Hearts: troubled and embraced

The texts of two reflections shared on during our zoom worship this morning. Thinking about parting conversations, being enfolded by, and letting go in, love and the ways in which our lives are drawn into God's story.  The thing about an embrace is that it is risky - we have to wait with outstretched arms for the other to respond; but for an embrace to be an embrace, we have to let go as we open our arms again. May we enfold and bless in our communities. The texts were Acts 7:55-end and John 14:1-14.

Reflection One

Like many folk, I’ve found the BBC’s adaption of Sally Rooney’s bestselling novel Normal People to be utterly compelling. 

The ending however, is about a letting go. 

A parting conversation. 

Looking back on misunderstandings, triumphs, disappointments, failures in communication. 

These have been troubled hearts. 

A still from the BBC's adaption of 'Normal People'

And Connell says:  I wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for you. And Marianne contemplates this new life that’s been made possible.  

They emerge from the shadows of loneliness; hearts troubled by being unloveable beat with purpose. One person has shaped another; the other has marked them with love. 

They’ve had a place in each others lives and hearts; they still do. They’ve grappled with questions of truth, trying to find their own way and are embarking on a new phase of life.

I wonder if the disciples, as we encounter them today, feel a bit like that too. Partly despondent and uncertain. In the midst of this parting conversation, do their minds drift back to that moment of calling? The time when the stepped out of boats and looked to a broader horizon?

Fishers of Men - Michael Dudash

 Did they perhaps recall other meals? The familiarity of the home of Mary, Martha and Lazarus; the seats amongst the religious leaders; the intense debate and the way Jesus would turn an observation into a new parable, a story to re-tell. How many of our deepest relationships and most memorable moments have been over a meal?

Jesus walking with his disciples - unknown

And there would have been conversations along the way. The one to one discussions; the opportunity to ask Jesus something away from the crowd; the moments of rebuke when they’d started to disagree.  We will have our own recollections of those we love and those who’ve had an impact on us:  genuine love and kindness; the colleague who inspired us; the person who held us close when we cried. 

Yet now, all those things are cast in a different light; conversations now are under a shadow. This is a farewell conversation. He’s talked of love. Again and again he says this commandment is made new. Love. But it isn’t cheap. 

Jesus washes his disciples feet - unknown

Some parting words we anticipate and script: the leaving do or the exit interview. Others we sit lightly too, aware that it might be the end: graduation days, the house moves, the lengthening gaps of time between calls. Yet every day holds that possibility of last words: things we can’t say; don’t say; the things we dismiss, cling to or only really hear long after the last breath. 

This conversation is one which shaped lives and imaginations; which has been dwelt on and lived with. A parting conversation which says: love allows you to do great things.

Now what does he say, the one who’d asked them what they were looking for and invited them to see? He says don’t let you hearts be troubled. He says trust me. Believe in God. He says there’s a place for you; and I’ll come to you. He says, after feet are washed and before bread is dipped, he says you already know all this.

The Lord's Last Supper - Okaybabs Studio

But the questions around this table are real and intense: we don’t know, how can we? Show us the Father, then it’ll be fine. The hearts of these disciples are troubled, perhaps our are too. And yet even in this movement Jesus stretches their imaginations. Their belief, their hope, their trust is not just in him as an end in itself; it’s not a personal possession. It is a more radical gift. Something greater will emerge as these troubled hearts embrace new life.

In Jesus, God chooses to dwell with us; to have a place with us. In the midst of grief, uncertainty and all that troubles our hearts, Jesus invites us to place our trust in God; to abide, with him, near the heart of the Father. We are held in this eternal embrace. 

William Blake

Yes, we trust that when earthly life is over, we will have a place at home with God, in whose image we are made. But here and now, in troubless days; in days of possibility, we have a place too. A place amidst homes and colleagues; churches and communities.

A place where new life is made possible, even when - especially when - there is sickness, disruption and death; even when we have let go of all that is familiar. In this letting go, we are embraced by a love that opens our hearts; by a love that gives us a share in God’s story. 

We will explore that in a moment through Stephen’s story woven into God’s story.

Let not your hearts be troubled. 

Reflection Two

We know that in our human experience, moments of letting go can be hard and messy. As adults, we experience the nervousness and courage of a toddlers first steps: when we say yes to a job; when we say I do to a loved one; when children move out; or when we empty a parental home. And there will be many more ‘letting gos’: moment by moment, when we resist the urge to cling on tightly to what we know in order to do a new thing.

Banksy

Our reading from Acts tells us of Stephen: of his letting go of life in order to gain life. He is enfolded in love. Earlier in Acts, we hear how he is one of those who is committed to care for some of the most vulnerable.  He is one of those deacons, filled with the Spirit, who with wisdom and compassion to a great work.  They take on the great work of enabling many bodies to become one body. Hope and struggle are bound together as resurrection life, life in abundance, breaks into the ordinary and intimate, the domestic and the public. 

