Second Sunday of Advent
Sermon given by Fr Peter Wolton on Sunday 6th December 2015
When I was a child, Advent was a time
for longing, the countdown to Christmas Day, the opening of the Medici calendar
to reveal pictures of the story of the nativity, and of course waiting for much
wanted Christmas presents.
As adults we learn gradually that Advent
remains a time of longing, longing for God’s kingdom to be established on
earth. But the reality for many of us is that Advent is more of a mad scutter
to be ready for all the festive add ons, rather than a “mini Lent” time for
prayer and reflection.
St. Paul in his letter to the
Philippians gives us an anchor to allow us to hold fast in the secular storm of
the run up to Christmas. “And this is my prayer that your love may overflow
more and more with knowledge and full insight.”
At this time of Advent, as we reflect on
the Incarnation, distinguishing between the human and the divine, the words of Austin
Farrer come to mind:
“For what is a human mind, and what is a
divine mind? A human mind thinks its way from point to point. God sees all
things in one vision. The life of man is a path he has to find, step by step,
in ignorance of the event. God’s life is a glory he enjoys and possesses all
together, an existence infinitely rich, but at the same time perfectly unified,
and filling all eternity.”
During Advent, as we prepare for the
arrival of Christmas, we should find time to deepen our knowledge and put in
place plans for the New Year to build our understanding of the gift that we
have received, “step by step”.
To help prepare ourselves for the coming
of Christ, St. Luke reminds us of the mission of John the Baptist, who prepared sinful Israel to meet God. John’s words are as relevant to us today
as they were in the Palestine of his day.
He proclaimed a baptism of repentance for the
forgiveness of sins:
“Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low,
and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”
Thereby
foretelling the universality of the Christian message.
Advent is a time for us to pray that we may iron
out our lives so the rough ways are made smooth. It is a chance to turn the
tide in those parts of our lives that are flowing in the wrong direction, being
guided by the life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
We rejoice in the birth of Christ, but for many of
us the reality of the Incarnation is difficult to comprehend. We are all
familiar with the opening verses of St. John’s Gospel “In the beginning was the
word”. I think the King’s College carol service puts it well with the
introduction to the Ninth lesson:
St John unfolds the great mystery of the
Incarnation.
For those of you who don’t know it, I would also
like to share with you another unfolding of this mystery, C.S Lewis’s poem “The Turning of the Tide”. Lewis describes
the impact of the birth of Christ which quietly yet inexorably sweeps over the
world, bringing to spiritual life a dead silent planet.
I’ll put the whole poem on the website with this
sermon.
Here’s the opening verse:
Breathless was the air
over Bethlehem. Black and bare
Were the fields; hard as granite the clods;
Hedges stiff with ice; the sedge in the vice
Of the pool, like pointed iron rods.
And the deathly stillness spread from Bethlehem. It was shed
Wider each moment on the land;
Were the fields; hard as granite the clods;
Hedges stiff with ice; the sedge in the vice
Of the pool, like pointed iron rods.
And the deathly stillness spread from Bethlehem. It was shed
Wider each moment on the land;
Lewis goes on to describe the different
parts of the world being silenced, hesitating for reasons they know not why,
Caesar on the Palatine, the people of Carthage, Gaul, then the universe,
Salamanders in the Sun, and great Galatal Lords.
Then into this silent void comes music,
such note that neither Throne nor potentate had known, since the Word first
founded the abyss.
The poem’s fourth verse or perhaps I
should say, the final movement is as follows:
Heaven
danced to it and burned. Such answer was returned
To the hush, the Favete, the fear
That Earth had sent out; revel, mirth and shout
Descended to her, sphere below sphere.
Saturn laughed and lost his latter age’s frost,
His beard, Niagara-like, unfroze;
Monsters in the Sun rejoiced; the Inconstant One,
The unwedded Moon, forgot her woes.
A shiver of re-birth and deliverance on the Earth
went gliding. Her bonds were released.
Into broken light a breeze rippled and woke the seas,
In the forest it startled every beast.
Capripods fell to dance from Taproban to France,
Leprechauns from Down to Labrador,
In his green Asian dell the Phoenix from his shell
Burst forth and was the Phoenix once more.
To the hush, the Favete, the fear
That Earth had sent out; revel, mirth and shout
Descended to her, sphere below sphere.
Saturn laughed and lost his latter age’s frost,
His beard, Niagara-like, unfroze;
Monsters in the Sun rejoiced; the Inconstant One,
The unwedded Moon, forgot her woes.
A shiver of re-birth and deliverance on the Earth
went gliding. Her bonds were released.
Into broken light a breeze rippled and woke the seas,
In the forest it startled every beast.
