WISDOM IN THE SECRET PLACES

Psalm 51 prays ‘O Lord, grant me wisdom in the secret places of the heart’. Jesus taught that ‘your Father who is in the secret place sees what is done in secret.’ Lent is not a time for outward piety it is a time for visitng the secret place of the heart where our Heavenly Father waits for us.

Ash Wednesday Gospel and Sermon

THINKING ABOUT SIN AND THE SECRET PLACE OF THE HEART.

 

One of the ways I help children understand what the word ‘Sin’ means is to think about ‘S’ standing for ‘ being selfish’;  when we think only of what is best for ourselves and don’t think of the needs or feelings of other people. ‘I’ stands for all those times when I say ‘I will or I won’t do that’. ‘N’ stands for saying ‘No’ to God’s commandments. This usually proves a useful way of helping the children understand that ‘sin; is not something on the edge of life but something that is mixed up with everything we do or think. Experience shows that when children begin to understand how difficult it is to be free of sin then they begin to understand how amazing the love of Jesus is. They see that we need to be saved and that we have a Saviour.

This stands in marked contrast with much of my experience of adults. It sometimes would appear that rather reflect on the meaning of ‘sin’ many people have erased it from their vocabulary. It would seem that we live in a sinless society. Instead of selfishness we have that oft repeated phrase ‘I/you owe it my/yourself’. Instead of the ‘I’ of wilful imposition of my will on others there is the clarion call to ‘be myself’. When it comes to saying ‘No’ to God’s commandments there is a woeful ignorance of what they are or, what is even worse , a straightforward rejection of the Word of God as out of date or irrelevant. Everything that is wrong in life would appear to be someone else’s fault!

Much of modern church liturgy says very little about ‘Sin’ and the penitential aspect of corporate prayer lacks conviction. This is particularly striking if, like me, one is a regular user of the Book of Common Prayer where the General Confessions have the genius to be both corporate and personal expressions of heartfelt penitence. Phrases like ‘the memory of them is grievous unto us, the burden of them is intolerable’ would not find a place in many modern service booklets. It is a simple fact that we don’t ‘do sin’ very well at the moment.

Lent is a good time to think again about sin. Do you consider yourself to be ‘sinful’? How do you begin to engage with God in a spirit of penitence and open your heart in need to the Lord? Scripture is the best place to begin ‘If we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us’ Be straight with God; ask for grace to know where your life is at enmity with Him. Two prayer exercises that I have found helpful I offer as possible ways to a deeper penitence. The first is to reflect on the saying of Jesus ‘ I call you friends’ – consider Jesus’ friendship to you and then ask yourself ‘am I a good friend to Jesus?’ The second is from the Ignatian Exercises, in your imagination place yourself before Jesus on the cross and ask three questions of him’ what have I done for you, what am I doing for you, what should I do for you?’ Then go and make your confession.

 

MAN CANNOT LIVE ON BREAD ALONE

George Herbert, the sixteenth century Anglican Priest and Poet wrote about the Country Parson that it was on the words of scripture ‘that he doth both suck and live.’ I like the image of ‘sucking’ the goodness out of the Word. It has echoes of the collect through which we ask God that we might ‘read, mark, learn and inwardly digest’ scripture, that by the ‘comfort and inspiration of the Holy Spirit we may attain at last to everlasting life.’ This ‘chewing over’ or turning over of scripture in the mind and heart is also known by the name of ‘lectio divina’ –‘ holy reading’.

It is a reminder to our generation who enjoy  the printed word as ever present and ever accessible that the words of Holy Scripture are precious – they are a treasure trove of multi –faceted light filled diamonds of beauty and truth. To return to the digestive theme – they are finely crafted dishes of the rarest and purest ingredients. This leads me to offer some thoughts about Bible Reading in Lent!

There are two contrasting ways of using Lent to place oneself in the light of God’s Word through Scripture. One is to set about reading large chunks of it; biting off more than one can chew! One suggestion is to take one of the Gospels and read it as one would a short story or a long article, and then do the same with another book of the Bible. This can help in completing and confirming often fragmentary knowledge; it will also lead the reader into seldom visited parts of the Bible. Both of these benefits will be a certain source of light and encouragement. I am not a great advocate of beginning on page one and then ploughing on; that seems to me a slightly unintelligent way to approach scripture – as much of the material in Exodus is repeated through to Deuteronomy and the same is true in the history books. It is far better to take one book and get to know it well. Lent is also a good time to get to grips with the Passion Narratives of the Gospels in their entirety, and for reading ‘around’ other scripture passages we hear on a Sunday.

