The Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ According to Matthew

Jesus stood before the governor; and the governor asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus said, “You say so.” But when he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he did not answer. Then Pilate said to him, “Do you not hear how many accusations they make against you?” But he gave him no answer, not even to a single charge, so that the governor was greatly amazed.

Now at the festival the governor was accustomed to release a prisoner for the crowd, anyone whom they wanted. At that time they had a notorious prisoner, called Jesus Barabbas. So after they had gathered, Pilate said to them, “Whom do you want me to release for you, Jesus Barabbas or Jesus who is called the Messiah?” For he realized that it was out of jealousy that they had handed him over.

While he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent word to him, “Have nothing to do with that innocent man, for today I have suffered a great deal because of a dream about him.”

 Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to have Jesus killed. The governor again said to them, “Which of the two do you want me to release for you?” And they said, “Barabbas.” Pilate said to them, “Then what should I do with Jesus who is called the Messiah?” All of them said, “Let him be crucified!” Then he asked, “Why, what evil has he done?” But they shouted all the more, “Let him be crucified!”

So when Pilate saw that he could do nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took some water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.” Then the people as a whole answered, “His blood be on us and on our children!” So he released Barabbas for them; and after flogging Jesus, he handed him over to be crucified.

Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor’s headquarters, and they gathered the whole cohort around him. They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and after twisting some thorns into a crown, they put it on his head.

They put a reed in his right hand and knelt before him and mocked him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” They spat on him, and took the reed and struck him on the head. After mocking him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him.

As they went out, they came upon a man from Cyrene named Simon; they compelled this man to carry his cross. And when they came to a place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull), they offered him wine to drink, mixed with gall; but when he tasted it, he would not drink it. And when they had crucified him, they divided his clothes among themselves by casting lots; then they sat down there and kept watch over him. Over his head they put the charge against him, which read, “This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.”

Then two bandits were crucified with him, one on his right and one on his left. Those who passed by derided him, shaking their heads and saying, “You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.”

In the same way the chief priests also, along with the scribes and elders, were mocking him, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down from the cross now, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he wants to; for he said, ‘I am God’s Son.’” The bandits who were crucified with him also taunted him in the same way.

From noon on, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. And about three o’clock Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

When some of the bystanders heard it, they said, “This man is calling for Elijah.” At once one of them ran and got a sponge, filled it with sour wine, put it on a stick, and gave it to him to drink. But the others said, “Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to save him.”

Then Jesus cried again with a loud voice and breathed his last. At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After his resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many. Now when the centurion and those with him, who were keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were terrified and said, “Truly this man was God’s Son!”(Mt 27: 11-54)

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You know, this Sunday, Palm Sunday, we share the joy that people felt when Jesus rode into Jerusalem, as we joyfully sing ” Ride on Ride on, in Majesty ” –  and then later we share the sadness in his death by crucifixion.

We walk alongside a triumphant Jesus, and then we stand at the cross and see his humiliation.

What are we supposed to feel today? Happiness or sadness?

Are we supposed to feel an affinity with a Messiah, a winner, someone who will conquer those things that oppress us, or feel kinship with a man who dies on the cross, humiliated? Make a choice!

In the Eastern Church, the Orthodox Church crucifixes tend not to have the figure of Jesus on them. Here, in the Catholic tradition, we have crucifixes with the “corpus,” the body of  Christ on them

The first emphasizes the resurrection, the latter the crucifixion.

So the church is divided East and West on which reality to focus. .

But maybe we don’t have to choose one or the other as a guide to faith.

Maybe the tension is between, on the one hand, praising Jesus, as a winner, and then deserting him as a loser.  Praising him and then condemning him. Because make no mistake about it we do condemn him in some of the things we do in life. 

I remember when I was in elementary school. I was perhaps eight years old. I saw some of my friends gathered around a boy who was a year or so younger. I asked what was happening, and I was told that you only had to pull a face at this kid and he would break into tears.

So I did.  I grimaced at him and sure enough he started crying. It was funny.

It wasn’t funny for him. But we soon got tired of it and left him alone.

We all have a share in driving the nails.

A punishment for thievery, in Medieval England was to be placed in the stocks. The stocks were a wooden frame with holes for the legs, and the head, and for the hands too, and a thief would be locked into the stocks and left there for a few days. And anyone going by could throw vegetables, fruit, mud, even stones, at the poor unfortunate victim. It was expected. Considered the duty of all law-abiding citizens. 

Even people who didn’t know the miscreant or his crime, would take a shot.

In Biblical times and in now in Afghanistan where the Taliban rules.  and stoning was reintroduced, everyone  watching was expected to take up a stone and throw it,

You share the punishment. You share the blame.

But we have all thrown stones, haven’t we? 

