Harvest 2017 - All good gifts around us....
Talking to someone in the week about some church buildings he said, 'Churches were built to express people's feelings of worship towards God, but now people have begun to worship the buildings.'
The Victorians were passionate about church building as it was a way to proclaim the glory of God - unfortunately a lot of the buildings were built in such a grand way that people started to think that it was the buildings that were important and not what they pointed to.
The Victorian legacy to the church is one that has very mixed results but one legacy is the Harvest Festival, and in a way this draws us to reflect on what is really important with regard to our faith.
For centuries Christians have celebrated and given thanks for the Harvest, but it was as recent as 1843 when the Revd R S Hawker put up a notice on his Church in Cornwall saying that there would a special Sunday of thanksgiving, and that the old custom of making eucharistic bread from the first corn would be revived. It read: "Let us gather together in the chancel of our church, and there receive, in the bread of the new corn, that blessed sacrament which was ordained to strengthen and refresh our souls."
I'm not sure that it would be the most eye catching and appealing poster today, but it worked then and it has continued since.
The harvest festival has become an important part of the Church calendar – it is obviously a day when we give thanks to God for the harvest, but I think that is only part of our celebration, because as we give thanks to God we recognise again our need for a response to God's love.
The first part of thanksgiving is our recognition of God’s gifts. All around us we see evidence of the goodness of God – we see it in the beauty of creation, we see it in the birth of children, we see it in some of the spectacular weather or in the vast oceans, but God’s glory never changes – we may see it in the spectacular, but we must also see his glory in the mundane things of life, in the everyday events, in the bits of life where nothing really seems to be happening.
The reading from Deuteronomy (8:7-18) reminds us of a land with flowing streams, with springs and underground waters welling up in valleys and hills and the reading goes on to tie up the recognition of everything good with a need to remember and respond to God.
It is a message that's repeated in the gospel (Luke 12:16-30) as Jesus told the parable of the rich man storing up treasures for himself - treasures that he would never get around to using.
In a society where there has been an increasing trend to look after ourselves whatever is happening to others, we're challenged to see God's love, extravagant, indiscriminate and unlimited.
It’s in those moments when we recognise the good things that God has given us that we look and recognise that God is there for us, every moment of every day, that the love that took Jesus to the cross, ready to die for all of us or any one of us, is just the same love that he has for us at this moment – a love which we can trust through thick and thin, a love that has conquered death – a love that will never die.
And it is with that love that he has promised to care for us and provide for us, and our recognition of that is one of the things that we are giving thanks for at harvest.
So thanksgiving is actually a secondary response to that of recognising God’s goodness. Someone once said that there are 3 kinds of giving, grudge giving, duty giving and thanksgiving. Grudge giving is obviously offering something with a heart that is saying ‘Don’t !’ - As far as God is concerned grudge giving is largely pointless !
And then there are some who give out of duty – and this is probably somewhere in between grudgingly giving something and really giving something out of thanks... All of us have a sense of duty to the Church I’m sure – to preserve the buildings, the institution, the traditions, but most importantly to share the gospel message.
A sense of duty is important as we remember that when serving God, we should give our best, whether it is in terms of attendance or performance of something, or money or service or devotion.
But then there is real thanksgiving and that is what harvest is about. Harvest provides us with a wonderful link with reality – for many of us we rely on shopping at the supermarket and we don’t really see the work that goes in to the production of our food, but someone somewhere is working on a farm or at sea, to get that food to us – the food chain is a long one with many people involved, and today we are giving thanks to God for helping lots of people to do their work and to provide us with our food.
We are thanking God for providing people for us and providing them with the resources to do their work. It’s an obvious fact that people who are starving will be more grateful for what they receive than many of us who have plenty, but harvest is a reminder that our blessings must never be at a cost to others.
We must never take for granted the gifts of God, although he has promised us that he will support us and sustain us always. And so we recognise God’s gifts and we give thanks for them, but this is only a little part of true thanksgiving – because a true thanksgiving must involve a response.
We will know the story of the lepers who were healed by Jesus found in Luke’s gospel (17:15-19). Of the 10 that were healed only 1 returned to thank him – physically the others had been made well, but spiritually there was something lacking as they failed to show any real response to Jesus’ actions.
As I said earlier, today's gospel is reminding us not to store up all our benefits whilst others could be benefitting from things that we probably wouldn't even miss.
Harvest is a nice festival – a time of celebration but it contains a challenge to respond. In that poster of R S Hawker he wrote of receiving the sacrament to strengthen and refresh our souls, but we don’t just do that for ourselves, we do it in order to be equipped to go out and serve God, living our lives as a response to the gifts that he has given us.
At harvest we think especially of the food we have, we remember those in need, but above all we give thanks to God for all of his gifts, and most especially we are reminded of his gift of love, the love that allowed Jesus to go to the cross and to reach out his arms calling each one of us to come closer to him.
Responding to the gifts of God with the response he deserves is well beyond my ability, and probably beyond the abilities of every one of us here, but that must never stop us from trying – to live out the message of Jesus, a message of hope, of peace, of joy, a message of salvation, of justice and a message of love for all people, and living out that message will involve our care for others, in prayer, in word and in action.
Harvest is about recognition of God’s goodness and mercy, it is about thanksgiving and most importantly of all, it is about our response to the gifts we have received.
To finish I want to think of some of Paul's words to the Corinthians (2 Cor 9:6-15). He wrote, 'the one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.' Like the man in the gospel who stored up goods which could have benefitted others, we are to look around and see where we can bless other people.
