The Word as a Wordle - Trinity 5

This Sunday's Gospel reading as a Wordle...

The Wordled Word

Next Sunday's Gospel reading through the eyes of Wordle... It's interesting to see which words are used most often in the passage as they come out the largest. It's an interesting way of seeing a way into what the text might be saying to us... Enjoy!

Shalom, Michael Jackson, Shalom...

Herewith a draft of this morning's sermon. It was tough to get to a point where I had something meaningful. Worth the wait though I though...

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The king of pop is dead. Long live the king...There cannot be a person left unaware of the death of Michael Jackson in recent days. As someone never moved by his music, I have been left a little bemused by the outpourings from the media about the man, his life, his music and his legacy. The thing that has struck me has been the way that the press have not been circling looking for prey in this story so far. Instead, aside from the ongoing pictorial and musical tributes, we are left looking at 50 years of a very private individual, living in the limelight, and yet not knowing very much about this apparently very troubled man. A man who apparently longed for a childhood, a ‘normal’ relationship with anyone, and healing from things that clearly caused him enough emotional pain to seek relief in the form of prescription medication.

The media, life in public, more money than you can shake a stick at did not seem to provide the hope, stability, love and healing that he and indeed all of us crave for deep down. This morning, the encounters Jesus has with two groups of people go right to the heart our deepest longings.

Jesus crosses the lake with his disciples and they encounter a great crowd. Jairus comes by, he sees Jesus, falls at his feet and begs repeatedly for Jesus to come and heal his daughter. Now just hold the action there a second - it is all too easy to miss the scandal of what is going on here. All too often it is the leadership of the synagogues and their priests that give Jesus a hard time, and yet here, Jairus part of that leadership comes to Jesus. He is clearly a desperate man - so desperate that he will reach out across religious boundaries seeking healing that he has been unable to obtain through other channels for his daughter.

Whilst heading off with Jairus, his story is interupted by another one, that of the haemoraging woman. She has endured much physically, medically and financially over the years. She, like Jairus, was desperate - so desperate that she will reach out across the religious and social boundaries seeking healing that she has been unable to obtain through other channels. But...

Jairus came to Jesus as an equal - as a man. This woman approaches knowing that according to the religious and social rules of her day she could not even speak let alone touch another man. Jairus was first, this woman was most definately last.

The woman who touches Jesus has been bleeding for twelve years. Jairus’ daughter is twelve years of age. Although this is inserted in brackets in the text, it is no afterthought, but an absolutely deliberate dramatic irony. Here are two women – one whose life as a woman has apparently finished, and another whose life as a women is just starting. The woman has been bleeding for the lifetime of Jairus’ daughter. All the time the girl has been growing, the woman has had her life ebbing away. Two lives that should never meet. The woman is one of “the crowd” – one of the poor and socially outcast. She is doubly ostracised because of her menstrual bleeding. She has become one of the “untouchables”. Jairus’ daughter, by contrast, comes from wealth and privilege. Yet they are destined to meet in Jesus. Here is a sign of the new community: the barriers between rich and poor, between those at the social centre and those on the periphery, are removed in Christ. Ironically, the woman is restored to life at the very moment at which the girl dies. Do you see how socially loaded this story is? For one woman, the social ostracism of the past twelve years is ending; for the other, the wealth, privilege of the past twelve years is also ending.

Two powerful stories. But take another look at the small details of the stories as they have as much to teach us as the main events themselves.

In both cases there was a crowd - people clearly expected Jesus to demonstrate the power of God in word or action. In both cases, both Jairus and the woman had an urgency about them, they know that Jesus could do want they wanted, needed, longed for. In both cases, touch was seen as central to the act of healing - lay your hand on her - touch the hem or edge of his robe - there is something quite physical going on here.

One thing we could learn fro this story is that healing is to be expected with the power of God at work in Jesus. We should expect it, even if it doesn’t seem to work out the way that we thought or hoped. The danger is we live in an instant world and expect instant results and when one desperate prayer is not answered we shake our fist at God and walk off. And yet physical healing falls into place as a small piece of God’s healing plan for Jairus, this woman, Michael Jackson and us.

In these two encounters, Jesus begins to heal the social and religious rifts of his day and offers healing through the creation of a new social order where no one dies and no one is excluded. Here is a sign of the new community: the barriers between rich and poor, between those at the social centre and those on the periphery, are removed in Christ. And if you think that sounds pie in the sky, look at what Jesus says to the haemoraging woman - your faith has made you well, go in peace and be healed of your disease.

A really strange way of saying - be healed but there is something more to what Jesus offerers that woman, Jairus and his daughter, Michael Jackson and you and me. Jesus assures that woman that it is her faith that has healed her from her disease. There is another whole sermon on what that might mean, it is the words - go in peace that sit staring us in the face this morning.

Peace - shalom - is the presence of the good ness of God, of wholeness, completedness. To go in peace is to have the blessing of God on all of her, not just her physical body - but God’s presence on and in her whole being.

Peace and salvation - restoration with God and living in harmony with him and each other.

What did Jairus and the woman really want from Jesus? What did Michael Jackson crave? And us, what do we really want? Quick fix answers from an instant god in an instant world?

