Who Belongs in the Kingdom?  Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26   

Our Gospel reading today is made up of at least three separate encounters with Jesus. First, Jesus calls Matthew the tax collector.  Second, he shares a meal with tax collectors and sinners, provoking criticism from the Pharisees. Third, while on his way to help the dying daughter of a synagogue leader, he encounters a woman who has suffered from a flow of blood for twelve years.

At first glance these stories may seem quite different. Yet Matthew has deliberately placed them together, inviting us to see a common thread running through them. In each case, the focus falls on people who occupy the margins of society. Matthew is a tax collector, a collaborator with Rome, viewed by many as morally compromised and religiously suspect.

The "tax collectors and sinners" gathered around the table are people whose lives place them outside the boundaries of respectable society.  The woman suffering from haemorrhages is doubly marginalised. As a woman in a patriarchal society she possesses little status, and her condition would have rendered her perpetually ritually unclean, excluding her from much of normal social and religious life.

Even the synagogue leader who approaches Jesus is, despite his position, utterly powerless before the reality of his daughter's impending death. They are different people in different circumstances and yet all share a common experience of vulnerability. Each stands in a place where the usual structures of status, respectability, power, or religious certainty offer little help. And it is precisely here that Jesus is found.

This should not surprise us, it is one of Matthew's great themes.

At the beginning of the Gospel, Jesus is called Immanuel, God with us. The question throughout Matthew's narrative is: What does "God with us" actually look like?

The answer is found repeatedly in scenes like these. God with us looks like Jesus sitting at a table with people others avoid. God with us looks like Jesus stopping for a woman everyone else overlooks. God with us looks like Jesus responding to those whom society regards as insignificant, unclean, or beyond hope.

One of the most striking features of this passage is the call of Matthew himself. Jesus sees Matthew sitting at the tax booth and simply says, "Follow me." Nothing more. No examination of his beliefs, no demand that he first put his life in order. No requirement to prove his worthiness. Just an invitation. And Matthew responds as he rises and follows.

For Matthew, discipleship is one of the central themes of the Gospel. Yet discipleship always begins not with human achievement but with divine initiative. Jesus calls first, then the response follows. This pattern appears throughout the Gospel: fishermen, tax collectors, women, foreigners, children, the poor, the sick - all are invited into God's kingdom. The kingdom is not built upon human qualifications. It is built upon grace.

This explains the meal that follows. When the Pharisees ask why Jesus eats with tax collectors and sinners, Jesus responds with words that reveal the very heart of Matthew's Gospel "I desire mercy, not sacrifice." The quotation comes from the prophet Hosea, but Matthew gives it special prominence. In fact, Matthew alone among the Gospel writers records Jesus using this text twice. This is significant.

For Matthew, true religion is not primarily about ritual correctness, status, or boundary-keeping. It is about mercy. Not that worship and devotion are unimportant. Matthew values both deeply. But when religious observance becomes disconnected from compassion, something essential has been lost.

And so while the Pharisees see categories, Jesus sees people. While the Pharisees see who belongs and who does not, Jesus sees human beings loved by God. While the Pharisees focus on religious purity Jesus focuses on healing.

The challenge of this passage is not confined to the first century. Every generation creates its own categories of insiders and outsiders. Every society develops subtle ways of deciding who matters and who does not. But Jesus in the Gospel stories continually invites us to examine our own assumptions.

Who are the people we instinctively avoid? Whose stories do we dismiss? Whom do we regard as beyond redemption?  The answer to those questions often reveals where we most need to hear Jesus' words: "I desire mercy, not sacrifice."

The story of the woman with the haemorrhage deepens this theme even further. For twelve years she has lived with her condition, meaning twelve years of exclusion, twelve years of disappointment, twelve years of being defined by a problem she cannot solve. Yet in the story she approaches Jesus with remarkable courage (or is it desperation. Or does desperation call forth courage within us?).

Matthew's account of the story is much shorter than Mark's, but he preserves the heart of the story. She reaches out in faith and touches the fringe of his cloak. And what follows is remarkable. Jesus does not simply heal her, he addresses her as "daughter." In a Gospel where names and titles carry great significance, this is significant. Her illness has isolated her, but  Jesus restores not only her health but her dignity and belonging. The healing is not only physical, but it is also relational and spiritual. She is no longer defined by her condition. In the eyes of Jesus she is recognised as a beloved child of God. And even more than that, Jesus affirms her faith – that she has been a participant in her own healing. Jesus has inspired her to find a faith and a strength that she didn’t know she had within her. 

There is profound symbolic significance here  Within Matthew's world, she represents all those excluded by social, religious, or cultural boundaries. Within our world, she continues to represent all those who feel unseen, unheard, or forgotten. This Gospel story proclaims that no one is invisible to God. No wound is beyond God's compassion. No human being is reducible to a diagnosis, a failure, a label, or a social category.

We should not overlook the third person at the centre of this story: the ruler's daughter. Ironically, although her father occupies a position of status and influence, the girl herself possesses very little status in the eyes of her society. She is both a child and a female, belonging to two groups that held little social power in the ancient world. And now she has died, placing her beyond the reach of all human help.

Just as the woman's condition rendered her ritually unclean, so too contact with a dead body brought ritual impurity. Yet once again Jesus moves towards what others would avoid. He enters the house, takes the girl by the hand, and she rises.

Matthew's account is strikingly brief, but its symbolism is powerful. Throughout the Gospel, Jesus is continually raising people into a new way of life. Tax collectors leave their old identities behind and become disciples. Sinners discover that they are welcomed rather than rejected. The excluded are restored to community, the fearful find courage, the lost are found.

The raising of the girl becomes a vivid picture of what happens whenever a person encounters the life-giving presence of Christ. Something that seemed lifeless comes alive. Something that seemed finished receives a new beginning. Something that appeared beyond hope is touched by grace and transformed.

In Matthew's world, this story points towards the renewing power of God's kingdom – the transforming Presence of the Divine at the heart of life that we are all invited to tap into. In our world, it continues to speak wherever people feel trapped by despair, failure, grief, addiction, loneliness, cynicism, or fear. The Gospel's claim is that God's life-giving power is always greater than the forces that diminish life.

The girl's rising therefore becomes more than a miracle story. It becomes a sign of resurrection in its broadest sense: God's ability to awaken new life where none seems possible.

Seen together, Matthew the tax collector, the woman with the haemorrhage, and the young girl each represent different forms of human brokenness and exclusion. One is morally suspect. One is ritually excluded. One is overcome by death itself. Yet all three are met by the same compassion, the same mercy, and the same life-giving presence.

Nothing - not failure, not exclusion, not suffering, not even death - lies beyond the reach of the Kingdom that Jesus proclaims.

Taken together, these stories offer a vision of what discipleship looks like  To follow Jesus is not simply to believe certain things about him. It is to learn to see as he sees: to notice those whom others overlook, to value those whom society devalues, to practise mercy rather than judgement, to move towards suffering rather than away from it, to recognise the image of God in every person.

And perhaps that is the deepest thread connecting all three encounters. Each person is encountered by a love that sees beyond labels. A love that sees beyond social status. A love that sees beyond failure. A love that sees the possibility of transformation where others see only limitation.

In the end, that is what Matthew's Gospel is about. The Kingdom of Heaven is not reserved for the worthy It is a community of grace where the excluded are welcomed, the wounded are healed, the lost are found, and ordinary people are called to become disciples.

This is why these stories remain so powerful. Matthew the tax collector symbolises those who believe their past disqualifies them. The woman symbolises those who carry wounds, burdens, or exclusions that seem to define their lives. The young girl symbolises all those situations that appear beyond hope, beyond healing, beyond renewal. To each of them, Jesus offers the same thing: presence, mercy, healing, and invitation.

In the end, that is what Matthew's Gospel is about. The Kingdom of Heaven is not reserved for the worthy, it is a community of grace where the excluded are welcomed, the wounded are healed, the lost are found, and ordinary people are called to become disciples.

And the invitation that came to Matthew beside his tax booth is extended to us again: "Follow me." What might it mean for us to respond to that invitation today? 

​But Some Doubted– Matthew 28:16–20

Our Gospel reading today brings Matthew's story of Jesus to its powerful and moving conclusion.

The disciples have travelled north to Galilee, back to where it all began. It was in Galilee that Jesus first called fishermen from their nets and invited them to follow him. It was in Galilee that he taught, healed, welcomed outcasts, and proclaimed the coming of God's kingdom. Now, after the trauma of the cross and the mystery of the resurrection, the disciples find themselves once again in Galilee, gathered on a mountain to meet the risen Christ.

