Category: General Sermons (page 2 of 2)

Just before Christmas an American judge ruled that the theory of intelligent design (such as a Creator God) of Creation is based on a supernatural explanation for natural phenomena, and cannot be taught as part of a high school science curriculum. The ruling is part of a perennial debate as to whether the biblical account of Creation in Genesis 1 is science, or something else.

Those who look to Genesis 1 for a scientific account on Creation point to the evolutionary nature of that account. From a formless void there emerges sequentially over six “days” light and darkness, the heavens, land and sea, vegetation, sun, moon and stars, living creatures and finally human beings. This is not strictly in line with the scientific order of evolution, but is evolutionary in concept. The parallel with science is striking, yet the biblical story-tellers of 3,500 years could not have a knowledge of science equal to our own. Nor was science their intention in crafting the Creation story.

Taking another approach, Archbishop James Ussher of Armagh, a theologian of note in the 17^th century, calculated from an historical perspective that the world was created in 4004BC. Some old bibles have this and subsequent dates appended in the notes. It is unlikely that the Archbishop, armed with today’s knowledge, would make such a calculation.

Others argue that the Bible must be right in postulating God as Creator, for how else could one explain some of the many unanswered questions we have about the beginnings of the universe. The problem with this “God of the gaps” argument is that as science advances and more answers are found, the dependence on God as the stop-gap solution diminishes.

These and other such arguments that seek to prove that the writers of Genesis provide us with a scientific or historical account of Creation make a fundamental category mistake. They miss the real purpose of the Creation story which is not history or science, but theology. The story conveys the Hebrew understanding of God’s relationship with the created order, and with humankind. It provides us with a world-view as to how we should live in relationship to God, other people, and Earth itself.

All cultures have their stories about the origins of life. Maori have the story of Rangi-nui, the sky father, and Papatuanuku, the earth mother. The Maori story is no more science or history than is the biblical story of Genesis 1. But both have similar themes in the sacredness of nature, and the consequent reverence we should have for people, all life forms and Earth itself.

The Judaeo-Christian story of Creation from Genesis 1 tells us several key things :

1. The whole of Creation is alive with the active and life-giving presence of God (Genesis 1.2 : “The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters”)
2. The Earth is God’s gift to us, and it is good (Gen 1.31 : “God saw everything he had made, and it was very good”)
3. We live in relationship with Creation, respecting each person and part as created by God. It is from this concept of relationship that all our efforts for justice, peace and environmental conservation stem : this is not merely a matter of ethics, but an expression of our deep relational connection with all life.
4. At the heart of our being is our core relationship with God : it is because we see God as the source of all life that we regard all life as sacred and worthy of respect (“When we see God as our father and mother, we see every other person and part as our brother and sister”).
5. Having God at the centre of life prevents us from acting selfishly and exploitatively towards others or to the Earth itself.

Science is science, and theology is theology : they are not competing truths, but complementary. Science tells us how the world was made. Theology gives us a world-view which tells us how we should understand the world, and how we should live within it.

On January 1 we celebrate the feast of the circumcision of Jesus, more often known today as the naming of Jesus. It is a day of dedication, the 8^th day following a birth according to Jewish custom. The name “Jesus” means salvation – a Latin word meaning wholeness in every aspect of life, wholeness because as Jesus was dedicated to God, so we too dedicate our lives afresh to God for the year that lies ahead.

Our reflections about Creation are very relevant to a feast of dedication. The story of Creation provides us with this picture of a life-giving and divine spirit at the heart of all life. It instils within us a profound sense of the gift and the goodness of God in Creation and calls forth from us a song of praise and celebration. In affirming the integrity and God-given nature of all people, other species on Earth, and the Earth itself, it calls us to a life characterised by love and compassion for all living things, and leads us into ministries of justice, peace and caring for the environment.

And by having God at the centre of our life, we are not only sustained personally by the divine love and power, but we are prevented from the self-seeking that leads to power over others and abuse of the Earth’s resources.

Sermon at Holy Trinity Cathedral, Auckland;  17 March 2002

A few days ago I had a surprise visit from a friend of a friend from 35 years ago. It took me back to the mid-60s when I was first ordained and curate at Papakura. It was a time in my life when I was very depressed as I wrestled with faith, ministry, future, life.

The charismatic movement was strong, and I sought a pentecostal experience of the Spirit to help me, but never received one. My unexpected visitor had had such an experience and left the Anglican Church to set up a pentecostal fellowship which he and his wife have run to good effect for the years since.

He came to share his experience with me and to express his concern that the Anglican bishops seemed to lack any passion in their ministry. He saw them as kind and loving people but not drenched with the Spirit so as to inspire their flock. He said he would like to pray for the bishops.

