Mark 1:40-45

There is no situation in this world where you are not loved entirely, deeply, profoundly, awesomely, by Jesus Christ.

In the name of the father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen

I’ve got an account here of of leprosy and its symptoms. I want to read them to you.

There are three kinds of leprosy. The first is called Nodular Leprosy. It begins with unaccountable lethargy and pains in the joints. Then there appears on the body, especially on the back, symmetrical, discoloured patches of little nodules. At first pink and then turning brown. The skin is thickened. The nodules gather, especially in the folds of the cheek, the nose, the lips and the forehead.

The whole appearance of the face is changed until the afflicted person loses all human appearance and looks. The nodules grow larger and larger. They ulcerate, and from them comes a foul discharge. The eyebrows fall out, the eyes become staring, the voice becomes hoarse, and the breath wheezes because of the ulceration of the vocal cords, the hands and the feet also ulcerate. Slowly, the sufferer becomes a mass of ulcerated growth.

The average course of the disease is nine years and in the end it leads to mental decay, to coma and then death. Those suffering from this type of leprosy become utterly repulsive both to themselves and to others. 

The second kind of leprosy is called anaesthetic leprosy, and this is where you start to lose feeling, all your nerves stop working.

The most common form of leprosy is where you get both of those sets of symptoms. So you have the physical distress, you have the physical ailments, you have the mental ailment and you also have the loss of feeling that of course, is what leads to people losing limbs.

Why have I read out these horrible descriptions on a gentle Sunday morning in February when you’re all dreaming of your Sunday lunch?  

It’s physically absolutely horrible. I want you to understand the sheer disgust that the vast majority of the population held these lepers in. Lepers were sent to leper colonies, they were sent to special hospitals called lazars, where they had to hide away, they weren’t allowed to look outside except through something called a leper’s slot where they could peer outside and see the outside world. They weren’t allowed to approach anybody. They weren’t allowed to talk to anybody. 

They were visually disgusting and to the whole of society. 

I tell you all of this because I want you to understand how outrageous, how absolutely outrageous it was that this leper should approach Jesus.

It’s beyond comprehension. It’s beyond understanding, 

How this leper got near Jesus in the first place? 

That’s the first thing to think about. What that suggests to me is that the disciples are finally starting to understand that to Jesus, nobody is beyond the pale. Nobody is too far gone for redemption. Nobody is unapproachable in his eyes. To Jesus we are all approachable, more importantly all may approach Him.

We are all wonderful in creation. It doesn’t matter what we’ve done or what we suffer with how unacceptable we may be to the rest of society. We can go to Jesus, and when we feel like that, when we think that perhaps we’ve done something that’s just unbelievably unacceptable, that we can’t even approach Jesus, scripture tells us, this gospel tells us, you can approach Jesus. 

It’s all very well saying you can approach Jesus, but how will you feel when you do approach Jesus? Will Jesus even want me? I’m so unworthy, I’ve done all of these things wrong. Society hates me, I hate me!

Yes, Jesus wants you. Yes, Jesus wants to heal you. 

You can almost hear the reproach in Jesus’ voice when he says, of course I want to heal you. The un-muttered next line. Why wouldn’t I? Why wouldn’t I want to heal you?  Of course I want to heal you, and Jesus reaches out and heals the leper immediately.

And what does Jesus tell him? The same thing He tells all those people that he’s healed. Don’t go tell people, don’t go showing off about this. Don’t go boasting about this boast only in the Lord. But go now, go to the temple and be made clean.

That’s an interesting instruction. It’s worth understanding it. If you suffered from leprosy, in fact, if you suffered from any kind of skin condition that might even slightly look like leprosy, you were declared dead to wider society.

There was a service that happened where the priest would pray your funeral over you. You were a dead man walking. And so if you were healed of leprosy there was a complex ritual you had to go to through become alive again in the eyes of wider society.

Now, Jesus didn’t say don’t go do that. All of that is tosh, what Jesus said was, go and do that. And his message remains clear today. We have to engage with the human world if we’ve done something so terrible and so wrong that we don’t think that Jesus will heal us and then we come to Jesus and are healed we must face up to the consequences of those things that we’ve done in society and deal with the human world to be accepted once again. 

But you’re not doing it on your own. This time you’re doing it healed by the love of Jesus Christ. And in this one short gospel, Jesus shows us His compassion, His power and His wisdom.

There is nothing for which you cannot turn to Jesus and seek to be healed. There is no situation in which Jesus will not reach out to you and heal you.

There is no situation in this world where you are not loved entirely, deeply, profoundly, awesomely, by Jesus Christ.

Approach Jesus in this mass at the altar, be healed, be sent out, be alive once more in the world around you. 

Amen

Job 7:1-4,6-7 | 1 Corinthians 9:16-19,22-23 | Mark 1:29-39

Go throughout Hayes Town as Jesus went throughout Galilee, preaching the good word of Jesus Christ, not by screaming about how happy he makes you, but by showing you how he helps you and reveals the light of God, little bit by little bit, amongst the darkness.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen. Please sit. Oh, my gosh. Hasn’t it been a long winter? I don’t know about you, but I am sick to the back teeth of dark mornings and of dark evenings.

It has felt like drudgery. I love that word, drudgery. It’s why I enjoy the book of Job. Because I think job speaks to what it’s really like to be a Christian. Sometimes, day in, day out, it is drudgery.

And it’s okay to feel like that. Sometimes you feel like, well, if I’m a Christian, I should have sufficient faith that I am joyful in the Lord. That’s the word. Joyful in the Lord. Now, to be joyful in the Lord doesn’t mean that you have to be saccharine.

You have to be happy. You have to be jolly. You don’t have to try and emulate me all of the time. No. Being joyful in the Lord means understanding that even when things are hard, even when you’re not feeling happy, you can take inner joy in knowing that God is walking with you.

That’s what job teaches us, even though his life is one of drudgery. And doesn’t he use such wonderful language to express that drudgery? When will it be day? Lying in bed wondering when it will be day. We’ve all led in bed, not able to sleep with worries and concerns on our heart.

When will it be day? And then when we do get up, what do we think? Oh, how slowly evening comes. Those worries and those concerns and the work that we’re doing. It feels like we’re not getting anywhere.

That drudgery walks through the day with us. But Job had that joy in God. He was able to walk that path of drudgery. He was able to walk that path of hardship and carry them because he knew, he absolutely knew that God was doing it with him.

The thing is, of course, that that doesn’t actually make you feel any better, does it? It doesn’t put an extra skip in your step. It doesn’t make you smile. And nor should you expect it to. Because we are human beings that experience happiness and experience sadness.

And that drudgery is something that we should embrace.

Not to change. Not to say, I want to change this drudgery, not to say I want to do something different, but to say, okay, this is what it is like living this life now. Because I know that I will be with God in eternity. My faith. I will keep my faith because eternity is more important, if we think about that, as I started with winter, what are we starting to see now?

