Part III Why are you weeping?

Why are you weeping?

As Jesus set his face to calvary, and carried the heavy cross through the streets of Jerusalem, the wood biting into his skin, a group of women, began weeping and wailing for him. Did they feel more keenly what he was going through, overwhelmed with empathy and pity?

Jesus hearing their cries turns to them and says:

Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me….weep for yourselves and for your children.

What did he mean? Why did he reject their tears?

Perhaps Jesus rejected their tears because he carried more than his own grief to the cross he was carrying the sins and sorrows of the whole world, past, present and future.

The Prophet Isaiah says “surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows…upon him was the chastisement that brought our wholeness, and with his stripes we are healed” 

Jesus carries with him to the cross, the grief and sorrow of this mortal life, the brokenness that yearns for wholeness,  the wounds that need healing. 

Jesus death is not an abstract economic exchange for the price of sin, it is not a judgement or an act of condemnation, it is not the wrath of God being satisfied, but an act of love, to bind up all that is broken, and save all that is perishing.

Isaiah says again ‘Look away from me,let me weep bitter tears; do not try to comfort me for the destruction of my beloved people. Jesus says, weep for yourselves…..

For on the cross, Jesus drew near to us in our pain and fellowshipped with us in our suffering and he continues still, to extend his wounded hands to embrace us in our brokenness. 

For the imprint of the cross is found on every human heart, and through the cross He knows us, in our pain. He understands us, in our brokenness. He is near to us, in our sorrow and in our grief. 

He is with us, in the places where feel abandoned by all, he is with us, beside us, before us, above us, below us, even when we feel abandoned by God. 

“For we do not have a high priest’, the writer of the Hebrews says, who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are,  yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need

George Herbert writes of this sacrifice made once for all-

Weep not, dear friends, since I for both have wept

When all my tears were blood, the while you slept: 

Your tears for your own fortunes should be kept: 

Was ever grief like mine? 

So do not weep for me, Jesus says, but for yourselves and for your children, and your childrens  children. Weep for those who suffer now, and for those who will suffer in time to come, for those who will inherit the seeds we sow, whether good or ill, and let your tears be the engine oil of justice and righteousness, let your tears be the balm of compassion and the medicine of mercy and love.

Jesus does not want us to look on as if watching a public spectacle for the cross is not the seal set upon a hopeless fate. To walk the way of the cross with him, requires that we become living branches and that the cross becomes the source of all life.

The dry splintered cross, in all its heaviness is to become the tree of life which will bear fruit for all eternity and our tears become the water that brings forth growth, and causes the flower of faith to blossom.

It marks not the end, but the beginning. Jesus speaks with the voice of the prophet. With a voice that points us beyond suffering and death, through the conversion of life- “Seek the Lord and live… then shall the maidens rejoice in the dance, and the young men and the old shall be merry. I will turn their mourning into joy, I will comfort them, and give them gladness for sorrow, a garland for ashes.

At once, St. Anselm writes,

At once the tears are changed, 

I do not believe they stopped at once, 

but where once they were wrung from a heart broken and self tormenting, 

they flow now from a heart exulting.

The tears are not the end, but only the beginning. Sorrow may endures for a night, but joy cometh in the morning, and those who sow in tears, shall reap with shouts of joy. 

Perhaps Mary Magdalene had forgotten all that Jesus had told her when she went to the tomb early that morning. Her heart was stricken, her tears were a river. But then a strangely familiar voice says Mary, Why are you weeping? For Jesus speaks through her tears,  he speaks from beyond the grave, from the other side of death, for the war has been won, life is the winner, and the cross has been glorified.

And from where Jesus speaks there will be no more tears, and as she looked up into his face, perhaps Mary saw those things which John would later dream of….a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 

The holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And there was a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes.

Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.’

And the one who was seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new.’ Also he said, ‘Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.’ Then he said to me, ‘It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. 

To the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life. Those who conquer will inherit these things,  and I will be their God and they will be my children.

And in that moment, Mary’s tears of sorrow,

became her tears of joy.

Part II She bathed his feet in her tears

A God who weeps will hear us weeping too. 

Why did she weep that night, and why did she use her tears to bathe Jesus tired feet?

A woman in the city we are told. A woman who was a sinner.   A woman with no name, stands at Jesus feet and weeps. She was pouring out her soul that evening, to the source of all being, and light of the world, to the one who had given her a new life.

