Are we nearly there yet? A sermon for Advent 3

Are you the one? John’s disciples asked it of Jesus, and we ask it of our day-to-day ‘heroes’ we hope will set us free — will this President fix the economy (and Covid-19)? Will this Lotto ticket win? But there is only One, and he promises that ‘whatever it is that holds life hostage is about to be defeated.’

Prepared for the Scottsville Methodist Fellowship, Pietermaritzburg, 13 December 2020 (Third Sunday in Advent)

For the prayer from the end of the message, see here

God hears and hearing God: A prayer for 21 June 2020

 

Let us pray

Lord our creator God,
You allow us to call you Father, our parent.
We also claim the title ourselves,
Yet we fall far short of the ideal and practice of parenthood.

Forgive us for our failures,
Forgive us fathers, especially, for the ways in which we have given fatherhood a bad name;
For our abuse of power and our fear of love;
For our criticism, our negativity, our controlling ways.
Forgive us when we have destroyed or contributed to the destruction of a family.

You are the God who hears,
and we live in a world desperate to be heard.
There are cries for lives and for livelihoods lost,
for the violence that has erupted in our homes and across the globe.
There are cries of pain and anguish and fear.

Our loving Father,
As you hear us, your people,
So, help us hear the cries of those around us.
Help us to be wells filled with your compassion, bringing grace and mercy and hope.

In the name of Jesus, who taught us to pray together:

Our Father, who art in heaven,
Hallowed be your name
Your kingdom come, your will be done
On earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
And forgive us our trespasses
As we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil
For yours is the kingdom, the power and the glory
For ever and ever.

Amen

This prayer follows the sermon for this Sunday, which can be found here

What’s Your Story: Forgiveness (A Sermon)

[A sermon for the 5th Sunday of Lent at Prestbury Methodist Church, 2 April 2017]

SCRIPTURE:    Zechariah 7:8–14; Matthew 9:9–13; Colossians 3:8–17

This is the fifth and last in the Heartlines’ series ‘What’s Your Story?’ which we have been following during Lent.

The first week was called ‘The Power of Storytelling’, and Collin introduced us to the Heartlines’ framework for sharing stories: Ask. Listen. Tell. Then he explained the Heartlines’ method for telling our story called ‘The River of Life’. I wonder if you have written your ‘river of life’ story, yet.

On the next three Sundays, we looked at Love and the new commandment of Jesus to love one another, Understanding and how understanding comes from experiencing the world as others experience it and Acceptance and Respect, where Delme reminded us that we were all outside of God’s family, until the love of Christ brought us near.

Today, the subject is Forgiveness.

There are two aspects of forgiveness we are going to look at today. The first is being forgiven and the second is forgiving others.

Being forgiven
I am not talking here about being forgiven by God.

We are forgiven. We know that.

The cross is God’s forgiveness splashed onto the big screen. God, in his loving kindness, taking all the sin in our lives that destroys relationships – our relationships with God, with each other and with ourselves – Jesus taking all of that and dealing with it through his own death. Jesus opening the door into the Kingdom of God for each one of us.

We are forgiven.

That famous verse in John 3:16: ‘For God loved the world (you and me) so much, that he gave his only son so that whoever believes in him shall not die but shall have eternal life.’
Paul says in Romans 6:23, ‘The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.’
And in chapter 5:8 ‘But God has shown us how much he loves us—it was while we were still sinners that Christ died for us! ‘
And in verse 10, ‘We were God’s enemies, but he made us his friends through the death of his Son.’

We are forgiven by God. That forgiveness is the foundation for everything else. We are forgiven, therefore we reach out to others.

So, today it’s not about being forgiven by God. What we are talking about is how we need to be forgiven by others, by those we have hurt and are still hurting. Now that’s much more difficult. It is difficult not just because of the humiliation of having to say you’re sorry and to ask for forgiveness. That is hard. But it is difficult because we don’t always recognise just how we have hurt others and do hurt them.

I’d like to focus on just one way we hurt others without thinking and, sometimes, without even knowing. I want us to think about our language – what we say and how we say it.

You know, the biggest problem with communication (and it doesn’t matter whether it’s a formal presentation or a quick word as we pass in the street), the biggest problem is in the ‘decoding’ process. When we have something to say and, whether it’s a presentation to the board or a word to the children, our brains work out what we want to say. We take our thoughts and translate them into words or pictures, which we then convey to the person. And we might do that through a PowerPoint presentation, a WhatsApp message or by talking to them.

