19th February 2006Sexagesima
Bishop Edward Holland
Proverbs 8
: 1 &
22 – 31 ; Colossians
1 : 15 – 20 ;
John 1 : 1 -
14
Some
years ago I had a sabbatical leave and went to stay with various
Christian contacts in different parts of India. I began in
Delhi where I stayed with the Delhi Brotherhood, founded as an Anglican
Religious Community and now part of the Church of North
India. They took me to see some of the work with people on
the very edge of society, who had been moved by the City Council to
waste land on the edge of the city with virtually no infrastructure of
roads, water, electricity, drainage or indeed buildings.
While
there I was told a wonderful story of how two doctors from St
Stephen’s Christian Hospital in Delhi had gone to such a
settlement, and had simply sat under a tree. After a while
people began to come to them and ask what they were doing there, and
they would say that they were doctors and that they were available to
anyone who should need them. And of course people began to
come to them immediately for advice, treatment, and
medicine. It was all the easier for people to come since
they were not part of any institution, but were so immediately
available sitting under the tree.
Jesus always seems to have an eye for the real seeker, for the person who has a real desire.
After
a while the leaders of the community came to the two doctors and
offered them a room to work from, and by the time I was there, 10 years
later, there was an entire clinic served by quite a large number of
medical services.
It is what can happen when someone makes
themselves available. It struck me that this is what Jesus
was doing in the Gospel reading we have just heard.
Everybody is there, crowding round, pushing and shoving to get near to
him, to get a good view. But Jesus always seems
to have an eye for the real seeker, for the person who has a real
desire - like Zacchaeus up his tree, or that widow in the Temple
with her mite. There must have been many other people
around, but Jesus spots the one with a zeal for what they need and want.
In
this case he could hardly miss them – the four men with their
palsied(newer translations say ‘paralysed’) friend having
to break open the roof and let the man down on his stretcher to get him
near Jesus. But Jesus sees more – he sees their
faith, he sees their desire and their love, and he says to the palsied
man, “Son, your sins are forgiven”, speaking to his whole
condition – he is not just sick, he feels unforgiven, separated
from God.
Immediately the religious professionals are
affronted. What right does he have to forgive
sins? They would not think of doing it, only God can do
that. As far as they were concerned the man’s sins
were unforgivable , at least in this life – no one could say he
was forgiven. He is a sinner and remains a sinner
– that’s why he palsied, it’s a sign of God’s
disfavour.
But Jesus knows his Father. He
knows God always forgives – indeed that God is love and therefore
forgiveness is part of his nature. It is there before sin
is even committed. All we need to do is to receive it, to
have faith and seek it. And so to confound the grumblers he
removes the sign of God’s apparent disfavour – the
man’s palsy. “Is it easier to say you are
healed or to say your sins are forgiven?” The answer
of course is to say you are forgiven since healing requires evidence,
and so Jesus does the apparently harder thing.
So
often the Church presents God as unforgiving, demanding, making
conditions. ‘He will love you if you change your
ways, if you behave, if you conform to our rules’ But
Christ shows us God as a loving Father who does indeed want the best
for us – he wants us to share in his life and his perfection, and
to be able to live well. But before anything he wants us to
know his love for us.
Like those doctors at St
Stephen’s Hospital he is available, at our side, waiting for us
to turn to him, to recognise him and to discover, or at least begin to
discover, his love.
When we do then things begin to happen,
change begins to happen. We begin to discover our value,
that we are loved, created with a purpose. We did not just
happen by chance – the Spirit of God moved to give us life.
Our
life is precious and it matters how we live. God never
leaves us stuck with the things that diminish us – whether it is
sin, sickness, misfortune or whatever – he comes, indeed he does
not need to come for he is already with us through the Holy Spirit, and
he warms us with his acceptance and his delight in us. He
is delighted with us as we are, but he also desires that we shall grow
to become the person he has made us to be.
As St Paul
writes in the Epistle “The Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was
preached among you by us was not yea and nay but in him was
yea. For all the purposes of God in him are
yea”. God as he is shown to us in Christ always says
“Yea” - “Yes” to us, so that we too are able to
say “yes” to him with great confidence. And
indeed to say “Yes” to each other. If God is
saying “Yes” to us all then we can and must do the same.
And
that means that we too must declare forgiveness of sins to those around
us, even those we see as the greatest of sinners. We have
to be very careful when we say or think or suggest that something or
someone is unforgivable, for that is to suggest that God does not
forgive and that is bordering on blasphemy. It says sin is
more powerful than God and God can do nothing about it.
In
our first reading Isaiah speaking in God’s name lists the ways in
which the people of Israel have neglected God – “thou hast
wearied me with thine iniquities” he says, but then goes on
“I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine
own sake, and will not remember thy sins”. God will
remain faithful, however unfaithful we are – he is always true to
his nature of forgiveness, of unconditional love.
But
we do need to recognise it and to live as though it is so.
Firstly knowing we are forgiven and so able to let go of the past and
be part of God’s new creation. Secondly, knowing that
others are forgiven too we are to become part of God’s forgiving
action in the world.
When we hang on to old hurts and
old quarrels we do immense damage – think of Northern Ireland or
Palestine and Israel. Think of so many family and personal
quarrels where people insist on continuing with animosity and a pattern
of getting even, getting our own back. Think of the Church
where Christians so often remain set against each other in their sects
and parties and even in their personal relationships. Who
are we in communion with or out of communion with are important
questions.
Jesus says as he heals the palsied man that he
does it so that they may know the Son of Man has power on earth to
forgive sins. Jesus is the Son of Man, but he calls
us to discover that we too are sons and daughters of man, and that we
too as humans have power, indeed a duty, to forgive sins on earth in
the Father’s name. This is the meaning of our
baptism, which is a sacramental sign that we human beings share in
Christ’s Sonship, that we are wanted, perhaps even needed by
God. It is the meaning of the Eucharist, that God in Christ
gives himself to us, feeds and sustains us with himself, with his
Spirit and his new humanity.
The Church is to be a
community of people who, knowing they are totally forgiven and accepted
by God whatever they are or do, live with each other in committed
forgiving love . Liking does not come into
it. We are called to love and forgive one another,
and then to live with that same love out in the world.
The
doctors of St Stephen’s Hospital were witnessing to the love of
God for those marginalized and excluded people outside Delhi, and we as
sons and daughters of men are to do the same, not just in the Church
but in the world, and especially in those places where there is
division and hurt, and especially towards those people who are most
excluded and despised.
And as we do so then we begin
to be seen not just as human beings but as sons and daughters of God
living through the Spirit of the Son of God – just as we see
Jesus to be the Son of God because he lives so fully as the Son of Man.