Stephen reminds us that we live in what Willie Jennings calls ‘the tight space between faith and fear’. Wherever we are placed - at home or at work, in our daily activity and times of isolation, it is the nearness of the Spirit that prevents faith being overcome by fear. The Spirit that Jesus promises in his parting words enables us to imagine the embrace of Jesus;  and embrace that enfolds our deepest longings and enables us to embrace a new way of life. 

The Questions: We will have our own questions; uncertainty about finding the way; needing others to point us in the right direction; allowing us to trust the compass point, the GPS of God’s love.  We are enfolded love so that our lives are unfolded in love. Rachel invited us to sit with one particular question last week: where do we find abundant life, even in lockdown.

The Way: It’s a journey. Yes, Jesus is our way; he walks with us; guiding us behind and before. It takes time; and the process of placing one foot in front of the other changes us. In the 2010 film, The Way, Martin Sheen’s character experiences this change on the way to Santiago in Spain. A pilgrimage route walked by thousands, each one carrying hopes, griefs, expectations; yet the personal, as the film reveals, cannot be contained. On this way, the lives and loves of others change us.

The Truth: Jesus promises to be our guide; to be with us on path to the place he is going - through life and death to life eternal.  Jesus reveals the truth of God’s love: in all its depth and breadth. Jesus reveals the truth of our human condition - in all its contradictions and confusion, its potential and beauty. Light shines in the darkness - attracting us back to the truth of love.

The Baptism of Christ with Dove - Daniel Bonnell

The Life:  The way, truth and life of Jesus is to reconcile all things in love. That is our ultimate reality.  In laying down his life for us, Jesus goes to the depths of the grave and reveals the power of the resurrection. It is perhaps this image of baptism that speaks also of the power of this new life.

We see in Stephen the embrace of this new life.  Like him, may our hearts be set on the world to come; like him, may we sow seeds of new life on earth. Stephen has become a story teller: it’s a story with Jesus at its centre; a story of God, the great I AM, in the midst of all things - past, present and future. In the moment we heard today, Stephen is able to witness to the way, the truth and the life; he is enfolded by the Spirit. As he speaks the Spirit speaks; he point us to the love of God revealed in Jesus. 

Let not your hearts be troubled; I have prepared a place for you; I am the way, the truth and the life. Those things are about love: consoling, reimagining, embracing, convicting, cherishing. 

Stephen has found his way to the truth of this love; and through his life, so will Saul. That figure, lurking in the shadows of hatred will become that great witness, Paul.

Our human bodies reflect something of this way of life. Jesus taught his disciples to love. God’s Spirit is at work in us - when we show compassion and kindness, when we show hospitality and friendship. We are to walk this way; embrace this truth; discover this new life. We are called - like Stephen and Saul, Thomas and Philip.

For a long time, Christian Aid has adopted the slogan: we believe in life before death.  Like Stephen may we perform with grace and power the story of  Jesus.  This Christian Aid week may our gestures reveal the divine life made flesh. 

Heart of God - Gary Rowell

©  Julie Gittoes 2020

Angelic embrace

A sermon preached on the Feast of St Michael and All Angels (Eucharist). I can't believe that the Angel of the North has turned 21. I still remember the first glimpse of the sculpture; and look out for it every time I travel north. How might this iconic angel shape our understanding of the place of angels - and indeed enable us to extend an embrace. The texts were: Genesis 28:10-7, Revelation 12:7-12; John 1:47-51

The Angel of the North

The Angel of the North is iconic.

With its 54 metre wing span creating a sense of embrace, this 20 metre steel sculpture greets travellers to and from the north east.

When Antony Gormley was invited to submit his ideas to Gateshead Council, he famously said that he didn’t do “motorway art”. 

What changed his mind was the context: an image of a remote mound next to the A1 which covered 300 years of mine-workings.

‘Is it possible’, writes Gormley, ‘to make a work with purpose in a time that demands doubt?’

His answer was to make an object which would (in his words) be a 'focus of hope at a time of painful transition for the people of the North East, abandoned in the gap between the industrial and the information ages’.

It recognises the sacrifice of generations of miners who’d worked the pits; it marks the end of an era and refuses to lets us forget.

The angel’s form modelled on the torso of the artist himself; its 200 tonne body is ten times life-size. 

This angel has come of age, having stood for 21 years: withstanding winds and rain; shrouded in snow and bathed in sunlight.

Rarely does this angel stand alone; nor does this icon slip from view. 

An angelic way-marker and gateway; rooted in earth and raising our eyes heavenward.

In uncertainty, transition and abandonment this northern angel remains a focus of hope and belonging.