Her tears sprang up from within her, and in washing Jesus, she washes not only herself but the rest of humanity.

In gratitude for beginning again, she humbled herself, and washed Jesus feet in this most costly water. Water so costly that each drop was priceless.  Each drop of that water, like a shimmering pearl, could not be bought with money, but only with love.

And Jesus knew how costly her tears were,  because his tears always mingled with those of his creation.  And remember Jesus wept.

God is not distant from suffering but embodied in it, and God in Christ, knew the place from where her tears came.

To know that place fully, God would send his only son into the world to die upon the cross. For God always hears the voice of our weeping, he can interpret it’s meaning; and the soft fall of a tear given in prayer to God, though unable to move the stony hearted, can shake the foundations of heaven. 

Remember Peter’s tears in the garden?  After he had betrayed Jesus three times, he wept bitterly, and God heard his tears as well.

Peter’s tears were also costly,  and welled- up from the depths of a truly sorrowful soul. God can interpret this language of tears, the language that Peter and the woman with the alabaster jar chose to use.

For God knows that the language of human tears is the language of a soul suffused with sincerity, the consolation of the oppressed, the country of the homeless, the comfort of the weary. 

God knows this language speaks, of the sorrow for sins, the sign of regret, the hope of redemption. 

It is the washing of the heart, the healing of the soul, the language of the spirit, compassion for the world, the longing for heaven, the waiting for death.

Although our tears may drop to the ground and seem worthless, God gathers them in his phial, put thou my tears into thy bottle, the psalmist cries….God collects our tears as he would search for a lost sheep,  And through our tears God brings us home.

Part I

Jesus Wept. 

Jesus wept. The shortest verse in the bible.

Two words which speak volumes about our God, human and divine. Jesus wept at the death of Lazarus his friend.  He wept also for Mary and for Martha. 

Perhaps he also wept for himself as he experienced the pain that rips apart everything we are.  When we lose people or things we love, our hearts are torn in two, and from the depths of our broken heart, wells up the water of the soul. 

Tears are a natural response to loss. The tongue fails and our speech is silent, but often at such times, the heart speaks and the eyes utter tears. 

And our tears become a language in themselves, they mean so much more than words can ever mean. 

Tears are the poetry of the soul and the consolation of the spirit. They say a picture paints a thousand words, and through a tear you can see a thousand pictures.

When God became incarnate, his divine being embodied our human nature.  Took on our flesh.

When God became human, God experienced all the turmoil, and longing, and loving that we experience, all the sorrow, all the pain, all the uncertainty…

And because Jesus wept, we know that our God, is a God who weeps as well. A God for whom tears matter. 

A God, who through his own tears, can interpret ours.When Jesus wept at the grave of his friend, his tears told a story.

His tears were prophetic. A whole world of what would come to pass, might have been seen, in the tears that Jesus shed for Lazarus.

Contained in each drop was his future betrayal by Judas,  Peter’s denial, the corruption of those in authority, the baying of the crowds for his blood, his own arrest and torture.

Contained in each drop were the future pains he must obediently endure, the nails being hammered into his hands and feet. 

Contained in each drop was his future yearning for water, but the taste of vinegar and gall, a vision of cruelty beyond compare seen through his tears. Blood as earthy as iron, dripping from his crown of thorns and mingling with his salty tears 

Contained in each drop of Jesus tears, were the faces of his Mother, and Mary and Martha, and John and the disciples whom he loved, weeping this time for him as he breathed his last.

In each of his tears Jesus could see his own face, calling to the Father from out of the deep;  As he wept, both day and night, on the lonely hill of calvary- he only heard the voices whispering ‘where is now your God?’

At the grave of Lazarus, in each of one of Jesus tears there was a shadow of all that must be soon endured, before the light of glory could be seen, before the tomb could be opened, before the dead could be raised.

Jesus, like everyone else, had to sow in tears before he could reap in songs of joy….

Jesus might have wept again on the mount of Olives, in the garden of Gethsemane- in the Garden of tears.

It was in that garden that Jesus, in pain and anguish said, ‘My soul is overwhelmed with pain and anguish, with sorrow to the point of death’. 

We are told he fell with his face to the ground, weeping into the earth, the second Adam taking on the sin of the first-

‘Father if you are willing, remove this cup from me’ ….

‘don’t make me go through this’…he said, ’can there not be another way…..?