Passing on gossip.  Condemning people without really knowing them.

We have all hurt someone at some time.

We have all taunted Jesus.

Wait a minute, how did Jesus get in there? I never taunted him!

 “What you do to the least of these my brothers or sisters, you do unto me.”

That’s how!

I wonder if we get into a certain way of doing things, that it becomes habitual, and we don’t realise we are doing it. 

Like Sunday we are good Christians, but other days we are not so good? 

Like when there is nothing at stake, we are good Christians, but if rules need to be bent, or when acting as  a Christian would make doing our job difficult, we aren’t?

I have seen commercials advertising a great deal on an automobile – so much down and a ridiculously low monthly lease amount, which looks really good at a glance, but the small print which by law has to be there, mentions that the lease is a reduced mileage lease – 10,000 kilometers a year only.

You are not going to take the reduced lease of course, but it gets you into the showroom. 

Or the store manager who marks up the prices of the furniture on the floor, by ten percent and then holds a sale featuring ten per cent off.

And he has no problem coming to church on a Sunday, never even thinking about the contradiction in his Sunday behaviour and his weekday behaviour.

It’s what he has always done.

Its normal marketing behaviour.

Nothing wrong with it.

I wonder if the marketing person who thought up that scheme is a Christian.

If he or she is, then they are doing something that is at odds with what they do on Sunday, aren’t they?  If they did this, then they probably have done other slightly misleading things too.

Because you kind of get into the habit of it.

The point I am trying to get to is that if that is the case with us, then we need to bring both sides of our lives into line with each other.

Live our Sunday life, Monday to Saturday.

Break old habits.

Habits can be dangerous.

I read about a man who was a creature of habit.

 He followed a strict and precise routine every morning. His alarm went off at 6.30 a.m. He rose briskly, shaved and showered, ate his breakfast, brushed his teeth. Picked up his briefcase, drove to the nearby ferry landing, parked his car, rode the ferry across to the downtown business area, got off the ferry, walked, hung up his coat, spread his papers out on his desk, and sat down in his chair at precisely 8.00. Not 8.01, not 7.59. Always 8.00 on the dot.

He had followed this same routine for nearly eight years.

Until one morning, his alarm did not go off, and he slept fifteen minutes late.

When he did wake, he was panic stricken. He rushed through his shower, nicked himself when he shaved, gulped down his breakfast, only halfway brushed his teeth, grabbed his briefcase, jumped into his car, drove to the ferry landing, jumped out of his car and looked for the ferry. There it was out in the water a few feet from the dock.

He said to himself,  “I think I can make it.” And he ran down the dock towards the ferry at full speed. Reaching the edge of the pier he gave an enormous leap out over the water and miraculously, landed, with a loud thud on the deck of the ferry.

The captain rushed down to make sure he was alright, and said, “Man that was a tremendous leap, but if you would have waited just another minute we would have reached the dock, and you could have walked on.”

Every year at our Palm Sunday service, we break the routine a bit don’t we? Instead of sitting squashed up in the back five or six pews, we have to meet in the hall,  then process into the church in a sort of mixed up order.

And we are scared stiff that someone will have taken our seat – the one we have occupied every Sunday for the past umpteen years.  

And we are reminded that going with the flow, doing things without thinking about them, taking the easy way, is what condemned Jesus. Not everyone in that crowd that yelled out, “Crucify him,” really wanted to have that man hung on a cross, but they went with the flow.

Some of them had even welcomed him when he rode into Jerusalem, shouting Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest heaven!”

If our life is like that, loving Jesus on the one hand, and then on the other hand, by our actions “condemning him,” then we need to look at our daily habits, and change them.

We need to think for ourselves.

Maybe go against the flow for once in a while.

Don’t do what everyone does.

Take a stand against racist or sexist jokes; stand up for the underdog; speak out when we know someone is lying; don’t gild the lily; tell the truth.

Write to the government when you disagree with its policies, rather than just letting it go by.

Get involved in a writing campaign for Amnesty International, adopt a Foster Child, take positive action to try and put right, things which are wrong.

Don’t be afraid of standing out in a crowd.

You know, the Jews have been blamed over the centuries for crucifying Jesus. That fact has been used to justify pogroms, persecutions and ultimately genocide.

Right now, Hindus are persecuting Moslems in India, and Moslems have persecuted Hindus, in Pakistan.

Israelis are persecuting Palestinians, and Palestinians are persecuting Israelis.

Every hour of the day someone drives a nail into his hands, or into his feet, or drives a sword into his side.

Don’t you agree that it’s time we changed out habitual way of looking at other people?  

That we changed the way we do things?

Maybe just take a look at how we live, and if there is a bad habit that needs to be thrown out, to do it.