In her beautifully illustrated book on angels, Jane Williams ponders her own underlying questions about what these figures. What do they tell us, she asks ‘about our own longings and what messages they might bring us about our place in the world, our connections with each other and our relationship with God - if we really listened to them.’

The Angel of the North speaks powerfully of hope, place and connection - emerging of a sense of abandonment.

The Angel

This feast of St Michael and All Angels extends to us an invitation to us to listen carefully to our world and our longings; to notice and bridge the gaps.

The ordering of angels speaks of God’s holiness and greatness; but they also speak of the distress of separation and division between us, earth and heaven, humanity and God. 

They stand as way-markers, ladders, gateways, reminding us that even at points of isolation God still reaches out; God still reaches out with a fierce, tender and radiant love.

The language our Eucharistic Prayer speaks of how angels reveal God’s wise purpose for the salvation or healing of the human race.

The ministry of angels speak of steadfast love and protection. Whilst they behold the one equal light of God’s glory, beyond dazzling and darkness, they also keep faithful vigil for us. They guard us in the way that leads to life; they guide us to God’s kingdom of light. 

As Jane Williams writes: ‘The angels are part of the struggle to define what kind of a universe this is to be be.’ 

The help to enlarge our vision of the world. Reminding us that in the struggles against fear, oppression and suffering, the strength of God’s goodness is the ultimate reality. 

It may not always feel that way - our God doesn’t coerce humanity to make the good, wise and just choice. The struggles and tensions are real; and yet, as in the stories we hear today, we are to be alert to messengers of assurance and encouragement, who help us to glimpse traces of grace.

In our Gospel reading, Jesus greets Nathaniel as someone he already knows - even though they’d never met. 

Jesus looks on him and sees someone who is honest; a child of God without deceit. Nathaniel takes Jesus’ literal answer as a sign that he must be the Messiah, God’s chosen and anointed one.

Jesus has something deeper in mind. He is more than what they think that title means. John tells of the call of Andrew, Simon, Philip and now Nathaniel. They are all invited to come and see; to open their eyes to something that is ‘more than’. 

They are to name their heart’s desire; the thing they seek. They are invited to stay. To be with the one who was with the the Father. To abide with the one who stoops down to earth to raise earth to heaven.

Jesus enables them to go deeper when he talks of angels ascending and descending on the Son of Man. He’s reminding them of a story of their ancestor Jacob; the story which we have heard this morning.

At this point in Genesis, Jacob is a fugitive. Having tricked his elder twin brother Esau out of his birthright, he had fled. In that time of being separated from his own kin, he earns a living using his skill in rearing animals; he settles in marriage. And yet, here he is sleeping out in the open with a rock for a pillow.

He is utterly alone. He is in-between places and in-between people. He’s caught between the consequences of his act of deception and self-will; and the purposes God has in store for him.

The vision he receives is one of hope.

Jacob’s ladder by Albert Huthusen

God is saying, I have not abandoned you; I know you and I am bound to you. 

Despite his physical isolation, he is reminded of his human ancestry and of God’s faithfulness. This land is gift; his people will be a blessing; blessing the earth.

Heaven and earth were not separated. There was an unseen ladder - upon which angels ascend and descend, ministering to the world. 

Through a flawed human being a promise is renewed: blessing is extended.

Today we hear Jesus reminding the honest Nathaniel of the story of crafty Jacob; but he goes a step further in telling him that he is that ladder. 

He is the visible means of joining earth and heaven.

Come and see, says Jesus; open your hearts and minds to see more.

Jesus is still inviting people into a journey of faith and transformation; Jesus is attracting us to abide with him and walk with.

We live in a world where many still cry out to God; willing God to tear open the heavens and come down. 

We live in a world where many echo Gormley’s question: asking, is it possible to create and work and live with purpose in time of doubt?

We live in a world where many still long to open their hearts and minds to a new vision; to follow a more authentic way of life and love; to begin, however falteringly, a journey of faith.

In Jesus, the heavens are opened. 

The Word becomes flesh: walking with us in human weakness to lead us into a new vision.

The longings of Jacob and Nathaniel have been fulfilled and God’s promises continue to be renewed here among us.

For, how awesome is this place!

The altar around which we gather is where we are no longer alone; here we unite our praise with angels.

The bread which we take, is Word made flesh stooping down to be with us.

The world in which we tread, is raised up to heaven; the ultimate hope and reality is revealed.

And yet, the image of St Michael reminds us of the ongoing  struggle. He is more than an angel; he is a warrior. He reminds us with utter seriousness of the fight for all that is good and just and holy.

St Michael

May we be messengers of love’s fierce radiance; discerning traces of grace.

May we pierce the darkness of our world with words and actions of hope; and, like that northern angel, offer a tender embrace of belonging.

© Julie Gittoes 2019