We haven’t had that many weddings this year in Glencraig, but I can be sure that before the year is out we’ll be singing one of the classic wedding hymns (especially when an Englishman is involved), the hymn best know as “Jerusalem” - William Blake’s poem which asks the question, “And did those feet in ancient time walk upon England’s mountain green? And was the holy Lamb of God on England’s pleasant pastures seen?” When everybody knows the answer to both those questions is ‘No’! Those feet did not walk on England’s mountain green, not was he ever seen here! In fact, according to that other wonderful poem, ‘One Solitary Life’, Jesus probably never travelled much more than 100 miles from where he was born.

But it’s a lovely idea, and it comes from an apocryphal story of a young Jesus accompanying his uncle Joseph of Arimathea on a journey to England where he visited Glastonbury! And the music was added to Blake’s words by Parry in 1916 - it can stir up national pride and patriotism like nothing else, apart from ‘Land of hope and glory’ (which really should be England’s national anthem). The feeling that England is important enough for the Lord of life to have set foot on England’s mountain green!

Yeh, right!!

Second to music (perhaps) in stirring nationalistic passions is, of course, sport. I could watch the Olympics all day. In fact I did on Tuesday because I was struck down by a bug on Monday and I could hardly move for two days! But who am I shouting for? Who am I ‘willing on’?

By the way, how much faster and higher and stronger are we going to get? In 1999, Maurice Greene set the 100 metre record of 9.79 seconds which stood for 6 years. Yesterday Usain Bolt ran 100 metres in 9.69 seconds; that’s just unbelievable. It’ll take a few years, but will it all be reduced to half a second, a millisecond or will it be instantaneous? And then, of course, that will be the end of the world? I don’t know!

My patriotic loyalties are clearest when I’m watching a rugby international, and any rugby follower will never forget Croke Park on Saturday 24 February 2007! (I’ve even preached about it before, when Ireland beat England 43-13!). National identity, however, seemed to be irrelevant when it came to the coverage of the Omagh bombing anniversary. I found it harrowing and difficult to watch or even read about. But, again, whatever your politics, the true common enemies are those who want to kill and maim just because others don’t agree with them. How could we have let madness reign for so long?

I do have a bit of a split personality when it comes to national identity, and because of my background, I could claim anything in this part of the world and it would be quite legit! That’s maybe why I have two passports!

But it is true that one of the greatest moral and cultural issues of the last hundred years has been racial identity.

That’s a direct quote from Tom Wright, Canon Theologian of Westminster Abbey and one which may seem fairly obvious.

But now, for many, the challenge is on: “to take the widespread belief that all humans are equal, irrespective of race and colour, and to make this work within actual societies, where people from very different backgrounds can live together in peace and harmony”. Doesn’t all sound quite idyllic? There’s a huge distance to go, but I think the attempt is there.

Racial identity is very clearly set out when we read our New Testament lesson this morning

When we read Matthew 15, we’re shocked at its wording. Jesus has wondered about as far away north from his birthplace as he has ever gone, into Phoenician Gentile territory, the land of Tyre and Sidon, and he meets there this extraordinary, feisty Gentile woman. It looks as though Jesus is refusing to help someone in need just because she’s from the wrong race! How “un-PC” is that?

Yet, we’re at a point here where Jesus’ fundamental mission is being defined. God’s people, Israel, needed to know that their God was now at last fulfilling his promises. The Kingdom was appearing and He was its herald – it was a message always aimed at Israel itself! Not to aim it at Israel would be to negate the whole of the Old Testament; that Israel was God’s special people, the promise-bearer’s through whom his word and his new life would be brought to the rest of the world.

In other words, Jesus’ mission was to fulfil the purpose for which this people (Israel) existed in the first place. That’s quite something!

And it’s something that this wonderful Canaanite woman already knows. She does have great faith, she addresses Jesus as ‘son of David’ a Jewish messianic title that only the disciples just about coming to terms with and in the banter she understands better how all this was to work out in practice. She is streets ahead of everyone else; that Israel’s Messiah will ultimately bring blessing to the whole world!

You couldn’t make this up! This encounter is startling to us, just as it was perhaps to Jesus’ followers at the time, but it was indicative of the battle (won by Paul eventually); the acceptance, within the Church, of Gentiles on equal terms with Jews. The woman’s faith broke through the waiting period! In many ways, this ‘foreign’ woman saw beyond Easter and it is one of the most incredible stories of ‘great faith’ in the whole of the New Testament.

Mabe there are things which need to happen now! What promise of God have we imagined might be fulfilled in the distant future, but ought to be claimed in the present with a persistence which refuses to be put off? You can think about that, but in the meantime, thank God for Gentile women!