St Helen’s Church | Hexhamshire

16^th June 2024. 3^rd Sunday after Trinity.

Prayer for today: Almighty God, you have broken the tyranny of sin and have sent the Spirit of your son into our hearts whereby we call you Father: give us grace to dedicate our freedom to your service, that we and all creation may be brought to the glorious liberty of the children of God; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Among those who are sick we pray for Barbara Parker, Liam Marshall, Maureen Stevens, Prue Critchley, Ned Ryan, Daniel Bosman, Suzie Dent, Nick Cook, Christina Baldwin, Lorraine Dodd, Kathleen Lee, Carol McKendrick, Stuart Bell, Maggie Bennett, Hayley Gennery, Elizabeth Sambell, Katherine Patterson, Heather Loughead, Carol Allen, John and Gwyneth Wilde.

Among those whose years’ mind is about this time we remember Ulric Dixon, James Alder and Nora Isabel Tailford.

The day has come: it’s the Garden Trail! We’re praying for a fine day, but what will certainly shine is the passion, flair and hard work of those who are opening their gardens today.

Let’s get out there and enjoy this day. Tickets are available from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. from the Parish Hall, where soup and refreshments will be served. And Happy Father’s Day!

Readings:

2 Corinthians 5: 6-17

⁶Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. ⁷For we live by faith, not by sight. ⁸We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. ⁹So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. ¹⁰For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.

¹¹Since, then, we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade others. What we are is plain to God, and I hope it is also plain to your conscience. ¹²We are not trying to commend ourselves to you again, but are giving you an opportunity to take pride in us, so that you can answer those who take pride in what is seen rather than in what is in the heart. ¹³If we are “out of our mind,” as some say, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. ¹⁴For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. ¹⁵And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.

¹⁶So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. ¹⁷Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!

Verses from Psalm 92

It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord,
and to sing praises unto thy name, O most High:
²to shew forth thy lovingkindness in the morning,
and thy faithfulness every night,
³upon an instrument of ten strings, and upon the psaltery;
upon the harp with a solemn sound.
⁴For thou, Lord, hast made me glad through thy work:
I will triumph in the works of thy hands.

¹¹Mine eye also shall see my desire on mine enemies,
and mine ears shall hear my desire of the wicked that rise up against me.
¹²The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree:
he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon.
¹³Those that be planted in the house of the Lord
shall flourish in the courts of our God.
¹⁴They shall still bring forth fruit in old age;
they shall be fat and flourishing;
¹⁵to shew that the Lord is upright:
he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.

Mark 4: 26-34

²⁶He also said, ‘This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. ²⁷Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. ²⁸All by itself the soil produces corn – first the stalk, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. ²⁹As soon as the corn is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.’

³⁰Again he said, ‘What shall we say the kingdom of God is like, or what parable shall we use to describe it? ³¹It is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest of all seeds on earth. ³²Yet when planted, it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants, with such big branches that the birds can perch in its shade.’

³³With many similar parables Jesus spoke the word to them, as much as they could understand. ³⁴He did not say anything to them without using a parable. But when he was alone with his own disciples, he explained everything.

Thoughts on today’s readings.

A better gospel reading could not be found for this morning: the parables of the mustard seed and the harvest are admirably illuminated by the Garden Trail: the very different outcomes to the labour of each gardener, the wonder of the vigorous growth of the summer, each plant with its origin in a tiny seed. As the rain fell yesterday we were sorting out a basket full of packets of seeds at home. Some have lain unused for many years. No longer capable of producing life, they went into the bin. Had I used them at the time, they might have produced a harvest, or filled the garden with flowers. They had their season and their time – and so do I. Procrastination and chaos are not marks of the kingdom. I know that, when the time is right, I have to get out there, prepare the ground and sow the seed; and if there is a harvest, I need to gather it and make sure it is used, not left to rot on the ground. When the Garden Trail was planned we had no way of knowing what sort of day today would turn out to be; the only things that are predictable are the hours of sunrise and sunset. Yet unless we got on and did something, planned the day, nothing would happen. Our God is Lord of life: it is the greatest gift of all, and we have to live in the present. The seed of God’s kingdom is the word..the Word. Not only the words he gave but the living presence of Christ himself, who brings the life and light of God into the world. There is a time and a season for everything: how I speak to children at school is not how I speak to people in hospital. In order for there to be a harvest, the ground must be prepared and the seed must be sown. But we cannot know if there will be drought or flood. We do not control the future or know how good the harvest will be and in any case it may be that someone else will gather the harvest. The person I pray with in hospital who came to know the Lord through the faith of someone else, grew and was nurtured by a community other than my own. If I am where God has sent me, if I am alert and listening to his call, I may play my part in the work of his kingdom. The people whose lives we have touched, whom we accompanied for some distance on their journey of faith, move on, and we pray that they will bear fruit and that the harvest of their lives will be a blessing wherever they are. Surely this too is the story of our own journey. The gospel reading tells us that Jesus taught the people in parables: they were unable to hear the fulness of his revelation. To the disciples he explained everything. When we sing the hymn, ‘Let me be as Christ to you,’ what exactly does this mean? Is it just about being a kind and good neighbour, important though that is? Surely it means just what it says, that we are called to enable that living presence of Jesus, who is the source of life, who is life in all its fulness, to bless the lives of those whom we are sent to serve. And we cannot control what impact this encounter may have, but unless we play our part, that seed, the word has, as it were, remained in the packet. To quote Teresa of Avila: Christ has no body but yours, no hands, no feet on earth but yours. The basket in our laundry still contains many packets of seeds, which are still in date. I still have time, and maybe seasons in which to get out there and make sure those seeds have a chance to bear fruit. And if I feel any discouragement, the words of our first reading remind me that Christ died for all .. for all! In the words of another beautiful hymn which we sing at St. Helen’s, and this one by the late Kevin Nichols, ‘the chances we have missed, the graces we resist, Lord in this eucharist, take and redeem.’

