Sermon: Easter VI (A)
Sunday 14th May 2023
St Anne’s, Wrenthorpe
Video: YouTube
I think that the video we have just watched offers some hope… but also reminds us of the mission before us all.
When I was a teenager, helping with Christian Aid in the parish, by delivering and collecting envelopes, the “inspiration resources” were not so engaging.
Even though the “brand” was well known then, churches mostly relied on leaflets and posters.
Now, we have all manner of technical and far-reaching methods: such as a well-produced video that tells a story – a human story – and this helps to make it all more real…
I can almost smell Esthers fresh bread, and as for Pigeon Peas… well they seem positively magical!
Esther becomes someone we know more about… and that is the hope of such a message – that we see the human beings – God’s children in the everyday.
And we can’t help but overlay such stories with other images of impoverished, mostly-African countries.
The places that appear on news reports…. For a while…
The places we hold in prayer, week after week….
And nothing much seems to change… surely all of this poverty should have gone away, in our brave new world…!
We see the same places at war, or affected by the ravages of nature or just plain misfortune.
We respond in whatever ways we can. And we pray.
Each year Christians celebrate Pentecost and the coming of the Holy Spirit.
Each year there is a…. Well… what is there?
What do we experience or feel? What will it mean to you?
A sense of expectancy and excitement? Will our Sunday services be filled with transformed people on that one day?
Or do we acknowledge that all of that was a very long time ago – the gift was given, the blessing bestowed…. And is still with us.
A memorial to a greatest ever blessing?
In todays gospel, Jesus promises His friends that they won’t be alone.
He knows what’s coming – for Himself and for them.
They will need an Advocate – a Comforter – a Helper – whatever the translation, they will be in great need of some assistance to continue with the mission.
He asks them to keep His commandments.
“Love one another as I have loved you.”
To keep doing that takes more than we have on our own.
Even with all the other agency and support we find in this world, it is to the Holy Spirit that Christians turn, to keep going.
It is the Spirit – this enduring presence of God – that brings Jesus into our lives even now.
This free gift acts in and through us, reminds us of all that we have been and can be – and that we are not alone.
Yet such grace and love as we find in the Spirit of Truth is too much for the world to accept, we are told.
It can be hard to live as Christian Disciples in this age, and yet even we can do great things, because we have the Holy Spirit.
Christian Aid, and many other initiatives that seek to transform lives and communities, are ever hopeful of the human spirit, that all may be changed by the Holy Spirit.
Love one another…. Our commandment directly from Jesus.
Our society may feel a sense of fatigue at all the misery on the telly.
People will likely switch off before climate change really begins to affect them…. Even though vast areas of the globe are already affected and nations are not moving fast enough.
Another plea for help, from people a long way from here – whether it’s Ukraine, Sudan, India or Malawi….. it seems we are challenged in keeping our neighbours engaged, in the global village, where there are so many calls upon our compassion and yet so many ways to help.
Where does that leave us?
Pentecost is coming soon. In two weeks time!
However you experience it , we cannot fail to be transformed by the Holy Spirit in some way at some time.
Christian Aid week is just one small part of our building the Kingdom of God here on earth, and it needs our help.
We might not meet Esther, or visit Malawi, but we will respond in the Holy Spirit…
There is the essential work of delivering envelopes and getting the message out…
We do what we can, from what we have….
And, as we heard in Esther’s story, there is such hope to be found in our village community.
Our neighbours needs prayer and to know that God is at work here.
Maybe one day the aid agencies won’t be needed… we can pray for that…. but if we can can help people to get started in their own endeavours then we can also do that now.
For us to love one another, to keep the commandments of Jesus;
For us to have resurrection stories of hope, that others can see, we must live daily in the Holy Spirit;
We are not alone in this, for we dwell in Christ, in Christ dwells in us.
Amen.