Luke 15:8-10 / John 12:23-33
Never Lost to God

I recently saw two stories in the news about people who were reunited with family members after years of separation. 

On the 19th July the BBC ran the story of Tony May, who was abandoned by his parents on the Victoria Embankment by the River Thames in London in the middle of world war II.  With the help of a DNA detective Julia Bell, eventually the mystery of his abandonment was solved and he became united with a half sister on his mom’s side who lived not far from him here in the UK as well as a half sister on his Dad’s side living in Australia. 

And then a few days later, I came across an article dated from May last year about a young man in China who had been abducted from his parents at around the age of 2 and a half when the toddler asked for water, and his father stopped at the entrance of a hotel to get some. For three decades, his Mom kept up the search for him. 

Eventually after more than three decades, a tip-off in late April of 2019 finally led to the long-awaited and hoped for reunion.  Authorities had utilised facial recognition technology to to match baby photo’s with an adult photo on the national database and then confirming with a DNA test. 

Both of these stories are heart-rending stories of being lost and found. Stories of separation and being re-united.  They show the power of human determination to search and never give up. 

It raises the question: If human beings can be this determined, why do we think less of God.  If a mother would spend 32 years searching for a lost son, why do we think less of God. Why do we think that God, the Most High, the Eternal One, who Jesus called Abba, would ever give up on us?  If a DNA detective like Julia Bell can be so determined to help Tony May, why do human beings have such a low view of God to believe that God could ever abandon or forsake us? 

Another question comes to mind? If God is all-knowing, and all-loving, then surely, we are never ever truly lost. Because God knows where we are and has the ability to bring us back home in the end. 

Even when we feel lost, no-one is ever lost to God.  Even when a friend or loved one feels lost to us, no-one is lost to God, the Infinite Wisdom and Infinite Compassion in which all things exist. 

But many Christians live with this frightening possibility that we will be lost and separated from God forever.  At the root of many a Christian faith is a terrible fear of Eternal Hell and Damnation. 

But the Scriptures are filled with passages that speak of the Divine intention to bring all of us home no matter how far we stray. 

This is the sense that one gets reading the prophets. Even when the people of Israel feel lost in exile,   the voice of God is heard to say again and again, “Do not fear! I will bring you home.” In Ezekiel, “I will search for my sheep. I will save them and bring them back from all the places where they were scattered on that dark and cloudy day.” (Ez 34:12).

In the parable of the lost coin, we have to admit that lost coins cannot find themselves.  There are many in this world who feel they have strayed so far from God, and are so lost, that like a lost coin, they will never be able to find themselves again. But just as the lost coin was valuable to the woman in the parable, so the suggestion in the parable is that we are valuable to God, and even when, unlike the prodigal son, cannot turn and come home God will make sure that we are found in the end. 

One of my favourite quotes from Huston Smith is: It is impossible to fall out of the Infinite… The full quote reads as follows: “The ...Infinite’s inclusiveness is an all-encompassing circle that encompasses our finite universe and out of which it is impossible to fall, for “In Him we live and move and have our being”.  (Soul of Christianity page 3). In other words, we can never fall out of God. You can never be utterly lost to God. 

In the 2nd letter to Timothy, we read an interesting line that says, “God desires all people to be saved...” Another way of putting this is that God desires all people to come home to God. As Rob Bell puts it…  are we really to believe that God cannot accomplish that which God desires.  As Jesus says of the rich young man who is lost in his attachment to his wealth, and unable to let go of it in order to follow Jesus, “What is impossible for human beings is not impossible for God”. Even the Rich Young Man who chooses his wealth over God will in the end be brought home. 

In John’s Gospel we hear of the universal love of Christ that will bring salvation and wholeness to all people: John 12:32: “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself.”  Not just some, but all. No matter how far they have strayed, all people will be brought home again.  In the end, all people will be drawn back by the irresistible love of God. Love will break through even the hardest of defences. As the Tao Te Ching put’s it: “The softest thing in the world overcomes the hardest.”

And so, like the love of that Chinese mother searching for her kidnapped child, or even the DNA detective, searching for Tony May’s lost family, no-one in the end is ever so lost, that God's irresistible love expressed in Christ Jesus will not be able to draw us back to God's Self. 

And so, when you feel lost or that you have strayed far away, or perhaps when you worry about a friend or family member who feels lost in some way, or who it feels like they are straying far away, may we never doubt the love of God made known in Jesus, and that no-one ever is or ever can be truly lost, for no-one is ever lost to God. You can never fall out of the infinite.  