9^th June 2024. 2^nd Sunday after Trinity

Prayer for today: Lord you have taught us that all our doings without love are nothing worth: send your Holy spirit and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of love, the true bond of peace and of all virtues, without which whoever lives is counted dead before you. Grant this for your only Son Jesus Christ’s sake, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Among those whose year’s mind is about this time we remember Ruth Armstrong, George Lowdon, Joan Ross, Harry Eastwood, Helen Thompson and Hannah Wrighton.

One week to go: next Sunday is the Hexhamshire Garden Trail, ten beautiful gardens open to visit from 10 to 4. Tickets on the day from the Parish hall.

Readings: 2 Corinthians 4: 13-5:1

¹³It is written: ‘I believed; therefore I have spoken.’ Since we have that same spirit of^[ faith, we also believe and therefore speak, ¹⁴because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you to himself. ¹⁵All this is for your benefit, so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God.

¹⁶Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. ¹⁷For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. ¹⁸So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. 5 For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.

Psalm 130

Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord.
²Lord, hear my voice:
let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications.
³If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities,
O Lord, who shall stand?
⁴But there is forgiveness with thee,
that thou mayest be feared.

⁵I wait for the Lord, my soul doth wait,
and in his word do I hope.
⁶My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning:
I say, more than they that watch for the morning.

⁷Let Israel hope in the Lord:
for with the Lord there is mercy,
and with him is plenteous redemption.
⁸And he shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities.

Mark 3: 20-35

²⁰Then Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. ²¹When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, ‘He is out of his mind.’

²²And the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said, ‘He is possessed by Beelzebul! By the prince of demons he is driving out demons.’

²³So Jesus called them over to him and began to speak to them in parables: ‘How can Satan drive out Satan? ²⁴If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. ²⁵If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. ²⁶And if Satan opposes himself and is divided, he cannot stand; his end has come. ²⁷In fact, no one can enter a strong man’s house without first tying him up. Then he can plunder the strong man’s house. ²⁸Truly I tell you, people can be forgiven all their sins and every slander they utter, ²⁹but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; they are guilty of an eternal sin.’

³⁰He said this because they were saying, ‘He has an impure spirit.’

³¹Then Jesus’ mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone in to call him. ³²A crowd was sitting round him, and they told him, ‘Your mother and brothers are outside looking for you.’

³³‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ he asked.

³⁴Then he looked at those seated in a circle round him and said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers! ³⁵Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.’

Thoughts on today’s readings:

It’s June and a month when, if you have the opportunity, you want to be in the garden. Everything teems with life, the birds busily feed the young in their nests, and the days do not seem long enough to get all the jobs done. I love to be there, working and clearing, when I can, but sometimes my back reminds me that I cannot do some of the things I could do 20 years ago. But how much does this matter? One of the things that surprised me when I came to Whitley Chapel was visiting people who seemed to have, as it were, ‘retired’ from coming to church. It was as though coming to Church reminded them of the impact of age: the failing of sight and hearing, the difficulty in holding a note, not to mention the hardness of the benches. The other day I was visiting a man in hospital. He used to be a keen cyclist, and spoke of the days when he would ride over 100 miles in a day, and was tireless. Now he sat, his legs unable to support his weight, and I felt his grief for the life he no longer had, but we spoke of faith and of the things of God. When my grandmother’s mother was 40, she summoned her friends and announced to them, ‘I have entered into my decline!’ Her family thought this was a ridiculous statement, and indeed she lived well into her 80s, but there is a serious point. Do we see each stage of life’s journey as a journey with God, full of possibilities and interest, or is it ‘downhill all the way’ as we grieve the loss of past glories. In the monastery where I spent a season working in the gardens and cutting the grass ( the French thought it was amusing to have an Englishman cutting their lawns), I was answerable to the Prior, a man of reserve and a former seafarer. He saw old age as an opportunity to let go of the clutter, the responsibilities, the activity, in order to be free to be open to God, who was the centre of his life and the goal of his journey. This is what I read in this letter to Corinthians: words of encouragement for those who see that ‘outwardly we are wasting away.’ But then, he writes, we must fix our eyes on that which is eternal, that is to say, on Jesus Christ, and on him alone. The woman in the wheelchair whom I visited in a care home in Rome many years ago, and who spoke to me of how Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane prayed that the cup of suffering might pass from him, but said, ‘Father, your will be done,’ did not speak out of a sense of resignation or fatalism. She radiated the love of God and embodied the living presence of Jesus.

