The World of Rev Ken
Pentecost 18 2005Exodus 16.2-15, Psalm 105.1-6, 37-45, Philippians 1.21-30,
Matthew 20.1-16.I used to manage a small business in Shepparton, in Victoria.
It was a small branch of a larger graphic arts and repro company that was based in Albury, NSW. It was in Shepparton largely to service one particular company whose main trade was labels for the tinned food industry, an industry which is pretty much the backbone of the Shepparton district. All of the SPC and Goulbourn Valley labels, a large proportion of IXL jam labels, and many other labels in the early 90’s came through our little place. It was mostly a happy place, apart from that inferiority complex that you will often find in the poorer, under-resourced and neglected branch office of a company who seem to want to extract money but not invest in equipment and training. And I’d have to admit that I wasn’t ready to be a manager, I had very little, actually, no training whatsoever, or experience, and I was pretty much sent there because the previous guy had made life difficult for himself with personality clashes with the staff. And the fact that no one else wanted it. He went back to Albury, and I moved in.
It all went ok, until the two photo-typesetters were discussing their wages. It turned out that one was on more than the other, even though she had been there a shorter time. Suffice to say that the one on lower wages didn’t think it was fair. And gee, did the proverbial hit the fan then. I had a revolt on my hands, and the only way to quell the riot was to convince head office to make the pay rates equal. Disaster was averted – just, and we went on, until I ran away to Adelaide, and that, my friends, is another story for another time.
The parable in the Gospel reading for this morning is kind of similar. It’s about the fairness of wages in the workplace. It’s an industrial dispute. Whilst at Ross Graphics it was different pay for the same amount of work, in this parable we have workers who have done different amounts of work getting the same pay. The money they have been paid is nothing extravagant – it is enough for them to live on for one day. That’s all. It’s not like they are company executives or anything. The problem is the grumbling of the ones who have worked all day against the ones who have worked a shorter time, who get the same cash. Now, on the human level, there is some justification in their complaints. It’s not fair, is it, by human standards? They should be paid by the hour, they should be paid fairly for the work they do, and if they don’t do enough work, then they should get less than those who have been there all day. But the thing is, this is not on the human level. It is a parable about the kingdom of heaven. And God’s abundant generosity.
Now, unless you hadn’t noticed yet, you will know already that the kingdom of heaven is very much NOT the kingdom of humans. The rules are different, the perspective is different, and things operate on a different set of rules, a different set of industrial laws. Not for this kingdom is the highly regulated labour market sought after by the ultra-lefties, or the dog eat dog utopia envisioned by the neo-liberals. No, it runs on the law of God’s grace. A believer is a believer and is saved, regardless of the amount of time one has been a believer. There’s no gold watch for long service. The wage of faith is life eternal, salvation, forgiveness, God’s love. Regardless of whether the believer is a long term Christian or a newby.
As a church, we are called to live in the kingdom NOW, as much as we possibly can. That means sharing that grace that God offers us, as unconditionally and fully as we can. There are implications in this for us as members of the church. Especially in the way the church, the diocese and the parishes are run.
Who is a full member of the church? Who has the right to make decisions? Who controls the church? Every baptised member, guided by God, is the correct answer. But often it is the long term members of the church, who are given or who take the power, who control the destiny of the parish or diocese, and have great difficulty allowing newcomers to have a voice. Perhaps it’s that old respect your elders thing. Now there isn’t anything wrong with that as such – respect for your elders and your seniors is important. However Jesus is pointing out that this is not how the kingdom of God operates. That giving of power to the longest serving members, the giving of special priveledges, is a human thing, not a God thing.
