Merciful God,
you have prepared for those who love you
such good things as pass our understanding:
pour into our hearts such love toward you
that we, loving you in all things and above all things,
may obtain your promises,
which exceed all that we can desire;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The other day; can't remember which, I wrote down a list of my senior moments. When I went to look for it later I couldn't remember where I'd put the list or what the list was about, or indeed, if I'd made a list at all. When I did remember and I found it, all I found was a blank sheet of paper!
Whether or not you've suffered from what seems to be this modern phenomenon of 'senior moments', you've got to admit that the human brain is a very remarkable thing. When you look at the wonderful, quite remarkable technology there is these days in computing; it's nothing compared to what the human brain can do. Nowadays, you tend not to get a book of instructions with a computer. They are put together to be 'intuitive', easy for anybody to find their way about without any sort of instructions. But that just goes to show how very much further advanced the human brain is. We think, as human beings that we are very clever, but creation is light years ahead of anything we human beings can devise.
Those of us who are religious tend to put creation down to God; probably because it is so remarkable, wonderful and even miraculous. But that's not a 'cop out'; because we of faith I think have what we might call a 'knowing'. What I'm trying to describe goes beyond words because we don't have a language to describe it. There are no words. And therefore it's beyond reason. It's beyond even the capacity of our own brain, I hazard to say. It's not emotion either. God isn't a good idea, neither is He a good feeling. So what do we do? How do we get to grips with God if our reason, such as it is and our emotions, such as they are, don't really help in groping towards a sense of God.
The saints that we remember in our Church's calendar describe God as love. And right away we've got to recognise I'd say, that by this we mean that part of love that's beyond emotion or feeling or reason. It's described in words like faith and trust and hope. Those words bring us nearer to it or point towards it. And I think it's that sort of love that I mean when I say that we religious people, certainly we Christians, have that 'knowing' of God. You see how I'm scratching round here? That's because it's beyond reason and emotion. It doesn't mean that loving God doesn't make you feel good. It does sometimes, like it makes you feel bad sometimes as loving a human being makes you feel alternately good and bad.
All this might sound rather vague. But try and describe to someone what it means to love a person and you'll be in difficulty. You'll never be able to say what it means in essence, or what that love is, in essence, it's just there, you 'know'. And it's like that with God. And the Collect today is about that sort of stuff.
Loving God takes us beyond all that we can think or feel, it's beyond our understanding as the prayer puts it, because God is always beyond our understanding. And yet we still 'know'. We can say we know God because we love God. And it's as we come to know God this way and, as we say, 'grow in His love' because we've no better way of talking about our continuing and developing relationship, with God, that we can begin to see that we can ask for his blessing that up to now we've known nothing of.
The Collect puts it this way; 'pour into our hearts such love towards you, that we, loving you in all things and above all things, may obtain your promises, which exceed all that we can desire'. You know, don't you, that when you love someone, blessings come to you from that relationship which aren't in the realm of solid objects like birthday and Christmas presents or gifts given just out of kindness or affection. When you love someone and they love you, the love supports and upholds you through all that life can do to either of you, the love blesses you in intangible ways. Again, we struggle for words. And it's that sort of thing that we are asking God for in our relationship with Him. And His blessings which come out of His love for us and our love for Him have got to be far bigger than the blessings we receive in and through human love. And the reason for that is because we only know what love is because God loved us first. Our love is possible only because of God's love for us. St. John tells us that in his letters.
So this prayer today encourages us to give ourselves to loving God and in that way coming to know God's deep and everlasting love for us and all the blessings that love brings.
Sunday, 31 July 2011
Friday, 22 July 2011
Fifth Sunday after Trinity
Almighty and everlasting God,
by whose Spirit the whole body of the Church
is governed and sanctified:
hear our prayer which we offer for all your faithful people,
that in their vocation and ministry
they may serve you in holiness and truth
to the glory of your name;
through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
I think this Collect for the Fifth Sunday after Trinity is a prayer for the Church, for who it is and what it does. So it's a prayer for all of us gathered as the Body of Christ, for a our good and for our work as Christ in the world today.
