Love that makes us real

 

A sermon preached at Guildford Cathedral on the First Sunday of Lent - which this year falls on 14th February.  Thinking about the impact of Valentine's Day on the popular - and Christian - imagination is a salutary thing in Surrey. On the one hand, Weybridge was named as the most romantic place in Britain in a survey revealing couples spent £235- or nearly four times the national average - on Valentine's Day gifts. On the other hand, arrest rates for domestic violence across all 43 forces, which caused concern and including training/development needs for the sake of victim safety. Love that is real condemns abuse and goes beyond material gifts. My colleague Helen Dawes sparked some thoughts by her Tweet this morning! However, in today's readings Romans 10:8b-13; Luke 4: 1-13, we focus on how God loves us and what that might mean for each human 'I love you'. 

The first Tweet I read today said: is it happy Valentine's Day or gloomy first Sunday of Lent? @revhelend

My reply was: Or subverting Valentine's Day and saying something joyful about love of God on first Sunday of Lent? Far from gloomy @GuildCath

Today's readings draw us into the reality of love, which is far from gloomy.  We subvert the cliches and excess; the flowers and chocolates. And we glimpse a love that is so real it vulnerable. It bears our hurts and increases our capacity for joy. God's love is the first breath and the last word. It reconciles, strengthens, waits and transforms. God chooses to love us by becoming one of us. It's a reality that subverts and deepens our human 'I love you'.

It's such a simple sentence.

Three monosyllables.

Subject. Verb. Object.

I love you.

It's such a familiar phrase: longed for, expected, demanding or routine.

Developers of auto-correct technology for our smart phones and tablets have analyzed billions of key strokes. They tell us that the most commonly typed sentence is: I love you.

As Joe Moran says in the Guardian Review: 'all those millions upon million of what seem... to be inimitable feelings, with intricate emotional histories behind them, condenses into the same three-word chorus.'

I love you.

It's enough: reassuring words; habitual words; an everyday sign off.

It's freighted with meaning: a grand gesture; a formal declaration. 

I love you: the intimate becomes the universal.

It's layered with excess: the Truly, Madly, Deeply  of love expressed in some of our films.

It's open to manipulation and control: anyone listening to The Archers senses unease and fear when Rob Titchener expresses his love for Helen.

Three words: I love you.

It's a sentiment that is relentless extended: Gonerel declares to Lear that she loves him 'more than words can wield the matter'.

It's given and expressed within the limits of our relationships. Lear's youngest daughter rejects the competitive excess.  She knows she's not poor in love. Her love is 'bigger than her words'. Yet, when faced with transaction and conditions; with rhetorical word play to gain a greater share of the kingdom, there is nothing that she can add.

She loves as a child should love a father, neither more nor less.

Love, obedience and honour: half as daughter, half as wife.

If love is bound by conditions, what more can she say?

What can be added to 'I love you'?

Cordelia utters painful, honest truth:  'Nothing, my Lord.'

At church weddings, couples increasingly seek out non-biblical readings to give expression to their love. Perhaps the nursery rhyme familiarity of The Owl and the Pussy Cat adds a quirky edge to their personal commitment. Perhaps the image of entwined tree roots in Captain Corelli's Mandolin says it better than they could. One couple reverted to The Velveteen Rabbit.  Perhaps it's the safety of a children's book that renders the inexpressible cost of love, say-able.  Perhaps it's still a favourite of grandparents and babysitters.

The Velveteen Rabbit longs to be real.  In the nursery he seeks the wisdom of one of the oldest toys. How can he be real? 

'Real isn't how you are made,' said the Skin Horse. 'It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.'

'Does it hurt?' asked the Rabbit.

'Sometimes,' said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. 'When you are Real you don't mind being hurt'.

In Luke's Gospel, we have already learnt that Jesus is conceived by the Spirit; he is baptised with that same Spirit. Now that same Spirit leads him in the wilderness. The Spirit fills Jesus and the Spirit guides him. Here in the desert, Jesus commitments himself to loving the world. Tempted as we are - yet without that fracturing of relationship, or selfish desire, that we call sin.    