And then through his tears he cried out to God again 

‘not my will but yours’….

there in the garden of tears, our heavy load, he chose to bear, ‘not my will but yours’. 

And he cried, there in the garden, those tears we all cry, when we know something impossible has to be done, when something has to be said,when we know something is unsolvable, just a messy tangle of life. When we offer up to God all that we are, we fall into his hands, at a loss as to how to go forward.

And though we feel abandoned, we hope that God will hear our cry and somehow our tears open a door into something else, they can herald a breakthrough, a cleansing, the water always finds a way through.

Jesus wept again on the cross, and for whom did he weep then?  

What can you see through his tears on this day, when they are mingled with his blood?

Can you see his mother in pain, as the sword that Simeon talked of pierced her aching heart?  Can you see the disciples left alone afraid and ill-equipped? Or can you see Pilate who chose power and politics over justice and mercy?  Or Ciaphas who could not see the light because he was blinded by tradition? Can you see those who shouted abuse for no reason other than their own insecurity? Can you see those who stayed silent as evil prevailed? 

Can you see in Jesus’ tears from the cross, the crowds who jeered and shouted ‘crucify’, and the soldiers who cruelly mocked him as they put a crown of thorns on his head?

Jesus wept for all of these. 

They were in his tears on that day, 

‘Father forgive them, for they know not what they do’

they were all in the silent prayers of Jesus sorrowful heart, 

in the words that only God could interpret.

Jesus wept for all these and more…He wept for all those who have betrayed him, and all those who have loved him, those who are in pain, and sorrow too, those who are lonely, or lost, those who have their own cross to bear…those who would join him in paradise on that day and on every day since.

And perhaps Jesus, also wept for himself- as he was torn from the heart of his Father and left desolate on the cross, when he had done all he could do, and had given all that he could give. 

As Jesus wept that day on the cross, God his Father also wept, as the sky turned black and the foundation of the temple was torn in two. 

The earth shook, the heaven’s trembled. And in that moment, the Holy Spirit -in a song of lamentation, hovered over Jesus watery face. 

Sermon Preached on the Festival of Corpus Christi, 4^th June, 2015, at the Eucharist with Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, Ely Cathedral.

In St Mary’s Cathedral, Edinburgh, there is a most remarkable painting.  It’s called ‘The Presence’ and it’s by a little known painter, Alfred Borthwick. 

Look it up when you get home. It’s a painting of the inside of St Mary’s Cathedral, viewed from what is probably the West Door, looking down the nave.  In the distance, at the East end, communion is being distributed at the high altar.  At the back of the cathedral, but in the foreground of the painting, there is a figure kneeling, dressed in black, hunched over, head bowed. 

He or she, you cannot tell, is just hidden in the shadows, and keeping well away from the worship. But there at the back, alongside them, stands Christ himself, bathed in radiant light. The scene could be of any cathedral, any church. 

Infact, there is a copy of ‘The Presence’ in St Paul’s Cathedral, which Borthwick painted especially for them. The same title, the same story, but just a different building. We could easily re-create the painting here. Imagine if you came into this cathedral tonight; Imagine if you had been brave enough to enter in through the darkness of the Galilee Porch, perhaps thinking that you’re not really good enough, or holy enough to come in, but curious to know what’s going on inside and what kind of service this ‘Corpus Christi’ might be. 

Imagine, if you hovered at the back in the shadows, and looked down the nave and observed this scene: The candles, the smoke, the lights, the clergy, the choir, and though it was such beautiful sight, and though it sounded like you were in heaven, you felt as if you were an outsider, you felt as if you didn’t belong, you felt as if you were looking in at a christmas display through a shop window, on a cold december night. 

So you slump down at the back, bow your head and close your eyes. You are longing to be near the warmth and the light but your courage fails.  And you think to yourself, ‘this Jesus would never invite someone like me to be part of this.’  In the silence, you sense something, and you hear a voice which says:  ‘I am with you always to the end of the age’.

The picture we have been painting with our imagination, causes us to wonder where Christ might be this evening. At the back, or the front? Is he at the west door- or at the high altar? The Presence of Christ, we believe, is somehow,  through mystery and miracle, to be found in the bread and wine, which are for us, his body and his blood as we share in this eucharist. 

