Today the whole Church proclaims: “Christ is Risen!”  The traditional reply to this is: “He is Risen indeed, Alleluia!”
   But let’s go back a moment to the gospel reading from John.  At the centre of this story is a Jesus-shaped hole.  All that the disciples first knew is that he was not there: there was no sign of his body and the stone had been rolled away from the tomb.  There was an empty space except for the linen cloths which lay on the ground.
   Despite all this emptiness and absence, we are told that the disciple who first went into the tomb “saw and he believed.”  Something about that scene must have triggered his memory, otherwise all he would have seen would have been that empty space. 
   How we see things often depends on our state of mind.  In the darkness and emptiness of a tomb, the disciple saw the beginning of a story of faith brought to its fulfilment.  It might seem to us a strange way to announce that Jesus was alive.  Perhaps we might think that if we had been Jesus, one of our first actions might have been to creep up on the chief priest and frighten him out of his wits.  Or maybe we might go up to the disciples who deserted him and say: “I told you so!”
   This is not the way Jesus chose.  His disciples begin to see him once again, but in the least expected ways.  “Seeing” is a word that rings through all the resurrection stories.  But ever since then we have been asked to believe without the evidence of our own eyes.  Believing in these distant events can be difficult.  Believing in the difference it has made can be hard too, whether we look at the world, or the church, or at our own lives.
   Where there should be faith, there can sometimes be an empty space, rather like the scene that confronted those first disciples.  On Good Friday, I was listening to a meditation on the radio, where a priest was describing the experience of her son taking his own life.  She spoke of the emptiness, the “gone-ness” that she felt when she saw his familiar possessions in the house.  He was not there and there would always be a space.  But she also spoke about how she had been able to connect with some of his friends and to offer them something of the care and support that she could no longer give to her son.  Nothing could replace him and the scars would remain, but there was life once again.
   In every word of forgiveness, in every good action that is done in someone’s memory, we see a sign that points us towards the resurrection.  Good Friday is still a reality, but Easter did not happen despite Good Friday – it happens because of it.  Through the Cross comes life.  As Christians, our faith calls us to do what St Paul encourages us to do in the letter to the Colossians: to seek the things that are above, even as we live our lives in this world.
   As we look at our world we can see plenty of empty spaces and absences.  We see the terrible losses people are still suffering in Ukraine.  Perhaps we are reminded of our own losses too.  There is no easy way to explain these things away.  But in the darkness and emptiness, people of faith and of goodwill are reminding us that Christ is risen.  They do this not by just saying the words, but by living lives of forgiveness, of compassion and of hope.
   As we look at the empty spaces in our own lives, we have a choice.  We either focus on the loss and on the ending, or we see the signs of a new beginning.  Sadness and loss will always be a part of human life, but what we see makes all the difference.  The hope that arises in our hearts is the fruit of the Resurrection of Our Lord.  Jesus is inviting us to choose life.  When that light of Christ enters our lives then the world looks different and we ourselves are changed.
   Christ is risen because love is stronger than death.  The powers of darkness have done their worst, but the love of God has overcome them all.  In the risen life of Jesus, we too are raised to life.  We can look to the time when all tears shall be wiped away and when everything that is good and beautiful in the lives we live shall be brought to perfection.  Jesus lives, and we live in him, now and for ever.

We begin Holy Week on a note of celebration with the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem.  Despite being acclaimed as a king, Jesus makes sure that he doesn’t play up to the people’s expectations of power.  He enters the city on a donkey to fulfil the words of the prophets, but also to make a mockery of earthly power.
   We see how the celebrations begin to turn darker as we hear the words of the Passion according to St Luke.  The crowds become fickle and the cheers turn to jeers.  The religious authorities become determined to do away with him because he is prepared to speak truth to power.  In the end the Roman authorities, fearing a rebellion, send him to be crucified.
   Throughout this week we witness how the one who is Lord and God is subjected to the worst that the world can throw at him.  Yet, in the words of the prophet Isaiah, we also see how he met that rejection and abuse with gentleness and refused to play the same game.  He trusted only in God.
   On Maundy Thursday we come to see how Jesus gave the example of sacrificial love and of servanthood.  We also see how he came to be denied and rejected by those who were closest to him.  Then on Good Friday we journey with him to the Cross and to his words of mercy: “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
   There is a time of waiting and of preparation, before we commemorate that first Easter, when the disciples first became aware that the life that seemed to have been destroyed was still with them.  Hope would rise again and love would triumph.
   We live in a world where there is much violence and where the voices of good people often seem to be drowned out by hatred.  We live in a fickle world, where commitment is often laid aside for convenience or for personal gain.  Holy Week reminds us that despite the worst of our human nature, God’s love will overcome that darkness within us and around us.
   We are invited to walk the way of the cross with Jesus – the path that leads to eternal life.  In the meantime, let’s learn how to serve our King.  In the words of St Andrew of Crete, we are invited to lay ourselves, instead of palms, at the feet of Jesus.  In serving him we love both God and one another - and love is stronger than death.

