When I asked Julian for the notes to this sermon he replied:
Hi Ben,
All these good comments - that is a great encouragement to me.
My notes, well as I said they were on the back of a fag packet.
When I do a sermon I use bullet points only, that are hand written, don't know why but it works for me.
These are the bullet points used, I think...
- these parables, all those used so far contain much more than can read on the first reading.
- on the face of it the parable says all that there is to say - keep praying and don't give up. - but pray about what?
- review the story - judge and woman. Excellent judge not influenced by God or Man. - perfect. yet he gives into the woman. - thus making someone else lose. We have no idea of the events, if they ever occured - Christ doesn't need the detail.
- after the campaign, the judge gives in - link to "George Davis is innocent campaign".
- can we chivvy God like the woman? Would he be a God worth worshipping if we could?
- what if we pay for justice?
- Jesus does promise in the text to give justice, but do WE want to receive justice from God - I don't!!! I know what I've done.
- so God takes on the role of the judge and gives us what we want - freedom from judgement, then somebody has to pay - Christ.
- Jesus says - God will give them justice soon enough - when he is on the cross, then he loses, and we like the woman win, whether we deserve it or not.
- in OT - Judges (good link) Israel did what they wanted and God raised up a local superpower to sort them out.
- in NT - God puts himself on the cross for us - giving justice at the expense of someone else. (himself)
- Jesus finishes by asking will the Son of God on his return find faith - earlier chapter was talking about the end days.
- aside judgement day - no list of wrongs will be published, however big or small because Christ has already paid the bill.
- the justice we seek is to be in God's Book of Life - Luke 10 - v20
- we live in a time when faith is under pressure - big time - we need to focus and not be drawn into unimportant matters - including the WFC/RFC issues - lets get on with what is needed.
- we have a message of grace which no other faith has - let's use it and show the world what it means.
There - I think that covers it - sure to have missed something, but these are the main bits.
See you - regards, Julian.
Thanks Julian!
Tuesday 3 April 2007
The Unjust Judge (Luke18:1-8)
Monday 12 March 2007
The Rich Man and Lazarus - Luke 16:19-31
Introduction
We are continuing our series in parables. Parables are stories – controversial, challenging, disturbing, often with a twist, something we don’t expect. They work at different levels – say different things to different people – depending on who you are, where you are. This is no different.
I’ve found this one quite hard – what does it mean? What is it about? Why did Jesus tell it? Who was he addressing? Parables make us ask questions when we try and engage with them – that’s a good thing and we shouldn’t be afraid of that. . Keep looking at the blog – useful comments – you may not agree – but think! This series has really helped me go beyond what I’m reading – and that’s been really helpful to get me out of a rut.
Reading this parable, it seems to me that it speaks to different audiences at the same time – I think this is often true of the parables. And its often why they seem to be saying different things at the same time.
Let’s start by recapping on last week – because it seems to me that there is a link.
Last week – Shrewd manager – slippery Sam! Strange story – not really what you’d expect, because Jesus seems at face value to be praising dishonest behaviour, and yet as Ben pointed out – maybe not. Jesus seemed to have been addressing the disciples – yet at the end, there is a reaction from the Pharisees, so clearly they were in the audience too. Let’s look at this for a moment because I think it has a bearing on today’s parable. In vv 13 he clearly points out that you can’t serve two masters – a message I think Jesus wanted to make really clear to his disciples – really well known verses – “No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.” Now let’s look at the Pharisees reaction - in v14. “The Pharisees who loved money heard all this and were sneering at Jesus. He said to them you are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of men but God knows your hearts. What is highly valued among men is detestable in God’s sight.” The Pharisees – concerned to be “doing the right thing” very concerned about the law and how important it was – and yet something seemed to be lacking.
Let’s look at the parable for today – and I want to look at it from the standpoint of some different audiences – and by doing that see what it has to say to us.