Matthew tells us that when they saw him, they worshipped him; but some doubted.  That brief phrase is both surprising and deeply reassuring. These are not strangers encountering Jesus for the first time. These are his closest followers. They have walked with him for years. They have heard his teaching, witnessed his miracles, and now stand in the presence of the risen Christ. Yet even here, Matthew tells us, some doubted.

Perhaps Matthew includes this detail because he understands something important about the life of faith. Faith is not the absence of doubt. Faith and doubt often travel together. The opposite of faith is not doubt but indifference. Doubt can be a sign that we are taking the mystery seriously. It reminds us that God is always greater than our understanding.

Those first disciples stood between certainty and uncertainty, between worship and questioning. In many ways, so do we.

In the Christisn Calendar, today is also Trinity Sunday. Traditionally, Christians following the litirgical calendar have reflected on Jesus' instruction to baptise "in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."

But it is important to remember that Matthew is not presenting a fully developed doctrine of the Trinity as later generations of Christians would formulate it. The great creeds and theological definitions would come centuries later.

What we find here instead is something more experiential. We glimpse the living faith of the earliest Christian community. They had come to know the One Divine Reality in three profound ways.

First, they experienced God as the loving Source of all life, the One whom Jesus called Abba, Father. Not a distant ruler in the sky, but the intimate and compassionate ground of all being, whose care extends to every sparrow and every human soul, who according to Jesus earlier in Matthew makes the sun shine on good and bad alike, sending the blessing of rain upon both the righteous and the unrighteous. This is the God of indiscriminate love. 

Second, they experienced God through the humanity of Jesus himself. Matthew's Gospel begins by calling Jesus Immanuel, "God with us." In Jesus they encountered a human life so transparent to the Divine that they sensed the very presence of God shining through his words, his actions, his compassion, and his self-giving love.

Third, they experienced God as Holy Spirit, the living breath of God active within them and among them. The Spirit was not merely an abstract idea but a living presence empowering, guiding, inspiring, and transforming the community.

The doctrine of the Trinity would eventually emerge as the Church's attempt to make sense of these experiences. Christians came to speak of One Divine Reality encountered as Source, Word, and Spirit; as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Yet perhaps the deepest truth of Trinity Sunday, whether one is Trinitarian or not, is not a mathematical puzzle about how three can be one. Rather, it is the recognition that the Divine is not distant or static but living, relational, and continually present to us in multiple ways.

Returning to our Gospel reading, Matthew's final scene does more than invite us into a theological debate about the Trinity. It profoundly gathers together many of the central themes that have run throughout the entire Gospel.

Jesus begins by declaring, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me."

Throughout Matthew's Gospel, questions of authority have appeared again and again. The crowds were astonished because Jesus taught "as one having authority." He healed with authority. He forgave sins with authority. He challenged religious and political powers with authority. But Jesus' authority is unlike the authority of earthly rulers. It is not based on coercion or domination. It is the authority of self-giving love, truth, compassion, and service. The crucified and risen Christ reveals that genuine authority is found not in power over others but in love for others.

Then comes the great commission: "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations." 

Notice that Jesus does not tell them to make converts, build institutions, or establish an empire. He tells them to make disciples. Discipleship has been one of Matthew's central themes from the very beginning. When Jesus first called Peter, Andrew, James, and John, he invited them into a way of life. A disciple is simply a learner, a follower, someone who seeks to walk in the footsteps of the teacher.

Throughout the Gospel, Matthew has shown us what that discipleship looks like. It means learning the values of the Sermon on the Mount. It means, letting our yes be yes and our no be no – speaking and living with integrity. It also means loving enemies, forgiving others, seeking justice, practising mercy, trusting God, and putting the kingdom before our own ambitions.   The mission of the Church is therefore not simply to spread beliefs but to nurture people in this way of life.

Thirdly, the scope of that mission is also significant. The disciples are sent to "all nations."

At the beginning of Matthew's Gospel, foreign sages from the East came seeking the Christ child. Throughout the Gospel there are hints that God's compassion reaches beyond every boundary of race, nationality, religion, and culture. Now, at the end, those hints become explicit. The good news is for everyone. Jesus is creating a new trans-national community of faith transcending humanity’s tendency to too narrowly define itself by tribe and nation. 

Then lastly, Matthew's final words also echo the very beginning of his Gospel.

The Gospel opened with the declaration that Jesus would be called Immanuel, "God with us." Now it closes with Jesus saying, "And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age." The promise of God's presence frames the entire Gospel of Matthew. At the beginning, God is with us in the child of Bethlehem. At the end, God is with us through the living presence of the risen Christ.
Between those two promises lies the whole story of discipleship.

And perhaps that is the deepest message of this passage. The disciples are being sent into an uncertain future. They do not have all the answers. Some are still wrestling with doubt. Soon they will face persecution, hardship, and challenges they cannot yet imagine. Yet Jesus does not promise them certainty. He promises them presence. "I am with you always."

The life of faith is not a journey undertaken alone. We walk it sustained by the Divine Presence that the earliest Christians experienced in three ways, through the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the Source of life beyond us, the Divine revealed in and through Jesus revealing our own dignity as children of the Divine, and the Spirit of Life within us.

And so Matthew leaves us where every generation of disciples must begin: called to follow, called to learn, called to embody the way of Jesus, and called to trust that whatever lies ahead, we do not walk alone.  For the One who was Immanuel at the beginning of the story remains Immanuel at its end: "Remember, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."

Amen.

The Fire of Love - Pentecost - Acts 2:1-11

According to Luke in Acts 2, when the day of Pentecost arrived, the disciples of Jesus are gathered together in one place, with Mary the mother of Jesus (who in Luke’s Gospel is a symbol of prayerful trust). Together they are watching and praying – as Jesus had told them to. This scene is symbolic of the church at prayer.

But the disciples (like us) are still an uncertain people. Even after the resurrection, they still do not know what the future holds. They are confused, uncertain, anxious.

And perhaps that is important to notice. Their prayers do not magically remove the uncertainty. Prayer does not always change our circumstances. The world outside is still unsettled. The future is still unknown. But prayer changes people. Slowly, quietly, prayer opens hearts. It steadies us. It deepens our awareness of God’s presence within and around us. It helps move us from fear toward trust.

And prayer itself is not always about saying many words. Jesus warns against empty prayers that simply pile up words. Sometimes prayer can be as simple as whispering “thank you.” Meister Eckhart once said: “If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough.” Sometimes prayer is simply resting in the stillness of God’s presence… becoming aware of the sacred life that holds us even in uncertain times. Sometimes prayer may simply be sitting quietly and gently repeating a single word like “thank you” until gratitude slowly softens the heart. And when we pray in that way, something within us begins to change.

And then suddenly, there is a sound “like the rush of a violent wind.” Tongues of fire separate and rest upon them. They begin speaking in different languages, and the crowds gathered outside are astonished because each person hears the message in their own language.

We are told that people from all over the known world are gathered for the festival — Parthians, Medes, Egyptians, Romans, Arabs and many others. Different cultures, different languages, different backgrounds. And yet, according to the story, somehow, through the Spirit, understanding becomes possible – each hears the message spoken in their own language.

As I have suggested previously, many Bible scholars suggest that this story is meant to remind us of another story from the Old Testament, the story of the Tower of Babel. In the ancient story of Babel humanity becomes divided. In their pride people reach up to heaven by their own power and ingenuity rather than through transformed hearts. And so language becomes confused and humanity is scattered in fear and separation. Isn’t that a powerful image of the world today? People talking past one another, shouting over each other. No real communication in the sense of building community as is implied by the very word ‘communicate’.

But Pentecost moves in the opposite direction. At Babel, there is division. At Pentecost, there is connection. At Babel, confusion. At Pentecost, there is understanding. At Babel, people scatter. At Pentecost, they are drawn together into new community. The story of Acts suggests that Spirit of God moves toward connection, toward relationship, toward community, communion, toward love.

And perhaps prayer itself is part of that movement. Genuine prayer softens the walls we build around ourselves. It loosens the grip of ego and fear. It slowly awakens us to our connectedness with others and with God. Prayer may begin in silence and stillness, but if it is real prayer it gradually changes the way we see and respond to the world.

