The long and winding road

 Monken Hadley: Acts 8:26-end, 1 John 4:7-end, John 15:1-8

In 1970, The Beatles released “The Long and Winding Road”. Written by Paul MacCartney, and inspired by the sight of a road stretching up into remote highlands of Scotland, it’s a sad song: wind and tears, waiting and loneliness. Decades later, he told his biographer that it was ‘all about the unattainable; the door you never quite reach ... the road that you never get to the end of’.

Album cover from The Beatles Bible website

Roads occupy a kind of in-between space in our lives - literally and metaphorically. Children straining to see the first glimpse of the sea; the rocky roads of adolescence and ageing; the familiar tedium of a commute; the seasons of joy, celebration, waiting or grief. The roads that lead to doors and threshold moments - the many times we’ve cried and the many ways we’ve tried, as the song puts it.  

In his commentary on Acts, the black American theologian Willie Jennings describes a ‘road-embedded life born of old and fresh memories of migration, mobility, transition, upheaval and hope’.  Naming the particularity of the road from Jerusalem to Gaza, he talks of a road where we are searching for what he calls  ‘life possibilities or at least running away from the forces of death’.

For the peoples of Israel and Palestine, those roads continue to hold the fear and horror of the forces of death - the stories shared across the faith networks and fora across this borough; the stories of hostages, destruction and starvation. Yet somehow, stories of life possibilities are still being told - life free from prejudice and complicity - stories told at community Iftas and around seder plates, at vigils and also at every Eucharist we share.

Today we hear that God is found on this road between Jerusalem and Gaza: found there to transform lives with an expansive love, which embraces every soul, every identity and border. 

Philip is sent on that road to find the Ethiopian eunuch - to join him, to respond to the invitation to be his guide, as reading the next becomes a communal activity.  On that long and winding road, there’s an echo of MacCartney: 

Why leave me standing here?

Let me know the way

They begin reading and interpreting a text from isaiah: about a person in pain, a body suffering and humiliated; a body subject to the forces of death.  It is this body, explains Philip, that God’s love has been revealed among us.

The Son sent into the world because God’s response to all that wounds and separates us -  what we call sin - is to love us.  The Son sent into the world to lay down life that we might live; laying life down in order to take it up again; dying to rise and bear fruit. This is the sacrifice that makes one all that was torn and divided.

There is no greater love than this - says Jesus elsewhere in John - than to lay down life for friends. God’s love made flesh calls us friends, calls us beloved; love that invites us to love. 

As a result of this intimate, one-to-one sermon, the winding road becomes a borderland, a door to life. The Ethiopian eunuch is brought close to the joy of this extraordinary divine love. He matters in his difference and complexity, his ethnicity and sexual ambiguity. The one whose body is enslaved and put to use, who has responsibility but little power, finds a new future of light and life. 

The Ethiopian wants God as much as God wants him: what is there to prevent his baptism, this joining of water and spirit? 

Baptism makes visible the depth of God’s love and its redemptive power. By the power of the Spirit, his life is redirected to this love - like us, he is found in the body of Jesus, wounded, risen and glorified. He is in Christ and Christ is in him. He abides in love. 

It is this relationship of love and mutual indwelling that Jesus is drawing us into in John’s Gospel. Horticultural imagery is stretched to expand upon the joy and risk, demands and potential of this life.

Abiding is such a rich word: speaking not of the winding road, but the door we open, the threshold we cross and the place we call home. The place where we can dwell long term: it speaks of the relational indwelling of the Spirit and it expresses our life together as friends seeking to be true to Jesus.

And bearing fruit is what we are called to do.John speaks of this with vibrancy and abundance throughout the Gospel - of doing greater works and washing feet, of bread that feeds a multitude, and water turned to wine when our own resources run out. 

In all these images, John gives us a way of understanding how we are to live out a pattern of life shaped by the Eucharist. He teaches us about the bread of life - and how we improvise on the command to ‘do this in remembrance’ by our own embodied acts of service.

