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.