I close with two passages of Scripture: 

Psalm 27:10 Even if my father and mother abandon me, the LORD will hold me close.

Isaiah 49:15 “Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you!

SERMON TEXT: Romans 8:18-19 & 28 

During the week, BBC news told the story of Maria Barnard who did a parachute jump on the birthday of her son, Morgan Barnard, who had died in the Greenvale Hotel tragedy a year ago.  It was a way for her to remember and celebrate her son’s life as well as to raise funds for charity so that the pain of her grief for her son might begin to find some kind of positive expression in the world. 

On Sunday evening and Monday I had a number of sermon idea’s swirling around my head. But on Tuesday morning as I was sitting in quiet meditation, a line from last weeks reading from Genesis 32 began ruminating on. 

“I will not let you go until you bless me.”

I have decided that for today, we will not let go of the Jacob story until we receive another insight or blessing from it. 

As one reads the series of Jacob stories, it becomes apparent that Jacob is a character who is hungry for blessings. In fact his hunger for blessings gets him into trouble in the first place when he steals his father’s blessing that was supposed to be reserved for Esau as the first-born.  Jacob is like us. We all long for the blessed life. 

But what happens when bad or difficult things happen to us in life? Jacob’s hunger for blessings makes him determined to receive a blessing even in what might be described as a difficult or traumatic experience. In the story, wrestling all night long with a stranger in the dark one can imagine that the character of Jacob must feel like he is in fact fighting for his life. 

And if the stranger had to slipped away in the dark, one can imagine the possibility of Jacob fearing, for the rest of his life, that this dangerous adversary might return.

But in the story, Jacob does something unexpected. He asks his adversary for a blessing.  In fact he refuses to let go of his opponent until he has received a blessing from him. 

What could it mean to refuse to let go of one’s opponent until we have received a blessing from them?

What could it mean, like Jacob, to seek a blessing out of one of the most difficult experiences in one’s life? 

The story of Jacob is not alone in communicating the idea that one might be able to receive blessings even in our most difficult of experiences.  Jesus points to this as well in the beatitudes at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew’s Gospel.  The beatitudes come to us unexpectedly as they turn our own systems of expectation upside down. 

There’s a blessing to be found in mourning according to Jesus.
There’s a blessing to be found in being poor in spirit
There’s a blessing to be found in being meek and humble
There’s a blessing to be found even in being persecuted

What could Jesus mean when he tells us that we can find a blessing even in these negative places?
The apostle Paul also concluded that God has the ability to turn negative experiences into good. That does not mean that God willed it to happen but that God can turn it into good, like an alchemist turning base metal into gold. 

He seems to have come to this conclusion based on his understanding of the death of Jesus. The death of Jesus represents a moment of darkness, cruelty and torture. It represents a moment in which humanity choose darkness over light and in which violence appears to triumph over goodness. And yet Paul is utterly convinced that God has turned this most terrible act of cruelty, darkness and violence into a supreme good, and that somehow in the death of Jesus, God has used it as a moment to bring reconciliation to the world, reconciliation between enemy people, and reconciliation between people and God, and in fact in his mind, the renewal of the whole universe. 

Life out of death. Hope out of hopelessness. Light out of darkness. Love out of hatred. Peace and reconciliation out of violence and torture. 

For Paul there was an even more personal element to this truth of God’s ability to bring blessing out of negative experiences, for God had somehow brought good out of his own life as one who he regarded as the chief of sinners. Having sought out and murdered Christians in his narrow-minded religious zeal, God had somehow been able to bring light out of the darkness of his own life and use him as a means of spreading God’s love made known in Jesus across the then known world. 

And so Paul comes to the profound conclusion that God can work through all things for good in the lives of those who love him… and even ultimately in the lives who do not yet love God, for it was for sinners that Paul believed Christ died, not for the righteous. 

After a night of wrestling for his life, Jacob will not let his adversary go until he receives a blessing.   Like Jesus, and Paul, the character of Jacob believes blessings can come even from unexpected places. Jacob is willing and open to finding God’s blessing even in an experience which didn't feel like a blessing at the time. 

What could it mean for us to say: “I will not let you go until I receive a blessing from you?”

I get the sense that Maria Barnard, as she parachuted from a plane this week in memory of her son, in her own way was saying: “I will not let go of this grief and trauma until it becomes transformed into a blessing for others.”