Today he gives us the image of vine and vineyard - and image of how we abide together. It is an image of stability and trust, of faithfulness and utter commitment to God and others. It is an image that reminds us not only of the last supper, but of the blood shed for us on the cross and the promise of the new wine of the kingdom.

As David Ford writes in his commentary: ‘together the image of abiding, offers readers a way of understanding, deepening and living both eucharist and covenant, centred on who Jesus is, and the call to abide in him.’  It is a call to be faithful in prayer, to face the truth of who we are - and when and where we need to be pruned to be fruitful. 

Here as we celebrate this Eucharist, we are pilgrims on the long and winding road of our earthly life: we find abundance in the fragility of a wafer of bread  and the richness of wine, bread broken and blood shed so that we might live. 

Here the possibilities of life are named - a renewed vision of justice and peace and of love for each other even in, especially in, our difference. Here we name the ultimate victory of love over the forces of death - we are reminded that love casts out fear. Here we are restored and recalled - invited to love the brothers and sister, the strangers and friends we do see. 

We love because love is from God and because God loved us first. 

Therefore, like Philip we should be confident in speaking and living the gospel of Jesus. Therefore, as John reminds us, we should be compassionate in serving communities with the love of God the Father.Therefore, we should be creative in reaching people with the gospel - walking that long and winding road with them - in the power of the Spirit.

If all that sounds a bit familiar, it is because it is your own hope and commitment set out in your mission action plan. There will be others, who we are drawn to as Philip was called to the Ethiopian. We might not know them yet; they might be close neighbours already: the ones who say to us - don’t leave me standing here, let me know the way. 

God is love and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them. Bear fruit that will last. Abide. Love one another. 

© Julie Gittoes 2024

Let it be

This is the text of a sermon preached for Patronal Festival of St Mary's Hendon: Galatians 4:4-7 and John 19:25-27 

When Paul McCartney took part in James Corden’s Carpool Karaoke, he retold the story behind writing Let it be. One night, when he was feeling anxious, he dreamt of his mother Mary: in his time of trouble, she spoke words of wisdom and peace. 

McCartney told Corden: ‘She was reassuring me, saying, ‘it’s long to be OK, just let it be’. So he wrote the song out of that positive place of reassurance. 

In trouble; in darkness. 

    Speaking words of wisdom; whispering wisdom. 

           Let it be, don’t fret. 

Be at peace. 

    All shall be well. 

        Let it be. 

But placing the name Mary alongside the phrase “let it be” conjures up a different story. The story of a young woman who says yes to God. A woman who, through troubled and perplexed, says “let it be”. 

According to God’s word. 

       In fulfilment of a promise. 

            Embodying hope. 

 In the fullness of time, the fullness of God, dwelt in her womb, birthed by this woman. 

 In this place, made by God, God was made flesh, to have a place amongst us. The priceless sacrament; the corner stone. The one without reproach; our sure foundation.

This woman bears her child so that we might be children of God. God’s very self revealed in flesh of our flesh. 

Loving the lowest and the least. 

Mixing with the marginalised. 

Healing the hurting. 

Challenging the curious. 

Infuriating the influencers.

Debating the detractors. 

Feeding the famished. 

Restoring the rejected. 

In the fullness of time, the fullness of God, was made flesh. Flesh that lived and walked and breathed. Flesh that died, was buried and raised to life. Flesh that spoke words of peace in our fear. Breathing on us the Spirit that our hearts might turn outwards: crying, Abba! Father! 

 Breathing in the Spirit of God, might we cry out: let it be. according to your word: let it be. 

And that can be hard; and it can be compelling; It can make perfect sense; using our gifts and skills; being more fully human. How are we to know what to do? Seeking what might be the loving thing in each moment. 

By saying, ‘let it be’. Being receptive to God’s word. Allowing it do dwell in our hearts. To fill our lungs. That we might speak, might whisper, words of wisdom. Let it be. 

 Let it be in my heart as it is in your will. Let it be in my heart.

