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Thought for Pentecost Sunday: are we as a Church fit for purpose?

Juan Bautista Mayno, Pentecost (Prado)

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Maino_Pentecost%C3%A9s._Lienzo._285_x_163_cm._Museo_del_Prado.jpg

Today we recall the birth of the Church. So as we remember how the first Christians were inspired by tongues ‘as of fire’, what better Sunday can there to be consider where we are as a Church and where we should be going as a Church? Are we ‘fit for purpose’? Not our purpose, of course, but God’s. And what is God’s purpose for us?

         Before we answer these questions, we would do well to pause for a moment to consider the values of the world. We have frequently noted the distinction between the values of the world and the values of Jesus himself and his disciples, the embryonic Church. ‘I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world… the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one’ (John 17:9, 14-15).

         Now the Church has to be active in the world. It can no more isolate itself from the world than can this congregation, as a community church, isolate itself from, or confront, its community. Yet there is necessarily a degree of tension between the Church community and the world because the values of the world are not those of the Church. We cannot worship, for example, the God of materialism. On the contrary we necessarily denounce the false God of Mammon. ‘You cannot serve God and wealth’ (Matt 6:24; Luke 16:13).

         The ‘vision of a community united by the common good, public service and the pursuit of justice’ is not an exclusively Christian one. But it is certainly one to which true Christians would wish to subscribe. And if we as Christians want this for our society we must also, as a minimum requirement, want this for our Church. But we want other things as well. The Church of England has identified fifteen values which articulate the Christian vision for church schools, things which give them their special ethos. One could have wished for a shorter list, because few of us can remember fifteen values! (I can remember two or three…) But the list is of importance to our concerns: the Church identifies reverence; wisdom; thankfulness; humility; endurance; service; compassion; trust; peace; forgiveness; friendship; justice; hope; creation; and koinonia (= fellowship). Most of us can feel at ease with each of these values, the background theology to which are explained in relatively simple fact sheets. I particularly value the terms compassion, trust, peace, forgiveness and humility.

         But a Church school is not a worshipping community or a mission-oriented organization in the sense that a Christian Church is; so there are necessarily one or two additional values which make up the ethic of Jesus which need to be added to our list and which perhaps should perhaps be our principal or core values. In chapter 19 of the Gospel of Matthew, the Rich Enquirer asks of Jesus ‘what do I still lack?’ – the ethic of Jesus offers us something more, over and above the generally accepted principles of morality which arise out of the Hebrew Scriptures. ‘Set your mind on God’s kingdom and his justice before everything else’, Jesus tells us in Matthew chapter 6, ‘and all the rest will come to you as well’ (Matthew 6:33).

Sadly, in this world, people define themselves by what they own and consider wealth and valuable possessions to be a blessing, if not the chief blessing, that can befall them. Success is also often defined in material terms: how much did X leave in his will? (The emphasis is not on which good causes were the beneficiaries of his generosity?) In contrast, the teaching of Christ is dedicated to freeing mankind from the slavish pursuits of material possessions. ‘Do not set your hearts on the godless world or anything in it. Anyone who loves the world is a stranger to the Father’s love. Everything the world affords, all that panders to the appetites or entices the eyes, all the glamour of its life, springs not from the Father but from the godless world of man. And that world is passing away with all its allurements – but he who does God’s will stands forevermore’ (1 John 2:15-17). Our church has to be a generous community. It has to give freely: of its possessions, such as they are; of its hospitality; above all, of its love.

And there is a second chief or core value which we need to espouse, and this is actively to seek the intervention of the Holy Spirit in our day to day affairs, in our services, and in our planning for the future. We cannot always be fired up as were the first disciples when they received the ‘tongues as of fire’. But we can always remember that first Pentecost and pray for its spirit to guide us, our deliberations, our work and all we think about, we pray for, and all we act for. And the second memory we can cherish is the Emmaus road experience recounted in Luke chapter 24. ‘Were not our hearts burning within us while he – that is Jesus – was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?’ (Luke 24:32). That ‘burning experience’ is the individual equivalent of the collective Pentecost experience.