Now comes the tricky part. The message has reached the other person or group. And that person has to understand it, has to decode it, interpret it and make sense of what you are saying. And it is tricky, because that person, or that group, uses their entire history to interpret your words. Everything they have ever heard, seen or experienced goes into the interpretation process – including your relationship with that person. Or rheir relationship with people they think are like you.

Let me be controversial for a moment to make it more real. There has been a lot of talk recently about the use of the word ‘monkey’ in talking about people. And I know that a lot of white people have grown up using ‘monkey’ as a term of endearment. ‘Hey, you little monkey.’ But it is a term that, in this country, comes with a whole lot of painful and hurtful baggage.

Now we can say, as I have heard a lot of people saying, ‘Oh, please. They are so oversensitive.’ But until we have experienced the pain of that word (or any other) being used against us to oppress and to hurt, we dare not call other people oversensitive. We have to hear their pain.

‘But, I didn’t mean anything by it,’ we often say. What we mean by something is not important. We are trying to get a message across that we want others to receive, understand and respond to. If they don’t get the right message, we have a problem. It’s like advertising. If people are getting the wrong message, you have to change your advert. It’s no good wringing your hands and telling everyone, ‘That’s not what I meant.’

Jen grew up with the term ‘silly sausage’ being just about the worst thing her father would say about (for example) a taxi driver who swerved in front of him. I grew up with ‘silly sausage’ being a term of endearment my mother would use. Can you imagine the first time I called my wife a silly sausage!

So, when we talk about being forgiven, it is not enough to confess to God and ask for his forgiveness. We, as Christians, need to be humble enough to recognise that we contribute to the pain that others experience. And while that includes people of different race or gender, of religion or culture, it also includes our children and parents, our spouses and our friends our domestic workers or work colleagues.

We need to find ways to listen more, to listen to the stories of others that will help us understand what our words and actions might mean to others.

Forgiveness is not just about being forgiven by God; it is about recognising that we need to be forgiven by others day by day and about seeking out their forgiveness.

Forgiving others
The second aspect of forgiveness I want us to consider today is forgiving others.

Of course, we know that we have to forgive others. We are reminded every time we pray the Lord’s Prayer: ‘Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.’

Jesus said, ‘If you do not forgive the sins of others, neither will you be forgiven.’ We can’t horde forgiveness. If we are not passing it on, we can’t receive it.

So, we know we have to forgive others. But how do we get that right?

One of the ways I have approached it is to remind myself by repeating that word throughout the day: ‘Forgive.’ A kind of mantra for every situation:

• When something goes wrong – forgive.
• The neighbour revs his motorbike – forgive!
• The kids are annoying – forgive!
• My wife is late – forgive!
• Yes, even when the taxi swerves in front of you – forgive.’

But as I thought about it this week, I realised that there is a comforting little message that is perhaps getting through to us. Well, to me, anyway. You are probably much more loving than I am. You see, if I’m really angry, and I say ‘Forgive!’ I am not letting go of my negative thoughts; I’m not changing my attitude towards the person.

What I am often saying is, ‘He’s an idiot, but I forgive him.’
‘She’s irresponsible, but I forgive her.’
‘They are disgraceful, but I forgive!’

You see what we are doing here. Well, not you, of course. It’s probably just me.

I am saying, ‘They are terrible, but I am a good Christian.’ The focus is on how bad others are and how good I am.

I mean, why do I have to forgive people? It’s because they are bad; they have done something wrong. So, when I focus on forgiving others, there is a danger that I may be encouraging myself to think how wonderful I am compared with them.

But Jen read an article to me last week (Witness, Sat, 25 March 2017) about three-year-old Prince George of Great Britain going to school. And what struck us is that the school’s website says that its most important rule is ‘be kind’.

Be kind.

Now, think about that for a moment. What if ‘be kind’ became our most important rule. What if, instead of talking about love, we started to act out our love by being kind. So, ‘be kind’ becomes our mantra, something we say to ourselves throughout the day. Think how that would begin to transform our relationships. And isn’t transforming relationships what our faith is all about?

Now don’t try to second guess this being kind. Don’t start saying to yourself, ‘Well, the kind thing to do here would be to discipline him, to make her face the consequences, to….’ Just be kind.

‘Well, if they are going to benefit from this kindness thing, then I need to explain to them….’ Just be kind; be kind.

