Sermon by Fr Peter Wolton, United Benefice of Holland Park, Sunday 13 August 2017, Trinity 9
Sermon by Fr Peter Wolton, United Benefice of Holland Park, Sunday 13 August 2017, Trinity 9
According to
newspaper headlines, it’s been a good week for the manufacturers of one
commodity. Presidents Kim of North Korea and Trump have been busy. Here in the
Royal Borough, the commodity is not in short supply as nearby residents of
Grenfell Tower worry that their voice will not be heard in the forthcoming
enquiry and councillors and borough employees wonder how their actions will be
assessed.
The
commodity is of course fear – this corrosive and sapping state of mind.
As you know,
the church continues to be quietly active, working to lift the climate of fear.
Our Bishop Graham has suggested that a panel reflecting the diversity of the
community could “represent both the local community and win their confidence,
and … can bring the perspectives of a wider range of our society, socially and
ethnically, to the important issues the inquiry will examine”.
Our Gospel
reading this Sunday is the miracle of Jesus walking on the water through a
storm on the Lake of Galilee to join the disciples who are cowering in their
boat, (hence our choice of the Turner painting on the service sheet cover, a
ship being tossed in a sea storm). On joining them, he says to them: “Take
heart, it is I, do not be afraid.” The storm has calmed. Fear has subsided.
When the
current Archbishop of Canterbury was enthroned in 2013, he preached on this very
passage from Matthew’s gospel. He finished with these words: "There is
every possible reason for optimism about the future of Christian faith in our
world and in this country. Optimism does not come from us, but because to us
and to all people, Jesus comes and says “Take heart, it is I, do not be
afraid”. We are called to step out of the comfort of our own traditions and
places, and go into the waves, reaching for the hand of Christ. Let us provoke
each other to heed the call of Christ, to be clear in our declaration of
Christ, committed in prayer to Christ, and we will see a world
transformed."
What I want
to do this morning is to explore why this miracle was so significant to St.
Matthew and the disciples and what it means to us today and ask how we can in
the words of Archbishop Justin, be committed in prayer to Christ and provoke
each other to heed the call of Christ?
First, the
significance of the miracle to St. Matthew.
It is easy
for us to view the story of Jesus walking on the water from the position of
post resurrection Christians, by which I mean those who have not seen yet have
believed – those who know that Jesus rose from the dead and was the Son of God.
So we are in
a different boat from the disciples in the Gospel. Their perspective would have
been very different. They had chosen to give up their vocations to follow Jesus
but had yet to understand the true meaning of Jesus’ ministry.
For the
monotheistic Jewish people of Jesus’s time, water and the power of the Creator
God over what he had created, was a major part of the Old Testament. It was God
who had flooded the earth and promised never to do so again. It was God who had
a carved a path through the waters that enabled them to flee to Egypt, The
Psalms also are full of allusions to God’s power over the elements. The best
known is Psalm 107.
23 Some went down to the sea in
ships,
doing business on the mighty waters;
24 they saw the deeds of the Lord,
his wondrous works in the deep.
25 For he commanded and raised the
stormy wind,
which lifted up the waves of the sea.
26 They mounted up to heaven, they
went down to the depths;
their courage melted away in their calamity;
27 they reeled and staggered like
drunkards,
and were at their wits’ end.
28 Then they cried to the Lord in
their trouble,
and he brought them out from their distress;
29 he made the storm be still,
and the waves of the sea were hushed.
The reaction
of the disciples of being in a storm and seeing Jesus working towards them is
understandably one of fear. It is my namesake who reacts first. He jumps over
board and starts to walk towards Jesus; and then the enormity of what he has
done, sinks (I use the word advisably!) sinks in, and Peter’s faith starts to
falter. “Lord save me!” cries Peter and Jesus reaches out his hand and catches
him. “You of little faith, why did you doubt.”
Our passage
ends with the disciples saying “Truly you are the Son of God” their leader who
like the God of the Old Testament has control over the elements, that Jesus was
divine, that he really was the Son of God, that God had taken human flesh. That
is the meaning of the miracle for St. Matthew.
What does
the miracle means to us today and how can we, in the words of Archbishop
Justin, be committed in prayer to Christ and provoke each other to heed the
call of Christ?
On Friday,
the church remembered Clare of Assisi, who was born of a wealthy family and
caught with the joy of St. Francis’ preaching and went on to establish her own
order of contemplatives, the Minoresses, or nuns in the Second order of
Franciscans, or Poor Clares as they became known. And
if you have passed through the Minories in the City of London, you may not know
the name is derived from the former Abbey of the Minoresses of St Mary of the
Order of St Clare, founded in 1294.
Today there
are 20,000 members of this female order across the world. There is a community
in Nottinghamshire at Bulwell and recently when a priest friend of mine asked
one of them to pray for him, they replied “But we have been praying for you for
years.”
There are
few more encouraging things than to be told that we are being prayed for.
Very few of
us will found orders. Or create organisations that will be enduring. But we can
be committed in prayer, praying for each other and the world. And we can
participate in our local church and wider community and deepen our life of
faith and go about our lives strengthened and encouraged by the words “Take
heart, it is I, do not be afraid”. And we can pray for understanding hearts and
show people we come across in daily life that they are valued. And when storms
occur in our lives or in the world, let us recall Jesus reaching out and catching
a faltering Peter.
If we do all
these things and are not afraid to go out of our comfort zones, fear will be on
the back foot and the world will be transformed.