Sunday, May 10, 2020

Sermon in lockdown Easter 5 for Coventry Cathedral

I wonder if you’ve turned to any box-sets for comfort and consolation during these days of Lockdown. Beset with unreliable internet at the Canonry, I’ve been enjoying a happy reunion with Call the Midwife and Downton Abbey on DVD – but more than anything else I’ve immersed myself in the life and times of the fictional President Jed Bartlett and his team in the West Wing.
Bartlett’s signature catch-phrase is “What’s next...” - and I think part of the appeal of the series for me is the way he models the kind of compassionate leadership I long for – so that I feel that whatever IS next, he will power on towards it, making mostly good choices. His confidence in tomorrow is infectious and reassuring…

Whatever you may feel about current government, not even their most ardent fans could claim that we are currently able to look forward with that sort of certainty. Right now the question “What’s next?” would sound more as an existential cry of despair than an eager response to fresh challenges...We have no idea what’s round the corner. Even as we begin to imagine the gradual easing of lock-down, we are very aware that the world to which we will return little by little will not be the same one we left back in March. For some of us, this season has been a helpful exercise in perspective. Stepping back from some of the frenetic busyness that has been part of life for many in the 21st century West has enabled us to reflect on what actually matters most and I have been involved in many many conversations of which the gist is “I do hope we DONT just “get back to normal” “. There’s a widespread recognition that life needed some sort of “reset button” and while this is  not for a moment a route to reset that anyone would ever have chosen, nonetheless there are good and important things to learn from our experience

But still and all, this is a difficult season.
We do not know where we are going so how can we know the way?
There goes my good friend Thomas, once again daring to express the uncertainties that are often part of the journey of faith.
And this time it’s fair enough, isn’t it?
Jesus talks about going ahead to get things ready for us in his father’s house -and then returning to take us there...but we’re not really clear where “there” might be. It doesn’t sound as if he’s planning a trip to Nazareth and inviting his friends to follow…
It’s a bit too easy for us to spiritualise this passage (and not this passage alone) and to downplay the very real confusion that it inspires in those who meet it for the first time. It’s often chosen for funerals – that sense of a real home ahead offering huge comfort to anyone who is mourning someone dear to them – but it’s not an easy read if you look at it closely. Even that promise to “take you to myself” can encourage a view of a God who is capricious, plucking individuals out of life just because he can...I’ve met far too many people who have lost any sense that God is on their side as a result of those words and I’m sure that in the months ahead we will have to engage with the grief stricken anger of those who feel that God CHOSE to allow their dear ones to die in the pandemic.
And if that’s not problem enough, what are we to do we do with those apparently exclusive words
“I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No-one comes to the Father except by me”?

If  you and I have met, you may not be surprised to hear that I do NOT believe that this verse justifies a view of salvation that divides humanity into saved and  lost. I don’t read here the assertion that everyone has to have made a conscious personal decision to follow Christ in order to be welcome at the heavenly banquet. I know that this verse is often used to justify a belief that only card-carrying Christians will finally reach home in safety...but I cannot embrace that vision of Jesus as door-keeper, turning away all those whose faces don’t fit.
Nonetheless I am convinced that Jesus IS the Way, and in describing himself thus he confirms that the events of Good Friday and Easter Sunday have opened a route for each of us to be whole and happy with God.
More, the model of self-giving, unconditional love which is revealed there is the way to which each of us must aspire….

This season has seen us stripping away so much that just doesn’t matter so that those things that are deeply true, deeply real, are thrown into sharp relief.
Surely this truth stands Head and shoulders above them all: that we are made to live in loving relationship with one another and with God...and that Jesus both models  and enables this.
To grasp that changes everything.

While I try to avoid cliches in my preaching, this gospel makes it practically compulsory to reflect on life as a journey...But notice that even here Jesus doesn’t spell out exactly where we are going. He says there’s room for everyone – an endless series of extensions surrounding the father’s house (a model that I was fascinated to see made real in  the ruins of 1st century  Capernaum)...but he doesn’t tell us much about the landscape or what we can expect to be doing with our time.
He does, though, make it clear how we’re going to get there.

If you’ve been finding it hard to love anyone very much in the frustrations of the current season...if you’ve decided you don’t much like, still less love, yourself, and heaven help your neighbour ...then be thankful that Jesus has cleared the path for us.
Listen, he says, I am the way. Let me hold your hand and take you...live as I do...in your personal relationships, in your political culture, as you respond to those whom might otherwise fear or dislike. Live my way. Seek to love and love and love again – no matter what it costs.


What's next?
I have absolutely no idea...except that there will be love.
Love as we journey, and love as we arrive.
Love lavished on us by the one who is ALL love…
So, do not let your hearts be troubled.
Believe in God. Believe in Jesus.
All shall be well.


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