I’m sick to the back teeth of the dark mornings and the dark nights and of the cold and of the wet. But what are we seeing now? We are seeing the shift to spring. And each morning I wake up, it’s a little bit brighter. And each morning, each evening, each morning I go back to bed.

Each evening I go back to bed, it’s a little bit lighter. And that is what our faith in God does when we are walking in drudgery. When we are walking in difficulty, that faith makes things a little bit brighter each day a little bit better.

Now, the trick, of course, and our duty as christians is to share that little bit that we’ve been given that little bit of light with people that we know. And that is exactly what Paul is talking about in our second reading. I do not boast of preaching the gospel since it is a duty which has been laid on me. I should be punished if I don’t preach it. Paul is telling us that that little bit of light, that little bit of encouragement is what will bring other people to faith.

It is not being joyfully jumping up and down the street saying, I love Jesus, and he’s made absolutely everything wonderful. But it is how you behave as a Christian when you are in drudgery, when you are in difficulty and you are able to see that little bit of light, that is where people will be able to see your faith and go, there is something here, there is something worth following, because God is with me, not just when I am happy, but God is with me in the drudgery. He brings it out a little bit more. He says, for the weak, I made myself weak. I made my things to all men in order to save some at any cost.

What he is talking about is sharing how God works in our lives in a way that other people can understand and other people can see. And the reality is most people walking around are not walking around high on Jesus. Most people are walking around, if we are honest, carrying a degree of drudgery.

Now, we can either find that depressing and difficult and throw up our hands and go, well, then what’s the point? Or we can go, I shall keep my faith strong as job kept his faith, and I shall use that little bit of light to show others who are struggling that this is a good and wonderful path. That God, that Jesus is that extra two minutes of light at the end of every day is that extra two minutes of light every morning. That is what will move people’s hearts. Even Jesus.

Even Jesus in our gospel faces drudgery. You can hear it speaking loud through that gospel, I think, can’t you? Jesus is, he heals. He goes to Simon and his mother in law of Simon is feeling ill, so he heals Simon’s mother in law. And then before he knows it, there is a crowd at the door demanding, wanting things.

Do this, Jesus, do this. Do this for me. And Jesus heals all of the people. He brings life out of death. And what does he do at the end of that demanding time?

People have demanded this power, this healing, all of this of Jesus. What does jesus do? He goes off somewhere quiet and he prays. And so jesus gives us the model of what to do when we feel like everything is just pushing on us and demanding everything of our time when we’re in that drudgery. Jesus says, by doing, take yourself off somewhere quiet and pray.

He does it in the early morning, the quiet hours of the morning. And so he gives us a new model. A new model to what job was talking about. That’s the point of the new covenant with Jesus Christ over the old covenant in the Old Testament with job. He lies in bed going, when will it be day?

But Jesus takes himself off and prays, there’s the answer to the drudgery. Pray. Call on Jesus and say, I can’t see the light, Lord. All I can see is the drudgery. Where is the extra two minutes at the start of the day?

Where is the extra two minutes at the end of the day? Lord, show me. Pray that your eyes will be open to see that extra light. That’s the model that Jesus gives us. And then he says, of course it is time for us to move on.

And I can’t help but that feeling very prescient as I prepare to move on. Jesus does the work in front of him and it is wonderful and it is good. And then he says, we’ve done this here, it’s time to move on. And that is what Jesus is telling us all. Because when we do the job of work in front of us, when we speak to people about that little bit of extra light, you have to keep going.

You have to find the next person. You have to find the next thing that God is calling you to do. You have to go to the next thing that God wants you to do because it’s ever so easy to become very comfortable and to stop listening to what God is calling you to do. So I think a wonderful collection of readings this morning at this point in the year when we are sick of winter, when we are sick of drudgery, when we are wondering what on earth it is we are doing with our lives, when we are feeling depressed and down. A reminder that Jesus will not suddenly make us happy, but that Jesus will show us that extra little bit of light.

And if we can’t see it, then we should pray to see it. We should find some rest, and we should see where God is calling us and what God is calling to us next.

Go throughout Hayes Town as Jesus went throughout Galilee, preaching the good word of Jesus Christ, not by screaming about how happy he makes you, but by showing you how he helps you and reveals the light of God, little bit by little bit, amongst the darkness. Amen.

Mark 1:21-28

So go home, get hold of your children who do not come to church. And tell them in Jesus name, come and help run the new boys brigade at St Anselm!

[automatically transcribed]

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen.

Please sit.

And he taught them with authority. I said at the start of mass that I was going to ask you ladies, you mothers, you grandmothers, you aunties in the congregation to use your authority with those men in your life to get them to come and volunteer for boys brigade, and to come and send their children to boys brigade.

When I say authority, though, what do I mean?

Do I mean the authority that is, ‘you will do as you are told, otherwise you will get a thick ear’. That’s the kind of authority that my parents exercised over me. And it works up to a point, doesn’t it? You do as you were told because otherwise you’ll get a thick ear.

You do as your parents tell you to do because they know better than you. But Jesus speaks with a different authority. He speaks with the authority of God that commands all creation. That is what we hear in the gospel. And so we as christians are also able to speak with that same authority.

So when I tell you to go home and to tell your sons and your nephews and your grandchildren to come and help run boys brigade to send their children to boys brigade, I’m not telling you to tell them using the authority of do as I say or I will give you a clip around the year I am doing you to do it using Jesus authority, using the authority that you have as christians, because Jesus grants you that authority in his name, because your children will respond to you when you speak to them using that authority far better than they will when threatened with a clip across the ear.

Because children, just like all of us, recognise the authority of God. We recognise the purity of it. It is authority that does not require a threat to be carried out and for obedience. It is an authority that simply requires a love and respect and honour that Jesus gives us.

So go home, get hold of your children who do not come to church. And tell them in Jesus name, come and help run the new boys brigade at St Anselm. Tell them in Jesus name. Bring your children to the new boys brigade at St Anselm. Tell them with the authority of God that if they come and be part of this, they will know him better.

Amen.

Mark 1:14-20

We are ordinary people who go about our daily tasks. We are ordinary people who are called to love Jesus Christ. And now we are asked by him to go out into the world in his name and to bring others into that love as well.

[automatically transcribed]

The name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

This is a very short, but very interesting gospel, because it teaches us about the way that Jesus calls us, about the model that God uses to call us. Now, if we look at how other teachers and other rabbis over the time called disciples to them, well, they didn’t really do that. They didn’t say to people, follow me. Become my disciple. They’d set themselves up as a teacher, as a rabbi, and they would go into the synagogue, and they would go into the marketplaces, and they would teach.