Pharisees
Let’s start with the Pharisees – from what I’ve already said, I think they were perhaps the people Jesus was talking to. They loved money so I guess would have identified with the rich man – who doesn’t have a name. He is doing very well for himself. The poor man is a beggar, full of sores – and bothered by dogs – probably would be considered unclean by the Pharisees – and so to be avoided. Remember the Good Samaritan – the religious people passed by, afraid to become unclean. The rich man dies and is buried – Lazarus dies and is not buried.
There is a twist – it’s the beggar – the unclean, dirty, poor man who seems to now have the luxury – close to Abraham – Abraham the friend of God.- and therefore by inference – close to God.
The rich man on the other hand is in torment. Still he was rich so even in torment surely he has some influence – so he asks Abraham to send Lazarus to bring him some water. Its as if he thinks that the influence he had because of his money and wealth will still be with him. But no – there is no way. Abraham explains that there is a great chasm between them and nothing can cross. There is a finality about this.
Now it seems to dawn on the rich man – and he now wants to do something to stop his brothers facing the same torment – we see a change of heart perhaps – suddenly the reality of the situation he is in seems to dawn - now he wants Lazarus to be raised from the dead and go back and tell his brothers to warn them so they won’t have to face this torment. This is a good reaction – but it’s too late. The parable ends by saying that they have already had this information in the law – the law and the prophets already tells them what they should be doing.
This is another twist – the Law was really important to the Pharisees – they worked really hard to meet its demands and yet had missed the vital point about love and mercy towards fellow man being a vital part of a real faith.
Lazarus/The poor
Let’s look again at the story from a slightly different viewpoint – that of Lazarus or the poor.
For a start – this poor beggar has a name where the rich man doesn’t. That suggests to me that the poor matter to God. We can tend to see the poor as a faceless, nameless mass of something – somehow stripped of their individuality they become less real and almost less human. This poor beggar is named. The Pharisee saw him as something to be avoided in case it made him ritually unclean – Jesus knew his name.
The rich man died and was buried – still receiving honour and privilege because of his wealth. Lazarus dies and is carried by the angels to Abraham’s side. Now close to Abraham – the friend of God – a picture of comfort and blessing. The rich man is in torment.
The very name Lazarus means “he whom God helps” – this poor man could do nothing but trust God – he had no other way, no other means. We often hear don’t we of the amazing way God seems to be moving in countries where people are poor – we have so much else we can trust in – they have nothing but God. This was true for the rich man – he had his wealth, position, status – the poor man had nothing – but God helped him. And in the final analysis – this is what matters.
Let’s remember what Jesus himself said when he started his public ministry – Lk4: 18 – he quotes part of Is 61. “The spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour”. At the heart of Jesus ministry was this – the poor, the needy, the blind, the oppressed, the prisoners. This was a direct quote from Isaiah – the prophets – this was known to the Pharisees – known to the Jews. Interestingly when Jesus quoted this he stopped half way through v2 – which goes on “and the day of vengeance of our God”. This passage seems to give more than a hint of this sense of judgement – of God putting injustice to rights.
What about us?
As I was reading this passage in preparation – I was reminded of James letter. You see for the Pharisees – they were a real mixture – time and again Jesus said they were one thing on the outside and quite another on the inside. He described them as whitewashed tombs – looking all ok on the outside but dead inside. Think back to the Sermon on the Mount – Jesus says in Mt 6: 5 “When you pray do not be like the hypocrites, they love to pray standing in the synagogue and on street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth –they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your father who is unseen. Then your father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.” He says here as we’ve already seen – they try and look good to the eyes of men but God detests what’s in their hearts
In James letter there is a debate about faith and works – James 1:22 “Do not merely listen to the word and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.”
At the end of the parable, the rich man has a welcome change of heart. He realises that he should have done more for the poor – and he wants Lazarus to tell his brothers. This is a good desire – but too late. And actually as Abraham says – his brothers already know because care for the poor is writ large in the Law and Prophets. This is not some new revelation – this is something throughout the Old Testament.
