How many people have heard of C.S. Lewis? How many of you have ever read any of his books? It wouldn’t be a surprise if most of you have heard of Lewis, nor if a lot of you have read his books because he is a well-known and much-loved author. His most well-known work is The Chronicles of Narnia and I think pretty much everyone will at least have heard of that and perhaps read one, if not more, of the 7 novels that make up the complete Chronicles. But Lewis is also well-known, particularly amongst Christians, for his books on the Christian faith. And if you’re looking for something to read during Lent, which is only just over 3 weeks away now, you could do worse than read at least one of Lewis’ books on Christianity.

Lewis’ books on Christianity were published quite a long time ago now, between the early 1940s and the mid-1960s actually, but even so, I think they’re still relevant to us today. The reason for that is that they draw on Lewis’ own experiences of faith and struggles with faith and although those things are personal and peculiar to each one of us, Lewis’ own journey of faith is an interesting one because it will have both a lot of similarities with many of ours but, at the same time, it’s quite an unusual one.  

Lewis was born in Belfast. He was born into a Christian family who were members of the Church of Ireland, which is essentially the Anglican Church of Ireland. Like many of us here today, I’m sure, he went to Church as a child but, when he was 12, he abandoned his Christian faith and stopped going to Church, in large part it seems because he found it all to be something of a chore and lacking in joy. Then through his teens and 20s, he confessed himself to be an atheist and it wasn’t until he was in his early 30s that he became convinced of the existence of God. At that time though, that was as far as his faith went. It was another 2 years before he finally returned to the Christian faith and to the Church of England.

I’m sure some of us will find at least parts of that story are similar to our own journey of faith. What’s unusual about Lewis’ story is the way he came back to the Christian faith and the Church.

Lewis always insisted that his conversion was brought about by reason and logical thought: it was a conversion brought about by words rather than deeds. He came to believe in God again, and later came back to the Christian faith and the Church, as a result of long conversations with his friends. Among those friends were the famous authors J.R.R. Tolkien and G.K. Chesterton, both of whom were Roman Catholics. And yet, much to Tolkien’s disappointment I believe, Lewis became an Anglican, and remained a member of the Church of England for the rest of his life.

That’s unusual in a number of ways. It’s not often that people are convinced of the existence of God and become Christians as a result of intellectual discussion. For most people that happens because they’ve seen, or particularly when they’ve experienced an act of Christian charity, some act of love or kindness or generosity that’s been performed by a Christian. Or it happens when people have a sudden revelation of God, they suddenly realise that God is there with them and at work in their lives.  And it’s also unusual for someone to become a member of a different Church to the one those who’ve convinced them to believe in God and become a Christian belong to; they usually join their friends or those who’ve shown them Christian charity in the Church they belong to.

So whilst Lewis’ journey of faith may be familiar to many of us because it’s not too dissimilar to our own, the nature of his return to faith and the Church, is quite unusual. And I’m sure Lewis himself realised that because he said of it himself,

“The intellectual life is not the only road to God, nor the safest, but we find it to be a road, and it may be the appointed road for us.”

So, as Lewis said, and as I’m sure we know ourselves, there are different ways to bring people to God and faith and the Church. And if we’re going to be successful in bringing people to God and faith and the Church, if we’re going to be successful at mission, we need try as many of these different ways we possibly can, to do it.

I think perhaps one of the mistakes the Church makes when it talks about and plans and engages in mission though, is that it seems to forget what the mission of the Church actually is. The mission of the Church is set out in the Great Commission that Jesus gave to his disciples to,

“Go … and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” 

So the mission of the Church is to bring people to God, to faith and to the Church, and to teach them about Jesus. There are many ways to that, as I’ve said, I think though, what the Church tends to do is concentrate so much on the how we do that, that why we’re doing it is forgotten, or at least neglected.

I’ll give you an example of what I mean. We’re being encouraged these days to make more use of our church buildings and one of the ways we’re encouraged to do that, is through what seems to come under the banner of ‘Community Engagement’ or perhaps of ‘Serving the Community’. Some of the ways that churches are doing that is by using their buildings as ‘Drop-In Centres’ or using them for ‘Coffee Mornings’ and ‘Luncheon Clubs’ and all sorts of things like that. Now there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that in itself and, in fact, there’s a lot that right and good about it. It’s part of loving our neighbour and caring for people in our communities who may be in need of these things. But there’s nothing specifically Christian about doing any of these things is there?

