Author: Sue Lepp

I am currently the Lead Chaplain of Gatwick Airport and the Priest-in-Charge of Charlwood St Nicholas and Sidlow Bridge Emmanuel in the Diocese of Southwark. I served my curacy in the Parish of Langley Marish and trained at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford. Former Nurse in both Canada and the UK. Specialised in Palliative Care, Gynaecology-Oncology and a bit of Orthopaedics (just to keep me travelling). Worked as a MacMillan Nurse Specialist in a few specialities in London.

Advent 2: Lives of the Prophets – Light in the Darkness

Emmanuel – 11:00 am P&P
8/12/24
Advent 2 – Year C

Malachi 3:1-4
Luke 3:1-6

This past week I have spent quite a lot of my parish time on funeral planning for three upcoming services. Yes – we are starting on a happy note. I went looking for a grave from 1872 in the St Nicholas churchyard with no luck. While there I ran into an aunt visiting the grave of her nephew on the anniversary of his death. I also went to East Surrey Hospital to give our dear Marion Dallison last rites before she died on Wednesday evening.

There has also been a spate of deaths in the Gatwick terminals that I have been made aware of. And I learned about the impending death of an old school friend in Canada after a horrendous cancer journey and she will be leaving a husband and two little boys.

My heart has been rather heavy! This is supposed to be a holly-jolly time of year…

Yet in the midst of this I met a family to discuss the baptism of their delightful first born daughter Anthea. What a joy that was. To bask in the smiles of a 5 month old baby to talk about her life in Christ at the start of the journey was balm to this soul. This was a reminder about light in the darkness, in the sorrows of life that there can be joy.

This theme is found in the heart of the messages and prophecies of the prophets.

The Second Sunday of Advent focuses on the prophets of the bible. The Wednesday Advent study group has been looking at them as well. There are four Major Prophets: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel. The prophets and prophetesses in the Old Testament were spokespersons for God. Their job was to announce God’s will or intentions for people, predicted the future, or did both. They represented God to a particular people at a particular time about specific events. They voice God’s opinion on what is going on – offering God’s perspective.

The messages of the prophets cannot always be applied to other events so careful reading is required. The original messages are rooted in historical events. Some spoke to the political & military crisis (Isaiah). Amos spoke about lament and social justice. The prophecies are always connected to the now and possible future consequences; prophets are not fortune-tellers or speaking directly to future events.

Many of the prophets found themselves literally and figuratively in the wilderness. That place of loneliness where nothing grows; all seems empty and lifeless. We too can find ourselves in those wilderness places, maybe when things do not work out the way they should, when that death comes sooner than we thought, health fails, that job gets lost, a relationship breaks down.

To make wilderness experiences all the more painful, we can often feel that God has somehow left us alone and has become distant or absent. We may not feel close to Him or Him to us.

Malachi is assumed to be the last prophet of the Old Testament as his book closes it out. There was roughly a 400-year gap when God was silent. (Jane Williams): In Malachi there is an argument going on between God and his people. At the end of chapter 2, Malachi says that the people have wearied God, and they ask indignantly what they have done.

Malachi replies that they have called into question God’s justice and so his very character. The people have said, ‘All who do evil are good in the sight of the Lord. Where is the God of justice?’

God answers them – both in Malachi and Luke. God is a righteous God and he will make sure his righteousness prevails. He does this by sending his messenger and the people may well live to regret it. God’s messenger is of course Jesus. The Lord’s messenger will be sent to prepare the way and then the Lord will suddenly come to his temple. There is no time given for this. The people have to watch and wait for the signs.

And then the dawn breaks in the wilderness. After 400 years with not a word from the heavens, the forerunner to the messenger appears in the wilderness. ‘The word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.’

This is no random appearance. If you look at the detail that Luke provides: ‘in the fifteenth year of reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, when Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of Ituraea and Trachonitis, Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.’

John’s timing was precise and divinely ordained for that exact moment and place in the wilderness. Our time on earth is just as precise and divinely ordained. When you pray with and for someone around the time of death there is always a space for prayers of confession, repentance and absolution. This is a very fruitful time for many people.

I understand not everyone gets this opportunity for repentance at the time of death as it is very dependent on various factors. Therefore, my friends, we need to take the opportunity in life to use our time and timings for this very fruitful activity!