In the Kingdom of God, all are equal. No one is more equal than anyone else. Everyone is saved. Everyone is given grace. God’s grace is infinite. How do you get more of a share of something that is infinite? Its only limited by our capacity to accept it. It’s a hard thing to comprehend, but from God’s perspective, individual things like length of service, or how many brass plaques are about the church with your name on them don’t matter a damn. God doesn’t give out gold watches for 50 years service to the Kingdom. God gives out grace and forgiveness to all who ask and who accept Jesus into their lives, regardless of the length of time they are believers. Everyone is equal. Everyone gets love. It’s up to us to get over our sense of injustice about it, and share that infinite love and grace just as abundantly and recklessly as God does.
So then, in terms of our parish, how might this affect the way we live? Well, what it means is that every member of this community of faith has an equal say in the future of the parish, and the present of this parish. Everyone can take part in the decision making and the vision forming and the mission of this parish. Some may choose not to take this up – that’s up to them - but it is there. Everyone is free to have a say – even the kids. And no one has the right to shut them up. They have a right to say what they think just as much as adults do. I was at a parish once where, at a meeting about children’s ministry, someone said “Who cares about the children. They don’t pay the bills”. Shocking, isn’t it. Yet I think that person was actually brave enough to voice what many others think. It’s the same with new comers, and with other people who we see as not having as much right to a say in the church. It shouldn’t be based on length of service or the amount of giving. Clergy are really good at trying to silence voices. We have to listen to each other, to be able to allow each other to have a voice. Going back to what I said a few weeks ago about confronting each other when we need to, the key is listening and affording each other the respect that is due to a fellow human and a fellow member of the family of God. No one deserves more or less respect due to their social position, their age, their gender, their length of membership, their giving to the church, or even whether they are ordained or not. Every single person deserves our respect as fellow human beings, especially in the church. Any rule that states this is so is not from Jesus, it is human in origin. Membership, full membership of the Kingdom of God, and hence the church, is based solely on our faith and our acceptance of Jesus as our Lord and Saviour. Hopefully our community will reflect this.
The Lord be with you.
Pentecost 16 2005
Exodus 12.1-14, Psalm 149, Romans 13.1-10, Matthew 18.10-20.
Today’s Gospel reading is scary, isn’t it?
I mean, readings about judgment and death and all that sort of stuff just don’t hold a candle to this one.
What do I mean?
Well, in today’s Gospel readings, Jesus is talking about how to confront people.
AAAAAHHHHHHH
Confrontation. That’s the scary bit. The thought of having to confront someone causes more anxiety than just about anything else. People stay awake all night dreading a looming confrontation. People stop talking to each other to avoid having a confrontation. People will pretend another person doesn’t exist, they will move states, move countries even. Fear and anxiety about a much needed confrontation splits up marriages and families. People will allow a relationship to go down the plughole rather than be honest.
It’s the little things, isn’t it? Things that others say, things they do, that harm us in some way, that change us for the worse. If we fear confrontation, then the issues is never resolved. It becomes a grudge. It becomes something that drives us. It grows and grows, until we forget the reason for the grudge, it becomes ingrained, it becomes part of us, as we replace the anxiety with self-righteousness, stubbornness and plain pig-headedness. Not a nice situation.
Confrontation is hard. Each one of us handles it differently. I’m afraid I’m an avoider, and I suspect many others are. The issue itself, the sadness about it, the anger, all builds up until like a release valve on a steam engine, or to be more contemporary, a waste-gate on a turbo charger, it comes gushing out in an explosive release. Any one in the way of it will get burned. So in the end, nothing is resolved, and in fact it is made worse by the fact that the outburst was not driven by a sense of wanting to be reconciled, a sense of love, but by a long time of rising bitterness.
Another way is to not tackle the problem, to leave and avoid the issue. This is a killer of community and a killer of families. Church communities break up because of something that happens or doesn’t happen and no one has the guts to do something about it in a loving way. People leave parishes, even priests leave parishes rather than speaking up about something that troubles them, rather than attempting to address the issue. It’s not a good way to be. And can spark some interesting games at times.
Game playing is not nice. Game playing is often used instead of confrontation. Game playing is destructive and dishonest. It becomes a form of manipulation, of covert bullying.
