Bitesize Catechesis - Almsgiving

‘Bitesize Catechesis’

Almsgiving. It’s not a word that we use a lot. Although we use it here in Croydon when we talk about Almshouses.

Of course, we’re talking about ‘alms’ with an ‘l’ not with an ‘r’.

Almsgiving, the giving of alms, is about gifts to those less fortunate than ourselves. We are giving alms, with an ‘l’ when we give to those in need.

Almsgiving is all about receiving with gratitude and giving with grace. It’s a two-way process, as Ecclesiasticus notes:

‘Do not let your hand be stretched out when it is time to receive and closed when it is time to give’ (Sirach 4.31)

And almsgiving has long been associated with the season of Lent. St Leo the Great (400-461) was making this connection in the fifth century, when he wrote, ‘to this sensible and holy fast we should link almsgiving which under the one name of covers a multitude of praiseworthy deeds of charity’.

And the book of Tobit gives us another thought for Lent, ‘Prayer with fasting is good, but better than both is almsgiving with righteousness. A little with righteousness is better than wealth with wrongdoing. It is better to give alms than to lay up gold’. (Tobit 12.8)

That places almsgiving firmly in the practices of Lent, although we can do it anytime too, but let’s now think what it is, why we do it and how we do it.

What is almsgiving?

It is, at it’s most basic, a gift we make out of love.

This is charitable giving, motivated out of love and prayer.

It’s not about duty; but about joy and generosity and love.

Almsgiving is traditionally combined with fasting because, when we do, we both give something up and we take something on.

So someone fasting should also be generous in giving to those who do not choose to go hungry.

Almsgiving is also part of our wider giving. So Christians would normally give in a twofold way: for the mission and worship of the church and for those in need.

And both are offered ultimately to God.

Why do we give alms?

The most basic reason is that it is something that will make a difference to another person, it will improve their life, it is, in a beautiful, older expression, a corporal act of mercy.

That goes deeper too. It is the lesson of the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats (Matthew 25.31-end), summed up in the pithy phrase of St Rose of Lima (1586-1617) who said:

When we serve the poor and the sick, we serve Jesus. We must not fail to help our neighbours, because in them we serve Jesus.

This connects the act of giving alms with the motivation for giving alms.

That’s why we do it: out of care for those in need and love for Jesus.

How do we give alms?

There are many and various ways to give alms today.

Churches used to have an ‘alms dish’ but now we can have a Direct Debit, a Standing Order, Chip and Pin, Contactless, Just Giving or putting a coin in a collection box.

It is wonderful that the how of giving alms has never been easier.

The question of how we give alms also comes into the discussion about tithing, which is the Biblical imperative of giving away a tenth of your income.

The Church of England, which is tremendously bashful about money (unless saying it hasn’t got enough), commends giving away 10% of income which 5% might be directly to the church, and 5% to charity, in other words almsgiving. Either way, St Paul gives some helpful advice:

Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. (2 Corinthians 9.7)

How we give is down to us: but, however we do it, we should give with a cheerful heart.

To all those who practise righteousness give alms from your possessions, and do not let your eye begrudge the gift when you make it. Do not turn your face away from anyone who is poor, and the face of God will not be turned away from you. If you have many possessions, make your gift from them in proportion; if few, do not be afraid to give according to the little you have. (Tobit 4.6b-8)

Where do we give alms?

I’ve mentioned the what, why and how of alms, but another bit of the how is, where? Who do I give alms to?

I would suggest that we give alms, charitable gifts offered in love, to those bodies who seek to care for our common home in this world and the people who live in it.

I would say we should look to give alms to charities like Christian Aid, that seeks to care for the environment and the material welfare of the poorest in our world.

There will be other charities you know, for example Christians Against Poverty, our Floating Shelter, or others working at home and abroad for those in need.

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So that’s a bit on the what, why, how and when and it moves us on to some important principles about almsgiving.

We can do that by considering ‘almsgiving and secrecy’, almsgiving is not about the amount’ and ‘almsgiving and abundance’.