And yet, the presence of Christ also reaches and extends to the very back of any cathedral.  His real presence extends beyond the sanctuary of any church,  it emanates from every altar, it winds its way through every nave, it gathers in its wake, penitents, sinners, doubters,  just like you and me, and it carries grace to those places on the edge, the places at the back, the places where people think God will not dare to go. 

The real presence of Christ is there on the streets, in the abandoned and neglected, in the tears, the sorrows, the pain, in the humble self-sacrifice offered between one and another, it’s there in the joy which bubbles up in laughter, the love shared between two hearts, the gifts given, the thanks-givings barely spoken by those who have waited for too long, and the sighs too deep for words, exhaled from weary lips.

There have been many well-rehearsed theological debates over the centuries about the real presence of Christ in the sacrament, but whatever we believe,  the bread and the wine that we will receive, challenge us with a more pressing question: 

Is Christ a real presence within us? 

Do we let Christ live in us, breathe in us, and bless us? The Holy Eucharist is often thought of as a personal and private act of devotion, a quiet interior moment of communion with God. It is indeed that place where we find personal, spiritual nourishment and strength. 

It is also a sign of something beyond merely ourselves. It is a sign of community, of the body of Christ corporate. It has the power to gather us in, and bind us together, and then send us out from the church, scattering us like grains in the fields, and grapes dispersed on the hillside.

This blessing is not be hoarded for ourselves but shared with the world. ‘Do not hold on to me’, the risen Christ said to Mary, in the garden. 

There is a sense of that here. Do not cling, do not hold on to me, let me work in you and through you, let me live in you, and you in me. 

Are we in Christ, blessed, broken, given and shared? At the conclusion of this eucharist, we will be blessed by the sacrament, we bow our heads… the host is held aloft, and we bathe in the presence of Christ.

He shines through us, and beyond us… 

Beyond these doors to our city streets, 

beyond our expectations, 

beyond our judgements, beyond our failings. 

His light falls on the righteous and the unrighteous. 

Christ is with us, around us, and through this this sacrament we begin to understand that Christ is already ahead of us, already out there calling people, drawing people, to himself. 

There should be no-one left at the back looking on, Christ calls everyone to participate, he invites all to sit and eat. It may well be, that as the years roll ever onwards, there will be more and more people standing fearfully at the back of our churches and cathedrals, more people standing in the shadows, at a distance, as if looking on at a christmas display through a shop window on a cold december night. 

So what can we do?

On this night the words of the Tantum Ergo are sung as we are blessed by the Body of Christ. They are sung in latin, the language of ancient liturgies, they are words which speak of old practices and new rites, and faith overcoming the failure of the senses.  The choir will later sing:

Therefore we, before him bending, This great sacrament revere:

Types and shadows have their ending, For the newer rite is here;

Faith, our outward sense befriending, Makes the inward vision clear.

What can we do? We can bow our heads and we can hold out our hands, and let our senses experience the presence of Christ in bread and wine, the presence of Christ within us, re-constituting, re-membering, re-newing, until we each become part of his blessed body,  his feet, his eyes, his hands, with which he blesses the all the world. We can bow our heads again, and pray that when our senses fail, our faith will point us to Christ, where ever he is.  Christ at the altar, and Christ at the door, Christ at the front, and at the back. Christ in the heart of his Church, and Christ at the edges and beyond it…..so that by his grace, everyone may be welcomed into his glorious presence. 

And maybe, through this old and ancient practice,  people may one day see again, that Christ is not far off, but very near. Amen

A Sermon Preached At Ely Cathedral on the Feast of Christ the King, 25^th November, 2018 

Readings: Daniel 7:9-10, 13-14, Revelation 1.4b-8, John 18:33-37

Title: The Hymn of the Universe

There was once a sound of the most unimaginable purity, a sound of the most staggering clarity and beauty- a sound of the most perfect truth. 

(A single note sounds from the organ)

The sound was there before anything else, the first of all things, a perfect singularity. 

From the resonance of the sound all manner of things came into being-  dust and matter emanated from its core, stars were flung into space, galaxies spun into position, supernova were thrown into existence and the embryos of billions of planets were set on their course.  

• 

            (There are sparkles of notes glimmering from the organ)

The sound expanded. The sound was persistent, it did not flicker, or waver, it never stopped even for a nano-second, whatever that might mean in a universe without measure. As time came into existence the sound evolved, it wasn’t just a sound anymore it was a note- as clear as the day. 