In the weakness of our flesh, God loves in a way that it so real it hurts; so real it saves.

 

The Temptation In The Wilderness

Briton Riviere (1898)

Guildhall Art Gallery, London 

The devil's questions, prompts and offers to Jesus are lens through which we see the power of love.  In the human frailty of hunger, Jesus faces the relentless psychological nagging 'if you are the Son of God do x or y.'

Satisfy your hunger!  

No, says Jesus, for we are sustained not by bread alone. No, I will not love the world simply by satiating physical desires; by refusing to go deeper into human longings; by colluding with greed.  Love that gets to the heart of our needs and hopes, that is real.

Accept earthly power!

No, says Jesus, seizing glory and authority in that way is not God's way of loving. Resorting to domination on someone else's terms is not real love.  Love that coerces and bullies a response isn't real.   Attention to God in worship is the beginning of love; serving others by attending to their needs, that's real love.  This is love that walks the way of grief and exclusion; transforming it into joy and welcome.

Perform a dramatic stunt!

No, says Jesus, I won't take a short cut. I won't put God to the test in that way. Real love doesn't change human hearts by performing feats of reckless showmanship. Such love is superficial and fleeting: it doesn't forgive or heal; it doesn't challenge or embrace.

Three times, Jesus chose to serve God. 

 Three times he rejected the temptations power and security. 

This is what God's love looks like: it doesn't dominate or seek easy wins.  It's a love that walks the way of the cross. It's a love that is our ultimate reality. A love that overcomes pain, sorrow and death itself. 

And if that's how God loves, then it's how we should love too. This is the word that is near us; that is to be on our heart and on our lips.   It is a word of love that shapes our community; it is the assurance that our fears and hopes are held in his generous love. 

Paul reminds the Romans that this has three implications:

We can have confidence in what we believe: we confess that Jesus is Lord; we proclaim that God raised him from the dead.

We are to be messengers of God's grace: rather than being self-sufficient, we are to draw on his love, living  out of that well-spring.  As one of our confirmation candidates put it 'God is our daily basis'. God is our all - our beginning and end; the one in whom we live and move and have our being. The one who gives us breath; and teaches us love that is real.

We are to rejoice in the breadth and depth of God's love for us, and all people: there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile.  In Christ, God is faithful in fulfilling the promise to his people Israel - that all nations will come to his light.

There is no distinction or partiality in the love we celebrate today: whatever our ethnicity, status, age, popularity, knowledge, experience. All those 'implicit' tribal identities are swept away as we kneel and receive the gifts of God's love: in broken bread, in out poured wine, in signs of God's blessing we hear God say 'I love you'.

The Skin Horse tells the Velveteen Rabbit that becoming real takes a long time: 'your hair has been loved off, your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby.'

And Toby says: 'you were right, Rabbit. Love makes us real'.

In Jesus Christ, God tells us that love that is real bears all things to the agony of the cross and the silence of the grave.  In the power of the Spirit, we are called to love that way too: bearing the weak; forgiving hurts; challenging the strong; growing in trust, and encouraging each other.   

May the God's word of love be on heart and lips. 

May the love we celebrate this Lent, make us real.

© Julie Gittoes 2016

Shades of grey

This is the text of a sermon preached at Sidney Sussex College Cambridge. The theme of the term is 'Epiphanies in Broken Things', which takes seriously the shift from Christmastide to Lent.  I took as my title 'Shades of Grey: glimmers of light in darkness'.  The texts were about Moses and his encounter with God at the burning bush (Exodus 3:1-7) and Jesus's paradoxical words about glory in John (John 12:7-36a).

 

And Moses said, 'Let me turn aside and see this great sight; why doesn't the bush burn?'

Tonight we begin by entering into a familiar story. Its retelling breaks out beyond the text of the Hebrew Scriptures and  shapes our cultural imagination.

