Sermon preached by Revd Lizzie Kesteven

I was walking down the Fishponds Road last week and wondering about the 5 senses that God has blessed humans with – sight, hearing, touch, taste or smell. Just metres from here on that road there is so much for all of them. The noise of the traffic and the chatter of people, the lights from the shop windows and the smile in people’s eyes. The taste and smell of coffee coming from the cafes. And the weight of heavy bags felt on my hands. Such gifts of senses. I have sometimes wondered rather morbidly that if I were to only have 4 of these senses, which would I choose? Or alternatively which one given the choice would I lose? Have you ever thought that? I think it might be different for everyone here. In my wondering I think then it would be the sense of sight that I would be the most reluctant to lose. I have so a deep and profound respect for anyone who manages life without physical sight.

The Old Testament reading from Isaiah today speaks a lot about sight. Isaiah says “for in plain sight they see the return of the Lord to Zion” and “before the eyes of all the nations” and again” all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God”.

Lots to see! Lots to look at in just a few verses.

Yet from the Old Testament this prophesy is rather remarkable. The Jewish heritage and traditions which form the foundation and bedrock of the Christian faith tells the story of the nation Israel’s relationship with God. It is a relationship which has its many ups and downs, covenants and renewals of faith. It has people such as Moses, Sarah, Jacob, and Rachel. It speaks of an intense relationship between God and Abraham. There are falling outs and making up. But in all of this the idea that a human could see God face to face was not possible. Moses makes it clear early on in Exodus that no one can see God and live. The people of the Old Testament hear God, can be in the presence of God, experience God and see Gods actions, wrestle with God, they can even have their own faces lit up by God. But to meet God literally face to face and live was not deemed possible. There is still a divide between the Creator of the world and the created beings that live in it.

Yet here tonight – as on every Christmas Eve – the night when Christians celebrate the incarnation, the dwelling of God in an actual physical flesh of a person. God in a baby. A baby who is God. Here on this night. We celebrate the change in the relationship between God and Us. The sheer magnitude of the claim of Christians in this statement is eye watering. Perhaps after 2000 years of saying it I can become more blaze about being able to physically see God, know God, and be invited to have a connection, a relationship with God. But the essence of what occurred 2000 years OK was more than just a key change in the music score of faith. It was an earth shattering revelation of how God intends to reset the whole thing. 

And God chooses to reset by crossing over that original divide that had Creator of the world on one side and humanity on the other. In the manger in that stable in Bethlehem the reset of the world is born. No longer will God be some elusive voice or spirit. The wind which we cannot see, the force which we cannot touch or smell, is seen clearly. In a child. Sharing the most fragile and vulnerable aspects of our very selves. A child who sees as you see, a child who requires the human touch that you and I need, the child who will taste and smell and hear and cry. God who once made themselves known in burning buses and wrestling angels is now known in flesh as a human being. One that we can all see. One we are invited to look at.

God takes on flesh. God is a person – just like you. Just like me.

So what difference does this night, the remembering of this night, make?

I suggest it is two fold

It means that every person that we encounter – however much we might know them, or not know them, however much we might like them or not like them. However much we might feel connected to them or not. They bear the face of God. Because God now has a face. And in that way how I respond to them needs to be from this point of reference. They bear the mark of God. Just as I do. The harder part might be not the seeing Gods face in others, but accepting that people see God’s face in us. That is a joyous thing. It also marks out the responsibilities that we have towards each other. One of the benefits of mass media and mass social media in this age is also that we can see that the face of God is not confined to how we might see it just on the Fishponds Road – but how that face of God looks in Johannesburg, in Laos, in Kabul, and in Rio. So the connections between us become deeper, more diverse and in that we too can become more empathetic. It raises our horizons and lifts our heads to the many different faces of God.

Tonight’s celebration of the incarnation of God, the way in which God took on flesh and dwelt among us also means that God is with us. Not outside or removed, or far away or distant. But here. That God understands what it is to bear the joys and sorrows of a human life. The scars and celebrations. The laughterand joy and the tears and frustrations. Jesus life, death and ministry testify to that. It is the story that Christians hear and speak of and seek to understand for the other 51 weeks of the year. And that is a re set. That is eye opening. That is the way in which we can grasp with full sight face to face the revolution that God brought upon the world in a manger, a long way from here many years ago. 