Almsgiving and secrecy

We’ve seen that the scriptures and church tradition believe almsgiving is a jolly good thing! Ecclesiasticus writes of it:

One’s almsgiving is like a signet ring with the Lord,

and he will keep a person’s kindness like the apple of his eye. (Sirach 17.22)

In other words, it is one’s marker or identifier, just like a signet ring. And, what better than to be identifiable as an almsgiver?

There’s a ‘but’ hovering here – but the marker is with God, not with other people, and, in a way, not even yourself, as Jesus says in St Matthew’s Gospel:

So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.’ (Matthew 6.2-4)

Visible, showy and slef-satisfied giving is contrary to the spirit of Jesus.

Almsgiving is not about the amount

It's not about the amount you give; it is the action of giving that counts.

Jesus looked up and saw rich people putting their gifts into the treasury; he also saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. He said, ‘Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them; for all of them have contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in all she had to live on.’ Luke 21.1-4.

Almsgiving reflects a movement of our heart first and then the hand to the pocket, irrespective of the amount that comes out!

Almsgiving and receiving

The very act of giving is good in itself.

And as we find with love, the more we give the more we receive. As the prayer attributed to St Francis says, ‘it is in giving that we receive’.

We don’t need to be loaded to give. Remember that definition of almsgiving, a gift we make out of love. If that’s true then when we give out of love, we receive in love.

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I hope you feel you moved to ponder your own almsgiving, and parents why not encourage your children this Lent to consider what they could give too and together you might think about where you might give.

And finally here are some quite dramatic, but heartening, words from the book of Tobit again:

For almsgiving delivers from death and keeps you from going into the Darkness. Indeed, almsgiving, for all who practise it, is an excellent offering in the presence of the Most High. (Tobit 4.10, 11)

On that note, I’ll stop.

Bitesize Catechesis - Fasting and Abstinence

‘Bitesize Catechesis’

I wonder what the words fasting and abstinence mean to you.

Perhaps what Muslims do in Ramadan springs to mind; and how impressive that is amongst the devout, fasting between sunrise and sunset and breaking the fast with prayer and communal celebration.

It seems that Christians have long drifted from the ascetic sense of what fasting and abstinence are.

Although that’s not true for all Christians, certainly outside Western Europe.

I was once very chastened when a student at the University of Surrey, a Jordanian Christian, asked when English Christians begin fasting before Christmas. That prompted a fair bit mirth. After all, the Advent fast is less about preparation for a great feast, and more about mince pies, mulled wine, parties and over-indulgence. The secularised Christmas fast is ‘Dry January’ and ‘Veganuary’.

What she described was the Little Fast - in Advent and before Lent, the Sundays known as Septuagesima, Quinquagesima and Quadragesima -of abstaining from meat, and then the Great Fast – Lent - which is a meat free, dairy free diet.

That sounds very remote, but there are remnants of it still. After all, we say pancakes are eaten the day before Lent because they use up all the ingredients that are going to be given up; except the next day we carry on as normal.

Interestingly for Anglican Christians the same rigour is picked up in the Book of Common Prayer 1662 that speaks of days of fasting and abstinence.

And boy, is it rigorous.

I have done a rough tally that there are 122 fast days which include the eve of feast days, the 40 days of Lent, Ember days and every Friday of the year, unless it’s Christmas Day.

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That says something about practices of fasting. But let’s just get our terms clear first.

Fasting and abstinence. But which one’s which?!

Both refer to renunciation, the act of giving something up. Fasting applies to the amount we eat; abstinence to what we eat.

In other words, fasting is going easy on something; abstaining is giving up it up all together.

So when I fast I reduce the intake of all foodstuffs; but when I abstain I remove a particular foodstuff from my diet.

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So we’ve thought about fasting practices, what they are and how people might do them. But why do Christians fast?

We fast because Jesus teaches about it.

