Hambleden Valley Group Service – St Mary the Virgin, Fawley
6/6/21
Proper 5
1 Samuel 8:4-11,16-20
2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1
Mark 3:20-35
I can only trust that it is divine providence to be preaching on 1 Samuel 8 and Mark 3 this morning; my first Group Service as Priest-in-Charge of the Hambleden Valley Group. I also realized that I haven’t written a sermon on this Sunday before either. Indeed a fresh start.
Both of these books along with 2 Corinthians will feature over the coming weeks according to the lectionary. Might I suggest adding them to your summer reading lists! There are some solid and still relevant lessons in them. I hope that the take away today: Is Jesus at the centre? It is a fundamental question for the Benefice at this time and for each of us. What happens when He is not? How do we put him back?
To set up my stall: I like the Old Testament. A lot. I am by no means an expert, it does take some time and energy to get one’s head around it and when you do there is beauty and story to be discovered.
If I had to nutshell the Old Testament it is this: it is a story of a people who messed up and the God who loved them anyway. These people, Israel, had been chosen by God to be his people (unsure why them), to be the Chosen ones they had to follow some rules – the Chema (love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, mind and strength and love your neighbour as yourself. Super easy!) Israel had to care for the neighbours, the widows and orphans but above love God.
Yet, they couldn’t do it. They focused on what they didn’t have, they worshipped other gods, complained about what they felt entitled to, nothing was quite good enough, they wanted what the neighbours had. Does any of this sound vaguely familiar?
In 1 Samuel, this all comes to a head as Israel demands a human king to look after them ; just like all the neighbours had. They thought this was a better option than obeying God. At this point, Samuel was an old man, his own sons had chosen their own paths and went astray so he would not be leading them for much longer. Israel has reached a critical moment in their history, two ways to go here. The way of God or the way of themselves.
Samuel gets a warning from God which he passes on about how awful the ways of a human king are going to be. A human king will turn their sons into war labourers, daughters will be put to work; he will take the best of their flocks, fields and vineyards for his friends, and then a 10% cut on top of that for his own personal use. This is grossly unfair. However, the people will not listen and continue their demands, they are actively rejecting God for their own agenda.
God’s response, despite the warning, is to give the people what they want. There are consequences, the Lord will not answer when they cry out because of the king. God did not do this because he is uncaring or gave up on his chosen people; he wanted to show them that His way is the better one, following him leads to life and not death. If God is not at the centre of life and we choose to go our own way, there are consequences, there are responsibilities that come with free will.
Stay tuned as the first human king of Israel will be appointed in next week’s edition!
Summer Reading Book 2: Mark’s Gospel
We are now in the early days of Jesus’ ministry and things are hotting up. Jesus is travelling, healing, teaching and gaining attention. He was doing things, like healing people on the Sabbath and declaring forgiveness of sins, getting in the face of the religious establishment. This attention is likely causing some pressure on his family.
We do not know very much about Jesus’ family life as there are few references to them. We have two in Mark 3 and they both indicate that Jesus’ family life likely was not easy! His family certainly doesn’t come across well; Mary and the brothers go to restrain him, public opinion was that ‘he had gone out of his mind’ and his family seem to have gone along with the crowd on this one. I am sure that many of us know what it is to have awkward/difficult/odd family members.
However, what Jesus is saying is lucid and makes sense. Jesus is pushing them to look not just at the theory of God but the reality of God. Everything Jesus was doing was good. Everywhere Jesus went people were being restored to God, evil and sickness were banished, demons were exercised. The root of the problem was that the power Jesus was displaying could only come from two sources: God or the devil.
Jesus is not only proclaiming the word of God but performs it in action. If we read God’s word, then we should be able to see it in action. Evil simply cannot work against itself.
This pushing made them, his family and the religious leaders, uncomfortable. His family was risking a bad reputation. The religious leaders could lose control of the population; so much so that they were willing to lie and deny the consequences of what Jesus was saying and doing was true.
Revd Dr Cally Hammond in this week’s Church Times, ‘We human beings have the terrifying freedom even to reject our Maker, and refuse to hear his voice. There are people, both inside and outside the churches, who put themselves – and keep themselves – beyond God’s forgiveness. This makes them literally ‘unforgivable’; because they refuse to respond to him, they harden their hearts against the call to turn and begin anew with him. This is not a matter of religious observances (reading the Bible, church attendance, saying prayers): it is about the command to confess that God is, with all that flows from that confession It is no sin to be ignorant of that, or to refuse it on the basis of a misunderstanding of what God is. But truly to know and still refuse? That really is unforgivable.’
I have always been curious about the nature of the unforgivable sin and what it means to blaspheme the Holy Spirit. I don’t think I have found a clearer explanation than Dr Hammond’s. It is to know God truly and still refuse. This does not apply to people of other religions or little tribes of people in deepest, darkest, wherever. This applies to people who know and refuse to put God at the centre, actively rejecting what is on offer. Unfortunately I know many more of them than I do Muslims, Hindus and Samburus.
How do we keep God at the centre as a Benefice and as the beloved children of God? From the examples of 1 Samuel; choose God’s kingship over that of other imperfect and fallible humans, care less about what the neighbours have and what you do not. God is faithful and he will give us what we ask for sometimes; be careful what you are demanding and why. You just might get it!
From Mark, look to the love and goodness of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Living a God-centred life is not always easy, the temptation to lie and deny can be strong at times, what other people think has a powerful influence on us, tuning that out to follow truth and conscience is never easy – not even for Jesus.
Good and saintly people of the Hambleden Valley Group – we will face consequences if we do not stay together, we cannot become divided over opinion, preferences or money and all the myriad of things that can cause difficulties in churches. We need to be united with God and with each. With God at the centre of our lives and churches there is a bright and hopeful future ahead of us.
I am going to end with a poem today called ‘I Am Bending My Knee’ by the Scottish folklorist, Alexander Carmichael.
I am bending my knee
In the eye of the Father who created me,
In the eye of the Son who purchased me,
In the eye of the Spirit who cleansed me,
In friendship and affection.
Through Thine own Anointed One, O God,
Bestow upon us fullness in our need,
Love towards God,
The affection of God,
The smile of God,
The wisdom of God,
The grace of God,
The fear of God,
And the will of God
To do on the world of the Three,
As angels and saints
Do in heaven;
Each shade and light,
Each day and night,
Each time in kindness,
Give Thou us Thy Spirit.