            (The sound gets louder, other notes join in)

Cosmologists, and those who study these things say the note is in fact a B flat- 57 octaves below middle C. 

            (The lowest note on the organ is played, it rumbles around the cathedral)

The universe was humming from the very beginning and began to gather other notes until the notes became music. 

            (The organist improvises, but beneath everything is the one note)

In a corner of this universe, a rocky globe was growing into its vocation. It was gathering speed and spinning through space- it was battered and bruised by colliding comets and asteroids. It was stretched and shaped, and cracked, and moulded. It was waking from its slumber as it circled the brightest of lights, its cold and icy centre was melting. 

• 

On its surface there was a stream of fire, molten lava and explosions, vast plates were being formed and from these growing pains there came something of the likeness of land and sea, a crystal river, the water of life from which life emerged. 

            (The Organ gets a little louder and louder)

With all the noise it was difficult to hear anything, but if you listened carefully there was that note, clear and bright and true at the foundation of all things.   

The symphony of creation itself was taking shape and everything that was created had the capacity to echo the sound of the most perfect truth, the song of the universe, which was from the beginning.

But the sound needed a voice- the music was yearning to be embodied in flesh and blood and at last- into this bundle of life came song, in something like the sound of a crying baby. It was a song of the most imaginable purity, the most staggering clarity- the sound of the most perfect truth. 

            (The Music stops)

Over two thousand years ago there was a conversation- a conversation after a betrayal, which would turn the world on its axis.  A conversation to reveal the truth which had been humming in the universe from its inception.  

The proud and powerful of this earth had come to think that they had the first and the last word in everything, they lauded themselves and sat on their thrones, they pronounced judgement without wisdom and without mercy and they thought they were gods. They couldn’t hear the sound of the universe, they couldn’t hear its truth- because their ears were full of their own importance.  But remember, the sound had become a voice and the voice now spoke from human lips. 

The voice said ‘My Kingdom is not from this world’. 

‘So you are a king?’ Pilate asked him. 

Jesus answered ‘You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth, listens to my voice’. 

What kind of king was this? 

Rulers, and principalities and powers would be flawed by him. He would burst the bubble of all small minded pomp. With clarity he would interrogate those who put their faith in riches and those who trampled on the innocent. 

But those with ears to hear would be exalted; the humble, the weak, the poor, the downcast, the small, they could hear his voice and they began to sing. Even those who were thought to be dead would hear him calling and walk out of their tombs. His kingdom, was not of this world; his kingdom was changing the world and its assumptions forever. The pure sound of his voice was able to crack the glass hearts of those whose universe had shrunk to the size of their own self.

But the conversation had consequences, and this strange king was nailed to a cross and wore a crown of thorns. 

What kind of king was this? 

He was more like lamb led to the slaughter. With the sound of each nail being hammered through his flesh into wood, the universe trembled, the earth began to shake and the sky turned black.  

(A single note sounds from the organ)

Early in the morning, just before dawn as the birds sang innocently in the garden, a sound could be heard. 

A sound so pure, and clear and true it was unmistakable. The sound had never stopped. It wasn’t just a sound, it was a note as clear as the day, something of the likeness of a B flat but we can’t be sure, and then it was a voice, and then it was a song and then the whole universe joined in this hymn of praise.

The song continued. It continues still. Can you hear it? 

            (The organist improvises)

One day, the day we are all waiting for, this king, not of this world, will come again with the clouds of heaven and all peoples and languages and nations will behold, every eye shall see him and they will hear his voice, they will join in with his song, they will be swept up by his music. With majesty like no other he is the one who was, and who is, and who is to come. 

The ancient one, forever made new, will take to his throne and a stream of fire will flow from his presence, burning up injustice, and hatred and sin and his kingship shall never be destroyed. ‘So it is to be’, creation sings. Amen and Amen. 

Christ is King, not only of our hearts, not only in our worship, not only in the church, not only of this world. Christ is King of the Universe, over all things, in all things, above all things. The ground of our being. The song that never stops. The truth above all truths who comes to dwell with us, so in this feast, we can hold the universe in our hands, and taste and see. 

Suffer us not to make our vision of his power and glory too small. 

Christ is the power beyond all power, the glory of all glories, the love of all loves, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end- and we and the whole created order are called to worship at his feet. 

So it is to be. Amen and Amen. 