Capripods fell to dance from Taproban to France,
Leprechauns from Down to Labrador,
In his green Asian dell the Phoenix from his shell
Burst forth and was the Phoenix once more.
So death lay in arrest. But at Bethlehem the bless’d
Nothing greater could be heard
Than a dry wind in the thorn, the cry of the One new-born,
And cattle in stall as they stirred
Nothing greater could be heard
Than a dry wind in the thorn, the cry of the One new-born,
And cattle in stall as they stirred
This Advent let us turn the tide in our spiritual
lives, both individually and also collectively through our Mission Action Plan,
which Fr. James launch last week. If you haven’t seen it please speak to Father
James or myself after the service and we will arrange for you to have a copy.
Our plan is that we will actively over
the next four years seek to witness to God’s all embracing, generous and
compassionate love by:
· Serving
God and our community and telling the story of Jesus Christ in Holland Park
· Equipping
ourselves to welcome the stranger, the seeker, the joyful and the broken so as
to be the body of Christ
‘Our Vision for is to have:
Well-run churches/ make good use of our
resources, and plan for the future and develop for growth.
We will be welcoming hospitable churches
where all feel included “All flesh shall see it together”, guided in prayer and
encouraged in faith.
In the words of Baruch:
We will “Put on the robe of the righteousness that
comes from God; put on your head the diadem of the glory of the Everlasting”
To do this we will need everyone who feels
able, to contribute of themselves and their skills
I particularly pray that the life we see
at St. George’s will be replicated in abundance at our sister church St.
John’s, and that St. John’s will become a centre for the community in the
western part of our Benefice.
To adapt this morning’s words from Baruch
: Arise, stand upon the height (Campden Hill); look towards
the east (Palace Gardens Terrace), and see our people of the United Benefice
gathered from west (Westfield) and east at the word of the Holy One, rejoicing
that God has remembered them.
I conclude with a prayer for three
things, that:
· During Advent we should find time to deepen our
knowledge step by step, point to point, of the gift of the good news
· We put in place plans for each of us to play our
part in our Mission Action Plan in the New Year
· The tide may turn in those parts of our lives
where change is needed
So that love may overflow and God’s
kingdom comes to our United Benefice.
Fr. Peter Wolton
6th December 2015
The Turn of the Tide
by
C. S. Lewis
Breathless
was the air over Bethlehem. Black and bare
Were the fields; hard as granite the clods;
Hedges stiff with ice; the sedge in the vice
Of the pool, like pointed iron rods.
And the deathly stillness spread from Bethlehem. It was shed
Wider each moment on the land;
Through rampart and wall into camp and into hall
Stole the hush; all tongues were at a stand.
At the Procurator’s feast the jocular freedman ceased
His story, and gaped. All were glum
Travellers at their beer in a tavern turned to hear
The landlord; their oracle was dumb.
But the silence flowed forth to the islands and the North
And smoothed the unquiet river bars
And levelled out the waves from their revelling and paved
The sea with cold reflected stars.
Where the Caesar on Palatine sat at ease to sign,
Without anger, signatures of death,
There stole into his room and on his soul a gloom,
And his pen faltered, and his breath.
Then to Carthage and the Gauls, past Parthia and the Falls
Of Nile and Mount Amara it crept;
The romp and war of beast in swamp and jungle ceased,
The forest grew still as though it slept.
So it ran about the girth of the planet. From the Earth
A signal, a warning, went out
And away behind the air. Her neighbours were aware
Of change. They were troubled with a doubt.
Were the fields; hard as granite the clods;
Hedges stiff with ice; the sedge in the vice
Of the pool, like pointed iron rods.
And the deathly stillness spread from Bethlehem. It was shed
Wider each moment on the land;
Through rampart and wall into camp and into hall
Stole the hush; all tongues were at a stand.
At the Procurator’s feast the jocular freedman ceased
His story, and gaped. All were glum
Travellers at their beer in a tavern turned to hear
The landlord; their oracle was dumb.
But the silence flowed forth to the islands and the North
And smoothed the unquiet river bars
And levelled out the waves from their revelling and paved
The sea with cold reflected stars.
Where the Caesar on Palatine sat at ease to sign,
Without anger, signatures of death,
There stole into his room and on his soul a gloom,
And his pen faltered, and his breath.
Then to Carthage and the Gauls, past Parthia and the Falls
Of Nile and Mount Amara it crept;
The romp and war of beast in swamp and jungle ceased,
The forest grew still as though it slept.
So it ran about the girth of the planet. From the Earth
A signal, a warning, went out
And away behind the air. Her neighbours were aware
Of change. They were troubled with a doubt.