May we take that home this night so that we can live by it tomorrow.

Sermon preached by Revd Lizzie Kesteven

Light a match. –

There is something fascinating about lighting a match. Something that has since the beginning of time has captivated humans about that ability to make fire. That first spark. The effort it takes to make sure that the rough surfaces connect in such a way as to create that initial spark. Sometimes several attempts are needed. And then seeing the flame eat away at the slim wooden splint. Watching it light the small space of darkness around it. Feeling its heat – and then knowing the right moment to blow it out before it burns your fingers.

The spark gives both light and warmth – and for that to continue then other items are lit from it – like our candles tonight – so that the light and warmth can be shared with others.

It is both fragile – the fear that the match will give out before we have used it. As well as being dangerous – 2don’t play with matches” always a slogan ringing from adult lips to children’s ears.

Fragile and Dangerous. Light and Warmth.

Stories – Shepherd/Kings/Holy Family – both fragile and dangerous. Seeing the light in the dark

The Christmas story, the baby in the manger, the kings, the shepherds, the angels and Mary and Joseph that we hear tonight and sing of in our carols also speak about both fragility and danger. Light and warmth.

The Kings Journey to the manger was fraught with difficulty. They could so easily have given up and turned back. The danger lies in their encounter with Herod a brutal tyrant who tries to use the kings for his own benefit. But the Kings preserve and in doing so bring to the manger the gift of colour and brightness. Their gifts indicate not only who Jesus is and will be – but they also bring light and warmth – just as any gift freely given with a generous heart.

The Shepherds whole lives are fragile and dangerous. They sleep rough at night always alert to predators who may wish their flock harm. And yet here they are at the manger. They too show us light and warmth – their very presence a reminder that God calls all people to his stable. That the outsiders, the ones least thought of, the forgotten, the lost and the poor are part of Gods story and welcomed into Gods home. That is a message of light and warmth.

The fragility of Mary and Joseph is perhaps obvious. Travelling that distance whilst heavily pregnant would have been hugely dangerous. And yet the fragility of their relationship is also present in the Christmas story – the disgrace that would have followed Mary around, the humiliation that Joseph might have felt – what conversations might they have had on that road to Bethlehem. Yet Mary and Joseph bring a message of light and warmth. They stick it out, they stay together. Joseph trusts Mary and Mary in turn trusts Joseph. Their trust brings with it light and warmth to the stable.

And as we look back on this year we have known as part of our human story a most fragile world. Everything has seemed breakable and at breaking points. People, plans, work, schools, hospitals, hospitality. We have known a fragility, that was also perhaps unexpected as we had hoped that this year would look so different to the one before it.

And yet in that fragile place God meets us. That is what the eternal truth of Christianity proclaims this night. That is the story that we celebrate at Christmas and that reaches beyond to Easter. It is a God who meets us and is with us. Emmanual. Not far away and distant. But near. Close. With. And in that bringing that light and warmth not just to the stable but to the world. It is not a message for the faint hearted, the good news of Jesus Christ , of God with us, is a dangerous one and one that many did not want to know or hear, and yet others died in order to tell it. And because of their hope and trust, because of their belief and courage we can stand today and sing that same story. Proclaim loudly that same truth of light and warmth. God is with us.

Prince of Peace. Emmanuel. King of Kings.

May we too know that light and warmth of Jesus Christ this Christmas. May we stand at the stable, and see the fragility of the baby in the manger and know the love of God that came to be with the world.

Amen

Sermon preached by Rev’d Lizzie Kesteven.

Mark 1:1-8

Today we begin to look at a new gospel. Every year they rotate, and this year we get Mark. Mark’s gospel is the shortest, possibly the punchiest, some suggest the sternest, and it is almost definitely the first one to be written down.

In a time when there is lots of talk in our own world about risk, and how to manage and mitigate and balance that, then Marks gospel is perhaps a blueprint for risk. Writing it down was a risk and it would have taken courage and conviction.