In The Prince of Egypt, Dreamworks animated it using the tagline: 'the power is real; the story is for ever; the time is now'.

In January Song, Billy Bragg's lyrics lament that he's 'tired of being wired'; he's journey's hard; he's 'standing on the sidewalk, talking to a burning bush'; meanwhile the politicians are selling freedom.

In Steinbeck's novel Grapes of Wrath, Jim Casy describes himself as a 'Burning Busher' -  convincing them others to work together towards a common goal.

The burning bush: a moment full of mystery, human curiosity and divine holiness.

The Jewish poet Yakov Azriel retells the story of Exodus by revisiting the words and finding meaning in the gaps between them:

In the shadow of a burning bush, and in

Its light, we gaze beyond the desert dune...

He paints pictures of not only what the mind sees, but what our hearts and souls intuit; he takes universal themes - the atoning for sin and God's sacred names; he plays with light and shadow and shades of grey. He goes on:

In the bush's shadow, and its light a thin

Unbroken thread of grace is seen...

The Moses we encounter tonight is a shepherd fugitive.  His story is complex. A Hebrew by birth, given up for his own safety and raised in Pharaoh's palace; living in privilege yet aware of the injustice of the regime. His intolerance for abuse and exploitation leads to an act of violence. He's a man fearing for his own life and feared by his own people. 

If this story is already fifty shades darker, then the burning bush is the breaking in of shades of freedom.  God does not coerce Moses; rather he ignites his curiosity.  This isn't a dazzling display of power and glory.  Rather in the shadow and light of an intriguing phenomenon, there's a thin line of grace which enables us to gaze beyond the desert dunes.

Creation is infused with the intensity of God's presence. This is holy ground. In the darkness of exile there are glimmers of light. Moses is called to embody that light of justice; to be one who calls for freedom in the face of systemic oppression. His 'Here I am' is met my the divine 'I am.

God acts through one who burns with a passion for justice; whose endurance thus far is a thread of grace. Shades of grey carries the light of promise. Holy ground is a place of transformation. The tale of wretched slaves and fugitives becomes a story of blessing, of lives marked by hope. 

We too are called to gaze beyond the desert dune. As the scholar Walter Brueggeman puts it: 'the end reach of this text will not come until the last man and woman enacts courage and possibility. A voice from the bush is a flaming warrant for truth to power.'

 

Such a warrant is the essence of the good news of the Gospel. Jesus reaches out the weakest and marginalised; he disrupts the seductive power of selfishness and challenges the false assurance of possessions. He brings light into the darkness when we are wounded and if we retaliate; he brings love when we are criticised and when we judge.

He sees our goodness, the expression of that most excellent gift of charity: we are bonded to each other through our bodies - they express our love and compassion, friendship and support. Bodies are conduits of tenderness, intimacy, care, passion and creativity.

In Jesus, we see the power and cost of God's love for us. His soul is troubled. He reaches a point of anguish - the prospect of his death. He cries out to his Father, and hears words of paradoxical assurance. The moment of dereliction will be the moment of glory.  All that he does reveals who God is. In life and death and risen life sin, separation, desolation are overcome. God's 'I am' plumbs the depths of humanity and raises us up. Love has the final word.

The dehumanising value judgments of this world; the dishonesty that crushes us; the cruelty that breaks our hearts: on the cross the consequences of all that are laid bare.   In its place we see a love that is so generous and  compelling that all are drawn to it.   That is our hope, our ultimate reality. 

We are to walk in the light of that love. The gift and potential of our humanity refracts God's radiant light in the tiniest of gestures and most fleeting exchange. It glimmers in the things that lift us up when we are bowed down.

Communities where people live, work, worship and socialise together, can be extraordinary places of intellectual and spiritual formation; places where we learn habits of kindness, generosity forgiveness and trust. It is a place of security and stability - where we can give and receive love and esteem.

It can be tough and risky.

We live in a world where  our 'success' is quantified in metrics of social influence, research output, degree classifications and career prospects.   We recognise complex pressures at work in us; things we shy away from; the challenges we embrace; our nagging doubts; the colleagues we find difficult.

