Building his Church

Today’s gospel reading begins with some of the most powerfully symbolic words we read in the Bible – ‘when the days drew near for him to be taken up, Jesus set his face to go to Jerusalem’ (Luke 9:51). Quite an innocuous sentence perhaps, but this one verse marks the turning point in Jesus’ ministry – up to this point he has taught people, he has encouraged and preached, he has challenged people, he has performed miracles, and he would continue to do these things, but now he is moving on to another part of his mission – the trip to Jerusalem and to the cross.

Thinking about a trip I read a joke this week about a couple who were going on holiday. They were standing in line waiting to check in their bags and the husband said to the wife, ‘I wish we’d brought the piano.’ The wife turned and looked at him as if he was stupid (something wives often do to their husbands from my experience !), but anyway she asked ‘Why would you want to bring the piano ? We’ve got 6 bags already !’ ‘Yes’, replied the man, ‘but the plane tickets are on the piano!’

But this journey of Jesus has many lessons to offer us as a Church today. Firstly it was a journey ! Someone once said that ‘even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get nowhere if you just sit there !’ As Christians we represent the body of Christ on earth, a living and a working body, continually striving to find ways of engaging more closely with people to share the love of God.

As Christians we don’t reach a point of faith where we stop learning and growing, and we never a reach a point where there is no more work for us to do. Today throughout this country many people profess a faith of some sort, but those people are often unmoved by the Church or in some cases are actually hostile to the Church.

And one of the reasons for this is that they don’t see the Christian faith as being particularly relevant to their everyday lives. One of the great challenges for us as a Church today must surely be to engage people and challenge people to consider the clams and the call of Jesus. It will be a tough journey but it is a journey the Church must make.

And that leads on to the second point which is that Jesus really approached Jerusalem aware of the pain and suffering that would follow. He had a mission and would complete that mission whatever the cost. Today the mission must be, as I’ve said, to take out the gospel message of hope and peace and love into a world that perhaps doesn’t always appear ready to listen.

If we speak in the way Jesus spoke, we too must challenge so much of what we see in society today in terms of injustice, poverty, discrimination and so on. That will sometimes lead us into situations of conflict with others, but it is a challenge we must accept willingly, just as Jesus accepted a far greater challenge on our behalf.

But the message that will bring us into conflict with others isn’t all about social action; it is also about love and compassion. The major instruction that we find from Jesus is the command to love – a command which shouldn’t be too controversial until we begin to look at the reality of it.

Jesus loved indiscriminately and without any limits, and that is what he is calling on his people to do as well. The love of Jesus is love for God, love for our family, our friends and our neighbours, but also love for the person we don’t like, and for the person that perhaps seeks to hurt us. That sort of love is a love that contradicts so much of human behaviour – it’s not natural, it doesn’t always seem practical, but it is the love that Jesus exercised for his persecutors, and it is the love he calls us to show to everyone.

And so the second lesson that we learn from Jesus turning to face Jerusalem is that we too must sometimes make journeys that are going to be painful, and they may involve suffering or even humiliation, but walking our journey in God’s name we will walk with his guidance and his support.

And the third lesson is that this was also a walk into resurrection, into victory and new life. Without the cross and the suffering, there would be no victory to celebrate, but our journey is a journey of celebration as we consider the triumph of Jesus overcoming death in order to win new life for all who put their trust in him.

Our first journey is of trust and faith as we seek to grow closer to God and to other people, our second journey is to understand the pain of those around us, and accept the risk of pain and suffering for ourselves in order to proclaim this third message, the message of resurrection and new life – the message of love, the message that light has overcome darkness in the world, and that light as John’s gospel famously puts it, ‘can never be extinguished.’

We, as Christians, often get bogged down with things are really not that important – we get concerned with procedures and rules which have no impact on the lives of others, and we so often start our discussions with people from a position of weakness, as we discuss the problems of the Church.

I don’t think people want to hear that, and people certainly don’t need to hear that – what people need is this message that we have a God who loves each one of us, and who wants to spend eternity with us.

If we go outside today and pop down to the shop or out for a meal and ask people what their perception of the Church is, I’m sure we’ll get a fairly mixed response, and I’m equally sure that there will be some none too complimentary remarks, but wouldn’t it be wonderful if we went outside and spoke to people, and their perception of the Church was a body of people committed to sharing through their lives and their words, good news of hope, love and peace, and committed to building a better life for everyone – that is the Church we surely must continually seek to build. AMEN