Like John, we too have been given a way to prepare. The way of repentance. This is what the people who heard Malachi’s prophecy and later John’s and likely many of us today may not want to hear! John came at that exact moment to proclaim a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. What if we too started this new church year with an honest, wilderness-style reckoning of our sin?

Debie Thomas. ‘What is sin? Growing up, I was taught that sin is “breaking God’s laws.” Or “missing the mark,” as an archer misses his target. Or “committing immoral acts.” These definitions aren’t wrong, but they assume that sin is a problem primarily because it angers God.
But God’s temper is not what’s at stake; he’s more than capable of managing his own emotions. Sin is a problem because it kills. It kills us.
Why? Because sin is a refusal to become fully human. It’s anything that interferes with the opening up of our whole hearts to God, to others, to creation, and to ourselves. Sin is estrangement, disconnection, sterility, disharmony. It’s the slow accumulation of dust, choking the soul. It’s the sludge that slows us down, that says, “Quit. Stop trying. Give up. Change is impossible.”
Sin is apathy. Care-less-ness. A frightened resistance to an engaged life. Sin is the opposite of creativity, the opposite of abundance, the opposite of flourishing. It is a walking death. And it is easier to spot, name, and confess a walking death in the wilderness than it is anywhere else.

Here’s the really great news, repentance and forgiveness are not far away from any of us. We do it in every service whether Matins or Communion. We started this morning with the Sentences of Scripture before we are invited to confess our manifold sins and wickedness.

Can I ask you to think back a few minutes, what did you do with that time this morning? What goes through your head when we say these things? Did you repent of anything? Ask for forgiveness?

You were then offered absolution; did you take it? I make an assumption every time I put my hand up to make the sign of the cross, that you have repented and that you take the comfort of the absolution offered. There is also further reference to repentance and forgiveness; in the Benedictus and the Apostles Creed, ‘suffered under Pontius Pilate’ – there’s that timing again – ‘was crucified, dead and buried.’

Lord’s Prayer – forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.

This is not in any way to condemn, make us dwell in our failures and shortcomings but rather to free us from the bonds, to wake us up to the reality we may live in, become more aware of the dust and sludge has built up and we may not have even realised it. This is what stands in our way to the manger on this Advent journey.

Our human love, however well-meant and deep, remains imperfect in the light of God’s love. Love and repentance go together. There is no love without forgiveness, and there is no forgiveness without love.

At the start of this new year, we need a wilderness moment that will lead to fruitfulness and abundant living in this new season. The time is now and the time is always right to confess, repent and accept forgiveness that is on offer to us. If this is a wilderness season for you, start to look for signs of new life. That life may start with confession.

We don’t have to go far: it is in your hands at every service, it is in the words we say. Sometimes it simply needs to be brought to our attention. Grab hold of the promises of God, grab hold of the messenger who has come to prepare the way for us, grab hold of the deep and unchanging love of God. Listen for the voice of the one crying out in the wilderness.

Advent 1: Watch & Wait


1/12/24
Advent 1 – Year C

Jeremiah 33:14-16
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Luke 21:25-36


Happy New Year!

No – I mean it! Today is New Year’s Day on the church calendar. Forget about January 1st December 1st is where it is at.

In this season of Advent, we remember again the coming of Jesus in human form as we repeat stories of that first Christmas. We also look ahead to His coming the second time at a time known to God but not us. We wait in hope and preparation for God’s arrival to make sure we recognise Him when he comes. In preparation for that we can pray that this Advent is a season of hope, relief and watching.

Hope. Who doesn’t need a little bit of hope today? Hope is like a light shining in a dark place. The Bible has a lot to say about hope:

Psalm 42 – Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my help and my God.
Psalm 62 – For God alone my soul waits in silence, for my hope is from Him.
Psalm 71 – But I will hope continually and will praise you yet more and more.
Romans 5 – Endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.
1 Corinthians 13 – Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

We need hope because when we give up on hope, we give up on life.

The prophet Jeremiah had a difficult job; it is almost hard to believe that this reading came from him. Jeremiah was the prophet of doom and his book is one of the most depressing in the Bible. His calling set him apart from his friends and neighbours because they simply did not want to hear what God had to say through him. Jeremiah had hard messages to give the Israelites about the destruction of Jerusalem; this weighed heavily on Jeremiah. Yet in the midst, we have this beautiful piece full of hope and trust.

