LENT 5

John 12:20-33 (Sermon 1: “One Buried Grain”)

Hebrews 5: 5-10

Jeremiah 31:31-34

Psalm 51:1-12 (Sermon 2: “For Those With No Pretensions””)

or Psalm 119:9-16

THEME AND GREETING

On this fifth Sunday of Lent, the paradox of the way of Christ challenges us:

Through loss comes gain, through death comes abundant life.

Jesus said: “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the soil and dies,

it will remain a lonely thing. But if it is buried, it will yield much harvest.”

The grace, mercy and peace of Christ Jesus be with you all.

And also with you!

Christ did not want to suffer and die. It is written:

“In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications,

with loud cries and tears, to the God who was able to save him from death.”

Although he was a Son, he learned obedience in the school of suffering.

When he calls us to take up our cross and follow him,

there is abundant joy in his presence

but there is also discipline and self sacrifice.

With my whole heart I seek, You loving Lord,

let me never wander from your ways.

ASKING GOD’S HELP

Most holy and most loving God, by your Spirit unclutter our hearts and minds this day, and enlarge within us a larger space for Christ.

Being enthused and possessed by his costly glory, may we glorify you in the totality of this service of worship, and be better resourced to glorify you in the common daily-ness of this new week.

Whenever discipleship proves costly, help us to embrace sacrifice as readily as we accept our many blessings. In his name and to your praise;

Amen!

REPENTING AND TRUSTING GOD’S MERCY

Let us return unto God, who will have mercy and abundantly pardon.

Let us pray.

Most mysterious and loving God, we come before you, not as those who are perfect practitioners of Christ’s method, but as those who have sincerely admired him, yearned to be like him, yet have only applied his truth in fragmentary ways. We admit to each other and to you, God:

We have grabbed at life and hoarded it for ourselves, rather than sharing and losing it in the cause of the Gospel.

We have sought the shabby glory of this world’s praise and have badly compromised our faith in this mad pursuit.

We have tried to nullify our anxieties by surrounding ourselves with possessions, but have reaped only deep discontents.

We have trodden over the lives of others in our hurry to get what and where we want, but have ended up missing out on much love.

Every now and then we have dared to be bold in faith, hope and love, and have briefly tasted the nobler joy of Christ, only to slip back again into a no-risk policy of self preservation

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your loving kindness,

according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions.

Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity

and cleanse me from my sins.

Create in me a clean heart, O God,

and renew a right spirit with in me.

Restore to me the joy of your salvation,

and uphold me with a willing spirit.

Through the grace of Christ Jesus, we pray.

Amen!

FORGIVENESS

Fellow students in the school of life, know for certain that God in Christ has acted once and for all for our complete rescue and healing. Your teacher has become your Saviour. Trust in his saving grace and no longer weary yourself with guilt and frustration.

“The time is coming, says our God, when all people shall know me, from the least of them to the greatest, for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sins no more.”

Thanks be to God!

PRAYERS FOR CHILDREN

God our holy Friend,

there is something gross in us

that makes us want

to get our own way

all the time.

You know that,

don’t you God?

We don’t like it, you know.

We need your help to fix it.

So when we wake up each morning,

please spread the love of Jesus in our hearts

so that we may be keen to do what you want

much more than what we want.

Thanks God.

You are the best.

Amen!

PSALM 51:1-12

See Australian Psalms p. 74

Ó B D Prewer & Open Book Publishers

UNLESS A GRAIN FALLS

John 12: 24

Let this be admitted plainly:

We shrink from being buried

alive in Christ’s mission.

Where is hope to be found

in grain shoved underground?

Why was this Jesus

so uncompromising, blunt

leaving no other choice

when the world seems full

of options not so dull?

We want to seize life

and enjoy its favours

savouring its pleasures

without worrying much

about the results of such.

Why couldn’t he

have made the whole thing

a bit easier for once.

“Please yourself,” why not say,

“and now have a good day?”

