delivered on Sunday 15 November, 2009
by Rev Dr John Evans
1 Samuel 1:4-20
1 Samuel 2:1-10
Hebrews 10:11-14, (15-18), 19-25
Mark 13:1-8
It is mid November. Where has the year gone? Advent and Christmas are just around the corner. Folk in our congregation are preparing to depart and return to their families overseas for Christmas. And the cyclical pattern of the Christian year is also almost finished – for another year. Effectively this is the last “ordinary” Sunday of the year. Certainly is the last Sunday in which we will see the liturgical colour green. Next Sunday is the Feast of Christ the King – the culmination, the last Sunday of the Christian year. It then all begins again on Sunday week with the first Sunday of Advent, and then soon Christmas.
Our Christian faith won’t fall over, if we do not rigorously follow such an annual pattern in worship; or that we slip out of the discipline of the lectionary readings which accompany such a cycle. What this cycle or rhythm however, does, is that in a very tangible, obvious way it presents, or re-presents to us the Christian story, the story of Jesus. Each year, at least from Advent to Advent, we travel with Jesus: the promise of his coming, his birth, his baptism, his passion, his resurrection, and then the gift of the Holy Spirit, and then in those long Sundays after Pentecost, we reflect on his life and teaching as recalled in within the gospels.
The Christian story, the story of Christ each year is presented and we are invited to incorporate that story within our story. Our life is to gain meaning as we ponder the revelation of God’s will through this story of Jesus. Jesus can, in a real sense, become the focus of our worship. As we know, so many people are not sure of who they are, what indeed is their own story, what is the narrative that undergirds their lives. Their life is aimless; it can lurch from crisis to crisis; or from thrill to thrill. Or their story, takes them away from others, and this world and its wider needs, and just becomes about “me”, “myself” and “I”. For a person of faith there is another story which can inform, guide, encourage and ultimately give hope. The yearly rhythm of retelling that story is a simple re-enforcement of that story within our lives.
Our readings today are of course a part of that larger story . . . but as we are drawing to a close on one of these yearly cycles – our readings today are useful reminders to us about the nature of this story. Indeed our readings seem to operate a little like the latest Hollywood technique of being a prequel or a sequel. Somewhere in the middle there is the actual story, the film, the blockbuster. However, what led up to that story, and what actually followed. For Hollywood, prequels and sequels are all about making more money, and capitalizing on the “brand” as they say. And how many Rocky films can there possibly be! However, for us today our prequel and sequel today poignantly relate to the central story of Jesus.
Our prequel comes in our reading from 1 Samuel. It is a sign, a pointer to Mary’s birth to Jesus. Our sequel is in Jesus’ strange teaching in Mark 13 about end times, and even the passage from Hebrews. What indeed happens after the life, death and resurrection of Jesus? These prequels and sequels give us a clue as to how story, our lives, might relate to the story of Jesus.
The Old Testament reading is about the story of Hannah, and the birth of Samuel. It is a story about a particular phase of life in a particular individual. Hannah was a wife of the polygamous Elkanah. As I can imagine in such a situation, there would have been favourites and much bitterness; and with Hannah being barren, it would have been a miserable life for her. She is however, a good woman, and prays in the presence of Eli the old priest – her prayer is answered, she conceives and the boy Samuel is born.
Hannah’s life is transformed and we have recorded her prayer of thanksgiving in the next chapter. It goes in part
“My heart exults in the Lord;
My strength is exulted in my God.
He raises up the poor from the dust;
He lifts the needy from the ash heap
to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor.
For the pillars of the earth are the Lord’s,
and on them he has set the world.
The Lord! His adversaries shall be shattered;
the most High will thunder in heaven.
The Lord will judge the ends of the earth;
He will give strength to his king,
And exalt the power of his anointed.” (1 Sam 2: 1 ff)
As we have seen this prayer is very similar to the prayer that Mary herself offered on discovery that she was pregnant with Jesus. I guess in that sense this is a prequel, almost a rehearsal . . . certainly a model that God will again take a “lowly handmaiden” and use her to give new life, new hope and new future. Miraculously God transforms the life of these women; but in Hannah’s case also the life of the nation. It was one person’s story, but that story of young Samuel, becomes a significant transition in the nation’s fortunes. Samuel is the last of the judges. He indeed anoints the first king – King Saul. A huge change in the life of the people takes place . . . all because God acts in the story of Hannah’s life. Dramatically Hannah’s story becomes the story of the nation. Indeed if you look at her prayer – it obviously has been tampered with to reflect how important she becomes for the whole of the people: “The Lord will give strength to his king, and exalt the power of his anointed”. When Hannah was alive there were only judges, no kings, Samuel was the last judge. Her importance for this change (which I might add tuned out to be a problematic change – the kings were not necessarily great) is noted in her prayer.