The first couple of sentences of the prayer say something about what we believe about the Church. And this is the whole Church of God not just one small part of it. But having said that, even a small part of the whole world wide Church is in essence and in everything the Church. Like a drop of water is the whole thing, it's all water. It's not the whole of the water on the planet but it's exactly the same. So we here at St. Andrew's are the Church in every way, just as the whole Church throughout the world is the Church. Another way of saying it is that we here don't just represent the Church, we are the Church. When people join St. Andrew's, it's not simply St. Andrew's that they are joining, they are joining the Church. There are lots of ways we could put this I'm sure.
However we see the Church, the important thing to note is that it is constituted through the Holy Spirit and takes it's life from the Holy Spirit. Our Collect says that the Church is 'governed and sanctified' by the Holy Spirit. Without the Holy Spirit we would be just a gathering of people. We'd be a body; a club; a corporation; even an institution. But we wouldn't be the Church. It's the Holy Spirit and the Spirit's presence, that is, Christ's presence, God's presence that makes us the Church. 'Where two or three are gathered together in my name', says the Lord, 'there will I be also'. And we can only meet in the Lord's name through the Holy Spirit.
And it's this that makes the Church different, wholly different to any other body in the world. And it's this difference that people really ought to recognise, or at the very least sense when they encounter the Church. It does mean too that we should expect the Church to be different, to have different structures, constituted differently and have different ways of working than human organisations. For, as Metropolitan Hierotheos puts it 'the Church isn't a human organisation, it's a divine/human organism'. God says in Isaiah, 'my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are my ways your ways'. And that's why we should always asking ourselves many times over before making changes so that we feel releant to the life outside the Church, 'is this really God's way of doing things, or merely human ways revered by human self interest?' Another way of looking at it is that the Church manifests or makes real in the world, the Kingdom of God. That's my understanding of things anyway. And the Church is a force for good as it manifests God's Kingdom; His peace, His justice, His mercy; which don't necessarily show up in the same way the world shows these things.
And so it's in this context, in this Church formed and sustained through and in the Holy Spirit of God that each of us is called to live and work for God, in the name of Jesus Christ and through the Holy Spirit. Each and every one of us has a vocation, a calling. That term isn't just reserved for those who find themselves in ordained ministry. Every single Christian, by virtue of his or her baptism has a vocation, a calling; first of all to live according to God's commandments, according to His Word that we read in scripture and see lived out in Jesus Christ himself. Every single day we are called to commit ourselves anew to that life in Christ.
And then what comes out of that calling, what grows out of it through the gifts and talents that God has given each and every one of us, is our ministry. So just as each of us has a vocation, each of us has a ministry. And that ministry can take one of many many forms, some of which we read about in the Bible and others which although not named there are equally vital to the life of the Church and so vital to the life of the world itself. Never underestimate the value and sacredness of the ministry you are called to offer day by day for the good of humankind, whether it be administering the sacraments, or giving a glass of cold water to a hot and thirsty soul. You do it in and through the Holy Spirit if it's done in the name of Christ.
And this is service 'in holiness and truth' as our Collect says today. To live true to what God has made us is holiness in itself. To live out and to offer all that we are and can be, to the good of humankind is service 'in holiness and truth.' It's nothing very complicated, but at the same time it's not at all easy; because there is always that in the world which would divert us or snatch us away from this ministry in the Lord's name. The siren call of the world will lure us away from the still, small calling of the voice of God. So that's why today we ask God especially to hear the prayer we make for one another so that we might always, day by day, hear God's call and be faithful to Him and to one another as His Church.
by whose Spirit the whole body of the Church
is governed and sanctified:
hear our prayer which we offer for all your faithful people,
that in their vocation and ministry
they may serve you in holiness and truth
to the glory of your name;
through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
I think this Collect for the Fifth Sunday after Trinity is a prayer for the Church, for who it is and what it does. So it's a prayer for all of us gathered as the Body of Christ, for a our good and for our work as Christ in the world today.