Where is the glory

in the precious grain buried

in the dark, chill soil?

Why is the easy way a loss

compared to his bleak cross?

Let this be said plainly:

it defies common sense

this way that Jesus takes.

Yet when we go just one mile

with him, we start to smile.

Ó B D Prewer 2002

PRAYER FOR THIS DAY

God of innumerable mercies, give us the grace to be daily buried in the love of Christ, like the seed that is buried in the earth, and thereby may we begin to live more abundantly.

With his help, may we learn of that fruitful life which spent in loving others can glorify your name throughout the world. Then may the earth know its Saviour, who with you in the unity of the Spirit are loved and worshipped, world without end.

Amen!

SERMON 1: ONE BURIED GRAIN (Long Version)

John 12:24

The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

You can’t find a smaller parable than this. One grain of wheat cast into the earth.

On the surface this speaks of what is obvious in agriculture. Grains of wheat, barely, rice, corn, or rye are planted in the fields, or other seeds like beans or peas are planted in gardens. They are buried. Yet in time those solitary seeds bring forth an abundant harvest. The one becomes many.

However, under the surface of this Jesus is pointing us to a similar truth at the personal spiritual level. Loss is gain. Death becomes life. It is a truth which for him, as he lives life to the utmost, is carrying him forward to his destiny.

It is also a truth about us, an immutable fact of human life.

Protect your life and it will shrink. Lose it and it will expand. Truly, truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit

WE GET SPOOKED

At this point our spontaneous reaction is to shy away like a spooked horse. We don’t want to hear this message. We don’t want to know about it.

We protest “Please Jesus, stop this talk and get back to telling us about the yoke that is easy and the burden that is light. Leave this painful tune and give us again that sweet music about the carefree birds of the air and the lilies of the field that are cared for by a benevolent God.”

“That stuff about falling I into the soil and dying, may be okay for wheat, barely, tomatoes, and sweet corn, but it is not the right thing for Tom, Dick and Harry, or Jan and Beth and Mary. It spooks us. Too negative and gloomy by far.”

It is not surprising that we shy at the thought of being “buried” for God’s sake. The ever-pressing world around us shouts: “Save your life, protect yourself, hoard it, and pamper it. Keep it safe from the inroads of other people. Spoil yourself with all your energy and all your cunning. Don’t make yourself vulnerable. Be cautious, be cagey, be firm in saving yourself. Look after your own interests at all times. Protect the wants of number one”

That is the gospel according to Women’s Day, Cleo, Playboy, Wheels, The Financial Times, Dolly, The New Idea, Home Beautiful, and it’s the message of almost every clever ad you see on the ubiquitous TV. The secular world advises: “Spoil yourself. You are worth it! Take your solitary grain of wheat and indulge it with all the comforts and pleasures that cunning can accrue or money can buy. Save your life at all costs.”

THE FRUITFUL WAY OF JESUS

Yet the most alive person who ever walked mother earth, practised a harder, deeper, and a remarkably fecund truth: Be willing to let your ego be buried, let your precious grain of wheat appear to die, and you will discover an abundant quality of life which out-grows, out-fruits, and out-celebrates all the 'me-first' millions in the world lumped together.

Share your life, give of yourself, and share your talents. Give yourself entirely to God, and be willing to sacrifice whenever required, just as God will lead you to relax whenever it is appropriate.

We are not likely to have to literally give up our life in the early thirties, as Jesus did, but we are asked to die thousands of little deaths in the cause of God, and as a consequence find ourselves bearing fruits that we never thought possible. And if it were ever asked of us to be ready to physically suffer and die in the name of Christ, then the harvest would certainly be gloriously fruitful in the immeasurable economy of God’s kingdom.