There is more blatant bullying. For some people it is easy to say what they don’t like. However, it is difficult to say it in a way that is loving. It becomes insulting. This is also a sign of fear, even though it comes across as aggression and bullying. Bullying behaviour is based on fear – the bully is usually frightened, and cover for it by frightening others. It is not honest at all, it says nothing about how they really feel, and pretty much slams the door on any chance of reconciliation. The fear is so great that the chance for healing of the relationship is lost. This sort of stuff has also been known to fracture and split families and communities, even church communities.
But as they say, it takes two to tango. I’m not sure I have the confidence tgo stand up to any of these behaviours, and I’m sure I’m not alone. This sort of stuff goes on until someone challenges it in a loving way and gradually the behaviour ceases, hopefully. This is the thing with what Jesus is saying, that there is a mutual responsibility to seek reconciliation. The person who is sinned against is to go and talk with the other person to try to work it out. Jesus is actually encouraging us to confront, but confront in a way that is loving and holds some hope of actually getting somewhere. Jesus says to speak to the other person and point out the issue, in private. He is telling us to be honest, to actually name the issue to the person concerned and invite dialogue. We cannot make others change, we can only say how we feel and hope that they respond, and this is the very opportunity that is offered. If it does not work, then there are other steps that can be taken to attempt reconciliation. And attempt it we must, even though often a true reconciliation will have to involve some confrontation.
As Christians we are called to be people of reconciliation. It’s unfortunate then that even in the church we often have conflict. I guess that’s bound to happen whenever there are human beings involved. Paul writes about trying to avoid breaks in relationships with others and with God, living in love. But inevitably these problems happen, so when they do, we have these words from Jesus to help resolve the conflict, setting up a process to work towards reconciliation. So perhaps it’s in this that we can find a way of making confrontation less scary.
The thing with this process is that it is done with the goal being reconciliation. It’s not done to exact vengeance, to take away honour or to hurt in some way, which is what happens so often with confrontation. It is a process which, if both parties allow it to happen, can lead to a peaceful resolution. As I said earlier, it takes two to tango, so it needs both parties to be willing to operate within it and to be loving and honest in the process. Often when we are confronted we resort to particular behaviours ourselves, defensiveness, or anger, or denial. We need to listen and be honest about our responses, seeking to examine ourselves to see if there is truth in what is being said, and to work towards a suitable resolution. Not ignore and go and gossip about it, nor blow up, nor use any other game playing that deflects the criticism and makes it so we don’t have to deal with it, so we don’t have to consider it seriously. Listen. And consider.
This is the central point. Listen. If we listen to each other and properly hear each other’s concerns, we will be a lot better off as a community. If we speak of our own concerns appropriately in ways that are loving and honest then we give others a better chance to hear those concerns and open the door for reconciliation. If we say nothing, or react badly, then we are closing the door on reconciliation. Imagine if God our Father had done that to us, closed the door and punished us, instead of listening to us?
We accept that grace from God that is offered to us. How about offering it and accepting it from each other? How about not letting things escalate until relationships are fractured forever? How about saying something about what bothers you in a loving and peaceful way? How about listening to each other without reaction? Jesus would.
The Lord be with you.
Pentecost 15 2005
Exodus 1.8-2.10, Psalm 124, Romans 12.1-8, Matthew 16.13-20
If any want to become my disciples, let them deny themselves and take up the cross and follow me.
Apathy is the great Australian killer.
I don’t know whether it kills the body, apathy, maybe in the sense that we aren’t real good at getting off our butts to do anything it could, but its more a killer of the soul.
