Sunday Services

 

 

 

Reading: Deut.8,1-10 and Jn.6,24-35

Sermon:

Dear friends

Let’s talk about hands. Some are aesthetically pleasing, some are less so; some are small and some are big; some are beautifully proportioned and some not so much. Differences of this kind may matter on some level, but you will agree that what is ultimately important about hands, really, is whether they do what they are supposed to do (big or small or whatever). When we ask, however, what hands are supposed to do, we find that soon our focus shifts from the hand as such, its look and appearance and dexterity, to the heart, because we realise what hands are supposed to do is to carry out the instructions coming from a good, upright, loving heart. So the question: “What do my hands look like?”, matters far less than the question: “Are they kind hands, the sort of hands they are supposed to be?”

The point I want to make in connection with harvest and thanksgiving has to do with this issue of what a thing is meant for and is supposed to do, in distinction from its appearance and uses that are forgetful of its true meaning.
In the passage we read from Deut.8 God’s people are called to consider what all they have received at the hands of God is supposed to do, what it is meant for.
For the use of all that they have received, that is its purpose, is not fully realised in the immediate benefit the people derive from it for themselves or in the uses they put it to when these are self-centred and self-glorifying. Because what they are supposed to do, what they are meant for, is to prompt the heart to attend to that which will enable it to be alive – in the way the Bible understands this: alive to God and one’s neighbour in love; in other words, to that which will enable the heart to give the sort of instructions to the person that are good, upright, generous, loving, and righteous.
And what enables it in this way is the word of God – hence the call to attend to it and let God’s gifts, whatever they are in size and appearance, prompt and encourage one to do so. “.. to teach you that man does not live by bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD.” “When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the LORD your God for the good land he has given you.”

Have you ever heard such a thing?! And if you have, did you listen? I rather hope, of course, that you have. I hope this is not like foreign music to your ears. Yes, would that every day, and this day in particular, we saw what we have been given – the harvests, the food that we eat and the means we have to secure it, the fruitfulness of people’s efforts on and off the fields, the ability to produce and often abundantly so – and let it prompt us to praise God and seek and search out his word so that we may do it ( = that we may not just ‘have’ but may live)!
Yet, I rather think that we may know too much (still) in our selves of this attitude which God is here warning his people about – the attitude of mistaking having much with living: of considering the end of what God gives us to be of course whatever immediate benefit it yields for us, the right use of it to be a matter of how we like it for ourselves, in line with instructions proceeding from a heart that is ruled by greed, fear of missing out or love of money.

This concern is illustrated quite straightforwardly in the parable Jesus tells (Lk.12,13-21) of the rich farmer whose fields (ground) yielded an abundant harvest, too big as it turned out for him to store it all. So he asked himself what he should do. (This bit is about the heart’s instruction regarding the question what to do!) He decided to expand his storage facilities so that he would be able to use all of it in the pursuit of his own personal welfare and wellbeing: “And I’ll say to myself, ‘You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.’” But that very night God recalled that farmer’s life, saying, ‘You fool, … who now will get what you have prepared for yourself?’ The heart’s instructions that he had followed were all wrong. Jesus finished this parable with the words: “This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich towards God.”
This sounds the same note made also in Deut.8, for this is how the passage we read goes on – with a warning to his people not to forget “the LORD your God” or fail to listen to his word, because doing so would make their hearts proud, effecting what kind of instructions would proceed from it. “You may say to yourself, ‘My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.’ But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your ancestors, as it is today. If you ever forget the LORD your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed.” (8,17-19)

Dear friends, we rejoice at the plenty of our harvests and are grateful for all the ways in which our needs are supplied. And we realise also the temptation, inclination, to forget the Lord our God and what his gifts are meant for, to hold it all without regard to his word. (In this context: Can we fail to notice the deafening silence in regard to God and his word in the conversations about abundance and want, environmental issues and social justice?)
The heart is forgetful, it wants to instruct as it pleases. But what all harvests are meant for is to be received as the means for us to be rich towards God through carrying out cheerfully and without worrying his word/will – the instructions proceeding from hearts that are loving, compassionate, generous, giving, pure (hearts at peace because on friendly terms with God!).
This, as Jesus points out, is not in the gift of the world’s abundance and the satisfaction one derives from it, but in the gift of what he calls ‘the bread of life’ for those who receive it.
“Then they asked him, ‘What must we do to do the works God requires?’ Jesus answered, ‘The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.’ So they asked him, ‘What sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written: “He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”
Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.’ ‘Sir’, they said, ‘always give us this bread.’ Then Jesus declared, ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”
                                                                                                                                                                AMEN

