Still Quarrying: The Fruitful Vine.

I have not been a diligent blogger recently.  At many levels the medication I am on at present is taking its toll.   However, what follows below appeared as a Facebook memory today, a pastoral letter I wrote eleven years ago when I was coming to terms with a blood abnormality that might develop into cancer.   I have no clear memory of having written it but thought it might be appropriate in the season of Lent.

 I had never read anything by Ben Okri until recently when this prize-winning novelist and poet wrote an article for a Sunday supplement.  He mentioned his childhood in Nigeria  in a time of civil war.  Young Ben saw things that even now he finds difficult to talk about.  Dead bodies in rivers.  People shot in the streets.  He writes:

 

‘I’ve blanked out a lot of it.  But writing comes partly out of being wounded by life.  Something has had to have bruised and shaken you a little bit; otherwise, why do we ask questions?  It’s very rare that people who have lived perfect lives become artists because the need to create art is connected to a need to heal something that is imperfect.’

 

There’s a lot to think about there but I am struck by his idea that suffering can be creative.  Certainly, you don’t have to go too far into the artistic world to find this borne out.  The painting of Van Gogh and the music of Tchaikovsky were the products of tortured psyches - and it has often been said that Bob Dylan is at his best when he is going through a bad time. 

 

Let’s be clear.  Suffering is never to be commended.  No one wants it.  Of course there are people, perhaps the majority, who look at their suffering and find no answer to the question why and, moreover, see no good in it.  But the testimony of people like Ben Okri shows there is this other side to the darkness.  And then there is the Cross.  On the face of it a disgusting spectacle but it stands at the centre of our faith as an assurance that there is forgiveness with our God and the promise of a life beyond this life.  Jesus sacrifice was motivated by a need to heal something that was imperfect in us.

 

This tells me that there are no no-go areas for our God, not even our experiences of pain, abandonment and anguish.  Nothing prevents him working out His purpose in our lives; in fact he works through our suffering to make us the people he wants us to be.  Jesus once said something startling: ‘I am the true vine and my Father is the gardener.  He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.’  (John 15: 1-2)  I confess that I haven’t done much pruning in the garden but doesn’t it involve cutting, breaking and sap bleeding from branches?  But it is all necessary for the plant or tree to grow towards its full fruitfulness.  Jesus says the same process is necessary for spiritual fruit to grow in our lives. 

 

This is one of the challenges of Easter.  To live as Jesus lived in the firm conviction that while the Father’s will is sometimes hard, it is always good. 

Still Quarrying: Vast Eternal Plan.

 

I never saw Fiddler On The Roof but at one time everyone was familiar with one of the big moments when the main character, Tevye, sang ‘If I Were A Rich Man.’   It came to mind the other day when I heard that the actor who played Tevye in the movie, Chaim Topol, had died.   For some reason two lines from the song stuck in my mind.  Crying out to God Tevye says:

‘Would it spoil some vast eternal plan/

                                                                     If I were a wealthy man.’  

In the outworking of the providence of God surely there is room for a Tevye who has no financial worries and can provide the best for his family.  Would there really be any major disturbance in the goodness, justice and love of God if this was to happen?  We can all get caught up in this current of thought. It may not be a yearning for money but substitute ‘wealthy’ for ‘healthy’ or anything that we believe will enhance our quality of life and we stand with Tevye.  What would it cost God to make our lives just that bit easier?  Surely  that would be the merest tweak to the ‘vast eternal plan’.

That protest can be heard time and again in Scripture.  Man and women faced with pain, poverty, persecution, psychological and spiritual desolation and yearning for something better.  David, Job, Paul come to mind.  Sometimes their prayers were answered but often not - or at least not in the way they expected.  What they were challenged to believe was that whatever the circumstances God was still present and still working out his good and loving purpose for their lives.  Their suffering did not exclude them from the ‘vast eternal plan.’      

I was faced with this challenge in the first year of my studies for the ministry.   There were many books I had to read and some made a big impact,  but none more than a book that was not on my reading list and written by someone who would not be recognised in academic circles as a front-line theologian.  It was called A God Who Acts by Harry Blamires.   It was an attempt to work out what the Incarnation teaches us about God and how He works in the lives and circumstances of men and women.   Central to Blamires thought is that the life of Jesus was on the surface not one of success and accomplishment, pain free and without any psychological or spiritual disturbance.   And yet, God was in Christ, and through a life that that was anticipated by Isaiah as being characterised by sorrow and acquaintance with grief He made it possible for humankind to be redeemed from sin and death.  