I end with words from Jonathan Gallagher on the ‘the Emmaus experience’, which to my mind sum up the core values of what we should mean by ‘Church’. ‘This Emmaus experience’, he writes, ‘is what we should be looking for. It tells us that our faith is not to be founded on miraculous amazement, the signs and wonders that Jesus refused to perform to his unbelieving generation. Nor is it based even on blind and unthinking acceptance of whatever God says… Rather Jesus appeals to all the evidence of God’s past actions, of the historical record of his involvement in human affairs. This record, won at such great cost to God, is the demonstration of who God is and how he chooses to act… (‘Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures’: Luke 24: 27).

 ‘The Emmaus experience is also the model for our outreach. For once convinced, and with their faith energized by evidential truth, the disciples rush back to Jerusalem to share with the others…

‘And in his compassion, Jesus waits for these two disciples from Emmaus to explain their experience to the others before he appears to the group. He wants the reasons for faith to be explained even before he returns to speak personally to his closest friends. For while they are still excitedly talking about what has happened, Jesus appears…

‘Jesus wants faith based not on the thrill of the moment, but on carefully-examined evidence. So our words must also have that same ring of truth, without the need to make appeal to gimmickry or emotionalism, signs or wonders, manipulation or authoritarianism… We have the privilege of sharing our faith in a God who makes sense, who does not need to use any means to overpower us, but simply speaks to convince us of what is true and right, and who chose to die at our hands on a cruel cross to convince us of that supreme reality of truth.’

I want to end with a remark of St Francis of Assisi: ‘preach the Gospel at all times’, the Association for Church Editors’ Web Site quotes him as saying, ‘and, when necessary, use words.’ It is a reminder of the need for deeds rather than words and for reflection rather than just exhortation. However, it is not complete in itself. The risen Christ on the road to Emmaus used words to his disciples to arouse the fire in the hearts when he expounded to them ‘the evidence of God’s past actions, of the historical record of his involvement in human affairs’. Evangelism requires both words and deeds. ‘Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?’ (Luke 24:32). We must find new and better ways of communicating our faith to others. This is the priority for us, and we trust that the Holy Spirit will make this possible for the renewal of our Church.

On sharing testimonies

Caravaggio: The Conversion on the road to Damascus

http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/c/caravagg/05/29ceras.html

‘Long my imprisoned spirit lay fast bound in sin and nature’s night. Thine eye diffused a quickening ray. I woke, the dungeon flamed with light. My chains fell off, my heart was free. I rose, went forth, and followed thee.’ John Wesley’s ‘strange warming of his heart’ came not from hearing our first reading from Acts 16 (Acts 16:16-34) but from Luther’s introduction to St Paul’s epistle to the Romans, but its depiction in hymn is one of the greatest personal statements of conversion, akin to the great story in Acts about the conversion of the family of Paul’s jailer.

What are we to make of statements of conversion? We can’t all put them into the compelling language of John Wesley because we are not all great evangelists in his mould. But we need these testimonies. Here’s why: firstly, because it keeps us humble. If we remember when we first committed ourselves to Jesus, then it reminds us of that time in our life, earlier, when we had not done so – when, in effect, whether we knew it at the time of not, we were still sinners on a much greater scale than today. Secondly, it’s a personal help to keep the Gospel at the centre of all our stories. If we talk about the way in which obstacles to our faith, and our doubts, were overcome, then it enriches our Church with the evidence of conversion that has taken place already and may yet arise again. Thirdly, it provides an example of the importance of sharing a personal testimony. We need our faith to be refreshed by the experiences of others. That is part of what our fellowship is about. As a practical action step, we are advised to create a one-page, two-minute conversion story testimony; and to practise sharing it with at least one person a week, asking the other person to share their conversion story with us. If my own statement is not one page, it is because of the length of the Biblical passage which I refer to.

Now it’s important to stress here that some people don’t feel that they have a clear ‘conversion story’ to tell: their faith came upon them gradually or else was in them from a very early age and it proceeded and grew without any single blinding ‘road to Damascus’ type experience that Saul underwent before he became Paul. ‘The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. And I am the foremost of sinners’, St Paul tells us (1 Timothy 1:15). The greater the sinner, the more important the conversion story: but there is no harm in hearing the story of those who were not sinners on Saul’s scale.