When Jesus teaches about it he’s absolutely clear about three key points:

1.      We only fast in his absence, as part of our expectation for his coming and return; (Matthew 9.14, 15; Luke 2.37);

2.      Fasting is not an excuse for showing off, a ‘look how marvellous I am’ approach; it’s about our interior journey with God; (Matthew 6.16, 17);

3.      Fasting doesn’t earn you any heavenly brownie points unless accompanied by penitence and sorrow for sin; (Luke 18.12).

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So where does this leave us? Is it all too overwhelming? How might fasting connect with us and we with it?

One response is for people to say that they are not going to give up something for Lent but instead take something up, a good work, for example.

Perhaps fasting sounds too old-fashioned or traditional or demanding. Fasting and abstinence can sound uncomfortable in relation to eating disorders, body image issues or controlling habits. Certainly health should be taken into account around fasting practices, especially if you’re taking medication.

Taking something up sounds much more active; you’re doing something. The danger is that we take refuge in doing rather than being.

Fasting is a way of doing something without activism. In other words what we do is give up control by relinquishing a particular pleasure so that we come to appreciate what we have.

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I hope that fasting becomes less of a remote practice, because in that way we become a less controlling, less self-indulgent church and a church that turns a way from self-preoccupation and focuses on Christ.

And we can be creative. I know one 17 year old who has given up Instagram for Lent, and believe me that’s a life-changer for him! Another, 15 year old, is omitting lunch on Fridays; he’s doing that prompted by the impressive example of his Muslim friends, and he wants to reconnect with his own faith and its tradition.

So what might all this mean for you?

That’s for you to ponder. And as you do here are three final positives to consider:

1.      Fasting and prayer. Prayer is what gives ballast to fasting and abstinence; they’re empty practices unless accompanied by prayer: Jesus is abundantly clear about that. Fasting clarifies prayer, intensifies prayer and turns prayer away from ourselves and back to the heart of God. One practical way to combine fasting and prayer is to skip a meal and use that time to pray; fasting without prayer is a diet!

2.      Fasting and the body. The great thing about fasting is that it connects our bodies and spirit. When people talk about ‘spirituality’ it can be very removed from the body. And Christianity is nothing if it is not about body and spirit together. Our spirituality always has to be embodied in physical practice – fasting is a great example of that;

3.      Fasting and consumption.  Fasting gives a deep perspective on our relationship with food. Fasting is a great antidote to food waste and it gives us solidarity with the hungry because giving something up makes us appreciate it all the more. The fast God desires, says the prophet Isaiah is all about justice, freeing people and lifting the yoke from the poor; (Isaiah 58). One way to live this out is to give away the amount we would have spent on the meal we’ve omitted to give; that’s what our Lent lunch on 29^th March is about, as we give to the Bishop’s Lent Call for Zimbabwe.

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Fasting and abstinence: what it is, why we do it and how we do it. Happy Lent!

Lent: Into the wilderness

A sermon preached at Croydon Minster on the First Sunday of Lent, the reading were Genesis 2.15-17; 3.1-7; Romans 5.12-19; Matthew 4.1-11.

“One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God’

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Lent has begun!

And we are taken in our gospel reading, for this first Sunday of Lent, to the Judean Wilderness, where ‘the Spirit led Jesus to be tempted by the devil’.

From the dust and ashes of Ash Wednesday, the solemn marking of the sign of the cross in ash upon our heads, we are taken into the dust, sand and grit of the Judean Wilderness.

In the Bible the wilderness is physically a barren place, but spiritually a fertile place.

The prophet Isaiah says ‘the wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus’ (Isaiah 35.1):

Things can happen in the wilderness that can’t happen elsewhere, or at least, the contrast is seen more clearly.

The twinkle and beauty of a star is far more powerful in the darkness, than when a star shines in the daytime. We miss it!

So it is with the wilderness: where all is stripped away, so that nothing can impede one’s immediate experience of the deeper realities of life, exposed in all their starkness: what we truly depend on is revealed to us.

