Sermon for the 21st of April - Easter 4

In this season of Easter, we are encouraging us all to think intentionally about a Rule of Life or way of life.  During Easter our weekly first reading is from the book of Acts, where the first followers of Christ were not known as Christians, but as those who ‘belonged to the Way’.

Arranging a rule of life goes back to the monastic communities of the third century. And monasteries and convents today still function under a Rule. These principles can be used by anyone to help in their journey of faith.

In the United Benefice we are focussing on five areas that can act as a “rule of life” for us today. Last week we reflected on worship. And this week’s focus is generosity.

The starting point of reflecting about generosity is God, the Holy Trinity. As Rowan Williams puts it: We are, because God is. God is eternally, necessarily, unchangingly, the infinity of love and exchange, of mutuality. What God does in making the world is rooted in the overflow of that mutuality, that sharing of bliss. God didn’t make the world because he was bored or lonely. He didn’t create the world as an outlet for frustrated creativity. God made the world gratuitously, so that there would be love in what was not God.

If the basic way of arranging our thinking about generosity is as an overflow of love, there is a problem. Our existence is ensnared in the zero-sum dynamics of a debt-based economy. There is only so much to go around. If others are getting more, I’m getting less. It’s a sort of theology of scarcity.

This is at the root of virtually all major conflicts, social, national and political as well as personal. It assumes there is never enough to go around. If I have more, they have less; if they have more I have less. And this mentality has affected the church, which is odd given we are supposed to be following the way of Jesus’ life in the Gospels. And the way the early church, under extreme persecution, cared for each other, and shared what they had.

Put bluntly, we tend to believe in a God of scarcity; Jesus believes in a God of abundance.

Jesus was constantly giving to others – time, attention, teaching, healing, showing compassion. He gave dignity to outcasts and hope to those in despair.

Jesus was profligate in his giving. Think of the wedding in Cana, when Jesus turns water into wine. It amounted to the equivalent of 700 bottles – completely over the top, even for a St John’s party. Or the parable about scattering seeds, in which the farmer is reckless in how he sows precious, expensive seeds, not minding whether they fall on unproductive thorny or rocky ground, or good soil. Let the message of God’s love be flung far and wide…. The invitation is to all.

It’s a remarkable insight into the heart of God and it sets a pattern for our lives as followers of Christ.

At the heart of the Gospel is these words: For God so loved the world that he gave... John 3:16

This giving of God’s Son confronts our scarcity theology. It challenges our perspective of who is deserving. Jesus’ constant emphasis was on God’s absurd and prodigal love for the undeserving. My favourite parable of the prodigal son, when this son returns having squandered his inheritance in wild living, what’s the response from his father? Its not finger wagging condemnation and strong words. The father gets new clothes for this son, puts a ring on his finger and then throws a party. The older faithful dependable brother doesn’t like this – he is living in the debt economy. The prodigal story affirms that God’s love for others more doesn’t mean God loving you less.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus calls his followers to seek first the Kingdom and all the rest will be added. It’s an invitation to live simply and generously, knowing that everything we have comes from God.

Don’t be obsessed with storing up treasures on earth, but store up treasure in heaven. This involves dethroning those gods that seek to seduce and control us. Jesus personalises the god of money (“Mammon”) – perhaps recognising its power in our lives.

Living simply and generously is the key to freedom and an important spiritual discipline. Generosity includes money, but extends to hospitality, encouragement, giving time and attention, and caring for God’s creation.

Generosity is the overflow of a heart that knows it is deeply loved and forgiven by God, as was beautifully demonstrated when a woman poured expensive perfume on Jesus’ feet (Luke 7.36-50).

All of this is to say that giving is a spiritual discipline. What does that mean for us as a church? Not too many years ago our future was in jeopardy. Thank God thinks are turning around. And if St John’s is going to flourish in the coming decades, all of us need to support it in whatever way we can – time, serving, and money.

So, our invitation for this Easter season is to encourage everyone who regularly attends St John’s to give regularly. Whether it’s £2 or £200 a month, we want to be able to say that we are all in this mission together.

We have set up a way of giving with the Parish Giving Scheme. The leaflet will tell you more, and it only takes a few minutes to log on, register, and set things up (or if you don’t have a computer, it can be done by telephone).

Tom Wright, former bishop of Durham, gives a wonderful vision of what church can be and one that’s worth giving to:

‘…a place of welcome and laughter, of healing and hope, of friends and family and justice and new life. It’s where the homeless drop in for a bowl of soup, and the elderly for someone to chat to. It’s where one group is working to help drug addicts, and another to campaign for global justice. It’s where you’ll find people learning to pray, coming to faith…it’s where people bring their own small faith and discover that when they get together with others to worship the true God, the whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts.’ (N. T. Wright)