Forthcoming

​EventsTwo of our readings today include Weddings.
In our first reading we talk about a wedding between Israel and God.
As Israel returns from exile in Babylon, God forgives and forgets the past and calls Israel his bride “for the lord takes delight in you and your land will have its wedding. The relationship between God and Israel has been changed.
And in our Gospel reading from John, we talk of the wedding at Cana in Galilee
This is a wedding that both Jesus and his mother have been invited along with Jesus’s disciples.
The main story though, is on Jesus and his Changing of water into wine. Not just a few bottles but six large stone water jars, each holding about 30 gallons, in my reckoning that’s equivalent to about 900 bottles of wine. (What a party! ).
Of course the real reason that this wedding at canna makes it into John’s gospel is not for the wine and the party, but because it was the first miracle performed by Jesus, he performs his first of many more miracles to come, and his disciples had witnessed it. He had revealed his glory, this event would Change how they saw Jesus, and he would now begin his campaign a campaign that would eventually take him to the cross..  And we know now just how much this has changed the world we live in.
Both the Weddings in the readings are about change, they are about new beginnings.
Change is usually for the best, but it is not always easy. Ask any parent when their first child is born whether change is easy, their lives are turned upside down with sleepless nights, feeding, continuous nappies to change, and all the other situations that happen when a new baby enters into their lives. But ask them if they would change what they now have for what they had before and I am sure that most if not all of them would say no.
The marriage of two people is perhaps the most intimate of personal relationships we can have, these two people are changed a change that will mature, as time goes by, ever deepening and more fulfilling.  This change is mentioned in Genesis “Therefore a Man leaves his Father and Mother and clings to his wife and they become one flesh” (G2:24). Two joined together in wedlock becoming one flesh. Two become one (I am sure there is a song dying to come out here) ,Even the relationship between mother and child cannot equal it.
And so if we can see such positivity in change why is their always a temptation to try and resist it?
Some years ago Aldi supermarkets ran an advert campaign (other supermarkets are available) they showed you a leading brand and then an Aldi cheaper equivalent and the caption would be “I like this one but I also like this one, I like change” showing that the cheaper one was just as good as the leading brand was. ( I think the most memorable of the is set of adverts was the old lady holding up a branded box and non-branded box of teabags and saying my Husband likes these and he also likes these but I don’t like tea, I like Gin.)
Now I am a bit of a stickler when it comes to food brands I like my cornflakes with the rooster on the packet, my rice crispies need snap, crackle and pop,and my cans of beens need to be endorsed by a million housewives every day. I was not keen on the Aldi equivalents and the same went for soup, butter, bread etc.etc.
My children a lot younger then, were quick to pick up on this and they would start picking up various brands whilst in the supermarkets, and would find it hilarious to try and mimic me by saying” I like this one but I don’t like this one, I don’t like change” this is still a standing joke in our house to this day.
All a bit of fun, but actually I suppose like many I was to a degree opposed to change, I liked things the way they were.
 And we can see this in society today all the time. And I don’t just mean the old man that must have his breakfast at 7:30 every morning, or the neighbour who gets upset that the local post office is closing at 5:30 instead of 6:00pm. I would imagine you all know people that are set in their ways and resist even these minor changes.
But these are not the sort of changes we should be concerned about.
We resist changes being made in our own interests, like the changes we are asked to make in order to try and slow down the spread of corona virus.
 We watch on as our planet faces one of the biggest environmental crises in its history. But we refuse to see or accept any need for change foolishly believing it will sort itself out.
Even as global warming becomes blatantly obvious we continue to turn a blind eye.  “there’s no need to change, nature has a way of sorting things”
We fail to see the need for change as thousands of animal species face extinction or have their habitats destroyed to provide for our ever demanding consumption.
We are not prepared to share our wealth and way of life in order that others may be brought out of hunger and poverty.
Governments continuously need to change, countries continuously need to change, we continuously need to change and our attitudes to these ongoing topics need to change
It is the rule of life, the cells in our bodies are constantly changing and renewing, the seasons must change
Change is not all bad, change can be good, Change is good. Like a good marriage there will be ups and downs. As we make these changes not everything will always run smoothly,
 Change is by no means easy and we could be in for rough times but eventually it is usually for the best. Maybe our generation will not live to see the benefits, but future generations, our Grandchildren, possibly even our own children will.
 Since the beginning of time we have been changing and adapting. The Bible repeatedly tells of change,
 just a couple of weeks ago we celebrated an event that changed our very relationship with God; we welcomed God in human form as a fragile baby. The word became flesh.
Today as we celebrate Mass, Bread and wine will be transformed (changed) into the most precious body and blood of our lord and saviour Jesus Christ. And we eagerly and reverently approach his alter of  to consume that precious body and drink that precious blood as we strive to be “changed” to become more like Jesus, to become better Christians.
In a few more weeks we will enter into lent when we will prepare ourselves throughout the Lenten period, yet again preparing  for a life changing event, and we shall live out this event as we enter into holy week. That small helpless babe we welcomed into the world is now going to once again, change our futures, he will go to the cross totally innocent and without sin of his own, but he will take with him all the sins of humankind and he will pay (for us)  the ultimate price.
 But we as Christians know that his death was not the end, conquering death he will arise again victorious changing deaths grip over us forever, death will no longer have any claim on those of us who have believed in Jesus.
My dear Brothers and Sisters,
However hard it may be to embrace the changes we will need to make over the coming years, we must all think of the future generations, and we must remember the changes made for us by God the Father, Son and spirit.
And most of all we must continue to trust God and his mercy and know that his love for us will be the one thing we can rely on that will never change.