And people were listening to what they said. And if they agreed with them, if they went to the synagogue, marketplace and they heard the teacher and they agreed with them, then they would follow that teacher. The followers would go and listen to different teachers, and then they would choose who they might follow based on what they were teaching.

It’s a very greek way of doing it. It’s argument. If I can persuade you through argument, through reason, to follow me, then that’s how it worked. It’s an exercise of intellect and of reason, and that’s how they would get people to follow them. That was very much the model of gathering disciples and of gathering follows.

People would listen. They would think. They’d reason, and then they would decide to follow. They’d go away. They’d think about it.

But Jesus does something different. Jesus comes and asks people to follow him. Jesus issues us an invitation. God comes to us and asks us to follow him. And who does God choose to follow him?

Well, the teachers and the rabbis of the time would attempt to persuade politicians and important people, people with money, to follow them. Because if those people with money, if those people with influence followed them, then their star would rise. They would chart those political waters. So they would go to the markets where rich people shopped. They would go to the synagogues where the great Pharisees were who could help them in their political career.

But Jesus, who does Jesus choose to call to him? Well, of course we know that Jesus did the same thing, didn’t he? He always went to the important people. He went to the rich.

Oh, no, no. Definitely didn’t. I’ve got that wrong, haven’t I? Jesus didn’t do that. Jesus called straightforward, ordinary, normal, everyday people, to follow him.

He didn’t try to find people with influence, with money, with power. He didn’t try to chart those political waters. He wasn’t very clever about those earthly things, if you like. He wasn’t sneaky. He wasn’t political in that way.

He just asked ordinary people to follow him. And he asked people who were doing their everyday work. He asked fishermen who were about their work. They were casting their nets, just getting on with the everyday task of living. They weren’t trying to engage in any political uprising.

They weren’t trying to engage in becoming more important in the community that they were living in. They weren’t trying to do things. They were just doing their job. And this is how Jesus continues to call us today. He calls us in our everyday life.

He calls us to follow him, believe it or not, when we’re doing our shopping in Iceland, and I don’t know about you, but I’ve been in Iceland, in Hayes Town, I don’t know how many times, and called on God, that’s for sure. God calls us to follow him when we’re sat at our desk. God calls us to follow him when we’re loading the washing machine. God calls us in our everyday life and in our everyday tasks. And so, as much as we know that God talks to us through scripture and through sacrament here in church, he also speaks to us, calls to us, as we do the shopping, as we sit at our computers, as we load the washing machine, as we live our lives.

But we must be alert to how and when Jesus does call, because it’s very easy to shut Jesus out when you’re getting on with the task of living your life. It’s very easy to be open to jesus when you come to church. But you must be open to that call all of the time. And one of the ways that you can do that is by being aware of how Jesus calls us. He does it with love.

Not like the teachers and the rabbis who try to reason with you, not like a politician who tries to know, if you follow me, then I will give you this. It’s not a deal. Jesus talks to you through love. He doesn’t give you a list of reasons to follow him. He doesn’t try to persuade you.

Jesus asks people to follow him. The way you know it’s right is because he will then immediately ask you to call others to him. That is the model that Jesus gives us, particularly apparent in today’s gospel. He says, follow me and I will love you. You will know the greatest love there has ever been.

And that is how Jesus continues to call us a day through love, through grace, through hope. And then, and maybe only then, may we start to go through the reasons. We may start to apply our analytical thinking to it. But Jesus calls us from deep within us to follow him.

This week I did an assembly at Dr. Triplets. I love going to Dr. Triplets. I love speaking with the children. And unlike some of the other people who come and do assemblies, I don’t do wizzy powerpoints and I don’t do songs.

I just talk. And this week I was asked to talk about calling. How does God call us? And that’s a very hard thing to talk about with children who are four, five, six, right the way up to eleven. How do you explain calling?

So I had come up with a good way of explaining how God talks to us with all of the examples in scripture of how God talks to different people, right the way from Moses all the way to Our Lady and to St. Joseph. How does he talk to people? But when I got to the school, the headmistress, Mrs. Anderson, and Mrs. Byles, said to me, Father, will you tell the children of how you were called to be a priest? I said, I haven’t prepared that. And that’s a story. I’m not sure the children.

“No, no, please tell that story now.”

Fortunately, Edmund’s no longer. My son is no longer in Dr. Triplet’s, so I could tell the story. Gavin, were you there for the assembly? I won’t ask you to remember what I said. That’s really unfair.

But Gavin was there and I told the story of how God called me in the delivery room at the John Radcliffe hospital in Oxford.

After my son was born, Catherine had had to go off to surgery and I was left in this windowless delivery room holding Edmund for 5 hours. I really thought something had gone very badly wrong with Catherine. And I didn’t want to leave the room, I didn’t want to change anything.

I just held onto Edmund for 5 hours and I prayed like I had never prayed before. And in amongst that prayer, I recognised the love that I had for my son as I held him, the deep love that I had never experienced before. And I heard Jesus say to me, if this is the love you have for your son, imagine the love that God has for you.

And I went right back to this piece of gospel. How did those men respond? They stopped what they were doing and they followed him, which is exactly how I responded. It was an act of love. It was not an act of reasoned, analytical thinking that came next.

When I went to the vicar the following Sunday and said, God has spoken to me. God has called me. Now what? And then started a ten year journey to ordination.

Just so you know, Catherine was absolutely fine. She’d had a very normal thing. She was out of surgery in an hour or two, they’d just forgotten about me in the basement of the John Radcliffe. It was only when the nurses changed shift that they discovered that there was some bloke and his baby sitting in a delivery room. I got taken up to the ward and given a cup of tea and a biscuit. Even Catherine hadn’t been offered a cup of tea and a biscuit!

At that point, Jesus says, follow me and I will love you. Follow me and then call others to me. I will make you fishers of men. I believe very, very strongly that every single one of us has that spark of God within us, even people who are not christian. We had a school group in church this week from the De’Salis college.

And those children, there was one christian child amongst them and he was russian orthodox. He was great because he answered all of my questions. But all of the other children were Muslim, they were Sikh, they were Hindu, and they had no understanding of who we call God. And for an hour I told them what it meant to be a Christian. And I saw in each and every single one of those children that spark of God in their heart.

And I tried to communicate the love that Jesus had for them and why we believe that Jesus was the son of God and why we believe the Holy Spirit is active in our lives. For an hour they sat and they listened. These children who were between eleven and 14 year olds, and those of you who have or know children who are of that age know, they do not sit and listen for an hour to some bloke at the front of church where they’ve got to do their schoolwork and answer some questions. But they listened for an hour and you could hear a pin drop because I talked of the love that Jesus had for them and how Jesus called them. And at the end of that lesson, one of the muslim children came up to me and asked if I had a Bible, because I’d been teaching about the Bible, how it was made up, where it came from, how it speaks to us.