And then we have the words of Paul, 'Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift' - that gift is the gift of life, the gift of everything good and the gift of God's love.... May we live secure in the knowledge of that love and ready to share that love always.... Amen
The Victorians were passionate about church building as it was a way to proclaim the glory of God - unfortunately a lot of the buildings were built in such a grand way that people started to think that it was the buildings that were important and not what they pointed to.
The Victorian legacy to the church is one that has very mixed results but one legacy is the Harvest Festival, and in a way this draws us to reflect on what is really important with regard to our faith.
For centuries Christians have celebrated and given thanks for the Harvest, but it was as recent as 1843 when the Revd R S Hawker put up a notice on his Church in Cornwall saying that there would a special Sunday of thanksgiving, and that the old custom of making eucharistic bread from the first corn would be revived. It read: "Let us gather together in the chancel of our church, and there receive, in the bread of the new corn, that blessed sacrament which was ordained to strengthen and refresh our souls."
I'm not sure that it would be the most eye catching and appealing poster today, but it worked then and it has continued since.
The harvest festival has become an important part of the Church calendar – it is obviously a day when we give thanks to God for the harvest, but I think that is only part of our celebration, because as we give thanks to God we recognise again our need for a response to God's love.
The first part of thanksgiving is our recognition of God’s gifts. All around us we see evidence of the goodness of God – we see it in the beauty of creation, we see it in the birth of children, we see it in some of the spectacular weather or in the vast oceans, but God’s glory never changes – we may see it in the spectacular, but we must also see his glory in the mundane things of life, in the everyday events, in the bits of life where nothing really seems to be happening.
The reading from Deuteronomy (8:7-18) reminds us of a land with flowing streams, with springs and underground waters welling up in valleys and hills and the reading goes on to tie up the recognition of everything good with a need to remember and respond to God.
It is a message that's repeated in the gospel (Luke 12:16-30) as Jesus told the parable of the rich man storing up treasures for himself - treasures that he would never get around to using.
In a society where there has been an increasing trend to look after ourselves whatever is happening to others, we're challenged to see God's love, extravagant, indiscriminate and unlimited.
It’s in those moments when we recognise the good things that God has given us that we look and recognise that God is there for us, every moment of every day, that the love that took Jesus to the cross, ready to die for all of us or any one of us, is just the same love that he has for us at this moment – a love which we can trust through thick and thin, a love that has conquered death – a love that will never die.
And it is with that love that he has promised to care for us and provide for us, and our recognition of that is one of the things that we are giving thanks for at harvest.
So thanksgiving is actually a secondary response to that of recognising God’s goodness. Someone once said that there are 3 kinds of giving, grudge giving, duty giving and thanksgiving. Grudge giving is obviously offering something with a heart that is saying ‘Don’t !’ - As far as God is concerned grudge giving is largely pointless !
And then there are some who give out of duty – and this is probably somewhere in between grudgingly giving something and really giving something out of thanks... All of us have a sense of duty to the Church I’m sure – to preserve the buildings, the institution, the traditions, but most importantly to share the gospel message.
A sense of duty is important as we remember that when serving God, we should give our best, whether it is in terms of attendance or performance of something, or money or service or devotion.
But then there is real thanksgiving and that is what harvest is about. Harvest provides us with a wonderful link with reality – for many of us we rely on shopping at the supermarket and we don’t really see the work that goes in to the production of our food, but someone somewhere is working on a farm or at sea, to get that food to us – the food chain is a long one with many people involved, and today we are giving thanks to God for helping lots of people to do their work and to provide us with our food.
We are thanking God for providing people for us and providing them with the resources to do their work. It’s an obvious fact that people who are starving will be more grateful for what they receive than many of us who have plenty, but harvest is a reminder that our blessings must never be at a cost to others.
We must never take for granted the gifts of God, although he has promised us that he will support us and sustain us always. And so we recognise God’s gifts and we give thanks for them, but this is only a little part of true thanksgiving – because a true thanksgiving must involve a response.
We will know the story of the lepers who were healed by Jesus found in Luke’s gospel (17:15-19). Of the 10 that were healed only 1 returned to thank him – physically the others had been made well, but spiritually there was something lacking as they failed to show any real response to Jesus’ actions.
As I said earlier, today's gospel is reminding us not to store up all our benefits whilst others could be benefitting from things that we probably wouldn't even miss.
Harvest is a nice festival – a time of celebration but it contains a challenge to respond. In that poster of R S Hawker he wrote of receiving the sacrament to strengthen and refresh our souls, but we don’t just do that for ourselves, we do it in order to be equipped to go out and serve God, living our lives as a response to the gifts that he has given us.
At harvest we think especially of the food we have, we remember those in need, but above all we give thanks to God for all of his gifts, and most especially we are reminded of his gift of love, the love that allowed Jesus to go to the cross and to reach out his arms calling each one of us to come closer to him.
Responding to the gifts of God with the response he deserves is well beyond my ability, and probably beyond the abilities of every one of us here, but that must never stop us from trying – to live out the message of Jesus, a message of hope, of peace, of joy, a message of salvation, of justice and a message of love for all people, and living out that message will involve our care for others, in prayer, in word and in action.
Harvest is about recognition of God’s goodness and mercy, it is about thanksgiving and most importantly of all, it is about our response to the gifts we have received.
To finish I want to think of some of Paul's words to the Corinthians (2 Cor 9:6-15). He wrote, 'the one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.' Like the man in the gospel who stored up goods which could have benefitted others, we are to look around and see where we can bless other people.
And then we have the words of Paul, 'Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift' - that gift is the gift of life, the gift of everything good and the gift of God's love.... May we live secure in the knowledge of that love and ready to share that love always.... Amen
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