In Jesus, God meets us precisely where we are, as we are. Here in the stillness, beauty, word and music of our worship. Later in the conviviality of hall; as we go about our lives tomorrow, might there be a shadow of a burning bush.

A place where Jesus' love and humility, his wisdom and mercy break through the barriers we build around our hearts in fear. He continues to reach out to grieving, joyous, fractured and hopeful humanity. He draws us, and people who are nothing like us, to treat others with dignity. That all may find freedom to flourish.

Where do we see glimmers of light amidst the shades of grey?  What is it that ignites our curiosity or arouses our passion for justice?  We are caught up in God's story. We are to be channels of his healing and reconciling love -  directing our time, energy, learning and skills towards goals that transform our world.

To be bearers of the flaming warrant of truth confronts the power of illness, inequality and discrimination.  It's expressed in the way universities have marked LGBT history month; it's reflected in how we raise the profile of charities - including their research, outreach and fundraising.

The thin unbroken thread of grace that transformed Moses runs on.  You have an awesome potential to be agents of change - bringing grace into law and commerce; research and teaching; public service and creative arts.  We are called to walk in the light of Christ, by the power of the Spirit at work in us, revealing something of God's love. We do that moment by moment; conversation by conversation; embodying courage and possibility: the power is real; the story is for ever; the time is now'.

©  Julie Gittoes 2016

 

Embrace

The text of a sermon preached at Guildford Cathedral on Sunday 17th January. In the midst of Epiphanytide, we focused our attention on the wedding at Cana - a celebration of human love and commitment; the first of Jesus' signs recorded by John.  Preaching on this theme in the context of Primates2016 was challenging and I am very much aware that I am on a journey in relation to how we live in Communion.  Recognising we're called by the one Spirit, to witness to the love of God made manifest in Jesus Christ, yet worshipping and living in radically different contexts. I find myself drawn to a hopeful, challenging, irenic place.  That's costly. It expresses both a range of loves and relationships; it risks a bigger vision of God's Kingdom.  I keep thinking of my late supervisor Dan Hardy - renowned for saying 'it's more complicated than that'.  However, at this point I cannot give up hope for reconcilation, deepening trust and mutual affection. The readings were 1 Corinthians 12:1-11; John 2:1-11. The conversation afterwards was stimulating, honest and somehow  oriented to God's future.

The opening airport scene of Love Actually is full of moments of loving recognition: Regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, health or status human love is poured out in hugs, kisses, embraces. From Heathrow to Guildford Station, we've all been there: waiting, scanning the crowd, glimpsing love.

The Prime Minister, played by Hugh Grant, says: 'Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport. General opinion's starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don't see that. It seems to me that love is everywhere.  Often it's not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it's always there...'

To embrace expresses the risk and vulnerability of love - you stand, arms flung wide; waiting and hoping that the other will respond. You embrace, enfolded for a moment in wordless affection. That's but the beginning. For embrace then means letting go, stepping back, moving on. Embracing whatever might unfold.

Embrace risks openness to the other: the lonely, ostracised and busy; the self-sufficient, judgemental and weary. As a Communion, we face most acutely the hope and  pain of being in relationship: the desire to maintain conversation and build trust, the deep hurt  of alienation and the depth of our difference.  Today's  Gospel  of overwhelming abundance meets us in this broken middle.

Jean Vanier in his poetic and prophetic commentary on John, describes marriage as a covenant of love a 'sign of sacred union, enfolded in love, that enables people to grow in forgiveness, tenderness, kindness and compassion'.  Having recently contributed a chapter to a book that seeks to think again about marriage, the fruitfulness of such exclusive intimacy is, I think, important precisely because it looks beyond the bonding of human sexuality.

Jean Vanier: Drawn into the Mystery of Jesus through the Gospel of John 

That bonding becomes a sign of a love that is radically "more than".  Marriage is a public and inclusive relationship which can be a sign of the abundance of love that cannot be possessed but only given.  The paradox is that as two become one, space is created for a third - and for many others - in hospitality, compassion, generosity. Things extend beyond the couple into a multiplication of love.