Truly, truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

JESUS DID IT HARD

Such is the way our Master went. But please do not get sidetracked by the thought that Jesus found it easy; or that he got a kick out of pain. Jesus liked the “good life” as much as any of us, but for God’s sake he took the steep, narrow, rough road. Long before Good Friday, he did not find self giving, and making himself being vulnerable, the easiest of options. He found himself misunderstood and derided, homeless, hounded out of some towns, often weary and exhausted, and stalked by enemies.

It got worse near the end, or course. As Jesus drew nearer to that horrible destiny that awaited him in Jerusalem, he recoiled from it with his whole being.

The letter to the Hebrews paints the true picture:

In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the God who was able to save him.....................................Son though he was, he learned obedience in t he school f suffering.”

Along the same lines, our Gospel story for this 5th Sunday in Lent reveals the emotional trouble and struggle which Jesus experienced in those last days. We are told that some Greeks sent a message via Philip that they wished to meet with him. It must have seemed like an honourable way out. Why lose his one life in stubborn Jerusalem, while others were eager to hear his Gospel? Jesus was tempted. Sorely tested. He prayed.

Now is my soul in turmoil. What shall I pray: Father, save me from this fateful hour?

No. For this purpose I have arrived at this hour. Father, glorify your name through me.”

Jesus did not readily surrender his solitary grain of wheat; to be lost; to be buried and forgotten. His self giving was far from easy. It came at a large cost.

IT’S NOT AN EASY OPTION FOR US

Nor is it always easy for us. Not for Christian teenagers who make themselves vulnerable to peer ridicule. Not for those followers of Christ in the work force trying to maintain their Christian integrity. Not even for the retired folk who try to balance service for Christ with diminishing energy and declining health.

Although we may shrink back at times, we need to continue welcoming those thousands of minor deaths as we lovingly sow our seed in the furrows of life. All these little self-offerings are the valid sequence of giving our mind and heart to the Lord Jesus. In the continuous offering of our one, precious life, we soon discover that our experience deepness and widens and lengthens and heightens; in a way the lone grain could never predict if it closed its borders and lived in solitary self-containment.

It is not always easy, not always comfortable, but it is delightfully fruitful.

Why then do we fight this message which Jesus gave us and enacted for us? I think it is fear.

It is because we are afraid of losing ourselves, that we want to cling tenaciously to the lone-seed existence. Numerous souls, including me, have put up a fight against God before throwing in our lot with Jesus. As a young man, I had my own plans. I vigorously wanted to save my life; to use it as I saw fit; to own it or spend in my own way in my own time.

Nothing could have prepared me for the awe-joy that arrived when I gave it away and found it returned to me immensely enhanced. Nor could anything have prepared me for the ongoing cost, yet the ongoing privilege and delight, of giving it away again each morning.

A YELLOW LIGHT

At this point I want to flash a cautionary yellow light. Losing one’s life in the service of Christ, and for our fellow human beings, does not mean we must comply with every external demand made on us.

We are not asked by Christ to become the puppets of bossy or manipulating people. Christ does not reduce us to subservient, lap dogs that must yap and jump or walk on our hind legs whenever importunate people elbow themselves into our space. Those precious grains of wheat that belong to Christ must not hand themselves over to the selfish agenda of others. The agenda of Christ is the only one that matters.

The sacrifices of self should be discerning. They must be the ones to which Christ calls us, not the ones that others attempt to impose on us whenever they have the whim or fancy. Jesus never allowed others to boss him around. He kept charge of what was happening in the expenditure of his time and energy. He even kept charge in those last few fateful days in Jerusalem before betrayal, arrest, trial, suffering and death. As he stated: “No one takes my life from me. I give it of my own free will.”

Jesus is our template; the pattern for that grain of life which discerns what is happening, makes choices, and then embraces a little death (or a large one) whenever and wherever God wants us to.

SELF PROTECTION IS COMMON

Of course we will continue to be tempted to protect ourselves. Anxiety and fear can push us towards a “security first” stance.

Pressing around us in this world are masses of other human grains of wheat; millions of our fellow beings. Most of them are afraid of losing themselves. So much so that either they wall up tightly, or go on the attack to enlarge their domain by pushing in on ours.

