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21st April 2013 - Morning - Revd. Preb Maureen Hobbs

Sermon for Easter 4 - Sunday 21st April 2013 Acts 9.36-43 John 10.22-30 Do any of you keep diaries??? And do you revisit them after a period of years and read what you have written? Like me, do you sometimes marvel at the things that seemed of such importance and significance at the time - but which, with the benefit of hindsight, you know were just part of the ordinary stuff of life??? I don't exactly keep a diary - but I do keep a record of the sermons that I preach - and of course the readings come round on a three year cycle. So at the moment I can go back and see what was occupying my mind on this Sunday in years gone past And back in 2001 - the fourth Sunday of Easter, - I was preparing to baptise a little girl - India - the first baptism that I carried out as a brand new Incumbent in my first parish. Astonishing to think that she - wherever she is - will now be becoming a teenager! All these years on, and lo and behold, I am again preparing to baptise a little girl - this time Anabelle Eve - who will be coming here later today with Mum and Dad and quite a lot of her friends and relatives to celebrate an important step in her young life. Now Anabelle is just over a year old - and you don't have to be an expert in child development (and I am certainly not that!) to know that at that age she will know a lot of what is going on around her. She will also know that I am not Mum or Dad - or Granny or Granddad for that matter - so I won't be surprised if she protests rather loudly when this strange woman grabs her and pours water on her head! But she will also be beginning to get to know something far more important than the familiar sound of family voices. She will be beginning to get to know the sound of God reaching out to her. For that is what baptism is all about really. Acknowledging that, growing up in a Christian household, Anabelle will need to get to know and recognise when God, when Jesus, has something for her to hear - something to which she should listen. God calls to us. Constantly. God calls to us in our childhood - as adults - as older people. And at the end of our life, God calls us home to join him. And those who have learned to listen to his voice and appreciate the love with which he calls, will make that final journey full of confidence and reassurance that nothing bad could possibly await them. Listening for a familiar voice… We all do it. How often, when you pick up the phone and someone says "Hello - it's me" at the other end; how often do you know automatically who is calling? Before they even tell you their name….? And I am not counting those of you who might have those fancy phones that identify the caller's number and give you the name - that's cheating for the purposes of this talk! Someone you know, someone you love is instantly recognisable by the tone of voice, the inflexion used, the particular way the speaker addresses us. Do you remember the story of Mary of Magdala in the garden that we listened to a few weeks ago? How she recognised the Lord, not by his looks, but by his voice? When he spoke her name? "Mary" - it couldn't be anyone else and she immediately responds - "Rabouni - Master" - even though logic tell her that it cannot be Jesus - for he died on the cross. The sound of his voice is so powerful that she cannot help but respond. Well that is what happens when we know God intimately. The more we study him through scripture; the more we get to know him in our lives by learning alongside other people; the more we learn to see him in other people - the easier it gets to hear when he calls our name. When there is a task that God wants us to undertake in his name and for his glory. The sheep follow the shepherd because his voice means safety - means nourishment - means protection from danger. If even sheep (not always the brightest of animals!) can get to know the shepherd by the sound of his voice alone, how much more should we - who can take positive steps to get to know God in Jesus Christ - how much more should we know and respond to God's call? Peter listened - even after he thought he had betrayed his friend and that he would never be trusted again. Peter listened and found forgiveness and a commission. Peter was to tend the sheep in Jesus' place. Peter received the confidence to heal and even to raise Tabitha from the dead in the name of Jesus Christ. Tabitha heard her name being called by Christ - through Peter. And she couldn't help but respond. I hope those who will make promises for baby Anabelle today will teach her to listen hard and get to know that lovely voice - bringing security, reassurance, nourishment. I have just spent most of this week talking to potential vicars - ordinary men and women who feel that God has been urging them to answer his call in a particular way and to offer themselves for ordained ministry. They come in all shapes and sizes and varied in age from 22 to 54. It may surprise you to learn that the Church does not just take at face value anyone who asks to be ordained? There is a long process of discernment, culminating in a week - like the one just past - when the candidates have to come together in a group and be interviewed by experienced clergy and lay people who will try and assess how genuine their sense of calling is, whether their own instincts have been supported by other people in the churches where they worship currently or in the past, and whether they have the intellectual strengths and personal qualities and robustness to take on the role of being the ordained minister in a community in future. And, having got through our panel of interviews, they will then face 2 -3 years of training before a bishop somewhere agrees to ordain them for the ministry in which they seek to serve. Some will be in established churches like this one. Some will be Pioneer ministers - setting up brand new worshipping communities on housing estates or in schools or sports centres. But what of each one of us? We are Easter People - people of the Resurrection. What have we done recently to listen if God may be calling us to do, or to be, something in his service? And to really come alive?