For me the challenge of this passage is to make sure that I match on the inside and outside. To borrow a slogan from ads – does it do what it says on the tin! Some more of James 2:14 – 18 “ What good is it my brothers if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds. Can such a faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him” Go I wish you well, keep warm and well fed but does nothing about his physical needs what good is it? In the same way Faith by itself if it is not accompanied by action is dead. “
There is also the challenge that the rich man realised too late – the eternal realities of the finality of judgement. He wanted to save others from receiving the torment he had. We can forget about this reality – because it seems unreal and unclear to us now. But it is a reality. We need to tell people now while we can about their need to repent and come back to God. We need to make sure that we are living up to what we know we should be doing.
As we look to mission and all the very many different ideas that we have come up with, let’s not lose the plot. Let’s remember what’s at the heart of it.
So often we struggle to know what we should be doing and we can get stuck – but actually in very broad terms we do know. Micah 6: 6-8 …” He has shown you O man what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”
The truth is that as we walk humbly through our lives with God our whole lives, inside and out will be changed. It will affect everything. The choice before us is will we do that.
A challenge for us. I have a very violent picture for you – but one which I think helps us. Imagine your faith is like a hand grenade – with the pin in so it’s quite safe. We have a choice – do we leave the pin in – then we keep our faith “safe” – something to do on Sunday’s but that’s it. Or – do we take the pin out and let our faith permeate us through and through and make our inside and outside match.
Monday 5 March 2007
For those with a Mathematical Bent
This one made me smile when I first heard it...
One day, Jesus said to his disciples:
"The Kingdom of Heaven is like 3x squared plus 8x minus 9."
A man who had just joined the disciples looked very confused and
asked Peter:
"What, on Earth, does he mean by that?"
Peter replied:
"Don't worry - it's just another one of his parabolas."
The Unrighteous Manager - Luke 16:1-9
“Morning, Slippery Sam’s the name, surviving’s my game! I’m the master of duckin’ and divin’
My Boss, he owns all the land around here. Rich as they come he is! You should see how much money he’s got stashed away… I have, I collected most of it for him. That’s my job you see, I’m his manager, or steward. He’s too rich to do a proper day’s work like what you and me do, so ‘e pays me to do it.
My job is to go around all the folks that live on his land and collect the rent money from them, or those that sell the produce what they grow on his fields. Not always a pleasant job – now I’m not a tax collector, I’m not like them no, but some folk see me like one of them. It probably doesn’t help that sometimes I add a bit to the bill when no one’s looking and keep it for myself!
Of course I have to be careful playing that game. If my Boss sussed, well there’s no doubt that I’d be out of here, and if anyone else sussed, well that would be getting the Boss’s name a bad reputation… Catch is you see, there’s a queue of others waiting to take my place.
Why? Why do they want my job? It’s the money of course. I may not be rolling in it, but I’m a darn sight better than all these pheasants around here you know. A bit of 'agro' from the commoners is endurable if you’ve got some cash to spend.
Anyway, the other day I got in trouble, big trouble. Don’t know what it was, but that Mrs Jones, she must have realised that I’d been pulling a fast one on her, asking for too much money. I thought I’d been careful too. Anyways, whatever gave it away, she worked it out. Next thing I know the Boss has called me into his office and demanded to see the books – no not the latest Harry Potter, but the accounts where I record all that is owed to the Boss and all I’ve collected. Of course I take it to him straight away.
Did I know I was in trouble? Immediately. He’s never asked me to hand over the accounts before. Blindingly obvious that he was going to check them, and if he checked them, he would soon know that I’d been tricking him and his tenants, and taking a small share for myself. That was it. I was about to lose my job.
What’s the problem with that? This job is all I know. I couldn’t be a gardener, or a teacher. I can’t fix things. I’m no good with my hands – if you are by the way, don’t forget to sign up for the workday or the set-up teams. No, this is the only job I know, its all I can do. If the Boss sacks me for fiddling the books, then no one else is going to take me on are they? Who’d trust a cheat like me! All that would be left would be to beg. I don’t want to beg money from others…
You know sometimes when you have a problem, you can think about for hours and hours and come up with nothing? Then there are those days when something comes to you in a flash of lightening. This was one of them days.
