Trinity 1

Trinity 1 – 2021

A short service of Morning Prayer, today’s Gospel Reading and some thoughts on it.

With every blessing to you all,

Mary Tucker

This is the day that the Lord has made,

Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Let’s sing together,

Holy, holy, holy!
Lord God Almighty
Early in the morning
Our song shall rise to Thee Holy, holy, holy!
Merciful and mighty
God in three persons
Blessed Trinity!

Holy, holy, holy!
Though the darkness hide thee
Though the eye of sinful man
Thy glory may not see
Only Thou art holy
There is none beside Thee
Perfect in power, in love and purity

Together we confess our sins and are forgiven

Have mercy on us and redeem us, O Lord

for our merits are your mercies

and in your judgement is our salvation

Happy the one whose transgression is forgiven and whose sin is covered,

. . . You surround me with songs of deliverance.

Thank you.

Amen.

Let us pray in the words of St Benedict,

Gracious and Holy Father,

give us wisdom to perceive you, 

diligence to seek you,

patience to wait for you,

eyes to behold you,

a heart to meditate on you

and a life to proclaim you,

through the power of the Spirit

of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

Gospel Reading

Mark 3:20-26, 31-35

Jesus Accused by His Family and by Teachers of the Law

20 Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. 21 When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”

22 And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, “He is possessed by Beelzebul! By the prince of demons he is driving out demons.”

23 So Jesus called them over to him and began to speak to them in parables: “How can Satan drive out Satan? 24 If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. 25 If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. 26 And if Satan opposes himself and is divided, he cannot stand; his end has come . . . “

31 Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call him. 32 A crowd was sitting around him, and they told him, “Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you.”

33 “Who are my mother and my brothers?” he asked.

34 Then he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! 35 Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”

Some thoughts on the Reading

Misunderstanding – that’s the text for today. Misunderstanding of Jesus by the authorities, by his disciples, even by his own family. And, in the, frankly worrying, passage we’ve just read from Mark’s gospel, the possibility, nay probability of misunderstanding of Jesus by us too.

This is a piece of scripture which has caused pain and worry for many Christians down the ages and certainly makes uncomfortable reading. So we must be willing to look the problem straight in the eye and give it some time and thought. If we are not willing to do this we may become guilt ridden and fearful, but if we will do so we have words that, in the end, are the words of eternal life.

Jesus is, not surprisingly, the central figure in today’s gospel reading. People are crowding around him for several reasons. To begin with, he has been healing the sick, forgiving sins, casting out the powers of evil and teaching with authority and conviction. There’s no doubt that he has power. Even his enemies have to admit that – and he does have enemies. The opposition that will eventually bring Jesus to the cross has already started. Their accusation of him as working for Satan is shown quickly and forcefully to be arrant nonsense and dismissed with the contempt it deserves. But, there are the people who aren’t his enemies who still don’t understand him, in fact, think he’s gone mad – that he’s crazy. Sadly, these include some members of his own family. They want to take him home and sit him down quietly until he’s better. They are, I am sure, genuinely worried for him. Put yourself in their place and perhaps you will have some sympathy for them but also for Jesus.

They see their son/brother/friend giving up everything, pouring himself out endlessly, sacrificially to all and sundry. Not only that, but they see the attitude of the authorities. They see the danger he’s putting himself into. They truly believe that it’s all been too much, that the balance of his mind has been disturbed, that they need to restrain him and so they come to persuade him to abandon his mission of madness as they see it.

For Jesus however the painful truth is that even his family misunderstand him. What must it have cost this supremely loving man to say those words, knowing that God’s work for him could not be abandoned even for the ties of kinship and love?

Had Mary told him of Simeon’s words to her in the temple three decades before? If she had then the sword piercing the heart had perhaps become a reality for the first time that day – not just for the mother but for the son too facing the true cost of faithful obedience.

It is a sword which has pierced the hearts of many Christians down the ages and the accusation of madness still goes on.

‘Much learning has made you mad,’ says Festus to Paul at his trial in Rome.

‘What crack brained fanatics,’ cried the men of the Eighteenth century to Wesley and Whitfield.

‘God is a delusion. . . invented by mad, deluded people,’ asserts Richard Dawkins in his famous book denouncing Christianity in favour of Science.

On the other hand this Gospel reading may bring great comfort to those, rejected by home and family when they commit to Christ. One hopes such folk will find love and support in him and in his church but, like Jesus, they must not cease to love and care for their families

It does not, however, make any easier the following of a Lord who in his own life points to a loyalty and a commandment far more basic even than hearth and home – the claim of God that goes far deeper than the claims of an earthly family.

Let those of us who can then, give thanks that God’s call for us is one that is, thus far, inclusive not just of loving but also of being with and alongside our own whether they consider themselves Christian or not. Let us pray that we may be protected from having to make such soul piercing decisions but let’s also be mindful of those whose sacrifice of family ties down the years has added to the growth of the kingdom though at great personal cost.

