Of floods and rainbows

Lent 1 year B Sermon 

Title slide

In every life… there is a flood…sometimes more than one…
a time of crisis…when it feels like we’re drowning
in despair …or loneliness or tears…

Sometimes we bring these floods on ourselves…
through our own carelessness… or selfishness…
and sometimes the deluge… is entirely outside our control…

Others abuse or abandon or betray us

Or death takes the ones we love

Or as we remembered this week…the destructive forces of the earth’s crust…flood our cities with liquefaction and lost dreams…

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If we’re blessed with loving parents…
when we’re young…those who look after us
will want to protect us from the crises of of life’s floods
as long as they can…

But one day we will find… the waters rising around us…
because these floods are an inevitable part of life…

And when they happen the question arises for us…
what will we cling to…how will we keep our head above water…keep on breathing…what sort of emotional and spiritual life raft…do we have…
where we can find the strength to hold on

One of the privileges of ministry… is that I get to go through these floods with people…death and dying…financial difficulties…relationship problems…

nine years ago right after we called her to  Eldership in this church…Lynda Gregg went through two great floods one after the other…first her brother committed suicide and then a few months later Lynda’s husband Johnny was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumour. Johnny died a year later.

I told her that today I’d be asking her to share how she kept from going under at that time…so Lynda come up here for a moment and lets talk about it.

What did you cling to at the time…

How did you handle doubt and disappointment

Thank you Lynda [Lynda goes back to her seat]

Rainbow slide

We know that the account of Noah’s flood…
is an ancient story shared by the peoples of the middle east. First appearing in the ancient creation myths of Babylon gathered in what they called the Enuma Elish

These stories like their creation poem and their version of the great flood…would have needed careful reinterpretion…
by the Jewish exiles in captivity in Babylon…

in light of what they knew… of a loving a faithful God.

I imagine there were many devastating natural events… floods and earthquakes
which people thought would truly destroy the world they knew. But the stories of the Hebrew people always served to reassure them… the bad times would not last forever …God’s rainbow would remind them God’s promises could be trusted.

Mt Damavand near Tehran in Iran

I imagine the original Babylonian story teller was a mountain climber who lived a few thousand years ago… in what became the Persian Empire

One day in the clear thin air near the top of beautiful
Mt Damavand about 2 hours northeast of Tehran
our ancient climber is kicking little stones off the path

up the mountain as you do… and notices a few cockle shells lying around…Curious…he picks one up….

Shell slide

Holy maloly… the only thing the climber can think of
is that this mountain he’s standing on
has once been underwater! Good grief!

When the mountaineer’s discovery…becomes hot news on the Babylonian bush telegraph…
some explanation has to be found.

Of course they know nothing about the upward movement of the earth’s crust and the grinding of techtonic plates
that causes mountains to form…where once were only shallow seas

our storyteller begins to weave a tale consistent with the regions beliefs  about the god’s…
and their attitudes to human beings.

Gilgamesh slide

And what we know as the
Epic of Gilgamesh is created…

Once upon a time the story goes…the gods found they couldn’t sleep …because of all the noise… created by human beings… so looking down in anger from their lofty heights the gods decide to drown every last human on earth!

But one guy named Utnapishtim is warned by a god who likes him…this god suggest he lies to his neighbours…
so they’ll help him build a boat.

The lie works a treat and finally Utnapishtim is able to bring his family… all their valuables… and many animals onto the boat… to keep them safe when the water starts to rise.

When they rain stops they send out a dove which returns, then a swallow which returns, and finally a raven which does not return…

The survivors make an offering of some wine and a sheep and the gods argue about what to do next. In the end the gods decide to bestow immortality upon Utnapishtim and his wife who become like the gods create fourteen completely brand new human beings to repopulate the earth…

But there’s no reason to suspect this whole catastrophe couldn’t happen again…
so for heaven sake keep the noise down!

Well naturally the exiles from Israel have to come up
with a version of the story which is true to their understanding of a loving God –


who created the earth and all that’s in it…to be good… and wishes no harm to humans and beasts.
 