So here is a quick review of a more modest sinner and how he was converted. Between my confirmation at the early age of 12 or so and middle age of 41 or so, I was not an agnostic, let alone an atheist, but I had also not committed myself to follow Christ. Marriage to a committed and practising Christian and agreement that our children would be educated as Christians in so far as that is possible in our society had led to a significant event, which was to attend church on a regular basis from the time of our marriage in 1987. When living in Paris two years later we were quite actively involved with the English-speaking Anglican community and I was asked to be a reader in the church. On Easter Sunday 1991 I was asked to read the epistle, which was from 1 Corinthians 15. I believe that the text I read from was from the NIV, so here is that translation, beginning at verse 12, where Paul addresses the implications of Christ’s resurrection:

But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? ¹³ If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. ¹⁴ And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.¹⁵ More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised.¹⁶ For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. ¹⁷ And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. ¹⁸ Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. ¹⁹ If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.

²⁰ But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. ²¹ For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. ²² For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. ²³ But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. ²⁴ Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. ²⁵ For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. ²⁶ The last enemy to be destroyed is death.²⁷ For he “has put everything under his feet”. Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. ²⁸ When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.

²⁹ Now if there is no resurrection, what will those do who are baptized for the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized for them? ³⁰ And as for us, why do we endanger ourselves every hour? ³¹ I face death every day – yes, just as surely          as I boast about you in Christ Jesus our Lord. ³² If I fought wild beasts in Ephesus with no more than human hopes, what have I gained? If the dead are not raised,

“Let us eat and drink,
for tomorrow we die” (Isaiah 22:13).

Now what we do not ever get from Paul is a sense that less is more. There he and Silas were, in prison, still praying and singing hymns at midnight! And elsewhere at Troas, in chapter 20 of Acts, Paul is still preaching at midnight whereupon a young lad called Eutychus, who had been listening to him while sitting on a window ledge on the third floor of the building, fell asleep and then fell out of the window and had to be brought back to life by Paul! (One can’t help feeling that Luke liked telling this story to make the point about Paul that he could have learned that sometimes less is more.)

But whether or not it is a long and difficult passage, 1 Corinthians 15 is the definitive statement on why, as Christians we need the Resurrection. Without the Resurrection, Paul tells us, our faith would be in vain. We would deserve pity for our false hopes. But our faith is not in vain. There are countless witnesses to the Resurrection as Paul had earlier recounted in the chapter. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia! We are an Easter people and Alleluia is our song.

All I can say about my own conversion is that physically my legs went weak as I realized the significance of that text on Easter Sunday 1991. I wanted to fall down on my knees and thank God. And I have remained a Christian and grown as a Christian ever since. Thanks be to God. Alleluia! Alleluia!

On being led by the Holy Spirit: last Sunday's Thought

How do respond to an advertisement such as the above? The scene depicts the Last Supper, with the light shining on the one disciple who has no halo (Judas Iscariot). The punchline is: ‘the right lighting changes everything’. Do we respond with nonchalance? After all, all publicity is good publicity; at least the message brings the Christian story into the market place. Are we offended? How can the Last Supper be mocked publicly? Or do we respond with regret? The problem is that very few young people have now heard the Christian story and therefore many may not understand what is happening at all... 

‘In some sense,’ it has been argued, ‘the current times are not unlike the pagan world in which the apostles first proclaimed the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is true, that the West is more an “angry divorcee,” and the ancient Gentile world which was more like a virgin awaiting her groom. But there are still some parallels, and our presumption that most people heard the basics of Scripture, and the gospel is generally a poor presumption today. Most have not heard Christ, or the Scriptures authentically proclaimed. And to the degree that they have, it has been proclaimed to them with hostility and cynicism by a world and a culture that scoffs at the claims of Christ, his Church, the Christian tradition.’

If this argument is correct, then a great deal depends on who we think brought about the growth of the early Church and the  way in which it was done. Here there is a basic contradiction between the accounts of the eastern Orthodox Church and the western Catholic Church, which led to the historic split in the year 1054. 