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A happy and safe new year to you all.

Forthcoming Events
Thursday 6th Jan Communion at 10.00am.
Sunday 9th Jan Parish Mass at 9.30am.
The coffee mornings will resume after the Christmas break in the Church Mice cafe (in the Narthex) from 10.00am on Tues 11th January and every Tuesday thereafter. 

Sermon: Second Sunday after the Nativity
  "The Word was made flesh and he lived among us”. 
In the year when I left the College of the Resurrection and was ordained deacon – 1995 – there was a song in the charts by Joan Osborne.  It seems like yesterday, but it’s more or less 26 years ago.  The song was called: “What if God was one of us?”  It asks a few hypothetical questions, like how we would address him, what we would ask him and what he would look like.  There’s no harm in pondering these things and maybe some of our answers might shed light on how we see God and how we understand our relationship with God.
  But surely the most comprehensive and majestic answer to that question, “What if God was one of us?” is found in the prologue of St John’s gospel which we have heard just now.  Those two words, “What if?” are answered by the awe-inspiring message that the power and the majesty of God has appeared in our world first of all in the form of a tiny child.  Through him he light of God shines in the darkness of our lives and nothing can overcome that light.  The pure truth that overwrites all the deception that surrounds us is there for us to hear.  Perhaps most amazingly of all, the presence of God in our world in the form of Jesus gives us the grace to become what we are intended to be: God’s sons and daughters; brothers and sisters in Christ.
   As the song goes: “What if God was one of us, just a stranger on the bus?”  Well, for the people who were first expecting the Messiah, it seems that he was treated as a stranger.  The gospel tells us: “He was in the world that had its being through him, and the world did not know him.  He came to his own domain and his people would not accept him.”  Perhaps their idea of what God is like was too conditioned by their own prejudices and standards.  The Messiah would never have grown up in a minor town like Nazareth.  He would not have had ordinary parents.  He would not have called fishermen to be his followers.  Nor would he have lingered in the company of tax collectors, publicans and prostitutes.  God would want to limit himself to respectable people like them and us.
   Is it really much different today?  People expect to be impressed.  They want their opinions and their outlook to be confirmed.  All too often we don’t want to be challenged or to be taken out of our comfort zone.  From childhood upwards, Jesus breaks the mould and whilst some welcomed his message, many turned away or were hostile.  He did not come to impress or to overpower us, but to live alongside us and to show us what God is really like.  Although he performed miracles, these were not done for effect, but to reveal the healing, forgiveness and compassion of the God who is our Creator.
   Even in the manger in Bethlehem, Jesus revealed himself in poverty.  He showed his love by embracing our humanity in all its limitations, its weakness and its woundedness.  He showed us that he did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself a servant: the Servant King.  As St John Henry Newman put it:
“He had once meant to come on earth in heavenly glory, but we sinned: and then he could not safely visit us, except with shrouded radiance, and a besmirched majesty, for he was God.  So he came himself in weakness, not in power.”
   So we don’t need to ask, “What if God was one of us?”  He is one with us in Christ Jesus.  If God had come among us in power and might, his glory and light would have overcome us.  We are not yet ready for that.  But the light that was there at the beginning of creation shines in such as way that we can receive it.  That light leads us on through the darkness that is within us and around us.  The truth of God gently leads us away from falsehood and enables us to hear and accept the message of eternal life.  In all our weakness and wrongdoing, the compassion of God comes to meet us and lifts us up to see salvation.
   Let us pray:
Loving Father, your Son Jesus was born to save a fallen world.  Rescue us from the ways that lead us into ignorance and harm and help us to walk the path of life in the company of your Son, our Saviour, Jesus Christ.                                                                                 Amen.
 
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