The account in St. Mark’s Gospel tells us that the family of Jesus saw him as an embarrassment: the powers that be had declared that he was possessed. They accepted that judgement and came to take him away. Jesus refuted the arguments of his enemies and warned that to blaspheme the Spirit of God is to put oneself beyond the love and forgiveness of God. For whoever does not recognise in Jesus the face of God and the word and work of God has closed themselves to him. We do not come to God as customers visiting the shops to buy products. We do not come to God as slaves begging the mercy of a distant master. We are invited into a relationship where we are mother, sister and brother of Jesus Christ : Christ who has embraced our life, and who invites us into his life, in the way of the cross, but also to the Easter garden and the promise of glory.

2^nd June 2024. First Sunday after Trinity

Prayer for today: O God, the strength of those who put their trust in you, mercifully accept our prayers and, because of the weakness of our mortal nature we can do no good thing without you, grant us the help of your grace, that in the keeping of your commandments we may please you both in will and deed; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.

Among those who have died we remember Eleanor Barron, and also Jack Cross, Joyce Swallow, Ridley Roddam, Hannah Wrighton and Helen Craig Eastwood, whose year’s mind is about this time.

Hexhamshire Garden Trail; June 16^th : please collect and display posters from Church , and volunteer to help in any way you can

2 Corinthians 4: 5-12 For what we preach is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. ⁶For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’^[^a^] made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ.⁷But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. ⁸We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; ⁹persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. ¹⁰We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. ¹¹For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may also be revealed in our mortal body. ¹²So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.

Psalm 81: 1-10

Sing aloud unto God our strength:
make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.
²Take a psalm, and bring hither the timbrel,
the pleasant harp with the psaltery.
³Blow up the trumpet in the new moon,
in the time appointed, on our solemn feast day.
⁴For this was a statute for Israel,
and a law of the God of Jacob.
⁵This he ordained in Joseph for a testimony, when he went out through the land of Egypt:
where I heard a language that I understood not.

⁶I removed his shoulder from the burden:
his hands were delivered from the pots.
⁷Thou calledst in trouble, and I delivered thee;
I answered thee in the secret place of thunder:
I proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Selah.
⁸Hear, O my people, and I will testify unto thee:
O Israel, if thou wilt hearken unto me;
⁹there shall no strange god be in thee;
neither shalt thou worship any strange god.
¹⁰I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt:
open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.

Mark 2: 23- 3:6²³One Sabbath Jesus was going through the cornfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some ears of corn. ²⁴The Pharisees said to him, ‘Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?’

²⁵He answered, ‘Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? ²⁶In the days of Abiathar the high priest, he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions.’

²⁷Then he said to them, ‘The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. ²⁸So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.’

3 Another time Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shrivelled hand was there. ²Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath. ³Jesus said to the man with the shrivelled hand, ‘Stand up in front of everyone.’

⁴Then Jesus asked them, ‘Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?’ But they remained silent.

⁵He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored. ⁶Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.

Thoughts on today’s readings

The Sabbath is one of the most precious, beloved and distinctive customs of Judaism, and is a cornerstone of a Jew’s sense of identity, of what defines them, and therefore of their spirituality, regardless of whether or not they are religious. On one level, it restores a balance between work and rest, between doing and being, and so traditionally is a time that families spend together, rather than responding to the pressures of life. In a world when the pressure is to work long hours, it provides the labourer with a breathing space and is a shelter from endless exploitation. For those with a love of God and of the word of God, it is a time to be used to deepen that love, and to explore that word. It is hard to believe that God’s purpose in creating the Sabbath was to create a burden to lay on the shoulders of his people. Jesus did not deny the importance of the sabbath: his objection was the way it was being used by the religious establishment to enhance their power and authority, perhaps even by giving them the means of policing their brothers and sisters. So in this passage Jesus asks the questions, ‘Is it the purpose of the sabbath to impose hunger on those who are hungry? To say to them, “No, you can eat tomorrow.” Is that what God wants? And again, ‘Is it the purpose of the sabbath to impose suffering on those who could be healed? To say to them, “ You’re not going to die immediately. You can wait.”?’ Surely, Jesus says, God created the Sabbath as a blessing for the human race, not merely as a religious discipline. And if, in centuries past, the priest gave the consecrated bread to David to feed himself and his men on the sabbath, is it scandalous now if the followers of Jesus pick a few heads of corn because they are hungry on the sabbath? The sabbath then is not an end in itself: it is there as a blessing for the children of God, and a time when they may better reflect on how they may follow God on their life’s journey and express their love of God. To focus narrowly on the legal demands, to make the sabbath an end in itself, it is in the end another form of idolatry; to concentrate narrowly on the letter of the Law, however perfect that law, is to make of it an idol, rather as seeing it as the means given by God by which we may better live – live with one another and live with God.