Ark slide
And this is where Noah comes in…

The ancient Hebrew people also have no idea about the way in mountains are created and how long it takes…

and they do have to acknowledge that there are shells up there on the mountains…

but in their adaption of the story …
it’s human lies and human violence and human greed
that brings God to the end of his tether…

In the Hebrew attempt to understand how sea shells got there…God says decides to start the whole creation project over again with the one righteous man God can find
and his sons and their wives…

secure in their boat…the rains come and the waters rise…
and eventually when the sun starts to shine…they send out a raven which returns, then a dove which returns the second time with an olive branch, and flies away…

Noah and his family make an offering of clean animals and birds…and God makes a covenant with Noah and the animals and promises never to destroy all life again
with such a flood…

Rainbow slide

You see the ancient Hebrew people say…
we don’t know how to explain those sea shells either
except but for a flood …
but you can bet  your boots on one thing…it’s never going to happen again… because of God’s covenant with us!

And the sign of that covenant
the sign of hope we can cling to…
when we fear the worst is upon us…
the sign of hope is the rainbow.

God doesn’t want us to fear him. Yes human beings
continue to be dishonest and violent and greedy…
but we know one thing…for sure…
our God’s promises never fail!

Our God’s promises never fail!  Not only is God with us…God is for us…

Cross and Rainbow

Today you and I live in the Messianic Age…
and we have seen in Jesus Christ…
just how much God loves us…

enough to suffer and die
rather than strike back and destroy us…
when the foulest provocation…the worst pain imaginable
couldn’t make the Son of God retaliate…

and so for us as Christians
the cross is just as much a symbol of hope… as the rainbow.

Signs that give oppressed and suffering people all over the world…the strength to dream…of the Shalom of God.
A time when every tear shall be wiped away there shall be peace and wellbeing for all humankind.

It’s coming is God’s promise and God’s everlasting covenant with every living creature on the earth.

It is this hope to which we cling…
in the floods and the earthquakes of life… [pause]

A hope…which must shape everything we do and say.

This hope is what really matters and the world is waiting to hear it proclaimed in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Mount Iron slide

And here beneath the shadow of Mt Iron
as we journey toward Easter through the forty days of Lent
we enter a time in the church calendar
which calls us to confession and repentance
of every affront to the Shalom of God in our own lives and in the life of our nation

A time to expose our values and our beliefs and our attitudes
to the light of the rainbow and the empty cross…

A time to set things right with God and with others

And in our own turn… to be beacons truth and courage…for our community…to be signs of resurrection life…

living symbols of
God’s promised future… coming toward us.

Transfiguration

Epiphany 7 year B Sermon Mark 9:2-9

Have you ever wanted to freeze time? Make a moment last forever…

Maybe you were in love…maybe you were holding the most beautiful baby you’d ever seen…
maybe you were about to say good-by
to someone you knew you’d never see again…

Remember how you longed to capture the moment … tame it … hang on to it….

Sometimes this happens to us with our spiritual experiences too…our experiences of God…
we have a moment of palpable immersion
into God’s love for us…we feel it…it overwhelms us with beauty and awe…the glory of God seems to shine around us

And the moment passes…you look around and everything appears just as it was before…
only something inside you has changed…

But you want the feeling back…you want to go back to that moment…you want to recapture and re-experience that sensation of high altitude spiritual encounter…

If only you could freeze time…if only you replay the experience at will…but all you can do is remember it…

Transfiguration slide

I think something like that happened to Peter
there on that mountain…with Jesus and the other two disciples…
in the event we call the Transfiguration of Christ.

With the dazzling light…the change in Jesus’ appearance and the arrival of the long dead...in his fright and confusion …
and the rush of adrenaline …in the face of the unimaginable spiritual implications of what he sees and hears…
all Peter can think of… is to freeze it in time…

to make it solid…to build something…
maybe some walls and a roof…

to contain it…to make it permanent…make it last.

I mean wouldn’t you…want to hang on to this? Wouldn’t you think I’m never going to go back to the old me again …I’m never going to doubt again…never going to be afraid...nor deny Jesus…

Now I’ve been to the mountaintop!