Blamires writes:

‘The God of Christians, if he is truly revealed in Jesus Christ, is not a distributor of earthly  success and prosperity.  His chosen course on earth brought his disciples to a shameful rout, and the most faithful ones to the foot of his cross.  Few of us have the right to declare what is the true nature of that Kingdom of Heaven in which we are called to share here and now.  But many of us can safely what it is not.  It is not an eternal Speech Day, at which prizes are handed out to the week’s best pray-er of prayers and the weeks best doer of good works.  God chooses no “Man of the Year” to whom to present a silver trophy - a cup flowing over with health and wealth . . . If we turn earnestly to God, imagining that we are entering a discreet competition for the award of earthly well-being, then sooner or later, with more or less pain, God will make plain our error.’  

Blamires recognises that this can come over as being unduly morbid but if God was in Christ then He is present in suffering and able to work through suffering to a good end.  In one of the worst experiences in the life of David when all his natural resources seemed to dissolve we are told he ‘found strength in the Lord his God.’  (1 Samuel 30: 6).  That was possible because of the closeness of God to human experience the ultimate assurance of which is in the life and ministry of Jesus.  

When we think of quality of life we think of material stability, good health, rewarding relationships but from the perspective of God the absence of these does not mean exclusion from the ‘vast eternal plan’ but fixes us more firmly in its outworking and takes us forward in the hope of what can be accomplished even in our brokenness.   

Still Quarrying: Eric Alexander.

 The Service of Thanksgiving for the life of Eric Alexander was not just a tribute to the man to whom the description ‘great’ has been used in the days following his death.  It was a witness to the hope of the Resurrection and to what the Holy Spirit of God can do in the life and ministry of a man who seeks to live in step with Him.   In his contribution to the service Ian Hamilton said that her never came away from a sermon Eric preached without wanting to be a better Christian.  Many of those present knew exactly what he meant.  Eric’s preaching did not just give us a deeper understanding of biblical truth it encouraged us to apply that truth to our lives.  The purpose of the Holy Spirit’s coming into our lives is to make us more like Jesus.  Nothing gives God the Father more pleasure than to see His Son reflected in the lives of those for whom He died.  Eric’s preaching did not allow us merely to enjoy hearing the Gospel preached in such a clear and passionate way, every word coming across as if newly minted.  We were brought to a sense of responsibility.  Having heard and understood how willing were we now to live by God’s ways and to be motivated by God’s priorities?

Ian never came away from Eric’s preaching without wanting to be a better Christian.  But there is something I would add to that.  I have often said that in the aftermath of Eric’s preaching I had my vision of God expanded.  I may well have reflected on what a great preacher I had just heard but more than anything else - and more important to the preacher - I was carrying a renewed awareness of what a great God had been revealed in the life and ministry of Jesus.   I have often heard Eric’s preaching described as ‘majestic’.  That was because he had been deeply touched by the majesty of God and was given grace to convey that to those who were blessed in listening.  One of the books he wrote in retirement was ‘Our Great God And Saviour’, a reflection on Paul’s description of Jesus  in Titus 2: 13.  If we were looking for a way to sum up the chief motivation in Eric’s life and ministry it was to being that greatness home to the hearts of men and women.  

That he did this is a testimony to his humility.   His pulpit presence was always appropriate to the Word that God had placed on his heart.  I have heard this described as ‘awesome’.   But this was only possible due to his awareness of where he stood in relation to Christ.  As he came to end of his life John Newton said:  ‘My memory is nearly gone; but I remember two things: that I am a great sinner, and that Christ is a great Saviour.’   That is the default position of every Christian and no one felt this more deeply that Eric Alexander.  To keep company with him was not first and foremost to be with ‘a prince of preachers’, as he was often described, but to be in fellowship with a brother in Christ who supported you with his prayers and coveted your prayers for him.   In the times I was blessed to share with him he would often end by saying: ‘Let’s continue to pray for one another.’  