I would like to end with two quotes: 

“God wastes nothing – not even sin. The soul that has struggled and come through is enriched by it’s experiences, and Grace does not merely blot out the evil past but in the most literal sense “makes it good.””— Dorothy L. Sayers

“You must learn, you must let God teach you, that the only way to get rid of your past is to make a future out of it. God will waste nothing.” Philip Brooks. 

Genesis 32:22-32

Last week, we reflected on a moment in the life of Jacob that could be described as a moment of Spiritual Awakening in Genesis 28. 

On the run from his brother who had intentions of murdering him after he stole his brother's birthright and his father’s blessing, Jacob sleeps out in the open on his first night. 


With a rock for a pillow, he has a dream of a ladder reaching from earth to heaven with angels ascending and descending. He wakes up and declares, surely God is in this place and I was unaware of it. This is the gate of heaven. 

In this moment, he becomes aware of God’s presence in the temple or cathedral of creation. It is a wonderfully symbolic story that can invite us to wake up to the omnipresence of God for ourselves.  The spirit of God who is everywhere present. 

Today, I would like to explore a second significant story in Jacob’s life that I believe can also be a pointer to us on our own spiritual journey. 

Jacob has been away from home for the past 20 years. During that time he has built up a large family with two wives, Leah and Rachael. He also has amassed quite a sizeable amount of wealth in the form of livestock. 

But he is nervous of being reunited with his brother Esau.  He had fled in haste after he had deceived his brother, and his brother had intention of murdering him.  The night before meeting his brother, he sends his family and flocks across the river Jabbok ahead of him, and he spends the night alone. 

We are often afraid of spending time alone. But time alone can often be extremely beneficial. It can give space to bring a clarity of mind and heart that we can often miss in the company of other people.  We can be so busy playing roles in the presence of others that we don’t always truly know ourselves. 

The English word alone could be extrapolated into two words “all-one”. When we are alone, there is the possibility of discovering a greater sense of inner one-ness, inner unity that we can lose through the many fragmented roles that we play. 

So Jacob spends the night alone out in the open, just like he had done 20 years before when he laid his head on a stone to sleep at the place that became known as Bethel.  

This time it happens at the ford of the River Jabbok. As Davis Marshall says, rivers represent boundaries and moments of transition.  The river in this story represents a moment of transition in Jacob’s life, a crossing over from a former life to a new one. From an old identity to a new one. 

In the story, during the night, Jacob wrestles with a mysterious character who is at first spoken of as being a man, and then later is identified as being God. So Jacob wrestles with this unknown figure in the dark all night long. 

It is a wonderfully vivid description. I think many of us have had this experience of wrestling on our beds during the night at difficult moments of transition. 

As the sun rises on Jacob,  the unknown assailant begins to leave him and Jacob refuses to let go of him until he receives a blessing from him.  The unknown shadowy figure then gives Jacob a new name.  It is a symbolic echo of the creation story where God names everything and then later Adam names everything. This is a moment of new birth and new creation in Jacob’s life.  The shadowy figure renames Jacob as “Israel” which means “one who wrestles with God”.  “Your name will no longer be Jacob but Israel because you have struggled, or wrestled with God and with human beings and have overcome.” 

Jacob asks his opponent's name, but the opponent refuses to give to him.  It comes as a reminder to us of the unnameable nature of God.  As soon as we name God, we have reduced God to a human conception and a human understanding and so in the story, the mysterious opponent, who turns out to be God, remains nameless. 

Byron Katie, like Michael Dowd, believes that God is synonymous with Reality itself. When we wrestle with God or Reality, she says we will always lose unless we accept Reality as it is. Reality is always what is and therefore is unchangeable. When we wrestle with that which cannot be changed, we will always end up the loser, unless we come to accept Reality as it is. 

I wonder if in this story, we see Jacob wrestling with the reality of his own deceitful nature. Before he can meet his brother Esau, he has to come to a new honesty about himself. This feels like he is wrestling with none other than God.  Until Jacob can become honest with himself about his own past , he is not ready to meet his brother. He is not ready to be reconciled to him. 

As Marshall Davis puts it: We wrestle in the dark with the Unknown, but if we persevere, we will be transformed so dramatically that we will need a new name, just as Jacob received a new name to reflect his new identity.  But as Marshall Davis says, we will not come out of this struggle unscathed. In the story, Jacob is wounded in this fight. His hip is put out of joint and he walks with a limp for the rest of his life. 