            (The improvisation draws to a close into a single note- a sound which was from the beginning)

• 

Like a new born, the humble snowdrop peeps out into the world, just as we’re experiencing the last throws of winter. They are like the first heralds of spring. Perhaps the first flower we’ve seen this year. 

Something of beauty, so precious, so small, so perfect, and yet steely enough to burst through ice and snow and earth, as hard as iron. Snowdrops, have for long years been bestowed with deeper levels of meaning, beyond their size or significance. For centuries Christian folk in particular have seen in the snowdrop a sign of hope and new life, and also something bitter sweet. 

If a snowdrop was brought into the house, (superstitious country folk used to say), death wouldn’t be far behind. Their beauty is fading and fleeting. 

When each flower raises it’s head above the earth, there is no fanfare, no great trumpeting of spring….like the loud and confident daffodils -that are getting ready to burst open. No, the snowdrop emerges, somewhat forlorn, bowing her pale head, as heavy as metal, says Ted Hughes in his poem, Snowdrop. 

They were once commonly known as “Candlemas Bells”, and in one folk rhyme we are told that “The Snowdrop, in purest white array,  First rears her head on Candlemas day.”

• 

It’s thought that they were intentionally planted around churchyards, and at vestry doors, and this simple flower, because of it’s own annual life cycle, has become entwined with the churches festival of Candlemas, and this might explain the meaning that people have ascribed to this perfect, delicate, little flower, which holds within it’s petals a sad farewell and a remarkable re-birth, -a death and a resurrection.

The festival of Candlemas falls almost exactly half way between the winter solstice and spring equinox and liturgically, the festival of Candlemas or the presentation of Christ in the temple, falls 40 days after Christmas, signaling the end of the season of Christmas and Epiphany and the beginning of our turn towards Lent, Passiontide and Easter.

Candlemas often marks a kind of turning away from the nativity of Christ, to consider his suffering and his death and yet, we are also given hope of what is beyond. Our Gospel reading recalls the time when Mary and Joseph took their new born child to the temple, for the ceremonies of ritual purification.

It is there, that they meet the old man Simeon, and the elderly woman Anna, both of whom, nearing the end of their lives, rejoice that they have at last seen God’s messiah. 

Simeon and Anna, have been waiting years for this day. It’s as if they have been in stuck, in what seems to them, like an eternal winter. Perhaps they had begun to wonder if God’s promises would actually be fulfilled.  And then into the temple comes someone so small, and vulnerable and pure and full of light, that they can hardly believe their eyes. 

A child, like a tiny flower, just a few months old. A child who cannot speak for himself, a child who is as powerless, as much as he is a sign of God’s grace.  Simeon and Anna rejoice at this gift. Simeon is so overcome the only way he can express himself is through song,  and after a lifetime of waiting, 

Simeon can at last, face his own mortality and be released into eternal life. His winter is over. Spring has come.

But for a moment his joy turns to sorrow, as he sees a future for this child, which is by no means an easy one.  He sees suffering, he sees betrayal, he sees pain, and he sees that this child, almost unbelievably, will cause division, even within households. 

No one will be able to hide from the purity that this child will bring, and the inner thoughts of many will be revealed. To Mary, he offers words of forboding: a sword will pierce your own soul too. 

Mary, the young mother, would not have been consoled by Simeon’s words in the temple that day. He was warning her of a future grief, before life had even begun.

CS Lewis, in his book A Grief observed, said: ‘don’t come talking to me about the consolations of religion, or I shall suspect that you don’t understand.’ 

What Simeon saw in this child was no consolation in the way we might imagine. There was no promise in this child of an easy life for anyone, there was no promise that we would be free from sorrow, struggle, and anguish,  and yet…

In this child, there was light and life surging through every bone in his body, This child was so full of the spirit, that through him even in the darkest moments, hope would emerge, and love would overcome. And this overwhelming love, would roar into life like a lion.

In another book, C.S.Lewis, made his famous Lion, Aslan, an archetype for Christ.  And it is Aslan who breathes new life into a frozen world. 

“When Aslan bears his teeth, winter meets its death. 

When he shakes his mane, we shall have spring again.” He writes.

Like a searchlight, like a beam of pure light, this child will expose sin, and hatred and injustice, this child will witness against all those who oppress the orphan, the widow, the alien, the hired workers, he will comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. 

