Septuagesima - Hard to spell, even harder to preach on the readings!

So here we are in church on the THIRD SUNDAY BEFORE LENT, or Septuagesima.

The word SEPTUAGESIMA isn’t used that often, but the name is still in the lectionary. It’s actually the ninth Sunday before Easter and it traditionally marks the beginning of the preparations for LENT.

Septugesima and the two following Sundays Sexagesima and Quinquagesima were removed from the Roman Catholic Calendar in 1969 although they remain an alternative name for us. We keep them in ORDINARY time though, that’s why we have green today.

SEPTUAGESIMA because it means the 70th in Latin, and today is only 63 days from Easter, and it always will be (because 9 weeks x 7 days=63 days)

However, just as we say 40 days of Lent, when it’s actually 46 between Ash Wednesday and Easter (because we don’t count the Sundays), the early church needed to FAST for 40 DAYS as CHRIST did in the Wilderness. Now there was a problem!

Traditionally, Saturdays and Thursdays were 'fast free' days, so the FASTING needed to start early.

That’s right, today (Septuagesima) was the beginning of the FAST for the Early Church – and they didn’t just give up chocolate. It was refraining from anything considered luxurious. This included ALL dairy products and fish, eggs and meat.

It won’t surprise you to discover that I find it difficult to fast. It comes from my early years as a Christian. When I was confirmed at 19, one of my very first Priests liked to talk a lot about ‘Holy Poverty’ and the commitment some religious orders especially the Franciscans make, when I was 20 or so and working with people in poverty, many of which weren’t particularly holy, I thought that there were many different types of poverty, many different types of fasting and many different types of sacrifice we can make for our faith. I thought that ‘poverty’ in all its’ forms was something that needed to be fought against, and I thought it was unhelpful to use the word ‘poverty’ in two so very different contexts.

Without me really realising, It led me to a point where I found certain things difficult to read in the Bible. The Gospel for today is one of those readings.

Jesus is telling the crowds to ‘turn the other cheek’ and to give your cloak to someone who is wants your coat. Give to everyone who begs and lend anything to those who ask. He goes on to say ‘love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you’. He tells us that this is the way to perfection.

It all seems so counter-intuitive; I thought that would be the wise thing to do, to preach today on the hopelessly high standard set for us, and how we all seem to fail!

I don’t know why, I thought that the readings were so topsy-turvy today I might get a hand from St. Paul (although I never have before) but he endorse my feeling that the wise thing to do might be to realise that we all fall short of the mark.

However, even the reading from the First Letter to the Corinthians gave me little comfort, it tells us that if we think we are ‘wise in this world’ then we should ‘become like fools’ because ‘the wisdom of this world is foolishness to God’.

It seems that the readings for today are a REAL challenge for us, even the Psalm gives the refrain ‘Lord, lead me in the path of your commandments’.

I don’t know! It looks like the bar is set particularly high.

Today is the ‘Brownie, Scouts, Guides and Beaver’s Thinking Day’ in Magor, and after this service, I’m going to lead that. You can imagine, I’ll be struggling for a talk there on the readings about ‘turning the other cheek’ and being ‘foolish’, but I think I’ve got something that’ll work, and it might work for us too.

I’m going to tell them that our community, our nation and even the whole world needs heroes, and it’s a difficult job. Heroes will be people who will help others regardless of the cost. They will;

1. Be the sort of person that will never give up

2. Be willing to do more than people ask for

3. Be able to struggle through, even when things are tough

4. Be wanting to do their best for people wherever they are

I hope the children don’t get scared off!