We could start with today. Here and now.  On this kind of crazy mixed up Sunday.

Amen.

The Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ According to John

Now a certain man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village where Mary and her sister Martha lived.^[a] (Now it was Mary who anointed the Lord with perfumed oil^[b] and wiped his feet dry with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick.)^[c] So the sisters sent a message^[d] to Jesus,^[e] “Lord, look, the one you love is sick.” When Jesus heard this, he said, “This sickness will not lead to death,^[f] but to God’s glory,^[g] so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.”^[h] (Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.)^[i]

So when he heard that Lazarus^[j] was sick, he remained in the place where he was for two more days. Then after this, he said to his disciples, “Let us go to Judea again.”^[k] The disciples replied,^[l] “Rabbi, the Jewish leaders^[m] were just now trying^[n] to stone you to death! Are^[o] you going there again?” Jesus replied,^[p] “Are there not twelve hours in a day? If anyone walks around in the daytime, he does not stumble,^[q] because he sees the light of this world.^[r] But if anyone walks around at night,^[s] he stumbles,^[t] because the light is not in him.”

After he said this, he added,^[u] “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep.^[v] But I am going there to awaken him.” Then the disciples replied,^[w] “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.” (Now Jesus had been talking about^[x] his death, but they^[y] thought he had been talking about real sleep.)^[z]

Then Jesus told them plainly, “Lazarus has died, and I am glad^[aa] for your sake that I was not there, so that you may believe.^[ab] But let us go to him.” So Thomas (called Didymus^[ac])^[ad] said to his fellow disciples, “Let us go too, so that we may die with him.”^[ae]

When^[af] Jesus arrived,^[ag] he found that Lazarus^[ah] had been in the tomb four days already.^[ai] (Now Bethany was less than two miles^[aj] from Jerusalem, so many of the Jewish people of the region^[ak] had come to Martha and Mary to console them^[al] over the loss of their brother.)^[am] So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary was sitting in the house.^[an] Martha^[ao] said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will grant^[ap] you.”^[aq]

Jesus replied,^[ar] “Your brother will come back to life again.”^[as] Martha said,^[at] “I know that he will come back to life again^[au] in the resurrection at the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live^[av] even if he dies, and the one who lives and believes in me will never die.^[aw] Do you believe this?” She replied,^[ax] “Yes, Lord, I believe^[ay] that you are the Christ,^[az] the Son of God who comes into the world.”^[ba]

And when she had said this, Martha^[bb] went and called her sister Mary, saying privately,^[bc] “The Teacher is here and is asking for you.”^[bd] So when Mary^[be] heard this, she got up quickly and went to him. (Now Jesus had not yet entered the village, but was still in the place where Martha had come out to meet him.) Then the people^[bf] who were with Mary^[bg] in the house consoling her saw her^[bh] get up quickly and go out. They followed her, because they thought she was going to the tomb to weep^[bi] there.

Now when Mary came to the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the people^[bj] who had come with her weeping, he was intensely moved^[bk] in spirit and greatly distressed.^[bl] He asked,^[bm] “Where have you laid him?”^[bn] They replied,^[bo] “Lord, come and see.” Jesus wept.^[bp] Thus the people who had come to mourn^[bq] said, “Look how much he loved him!” But some of them said, “This is the man who caused the blind man to see!^[br] Couldn’t he have done something to keep Lazarus^[bs] from dying?”

Jesus, intensely moved^[bt] again, came to the tomb. (Now it was a cave, and a stone was placed across it.)^[bu] Jesus said, “Take away the stone.”^[bv] Martha, the sister of the deceased,^[bw] replied, “Lord, by this time the body will have a bad smell,^[bx] because he has been buried^[by] four days.”^[bz] Jesus responded,^[ca] “Didn’t I tell you that if you believe, you would see the glory of God?” So they took away^[cb] the stone. Jesus looked upward^[cc] and said, “Father, I thank you that you have listened to me.^[cd] I knew that you always listen to me,^[ce] but I said this^[cf] for the sake of the crowd standing around here, that they may believe that you sent me.” When^[cg] he had said this, he shouted in a loud voice,^[ch] “Lazarus, come out!” The one who had died came out, his feet and hands tied up with strips of cloth,^[ci] and a cloth wrapped around his face.^[cj] Jesus said to them, “Unwrap him^[ck] and let him go.”  (John 11:1-45)

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That is some story in the Gospel today. A man dead four days is brought back to life!  

Just imagine it. A group of men roll the large circular stone away from the opening of a cave that has been turned into a tomb. Then they stand back. Jesus calls out in a loud voice, “ Lazarus come out!” and out comes a figure, its face and hands wrapped in bandage-like cloths, and wearing the simple funeral nightgown.