And that brings us to Jesus. The Spirit of Love poured out at Pentecost is the Spirit of Jesus himself — the Spirit that lived in him and moved through him. A Spirit of truth, integrity, compassion, forgiveness. A Spirit that reached across boundaries and welcomed outsiders, a Spirit that broke down walls between people. In Acts 16:7 Luke explicitly refers to the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of Jesus. To be moved by the Holy Spirit is to be moved in the ways of Jesus… to live in the spirit in which Jesus lived, to move beyond fear and separation and into deeper relationship.

And that is not just a religious idea. It is woven into the very fabric of life itself.

Thomas Campbell, a NASA Scientist, who has studied the nature of consciousness has written a book called My Big TOE – his Big Theory of Everything. And even as a non-religious person the conclusion he came to through his studies and investigations is that the purpose and goal of life itself is to grow in love. He says this is the very trajectory of evolution, the evolution of the physical world, and the evolution of consciousness from its earliest beginnings. The trajectory is towards connection and love.

When we look at evolution, we often think only about competition and survival. But there is another side to evolution. When we consider the great arc of evolution itself, we begin to see something astonishing. Evolution moves in two directions simultaneously.

On the one hand, evolution produces ever greater diversity. From simple particles emerge atoms.
From atoms, molecules, then cells, then multicellular organisms. Then fish, reptiles, birds, mammals, human beings, cultures, languages, civilisations. Life becomes increasingly varied, differentiated, and complex.

But at the very same time, evolution also moves toward deeper connection, cooperation, and interdependence. Single cells join together to form multicellular organisms. Individual organisms form ecosystems. Human beings form families, tribes, societies, nations, and now, at a very difficult place in our evolution, we have become a globally interconnected humanity – with all the teething problems that go with that.

The more complex life becomes, the more profoundly interconnected it becomes. Diversity deepens, but so does communion. This is one of the deepest patterns woven into the universe itself.

The forest is not merely a collection of isolated trees. Beneath the soil runs a vast fungal network through which trees share nutrients and communicate with one another. Our own bodies are not singular entities but living communities of trillions of cooperating cells. Even our breath unites us with forests and oceans across the planet.

Life evolves not toward isolated separateness but toward relationship, toward participation, toward communion. Thomas Campbell’s conclusion – the trajectory of evolution is towards love. That he concluded, is the purpose and goal of life.

That doesn’t mean that growing in love is easy. But that is the trajectory… that is the ultimate meaning and purpose of life. Your life, my life, our life together.

And even as a non-religious scientist, Thomas Campbell admits that this truth that he stumbled upon can be found in the teachings of Jesus. The whole meaning and purpose of life in the Scriptures is love: Love for God – the Greater Life – and Love for neighbour. And in the Good Samaritan he reminds us that our neighbour includes the despised other. It is a love that reaches beyond ego, beyond tribe, beyond “us” and “them.” In 1 Cor 13, Paul speaks of faith, hope and love but concludes that the greatest of these is love. You may have no faith. You may not even feel there is much hope, but if you live in love you are living in alignment with God, the Universe and the Trajectory of Life.

There is no way around the fact that Love was at the heart of Jesus teaching – even love for those we don’t like. But that doesn’t mean that love is easy… it might in the end get you crucified.

But the truth is we are hard-wired for love. We are not made for estrangement, enmity, separation or division. We are made for connection, relationship, for love. When people who have been estranged somehow find reconciliation, tears often well up in our eyes. Why? Because we are made for connection. We are hard-wired for love. Separation, division, enmity is painful… why? Because it moves us against the grain of how we have been made.

We were made for unity and community… but that doesn’t mean the journey to get there is easy.

In Romans 8:29, the Apostle Paul speaks of Jesus as “the first among many brothers and sisters.” Perhaps that means that in Jesus we see what humanity is capable of becoming. In him we see a fuller humanity. A humanity no longer trapped in fear and separateness, but awakened to love and connection. Jesus reveals to us the true goal of our evolution.

And perhaps that is what Pentecost is really about. The disciples begin locked away in fear. Concerned for themselves. Protecting themselves. But then the Spirit comes like fire. A fire that changes them. They move outward. They become courageous. They begin speaking across barriers.
A new kind of community begins to emerge. Not a community where differences disappear, but one where love becomes greater than difference.

And notice again where it all begins: in prayerful waiting. In stillness. In openness. In people gathering together, not with certainty and easy answers, but with longing hearts. Prayer had not removed all their fear, but it had opened them to transformation. It had prepared them to receive the Spirit of Love.

That could be called Pentecost consciousness. The opposite of what we might call Babel consciousness.

And if we are honest, much of our world still lives there. We see it in racism, in political hatred, in religious division, in the constant anger and suspicion of modern life. We see it in the darker side of nationalism. It is the consciousness of separateness. But the Spirit of Jesus, and the trajectory of evolution invites us into something deeper. Into the realization that we belong to one another. That beneath all our differences we share one humanity, one earth, one sacred source of life. As Paul says in Ephesians, One God and Father of us all, who is over all, in all and through all.

And so the Spirit of Love draws us into a larger awareness — the awareness of God’s love flowing through all things. That does not mean losing our individuality. Pentecost is not about everybody becoming the same. The miracle of Pentecost is that every language remains distinct, and yet understanding becomes possible.

Love holds diversity together. Like the many colours in a stained-glass window illuminated by one light. And perhaps this is the direction humanity is slowly growing toward. Not perfectly. Not quickly. Often with terrible setbacks. But the deeper movement of life seems always to pull us toward ever wider circles of connection. Toward deeper communion. Toward love.

The fire of Pentecost is still burning in the world. It burns wherever the language of love is spoken, where people are moved by the Spirit or breathe that was in Jesus. And it all begins in Prayer.

For prayer may not always change the world around us immediately. But slowly, deeply, prayer changes us. And changed people can help change the world.

Amen.

Where is Christ? (Ascension Sunday - Acts 1:1–11 & Ephesians 1:15–23,  Ephesians 4:7-12)

Many modern people, shaped by science and a modern worldview, struggle with the story of the Ascension. Jesus seemingly beams upward like some kind of ancient astronaut, disappearing somewhere above the clouds, while the disciples are left standing below, staring upward, wondering where he has gone.  And honestly, we should not be surprised that many people today find that difficult to accept literally.

But what if we do not have to take the story literally to find meaning in it? What if, in fact, it was always meant to be understood symbolically?  How might the symbolism of the Ascension speak to us today?

An important key to the whole story may lie in the question the disciples ask Jesus just before the Ascension in verse 6:

“Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?”

It is a fascinating question. Even after everything they have experienced with Jesus…
even after his teachings… even after the resurrection… the disciples still seem to imagine the Kingdom in rather conventional political terms. They are still thinking in terms of a visible kingdom: a restored nation, a restored throne, restored national borders, a restored political order.
They are still imagining something outward, geographical, visible, and dramatic.

But throughout Luke’s Gospel, Jesus has been gently reshaping the meaning of the Kingdom.

Again and again, expectations are overturned. The Kingdom belongs not to the powerful, but to the poor. Not to the self-important, but to the humble. Not to the the special, chosen, and exclusive few, but to outsiders and strangers.

And in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus even says:  “The Kingdom of God is within you”, also sometimes translated, “among you.”  The disciples are still looking outward.  But Jesus has been pointing inward all along.

And perhaps that is part of the meaning of the Ascension. Notice carefully: Jesus does not answer the disciples’ question directly. He does not say: “Yes, the Kingdom will soon be restored.”
Nor does he simply say: “No.”  Instead, he redirects the whole conversation.

The disciples ask about: political power, national restoration, and political fulfilment. Jesus speaks instead about: Spirit, witness, and mission.  “You will receive power [a different kind of power – an inner power] when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

The Kingdom suddenly expands outward beyond all their narrow expectations.  And then Jesus is taken from their sight.  The disciples stand staring upward into the sky. There is almost a touch of gentle humour in the scene.One can imagine them standing there with mouths open, gazing upward, still searching for something external, still wondering where Jesus has gone. And the angels ask:

 “Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” – gently reminding them that they are looking in the wrong direction. 

Perhaps that question is aimed not only at them, but also at us. Why are you still looking “up there”? Why are you imagining God’s presence as something distant, somewhere else?

