Sermon for Harvest Evening

Sunday 11th October 2009

Preached by Rev Paul Hewitt

When Captain James Cook became the first European to discover the Eastern coast of Australia in the 1700’s, he once took an inland excursion into the bush. And amongst his men, he brought with him a native guide. (This is supposed to be a true occurrence). Suddenly, he saw this weird looking animal jumping about with big feet, a long tail, small upper arms and funny ears! And Captain Cook said to his guide, “What’s that weird looking thing jumping about on its hind legs, with a long tail and funny ears. What is it?” And the guide said, “Kangaroo!”

Do you know what ‘Kangaroo’ means? Kangaroo means, “I don’t know”. So when Captain James Cook asked the question, “What’s that weird looking thing?” His guide replied, “I dunno!

Aren’t some questions easier to answer than others? We’re in age of questioning. Nothing now is ever taken for granted. 100 years ago when the Church said something, everyone went with it. But not now! Questions, How? Why? What? Some are imponderables!

Peter Kay, the comedian, has some serious issues to consider, for example, why do Kamikaze pilots wear helmets? Why doesn’t Tarzan have a beard? Or, one which is more personal to me, how is it, the less hair you have, the more often you have to go and get it cut? I can’t get that one at all!

We had a very interesting Service here last Friday at 9 in the morning! It was held in aid of The Alliance of the Orders of St. John; of which the famous St. John Ambulance is a part.

The former Bishop of Sheffield, Jack Nicholls, spoke at that service and we were all hugely impressed with the few words he spoke which struck home some real truths.

He spoke from the passage of the man who had been trying to get in to the pool at Bethesda. I do not want to even attempt to repeat tonight what he said, and it wouldn’t be fair on our choir particularly, because they have heard it already, from the horses mouth, as it were.

But, at the pool of Bethesda, Jesus asked another question to seriously ponder tonight. To the sick man, Jesus asked, “Do you want to get well?” Good question.

The Bishop pointed out that the man didn’t answer ‘yes’! It was a reply more like, ‘Well, you see it’s like this...’ And he referred to his own mother who enjoyed bad health for years; ‘How are you? Well, you see it’s like this...’

One of our own folk, who lives down the road and who is truly now housebound, would have said to me about people who ask how he is. And he wants to reply, ‘Do you want the ten second version or the one hour version?’ because he felt that people turn off after about ten seconds. Even when we get round to asking the question, we don’t really want to know the answer.

I wonder did you see the interview on television between Cliff Richard and Piers Morgan, now a television mogul, but one time editor of the Daily Mirror. I know it’s a bit naff to say you like Cliff Richard, in ways it always has been, but actually I have always had a great admiration for him, even from my very early days as a young Christian. He was a cool guy, and a rocker, and to be brave enough to confess his Christian faith in public took huge courage and it was a huge risk to his career; he knew it could ruin it! One of Piers Morgan’s questions to him was about how his faith has changed over the years. Cliff Richard is nearly 70! And he replies, ‘Well, I’m less judgemental of people’. Or, at least, words to that effect, and I think he meant that people should be let believe what they want to believe; it’s a modern day approach to life. One might even say it’s quite gracious.

However, it’s not an attitude I find among many Christians. In fact it’s not an attitude I find among many Churches. I call it a distinct lack of grace. I mentioned the Bishop from last Friday morning’s Service because I found him a very gracious individual. Far from wanting to put up barriers, I found him a person that could help to take barriers down. Sadly, grace is not a thing you find kicking around many churches!

And, even worse, I often find that Christians are often the worst advertisements for Christianity one could find. We know well here in Glencraig a quote by a very famous Roman Catholic theologian, Karl Rahner, whom I quote all the time, ‘The number one cause of atheism is Christians. Those who proclaim with their mouths and deny him with their lifestyles is what an unbelieving world finds simply unbelievable’

Everyone should read Philip Yancey, who asks another incredible question in the title of one of his books called, ‘What’s so Amazing About Grace?’ Almost every line in it is worth repeating in a sermon, but one that struck me was his reference to Mark Twain: “Mark Twain used to talk about people who were ‘good in the worst sense of the word’ a phrase that, for many, captures the reputation of Christians today”, says Philip Yancey. The real scary bit for me is that it is all so subtle. Yancey has made me discover a new word and that’s ‘ungrace’. It’s all too real; it’s not just asking the question, ‘Are you saved?’, it’s much more subtle nowadays; ‘ungrace’ questions the way you dress, the way you put your hands up when you pray! Oh, you don’t do that? Or you mustn’t be really one of us... All the time Christians, however subtle (or more obvious sometimes) often put up barriers to exclude rather than include. Have we completely lost the plot here? Have we completely moved away from the Jesus of the Gospels? As Jesus said to the man at Bethesda, ‘Do you really want to be well?’ seemingly not! Where’s the grace?

How is it that we find it easier to get reasons to exclude people from the Kingdom rather than to include them?

Somehow, we find it easier to put up barriers, than take them down! Where’s the grace? Where’s the Jesus that we know? Why are we still so judgemental?

There was once a dad who had a three year old son called Brandon. One day, Brandon sees his dad eating chip cookies in the living room and says to himself, Daddy loves chocolate chip cookies with milk. So I’m going to get dad a glass of milk. He goes into the dining to drag a chair into the kitchen, leaving a trail of scratch marks on the floor. He hitches himself up on the chair to get to the counter to pull at the cabinet door. The door smashes against the adjacent cabinet door, leaving a gash where the handle hit it. He reaches for a glass, accidentally knocking off two other glasses from the shelf. There’s a smash and the sound of breaking glass! Undeterred, he scrambles over to the fridge, dodging the pieces of broken glass. He flings wide the fridge door, but leaves the glass on the ground, for safety’s sake! He grabs the largest container of milk from the fridge, and from the chair he pours the milk into the glass, and some of the milk even manages to stay in the glass; the rest is all over the floor. Finally done, Brandon picks up the glass, leaving the fridge door wide open, and runs over to his dad, I’ve got you some milk! Whereupon he slips on the floor and the milk ends up all over the living room floor, the sofa and his dad. The place is a mess, and tears began to fall down Brandon’s face which had that expression, ‘What are you going to do to me?

His dad only smiles. He doesn’t see a kid that has just half destroyed the house. He only sees a beautiful little boy whom he loves very much, and he took Brandon in his arms and told him how much he loved him! You are my son.

The versicle in our intercessions tonight asks God to give us grace; how desperately we need God’s grace in our lives and in our Churches. Do we not want to be well?