Kinda scary. Kinda wonderful.

Martha and Mary are going to take Lazarus home from the tomb. He is alive, and well, and lives for some time afterward – he is mentioned again in the New Testament.

It’s bizarre, isn’t it?

Why? Why does Jesus do this?

He loved Mary and Martha and Lazarus, and came to help his friends. That’s what friends do, isn’t it?  They help each other.

There’s a wonderful story about two friends who served together in the First World War. One of them was wounded and left lying helpless and in pain in no-man’s land. The other, at peril to his own life, crawled out to help his friend; and when he reached him, the wounded man looked at him and said, “I knew you would come.”

Martha and Mary  knew Jesus would come.

The simple fact of human need brings Jesus to our side. 

When you need him, he is there.

It was dangerous for Jesus to go to Bethany.  The authorities were looking to kill him. His disciples warned against it.   And Jesus well knew that going there would be a first step towards the cross.

He went anyway.

But in the accounts of Jesus’ life, everything happens for a reason. We are told in Jesus’ words that God will be glorified, and so He is.

Because the great  proof of  Christianity is seeing what  God does in Jesus Christ. Words may fail to convince, but there is no argument when we see  God in action.  Simply stated,  the power of Jesus Christ has made the coward into a hero, the doubter into a person of certainty, the selfish man into a willing servant.  The power of Christ has made the bad person good throughout history.

When you think about it, that puts a tremendous responsibility on the shoulders of  today’s  Christians doesn’t it? . It’s God’s design that  every one of us should be living proof of his power. ^[1]

Glory to God whose power working in us can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine.

Through his power, we can do much more than we can ever imagine we can do.

Through his power we are able to do things we could never even think of doing before.

Are we empowered? 

How do we know if we have been empowered?

Have you ever tested it?

We used to have wooden bird houses in the trees at the front of the house. Every year sparrows moved in. They would bring in grass, and feathers, and other mysterious stuff to build nests in there. The entrance was only a small hole and there was just a small peg for them to rest on before entering.

I have wondered how the baby birds are ever going to learn to fly. How are they going to be able to get on that little peg, and how is the mother going to show them what to do.

They will sit there, feet firmly wrapped around that peg, hanging on for dear life, equipped magnificently for flying, and yet scared to take off. The mother bird will somehow have to convince them that they can actually fly. She will have to push them off, I imagine, and when they feel themselves falling, they will flap their wings and find out that indeed they aren’t going to crash to the ground (where the cat from across the road will be waiting for them)  but indeed they  will be able to fly.

To soar heavenwards.

That’s us. We are empowered Christians. We have been given our wings. We have the spirit of God within us and we are equipped to do his work. We just have to be convinced of that.  

And try using it!

And we will be rewarded.   We will live forever.

Jesus says, “I am the one who raises the dead to life. And everyone who has faith in me will live, even though they die. And everyone who lives because of faith in me will never die.”

Live  for ever! Never die!

He doesn’t mean that we will live for ever in this world. What he does mean is that we will have new life in this world, and eternal life in the next.

And one depends on the other!

The few years we are in this world, and everyone over fifty knows that the years we are here are few indeed, are our preparation for the next world.

If we live right, then we are promised eternal life, and a life that is infinitely better than this one.    It had better be hadn’t it, if it’s to last for eternity!

If we live wrongly, then we will be judged accordingly.

If that is so, then what fools we are to live this measly three-score-years-and-ten completely for ourselves, never caring about others, or indeed about God, when it’s going to directly affect how we spend eternity.

You would have to be spiritually dead, wouldn’t you, not to care? 

Tokichi Ishii was hanged in Tokyo for murder, in 1918.

He was a man with an almost unparalleled criminal record. He was way worse than Clifford Olson. He had murdered men, women and children in the most brutal way. Anyone who stood in his way was pitilessly eliminated. Now he was in prison awaiting death.

As it happened, he was visited by two Canadian women. They were allowed to talk to him only through the bars of his cell. They tried to communicate with this monster, but  he only glowered at them like a caged and savage  animal. In the end they abandoned the attempt but they gave him a Bible, hoping that it might succeed where they had failed.

Strangely enough, he began to read it, and having started, he  could not stop. He read on until he came to the story of the Crucifixion. He came to the words, ‘ Father forgive them, for they know not what they do,’ and these words broke him.

“I stopped,” he said, “I was stabbed to the heart as if pierced by a five inch nail. Shall I call it the love of Christ? Shall I call it his compassion? I do not know what to call it. I only know that I believed and the hardness of my heart was changed.”

Later when the condemned man went to the scaffold, he was no longer the hardened, surly brute he once had been, but a smiling radiant man.