For us though, when we are thinking about SEPTUAGESIMA and the fact that the chocolate for us doesn’t stop for a few weeks, there is a tougher list of things that Christ is asking us today. It’s hard to write a sermon for, it’s hard to preach, and I suspect that it’s quite hard to listen to. But we are being called to;

1. Be Willing To Get Worse Than You Deserve

2. Be Willing to Give More Than You Are Asked

3. Be Willing to Go Farther Than You Are Required

4. Be Willing To Grant what is Needed…..

In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. AMEN

Holocaust Memorial Day – 27 January

Each year on 27 January the world marks Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD). HMD has been held in the UK since 2001 and the United Nations declared this an International event in November 2005. 27 January was chosen as the date for HMD because it was on this date in 1945 that the largest Nazi Concentration Camp Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated.

The day of remembering isn’t only about WWII, it’s also about remembering the victims and those subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and the ongoing atrocities today in Darfur.

It says on the Holocaust Memorial Day Website

“Genocide doesn’t happen overnight, it’s a gradual process which begins when the differences between us are not celebrated but used as a reason to exclude or marginalise. By learning from the lessons of the past, we can create a safer, better future.”

HMD has taken place in the UK since 2001. It was established at a meeting on 27 January 2000, when representatives from forty-four governments around the world met in Stockholm to discuss Holocaust education, remembrance and research. At the conclusion of the forum, the delegates unanimously signed a declaration which is the basis for national events, education and publicity.

Prayers for Holocaust Memorial Day

Let us pray for God’s ancient people, the Jews, the first to hear his word - for greater understanding between Christian and Jew for the removal of our blindness and bitterness of heart that God will grant us grace to be faithful to his covenant and to grow in the love of his name.

(From the Intercessions for Good Friday: Lent, Holy Week and Easter Services and Prayers, as commended by the House of Bishops of the General Synod of the Church of England)

Lord, remember not only the men and women of goodwill, but also those of ill will. Do not remember all the sufferings they have inflicted upon us; remember the fruits we bear, thanks to this suffering - our comradeship, our loyalty, our humanity, courage, generosity, the greatness of heart which has grown out of all this. And when they come to judgement, let all the fruits that we have borne be their forgiveness.

(A prayer found on a scrap of paper beside the body of a girl who died at Ravensbruck)

Prayers said on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the death of Anne Frank:

God, you created us all in your own likeness. We thank you for the wonderful diversity of races and cultures in your world. Enrich our lives by ever-widening circles of fellow feeling and understanding; show us your presence in those most different from us, so that in all our relationships, both by what we have in common and by things in which we differ, we may come to know you more fully in your creation; for you are Father, Son and Holy Spirit for ever. Amen

Judge eternal, bringer of justice, hear the cry of those who suffer under the lash of heartless political oppression; those who languish in prisons and labour camps, untried or falsely condemned; those whose bodies are shattered, or whose minds are unhinged by torture or deprivation. Meet them in their anguish and despair, and kindle in them the light of hope, that they may find rest in your love, healing I your compassion and faith in your mercy. In the name of him who suffered, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light

“There will be no more gloom for those who were in darkness. The people walking in darkness have seen a great light”.

Over the Christmas period I spent some time (when I was all but snowed in) thinking about why so many people came to our churches this Christmas?

Across the Benefice, there were hundreds of people that we know, who would otherwise not be regular worshippers, there were just as many people that we hadn’t seen before who crossed the threshold in the ten churches.

So, the question is…why?

1. Did we do something right last year that meant that people thought it a good idea to celebrate the birth of Jesus with us?

2. Did the national church do something right, so that people questioned that faith they might hold? Deciding that it needed dusting off?

3. Or, are there other circumstances that meant that people braved the ice, snow and sub-zero temperatures to join us in worship?

I need to know what happened? It isn’t a vague or fuzzy question, it’s absolutely critical to us as a church.

In my prayers, and hopes, I would like to think that perhaps they might have seen that it’s more than just mere religion and that faith is something shiny and bright, which can light up the darkest things.

Of course, we were all fabulously welcoming and friendly, our conversation was both well informed and informal. Our music was just like the heavenly host that the shepherds saw and the preaching made people think about God in their lives and the Christ child, born in Bethlehem.