Picture the scene. There I am behind some scary taxi driver or some idiot driving erratically – probably on their cell phone! – and I grip the wheel and say to myself, ‘Forgive! Forgive!!’

I haven’t learned anything; I haven’t changed anything.

But, what if I relax my grip a little and start saying, ‘Be kind; be kind.’ What if I look for ways to be kind. What if I start saying ‘be kind’ before I respond to my child, my parents, my spouse, the teller, my employees?

What will happen is that we will begin to let go of the failures of others and focus on what we can do to make a difference in the world, to listen to stories, to create relationships, to encourage rather than tear down.

Just for today, let go of the negative, and speak words of encouragement.

Be kind.

Prayer: click here

How do we live in such a world? A sermon

[A sermon for the 2nd Sunday after Epiphany at Prestbury Methodist Church, 25 January 2015]

SCRIPTURE:    1 Samuel 3:1–20; 1 Corinthians 6:12–20; John 1:43–51

How do we, as Christians, respond to the Paris massacre at Charlie Hebdo or the Boko Haram atrocities in Nigeria?

We may be protected somewhat from violent extremism, but even here we have xenophobia, racism, intolerance, poverty, corruption, you name it. We live in an angry, desperate and violent society. Look at our roads….

How do we live in such a world? Are we, in fact, any different from society around us?

Paul tells us we are the body of Christ. What does that mean? What difference does it make to our responses, to the way we live? If the community who follows Jesus provides an alternative to the ways of the world, how alternative are we? What do we do differently? Do we project something that is better and more desirable than the way people are living now?

I want to suggest three things that stood out for me in the three readings. Three ways in which we can be different.

1. LISTEN
First, from the book of Samuel, we learn to listen.

How often do you get into a conversation with someone where you sense that the person is really listening to you? Listening doesn’t come naturally to us. We are so busy, for one thing. But we also feel vulnerable, so we listen with half an ear while the rest of us is trying to think of a response that will keep us safe.

And we live in a society and in a world that is so divided along crisscrossing lines of race and gender, of religion and politics, of poverty and power. So we don’t listen to what people say anymore. We ask who is speaking, then we know if we need to listen or not.

Samuel had to learn to listen to a different voice, to the voice of God. And God had a tough message for Eli.

Eli’s sons
Eli’s sons had been abusing their position as sons of the trusted priest for years. God had been talking to Eli about it for years, too. But Eli wasn’t listening. Perhaps he thought it was just the exuberance of youth; they’d soon grow up and become responsible. Perhaps he thought it wasn’t really so bad – just a little bit here and there. After all, no one is perfect.

And perhaps it wasn’t God who had spoken to him, anyway. After all, God hadn’t done much speaking to people lately, and he hadn’t appeared in visions. Perhaps Eli had imagined it. But perhaps the visions were rare, not because God didn’t have something to say, but because people weren’t listening.

Sometimes we treat God like the politicians on the front page. We know what he wants to say, and it’s all bad news and condemnation. So we’d rather turn to the sports or the comics.

But God’s message to Eli wasn’t his message to Israel as a whole. Eli and his family were a blockage to the message of God for Israel. God couldn’t get through. So he said, either let me through or get out of my way and I will work with Samuel.

Samuel began to listen
What happened when Samuel began to listen?

‘As Samuel grew up, the LORD was with him and made come true everything that Samuel said.’ (verse 19)

Samuel’s life, his words and actions, began to reflect God’s activity in the life of Israel.

‘So all the people of Israel, from one end of the country to the other, knew that Samuel was indeed a prophet of the LORD.’ (verse 20)

God was speaking to them again.

The gift we can give to our broken and divided world, to our broken and struggling families, to our fear filled and divided communities: we can offer an ear that is tuned to the heart of God. An ear that can hear God saying, I love this world so much; I love this community so much; I love this family so much; I love you so much.

Like Samuel, we can learn to listen to God, who has so much to say to us that we so desperately need to hear.

2. REFLECTION
The second gift we can give the world is reflection. We can reflect before we act.

Not everything is good for you
In 1 Cor 6 we read about those who say, ‘I can do anything I like.’
‘Yes,’ Paul says. ‘Of course you can. In Christ we are free. There are no rules, no laws. You can do anything you like. BUT … not everything is good for you.’

‘You can eat anything you like, too. But some things will make you very uncomfortable; some things will even kill you.’
You can do anything you like, but not everything is good for you; not everything is good for your family, not everything is good for your neighbour.

