Second Sunday after Pentecost- 14th JUNE 2020

Genesis 18: 1–15 

The Lord appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the entrance of his tent in the heat of the day. He looked up and saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent entrance to meet them, and bowed down to the ground. He said, ‘My lord, if I find favour with you, do not pass by your servant. Let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree. Let me bring a little bread, that you may refresh yourselves, and after that you may pass on—since you have come to your servant.’ So they said, ‘Do as you have said.’ And Abraham hastened into the tent to Sarah, and said, ‘Make ready quickly three measures of choice flour, knead it, and make cakes.’ Abraham ran to the herd, and took a calf, tender and good, and gave it to the servant, who hastened to prepare it. Then he took curds and milk and the calf that he had prepared, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree while they ate. They said to him, ‘Where is your wife Sarah?’ And he said, ‘There, in the tent.’ Then one said, ‘I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son.’ And Sarah was listening at the tent entrance behind him. Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in age; it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women. So Sarah laughed to herself, saying, ‘After I have grown old, and my husband is old, shall I have pleasure?’ The Lord said to Abraham, ‘Why did Sarah laugh, and say, “Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?” Is anything too wonderful for the Lord ? At the set time I will return to you, in due season, and Sarah shall have a son.’ But Sarah denied, saying, ‘I did not laugh’; for she was afraid. He said, ‘Oh yes, you did laugh.’

Romans 5: 1–11    

Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God.  And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us. Much more surely then, now that we have been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from the wrath of God.  For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life. But more than that, we even boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

Matthew 9.35–10.8 

Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and curing every disease and every sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.  Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the labourers are few;  therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into his harvest.’ Then Jesus summoned his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness. These are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon, also known as Peter, and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax-collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon the Cananaean, and Judas Iscariot, the one who betrayed him. These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: ‘Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, proclaim the good news, “The kingdom of heaven has come near.” Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment.

Reflection: 

One of the limitations of being human is that we often have a finite way of understanding and viewing things around us or the possibilities of happenings. It’s easy to believe in the probability of something if we can see how or where or why this should be. However, when we are faced with uncertainty and what seems like an impossibility before us, it is easy to concede to defeat before we even begin. 

Our Old Testament scripture today is one that always leaves me a little amazed. “Abraham and Sarah were old, well advanced in age. Sarah had passed the age of childbearing” And then there appear before them three strangers who Abraham welcomes and extends generous hospitality toward. These travellers not only know Sarah’s name but know her circumstance of being childless. Despite Sarah’s laugh and seeming logical rationale that by this stage of Abraham and her life, to bear a child was an impossibility, the strangers remind them that there is nothing too difficult for God.

The limits of being human compared to the limitless amazingness of God are incomparable, and sometimes I suggest that we need to be reminded of this fact. The condition of limitation is common to human kind and is not a weakness but more likely a reality of who we are in comparison to God. God has a plan for us that is beyond all human imaginings and he will see us through to the end.

Perhaps this prayer by Thomas Merton encapsulates some of our concerns:

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please You does in fact please You.
And I hope that I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this,
You will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. 

Therefore, I will trust You always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and You will never leave me to face my perils alone. Amen. ….

Now sometimes, I feel a little like Sarah who faced a seemingly impossible hope, a dream before her that she longed for but really didn’t believe would ever come to fruition, I feel like her when it comes to the harvest and the church of God. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we had no obstacles to the kingdom of God being glorified and magnified and thriving through our churches and in our communities? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the work of the church was easy and people responded in hundreds!

I may have only been Priest on the Bellinger for a few months now, 4 months to be precise, but I have been aware of the plight of the Bellinger church as most other churches for years. How do we inspire people to hear the call and accept the invitation to turn to Christ and find healing and wholeness? 

Bishop Murray in his clergy update this month wrote that as he reflects on the theme of Pentecost and how the Holy Spirit works in the church and beyond the church, he wonders how the Spirit is prompting us and moving us during COVID-19? Two weeks ago, we celebrated Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit. Last week was Trinity Sunday and I reflected that the challenge for us as the church, that is as the people of God- not just of the Bellinger Parish or the Grafton Diocese, but for us as the church of God- is unity in diversity. We are community and we are called to make disciples of all nations. And yes, it’s hard to welcome everybody. It’s hard to share the gospel and share our faith. It’s hard to see someone who has flittered their life away or who has different ideas to us get the same reward as we do…

It is becoming more and more evident that there is a great need for God for those who do not know him. It seems to me many have turned from him for whatever reason. Every day, I meet people who tell me they were brought up in the church and yet for numerous reasons they no longer attend or feel a need for it in their lives. The harvest is not just about people who don’t know anything of God. The harvest includes this multitude who have been hurt by the church or because of the pressures of life have no longer time for church, or see the church as hypocritical or …. The reasons are limitless and in many ways the church has a lot to answer for.

BUT, the opportunities are also limitless- Matthews gospel says ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the labourers are few; therefore, ask the Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into his harvest.’ Then Jesus summoned his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness. Likewise, God has given us authority- so the question is, will we accept his call. Or will we like Sarah, laugh and say oh the time is too difficult, too hard, what can we do, we’ve tried this before and we’ve done that….

The limitations of being human compared to the boundless supremacy of God are unparalleled. As we face the ‘what if’s’ in life the scriptures today remind us that with God nothing is impossible. 

Last week I said that the gift of God that we hold and have is something to be shared, not kept just for ourselves. We are called, as the people of the church of God, to work for the kingdom. 

Presently, we are beginning the process of reopening the churches in our parish, this may take a few weeks yet. It will require helpers, people to participate in ensuring we can, to the best of our ability, provide a Covid safe place to worship and gather. We are all in this together. As we prepare to begin worshiping and functioning again as the Bellinger, there are many things to consider, not just the physical aspects of how we re activate our church community? We also can consider which things we want to pick up and do again and what can we might tweek or even leave aside- for now at least? 

The work of the church is more vital than ever. The harvest is enormous, waiting for the picking and yet often it may seem that we can each do so little. Mother Theresa wrote: We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop.

If we all do what we can: pray, care, forgive, love, show kindness, share a word, invite others to join, reach out to those in need etc. how much greater will the work of the Kingdom be!

I heard a story of a damaged statue of Jesus in London. The city had been devastated by the bombings during World War II. The bombs destroyed buildings in the city of every kind.

Soon after World War II, a group of German students, through kindness and love volunteered to go to London to help rebuild an English cathedral that had been severely damaged.

As work progressed, they became greatly concerned about a large statue of Jesus Christ, whose arms were outstretched and beneath which was the written inscription from Matthew 11:28: “Come to me, all you who labour and are heavily burdened, and I will give you rest.”

The student volunteer workers had great difficulty trying to restore the hands, which had been completely destroyed. As much as they worked and tried, nothing seemed to successfully replace Jesus’ outstretched hands.

Finally, after much work and much discussion, they decided to let the hands of Jesus remain missing and they changed the written inscription to read this way: “Christ has no hands but ours.”

Jesus is still calling disciples today and commissioning them into service in the gospel ministry. Every Christian is called. Certainly, it is the church’s job to prepare men and women for discipleship and we look for ways to be a disciple-making church. Creating disciples means opening Christians up to the possibility that the Spirit of Christ can work through them with transforming power. Power to change lives.

It is easy to be like Sarah and say ‘How can this be?’. But be mindful that we are the body of Christ and His Spirit is with us. We are called, we are chosen, we are empowered and we are people who are to walk in faith. May we proclaim the good news in all we are, all we say and all we do.  Amen.