God acts in the particularity of our lives – often with wider consequences than for just us. God acted in the particularity of Mary’s life, not just for Mary, not just for the Jewish people, but for the whole world.
Meanwhile the sequel.
What happens after the death and resurrection of Jesus? What does this story mean? How does it live on?. . . . how was this story to play out without Jesus being around? By their nature the letters of the New Testament, provide a guide to this. They are written by great pillars of the faith, usually attributed to someone who was around at the time of Jesus , or who claims such an association, like Paul. These letters encourage, explain, correct, and proclaim that this story of Jesus is still relevant and important for that community’s life. And the letter to the Hebrews is no different. As to who the author is we do not know, but we can discern that the group to which it was addressed was in crisis. Throughout the letter there are various points of encouragement in what would seem to be difficult circumstance.
“Let us hold fast to our confession” (4:14)
“There fore lift you drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed.” (12:25)
And in today’s readings
“And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together as is the habit of someone encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching.”(10:24,25)
It does not seem to be persecution they were facing. Possibly it was that the expected the second coming and it had not occurred. Perhaps these Jewish Christians were drifting back to Judaism. Perhaps their initial religious enthusiasm was waning. Their story was becoming disconnected with the Christian story and the author encourages “the Hebrews” to focus on Christ and Christ’s story.
However, Jesus himself offers his own sequel in the words we have in Mark 13. They do not look like a sequel to begin with: strange words about wars, and rumours of wars, and much “end times” sort of language. They are images and the language of apocalypse. What we have in this dramatic language, is not really teaching for Peter, James, John and Andrew (as it says it is) but encouragement to the Markan community, the gospel writer’s own community, at around the time when events like these would have been unfolding. It is generally thought that this discourse has as its context the failed Jewish uprising against the Roman Empire and the destruction of the Jerusalem temple – around the year 70. It indeed would have been troubling times for Christians at this time. Our reading seeks to assure the Markan community these events happening around them are not signs of God’s abandonment; the failure of the Jesus story, but indeed that God is still about to do something new: This is “the beginning of the birthpangs” of God’s rule. New life will come to you – you will experience the new life of Christ, and it will come to birth even in such arduous times.
Indeed we might say what goes around comes around.
Way back at the end of November last year, the first Sunday of Advent for this Christian year, we read from this chapter of Mark: the ending of the Markan apocalypse. Its message was then, don’t despair; don’t try too hard to predict everything about the future, nail dates and times down. Rather “wait”!
“But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven nor the Son, but only the Father. Be aware, keep alert (32)…. Keep awake.(37)”
We then, on the first Sunday of Advent, were looking expectantly to the birth of Jesus, the coming of our hope. There was expectation and need for encouragement. And indeed the Christ child came. Now almost a year later we again are reminded that Christ has come, the story has been told, and God continues to be with us – even though we may seem to be remote and far removed form the Christ story.
In these prequels and the sequels, we learn that all of history is swept up in God’s story. The church’s, even the particular local church’s story, even you own life’s stoy , is incorporated in the overall Christian story. The saints who have gone before are our story; and we will become the story for others after us. At least, I trust we will.
During the week I had a sad conversation with a former member of this church. They had been suggested to me as being someone who would be able to help me in a project we are engaged. I was greeted warmly. The period about which I enquired was fondly recalled. The church and its story was then a part of that person’s story. But then the conversation perceptively changed. There was hesitation. Indeed a mood of sadness entered the phone call. “I am no longer associated with the church – anywhere, any more. Three or four years ago I just drifted away. I wouldn’t be able to help you now. Thank you.” The Christian story was no longer his story . . . and he regretted that; and although he did not say this, one sensed part of his own identity also had died.
So – next Sunday will be Christ the King, and we then begin again the story of Jesus in our lives, all over again.
