Hopes and fears
We sing about them in
our Christmas carols – but they are very much part of the stuff of
life in the Easter season too...both for the apostles, as they
struggled to make sense of the wild rumours that abounded on that
first Easter day, and for we who come after.
Both, of course, are
present in our readings this morning – but they are also present in
the life of our nation as we look towards the coming election, and
perhaps they are there in the life of this Cathedral community too,
with the AGM ahead.
Reflecting on the
gospel, it seems at first as if hope has been utterly banished.
The doors of the
house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews...
Things are pretty bad
if you are so afraid of your own people that you are hiding behind
closed doors – but the events of that extraordinary Passover
festival have certainly left the disciples with a sense that nobody
could be counted on.
They have seen one of
their own number betray Jesus, and are painfully aware that none of
them, not one, has really measured up to the ideals of loyal
friendship they might have aspired to. This feels like a community
that has failed to be true to itself – and one that has also failed
in its relationship with those outside.
Not a lot of room for
hope, then, as the disciples look inwards caught up in and
overwhelmed by their own sense of despair and defeat, united only in
their misery.
A fellowship of
failure.
And then, suddenly,
Jesus shows up – and as so often happens, his arrival changes
everything.
Where there was fear
and distress, he brings his peace and a joy that the disciples had
thought never to experience again.
“Peace be with
you...”
Extraordinary.
Put yourself there for
a moment.
Imagine that you
carry that burden of guilt and failure that so weighed down the
beleaguered group huddled in the upper room.
You ran away in
Gethesemane.
You were too fearful to
stand at the foot of the cross.
And imagine that Jesus
comes to you – to YOU – knowing how you've let him down – with
not one word of reproach or disappointment.
Instead, he speaks
peace – so convincingly that you lose all urge to apologise or
justify yourself.
You simply bask in the
joy of his presence – and find new strength and new hope in that
moment.
Suddenly that group, on
the verge of imploding, with each individual going his separate way,
back to the old order that had once seemed enough, -
Suddenly that
heartbroken, disintegrating community is reborn.
PEACE be with you...
The peace of God's
presence...Shalom – more than peace of heart and mind, more even
than an end to conflict in a warring world...as Tom Wright puts it
“rich and fruitful human living, God's new creation bursting into
many coloured flower”
PEACE
And with that word
everything is transformed – and a new fellowship is created and
commissioned
“As the Father has
sent me, so I send you....Receive the Holy Spirit”
While Luke will thrill
us in a few short weeks with his account of rushing mighty winds and
extraordinary life-changing preaching on the feast of Pentecost, this
quieter moment is no less one of radical transformation.
As God breathed life
into clay at creation, so Jesus breathes resurrection life into the
disciples – and they are changed from a group gathered to learn, to
one commissioned and sent out – no longer disciples but apostles.
They learn for themselves the essential message that God's love is
always greater, always stronger than our failure...
And isn't it wonderful
that the first gift of the Spirit that Jesus mentions to them is that
of forgiveness – for it is, undoubtedly, the one that they are at
that moment most conscious of both needing and receiving....Now they
too can forgive in God's name, can themselves become both reconciled
and reconciling people in this new world order.
A fellowship on the
verge of dissolution is reformed and re-invigorated...once again,
love changes everything
This is what it means
to be the Church – the people who know themselves reconciled with
God through the transforming love of Jesus – and who go on to live
in a new way that speaks of reconciliation beyond any imaginings.
And, of course, at the
moment we have freedom to imagine on a grand scale. We have the
privilege of helping to shape the society we live in, - and aspects
of Cathedral life as well..To dream dreams, but also to help to make
them reality.
Last week a friend sent
me a Facebook link to a site that enabled me to compare the main
elements of each party's manifesto on the topics closest to my heart
without knowing which party's policies I was viewing – and at the
end told me how I should vote. I'm not going to tell you the results
nor suggest where you should plant your X – though I will say that
I'm absolutely sure that it is the duty of anyone who HAS a vote to
use it, prayerfully, thoughtfully, wisely...
I was, though, struck
by just how utopian some of the policies were – and how very
hopeful they made me feel.
Almost as hopeful, in
fact, as the picture of community presented in Acts 4.
Wouldn't you like to be
part of a group that was “of one heart and soul”, to live
somewhere where
“There was not a
needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold
them and brought the proceeds of what was sold...and it was
distributed to each as any had need”? Wouldn't that be truly wonderful...?
Of course, it was deeply shocking at the time, for it flies in the face
of the Jewish custom and of the Torah itself...to sell your
inheritance and share the proceeds was not an early version of
Communism but a change of direction away from a culture that was
forged by strong emphasis on the inheritance, in lore and custom as
in property, of the Jews as God's people. This radical departure was
one more sign of a new world order, more evidence that in this time
of transformation undreamed of possibilities would come to pass.
And we – we are the
inheritors of that new way of being.
Though experience shows
that even the most high minded and well-intentioned politicians are
likely to let us down on some things – and that our own faltering
attempts to be a community here in this place are a far far cry from
the heady days of Acts 4...nonetheless– we are an Easter people and
alleluia is our song.
So let us sing it today
– but let us live it as well. Let us dare to dream that “Cathedral
Community” might become something more than a label...That we might
so live our faith that others long to travel with us...might glimpse
in this corner of the kingdom the unmistakeable evidence of God's
kingdom in our midst.
That we might be
transformed and transforming...reconciled and reconciling...
We will fail. Of course
we will. But we know that even here, even now, God's love is stronger
is stronger than our failure...
so – let us not hide
behind closed doors but pray afresh for the power of the Holy Spirit,
so that we may reach out to share the Love in which we live and move
and have our being.
The Spirit is with
us...and the world is waiting.
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