Sermon on Ascension (Acts 1:6-14)

Sermon on Ascension (Acts 1:6-14)
Originally given 21 May 2023 at St. Alban’s Church, Coventry

(Audio of text)

This past Thursday, the worldwide Church celebrated the Ascension of Christ. Ascension is the day we remember Christ ascending into heaven on clouds before his disciples, as we heard about in the Acts reading today. Ten days after Ascension we celebrate Pentecost, the day the Holy Spirit came down on the disciples in the form of fire and wind. The day we mark the foundation of the Christian Church. But I’ll say no more about Pentecost, as I don’t want to give any spoilers for next week!

The days after Ascension until the eve of Pentecost are held in the Church as days of prayer and preparation for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The main prayer of the Church at this time is embodied in words from the prayer Jesus taught us – Thy Kingdom Come.

It perhaps seems quite simple – three words, fourteen letters, a prayer said so often we may feel almost robotic when we recite it. The other week in our Bible Study group, I talked about how I first learned the Lord’s Prayer. I was perhaps 6 or 7 years old and I had only recently learned to read. I saw a picture in a magazine of a stunning rosary that I would never be able to afford, and in the centre of the cross, the Lord’s Prayer was written. I saved the page from the magazine and read the prayer again and again until I had it committed to memory. And shortly after that, when there was a tornado warning and I was huddled in the downstairs bathtub with my mom, my brother, our dog, and our cat, waiting out the storm, I prayed that prayer again and again. I had no other words, I didn’t know how to pray, I just knew that I was scared and that when people were scared they prayed, and so I prayed until the radio finally said the storm had passed us by.

Thy Kingdom Come – these three words can be simple if said without thought, but they can be powerful beyond measure. As a child before I even really knew Jesus, I knew the power of the prayer He taught us. So what do these words mean? What makes them powerful?

First, the word ‘thy’. From our modern translation of the Our Father, we know that ‘thy kingdom come’ is translated as ‘your kingdom come’, which tells us that ‘thy’ means ‘your’. But what’s so special about using the word thy? Since thy is the traditional English translation, taken from the King James Bible, a lot of people assume that thy is only used to refer to God as a sign of formal respect. But the truth is closer to the opposite. Like the Spanish and German languages, English used to have two different second person singular forms – the formal and the familiar. ‘Thy’ was actually used as the second person familiar. So referring to God with the pronoun ‘thy’ tells us that the relationship we are meant to have with God is not a distant, far-off relationship, but rather a familiar, personal relationship. When we pray to our Father in heaven, we’re not praying to an unfeeling, disconnected God, but instead to a God who wants to be in close relationship with us.

The next word is ‘Kingdom’. With the recent Coronation fresh in our minds, we probably jump straight to earthly kings and kingdoms when we hear that word. In fact, it’s probably easy for us to understand why people living at the time of Jesus expected the Messiah to come as an earthly king, to restore power to God’s chosen people. But that’s not the kingdom Jesus talks about, and it’s not the kingdom Jesus shows. The Kingdom of God is greater than any earthly institutions. Jesus lived his life showing us what the Kingdom of God looks like. Jesus proclaimed the year of the Lord’s favour at the start of his ministry in the Gospel of Luke by saying, 

‘The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
    and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free…’ (NIV, Luke 4:18)

The whole ministry of Jesus is about lifting up the lowly and oppressed; it’s about shining light in the darkest places to recognise those who lack power and influence; it’s about showing that the Kingdom of God is for everyone, especially those who have been most rejected by earthly society.

So from this, we know ‘Thy Kingdom’, refers to God’s Kingdom. The kingdom of someone we have such an intimate relationship with, that they know us by name and knitted us together in our mothers’ womb. And this Kingdom is one that challenges the traditional human structures of what a kingdom looks like, flipping it on its head, and instead giving strength to the weak, riches to the impoverished, and power to the oppressed. So we only have one final word as we pray through these days from Ascension to Pentecost, which is ‘come’. 

Thy Kingdom Come. This prayer is not about what’s happened in the past when Jesus walked the earth. This prayer is about right here, right now. This is an active prayer. This is a prayer full of power because this is a prayer that doesn’t just sit and wait for it to happen, but instead stands up and says make it happen now. Not at an unspecified future time, but right now. Here, in this church, we are the Kingdom of God, and we are not only called by God to build his Kingdom, but we are praying to make Thy Kingdom Come. We are not meant to be passive in this exercise, but rather to rise up and feed the hungry, clothe the naked, lift up the oppressed, give voice to the marginalised. There is power in the name of Jesus and there is power in praying Thy Kingdom Come, because each of us has the power to make that happen now. When we pray ‘thy kingdom come’, let us not wait and see what God does, but instead let us take the lead from Christ Jesus and bring the Kingdom of God to earth, right now.