I wonder if it is a symbol of Jacob’s overconfident ego and pride which are now dented.  He is no longer as confident as before and this is a good thing.  It is often the case, that moments of spiritual awakening are accompanied by a greater degree of humility and not-knowing. Coming to terms with a deeper awareness of our human fragility, weakness and limitation invite us to become a little more humble and grateful than we were before.  Jacob has overcome, not as a superman who defeats his enemies, but maybe as someone who has come to know and accept himself a little more than before.  Jacob’s freedom comes as he learns to walk with a limp.

So, as you wrestle with God, with Reality, with life, as you seek to become your truest, most authentic self, may there come a moment when you receive a new name, as one who has wrestled and come out the other side a new person, even if it feels that you walk with a limp, with a little more humility, gratitude and grace. 

SERMON TEXT - The Spiritual Awakening of Jacob

Over the next two weeks I would like to reflect on two moments of spiritual awakening in the life of Jacob in the book of Genesis.

Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel might be regarded as the father of the nation of Israel. According to the story of Israel, his son’s offspring became the twelve tribes of Israel.

Now when one talks about having a spiritual awakening, one normally thinks of people who are in some way holy or saintly. But if truth be told, Jacob is described as something of a scoundrel in his early life.

Even his name itself suggests this. The name Jacob has two possible meanings in Hebrew. The first possible meaning is ‘heel-grabber’. And the second possible meaning is ‘supplanter’. In the first shade of meaning, Jacob is described as holding onto his twin brother’s heel as he came out of the womb. This is undoubtedly a legendary detail that was intended to describe in story form, something of the character and personality of Jacob. To grab onto some-one’s heel would be to trip them up. In the second possible meaning for his name “supplanter” this rather aptly describes his relationship with his twin brother, Esau. Esau as the older of the two twins, having come into this world just moments before Jacob, had all the rights of the firstborn son, which in ancient Hebrew culture were significant. But as the story unfolds, we see how Jacob first takes advantage of his brother in a vulnerable moment and tricks his brother Esau out of his birthright, and then, with the help of his mother, he steals his father’s blessing, which in Hebrew culture should have been reserved for Esau as the firstborn.

Jacob is no saint. He is a ‘heel-grabber’ ready to trip his brother up and take advantage of him. And he is a supplanter, being willing to use manipulation and deception to take from his brother what is not rightfully his.

Jacob is symbol of the heel-grabber and the supplanter in each of us. That part of us that is willing to use subtle and not-so-subtle manipulation and deception to get our way. That part of us that is willing to step over others if necessary in order to ensure our own success.

As can be expected, Jacob’s deception and manipulation alienates him from his brother Esau. And as Esau’s resentment and anger towards Jacob smoulders and then ignites, he vows to kill Jacob after their father has died.

Again with the help of his mother, who was clearly playing favourites in the family, Jacob runs away north to the country of his uncle Laban to escape his brother’s murderous anger.

What Marshall Davis says about the story is that it is very reminiscent of the story of the prodigal son. They both leave their father’s house for a far away country. Both eventually return home, and both have stories of spiritual awakening.

It is on his first night on the run that Jacob has his first spiritual awakening experience. We read that when he reached a certain place he stopped for the night because the sun had gone down. Taking one of the stones that was lying about, he made his bed under the stars and put the stone under his head as a pillow.

It is one of those details in the story that cries out for some explanation. I can’t imagine resting my head on a stone for a few minutes, let alone for a whole night. I wonder if it is in fact a symbol, that when we have done something we know has been wrong or harmful we no longer experience the softness of life. Even sleeping can become hard and difficult.

During his sleep, Jacob has a dream of a ladder, or a stairway between heaven and earth, with the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. And suddenly Jacob discovers that God is present with him. In John’s Gospel, Jesus uses the same image to speak of his own spiritual experience. Interesting, despite Jacob’s sin and deception, God doesn't bring a message of judgement or anger against him, but rather blesses him and promises to be with him: “I am with you and I will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you.”

Even in the midst of our sin and deception, God (or Reality with a capital R as Michael Dowd refers to God), promises to be with us and to watch over us, continuing to nurture us in order that we might flourish into who we really are.

As the story proceeds, Jacob wakes up from his dream. Marshall Davis suggests that this could be read both literally and symbolically. A change has taken place in Jacob. He has woken up to a depth of life that he had previously been unaware of.

So, in his now awakened state, Jacob declares: “Surely the Lord or the Eternal One is in this place and I was not aware of it. How awesome is this place. This is none other than the house of God: this is the gate of heaven.”

