Sermon on the plain

There’s a story about St Cedric which I think I’ve told you before, but it’s always worth repeating ! One day Cedric was working on the reception desk in heaven when a beautiful blonde actress came in and stood before him. Cedric was a little surprised to see her – considering her infamous reputation.

‘Are you sure you’ve come to the right place ?’ he asked. The actress smiled seductively and replied, ‘I went to an evangelistic rally, where I was converted just before I died.’

‘Those rallies are going too far these days’ said Cedric, ‘life was much tougher in my day. So just to make sure you’re converted properly, you’ll have to walk down that long corridor to heaven, and if you think one bad thought a trap door will open, and you’ll drop down to the other place.’

So the actress walked off down the corridor, swaying her hips as she went… about halfway along, a trap door opened and Cedric, following behind, fell through !

All of us at times are called to consider our condition in life – where we stand on moral judgements, faith issues, politics; what is our financial position, what importance do we give to material possessions, a comfortable house, a nice car; how we’re thought of in our community, or in work or Church, and so on…

And probably most of us will be fairly happy in those considerations – content that we’re living good lives, we’re well thought of, and comfortably well off. But in this evening’s reading Jesus once again turns some of these thoughts around.

He calls us to look at the poor, hungry, grieving, hated, excluded, and as we do so, I suspect our natural response would quite correctly be to look at them with pity and compassion. And I’m sure that was what Jesus thought as he considered people in any sort of need, but he also recognised something more in them and that was their need and desire to involve him in their lives. A need and a desire which so many of us, apparently more comfortable, wealthier and outwardly happier, don’t seem to recognise.

In the Sermon on the Plain Jesus taught in the same way as he had in the sermon on the Mount. As he so often did, he confounded popular wisdom. The Lord looked to the kind of people whom we pity, who seem hopeless, and said: "Blessed are you who are poor, who are hungry, who weep. Blessed are you when people hate you, exclude you, revile you, and defame you."

Then, even more astonishingly, Jesus looked to another group of people who are like most of us and said, "Woe to you who are rich, who are full, and who are laughing. Woe to you when all speak well of you." In reality Jesus is offering a message to all who seem to be comfortable and content “Watch out!! For your seeming blessedness is actually a great danger.”

So what is Jesus saying here ? What message is he giving ? Is it that we should all be poor, or hungry, or grieving ? Is it that we should all seek some way of being excluded or reviled ?

Perhaps it says a lot about me and all of us that I and I suspect you will be very pleased that I don’t think this is what Jesus is actually saying. In these words Jesus isn’t for one moment trying to glamorise poverty or suffering – those are things that he spent time working to alleviate in his life. If we look at all kinds of social statistics today we find that poverty and deprivation are things that often lead to crime and violence, and a huge amount of personal despair and misery.

So these things aren’t good, but one thing that Jesus did realise was that these things can help a person to realise that they can’t live by their own power and strength alone. It is often people in the greatest need who realise that their need can only be met by God.

And what a blessing it is when we all realise that we need God – we need God for salvation, we need him for strength, we need him for comfort and healing and peace. We need him for company, we need him for joy – we need him because he loves us unconditionally and understands every need and fear that we can ever have… We need him because the truth is we can’t manage by ourselves !

Jesus knew the most likely way for us to turn to God is when we are in danger and difficulty. Then, we may knock on that door that God will open. Then we will find a saviour to befriend us. And so this sermon on the plain is a call from Jesus to recognise our need, and to do so before we hit the depths that life will occasionally bring.

Jesus calls us to join the spirit of the poor or needy. Those people who had nothing but also expected nothing from the world, but who recognised that they had everything to expect from God.

It is through their need that Jesus shows us the way to look towards God, to turn to God for help in our lives and in our attitudes and in our values. If we can recognize our need we can begin to learn where God leads us. We can understand the necessity of seeking God. Our deep sense of helplessness brings us before God just as we are – not as we imagine ourselves or would like ourselves to be. And when we do those things then we are recognising the power of God that can transform us into the happy, complete, caring, and loving people Jesus calls us to be.

And like all things in faith, it is a journey that will have ups and downs along the way. There’s a story about a man who called in at a garage, and asked how far it was to Cardiff, and the attendant replied, ‘well if you keep going in the direction you’re going, it’s about 25,000 miles, but if you turn around, it’s about 10… Going in the right direction is what is important in our lives.

The poor can help us get to that glorious day when we will give up on seeking personal resources of privilege or power as the path to true happiness. The poor of Jesus’ time turned to God who cared, who healed and uplifted – who, above all, loved them as they were. Their story teaches us that the love of God is close at hand and powerful far beyond those who rule this world. The poor that Jesus describes remind us of the need for a power greater than ourselves to heal us and give us happiness and meaning. They help us come to the day when we will see clearly the source of this power: Jesus, the Christ, our Saviour. AMEN