 It was probably written between 60 and 70 AD. It was at a time when Christian communities were starting to pop up in all sorts of places across the Roman Empire. Saint Pauls work as a missionary, from his letters to many different places, Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus suggest that Christian communities had started to grow. Mark was writing in the centre of this world. If he is the same Mark that we hear in Acts and also later mentioned in Colossians and the letter to Timothy, then this Mark knew Paul. He also by other accounts knew Peter. Mark was writing in Rome. A place where in very recent years Saint Paul and Saint Peter had just been executed. Christianity was now seen as a threat, perhaps only mild and irritating, but nevertheless a threat to the Roman Emperor. Enough for the first wave of Christians persecutions to begin. Nero had a particularly nasty habit of using Christians as burning torches to light up his parties.

Mark was writing in a risky time.

And in order to just make it really clear to people that he was a man of courage and conviction, he begins by making a very dangerous statement. He begins by saying

“The beginning of the good news about Jesus Christ, the Son of God”.

It could be a fairly neutral start to a gospel yet at the time the only other person who was linked to that phrase was Augustus Caesar – who when he decided to re jig the whole calendar system based on his own birthday , -sent out a decree because it was believed that

 “The birthday of the god Augustus was the beginning of the gospel for the world…”

The similar phrase and wording was chosen deliberately by Mark. It wouldn’t have gone unnoticed, by Christians and Emperors alike. It is as if we are meant to hear and read that first line and take a sharp intake of breath.

Mark has just literally signed his own death warrant in the first 13 words of his gospel.

He was a man of courage and conviction.

He doesn’t stop their either. His first opening phrases for us all are ways in which he affirms his faith and belief. They are like a mini creed. He speaks of Jesus as good news, he speaks of Jesus as the Messiah, he talks about Jesus as the Christ. He then brings in the prophets and their words about preparing the way for the Lord and making the paths straight.”

We are in no doubt that Mark was letting us know, and telling the people of the day that this was not just any other story, or any other person. But that Jesus was the Christ who the Jewish people had been waiting for thousands of years.

It’s pretty pokey.

Strangely the rest of Marks gospel often has Jesus telling the disciples not to tell anyone who he is whenever they get ever so close to suspecting that he might be the Son of God. Mostly in the rest of the gospel Mark talks about Jesus being the Son of David – it’s a very human story. A very human Jesus. It’s a very humbling story. Yet here at the beginning. We get Marks ungarnished truth.

So why? Why write it down in the first place? Why did he need to?

Maybe as time passed it felt more urgent to have a written form of the words and stories people were learning. Perhaps he feared that it would be lost if it wasn’t written down. Perhaps the Christian community was growing enough that it became a time when they needed a clear and clarified version of Jesus Christ’s story, so as not to get muddled.

Whatever his eventual motivation. What we have in Marks gospel is a person who wanted to be clear about who Jesus was. And at that time it involved risk.

We don’t live in a country that makes it dangerous to share those words. Some Christians still do. Yet there is a way in which I feel encouraged by Marks example of courage and conviction. He was prepared to risk everything, so that other people might hear about Jesus, and not just hear but respond, through faith to become part of this small underground and persecuted community.

And although in this time and in this place here in Fishponds it is not a life threatening thing to be a Christian. It is still counter cultural. Christians are a minority and increasingly so. Therefore some of the things that we might rub up against – incredulity or ridicule, dismissiveness or even bafflement are ways which mean we have to dig deep and ask ourselves – what is this all about? What does this mean for me?

As we creep in anticipation towards the cradle, towards that stable, to peer inside and see that manger with that whole picture of shepherds and magi, Mary and Joseph and the Baby Jesus (a story that Mark doesn’t actually have in his gospel!) but as we do that – where will my courage and conviction be to say like Mark – that this event – this moment – changed the world. Not just to coo at a crib – but to worship and adore as so many carols put it. To look at the child and know that he grows to be the man who then teaches, heals and speaks of a world that is being invited to turn to God and understand and know that love, connection and relationship that is possible with the Creator of the world.

This week I wondered if we might encourage each other to pray for one other person. Just one. Keep them in mind, store them in your heart, think of them when out on a walk or when doing the washing up. Intentionally and unintentionally keep them close this week. They might be someone you know really well, they might be someone who is a Christian, they might not be. They might be someone you have only a passing acquaintance with.  And then wait. Wait for the Holy Spirit to tell you what to do next. You will all have very different experiences of that. But something will happen. You will know what to do with that – and I suspect that you will need both courage and conviction.

That is the extraordinary gospel that Mark starts us on today – I pray that we and others around the world delight, give thanks and rejoice in the words that he had the courage and conviction to write down.