The other way is the masticating way. To begin select a morsel – perhaps from the readings for next Sunday and read through them as if they were a menu. When something appeals (or appals) one’s spiritual appetite carefully select it and then read, mark, learn and inwardly digest it; ‘suck and live’ in it. It need only be a verse or two – something to carry and chew over in the heart and mind. Let it become part of your continuous mental reflection. In this way it will open and deepen your prayer moment by moment. St Ignatius Loyola had good advice about this kind of prayer. He suggests that if such prayer is nourishing one should stay with it until one is ‘satisfied with its goodness’. There is no need to rush at these things; this is not an agenda to complete but a whole menu to savour. It takes time. As the waiter might say ‘enjoy’!

 

Advent Poetry – Judgement

JUDGEMENT

For the last of our three evenings exploring three of the four ‘last things’ we turn to Judgement. As we pray in the Te Deum at Morning Prayer ( and in more traditional funeral rites) –‘ we believe (Christ) that thou shalt come to be our judge, come Lord help your people bought with the price of your own  blood and bring them with your saints to glory everlasting.’ This petition to Jesus prays to the one who we call  the ‘ merciful redeemer’. But , he is only able to exercise mercy for he has power to condemn. In Advent we look not only to the individual judgement we must face but also the final judgement on the last day when there will be a  ‘general resurrection and reckoning’.Jesus pointed to the initial judgement beyond death in the parable of Dives and Lazarus – where poor Lazarus is placed in paradise and the self centred Dives in hell ‘betwixt which there is no way of crossing’; and  this same judgement is explained in detail by St Paul  ( 2 Corinthians 5 v 10) ‘ for we must appear before the judgement seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due to him for things done while in the body, whether good or bad.’ This is the first judgment after the ‘first or physical death’.

 

In Advent we meditate with particular attention to the second judgement at the end of time – The ‘parousia’ or ‘second coming’ praying to be spared from the ‘second death’ of Revelation Chapter 20 v 13ff ‘The sea gave up the dead and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what he had done. The death and Hades were thrown in the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. If anyone’s name was not found in the book of life, he has thrown into the lake of fire.’

 

Here we are talking of a process of time out of time, so it is in a way futile to consider any sequence, but there is a state between the two judgements – between the ‘fire and the fire’ and this is heaven, paradise – this is a place of worship and adoration of ‘being in communion’ it also a time of ‘rest and waiting’. So first there is death and judgement, then the parousia the final act of God in history and the last judgement, and then the New Creation – the New Jerusalem. This is the Advent Hope – the chain of events leading to the recreation of all things of which the first coming at Bethlehem was the first ‘historic act’.

We live in an in-between time where we walk by faith and not by sight. As St Paul again writes to the Corinthians ( 2 Cor. 4 v 16). ‘Therefore we do not lose heart .. for our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that outwits them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporal, what is unseen is eternal.’

 

Reformed Christians have seen the process as dominated by individual faith in the redeeming love of Jesus. They trust that heart felt repentance brings forgiveness and entry in to the heavenly places. A good example of this are some verses for a poem by Joseph Addison( 1672 -1719)  – known in his time as a politician more than a poet.

 

From – The Last Judgement.

 

But thou [Jesus] has told the troubled mind,

Who does her sins lament,

The timely tribute of her tears

Shall endless woe prevent.

 

Then sees the sorrows of my heart

Ere yet it be too late

And hear my Saviour’s dying groans

To give those sorrows weight.

 

For never shall my soul despair

Her pardon to procure,

Who knows thine only Son has died

To make her pardon sure.

 

There we have it – salvation by faith. This leaves those without faith in a predicament at death – one that has been the impetus for much evangelism. There remains the question of what happens to those who deny Christ at the first judgement? For the more fundamentalist protestant the best that they can say is ‘it’s in God’s hands and he in merciful, but there is nothing that can be done but trust God.’ This is largely the position – if rather vague – of ‘middle of the road Anglicanism’. It is a logical outworking of the picture of heaven and hell in the parable of Dives and Lazarus – there is a gulf and who can cross it?

But there is a paradox here even in the New Testament where there was a clear concern for those who had died before the coming of Christ – this is the main topic of Thessalonians Chapter 1. St Paul also refers to the practice – which was obviously well established – of being baptised in the name of the dead’ so that they might share the benefits of the death and resurrection of Christ. 1 Corinthians 15 29ff ‘ Now if there is no resurrection, what will those do who are baptised for the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptised for them?’