I was still mulling over the real reason when I turned to the collect for today and started to prepare to write my sermon…

“Renew your people with your heavenly grace, and in all our weakness, sustain us by your mighty power”.

I started to smile because we pray that GOD might renew his people and then we are surprised when things go right.

It’s not just me though! It’s been happening for thousands of years…

In our OLD TESTAMENT READING we have that reading from the first part of the BOOK OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH. Written in the 8^th Century BC – the Prophet is reminding the people that those who WALK IN DARKNESS will see a great light.

Last week and the week before the OLD TESTAMENT readings we had were two of the four parts of the Book of Prophet Isaiah that we call the “Songs of the Suffering Servant” – which for Christians are the texts that tell us that even hundreds of years before the first Christmas people were waiting.

God is preparing his people for the time to come.

People say to me “Mark”, “Mark”, they say “why bother reading the OLD TESTAMENT?” It’s a good question, but it’s critical that we do – and it might have answer for us this morning!

There are TWO things we need to know realise about the OT;

Firstly it is realistic, we encounter a world of evil, violence and revenge. It echoes the world as it is today, with terrorists blowing up buildings, children shooting other children in schools and people being imprisoned and executed for their beliefs. It is startlingly realistic. There are passionate stories of love and hate, blood chilling stories of murder, matter of fact accounts of slavery and honest tales of the high honour and cruel treachery of war. There is also the wonderful irony of God. Spoiled brats like Solomon and Samson get supernatural gifts, and a good egg like Job gets a disaster.

Secondly, the whole of the Old Testament is a gradual but certain movement towards grace. The Hebrews lived in wild barbaric times. Their laws may seem harsh to us, they established basic rules for warfare, and also made rules to protect the poor and the needy. God, in his own time was working with them, establishing a seed of his grace to grow amongst them.

I think the answer to my original question might be in here somewhere…Why did so many people come to church at Christmas?

I’m not suggesting that people come to church because they have read the OLD TESTAMENT – I BELIEVE THAT;

1. MANY, MANY PEOPLE ARE SHUFFLING TOWARDS GOD.

2. MANY PEOPLE ARE WANTING TO WALK IN THE LIGHT, and

3. MANY PEOPLE ARE LOOKING FOR SOMETHING THAT MAKES THEM FEEL VALUED, GOOD, UNIQUE and LOVED

I had a good feeling about what happened at Christmas in our churches. I’d like to think that in the ice and snow, people were

looking for something important. A lot of people worked very hard to beautify our churches, produce our music, write our sermons, cook our food, rehearse with the children, clear the paths, make our Christingles and a hundred other things – but if it meant that EVEN JUST ONE PERSON who was walking in darkness was HELPED TO SEE THE LIGHT, then it will have been all worth it.

We are blessed indeed! May we be a blessing to others.

Midnight Mass 2010

As I sat to write a sermon for this evening, I realised that I really love Christmas! It’s absolutely fantastic!

There’s no other time of the year when we join in something so important. Meeting in this historic church very late on a Christmas Eve we are taking part in the history of our faith, we are adding another page to the story that is 2,000 years in the telling…so far.

(14^th Century)

On the way in this evening we sang Adeste Fidelis the carol we know as O Come all ye Faithful.

The original words are attributed to John of Reading, who wrote a book called “Prose for Christmas Day” around 1320. Just after this church was built on this site.

Much later, the tune (and the rewriting of some of the words) were changed by John Francis Wade, a Catholic Layman who fled to France during the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745. It’s suggested there’s a secret meaning to some of the words. The return of Bonnie Prince Charlie and the secret followers of The Old Pretender Stuart are all supposedly mentioned. The faithful are the ‘Jacobites’ who are being encouraged to return, and Bethlehem, was a code for them to mean England. So this was a carol of rallying the people to return.