Cana is about wine in abundance.  Vast quantities of water are transformed.  The ordinary becomes excellent.  It is enjoyed when the guests have already had plenty to drink.  But this generosity and abundance comes from a place of lack.

The party is in full swing, noone is paying attention to the potential crisis of grumbling guests and an embarrassed couple. One person does notice. It is Mary who pays attention. It is Mary who trusts Jesus. Their exchange is opaque. But perhaps it alerts us to the deep awareness that what is about to happen is not merely the alleviation of a potential social disaster; rather it is sign of the breadth and depth of love, actually.

Yes, this is about abundance of life and joy, which increases our capacity to receive, and therefore give, even more love.

Yes, it is a glimpse of our ultimate reality when God's love will be all in all.

Yes, it reveals our deepest desires to be known and loved.

But, when does this abundance manifest itself?

When the wine runs out, when there is nothing left, transformation occurs.

When we are most vulnerable, most wounded, most broken, most fearful, love is there.

When we lack everything, when hopes are crushed, in the face of terrible loneliness, the anguish of exclusion, even there is love.

When others seek to dominate or control, when the vanities of power, ambition or moral superiority come to the fore, when fragmentation seems all but inevitable; may be love is there.

When walking together seems impossible and mutual affection inexpressible; perhaps love is especially there.

When the cost of our loving is painful, when those who love face prejudice and violence, and when our own lack of love falls short: there, most generously, is love.

None of us can be written out of this story of abundant love.

To return to Jean Vanier, 'our desire for love is not a hoax, awakening in us a thirst for an unattainable, infinite, eternal love that can be quickly crushed by the limits and brokenness in us all. We are not cheated of love; love is possible'.

If this is our ultimate hope, how do we move forward when at a human or institutional level we feel cheated?

In part the answer lies in the moment we see Mary with her son our saviour in the final chapters of John. Jesus' hour has come. The consumption of excellent wine at a wedding reveals the abundance of God's love; the water and blood flowing from his pierced side, reveals the depth and cost of that love.

This is glory: the refusal to refuse to love.

At this Eucharist we are caught up in that - continuing to break bread; continuing to partake of one cup.  We do so in a fearless hope that this is not the end. Just as water was turned into rich wine, so the poverty of our human nature is transformed by the riches of his grace. It is only in the renewal of our lives that God's glory breaks through. And not in the renewal of our  lives alone, but those of our brothers and sisters in America, Pakistan, Nigeria, Australia and Mexico.

On Friday, Michael, the Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church said: 'The pain for many will be real. But God is greater than anything. I love Jesus and I love the church. I am a Christian in the Anglican way. And like you, as we have said in this meeting, I am committed to 'walking together' with you as fellow Primates in the Anglican family'.

May we remain committed to walk together, bearing the pain, hope and bewilderment.  May we walk together because the marginalised need the prophetic; the persecuted need visionaries; the proud need the humble. As in marriage, so in the church, love is abundant. The more it gives, the more it receives, in order to give.

Radical love cannot be an exclusive club; it has to be an inclusive witness.

In washing feet, the Primates stayed together.  Perhaps what Archbishop Justin has risked in reconciliation, is the possibility of the transformation of the Anglican Communion - where fear and rejection will be replaced by trust and affection, where reproach will be transfigured by grace.

Paul reminded the fragile and fractious Corinthian church  'No one can say "Jesus is Lord" except by the Holy Spirit'. More than ever, we need the affirmation of the varieties of gifts, service and activity; of wisdom, knowledge and healing.


©  Julie Gittoes 2016

Our basic human situation

And loneliness swept over her like a rushing wind, mysterious as the thin tears that covered her eyes suddenly, too thin to be noticed, she knew, as she lifted her head and glanced at the doorway again. 