At this point in his life, Jeremiah has been put into jail by his own King for being right. The enemies of Jerusalem are attacking the city, as Jeremiah said they would. Jerusalem is still standing but it will soon fall into the hands of Babylon.
Sitting in prison, Jeremiah is suddenly filled with hope. Jeremiah knows that restoration will come after the exile – this is what he is talking about when he says, ‘the days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will fulfil the promise I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah.’

If the people wait, watch, endure and try to see the hand of God at work, they will be preparing themselves and the people for the time when ‘Judah will be saved, and Jerusalem will live in safety.’ This would have been a mystery to the people listening! This is hundreds of years before Jesus arrived. This is still a mystery to people today; people in our families and friend groups who are not interested or do not know about what it is to be saved.

Jeremiah gives us an incredible example of human faithfulness that will not renounce God, come what may. Jeremiah brings good news too: whatever happens, God is God and God is for us. Even Jeremiah, who was the darkest of the prophets, has moments when he can see beyond the immediate destruction of his people to a time when they will again know that God has not abandoned them. He (Jesus) will execute justice and righteousness.

Secondly – Relief.

Just think for a moment about the last time you felt relief from a situation. That overwhelming sense of ‘this is over!’ or ‘well that wasn’t so bad’ or ‘thank God that passed me by’. Advent brings relief – the weary world rejoices!

Paul has been worried about the Thessalonians to whom he is writing. Paul got so worked up about it that he sent Timothy to visit them and he has come back with good news. The letter to the Thessalonians is an expression of Paul’s relief and joy for these new Christians. ‘How can we thank God enough for you in return for all the joy that we feel before our God because of you?’ (verse 1 asks)

Paul’s prayer is that they will use their time to prepare for their final meeting with God. There is no time to waste, every minute is vital according to Paul. He wants the Thessalonians to grow and abound in love for each other, to have their hearts strengthened in holiness so to be blameless before God at the coming of Jesus.

This is a big part of the Advent journey; are we ready for the great return? If we are ready then we will know relief when he comes back. However we should not get too comfortable while people around us do not know the Good News.

There is a verse in this reading that really stuck out to me. Paul wants to see the Thessalonians face to face and ‘restore whatever is lacking in your faith.’ What is lacking in your faith at the start of this Advent season?

Thirdly and finally; Keep watch. We need to prepare for Jesus’ return. This means taking the promises of God seriously. Where are our priorities towards God right now? Is he 2nd place behind our distractions and self-interests?

Luke tells of the signs that are coming in the sun, moon, in the stars and on earth. There will be distress among the nations and confusion in the seas and the waves. This passage is different from the rest of Luke. Luke tells the wonderful stories of the shepherds and sheep, the stable and the manger; it is Luke who tells the story of Mary and Joseph, Elizabeth and Zechariah.

Luke now gives us this rather frightening story of the Son of Man coming in on a cloud with power and great glory. The seasons are going to change and we need to be ready to change with them. Not only that, we need to watch for the signs of the coming of Jesus. This is not an easy task! We need to pay attention to the world around us, pay attention to what God might be saying to us.

The fig tree is the key to all three of today’s readings. Just as we know how to watch for the signs that mark the changing of the seasons, we need to be trained to watch for the return of Jesus.

Jeremiah and Luke talk about seeing the signs in times of turmoil. Paul is speaking into a situation of growth and joy with a tone of urgency. We too need to wait with intelligence, noting the signs, paying attention in situations of joy and relief while in turmoil too.

During Advent we are reminded that God is at work and draws us into His coming action. God is the prime mover, the initiator who is always present on the scene before we arrive. We need not worry or work under our own steam. By spending time with God, he will reveal what He is doing in our lives and the wider world. It is then that we can begin to recognize him.

In Advent, we are waiting for God’s arrival and we need to recognize him when he comes. We wait in hope, we wait for relief as we watch for God – both now and in the not yet.

Happy New Year!


2nd Before Advent: One for the Home Crowd

St Peter’s – 2nd Sunday before Advent
17/11/24

Daniel 12:1-3
Psalm 16
Hebrews 10:11-25
Mark 12:41-13:1-13

Hello to the friends watching online!