(19^th Century)

Then, before the Gospel reading we sang that calm and beautiful classic Christmas carol Silent Night. The original lyrics were written in Austria in by a priest, Joseph Mohr. The music was written by Xaver Gruber in 1816 and it was sung the first time on Christmas Eve 1818 in the Church of St. Nicholas, Oberndorf, Austria.

Nearly one hundred years later, in the 1914 Christmas truce of World War One, where troops stopped fighting and left the trenches to exchange gifts with the enemy, this carol was simultaneously sung in three languages (English, French and German) it was so widely known and sung. This is the quiet colossus in the Carolling world!

(20^th Century)

Even though Christina Rossetti wrote her famous poem “In the Bleak Midwinter” before 1872, it didn’t appear as a carol until 1906, in the English Hymnal with a setting by the famous English composer Gustav Holst.

It’s a fantastic carol (and probably my favourite) It’s got everything in, it’s like a KFC bargain bucket, the one where you get the fries, coke and the vienetta as well.

In the first verse, she describes the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem. In the second verse she compares the first and second coming of Christ, in the third verse she

writes about the simple surroundings of Christ’s birth. The fourth is usually omitted but it’s about Mary’s love and care for Jesus and the final verse is all about how we should treat others. It’s all there!

(18^th Century)

No midnight mass is complete without us leaving to Hark the Herald Angels sing. This carol was written in 1739 by Charles Wesley. Although he was a bit of a sober, sombre man, it’s still possible to sing this carol after a Christmas drink, as a few of you will know. The words are triumphant! In the last verse we sing “sing choirs of Angels” I looked through every Bible I have, and according to them the Angels “spoke” not “sang”, but that’s fine. It’s a good picture!

So, we are in a 13^th Century church singing Carols ranging from the 14^th to the 20^th century. We are hearing the words of those who have translated the Bible down the generations and we are saying prayers and doing things that date back to the earliest days of the faith.

Christmas has given us a wealth of art and music, poetry and philosophy history that goes well beyond the story of the Son of God being born to a young girl 2,000 years ago.

Although the message of Christmas is an unchanging one, we are adding to Christmas just by being here this evening. You are part of the Christmas story, the story of God and his people, the greatest story ever told.

We are creating Christmas!

That’s why I’m a Christmas person! In Church we speak of the Incarnation – the birth of Jesus - and at Easter, we speak of the Atonement; the crucifixion, death and resurrection of Jesus. I understand you can’t have one without the other, but I have to say that Christmas is for me, as C.S Lewis calls it ‘That Great Miracle’.

This year we are ‘creating more Christmas’ as we think of the real message of Christmas. This year we are adding to the story when we join as ‘community’ to celebrate with the people of faith from the last 2,000 years. This year, as this church resonates to music and carols this evening we are making history, and building faith. Tonight we are doing the same thing as those who came to worship here 700 years ago.

We can either fill it with stress and worry, or we can fill it with love and care. Archbishop John Sentamu cut through the Christmas theology to give us his considered message, he said;

“It’s xmas not stressmas”

May God give us all a break this Christmas and put us into the Christmas story in our time, creating something good and new, in the name of God; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. AMEN

Advent and Christmas in the Benefice of Magor

Advent and Christmas in the Church in Wales Rectorial Benefice of Magor

Llanmartin, Magor and Wilcrick

December

4^th Christmas Cake Saturday – Magor 2.00-4.00

4^th Lighting the tree in Magor Square with the Severn Tunnel Band 5.00

7^th Advent Quiet Hour – Magor 7.00

11^th Carols at Magor Marsh

12^th Advent Family Service – Llanmartin 10.30

12^th ‘Here we go down to Bethlehem’ songs and actions for the under 4’s Magor 3.00

14^th Mothers’ Union Deanery Advent Service– Magor Church 11.00

14^th Advent Quiet Hour – Magor –Church 7.00

15^th Carols at ‘The Lawns’ – 3.00

19^th Nativity – Magor (10.30)