A fleeting insight into overwhelming and incomprehensible loneliness; a glimpse into the heart of Therese at the very end of the Patricia Highsmith's novel Carol.  Todd Haynes has turned the book into a beautiful BAFTA nominated film, in which Cate Blancett embodies Carol with subtlety and power.

It's a psychologically complex narrative; an erotic novel in which love costs. Attraction, hostility, curiosity, vulnerability, misunderstandings, hopes - the process of making moral sense is laid bare. Highsmith conjures up an emerging world, distant yet familiar: perfume and cigarette smoke;  departmental stores and cafeterias; a mother buying a doll; a wife in the midst of divorce.

According to Therese's definition, it's a classic: something with a basic human situation.

Something of our human situation was captured in the BBC's The Age of Loneliness. Regardless of age, marital status, gender, health, sexuality, social or economic circumstance people sought to express the in expressible pain of being lonely.

Any reimagining of Body of Christ must also start with paying deep attention to the basic human situation. Why? Because that is where God meets us and because that's where we are called to meet others. In multiple encounters in worship and daily life, we become more fully Christ's Body.

Our reimagining is a way of life and a story of reconciliation. It is love that endures, hopes and transforms. It is love in fleeting human gesture and sustained social engagement. It is love that is with us and with others, even in face of disagreement. Love is prophetic: patiently impatient, enlivened by God's daring Spirit. In short, it's generous.

Today we keep the Feast of the Baptism of Christ, we continue to reflect on the mystery of God with us, the manifestation of God's love.  Perhaps it is as we recall Jesus Christ standing on the muddy banks of the Jordan that we are drawn into the depths of God's love for us.

In the Word made flesh, Godself identifies with our basic human situation in all its complexity.  The one who made us becomes one of us. Such our Feast reminds us of our calling as members of the body of Christ - and perhaps think though what that means in our own lives and contexts.

In worship, we hold before God, our desires and fears, our grief and fragility, our intellects and responsibilities; all that haunts us, even the mysterious loneliness that sweeps over us.  Here, our basic human situation is touched by God's love for us. In the silences that fall at the end of phrase...  or as the chord fades  away, we attend to soft echoes of mercy and grace. In the intimacy of our gathering together and in the spaces between us, we glimpse a hoped for reconciliation.

Paul in his letter to the Romans grapples with the reality of our human nature. He grapples with equal passion with God's faithful and loving response. Tonight we catch a but a glimpse of how he works this out - his argument is in full flow. If God's response to sin, is forgiveness, should we continue living as before that we might experience more grace?  No, he says, because we are caught in a new reality. A new reality that breaks into our basic human situation.

Paul knew all about misdirected desires - greed, rivalry, lust, abusive of power.  He wrestled with the guilt of doing what we sought to avoid; the betrayal of broken relationships; the mistrust of self and other. Like us, he saw creativity and compassion in human lives, and the echoes of God's love in our cries for justice and liberty. In his prison cell, perhaps he too knew the rushing wind of loneliness.

His letter is rooted in the assurance was that God's response to our human situation, was to meet us in it. Jesus identified with us in the burdens we carry - freeing us from the glittering prizes that seduce us. Encounter by encounter, step by step, Jesus' spoke words of freedom, love, challenge and forgiveness.  In the agony of the cross and the coldness of the grave, he plumbed the very depths of alienation.  In his resurrection power, light and glory break through. In the waters of, baptism our identity is reconfigured in him. Our old self is no more; we are set free.

Walk in the newness of life, says Paul.

Walking is a significant word in our thinking for what it is to be members of Christ's Body.  To think of ourselves as a body means we are called to walk in the world, just as Jesus did. Every gesture, encounter, task and conversation is an opportunity to make manifest God's love. This body isn't reducible to a building or an institution. We are a worshipping people, a pilgrim people; led by the Spirit, we reflect God's love.

This new life is revealed in gradual shifts in character - as we learn to be a little more patient, joyful, kind.  It bears fruit in the diligence of our research and as we collaborate with others in the pursuit of wisdom.  It's seen as we delight in the other; in extending hospitality; in a risk taking generosity that sees beyond the surface of things.  Walking in the newness of life is a foretaste of God's Kingdom. We see glimmers - light reflected in the darkness.