We watch those so-called current affair programs – Today Tonight, A Current Affair, and get our prejudices deep fried and ready-wrapped with a side order of self righteousness and paranoia. They tells us that we’re ok, and it’s those young dole bludging single mothers and those awful Moslems who are the cause of all the trouble in the world today. It makes us feel better about our carefree life on the couch, consuming. We let the tv channels do the agitating, we let them form our opinions for us, we subscribe to the world view they want us to have. They feed us this diet of moral garbage and we don’t even need to chew it – it is pre-masticated. Baby food. And we swallow it whole.
So then, this is a happy start to a sermon for a baptism isn’t it? I apologise a little bit, but I really wanted to get your attention and get you all thinking about what our role as Christians in the world is. Obviously when we are baptised we become part of the family of Jesus Christ, we become members of the church and we become heirs of the kingdom of God. But it’s more than that. There are other responsibilities, other duties. Because being a Christian is not a passive thing. You see, I just don’t believe as Christians we are supposed to live a life where all we have to do is just sit back and let all the bad stuff in the world happen, so long as it happens to other people. We are not supposed to be self serving all the time. We are not supposed to always put ourselves first at the expense of others. And we are not supposed, either by action or inaction, to allow others to suffer if we are at all able to do something or say something about it. When we are baptised, we are baptised, re-born, into a life of engaging with the world and forming opinions, especially about issues of social justice. We are baptised into lives of taking actions on those opinions and beliefs. We are not baptised into a life of accepting blindly what others want us to think, of sitting on the couch and accepting all the rubbish. We are baptised into a life of making a difference in the world. Just like Jesus did.
John Mellenkamp. Anyone heard of him? He’s a singer. First he called himself Johnny Cougar, and then it was John Cougar, then John Cougar Mellenkamp as he began to reclaim his birth name, and then finally John Mellenkamp. God knows what will be next. Anyway, he wrote a song about making a difference. Actually he wrote a few, but this one in particular has a line in it that always sticks in my mind. It goes “Stand up for something, or your gonna fall for anything”. I think that was pretty much the chorus. It’s a great line. It’s about having an opinion and doing something about it. It’s about being passionate about a cause and helping out. That’s how things happen, that’s how social justice occurs, that’s how change occurs. Has anyone heard of William Wilberforce? What is he famous for? He is famous for his tireless work for the abolition of slavery. He was a man who felt called to serve God and the Kingdom in politics, and it was in that arena that his beliefs drove him to work for social justice, in areas like education for all people, overseas mission, parliamentary reform, and religious liberty, as well as every year for 18 years raising a motion to abolish slavery. In this matter he was finally successful 4 days before his death in July 1883. He was a man who followed the example of Jesus, giving his life for the pursuit of a greater good for all humanity, not his own personal agenda of the acquisition of wealth and power. He stood up and made a difference, devoted his life to it. He was patient and he perservered because he believed.
Wilberforce’s example for the way to live his life was of course Jesus. So then, what was Jesus like. Meek and Mild? I doubt it. Gentle, compassionate, empathic – yes. Meek – NO! Mild – NO!
Jesus was an agitator. That’s the main reason he died. The powers that be don’t like agitators. Agitators are trouble makers. They can be dangerous, especially if they go around telling the truth. Jesus, in his work and his words, made a difference. He made a difference in terms of humanity’s relationship with God, but let’s set that aside for just a minute. Jesus made a difference in terms of His relationships and actions during His life. He befriended the friendless. He ate with the unclean. He touched the untouchable. He healed the sick. He liberated those held under the bondage of a legalistic interpretation of the Law, he set them free. He pointed out the hypocrisy of the rulers and law interpreters. He showed that the Kingdom of God could begin here on earth. He showed that Gods grace was available to all, not just the select few of a select few, a particular ethnic group or language speakers, a social class, or those who were fortunate enough not to suffer an illness or disability. He showed that God’s law was not given to separate people but to bring them together. It was not given to create a class of the elite and the privileged few, but a society of equals. Sounds a bit like a socialist, doesn’t he?