I ran around those who hadn’t paid up yet and cut their bills…
You see, I wasn’t the only one cheating. Of course my Boss was at it too. Everyone’s doing it! The Bible says that when someone owes us something, we should get them to pay interest, to pay extra because we’ve done them a favour. No, we’re to charge them just what they’ve borrowed. Now of course, everyone ignores that don’t they. This was my plan. I’d run around everyone who hadn’t paid yet, and cancel the extra that my Boss had been demanding. That would make them happy. If they were happy and told everybody how good my Boss was to them – of course they would think my Boss had told me to do this – then my Boss would suddenly become very popular. He’d like that. And because he liked that, he would be pleased with me. If he was pleased with me, then he wouldn’t sack me. To be honest, even if he wasn’t pleased with me, he wouldn’t dare sack me, because everyone now liked me!"
*****
Reading Luke 16:1-9
This is one weird story isn’t it? Everyone in this story is being selfish and devious. What on earth are we to make of it.
Made even more confusing by Jesus’ comments that we should be like this manager. He’s called unrighteous. That’s not normally a good thing to be called, it means that you’re involved in wrong doing, and that spoils your relationship with God.
So why does Jesus say that we should be like him?
One suggestion – he is unrighteous because he is relying on ‘dirty money’ to make a living. He’s caught up in a way of life, a system that is corrupt. Jews weren’t meant to charge interest, or cheat and take money for themselves like he was. But by the end of the story, he’s stared living a different way. He’s cancelled the interest, stopped taking that little extra for himself too. And because of that, the world has become a better place. It’s changed, and those who were poor and being hard done by are being treated better.
Now of course, we know that the manager is still acting if we’re honest, selfishly, he’s only doing it for himself, but it’s a start at least. He’s beginning to leave behind wrong ways of dealing with others, and being to treat others with respect. Because of that, they are beginning to like him, and he keeps his job.
Is this Jesus’ point?
Like the manager, our lives are so intertwinned with the way the world works that no doubt there’s no end of ways in which we’re living a little bit like the manager, doing this wrong, because that’s the way its done around here, and hurting others as a result. It’s so easy just to copy everybody else and not actually stop and think about whether or not God would be pleased with what we’re doing.
The challenge of this story is to stop and think about our lives, how we live. Are there things that we’re involved in maybe deliberately or without realising it, that we need to stop and put right. Ways in which we’re not living out God’s instruction to love him and those around us.
Perhaps its in the way we shop – is what we buy harming others because they aren’t paid enough for what they grow or make for us. Is our trade fair?
What about the banks we use – do they use our money for good things, or bad things – do we even know? Is our banking ethical?
How about the amount of power we use – the more we use our cars, the more we use electricity and so on, the quicker climate change comes about. Who’s that going to affect first and hardest – it’s going to be the poor everytime. They can’t afford to protect themselves like us.
What about the way we join in gossip about celebrities, politicians or even those closer to home?
The message of this parable is that if we step away from these things, and start living fairly and with love and compassion, then the world will begin to change. Not only that, but like the manager we shall receive approval. It might not be from those around us, but God will be pleased with what we do, and what is better than that!
Friday 2 March 2007
Revisiting 'A Family in Trouble - the Prodigal Son'
After the recent sermon on 'A Family in Trouble - The Prodigal Son' this intriguing comment was posted...
I would really like to know what happened next in the story...
How did the two brothers get on after this? Were they able to get on OK ? Did the older brother "wake up" to what he'd been missing in the sense that he too had his inheritance? (I dont mean that he ran off and wasted it...)
Were they both able to forgive , forget and move on? Did the farm go from strength to strength with their joint hard work?
Or was life intolerable for all ? What do you think?
I thought this deserved a post in it's own right. So what do you think? Answers on a comment please!
Thursday 1 March 2007
100 Outreach Ideas ...revisited
With the help of a last minute push we made it - 100 outreach ideas collected in a month - 117 in fact (although there may be some repeats in there!) Thank you to all who contributed ideas. Check them out over at the original post
That was the easy part... the challenge is to get doing them!