And I said, yes, of course I’ve got a Bible. And he asked me if he could have one. So I gave him a Bible. And in my pocket, as ever, I had a rosary. So I took the rosary out and I blessed it and I gave it to him.

And then another child and then another child and another child and another child. And before you knew it, 35 of those children had come forward and had asked for a Bible and had asked for a rosary. The fire of God’s love inside them was ignited from that spark because I had told them about the love that Jesus had for them. How Jesus calls to that spark, calls to God inside all of us. But then what?

Once you’ve done that, once you’ve accepted that Jesus is the son of God, once you have turned towards him. And remember that is what the word repent means. It means turn in the right direction to turn towards God. The first thing that Jesus calls us to is repentance. That means to turn towards God.

Once we’ve done that, then what? What is the first instruction jesus gives to the disciples? He says, follow me and I will make you fishers of men. He calls us to repentance, to turn towards God. And he calls us to bring others to his son.

What does he offer the disciples who are on one hand giving up everything to follow him? What does Jesus continue to ask us to do today? Repent and to preach the good news. That’s the task. That’s what we are called to do.

There’s no difference 2000 years later between those disciples at the edge of the sea of Galilee and us and how we respond to that call.

And listen. He doesn’t call us to elevate us. He doesn’t call us to make us special. He doesn’t call us to make us rich and influential. He calls us to service.

He calls us to serve the world, to serve one another in his name, in his love. He calls us to bring other people to that love. He calls us to do it through the food bank. He calls us to do it through being together on Sunday mornings. He calls us to do it through Thursday fun and fellowship. He calls us to do it through spanners and coffee. He calls us to do it when we say hello to somebody in the street. He even calls us to do it when we’re doing our shopping in Iceland.

He calls us to do it through smiling at one another and encouraging one another in dark times.

He calls us to service his name, to bring other people into that service.

He calls us to give us everything.

And all we have to do to receive it is say yes. To stop doing what we are doing and turn towards God and say yes. That’s all it takes.

We are ordinary people who go about our daily tasks. We are ordinary people who are called to love Jesus Christ. And now we are asked by him to go out into the world in his name and to bring others into that love as well.

So leave today and be like those disciples and say, yes, Jesus, and be fishers of men. Amen.

Matthew 2:1-12

…LISTEN, listen to what God tells you, listen to what Jesus whispers in your ear

I love Epiphany. Things feel like they’ve settled down after the busyness of Christmas. The urgency of the day; the fight to get everything ready is over and we find ourselves a little more relaxed. I can see the parallels with the Holy Family. Gone is the urgency of the ride to Bethlehem. Gone is the urgency of finding a place to stay. Gone is the urgency and pain of childbirth in a less than ideal place. 

Now…. Now there is peace. The Holy Family in the stable, surrounded by the animals keeping them warm. Wrapped up against the cold outside and simply being together. 

I hope that over the last week or so you have found space and time to be with your families. Wrapped up against the world, warm and quietly eating through the last of the treats from Christmas. 

Though I wonder how many of us are still doing that at Epiphany? We’ve almost certainly by this point turned our minds to the new year and new tasks. Perhaps the Christmas decorations have already come down and the Christmas cake is all gone. 

Traditionally Christmas decorations will stay up until at least Epiphany – today – because it is a moment to remember that Christmas is not over, it continues in the way we live our lives and how we react to the news that Jesus Christ is born amongst us. 

When I talk about Jesus Christ being born amongst us, I’m not just talking about that day two thousand years ago, but how Jesus Christ is born amongst us each time a new person comes to know Him or how Jesus Christ is born amongst us each time we renew our faith, or each time we remember we are His children and correct our behaviour to be more like him. 

Jesus Christ is born amongst us over and over and over again. 

It is how we respond to that realisation that defines what kind of Christian we are. 

To my mind there are three ways to respond to the birth of Jesus Christ over and over again in our lives. 

1 – Hatred and hostility. The reaction of Herod. 

When we realise that Jesus is with us, that He is prompting us to live a better and different kind of life we can get caught up in the world around us and dismiss Him with anger. We can find ways to work around Jesus – what we know to be true – in order to kill Him within us. We will rationalise bad things in order to continue in our comfortable lives. We will find ways to destroy Jesus within us, whilst outwardly saying we want to worship Him.

We come to church and show the outward signs of loving Him, but we ignore Him in our hearts and worse find a way to dismiss Him, to kill Him. 

This is very dangerous. When you do this the devil will find a way to work within you. Evil will work away in the hypocrisy that exists within you. 

When you find yourself hating what Jesus tells you to do, how to live, how to love, then it is time to fall to your knees in that stable and ask for the comfort and the prayers of the Holy Family. 

There is a way back, a way to safety – it is the love and care of the family of Christians around you. 

And fellow Christians – it is your job to see this happening in your brothers and sisters and to take care of them just as Mary and Joseph would have done in that stable as visitors knelt beside Jesus in his crib. 

The second reaction –  Indifference. 

This is the reaction of the scribes and the chief Priests that worked for Herod. The birth of Jesus made no difference at all in their lives. They were so engrossed in the life of the Temple – the Temple let’s not forget that Herod had built for them – that the prophecy of the birth of a King in Judea was utterly irrelevant to their daily lives. 

There are many Christians who are so indifferent to the teaching of Jesus, to His active encouragement in their daily lives, that He could appear in front of them, and they’d dismiss Him without a second thought. 

We just plod on, one foot in front of the other without looking for Jesus working in our lives. Without seeing Him working in the world around us. We must pull ourselves back to the wonder of the stable and the miracle of Jesus birth. To the awe of those who travelled so far to visit Him.

And fellow Christians – it is your job to see this indifference in your brothers and sisters and to remind them of the wonder and awesomeness of Jesus work around us. To remind our brothers and sisters of the miracles that happen in His name each and every day!

Finally, in Adoring worship.

The reaction of the magi. The desire to lay at the feet of Jesus Christ and offer the greatest gifts we can muster. 

Gold – the gift of a King. It does us great service to remember that Jesus is our King and that we must submit to Him before He can be our friend. We submit in our baptism, we submit to Him in prayer, we submit our lives to Him each day we wake when we say the Our Father. Then, and only then, are we able to see Him as friend, as counsellor, as the One who lifts and saves us.

Frankincense, the gift of a Priest. The work of a Priest is to build a bridge between men and God. That’s what the word Priest means in Latin – Pontifex, bridge builder. 

This is what Jesus did in being born amongst us and what He continues to do each time He is reborn inside and around us. He opens the way to God, he made – and continues to make it possible – to enter into the very presence of God. 

Myrrh – the gift of one who is to die. Jesus came into the world to die. He came into the world to live for men and women and in the end to die for us and for our sins so that we may be saved in eternal life.

