Sermon for the Second Sunday after Epiphany

Sunday 16th January 2005

Preached by Rev Paul Hewitt

I must admit, there’s not a great deal to be cheery about theses days. We’re still trying to come to terms with an incredible natural disaster in South East Asia which has created an opportunity to bring out the very best in people, with, indeed, a passionate desire to help, and also, it has created the opportunity to bring out the very worst in people, according to recent newspaper reports about looting, rape, abuse and kidnapping.

If you suffer from S.A.D., you’ll not be in the best form, anyway, with the amount of gloom about. So it was great, just yesterday when I met with two lots of couples about to get married. One later this year, and one next year. The groom-to-be of the first couple, an Englishman, looked at me near the end of our meeting and asked me if there were any special pieces of advice that I would like to impart before getting married. And it flashed into my mind the one-word piece of advice that I had been given before I got married (which I chose to ignore), but I hadn’t it in my heart to say it to him. How could I? (I’ll tell you later, if you don’t know already)

Isn’t it great that we live in a world which does not allow us to live in constant despondency? Even when there is utter catastrophe, there are relief agencies, which seem to be vying with one another to have an upper hand. I just hope they don’t forget the rest of world that needs constant aid and medicine and food, right now. Isn’t it great that the human spirit is such that we always rise above despondency? It is surely the way we have been created.

We read about the calling of the first disciples all the time. But the courage and tenacity that it took to forsake everything and follow Jesus was enormous. In a dark, gloomy world Jesus brings light and life. Earlier in John it says, ‘In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it’

‘The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, “We have found the Messiah”’. You remember, it’s the same word Archimedes used when he made his fantastic discovery, ‘Eurekamen!’ ‘We have found him!’ Or, as Archimedes put it, ‘Eureka!’, ‘I’ve found it’, ‘I’ve got it!’ It’s that kind of discovery and excitement. The opportunity was there, and they grasped it with all their might. And Simon, with all his faults and failings like shifting sands was about to be transformed, made new, into Cephas, solid rock! The opportunity was there! Jesus said to him, ‘You are now Simon, the big awkward fisherman that you are, but I am going to make you into somebody hugely strong in character, dependable resolute, in fact you will be Cephas, Rock. You are now Simon, but you shall be Cephas. What an opportunity that was, and Andrew and his brother took it with all their strength…

There was a young soldier accompanied by his commanding officer who got onto a train together. The only available compartment was where a young attractive lady was travelling with her grandmother. As the four engaged in conversation, it was obvious that the young soldier was eyeing up the young lady, and, indeed vice versa. Suddenly the train went into a tunnel, and the compartment was plunged into darkness. Immediately two sounds were heard: the smack of a kiss, followed by the whack of a slap across someone’s face.

The grandmother thought, I can’t believe he kissed my granddaughter, but I’m glad she gave him the slap he deserved. The commanding officer thought, I don’t blame the boy for kissing the girl, but it’s a shame she missed him and hit me instead. The young girl thought, I’m glad he kissed me, but I wish my grandmother hadn’t slapped him for doing it.

What actually happened?

As the train broke out into sunlight, the soldier couldn’t help but smile… He had managed to kiss a pretty girl and slap his commanding officer in one fell swoop, and get away with it!

I think opportunities arise everyday, and we don’t always act on them! There is a tiny little phrase which is worth looking at in v. 38. The two disciples were with John, and when John said, ‘Look, the lamb of God!’ The two disciples followed Jesus! (It was what John wanted). And then Jesus turned and spoke to them, and asked them, ‘What do you want?’ It’s a small throw away phrase, but it reminds me of countless encounters with Jesus. You remember the Samaritan woman at the well? He asked her, ‘Will you give me a drink?’ He asked her! It’s what you might call the divine initiative. When the human mind begins to seek and the human heart begins to long, God comes to meet us more than half way. The great Augustine once said, we could not even have begun to seek for God unless he had already found us. I think God presents himself time and time again in so many different opportunities, and we often do not grasp the moment. I hope Andrew and Simon Peter’s example may help us.