Misunderstanding of the priorities of God’s way will continue to be a stumbling block in the eyes of the world but there is reassurance for, in apparently turning from his own, Jesus turned to us the surrounding crowd, the Church, turned to us opened his arms and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers.”

A reassuring poem based on Psalm 121

I lift up mine eyes to the quiet hills,

And my heart to the Father’s Throne;

In all my ways, to the end of days,

The Lord will preserve his own.

And a few words from St Anselm

Jesus, like a mother you gather your people to you, you are gentle with us as a mother with her children.  Despair turns to hope through your sweet goodness, through your sweet goodness, through your gentleness we find comfort in fear.  Your warmth gives life to the dead, your touch makes sinners righteous.  Lord Jesus in your mercy heal us, in your love and tenderness remake us, in your compassion bring grace and forgiveness and for the beauty of heaven may your love prepare us.

Final words and a blessing

The Lord bless us and keep us,

the Lord make his face to shine upon us and be gracious to us,

the Lord lift up the light of his countenance upon us and give us peace

And the blessing of God Almighty,

the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit,

be with us this day,

with those we love and those we pray for.

Amen

Let us go in peace to love and serve the Lord,

in the name of Christ

Amen

Trinity Sunday

Worshipping Together –Apart

For those of you still preferring to worship at home here, once again, a short ‘Kitchen Table Communion’ today’s readings and some thoughts on them. Looking forward to seeing you in church when you feel safer

Every blessing
Mary Tucker

A Service to say at home

Call to Worship

The Lord be with you

And also with you

God in Jesus has revealed his glory

Come let us worship together

From the rising of the sun to its setting

The Lord’s name is greatly to be praised

Hymn – Sing something you enjoy!!

Prayer of Confession

Holy God we bring you ourselves

All that we are and all that we long to be

Our weakness, our failures, our sinfulness and our brokenness

Son of Mary Have mercy on us

Carpenter of Nazareth Have mercy on us

Healer of the sick Have mercy on us

Bringer of light Have mercy on us

Saviour of the poor Have mercy on us

Bread of life Have mercy on us

You who call us sister, brother, friend

Have mercy on us

Your body and Spirit with us

Holy God we bring you ourselves

All that we are and all that we long to be

Our weakness, our failures, our sinfulness and our brokenness Have mercy on us

Bible Readings

Isaiah 6:1-8

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty;
    the whole earth is full of his glory.”

At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke. “Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.”

Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.”

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”

This is the Word of the Lord, Thanks be to God

John 3:1-17

Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”

Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”

“How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”

Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spiritgives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You[c] must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

“How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.

10 “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? 11 Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. 12 I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? 13 No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man 14 Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15 that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”

16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

This is the Word of the Lord, Thanks be to God

Some Thoughts on the Reading

Today is Trinity Sunday and in our Bible readings we are faced with a Trinity of transformations, with the possibility of transformation, of complete change.

Many of us have lived lives of change especially recently, or if we have not it may be that we have lived a sort of ‘if only’ life – if only this were different hen everything would be all right. If only I had more money. If only I had a different job. If only I lived in a different place. If only this virus thing was over and done with. If only . . .

And for a few of us perhaps, some of these ‘if onlys’, these transformations may have come about. My experience however is that whatever the outcomes of these changes they are rarely if ever the total transformations, the complete answer to all life’s problems, that we had hoped they would be.

So today we meet Isaiah and Nicodemus and with them we meet God.

With Isaiah we meet the almost terrifyingly holy and powerful Father Almighty whose mere presence shakes the doorposts of the temple, whose glory is so overwhelming that all who look on him, even angelic beings, are forced to cover their eyes.

With Nicodemus we meet God in his human form, we meet Jesus and possibly, along with this apparently learned and knowledgeable Jew, we are confused by the God we meet, we fail to understand what he offers.

And yet both these encounters offer transformation and they offer it not just to the prophet, not just to the Pharisee but to us too.

With Isaiah, faced with the enormity of a totally righteous God, creator, sustainer and judge, we cry out in hopelessness, “Woe is me, I am lost, I am a man/woman of unclean lips” and we might add, “I can’t cope with this, I shouldn’t be here, I am a sinner and the righteous God will surely have nothing to do with me. I am lost!”

With Nicodemus, we hear the answer from the lips of God incarnate, come down to us as man in a form we feel we can bear. And yet we have no idea what he is saying to us. Perhaps we are still blinded by the fear of that smoke filled vision of total righteousness, holiness and glory we experienced with Isaiah.

We hear the words from Jesus about being born again and with poor Nicodemus say, “How can this be?” – “What on earth are you talking about. I don’t understand.”

A trinity of transformation I said at the beginning but thus far this seems to be a trinity of fear, confusion and misunderstanding for Isaiah, for Nicodemus and for us.

It would be tempting to give up at this point and admit that this is all beyond us but an amazing and unexpected thing is about to happen. As we stand with Isaiah, turning with him to run out of the temple, to escape from the presence of a God so mighty, so holy, so wholly ‘other’ that we cannot bear to be near him – God intervenes.