Because in the ancient world, while many people saw heaven as somewhere above the sky, for more sophisticated religious thinkers and mystics, heaven was not primarily understood as a physical location somewhere above the clouds. Heaven referred to the realm of Spirit, the deeper Divine Reality that surrounds and sustains all things.  The word heaven literally means ‘sky’… but that language if interpretted symbolically might give us a deeper clue as to the nature of the heaven. The sky is formless and empty in a conventional sense, and yet it surrounds all things, providing the air in which all physical things can exist. Just so, the realm of the Spirit, the Divine Conciousness is formless, containing everything and the source from which the world of outward form arises. 

And this is where the letter to the Ephesians gives us a profound insight. Paul prays:  “May the eyes of your heart be enlightened…” Not merely the eyes of the mind. Not outward sight alone. But the eyes of the heart.

For the spiritual life begins not simply with external observation, but with inward awakening as Jesus says in Luke ‘The Kingdom of God – the realm of the Spirit of the Etternal - is within you”. .

And later in Ephesians we read that Christ ascended “to fill all things.” (Eph 4:10). Not to abandon the world. Not to escape the world. But to fill all things with Divine Presence. Or perhaps rather, opening the eyes of our hearts that we might perceive that the same Divine Presence, the Same Divine Logos, Mind of God, or Mind of Christ that was seen and known in Jesus has been present all along, filling all things. 

Perhaps the Ascension can be understood as Jesus returning to the Source: the infinite life,
the eternal Spirit, the Divine Consciousness, the sacred Mystery from which all life flows and by which all life is sustained. The life that was visible in Jesus now becomes diffused through all creation. The Presence that once walked in one human life is now perceived as filling all things.

And if that is true, then the Ascension invites us in two directions at once: inwardly and outwardly.

First, inwardly. Jesus tells the disciples to wait in Jerusalem until they receive “power from on high.”  The spiritual life cannot be sustained by activism alone, nor merely by beliefs and doctrines. It requires inward connection: silence, prayer, awareness, the opening of the eyes of the heart. For unless we remain connected inwardly to the Divine Source, our lives become shallow, anxious, reactive, and exhausted.

The spiritual journey is, in part, the gradual awakening to the Divine Presence already dwelling within and among us.

But the Ascension also moves us outwardly. Notice the movement in Acts: Jerusalem, to Judea, to Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. The Spirit always pushes outward beyond fear, beyond narrow tribalism, beyond narrow political and national identity into something much wider and bigger.  That is why in Ephesians Paul speaks of Jesus mission as breaking down walls of enmity and his secret purpose to reconcile all things back to God the Source. 

And so the Ascension is not an invitation to escape the world.  The disciples as they stare up into the sky are looking in the wrong direction.  Their question to Jesus about the restoration of the Kingdom of Israel as a political entity is again a looking in the wrong direction. When our religious commitment is too closely aligned to our national aspirations we are looking in the wrong direction… we fall short of the wider vision of Christ.  When the disciples ask, “Are you now going to restore the kingdom to Israel” Jesus speaks not of the restoration of Israel, but rather the restoration of the whole of humanity. 

And so the Ascension is not an invitation to escape the world or to shore-up a narrow nationalist agenda. It is an invitation into the opening of the eyes of the heart to see the Divine Presence that fills all things and is silently present in all people. It is also a commissioning to serve the world.

For if Christ now fills all things, then the Spirit of Christ seeks expression through human lives.
Through our acts of compassion, our acts of courage, our acts of justice, and integrity, through  our acts of forgiveness, and above all through our acts of love.

There is a story told from the aftermath of the Second World War.  A church had contained a beautiful statue of Christ, but during bombing raids the hands of the statue were blown off. After the war, people discussed restoring the statue completely. But eventually they decided to leave the hands missing.

And beneath the statue they placed words inspired by Teresa of Ávila:

"Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good. Yours are the hands through which he blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, yours are the eyes, you are his body. Christ has no body now on earth but yours." 

Perhaps that is the deepest meaning of Ascension. Christ is no longer confined to one place, one body, one nation, or one moment in history. The Spirit of Christ now seeks to live through us. We become the hands through which compassion touches the world. We become the feet through which love walks into places of suffering. We become the eyes through which kindness sees the forgotten.

And so the angels still ask us today:“Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?”

For the Christ we seek is not absent, the Spirit of Christ fills all things. And the invitation of the Ascension is not merely to look upward, but inward, with the eyes of the heart opened, and outward becoming the living presence of Christ in the world.

Amen.

​Where is God?  (Acts 17:22-31 & John 14:15-21)

Our readings today invite us into one of the most profound and enduring questions of the human heart: Where is God?

It is a question that has echoed across centuries. People have looked for God in temples, in sacred mountains, in distant heavens, in extraordinary experiences. And often, beneath the question itself, there lies an assumption, that God is somewhere else, far away, hidden, absent.

But the scriptures set before us today gently challenges that assumption. In the Gospel of John, Jesus speaks in deeply intimate and mysterious language:  “On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.” This is not the language of distance. This is the language of indwelling.

Earlier in John’s Gospel, Jesus says, “I am in the Father and the Father is in me.” Now, astonishingly, he extends that same relationship to his disciples: “You in me, and I in you.” This is a mystical vision of reality.  God is not presented here as a distant ruler in a far-off heaven located in a different place, but as the Living Presence at the very heart of our being, the Loving Source from which all life flows.

John’s Gospel invites us to see God as the Hidden Inner Intelligence at the heart of all things, the unseen Life that animates everything that is. This is echoed in the Prologue of John’s Gospel: “In him was life, and that life was the light of all people… The true light that enlightens everyone was coming into the world.” Not just a few, but everyone.  And this presence is not merely around us, it is within us. …The Father in me, and I in you and you in me... 

This vision resonates with a saying from the Gospel of Luke, where Jesus speaks of the Kingdom of God as something that is not coming with signs to be observed, but is already within and among us. The Eternal, the Immortal One, the Silent Source of all things, dwells among us and within us as our deepest reality.

And yet, there is a paradox.  John’s Gospel does not only say that God is within us, it also says that we are within God.   We are not only temples of the Divine Presence; we are also participants in a greater Life that holds us, surrounds us, and permeates all things.

How can it be that simultaneously God is within us and we are within God? It moves us beyond our normal spatial categories.  But perhaps the language of consciousness helps us glimpse the mystery more deeply. If our consciousness is like a wave arising within the great ocean of Divine Consciousness, then God is both within us and beyond us at the same time. The light of awareness within us is not separate from the greater Light from which it comes.

This same vision appears, quite remarkably, in our reading from Acts. The Apostle Paul stands in Athens, surrounded by temples and altars, speaking to a people steeped in philosophical and religious thought. And instead of dismissing their beliefs, he begins with affirmation. (In other words, like Paul we do not need to be afraid of other religious systems… we should feel confident to find the points of truth and resonance that exist within them).

And so the Apostle Paul, speaking to people of another religious persuasion, points to an altar inscribed: “To an unknown god.”  In doing so, Paul acknowledges something deeply true: that God is, in a real sense, unknowable to the human intellect. Beyond concepts. Beyond definitions. And yet, this “unknown” God is not absent. Paul goes on to say: “He is not far from any one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being.”

Here Paul is believed to be quoting from Epimenides’ Hymn to Zeus, showing that even within Greek philosophy and religion there was an intuition of this truth. In him we live and move and have our being.  God is not elsewhere. We are, as it were, swimming in the Divine Presence, like fish in the ocean.

There is a story sometimes told: one fish turns to another and asks, “Do you believe in the ocean?” And the other replies, “What’s the ocean?” So immersed are they in it, they cannot see it. And perhaps this is our condition. We ask, “Where is God?” All the while, we are already in God.

Another image may help us.  Imagine two twins in their mother’s womb. One says to the other, “Do you believe in life after the womb? Do you believe there is a mother?” The other replies, “No, it’s absurd. How would that even work? How would we breathe? How would we be fed? There is no Mother and there is no life after birth”. But the first insists, “Sometimes, if I listen carefully, I can hear her heartbeat… I can sense her presence, I think I can even hear her loving voice.”

In the same way, we live within a Reality greater than we can fully comprehend. We may not see clearly. We may not understand. But something in us senses… listens… knows. We have an intuition of something deeper and something greater.

And yet, if this is true - if God is both within us and all around us - then another question arises:
Why do we so often experience God as absent? Why does God feel distant?

Jesus offers a clue in our passage when he speaks about seeing and knowing. “In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me” (vs19) “On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you…” (vs20)

And elsewhere this language is echoed, in the Beatitudes in Matthew’s Gospel, where Jesus says: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”  Not one day, in some distant afterlife. But they shall see. The pure in heart see and experience God in this world in a way that the rest of us do not. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”

The implication is that God is always present, but not always perceived. And the purer our hearts are the more we see. The less pure our hearts are, the less we see of God.  The problem is not the absence of light. The problem is the condition of the window. The Divine Light is always shining. But if the window of the heart is clouded, the light appears dim. Clean the window, and the light that was always there begins to shine through.