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This is where my notes peter out and the Holy Spirit took over. Make of it what you will...

The Word through Wordle

Here's tomorrow's Gospel reading through the wonder of Wordle. Notice that the commonest words come out the biggest - therefore meaning that 'crowd', 'Jesus and 'came' feature very often. Closely following that are the words 'touched', 'synagogue', 'immediately', 'made' and 'daughter.'

Doing this exercise has made me wonder about the stories from the point of view of the crowd watching what happened. Notice also that the stories happened somewhere else, Jesus went to them so to speak. It is also worth noting the physical nature of what took place - not just physical healing, but Jesus touched and healed. The outcome was immediate - no mention of in God's timing.

The passage makes us ask hard questions about healing today - outside that of conventional medicine. Also, to continue to ask - who is this man?

Who is this man?

Evening folks,

Just thought that I'd give you a heads up... One of the readings on Sunday is from Mark 5:21-43 and it deals with two amazing events in Jesus' early ministry.

Firstly a woman who has suffered from severe haemorrhages for many many years came to Jesus to seek healing - healing that the doctors of the day could not provide. And she was healed.

Secondly, the story of the rasing to life of Jairus' daughter, who had died.

Both passages speak powerfully of who Jesus is. He is not just another Rabbi, not just another religious teach, not just some other messianic nut job. The power of God that brought all things into being at the first moment of creation, is clearly at work in the man Jesus of Nazareth.

The question the crowds are left asking is - who is this man? *Really*, who is he?

It's the same question that we will be exploring in our services on Sunday. At 10am, as we are talking of healing, the opportunity to receive prayer for yourself or others as you ask the same question, or to receive the ministry of laying on of hands and annointing with holy oil for healing will be on offer for you or others known to you.

It should be a special time. Come and join us. Come expecting to meet with God. Come with your hopes and fears, your doubts and yearnings and come with open hands and an open heart to meet with each other and with the same God who was at work in Jesus.

See you Sunday!

Simon

Age of Stupid

I have been to the first of 2 upcoming Indie screenings of the arresting 'The Age of Stupid' tonight. The next one is in Bennetts End on 16th July.

Even though I saw the film first on it's world premiere on March 15th I was still moved by the central message of the film and the data that unfolds as part of the central story. If anythings, having seen it again tonight I feel more convinced that it is my vocation to act on making people more aware of the reality of peak oil and climate change...

I believe it is my human vocation, but I believe that it is also my vocation as a Christian. Much damage has been done in the name of '...And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth...' (Genesis 1:28.)

Having dominion over... Wikipedia tells us, '...In English common law, the dominions of the Crown referred to all the realms and territories under the sovereignty of the Crown, e.g. the Order-in-Council annexing Cyprus in 1914 provided that "... the said Island shall be annexed to and form part of His Majesty's Dominions and the said Island is annexed accordingly...' Dominion implies being a subject of the Empire.

When God tells human beings to have dominion over the fish and so on, are human beings not being asked to treat everything that lives as being under the authority of the King - namely God? It is therefore not our dominion that we are being asked to exercise - but God's.

Therefore, we need to ask, how does God view the whole created order? How does He treat it? In short we need to turn to words of Jesus to guide us. Jesus said, '... For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life...' (John 3:16.)

God loves the world. All that is. Not just Christians. Not even all people. God says He loves every thing indeed in Genesis 1, He is described as seeing all that He has made as good. God loves everything, and therefore, as as we are made in His image, we must act as He would. We are called love all that there is as God does. This implies are respect and a reverence as everything has the fingerprints of the Creator on it.

It is our God given vocation to treat everything that is with respect God gives it - both now and for the future. It is our God given vocation to act to reduce the impact of our modern ways of life on the world so that less and less do we see our footprints stamped everywhere, but so that we too still see the fingerprints of the Creator.

Go and see the film. Change your life. Fly less. Reduce your emissions. Drive less. Cycle more. Check out the website. It is your vocation to act

At the end of the day...

... I am tired. Sounds like a silly thing to say, but I am. Too many late nights. It's late now and yet I still have some domestic things I was hoping to achieve...

... I am excited. I have spent this evening with a group of lay people from the church community beginning to get a sense of the bigger picture that God is revealing of His purposes amongst us. It allows the group to get s sense of the diversity of new work that we are focusing on together. We also looked to the future together too. It was a hugely rewarding evening and one that begins to build friendship and trust between the members of the group too for mutual support and prayer, but also allows us to see the pattern of God's work and how each of the new Key groups can work together with each other and with God to bring that about.

... I am encouraged at all that God is doing amongst us. I am well aware of what lies ahead though too. This includes of course all the preparations for the inauguration of the new benefice, and all that goes with that. How are we church together? How do we continue to seek the purposes of God? How and where and when do we provide opportunities for people to gather for worship with resources that we have.

... I am hopeful. Hopeful that all will be well. I don't mean, basically a grasping at straws, but 'a sure an certain hope' that God will sort it all out. We need to be listening and watching and waiting and following.

... I am a child of God and loved by him through it all.

At the end of the day... I don't think it get's much better than this...