19^th Nine Lessons and Carols – Wilcrick with Llanmartin – Wilcrick Church 3.30

19^th Magor – Lessons and Carols 6.00

21^st Advent Quiet Hour – Magor 7.00

24^th Christingle – Llanmartin Church 3.30

24^th Midnight Mass – Magor 11.30

24^th Midnight Mass – Llanmartin 11.30

25^th Christmas Eucharist – Wilcrick 8.00

25^th Christmas Eucharist - Magor 10.30

26^th St. Stephen’s Day Eucharist – Magor 10.30

Undy, Redwick and Goldcliff

December

12^th Undy Nativity – 3.00

13^th Redwick Christmas Tree

19^th Redwick Carols 4.00

19^th Goldcliff and Nash Carols – Nash 4.00

19^th Undy Carols with Severn Tunnel Band – 6.00

24^th Crib Service with Carols – Goldcliff – 3.00

24^th Midnight Mass – Goldcliff – 11.30

25^th Christmas Eucharist - Undy 9.30

25^th Christmas Eucharist - Redwick 11.00

Langstone, Bishton, Nash, Llanwern

December

12^th Carols at Langstone Church with the School 10.30

19^th Nash and Goldcliff Carols – Nash 4.00

19^th Llanwern and Bishton Carols at Llanwern Church – 6.00

20^th RSPB Wetlands Nash – Carols – 10.00

25^th Christmas Eucharist - Nash 9.30

25^th Christmas Eucharist - Bishton 11.00

These services are generally in addition to the usual services on the Sunday/Weekday rotas

Please remember that dates and times may change, please check the notice sheet.

Revised 20^th November

Christ the King

CHRIST THE KING -- ARE WE JOKING?

Twice in recent weeks we've noticed outrageous claims made about Christ's power. It began with St. Paul's outrageous description in Ephesians of Christ's power as "far above all rule and authority and power and dominion." His waxing lyrical about the power recalls the greatest conquerors of all time

So why is St. Paul's description so outrageous? He's making this claim of ultimate power for a poor carpenter's son who was executed on the cross in shame and powerlessness.

There can only be two reasons for this;

1. Either Paul is completely mad, this is daft and crazy nonsense, or

2. God is trying to show us what really counts for power to God.

If this is God’s power, at work through Christ, then it is completely different than what counts as power for us.

Well, this week we have all of that outrageousness thrown right back in our face and made explicit. Christ the King Sunday, we call it. And if the joke isn't obvious yet, our Gospel Lesson makes it as plain as can be. Pilate makes a joke by posting a sign of "King of the Jews" above Jesus' head. He no doubt regarded the Jewish people as a joke and thought he'd mock them a bit. This puts everyone in a mocking mood, of course, so as Jesus hangs on the cross he is made to be the butt of everyone's jokes:

"He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!" The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine, and saying, "If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!" One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, "Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!" (Luke 23:35-38, 39)

The joke at the beginning of the sermon today wasn’t one of mine, it was Pilates - Christ the King! What a joke!

We all know though that the best jokes are usually close to the truth, or sometimes an inversion of what’s normal. Some of the best comedians, when you listen to them actually seem to know what we are thinking. Well, God’s like that, because even though on Friday it was a great joke, on Easter morning, of course, it was God who had the last laugh.

Or perhaps it was God's first laugh?

Easter, as we know was the beginning of something new, a new relationship and Christ Jesus is the true King of that new relationship, a Lord who will someday crown all of Creation with his eternal, never-ending source of life.

In the meanwhile however, we seem to be more concerned with allowing power in the way in which Pilate saw it. We need to be honest about this

Pilate's joke, a sign of "King of the Jews" hanging above an executed criminal is a joke humanity is still telling.

If we are ever to see how the joke is on Pilate, and on us, we need to begin to see with the eyes of faith what it is that God is trying to show us with the cross.

We can only begin to see this if we begin to see what counts for power to us.