His breath will turn hearts of stone into hearts of flesh, all desires will be known and no secrets hidden from his gaze. Like a refiners fire, like fullers soap, this child will cleanse and purify and re-create us in his image. 

It is no consolation to stand before this child, But we will be transformed, we will all be changed. This child exposes us completely in the light of his presence, in him there is no darkness at all- he comes to expel the dark shadows of evil and make the whole universe brilliant with his eternal light-

So we see, that Candlemas, is like a weaving together of the snowdrop and the lion, a poignant festival in the churches year which causes us to ponder the realities of death and new life.  Wrapped within it, we find our own stories of loss and longing and grief. 

We yearn for the light to once again dispel the shadows which linger over our world today.  And deep down, we each know that we are battling through our own winters and waiting for the spring, we all hope for new life and new beginnings, but often struggle to rise above the frozen earth.  

The story of Simeon and Anna, and the story of the Candlemas Bells, might give us all hope that the Sun of righteousness will arise with healing in his wings, to soften the earth and call the flowers from their slumber. 

Orthodox Christians call this day the Festival of The Meeting, because of the moment, when Joseph and Mary, and Simeon and Anna, meet in the temple, with the Son of God, the anointed one, the light of the world.

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A Chance meeting, orchestrated by the Holy Spirit, a convergence of people in a particular place at a particular time- And perhaps we can see that also met within this festival are many other things which through Christ are brought together. Christmas and Easter, life and death, darkness and light, sorrow and joy, winter and spring, endings and beginnings, the snowdrop and the lion, a sense of waiting and expectation, and the surprise that in Christ, sins will be forgiven and hope will be restored. 

Today, at this festival of meeting, we too have been called into the presence of God, and we gather here to meet this child, the light of the world, in bread and wine. Time and eternity meet together in this sacrament. We stand, in this place, before the bright beam of light and love, And we are seen and loved as we truly are, before the light of Christ.

We come here today not only with the light of our candles in procession, but with the whole of our lives, seeking God’s blessing and trusting in God’s promise as Simeon and Anna did, that for every winter we face, we will be given the strength, like the snowdrop, to emerge from the stone cold earth. 

And when our hearts are wintry, grieving or in pain, love will come again, like a small white flower, that springeth green. 

Sermon Preached at The Edington Festival of Music with the Liturgy
19th-26th August 2018, Beauty Came as the Setting Sun

In response to The Volunteer, by Ivor Gurney. Readings: Ezekiel 36:23-28, Matthew 22:1-14
Music: Lament, Francis Pott, Super flumina Babylonis, Philippe de Monte

A Song in a strange land

It’s hard to imagine that there was any singing in the trenches. In the mud and slush and among the damp spirits of war-weary soldiers.
It’s hard to imagine that there was any singing in the trenches, as day after day the reality of another loss, or a life-changing wound ate away at any sliver of hope that homesick hearts could muster.

But singing there was. Singing there was.

Music rose like incense; like prayers into heaven from the dark, desperate earth. Most accounts suggest that the Christmas Truce of 1914 began with singing. Graham Williams of the Fifth London Rifle Brigade described it so:
“First the Germans would sing one of their carols and then we would sing one of ours, until when we started up ‘O Come, All Ye Faithful’ the Germans immediately joined in singing the same hymn to the Latin words Adeste Fideles. And I thought, well, this is really a most extraordinary thing ­– two nations both singing the same carol in the middle of a war.”
Singing there was.

Song bubbled up like a spring, song of all kinds. Songs which brought enemies together. Rowdy drinking songs which numbed the singer to the stench of war and bound men together as brothers- strong as kin. Songs of lament, longing for sweethearts far away. Songs which dreamt of home, of greenness, meadows, flowers, blue skies, sunlight. Songs of peace, songs of love come again.

That songs could be sung in such a strange landscape is perhaps to use Gurney’s words one of God’s secret ways. Perhaps God began to smile, as from the dead, cold, wintry earth, shoots of life emerged, fragile yet defiant, songs resistant to destruction, to mans violence wreaking havoc upon fields, flesh and bone.

Harps were hung up on lifeless trees as men wept bitterly across Northern France, but the flickering flame of song was not quite extinguished, hearts had not been turned to stone, and in their flesh they cried, and hoped and sang.