The first couple of sentences of the prayer say something about what we believe about the Church. And this is the whole Church of God not just one small part of it. But having said that, even a small part of the whole world wide Church is in essence and in everything the Church. Like a drop of water is the whole thing, it's all water. It's not the whole of the water on the planet but it's exactly the same. So we here at St. Andrew's are the Church in every way, just as the whole Church throughout the world is the Church. Another way of saying it is that we here don't just represent the Church, we are the Church. When people join St. Andrew's, it's not simply St. Andrew's that they are joining, they are joining the Church. There are lots of ways we could put this I'm sure.
However we see the Church, the important thing to note is that it is constituted through the Holy Spirit and takes it's life from the Holy Spirit. Our Collect says that the Church is 'governed and sanctified' by the Holy Spirit. Without the Holy Spirit we would be just a gathering of people. We'd be a body; a club; a corporation; even an institution. But we wouldn't be the Church. It's the Holy Spirit and the Spirit's presence, that is, Christ's presence, God's presence that makes us the Church. 'Where two or three are gathered together in my name', says the Lord, 'there will I be also'. And we can only meet in the Lord's name through the Holy Spirit.
And it's this that makes the Church different, wholly different to any other body in the world. And it's this difference that people really ought to recognise, or at the very least sense when they encounter the Church. It does mean too that we should expect the Church to be different, to have different structures, constituted differently and have different ways of working than human organisations. For, as Metropolitan Hierotheos puts it 'the Church isn't a human organisation, it's a divine/human organism'. God says in Isaiah, 'my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are my ways your ways'. And that's why we should always asking ourselves many times over before making changes so that we feel releant to the life outside the Church, 'is this really God's way of doing things, or merely human ways revered by human self interest?' Another way of looking at it is that the Church manifests or makes real in the world, the Kingdom of God. That's my understanding of things anyway. And the Church is a force for good as it manifests God's Kingdom; His peace, His justice, His mercy; which don't necessarily show up in the same way the world shows these things.
And so it's in this context, in this Church formed and sustained through and in the Holy Spirit of God that each of us is called to live and work for God, in the name of Jesus Christ and through the Holy Spirit. Each and every one of us has a vocation, a calling. That term isn't just reserved for those who find themselves in ordained ministry. Every single Christian, by virtue of his or her baptism has a vocation, a calling; first of all to live according to God's commandments, according to His Word that we read in scripture and see lived out in Jesus Christ himself. Every single day we are called to commit ourselves anew to that life in Christ.
And then what comes out of that calling, what grows out of it through the gifts and talents that God has given each and every one of us, is our ministry. So just as each of us has a vocation, each of us has a ministry. And that ministry can take one of many many forms, some of which we read about in the Bible and others which although not named there are equally vital to the life of the Church and so vital to the life of the world itself. Never underestimate the value and sacredness of the ministry you are called to offer day by day for the good of humankind, whether it be administering the sacraments, or giving a glass of cold water to a hot and thirsty soul. You do it in and through the Holy Spirit if it's done in the name of Christ.
And this is service 'in holiness and truth' as our Collect says today. To live true to what God has made us is holiness in itself. To live out and to offer all that we are and can be, to the good of humankind is service 'in holiness and truth.' It's nothing very complicated, but at the same time it's not at all easy; because there is always that in the world which would divert us or snatch us away from this ministry in the Lord's name. The siren call of the world will lure us away from the still, small calling of the voice of God. So that's why today we ask God especially to hear the prayer we make for one another so that we might always, day by day, hear God's call and be faithful to Him and to one another as His Church.
Fourth Sunday after Trinity
O God, the protector of all who trust in you,
without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy:
increase and multiply upon us your mercy;
that with you as our ruler and guide
we may so pass through things temporal
that we lose not our hold on things eternal;
grant this, heavenly Father,
for our Lord Jesus Christ's sake,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
I'm doing a commentary on the Collects each Sunday during Ordinary Time. That's because I think that these very profound and, some of them, very ancient prayers can be so easily forgotten as we pass on in the eucharist to the Liturgy of the Word. And they contain so much of value to us which helps us to live our Faith day by day. They do contain, as does all our prayer in the Church of England, statements of what we believe about the Faith and so it's important for us to dwell upon what they say.