Here is Jesus’ sorrow at the hardness of heart of those who opposed him. He came with the good news of God, but they replied, ‘We know, ‘ and ‘We understand,’ and therefore did not hear him. Their minds were closed; they had already judged him.

In the same way that the Law was given to help people come closer to God, Paul in our first reading emphasises that his purpose was never to draw people to him, to proclaim himself, but to lead people to Christ, to be a messenger, a herald, a guide pointing them to the Truth: to Jesus Christ. There is no room in Christianity for the cult of personality, for self-importance or a focus on celebrity. Our focus has to be on our neighbour, our eyes turned to Christ, our ears open to his word. Paul, imprisoned, shipwrecked and beaten, rejected by the Jewish leadership he had once zealously served, living with pain (the ‘thorn in the flesh’) knew only too well how frail is the human body, how fragile and uncertain our life. We are, as he affirms, no stronger than clay pots – and like clay pots we did not create ourselves – yet we have been entrusted with the extraordinary treasure of God’s word, not to be hidden away in a sealed pot, but to shine with the glory of God in order that all might see, and come to that light which is the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. In his ‘Ode on intimations of immortality’ the poet Wordsworth wrote, ‘trailing clouds of glory do we come from God who is our home.’

Every day lives are destroyed senselessly in war and by other human acts; every day lives are lost to natural disasters. We know the justice is often denied, and that so many are oppressed. In this sense our world is no different to the one in which Jesus walked and Paul preached. The children of our day also need the word of life, the light of God in Jesus Christ. For when we open our eyes, when we listen, we may know that we have been entrusted with this great treasure, and that the light of God shows us his way, at all times and in all places.

26^th May 2024. Trinity Sunday

Prayer for today: Almighty God you have given your servants grace, by the confession of a true faith, to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity and in the power of the divine majesty to worship the unity: keep us steadfast in this faith, that we may evermore be defended from all adversities; through Jesus Christ your son our Lord. Amen.

Among those who have recently died we remember Eleanor Barron, and also Ken Wootton, George Forster, William Hawkins, Ian Hudspith and Hazel Lee, whose year’s mind is about this time.

Readings:

Isaiah 6: 1-8

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. ²Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: with two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. ³And they were calling to one another:

‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty;
the whole earth is full of his glory.’

⁴At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.

⁵‘Woe to me!’ I cried. ‘I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.’

⁶Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. ⁷With it he touched my mouth and said, ‘See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.’

⁸Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?’

And I said, ‘Here am I. Send me!’

John 3: 1-17

Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. ²He came to Jesus at night and said, ‘Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.’

³Jesus replied, ‘Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again’

⁴‘How can someone be born when they are old?’ Nicodemus asked. ‘Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!’

⁵Jesus answered, ‘Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. ⁶Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. ⁷You should not be surprised at my saying, “You must be born again.” ⁸The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.’

⁹‘How can this be?’ Nicodemus asked.

¹⁰‘You are Israel’s teacher,’ said Jesus, ‘and do you not understand these things? ¹¹Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. ¹²I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? ¹³No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven – the Son of Man.¹⁴Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up ¹⁵that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.’

¹⁶For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. ¹⁷For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

Thoughts on today’s readings

The fascinating Yorkshire coast between Saltburn and Filey is full of interest for those wanting to discover more about our natural history. Fossils and geological treasures of all kinds abound; a well- signposted path, the Cleveland Way, invites walkers to enjoy this beautiful area. Yesterday thousands of walkers did just that, raising money for the Alzheimers Society, a noble aim. Yet having walked those same paths on previous days, I have a sense of unease. The relentlessly wet weather since last October has caused sections of the Cleveland Way to collapse into the sea, and beautiful paths, bordered by wildflower meadows, are already no better than seas of mud churned up by the feet of thousands of walkers. To be sure, past generations did not hesitate to dig out enormous quarries and pits in the search for minerals, but are we not in danger of destroying the very things we treasure and want to cherish?

In the grammar school I attended until I was 16 we were often told how fortunate we were to attend such a modern and well- resourced school, and it was true. The facilities for studying science were particularly excellent, and there was a belief that our progress in science would enable us to solve many of the world’s problems and create a better world. In the 1980s haematologists based in London produced a revolutionary treatment for haemophilia based on a molecule called Factor 8. From henceforth this cruel condition could be successfully treated. Sadly, what we have been learning recently is how commercial considerations led to the factor 8 given to patients being derived from contaminated blood bought from convicts and drug addicts in the USA. This shameful scandal has been compounded by justice for those affected being delayed for decades, and the lies and denials of those whose duty was to serve the public. This is just one of similar tales, to sit alongside the treatment of the sub-postmasters and the failed Post Office computer system, and the failings in our water treatment and water supply systems. It’s not true that we can’t do anything about it: we have the knowledge, but do we have the will?