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For Jesus the forty days and forty nights in the wilderness culminate in the three temptations placed in front of him.

Temptations placed in front of him when he is at his lowest ebb: famished through fasting; windswept; sunburnt in the day; frozen at night; utterly exhausted.

The wilderness bespeaks the extremes of physical and spiritual experience. Indeed, the physical and spiritual are inseparable.

There’s no hiding place in the wilderness. And as we heard about Adam and Eve, the human propensity is to cover up, hide, ‘dissemble and cloak’, as the Book of Common Prayer puts it.

Jesus did not hide from the devil. He faced the devil and endured the temptations of being fed when famished, the temptation of being given security and safety in a hostile environment, the temptation of the allure of power: all which would be received if he would only turn away from God.

He was tempted as we are. But the depth of his relationship was God was such that he did not succumb.

A definition of sin is the fracturing of our relationship with God: in that Christ did not sin.

We will be tempted; temptation never goes away.

What Lent is about is schooling us in being able to name and to face down what fractures our relationship with God and begin to find ways to repair it.

In the temptations in the wilderness Christ reveals his fidelity to God and opens to us the possibility of living life without masks, life without being trapped in the power games and manipulations of so many human relationships.

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I have been to the Judean Wilderness, albeit, like many pilgrims in the Holy Land, I did as a passenger on an air-conditioned coach. For the modern-day pilgrim to the Holy Land the physicality of the wilderness is a very different experience from the experience of the People of Israel and indeed for Jesus.

One evening, on my most recent pilgrimage there, we were travelling from Jericho to Jerusalem. The lights of the Holy City were far away, but visible, and the coach pulled over at the side of the road so that we could see a Greek Orthodox Monastery that is built into a rock face above a dried-up wadi, a little stream. Just like the first monastics, known to us as the Desert Fathers, people like St Anthony of Egypt, those monks live out the wilderness experience of prayer and fasting.

But we needed to be in Jerusalem for Mass at a church there, and we were running late.

We stepped down from the coach and my mind was taken to the Temptations in the Wilderness and also to the book of Exodus which describes the movement of the People of Israel through the Wilderness of Sinai after their liberation from Egypt.

Their experience in the wilderness is a microcosm of our human condition with its ups and downs; our experience of closeness to God at times and distance at others.

The Israelites wandered in that wilderness for forty years. A migrant people: they marvelled at what God had done for them; and wrestled with what they were doing stuck wandering in the middle of nowhere. They drank from miraculous streams of water flowing in the desert; yet they grumbled about the lack of food, saying, ‘shall God prepare a table in the wilderness?’ (Psalm 78.20).

Speaking with our local guide we decided that rather than hurry to Jerusalem and perhaps be late to the service, we would celebrate the Eucharist there, by the roadside, in the wilderness.

It is perhaps one of the most beautiful masses at which I have ever presided. I had with me all we needed: bread, wine, the Bible. And so we found two large stones which we placed on top of each other which formed an altar about a foot high.

And there we celebrated the Eucharist. To answer the Israelites question: yes, God can prepare a table in the wilderness!

I read from Psalm 78 which narrates the people of Israel’s experience in the wilderness:

‘So God commanded the clouds above and opened the doors of heaven.

He rained down manna also upon them for to eat and gave them food from heaven.

So man did eat angels’ food for he sent them meat enough’. (Psalm 78.25)

And the gospel we read was the one we have read today. Hearing that gospel standing in the very wilderness where Jesus fasted forty days and forty nights sent a tingle down the spine. But it was more than that. Where we saw stones on the ground, we heard the words, ‘command these stones to become loaves of bread’.

There in the wilderness we ate the bread of angels in the Eucharist, and the reminder that we live ‘by every word that comes from the mouth of God’.

Here. Now. We come to eat the bread of angels. Into barren places God’s presence blossoms and we learn to be his people, once again.

Sunday before Lent: Glory and Reality

Lord, may we see your glory.  May that glory fill this holy place and fill the whole world. May your glory seep from the heavens into our lives to animate us and illumine our hearts, that, as Christ’s glory was seen by human witnesses on the holy mountain, we may see that glory in our worship.