It would seem that the church on earth can make a difference to the church beyond death. Prayer for the dead that they may receive the fullness of God’s mercy at the time of judgement has always been part of Christian life – the Eucharists held in the Catacombs on the anniversary of a death of a loved one are an early example. This is became highly developed in the Middle Ages with the establishment of chantries – places of prayer for the departed. (Edenham had five Chantry Priests at the dissolution of the Augustinian Priory in 1539) This was matched by a highly developed doctrine of purgatory (cleansing or purging) with is still a doctrine in the Roman Catholic Church.

It was the imaginary journey of a soul through death into purgatory that inspired J H Newman’s the Dream of Gerontius. Written first in fragments on scraps of paper he made a fair copy in 1865 – when it was published in a Jesuit periodical. In 1900 Elgar set it to music but it was not until 1930 that an uneditied version was performed in an Anglican Cathedral – so repugnant was (and to a great extent is) the concept of purgatory and the idea of intercession for the dead by the living, the offering of masses for the soul, and the prayers of the saints as an aid to eternal salvation.

As an Anglican you ‘pay your money and you take your choice’ to my mind the concept of a continuing journey and enlightenment beyond death is not repugnant to the Word of God, and clearly some people have further to go than others when they die if the destination is knowledge of God and knowledge of self –‘to be known as I am known.’ I always pray for the departed and trust they pray for me!

In this passage Gerontius ( which simply means old man) is taken to purgatory by his guardian angel – who calls himself ‘ the angel of the agony.’

 

Softly and gently, dearly –ransomed soul,

In my most loving arms I now enfold thee,

And o’er the penal waters, as they roll,

I poise thee and I lower thee, and carefully

I dip thee in the lake

And thou without a sob or resistance

Dost through the flood thy rapid passage take

Sinking deep, deeper, in to the dim distance

 

 

Angles to whom the willing task is given

Shall tend, and nurse, and lull thee as thou liest

And Masses on earth and prayers in heaven

Shall aid thee at the throne of the most highest.

 

Farewell for not for ever! Brother dear,

Be brave and patient on thy bed of sorrow

Swiftly shall pass thy night of trial here,

And I will come and wake thee on the morrow!

 

 

However we may respond to these two ends of the spectrum when it comes to understanding our judgement we hope and pray in Advent that The Lord will come again swiftly – ‘with clouds descending’ and ‘end our sojourn here,’ ‘to make the new heavens and the new earth where righteousness dwell and God will wipe away every tear from our eye.’

 

And to end a wonderful poem by Jeremy Taylor ( 1613- 67) an Anglican Priest who was imprisoned three times during the civil war and is most famous for his ‘ Holy Living and Holy Dying’. No doubt in his times of persecution Taylor would pray for the Lord to come swiftly! One can see the inspiration for this poem in reading the Gospel for Advent Sunday in the Book of Common Prayer ( which recounts the arrival of Jesus in Jerusalem and the cleansing of the temple’.

 

Hymn for Advent

 

Lord, come away!

Why dost thou stay?

The road is ready and thy paths made straight

With longing expectation wait

The consecration of thy beauteous feet.

Ride on triumphantly; behold we lay

Our lusts and proud will in thy way!

 

Hosanna! Welcome to our hearts! Lord here

Thou hast a temple too; and full as dear

As that of Sion, and as full of Sin:

Nothing but thieves and robbers dwell therein;

Enter and chase them forth and cleanse the floor

Crucify them, that they may never more

Profane thy holy place

Where thou hast set thy face!

And then if our stiff tongues shall be

Mute in the praise of thy deity

The stones of the temple wall

Shall cry aloud and call

Hosanna! Anf thy glorious footsteps greet.

 

Maranatha! Come Lord Jesus!

Hymn for Advent

 

Lord, come away!

Why dost thou stay?

The road is ready and thy paths made straight

With longing expectation wait

The consecration of thy beauteous feet.

Ride on triumphantly; behold we lay

Our lusts and proud will in thy way!

 

Hosanna! Welcome to our hearts! Lord here

Thou hast a temple too; and full as dear

As that of Sion, and as full of Sin:

Nothing but thieves and robbers dwell therein;

Enter and chase them forth and cleanse the floor

Crucify them, that they may never more

Profane thy holy place

Where thou hast set thy face!

And then if our stiff tongues shall be

Mute in the praise of thy deity

The stones of the temple wall

Shall cry aloud and call

Hosanna! Anf thy glorious footsteps greet.

 

 

 

Lincoln Cathedral (2)

 

This space:

A foretaste of heaven;

spangled with sound.