Let us take the Orthodox account first. The Book of the Acts of the Apostles reveals to us that the Holy Spirit was at the heart of the growth of the Church from the outset. He encouraged the early churches and found leaders for the new congregations. The Church existed and grew only through the Spirit working in the hearts of believers. Our task is not just, as Paul tells us, not to put out the Spirit’s fire, not to quench or stifle it (1 Thessalonians 5:19). It is about igniting it to illuminate all our actions and decisions as a Church community. The true mark of the Church is that it prays and worships in the Spirit (Philippians 3:3). At its best, worship is thus a Spirit-led movement, giving praise to God, proclaiming what He has done and is doing, and what our human response should be (T. Page, ‘Holy Spirit’, in Dictionary of Paul and His Letters, 412). We are not left as ‘orphans’ by a Christ who we can no longer see (cf. John 14:18) if all our ministry in the church and beyond its walls is done in the Holy Spirit. The people of God walk in the comfort of the Holy Spirit (Acts 9:31). They rejoice in the Holy Spirit (Luke 10:21), resolve and decide things in the Holy Spirit (Acts 15:28), have their conscience bear witness in the Holy Spirit (Romans 9:2), have access to God in the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 2:18), pray in the Holy Spirit (Romans 8:26, Jude 1:20), and love in the Holy Spirit (Colossians 1:8). 

For all these reasons, the Orthodox Church regards the Holy Spirit as the ‘creator’ of the Church and rejects the formulation in the Creed known as the filioque, namely that the Holy Spirit proceeds through the Father and Son and not directly from the Father. In the Western Church after the year 589, the Son submits to the Father, while the Holy Spirit submits to both the Son and the Father. The Eastern (later, Orthodox) Church, however, never accepted this further definition and contended then and still contends today that the Spirit proceeds only from the Father: this issue ‘remains the primary theological difference between the Eastern and Western churches’ (Stanley M. Burgess, ‘Holy Spirit’, in The Encyclopedia of Christian Civilization, ed. G. T. Kurian, ii.1146; the term filioque means in Latin ‘and the son’). In Eastern Christendom, Basil the Great, known as a ‘Doctor of the Holy Spirit’, went further than anyone in the west in a treatise On the Holy Spirit, proclaiming that the Spirit is the creator of the Church (Burgess, ‘Holy Spirit’, 1147).


In the western church, the emphasis was rather on the Church being led by Jesus himself through his appointed disciples and then through the apostolic succession. Instead of being lost and reduced to silence, the disciples are ‘sent’ and the Spirit is to be sent to them so that they may have the ‘truth’ continually revealed to them and its significance instilled in them. The Holy Spirit will therefore be their ‘teacher’ and ‘revealer’, perhaps even ‘exhorter’, the means by which they will ‘understand’ the gospel and the presence and guidance of God the Father and the Son, thus creating the ‘Spirit of mission’ (M. M. B. Turner, ‘Holy Spirit’, in Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels, 350). The initial proclamation sought to get right to the point. In effect, this kerygmatic approach was seen more as a proclamation addressed directly to the hearer, and is a call to conversion, rather than as an extended appeal to the reason or to motives of credibility. Jesus is the chosen Messiah of God, the one who was promised. And though he was crucified, He rose gloriously from the dead, appearing to his disciples, and having been exulted at the right hand of the Father through his ascension, now summons all to him, through the ministry of the Church. This proclamation (kerygma) requires a response from us, that we should repent of our sins accept baptism and live in the new life which Christ is offering. This alone will prepare us for the coming judgment that is to come upon all humanity.

Is it possible to reconcile the different accounts of the early Church? Perhaps we can do so through the writings of St Paul, for whom the Spirit is the only means to know God and to accept the gospel. There is a ‘Jesus character’ to Paul’s view of the Holy Spirit, referred to as ‘the Spirit of Christ’ (Romans 8:9) or ‘the Spirit of God’s son’ (Galatians 4:6). The Spirit promotes the confession of Jesus as Lord in the church: ‘no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit’ (1 Corinthians 12:3). The reverse is also true: ‘if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His’ (Romans 8:9). For Paul, the Holy Spirit is the guarantor and hope of the coming kingdom of Christ: when you trusted in the Lord Jesus, he tells us in Ephesians, you were ‘sealed with the Spirit of promise’ (Ephesians 1:13). The promise includes freedom for the believer (‘The Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty’: 2 Corinthians 3:17).