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Our readings today tell of human witnesses led up mountains where they see God’s glory.  First Moses goes alone, leaving Aaron and Hur, and then Jesus goes up the mountain, taking Peter, James and John with him.

When glory bursts out heaven touches earth.

This glory breaks out in the Law, the way of hallowing every day in relationship with God, revealed through Moses on the mountain top. This glory is described as a devouring fire, so powerful and searing it was.

God’s glory doesn’t just appear on mountain tops. The prophet Isaiah has a vision within the Temple: heaven touches earth. Isaiah sees the Lord enthroned in heavenly splendour as seraphs call ‘Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory’ (Isaiah 6.3). Glory is released and unrestricted, it’s not hemmed in or defined: unbounded glory!

And yet in Israel’s story the glory has dimmed. It was like that before God raised up Samuel. In Eli’s day the light was dimmed, but not quite gone out God (1 Samuel 3.1-3a). The glory itself was not dim, but it appeared dim because frail human eyes could not see it.

(Glory dims in our own day when the gospel is betrayed by those who espouse goodness, truth and beauty and then - from positions of authority, power or trust - abuse the young and the vulnerable physically, emotionally or spiritually. I am thinking here of instances of the diabolical abuse of minors. That violates the vulnerable and defaces the beauty of the vision of Jesus Christ).

That is no vision of Christ, but a vision of obstinate human sin.

Such a contrast is when Jesus takes Peter, James and John up the mountain and there they see the most overwhelming sight. It is the radiant glory of God. Nothing brighter or more splendid is seen in all creation. Accompanying this sight are the words of the Father,, that we recall from Christ's Baptism, ‘this is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him’. (Matthew 17.5b)

This glory is intertwined in the tapestry of the scriptures. And on the Holy Mountain there is the intriguing reference to the presence of Moses and Elijah. Threads from Israel’s story are woven into the Transfigured Glory of Jesus. The witnesses saw not only Jesus Christ but Moses, representing the Law and Elijah representing the Prophets; Elijah’s presence hinting at the ministry of John the Baptist, our patron saint who prepares the way of the Lord.

On that mountain Jesus is central, flanked by Moses and Elijah, and he is the light through which the Old Covenant of Law and Prophets is to be seen.

It’s little wonder that Peter wants to capture and hold on to this glory.

In words, later attributed to him, Peter describes how he saw this uncreated, divine light, and heard those words, as an eyewitness of Christ’s majesty. And he wants us to glimpse what he saw. He exhorts us, ‘You will do well to be attentive to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your heart’ (2 Peter 1.19b).

St John reflected on this glory in the life of Christ: ‘The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ’ (John 1.17). It is in Jesus Christ that we see the fullness of God’s glory: ‘And the Word was made flesh and we have seen his glory, glory as of a father’s only Son, full of grace and truth’ (John 1.14)

How do we connect with this glory?

The way is through Jesus Christ. The journey of glory is not just about mountain top revelations, but a way that takes us through the dark valleys and the sunlit peaks of human experience.

We see this when Jesus takes Peter and James and John somewhere else. This time it is to a dark place and not up a mountain. He takes them down, into the Valley in Jerusalem, between the Temple Mount and the Mount of Olives: to Gethsemane.

It’s as if to say, if you want to see the glory you have to go into the darkness too. From Gethsemane Jesus begins his walk to the Cross, lifted up on the hill, the mount of Calvary. He had already revealed to the disciples, and to us, that it is when he is lifted up on the cross that his glory will be fully seen. (John 12.20-26). And there he is not flanked by great figures of Israel’s story but by two convicted criminals; his glory is revealed even there.

Lent is a journey into glory, in its darkness and acknowledgement of our sinfulness. As we hear on Ash Wednesday, as the sign of the cross is marked on our heads in ash, ‘Dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return; turn away from sin and be faithful to Christ’.

