A Last after Trinity 2008

Heaven and earth shall pass away: but my word shall never pass away.

How do you think of the novel, Mrs Fitzgerald?
Long silence. I suppose I think of the novel... as something oblong.

Vincent Taylor, The Text of the New Testament, second edition, 1963, 18 shillings net, second-hand copy, according to the flyleaf once the property of Illegible McGoughlin:
the original autographs of the New Testament which it has pleased God not to protect from the accidents and fortunes of scribal transmission.

The solidity of the book: the fluidity of the text. Books are solid, oblong, portable, can prop up tables, stop bullets (allegedly), in political or personal extremity can light fires. They can get lost. They can be rediscovered during building work: 2 Kings 22. The people return from exile to a book. One of the reasons why books are oblong in the first place, and not cylindrical, is the way Christians spread round the Mediterranean in the first century.

At the same time, the fluidity of the text: manuscripts, battles over hand-copied bibles (to every cow its calf, to every copy its book), misreadings, well-meaning emendments, untranslatable verses, and ordinary misprints (‘printers have persecuted me without a cause’, Ps 119, 1702). Whereas ‘Now Barabbas was a publisher’ is not a misprint but an exasperated remark by a Scottish poet.

Heaven and earth shall pass away: but my word shall never pass away.

Non-endings. Mark: women running. Matthew: the Great Commission. Luke: waiting for the Spirit. John: the world could not hold the books that would be written.

‘... in the interests of truth.’
The word made its mark. Broadcasting House was in fact dedicated to the strangest project of the war, or of any war, that is, telling the truth. Without prompting, the BBC had decided that truth was more important than consolation, and, in the long run, would be more effective. And yet there was no guarantee of this. Truth ensures trust, but not victory, or even happiness. But the BBC had clung tenaciously to its first notion, droning quietly on, at intervals from dawn to midnight, telling, as far as possible, exactly what happened. An idea so unfamiliar was bound to upset many of the other authorities, but they had got used to it little by little, and the listeners had always expected it.

Lost Books

Nehemiah's talking about a book that had been lost. This is the rediscovery of the book. Coming home to the book (look at how important it is that everyone understands) is coming back from exile.

There was a lost book that was discovered when Josiah was rebuilding the Temple. 2 Kings 22.

In the eighteenth year of King Josiah, the king sent Shaphan son of Azaliah, son of Meshullam, the secretary, to the house of the Lord, saying, ⁴‘Go up to the high priest Hilkiah, and have him count the entire sum of the money that has been brought into the house of the Lord, which the keepers of the threshold have collected from the people; ⁵let it be given into the hand of the workers who have the oversight of the house of the Lord; let them give it to the workers who are at the house of the Lord, repairing the house, ⁶that is, to the carpenters, to the builders, to the masons; and let them use it to buy timber and quarried stone to repair the house. ⁷But no account shall be asked from them for the money that is delivered into their hand, for they deal honestly.’

8 The high priest Hilkiah said to Shaphan the secretary, ‘I have found the book of the law in the house of the Lord.’ When Hilkiah gave the book to Shaphan, he read it. ⁹Then Shaphan the secretary came to the king, and reported to the king, ‘Your servants have emptied out the money that was found in the house, and have delivered it into the hand of the workers who have oversight of the house of the Lord.’ ¹⁰Shaphan the secretary informed the king, ‘The priest Hilkiah has given me a book.’ Shaphan then read it aloud to the king.

11 When the king heard the words of the book of the law, he tore his clothes. ¹²Then the king commanded the priest Hilkiah, Ahikam son of Shaphan, Achbor son of Micaiah, Shaphan the secretary, and the king’s servant Asaiah, saying, ¹³‘Go, inquire of the Lord for me, for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that has been found; for great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us, because our ancestors did not obey the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us.’

That was before the exile. Nehemiah is about returning from exile. During the exile, when the land was lost, the exiles remembered their story and again rediscovered the book. Bits of books they already had, bits they put together, bits that were their own history.