Essentially what I want to say this morning is this - Please make a difference in the world. This is what we are called to do as the baptised members of the family of Jesus Christ. (This is what I implore you, the parents and godparents of Kane, to do – to help raise Kane to be someone who will strive to make a difference, who will question and investigate, who will speak up when it is warranted,who will be compassionate, caring, assertive and always seeking justice. This is vitally important. Our nation, our world, depends on people like that.) Its not always easy – Jesus did say to the disciples that those seeking to follow him must take up their cross. This implies a hard road, a journey that will be difficult, a journey that may mean self sacrifice, but ultimately a journey that will benefit others, as well as being self-fulfilling. It’s a journey that has as its destination something that lies beyond our mortal existence, a journey that actually has some meaning, that actually goes somewhere. It’s a journey that benefits the many, not just the one. It’s a journey of love.
Get off the couch. Make a stand for something. Change the world, change yourself.
The Lord be with you.
Pentecost 12. Jealousy and Envy.
Genesis 37.1-4,12-28, Psalm 105.1-6,16-22, Romans 10.4-15, Matthew 14.22-36
Sibling rivalry.
Its great fun, isn’t it?
Anyone with siblings will know about it.
Anyone with Children will know about it.
Sometimes it goes on for years. I know of elderly people who are still resentful of siblings, and don’t talk to them.
Usually at the heart of it is jealousy and envy.
Jealousy and envy. The two emotions more likely than most to bring about bloodshed. Most hatred can be brought down to this. Many wars can be attributed to these two. Many, many deaths. I saw a murder investigation show the other night, an Australian show, where a man had murdered his ex-girlfriend’s new boyfriend. Quite horrible. Some may call it a crime of passion. A crime of passion? No, a crime of jealousy.
Joseph’s brothers were jealous and envious of him. They coveted his favoured status with his father. They resented the fact that he dreamed of them bowing down to him, that he would have lordship over his older brothers. This part of the story has been left out of the appointed reading for this morning, unfortunately. Because it appears that they took this seriously as well, and it created more resentment. Apart from the dishonour of it all, why was this kid so blessed?
Israel, Jacob as we knew him last week, had a few wives and concubines. He wasn’t just sowing his wild oats, he was sowing quite a few domestic ones as well. But Joseph was the son of his favourite wife, Rachel. So this of course helped him to be the favourite. And being the youngest, and a child of his father’s older age, also stacks up in his favour. Its no wonder his brothers were slightly peeved.
Jealousy – Why has that person got what I haven’t? Envy – I want what that person has got. Powerful emotions, and usually built around possessions and comparisons. Not just material possessions, but things like the why does that person get more than I get? Why doesn’t that person love me? Why does that person get favoured treatment? I mean, it’s not even objective, this stuff – our own internal perceptions of what others have and haven’t got are not at all reliable. Rarely do we know the actual background, and that there may actually be a reason for the difference. My immediately younger sister and I were always jealous of the attention our youngest sister got from our parents. One day my mother, who didn’t deny it, told us why. My youngest sister had meningitis as a baby, and nearly died. It left her with epilepsy as a child, something which fortunately seemed to lesson, although she has other health issues. But in the light of this, the fact that she almost died, perhaps it’s understandable that there was some favouritism. Getting the whole picture helped me to understand, a little at least, and work through it. And let’s face it, the fact is that no one gets an equal share of anything. I have much better health than her. Perhaps she is envious of that. So it works both ways. We each have something to be envious off in each other.
We have something of a sibling rivalry thing happening in the church, with the more traditional parts of the church in a bit of a decline, whilst the more lively contemporary parts having a bit of a boom time. The reasons for this are probably fairly obvious, and in any case are probably best kept for another time. At the heart of it all is, I think, jealousy and envy. I feel it myself at times. I feel jealous and envious of the fact that at a time when the part of the church that I belong to is shrinking, their’s is growing. Not gradually either, but at a huge rate of knots. It’s not fair, is it? We are just as faithful as them, yet they are growing.