Let me repeat one more time: either this is absolutely daft and crazy nonsense, or else God is trying to show us that what counts for power to God is completely different than what counts for power to us. We must understand the dark reality that the cross reveals to us about ourselves and the way we do things.

All of human culture, and all of our human kingdoms, are founded around a collective violence of an "us" against "them" variety.

Sometimes we get to ‘scapegoat’ someone, giving them the aura supernatural, getting to blame them for our own failings. In doing this we may feel better about ourselves, but we distance ourselves from God.

Them and us is the humour of Pilate and has nothing to do with Christ the King or his Kingdom.

If you find yourselves in conversation with someone on a bus or in the pub, if you are at a meeting or a party and someone is proposing that it’s all about us and them, think about Pilate and ask yourself if that’s the humour you prefer, or whether you would rather laugh with Christ the King, because he will have the last laugh. And he who laughs last… (we all know the rest)

The Kingdom of God is the Kingdom of mercy and goodness. It is that place we can create in our communities, our churches, but also in our lives.

The last few weeks in our readings we were peacefully led through stories that told us about life in first century Palestine- following Christ down the highways and byways with his bunch of followers, hearing about the work of the Son of God when he walked amongst us. We (yes us) were getting the plans for building the Kingdom on whatever space has been entrusted to us.

In a few weeks time we will be thinking of the little town of Bethlehem – the town Matthew refers to as insignificant. In this sense, all the poor and forgotten people are insignificant, like Bethlehem, yet from them, the LORD comes to us as KING. (this is another part of God’s humour)

Next week, Advent Sunday is the start of the time of preparation for us. It is the time we get to plan for the great celebration of Christmas once again. This year, make is one to remember, not just another one when we enjoyed too many mince pies, sang too many carols and fell out over things that were never important.

Make this the Christmas when you welcomed not Christ THE King, but Christ YOUR King.

Sermon - The last Sunday after Trinity


An elderly woman had just returned to her home from Church one Sunday morning when she was startled by an burglar.

Caught the man in the act of robbing her home of its valuables he runs towards the door,

"Stop! Acts 2:38!" The woman shouted



(Repent and be baptised, in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven.)

The burglar stopped in his tracks. The woman calmly called the police and explained what she had done.

As the officer cuffed the man to take him in, he asked the burglar, "Why did you just stand there? All the old lady did was yell a scripture to you." "Scripture?" replied the burglar. "She had a cricket bat and a rolling pin”

The Gospel reading this morning is proof that Luke had no sense of comedy timing, and no idea how to inject irony into the scenes of the Bible. He was a Doctor after all; the report today is a little clinical.

“Jesus told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt”

Aaggh, that’s the punchline.

The issue in this part of the Gospel is one of self-righteousness. This was an important issue when Luke wrote. The Pharisees were still a force to contend with, and they had taken control of the Jewish religious tradition amongst the Diaspora as well as in the Jewish homeland.

Luke was almost certainly writing to Christian converts from Judaism with this parable. He would undoubtedly have known the ancient Jewish morning prayer which thanked God for not making him a Gentile, a slave or a woman. He was trying to get them to understand that self-righteousness was a hugely destructive force in the early church.

The story itself has a ring of immediacy about it. This makes it seem as if everyone who may have heard Jesus utter it may well have witnessed this very incident many times as they went to offer their own prayers in the temple. Note that the Pharisee stood off by himself to avoid contamination from anyone who might be in the temple courts in a ritually impure state. The tax collector, on the other hand, afraid perhaps of even daring to enter the sacred precincts, is "standing far off." In fact, this may refer to the fact that tax-collectors were regarded as unfit to enter the temple, and required to stay in the exterior Court of the Gentiles. Yet in Jesus' estimation the sincerity of his prayer far exceeded that of the Pharisee. He responded in repentance to the grace he hoped to find by acknowledging his own unworthiness.