Isaiah speaks of an abundant feast overflowing with richness. He kindles a vision where those who have nothing are nourished by goodness. The bread that satisfies is the Word made flesh. We  taste and see the love of God broken bread; in receiving his body is nourished and sent out. In a generation of increasingly loneliness - and increasing inequality - the life of the Body of Christ needs to resist being so preoccupied with its inner life that we fail to be compelling witness to God's healing love.

Generosity flows from God, a gift to the world; a compelling light that demands our attention:  as Dan Hardy put it: The truth and purposes of God are 'refracted' – as it were spread like a band of colour – in other forms of life and thought; and the purpose of theology is to rediscover the dynamic of God's life and work in this 'band of colour' and from it.

That's a good summary of the vocation of the Body of Christ too. We pay attention to the intensity of the light of God in worship, abiding in faithful love  and receiving forgiveness.  We also pay attention to the refracted light in our world - walking as Jesus did conversation by conversation.

Such an imagining of the Body is costly for we carry with us the pain and prejudices of our world. Such an imagining of the Body is vulnerable as we carry within us the joys and longings of our world. Perhaps a global level we pray for a reimagined  and generous Body as the Primates meet in Canterbury:  refined by God's love in prayer, attentive to God's love in the cries of the world.

How we reimagine the Body of Christ will unfold over the term - from the digital to the erotic, the resurrected and the imprisoned. For now, dare we extend the sphere of intimacy in response to the other, bringing a balm in loneliness; dare we extend our compassion to the other, out of the vulnerability of our loneliness ?

May generosity,  that is the Spirit's gift, sweep over us, mysterious and radiant. Not so thin it goes unnoticed; but that others walk with us in Christ's steps.


©  Julie Gittoes 2016

Text of a sermon preached at Jesus College,  Cambridge on 10th January 2016: Isaiah 55:1-11 and Romans 6: 1-11

What about him?

A sermon preached at Guildford Cathedral: St John the Evangelist - 1 John 1; John 21: 19b-end

Call the Midwife, Strictly Come Dancing, Eastenders, Doctor Who: just some of the familiar 'stories' and seasonal 'specials' which have dominated the TV schedules over the last 48 hours. The Christmas Day ratings battle was won by an ongoing saga, described by The Telegraph as a 'posh fantasy'.  Downton Abbey delivered a festive round of 'happy endings'.

A straw poll of my Facebook friends revealed that I'm not alone in not having watched a single episode.  Yet we, the detractors and the indifferent, couldn't escape the comment before, during and after this 'final special episode'.  It's been ridiculously successful example of what one friend called 'fictious nostalgic goo'.

After 6 seasons of class drama, made up of increasingly tenuous sub-plots, Lady Edith got married.

Fans may well be rejoicing at this saccharine conclusion.  But will we talk about it in the same breath as Brideshead or Barchester? Will the witty put downs of the Dowager Duchess become as well rehearsed as lines from Friends or the wisdom of The West Wing?

We'll remember the cultural phenomenon; but there'll soon be a new contender for the top slot on Sunday nights. I doubt that Lord Fellowes will say tomorrow morning: 'many other things Lady Edith did - if everyone of them were dramatised, I suppose the world itself could not contain the DVD box sets that would be produced'.

That said, the curiosity and possible jealousy of Peter's 'what about him?', as he looks back at the Beloved Disciple, might be worthy of Lady Mary's rivalry. Jesus' response sounds like a stinging rebuke; a parental 'never you mind' to a fractious sibling.

Eugène Burnand - The Disciples Peter and John 

Running to the Sepulchre on the Morning of the Resurrection (1898)

The exchange between Peter and Jesus about reveals something of human capacity for comparison and resentment; but what is it saying about the nature of our calling as disciples? The text focuses on the Apostle Peter on the day we celebrate John's ministry as an Evangelist; yet by including it, perhaps we are drawn back to the one to whom they both witness. At the heart of this story is the word of life, Jesus himself.