The fact is, people of all faiths and no faith do these kinds of things. These days, people of other faiths and no faith use our church buildings to do them, and sometimes they’re even do that at the expense of the Church’s worship. In fact, at times, the Church itself does these things at the expense of worship, or at least, these things have become more important to some churches than worship because more people go to them than go to church to worship God.

But if there’s no specific and observable Christian involvement and input at these events, I think we have to ask how they’re actually helping the mission of the Church? These things might be serving the community by providing the community with a building to hold events in, but if the Church isn’t involved in them or making their faith known to those who go to them when it is involved, how are these things helping the Church to fulfil its great, Christ-given commission to bring people to God, to faith and to the Church and to teach them about Jesus? 

Now I know people say we shouldn’t talk about our faith at community events. They say that puts people off going to them because they don’t want to have our faith rammed down their throats. But we can talk to people about our faith, and use these things for mission, without ramming our faith down their throats. And it’s so simple. For example, if we hold a community event or help out at one and someone thanks us for what we’re doing, we simply need to say that they’re welcome, that we’re only doing what we’re supposed to do as Christians and showing some love and care for our neighbours.

If we get into a conversation with people, eventually the conversation will no doubt come round to what we do in our lives. In that case we simply need to make sure that we say, at some point, that we go to Church and we’re Christians. But if we don’t say things like this, how do people know who we are or why we’re there doing what we’re doing? We could be anyone, community volunteers, friends or family of the volunteers or organisers. Just because we’re at a community event in a church building doesn’t mean that everyone there automatically knows, or even assumes, that we’re Christians and are at the event because we’re Christians. But if we do say even such simple things as this, we’ve shared our faith, we’ve tried to use a community event to help the Church’s mission and we’ve tried to play our part in fulfilling the Great Commission that Jesus gave us.

We can help people to come to God, to faith and to the Church, and we can teach them about Jesus in many ways, by both word and deed but we’ll be able to do that much more effectively if our words and our deeds go together. We see that in our gospel readings today. Depending on which readings we’re following this morning, we’ll read either about Jesus calling some of his disciples, by word, or about his changing water into wine at the wedding in Cana, the first of the signs he performed through which, St John tells us, Jesus’ disciples came to believe in him. So we see that, in Jesus, words and deeds went hand-in-hand in order to bring people to faith. We could say that Jesus’ words got people interested enough to follow him, and it was what they saw and experienced as they followed him that convinced them that Jesus was the one to follow. And if that was the way Jesus called people to faith, surely, it’s the way we should try to call people to faith too?

Jesus’ way of calling people to faith, Jesus’ way of doing mission, if you like, worked: we know it did because we wouldn’t be in Church today if it hadn’t worked. Jesus’ brought people to faith by putting words and deeds together. So why should today’s Church seem to want to try a different way? Why should today’s Church want to try to bring people to faith by separating our words from our deeds, or by trying to use deeds alone? We must have deeds, good works if you prefer, but they must go hand-in-hand with words. That was Jesus’ way, and it should be our way too. Unless of course, today’s Church thinks it knows better than Jesus?

Amen.

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The Propers for the 3rd Sunday of Ordinary Time (Epiphany 3) can be found here.

The readings for today are different in the Missal which we use at St Mark’s and the Revised Common Lectionary (RCL) used at St Gabriel’s. For that reason, there will be a different paragraph which corresponds with the Gospel being read at that particular church. Each of the paragraphs have been highlighted in bold and labelled.

One of the things that a parish priest is called to do, is to identify the gifts and talents that people in their congregations may have, and to encourage people to use those gifts and talents in the service of God and his Church.

Sometimes this is expressed as ‘fostering vocations’ but I think that really limits what a parish priest is called to do in this respect, at least in the minds of many people. When we speak about vocations in the Church, we’re usually talking about a calling to the ordained ministry and so ‘fostering vocations’ is often seen as encouraging people to offer themselves for ordination. But whilst that is a very important part of a priest’s duty with regard to identifying and encouraging people to use their gifts and talents in the Church, it’s only part of it. The ordained ministry is just one particular calling, or vocation, from within the general calling or vocation of all Christian people. The ordained priest is someone who has received a call to that particular vocation within the many that exist in general vocation of the universal priesthood of all Christian people.