Is built on bones.

 

So many

For so long

Have sought to have a place here.

Now

Marked by brass or stone

They sought permanence

In this house of God.

 

Walked over

And ignored;

They are a curiosity.

Some are faintly ridiculous:

Old honours  unregarded;

Decades of service

Mocked by centuries.

 

The building itself

Has a ridiculous quality;

It’s only flesh

The thin skin

Of bread

Lifted high

In the side chapel,

Built for yet

more bones.

 

 

 

 

 

Confess your sins to one another ( Letter of James)

It has struck me very forcibly in recent months how I have not been diligent enough in teaching about and encouraging the practice of making a personal confession – the sacrament of reconciliation. Find below a letter distributed through the parishes before Advent Sunday and a recording of last Sunday’s homily at Swinstead ( apologies for the sound quality – I didn’t use a microphone!)

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

I am writing to you to encourage you to make Advent a special time in your spiritual life. I realise that it is an extremely busy time in home, work and school and that you may feel you haven’t got much time left for ‘church’; nevertheless, I want you to make the most out of one of the richest times in the our Christian calendar. There are some small steps you can make: use a devotional Advent calendar, use a copy of the daily readings available in church, make writing your Christmas cards an opportunity of prayer and thanksgiving to God for your family and friends, use an Advent ring at home to reflect the light of Christ coming to share our lives.

Advent mirrors Lent as a penitential season – a season for self-examination and renewed devotion to Jesus. One of the ways of taking up this invitation to renewal and reconciliation is through the sacrament of Confession – sometimes called the Sacrament of Reconciliation. This is always available to any individual in the Church of England; indeed some parishioners make a regular confession part of their rule of life. It is a great pity that this is so few, and this means there are many of you who have not experienced the light and healing that comes with the certainty of God’s forgiveness.

Some people will say ‘I don’t need to do that to know God forgives me’ and I will answer ‘that’s true’. However, there is a big ‘but’ – but without the prayerful preparation for a confession how do you know what needs forgiving? Are there some things ‘done and not done’ you have buried or ignored? What is the effect of these ‘buried burdens’ having on your health and well being? How do you know your need for God (which is the source of all blessing and communion) if you never examine the working of your heart?

There is another reason why confession should be more a ‘routine’ part of life rather than an extraordinary or ‘odd’ event. In the Church of England Confession has always been the setting for ‘Ghostly Counsel’ – that is to say spiritual help and guidance.

It may be you don’t want to make your confession to me – that is understandable and we can talk about that. I can arrange for other Priests to be available. I do hope that you will not just cast about for excuses but respond to the invitation. Please contact me to find out more.

Baptism by spirit and fire

HOSPITALITY – A FEW THOUGHTS BEFORE CHRISTMAS

Hospitality is a gift of the Holy Spirit and as such is used by the Lord to build up the Body of Christ and extend his Kingdom. As the Christmas season approaches with all its hospitable opportunities it is timely to ask the questions –‘ is this a gift I have and am I being a faithful steward of it?’ There are some people who do not have either the gift or the wherewithal to offer hospitality; but, there will be some readers although reticent to be hospitable ought to be more confident in opening up their home to others. There is no doubt that where hospitality is offered the Holy Spirit is at work.

In reading the Gospels we are aware that although ‘there was no room at the inn’ the holy family began their ministry through welcoming both the shepherds and the magi to their temporary home. Throughout the ministry of Jesus the evangelists report how Jesus was able to teach and heal because individuals and families ‘welcomed him into their home.’

 

We are told in Acts Chapter 2 that the ‘community of the resurrection’ shared their meals in each others homes ‘with unaffected joy.’ The epistles of St Paul are punctuated with thanks to those who offer hospitality. The ‘house church movement’ of the early church was indeed founded on the gift of hospitality. Having lived with an ‘open door policy’ as a parish priest and retreat house warden for the best part of thirty years I do not have a romantic or idealistic view of hospitality. To begin with it is hard physical work – the preparation and clearing up of food, drink, rooms is often hidden and ‘thankless’. All true hospitality has a cost and very little of it is financial. If you resist the impulse to be hospitable – to send that invitation or make that call – is it just ‘deadly sloth’ that is the cause? If it is – it needs kicking out of the house immediately.