It is not we who are to bring about transformation, he will do it. His angel approaches and touches us, bringing us to a standstill with his words, “Now that this has touched your lips your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out” – “This is a sign for you, you are forgiven, you are accepted, it’s alright, it’s OK.”

And as we stop in amazed incomprehension about to cry out with the prophet

“But how can this be true?” when God himself speaks, and it’s not roaring thunder and it’s not with ear-splitting noise, it’s a still small voice and it asks a question, “Who shall I send? Who will go for us?” And the answer, amazing and unexpected as it is, leaps to our cleansed lips before we realise it, “Here I am – send me.”

We have been transformed in an instant from quivering wreck to willing, if apprehensive, servant. Offering ourselves we know not how to the service of the Almighty. Knowing beyond all hope that he is to be with us, that it is he who will enable us.

Nicodemus too may well have had such an epiphany for, though the gospel writer

doesn’t tell us exactly what happened to him next, we do come across him again later on. First, defending Jesus before the Pharisees (a dangerous thing to do), and at the very last assisting Joseph of Arimathea at Jesus’ burial (an equally risky endeavour for a member of the Sanhedrin, the ruling council of the temple to be involved in.)

But that was still to come, Nicodemus’ first reaction was one of utter confusion, a complete inability to understand which was causing him, and with him possibly us, to want to walk away shaking our heads and saying, “This makes no sense. This is impossible.”

This time it is the still small voice of Jesus, with possibly the most famous and certainly the most significant words in the whole Bible, who stops him and us in our tracks with a picture of God and his Son still so holy, still so wholly ‘other’ yet, in this case, unbelievably amazing.

“God so loved the world,” he reminds us, “that he gave his only Son so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”

Today – this Trinity Sunday we are faced with a Trinity of transformations, the possibility of complete change.

Isaiah was changed, Nicodemus seems to have been changed and we can be changed all because God loves you so much that he has come to earth as a human being, has taken the punishment upon himself, to release us from the threat of death and to offer us an answer to all our ‘if onlys’ in a transformed life with his Spirit in and beside us now and into eternity.

Prayers

We pray to the Lord for courage and to give ourselves to him for transformation.

Give your Church the courage to give up her preoccupation with herself and to give time to your mission in the world. Lord, meet us in the silence, give us strength, transform us and hear our prayer.

May the blood and water flowing from the side of Jesus bring forgiveness to your people and help us to face the cost of proclaiming salvation as we work together in your damaged world. Lord, meet us in the silence, give us strength, transform us and hear our prayer.

Give your world the courage to give up war, bitterness and hatred, and to seek peace and healing for each other. Lord, meet us in the silence, give us strength, transform us and hear our prayer.

May the shoulders of the risen Jesus, once scourged by soldiers, bear the burden of our times. Lord, meet us in the silence, give us strength, transform us and hear our prayer.

Give us the courage to give up quarrels, strife and jealousy in our families, neighbourhoods and communities. Lord, meet us in the silence, give us strength, transform us and hear our prayer.

May the presence of the risen Jesus, his body once broken and now made whole, bring peace and direction as we live with one another. Give us the courage to give up our selfishness as we live for others, and to give time, care and comfort to the sick in ways that are safe for them and for us. Lord, meet us in the silence, give us strength, transform us and hear our prayer.

May the wounded hands of Jesus bring his healing touch to all who suffer, and the light of his presence fill their hearts and homes. Lord, meet us in the silence, give us strength, transform us and hear our prayer.

Give us the courage to give up our fear of death and to rejoice with those who have died in faith. May the feet of the risen Lord Jesus, once nailed to the cross, walk alongside the dying and bereaved in their agony, and walk with us and all your Church through death to the gate of glory. Lord, meet us in the silence, give us strength, transform us and hear our prayer.

We pray with confidence as our Saviour has taught us

Our Father, who art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy Name.
Thy Kingdom come.
Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever.

Amen

A Home Communion

Take bread and wine or juice and pray

Blessed are you O God

For you have brought forth bread from the earth

Blessed are you O God

For you have created the fruit of the vine

Here at your table

You offer us light, bread and wine for the journey

To nourish us as sons and daughters

Jesus took bread, and having blessed it

He broke it and gave it to his disciples saying

Take, eat, this is my body which is given for you

In the same way after supper, he took the cup of wine

And gave you thanks, he gave it to them saying

Drink this all of you, this is my blood of the new covenant

Which is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins

So now, following Jesus’ example

We take this bread and this wine and pray

Lord Jesus Christ, present with us now

Breathe your Spirit upon us and upon this bread and wine

That they may be heaven’s food for us

Renewing, sustaining and making us whole

That we may be your body on earth

Loving and caring in the world

Look – The bread of heaven – The light of the world

Here is Christ, coming to us in bread and wine

The gift of God for the people of the world

The table of bread and wine is now made ready

It is the table of company with Jesus

So, come to this table, you who have much faith

And you who would like to have more

You who have been to this sacrament often

And you who have not been for a long time

You who have tried to follow Jesus

And you who have failed

Come – it is Christ himself who invites us to meet him here

Eat your bread and sip you drink and take a moment of quiet before praying

Concluding Prayer

Holy God, we have seen with our eyes

And touched with our hands the bread of life the light of the world

Strengthen our faith

That we may grow in love for you and for each other

Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

And may the blessing of God Almighty the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit be with us all, those we love and those we pray for. Amen

Pentecost

MORNING PRAYER
I know there are some of you who are still finding this morning worship on the web useful so here is this week’s offering. Mary Tucker Come, Spirit of God!
Come with your power to transform us.
Come Fire of Love!
Come with your wisdom to enlighten us.

