Lord,
we do not know where we are going. How can we know the way?
It
has been truly said that while you live life forward, you understand
it backwards...and that on the whole we don’t get a map to show us
the way our lives will work out. I remember once at vicar school
spending an evening discussing with fellow-students whether the - or
Bible might be such a map, or whether it was more a guide-book,
pointing out the main features that we might expect to run across,
without actually prescribing a route from here to there….
Not
that I’m great with maps, actually. Before the advent of sat navs,
if setting out on a long car journey I had to write out a list of
land-mark towns as the pressure of trying to work out where I might
be on a map at a motorway service station was simply too much for me.
So last week when a small group of us elected to do an independent
cross-country journey across Iona, disliking the idea of being herded
along in the official pilgrimage that stuck to metalled roads, I was
very much NOT in charge. There were five of us that day, 2 younger
and fitter, 3 of us substantially less so, and friendships were made
or strengthened as we adjusted to one another’s needs, for space,
for silence, for time to breathe though the challenges and delights
of the day.
I
learned a lot.
About
myself – how knowing that there ARE people who will help when I’m
feeling stuck often means that I don’t need to ask for help at all;
and that there is sometimes more kindness in not jumping in to assist
than there is in hasty intervention; that actually, given time, I can
do things that seemed well beyond me to start with.
I
learned that we all tackle challenges in different ways and that for
me sometimes it’s easiest to negotiate obstacles (specifically
steep descents on boggy ground) on my bottom, or (if going uphill) on
my knees.
That
might have made a nice little parable, if I hadn’t found myself
kneeling in the very bog that I’d been trying to avoid slipping
into...because appearances are deceptive, and it’s not just the
obvious muddy patches that turn out to be squelchy and unreliable.
We
climbed Iona’s one serious hill, Duni, early on...and that path to
the summit was the only obvious route of the day. Once we left the
hill-top cairn behind us, it was by no means clear which way to go,
as the whole hillside was criss-crossed with sheep tracks – and, as
we learned early on, just because a sheep can get down somewhere, it
doesn’t follow that 5 middle-aged clergywomen can follow them. Lots
of paths – but which one was THE WAY?
My
US clergy friends were peculiarly fascinated by shaggy Hebridean
sheep, so there were a fair few jokes about lost sheep and about
good-enough shepherds as the day went on….the latter, of course,
referring to the brave soul who undertook to be our pioneer, striding
ahead and exploring the territory for we who came after.
For
all the joking, actually she reminded me of some important truths.
That
a good leader knows where you are actually aiming for, and has a
sense of the overall course of the journey….
That
she isn’t too proud to admit mistakes – and to use her own
experience as a learning point – DONT put your foot on that stone,
it’s so wobbly I’ve just landed up to my knees in muddy water.
That
she will not only have an eye to immediate hazards, but an overview
of the wider terrain (so easy to lose the path when you’re simply
intent on taking the next step safely), and will sometimes forge
ahead simply to encourage from the hill-top
“The
view from here is incredible”.
A
good-enough shepherd indeed, as all of her flock made it home
safely., but as I wobbled across the slough of despond on the
stepping stones of uncertainty, some other words were echoing in my
thoughts – words drawn from the reading we have just shared and
used, as it happened, in the Iona Community’s own liturgy for
Communion.
“Then,
just as we think we’ve got it right as to where we should go and
what we should do;
Just
when we’re ready to take on the world you come, like a beggar to
our back door saying “This is the way. I am the way.” and
offering us bread and wine….
I
am the way – he says.
A
way we can rely on, without wobbly stepping stones or unexpected mud
baths.
A
way that may challenge us, draw more out of us than we had believed
possible but will lead us to see unexpected beauty – the view from
here is incredible.
A
way that stretches out clearly in front of us,
unmistakeable...leading each of us safely home to our Father’s
house where there are so many many dwelling places….
But
what does that mean in practice?
No-one
comes to the Father except through me”..seems pretty clear and
non-negotiable, so much so that sometimes Christians have behaved as
if they thought of Jesus more as a road-block than a route to
wholeness and happiness with God.
Of
course it is true that the only way that we will get home safely is
by taking the route that Jesus forged for us on the cross, the route
of self-giving love that is stronger than death.
That
is what it means for us to be fully human,
I
don’t think, though, that this means that only card-carrying
Christians can expect a welcome home.
The
Jesus-event – life, death, resurrection – is indeed once for all
but it IS truly for all – and in those many dwelling places of our
Father’s house there is surely room for everyone who lives
according to his law of love.
When
it comes down to it, I cannot believe that the God whose love is
without limits will intentionally exclude anyone….and nor can I
believe that those who seem to be turning their backs on his gracious
invitation in this life will do so when they see for themselves that
beauty of God that is beyond all words.
I’m
pretty certain that those who seem to reject Christianity in the here
and now are rejecting not the truth in all its beauty but the broken
partial way in which all too often, we, the Church, present it…
But
fortunately it doesn’t matter how I see things...what matters is
how God sees things, and we can be confident that his perspective is
wide and generous beyond our widest and wildest dreams….because,
you see, that is how Jesus is….pure, unbounded love….
And
he and the Father are one. To see Jesus is to see God. To walk the
Jesus way in open-hearted love is to find ourselves on the road safe
home, to the place where we all of us belong.
Here
is the way. I am the way, Walk in it.
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