Christ had brought Tokichi Ishii to life, and life to Tokichi Ishi. And this unlikely man, formerly ‘dead,’ but now ‘alive’ – ironically just when his earthly body is to be put to death – will inherit eternal life.

We are told that when he learned about his friend Lazarus, Jesus wept.

Seeing that………… we know that God too weeps for us, his children, even for those of us who have become dead to him. Even for Tokichi Ishii.

Incidentally, the Greeks, for whom John’s  Gospel was written, were astounded to hear of a God who actually cared for people. 

Note that when Lazarus received new life, it was through Jesus’ prayer to his Father. Jesus does nothing by himself.

In everything Jesus did, he acted for his Father, was obedient to his Father, and allowed his Father to work through him.

How would it be in this world if we set God in his proper place in our lives, and instead of acting for ourselves,  we acted for God?

How would it be if we took the new life he has given to us, the empowerment with which we have been gifted, and did something wonderful for God?

……….if .. like a baby bird which has never flown before, we can step out into the world, trusting that the wings he has given us will hold us up, and do something that we have been scared to do before …………

………because if we don’t use what we have been given, we will lose it.

We can stick with the bird metaphor – I hate to change metaphors mid-stream,  and I hate clichés like the plague  – A bird when flying has to keep flying.   Oh, it may find a thermal current somewhere that it can ride for a little while, but they don’t last long. If the bird doesn’t keep flapping its wings, it will fall to the ground.

Likewise, we have to keep using the power we have been given. We have to continue to grow in Christ – otherwise, we will fall back………..fall into spiritual decline….become like everyone else……….stop coming to church….. stop caring so much….become….spiritually dead.

What a shame if that came to be, after the magnificent sacrifice that Jesus made on our behalf.

What a shame to have wasted our time here.

Far better,  to be alive, and vibrant  – noisy for Christ  – if you like –  and to let the world see his triumph – in the world, and in us:

       Lord, make us pure; enrich our life

      With heavenly love for evermore;

     Give us thy strength to face the strife,

     And serve thee better than before.

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[1] The Daily Study  Bible, William Barclay, G.R.Welch Co. Ltd., Burlington, Ontario. Vol 2 1975 pp86-87

                The Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ According to John

As Jesus walked along, he saw a man blind from birth.

His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him.

We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming when no one can work.As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”

When he had said this, he spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva and spread the mud on the man’s eyes,saying to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means Sent). Then he went and washed and came back able to see.

The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar began to ask, “Is this not the man who used to sit and beg?”

Some were saying, “It is he.” Others were saying, “No, but it is someone like him.” He kept saying, “I am the man.”But they kept asking him, “Then how were your eyes opened?”He answered, “The man called Jesus made mud, spread it on my eyes, and said to me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash.’ Then I went and washed and received my sight.”

They said to him, “Where is he?” He said, “I do not know.”
They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind.

Now it was a sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes.

Then the Pharisees also began to ask him how he had received his sight. He said to them, “He put mud on my eyes. Then I washed, and now I see.”

Some of the Pharisees said, “This man is not from God, for he does not observe the sabbath.” But others said, “How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?” And they were divided.So they said again to the blind man, “What do you say about him? It was your eyes he opened.” He said, “He is a prophet.”

The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight and asked them, “Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?”

His parents answered, “We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind;
but we do not know how it is that now he sees, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself.”

His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews; for the Jews had already agreed that anyone who confessed Jesus to be the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue.

Therefore his parents said, “He is of age; ask him.”

 “Give glory to God! We know that this man is a sinner.”

He answered, “I do not know whether he is a sinner. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.”

They said to him, “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?”
He answered them, “I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?”

Then they reviled him, saying, “You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses.

We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from.”

The man answered, “Here is an astonishing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes.

We know that God does not listen to sinners, but he does listen to one who worships him and obeys his will.Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind.

If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.”

They answered him, “You were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us?” And they drove him out.

Jesus heard that they had driven him out, and when he found him, he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”He answered, “And who is he, sir? Tell me, so that I may believe in him.”Jesus said to him, “You have seen him, and the one speaking with you is he.”

He said, “Lord, I believe.” And he worshiped him.

Jesus said, “I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind.”

Some of the Pharisees near him heard this and said to him, “Surely we are not blind, are we?”

Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains. ,(John 9: 1-41)

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Jim Smith went to church one Sunday morning. He heard the organist miss a note  during the prelude, and he winced.  He saw a teenager talking when everybody was supposed to be bowed in silent prayer.  He felt like the usher was watching to see what he put on the offering plate and it made him boil. He caught the preacher making a slip of the tongue five times in the sermon, by actual.

count. As he slipped out through the side door during the closing hymn, he muttered to himself, “ Never again, what a bunch of clods and hypocrites.”