Lord God, you have supplied us with your good gifts – a token of your generous love; you have blessed the work of many hands in many places and have let their labours be fruitful; you have caused the earth to yield its fruit, to provide us with plenty of food and fill our hearts with joy. We thank you and we praise you, the giver of every good gift.
Let not our heart grow proud over the abundance of your gifts, but give us a huger for your bread from heaven, even Jesus Christ in his atoning sacrifice for our sins, and that we may eat and believe, so that our heart may instruct us to praise you, use what you give us wisely and share willingly and cheerfully our plenty with others. Amen

- time of prayer / intercession – [ what concerns we have on our heart we pour out before God and seek in thanksgiving the gifts of His blessings; ]
we pray for God’s blessing on our farmers, those involved in the production and distribution of food, charitable organisations like the Foodbank etc.; we seek for light into the darkness of hunger and poverty, for humbleness to recognise our calling to serve;
we ask to discern His judgments and for a spirit of understanding and repentance, for mercy and an end to the spiritual ignorance whereby we fail to reject and abhor sin and wickedness;
we plead for the lost, the broken, the lonely, the abandoned, the persecuted, the suffering…;
we think of the victims and the ongoing trouble of the pandemic in our country and around the world and pray for those who care for the ill and for those tasked with keeping the people safe and for faith and courage…;
we pray for the authorities and those in leadership, for our communities;
we thank God for His guiding and keeping, for all the ways in which we discern his helping hand;
we pray:]

‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen

 

Sunday 10^th October 2021, Haddington West with Garvald and Morham           

                                  

‘Two kinds of wisdom’

                                                                                                                                                  
Grace be with you and peace from God, our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ

 

Collect:
Almighty God, in our baptism you adopted us for your own. Quicken your Spirit within us, that we, being renewed both in body and mind, may worship you in sincerity and truth and serve you with thankfulness of heart; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen

Reading: James 3, 13-18

Sermon:

Dear friends

The question James is asking here is surely meant to address us directly: “Are you wise and understanding? Has your faith made you wise and understanding?”
Let us receive this question in good faith, not as a provocation or a veiled rebuke or intended to cast us into doubt. Let us receive it in good faith, because we know that genuine faith produces what James calls ‘a harvest of righteousness’, and wisdom and understanding have a part to play in this. This harvest is not the fruit of human self-belief and autonomy but of faith in the true and living God. That this is so we know by faith, for it is said, ‘The righteous will live by faith.’ (Rom.1,17) Are we wise to this, are we understanding?
Let us bring to mind that it is not the wise who says in his heart, ‘There is no God’. It is the fool (see Ps.14), who does not therefore understand, and is not able to act upon, “what God has freely given us”, and never has that gift of faith which is “the mind of Christ” (1Cor.2,13.16!)

The question “Are you wise and understanding (in your faith)?” is yet another and further way, then, of asking after the fruit of the kind that indicates the presence of genuine faith. And it could also be posed in this form: “Do you have the mind of Christ?”
Do we? This is the same question but in a more focussed way. Underlying it is the truth that faith in Christ yields for the believer the mind of Christ: Through the operation of the Holy Spirit in them, the faithful, by way of faith, begin and learn to see as Christ saw, to know what Christ knows, to understand as Christ understands, to engage in the way that Christ did.
Now of course, believer and church can resist this, and there is something that does this – sin. Which is why when sin goes unchecked or is un-repented of, the resistance to the growth of Christ-mindedness in life and church is strong. Only grace can overcome this, and grace does, it is a greater power than that which resists. Therefore, the grace of God is the light of wisdom and understanding.