I grew up in Cochrane and come from one of the founding families of St Peter’s. I graduated from Cochrane High way too long ago. In 2007 I moved to London, England for some travel, education and different nursing experiences. I began to attend a church (Holy Trinity Brompton) where the Alpha Course started as a way to meet people. While there I got very involved in many church groups including volunteering as a hospital chaplain. This led me, over a couple of years and much surprise, to pursue becoming a Priest in the Church of England.

10 years ago I put aside my nursing career (I trained at the U of A and worked at the Foothills & Tom Baker and then in Scotland & London) after being selected for training. I went to Oxford University to study for 2 years (most fun I have had as an adult) and was ordained as a deacon in 2016 and then as a Priest in 2017. In the CofE you serve a curacy which is basically on-the-job training/apprenticeship for 3-4 years; mine finished at the end of 2020. During my curacy I became a volunteer police chaplain with Thames Valley Police.

I then moved to my first parish where I was in charge of 6 small village churches to the west of London for a 3-year fixed-term. Last year I began to look for another job thinking that I would like another short-term role within reach of my beloved police. Not long into the search I found an ad in the CofE weekly newspaper for the Lead Chaplain of Gatwick Airport (the 2nd largest airport in the UK). I thought this was a job for a crazy person but was equally intrigued! So I applied, was successful and have just completed my first year.

Airport Chaplaincy is fairly niche but like all chaplaincies it is a ministry of presence. You have to be seen to be believed and you never know what is going to happen next! I spend my days looking after the two airport chapels and my volunteer team of Buddhists, Christians & Muslims, walking the terminals looking for passengers and staff who look like they might need some help. I get involved in emergency response situations and work alongside airport security, the police, the Airport Fire Service, passenger operations team & airline staff both as a colleague but also chaplain for personal or team matters. I have a high level of security clearance and can stick my nose in pretty much anywhere. This is an ideal role for me! I also look after two small churches on the edge of the airport.

I am so delighted/slightly lamenting to have flown all the way from London having volunteered to preach today before I checked the readings! We have some heavy going this morning. I tried to avoid doing this to my own two parishes by taking holidays now. Yet here we all are about to wrestle with some of the more challenging/mysterious/confusing parts of the Bible.

To ease us in, I am going to start with a fictitious yet amusing story from a favourite novel of mine.

A typesetter in a Rotterdam suburb had been through a personal crisis. Several years earlier he had been recruited by Jehovah’s Witnesses; but they had thrown him out when he discovered, and questioned rather too loudly, the fact that the congregation had predicted the return of Jesus on no less than fourteen occasions between 1799 and 1980 – and sensationally managed to get it wrong all fourteen times.

Upon which, the typesetter had joined the Pentecostal Church. He liked their teaching about the Last Judgement; he could embrace the idea of God’s final victory over evil, the return of Jesus (without actually naming a date) and how most of the people from the typesetter’s childhood, including his own father, would burn in hell. But this new congregation had sent him packing too after a whole month’s collection had gone astray while in the care of the typesetter.

The now bitter typesetter started the layout for that day’s job, which ironically happened to consist of printing two thousand bibles for an order from Sweden. This troubled the typesetter because as far as he knew, his father still lived there after having abandoned his family when the typesetter was six years old.

With tears in his eyes, the typesetter set the text of chapter upon chapter. When he came to the very last chapter – the Book of Revelation – he just lost it. How could Jesus ever want to come back to Earth? Here where Evil had once and for all conquered Good, so what was the point of anything? And the Bible…It was just a joke!

So it came about that the typesetter with shattered nerves made a little addition to the very last verse in the very last chapter in the Swedish bible. The typesetter didn’t remember much of his father’s tongue, but he could at least recall a nursery rhyme that was well suited in the context. Thus the bible’s last two verses plus the typesetter’s extra verse were printed as:

20. He who testifies to these things says, Surely I am
coming quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
21. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.
Amen.
22. And they all lived happily ever after.

What do you make of happily ever after? It is how many fairy tales, movies, books, etc conclude. Everything comes good in the end; the baddies are punished, the goodies are rewarded, the couple reunites and everything is put right. Hallmark Christmas movie season is upon us! This formula is simple, predictable, convenient, comforting and shallow. This is why we like them – comfort, easy with little thinking required.

Upon return to the rest of life we are confronted with the endings that are much more complicated, messy, misunderstood and difficult. No wonder we long for the happily ever after.