Fellow Christians. It is our job to come before Jesus Christ in adoring worship. It is our job to bring before Him the greatest gifts we can give. 

The gifts of submission, the gifts of bringing others across the bridge that He has built for us, the gift of understanding that our sins are forgiven, and that anyone we bring to Him will also be forgiven and given a place in heaven. 

How do we react to the birth of Jesus Christ, not just in that stable two thousand years ago. But today and every day we wake?

Leave here today asking that question. Perhaps write it down on a note next to your bed so you wake up each day and ask that question. 

How do I react to Jesus Christ born in me today? 

When you get angry and upset in the world, ask the question, how do I react to Jesus Christ born in me today?

When you find yourself indifferent about coming to church or praying, ask the question, how do I react to Jesus Christ born in me today?

When you come to church, to offer praise and worship, ask the question, how do I react to Jesus Christ born in me today? 

Ask it just as you receive the body and blood of Christ at mass – then return to your seat and LISTEN, listen to what God tells you, listen to what Jesus whispers in your ear. 

Amen.

In the name of the Father, and of the son and of the holy spirit, amen.

Our Gospel this morning speaks of a mother’s unwavering faith in her meeting with Jesus. It has important lessons to teach us – as all encounters with Jesus do – a lesson about persistence, about humility, and about the amazing power of our own faith.

We start with Jesus withdrawing to Tyre and Sidon. Jesus has just fed the five thousand, healed the sick in Gennesaret, and mourned the death of John the Baptist. 

He appears to be – quite understandably – tired and fed up. His manner could even be described as grumpy. He has come away from the big Jewish towns and cities and come to a non-Jewish area where perhaps he feels he may have some peace to process all that has just happened to him and as we turn to the rest of Matthew – face his questioning, trial and execution. 

But as ever, this episode is deliberate – Jesus is teaching us something quite important – even when he is tired, grumpy and fed up – a lesson for me in and of itself!

When the lady – a Gentile, a non-Jewish person – approaches Jesus she is desperate. Her daughter is being tormented by evil and she pleads with Jesus for mercy. 

The disciples respond by asking Jesus to send her away – ‘she is crying out after us!’ They are tired as well. They seem to be embarrassed and I’m sure they were looking forward to a rest as much as Jesus was.

…and this is what Jesus was waiting for. A moment to teach his disciples – and us – about the width of God’s mercy. He speaks to an inner thought that he knows all his disciples carry – ‘I am here for the lost sheep of Israel’. 

In other words – Jesus says that he is here purely to care for the Jewish people – all those who were born Jewish but who have wandered away from the Law.

The disciples must have had a moment… hang on… look at this poor woman who needs your help – and we know you can help… and that is the moment Jesus is waiting for. 

As soon as he says this the woman falls to her knees in front of Jesus and cries out, ‘Lord, help me!’.

She goes on, ‘Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the master’s table’. 

With this simple exchange she has demonstrated her FAITH. She has demonstrated that Jesus is not just for the Jewish people but for all with faith! She has acknowledged Jesus divine authority and power – even in the face of direct pressure to say or do otherwise.

What an amazing woman! What an amazing faith! To not simply accept what is before her – but driven by LOVE for her daughter to kneel before Jesus and seek his mercy and Love in return – KNOWING that it will come. WHAT FAITH!

It is this faith that Jesus responds to – and here is the lesson for his disciples – and for us – it is our FAITH that comes from LOVE that God will always respond to. 

Jesus grants the woman’s request, and her daughter is immediately healed. 

There are four aspects of this encounter that we can learn from.

1 – Persistence in prayer

The woman did not give up at the first rebuttal – even though that rebuttal was so strong. Even when it feels our prayers go unanswered, we must continue to pray with patience and determination.

2 – Humility

Despite her pride and discouragement and the eyes of the disciples upon her – the woman kneels before Jesus – submitting herself to his divine authority. Her humility opens the door for a powerful exchange with Jesus. We must approach Jesus with the same humility in our prayer and here at mass.

3 – Faith

We learn that Jesus love, mercy and healing is not simply for one group of people – but for all. We need to consider our reactions when people reach out to us for help – do we send them away or dismiss them because they’re not one of us? Do we say that because you’re not Christian we can’t help you? Or do we do all we can to heal them and provide them with hope and love – and from that love the greatest gift we can give – FAITH in Jesus. 

4 – Faith that moves mountains

Jesus describes the woman’s faith as ‘great’. Her unwavering belief in Jesus’ ability to heal her daughter and in who Jesus is shows us that a deep and genuine faith can move any mountain, can attack any obstacle in our life. 

Our faith must be persistant, humble, and deeply trusting in Jesus. 

As we approach the altar today we should pray for a faith that is unyielding, a faith that is willing to approach Jesus with boldness and humility, and a faith that recognizes the power of God’s grace to transform even the most difficult circumstances.

May we develop a faith that not only receives but also brings healing and restoration to our lives and the lives of those around us. 

And as we leave today, may the story of the Canaanite woman guide us in developing a faith that truly moves mountains. Amen.

The Transformational Power of the Transfiguration

Matthew 17:1-9

Good morning everyone. Today, we celebrate the feast of The Transfiguration. The moment that Jesus ascends the mountain, and his very physical presence is changed in front of his disciples. The moment God speaks to Jesus disciples and tells them exactly who He is. 

It is both a profoundly symbolic event AND a miracle so awesome that it reverberates through history to us and calls on US to be transfigured.

Let’s first deal with where this miracle happens. I aways tell you to pay attention to the geography of the Gospels – where things happen – because understanding that can often open new doors to understanding why they’re happening. 

In Matthew we see Jesus’ transfiguration on a mountaintop. Not just a mountaintop – but a high mountaintop. 

A pinnacle. In fact a pivotal pinnacle! Try saying that fast three times! This is the moment where we see a shift in Jesus’ ministry here on earth. His divinity shines forth with quite literal radiant glory. There’s no allegory here, no story, no teaching to be interpreted – Jesus’ face shone like the sun and his clothes became as white as the light. It must have been a sight to behold… it must have been breath taking… especially after a long walk, a long journey to this very high mountaintop. 

That journey remains the same for us today – we walk in the footsteps of the disciples. We journey through our daily lives and attempt to engage with Jesus – our mountaintop is coming here to mass and we are transformed by it. Our journey to the mountaintop can be difficult and fraught – but once we’re here – we can allow ourselves to be transfigured by the radiant glory of Jesus in the body and blood of the eucharist. 

We climb our own mountain to meet Jesus and in meeting Him we discover something important… Jesus is not simply a man who teaches some helpful ideas… no – he is the Son of God.

The earth-shattering revelation of Jesus’ divinity in our Gospel today reinforces the truth that Jesus is not just a great teacher or prophet but the very incarnation of God’s LOVE and GRACE. 