As Marshall Davis says, it is a powerful passage filled with symbolism. The gap between heaven and earth is bridged by a stairway. Heaven and earth are united in a reversal of the creation story where God is said to have divided or separated the two.

So Jacob becomes aware of God’s presence in an ordinary place, in the temple of creation. This wasn’t what people would have called a holy site. It was simply a matter of Jacob becoming aware of something that had always been present but which he had missed all that time. It is a reminder that in the most ordinary places of this world, God is present. As one ex-colleague used to put it, there are no God-forsaken places in this world.


In the words of Marshall Davis, the House of God is not a holy building. It is everywhere. In the open countryside. It is here and now. Wherever we are is the gate of heaven. But later on, Jacob’s descendants took this statement literally, as religious people tend to do, and they built a temple on that spot and named it Bethel, meaning the House of God. Religion always has the danger of fossilising and literalising the spiritual experience of a spiritual ancestor, leaving an outer shell often with very little or just a faint sense of the inner experience.

It is for this reason that in this denomination, there has been a tradition of making a distinction between the religion of Jesus and the religion about Jesus. The religion of Jesus is the way he lived and taught and acted in this world. The religion about Jesus refers to all the religious traditions that have grown up around Jesus and which sometimes have the danger of becoming an empty shell where the living spirit of Jesus, how he lived and taught and interacted with people can so easily be lost.

So may you, in those moments when it feels like you are sleeping with a stone or rock under your head, dream a new dream with Jacob, of a ladder uniting heaven and earth and earth with heaven, and wake up to discover the wonderful truth that God is in this place here and now, in the beauty of a flower, in the miracle of an insect, in the playfulness of a child, in the smile and the handclasp of a dear friend. May you discover that God is in this place and you were unaware of it, and that this, sacred here and now, is the very gate of heaven. Amen.

Ephesians 4:21-33

When my mom and dad got married, like many here, the old version of the vows were used which made the woman vow to love and obey her husband. My mom and dad have often joked about the day of their wedding when the old Salvation Army officer got my mom to say her vows, when she repeated them back, she somehow left out the word ‘obey’, not as a conscious decision, she said it just happened. But she was quite pleased afterwards! It left the Salvation Army Officer conducting the wedding a little flummoxed at first, raising his eyebrow, he regained his composure and continued with the service.

Last week’s sermon examined the question from 1 Corinthians 14 over whether women should remain silent in church and by implication whether women should be allowed to preach. I won’t go into the detail of the argument but I suggested that a mis-translation of a small Greek word potentially changes the whole passage making Paul a supporter of women preachers and leaders rather than a misogynist who has been responsible for the oppression of women.

Today I want to pick up on one little line in last week's passage which reads as follows: “Women should remain in submission, as the law says.”

As I said in last weeks sermon, there is no law that says women should remain in submission.

But the law in Judaism was in fact more than just a list of individual dos and don’ts. The law, or the Torah in Judaism was a word that could also refer to the entirety of the first 5 books of the Bible. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. Collectively they were called the Torah, which in our English Bibles is most often translated as law.

Now in the Torah, in Genesis, we do read a verse that speaks of women being in submission to men. But it is not written as a law.

The context of the verse is the so-called fall of humanity. In the Genesis story, the man and the woman have been told not to eat of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil. They have disobeyed the command. In in response, the God voice in the passage begins to outline the consequences of their actions… One of the consequences is that the women is told she will be in submission to her husband.

In other words, according to this Genesis story, the submission of woman to men is a sign and a consequence of human sin. When humanity is out of sync with the spirit of God, hierarchies of begin to form and one of the hierarchies is the domination of men over women and the submission of women to men.

Genesis 2 is very clear therefore that this is not the way God had intended it from the beginning. Rather it begins to be expressed in human relations as a result of disobedience and sin. To put it bluntly, it is an expression of sin and not the way of God.

That is quite revolutionary because somewhere along the line religious people got this wrong. Religious people began to take this sinful pattern of dominant and submissive hierarchies of male and female relationships and asserted that it is the divine order of things.
​
In some cultures today, women have less authority and status than young boys. But before we look down on such cultures, it should be acknowledged that this would have been true of Western European culture a few hundred years ago too. The general attitude that women should be submissive to men is still deeply ingrained in our modern western psyche, despite a century of the women’s liberation movement.

But in the mythical garden of Eden of Genesis 2, we discover, male dominance over women was not originally part of the Divine order of things. It comes according to the story in Genesis 3, as an expression of and a consequence of a humanity which is out of sync with the way and the spirit of God.