The set readings before Advent (a mere 2 weeks away) focus on the return of Jesus. We are about to celebrate the first coming which is central and important to the Christian faith. Advent should remind us there is more to the parties and presents and only seeing Jesus as the baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in the manger. The reminder is that Jesus has come, has gone after the resurrection and He will be coming again. His next and final return will be both an ending and a new beginning.

The passage in Mark’s Gospel occurs in the middle of the last week of Jesus’ earthly life. Jesus and the disciples have entered Jerusalem, think donkeys and palm branches. Jesus has been preaching in the Temple; the preceding two chapters of Mark provide this teaching. Jesus is now focusing on the end of the age and is alerting the disciples to the troubles ahead.

As they are leaving the Temple, Jesus sits down and watches people. Both rich and poor put their offerings in the collection plate. We could assume that the disciples’ attention was on the people with large amounts of money going in the treasury. However, Jesus’ attention is on the poor widow who throws in her two very small copper coins.

Jesus calls the disciples to attention and points out the sacrifice she has made; her two pennies were worth more than what everyone else gave. Some bible commentaries have questioned whether this woman’s trip to the Temple was her last act before she died. This may be what Jesus sees in her; impending death. She is preparing to die by giving away all she has. The poor widow gave her very last to the Temple, to God. What an ending.

The disciples’ response? What massive stones and magnificent buildings! How about those Flames? Their diversion tactics are not brilliant and neither are ours. What struck me is that I began to ask myself about my massive stones and magnificent buildings.

What are your massive stones? Your house? Bank accounts? Career? Job? Family? Connections? Opinions? Politics? Pension? Leaving something for the kids? We all have them. These are things that can get in the way of our relationships with God.

Maybe it was easier for the disciples to look at the stones and magnificent buildings than consider the poor widow and her two cents or Jesus’ tough teachings they had heard.

Jesus is coming to throw down the big stones. However wonderful, lovely and whatever security (real & imagined) our stones provide – will come down. What are we storing up that will last? What will we have to show Jesus when he returns?

Jesus then leads the disciples for a walk up the Mount of Olives across from the Temple. If you have had the privilege of visiting Jerusalem you will know the view that I am talking about. I imagine them sitting up high enough to overlook the Temple and all of Jerusalem. He changes their perspective to see beyond the rocks and buildings to the whole city. How is your view this morning?

The disciples have serious questions and rightly so. When? What are the signs? They do not seem to fully grasp the whole view but they don’t want to miss it either. No time frame makes this difficult and Jesus was still sitting next to them. I choose to believe that Jesus does not want them to get overly fixated on either the time [whether it is long or short] or the events themselves. There is a kindness in this. How do we measure time or response to a situation when there is nothing to measure? At least not yet.

Working at Gatwick Airport over this past year I have learned a huge amount about airport security, the aggravation of unattended bags, emergency situations, counter terrorism measures and what to look out for. None of us staff know when something is going to happen until it happens. But when things do happen we have to be ready and jump into action. There are plans and practices, policy and procedure.

Jesus will return. It will happen. No one knows when. Rumours of wars, earthquakes, nation against nation, kingdom against kingdom. A quick look at the news and a flip through some history books and we can identify almost all of these events at any time in the last many hundreds of years. Immediately after the crucifixion and resurrection everyone thought that Jesus was coming back again very soon, like any day.

There are people now who spend a lot of time and energy trying to work out the date when Jesus will come again. I would suggest that this is not what we should be spending time and energy on. It will happen. We should be ready for when Jesus does return. Back to massive stones…

It is not something we would want to rush into coming; the return of Jesus for some will not mean a happy ending. There are a few ways to have a happier ever after when the stones come down. The Hebrews’ passage urges appreciation for what has been done for us and the great hope to which it leads. What was done for us: There is another priest (Jesus) who offered for all time the one sacrifice for sin. He sat down at the right hand of God and made his enemies a footstool.

There is a new way and a new hope that comes through the curtain; the body and blood of Christ. This new way comes with hardships and is more daunting than we might want yet we have been warned and are to be watchful. Both the Old and New Testament are full of wisdom on what to focus on:

Daniel: The wise and those who lead people to righteousness will shine like stars in the heavens. Gain wisdom; not worldly, social media meme wisdom but the wisdom of God. Read, pray, watch and listen: these are the disciplines of Advent.