PSALM 113 
God’s glory shines over the heavens. Who compares to our God?
Servants of God, praise,
praise the name of the Lord.
Bless the Lord’s name
now and always.
Praise the Lord’s name
here and in every place,
from east to west.

The Lord towers above nations,
God’s glory shines over the heavens.
Who compares to our God?
Who is enthroned so high?

The Lord bends down
to see heaven and earth,
to raise the weak from the dust
and life the poor from the mire,
to seat them with princes
in the company of their leaders.

The childless, no longer alone,
rejoice now in many children.

Hallelujah.

CANTICLE
Be glad, rejoice, give glory to God!
I will draw you from the nations,
gather you from exile
and bring you home.

I will wash you in fresh water,
rid you from the filth of idols
and make you clean again.

I will make you a new heart,
breathe new spirit into you.
I will remove your heart of stone,
give you back a heart of flesh.

I will give you my own spirit
to lead you in my ways,
faithful to what I command.

Then you will live in the land,
the land I gave your ancestors.
You will be my people
and I will be your God.

READINGS

Acts 2:1-21

The Holy Spirit Comes at Pentecost

When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard their own language being spoken. Utterly amazed, they asked: “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language? Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia,[b] 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome 11 (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!” 12 Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, “What does this mean?”

13 Some, however, made fun of them and said, “They have had too much wine.”

14 Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. 15 These people are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! 16 No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:

17 “‘In the last days, God says,
    I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
    your young men will see visions,
    your old men will dream dreams.
18 Even on my servants, both men and women,
    I will pour out my Spirit in those days,
    and they will prophesy.
19 I will show wonders in the heavens above
    and signs on the earth below,
    blood and fire and billows of smoke.
20 The sun will be turned to darkness
    and the moon to blood
    before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.
21 And everyone who calls
    on the name of the Lord will be saved.’

This is the Word of the Lord, Thanks be to God.

John 15:26-27, 16:4-15

The Work of the Holy Spirit

26 “When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father—the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father—he will testify about me. 27 And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning.

I have told you this, so that when their time comes you will remember that I warned you about them. I did not tell you this from the beginning because I was with you, but now I am going to him who sent me. None of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ Rather, you are filled with grief because I have said these things. But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. When he comes, he will prove the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: about sin, because people do not believe in me; 10 about righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; 11 and about judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.

12 “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. 13 But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. 14 He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you. 15 All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will receive from me what he will make known to you.”

This is the Word of the Lord, Thanks be to God.

Thoughts on the readings

Welcome again to one of the great days of the Christian calendar, welcome to Pentecost, welcome to Whitsun, welcome to the Holy Spirit and . . . welcome to journeying.

One of the joys of our Eucharists, our communion services, is the way they lead us on a journey, a journey through prayer and praise, a journey through word and teaching, a journey once again through the last great journey of Jesus from life, to death, to eternal life.

Today I could have wished a slightly different order in the journey, if only in the order of our readings. We started with the great and familiar words telling of the coming of the Spirit in wind and flame and then, as it were, stepped back a pace to Jesus telling the disciples that this was what was going to happen.

But as those of you with dodgy sat. navs. or poor map reading skills will know, many a journey is actually enhanced by an unexpected detour or, as I like to call them, scenic routes! Welcome then to Pentecost, welcome then to a journey or, as it happens, three journeys.

The first is a shared journey, shared by the Israelite nation and us the Christian descendants of Abraham. It’s a journey of learning, a journey into faith and understanding and takes up much of the Old Testament. For much of that time God’s chosen people had special holy places, perhaps a tent, like that set up for God to live in by the wandering Israelites in the wilderness. It seems strange to us but is part of the journey to understanding what God is like and where he is.

In those early days it helped the people of God to have a special place to, as it were, ‘keep God’. They feared as well as worshipped him and perhaps the tent and later the temple (and for us our churches) was not just a special place to worship, but an attempt to keep God where they wanted him – safe and out of the way!

Throughout their journeying, and ours since, we have eventually come to realise that God is not to be caged or limited by our imagination of him. So the journey continued and God became man. Jesus lived and died and rose again to show that the fearful God they, and possibly we, were tempted to hide away was actually a God motivated entirely by love.

The man Jesus demonstrated that this God was powerful indeed but also and overwhelmingly a God of love, a God of forgiveness, a God for all people however undeserving. And today we celebrate another step on the journey, another step in God’s patient explanation of what he is like, in the stories of the Ascension and of Pentecost,

In the second reading, our reading from John, Jesus prepared his disciples for the fact that he was going to leave them, to ascend. That his physical body, which had shown so clearly what God was like, was to go but that this was to be a good thing, that something even better was on the way.