‘Yes,’ we can say to the cartoonists. ‘You can draw what you like.’ And to the journalist, ‘Yes, you can write what you like.’ BUT, not everything is good for you. Not everything is good for your neighbour. Not everything is good for the world.

Do we want to live in a world where everyone does whatever they like and says what they like, just because they can? And if everyone else is speeding on the road, then I will, too; and if everyone else is cutting in front of everyone else, then I will, too – why should I be left behind; I also have an important meeting.

Or we can learn to reflect before we act and before we speak. We can ask the question, ‘What would love look like here, in this relationship, in this conversation, in this activity, in this community?

Slavery
We can do anything, but Paul said: ‘I’m not going to do anything that will make me its slave.’

And believe me, we don’t just become slaves to alcohol and drugs and gambling. Perhaps more insidious is that we become slaves to irritation; we become slaves to negativity. We become slaves to fear, so that we never reflect and speak the truth to our partners, our families, our communities. We fail to take action because we are afraid of what might happen.

But we don’t escape such slavery without reflection. Without learning to create a gap between actions and our reactions:
Someone does something – we get irritated.
Someone says something – we get angry.
Something happens – we are afraid.

Viktor Frankl
Viktor Frankl says we need to get into that gap. When something happens, we need to stop and reflect before we respond. And as we learn to do that, the gap gets wider and we empower ourselves to make new decisions, to take new actions that can transform our lives and the lives of those we interact with.

I can do anything I like. Yes. But what would love look like right now?

I have a sign in my office: ‘How can I make it easy for you to do great work?’
And what if, before we react to people around us, we were to ask ourselves: ‘How can I make you feel good about yourself?’
Imagine how different our interactions with spouse, children, employees might be.

It’s so easy to criticise, to be negative, to be irritable, to put people down. And we become slaves to those reactions. But what if I were to stop and ask how can I make you feel good about yourself?

Wouldn’t that transform our relationships?
Wouldn’t that transform our families?
Wouldn’t that transform our communities and places of work?

What can we do that is different?
We can listen to the heart of God who loves this world he has created so much.
We can learn to reflect; to consider how love would act, what love would say in each situation and every conversation.

3. BRING PEOPLE TO JESUS
The third thing we can do is found in Phillip’s action in John 1. We can bring people to Jesus.

Phillip said to Nathanael, ‘We have found the one whom Moses wrote about…. He is Jesus … from Nazareth.’

When people ask, ‘What’s happened to you? You used to be so irritable; you used to be so angry; you used to be so fearful,’ we can tell them, ‘We have found the one who makes all the difference. It is Jesus.’

If there is anything good in me – and there is a whole lot of bad stuff that still needs to be fixed; the work has only just begun. But if there is anything good in here, you are looking at Jesus. It isn’t me. It’s what Jesus is doing. If you like it, he can do the same for you

How do we make a difference in this world? How do we live differently?

We can listen. We listen to the one who has a message of love and of healing and of hope.
We can reflect. We can ask how would love respond? How can I make it easy for you to do great work? How can I make you feel good about yourself?
And we can point people to Jesus.

 

The spirit of Easter: A sermon for Easter 2

Easter 2 – Freedom Day

SCRIPTURE:    Acts 2:14a, 22–32; Psalm 16; 1 Peter 1:3–9; John 20:19–31

The Lord is risen! He is risen indeed.

Today is the second Sunday of Easter; the day Jesus appeared again to his disciples in the upper room, and in particular, to Thomas.

Today is, of course, also Freedom Day (South Africa’s 20th ‘birthday’). I think that South Africans in 1994 had a lot in common with those who were around Jesus.

Change
The difficulty that the Jews had with Jesus – whether they were part of the establishment, or Zealots working against the status quo or the disciples themselves – the problem they had didn’t lie with Jesus, but with what they expected from their Messiah: what he should look like, how they expected him act, what he would teach.

That the Messiah would change the status quo was pretty much a given, whatever party you belonged to. But to what extent, and how ruthlessly was up for grabs. Much the same as South Africa in the early 90s. Apartheid had to go. That was a given for everyone, except for a few diehard denialists. But how it was to go and what would take its place was very much under discussion (to put it politely).

Elijah and the widow of Zarephath: A Sermon

English: Elijah Resuscitating the Son of the Widow of Zarephath (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Last week Debs reminded us that God loves us.