Ron Brown went to church one Sunday morning, He heard the organist play an arrangement of “A Mighty Fortress,” and he thrilled at the majesty of it.  He heard a young girl take a moment during the service  to speak her simple message of the difference her faith makes in her life.  He was glad to see  that this church was  sharing in a special offering for the hungry children of Nigeria. He especially appreciated the sermon that Sunday – it answered a question that had bothered him for  a long time.  He thought, as he walked out the doors of the church, “ How can a man come here and not feel the presence of God?”

Both men went to the same church, on the same Sunday morning. Each had a different view of what had transpired.

Jesus said, “I am here to give sight to the blind and to make blind everyone who can see.”

He said it to the Pharisees who were challenging him about the man being cured of his blindness, because it had taken place on a Sabbath.

A miracle like that could not have been done by a good person, they said,  because it was done on the Sabbath when you weren’t supposed to work..

They were blind to this mighty miracle because they wanted to condemn Jesus.

Just as each of those men, both of whom attended church in that story had  a different way of looking at what had happened, so did the Pharisees.

They had made up their minds about Jesus – namely that he was a trouble-maker – and they judged everything he did through that prism. They were blind to the good he was doing.

For Jesus love came first.

For the Pharisees, rules came first, and foremost. There was  no way they could  bring themselves, to see another’s point of view. 

They didn’t even want to know about another point of view.  They wanted Jesus silenced.

The right to free speech in this country came out of a belief that  everyone has a right to say what they believe, not only because that’s a desirable thing, but because those hearing opposing views can then weigh arguments both for and against,  and thus make up their minds. That’s the way that truth comes out. Not by shutting up those you don’t agree with.

The Pharisees blocked up their ears, and closed their eyes to any ideas that were alien to what they believed. And didn’t want anyone preaching different views to theirs.

They thought they saw clearly. But they were blind.

I have come across people who were a certain way – maybe grumpy, maybe stern, and reserved, maybe even obstreperous – and I might have been hurt by them, or inspired to be grumpy with them in return, but when  I have learned something about their life’s struggles, something about what it was that shaped the way they had grown up, then I understood them a bit better, and I was able to love them. 

Learning something about them was just like getting  my glasses fixed.

Jesus helps us to see beyond a person’s surface characteristics.  And to understand how they are. And to allow us to be compassionate toward them.   As he himself  was, with those who had been cast out of society.

Jesus has a love for those who suffer from physical or mental, or spiritual affliction, and we see that clearly in him, as he reaches out to them and heals and forgives them.

His love includes sinners too, even the worst sinner.

And we see this in his amazing sacrifice on the cross. He isn’t someone who gave up his life for worthy people. No, he gave his life for sinners,  gossips, murderers, terrorists, liars, thieves,  ungrateful wretches –for those who don’t care or even want to be saved – he gave his life for us all.

We may go through  life hurting others, like Mister Magoo, bouncing from here to there, and from there to here, hurting people on our way, and not even knowing it.

I have known people who actually and deliberately set out to destroy the reputations of other people, by spreading lies about them. Can you imagine it?

But I don’t believe they really understood what they were doing. They probably thought they were bringing some upstart down a peg or two; or putting someone in their place.   

I am sure if they could see how much they hurt someone they wouldn’t do it.

Jesus, by challenging us to live in a loving way, and making us aware of what real love is, enables us to see more clearly. We see the direction in which we are headed and we are able to make a sharp right turn – to repent.

The paradox is that until we meet Jesus, we are blind. When we meet him, he gives us new spiritual sight that is twenty-twenty.

Seeing clearly we can plot our path ahead in his service.

But you can see how people have  different perspectives in every day happenings, can’t you?

Like the time Father Murphy stopped in the local barber shop for a shave and a haircut, and found the barber hung over from a heavy week-end. He endured the shaking hand, but when the shave was over decided that a brief sermon was in order.

“Look at this cut on my throat,” he exclaimed, “And this one by the ear, and this other one on my upper lip, it might have cost me my nose. And all due to whiskey!”

The barber replied, “ You’re right Father, drinking does make the skin very tender.”

Little differences like that don’t matter much. You like the Raptors, he likes the Heat. She likes watching figure skating, he likes the hockey.   But when you read the newspaper, or watch the news on television, you will see that major wars, civil conflicts, great disturbances, the killing of innocents, all take place because of differences in perspective.

Because of blindness to what other people may be suffering.  

The most horrific example of this right now is in the Middle East.

Palestinians see Israel as an occupying force in their land. Israelis see Palestinians as a people which won’t let them live in peace in their land.

So one side attacks with the only weapons it has – people willing to die – and the other attacks with military might.

Each attack is in retaliation for an attack by the other side, and so on ad infinitum.