But the spiritual impact of that moment doesn’t last for Peter…does it…even the dazzling sight of Jesus transformed in the company of Moses and Elijah…
even the voice of God…proclaiming Jesus identity and authority…doesn’t last with Peter…

He will still go on to fear and betray and cower…
and yes he will doubt…if his performance on the night of Jesus’ arrest is anything to go by…

If only Peter could have frozen time. If only he could have stayed in that place… beyond doubt…

And even though he’d become the rock on whom Jesus would build his church…
even though Peter would stand on the beach before the risen Christ… even though Peter would become the first Bishop of Rome…and a martyr of Christendom…

There will always be moments when Peter’s human failings would get in the road…no matter how high he climbed with Jesus.

fishing slide

And yet…Jesus continues to call him and stick with him
and extend grace and mercy to him…sending out as his disciple…not only to catch people for the kingdom of God…but to feed them and nurture them as their shepherd.

There is no indication that at any time in the gospel story that Peter is able to rise above his humanity – just because he’d had the ultimate peak spiritual experience.

We will never know if Peter ever understood the full impact of what happened right before his eyes although we knew he felt it…as the transfigured Christ met Moses and Elijah…icons of the Law and the Prophets …almighty thunder and the still small voice…

as they…disappear and converge once and for all…
in the transformed and glorious person of Jesus Christ...as he takes on the mantle of Israel…
to bring hope and justice and peace and light to the nations…

Now

Slide words

"This is my beloved Son….listen to him!" [pause…………………..]

Coming down the mountain slide
And just as suddenly as it began…
Peter’s peak experience is over

Slide words

And when they looked around, they saw no one with them anymore, except Jesus.

Blank slide

And then what happens…in the company of Jesus…
they must descend from that rarefied atmosphere…
they must come down the mountain…

and continue with the everyday hard yacka...of bringing in the Messianic Age…announcing the good news…
to the poor and the lame and the blind and the widow and the orphan and the stranger…touching the leper and the unclean…breaking the religious law in favour of God’s Shalom for all people.

They must come down from their high altitude spiritual experience…and most important of all…dang it…

Jesus orders them not to tell anyone one about what went on up there till after he’s risen from the dead. [and Mark tells us they didn’t have a clue what Jesus meant.]

Mountain top slide

And it’s like that for us too isn’t it…like Peter we often think the height of success in our spiritual life are going to be a peak experiences

we look for them sometimes desperately…
in worship…or in our devotional time …

and like Peter …we try to control…
what we have no power to control…
all we can do is be open…to say ‘yes!’

like Peter… we want to freeze time…to pin down concretise…and capture the mystery that is God

But such mountain top experiences are not in our control …we can neither conjure them up in worship
nor in our private devotions…we can’t bottle
and preserve them …

and I think Mark’s story of Jesus transfiguration
tells us that it’s pointless to even try…

There are two reasons why

One…such moments are God given…they don’t happen because we have achieved perfection or even wisdom

Two…as Jesus shows Peter…when the clouds have cleared away…

such moments do not signal the end of our journey…

Dazzling visions and peak experiences
aren’t the point of our formation as Jesus disciples…

New mountain slide

Were we to stay on that mountaintop…
what Jesus came to accomplish… would be reduced to our feelings and our experience of God

The rest of creation with all its bothersome darkness …the rest of humanity…with all its inequality and brokenness…its pollution and hunger…

Even our relationships in our family and our church and our community…

would be irrelevant…because we’re OK! We’re already standing in the light! [pause]

But Jesus came to shine the light of God’s love
into the darkness… that God’s purposes of love would be achieved… even to the ends of the earth.

Times of calling and revelation and intimacy with God are to be treasured for sure…
and Jesus modelled this himself…

but they are oases of refreshment… on the way
because we are called to carry on his work.

So if you’re poor in spirit because you think you’re missing out on signs and wonders…

or if you think there’s something wrong with your faith because you’ve never had a blinding vision of the glory of God…

Maybe you’re just at a different part of the journey…
maybe you’ve already come down the mountain with Jesus …and are right where you’re supposed to be.

And if you think that somehow if only you worshipped harder… prayed more fervently…or sang more passionately ...then somehow you’d find yourself… standing in the dazzling light of God’s glory

Then maybe you’ve forgotten that such moments are God’s doing…not ours…maybe you’ve forgotten as Paul told the struggling Christians in Corinth…

if you’re looking for the light…

the light of God’s love shines in our hearts…

and the glory of God in the face of Jesus.