I'd like to pick up on two themes here in this Collect of the Fourth Sunday after Trinity. First of all the opening couple of lines: 'O God, the protector of all who trust in you, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy'. This is a statement of what we believe about God. When it says that he is our protector it sums up all we believe about our life in Christ; not so much that we are protected against the things that life brings upon us, that comes about through the merely living out of our life in a fallen world; nobody escapes those. But the notion of God as our 'protector', is the logical consequence of a life of faith, that in the end, as St. Paul says, 'all things work together for good for those who love God'. We have faith IN God, that being our creator and created in and out of love, God has our good at heart and will, like a human parent seek the greatest good for his or her child, whatever befalls the child. And we'll put this in context when we look at the fourth and fifth sentences of the Collect in a moment which will be the second theme.
But first, we pray more about this notion of God being our protector by acknowledging our further dependence upon Him. We affirm that outside of Him there is nothing that has any significance in our life; 'nothing is strong, nothing is holy', we pray. But maybe we can turn that around and look at it in a different way. And by that I mean that we can say that outside God there is nothing; life is nothing outside of God, and yet, that nothing can be very attractive; we can reverence life outside of God. That's what happens with our fallen nature. Everything outside of God becomes important to us and has a huge influence on our life. And that seems to be the way of the world ever more so these days, as the world forgets God.
And this leads us nicely into the next few sentences which make up our second theme or the second point I'd like to make. We ask God to be with us, to be merciful to us. And by that we are asking God to send upon us all goodness and blessing. All of that reminds us of God's presence in our lives or to put it the right way round, His mercy reminds us of our life in Him. And acknowledging that presence as THE reference point of our life and following God's will and commandments we can say He is our 'ruler and guide'. And as we live our whole life in Him, we want to do that so that not only do we live our life in the best way possible now, in the present, but that we will always recall where our life comes from i.e. the eternal God and that our lives have that eternal element about them. It's our Christian belief that we live our lives not simply for the present but that how we live our lives now has consequences for our continuing life after our physical death. And the Collect puts it this way '(that) we may so pass through things temporal that we lose not our hold on things eternal'.
I think that if there's anything missing from our lives today in this Western world, certainly in the last 30 years or so, it's a sense that there is more to life than this present moment and what we can get out of it. Yes, there is a sense that the only time you know you have is now, this present moment. And it's right that we should remember it's sacredness, it's sanctity and be thankful for each moment of this life that we have. But we live with faith in the hereafter and with a belief that what we do, think and say now has consequences for us and for all humankind both now and for ever, in this world and the next.
I'm convinced that most of the crises we've witnessed in public life and most of the crises that have happened in other arenas of life in recent decades have been precipitated by the loss of a sense of the eternal, that even the smallest of our actions has huge consequences for all people for all time. We only remember that as we remember God.
So this Collect is a timely reminder that our life without God is as nothing, which in itself may feel a good and attractive life well spent; but at the end of the day is nothing without God. And our life has consequences beyong this present moment we find ourself in. Without a sense of the eternal, we lose a sense of the reality and importance of the present. And we see every day, the awful consequences of that all around us.
without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy:
increase and multiply upon us your mercy;
that with you as our ruler and guide
we may so pass through things temporal
that we lose not our hold on things eternal;
grant this, heavenly Father,
for our Lord Jesus Christ's sake,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
I'm doing a commentary on the Collects each Sunday during Ordinary Time. That's because I think that these very profound and, some of them, very ancient prayers can be so easily forgotten as we pass on in the eucharist to the Liturgy of the Word. And they contain so much of value to us which helps us to live our Faith day by day. They do contain, as does all our prayer in the Church of England, statements of what we believe about the Faith and so it's important for us to dwell upon what they say.