Had we been there in those far off days, I suspect that we, like Mary Magdalene outside the tomb, would have been too keen to hang onto Jesus in his bodily form, to keep him with us as he was. But the job of Jesus on earth was done. The job of showing us God. The job of salvation which required God to die for us was also done and now the next part of the journey was to begin and for it, a completely new understanding of God was needed.

This was to be an even more constant support than a human version of God, this was to be an unseen but powerful presence available to us all, everywhere and for ever. The Spirit of Jesus. The Spirit of God – of God with us.

So there’s journey one and how fortunate we are to live in these days, to have all the learning of thousands of years of developing understanding of God which is wrapped up in our scriptures, our growing knowledge of God as powerful father, loving Son and present Spirit.

But the journey is not over and, in Peter, we have a wonderful example of just what the power of God’s Spirit can do for those who are journeying. Peter, who today we heard inspired and confident, speaking to the assembled crowds without fear and full of conviction.

Hang on a minute! This is Peter. This is Peter the impetuous. This is Peter of ‘foot in mouth’ fame who so often got things so badly wrong that at one point Jesus said to him, ‘Get behind me Satan.’

This is Peter who tried and failed to walk on water, who pulled out a sword and chopped off a servant’s ear’, a tired fisherman, the man who swore to keep faith and then ran away, the man who swore blind three times that he didn’t even know Jesus.

If we are tempted to look on the Holy Spirit as some lesser manifestation of God – stop right there. Just look at Peter’s journey. A journey from confusion to conviction, from fear to faith. A journey of change so profound it beggars belief except that in the power of the Spirit, of God’s Spirit, of the Spirit of Jesus, all things are possible, for all people, everywhere and for ever.

And so to the third journey, our journey.

We may take huge comfort from today’s reading about Peter and the disciples for it is full of promises of what is available to us as we journey on with God. First and foremost of course is that promise of presence. ‘I will be with you always,’ says Jesus to each one of us, ‘even to the end of the world.’

We may feel God’s presence, especially in church or out and about in the beauty of nature. We may even, like the early Israelite people, have a particular awareness of him in a ‘tent’, some corner we have set aside for him in our homes or gardens, but oh how much more precious is that feeling of him beside us, with us, in times of trail and torment. That knowledge that we can call on him, deep in our own hearts at any hour of the day or night.

And there’s another promise too, and it’s one that makes me smile enormously – it’s that drunkenness allegation! So it can be with us! It’s a promise of joy, of confidence, of overflowing love so great that we may feel, and appear, drunk on it!

And what better advertisement can there be for a world lost in sadness and fear, but to see Christians living in exactly the same circumstances as their own but filled with God’s Spirit of love, so much so that we appear drunk with it!

So as you journey on, and we’re all at different stages on that journey, rejoice that we are in a time and place on the whole journey of God which means we know him as Father, Son and Holy Spirit anywhere, everywhere and for ever.

Welcome to journeying. Welcome to Pentecost. Welcome to Whitsun. Welcome to the Holy Spirit.

CANTICLE OF ZECHARIAH
I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh.

Praise the Lord, the God of Israel, who shepherds the people and sets them free.

God raises from David’s house a child with power to save.
Through the holy prophets God promised in ages past to save us from enemy hands, from the grip of all who hate us.

The Lord favoured our ancestors recalling the sacred covenant, the pledge to our ancestor Abraham,
to free us from our enemies, so we might worship without fear and be holy and just all our days.

And you child, will be called prophet of the Most High, for you will come to prepare a pathway for the Lord by teaching the people salvation through forgiveness of their sin.

Out of God’s deepest mercy a dawn will come from on high, light for those shadowed by death, a guide for our feet on the way to peace.

INTERCESSIONS
Jesus, you promised us the Spirit to be our advocate and guide. Recognizing your fidelity and our many needs, we pray:

~ Fill us with your Spirit, and send us forth to serve you.
That we may be renewed in heart and mind:

That we may see you in your people who are poor:

That we may speak the truth in love:

That we may make wise choices for the common good:

That we may work to bring about a new heaven and a new earth:

That we may be credible witnesses to your mercy:

THE LORD’S PRAYER

PRAYER

Spirit of Jesus, on Pentecost you stirred the apostles to go out and proclaim the Good News. You blessed them with the faith and courage to carry the gospel throughout the world. Kindle in us zeal for the coming of the kingdom. Translate our vision of a more loving world into daily acts of justice. This we ask in the name of Jesus, our friend and Saviour. Amen

BLESSING
May the Spirit of God dwell within us. Amen.
May the Spirit of God animate us. AmenMay the Spirit of God create new hearts in us. Amen.

Easter 7

Easter 7 – 16th May 2021

A short service of Morning Prayer, today’s Psalm and some thoughts on it from Mary

This is the day that the Lord has made,

Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Let’s sing together,

O God our help in ages past,

our hope for years to come,

be Thou our guard while troubles last

and our eternal home.