Now many modern day Churches continue to preach and teach that within a marriage, the wife should submit to the husband. Such preachers would appeal to the Apostle Paul in the book of Ephesians where it states in Ephesians 5:22 “Wives submit to your husbands as to the Lord”. But unfortunately, those preachers ignore the other verses around it. Firstly in verse 21, Paul begins this section by saying very clearly “submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.”

The NIV Bible however puts a heading break in between these words and verse 22, separating two verses that originally in Paul’s letter belonged together.

Paul’s advice to married couples begins in verse 21 with the words “submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Only then does he go on to say: Women submit to your husbands.

But what we forget is the instruction to the husband: “Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church?”
And how did Christ love the church one might ask? By becoming a servant, and the least of all. Kneeling down as John describes washing his disciples feet.

This reinforces verse 21 which suggests that what Paul is actually calling for is a mutual submission from both the wife and the husband.

He is taking the curse of submission in Genesis 3 and he is turning it upside down, turning it inside out. He is taking the culturally accepted Jewish norm of women submitting themselves to husbands and now extending that submission into mutual submission between both the woman and the man.

Marriages become sacred and holy when both partners are able to humble themselves before each other. When both partners treat the other with equal dignity. When both partners are willing to step down from the throne of their own selfhood to love one another with Christ-like love.

By reading verse 22 about woman submitting to their husbands without taking into consideration verse 21 where Paul clearly states his true position of mutual submission, and without consideration for the instruction to the man in verse 25, Paul’s real teaching on marriage is lost, and we find ourselves back in Genesis 3 where the woman and the man have been expelled from the garden and are now living out of harmony with God and each other.

It is a reminder when interpreting the Bible, not to latch onto a verse without placing that verse in the wider context from which it comes. It is like a tabloid newspaper taking one line of a politician’s speech and turning it into a headline to make it mean the very opposite of what it was intended to mean.

Reading the Bible requires that we love God not only with our hearts, but also our minds. We are invited to bring our critical faculties with us.

In all our relationships, may we learn the way of Christ-like humility and submission that enables real tenderness, love and intimacy in a relationship. But just as Christ asserted himself sometimes as well, may we also assert ourselves when it is appropriate to do so. Mutual submission and mutual assertion together help to create the rhythm of a healthy relationship of love. Amen.

​Silence Speaks 
John 8:1-8

In the last two weeks I read an online article about Steve Jobs and Elon Musk. Steve Jobs was the founder of Apple while Elon Musk is the founder of Tesla.  The article reflects on the fact that both Steve Jobs and Elon Musk display a capacity for sitting in what others might regard as uncomfortable silence.  In the flow of a media interview the writer gives examples of how both Steve Jobs and Elon Musk, when asked a difficult question allowed themselves the space to sit in 15 – 20 seconds of silence before answering the interviewer.  Now 15-20 seconds of silence doesn't sound like a lot on the face of it, but in most ordinary conversations it would be very rare for two people to allow 15 – 20 seconds of silence. After 10 seconds of silence between two people, many people would begin to feel a sense of discomfort. 

The writer suggests that part of the success of Steve Jobs and Elon Musk lies in this ability to sit in the uncomfortable silence and in that space they are able to access a broader perspective, and a wider or deeper intelligence that is normally short-circuited by our compulsive and reactive communication.  

Now clearly Elon Musk does not always live in this space because over the past number of years he has shown that he is quite capable of being reactive and of making some rather foolish statements.  I don't know a lot about Steve Jobs, but I don't think anyone would classify him as in any way a person of unwavering wisdom, but I do get the sense that there is some truth to the fact that when we create space for space, even if for fairly short periods, we have the opportunity to briefly step outside of our normal compulsive and reactive way of responding to life, and have access to something wider and deeper. A greater intelligence and even wisdom, that resides within us. 

I believe that we see that in the passage we read this morning about Jesus. It is a well-known and familiar passage to many.  Jesus’ opponents, the Pharisees, who are wanting to catch Jesus out and expose him as the fraud that they believe him to be, drag before him a woman who they had allegedly caught in the very act of adultery.  They confront Jesus with the requirements of their Jewish Law – that she should be stoned.  If Jesus contradicts their written scriptures, the Word of God, as many would call it today, then they will have a case against him. 