Sometimes it can be hard to discern God’s word. For Mary, it was unexpected and disruptive. She asked questions; and took it to heart. She played her part. She doesn’t laugh; or test it. She trusts it, and says ‘here I am’. She says, let it be. 

She's says let it be, even though a sword will pierce her own soul too. He speaks to her and says, here is your son. She sees him; unable to comfort or console. At a wedding in Cana, she’d told others to listen to him. At a cross on Calvary, she hears words of love. 

For here, her son is drawing humanity to God’s very self. Soon he will draw his final breath; dying to destroy death. Soon he will be buried; a place on earth in a tomb. A tomb that will be emptied, as abundant life is restored. 

But for now, in his hour of darkness, Mother Mary is standing right in front of him. She stands alongside the beloved disciple; two broken hearted people. And though they will be parted, her son speaks words of wisdom; and of care. 

Here in the long labour of death, a new community is born. 

     Waters break; blood is shed. 

            We are given new birth; into a living hope. 

He says to her, here is your son; my friend; my beloved; my disciple. He says to him, here is your mother; who bore me; who said ‘let it be’. 

In this home, these two broken hearted people prayed; they prayed in this dark night clouded by death. They waited trusting that a light would still shine. For the one who had entrusted them to each other, would bring new life. Through him, mother and friend become God’s adopted children. 

Mary and the beloved disciples are drawn into a deeper fellowship. They are united in a unity of love; of communion and of blessing. This place, their home, was made by God. A place where they cold grow in trust and compassion. 

Our places of worship too, made by human hands, are sacramental signs too; reminding us that God dwells with us on earth. But our bodies too are places where God chooses to dwell. Though we are many, our bodies are one in Christ’s body. And through the work of our hands, we bear Christ in the world. 

We labour in love; labour for God’s Kingdom. In our churches and our homes, we are bound together not just be physical or digital connection: we have a spiritual communion. Although we are parted, and though we sometimes feel broken hearted, light still shines; our lives become whispers of wisdom; as we say, let it be in my hearts according to God’s word. 

Let it be, as we pray for the Spirit to bring: 

     peace to the broken-hearted; 

            patience in our relationships; 

                     joy and gentleness and kindness in our work. 

Let us pray for one another, adopted children in God’s family: 

     For pastors in medicine, childcare, and social care; 

         For prophets seeking justice in public service, business and volunteering; 

                 For wise stewards in accountancy, tech industries and administration; 

                         For imaginative witnesses in the arts, education and hospitality. 

                                 For calls to ordination and leadership in church and world. 

For a deepening of our fellowship in Christ; that in the power of the Spirit we may witness to God’s healing love. Let it be in your hearts, according to God’s world. Broken hearted; let it be.

© Julie Gittoes 2020

Help!

This is a text of a sermon preached at Evensong on Sunday 4 September: the readings were Isaiah 43:14-44:5; John 5:30-end.  Perhaps it's because as a cathedral we are in the midst of a period of refurbishment of the building and disruption to familiar patterns of life, that the 'key' to these passages seemed to me to be 'help'. Whatever our situation or season of life, there are moments when we cry out (silently perhaps) for help: to God, to others or within our own hearts. To help and be helped, takes us to the depth of our humanity - where in love and vulnerability we re-learn patters of dependence and freedom.  May the cries of our hearts be heard.

My help cometh even from the Lord; who hath made heaven and earth.

Help!

A single word which signals so much about our human condition: we make life easier for one another when we help out with ordinary household chores; we might improve a situation by offering help in the form of mentoring, feedback or other assistance. Help is woven into our discourse about our common life: Help for heroes and help to buy; helplines to smooth out glitches in our hi-tech lives - fixing our broadband or rescheduling a flight; helplines staffed hour by hour to offer confidential support in the face of abuse or mental distress.

Help!

It echoes in so many registers: commanding, pleading, longing and crying.

