect one. In fact there isn’t any other sort, as I’m sure John Henry Newman and the whole host of saints would agree. What matters is that, by virtue of knowing Jesus, we realise how fortunate we are to be included in God’s love and to be able to share that love with others.

For we are all saints.

Ephesians 1: 11-23, Luke 6: 20-31, saints

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