Lost books. The library of Alexandria. Books you lend to people. Books you once had and books you can't quite remember. Books out there propping up tables, left on trains, adrift in the world.

the original autographs of the New Testament which it has pleased God not to protect from the accidents and fortunes of scribal transmission

(Vincent Taylor, preface, The Text of the New Testament, 1963, second-hand copy, 18s net, formerly the property of Illegible O'Loughlin, 1969)

A Last after Trinity; Bible Sunday: readings

Nehemiah 8:1-4a, 8-12
all the people gathered together into the square before the Water Gate. They told the scribe Ezra to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord had given to Israel. Accordingly, the priest Ezra brought the law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could hear with understanding. This was on the first day of the seventh month. He read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand; and the ears of all the people were attentive to the book of the law. The scribe Ezra stood on a wooden platform that had been made for the purpose;
and beside him stood Mattithiah, Shema, Anaiah, Uriah, Hilkiah, and Maaseiah on his right hand; and Pedaiah, Mishael, Malchijah, Hashum, Hash-baddanah, Zechariah, and Meshullam on his left hand. And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was standing above all the people; and when he opened it, all the people stood up. Then Ezra blessed the Lord, the great God, and all the people answered, ‘Amen, Amen’, lifting up their hands. Then they bowed their heads and worshipped the Lord with their faces to the ground. Also Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, the Levites, helped the people to understand the law, while the people remained in their places.

[omitted in the passage as set by the lectionary - because of the names?]

So they read from the book, from the law of God, with interpretation. They gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading. And Nehemiah, who was the governor, and Ezra the priest and scribe, and the Levites who taught the people said to all the people, ‘This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn or weep.’ For all the people wept when they heard the words of the law. Then he said to them, ‘Go your way, eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions of them to those for whom nothing is prepared, for this day is holy to our Lord; and do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.’ So the Levites stilled all the people, saying, ‘Be quiet, for this day is holy; do not be grieved.’ And all the people went their way to eat and drink and to send portions and to make great rejoicing, because they had understood the words that were declared to them.

Colossians 3:12-17
As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; teach and admonish one another in all wisdom; and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.


Matthew 24: 30-35
Jesus said:
Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see “the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven” with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.
From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. So also, when you see all these things, you know that he is near, at the very gates. Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

Creation 5

The word Jesus uses for ‘perfect’, in the alarming teaching ‘Be perfect as God is perfect’, is τέλειος, and it means complete, finished, something that has done what is was supposed to do or become what it is supposed to be. If I go home today and pick apples and make the perfect apple crumble, that is a teleios apple crumble and the apples are teleioi. They have become completely what they are supposed to be, at least from my point of view. Which makes it interesting that from the apples’ point of view they aren’t perfect, they aren’t even apples any more in any way that an apple might recognise, because I’ve eaten them.
So Jesus is not saying to the crowds Be nice or Be nicer or Go further or Do more or even Be different. He is saying Be everything. Be everything you are supposed to be. Find everything you are, do it all, get there, finish the race. Be perfect.
And to illustrate this - as a model - he points them towards God. God is perfect. That doesn’t mean God is exceptionally good at everything or always keeps his room tidy. It means God is completely God, is everything God can be. I am that I am, says God, introducing himself to Moses. God is perfectly God, God is completely God: God is.
That’s one thing we know about God. God is. The other thing we know is the whole story that says that for God, being God means loving us. And not just us here but also the apples in my crumble and the planet Jupiter and the centipedes in my compost heap and all the people I particularly dislike. That’s what the first reading is about. Something perfect might be something complete in itself, something that didn’t need anything else. But God is perfectly God, and it’s not that sort of perfect. God pours himself out in love; being God means doing that. This is not the perfect calm of a lake: this is a torrent, a waterfall, Niagara.
Jesus is talking to the crowd about other people. How they could be towards other people. He is saying Be towards other people the way God is to other people. Don’t be nice to the nice ones and disapproving to the nasty ones. Love them. Not because that will do them a lot of good, but because you need to be perfect. You need to be everything that you are, the way God is everything God is, and you cannot do that by closing up inside yourself and being perfectly cut off; or by judging other people and being perfectly right; you have to do it by loving people. You may end up unrecognisable to yourself or your friends, the way the apples ended up unrecognisable as apples. But you will have become the person God is pouring himself out to make.