Nicodemus, who came to Jesus by night, is presented to us as a man of knowledge, influence and personal integrity. He was on the Jewish council: a man of importance, respected and trusted. He was a pharisee, a man who knew his religion thoroughly and lived it to the letter. He could see that there was power associated with Jesus and he wanted to know more. Jesus was obviously seen as a controversial figure: he came to him by night, to avoid scandal or awkward questions. But nothing could have prepared him for what he heard. Jesus swept away his words of polite flattery with words that challenged his very notion of himself, and the whole structure on which he had built his life. Jesus says, ‘To see the kingdom of heaven, never mind enter it, you must be born of water and the spirit. Of water: that is the way of baptism, that is to say the way of conversion, of a radically new life. Of the Spirit: that is to say this is the gift of God, and cannot be attained by effort or human wisdom alone. And Jesus is not speaking of a new god, a different God: this is the one god, the God of Israel. Of all people, he tells Nicodemus, you should know this. For this is the God who appeared in the temple to Isaiah, so other, so immeasurable that to describe this God is beyond language..’the hem of his robe filled the temple.’ Who are we, with our rules and our laws, to presume that we have the answers where God is concerned. And yet the appearance of God in the temple was not in order to inspire reverence in Isaiah, but because God was calling him to bring his word to his people. The vision filled Isaiah with a sense of his own inadequacy, his uncleanness, yet the Lord’s messenger touches his lips with fire and says, ‘Your sin is blotted out,’ so when the Lord asks, ‘Whom shall I send?’, Isaiah replies, ‘Send me.’

The purpose of Jesus in this passage from St. John’s Gospel is not to wipe the floor with Nicodemus, to humiliate him; rather it is to call him, to make a disciple of him. But to be a disciple, to lead others to Jesus, he will have to leave behind the security and the influence he has built up in his lifetime, to embrace radical change, to proclaim the good news of the God who defies definition. Yet the heart of the good news in in these words of Jesus: God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. And this: that God did not send his son to condemn the world but to save it.

The gardener labours to create something of beauty and order and life, perhaps even a little taste of paradise, but who can measure the fields where Christ, the new Adam, sows the seed of God’s living word? We can no more arrest the action of the sea and the tides than could King Canute, yet there is power enough in our seas and rivers to meet the needs of the whole earth, should we wish to apply our knowledge.

Here is the boldness of our gospel: that God so loved, not one race, not one species, but the whole world: shall not we, who have been called by name and signed with the sign of the cross, likewise love and serve God’s world?

19^th May 2024. Pentecost.

Prayer for today:. God, who as at this time taught the hearts of your faithful people by sending to them the light of your Holy Spirit: grant us by the same Spirit to have a right judgement in all things and evermore to rejoice in his holy comfort; through the merits of Jesus Christ our Saviour. Amen.

Among those whose year’s mind is about this time we remember Dougy Lamb, Robert Blackett Charlton, Marjorie Francis Leybourne and Joseph Nichol.

A Choir in the Shire: an evening service for Pentecost, this evening at 6.30 p.m. led by the choir Antiphon, under the direction of John Roper. Any help with refreshments after the service will be much appreciated.

Hexhamshire Garden Trail; June 16^th : please collect and display posters from Church , and volunteer to help in any way you can.

Readings:

Acts 2: 1-21. When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. ²Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. ³They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. ⁴All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues^[^a^] as the Spirit enabled them.

⁵Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. ⁶When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard their own language being spoken. ⁷Utterly amazed, they asked: ‘Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? ⁸Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language? ⁹Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia,^[^b^] ¹⁰Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome ¹¹(both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs – we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!’ ¹²Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, ‘What does this mean?’

¹³Some, however, made fun of them and said, ‘They have had too much wine.’

¹⁴Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: ‘Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. ¹⁵These people are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! ¹⁶No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:

¹⁷‘“In the last days, God says,
I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your young men will see visions,
your old men will dream dreams.
¹⁸Even on my servants, both men and women,
I will pour out my Spirit in those days,
and they will prophesy.
¹⁹I will show wonders in the heavens above
and signs on the earth below,
blood and fire and billows of smoke.
²⁰The sun will be turned to darkness
and the moon to blood
before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.
²¹And everyone who calls
on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

Psalm 104: 24-34

O Lord, how manifold are thy works!
in wisdom hast thou made them all:
the earth is full of thy riches.
²⁵So is this great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping innumerable,
both small and great beasts.
²⁶There go the ships:
there is that leviathan, whom thou hast made to play therein.
²⁷These wait all upon thee;
that thou mayest give them their meat in due season.
²⁸That thou givest them they gather:
thou openest thine hand, they are filled with good.
²⁹Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled:
thou takest away their breath, they die,
and return to their dust.
³⁰Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created:
and thou renewest the face of the earth.