Some, indeed many, try expanding themselves at the expense of others. By grabbing all they can. Trampling on others’ basic rights, if they can get away with it.

It is understandable (though pathetic) how anxious and fearful souls seek to insulate themselves with a plethora of possessions, positions of importance, imposing real estate and multiple pleasures. This self protective reflex is strong, but wrong. It is not constructive but destructive.

The self protective grain of wheat thinks it is saving itself. But in fact it is losing itself. Without making itself vulnerable by loving others, without readily dying to self and being buried in the ground of God, it remains one isolated, deprived little creature. It “remains alone.”

ORDINARY FOLK?

On the other hand, when one grain willingly dies to self, the results can be extraordinary.

My life (and I reckon yours) has long been wonderfully enriched by ordinary folk who have lovingly given themselves rather than hoarding. Who have made themselves vulnerable? Those who have not shied away from self sacrifice.

Forget for now those famous names that may inspire us. Think rather about the value of ordinary saints: those common grains of wheat that have brought a harvest of blessings into our lives or around our lives.

In a much earlier parable which Jesus told of a sower sowing his seed, the seed fell in various places. He said that of the seed that actually grew, some brought forth 30-fold, some 60-fold, and some a 100-fold.

Let us be modest in our expectations. Let us be at the bottom of the scale and rank ourselves among the 30-fold achievers for Christ. Suppose we are just a bunch lower yield people, yet willing to be sown in God’s field. Five years at that modest yield would result in a harvest of 243, 300,000 seeds!

Even if we go through a rocky patch, or have times of drought in our lives, or suffer from weeds around us; even if we only produce a harvest of that reaps 10-fold; in five years the yield will be 1,000,000. Not bad for solitary seeds who are prepared to give up what they have for the glory of God. There is something gloriously exponential about the spreading fruitfulness of loving deeds. As my youngest grandson, Lockie, would say:”It’s cool, Grandad!” The exponential effect of loving others is indeed cool.

I have used the word “gloriously.”

It is the glory of God that matters most. For in God’s glory is our deepest happiness and our perfect peace.

When Jesus reset his eyes on the cross and death, rather than go off with the Greeks, we are told that the Lord said: For this purpose I have arrived at this hour, Father glorify your name. And a voice from heaven answered: I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.”

In Christ’s realm, where love is what matters most, losing life means gaining a more beautiful and fulfilling life. And creating a richer life for those around us. And becoming a significant part of the glory of God.

Truly, truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

There, like some well kept secret, is the kingdom the power and the glory. For ever and ever. Amen!

SERMON 1: ONE BURIED GRAIN (Short Version)

John 12:24

The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

You can’t find a smaller parable than this. One grain of wheat cast into the earth.

However, under the surface of this Jesus is pointing us to a similar truth at the personal spiritual level. Loss is gain. Death becomes life. This an immutable fact of human life.

Protect your life and it will shrink. Lose it and it will expand. Truly, truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit

WE GET SPOOKED

At this point our spontaneous reaction is to shy away like a spooked horse. We don’t want to hear this message. We don’t want to know about it.

THE FRUITFUL WAY OF JESUS

Yet the most alive person, the most joy-full one, who ever walked mother earth practised a harder, deeper, and a remarkably fecund truth: Be willing to let your ego be buried, let your precious grain of wheat appear to die, and you will discover an abundant quality of life which out-grows, out-fruits, and out-celebrates all the 'me-first' millions in the world lumped together.

Share your life, give of yourself, and share your talents. Give yourself entirely to God, and be willing to sacrifice whenever required, just as God will lead you to relax whenever it is appropriate.

Truly, truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

JESUS DID IT HARD

Such is the way our Master went. But please do not get sidetracked by the thought that Jesus found it easy; or that he got a kick out of pain. Jesus liked the “good life” as much as any of us, but for God’s sake he took the steep, narrow, rough road. It got worse near the end, or course. As Jesus drew nearer to that horrible destiny that awaited him in Jerusalem, he recoiled from it with his whole being.