We begin that journey this Wednesday. The self-denial of Lent, the forty days and forty nights, clears our sight to see the glory of Easter.

In Lent we do not sing the great opening of the Eucharist, ‘Glory be to God on high’, the glorious word, Alleluia’ falls silent, and yet still we sing, ‘Holy, holy, holy Lord God of hosts, heaven and earth are full of thy glory. Glory be to thee O Lord most high’.

May our journey together this Lent, be a journey into life and hope; a journey into glory.

Lent Address 1: Jonah - call and commission

Given as an address before Compline at Croydon Minster: Week One of Lent

The Church, in her great wisdom, commends that we undertake a Holy Lent through ‘self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on God’s holy word’ (Common Worship: Times and Seasons, The Liturgy of Ash Wednesday).

I hope that two elements of that intention will be met through the singing of Compline, with its penitential element of self-examination and repentance and psalmody, and through the address that will precede it each Thursday through Lent: we will be reading and meditating upon God’s holy word. As for prayer, fasting and self-denial: over to you!

Chapter One

1Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai, saying, 2‘Go at once to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before me.’ 3But Jonah set out to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid his fare and went on board, to go with them to Tarshish, away from the presence of the Lord.

Paul Murray, whose book on Jonah I thoroughly recommend, notes that Hermann Melville’s novel Moby Dick is a brilliant response to the Book of Jonah, in particular the famous sermon delivered by Father Mapple, the sailors’ chaplain: “‘Shipmates’ the priest explains, ‘this book [the Book of Jonah] … is one of the smallest strands in the mighty cable of the scriptures. Yet what depths of the soul does Jonah’s deep sea-line sound! What a pregnant lesson to us is this prophet’”.[1]

Tonight I want to consider ‘Call and commission’ through the lens of the book of Jonah. Before getting underway, I should note that this is a Hebrew text, it is in the Old Testament, but I will flit between it and its Christian understanding and usage. After all, Christ himself speaks of the ‘sign of Jonah’.

Jonah is an archetypal human being who is respectful of God, but struggles with the implications of what life following God might mean.

Jonah’s name means ‘dove’, which naturally has all sorts of biblical connotations: the Holy Spirit; the offering made when Christ is presented in the Temple; the bird that found the sign of life, an olive branch, when sent out from the ark Noah had built.

Jonah is someone, like each of us, into whom the spirit of God has been breathed.

Jonah is son of Amittai. The name Amittai means ‘truth’. Jonah is a son of truth.

All this connects with Jesus’ words that the Spirit of Truth will guide us into all the truth (John 16.13).

Jonah is a deeply human character, and the book of Jonah is a short and whimsical read of his ups and downs. It invites us to read it not in a pedantic literalism, but, in fact, to allow it to read us.

It’s more like a mirror that reflects back than a pane of glass that we look through. After all, we might recognise elements of ourselves in Jonah. Jonah is called by, but runs away from, God. In that flight Jonah is caught up in the storms of life. Jonah knows what life is like at rock bottom; but Jonah knows redemption, scooped up by the great fish, in whose belly he was for three days. Even after that miracle, he experiences bewilderment and anger when his own expectations and machinations of missionary zeal go awry. In the end he finds shelter from God, a bush, which then withers away and Jonah is again angry, resentful and grumpy with God. There is no neat resolution to Jonah’s story, and neither is there to ours. His life was a mess, and from time to time, or perhaps a lot, so can ours be.

That’s the case for looking at Jonah in Lent from the point of view of our inner journey. And there’s one more reason too - the ‘Sign of Jonah’: ‘For just as Jonah was for three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so for three days and three nights the Son of Man will be in the heart of the earth.’ (Matthew 12.40)

This takes us to the heart of our Lenten destination which is Easter. The allusions to baptism are clear: Jonah was called by God and fled; Jonah cried out to God, and acknowledged his need of God, when plunged in the waters; and after three days the great fish spat him out – spewed him out as the AV has it – onto the beach.