Together we confess our sins and are forgiven

Have mercy on us and redeem us, O Lord

for our merits are your mercies

and in your judgement is our salvation

Happy the one whose transgression is forgiven and whose sin is covered,

. . . You surround me with songs of deliverance.

Thank you.

Amen.

Let us pray in the words of St Benedict,

Gracious and Holy Father,

give us wisdom to perceive you, 

diligence to seek you,

patience to wait for you,

eyes to behold you,

a heart to meditate on you

and a life to proclaim you,

through the power of the Spirit

of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

Psalm 1

Blessed is the one
    who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
    or sit in the company of mockers,
but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
    and who meditates on his law day and night.
That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
    which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
    whatever they do prospers.

Not so the wicked!
    They are like chaff
    that the wind blows away.
Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
    nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.

For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous,
    but the way of the wicked leads to destruction.

I wonder how you react to that Psalm. You may feel comfortable or uncomfortable. You may feel neither. I must admit that, for me, a brief moment of comfortable-ness (if that’s a real word!) quickly transformed into great discomfort, even worry and then strangely, back again.

The comfort came, momentarily, as I identified with the happiness, the blessedness of the first 3 verses. So often, even in bad times I DO feel like a well-watered tree, as though my roots somehow go right down into something much greater and powerful than me. As it says in another place I feel safe because I feel rooted in God’s loving-kindness. It’s amazing how often, usually on a bereavement visit or at somebodies sick-bed, a friend, a parishioner, will say something like, ‘How do people manage if they can’t turn to God?’ and I have to respond that I don’t know but that somehow I hope he can make his loving presence felt.

However, the discomfort which almost immediately replaced the slightly self-satisfied pleasure in my apparent situation came when I looked more closely and saw who these people were who were to feel all this peace and tranquillity deep down, to say nothing of guaranteed prosperity! Whichever translation you look at it is clear that these folk are ‘the righteous’ – they don’t appear to sin or do wicked things and spend the entire time in deep prayer and Bible study – if only! That is most certainly not me and I doubt (though of course I don’t know) that you feel it is you.

Comfort disappeared after an even shorter millisecond as I moved to verses 4 & 5. The self-satisfaction mentioned earlier clung on just long enough for me to dismiss the idea that I was one of ‘the wicked’ before, I’m relieved to say, it was swiftly replaced by a realisation that, probably, I was more properly to be filed amongst these people than amongst the aforesaid ‘righteous’!

And yet . . . and yet when I read the whole thing again, despite all the evidence against, my overall feeling was one of safety in the arms of God. How could this be?!

I turned to my trusty Bible Commentary to try and square this circle, and immediately the wisdom of its writers and patience of the Almighty began to explain the apparent un-explain-ability (another made up word?) of my reactions.

God and the commentators grabbed the bull by the horns immediately to deal with the palpable nonsense of words which seem to promise a lottery win for any and all who manage to live a perfect and godly life. Here is what they have to say,

“This promise of prosperity is not a pledge of good fortune in return for good behaviour – the Psalmist knows life too well for that! Rather, just as we continue to say ‘I believe in God the Father Almighty’ yet find that life often seems to deny both his fatherliness and his almightiness (glad I’m not the only one who makes up words!), so also this Psalm professes a creed: this world is God’s world and those who side with him will surely and ultimately enjoy blessing.” It fits so well with so many who I have heard, even in the depths of distress and pain, stating that however awful things are they are better with God than without him.

That helps a bit but still leaves us with the idea that this blessing from God, this feeling of his presence with us is bound up somehow with being ‘righteous’.

Again, in the power of the Spirit, our trusty commentary team gallop to the rescue by simply explaining what that word means. ‘Righteousness’ means ‘being right with God’, and if this present Easter season has taught us nothing else it is that ‘being right with God’, far from being something we can achieve ourselves, is a gift from him, bought at great price when he became man , died and rose again carrying away our guilt. We are right with him simply by accepting that priceless present.

If we accept the gift of salvation and allow ourselves to be transplanted, like a sapling tree, into a life where we try to live God’s way, we will feel our roots firming in, we will stand strong in his power through the storms of life however they may rock us. We will fail sometimes to live the distinctive way of his laws but we will also know that every time we turn back to the light of his presence we will be made anew, made right with him – indeed made ‘righteous’, and that means we will be blessed indeed. What comfort!

A reassuring poem based on Psalm 121

I lift up mine eyes to the quiet hills,

And my heart to the Father’s Throne;

In all my ways, to the end of days,

The Lord will preserve his own.

And a few words from St Anselm

Jesus, like a mother you gather your people to you, you are gentle with us as a mother with her children.  Despair turns to hope through your sweet goodness, through your sweet goodness, through your gentleness we find comfort in fear.  Your warmth gives life to the dead, your touch makes sinners righteous.  Lord Jesus in your mercy heal us, in your love and tenderness remake us, in your compassion bring grace and forgiveness and for the beauty of heaven may your love prepare us.