The letter to the Hebrews paints the true picture:

Now is my soul in turmoil. What shall I pray: Father, save me from this fateful hour?

No. For this purpose I have arrived at this hour. Father, glorify your name through me.”

Jesus did not readily surrender his solitary grain of wheat; to be lost; to be buried and forgotten. His self giving was far from easy. It came at a large cost.

IT’S NOT AN EASY OPTION FOR US

It is not always easy, not always comfortable, but it is delightfully fruitful.

Why then do we fight this message which Jesus gave us and enacted for us? I think it is fear.

However, nothing could have prepared me for the awe-joy that arrived when I gave it away and found it returned to me immensely enhanced. Nor could anything have prepared me for the ongoing cost, yet the ongoing privilege and delight, of giving it away again each morning.

A YELLOW LIGHT

The sacrifices in our own life should be discerning. They must be the ones to which Christ calls us, not the ones that others attempt to impose on us whenever they have the whim or fancy.

Jesus is our template; the pattern for that grain of life which discerns what is happening, makes choices, and then embraces a little death (or a large one) whenever and wherever God wants us to.

SELF PROTECTION IS COMMON

Of course we will continue to be tempted to protect ourselves. Anxiety and fear can push us towards a “security first” stance.

Many neighbours and work colleagues will try expanding themselves at the expense of others. By grabbing all they can. Trampling on others’ basic rights, if they can get away with it.

ORDINARY FOLK?

On the other hand, when one grain willingly dies to self, the results can be extraordinary.

My life (and I reckon yours) has long been wonderfully enriched by ordinary folk who have lovingly given themselves rather than hoarding. Don’t focus on those famous names that may inspire us. Think rather about the value of ordinary saints: those common grains of wheat that have brought a harvest of blessings into our lives or around our lives.

There is something gloriously exponential about the spreading fruitfulness of sowing love- seeds.

I have just used the word “gloriously.”

It is the glory of God that matters most. For in God’s glory is our deepest happiness and our perfect peace.

Truly, truly I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

There, in this briefest of parables, like some well kept secret, resides all the glorious ways of Godf! The little seed sown lovingly reveals the ultimate kingdom, the power, and the unstoppable glory. For ever and ever. Amen!

SERMON 2: FOR THOSE WITH NO PRETENSIONS

Psalm 51:1

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love,

according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions.

It seems to me that apart from Jesus, the most significant people in the Gospel stories are those despised souls who were scorned by some Pharisees as those “tax gatherers and sinners.” These are the people (with no pretensions of being good or self-worthy) who gladly encounter the totally free, generous mercy of Jesus.

These are the ones who know they have much to celebrate.

Like that diminutive crook Zacchaeus of Jericho, who to his amazement found Jesus asking for a seat at his dinner table among the tax gatherer’s disreputable friends.

Or like the unnamed prostitute who, when Jesus was dining at the house of a respectable man called Simon, caused a disturbance by gate crashing the party, throwing herself at the feet of Jesus and washing his feet with her tears.

These sinners had no pretensions about their moral and spiritual status. Yet they discovered in Jesus something which most of the loftier characters in the Old Testament did not find: The unqualified mercy of God; the unconditional good will of God; sheer grace.

OUR STATUS

I wonder to what degree has that same discovery penetrated our experience? God’s utter mercy? Boundless grace?

I trust we have no pretensions. I assume that all of us here are sinners. That we all, like arrows shot weakly or inaccurately, fall either short or wide of the target that has been set for us as children in the same family as Jesus the Christ?

I also assume that we are sinners in the sense that we seem to be incurably self centred. That we tend to assess the things that happen around us in terms of what they will do to us. Such is the case whether the issue is income tax rates, the new neighbours who move next door, how we treat asylum seekers, political parties, monetary exchange rates, stock market fluctuations, medical costs, interest rates, or even the induction of a new minister to our church. The first thought is: “How will it affect us?”