The total has since reached 118
Monday 26 February 2007
A Family in Trouble: the Prodigal Son Revisited (Luke 15:11-23)
What’s the point! Am I bovvered? Do I care? In so many ways the younger son sounds very much like Catherine Tate’s famous adolescent. He certainly doesn’t come across as a pleasant specimen, but let’s try and get into his head and see what’s going on there.
For all Jews, life under the Romans was depressing – theirs was a highly restrictive regime. There were all sorts of rules and regulations to follow and taxes to be paid. There wasn’t too much joy in everyday life. For the Younger Son, this was compounded by his position in the family. As the younger son (you might remember an earlier sermon in this series dealing with children arguing over their inheritance) he would expect to get the smaller share of his Father’s wealth. This particular Father wasn’t as poor as many others – he had property and hired men – and so their would be something for this young man to inherit, but chances were that it wouldn’t be enough to bring him security and financial freedom. Chances were, it may not really be even enough to earn his keep from.
As the youngest Son, I suspect he probably also was desperate to be seen as a person in his own right – not his Father’s Son. Can identify with this being the son of the local headmaster in a village school. Everybody knew me, I didn’t know them. Thought I would escape when I went to Uni. – but surprised when one of my lecturers knew of me because of some connection with Mum. No doubt he was sick of always being compared to his Older Brother too.
So how could he find the freedom he so desired? The freedom to find his own identity and life the life he wanted?
His desire was to escape – up sticks and leave. Leave behind those who knew him, those who held him back or oppressed him. We know the story – he had no money and so went to his dad and asked for his inheritance.
I remember my younger cousin Alan taking a fancy to my Grandparent’s reclining garden chair, and in complete innocence asking if he could have it when Grandad died!
This Son is not so innocent. He knows I’m, sure, that what he was saying to his Dad is I wish you were dead…
I wonder if he was caught by surprise when his dad said okay and divided his property between them!
Anyway, he took the land that his dad gave him, sold it, and left, heading off to a distant land where know one knew him, and where the regime was much more relaxed. In many ways, this part of the story reminds me of what often happens when students first get to University. For the first time have some money of their own, and freedom to do what they want with it and their lives. Party time! The Younger Brother, like many students, squanders his money on wild living. I suspect though, that his living is wilder than your average student. We’re not told exactly what he got up to, but the comment by the Older Son, ‘this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes’ suggests that it was truly wild living, and not the odd party.
Not having really dealt with money before, it is no surprise that before too long he runs out of money. To make it worse, the land he has gone to is hit by severe famine. In desperate straits he ends up ‘hiring himself out’ to a Gentile – totally degrading to the Jews who prided themselves on keeping separate, pure. To make it worse, he is put to work feeding the pigs – unclean animals – and eating their food when the boss isn’t looking. There isn’t much further he could sink. He was alone, away from the safety of family and faith.
In the midst of this darkness, it says he ‘came to his senses’. If I go back to Dad and say I have sinned against Heaven and him, then maybe he’ll take me in as a worker and feed men…
Some read this to be like a conversion experience – here in the darkest pit, the Son realises the error of his ways and determines to repent and come back to his Father. I fear it is nothing of the sort! Does the phrase ‘I have sinned again heaven and you’ sound at all like a heartfelt apology? It may be true, but there is no sense of love or regret in this – except that he regrets having got himself into this mess. It really does feel as if he is working out the right set of words to get exactly what he wants
This son is really quite contemptible isn’t he! We might be able to see contributing factors behind the way he behaves, but there’s no getting away from the fact that he is a self-centred, calculating, scum-bag.
Listening to Jesus tell his story are a range of people, Pharisees, disciples, tax-collectors and various ‘sinners’. Many of them would share the Younger Son’s desire to escape from oppression. For some the dream of getting away from this life would be a real one. Reminds me of the sentiments expressed by many of my friends in Sierra Leone in West Africa. If they could they’d leave, leave behind the poverty and corruption and seek a better life elsewhere. But at the same time, they would also despair of this young man. He’d broken every rule in the book. He’d abandoned his faith, he’d dishonoured his Dad, he’d deserted his family. Worse than that in fact. By selling up his share of the property, he was forcing them to live on a smaller patch, lowering their status in the community and their security and income.