Be aware of righteousness that is self-righteousness dressed as arrogance and used as a weapon to abuse and manipulate.

Hebrews: We have been forgiven through the sacrifice of Jesus and we can have confidence in this. We can draw near to God in full assurance of faith. This is where real life and true love are found. We need to spur one another on toward love and good deeds. The world needs more doers of good deeds!

Mark: Be aware of being deceived by false prophets, false Jesus’ claiming to be Him. Be on your guard. Be wise and prepare to be challenged. Jesus came to show us a new way of loving, redemption and salvation.

The Gospel must be preached to all nations. Wait – what?! Before we get all hot and bothered about the wars and earthquakes; how are we doing with the Gospel? Any evidence of it to the people, the community and the world around us? This will be the happily-ever-after ending. The only one. The Gospel of Jesus, of love and justice, joy and wisdom, grace and righteousness preached to all nations.

And finally from Psalm 16: whatever is coming and whenever it does God is our help, our refuge; apart from him you have no good thing, I have no good thing. I have set the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. And they all lived happily ever after.

All Souls: Wound & Bound Together

St Nicholas Charlwood
All Souls
November 3rd, 2024

All Souls by May Sarton
Psalm 27:1-6, 13-14
John 11:32-44

May Sarton ‘All Souls’

Did someone say that there would be an end,
an end, Oh, an end to love and mourning?
What has been once so interwoven cannot be ravelled,
not the gift ungiven.
Now the dead move through all of us still glowing.
Mother and child, lover and lover mated,
are wound and bound together and enflowing.
What has been plaited cannot be unplaited–
only the strands grow richer with each loss
and memory makes kings and queens of us.
Dark into light, light into darkness, spin.
When all the birds have flow to some real haven,
we who find shelter in the warmth within,
listen and feel new-cherished, new-forgiven,
as the lost human voices speak through us
and blend our complex love,
our mourning without end.

In Church of England tradition, we come together over these few days at the beginning of November for a short season of remembrance. The Church has marked All Saints and All Souls for hundreds of years. It stems from the belief that there is a powerful spiritual bond between those in heaven and those living on earth. It is often said in my family that the dead sit at the dinner table long after they are gone.

This service offers us space and time to give thanks to God for the life and love that was shared, for the memories we carry and to ask for God’s help if we have unfinished business with those who have died. Not all our remembering will be of the good, sweet times as none of us are perfect and neither were they!

The only alternative to avoiding grief is to avoid love. To avoid the grief I feel over my person who has died means I would have had to forfeit the love and the relationship that we shared. We cannot have it both ways. May Sarton’s poem that Lorne just read begins with a very good question…‘Did someone say there would be an end to love and mourning?’ I doubt there is anything more complicated than love and grief.

I appreciate that many relationships are complicated. We should not pretend they are not. Some feelings about the person who has died might be mixed or ambiguous; maybe there is guilt or shame if you felt you did not do enough for them or felt relief when death finally came. We must be very careful in how we interpret relationships; especially ones that are not ours even if they are in the same family. There can also be great temptation when someone dies to want to paint a rosier picture of them, their life and relationships than actually ever existed. We lie! We do it for all sorts of reasons; some even noble ones.

We are wound and bound together and plaited together as May Sarton says. It cannot be undone even if we come undone. We are held together by love.

Love is a thread through the story of the raising of Lazarus. We can be held together by love and belief even when it seems impossible and we do not understand what or why things are happening. This is a complicated story as it raises a number of questions about the nature of life and death, faith and belief, Jesus’ miracles and the wider story of what will happen to Jesus.

At the heart of this story is a close-knit, loving family with a brother who is ill. There is an assumption that Mary, Martha & Lazarus have been orphaned at some point. If this is true then they know something of grief. We also know that they lived in Bethany which was on the edge of Jerusalem. Bethany was known to be a place where sick and poor people lived. Along the way these three poor orphans met Jesus and they became friends. When Lazarus became ill, the sisters sent a note to Jesus telling him that. They did not ask Jesus to come to them; maybe they assumed He would.

The story unfolds that Jesus does not immediately go to see them. Lazarus dies and his body is put into the tomb before Jesus arrives and the normal Jewish grieving process begins. There was no waiting around like many people today have to wait around for cremation or burial.