His concern for me over the past few years of cancer treatment was a continuing encouragement.  His phone calls, emails, and written notes always seemed to arrive at just the right time.  In his last phone call he said: ‘I pray for you every day.’   I believe the Lord showed me the way forward in ministry through Eric but along with that his friendship and support have been a refreshment to my spirit in these days of uncertainty at a personal level and in the life of the Church.  

Still Quarrying: Days Of The Faint Line

Monday 12 December and I had  been coughing from a dry throat for a few days.   I was also a bit sniffly and  falling asleep in the chair more than usual.  I put it down to the kind of cold that many were catching in the restriction-free days were were enjoying. 

But Gabrielle had some symptoms and we decided that as we had a date to be with ‘Breakaway’, the dementia care group in St Paul’s we had better take a Covid test before going amongst that vulnerable group.  

I began the procedure without much thought or fear.  I had always tested negative through the worst of the pandemic and was surely fortified by the six jabs I had received.  But there it was on that wee oblong piece of plastic, the extra line that told me I was positive.  It was faint but the written and spoke word from the people that know told me that that doesn’t matter.  A double line is a double line.  

So an immediate call to Audrey, the myeloma nurse at the Beatson.  She told me  that as someone with a compromised immunity system I would qualify for anti-viral drugs.  She gave me an NHS number to phone.   I had to tell my story as a myeloma sufferer and the drugs would be sent out by courier.   They arrived within hours.  I was assured that bad things may not happen but they might.  So another regimen of pills had to be taken over five days and the course completed even if there were early improvements in my symptoms.  

By Friday of that week the faint but frightening line had disappeared.  The lady on the NHS advice line had said that hopefully the anti-viral drugs would deal with the symptoms and keep me out of hospital!  I think perhaps that that the Covid bug had been with me for a time before the test and was on the way to burning out.  But the drug did keep the symptoms at bay.   And unbelievably throughout this Gabrielle continued to test negative.  So with a confirmatory negative test on Saturday 17 we were set fair to spend Christmas with the family in Cheltenham.  

In the height of the pandemic I had often half-jokingly said that waiting for the result of a Covid test did wonders for your prayer life.  But that particularly week took me to a new depth.  A new wave of vulnerability swept through me.  You come to terms with living with an incurable disease.  Most of the time you don’t think about it very much.  But now and again the screw tightens and your feel the pressure.  That the way it was in the days of the faint line.  

And you think about the  blog you wrote on 11 December when you emphasised the importance of personal faith in Jesus no matter what circumstances are unfolding.   Well, now was my opportunity to put that into practise, to live that out.  I remembered the final lines I wrote:

‘Let our prayer be that by the end of Advent 2022 there will be a people renewed in their faith, closer to Jesus, confident in His promises, clear with regard to our destiny in Him.’

We too often forget that God’s way of growing a people like this is to lead them through days of challenge in which they will have opportunity to renew faith, become closer to Jesus, find new confidence  in His promises and be more clear in our regard to our destiny in Him.

With everything that was happening I missed out on blogging about the faith of Mary, a traditional  Advent theme.  ‘Greatly troubled’ by her destiny revealed by the angel, with questions in her mind, she was still able to say:

‘I am the Lord’s servant.  May your word to me be fulfilled.’   That was not the end of her questions or, indeed, her suffering.  But through many a day of challenge she trusted the God she knew.  

Still Quarrying: Emmanuel.

 

My first Christmas as the minister of St Paul’s took place in the shadow of the Lockerbie bombing.  On 21 December 1988 Pan Am Flight 103 was destroyed by a bomb that had been planted with the loss of 270 lives on board and on the ground.   It affected our congregation since we had a number of police officers whose Christmas leave was cancelled as every resource available was channelled to the stricken town.   

As I was preparing for the Watchnight service I was sure that the atrocity would be much in the minds of those who gathered.  In those days we could depend on a pack-out.  The challenge then was to speak some Biblical truth into the horror that had cast such a shadow on our Christmas preparations.  The cry was often heard that this was just the worst time of year for something like this to happen.  But if we focus on the truth that lies at the heart of Christmas then there is encouragement and hope.  People celebrate Christmas in their own way and they should be free to do so.  But if it is a celebration of the birth of the Son of God then that powerful truth can speak to us in the midst of our worst experiences.  