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21st April 2013 - Evening - Revd. Preb Maureen Hobbs

Sermon for Easter 4 evening - Sunday 21st April, 2013 Isaiah 63. 7-14 Luke 24. 36-49 I do not believe in ghosts; I believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. 2 statements that some might think are contradictory. I do not believe in ghosts because I believe in life lived in the here and now and I believe that death is something very real - it is not ~"nothing at all" whatever the Revd. Henry Scott-Holland may have written. I have lost those whom I loved, and that loss is real and I miss them and no amount of prayer or wishful thinking on my part will bring them back .... although of course they live on in my heart and mind. I am prepared to acknowledge that if someone dies with something dreadful unresolved in their life; perhaps a sudden and traumatic death; perhaps they have done something wicked, then something of the disquiet of their spirit may enter into a place or time and for a while others may sense something of their unhappiness - but that is not quite the same as saying that their ghost lives on and haunts the living. So I do not believe in ghosts. I believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, precisely because he was not and is not a ghost. The experience of the risen Christ that his disciples had was so real - so concrete - so flesh and blood and warm that it could not have been a ghost - and anyway he said he was not! And I have no reason to think that Jesus ever lied. And those who experienced his presence after death were a mixture of economic and educated people: straightforward working men, and middle ranking bureaucrats (Matt the tax collector) and women and educated Pharisees and Saducees. (Paul and Nicodemus) And ghosts do not eat bread and fish - broiled or not. But the point of these post Easter appearances was to form the church. Resurrection was not a belief that sprang up among some of Jesus' followers. Rather it was THE belief that formed the church. The belief that suddenly made sense of all of the Old Testament. The belief that was to give point and focus to everything that followed in the New Testament. This was the pivot point in human history. Here's a comment from one of Tom Wright's books - Simply Christian. The resurrection of Jesus enables us to see that living as a Christian isn't simply a matter of discovering the inner truth of the way the world currently is, or simply learning a way of life that is in tune with a different world and thus completely out of tune with the present one. Rather it is a matter of glimpsing that in God's new creation, of which Jesus' resurrection is just the start, all that was good in the original creation is re- affirmed. All that has corrupted and defaced it - including many imperfections that are woven so tightly into the fabric of the world as we know it that we can't imagine being without them, - are done away. Learning to live as a Christian is learning to live as a renewed human being, anticipating the eventual new creation in and with a world which is still longing and groaning for that final redemption. Without the resurrection, then the story of Jesus of Nazareth is just a tragic tale of a good man who got in the way of the political and religious authorities of his day. And while the hope and prayers of the people of God - as we have inherited them in the OT are still worthwhile and beautiful, Israel must increasingly feel as though the narrative is spinning out of control. But with the resurrection, there is a new way of telling and relating to the story. The resurrection is not just a surprise happy ending for one person, it is instead the turning point for everything else. It is the point at which all the old promises come true at last; the promise that is quite explicit throughout the Gospels, that through Abraham's seed - the Jewish nation - all the whole world would be blessed by God. If Jesus is really raised, Luke is saying, then he really was and is the Messiah, he is God's messenger, God's promise bearer, carrying the promises made to Abraham, Moses, David and the prophets, and promises not only for Israel as one nation, but for the whole world. Some years ago there were a number of films that were made on the subject of grief and love and letting go. You may remember Ghost with Whoopie Goldberg and Truly, Madly, Deeply with Demi Moore. Good films in their own way - and great love stories, but in the end the relationship with the departed one was shown to be damaging to the one who remained - often because it stopped one half of the partnership from moving on and developing into the full human being they were meant to be. Our relationship with the Risen Jesus is not like that. It does not freeze us in time or limit our potential - in fact most of us will find that we can only grow into the full human being that God wants us to be if we maintain and foster our ongoing relationship with him through Jesus. No ghost this but a living, breathing vibrant being - the beginning of God's new creation. He is real, he is familiar but he is also transformed; maybe Luke is saying that we can only recognize him in any sense when we learn to see him within the true story of God, Israel and the world? For that we have to learn how to read and interpret the scriptures; and for that we need, as our teacher, the risen Lord himself. Some of you may have been watching those brave souls competing in the London Marathon today. Many will have been running in order to raise much-needed funds for their particular pet charity. A good number have begun running and taking part because they have lost a loved one or a good friend to cancer or another debilitating disease. Many would say that without that spur, they doubt they would ever have thought of taking part and training to run, walk or in a few cases, hobble the 26 miles plus that is the marathon distance. Most of those people, however, will say that the experience of marathon running has changed them, made them a better, more fulfilled person. None I think (and hope!) would claim that they are being haunted by the ghost of their departed loved one, although, paradoxically they may feel closer to them in some ways than they did in life.... and will feel that they have become a better person - a more authentic version of themselves, than they might otherwise have been. May each of us find the resurrection power and inspiration to grow into the sort of people that God would have us be. Amen.