I'd like to pick up on two themes here in this Collect of the Fourth Sunday after Trinity. First of all the opening couple of lines: 'O God, the protector of all who trust in you, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy'. This is a statement of what we believe about God. When it says that he is our protector it sums up all we believe about our life in Christ; not so much that we are protected against the things that life brings upon us, that comes about through the merely living out of our life in a fallen world; nobody escapes those. But the notion of God as our 'protector', is the logical consequence of a life of faith, that in the end, as St. Paul says, 'all things work together for good for those who love God'. We have faith IN God, that being our creator and created in and out of love, God has our good at heart and will, like a human parent seek the greatest good for his or her child, whatever befalls the child. And we'll put this in context when we look at the fourth and fifth sentences of the Collect in a moment which will be the second theme.
But first, we pray more about this notion of God being our protector by acknowledging our further dependence upon Him. We affirm that outside of Him there is nothing that has any significance in our life; 'nothing is strong, nothing is holy', we pray. But maybe we can turn that around and look at it in a different way. And by that I mean that we can say that outside God there is nothing; life is nothing outside of God, and yet, that nothing can be very attractive; we can reverence life outside of God. That's what happens with our fallen nature. Everything outside of God becomes important to us and has a huge influence on our life. And that seems to be the way of the world ever more so these days, as the world forgets God.
And this leads us nicely into the next few sentences which make up our second theme or the second point I'd like to make. We ask God to be with us, to be merciful to us. And by that we are asking God to send upon us all goodness and blessing. All of that reminds us of God's presence in our lives or to put it the right way round, His mercy reminds us of our life in Him. And acknowledging that presence as THE reference point of our life and following God's will and commandments we can say He is our 'ruler and guide'. And as we live our whole life in Him, we want to do that so that not only do we live our life in the best way possible now, in the present, but that we will always recall where our life comes from i.e. the eternal God and that our lives have that eternal element about them. It's our Christian belief that we live our lives not simply for the present but that how we live our lives now has consequences for our continuing life after our physical death. And the Collect puts it this way '(that) we may so pass through things temporal that we lose not our hold on things eternal'.
I think that if there's anything missing from our lives today in this Western world, certainly in the last 30 years or so, it's a sense that there is more to life than this present moment and what we can get out of it. Yes, there is a sense that the only time you know you have is now, this present moment. And it's right that we should remember it's sacredness, it's sanctity and be thankful for each moment of this life that we have. But we live with faith in the hereafter and with a belief that what we do, think and say now has consequences for us and for all humankind both now and for ever, in this world and the next.
I'm convinced that most of the crises we've witnessed in public life and most of the crises that have happened in other arenas of life in recent decades have been precipitated by the loss of a sense of the eternal, that even the smallest of our actions has huge consequences for all people for all time. We only remember that as we remember God.
So this Collect is a timely reminder that our life without God is as nothing, which in itself may feel a good and attractive life well spent; but at the end of the day is nothing without God. And our life has consequences beyong this present moment we find ourself in. Without a sense of the eternal, we lose a sense of the reality and importance of the present. And we see every day, the awful consequences of that all around us.
Saturday, 9 July 2011
Third Sunday after Trinity
Almighty God,
you have broken the tyranny of sin
and have sent the Spirit of your Son into our hearts
whereby we call you Father:
give us grace to dedicate our freedom to your service,
that we and all creation may be brought
to the glorious liberty of the children of God;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
I thought I might take the opportunity during these Sundays after Trinity, rather than preaching on the readings this year, to pass on some thoughts about the Sunday Collects as we pray them week by week. Some of these prayers of the Church are centuries old. When lingered over we can savour the wonderful language, almost poetic sometimes and the vivid images, ideas and beliefs that they invoke.
The Collect, in the Eucharist is placed at that important point at the end of the gathering which forms the first part of the service and the part known as the Liturgy of the Word. It naturally provides a link connecting our coming before God with our settling to read and meditate upon God's written Word. It has a theme all of its own which sometimes but by no means always links with the readings these day. The consequence of that can be that what we pray for in the Collect can so soon be forgotten as we delve into scripture. So, again, I thought I'd take this opportunity in these Trinity Sundays to linger over the Collect to discover the gems that it has for us each week.