And how do we know when this begins to happen?  Very often, it is not through dramatic visions or extraordinary experiences, but through something much more subtle, and yet deeply transformative.

We begin to feel a certain lightness of being.  As the window of the heart is gradually cleared, as we loosen our grip on the false, ego-centred self, something shifts within us. The heaviness begins to lift. And in its place, there arises a quiet inner joy… a gentle peace… a sense of spaciousness… and a spontaneous love.

These are the signs that the Divine Presence is no longer just an idea to us, but a lived reality from the inside… the presence of unexplained joy, gentle peace, a sense of spaciousness and a spontaneous love that wells up from within… these are the signs of the human heart opening up to God.  It is as though the Light that was always shining begins, at last, to be felt.

And it does not remain contained within us. It begins to flow outward. Like the living water Jesus speaks of in his encounter with the Samaritan woman in John 4, this Presence becomes a spring within, overflowing into love, into kindness, into service.  We find ourselves loving not because we ought to, not to try and get other people’s attention or win their approval but simply because something within us is beginning to overflow with love.

And this brings us to the practical heart of Jesus’ teaching. In John’s Gospel, Jesus says: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” But in John’s Gospel, there is really only one commandment:  “Love one another as I have loved you.” This is not about earning God’s presence. God is already present, always present. This is about learning to live in harmony with that Presence.

The word translated “keep” (from the Greek teros) carries the sense of watching, guarding, attending to, keeping one’s eye upon. It is about learning to becoming mindful of the Divine Presence that is always here.  To live in love is to keep our attention aligned with the Divine Life within us.  It is to allow that inner Presence to shape how we think, how we respond, how we relate.

And this is where our faith becomes visible in the world.  This week, across the UK and Ireland, we mark Christian Aid Week, a time when we are invited to respond to human suffering, poverty, and injustice, not simply with sympathy, but with action.  It would be easy to think of this as something extra, an optional act of charity. But in the light of Jesus’ teaching, it is something much deeper. It is an expression of that very commandment: “Love one another as I have loved you.”

Because if God truly dwells within each person, if every human being lives and moves and has their being in God, then to love another, to serve another, to stand alongside those in need, is not simply a moral duty. It is a way of honouring the Divine Presence within them. 

And perhaps more than that, it is a way of keeping the window clear in our own hearts. For when we turn outward in love, when we give, when we act with compassion, something within us opens up. The flow of grace is no longer blocked. The inner life and the outer life begin to align.

And so, acts of generosity, justice, and compassion are not separate from the spiritual life. They are its natural expression. They are what happens when the living water begins to flow.

So, where is God? Not far away. Not hidden in some distant heaven. God is the Living Presence or Consciousness within you, closer than your breath, nearer than your own thoughts, the open awareness in which your breathing happens, the open awareness in which your thoughts arise and disappear.  And at the same time, you are held within God, like a wave in the ocean, like a child in the womb, a fragment of consciousness within the great ocean of consciousness. 

The invitation of the Gospel is not to go somewhere else to find God… but to awaken. To become aware. To live in love. To clean the window pane of the heart to let more light through.

And as we do, slowly and gently, we begin to see - not a different world, but this world, shining with a Light that was there all along.  Amen.

​I am the Way the Truth and the Life, No-one comes to the Father but by me. John 14:6

These words are amongst the most well-known and troubling in Scripture…You would probably have heard these words read at most funerals you have attended.  And at most funerals these words would most likely have been used as a kind of religious weapon, a an emotional blackmail to try scare people into making a Christian commitment. I am the Way the Truth and the Life… No-one comes to the father but by me.  At first reading it would suggest that Jesus is kind of like a heavenly gate-keeper… God’s bouncer in the sky determining who will get into heaven.  The implication in funerals is often made explicit by some preachers… if you don’t accept Jesus you won’t get into heaven and will face the danger of a life lived in hell for the rest of eternity.

The spiritual logic of that approach is interesting:  Jesus loves you… but if you don’t accept Jesus he will condemn you to an eternity of suffering.

And it raises all sorts of other questions, especially about people of other faiths and those who have had the hard luck of being born into a culture where they may never have had the opportunity even to hear the name of Jesus… Many have asked the question: what happens to such people when they die?

And so that is the exclusivist way in which those words have been been interpreted especially in evangelical circles.   But is that the only way of understanding and interpreting those words or is there another perspective?

The first things to notice is that these words are spoken by Jesus not as a threat,, but in fact as words of comfort to disciples who are confused and afraid.  Within the context of John’s Gospel Jesus has told his disciples that he will be leaving them (John 13:33, 13:36). They do not understand. They are filled with grief (John 16:6). They are confused. And into this situation according to John, Jesus speaks these words as part of a message that is meant to comfort them, not as a threat of exclusion.

The passage begins with these words:   Do not let your hearts be troubled, trust in God, trust also in me (John 14:1).

Jesus is not trying to trouble them more by giving them some kind of a threat as to what will happen to them if they do not accept him, he is seeking to alleviate their troubled hearts.

Do not let your hearts be troubled, trust in God. Trust also in me (John 14:1).

Many translations use the word believe: Believe in God, Believe also in me… as though what is being asked for is a kind of signing up to some kind of doctrine, dogma or belief system (John 14:1).  But the NIV translation is right in using the word Trust rather then Believe.   What is being called for here is not some kind of belief with our intellect… the invitation here is to a life of deeper trust… trust that there is a hidden wisdom and compassion behind all of life that we can entrust ourselves to.  The Christian faith is ultimately not about believing certain things it is an invitation to a life of deeper trust – a trusting ultimately in a goodness and a wisdom that underlies all of life.

When the disciples find themselves troubled, Jesus invites them to a life of deeper trust.

But Thomas is still confused… Lord we don’t know where you are going? How can we know they way (John 14:5).

And in response to Thomas’s confusion and his troubled heart, Jesus speaks these words to reassure him…

“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6)

The first thing to notice is that Jesus begins with the words ‘I am’ (John 8:58).

John’s Gospel as 7 I am sayings of Jesus.
I am the bread of life (John 6:35) -
I am the light of the world (John 8:12) -
I am the door (John 10:9) -
I am the good shepherd (John 10:11) -
I am the resurrection and the life (John 11:25) -
I am the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6) -  I am the true vine (John 15:1)

These are a particular feature of John’s Gospel. You don’t find them in any of the other Gospels. And so it is very unlikely that they are words spoken by Jesus himself.   They are far more likely to be a literary and teaching device used by the writer of John to help his readers come to a deeper understanding of Jesus.

And the deeper truth John wants us to see in Jesus is that the Jesus makes known the Eternal I am to us (John 1:18).   The phrase I Am was the name of God given to Moses at the burning bush (Exodus 3:14).  John’s Gospel asserts that this Eternal I Am is now revealed in and through the humanity of Jesus (John 1:14).

Jesus reveals the Eternal I Am in and through his life, and as such he is the Way that leads us back to the ‘Father’, in other words, to the Loving Source from which we have all come (John 1:12-13).  Jesus is the Way that can show us back home to the one who is our original Source.

The words ‘The Way’ is very significant here.  He is not saying, ‘I am the password’ that will get you into heaven, rather he says I Am the Way… Jesus is pointing us towards a Way that is to be lived and embodied, a Way that will lead us back home to the Source of al life, love and joy.

What does this Way of Jesus look like in John’s Gospel:

It is the Way of Love that turns the water of religious legalism into the wine of love and joy (John 2:1-11).
It is the Way of Love that meets Nicodemus in the night-time and darkness of his ignorance and invites him into a transformed way of being that will feel like a rebirth into a whole new form of existence (John 3:1-8).
It is the Way of Love that meets the Samaritan woman at the well, affirming her and accepting her despite her chequered moral past and despite her being a distrusted and heretical Samaritan (John 4:4-26).
It is the Way of Love that invites those paralysed by guilt and shame to pick up their mats and walk again (John 5:8-9).
It is the Way of Love that invites us to open our deeper spiritual eyes to see the deeper truth of existence (John 9:39), that not only is Jesus the son of God (John 9:35-37), but that as Jesus points out: Do not your own scriptures say you are gods (John 10:34)… in other words in your essence You too are Divine.
It is the Way of Love that invites those who live in  Bethany the house of poverty to come out of their tombs of death and to be raised to newness of life (John 11:43-44).
It is the Way of Love that gives up the way of violent domination so popular in the world today and takes a towel, wraps it around his waste and washes his disciples feet – even the feet of the one who would betray him and those who would within hours abandon him (John 13:4-5).
It is the Way of the seed that gives up its small ego self, and falls to the ground and dies in order to discover it’s more expansive Divine Self (John 12:24).
It is the Way of Love that is willing to lay one’s life down for one’s friends, and in fact even one’s enemies, in order that All people might be drawn back home to the Divine (John 10:11, John 12:32).