I moved my current account in May out of what we will call Bank X, after more than 25 years, not for reasons of high finance but because:

1. Bank X had a policy of investing heavily in oil and gas exploration, regardless of what that did to the environment or whether that meant they were propping up governments like the Burmese junta;
2. (and this was the last straw) Bank X was paying its London cleaners less than the minimum wage.

I moved the account to Bank Y, which is not a big flashy bank at all but does have a policy of not behaving like that. Bank X is one of the ones that has just collapsed spectacularly. Nobody has mentioned its behaviour towards its cleaners in the analysis of the last few weeks, but I think it is not entirely a coincidence, and I think that is to do with relationships and trust.

Rainbows. Signs.

Relationships in creation. God, Noah, creatures. NB animal sacrifice - Noah has just taken

of every clean animal and of every clean bird, and offered burnt-offerings on the altar

which appears to be why God has decided not to send another flood. First mention of animal sacrifice in Genesis, and thus in the Bible, but there's no account establishing it. (It takes until Leviticus 11 before there's any explanation of which animals are clean or unclean.) What is going on here? What are the relationships implied in the covenant? What is God's motivation in sending the flood and not sending another?

Relationships again. Peter: Jesus is the Lord and the one anointed, and you crucified him. Everyone: what should we do? Peter: repent and receive the Spirit.

The Spirit more or less is a relationship. Not a very personal Person of the Trinity.

Even more relationships. Neighbours, enemies, brothers, sisters, the good, the evil, tax-collectors, gentiles. And rain.

What does 'perfect' mean?

Readings for Creation 5

HC (T) Holy Trinity, HC Curbridge, HC St Mary's

Genesis 9.8 - 17
Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, ‘As for me, I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals, and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark. I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.’ God said, ‘This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.’ God said to Noah, ‘This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.’

Acts 2:36b-39
Peter said: ‘Therefore let the entire house of Israel know with certainty that God has made him both Lord and Messiah, this Jesus whom you crucified.’
Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and to the other apostles, ‘Brothers, what should we do?’ Peter said to them, ‘Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to him.’

Matthew 5.43 – 48
‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.” But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax-collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Creation 3; Harvest

In the Jewish harvest festival, Sukkot, the Feast of Booths - the week after next - people build shelters out of branches (olive, pine, myrtle, palm) outside and go and live in them for the seven days of the festival. (unless it’s raining or your booth is full of wasps or you’ve just got married) And they dance with the law. A pilgrimage festival. Why booths? because of the shelters they lived in in the wilderness. Or because of the huts the harvesters made in the fields. More shade than sun, but not so much that you can’t see the stars.
We do that in reverse. We bring the fields inside. But it would be good also to go outside - bareheaded, barefoot even - and go on a journey, or stand getting wet for five minutes in the garden. Because harvest is not, after all, a time to sit contentedly on your heap. Harvest is when you remember that you’re on the edge. Deuteronomy.
Deuteronomy: the copy of the law. A tendency to tell you things again. A wish to make things absolutely clear. A mission to explain. Who is the explanation for? A people on the edge of the promised land. A pilgrim people. A people in exile. Beware lest you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.’ That is false security. Pilgrimage is deliberate insecurity, the antidote.
The people looking for Jesus wanted bread and certainty. What is the sign? Where is the bread?
- work for the food that endures for eternal life
- believe in the one whom God has sent
- the bread is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world
A conversation at cross purposes. Where is God definitely guaranteed? God is here now. But you can’t take possession of God: you can only join in. Do not try to gather everything up and sit on it, it will not work. Even the promised land didn’t work, because they forgot they were on the edge. Seek first the kingdom of God, and live in that. You’re not on the edge of that. You’re in it.
A pilgrimage story. Galicia. Cowsheds, rain, spring flowers, green hills, tiny villages, no bread. Out of nowhere, the bread van.