One other detail of the story is significant: We are not told if the tax collector even knew he was forgiven. The word used is "Justified" (a typically strange Pauline word) with which Luke states this man's new relationship with God. (of course he was forgiven!)

Of the two men, he was the only one who had really prayed. For doing that he had been declared righteous, but not because he was good and the Pharisee bad, nor because he felt better for it. Rather he had the humility to do the one thing God requires: he had faced the truth about himself and asked for God's mercy and compassion.

Facing the truth is always a difficult task.

This isn’t all about us as individuals though, it’s also about how WE organize our shared life as a Church.

Being able to look at what WE do in our lives as CHRISTIANS, AND THEN organising our church life to affect those around us is very important!

SO HOW DO WE FACE THE TRUTH AS A CHURCH?

(It was at this stage that I made a coffee, looked out of the window and started to think about how we as a church could do things differently, how we could change…It was quite some time before I realised that it was nonsense – change for the sake of it is the sign of a church that has no idea what it’s doing).

I can tell you that this church is already very, very good at organising our church life to affect those around us. We have groups and clubs, events and talks, societies and services that include members of the community and the church in a seamless way – from cakes to churchmen and life groups to lunches. The Magor Church Centre is the centre of this and we should be really, really pleased!

Now I’m not suggesting that we shouldn’t bother doing anymore, I’m just saying that through the hard work and commitment of people in this church we have started things that are really important.

People are starting to ask the question “what ARE they doing in there on a Sunday Morning?” they don’t think that it’s just “Vicar of Dibley, and the Parish Council”.

SO HOW DO WE FACE THE TRUTH AS INDIVIDUALS?

In the Gospel reading, the Pharisee was a good religious man, but did he have faith. He trusted in the Law and the Prophets, but did he trust in GOD. Had he, at some point managed to define GOD, and how RELIGION worked? The TAX-COLLECTOR was a bad man, and he knew it – he was in the temple waiting for the thunderbolt. He had little RELIGION, but he TRUSTED IN GOD and HAD FAITH.

Have you ever sat in church waiting for the thunderbolt? We can all feel that we are not RIGHT with GOD for some reason – and then we can judge ourselves against the PHARISEE and NOT the TAX-COLLECTOR.

Now sometimes people misunderstand this.

Are you the Pharisee or the Tax collector?

If you are the PHARISEE, your FIRST CONCERN will be more worried about remembering how many books there are in the Bible and whether the New International Version is a more faithful translation than the New Revised Standard Version. You will eventually pray to God, but in that ordered way that sounds like a church service, you will expect God to answer in riddles that you need to decode. When you get home, you’ll hate me for preaching this sermon because you thought it was all about you.

If you are the TAX COLLECTOR you’re happy that you are even here this morning because you’ve come to be with GOD and your church family in your own way. Your prayers before the service were thankful about stuff and also concerned with everyday realities – you know that you have to say ‘sorry’ to God, but it’s fine because (as a Christian) the price has now been paid for you, but you still need to ask for forgiveness. Your prayers did not have any real punctuation because they came from the heart. You have not read an article on the doctrine of substitutionary atonement this week, indeed you didn’t have enough time because you were probably worrying about people and life in general and doing your best to help. You trust other people to guide you in religion and theology and trust God to lead you in faith. You don’t care if this sermon isn’t speaking directly to you, because it might be good for someone else. When you get home you will feel as though you have been recharged.

I don’t know if we can be half and half! Tax collector or Pharisee, but isn’t it strange that we can leave church this morning thinking we have to be more like ‘tax collectors’.

I’ve been told that a good sermon should have a good beginning and a good ending, and they should be as close together as possible.

Therefore, this week;

May you leave this place recharged by the Holy Sacrament and the Word of God, May your love for others lead you into a deeper knowledge of God, May your prayers be messy but full of love, and May God speak to you in the words of others, the smile of children and the wonder of creation. In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. AMEN