Jesus is the embodiment of the Way that leads back to the Father, back home to the Divine Source from which we have all come.

When Jesus says: No-one comes to the father by by me, what he is saying is that no-one comes back home to the Father except by this Way that Jesus embodies.  If God is the source of Love, then no-one comes back to the Father except by this Way of Love that we have seen embodied in Jesus.

And according to John’s Jesus, it is ultimately the Way that will draw all people back home to their source. When I am lifted up, I will draw all people to myself (John 12:32). (Not some people – All people).

These are the words not simply of the historical Jesus of Nazareth, these are the words of the Eternal Logos speaking through the human Jesus, the eternal Wisdom through which all things have come into being and which enlightens all people coming into the world (John 1:1-9).

IF God is Love, as is made plane in 1 John 3:16, then the Way back to God can only be by the Way of Love embodied in Jesus. No-one comes to the God of Love except by the Way of Love… and that Way of Love seen so clearly in Jesus is silently at work drawing all people back to that Infinite and Eternal Source of Love, referred to by Jesus as Abba, ‘the Father’.

And this Way of Jesus can be found in people of other faiths…  Indeed there are people of no faith at all who have also discovered this Way of self-giving Love that leads to life and wholeness. As Jesus says in John 10:16 “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also…” Whoever walks this Way of Jesus, this Way of Self-giving Love will find their way home to ‘the Father’.

I grew up with my own father reading CS Lewis’s Narnia series to me and my brothers before we went to bed at night.  In the final book of the Narnia series, entitled the Last Battle, when after the final and terrible battle the Old Narnia disappears and there is a New Narnia, Emeth, a worshipper of the terrible and fearsome god Tash finds himself in the Land of Aslan, the great Lion who is a symbol of the Christ.  As Emeth stands before Aslan, he is confused and says… “All these years I have served and worshipped Tash and yet now I find myself accepted in the Land of Aslan, how can this be?”  To which Aslan replies:  “Whatever acts of love, kindness and goodness you have done in the Name of Tash I have credited as having been done to myself."

And so as Jesus says a few verses later in John 15, may we abide and rest in the Infinite, Eternal Love of Christ (abide in me and I in you) (John 15:4) that this Way of Christ maybe opened up within us too that we may discover the Father, the Source, who dwells within us:  “I am in the Father and the Father is in me…” (John 14:10),  “On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.” (John 14:20)  Amen.

“He Made Them Male and Female” - Wrestling with Genesis 1:27

“He made them male and female.” Genesis 1:27

Those words from the opening chapter of the Book of Genesis are among the more familiar words of scripture. They seem, at first glance, beautifully simple - clear, ordered, and reassuring. Humanity, we are told, is created in two forms: male and female. A binary, distinct and complete.

And yet, as with so much in scripture, what appears simple on the surface begins to open into something far more complex when we look more closely at life, at science, the lived experience of human beings and indeed the Bible and theology as well.

I want to say at the outset that I approach this subject from a particular perspective, one that I don’t think is always heard in church. But it is not the only perspective. You do not need to agree with me. My hope is simply to open a space for deeper thought and reflection. 

My own perspective on matters of gender and sexuality was once very clear-cut. Right up to my late twenties, I held firm, definite and fairly conservative views. But then life did what life often does, it introduced me to real people… people of sincerity, integrity, and kindness… people whose lives bore the marks not of confusion or rebellion, but of a genuine and sincere desire to love and to live well, people whose desire and intent was to be of service to others often at cost to themselves. In other words they held many of the same values that I held as a Christian and follower of Christ. 

In meeting them, something in me softened. My certainty gave way to curiosity, y judgments gave way to listening and my strongly held opinions began to shift and change. 

Even before those real-life encounters, questions had already begun to arise for me - information and perspectives that didn’t fit neatly into my earlier understanding.

The first was a story I read in a South African Sunday paper. It told of a former Catholic priest.

This person had been born intersex. An intersexed person has a mixture of male and female biological markers not always immediately physically obvious. But in this instance, at birth, there was no clear physical indication that the child was either male or female, having a mixture of male and female reproductive characteristics. Faced with this uncertainty, the parents made a decision: they chose to raise the child as a boy.

For a time, that seemed to settle things. The child grew up, followed a vocation, and was eventually ordained as a Catholic priest, even teaching theology in a Catholic Seminary. The Church did not know that this person was intersex, neither clearly male nor clearly female.

But over time, something deeper began to emerge. Despite being raised as male, there was an inner awareness that this identity did not fully fit. More and more, the one everyone knew outwardly as “he” began to recognise inwardly that she experienced herself as “she,” (and perhaps this awareness was there all along.)

Nurture, family expectations, and religious expectations and formation could not override that inner sense of identity. And so at great personal cost, she eventually embraced her identity as a woman. Nothing physically had changed, but inwardly, everything had become clear.

The response from the Catholic Church was also clear: the priesthood was male-only, and so her ordination and licence were revoked.

That story planted questions for me. If a person can be born without clear biological markers of male or female, then perhaps the idea of a completely clear-cut binary is not as absolute as I had once assumed.

Science tells us that, at a purely biological level, around 1–2% of people are born with some form of intersex variation. Relatively speaking that is quite a high percentage. 1-2 out of every hundred people living in Dromore and Banbridge would fall into this category.  These are differences in chromosomes, hormones, or anatomy that do not fit typical definitions of male or female. Only a small proportion of these cases are obvious at birth; for many, the differences are less visible.

For example, a person may appear biologically female but have a male Y chromosome, or a person may appear male but have variations in chromosomes or hormone responses.

What this means, even for a small or medium size town like Dromore and Banbridge, is worth considering. In a school of around 1,000 pupils, statistically speaking, there could be around 15–20 children who, in some way, do not fit neatly into simple biological categories of male or female – and with those physical and biological markers one can easily imagine that such children, teenagers and adults might not feel they fit neatly into the socially acceptable binary categories of male and female.

A few years ago, the BBC aired a documentary asking: Do you have a male or female brain?

The premise, based on scientific research into average differences between male and female brains, is that there are some physical and functional differences. For example, some regions of the brain linked to spatial awareness and coordination on average tend to be more developed in males, while some regions linked to language, emotional processing, and social connection  tend to be more developed in female brains.

However, these are general patterns - not fixed rules.  What is increasingly recognised is that many people do not fit neatly into these categories. Some men show patterns more typical of female brains, and some women show patterns more typical of male brains.

This suggests that, biologically speaking, it is possible for a person to have a male body and, at the same time, patterns of brain development more typically associated with females—or vice versa.

This does not erase the categories of male and female, but it does suggest that they are not always as sharply defined as we might assume. (In other words things are sometimes fuzzier than we fist think)

These questions were deepened for me through reading Carl Jung one of the giants of early 20th century exploration into psychology and the inner workings of the unconscious. Through his work exploring the inner life, Jung came to the conclusion that within every person there exists both a masculine and a feminine aspect, just as all people have both male and female hormones.  He called these the animus and the anima.

For Jung, psychological growth involved learning to integrate these aspects in a greater balance:
For example, the average more typical man, with his more natural tendency towards assertiveness, learning tenderness and nurture, while the average more typical woman, with her more natural tendency towards receptivity, learning assertiveness and strength

In this way, Carl Jung came to see that masculinity and femininity are not strictly separate categories, but exist within each person—something more like a balance than a rigid divide.

I saw something of this in my own home growing up. My father carried a wonderful gentleness and a natural gift for care and nurture, while my mother had a strength and practical confidence—never afraid to pick up the tools and fix what needed fixing, whether it was the car or the washing machine.

And in their own ways, each of them reflected something rich and whole about what it means to be human.

Returning to the story of the former Catholic priest, what stands out is that upbringing and nurture alone were not able to override this person’s inner sense of identity.  She was raised as male, but it did not change her deeper inner sense of being female.