There's an intimacy to language of help. It reveals our vulnerability; our co-dependence. It undercuts our self-sufficiency, our omni-competence. Perhaps The Beatles were right: when we were younger, we 'never needed anybody's help in anyway; but now these days are gone, [we're] not so self assured. Now [we] find [we've] changed out mind and opened up the doors'.

It can be offered instinctively, yet it's hard to ask for.  Perhaps there's a fear of been refused; or being manipulated. But as life changes; when we feel insecure, giving and receiving help can be transformative. When we're feeling down; when we appreciate someone being round. 'Help me get my feet back on the ground, won't you please, please help me'.

Lennon and McCartney sing if needing somebody; not just anybody; but for the psalmist, that desire finds a very precise focus.  Regardless of age or circumstance; help is rooted in the Lord. More than that, it an expression of faith which acknowledges that the Lord is the one who preserves life itself.

Isaiah also expresses words of hope rooted in the conviction that God is our help. He addresses a community in exile; a people who'd confronted the consequences of the failure to walk faithfully in the ways of the Lord. Help for them takes the form of healing, salvation, liberation and restoration.  It's profoundly intimate and radically transformative.

'Thus says the Lord who made you, who formed you in the womb and will help you': do not fear; sins and shortcomings are blotted out; the spirit is poured out in blessing. A new thing comes into being. God is our help. Don't be afraid. God is with them. God is with you. God is with us.

That with-us-ness of God in the person of Jesus is the ultimate expression of God's help. John's Gospel uses the ordinary stuff of water, bread, light, wine to express the abundance of such love. John recounts Jesus descriptions of himself as a good shepherd and the true vine. We hear of conversations with a teacher of the law under the cover of darkness and a Samaritan woman in the glare of the midday sun. He piles on the images and metaphors to such an extent that the disciples say at one point - perhaps with a hint of sarcasm - that Jesus is speaking plainly.

The passage we hear tonight, is perhaps one where we, like the disciples, struggle to make sense: yet, this monologue tells us both who Jesus is and also reminds us of our need for help.

To set it in context, this passage comes at the end of a chapter full of life and transformation; a chapter full of challenge and controversy. In the first place, Jesus offers help to some of the most dispossessed, broken and rejected people in Jerusalem. He brings healing to the sick - including a paralysed man who's been crushed by despair; who has no one to help him.

Jesus healed him - telling him to take up his bed and walk. He helped him. He gave him new life.

He did so on the sabbath day: a day when people were invited to rest and give time to God.  Those in positions of power and privilege were disturbed and angered by what they saw - a man carrying his mat. They had so narrowly interpreted the law that rather than rejoicing in this sign of freedom, the Pharisees condemned it as work. Jesus' response was to help them too: to explore with the nature of God's work with them; to reveal that he and his heavenly Father were working to bring life. In love for them, Jesus begins with what they know: the scriptures, the law of Moses.

Jesus is one with us; he is one with God. He is perfect communion with God. He is the beloved Son, doing all that his Father wills. Life and love flows from them. Our help comes from God who made heaven and earth; who formed us in the womb; who dwelt among us.

Jesus enters into conversation to help them. He sees their fear and their hardness of heart; he names their prejudice and rigid interpretations. It's as if he invites them to respond at a deeper level - attending to the new thing springing forth. Jesus points them to the glory of God at work in him; and therein lies the challenge.

We, just as much as the Pharisees, can get caught up in a chain reaction revealing our own fears and prejudices. Like them, there are times when we seek our own glory or turn in on ourselves; times when we cling to our certainties and miss the grace of God bubbling up in the unexpected places. Yet when we risk response to God, drawing on divine help, we share in the depth of love; becoming channels of help. We proclaim the transformed life of the kingdom.

May the Spirit kindle in us a desire to cry out for help to the one who in Christ, reveals life and love. Or, as Jean Vanier put it:

Jesus came to heal us.
He is calling us
to come out from behind the barriers built up
around our vulnerable hearts
so that we may have life and give life.


© Julie Gittoes 2016