But what is Christ-mindedness? How do we know faith’s wisdom and faith’s understanding? In a crucial passage in Matthew Jesus says this: “All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” (Mt.11,27-29)

Here we learn what Christ-mindedness is: gentleness and humility of heart such as was displayed in and by Jesus.
Do our deeds express this, asks James?  For only if they do, do we prove that we have learned what Christ through faith is teaching, do we prove that we are learning from him. James, in other words, says, ‘Look at your practice, for it is your practice that announces the presence or not of wisdom and understanding.’ In a way, James proposes, in the interest of wisdom and understanding (Christ-mindedness), that a searchlight be switched on and an investigation be made: An investigation into what our practices – what we do and don’t do, say and don’t say – say about the inner drive that gives rise to them.
But if we do this, it may well be that we find in ourselves the same or similar drives that James perceives in the church and the believers that he addresses – namely, bitterness, envy, selfish ambition in the heart (the seat of these drives). We may find that our speech and our actions, as well as what we don’t say what we don’t do, at bottom show us to be concerned with ourselves first, seeking our own advantage; to hold grudges against others; to be self-righteous and therefore judgmental towards those we don’t think measure up, to excuse our own faults but lay the faults of others clearly at their door.

What to do, dear friends, when presented with a sight of ourselves that is not pretty (in spiritual terms)? James reckons that at this point there is a strong impulse to recoil/turn away: To save yourself this unpleasantness through denial (better to continue in an illusion that is comfortable than be exposed to a truth that is not), or even to excuse it (to yourself) by boasting that it teaches you so much about grace!

Let us not yield to such an impulse, it is not wise nor understanding, it is not a mark of Christ-mindedness. It would be a failing to realise the connection there is between such bitterness, envy and selfish ambition in the heart and what it gives rise to – disorder.
And disorder, dear friends, is very bad news: It is order undone, it is the undoing of what binds things together, relates them one to another in truth (communal flourishing). In James’ words: “But if you harbour bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. Such ‘wisdom’ does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.” 

But instead of yielding to this impulse to recoil from such finding ( = that there are deeds and that there is speech that reflect this wisdom from below, and that we have so done and have so spoken), we must let what we find move us to consider what wisdom and what understanding make for order, to consider the mind of Christ.
And the mind of Christ is this: It is ‘first of all pure’: it doesn’t look at another with a desire to judge but a desire to save and heal, not with a desire to exclude but a desire to embrace, not with a desire to use for selfish purposes but a desire to restore to God’s order, it delights in the will of God and his goodness and feels keenly the burden of sin on all of life, and is prepared to carry it, it is gracious and hopeful and trusting and rejoices in obedience to God;
it is ‘then peace-loving’: it is not interested in being right for the sake of being right, it abhors all power games and in all matters pursues peace even at a cost, it is never vengeful but seeks for all to ‘go in peace’;
it is ‘considerate’: seeing in everyone the image of God and honouring that image in everyone;
it is ‘submissive’: it gladly submits to the will of God and is passionately on the side of truth and seeks what benefits the other;
it is ‘full of mercy and good fruit’: it answers wrong with right, bad with good, error with loving correction, it bears out good knowledge with good actions and good words;
it is ‘impartial and sincere’: itself completely truthful and without guile it insists with gentleness and patience on truthfulness in all matters and is not swayed by flattery, fooled by pretence nor taken in or tempted by grandstanding and posturing and self-importance.

We can sum up Christ-mindedness, the wisdom and understanding in the heart that makes for order, by saying: It is those deeds and words by which the burdened and the weary hear us say, ‘Come, and let us share that rest that we have found.’

Dear friends, we learn such wisdom and understanding from Christ, as we join the weary and the burdened, join them with our own weariness and our own burden, and hear him say to us: “Come to me, and I will give you rest. I will show you the way of wisdom and understanding and be with you on the way to guide and uphold you. I will not ask what I do not first give, and in doing what I ask, your soul will know rest.” For this is what his suffering and death on the cross and his resurrection is saying. And is it not what his words are saying to all who come?    AMEN

Lord God, help us in your mercy to be free to say to the burdened and the weary “Come!” and do for them what Jesus did for us. It is not your kind of wisdom to have but not give, to know but not share, to judge but not save, to see and to recoil; too often that is our wisdom. Create in us, we pray in Jesus’ name, a pure heart, and renew a steadfast spirit within us. Amen

- time of prayer / intercession – [ what concerns we have on our heart we pour out before God and seek in thanksgiving the gifts of His blessings;
we ask to discern His judgments and for a spirit of understanding and repentance, for mercy and an end to the spiritual ignorance whereby we fail to reject and abhor sin and wickedness;
we plead for the lost, the broken, the lonely, the abandoned, the persecuted, the suffering…;
we think of the victims and the ongoing trouble of the pandemic in our country and around the world and pray for those who care for the ill and for those tasked with keeping the people safe and for faith and courage…;
we pray for the authorities and those in leadership, for our communities;
we thank God for His guiding and keeping, for all the ways in which we discern his helping hand;
we pray:]

‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen

 

 

Sunday 3rd October 2021, Haddington West with Garvald and Morham          

                                  

‘The perils of the tongue and the power of the Word’

                                                                                                                                   
Grace be with you and peace from God, our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ

 

Collect:
Grant, O merciful God, that your Church, being gathered by your Holy Spirit into one, may show forth your power among all peoples, to the glory of your name; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen

 

 

Reading: James 3, 1-12

Sermon:

Dear friends

James finds in the church a readiness to teach which produces an environment for faith and in the church which is detrimental to their flourishing. Too many folk are eager and encouraged to teach in a way that affects things negatively. Whatever the motivation and desire to teach in the church of these teachers may be, they divert faith from its path, the church’s teaching. There are too many words, with the result that the Word of the church suffers; there are too many teachers, with the result that the teaching of the church suffers.

James considers this a problem serious enough to lay down this warning and seek to put on the brakes on this proliferation of teachers. It indicates a problem that affects not those who teach, but believers more generally, as becomes clear when he speaks about the tongue and the need to tame it.
But he does first address this problem of the increase of teachers. Let us ask: Why is it a problem? (Perhaps James is just fearful of his own position as teacher?) Things develop, don’t they, in teaching? Who is to say that new revelations and insights cannot be given, which new teachers pick up? Are not the new teachings from the Spirit too? And so on.
The crux of the matter here lies with the church’s teaching. You see, it is the church’s teaching whereby faith and church came to be; it is also that whereby faith and church come to be and whereby the church grows and prevails against all opposition.
It is this circumstance precisely, this causal connection between the church’s teaching and the church’s being, that led the church to define the scriptures of the New Testament over against the increasing number of writings and teachings which were not of that whereby church and faith came to be (!), and which were lacking the authority and authenticity belonging to the Apostles who were witnesses of the Saviour’s resurrection. The need for defining the NT (and say ‘no’ to other teaching) arose from the recognition that the teaching of Jesus and about him – his life, his words and works, his death, his resurrection and the proclamation of it by the Apostles –, which had led people to faith and gathered them together as the church, retains its place and function in the life and the work of the church. This teaching of the church is not like a founding document which has an honoured place in the church’s history and memory, but which for direct influence needs amending all the time. It is that whereby God makes known the mystery of salvation, it is the message of which it is said, ‘Faith comes by hearing the message’ (Rom.10,17).

So what we see in James is an awareness already that the inflationary increase of teachers and their words masks a weakening influence of the church’s teaching and its word through a weakening regard for it and dependence upon it.
The seriousness of this is underlined by the reminder of judgment: “we who teach will be judged more strictly.” That is: To distort the teaching whereby God makes known the way of salvation, to speak words that pretend but fail to make known and to serve the truth of God, renders a teacher more culpable: Not only does he cause damage, he then also prevents healing; not only does he deprive man who needs healing, he deprives God who wants to heal man and has given the Word and the Spirit to achieve it!
The church’s teaching ought therefore to be of primary concern to the church and to faith, both of which live by this that its message is proclaimed in words of truth and faithfulness. To guard the church’s teaching - from those who would distort it, from those who would subject it to their innovations, from those who would instrumentalise it for their purposes, from those who would hold it captive to their cultural outlook and to the spirit of the age - is not optional nor is it ever unnecessary (or a done job): it is a matter of survival and a spiritual necessity.
This area of our faith, of Christianity, is one where the pivotal place of the word and the use of words is most apparent. It matters greatly what is said and what is not said and whether what is said is true and whether the truth is heard.

And when we see this, we also see that it is not the only area. In fact, in all areas that we are called to live out our faith, the way we use words – what we say and what we don’t say – has huge impact.
Indeed, James reckons that if we managed to speak truthfully at all times, if we used words with true knowledge and would never stumble when we speak, we would not in our heart be subject to those desires and fears which come to be expressed in words that hurt, destroy, betray and hide and suppress the truth. James: “Anyone who is never at fault in what they say is perfect, able to keep their whole body in check.”
Here we have an important clue why James speaks of the power of the spoken word and the need, consequently, to tame one’s tongue. It is because genuine faith is about cohesion, about fellowship; it is because faith brings together what stands apart, controls and overcomes that which divides, separates, corrupts and subjects us to death. Faith is nothing if not a most powerful cohesive, to bind us together: and at the heart of it is communication.