Similarly, leaders  and their followers on both sides  of other conflicts in the Middle East – Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan, are  blind to the real issue – which is that thousands  of innocent people have been killed  with nothing to show for their sacrifice.

And long held prejudices, prejudgments, hatreds, misperceptions continue to cause death and injury to countless innocent people.

And there seems to be no way to demonstrate that this suffering could be remedied – healed – if leaders could only have their  “eyes” opened.

I saw a documentary which told the stories of a few Israeli boys and girls and a few Palestinian boys and girls brought to the U.S. to spend a month together.

At the end of the month they were all friends. They cried when it came time to say ‘goodbye’ and promised to keep in touch.

It was a wonderful example of what can happen when people are given the gift of sight.

These young people were able, for the first time,  to see each other for what they were – kids just like them.

But within a short time of their return – to Israel and to Palestine – when they were questioned, sadly, the old attitude, the one that said all on the other side were evil, had returned.

I think it was a mistake to bring those children to America to that youth camp. They should have brought the leaders.

It seems obvious to us, doesn’t it?   But none of us is truly clear sighted. We all suffer from blindness at some time. 

When I try to read without my glasses, I have to take a step back, to enable my eyes to focus. Maybe that’s what we all need to do  sometimes – take a step back, and get a better focus on our attitudes, and our beliefs – about ourselves, and about those with whom we come into contact. 

God forbid that we should hurt someone, that we should condemn someone, that we should hate someone, because of  our blindness.

God give us a clarity of spiritual vision, that enables us to see what needs to be put right in our own lives; what we need to do  to make us better followers of your Son Jesus; what needs to be done to help us understand our family, friends, and neighbors better, so that we can be lights in this world, illuminating the dark corners of prejudice and hatred, and bringing about the conditions for true Christian love to flourish, and to bring real peace, in our lives and in the world. We ask this in the name of the One who gave his life out of love for all people, your Son, Jesus the Christ.

Amen.

The Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ According to John

Jesus came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon.

A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” (His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?” (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” \

The woman said to him, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?”

Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.” The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”

Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come back.” The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!”

The woman said to him, “Sir, I see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.”

Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.” Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who is speaking to you.”

Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, “What do you want?” or, “Why are you speaking with her?” Then the woman left her water jar and went back to the city. She said to the people, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?” They left the city and were on their way to him.

Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, “Rabbi, eat something.” But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” So the disciples said to one another, “Surely no one has brought him something to eat?”

Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. Do you not say, ‘Four months more, then comes the harvest’? But I tell you, look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.”

Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I have ever done.” So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them; and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.” ( John 4:5-42 )

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My mother died when I was sixteen. I still remember her. She was someone with few wants. She wasn’t a great shopper. She had neither time nor money.

For the life of me I can’t remember her ever buying anything for herself. She must have, of course. But  I only remember her buying clothing, shoes, and so on for  her four children.

Sometimes, very rarely,  she would say something like, “Trev, pop to the shop, for me love, I just fancy a drink of Dandelion and Burdock.”

Her hungers and thirsts were never too deep.

But she was a true believer.  

And at peace with herself.

Some time ago, I read of a young woman who had cocaine and heroin habits. Needs. Hungers. Thirsts. For something to ease the pain of living.

This woman sold her body to raise money to try and satisfy those needs.  

The last time she was seen alive was when she got into a car with two men  who had driven by, waving fifty dollar bills.

A man was charged with her murder.

The woman who met Jesus at Jacob’s well was a woman with needs. 

She had been married five times, and was living with her sixth partner. She had a need to be loved, and  not even five husbands had been able to fill that need.

You might say she thirsted for real, unselfish, undemanding love.  She had a  thirst of the soul.

Human beings have always had such thirsts. Poets have written about them. Psalmists have sung about them.

They drive us, and sometimes we don’t even know they are doing it.

When Jesus talked about the living water, the water that quenches  that  thirst of the soul for ever, the Samaritan woman jestingly said ,  “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not thirst and so I will not have to come back here.”

Suddenly, Jesus brings her to her senses, “Go and call your husband and come back here.”
The woman stiffened as if a sudden pain  had caught her. She recoiled as if from a sudden shock. She went pale, as one who has seen a sudden apparition, and she had  – she had suddenly caught sight of herself.

She was, for perhaps the first time,  compelled to face herself and to recognise what had driven her, how her needs had driven her into a looseness of life.

That’s what happens when we meet Jesus.  He looks right into our hearts, and knows us. And we suddenly know ourselves.  Meeting Jesus makes us honest about ourselves, perhaps for the first time.

And that realisation can bring us to God, and to want to make amends.

This woman wanted to make sacrifice to God to put things right.  But she got caught up in where to make that sacrifice.  The Samaritans believed  that Mount Gerizim was the holy mountain, the Jews, Mount Zion.