Jesus arrives and the sisters react differently. Martha goes out to meet him while Mary stays home. Jesus has to ask for Mary to come to see him. Mary’s opening statement is relatable to anyone who has ever felt abandoned by God, ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.’ If if if. If the cancer was caught earlier, if the NHS waiting lists were not so long, if the scan showed, if they had left the house 10 minutes later or earlier, if God really loved them or me, then…

Jesus offers no explanation or excuse for his delay as though an answer would make anyone feel better at this moment. Jesus does not speak. He sees. Jesus sees Martha & Mary and all the others weeping and begins to weep too. If nothing else we see a God who weeps with us, knows and shares our pain even when we think we have been abandoned. Jesus’ love for these poor orphans is visible to everyone.

If the story stopped there we would still have a wonderful picture of God’s love. It goes further of course with the raising of Lazarus from death. Now we might wish to have had longer with our loved ones and ask why they did not get more time. Why did God not spare their life and give them back to us for a while longer? These are questions that cannot and will not be answered on this side of heaven.

Lazarus was given more life and would have died again in the future. There is also no indication if Lazarus was healed from his illness. Whatever happened to the three siblings they knew that God was their light and salvation (Psalm 27). They had faced death and had nothing to fear as they knew Jesus to be the true resurrection and life.

Jesus wanted Martha, Mary and Lazarus and the others gathered to see the glory of God. When the stone was rolled away, I believe that they did. The same as when the stone was rolled away on the first Easter.

Where does that leave us on a November afternoon in Charlwood at an All Souls service?

Love and mourning have no ending because they are tied up, plaited together
Jesus sees
There is a lot we do not and will not understand
But we can inquire in his temple, be hidden in the shelter of God
We can know that there is life in the resurrection

Finally, let your heart take courage. You are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses in the heavenlies and around you right now. All of us here have loved and lost. We can share God’s goodness with each other in the land of the living even while we wait.


Bible Sunday: Staying on the Path

Bible Sunday
27/10/24

2 Timothy 3:14-4:5
John 5:36b-47

I am going to start today with a Bible quiz:

How many copies of the Bible are sold or distributed every year?
(average 100 million plus millions of downloads. It is through there are 5-7 billion copies in print)

How many languages have at least some scripture translated?
(Approximately 3,756)

How many human authors does the Bible have?
(Give or take 40)

How many years was the Bible written over?
(1,500 – give or take)

How many books are in the Bible?
(66 – 39 in the OT; 27 in the NT)

What is the longest book in the Bible?
(Psalms)

What is the shortest book?
(3 John)

Which human author wrote the most books?
(Paul – 13)

Which book of the Bible did Jesus write?
None!

There we go! I hope that you learned a few new fun facts about the Bible.

Another question for you: How many Bibles do you own?

I did a quick check on my bookshelves and I have: Anyone want to guess? 17. Plus an app on my phone and a website I regularly use. Which is not too surprising given my job! I do not have 17 copies of my favourite non-Bible book. So why do I have so many copies?! I am aware that I take for granted the 17 copies I have. This comes into sharp focus when the Bible Society shows a person getting their first printed copy of the Bible. I find that I can be embarrassingly blasé about the 17 that I own. Equally it would be hard to get rid of any of the copies currently occupying shelf space.

I have asked you to bring your own Bibles to church this morning for a few reasons. I want to think about the Bible in your hands for a moment (or one that is at home!):
Where did you get it?
Who gave it to you?
How much of it have you read?
If all the Bibles disappeared from the face of the earth tomorrow – how much of it do you know?

At the coronation of Queen Elizabeth in 1953, she was presented with a Bible from the Archbishop of Canterbury with these words: Our gracious Queen: to keep your Majesty ever mindful of the law and the Gospel of God as the Rule for the whole life and government of Christian Princes, we present you with this Book, the most valuable thing that this world affords.

How far do you agree with the Archbishop? Is your Bible the most valuable thing you own? I believe this to be true even though I do not understand all of it. I have neglected it, avoided it and got frustrated by it. Yet I believe it because I deeply love it, want to know and understand more of it.

If you are in any way daunted by the Bible here is a secret: do not worry about what you do not know or understand about the Bible. Worry about what you do know and understand.
Am I living to the standards that are set out here?
Am I becoming more Christ-like?
Is there any actual evidence of what I know about this book to my family, my friends, or the wider world?