Sermon on John 6:35-59

Sermon on John 6:35-59
Given 13 February 2022 at St. Alban’s Church, Coventry

Flesh and blood and bread. Today’s Gospel reading is pretty meaty, both literally and metaphorically. So how can we go about sinking our teeth into it? Okay, I’m done with the puns. But this is a really difficult passage to grapple with. Not only is there the constant repetition of bread and flesh and blood, but it could also be interpreted as a fairly exclusivist reading, suggesting that only those who partake in a eucharistic celebration are worthy of eternal life. But I suggest a different interpretation. Since we know that Jesus was a devout Jew, it doesn’t make sense that he would ever encourage people to drink blood as drinking blood is against Levitical law. And Jesus came to fulfill the law, not destroy it. So instead, I think the scholar Tom Wright was correct in his explanation that we drink the blood of Christ in that we profit from his death, his blood which was shed because of us. In our eucharistic prayers, it is said ‘this is my blood, which is shed for you’, so it is the death of Christ we remember. Christ saying ‘drink my blood’ could also be understood as him telling us ‘benefit from my death’, which we have done. We have benefitted because we have eternal life.

The reading begins with the first ‘I am’ statement in John’s Gospel, with Jesus saying ‘I am the bread of life.’ Last week Reverend Zoe talked to us about life, explaining that God came to give us abundant life without any conditions or restrictions, regardless of our faith or belief. She explained that healing can lead to a longer life, but that is not the life that God has planned for us. God has more than a mortal, temporary life planned for us, but an eternal life. I found her words so moving, and I’m sure those of you who know me won’t be surprised that I cried while listening to them. I cried thinking of all the prayers of healing I’ve said, and all the prayers I thought had been left unanswered when healing didn’t come. I cried because it was the first time I heard someone stand at the front of a church and proclaim that faith does not dictate healing, and a lack of healing does not mean a lack of faith. Nor does it mean God is absent or apathetic. You may be familiar with God’s three answers to prayer: Yes, no, and not yet. But there is another aspect of how God answers prayers. Sometimes God answers prayers in ways we could never imagine or understand. Sometimes we think we have an answer, but hindsight eventually tells us things weren’t quite what we thought. Because even in moments of our greatest sorrows, God is with us. And this is why the Psalmist says we shall continually praise God. Even when we don’t feel especially praiseworthy, our Creator continues to be with us and guide us.

Jesus saying he is the bread of life is a reminder that God nourishes and sustains us. In our moments of feeling empty with what the world has to offer, Jesus is with us to fulfill our needs. When we feel drained of all energy, Jesus can help us survive another day. Of course, at this point, I’m talking about spiritual hunger, so once again, this gets a bit complicated. Archbishop Desmond Tutu once said, ‘the Good News to a hungry person is bread.’ In this case, he was referring to physical, consumable bread to sustain physical life. If you are spiritually hungry, then Jesus saying ‘I am the bread of life’ gives you the sustenance you need spiritually. But how is it Good News to tell a hungry person Jesus is the bread of life and only offer our hopes and prayers? How can a hungry person see that God provides abundantly for all of creation?

I think the answer should be obvious. When we drink the blood of Christ, we become one with him. And in so doing, we become the Good News. Jesus didn’t only say, ‘I am the bread of life’, he also said ‘feed the hungry.’ It is not enough that we pray for God’s blessing, we must also be God’s blessing. 

But, there are a lot of hungry mouths to feed. And we are only human. So maybe it is asking too much. The thing is, you don’t have to save everyone, Jesus already did that. So if you can only help one person, or pick up one piece of litter, or write one letter to your MP, or give one homeless person a meal, or stop using electricity for one hour, or do any one simple thing, then you have saved something. You don’t have to make big gestures to be the Good News. It’s not about massive changes, it’s about setting an example. Because when someone sees you feed that homeless person, or pick up that litter, then they get an idea. And the next day they might feed another homeless person or pick up more litter. And maybe the one letter you wrote to your MP was the one that tipped them over the edge to do the right thing and become a voice for the voiceless. The Gospel is a movement and each of us can be the ripples to create a world-changing wave. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us, and all it takes is one small act of kindness. 

In the Lord’s Prayer, we pray for our daily bread. Jesus, the bread of life is our daily bread. We also pray for the will of God to be done, and who else can do the will of God but those of us who feed on the daily bread. And as we go out, having been spiritually nourished, we can realise our prayer to bring the kingdom of God to earth. We can be the Good News on earth, and by our small actions help to bring all of creation back to being very good.