Jesus told her the time was coming when people wouldn’t worry about where to worship. They would find God wherever they decided to seek him.

Her experience with Jesus  began with  being compelled to face herself and to see herself as she really was.  

The same thing happened to Peter. After the episode when Jesus guided Peter to the right place to fish,  Peter suddenly discovered something of the majesty of Jesus, and all he could say, was.  ”Depart from me for I am a sinful man, Lord.”

In the face of  such  righteousness, Peter felt the depth of his own sin.

I think we just don’t realise our need for someone to say, “You are forgiven.”

We just don’t know.

We get used to living a certain way. 

A little girl had been taken to church by her mother, to hear a famous preacher. When he had finished his sermon, the little girl whispered to her mom, “Mom, how does he know what goes on in our house?”

It isn’t just the knowing, it’s that when we meet  Jesus we see things for what they.

It’s like getting new glasses.

The next thing the Samaritan woman did was to rush away to tell her neighbors about her experience, and to bring them to meet Jesus.

She hurried off into town leaving her water jar behind.  You could be sure she was coming back.

When the people in the town heard what she had to say, they wanted to know him. 

Then when they met Jesus, they told her, ‘We don’t have faith in Jesus just because of what you told us. We have heard him ourselves and we are certain he is the Saviour of the world.’

But she had led them to him, hadn’t she?

The word of God must be transmitted person to person. God’s message will never reach those who need to hear it,  unless  someone delivers it.

                        He has no hand but our hands

                        To do His work today.

                        He has no feet but our feet

                        To lead people in his way;

                        He has no voice but our voice

                        To tell people how he died;

                        He has no help but our help

                       To lead them to his side.

All it took was that one woman to tell of her experience to save a whole town.

The woman was a Samaritan, a people rejected by the Jews; as a woman, she was also regarded as a second class citizen. Men were not supposed to speak to women out on the street. Or women to men.

In fact there were some holy men, Pharisees, who wouldn’t even look at a woman.  They were called ‘bruised, or bleeding’ Pharisees because of the way the would bump into walls when they closed their eyes every time a woman came into view. 

This woman also had another strike against her.  Having been married five times and living with a man, she was looked down upon by the other women. There was water in town, but she came to this well, a good way out of town. The other women wouldn’t have her near them .

Time and again, it seems, it isn’t the holy people who lead people to God, but the sinners, the rejects, those who have lost so much – and have found so much.

A Samaritan, a woman, and a fallen woman at that  –  in her gladness led the whole town to Jesus.

She had found the living water.

Others searched but didn’t find.

The emperor  Qin Shi Huangdi, after whom China itself was named, and by whose grave just a few years ago, a terra cotta army of 7500 soldiers was discovered,  thirsted for the water of immortality. 

He sent  repeated expeditions into the Eastern Sea to seek the elixir of life. One of  these missions involved scores of oceangoing junks and a crew of 3,000 young men and women. They never returned.

The water of immortality was unavailable.[1]

We look everywhere except the right place.

But eternal life is easy to find, if you know how. 

Just look for that person who has it all together. The person who has a sense of fulfillment in life. The person who seems to have some hidden strength that brings them through their trials.

The person who has found joy in Jesus.

They will point you to the place where that living water can be found.

They can’t help it.

It kind of bubbles up.

Some years ago, a group of prospectors set out from Bannock, Montana in search of gold. They went through many hardships, and several of them died en route. They were overtaken by Indians and robbed of their good horses, and warned to go home or they would be killed.

Defeated and discouraged, they made their way home.  On one of their many stops along the way – the lame ponies they had been left with could not go far without resting – they tethered their mounts on the side of a creek.

One of the men casually picked up a little stone, and calling for a hammer, cracked it open. “ It looks like there may be gold here,” he said.

Two of them panned for gold the rest of the afternoon and managed to realise about twelve dollars worth of gold. That was a lot of money at the time.

The entire little company panned for gold the next day and realised fifty dollars – a small fortune.  They said to one another, ‘We have struck it.’

They made their way back to Bannock and vowed not to breathe a word concerning the gold strike. They secretively set about equipping themselves with supplies for another prospecting trip, taking elaborate steps to hide what they were doing. 

But when they set out, three hundred men followed them.

Who had told on them?     No-one!   Their beaming faces betrayed their secret.

If we love Jesus, whose face we have not seen, we should be unable to conceal that treasure from anyone. Our beaming face will betray our secret.

O come  let us sing to the Lord;

Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!

Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving;

Let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise.

For the Lord is a great God, and a king above all gods.

Praise his wonderful name.

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[1] P.303 Contact, by Carl Sagan,Simon and Schuster, New York,1985.