Let us approach this again from the following angle: The scientists tell us that there are 4 fundamental forces of nature which govern and regulate the behaviour of matter (to hold things together!) - they are the strong and the weak nuclear force, electro-magnetism and gravity. Their values have to be “just so” in order for things to be held together such as to enable life – and astonishingly, against almost infinite odds, they are. There are millions of ways that their values could have been different, with the result that we wouldn’t be here, yet they are what they absolutely and without margin for “error” had to be. One may well ask if there is not another force required which is unlike these but defined them? But of more import it the observation that none of these forces bind humanity together or govern the behaviour of creatures that are not just bodies but are souls / spirits. Here we can begin to see something of the character of this other force that is required – that it is spiritual and that it communicates.
This force works through the Word – In the beginning was the Word (Jn.1,1). And this reasonably explains why the ability of the (human) tongue to form and speak words (to communicate!) carries such power. And therefore, why it is that:
by the power of his tongue man can destroy – think in this age of the internet in particular of the damaging effect of words on reputations, careers, prospects etc.;
by the power of the tongue man crushes and shames, divides and alienates, corrupts and sets things in motion that are simply evil;
by the power of the tongue man can withdraw love, silence the truth and cover wrong, can make the bad sound good and the good sound bad, can hinder every kind of flourishing.

Consider this power which the tongue yields that you possess and with which you communicate. And consider carefully! These deeds of the tongue, says James, because of the nature of the ultimate force that is God’s Word, originate in hell itself: “Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.”
And such is its activity that it would be foolish to think ourselves to be in control of it or able to tame it. Compelled by desires and fears living deep within us, the tongue will do their bidding. “All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.”
Let us not underestimate, or play down even, the power of the tongue to be quite deadly, by saying that surely James is exaggerating somewhat. How far back do we have to go when last our mouths ran away with us and we said things we thought we’d never say, said things we wish we hadn’t, things that cannot be unsaid, that leave scars? And how much, do we think, of what we have said and of what we have left unsaid, is the same as what we should have said or even meant to say?

But it should not be like that. Because by the tongue also are spoken those words that have the power to heal, comfort, strengthen, counsel and bring together, words speaking forgiveness and mercy, speaking love in truth and the truth in love. It is therefore a real anomaly and self-contradictory, for a Christian to feel free to use words of praise and faith in his relationship with God, but in his relationship with other people, esp brothers and sisters, use words that are neither true nor kind and should simply not be said, not to use words that help and build up etc.

Dear friends, the tongue, for the power it yields, is a part of the body most in need of redemption. And it is not irredeemable, there is a force that can tame it and it is the effect of the sanctifying work of the Spirit of God in our life. “A good man”, says Jesus, “brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.” (Lk.6,45) The grace of God by the death of Christ for our sins draws the poison out of the heart that humbly seeks it, and the grace of God through the resurrection of Christ by the Spirit fills the heart with new life, so that filled with the word that is Christ the heart may learn to speak this word.

Here is the source which as we drink from it in repentance and faith brings cleansing to our tongues.

                                                                                                                                                                                          AMEN

Lord God, you spoke through Jesus Christ once and for all for our salvation, and he now intercedes for us before you. Grant that we hear what you are saying in the power of your Spirit, so that our tongue may become an instrument for good and for blessing. Amen

- time of prayer / intercession – [ what concerns we have on our heart we pour out before God and seek in thanksgiving the gifts of His blessings;
we ask to discern His judgments and for a spirit of understanding and repentance, for mercy and an end to the spiritual ignorance whereby we fail to reject and abhor sin and wickedness;
we plead for the lost, the broken, the lonely, the abandoned, the persecuted, the suffering…;
we think of the victims and the ongoing trouble of the pandemic in our country and around the world and pray for those who care for the ill and for those tasked with keeping the people safe and for faith and courage…;
we pray for the authorities and those in leadership, for our communities;
we thank God for His guiding and keeping, for all the ways in which we discern his helping hand;
we pray:]

‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen

 

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