St Paul is often thought of as a rather blunt, maybe even not particularly pleasant sort of character in some of his letters. Certainly he was fairly ruthless in terms of trying to maintain a discipline in the Church, and he was passionate about sharing the gospel with as many people as possible. But tonight we heard part of the letter of James (1:19-27), and hear we find some even more blunt comments – James argued that whilst good works wouldn’t save a person, good works are certainly the marks of a Christian person. In the eyes of James, talk without action was meaningless.
‘Be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves’, wrote James. This remains one of the great challenges to the Church today – in Bible study over the past couple of weeks we have thought about the Church, and about some of the things we do in the Church, and actually many of these things, that have become an important part of our worship and tradition, are man-made things.
Some are very useful, but it’s very easy to also go a little too far, to push the boundaries of man-made things a little bit further and begin to introduce rules or traditions which really have no value. All this will ever do is to alienate people; to make them think that the Church isn’t a place for them at all.
There’s a story about a little old cleaning woman who went to the local Church, which I may have told before. When the invitation was given at the end of the service, she went forward, wanting to become a member. The minister listened, as she told him how she had accepted Jesus and wanted to be baptised and become a member of the Church. The minister thought to himself, ‘Oh my ! she’s so unkempt, even smells a little, and her finger nails aren’t clean. She picks up rubbish, cleans toilets – What would the members think of her?’
He told her that she needed to go home and pray about it and then decide. The following week, she came again. She told the Minister that she had prayed about it and still wanted to be baptised. ‘I’ve passed this Church for so long. It’s so beautiful, and I truly want to become a member.’
Again the Minister told her to go home and pray some more. A few weeks later, while out eating at a restaurant, the Minister saw the little old lady. He didn’t want her to think he was ignoring her, so he approached her and said, ‘I haven’t seen you for a while. Is everything ok?’
‘Oh yes’ replied the woman. ‘I talked to Jesus and he told me not to worry about becoming a member of your Church’. ‘He did?’ said the Minister. ‘Oh yes,’ she said, ‘even he hasn’t been able to get into your Church yet, and he’s been trying for years.’
Our actions as members of the family of Christ are incredibly important; people who know that we are members of a Church will look at us, and expect to see something different, something that they perhaps couldn’t even identify. People are ready to judge Jesus on how we behave !
But even our outward behaviour isn’t all that we need to be concerned about. The gospel reading (John 18:12-18), with the account of Peter denying that he even knew Jesus, reminds us that God sees what we do – not just outwardly, but in ourselves. God sees and knows our hearts. We can never deceive him. We can never hide from him.
At the end of the first date, a young man takes the girl home. Feeling quite brave in the dark he decides to try for that important first kiss. With an air of confidence, he leans with his hand against the wall and, smiling, he says to her, ‘how about a good night kiss?’
Horrified, the girl replies, ‘are you mad? My parents will see us!’
‘Oh come on – who’ll see us at this hour?’
‘No please. Can you imagine if we get caught?’
‘Oh come on, there’s nobody around. They’re all sleeping!’
‘No way. It’s just too risky’
‘oh, please, please… I like you so much !’
‘no. I like you too, but I just can’t.’
‘Oh yes you can, please ?’
‘No. I just can’t.’
‘Please?’
Just then, the porch light goes on, and the girl’s sister comes out in her pyjamas, with her hair dishevelled, and says in a sleepy voice: ‘Dad says to go ahead and give him a kiss... Or I can do it, or if need be, he’ll come down himself and do it. But for goodness sake, tell him to take his hand off the intercom button!’
God sees and hears everything we do, and that’s quite a scary thought – well, It’s scary until we realise that he isn’t trying to catch us out. God doesn’t want us to fail. God wants our love and he wants us to show that love to others. Peter denied Jesus, but Jesus understood, and he still gave Peter an important part to play in building his Church. Peter became a doer as he responded to the unconditional love of Jesus.
We can celebrate that fact that God is merciful and loving, and he is always looking to give us another chance to do better, but we must always remember that we are challenged to be doers not just hearers. AMEN
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