Today as we celebrate Bible Sunday, each reading has something to teach us about how we can take the Bible more seriously for ourselves.

The Bible is God’s means of our development and growth as Christians (2 Timothy 3.16)

To be honest, many of us struggle to see the usefulness of much of the Bible. We get comfortable with what we know or what we think we know. We might try to make excuses: the Bible is too hard, it is outdated, old, irrelevant to the world now, it is too violent, too misogynistic, etc. The God who breathed his Spirit into scripture, who understands us better than we know ourselves, loves us enough that Jesus would die for us tells us that ‘All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.’ Therefore He can be trusted. He knows what we need.

Growing and developing in our faith is a whole of life activity. It may ebb and flow in different seasons and situations but should never become stagnant. We need this book to help us get on with it. How can we possibly become more Christ-like (this is not the same thing as being a good person!) if we have not uncovered who Jesus is in the pages of the Bible? We have been called to abundant life, life in the fullest sense. This does not just happen but takes effort. We need the teaching, the reproof, correction and training that the Bible offers us.

The Bible keeps us on God’s path (2 Timothy 4.3-4)

Have you ever had a driving experience in thick fog? Those fogs that descend so quickly that all you can do is crawl along the motorway with the fog lights on and make slow progress. It can feel claustrophobic, like you are lost, and you can’t just stop and wait it out. You have to keep going. The lines marking the lanes suddenly became a lifeline. They showed you each metre of the road one at a time, helping to navigate the bends, avoid collisions, and eventually to getting to your destination.

Many people unfortunately believe the Bible to be a rather long and boring set of rules to take the fun out of life. We need rules, guidelines to keep life between the lines like the markings on a motorway. Imagine trying to watch a footie match that had no rules, or bake a cake without a recipe, or drive a car without road markings!

It would all end in disaster as we would each individually have to make up the way to do these things. Now we might be tempted to think that we know best. But likely the person next to us thinks that way too. This is what Paul is talking about in verse 3: ‘the time is coming when people will not put up with sound doctrine (teaching or belief), but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires.’

Paul is commending the importance of scripture to Timothy because he realises that a time is coming when the church will struggle to stay faithful to God’s word. Paul predicts a time when instead of seeking the truth, Christians will let their own desires be the filter for what they hear, distracted by false teaching.
Things like ‘just be a good person’; ‘it’s all the same God we believe in anyway’; ‘we all basically get there in the end’; ‘The Bible, church, Christianity, etc is fine for you but not for me.’ Those are not God’s words nor Jesus’ teaching. Watch out for itchy ears; especially your own.

In John’s Gospel, Jesus is taking on some Jewish people who have itchy ears. They know their scriptures and they are trying to find eternal life in them. Jesus is saying ‘no, no, no – I am the way to eternal life.’ The Jews are missing this because they do not believe that God has sent Jesus. They will not go to him to have life even though it is all there in the Jewish scriptures. Right back to Moses and yet they refused to believe it. Itchy ears can make you deaf!

How to grow & develop as Christians and stay on God’s path

First thing – pray! Pray to want to grow and develop in your faith. Pray for a closer relationship with God. Pray for purpose and guidance. No one is going to force you. Not even God. Maybe you have to pray to want to want to grow and develop, deepen your relationship and stay on the path. The Wednesday Group is going to be looking at prayer this week.

Secondly, do not take it for granted. Today access to the Bible is only a click away on a smartphone. I suspect many of our homes have multiple copies of the Bible and in multiple translations. As it is so easily available, it is possible that we undervalue it. Paul reminds Timothy of his rich and privileged heritage, because he wants to leave a legacy in the life of Timothy and the life of the church that will carry on into the future. What if all the Bibles disappeared overnight? How much would we still know?

Thirdly, Do it! Does the Bible feel like a dry and dusty book to you or does it captivate you like a long-awaited love letter? Maybe take some time this week to revisit parts that in the past have been especially meaningful to you.
For many people there are Psalms that have a special significance or the gospel accounts of Jesus. If regular Bible reading has become difficult why not revisit the parts of the Bible that you are familiar with. Pray that God would give you a fresh passion for his word.

In this book we have the most valuable thing that this world affords. It is God’s way of communicating to the world that he created and loves. We as his followers need to know what is in her so we can share that message with the people that so badly need it.