St James

Today of course we celebrate the Feast Day of St Mary Magdalene, and this morning we celebrated with the Church in Mawdlam their Patronal Festival. But this evening I want to look forward just a few days to Wednesday, when we celebrate the Patronal Festival here with the Feast Day of St James.

James was the Galilean Fisherman who, along with his brother John, was one of those called by Jesus to give up everything and follow him. He seems to have enjoyed a privileged position in the group as one of Jesus’ inner circle. He was one of the disciples chosen to be with Jesus at the Transfiguration, at the healing of Jairus’ daughter and also then at the Garden of Gethsemane as Jesus awaited his arrest.

It is believed that James was eventually put to death in the year 44AD on the instructions of Herod Agrippa who believed that by killing off the Christian leaders, he could kill off the spread of the Christian Faith.

How foolish Herod was to think that a faith was just about the people. Had that been the case then I’m sure that Christianity would never have survived and prospered as it has over the past 2000 years. The Christian faith, whilst heavily reliant on each one of us to act as witnesses for Jesus, relies on Jesus himself for its growth.

And in a couple of the incidents that we hear about with James, this point is emphasised to us. Firstly at the Transfiguration, James was one of the people chosen to go with Jesus to the mountain top, and there he witnessed the appearance before them of Moses and Elijah. The full glory and power of God was revealed before his very eyes.

The Christian faith is unique in that it offers a relationship, a really personal relationship with God, through Jesus. It’s good to feel relaxed in that relationship, confident enough to chat to Jesus like the friend that he is. It’s good to seek his guidance, and his strength in all that we do. But sometimes this personal relationship clouds the fact that Jesus is filled with all the power and strength and majesty of God himself.

When we worship we bow down to God the Creator, the Saviour and the Spirit working within us. We must never lose that sense of awe and majesty, because that is the sense that gives us the recognition of the enormous privilege we have in knowing Jesus.

But this isn’t something that Jesus paid particular attention to in his earthly life. He was a man of the people. He was there with the underdog, with the oppressed, with the victims…. Never did he suggest that he was any better than anyone else. His humility was incredible.

Winston Churchill said about somebody, and I can’t remember who it was, that he was a very modest person, and then he quickly added, ‘and he has much to be modest about’ !

The sort of humility that Jesus displayed was never false. It was never part of an act to attract people to him. It was a genuine concern and empathy with people whom he loved… In one of the not so memorable accounts from the life of James that we hear, he, and his brother John, approach Jesus, and ask him if they can sit with him, one at his right hand, and one at his left, in the kingdom of God. It was a huge misjudgement from them of what the kingdom of God was all about. And yet, Jesus didn’t rebuke them, and when the rest of the disciples became angry at this request by James and John, Jesus just took this as an opportunity to stress that to be a really GREAT person, then you must accept the position as a servant.

And so we’ve thought of the power and glory of Jesus, and we have thought of his humility, but in the third account that I want to think of from the life of James, we see a very different side of Jesus. In the Garden of Gethsemane, the night Jesus was arrested, he calls on Peter, James and John, to pray with him. There he shares with them some of his agitation, some of his pain about what is about to follow. There he asks that this terrible burden be lifted from him…

And all of the time he knows that is not possible. And he is willing to go ahead with his mission, however painful it may be, for Peter, James and John and for all of the disciples, but also for the soldiers who would come to arrest him, for those who would try him, for those who would beat and torture him, and for those who would put him up on the cross.

The third sense we have of Jesus is his love for each one of us…

In the last couple of weeks Britain sent home 4 Russian diplomats, following Russia’s refusal to send over the person police want to interview over the death of the former Russian agent, Alexander Litvinenko. And this week Russia retaliated by sending home 4 British diplomats. It’s a kind of tit-for-tat exchange that was once common in the cold war era – it may continue for a little while longer, or the powers in each country may decide that that is enough.

Both have been seen to show some sort of power, and make a stand. To many it just looks a little bit childish but that is sometimes how international diplomacy has to work in order to avoid bigger conflicts.

But this kind of exchange bears no relation to the sort of relationship Jesus revealed to the world. With him there was never any reprisals, never any comeback on anything people did or failed to do. His love was limitless… His love is limitless.

Jesus bore no grudges. Jesus used no strong arm tactics to draw people to him. He simply loved.

It was the love which James recognised and responded to as he, following the resurrection of Jesus, shared the gospel message. It was the love that millions of others have responded to since, and are continuing to respond to today.

It is the love that today draws his Church together, to reveal, to a world in need, some of the power and awesome majesty of Jesus, something of his humility as we seek to serve others, and the compassion and concern for our neighbours, whoever they are and wherever they may be.

This Church has survived for over 500 years, with many faithful witnesses passing through. Today we are the ones called to preserve this witness. We do so in ever changing circumstances, and in an often disinterested world, but we do so with the full force of God behind us, and within us, if only we open our lives completely to him. AMEN