Which is really is all we as preachers have to say. God loves you. That’s it. But what does it mean? God’s unconditional love for us means two things. Debs spoke about the one last week, and I want to speak about the other tonight.

God loves our neighbour
Debs said there is nothing you can do to stop God loving you. Nothing. Now, if that is true it means that there is also nothing your neighbour and my neighbour can do to stop God loving them; there is nothing your child can do to stop God loving him or her. There is nothing your irritating brother, your aggressive boss, your worst enemy can do to stop God loving them, nothing. There’s nothing your spouse or even your ex-spouse can do, nothing even the bullies in your child’s class can do, or your son-in-law or daughter-in-law can do.

Not even the stuff we hate about them; not even the really sinful stuff, nothing. God still loves them.

And then he says to you and to me, “Go and do likewise.” “Love your neighbour,” he says. “Love one another as I have loved you.”

Love, rather than belief
The fact that our faith is about love, rather than belief, means that Christianity is primarily about relationships rather than practices. Christianity has failed in the world, more often than not, when we have tried to change people’s beliefs and practices before introducing them to the startling, life-changing truth of a God who loves them.

Relationships are messy
And relationships are messy. God knows that. He has chosen to work with the mess of our relationships rather than wave a magic wand. Most of the time things don’t get sorted out instantly. There are difficult people in our lives and broken relationships where you and I may not be able (for now) to bring God’s love. We may be too hurt, too broken, too badly damaged to help these folk, who are perhaps closest to us, to help them recognise God’s love.

Don’t beat yourself
Please, don’t believe those who tell you that you are the only one who can bring your husband, your child, your parents or your boss to Christ; that it’s your job, and if you don’t do it, God will hold you accountable.

That’s not how God works. As Jesus himself said in Luke 4, there were countless widows in Israel at the time of Elijah, but he wasn’t called to minister to any of them. God sent Elijah way off, down to the coast to Sidon, to a widow in the town of Zarephath.

Don’t beat yourself because of the people you find it difficult to love, impossible to transform. Celebrate and enjoy and let the Spirit of God flow through you to those God has enabled you to love. Because you have a fantastic story to tell, a wonderful journey to share, however difficult it’s been: the story of one who loves you and who has shared your journey through joys and sorrows, through days filled with chocolate and sunshine, as well as those filled with rain and Brussels sprouts.

Elijah and the widow
Our readings explain something of how God works.

Elijah was sent by God, in the middle of a severe three-year famine, to Sidon, on the coast, to a widow in the town of Zarephath. God had something to teach the widow, and something to teach Elijah. It was the widow’s turn first.

“I have commanded a widow”
When God sent Elijah to Zarephath, God told him, “I have commanded a widow who lives there to feed you.” But we hear nothing about that command. The widow doesn’t refer to it. She doesn’t say to Elijah, “About time. God said you were coming. I’ve been waiting.”

What happened? I suspect that she had been praying for a while about her desperate shortage of food, and the only verses that kept popping into her head were ones like, “Feed the hungry,” and, “Love your neighbour.” And she thought to herself. “Yeah, right. I can’t even feed my son and myself. I’m afraid my neighbour and your prophet and all the others, are going to have to look after themselves.”

Elijah arrived
Then Elijah arrived asking for bread. And it’s Elijah! It’s not a local prophet; not one of the missionaries her church has been praying for. It’s a prophet from Israel, of all places—way inland. And what’s he doing here in the middle of a drought, coming to eat our food and take our jobs—blooming foreigner.

So the widow says to Elijah, “Sorry mate. You came too late. I’ve got no bread left, only enough ingredients to make a last loaf for my son and me, then we die.”

“Oh, no,” says Elijah.  “Let me phone the care team. We can set up a roster and bring you meals.” No?

Perhaps he said, “Oh, I’m so sorry. Please, let me pray for you.” No?

Well, I don’t think any of us would have dared say what Elijah actually said. I think most of us would have said to ourselves, “Oops, must be the wrong widow,” and gone looking for another one with some food to spare.

Elijah’s outrageous request
What Elijah said was outrageous, unreasonable, absurd even.

“No, problem,” He said. “Go ahead, make your last meal. But just make a small loaf for me first; then go ahead and make a meal from what’s left for you and your son.”

Hello? Elijah? I don’t think you quite grasp the situation here. Maybe it’s a gender thing. I mean, what part of “our last meal before we starve to death,” don’t you understand?