I was a little taken aback. It reminded me of 35 years ago when there was a distinct feeling that there were some who had received the Spirit and had a true relationship with God, while others were hovering around the edge and needed the pentecostal experience to be truly Christian.

I shared with my friend my own pilgrimage in faith since that time, especially my time in New York (‘68-’70) which had brought me face to face with many of the key issues of life in a global community : racism, poverty, justice, peace. I was forced to rethink my theology and my concepts of the Church, mission, ministry, and my own personal vocation.

Those two years laid the foundation for everything I have done in ministry ever since. In retrospect, had I been drenched with the Spirit at Papakura in the mid-60s I never would have been forced to wrestle with the questions that changed my life and ministry. A pentecostal experience would have diverted me from that task, and I believe that God denied me that in order to drive me on to much larger visions of the divine purpose in the world, and the role God wanted me to play within it. I am profoundly grateful for the way my life and ministry has been shaped.

What I have learned in a lifetime’s pilgrimage is that God calls each of us in different ways, gifts us with different gifts and experiences, and sets us down in different patches of the vineyard to exercise the vocation which is uniquely shaped for each individual. On this basis my friend and I prayed together, and hopefully rejoiced equally in the way God has worked in our lives

I was glad my friend visited. It is always good for us to be challenged about our faith, and how closely we walk with God in daily life. It is easy for the Church to be no more than just another organisation we belong to. Far from seeing ourselves as members of the Body of Christ whose lives are driven by the desire to serve God in every encounter and moment, we rank the Church along with the golf club, Rotary, office social club, or the graduates association. We may not be drenched with pentecostal passion, but if we are not deep down passionate about our calling as disciples of Jesus Christ we will be no more than salt that has lost its saltiness, no longer able to make a difference for God.

The Presbyterian Church has the best logo of any church I have ever seen. It is the image of the burning bush that Moses encountered at Sinai, with the words in Latin : nec tamen consumebatur, “it was not consumed”. Exodus 3.2 : “The Lord appeared to Moses in a flame of fire out of a bush; and Moses looked and saw that the bush was burning but was not consumed” – a powerful image of the energy of God which is never exhausted, and that all of us as we are filled with that energy gain the spiritual strength to go out and change the world.

An American Franciscan woman, Sister Joan Puls, uses that image to make the point that every bush in life is burning since God shines through the smallest and simplest of human experiences. All of life is sacrament. Sister Joan writes : “Spirituality embraces all of life, breathes through its homely details and its noble intentions. It is at the heart of our efforts to be human….It is the voice of our prayer and the progress of our pilgrimage towards peace. It is the silence of our struggles and the echo of our cry for justice.”

Many will know the words of Dag Hammarskjold, second Secretary-General of the United Nations:

I don’t know who or what put the question. I don’t know when it was put. I don’t even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer Yes to Someone, or Something, and from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life, in self-surrender, had a goal.[1]

Filled with that power Moses went to Pharaoh to struggle for justice and for the liberation of his people from slavery in Egypt. In the same power he led them for 40 years in the desert with no other guide than his God who was to them as fire by night and light by day. Spirituality is directly linked with the quest for freedom for the enslaved and justice for the oppressed.

Today’s first reading from Ezekiel 37 has the equally powerful story of Ezekiel in the valley of the dry bones, and hearing the voice of God asking : “Mortal man, can these bones live?” Sometimes we look around at the Church and it seems like a valley of dry bones from which the life of God has departed. But God says “I will cause my breath/spirit to enter you and you shall live.” And as Ezekiel prophesied there was a rattling sound, bone came together with bone. God covered them with flesh and put skin upon them, but there was no breath in them. So Ezekiel prophesied again and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood on their feet, and there were enough of them to form an army.

Is it too much to say that this is increasingly the experience of this congregation in recent months? In place of a spirit of complaint I detect a different spirit – the spirit of God at work bringing reconciliation and a new attitude of working together for the common good, and the building of God’s kingdom. As we come up to Palm Sunday, Holy Week, Good Friday and Easter we might use this time for deepening our walk with Christ and with each other, so that filled with God’s spirit we may do mighty things for God.

“Spirituality”, as Sister Joan Puls says, “is the degree of our harmony with all that is within and without us… We become spiritual when we discern the sounds of the earth, recognise signs of pending destruction, speak the words of blessing and reconciliation. We become spiritual when we know ourselves as potential sisters and brothers of everything and everyone who has lived.”

Such spirituality is a goal worthy of our best endeavours.

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[1] Markings, Faber & Faber, 1963.