³¹The glory of the Lord shall endure for ever:
the Lord shall rejoice in his works.
³²He looketh on the earth, and it trembleth:
he toucheth the hills, and they smoke.
³³I will sing unto the Lord as long as I live:
I will sing praise to my God while I have my being.
³⁴My meditation of him shall be sweet:
I will be glad in the Lord.

John 15: 26-27, 16: 4b-15

²⁶‘When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father – the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father – he will testify about me. ²⁷And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning. ⁴I have told you this, so that when their time comes you will remember that I warned you about them. I did not tell you this from the beginning because I was with you, ⁵but now I am going to him who sent me. None of you asks me, “Where are you going?” ⁶Rather, you are filled with grief because I have said these things. ⁷But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. ⁸When he comes, he will prove the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: ⁹about sin, because people do not believe in me; ¹⁰about righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; ¹¹and about judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.

¹²‘I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. ¹³But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. ¹⁴He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you. ¹⁵All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will receive from me what he will make known to you.’

Thoughts on today’s readings

Pentecost is celebrated as the sending of Holy Spirit upon the followers of Jesus, and therefore their being sent out, their mission, into the world. It is hailed as a new thing, a birthday, a radical new beginning, yet the Bible teaches us that the Spirit was there from the beginning. At the beginning of creation the Spirit is described as hovering over the waters. When he was anointed as king, we read how Saul was mightily filled with the Spirit and, in the account of the calling of David, read how the Spirit came upon that boy when Samuel anointed him. Nevertheless, Saul lost his faith and lost his way, and was rejected by God.

Jesus had told the disciples explicitly that he would send them the Spirit. They were not, as it were, surprised by a rather terrifying figure carrying a horn of oil; they were ready and waiting , together, when the day came. Nevertheless Jesus warned them that their mission, the mission of the Spirit, would be one of conflict, just as his mission had involved conflict. He had not been believed, and they must not expect to be believed either. The world looked for religion, and created gods which would endorse and bless their choices and their self-centred ambitions. Lacking faith, blind, they would not accept the one who showed them God who requires conversion and obedience to his call, yet who alone has the word of truth and life. Regarding righteousness, Jesus was going to the Father, and that journey meant the cross. To the world that made him a criminal and an outcast and a failure, moreover they had condemned him and judged him. Here , however, is God, and rather on the cross it is human judgement , the failure of human justice and the corruption of human power which is held up to the light of God and condemned. The Son of God endures the cross and goes to the Father to plead our cause and in order that, as the hymn puts it, ‘Thou didst clear me.’

Here was no mealy-mouthed lukewarm spiritual sticking plaster. Those who waited and received the Spirit were given God’s uncompromising gospel to bring to those who would receive it and to those who were hostile alike, conscious of their own falls and failings yet overjoyed and the reality of the presence of the life-transforming Spirit, no longer just in the lives of one or two, or even of 120 people, but in the lives of countless millions, of every race and language under the sun.

Prayer for today:

O God the King of glory, you have exalted your only Son Jesus Christ with great triumph to your kingdom in heaven: we beseech you, leave us not comfortless, but send your Holy Spirit to strengthen us and exalt us to the place where our Saviour Christ is gone before, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Among those who have died recently we remember Nigel Herold, whose life will be celebrated here in Church on Thursday 16^th at 2 p.m., and also Millicent Richardson, Anna Rossiter, Neil Robinson and Frank Thompson, whose year’s mind is about this time.

Please put these dates in your diary:

A Choir in the Shire: an evening service for Pentecost (May 19^th) at 6.30 p.m. led by the choir Antiphon, under the direction of John Roper. Any help with refreshments after the service will be much appreciated.

Hexhamshire Garden Trail; June 16^th : please collect and display posters from Church , and volunteer to help in any way you can.

Readings

Acts 1: 15-17, 21-26

¹⁵In those days Peter stood up among the believers (a group numbering about a hundred and twenty) ¹⁶and said, ‘Brothers and sisters, the Scripture had to be fulfilled in which the Holy Spirit spoke long ago through David concerning Judas, who served as guide for those who arrested Jesus. ¹⁷He was one of our number and shared in our ministry.’

²¹Therefore it is necessary to choose one of the men who have been with us the whole time the Lord Jesus was living among us, ²²beginning from John’s baptism to the time when Jesus was taken up from us. For one of these must become a witness with us of his resurrection.’

²³So they nominated two men: Joseph called Barsabbas (also known as Justus) and Matthias. ²⁴Then they prayed, ‘Lord, you know everyone’s heart. Show us which of these two you have chosen ²⁵to take over this apostolic ministry, which Judas left to go where he belongs.’ ²⁶Then they cast lots, and the lot fell to Matthias; so he was added to the eleven apostles.