The phrase 'follow me' is on Jesus' lips when he meets the first disciples; he repeats them when he likens himself to the good shepherd, laying dow his life for the sheep.  And now, having overcome death, the risen Lord continues to invite disciples to follow him.

Yet Peter struggles to embrace his calling without asking that honest question 'what about him?'

For each of us, response to God's call in our lives is deeply personal. It's an individual journey taking us into the intimacy of friendship and family life, equipping us to use our gifts and training in business, the public sector, creativity or voluntary  service.  It's a journey that draws us to abide with God in worship and which sends us out, as we walk in God's ways in the world.

We do all this in the company of others.  The person next to you today who offers you a smile, a word encouragement or concern; the person who two, ten, twenty or sixty years ago nurtured you in the faith; the person we've yet to meet who might discern in us gifts that build up and bless others.

The risk of journeying together is that we face the temptation to compete; to want to know what someone else is doing. Sometimes we want to control or direct them; or to envy their particular talent, work or energy.

That's when we hear Jesus' words to Peter: that's not your concern, your job is simply to follow.

No one else can do what you're called to do in his name - embrace that, step by step.

Ultimately, all that is entrusted to us, from the cash in our pocket to our very breath, belongs to God.

Like Peter, we acknowledge our shortcomings and the things that distract us.  Like him,  day by day we place our trust in God's faithfulness and love.  That assurance draws us out of ourselves, into relationship to others. Our following becomes an act of witness.

In word and gesture; in the authenticity of our character; in our capacity to be a little more patient or generous, joyful or kind: the Spirit is at work in us. In the Spirit's power we make manifest the love, light and glory of God, who was in Christ reconciling the world to himself.

We do that individually. We do that differently. We do that together. We do that in God.

Peter was called to be a rock, a servant leader of God's people. John was called to be a theologian, a story teller in God's world. John outran Peter to the empty tomb; yet, in love, they are both called to follow. They are both called to invite others to become God's beloved.

To be beloved disciples we must abide in God, dwelling in Christ and being inspired by the Holy Spirit.  The words of John are an invitation to that pattern of life.   The founder of the L'Arche community, Jean Vanier writes in his commentary:  'In the Gospel of John, I have come to see that to pray is above all to dwell in Jesus and let Jesus dwell in me. It is not first and foremost to say prayers, but to live in the now of the present moment, in communion with Jesus'.

That deep longing for God answers our human restlessness; that communion with God fulfils our desires; that unity with God and each other becomes the wellspring of our life and love. Two thousand years after John's witness we still declare that God is with us; that we have seen his glory. It takes us beyond fictional happy endings, like Lady Edith's, into costly yet abundant life.

John's retelling of the mystery of the incarnation is intensely particular. It is about the Word which was with God being with us. It is about the identity of the one who says 'I am':  the bread of life; the true vine; the light of the world.

John's declaration of what was from the beginning is also radically inclusive, daring and abundant: we abide with God in the same intimacy of Father and Son because of the power of the Spirit.

Our epistle is an ecstatic, heartfelt  and joyous outpouring of this spiritual fellowship in which we share.

This is the message: God is light and in him there is no darkness at all.

This is our calling: to walk in light as he himself is the light.

Here at this Eucharist we acknowledge our shortcomings and hear afresh God's words of forgiveness. Today we hear again that call to follow and receive the assurance that we are beloved. In bread and wine, we are nourished by the word of life; and in response to the final words of our service, we become the tangible and embodied proclamation of God's love.

Jean Vanier expresses our calling in this way: 'My hope and prayer is that we, as faltering followers and friends of Jesus, will continue seeking to dwell in him - just as he seeks to dwell in us. This seeking will challenge each of us to open ourselves to the pain of humanity and to become friends with those who are weak, broken, rejected and in need. Together, I pray we may rise up in the new life promised to all where we will know God'.

© Julie  Gittoes  2015