So there’s much more to ‘fostering vocations’ than simply looking for likely candidates for ordination and encouraging those people to put themselves forward for it. I think we find a much better way of expressing what a priest is called to do in terms of fostering vocations, or at least a more comprehensive way of expressing it, in the words that the Bishop uses during the institution of a priest as the incumbent of a parish or benefice. Towards the end of the address to the congregation in which the Bishop sets out what a parish priest is expected to do, we find these words:

“Guided by the Holy Spirit, they (the priest) are to discern and foster the gifts of all God’s people, that the whole Church may be built up in unity and faith.”

I think that makes it very clear that a priest’s duty to foster vocations, is about much more than simply looking for and encouraging potential priests.

One of the problems I’ve found in fulfilling this duty of fostering vocations though, is that people are often very reluctant to use their gifts and talents for the Church. That’s sometimes because they’re worried about the level of commitment that’s involved in what’s being asked of them, but more often, it’s because people simply don’t recognise their own gifts.

One of the best examples of that, in my experience, was a conversation I had with a group of people not long after I’d offered myself for ordination. We were talking about vocations and I suggested to them that it wasn’t only me who had a vocation in the Church, they did too. But they didn’t see it that way. Now all of these people were on the PCC, and they all did other things in the Church and for the Church too. Most of them were in the Church Choir. Most of them were on the Parish Social Committee. Some of them were Altar Servers. Some of them were licensed Eucharistic Ministers. Some of them had an authorised ministry in the parish as Lay Pastoral Assistants. And yet they didn’t see any of that as fulfilling a calling to God’s service or as a vocation. And when I asked them what they did see it as then, they just looked at each other and eventually one of them said,

“It’s just what we do. It’s not a vocation.”

But then I don’t suppose I was any different myself at one time. I’d never given a moment’s thought to the possibility that I might have a vocation to the ordained priesthood until the parish clergy and a few other people in the parish said that they thought I did, and ought to give it some thought!

We’re sometimes not very good at seeing in ourselves what others see in us are we? Whether that’s the good or the bad. But if that’s how we are, we’re not alone and we can find lots of examples in the Scriptures of people who were just like us in that respect.

This morning we heard about the call of Samuel. God called Samuel three times, but he didn’t answer because he didn’t realise God was calling him. In the end, it was Eli who understood that God was calling Samuel and told Samuel how to answer when God’s call came again.

(The following paragraph will be read at St Mark’s)
And in our Gospel reading, it was John who recognised Jesus and pointed him out to two of his own disciples. Jesus asked them both to follow him, but it was only Andrew who answered the call, and the first thing he did the very next day was to go and find his brother, Simon, so that he could hear Jesus’ call too. And when Jesus saw Peter, he recognised Simon’s gifts, his potential to be Cephas, Peter, the ‘Rock’ on which to build the Church.

(The following paragraph will be read at St Gabriel’s)
And in our Gospel reading, Jesus calls Philip, who hears and answers.  We know that because the next thing we’re told Philip does is that he goes to find Nathaniel so that he can hear Jesus’ call too. And when Jesus sees Nathaniel, he recognises Nathaniel’s gifts, his honesty and integrity, and his potential to be one of the twelve people to whom he’ll entrust the carrying of the Gospel into the world for the building up of the Church.

So our reading today are all about hearing and answering God when he calls us. But in addition to that, they’re also about listening to others when they see and recognise things that we haven’t or don’t see or recognise. They’re about listening to others when they see that God is calling us when we haven’t or don’t recognise God’s call. They’re about listening to others when they recognise gifts, talents and potential in us that we haven’t or don’t see. They’re about listening and then acting on what we hear by using our gifts and talents in answer to God’s call. And they’re about doing this for the building up of the Church, the Body of Christ, as St Paul calls it.

All these things have always been important to the Church, especially for building up the Church because we all have a part to play in that. St Paul’s analogy of the Church as the Body of Christ is a very good one in this sense because a body functions best if all it’s members are fully functioning. And it is becoming more important than ever in these difficult times for the Church, that everyone in the Church does play their part by hearing and answering God’s call, and to do that by using their gifts and talents for the Church, to the best of their ability. 

As you all know, there are some major changes being proposed to the way the Church operates in the diocese of Manchester. I’ve spoken about this both in church and at PCC meetings in the past, and these changes are due to start being implemented in the second half of this year. Although there is still some consultation going on, what these changes are expected to mean is that, by 2025, the number of stipendiary clergy, that’s full-time, paid clergy, in the diocese will have been reduced from just over 200, as it is now, to 160. The existing Deaneries will be formed into 7, larger Deaneries, each under the oversight of a full-time Area Dean. And each Deanery will be split into a number of Mission Communities, each under a Missional Leader, who will work with a team of stipendiary clergy and other ‘named focal leaders’ such as lay leaders, licensed readers and self-supporting ordained ministers, to minister to the parishes in their own Mission Community.