This transformation shows us that true change and growth come from encountering the divine and allowing it to radiate through our lives. Not just here in church on a Sunday – but every single day. 

The appearance of Moses and Elijah talking with Jesus on the mountaintop holds profound significance. Moses represents the Law, while Elijah represents the Prophets – together, they encompass the entire Old Testament. This connection emphasizes the continuity between the old covenant and the new covenant in Jesus. The Transfiguration underscores that Jesus fulfils the Law and the Prophets and stands as the culmination of God’s plan. 

The transfiguration is showing us that Jesus encompasses all, that he has always been, that he will always be, and that he should be the centre of our lives, our study, our faith, and the basis from which we live in the world around us. 

Amid the physical miracles of Jesus shining brightly and the appearance of Moses and Elijah a voice is heard… “This is my Son, the Beloved; he enjoys my favour. Listen to him!”

This message roars through history to us this morning. We are called not only to marvel at Jesus’ divine nature but to heed what he teaches us, what he gives us, to listen and to obey. 

What does Jesus teach us? What does he give us? What does he ask us to do? 

He asks us to repent, to love, to forgive, to serve and to do so unconditionally.

The Transfiguration is more than a historical event; it is a living message that reverberates through time and speaks to the depths of our souls. Just as Peter, James, and John were transformed by their encounter with the transfigured Jesus, we too are invited to allow Jesus’ light to shine in and through us. 

So, let’s ascend our own mountaintops, seek God’s presence, and be open to the transformation He offers in our daily lives. 

As we leave this place today, may we carry the radiance of the transfigured Jesus into the world, reflecting His love, grace, and truth in all we do.

Amen.

Matthew 13:1-23

[automatically transcribed]

There are many ways that you can help pull rocks out of the soil. Which one is God calling you to?

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Please sit.

Now, I dare say everybody in church today has heard the parable of the Sower. It’s one of those wonderful parables that we teach in Sunday school because it’s so easy to teach, there are such good colouring in drawings you can do with it birds picking up seed and things being scattered everywhere. And often we only hear the short version of this piece of scripture. We only ever hear the parable. What we don’t hear is the rest of the piece of scripture where Jesus is explaining to the disciples why he teaches in this way.

And I think that is more important for us to hear than the parable itself. The parable, if we’re not careful, gives us an excuse to say, oh well, things go out and sometimes they’ll work and sometimes they won’t. Every single one of us is a sower of the seeds of our faith in other people.

I’m not the Sower, Jesus isn’t the Sower. We are all sowers of the faith in other people.

Every single one of us has a responsibility to plant that seed in somebody else. They may come to Jesus Christ and to know his love and to know his care and to know his healing, as he talks about here in the Gospel of Matthew. But if we only pay attention to the first part of this Gospel, to the Sowing, it is easy for us to disregard that responsibility. We can say, well, people know I come to church. People know that I’m a Christian, I’ve talked about Jesus, but that seed must have fallen on the rocky ground or it’s fallen on the edge of the path, or it’s fallen in thorns.

It’s an excuse to say, well, these things happen. And when the time is right, that seed will plant in that person.

Now, if we didn’t read the second part of this scripture, that’s where we would finish off. We would think, let’s go look for the places where I can sow good seeds. Let’s go look for the good field, let’s go look for the good soil. And where there is good soil, that’s where we’ll plant. We’ll go to the places where people are ready to hear the message of Jesus Christ.

I don’t know about you. How many of you have tried to grow vegetables in your garden? I have. And you don’t just go out into your garden and put a seed in and kind of hope that it works. Even in good soil, you have to turn the soil over.

You have to kind of get the right nutrients in it. You have to dig the hole to the right depth. And then you plant the seed and then you care for it and it grows. Good soil doesn’t just happen. Good soil requires preparation.

Happy are you with ears to hear and eyes to see. Jesus is saying, Listen, you are the disciples, you are the good soil. You already know the story of Jesus Christ. Your hearts are open. We need to help the people who are on the rocky path, who are in the weeds, who are in the thistles, come to know us.

And the way to do that is to start to prepare the soil. It’s to start to prepare people’s hearts. It’s start to prepare people’s minds so they are ready to receive the seeds that it may grow in them. We don’t say, oh, we’re just a sower, and we throw our seeds and wherever they fall, they go, no. Jesus says, we have to prepare the soil.

We have to prepare people’s hearts. And my gosh, this prophecy from Isaiah that Jesus quotes, I mean, Jesus quotes scripture all the time, but this prophecy from Isaiah, could it not be about our time today? Could it not be?

“For the hearts of this nation have grown coarse, their ears are dull of hearing and they have shut their eyes for they fear, they fear they should see with their eyes, hear with their eyes, understand with their heart and be converted.”

Isaiah is speaking across the centuries into our time, as he was in Jesus time. People who do not come to church, who do not call them Christians, who do not call themselves Christians, who do not want to hear the word of Jesus, put their fingers in their ears and go, la la, I don’t want to know, they’ll put up lots of defences against it. And so Jesus says, this is why I teach in parables, because parables have a way of preparing the soil, of preparing people’s hearts ready to receive the message of the good news. Stories have a way of breaking down those things in society that get in the way of us learning about Jesus. We have to remember that we have already had our hearts opened, we have already accepted Jesus Christ, we are already open to hearing what he has to teach us.

But people in the rest of the world are not. And in fact, that language will result in the shutters coming down if we go out into the world and we start using language like, the Holy Spirit told me to come and speak to you today, it’s brilliant language, and sometimes that will land in exactly the right place. But more often than not, if you just speak to the person who stood in the queue in McDonald’s next to you and say, the Holy Spirit has told me to come and speak to you, they’re going to tell you to sling your hook.

So we have to find ways of speaking to people, of preparing the soil so that they can hear the good news of Jesus Christ. And every single one of us has to discern how we do that.

Now, we do that as a church and we give you some ways that you can do that. Thursday evenings are our way of preparing the soil of the people who live in this parish to hear the good news about Jesus Christ. Once a month, we have the new motorbike club.

People who have never thought of coming to church, who find the idea of coming to church, who find the idea of speaking about Jesus really odd, they just don’t get it. But they come that one Thursday a month and we had it on Thursday, and they bring their bikes into church and they take a photograph and they see the font and they say, what’s this? And I explain to them what it is and they go, I never knew that. Or they’ll say, Why are the candles in front of these statues? And they didn’t know that.

Now, the aim of that isn’t to convert people and bring them to Jesus Christ in one; kind of like they’re suddenly going to come and say, I’m a Christian! The point of that is to prepare the soil so that in the right moment that seed can be planted and grown. Thursday fun and fellowship, which is going to run on other Thursday evenings, is about saying, come and find a friendly, a warm, a welcoming place. Come and play some board games, get to know the people who live around you. It’s a community space and questions will start to come up and we’ll answer those questions and we’re preparing that soil.