There is also present in the ministry of hospitality a call to be ‘vulnerable’. We are often resistant to ‘opening up’ our homes, because we are fearful of opening up our hearts and lives to others. This is understandable but can provide a certain lack of faith in God and his presence in others, and a regrettable. ‘hardness of heart’. The truth about hospitality is that it a challenge to live a ‘gospel – shaped ‘life: it is about giving and receiving, at looking at the needs of others rather than ourselves. It is also ‘Christ – centred’ for the exercise of Christian hospitality the Christ ‘in me’ welcomes the Christ ‘in you.’ In so many ways the fellowship of the table anticipates the fellowship of the Eucharist. This in turn is a foretaste of the heaven – which has ‘many resting places.’ We ought always to remember that God is a God of hospitality. ‘Behold I stand at the door and knock, to whoever opens the door my Father and I will come in and sit and eat with him.’

Put all this into you prayers. Ask for guidance as to how you should be hospitable. As the letter to the Hebrews teaches us many by welcoming others ‘ have entertained angles unawares.’

ADVENT POETRY – HEAVEN

Address for an Advent Quiet Evening

In our second evening reflecting on three of the Advent themes with the help of poetry we approaching  the mystery of heaven. How shall we define it? A state of eternal being in communion with God? Bliss? Peace? Light? The book of Revelation of John the Divine takes up some of the images used by our Lord himself – it talks of the ‘wedding supper of the lamb’ is heaven a banquet? It might explain the paucity of poetry about heaven when we reflect we know very little – we have a few clues. It is often said that the very best in our earthly experience is a shadow of what is to come. St Augustine wrote of the ‘embrace that is not released at the satisfaction of desire.’ Out of time and space the heavenly life will be one without beginnings or endings it is simply ‘being’.

Christian mystics from St Paul and St John onwards have glimpsed the ‘heavenly realm’ a door has ‘opened into heaven.’ St John of the Cross transerved this threshold in his prayer and he wrote this about his experience.

From verses written after an ecstasy of high exaltation.

 

This summit all so steeply towers

And is of excellence so high

No human faculties or powers

Can ever to the top come nigh.

Whoever with its steep could vie,

Though knowing nothing, would transcend

All thought, forever, without end.

 

If you ask, what is its essence –

The summit of all sense and knowing:

It comes from the Divinest presence –

The sudden sense of Him outflowing,

In His great clemency bestowing

The gift that leaves men knowing naught

Yet passing knowledge with their thought.

 

 

In some way John of the Cross is saying that what he knows in impossible to share, which echoes what St Paul writes about being ‘ caught up into the third heaven’ … ‘ He heard inexpressible things, things that man is not permitted to tell.’ ( 2 Corinthians12). As Jesus said there are many things to tell  ‘but you cannot bear them now.’

 

So it is in Advent we have to live with the incompleteness of our being. In Advent we ‘to things eternal look’ for that what we were made for. Paul also writes to the Corinthians ( 2 Corinthians 5) ‘ Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed. We have a building  from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands’…  ‘ He has made us for this purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.’ As Jesus taught in John 14v 1-4 he has prepared a ‘dwelling place for us’, and that should suffice.

 

Henry Vaughan (1622 – 95) Having experienced defeat in the English Civil War, and having watched his friends die and the Church he loved suppressed came to a new spiritual understanding, and a renewal of hope –‘like sparks of fire out of the afflicted flint.’ His poem Peace is a poem about the hope of heaven.

 

This summit all so steeply towers

And is of excellence so high

No human faculties or powers

Can ever to the top come nigh.

Whoever with its steep could vie,

Though knowing nothing, would transcend

All thought, forever, without end.

 

If you ask, what is its essence –

The summit of all sense and knowing:

It comes from the Divinest presence –

The sudden sense of Him outflowing,

In His great clemency bestowing

The gift that leaves men knowing naught

Yet passing knowledge with their thought.

 

 

Somehow in talking about heaven we cannot escape the way to heaven who is Jesus – and in Vaughan’s poem the manger is present a hint of Christmas for an Advent evening.

 

Trawling through collections of poems looking for heaven – I came across this poem by Evangeline  Patterson – born in Dublin she played a large part in reengaging evangelical Christians with the arts in the second half of last century. We will give her the last word – it rings true to me – particulary the lovely image of the sunflower drenched in light. The Book of Revelation tells us ( Chapter 22 v 4ff) ‘They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign forever.’

 

AND THAT WILL BE HEAVEN.

 

and that will be heaven

 

and that will be heaven

at last     the first unclouded

seeing

 

and to stand like the sunflower

turned full face to the sun   drenched

with light   in the still centre

held    while the circling planets

hum with an utter joy

 

seeing and knowing

at last     in every particle

seen and known and not turning away

 

never turning away

again.