Psalm 1

Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly,
nor standeth in the way of sinners,
nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
²But his delight is in the law of the Lord;
and in his law doth he meditate day and night.
³And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water,
that bringeth forth his fruit in his season;
his leaf also shall not wither;
and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

⁴The ungodly are not so:
but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.
⁵Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

⁶For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous:
but the way of the ungodly shall perish.

John 17: 6-19

⁶‘I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word. ⁷Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you. ⁸For I gave them the words you gave me and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me. ⁹I pray for them. I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me, for they are yours. ¹⁰All I have is yours, and all you have is mine. And glory has come to me through them. ¹¹I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name, the name you gave me, so that they may be one as we are one. ¹²While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe by^[^c^] that name you gave me. None has been lost except the one doomed to destruction so that Scripture would be fulfilled.

¹³‘I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. ¹⁴I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. ¹⁵My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. ¹⁶They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. ¹⁷Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. ¹⁸As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. ¹⁹For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.

Thoughts on today’s readings:

The flowers that frame the door of the Church this morning and decorate the archway of the screen tell us that there was a wedding here yesterday. Under that archway Jordan and Anna stood together and made their vows to each other and exchanged rings. At the heart of what they were expressing was the truth that they have become one. Their little daughter Ava, who stretched out her arms to them, and was carried by her Dad, is an expression of that oneness: they are a family, the love that unites them has been blessed and fruitful in the life of this child. Nevertheless children, however amazing they are, can sometimes try to get their own way by playing off one parent against another, and show skill in detecting areas of division which can be exploited. I know that as a child I was aware of the essential unity of my parents, very different as they were. There was no point trying to appeal the decision of one parent to the other. There is really no chance we would have heard one of them criticising the other to us as children.

Our readings this morning have at their heart that sense of unity being not just essential but also of God and from God. Within the company of the disciples of Jesus there had occurred a division as a consequence of the betrayal by Judas. The twelve were a sign of God’s desire to establish a new Israel, a new people of God, no longer divided into separate princedoms, but united in the Spirit of God, one as Jesus and the Father are one. The number 120 is significant, representing the number needed by custom to establish a new community. It tells us that the followers of Jesus numbered many more than 12. It was from these that two were put forward, that the Lord might tell them which was to complete the twelve. We know little more about who Matthias was. As opposed to Judas, who went off into the night, when Satan had entered his heart, her are the disciples emphasising their unity as a community, and their desire to be the people that Jesus called, and to seek his will.

In the passage from St. John’s Gospel Jesus speaks of having made known to his disciples the Father’s name. This is not like some sort of social introduction, or even the revelation of a secret name, so much as making known to them the nature and character of God, whom Jesus addresses as Father. Jesus does this because he and the Father are one. Theirs is a perfect unity of love, the words, the work of Jesus are the words, the works of God; there is no difference, no otherness. And the fruitfulness of the mission of the Son is grounded in that perfect love. Yet this is not some sort of exclusive divine bliss, a sort of divine couples holiday. This is the creative , divine love which we believe to be at the heart of all creation, and to be at the heart of our existence as children of God, who have learnt to know God through Jesus, and to know God as Father. As beloved children, called by name, we are invited into that relationship and, as Jesus prays, that is a relationship of unity: may they be one as we. Jesus did not pray for the world which did not know him, but for those he had been given by the Father. Though they were in the world, they were his, not of the world, and he prayed the Father to protect them. Therefore they must be one, so that when the Spirit came it would fill and give life to one body: the Body of Christ which is the new people of God, to go out united in love to bring the Good news into the whole world. They were not to concern themselves with who the world considered them to be : provincials from Galilee. Christ the true high priest had offered the sacrifice on the cross which took away all unworthiness, and all the former things by which people sought God’s favour. Henceforth they did not need to offer the blood of animals upon the altar; Christ’s blood upon the cross had made them clean: he, the true high priest had consecrated himself in order that we, his disciples, might be sanctified – no longer earthen vessels but a royal priesthood, witnessing not to ourselves but to the truth. That truth is the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Good news of God.

5^th May 6^th Sunday of Easter

Prayer for today:

God our redeemer, you have delivered us from the powers of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of your Son: grant that, as by his death he has recalled us to life, so by his continual presence in us he may raise us to eternal joy; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.

Among those who have died recently we remember Nigel Herold, and also Mary Robinson, Henry Lockhart, Giuseppe Sanna and Peter Moore, whose year’s mind is about this time.

There will be a service of thanksgiving for Nigel here in Church on May 16^th at 2 p.m. Please remember his father tony and his family in your prayers.

Please put these dates in your diary:

A Choir in the Shire: an evening service for Pentecost (May 19^th) at 6.30 p.m. led by the choir Antiphon, under the direction of John Roper.

Hexhamshire Garden Trail; June 16^th : please collect and display posters from Church , and volunteer to help in any way you can.