The Collect usually begins by making a statement which says something about what we believe about God Himself, followed by a request or petition asking God for something and then perhaps something of a statement of the purpose, if you like, of that request. So each Collect has a set form which can be recognised more or less in each. And although in some, especially those that have been around for centuries, the language might seem arcane and convoluted, the form and rhythm of the prayer helps us with the sense of it.
This prayer today begins by our recognising before God His great work of redemption, of bringing us back to Himself and what that means for us. 'Almighty God, you have broken the tyranny of sin'; that can only be by the work of Jesus Christ Himself. Christ gave His life for us so that we might no longer be subject to the spiritual and ultimately physical death that is the consequence of sin. Ever since Adam and Eve sinned, humankind has been in thrall to sin. But it needn't be that way. This week the news has been filled with two very significant examples of the way in which sin can tyrannise humanity. First is the News of the World phone hacking scandal. None of us is without sin, none of us; but it seems that when we once fall into sin it's much easier to keep on sinning as time goes by until the way of sin becomes what seems to be normal. And I say seems to be because a sinful life isn't normality. Normality is Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden before they sinned. Normality is God looking on His creation and pronouncing it 'very good.' Sin is unnatural, an aberration, a turning away from God and the Truth. And once we fall into it we can so easily allow it to take us over and indeed to tyrannise us so that we don't seem to have the wherewithal to stop. It seems to me that those involved with phone hacking were tyrannised by this particular sin although they maybe hadn't realised they were being tyrannised.
The second great news item of the week has been the developing situation because of the failed rains and famine in East Africa. There is enough food in the world to feed every single human being plentifully. But it's only through our greed and selfishness that there are millions who every day go hungry and starve. It's through the tyranny of sin in the human race that people don't have what they need even for survival, let alone what they want for a comfortable life.
But it need not be like this. God has indeed broken sin's tyranny in His Son Jesus Christ, if we would but recognise Him. And not only that but the Spirit of the same Jesus Christ, God has put within us. We know this because as St. Paul says, nobody can call Jesus 'Lord' except by the Holy Spirit. And it's the same Spirit that allows us to call God, 'Father'. And so in the Collect we pray '(you) have sent the Spirit of your Son into our hearts whereby we call you Father.'
So the power to overcome sin is right within us all the time. We know this, we believe this, we say so in this prayer. It is fact, it is Truth.
And now knowing this and accepting this, believing this we make this plea to God; 'give us grace to dedicate our freedom to your service'. We are set free from the tyranny of sin by the Holy Spirit working within us so the natural working of the Spirit makes us reach out to one another, to our fellow human beings in service, that is the same service that Jesus Himself ministered to all He came into contact with. Our freedom from sin brings faith, hope, love, joy, peace as the Holy Spirit moves in us and places us so that we naturally work for the good of all humankind.
And the result of this freedom and working of the Holy Spirit in us, and our working together for the good of one another, on a larger scale is that 'we and all creation may be brought to the glorious liberty of the children of God.' This is the stuff of the Kingdom of God. These words paint a picture of the freedom of spirit and livelihood that is a characteristic of the people of God's Kingdom. And this we pray that it may come on earth as it is in heaven. This is a wonderful and glorious vision; of all of God's creation fulfilling all that it is meant to be. It's the Garden of Eden restored; God able to say of His creation again, that it is 'very good'.
If you wonder what being a Christian is really all about it's this, which embraces not only our own wholeness, health and salvation, but the wholeness, health and salvation of all of humankind. It's a great vision and one that we hold each time we come to worship God, each time we share in this Eucharist, this banquet of the Kingdom. And it's here that this vision is realised as we pray this prayer together.
you have broken the tyranny of sin
and have sent the Spirit of your Son into our hearts
whereby we call you Father:
give us grace to dedicate our freedom to your service,
that we and all creation may be brought
to the glorious liberty of the children of God;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
I thought I might take the opportunity during these Sundays after Trinity, rather than preaching on the readings this year, to pass on some thoughts about the Sunday Collects as we pray them week by week. Some of these prayers of the Church are centuries old. When lingered over we can savour the wonderful language, almost poetic sometimes and the vivid images, ideas and beliefs that they invoke.