Salamanders
in the Sun that brandish as they run
Tails like the Americas in size
Were stunned by it and dazed; wondering, they gazed
Up at Earth, misgiving in their eyes.
In Houses and Signs Ousiarchs divine
Grew pale and questioned what it meant;
Great Galactal lords stood back to back with swords
Half-drawn, awaiting the event,
And a whisper among them passed, ‘Is this perhaps the last
Of our story and the glories of our crown?
—The entropy worked out?—The central redoubt
Abandoned? The world-spring running down?
Then they could speak no more. Weakness overbore
Even them. They were as flies in a web,
In their lethargy stone-dumb. The death had almost come;
The tide lay motionless at ebb.
Tails like the Americas in size
Were stunned by it and dazed; wondering, they gazed
Up at Earth, misgiving in their eyes.
In Houses and Signs Ousiarchs divine
Grew pale and questioned what it meant;
Great Galactal lords stood back to back with swords
Half-drawn, awaiting the event,
And a whisper among them passed, ‘Is this perhaps the last
Of our story and the glories of our crown?
—The entropy worked out?—The central redoubt
Abandoned? The world-spring running down?
Then they could speak no more. Weakness overbore
Even them. They were as flies in a web,
In their lethargy stone-dumb. The death had almost come;
The tide lay motionless at ebb.
Like
a stab at that moment, over Crab and Bowman,
Over Maiden and Lion, came the shock
Of returning life, the start and burning pang at heart,
Setting Galaxies to tingle and rock;
And the Lords dared to breathe, and swords were sheathed
And a rustling, a relaxing began,
With a rumour and noise of the resuming of joys,
On the nerves of the universe it ran.
Then pulsing into space with delicate, dulcet pace
Came a music, infinitely small
And clear. But it swelled and drew nearer and held
All worlds in the sharpness of its call.
And now divinely deep, and louder, with the sweep
and quiver of inebriating sound,
The vibrant dithyramb shook Libra and the Ram,
The brains of Aquarius spun round;
Such a note as neither Throne nor Potentate had known
Since the Word first founded the abyss,
But this time it was changed in a mystery, estranged,
A paradox, an ambiguous bliss.
Over Maiden and Lion, came the shock
Of returning life, the start and burning pang at heart,
Setting Galaxies to tingle and rock;
And the Lords dared to breathe, and swords were sheathed
And a rustling, a relaxing began,
With a rumour and noise of the resuming of joys,
On the nerves of the universe it ran.
Then pulsing into space with delicate, dulcet pace
Came a music, infinitely small
And clear. But it swelled and drew nearer and held
All worlds in the sharpness of its call.
And now divinely deep, and louder, with the sweep
and quiver of inebriating sound,
The vibrant dithyramb shook Libra and the Ram,
The brains of Aquarius spun round;
Such a note as neither Throne nor Potentate had known
Since the Word first founded the abyss,
But this time it was changed in a mystery, estranged,
A paradox, an ambiguous bliss.
Heaven danced to it and
burned. Such answer was returned
To the hush, the Favete, the fear
That Earth had sent out; revel, mirth and shout
Descended to her, sphere below sphere.
Saturn laughed and lost his latter age’s frost,
His beard, Niagara-like, unfroze;
Monsters in the Sun rejoiced; the Inconstant One,
The unwedded Moon, forgot her woes.
A shiver of re-birth and deliverance on the Earth
went gliding. Her bonds were released.
Into broken light a breeze rippled and woke the seas,
In the forest it startled every beast.
Capripods fell to dance from Taproban to France,
Leprechauns from Down to Labrador,
In his green Asian dell the Phoenix from his shell
Burst forth and was the Phoenix once more.
To the hush, the Favete, the fear
That Earth had sent out; revel, mirth and shout
Descended to her, sphere below sphere.
Saturn laughed and lost his latter age’s frost,
His beard, Niagara-like, unfroze;
Monsters in the Sun rejoiced; the Inconstant One,
The unwedded Moon, forgot her woes.
A shiver of re-birth and deliverance on the Earth
went gliding. Her bonds were released.
Into broken light a breeze rippled and woke the seas,
In the forest it startled every beast.
Capripods fell to dance from Taproban to France,
Leprechauns from Down to Labrador,
In his green Asian dell the Phoenix from his shell
Burst forth and was the Phoenix once more.
So
death lay in arrest. But at Bethlehem the bless’d
Nothing greater could be heard
Than a dry wind in the thorn, the cry of the One new-born,
And cattle in stall as they stirred
Nothing greater could be heard
Than a dry wind in the thorn, the cry of the One new-born,
And cattle in stall as they stirred