How does Jesus respond?  He creates a bit of space. He does not immediately react. He enters into what might have felt like an uncomfortable silence for those who had gathered around. Jesus takes his time. He bends down. He begins to write in the sand with his finger.  Some people have suggested that he was writing down the names of each of the accusers who had brought the women before him. But it is also quite possible that Jesus was doodling in the sand.  The Greek word “graphó” can be translated as either write or draw. 

With all these mindfulness colouring in books that have been sold in the last 5 years or so, it is has become more common knowledge that doodling and drawing have a powerful ability to change our head-space. 

As Jesus bends down to draw or doodle in the sand, he creates space for himself so that he doesn't respond reactively. And in doing so, he begins to access a deeper wisdom and a deeper intelligence.

Kakichi Kadowaki, a Christian priest, who also studied and practised Zen meditation writes that in this story, we see the Zen-Mind of Christ.  In fact, it was a Zen monk who told him how deeply moved he was when he first read this passage.  He added: ‘Don't you think we can infer from this incident in the Bible that Jesus had the same experience that we have in Zen?”

Kadowaki continues: “Certainly, a person who reads this passage with a silenced heart will perceive that the Christ pictured there radiates a peace and lucidity that could be called Zen-like.  Something about him resembles the ancient Zen masters. 

Kadowaki writes that in this passage, like a Zen Master who is presented with a Zen Koan, which is a frustrating spiritual riddle, Jesus is presented with a difficult problem that that cannot be solved intellectually.  Solving the problem, Jesus uses an unexpected action, he bends down and responds with silence.  Thirdly, out of the silence, Jesus begins to speak with a remarkable clarity. Although replying in simple language, Jesus leads his questioners to self-introspection.  His simple clear words produce greater clarity and impact than a long exhaustive discussion could ever have done.  And lastly, Jesus transcends the dualistic thinking of the Pharisees and Scribes of whether to punish or not to punish. Going beyond punishment and non-punishment, Jesus takes a stand of a higher dimension. He accesses a mind of higher wisdom. 

Kadowaki writes that at a point in his life, (probably in the 1960s) at the height of university campus unrest, he had an experience of being surrounded by 10 or so angry left-wing students, who made him a target of their vehement questioning. Carried away by the violent emotions characteristic of youth, the angry youths showered him with cutting questions.  Reflecting on that situation he says that every time he reads John 8 about the woman caught in adultery, that oppressive and dangerous situation on the university campus would come back to him. Wasn’t that the situation that Christ was placed in when faced with the angry, vehement questioning of the Scribes and Pharisees. 

In such a case, the ordinary person writes Kadowaki, is thrown off balance and cannot respond appropriately. But in the story, Jesus never loses his tranquillity. Not only that, by his silence, he calms the violent emotions of his opponents so that in the end, it is they who are now off balance and on the wrong foot. 

Reflecting on the Zen-like silence and wisdom of Christ, Kadowaki concludes that silence speaks. In the silence, wisdom is accessed, embodied and communicated by Jesus.  The silence of Jesus is not just a head silence, it is an embodied silence, as Jesus non-reactively bends down, creates space and begins to doodle in the sand.  In Jesus actions, we see that it is not only the silence that speaks, but also the body that speaks. Jesus is not only at one with the stillness, he is also at one with his body, completely at ease within himself, even in the midst of a tense confrontation with his enemies.  Calm, poised, at ease. 

True spirituality does not divorce us from our bodies, or cause us to see our bodies as enemies, but enables us to be completely at ease within our bodies with mind and body working together as one. 

These truths are not new.  Steve Jobs and Elon Musk have only been tapping into a wisdom that goes back into our ancient past as humanity. Even in the Old Testament we see an intuition of this teaching that Jesus seems to embody with completeness and fullness. 

In the book of Proverbs we read: 

Proverbs 15:1 A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.

Proverbs 17:28  Even a fool, when he keeps silent, is considered wise; When he closes his lips, he is considered prudent.

Ecclesiastes 3:7  A time to tear apart and a time to sew together; A time to be silent and a time to speak.

And so, when life is crowding angrily in on you, may you, like Jesus, pause, create space, bend over, doodle in the sand for a moment, and access in that stillness, a mind of greater wisdom and compassion,  than the mind that would want to react without pause and without thought,  the mind of grace and truth (John 1:17), that Paul refers to as ‘The Mind of Christ”. Amen. 

​Psalm 1 The Way of Happiness
Today I would like to do something a little different as I reflect on Psalm 1 under the title: The Path to Happiness.