Many people who identify as gay, lesbian, or transgender describe something similar. From their earliest memories, they sensed that they were different - not as a choice, but as something they always felt deeply about themselves.

Their journeys are often difficult, involving confusion, struggle, being bullied and sometimes facing rejection by their closest family members. It raises a simple question: why would someone choose such a difficult path - unless, perhaps, it was never really a choice in the first place?

If we reflect on our own lives, most of us would say that our own sense of gender and attraction was not something we consciously chose, it was just a given.  What if we extended that same understanding to others? What if if for them it is also just a given? 

Another factor that challenged my earlier certainty is the understanding that development in the womb is a complex process. Biological development along male or female lines does not happen all at once. It unfolds over time and involves a series of processes influenced by genetic signals and the release of different hormones at different stages of pregnancy.

In most cases, these processes follow typical patterns. But they are not always identical in every pregnancy, and growing scientific evidence suggests that variations in these processes, including the release of certain hormones at certain times during pregnancy may play a role in shaping a person’s later sense of sexual orientation and gender identity.

I remember speaking with a mother in a church I served in Johannesburg.  She was struggling deeply with what she saw as her son’s “choice” to be gay. She blamed herself and felt pressure from others who suggested she must have done something wrong.

But when she began to understand that development during pregnancy is complex - and not simply a matter of upbringing - something shifted.  She reflected on her pregnancy with her son and remembered that it had not been straightforward. Her hormones had been all over the place, not following typical patterns.  For the first time, she began to consider that perhaps her son had not chosen this at all.  It became a turning point for her.

Where there had been shame and distance, there came acceptance and love. She no longer felt it was her role to try to change him, but to love him and support him in becoming the best version of who he already was.

So how do we interpret Genesis?

God is One. This is the affirmation of all monotheistic faiths. And yet Genesis tells us that both male and female are made in the image of God suggesting that masculinity and feminity are qualities that emerge from a single Divine source. 

And if that is so, that the masculine and the feminine emerge from a single Divine Source and male and female both reflect the Divine, then Carl Jung’s insight - that something of both exists within each of us - is not so far removed from a theological perspective. After all, even biologically speaking each of us have both male and female hormones in varying degrees. 

The question then becomes: How shall we respond? How do we live in a world where most people fit into clear categories, but some do not?  How do we respond to the statistical fact that quite possibly 10-20 children who attend a local primary school are biologically intersexed… at a physical level not fitting into the neat binary categories of male and female. 

Do we make those who do not fit feel like outsiders?
Do we force them to fit into our ideas of how we think they should be – even when key biological markers shows that they don’t?
Or do we make space for them to be themselves? Just as we have been given space to be ourselves?
And what if this is done not in a reckless way, but with deep care. 

Is there guidance in scripture you may ask? Hopefully by now we have begun to see that the Bible is more complex than some kind of an encyclopedic rule or law book… It is clearly not that. 

For Christians, the example of Jesus Christ is ultimately central and against whom the rest of scripture is evaluated. And when we look carefully at his life, a pattern begins to emerge - again and again, he moves towards those who are marginalised and excluded. Those who do not fit. Those who are pushed to the edges.

While others draw lines and build boundaries, Jesus crosses them.  While others exclude, Jesus includes. While others judge by outward appearance, Jesus looks deeper - seeing the person, the heart, and the humanity within.

And this pattern continues in the life of the early Church.  In the Acts of the Apostles, we find the story of the eunuch baptised by Philip. Under Jewish law, eunuchs were excluded - unable to participate fully in the religious community. But Philip, moved by the Spirit (of Jesus), does something remarkable: he does not hesitate, he does not question, he does not exclude. He baptises him, welcoming him fully into the people of God.  It is a powerful moment of inclusion.

And it becomes even more meaningful when we understand that in the ancient world, the word “eunuch” did not always refer only to men who had been physically castrated. While that was its most common meaning, it could also be used more broadly for those who did not fit typical masculine roles in society - those who, for various reasons, stood outside the usual expectations of marriage, sexuality, and family life. 

So here, in this encounter, we may be seeing not just the inclusion of one individual, but a sign that the grace of God reaches even those who do not fit neatly into society’s categories.

And perhaps that invites us to ask again:  If that is how the Spirit of Jesus was moving then… how might the Spirit of Jesus be calling us to respond today?

Those questions, while they should be central for us as Christians, don’t however simply remove all complexity.  In our modern world, there are real and difficult questions - questions around areas such as sport, privacy, and safety. These require careful thought and discernment. There are also cases where situations can be misused and abused.

But the existence of such cases should not lead us to reject or ostracise those whose experiences are genuine - many of whom are themselves vulnerable.

Finally I would like to get to what for me has become the heart of the matter

In 1 Samuel 16:7 we are told that God “does not look at the outward, external appearance, but at the heart”.

As I wrestled with these questions over the years, I came to see that the deeper issue is not about external categories, but about the condition of the heart. This was clearly Jesus position on parallel issues… what is the state of the heart?
 
Not, who is someone attracted but, what kind of life do they - and we - live?

Do they display what Paul in Galatians refers to as the fruit of the spirit:  showing love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control?  Because for Paul these were a kind of litmus test: he asserts in effect that wherever these are present, the life of God is present. And wherever the life of God is present, we are on holy ground.

A closing thought, getting back to the verse in Genesis that we started with:  “He made them male and female.”  Yes.  But perhaps those words are not meant to close down the conversation, but to open it. To invite us into wonder at the diversity of creation.

It is clear that God and the process of evolution favours diversity over a lack of diversity.   The process of evolution, guided I believe by the higher intelligence of the Divine Mind has not produced only one kind of tree or flower, but multiple kinds of trees, flowers, animals, birds and insects… and even human beings of diverse languages and colours. These are clearly not mistakes… this is the trajectory of evolution and therefore must in some way reflect the divine will and intention.  What if those who do not fit into our neat binary categories of male and female are not in fact aberrations but part of the diversity of the Divine will.  This would be a very boring world if we were all exactly the same.  There is something rich and beautiful in the diversity of creation… 

And perhaps what seems to be the Divine Love for diversity is call beyond fear into deeper understanding.  To remind us that human beings and human diversity are not problems to be solved but mysteries to be honoured.  And to lead us, above all, into a greater and a deeper love. Because according to Paul, if we miss love, we have missed everything. If I have no love says Paul I am nothing,  no better than a clanging cymbal. 

Whatever our views are on these things, (and ultimately we are talking now about ideas, but about people) how might we approach them with deep, sincere and Christ-like love? 

As always, just some food for thought… Amen.

We had hoped... Luke 24:13-35

This the third Sunday of the season of Easter.

And by this point, it is very easy for us to settle into the brightness of resurrection when we tend to  speak of hope, and joy and the celebration of new life.

But sometimes, in our eagerness to arrive at Easter, we move too quickly past the road that leads there. Because there is no Easter Sunday… without the journey that comes before it.

A journey that begins for many Christians on Ash Wednesday, with the words: “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust” a sobering reminder of our physical mortality.  It is a journey through the wilderness of Lent…Through the intensity of Holy Week… And into the deep, unsettling darkness of Good Friday.

And so if we want to truly understand our Gospel passage today, the story of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, then we have to carry that whole journey with us.

Because the Emmaus story is not just a happy ending, it is a story about what happens after everything has fallen apart. It is a story that takes place in the wake of the shock, grief and loss of Good Friday. 

One of the key lessons of Good Friday is the truth of impermanence.  The crucifixion and death of Jesus is a stark and shocking reminder of the impermanence of life in this world.  Everything and everyone you love is of the nature to change. 

If you think about your life, there are certain moments that define it. Moments of joy, and celebration, like births and weddings and achievments. But also moments of sorrow, like loss and death.  These are the moments that shape us – and for each of us those moments might be different. 

But there is something they all have in common. They do not last. A wedding day may be a beautiful and memorable experience, but it passes. The birth of a child may change a persons life forever, but children grow up. Bodies change. Circumstances shift. Everything in this life is moving… changing… passing. Nothing in this world is permanent. 

And yet, if we are honest, this is something we struggle to accept. Because deep down, we want things to last. We want loved ones to remain as they are. We want life to stay familiar. We want meaning to feel secure. And when things change… we suffer, not simply because something has ended, but because we had believed or we had hoped it would not. 