The Gospel of Waitangi

 Epiphany 5 year B Sermon Mark and 1 Cor

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After calling Simon and James and Andrew and John
to follow him – so he can teach them to fish for people with the message of the Gospel…Jesus goes on to preach in the synagogue at Capernaum and then on and on...to the neighbouring towns and villages…what his purpose? As he says…

slide words

to proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do. To fish…to win people over…to get people on board with the good news… about God’s love and God’s purpose of peace and wellbeing for all humanity.

Paul slide

A full twenty five years later…in his letter to the new church in Corinth…
Paul identifies the same purpose for his life…

Slide words

I’ve become all things to all people, that I might
by all means… win some.
I do it all for the sake of the gospel, so I may share in its blessings.

The blessings of living in the Messianic age…
the realisation of God’s peace and wellbeing for all people.

Fishing slide

Jesus extends himself…he goes out…our text reports …
so more people can learn… that the time for the Kingdom of God begins… right now…

Jesus walks and talks and restores people to  community …
by sharing the message of the Good News

And the same for Paul…blending in… adopting the language and the culture of the Empire around him…
becoming a slave to all…a Jew to Jews and a gentile to gentiles…showing his weakness to the weak

Why?

To remove any and every stumbling block…
which could get in the way… of people hearing that
good news [pause]

Roman slide

To expand their powerful Empire…the Romans had invaded the promised land of the Jews…and they confiscated any part of it they wanted… for their own use…yes
Caesar proclaimed…there could be peace…as long as those who were conquered…remember their place… in the scheme of things. As long as they don’t get above their station.
As long as they don’t demand equality with Roman citizens. 

Anyway equality is unthinkable…not in their vocabulary …nor their religion…not even between men…let alone men and women…or slaves and their masters. [pause]

Jewish slide

On the other hand the religious traditions of the occupied people… have long since moved away from the original insight of their faith…that all people are made in the image of God… shifted from the call of the prophets… to care for the stranger and the widow and the orphan –
even if they were outsiders.

By the first century… most Jews see the Roman’s
as unclean and untouchable foreigners.

fishing slide

So Jesus and then Paul…extend themselves… to bring the message of God’s love to everyone…
to both sides of this political and religious equation.

Within Judaism… Jesus enters the forbidden territory
of people who are branded by their religion…
as un-clean or a sinner…he goes right in there… to announce the good news to those who’ve been exiled from their community by these labels…And harvesting corn, healing on the Sabbath…and touching a bleeding woman… Jesus tears down the legal restrictions on what is clean and unclean.

And Paul…inspired by the risen Christ… becomes a subversive chameleon among
the diverse cultures of the Empire…so no people-group will miss out on the good news.

And my friends…everything they did requires discernment. It meant using God’s good news of justice and peace and wellbeing for all people…it meant using this gospel…
to decide what going to build the kingdom of God
and what is going to undermine it. It means discerning …
what is pro kingdom if you like… and what is anti kingdom.

It means constantly using the Gospel to critique the political and religious and economic powers…in every kind of culture …and not one of them escapes the scrutiny of the Gospel’s light.

The gist of Jesus message…the one he is sent by God to proclaim …the gist is …that both the Roman occupiers
and the indigenous Jews… have to wake up their ideas…
and repent of their anti-kingdom attitudes
because the reign of God intends to extend
to the ends of the earth.  [pause]

Mountain slide

A hundred and seventy two years ago…precisely at the ends of the earth…

Treaty slide

a treaty is signed between an occupying nation and the people of another land… far from Israel. This treaty is meant to eliminate hostilities and tensions between British settlers and those who’d already lived here.

The treaty is written in English and Maori…
with help of Christian missionaries who…like Paul had immersed themselves in the language and culture of another people… to bring them the good news.

The English text guarantees protection of Māori interests from the encroaching British settlers while allowing settlement to proceed… and establishing a government to maintain peace and order.

The Māori text suggests the Queen's main promise is to provide a government while securing rangatiratanga - Māori autonomy and authority over their own area and land ownership as long as they wish to retain it.

In this way peace and wellbeing was to be ensured for all parties. Perhaps even a microcosm of the kingdom of God proclaimed by Jesus Christ. Well that was 1840

Satelite slide

In 1866 without warning or consultation with the various tribes in the Bay of Plenty…the British Crown confiscated all the territory from the coast inland for ten kilometres. They did this to punish another tribe…but half the best land of the Tuhoe people is also seized –
The Tuhoe are the tribe with which the Presbyterian Church will have our primary mission presence.
None of this land is ever returned.