Final words and a blessing

The Lord bless us and keep us,

the Lord make his face to shine upon us and be gracious to us,

the Lord lift up the light of his countenance upon us and give us peace

And the blessing of God Almighty,

the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit,

be with us this day,

with those we love and those we pray for.

Amen

Let us go in peace to love and serve the Lord,

in the name of Christ

Amen


Stilman was at Slimbridge this morning

Easter 6

Dear All,

Here then is another morning service for those of you who still need to stay at home for safety’s sake but also, because it can of course be used on any day of the week, for any and all of you to use at any time. The thoughts on the reading this time are based on a very personal meditation I had some years ago concerning ‘my love of God’. Though you may not share the problem I had/have, I hope, nevertheless, it will speak to you as God spoke through it to me.

Keep keeping safe

With every blessing and love

Mary

A Service to say at home for the Sixth Sunday of Easter

Opening Prayer

This day Lord, may I dream your dream,

This day Lord, may I reflect your love,

This day Lord, may I do your work,

This day Lord, may I taste your peace.

Hymn – Sing something you enjoy!!

Canticle

In days to come the mountain of the Lord’s house

will be established as the highest of the mountains.

It will be raised above the hills

and all the nations will flock to it.

Many peoples will come and they will say,

let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,

to the house of the God of Jacob,

that we may be taught the ways of the Lord

and may walk in the right paths.

From the mountain of the Lord shall go forth the law

and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

The Lord will judge between the nations

and settle disputes for many peoples.

They shall beat their swords into ploughshares

and their spears into pruning hooks.

Nation shall not lift up sword against nation

nor ever again prepare for war.

Come, O house of Jacob

Let us walk in the light of the Lord.

Bible Reading

1 John 4:7-21

God’s Love and Ours

Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

13 This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Saviour of the world. 15 If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. 16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.

God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. 17 This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. 18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

19 We love because he first loved us. 20 Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. 21 And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.

This is the Word of the Lord

Thanks be to God

Some Thoughts on the Readings from Mary

I’m afraid I may be going to shock you!

You see I have a real problem with love – I’m not entirely sure I know what it is and, more shocking still, the bit of it that has always worried me most is the continually repeated assertions we Christians make in our liturgies that we ‘love God’.

Do I love God?

Given this problem I decided I’d better think about the reading from 1 John as it mentions love 27 times in just 14 verses!

“What is this thing called love?” That’s a quote – someone will tell me at some point who it was written by, probably Shakespeare, it’s usually Shakespeare!

I know about some sorts of love. I love gardening – meaning I like it a lot, I enjoy it, it gives me pleasure, but I wouldn’t want to do it every minute of every day and I love doing other things too.

I love Thornton’s Continental Chocolates, especially the spherical ones with sugar crystals all over them. Again – eating them is a pleasurable experience but would be spoilt if it happened too often? (to say nothing of what it would do to my health and well-being!)

I love my family – I care about them deeply, I want what’s best for them – want them to be happy, I feel a duty towards them and, in that awful modern phrase, want to ‘be THERE for them’ if they need me.

I love my husband. Even after over forty years together I still get that excited

clap-my-hands, grin-on-the-face feeling as I hear his car come up the drive. I feel all the caring things I feel about family generally but with something extra and hard to explain – it’s as though we’re two halves of some whole thing, that without him I wouldn’t be everything I am. There’s a giving side to this love of course, I desperately want what’s best for him and long for him to be happy but it’s matched by a more selfish side – I am a better, happier, more fulfilled person because he is my other half.

But are any of these four types of love (and I don’t claim they’re all that there are) – are any of them at all helpful in finding out whether I can claim to love God?

Like the gardening love I love taking part in worship, I enjoy starting the day in prayer and thanksgiving (usually!), I get great pleasure from the way God speaks to me and supports me through his Word, through meditation and contemplation and through preparing things like this ‘sermon’ – but is that loving him?

Is it, rather, more like my love of chocolate? I suppose if I greedily only spent my time reading the Bible and in prayer, meditating and contemplating I’d soon get bored with it – or would I? Can you have too much of a good thing? – even a really good thing like this? – I think the answer is probably, ‘yes’ unless one is called to be a monk, nun or hermit.

Love of family and friends or partner, that deep desire for the happiness of another doesn’t somehow seem relevant here. God doesn’t need me to want what’s best for him does he? Unless what’s best for him includes what’s best for those he loves? Hmmm! Perhaps we’ll come back to that one.

There is something in the love of my spouse though that feels similar to feelings I have about God, the excitement of being in contact, the clap hands – grinning feeling that comes over me sometimes in his presence, the ‘not being complete without him’. But is that selfishness again, because I know that I am a better, happier, more fulfilled person because he is with me? I don’t think I can claim that as ‘loving’ him – it’s more about him loving me and I never had a problem with that!

The most I could say, perhaps, is that I feel a deep gratefulness, thankfulness that God loves me, but I don’t think being grateful constitutes love.

Let’s turn to John’s words and see if he can help.

‘Dear friends,’ he writes to us down the ages, ‘let us love one another.’