​1. Psalm 1 begins with the Hebrew word ‘esher’ which means ‘happiness’ or blessedness’.
The first word of the book of psalms is a reminder that the divine intention for us all is that we should live in a state of happiness and blessedness.
We were created for happiness. The desire for happiness is part of our default programming.
When we are not living in a state of happiness, we are falling short of the divine intention for us. It could even be said that not living in a state of happiness is a sin in the truest sense of that word. To sin is to fall short. To live without happiness is to fall short of all that God has placed within us to be.


2. Secondly Psalm 1 points us in the direction that which leads us away from true happiness.
Blessed is the one who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, or stand in the way of sinners, or sit in the seat of mockers.
The psalm uses three phrases in parallel, each phrase seeking to cast meaning on the others:

• the counsel of the wicked
• the way of sinners
• the seat of mockers

“The seat of mockers” can also be translated as the seat of the scornful. In what way does sitting in the seat of mockers or of the scornful lead away from the path of happiness.
The seat of mockers or the scornful is the seat of arrogance, considering oneself higher than others, a law unto oneself and from that place of arrogance and looking down upon others, treating them with contempt. The counsel of the wicked is the counsel of those who would teach the way of gain by criminal or deceptive and false means.
What the Psalmist is saying to us, is that the way of selfish, deceptive arrogance is not a way to true happiness. Instead of helping to connect us with us with others and with life with God, the way of selfish, deceptive arrogance divides us from others, from life and from God, and as such is no path to happiness. It is interesting that the word “diabolical” means literally to throw across, which means to divide. That which causes division, which breaks the unity of the wholeness which God has made is a path that leads away from true happiness.


3. Thirdly, Psalm 1 points us in the direction that leads towards true happiness which it describes as delighting in the law of the Lord, and meditating upon this law day and night.
Before Jesus, a definition of the law of the Lord in the ancient Hebrew scriptures would have referred to the 613 laws of the Old Testament, written laws that Orthodox Jews continue to seek to observe even today in their tiniest detail.
But with the coming of Jesus, Christians were invited to a new understanding of the Law of the Lord, what Paul refers to as the Law of the Spirit of Life (Romans 8:2), not as a list of written commandments, but rather, the law of the spirit which according Paul is summarised as the Law of Love (Romans 13:8-10). Love does no harm to it’s neighbours, therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.
For Paul, the written law brings death, but the Law of the Spirit, which is the Law of Love, brings life. The letter kills, but the Spirit brings life as Paul puts it in 2 Corinthians 3:4-6.
The true path of happiness is therefore to delight in the law of love, the spirit of love, and to meditate on that law of love day and night.

4. Psalm 1 describes what happens when we take delight in the law of love and when we meditate on that law of love night and day…
The Psalmist says we become like trees planted by streams of water, constantly refreshed and given that which is essential for life and growth. One could say that in this psalm, love is compared to a river, which waters us at the roots of our humanity and at the roots of our personalities, helping us to grow into the fullness of all that we can be as human beings.
I get the sense that one of the great delights of a parent is seeing a child growing into all that they can be. We were all made to grow and flourish as human beings. True religion and true spirituality is meant to nurture our growth as human beings, helping us to become all that we can be.
It is just the most wonderful thing in the world to see another human being shine. We were all made to shine, and according to the Psalmist, our ability to shine in life and in this world comes as we take delight in the law of love, the way of love, and as we meditate on that way and law of love night and day.


5. The way of those caught up in the way of the arrogant self and who do not follow and meditate on the way of love, find their life of growth,wholeness and fullness undermined.
In verse 4 “not so the wicked! They are like chaff that the wind blows away.”
A life of emptiness with no real substance, and no real meaning.
A few months ago, there was a documentary series on rich kids who go homeless. We only saw one episode. It was a young man in his 20’s who bought clothes for thousands’s of pounds and who would spend easily 1600 pounds on a night out with his friends. But after 3 nights of living on the street and meeting a homeless man, who spent his days and nights clearing rubbish from the river and recycling cans and bottles that people left lying in the street, this young man reflected on this and admitted that this homeless man was a person of greater substance than any of his friends with all their money. The homeless man was living a life of love, love for the God’s creation, and love for the streets and the city in which he lived.
And so may you recognise that you have been made for happiness. May you discover that happiness as you take delight in the law of God’s love and as you meditate on the way of love day and night. May you become like a tree planted by streams of water, yielding its fruit in season, with leaves that do not whither, that as you grow, flourish and blossom, your life may be a life of blessing to others. Amen.