But Elijah carried on. He said, “The LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘The bowl will not run out of flour or the jar run out of oil before the day that I, the LORD, send rain.’ ”

The widow could easily have said, “It’s all very well for the God of Israel to say that, but we’re not in Israel. This is Sidon.” But she didn’t. She went and did the preposterous thing Elijah told her to do. And the miracle happened. Neither the flour nor the jar of oil ran out.

A fabulous gift, or a difficult lesson?
Fantastic. Amazing. Flour and oil to see them through to the end of the drought. What a fabulous gift.

Well… I don’t know. Perhaps not so much.

You see, she didn’t get a dozen bags of flour and litres of olive oil. She didn’t get the cell-phone number of the warehouse so she could SMS when supplies got low. Just a promise.

You realise what that meant? It meant that from that day on, until the end of the drought, every meal she prepared was her last. Every day, she would look into the almost empty bowl and the nearly empty jar, and ask whether God would be faithful to her one more day. And every day she would take the little that was left, make some food for her foreign guest (and who knows who else she learned to feed), and then prepare a last meal for her son and herself with what was left.

A daily discovery of God
The widow learned to serve, and she learned to pray. She began a daily discovery of a God who provides; a daily relationship with him. And that’s what God is all about: our relationship with him. No magic; not belief systems, but love; not proper practices, but relationships. Messy, slow, difficult, caring, beautiful relationships. And that’s something to get excited about.

Now it’s Elijah’s turn
But God wasn’t finished with them yet. And now it’s Elijah’s turn.

A little later, we are told, the widow’s son died. She was distraught. “Why did you come here and take my son’s life?” she said to Elijah. “We could have died together when we had no food. Now, I’m alive and he’s gone.”
Or, as The Message puts it, “Why did you ever show up here in the first place — a holy man barging in, exposing my sins, and killing my son?”

Well, that wasn’t part of the script for Elijah. This wasn’t a “Go to a widow in Zarephath. I’ve instructed her to feed you.” What is God doing? He provides food, but takes a life?

Elijah’s prayer
There is nothing Elijah can do except pray. So Elijah prays. And how he prays. You and I are not likely to pray this type of prayer too often.
“O LORD my God, why have you done such a terrible thing to this widow? She has been kind enough to take care of me, and now you kill her son!” Then Elijah stretched himself out on the boy three times and prayed, “O LORD my God, restore this child to life!”

Did God kill the widow’s son as Elijah suggests? I don’t know, but I’m pretty sure he didn’t. You see it’s not Elijah’s words that matter, or even his understanding. It’s his passion that God cares about; and his fundamental belief in God’s love and in God’s work of restoring relationships.

Restoring relationships
This is not about bringing people back to life; this is not about extending life here on earth. It’s about restoring relationships.

Elijah said to God, “why have you done such a terrible thing to this widow?” Not “to the son”, but to the widow, to the mother.

When Jesus saw the grieving widow of Nain we read that “his heart was filled with pity for her.” And he restored the son to his mother. He restored the relationship that was broken, that had broken her heart.

Something to get excited about
Friends, God loves your neighbour and mine. Sinful, unhappy, lost, lonely, desperate; trying all sorts of different ways to survive, to find happiness. God loves them all. And of all the desperate and stupid things they are doing, nothing will stop God loving them.

Can you wonder that the crowd was excited by what Jesus did, that the widow was excited by what Elijah did? Isn’t God’s way of restoring relationships something to get excited about?

Instead of trying to fix people, and telling them how to live, couldn’t we just stop for a moment and celebrate the fact that God loves them, right now, messy and messed up as they may be?

A God who brings even the worst of us into relationship with himself; a God who breaks down barriers and restores our relationships with each other. Let’s get excited about that. Who knows what God will do  next.

Something to shout about
In a country like ours, where life is so cheap, where violence is the norm for resolving disputes, where anger is the first resort even for us, whether on the telephone, in our cars or in the bank queue; isn’t God’s way of love and of building relationships something we and our country need to hear about.

So where are you, where am I going to start? Where is God sending us? Is there a widow, and orphan, a broken relationship, a broken life; an unforgiven sin, an unloved sinner? Let’s learn to pray with Elijah’s passion, “Lord, our God, restore this person to life!”

A sermon preached at Prestbury Methodist Church on Sunday, 9 June 2013, followed by the prayer Elijah and the widow of Zarephath: A Prayer

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