Did those same hearts pray? Perhaps prayers of anger raging against the enemy, against superiors, against politicians, against God.
Gurney, as many did, struggled to understand what God’s purposes were in all this bloodshed. Did God have a purpose? Could God in his love and mercy only weep as hatred held sway over Europe? But God could take the punches, the anger, the challenge from those who raged against the machine of war, God was an easy target. God had taken the punches before as his own Son cried out Why have you forsaken me? With nails hammered into his hands and feet.

I would test God’s purposes, says Gurney in his Poem, The Volunteer. I will go up and see what fate he’ll give, what destiny his hand holds for me. I’ll prove him, go up against the mouth of naked hell. Gurney perhaps must have known, in his heart of hearts, from his years as a Chorister imbibing the scriptures in Gloucester cathedral, that there is no purpose in putting God to the test. God can only look on in silence from the wood of the cross or from the eyes of a dying soldier.

Gurney volunteered for all this, he enlisted. He was turned down the first time on health grounds. Could he have had an easier war? He went back a second time, perhaps by then there was a realisation that no-one could be turned away, no willing body, voluntarily offered would be without use. That body, Gurney’s body, was shot, and gassed and shipped back to Blighty- to his ‘hereafter’ which was to be no less harrowing than his time in the Somme.

The wounds he carried into the war, his well-documented fragmenting mind, he also carried home as a greater burden.
Again he found himself being tested to the limit- from the frontline- to medical incarceration – he was a soul in agony for much of his life, but in his beating, pumping heart of flesh there was spirit. From his heart, song was born, from his heart there was poetry and music so sweet and sincere it was like honey. It was like the tender song of a minstrel at a wedding banquet, searching, whimsical, delicate, intricate. Looking on from the sidelines, never a guest.

His songs lilted with melancholy- he was not to have a wedding banquet of his own, how he would have loved to have been invited, how he would have dressed in the fine robes of the bridegroom, but his love for Annie Drummond the VAD nurse did not blossom to fruition. Perhaps the wounds he carried were just too much.

The words of the Good Friday liturgy seem to speak for Gurney- By virtue of the cross, joy has come into the world. Because from his own whirlwind of pain, from his own passion, emerged more songs, more poetry, more beauty. Gurney’s creativity, was as fragile as the paper thin poppies which wavered in Flanders fields, and yet also ruggedly defiant emerging from the war, pushing up through the earth to face the sun… This was beauty against the odds.

It is hard to imagine singing in the trenches, it is even harder to imagine that Gurney, in his troubled and complex life, could write so much poetry, so much music, or that, after the war anyone would ever be able to sing, or dance, laugh again. But sing and dance and laugh they did.
It is hard to imagine that anyone sang from the corridors of the institutions in which Gurney spent the last 15years of his life. But even there- beauty emerged.

He said his brighter visions brought music, the lesser brought poetry or mere pleasurable emotion- music was the high offering of this soul in the strange land of conflict and in the challenging landscape of mental ill health.

On his original gravestone it was written that Ivor Gurney was a lover and maker of beauty. In him God was at work, as we believe God is at work in the lives of all the broken-hearted, secret, smiling, the light of his countenance shining upon the darkest corners of our lives, revealing the hope that is set before us, even though often we cannot see it.
In God alone, beauty can come from tragedy, hearts of stone can be transformed into hearts of flesh, harps can be taken down from the trees and music will be heard again in a place called home. Flowers will emerge from the mud, there will be a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert, the mountains and the fields will burst into song, love will come again like wheat that springeth green, life will emerge from a stone cold tomb.

Did Gurney understand all this in his spirit filled heart? Amidst all his suffering, the tiny poem, The songs I had, suggests that he did.

The songs I had are withered,
Or vanished clean,
Yet there are bright tracks,
Where I have been,

And there grow flowers,
For other’s delight.
Think well, O singer,
Soon comes night.

Think well, O Singers-

When we look back on the bright tracks where we have been, do flowers grow there -for others’ delight?

As Christians, enfolded in the love of God, are we not called and chosen to forge beauty from all that is tarnished and difficult and see hope where others see impossibility? Are we not called and chosen to live each moment in the light of Christ, living each day as if it were the first and last? For our time is precious- soon comes the night.

In Jesus Christ, we are able imagine singing in the trenches- a distant song of lost tomorrows for our today. In Jesus Christ, who sang from the cross-our hope is made real, love is renewed, peace is born, and in his wake- there grow flowers.

Amen.