‘Yes,’ I start to bluster, ‘I’ve already said – I know about loving other people, it’s knowing whether I love God that’s my problem . . . ,‘ but I am interrupted,

‘This isn’t a human achievement,’ John reminds me sternly, ‘the ability to love

is only yours because love comes from God, it’s his gift to us.’

And as we read on he has more to say, not only is love’s origin in God but God IS love and this is probably the single most important statement in the passage. It means more than ‘God is loving,’ or ‘God sometimes loves’, it means that he loves, not because things or people are worthy of love but because it is his nature to love. His love for us depends not on what we are but on what He is.

Well that’s a thought worth restating, reminding ourselves of, but it is still about his love for us not ours for him. John’s ahead of us, he agrees,

‘You’re right,’ he writes (in my paraphrase!), ‘it is not that we love God, stop looking for an answer to your problem by concentrating on yourselves, you will never find what this love is if you start from the human end.’

God loves us so much, God’s nature of love is so fundamental to his being God that, John reminds us, he sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice, he came himself and gave himself up to death to save us from the punishment we all so richly deserve.

This calls out huge thankfulness from us. I do live in a life where fear for what will happen to me hereafter has been (largely) driven out. I know it’s not down to me. I know God has paid the price. I know and I’m grateful but is my gratefulness enough to be called love?

‘Dear friend,’ says John soothingly (I can almost feel him patting me on the arm and telling me to calm down, stop panicking and listen), ‘since God so loved us we also ought to love one another. God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.’

My love for God, your love for God is to be shown in our love for others. That’s what God desires, that IS our love for him, so much so that he says

in our love for one another God’s love is made complete. He loves us, we try to love others in an act of supreme thankfulness and that is accepted by God as our love for him.

Suddenly other words, the words of Jesus himself burst into my brain,

‘In as much as you do it unto others, you do it unto me.’

We do love God, we can love him, we will love him every time we show love for others.

Can we just ignore the bit at the end though? where it says, ‘If anyone says ‘I love God, yet hates his brother he is a liar?’

We DO love our brothers, our friends, our neighbours! Don’t we? Or at least we try. Again the voice of Jesus from another place interrupts us,

‘Who is your brother? Who is your neighbour?’ and of course we know the answer. It’s the Samaritan, the outcast, the untouchable, the stranger

In God, in his death for us, in Jesus his Son, in his saving of us all, whoever we are, whatever we are, we have the pattern for the love we are to show. Christians should love, we should love, I should love, not because all those we meet are attractive people, are friends and family, husbands, wives or partners, those we are naturally drawn to but because we are being transformed by God’s love into the sort of people whose nature it is to love, to love like God, unconditionally. To love everyone and anyone however unappealing or unpleasant.

Do you ever wish you hadn’t asked a question? The answer to mine, to yours as well possibly, is a tough one and I, for one, am not sure I can do it. Yet,

paradoxically, as we discover that the ability to love at all is a gift from God

he reassures us that the power to love him by loving others will also be a gift, will be made possible because he, God, will live in us and we live in him. He will give us his Spirit and the nature of that Spirit is only, and can only be, love. It is our other half, it will make us complete and it will give us the power, the strength and the ability to love our totally loving God in the only way possible by loving others as he loved us.

Prayers

Let us pray to God,
who alone makes us dwell in safety:

For all who are still affected by coronavirus, through illness or isolation or anxiety, that they may find relief and recovery:
Lord, hear us,
Lord, graciously hear us.

For those who are guiding our nation at this time and shaping national policies, that they may make wise decisions:
Lord, hear us,
Lord, graciously hear us.

For doctors, nurses and medical researchers, that through their skill and insights many, worldwide, will be restored to health:
Lord, hear us,
Lord, graciously hear us.

For the isolated and housebound, that we may be alert to their needs, and care for them in their vulnerability:
Lord, hear us,
Lord, graciously hear us.

For our homes and families, our schools and young people, and all in any kind of need or distress:
Lord, hear us,
Lord, graciously hear us.

For a blessing on our local community, that our neighbourhoods may be places of trust and friendship, where all are known and cared for:
Lord, hear us,
Lord, graciously hear us.

For the vulnerable and the fearful, for the gravely ill and the dying, that they may know your comfort and peace:
Lord, hear us,
Lord, graciously hear us.

We commend ourselves, and all for whom we pray,
to the mercy and protection of God.
Merciful Father,
accept these prayers
for the sake of your Son,
our Saviour Jesus Christ.
Amen.

We pray with confidence as our Saviour has taught us,

Our Father, who art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy Name.
Thy Kingdom come.
Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever.

Amen

Closing Prayer and blessing

May the love of God sustain us this day,

May the light of Jesus radiate our thinking and speaking,

May the power of the Spirit penetrate all our decisions,

And may all we do this day witness to your presence in our lives.

Amen

The Lord bless us and keep us,

The Lord make his face shine upon us and be gracious to us,

The Lord lift up the light of his countenance upon us,

And give us peace.

The Lord bless us.

Amen