Then when the sower does come, when the sower comes and plants that seed, then the soil is ready to receive it and it will grow.

Now, that is a very long way and a quite long sermon of me saying to you, we have to work on the soil. It’s all very well to go out and to give people a Bible and say, come and know Jesus Christ and to use all the language that we know, but before we do that, we have to prepare the soil. You don’t need any special qualifications to do it. You don’t need any special training to do it. In fact, Jesus makes this point over and over again.

Children are often the best way those innocent people of heart are often the best way of bringing people and preparing the soil, because it is the conversations that spring off that preparation that result in amazing things.

I’ll use the motorbike meet as an example. Again, we had about 60 people here on Thursday evening of one sort to another. In total, we had about 20 motorbikes through the church, inside and outside. And every single one of those people took a photograph of their motorbike underneath the stained glass window and a photograph of some chaps with their helmet at the baptismal font and next to the and those photographs got put onto Facebook and they got put onto Instagram, and they got put on Twitter and shared to an enormous number of people.

And in doing that, we’ve taken a rocky bit of ground and we’ve pulled some of the rocks out. We’ve made that ground a little bit better able to receive the seed of Jesus Christ. Every time that happens, we pull a rock out of the ground. It is hard work, but if we all go to the field and we all pull a rock out, before you know it, we will have a beautiful field ready for people to hear about Jesus.

So you can talk to the person in the queue in McDonald’s, or you can come and help make coffees or do burgers on a Thursday night. Or you can come and play Snakes and Ladders on a Thursday at Fun and Fellowship.

There are many ways that you can help pull rocks out of the soil. Which one is God calling you to? Amen?

Jeremiah 20:10-13, Psalm 68(69):8-10,14,17,33-35, Romans 5:12-15, Matthew 10:26-33

We have a message to proclaim as Christians and we must do it with all our hearts no matter the things that come our way as stumbling blocks

We have a message to proclaim as Christians and we must do it with all our hearts no matter the things that come our way as stumbling blocks, we must stay focused and present the message as it has been handed over to us. Jeremiah was being persecuted for delivering the message of God and this is because most of the people were not happy with the message Jeremiah was propagating. Beloved in Christ our core mandate as Christians is to win souls for Christ, and this can only be done by first accepting the message ourselves and be ready no matter the opposition to deliver it so that man will be saved. 

The world will not be happy with us so they will do everything possible to thwart our resolve to share the good news to them. This is because it is not everybody who would like to hear the message and it is not everybody who would like to change his or her ways. We all have been called and we must be ready to disciple others so that together many shall be won for Christ because man is sinful. 

Humans by nature are sinful therefore we must be saved from it because “the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:23). We have the duty therefore as Christians to present the Light to the world so that all will be saved from eternal damnation. This duty is not going to be easy at all and we must be ready and prepared because we will be persecuted.

As we go out to proclaim the Christ to the world, some people may not see our relevance or importance because they see the message we carry as a threat and will do everything to stop it. Attacks and terror will come from all directions and infact some of our friends will sit back and watch to see our fall. People will be watching to see us make mistakes and use it against us. Why will they do this? Because we have decided to be on the side of God which is the truth. In all this we may think we are alone, but one thing is sure beloved in Christ we are certainly not alone. The Lord of Host is on our side and our opponents will stumble, those who seek our downfall and disgrace will be disappointed because we serve a living God. Deuteronomy 32:35 says, “Vengeance is mine, and recompense, for the time when their foot shall slip; for the day of their calamity is at hand, and their doom comes swiftly.” In all this God wants us to leave everything to him lets just present our case to God and allow him to have his way. “Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.” (1 John 4:4).

Dear people of God being a disciple of the Lord is not easy if it were so everybody would have been a Christian. The task is not and will never be an easy one. The persecutions may come in different forms, it may come from our homes, friends, people we love so much, our families, and even from the church, but we should not throw in the towel but rely on the power of God to take us through it. Our God will always deliver the soul of the needy from the hands of evil men, so let us all be encouraged it may be that we have been waiting for the hand of God to heal us, deliver us from a personal problem, maybe it is about a lifestyle that you are not proud of, whatever it is that can be seen as our share in our struggles as disciples of Christ, let us still hope in the Lord and he will make all things beautiful.

We have all been sent out and the message of Jesus to us is “do not be afraid”, everything that is now covered will be uncovered and everything now hidden will be made clear”. The difficulties we go through in doing the work of God is enormous, but he assures us that we should not be afraid. We are admonished in 2 Timothy 1:7-8 “For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control. Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God,”. 

God will make our way clear; he will open our eyes to see things that are hidden, things shrouded in secrecy and all our fears will be gone. He will reveal to us wonderful things that will beat our imagination, things that we have been yearning to see for a long time. This will help allay our fears. Let us not be afraid and move out there and talk to people about Jesus, our experience with him since we became Christians because we have been sent to proclaim the message to the world. He has also assured us of his protection, guidance and how we are important to him. We are worth more than hundreds of sparrows so Almighty God will take care of us, and we must present the unadulterated gospel to the world. AMEN 

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Sheep are amazing creatures. Now, I’m sure as a Welshman, you would expect me to say that the Welsh and sheep have a long affinity with one another; and to play up to that stereotype I used to look after sheep. When I was 13 and 14, I used to go andwork in the spring on my cousin’s farm on the Hafod on the side of the mountain. And I couldn’t go very much in the spring because I was in school, so I never really got to see the lambs. But by the time the summer holidays had come around and I was more available, then I had a certain job with the lambs that involved elastic bands and the poor lambs having bits taken off them.

But I knew sheep and I got to spend a lot of time with them. And by the end of the summer holidays, I would smell of sheep. It was very clear what I’d spent my summers doing. And by the end of the summer, the sheep knew me. They knew because I smelt of them when I walked into the barn that they were fine.

They knew the sound of my voice, they knew the way that I walked. So when I first started in that farm at the start of the summer, they would skit away from me. They would try to be as far away from me as possible. They would run away. But by the end of the summer, because they knew, although I was messing around with elastic bands and bits that were dangling off them, they knew that they were going to get food.

And me being a big old softie, they also knew they were going to get lots of cuddles. So by the end of the summer, they knew me very well and they would run and greet me.

Now, Jesus uses the image of a shepherd and of sheep a lot and he uses it because it is written through scripture large, the scripture that Jesus knew in the Old Testament, as we call it, you hear the image of the shepherd and of sheep so often. And part of the reason for that is because Judea and Galilee, in the area where Jesus was preaching, teaching and living, sheep were ideal animals. And often you would have mixed herds of sheep and of goats.

