Sermons
Trinity 11 2009
There are quite a few well-established British cultural institutions which operate systems of liberal totalitarianism. They are inclusive and accessible to such a point that some people feel unworthy to enter them. The ethos tends to be slightly left-wing, suspicious of America, embarrassed about our country’s colonial past, supportive of the view that human sexuality is naturally varied, in favour of promoting the rights of minorities, protective of women (without demeaning them), and often distinctly pacifist. I was trained for the priesthood at such an institution and we were told that it was a distinctively Anglican thing to be liberal, to be accepting of difference and open to the views of others, except of course the views of those with whom we disagreed, those whom we thought were illiberal, the unlearned bigots with different views with whom we were at war. There were two other colleges for training for the priesthood at Oxford, one full of Anglo-Catholic homosexuals who didn’t think women could be priests, and the other full of very heterosexual evangelical men who agreed that women couldn’t be priests but thought that gay people might be healed of their infirmity. What a righteous war we fought against these twin iniquities! Except of course we wouldn’t have referred to it as war because the use of military metaphor was seen as spectacularly patriarchal and illiberal. The language of war was expunged from Christian hymns at college (to disastrous poetic effect); we were not urged onward as Christian soldiers marching as to war and we were rather dilatory about fighting the good fight (though one ordinand later had this hymn at his wedding). This over-sensitivity to military metaphor found itself in much difficulty with readings such as the first two we have heard this morning. Joshua would not have made a very good Cuddesdon ordinand and neither perhaps would the writer of the letter to the Ephesians.
Joshua was the all-conquering hero in the war against the enemies of the people of God, the war that had brought the Israelites into the promised land at the expense of their enemies. The chariots and horsemen of the Egyptians had been swept aside by the red tide of God’s wrath and the unfortunate Amorites had been defeated, King Sihon and King Og had licked the dust. So we read that Joshua assembled all the people to give thanks that the Israelites had conquered the land of Canaan as God had wanted, they celebrated Yahweh’s agency in the battle, they entered into solemn covenant with God and as the victors they wrote the history.
For the writer to the Ephesians the Christian’s battle against rulers, authorities, cosmic powers of darkness and the devil himself is not to be countenanced without first picking up the requisite divine kit-bag which contains the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of faith, and the helmet of salvation. This may sound a rather less useful armoury than that employed by Joshua but the writer wants to make it clear that as Christians we have a fight on our hands and we have to be ready to enlist immediately.
There is one more piece of kit though that I left out of the list in Ephesians and that is the recommended footwear. In the midst of all the talk of spiritual and therefore real warfare the writer suddenly seems to struggle over what to put on his Christian warriors’ feet and he stumbles perhaps because he encounters the word gospel. ‘As shoes for your feet put on whatever will make you ready to proclaim the gospel of peace’. It is as if in the rush of piling up his military metaphors a little light of peaceful intention has begun to glimmer.
But this may be the exception, if the Old Testament reading portrays God as backing up the armies of Israel, fighting on their side, and the New Testament reading is all about fighting the dark powers are we as Christians to see ourselves in a state of war, are we to be ready to fight? If we are to fight, who is our real enemy and how might we see victory?
Jesus didn’t put up much of a fight. At the time of the crucifixion of Jesus one gets the impression that nobody really knew what was going on but for the first Christians it was clearly a massive defeat; Jesus had been thoroughly vanquished and they had been terribly mistaken about him. The disciples all fled, the Romans thought they were just stringing up just another political trouble-maker or religious crackpot, some of the Jews thought they had unmasked a fraudulent mock-Messiah, and the so-called penitent thief on the cross next to Jesus seems simply to think that the man hanging next to him is a victim of wrongful arrest. There can be few displays of human emotion more undesirable to watch than mocking, gloating over someone’s defeat, and particularly in this case where there had been so much promise. And everyone in the scene is mocking Jesus, the leaders of the people mock his claim to be the Messiah the chosen one, the soldiers have fun with his absurd politico-religious title ‘king of the Jews’, and the criminal ridicules his claim to be the Messiah who has come to save his people. People tend to gloat in a particularly vicious way if the one who has been toppled has in some way un-nerved them, the rejoicing at someone else’s failure seems to be magnified if there has been an attraction that has been somehow disappointed, somehow let down.
And hadn’t Jesus been a let-down! What a disappointment. Hadn’t he said he was bringing in some kind of kingdom, even the kingdom of God? Weren’t all his good works, and healings, and wise words supposed to lead up to something? Surely not this defeat though, flung on a cross and derided by all and sundry. After all, what sort of kingdom has so little power and what sort of king was Jesus supposed to be when he seemed to let himself be put to such an ignominious death (particularly for a Jew) without a struggle? And in the midst of all the violence and noise all he can do is ask his father’s forgiveness for the brutes having their murderous fun, and promise the criminal hanging next to him that he would be entering paradise that day. They must have thought he was quite mad. No wonder the disciples fled.
Jesus was mocked for being the wrong sort of king; in a situation of religious repression and Roman overlordship surely God would send some sort of dynamic military hero to throw out the foreign rulers and restore political power to the hands of the religious leaders of the Hebrew people. They needed a victorious conquering king like Joshua. They were looking for Rambo and they got a little lamb. But this lamb of God shows them through his obedience and sacrifice that the kingdom which has been proclaimed is not one where power and strength and military might are going to count for anything. The strong men and women in this new kingdom are not going to be the fighters but the ones who know how to forgive their enemies, they are going to be the ones who know how to sacrifice their own well-being, even their lives, for the sake of others, they are going to be the ones who can give assurance of God’s gentle love to all around them.
And that is why the good liberals of Cuddesdon refused to sing of battle. They were no doubt over sensitive but they found it an anomaly to sing of going into war when they believed that God didn’t exercise brutal power over people. On the throne of the cross, wearing his crown of thorns, with a title above his head proclaiming his identity for any who can see through the irony, on this throne Jesus shows us what sort of kingdom he is bringing in, what sort of victory he is achieving, and what sort of citizens we are to be if we are to take our place in that kingdom. Forgive your enemies, sacrifice your well-being for that of others, assure people of God’s love, acting in the knowledge that you follow your Lord’s pattern.