This transgression against the mana and dignity of their people embeds itself into the consciousness of Tuhoe.
And the loss of half their finest land,,, has devastating long term consequences to the wellbeing of the people.
And the confiscation line remains to this day… a highly visible symbol of grievance for the Tuhoe people.

To add insult to injury when some Māori retaliated against the seizure… the Crown sends its troops to arrest the ringleaders and restore peace…
but in the chaos of fighting…women and children are killed Homes crops and cultural treasures are destroyed.

Mountain slide

Yet somehow the gospel of Jesus Christ finds its way to the mountains of the Urewera and the Tuhoe people.

In 1887 a young Rua Kenana joins a shearing gang on the East Coast. During this time he studies the Bible and
develops a sense of prophetic call. When Rua returns home he forms a self sufficient community at Maungapohatu which he calls the ‘New Jerusalem’ Eventually his followers number almost a thousand.

Rua slide

Rua Kenana Hepetipa was of many Māori prophetic leaders who arose in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The young man set about deliberately to usher in the Messianic Age to the people of the Urewera…and many say he owed his influence to the great skill with which he applied the scriptures to the daily lives of his followers.

Inspired by the Gospel…Rua’s community was steadfastly non violent and shared all their possessions in common like the Acts church.

The few European visitors who were willing to risk the difficult journey inland to the mountain settlement
praised the enthusiasm of the faithful, whom Rua was leading towards an enightened and equitable life on ancestral Tuhoe lands.

But Rua allowed the gospel to influence his politics in a way the secular Crown couldn’t tolerate…holding to the beatitude…blessed are the peacemakers…during world War One… Rua tried to keep his people out of military service. Rua insisted it was immoral to fight for a Pākehā King and country… given the injustices meted out to Māori under the British crown.

His gospel commitment to non-violence was viewed as sedition by the Government and created the excuse to launch a raid against the community during which Rua was arrested.

But there were people who would not be put off by the labels placed on Rua and the Tuhoe…nor were they deterred by the isolation of their settlements…These were apostles who like Paul who became slaves to all… in the service of the Gospel

Annie Henry reveal

…chief among them Deaconess Sister Annie Henry
John Laughton reveal

and her contemporary the Rev John Laughton. Known as Hoani…that’s Maori for John …Laughton ministered across the Urewera and Taupō region. He became an recognised scholar of the Māori language… and played a major part in the enormous task…
of revising the Maori translation of the Bible.

Once Rua was released from prison…through tactful and careful listening on Laughton's part, and an open interest on Rua's, mutual trust and friendship developed between the two men. Together they developed a concept of unity based on the belief that one God was the authority for all peoples and their relationship forged an on-going connection… between the Presbyterian Church and Rua’s own church of the Iha rai ra…the Israelites…

In a tribute to Hoani Laughton when he died, the Moderator of the Presbyterian General Assembly, said ‘No words of mine can convey the sense of loss our Church will feel on the passing of this great and humble man … I believe history will speak with deep gratitude of his leadership and the solid foundation he has laid… for a true and practical expression of Christian faith and deep harmony in race relations in New Zealand.

Today the legacy of this commitment to equality under God is still manifest in the Presbyterian Church…
because significant decisions are not made without consultation with one another as equal partners.

The Maori section of our church is called…

reveal Te Aka Puaho

Te Aka Puaho…the glowing vine…
a version of the Presbyterian burning bush.

Over the years it’s been necessary and often painful
to allow the Gospel to critique our relationships with one another…as well as our approach to political issues.
Yet the good news of God…the Shalom of God…
revealed by Jesus Christ… must be the ultimate authority
by which we evaluate every thought and every action…
in our Christian life.

Blank slide

So when we read the paper or listen to the news or chose a hymn or song or decide what to think or how to vote on an issue…my prayer is that you will allow the Gospel to speak into your thoughts and your actions.

As Jesus said

slide words

I came to proclaim the message there also; that’s what I came out to do.

To win people over…to get people on board
with the good news about God’s love and God’s purposes
of peace and wellbeing for all humanity.