Sermon preached at the St John the Baptist, Canberra
Bishop George Browning
Anglican Bishop of Canberra and Goulburn
27 November 2005
While I was in the UK in October I participated in a workshop at Lambeth Place hosted by the Archbishop of Canterbury and chaired by Richard Chartres the Bishop of London.
The workshop included participants from every Diocese in the UK and had been called to urgently discuss the need of the Church to lead the environmental struggle: a struggle to overturn the downward spiralling effect unbridled consumption is having, not just on our human way of life, but equally significantly, its impact upon our total environment. The main presenters were two of the UK’s leading scientists who also happened to be Church of England priests.
After the presentation the rest of us were invited to participate in the debate. One of England’s leading Laymen got up to speak, he was clearly used to commanding considerable authority. He said it is not the Christian agenda to work towards sustainability in the world, because Jesus is coming again – soon.
I have to say I was flabbergasted! And in my Australian forthrightness I immediately rose to challenge what he had said. (Over lunch I was told who he was!). I was not flabbergasted that he should refer to Advent’s primary theme of the second coming of Christ, but that in doing so he should assume that because of this, care for this world was not a priority, or even the business of Christian people! He had probably forgotten that Paul had to chide folk about their refusal to work, or disinclination to marry for the same reason!
The readings for today set the Advent theme well. We start with the Isaiah passage, telling as it does of God who lives in Heaven, whose ways are not our ways, who has every right to judge the earth, but who is pleaded with because he is the potter, we are the clay, he is our Father, we are his children and there is no God like him. He is pleaded with on the basis that there is a relationship between us! The passage is, if you like, a prayer that Heaven’s door might be open so that the good things of Heaven might be experienced on earth.
The second reading from Corinthians reminds us that these good things have latterly been experienced in the coming of Jesus. Heaven’s door has been opened, God is not far away, He has indeed come, come in Jesus: the grace of Jesus is gift to us all, and we are all to expect that this grace is available to us day by day. Finally the Gospel reading tells us that this Jesus will come again as he came before to gather the chosen ones to himself: the language is apocalyptic and we are to understand that the end of the world as we know it is near. So near in fact that we are told this generation will not pass away until all things are fulfilled.
Since the time of Christ every generation has believed itself to be living in “end timesâ€. The calamities that each generation experiences are interpreted in this light and are seen to be the fulfilment of scripture. The tsunami, earthquakes and civil unrest that have marked 2005 have been thus interpreted
How are we to make sense of all these things?
First, we are to pray that Heaven’s door will be open and that the things of God will be experienced on earth. Indeed we pray this in the Lord’s Prayer – “thy Kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven”. I do not know how many of you are listening to the Boyer Lectures currently being delivered by Archbishop Peter Jensen. I commend them to you; particularly I commend his intention that the lectures will stimulate a national debate about Jesus. May I contribute to that debate by saying I do not think he was right in last week’s lecture to say that the Lord’s Prayer is primarily about the Kingdom coming at the end of time. It has always borne this interpretation, but its primary intent, I have no doubt, mirrored by most of Jesus’ parables of the Kingdom, is a prayer that our current experiences of earth may be touched and influenced by the values and grace of Heaven. We humans are not to see material realities as the only realities let alone the primary realities. Behind all the experiences of earth lies the mystery of the possibility of heaven. That is why I took such strong exception to the speech at Lambeth Palace. Care of this earthly environment is absolutely the responsibility of we human beings and a core vocation of people of faith, for we are to understand, even if others do not, that God has invested the whole of his creation with value as the potter does the clay in his hand. Christian ethics are imbued with the values of heaven. We are to outpace ungrace with grace, for that is the value of heaven where the cross has absorbed all ungrace thereby bridging heaven and earth. We are always to see the world through the prism of redemption, for heaven is the home of the redeemed. It is such a travesty of Christian values that our culture has become one in which punitive action is almost always preferred over redemptive grace and life. It is our unequivocal responsibility to ensure that what God has given is sustained and valued for future generation. The reality of Heaven is that there is nothing that we can hold on to as our own possession, all ultimately finds its custody in the hands of the potter who made it.
So yes, we should pray and act that Heaven might touch earth. Indeed I do not think there can be any other prayer. In as much that we pray through Jesus, we pray through the ladder which God has provided to link our physical and spiritual destinies, the ladder upon which the angels of God do constantly ascend and descend.
Secondly the urgency of the coming of Jesus gives urgency to our living. We are to live as if this day is the last. It is a wonderful discipline. If there is someone to be forgiven, this forgiveness should be offered today. Tomorrow might be too late, in any case why would we spend time on something less important when there is something more important to be done. If there is a person to be hugged, to day is the day for the hug, waiting until later may indeed be too late. While we are told to watch for the signs and seasons, we know that the same signs and seasons have been present to all generations, perhaps even more so in the past than in the present. These signs and events should be the stimulus for our repentance, another major theme of Advent. Repentance is so sadly misunderstood. It is usually understood to be the beating of a breast in grief and sorrow. While this is of course an important part of repentance it is secondary. What is primary is a change of heart, a capacity to see things differently, and a desire not to go down this path again. There are a number of moments in scripture when God repents – apparently changes his mind. One is following the great flood where God decides never again to wipe out all life; another is in the story of Abraham and Isaac where God apparently changes his mind and does not seek the offering of Isaac; yet another is in the story of Jonah where God repents of his punishment over Nineveh and wishes salvation for them. It is Jonah who fails to go along with God and wishes to pursue the punitive path! Always a good alternative for one’s enemies!! Advent is a time for us to change our mind, to go down a different track. One way of doing it this year would be to join a growing number of people who, instead of giving a gift to a friend, or colleague, give them an envelope in which they are told that money in their name has been sent to a charitable cause. Another clear way to change our mind is to seriously consider how we are to reduce the impact of our human footprint.
Finally the readings and reference to the second coming remind us that nothing is permanent, not even our own life, or indeed any of the castles we may have built. Our tendency to live as if things can, or should be permanent, is probably one of the main contributors to the stress and angst of the present generation and a reason why we are in danger of missing the sheer joy that each day can bring. Few of us are able to live without some hankering after permanence – it is only natural as they say. However, all things do pass away and the Christian hope is that in their passing they are caught up in the destiny that God has for us in Jesus.
Jesus has come again every time forgiveness is offered, generosity experienced or grace is victorious in the face of selfishness. Jesus has come again when each human being works for a sustainable world to be gifted to the next generation
Jesus has come again when this day is lived to its fullest as if it is the last. As Michael Thwaites has bequeathed to us, “I will live until I die and thank before I goâ€.
Jesus has come again each time the desire for permanence crumbles and the believer is able to risk all in the faith of a home not made with human hands.
In all of these ways Jesus’ coming again is a reality to this generation, and, like all generations before and after it, will not pass away until all these things are fulfilled.
Bishop George Browning Advent 2005
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