The Collect, in the Eucharist is placed at that important point at the end of the gathering which forms the first part of the service and the part known as the Liturgy of the Word. It naturally provides a link connecting our coming before God with our settling to read and meditate upon God's written Word. It has a theme all of its own which sometimes but by no means always links with the readings these day. The consequence of that can be that what we pray for in the Collect can so soon be forgotten as we delve into scripture. So, again, I thought I'd take this opportunity in these Trinity Sundays to linger over the Collect to discover the gems that it has for us each week.
The Collect usually begins by making a statement which says something about what we believe about God Himself, followed by a request or petition asking God for something and then perhaps something of a statement of the purpose, if you like, of that request. So each Collect has a set form which can be recognised more or less in each. And although in some, especially those that have been around for centuries, the language might seem arcane and convoluted, the form and rhythm of the prayer helps us with the sense of it.
This prayer today begins by our recognising before God His great work of redemption, of bringing us back to Himself and what that means for us. 'Almighty God, you have broken the tyranny of sin'; that can only be by the work of Jesus Christ Himself. Christ gave His life for us so that we might no longer be subject to the spiritual and ultimately physical death that is the consequence of sin. Ever since Adam and Eve sinned, humankind has been in thrall to sin. But it needn't be that way. This week the news has been filled with two very significant examples of the way in which sin can tyrannise humanity. First is the News of the World phone hacking scandal. None of us is without sin, none of us; but it seems that when we once fall into sin it's much easier to keep on sinning as time goes by until the way of sin becomes what seems to be normal. And I say seems to be because a sinful life isn't normality. Normality is Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden before they sinned. Normality is God looking on His creation and pronouncing it 'very good.' Sin is unnatural, an aberration, a turning away from God and the Truth. And once we fall into it we can so easily allow it to take us over and indeed to tyrannise us so that we don't seem to have the wherewithal to stop. It seems to me that those involved with phone hacking were tyrannised by this particular sin although they maybe hadn't realised they were being tyrannised.
The second great news item of the week has been the developing situation because of the failed rains and famine in East Africa. There is enough food in the world to feed every single human being plentifully. But it's only through our greed and selfishness that there are millions who every day go hungry and starve. It's through the tyranny of sin in the human race that people don't have what they need even for survival, let alone what they want for a comfortable life.
But it need not be like this. God has indeed broken sin's tyranny in His Son Jesus Christ, if we would but recognise Him. And not only that but the Spirit of the same Jesus Christ, God has put within us. We know this because as St. Paul says, nobody can call Jesus 'Lord' except by the Holy Spirit. And it's the same Spirit that allows us to call God, 'Father'. And so in the Collect we pray '(you) have sent the Spirit of your Son into our hearts whereby we call you Father.'
So the power to overcome sin is right within us all the time. We know this, we believe this, we say so in this prayer. It is fact, it is Truth.
And now knowing this and accepting this, believing this we make this plea to God; 'give us grace to dedicate our freedom to your service'. We are set free from the tyranny of sin by the Holy Spirit working within us so the natural working of the Spirit makes us reach out to one another, to our fellow human beings in service, that is the same service that Jesus Himself ministered to all He came into contact with. Our freedom from sin brings faith, hope, love, joy, peace as the Holy Spirit moves in us and places us so that we naturally work for the good of all humankind.
And the result of this freedom and working of the Holy Spirit in us, and our working together for the good of one another, on a larger scale is that 'we and all creation may be brought to the glorious liberty of the children of God.' This is the stuff of the Kingdom of God. These words paint a picture of the freedom of spirit and livelihood that is a characteristic of the people of God's Kingdom. And this we pray that it may come on earth as it is in heaven. This is a wonderful and glorious vision; of all of God's creation fulfilling all that it is meant to be. It's the Garden of Eden restored; God able to say of His creation again, that it is 'very good'.
If you wonder what being a Christian is really all about it's this, which embraces not only our own wholeness, health and salvation, but the wholeness, health and salvation of all of humankind. It's a great vision and one that we hold each time we come to worship God, each time we share in this Eucharist, this banquet of the Kingdom. And it's here that this vision is realised as we pray this prayer together.
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