We need to take time to revisit this devotionally.  If Christmas is to mean anything to me then it is an opportunity to reflect on a God who became one of us and in His human life and death experienced physical pain as well as psychological disturbance, spiritual abandonment and the annihilation of death.  His life among us is the fulfilment of the ancient prophesy which said that he would be ‘Emmanuel’, God is with us.   With us to the end.  Not that it was the end.  His resurrection showed that the darkness of pain and death does not have the last word.   Paul was to say that the resurrection is ‘the guarantee that those who sleep in death will also be raised.’  (1 Corinthians 15: 20 GNB).   It is in light of the resurrection that we have to view everything in our experience that threatens to take us apart physically, psychologically and spiritually.   In that light we can view the birth of Jesus as a new beginning for humanity, showing that God is with us, and even in the midst of the worst human tragedy is working towards the day when nothing that has ever made us cry will be part of our experience.  

This is not an easy message to preach.  I have always been conscious of the view that it is easy to stand in a pulpit and say things but not so easy to live it out.  (Actually, it is never easy to stand in a pulpit!)   But in the end a preacher has to preach the God he or she knows, the God the apostles knew, the God who was not defeated by the worst that humanity could throw at Him, but continued to move towards the final redemption of Creation, evacuated of everything that was an affront to Him and a source of pain to the humankind He loved.  

This is what Paul was given to understand as he unpacked the truth of God with us.  In Romans 8: 31-37 he reflects on the worst things that could ever break into human experience, much of it he himself had gone through.  He recognises the power of these worst things.  They threaten to separate us from the love of Christ.  But the reality of his coming amongst us, God in a human personality, is the ultimate assurance that his love is not extinguished by ‘trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or  danger or sword.’  (Romans 8: 35).   

It was a tradition in the St Paul’s Watchnight service that the lights were dimmed before the Word was preached.  That in itself was a powerful symbol on Christmas Eve 1988.  Light in the darkness.  And a spotlight lit up the cross behind the Lord’s Table.  A reminder of the purpose of Jesus’ coming, to give Himself to show that in the eyes of God humankind had a future where sins could be forgiven, where lives could be shaped according to the pattern of His life, where a Kingdom awaited its time when the Risen Jesus would announce ‘I am making everything new!’  (Revelation 21: 5). 

There is hope that can be preached in the face of every human tragedy if we preach the reality of God with us.  But it doesn’t stop there.  The apostles held out the love of Christ as a comfort, encouragement and inspiration but also as a human aspiration.   As we reflect on the meaning of the Season it falls to every believer to reach out in compassion to those who feel consumed by the darkness of human experience.  Paul’s hymn of praise to the Son of God ‘who made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant’ and became ‘obedient to death - even death on a cross’  - begins with the challenge: ‘In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus.’  (Philippians 2: 5-11.). 

‘O holy Child of Bethlehem

 Descend to us we pray.  

 Cast out our sin and enter in,

 Be born in us today.

 We hear the Christmas angels

 The great glad tidings tell;

 O come to us, abide with us.

 Our Lord Immanuel.’ 

Still Quarrying: When Faith Wobbles.

Reading Christian biographies can sometimes be an intimidating experience.  The impression can be given that there is a group of people within he Church for whom spiritual weakness and moral failure are alien experiences.  Their depth of faith highlights our shallowness.  Their use of time exposes how much we waste.  Their patience, kindness, compassion and tolerance reveals how far we fall short.  There are exceptions to this.  There are Christian biographies  that are honest enough to show that in the life of their subject there were struggles, failure, perhaps even loss of faith but in the grace of God the burden was carried and the cause of the Kingdom progressed.  An example of this is Winn Collier’s biography of Eugene Petersen,  A Burning In My Bones.  But we don’t have to look too far in the Bible to see that even the best witnesses to the faith have their worst of times.  

The third Sunday in Advent is traditionally a time to focus on the life and ministry of John the Baptist.  His whole life was geared towards preparing Israel for the coming of the Messiah.  As he baptised Jesus he was given insight into His life and ministry.  (John 1: 32-34).  He proclaimed Jesus as the ‘lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.’  (John 1: 29).  He encouraged his own followers to become part of the community that was gathering around Jesus.  (John 3: 27-31).  And yet there was a moment when spiritually John the Baptist hit the wall.  

