Sabbath Keeping

In his memoir, The Pastor, Eugene Peterson, who writes the only really good material I have ever read or come across, about Christian pastoral work as a whole, describes Holy Saturday through to the Sabbath Keeping of Easter Day as 'Staying in touch with people in despair, knowing them by name, and waiting for resurrection.'
He has just written of the Pastor's "work" assignment as paying more attention to what God does than I do, and then guiding others to find those daily, weekly, yearly rhythms that help get this awareness into our bones. And part of the awareness is the waiting of Holy Saturday.
This is to do with being alongside people in heir waiting. It is the 'Jesus wept' of pastoral ministry, the phase than spoke to me in the recent fire of Barn Mead.
Eugene Peterson learnt his lesson of Holy Saturday for the whole of ministry. Much of my ministry has to do with waiting. This gives me a Biblical context, at the heart of the Easter Story.
And i I must revisit what Isaiah says about Sabbaths. Isaiah 58:3 is relevant here. I must explore further this as an understanding of the Sabbath. Perhaps this has to do with Sabbaths as well as Saturdays, for the Sabbath of Sabbaths (Leviticus 16:29-31) is to do with fasting.

Isaiah 58:
6 “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness[a] will go before you,
and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.
9 Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.

Interesting sign in Stratford upon Avon

Prayers following the Barn Mead fire in Harlow

In this last week great tragedy and grief has struck our town.

How do we respond?

We respond as God did. God in Christ came amongst us at the first Christmas. As a grown man, he went to the tomb of a friend, and we read ‘Jesus wept’.

Weeping is not all Christ did; but that is where he began.

In weeping we share in our common humanity

As we allow ourselves to weep and to mourn

We know and see ‘the other’.

We begin to see them as God sees them.

We who spend so much time seeing ourselves

see the other,

and their need.

And that is why we pray and why we need to pray.

Prayer unlocks our hearts.

Prayer unlocks them to action

Prayer draws us to one another.

That is not all that prayer does. For as we are drawn to one another

God is enabled to work

in us and through us

and he hears our prayers

And the prayers we utter now were answered 2000 years ago

when Christ suffered with us

on the cross,

and arose from the dead

opening the door into God’s eternity

So today, we remember:

Sabah Usmani, and her children Sohaib, Muneeb, Rayyan, Hira and Maheen.

We pray for their father Abdul Shakoor

We remember and pray for all their neighbours, friends, family, and all involved this last week.

 It is right that we bring our grief and anguish to God

Psalm 6:6,7

I am weary with my moaning;
    every night I flood my bed with tears;
    I drench my couch with my weeping.

My eye wastes away because of grief;
    it grows weak because of all my foes.

It is right that we bring our questions to God.

One the cross Jesus cried: 

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me.

Lord, there are times when I am worn out with grief,

With no way forward and no way back.

Surely you are supposed to hear my cries,

And have mercy and save me.

But still my pillow becomes wet from my tears;

My body loses its appetite;

My mind falters;

My soul is weak to the point of exhaustion.

As trouble overwhelms me,

And panic sets in and I have nowhere to turn,

My only words are to you;

God give me strength. Amen

(Derek Browning)

[2 minutes silence]

Psalm 121: 1-2

I lift up my eyes to the hills – from whence will my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. O God our refuge and our strength, a very present help in trouble, we seek your comfort and your blessing for those who mourn the death of those they love, for all whose lives are torn apart by violence, for all the suffering people of the world; through Jesus Christ our Lord

Gracious God,

through your Son you have taught us

that nothing in life or in death

is able to separate us from your love.

Look in mercy on all to whom overwhelming sorrow has come.

Help all who are injured

Comfort all in anguish.

Strengthen the members of the emergency services -

the Fire Brigade, The Ambulance Service, the Police, PAH and Broomfield Hospitals,

and all who bring relief and comfort.

Console and protect Dr Shakoor

Give your light in darkness

to all who are near despair,

and assure them that you hold us all in your arms of love

through Jesus Christ our risen Lord.

Amen.

 A prayer scratched on the wall of a prison cell in Cologne during the Second World War

I believe in the sun,
even when it does not shine.
I believe in love,
even when I cannot feel it.
I believe in God,
even when he is silent.

Prepared for history?

Am reading Vaclav Havel's To the Castle and Back. Love this quote,
"I find people who are completely prepared for history rather suspect. They have a lot in common with the communists, who so arrogantly believe they have understood the world and therefore know perfectly how everything should be."
This speaks to my desire to understand everything and my frustration when I don't! Learning godliness means learning humility and learning not to know.

Quote of the Day

It is this single factor of being aware of personal need that enables someone to recognise that which God is doing in the earth - Bill Johnson, Face to Face with God, 112

Thought for the Day

Ivan Illich says that if you want to change society, then you must tell a different story .

Between: Metaphorical language is essential to faith

An interesting blog here for those preaching the parables, as we are at present at St Paul's and St Mary's...
Between: Metaphorical language is essential to faith: Here's an interesting segment from Stephen Abell's review in the Guardian of How to do Things with Fictions by Joshua Landy : 'The read...

To extend the quote slightly: 'As Landy triumphantly concludes: "the Sower is a meta-parable, a parable about parables, a parable that only indirectly concerns the kingdom of God, being focused, rather, on the ability to handle figurative language".

When we read the parable, then, it is the very experience of reading that is crucial.'