And indeed, pastor is the Latin word for shepherd. Our roots go all the way back to those shepherds on the sides of those mountains. Now, in the Holy Land, when you are a shepherd and when you’re looking after sheep, unlike in the west, you’re looking after the sheep for their wool, not for their meat. And so you get to know the sheep over a very long period of time. I’m sure you’ll remember when I last preached on this part of John and the shepherd, I told you that the crook, the crook that the shepherd carries isn’t a weapon, and whilst it is there to rescue sheep and pull them in line, it is predominantly there for the shepherd to lean on, to rest on when he stood in the field, when he first comes into a flock, so that the sheep can come up to him and learn what he smells like and learn who he is. And that can take three or four days.

So being a shepherd in the Holy Land is no easy task. It’s very different to the way that we understand looking Easter sheep. If you’re a shepherd in the Middle East and it’s still the same today, life is very, very hard.

There’s no time off, there’s no rest, there are no walls or fences. During the day, the sheep are constantly wandering off, because as much as I love sheep, I do have to say they can be incredibly stupid animals and will happily drop themselves over the edge of a cliff or get their heads stuck in something. He’s also there to make sure that the sheep do not get attacked, attacked by wolves and attacked by robbers. So the shepherd in the Middle East is a job that never gives up. It is a job of protection, it is a job of care and it is a job of love.

And so it’s not something that you take up lightly as a job. You cannot be a shepherd in the Middle East unless you do it to 100% of your ability, because unless you give it everything that you are, you are going to lose sheep. They are going to walk off the edge of a cliff, they are going to get themselves stuck in a ravine, or a wolf will come and devour the flock. And so the shepherd is committed. All of who he is is invested in that role of being a shepherd.

But doesn’t just do it on his own. He’s got certain tools. He’s got the crook for leaning on and he’s also got it there for protection and for rescue. Importantly, he never used a crook to beat off animals. He had a proper little cludgel for doing that.

That’s not what the crook was for. But as well as being something to rest on and to guide the sheep, the crook was also used in the evenings. So in the evening in the Middle East, you bring your flock together and when you’re out in the mountains, you put them into a sheepfold. That’s often just an area with a low stone wall that will keep out the wolves. And there is a sheep gate, and through the gate the sheep go into the sheepfold and the shepherd will sleep in that entrance.

This is what Jesus is talking about in this gospel. And when he was preaching that to the people around him, people understood exactly what he meant. Ah, Jesus is in the gate, he is protecting the flock. People would have understand that as they get to the sheepfold in the evening, the shepherd takes his crook and he puts it across the entrance into the sheepfold to slow the sheep down. So that one sheep goes in at a time and it goes under the crook and it allows the shepherd to check that the sheep is healthy and is safe and hasn’t caught any injuries in the day.

So Jesus is checking us as we come in to the sheepfold, as we pass through that gate under his crook to be checked. And then the shepherd will sleep in the gateway protecting his flock. And let me tell you, nothing gets past that shepherd. And the sheep know. They learn that they are safe and they can hear the sounds of their shepherd.

They can hear his breathing. And just like those sheep knew that it was me coming into the barn, they knew who it was at the gate, we too see that in Jesus. Over time, we get to learn how Jesus acts in our lives and we should pay attention to how he acts in our lives, so that we too can take that comfort of being safe in the sheepfold. But we, just like the sheep in the sheepfold in the Middle East, are difficult to look after.

Let me tell you a story about Moses. It’s one of my favourite stories and I tend to tell it to young men when I’m preaching in schools. And it is the legend of Moses when he was a shepherd, when he went off after the burning bush and he was looking after the sheep in the wilderness away from home. And the legend goes that he was looking after the sheep and one of the kids ran away. And Moses was really irritated by this kid that had run away.

He was quite upset and angry about it and he went chasing after it. For goodness sake, haven’t I got enough to be doing without chasing after this stupid goat? And when he catches up with a goat, when he catches up with this kid, it’s at the water drinking. And Moses says, Ah, you ran away because you were thirsty. And he picks the kid up and he carries the kid back to the flock.

That is how Jesus is with us as a good shepherd. We might do something wrong, but Jesus can see why we’ve walked down that path and he will pick us up and bring us back to the flock. It speaks to the character of a person, how we react when we discover those things. One of the ways that we see it in the gospel and we hear that notion of a shepherd knows his flock and the flock knows him.

So another little example of how those things work together in the Middle East. If the weather comes in and it’s raining and the shepherds will all head into a cave and you might have three or four different flocks in that cave all mixed up together. Now, here in the west, if that were to happen, we’d have to take each sheep out, look at its ID number, get the bit of paper and go, oh, that’s Mr. Jones. Look at the next sheep and go, look at the number and go, oh, that’s Mr. Evans.

And then look at the next one and go through all of the farmers and separate them out like that. But in the Middle East, the shepherds can just stand outside the cave and call their sheep. And the sheep know them so well that they will come running to their shepherd.

Shepherd and flock together, trusting each other, knowing each other over a long period of time. It is a relationship that takes time to develop. Jesus knows us, and he has known us since we were knitted together in our mother’s womb. We must trust him. We must come into his fold for protection and know that he will carry us when we run off.

Now, that’s not just Jesus who has that responsibility, but all of us have that responsibility. All of us are shepherds to our own flocks. It is very easy to abrogate, to get rid of our responsibility as a shepherd and say, ah, Jesus is our shepherd. I give everything to Jesus. Brilliant.

It’s a good start. Or to say, Father Matthew is my shepherd. I don’t have to worry about telling people about Jesus or Father Josiah is my shepherd. I do not need to worry about caring for people. That is the shepherd’s job.

But that is not true and that is not what Jesus teaches us. We are all shepherds to our own flocks, our families, our friends, people that we see at the bus stop regularly, we are shepherds to those people. And through imitating Jesus, through being the shepherd, and hopefully through imitating Father Josiah and I as shepherds, hopefully we are providing you the example of how to be a shepherd to your own flocks. And then it is up to you to bring your flock into the sheepfold here at St. Anslem’s, we are the sheepfold here in church together on a Sunday, we have come through the door and we are protected and cared for and are fed, and we will receive what we need to be sent out into the world.

People enter this sheetfold under the crook of Jesus. When we enter, he cheques us to make sure that we are okay, that we haven’t picked up any injuries that week, and we can come to Him for healing our flock. I am very happy to say here at St. Anselm is growing as we bring more and more people into Jesus care and protection.

More people in Hayes know the love and protection of Jesus in this sheephold because each and one of us cares for our own small flock and then brings that flock into the safety of this place. And the more that that flock grows, the more people we bring to Jesus, the stronger we are and the better able we are to defeat attackers the stronger the flock, the stronger each and every one of us is, the better able we are to reject evil in the world. The bigger we are and the stronger we are, the more people we are able to bring into the sheep fault. Jesus is the good shepherd and so are you.

Bring your sheep here, find the lost kid and carry them into the sheepfold where they may know the love and care of God. Amen.