Well, there are probably many, many factors for this, that have nothing at all to do with our faithful any of us are, or whether God favours some churches more than others. It’s probably got do with our ability to embrace change more than any perceived favouritism on God’s part. But what we must not do is let it divide us, because if we are divided, we are more likely to fall and to fail. And besides, there is a lot that bonds us together, much much more than what could break us apart.
Joseph’s brothers could have done well to have remembered that. That even though Joseph may have seemed more blessed than they were, there was still much more than joined them together. They were family. Some of them may have had different mothers, but they were joined in having the one father. They shared a common ancestry, they shared blood. They were, even if they didn’t want to see it at the time, one.
We’re like that in the church. For all our perceived differences in theology, scriptural interpretation and morality codes, we all share a common ancestry. We look to God as our Father, we look to Jesus as our saviour, we look to the Spirit as that which sanctifies and empowers us for our life and work in the world. We confess the Nicene Creed. And we seek to express our Christian faith in a way that is real for us, that says what we feel, and is authentic. Different ways of being church just don’t matter so much. Because when we get back to the basics of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, we see that Jesus was actually against exclusive religious hierarchy. Jesus was about unity. Even Paul – what does he say in the reading this morning? – “For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and is generous to all who call on Him.” Says it all, doesn’t it. God is God for all of us who confess the Nicene Creed. It’s just human stuff that keeps us apart. And it is those brave souls whose prophetic words of unity attempt to bridge the divides that struggle to keep us together.
Many of you will have heard of a new congregation that will be starting in the Brighton area in February next year. It is a church plant from Holy Trinity, North Terrace. Now if there was ever a sibling rivalry happening in the Adelaide diocese, its between the greater part of the diocese and Holy Trinity, which is largely directed from the Diocese of Sydney. Holy Trinity are hoping to bring a seeding congregation of 70 from their North Terrace congregations to kick things off. 70 people!!!!! To start with!!!!! They did a similar thing in Aldgate, which is now up to over 200 every Sunday. Now the first reaction in most of us, I imagine, is one of fear. They are taking us over. They are moving into our patch. Well, geographical boundaries for parishes have not existed in the Diocesan ordinances since the late 1980’s, so they are not infringing anything there. We fear they will decimate our congregations, which have already got smaller. Well, they didn’t in Stirling. If anything, they took a few people from the Uniting and other protestant churches. But they also reached a lot of people who were not church goers, who may not have even been believers. Now that is something to celebrate I think. Does it matter what type of church they go to, so long as they get some good teaching about the salvation of Jesus Christ and God’s grace, as long as they receive the spirit? We may not agree with everything they will hear, but they have become believers, and that is brilliant. I say good on them for taking seriously the mission of the church, when the traditional church was sitting on its hands wondering why the churches are empty. And when they do move in here, perhaps we can learn from them.
Because in the end, working together with our siblings is much more productive and life-giving than working against them. Setting aside the minor differences, and working together on growing the kingdom of God is so much more what God wants us to do. Being prophetic voices for extending a welcome to them is a step reminiscent of Joseph’s brothers Judah and Reuben, who whilst not actually convincing the brothers to not harm Joseph at all, at least managed to keep him alive, and in the long run, secure the future of God’s people, the nation of Israel. This is what we have to do to secure the future of the church of God, in whatever form it will take. Because the one thing about the church that doesn’t change, is, paradoxically, the fact that it does change. The Church has never been constant, it is dynamic, just as we are, just as our faith is, just as our God is. And just as there was a reason for Joseph to end up with Lordship over his brothers, to be in a position to save them, so it may be that there is a reason for one part of the church to be growing and one shrinking. Only God knows what will happen.
So, we are called to embrace others, seek to work with them, and try to at least set aside jealousy and envy. If we can do this, nothing will hold us back, and the hopes of all Christians will indeed be realised. God’s Kingdom here on earth.
The Lord be with you.