Moreover, there is an additional promise of no condemnation: ‘…there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit’ (Romans 8:1). Since we are God’s temple, if God’s Spirit lives in us (1 Corinthians 3:16), it is the Holy Spirit which renews and enriches our worship. The Spirit empowers all believers with various gifts according to need and inspires the faithful to use their gifts correctly: this is an important link to both the spirituality and good governance of the Church. Paul tells us in Romans 8:14 that ‘all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God’ (or, in another translation, his sons and daughters). This means that we are led by the Holy Spirit externally, to understand the Word of God in scripture: ‘This is why the Holy Spirit says, “Today you must listen to his voice…”’ We are led internally by the Holy Spirit ‘indwelling’ or strengthening us: ‘not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength’, a ‘mighty inner strength through his Holy Spirit’ (Ephesians 3:16. By his power working in us, God through the Holy Spirit ‘is able to do far beyond anything we can ask or imagine’ (Ephesians 3:20). If we believe that God is telling us to do something, then we need to do it. We need to respond to the Holy Spirit for him to lead us. ‘If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit’ (Galatians 5:25) – let us follow the Holy Spirit’s lead in every part of our lives. We need to work out its implications in every detail of our lives. ‘Since it is through the Spirit that we have Life, let it also be through the Spirit that we order our lives day by day’ (Galatians 5:25, Complete Jewish Bible).

         If we do indeed heed the call of the Holy Spirit to order our lives in a different way, there are radical consequences for our lives as individuals, and our collective life together as a Church. Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:15: ‘He died for everyone so that those who receive his new life will no longer live to please themselves. Instead, they will live to please Christ, who died and was raised for them’ (New Living Translation, Italics mine). We receive true refreshment in our surrender to Christ. Matthew 11:28 is often misunderstood when translated as ‘I will give you rest’: ‘Come to me all you that labour and are burdened, and I will give you rest.’ God’s service is not about taking a vacation, however. It is about true rest, that is, receiving refreshment from fulfilling God’s will: ‘Come to me all you that labour and are burdened, and I shall refresh you (or fulfil you).’ ‘…come to me and I shall fulfil you’, the Wycliffe Bible translates the phrase and by so doing conveys its true meaning.

         

Last Sunday's thought: On Seeing, Touching and Believing

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e0/Caravaggio_-_The_Incredulity_of_Saint_Thomas.jpg

Our theme is a central concern for our society: it is the contrast between faith and doubt (or religious belief and ‘scientific-based’ scepticism). ‘Have you believed because you have seen me?’, Jesus asks Thomas. ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed’ (John 20:29). In the New Testament epistle to the Hebrews, possibly written by Barnabas, we hear the words: ‘Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen’ (Hebrews 11:1). But this was not the view of the disciples in the immediate aftermath of the Resurrection.

The artist Caravaggio in a great painting dating from 1602-3 shows ‘Doubting’ Thomas placing his finger in the wound of the risen Christ. This is a depiction of believing and touching: because Thomas touched Jesus’ wounds he is depicted as coming to believe in the risen Christ. But did Thomas actually touch Jesus? The gospel of John does not tell us that this is what happened. Jesus invites Thomas to do so (John 20:27) but the gospel account does not actually confirm that he did do so. Even St Augustine admitted ‘it is not written “and Thomas touched”’, yet virtually all the Christian fathers until the Reformation assumed that, because Jesus had invited him to do so, Thomas actually did touch the Risen Christ. 

         Did Thomas behave any differently than the other disciples? If we turn to Luke’s account, we hear Jesus inviting them to touch him in order to believe: ‘“Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate in their presence’ (Luke 24:38-43).

Neither Luke nor the other synoptic gospel writers (Matthew and Mark) distinguish Thomas’s conduct as being any different from that of the other disciples, which leads one to conclude that John does so because of his overall Christological design: it is Thomas, who once convinced that the apparition is indeed Jesus, pronounces ‘my Lord and my God!’ (John 20:28). John intended this statement to form the climax of his gospel. Jesus can only be understood as Messiah, as Son of God, and as the Word (logos). ‘Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name’ (John 20:30-31).
At issue for us today is the centrality of the Christian belief in the Resurrection but also how we, as Christians, can live a life of faith in a world of doubt. Thomas is an emblematic figure for us today: his doubts are our doubts and his inconsistencies are our inconsistencies: ‘Thomas stands for us’ (Glenn W. Most, Doubting Thomas, 2005, repr. 2007). 

Peter Paul Rubens on the same theme, just a few years later. The drama is conventional instead of extraordinary: 

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