John was imprisoned for criticising King Herod and his departure from God’s ways. The future looked bad for him so it would not be going too far to say that a darkness may have decended on his soul.  In the loneliness of his cell with all the opportunity for reflection this afforded he began to have doubts.  Was this the way things were meant to be when the Messiah came?  The Messiah was supposed to bring in the Kingdom of God as the ancient prophets foretold.  It was difficult to see this in the low moral temperature of the nation and the way he was being treated for standing up for the values of the Kingdom.  The Kingdom seemed as far away as ever.  Was Jesus really the Messiah? John had to know so a group of his followers were sent to confront Jesus and to ask him: ‘Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?’  (Matthew 11: 3)

Jesus reply is reassuring to John but also challenging.  There may be moral darkness in the land.  Good people are being made to suffer for living according to God’s values but:

‘The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor.’   (Matthew 11: 4-5)

To paraphrase Karl Barth,  little lights are reflecting the Great Light.  There is evidence of the Kingdom in the ministry of Jesus.  The Kingdom is happening.  But Jesus doesn’t leave it there.  His final word to John is:

‘Blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of me.’  (Matthew 11: 6)

Jesus takes time to reassure John but makes it clear that the way forward for him is not doubt but faith.  This was always Jesus emphasis to those who would follow Him.  They are called to believe in Him.  Doubt may come but it is not an end in itself.  This is why Jesus does not give up on John as his faith shows the strain.  Indeed Jesus uses this moment to declare John the model citizen of the Kingdom to whose humility we are all called to aspire:

‘Truly I tell you, among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist; yet whoever is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.’  (Matthew 11: 11)

John’s story tells us that while faith has its wobbles that should never be the end.   Advent, if it has any meaning, is a time for self-reflection.  As Jesus once came to the earth as a baby so in God’s plan He will come again as the Lord of the Universe.  It will be a day of judgement when all will be called to account for their lives.  That inevitably drives us to consider the many ways that we have fallen short of the pattern of Jesus’ life.  But what the Gospels reveal is that more than anything else the life of the believer is shaped by how deeply he/she trusts in Him.  Is He who He claimed to be?  What is the effect on my life of His death on the cross?  Is His resurrection the guarantee that all those who sleep in death will also be raised?  Do we believe that despite the pains that wrack the Universe Jesus will come again to deliver a New Creation?

Let our prayer be that by the end of Advent 2022 there will be a people renewed in their faith, closer to Jesus, confident in His promises, clear with regard to our destiny in Him.

Still Quarrying: Sharing The Word.

People are called ‘prophets’  these days when they speak out about things they believe are wrong and need to be changed.  Stand-up comedians are sometimes draped with the mantel and so you will find people like Russell Brand appearing on ‘Question Time.’   In his latest book Keep Talking David Dimbleby, former chairman of QT,  avers that this in general is a good thing because it shows that significant opinion does not belong exclusively to an elite group of politicians, economists and pundits.   

Fair enough.  But this term ‘prophet’ as popularly  used is a bit different from the prophets we encounter in Scripture.  They were people who in times of crisis in the nation of Israel received a message from God which they in turn shared with the nation.  This was based on God’s blueprint for living as received in the Law supremely revealed in the Ten Commandments, the departure from which had caused crisis in the nation.   There can be no turning away from eternal values and expect no consequences.  The prophets received the Word of God in different circumstances but were confident enough of the message to introduce it with the words: ‘Thus says the Lord . . .’  What follows is not something dreamed up by the prophet or the offering of an opinion.  This was a message from God.

It is these people we remember in the second Sunday in Advent and the days following.  We began Advent remembering the community of Israel and their faithful waiting for the Messiah to be revealed.  Emerging from that community the prophets pointed forward to that day and the impact this would have on Israel and the world.  The apostles experienced signs of the Kingdom in the life, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus They preached  His promise of the fulfilment of His Kingdom when he came again, not this time as a baby in a small town in a small nation but as the Lord of the Universe.  

Advent is a reminder to us that what sets the Church apart is not philanthropy or political engagement but her message.  The Word faithfully preached has Jesus at the centre, the Way, the Truth and the Life, who was, and is, and is to come.