As I understand things, what this will mean for St Mark’s and St Gabriel’s, is that, by 2025, we will be in a Mission Community of 7 parishes, covered by 3 stipendiary clergy. To cope with the reduction in clergy numbers, it is a requirement of these plans that there will be an increase in lay ministry and lay leadership in parishes, so that, as the Briefing Document on the Proposals for Mission Communities puts it,

“Between them, the lay and ordained, paid and unpaid members of the team, will cover all the necessary roles and functions – liturgy, mission, social action, administration, buildings, links with schools – working across generations with children and adults of all ages.”

In other words, whilst we’re assured that there will be training and on-going support provided for everyone who takes on a role or function, the laity will have to take on more roles and functions, and more responsibilities, to cover for the reduction in clergy numbers.

How all this will work out, only time will tell. But these changes are coming, and this is the way the Church is going to operate in this diocese. So the role of fostering vocations has perhaps never been so important as it is now and will become in the future. But not only for the parish priest. In these changing times it’s important for all of us to foster vocations. It’s important for all of us to recognise the gifts and talents we have, both the gifts and talents of others and our own gifts and talents, and then to be attentive to God’s call so that we can use them in the best possible way, both in his service, and in the service of his Church. 

Amen.

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The Propers for the 2nd Sunday of Ordinary Time (Epiphany 2) can be found here.

One of the great misconceptions that many people have about the Church and the Christian faith is that the sacrament of Holy Baptism is the same thing as a Christening. But, if you’re one of those people, I’m sorry to disappoint you, it isn’t. When people either bring their children to church or come to church themselves to have water poured on their heads and to be anointed with holy oils, they come to receive the sacrament of Holy Baptism, and they are being baptised. A Christening, on the other hand, is simply a naming ceremony. If the person being baptised is an infant, or an older child or adult who’s being baptised decides to take a new, or additional name at their baptism, which is usually the name of a saint or ‘Christian name’, that part of the baptismal service is the christening. The service itself, the rite, is a sacrament of the Church called Baptism.

Perhaps some of you are now thinking, ‘So what?’ ‘What difference does it make what people call it?’ ‘What’s in a name?’ Well, actually, in this case, I think there’s an awful lot in a name.

When people contact me to enquire about having their children baptised, they almost invariably ask for a ‘Christening’ and when I start speaking about baptism, quite a lot of them get confused, because they think I’m talking about something they haven’t asked for. Well, I suppose I am in a way, but that’s because they haven’t asked for what they actually want; they’ve asked for a Christening when what they really mean is a Baptism. In fact, this misunderstanding is so widespread that the Church of England now refers to infant baptism, which as you know is what we usually do in the Church, as ‘Christening’ and ‘Baptism’ as something for adults, as though they were two different things (and if you go on the C of E’s website, you can see that for yourself). I think that is a great mistake because it encourages this misunderstanding people have of what Baptism is, and what it’s all about.

The problem is, that because people think in terms of Christening rather than Baptism, they think that once they’ve ‘been done’, as many of them say, they’re Christians. It’s as though they come to church on a specific day, once in their life, usually as a baby, to have water poured on their heads and ‘Hey Presto’ they’re a Christian for life and that’s all there is to it. So, because they think that, they never have to do anything else about it. They never have to come to church again, at least until they perhaps bring their own children to be Christened. Once they’ve been done, they’re a Christian and always will be. But that is not what being baptised is all about.

Being baptised does not make anyone a Christian. Being baptised makes that person a member of the Church. Being a Christian is something that takes a lifetime of hard work because it involves a lifelong commitment to living as Jesus Christ lived and taught us that we should live. And it’s as a member of the Church where people learn about what that means and how to do that, because it’s in the Church where those things are taught.

So, to be a Christian, rather than someone who’s simply been ‘Christened’, or even just baptised, we need to do what Jesus did and taught us to do, and that obviously means that we have to know what Jesus did and said. And so what we need to do, before we can start becoming Christians, is to listen to Jesus.