The Younger Son was taking a real risk here. There was every chance that his Dad would reject him completely here – quite right too everyone in the audience would have felt. Maybe the more generous amongst them might have some sympathy and let him come back as some servant, but he forfeited his rights… When he rehearses his line ‘I am no longer worthy to be called your Son’ he was telling the truth.
But then there’s this magical scene. The Dad sees him coming and is filled with compassion. Dignity would require the Son to come grovelling to him, but it is the other way around. The Father abandons all dignity and runs to him. He doesn’t care what everybody else thinks. He just wants his child back. He throws his arms around him and hugs him. This is the embrace of Father and Son. He calls for his best robe to be put on him, and places his ring on his finger. Kill the fattened calf, let’s celebrate the return of my lost son. He was dead, but now is alive again, lost now found.
The Father by putting on the robe and ring is treating the Younger Son as an equal – he is letting everybody know that this Son is his Son, part of His Family. There’s as always a scandal here. The mercy of this Father is beyond the scope of usual mercy. He doesn’t need to hear sorry before forgiving. He doesn’t need to see signs of repentance or to say I told you so. He pours mercy on him unconditionally, unsought for, undeserved. The only thing that matters is the restoration of his relationship with his Son.
But of course this isn’t the end of the story.
Out on the field the Older Son is working. He is the responsible one, the one who stayed behind to care for his Dad to work hard. He was a good Jewish Boy that any parent would be proud of.
Imagine what he has gone through these last months. Before his brother left, life was hard, but his leaving had made it so much worse. First of all there was the emotion strain of supporting his grieving Dad. Then there was the simple fact that they had had to make ends meet with less manpower and less land on which to do so. He had done the right thing, and all that he had to show for it was stress and sweat. His brother had swanned off having wrecked the family home, lived it up, and had now come back at was accepted without so much as a sorry and was being given a party at their expense. It wasn’t fair!!! There is certainly a lot to be said for the Older Sons complaint.
Maybe you can relate to him? I remember working alongside a bunch of guys doing community service and thinking how come you all have nice cars and gear, whilst I who have done nothing wrong have so little to show for it.
Certainly many in Jesus’ audience could relate to this. Whilst the younger Son had sought freedom in escapism, many thought that freedom would only return to the Jews if they worked harder at keeping the Law and maintaining the Jewish way of life – the Pharisees were prime examples of this. How many of us seek approval from our peers and the powers that be by working hard and striving to do the right thing?
The older son’s response to the return of the younger son would have been mirrored by many listening to Jesus.
So what does the Father do? No sooner has he got one son back, the other one threatens to leave him! He heads straight away to track him down, to try and sort things out. ‘All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so that I could celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’
The Father’s reply is again stunning, ‘My son, you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’
The truth is that his Father hadn’t given him a young goat, he’d given him everything! Right at the beginning of the story he divided up his property between them. It had been the Older Son’s choice not to use it, not to celebrate and make the most of what his Father had given him.
Is there actually a sense of regret as he lambastes his brother’s wild living – a touch of jealousy, I would have liked to have lived a little…
I love you Son, says the Dad, and I love your brother too. I have and will give up everything for you both.
Are either of the Sons on the right track, trying to discover freedom? Do escapism or grasping to rules and the traditional ways help? Or is the Father’s approach of putting relationships first a better way? Is freedom actually found in caring and accepting beyond the call of duty?
And how about the Father’s love? Is he misplaced? Naïve? A soft touch? Or does such love cut across barriers and offer the chance of transformation and hope?
It is fascinating that Jesus doesn’t comment on this story. He doesn’t say which is right and which is wrong. He just tells us the story and leaves us to let it do its work upon us. Let’s take a moment now to reflect on the story and to ask God what he wants to say to us through it…