Yes, I assume we are all sinners here in this congregation today. We repeatedly fall short of the target, and the reason we do so is our entrenched self interest. Self is at the centre of our lives. So much so that there are numerous piously-inclined people who will only entertain a brand of religion that will be like a personal chaplain to their ego. We are sinners.

In moments of sanity we recognise and admit this. We recognise what we have done; we face up to what we are. And we become open to grace. Like those tax gatherers and sinners in the Gospel stories; those people who had no illusions about their lack of goodness, in times of honesty we know we need help from the one source that has the power to come to our assistance: the God of grace.

OUR PRAYER FOR MERCY

And so we pray with the psalm writer from long ago: Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. Create in me a new heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.

Following this sermon, the choir will sing a beautiful setting of this ancient Jewish cry for mercy (Miserere :G Allegri, 1582-1652). In the songs of the church we know it as the “Miserere” from the opening word of the Latin version. Generations have either sung or recited this psalm as they threw themselves on the mercy of God.

A similar theme is present in every service. We join in some form of confession. Sometimes the minister prays for God to have mercy on the congregation. Sometimes we sing or repeat another ancient cry of the church; the “Lord have mercy. Christ have mercy. Lord have mercy.” This is the ‘Kyrie Eleison” from ancient Greek Christian devotion. On other occasions we repeat or sing the Agnus Dei: “Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.”

In such moments of unpretentious sanity, in bold-faced honesty, we admit (but not get bogged down in) the fact that we are chronically flawed creatures, self interested sinners, who earnestly need saving therapy of the mercy of God.

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love,

according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions.

DANGERS?

But, there is a contradiction in the way we use such language; a contradiction that can be misunderstood and used dangerously in a primitive and non-Christian way. When we recite or sing the Miserere, Kyrie, or Agnus Dei, it might sound as if we are pleading for mercy. As if by repeated begging we try to make God have pity on us.

Now that is the way it really is in some primitive religions. In such religions the spirits, or the gods, have to be flattered or coaxed, or bought with rituals and recited words. Such gods or spirits are thought in some cases to be largely indifferent to our needs unless we pester them and beg them. In some religions the gods are thought to be angry with us, and therefore we need to bow and scrape, make offerings or burn incense to placate these angry deities.

Given the way we use language in Christian liturgy, there is always the danger that we might interpret Christ and his God in these primitive ways. Our reverent singing of the Miserere or Kyrie might be mistakenly taken to mean that we are dealing with either an indifferent God who needs to be coaxed, or an angry God who needs to be placated. It might seem as if God’s attention needs to be won, or the Divine heart needs to be softened, or the Divine will changed to deal favourably with us.

If that happens to us, then we are indeed to be pitied; for then we would have totally lost the Gospel.

GOSPEL OF GRACE

The tax gatherers and sinners discovered that God in Jesus of Nazareth is merciful. The grace of Christ preceded any repentance, prayer or vow. The mercy of God came looking for them. It sought them out and called them by name. It invited itself to their house for dinner. Jesus was there for them. No begging was required, no offering was needed, and no price had to be paid. God was not only approachable, but was also the Approacher.

Not only did Jesus show this in his attitude and deeds, he taught it in his parables. Especially in the parable of the prodigal son. In the far country, the sinner son decides to go home and plead for mercy. But he misunderstood the Father. While the sinner son is still a long way off, the Father sees him, and with total disregard to his own fatherly dignity, he runs to meet the wastrel son with open arms and bountiful grace. The father came running before any word of apology could be blurted out. The son does not even have to say: Have mercy on me, O Father, according to your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions.

The action of Jesus in going to the cross becomes the ultimate point in the ultimate declaration of God’s free mercy. There, totally immanent in the agony of the beloved Son, Divine love persists in the face of the worst than human ego and its sin can do. There in the Lamb of God, the crucified One, God is being unconditionally merciful to the world.