In the Gospel this morning, we read about Jesus’ own baptism. Today, we read the story as recorded in St Mark’s Gospel, but it’s a story that we find in the Gospel’s of St Matthew and St Luke too. As we come to expect of them, each of the evangelists that the story in a slightly different way but, if we read them as a whole, and in the context of the Gospels as a whole, these stories of Jesus’ Baptism tell us so much about what the Church is doing when we baptise people today.

We know that John’s baptism was for repentance: it was for the forgiveness of sins and a change of heart and life in the baptised, and today the Church baptises for the forgiveness of sins, and the promises that are made at baptism are all about a change in the way the baptised, or their parents and godparents, will live. John baptised in water, and so does the Church. We believe that, through the waters of baptism, the Holy Spirit is given to the baptised to guide and strengthen them as they begin this new way of life. And in the stories of Jesus’ baptism, the Holy Spirit descends on him in the form of a dove. And immediately after this, Jesus goes into the wilderness to prepare for the beginning of his earthly ministry. Of course, we don’t have doves flying around in church when we baptise people, but we symbolise the Spirit’s presence in, and with, the newly baptised through anointing with oil which is another sign of God’s favour we read about frequently in the Scriptures. In obedience to Jesus’ command, we baptise in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. And all three are all present in the stories of Jesus’ Baptism. Jesus, the Son, is there; the Spirit, in the form of a dove, is there; and the Father, who speaks from heaven, is there.

So what we do in the Church in the sacrament of Holy Baptism is very much in accord with what we read about Jesus’ own baptism by John in the River Jordan. But, as we think about what Baptism signifies and the kind of life it calls us to, perhaps the most important thing we learn from the story of Jesus’ Baptism is found in thinking about the Father’s words. Perhaps not directly, but certainly in the context of the Gospels as a whole because the words of the Father at Jesus’ Baptism remind us very much of the Father’s words in another story about Jesus we read later in the Gospels.

As well as the story of Jesus’ Baptism, another story that the Gospels of Saints Matthew, Mark and Luke share, is the story of Jesus’ Transfiguration.  In both stories, Jesus is revealed as the Son of God by a sign and by a voice from heaven, and in both stories the Father’s words are very similar. At Jesus’ Baptism, the Father says to Jesus,

“You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.”

And at Jesus’ Transfiguration, the Father says to Jesus’ disciples,

“This is my beloved Son; listen to him.”

So in these Gospel stories, God the Father, proclaims Jesus as his ‘beloved Son’, with whom he is ‘well pleased’, and he tells his disciples to ‘listen to him’. And the message for us is unmistakable. Jesus is the beloved Son of God. The Father approves of what Jesus says and does. And if we’re going to be disciples of Jesus, if we’re going to be Christians, we’re called to listen to Jesus. And, if we think about it, isn’t that what the baptismal promises are all about? Aren’t promises to turn to Christ as Saviour, to submit to Christ as Lord and to come to Christ, the way, the truth and the life, all promises to listen to Jesus and do as he says? And aren’t promises to reject the devil and all rebellion against God, to renounce the deceit and corruption of evil and to repent of the sins that separate us from God and neighbour, all promises to do what Jesus taught us to do and live as he lived? And when we think about it in that way, isn’t it obvious that being baptised and being a Christian is about far more than simply coming to church on one day, usually very early in life, to be ‘done’?

An awful lot of people do think that they come to church on the day of their baptism to be Christened, to be somehow miraculously transformed into Christians. An awful lot of people speak about being Christened as being done, and the very word itself suggests that people think once they’re Christened, they’re then finished in some way; that being Christened is some kind of completion. In fact, the day of a person’s baptism is simply the beginning of a lifelong journey towards becoming a Christian and if people ever do want to complete that journey, they’ll have to spend a lifetime thinking about the promises they made, or that were made on their behalf; thinking about how to fulfil those promises and listening to Jesus to find the answers.

So, if you’re thinking of bringing a child to church to have water poured on their heads or know someone who’s thinking of bringing a child to church, or coming themselves, for that reason, please remember, and explain to others, that you, or they, are not coming to church to be Christened or to be done, but to receive the sacrament of Holy Baptism. Please understand and explain to others what that means and involves. And for those of us who aren’t in either of those situations but who are already on the journey towards becoming Christians, let’s remember that it’s up to us, all of us, to encourage the newly baptised, and their parents and godparents to take Baptism seriously by coming to church where they can listen to Jesus and learn what he has to teach us about how to be his disciples. And let’s make sure that, if they do come to listen and learn, we do teach them, not only in words, but by our own example.

Amen.  

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You will find the Propers for The Baptism of the Lord here.