It was from the beach that Jonah had to recalibrate, work out what his life was about as he breathed the fresh air of the world into which he had been delivered, as if born again.

Day by day, Christians try to work out what it means to live the life of the new air of being born again in Christ.

Last night at the Ash Wednesday Liturgy I suggested that the sign of Jonah points us to a challenge. The challenge is this: not to go through Lent, and then end it, in dust and ashes, like Jonah, grumpy and resentful; but prepared, expectant and alert to the purposes of God in our lives and in our world.

But let’s now go back to those opening verses of the book -you might want to have them in front of you - they’re beautifully concise and punchy.

v.1 ‘Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah’. St John tells us that ‘in the beginning was the Word’ (John 1.1), and it was God’s almighty Word that spoke over the chaos and darkness of the raging waters at the creation which brought light and life (Genesis 1.3). Of course later Jonah would plunge into the swirling waters, but more of that next week, but here the divine initiative of God’s word and call has come to Jonah.

v.2 ‘Get up at once’, or as other translations say ‘Arise, go…’ This is what we might know as an apostolic command, someone sent. The commission at the end of the Eucharist is ‘arise, go…’, or you could say when you go in peace to love and serve the Lord, have some ‘get up and go’ in you!

v.2 The ‘City of Nineveh’ had a reputation as a place of violence, that is their wickedness. (Here in Croydon we know what it means for a city to have a 'reputation': deserved or undeserved). Jonah’s cry against it is a cry for the nameless victims of that violence. Jonah himself as we will see, next week on the boat is an innocent who succumbs to violence (Jonah 1.14) as the perpetrators ask not to have the violence held against them. There is something Christ-like here, the innocent victim of the violence of others.

v.3 Jonah did what he was told, he arose, he got up, but promptly headed off in the opposite direction. He ‘set out to flee from the presence of the Lord’. That sounds like a pretty futile endeavour if God is omniscient and omnipresent. We know, as the psalm puts it,

‘Where can I go then from your spirit?

Or where can I flee from your presence?’

If I climb up to heaven, you are there;

if I make the grave my bed, you are there also.

If I take the wings of the morning

and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea…’ (Psalm 139.6-8)

Jonah looked to flee through the ‘uttermost parts of the sea’. It sounds ludicrous, yet we can distance ourselves from God too, and we do, through hardness of heart, indeed through all things we confess to in the Eucharist: ‘through negligence, through weakness, through our own deliberate fault’. (Common Worship)

No doubt Jonah had reason for heading off in the opposite direction: fear, self-preservation. For an Israelite sent to tell Nineveh its fortune would be a forlorn task, likely to fail, and more likely to result in a gruesome death for Jonah.

No doubt we justify our times of fleeing from God through ‘negligence, through weakness, through our own deliberate fault’; and yet… we associate ourselves with Jesus Christ, the One who turns to face into and face down the violence, injustice and pain of the world through walking the way of the cross.

Our call and commission is, like Jonah’s, to proclaim God’s peace in a violent world, God’s healing in a wounded world and the sovereignty of God in a disbelieving world. Jonah had the opportunity to proclaim the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of Israel, to a world in need of God, and he chose to flee. It is only in Christ that humanity becomes equipped, through the apostolic faith, to hear the call, to heed the commission and to go and live ‘good news to the ends of the earth’.

With wonders you will answer us in your righteousness,

O God of our salvation,

O hope of all the ends of the earth

and of the farthest seas. (Psalm 65.4)

Tonight may you ponder God call and claim on your life – terrifying, unsettling, daunting, as that might be – and ask yourself three questions:

1.     What is it that God calls me to in my life and in his service?

2.     Do I run from this call or into this call?

3.     How can I take hold of the call God places upon me: who might I need to speak to?

So now let us keep silence before Compline begins.

© Andrew Bishop, 2019

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[1] Paul Murray, A Journey with Jonah: The Spirituality of Bewilderment. Dublin: Columba Press, 2002. p. 13.