In a profound sense, at the cross the world is already forgiven. Each of us are already forgiven. We don’t have to plead for God’s mercy, make offerings and vows to obtain mercy, perform meritorious works to warrant God’s mercy, or repeat any special prayer, to receive this mercy. It is there. Totally there. Utterly available. All we have to do is accept it.

WHY THEN SEEM TO BEG FOR MERCY?

If we used liturgical language with strict logic, we might alter the Kyrie to “The Lord has mercy. Christ has mercy. The Lord has mercy.” And we could alter the psalm 51 to read: “The Lord has mercy upon me according to his loving kindness. According to his tender mercies he has blotted out my transgressions”

Why then do we persist with the language that sounds like pleading?

Firstly, because it is a recognition of our need to ask for, and to accept, mercy. In asking for mercy we open the door of our souls up to it. Definitely not begging God, but confessing our need and turning to the Source of salvation for help. We are accepting the grace of which we sing. When we recite such words, we are also expressing our longing for more and more of the grace of God in our motley lives. We are expressing our yearning and our hope, but also our confident faith in the grace of Christ Jesus.

Second, the use of these ancient texts expresses our partnership with all those souls (in the Christian story) who have gone before us and found those same, well-worn words an avenue into God’s abundant mercy. We are one with a shining host of the redeemed who treasured those phrases. Their need was the same as our need. Their saving grace was the same as our saving grace. There is a wondrous sense of solidarity with all the saints and martyrs, those dear ones, remembered or now forgotten, who repeated or sang these same phrases.

Third: the repetition of these beautiful prayers facilitates a kind of spiritual bathing in the mercy of God. It fosters a holy wallowing in the grace of Christ Jesus. Wallowing? Yes wallowing! I can find no other word, even though this one is so inadequate. I picture a water buffalo in Kakadu-like territory, wallowing in a lily pond; delighting in its good fortune. So we wallow in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ when we sing these ancient words.

THIS IS FOR YOU

This abundant grace is something I want the whole world to know, starting with every single one of you gathered here this morning. Please don’t stay tied to your guilt. Don’t be browbeaten by your own ego which will demand that you justify yourself. And please don’t remain in any bondage to a god whose anger terrifies you. Open up to the God of abundant mercy, foreshadowed in the Psalms of the Jewish people, but revealed in the saving grace of Christ Jesus. No begging. You are already forgiven. You are already surrounded by an immense mercy. All you need to do is to accept it.

When in a moment the choir sings the Miserere, Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions, let the mighty mercy of God embrace you and heal you. Discard all pretensions. Accept it, and yes wallow in it without inhibition.

YES! I BELIEVE!

I believe. So help me God.

I believe in the mercy which is from everlasting to everlasting to those who love God, and even to those who love but a little or at this moment love not at all.

I believe in a mercy that always free as the wind, generous as the sunshine and rain, and more boundless than the stars of the Milky Way

I believe in a God who from ancient days made glimmers of mercy known, from continent to continent and to islands in the distant paths of the sea.

I believe bright shafts of such knowledge are especially reflected in the best poems and prophecies of the Hebrew people as they were called to be a light to the nations.

I believe that in the fullness of time God has exceeded all expectations, and made divine mercy incarnate; visible and touchable in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.

I believe in a God who at this moment is more ready to embrace us with Christ’s mercy than we are to receive and trust it.

I believe that this very belief is itself only possible because of God’s mercy which precedes all our thinking, understanding, and speaking.

So I believe, and pray for the wisdom to express my belief in all I do and say.

So help me God. Amen!

ENCIRCLING OTHER PEOPLE

Loving others involves intention and effort, prayers and deeds.

Let us lovingly pray.

Most holy Friend, out of our poverty we seek your riches of mercy, for our loved ones and friends and neighbours, for strangers in other lands and also for our enemies.

Have mercy on us, O God,