Readings:

Acts 10: 44-48

⁴⁴While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit came on all who heard the message. ⁴⁵The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on Gentiles. ⁴⁶For they heard them speaking in tongues^[^a^] and praising God.

Then Peter said, ⁴⁷‘Surely no one can stand in the way of their being baptised with water. They have received the Holy Spirit just as we have.’ ⁴⁸So he ordered that they be baptised in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked Peter to stay with them for a few days.

Psalm 98

O sing unto the Lord a new song; for he hath done marvellous things:
his right hand, and his holy arm, hath gotten him the victory.
²The Lord hath made known his salvation:
his righteousness hath he openly shewed in the sight of the heathen.
³He hath remembered his mercy and his truth toward the house of Israel:
all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God.

⁴Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all the earth:
make a loud noise, and rejoice, and sing praise.
⁵Sing unto the Lord with the harp;
with the harp, and the voice of a psalm.
⁶With trumpets and sound of cornet
make a joyful noise before the Lord, the King.
⁷Let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof;
the world, and they that dwell therein.
⁸Let the floods clap their hands:
let the hills be joyful together ⁹before the Lord;
for he cometh to judge the earth:
with righteousness shall he judge the world,
and the people with equity.

John 15: 9-17

⁹‘As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. ¹⁰If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. ¹¹I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.¹²My command is this: love each other as I have loved you. ¹³Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. ¹⁴You are my friends if you do what I command. ¹⁵I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. ¹⁶You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit – fruit that will last – and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you.¹⁷This is my command: love each other.

Thoughts on today’s readings:

Some time ago I was talking to a local man about his life as a soldier. He spoke about the nature of the friendships he had known with those with whom he served. Living together, training together, they had grown into a body of people who could rely totally on one another; literally they held each other’s lives in their hands.

He had served in Afghanistan, where more than once the vehicle in which he was travelling was damaged by an explosive device, but he had always known that, no matter what, his friends would stick by him. Once, after a period of leave, he had been asked to return to Afghanistan with a different unit. He refused. Why? I asked him.

‘They didn’t know me; I didn’t know them,’ he replied. ‘ I could not be sure that, if something happened, they would not leave me behind.’

Friendships grow and are strengthened by what we do together. The friendship Jesus offered his disciples was strengthened by their common life: eating together, walking together, going together to the villages where they had to move far out from their comfort zone and bring God’s good news together; walking, listening, questioning and living their hours awake and asleep, with the one they called Teacher, Master and Lord. ‘You are my friends if you do what I command,’ he said. This is not about blind obedience: the obedience of a slave, or the fear of punishment for failing to obey a command. It is about being of one mind, with a common purpose. It is about accepting, and indeed being joyful in one’s calling.

As many of you know, I spent much of my childhood in the Caribbean. I had wonderful parents; my father was great fun, nevertheless I treated him with a degree of wariness. Parents in the West Indies in those days were strict, and my father was no exception. When I was 8 we went on holiday to the neighbouring island of Tobago, and one afternoon we were on the beautiful beach at Mount Irvine. Offshore there was a reef popular with snorkellers, and there were rocks in the sea. I had never learned to swim, but was hopping from one rock to another and looking down into the water.

However, as I leapt to yet another rock, I slipped and fell into the deeper water. I could not reach the surface and, for seemed like a very long moment, wondered if I would drown. Quickly my father dived into the sea, caught me up and brought me to the shore. I was not seriously hurt, but was apprehensive about what punishment I would receive for my foolishness. Then I looked and saw that my father was bleeding from where the rocks had cut him as he dived in. In that moment I was conscious and understood in way I had not understood before that he loved me.

Surely as parents we do love our children, and it is our greatest joy that they should count us as friends.

Jesus reveals to us God who is love, who loves us, who offers us friendship. I have a sense, reading the account in St. John’s gospel of the resurrection, of those disciples who saw the wounds in Jesus’ hands and feet, that they had come to realise how much he loved them.

Nevertheless, as our first reading reminds us, God is sovereign, and does what he will. As in last Sunday’s reading from Acts, and Philip and the Ethiopian, today’s account emphasises the unexpected in God’s action. Here we hear how the Spirit of God fell upon the household of a Roman soldier, Cornelius, to whom God had sent Peter. Peter and his companions see the Spirit come upon these gentiles in a way identical with its coming upon the followers of Jesus at Pentecost. The disciples are astonished, but recognise that this is God’s action and rejoice in it, baptising the new believers.

I consider the contrast with the story of Jesus healing the servant of the centurion: the soldier urged Jesus not to come into his house, understanding that this would make him ritually unclean.

Here Peter has not only come into the home of a Roman, but the accepts the invitation to stay some days.

Jesus urged his disciples to take all things to the Father in prayer: not in order that they might manipulate the will of God, but in order that they might be fruitful. So may we as disciples make this our order today and every day. Whatever it is: take it to the Lord in prayer. For as the Father has loved him, so Jesus has loved us; and let us love one another