And perhaps the most difficult place to see this is not in the world around us, but in fact in ourselves. Because we tend to think of ourselves as fixed, as continuous, as the same person we have always been.  But are we?

Perhaps take a moment and reflect. Think of yourself, your name, your identity, who you believe yourself to be. And then gently ask: has that been permanent?

The child you once were, is that still who you are? The teenager?  The young adult? At each stage of life, something has fallen away… and something new has emerged. When a little girl turns ten, the six year old child is no longer there… she has changed, she has grown.  And the little 10 year old boy is no longer the same boy when he turns 13 or 14. 

All through life we find ourselves having to shed an old identity and take on a new one: 
A new identity when you left school. Another when you entered work. Another perhaps when you married. Another when you became a parent. Another when your children left home or you became a grandparent.  And these are just a few examples of our ever changing identities… our ever changing sense of self. 

Each time, something was born…  and something else had to die. This is the universal truth of Good Friday. 

And even in our deepest experiences of loss, this truth is quietly present. When someone we love dies, of course we grieve them. But if we are very honest, something else is also happening. An identity within us is passing away. “I was a son…”, “I was a wife…” “I was a friend in this particular way…” And when that person is gone, that version of ourselves is gone too.

And that is part of what we are mourning. The loss of something real… but also the loss of an identity that, though meaningful… was never permanent.

But this is not something to make us cold or detached. It is something to make us more awake, to help us see life more truthfully, to hold things more gently, to love more deeply - because we know how precious and fleeting everything is.

A friend of mine says that might be one of the reasons we call it is Good Friday, because it teaches us to live with the truth of impermanence and to treasure and value each unrepeatable moment. 

Now bring that awareness with you… to the road to Emmaus.  Two disciples are walking away from Jerusalem. Away from the place where everything they had hoped for seemed to collapse in a matter of hours. They had found something in Jesus – a sense of hope, purpose, and direction. 
And somewhere within themselves, they had hoped and believed: “this will last.”

But then comes the cross and the death of Jesus, and everything changes. And so they say to the stranger they meet on the road: “We had hoped…”

Hope, for them, is over. Their expectation has died. And as they walk, so the story tells us, the risen Christ comes alongside them.  But they do not recognise him, which is astonishing. Here is the very presence of life… and they cannot see it.

Why are they prevented from seeing? Because they are still living in Good Friday. Because they are still holding onto what has passed away. They are still clinging to the way things were. They are still looking for Christ in a form that no longer exists. And so they miss the presence of Christ… as it is now.

And here is where the story opens into something profound, because the Gospel invites us to see that while everything in life is changing, there is something that does not change.

On Good Friday, Jesus - the human form – dies. But the Christ, the Eternal Divine Presence that was his true nature… does not die. The light does not go out. The deeper reality remains.

The Gospel of John says: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
Even when darkness covers the land, the light remains. Good Friday reminds us: in the midst of death, there is a deathless reality. In the midst of change, there is the unchanging. And this leads us to Easter.

As a friend of min said recently: Resurrection is not something that suddenly happens after three days. It is a truth that is realised by the disciples after three days. The Eternal Light of Christ never died and therefore it does not need to rise. It always is. Easter is the awakening to that truth. And when you realise within yourself that which cannot die, you have touched resurrection.

And this is where we must go even further. Because the Christ is not only something or someone that walks beside us.  The Christ is the deepest truth of who we are. The light that no darkness can overcome… is not outside of you. It is within you. It is your own deepest nature.

This is why resurrection is not simply about something happening to Jesus. It is about a truth being revealed: that beneath all that changes… beneath all that is born and dies… there is something deathless and immortal in you that does not come and go, something that was never born… and can never die.

And so, as they walk, Jesus begins to reinterpret their story. He helps them see that what they thought was the end… was not the end, that what had fallen away was not the deepest reality just the outward impermanent form.

And slowly, something begins to shift. Not in the world around them, but in how they see. And this new way of seeing is made known at the end of the story… but on the road they have already had an intuition of it – their hearts have been burning within them. 

At the end of the journey, when at the table, he takes bread… blesses it… breaks it… and gives it to them...their eyes are opened, and they recognise him. And then - he vanishes.

Because once the recognition has happened, the form is no longer necessary. They are no longer clinging to an outer appearance. They have glimpsed something deeper. And this is resurrection.
Not the return of what was… but the awakening to what always is.

So perhaps the question for us, today, is this: Where are we still saying, “We had hoped…”?
Where are we clinging to the impermanent, to something that has already changed? Where are we holding onto an identity… a role… a version of life… that is passing away?

Because the invitation of Easter is not to deny change. It is not to pretend that loss is not real. It is to see more deeply. To recognise that in the midst of all that comes and goes, there is something that remains, an Eternal Light at the heart of all things that can never be put out.

There is a presence that walks with us…but even more than that, a light that lives within us.  A life that is not destroyed by change. A truth of who we are that cannot be lost even when the outward form of our bodies is shed and fades away.

And perhaps, like those disciples, as we begin to see more clearly…glimpsing the Eternal Light  behind the impermanent forms of this world, we too may discover, that even in the moments when everything seemed to fall apart… when everything around us changes… there is something hidden that does not change.  When everything else fades… there is a light that does not dim. And that eternal light, is the life of Christ within you, your true eternal nature. 

Amen.

Sent in Peace - “As the Father Sent Me, So I Send You” - A Reflection on John 20:19–31

There is something very human about the scene in our lectionary passage today from John’s Gospel.

The disciples are gathered behind locked doors. They are afraid and disoriented. Unsure of what comes next.

This is not a triumphant church. This is not a community full of certainty and bold faith. This is a fragile, anxious, uncertain gathering of people who have lost their centre. And it is precisely here we are told, not later, not once they have sorted themselves out - that the risen Christ comes and stands among them and says:  “Peace be with you.”

John places this moment in Jerusalem, behind locked doors, on the evening of Easter Day itself. 
Unlike Gospel of Matthew where there is no Jerusalem encounter with the disciples, and where the commissioning happens later, on a mountain in Galilee, here in Gospel of John the sending happens right in the midst of fear on Easter night.

There is no delay between the events of Good Friday and the commissioning on Easter Sunday evening. There is no spiritual preparation course, and no requirement of perfect belief.  Just fear… and presence… and peace… and sending.

And perhaps that is the first thing John wants us to see: The mission of the church to live in the way of Jesus does not begin when we are ready. It begins when we are met by the Divine Presence and a word of peace is spoken into the midst of our fear. 

John tells us the disciples were afraid of “the Jews.” But many scholars remind us that this is better understood as “the Judaeans” - those associated with the religious and political centre in Jerusalem.
This is not a blanket statement about a people. It is a symbolic contrast.

The disciples, who are themselves Jewish, are however from the margins, from Galilee, the edges.
The “Judaeans” by contrast represent the centre of power, control, and religious authority.  And so the tension here is not ethnic, it is spiritual and social: The way of Jesus emerges from the margins… and often stands in quiet resistance to systems of power that cannot recognise it.

And as the narrative unfolds, we find that three times Jesus says: “Peace be with you.”
Before any sending, before any commissioning, before any instruction: Peace.

This is peace, not as a vague feeling, but as a grounding presence. Because the work to which they are called cannot be sustained by anxiety, fear, or striving. It must flow from peace.

And then comes the commission: “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

This is John’s version of the Great Commission and echoes the Great Commission at the end of Matthew’s Gospel.  But notice: Jesus does not say, “Go and build a religion about me.”
He says, in effect:  “Live the same life I have lived. Embody the same way of love. Become what I have been.”

This is a call to growth, a call to human maturity. In John’s Gospel Jesus represents not just the Divine Presence, he also represents the fullness of what it means to be a mature human being.  The commission to the disciples is to become what Jesus is in the world: As the Father sent me, so I am sending you… How was Jesus sent by the Father?  According to the opening chapter of John’s Gospel, he was sent as a light in the darkness, he was sent as the bringer of life in all it’s fullness, sent to enable others to become children of the Divine, sent as one who was full of Grace and Truth. And this is now the task of the disciples… and us. As the Father has sent me to I am sending you. 

Then comes one of the most profound moments in all the Gospels: “He breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” This is John’s Pentecost moment. Not 40 days later, as in Gospel of Luke and Acts, but here, and now in this room on Easter Sunday evening.

And the imagery and symbolism is unmistakable.  It takes us all the way back to Book of Genesis, 
where the first Human Beings come to life when the Divine breath is breathed into them. This is not just empowerment. This is new creation… The fearful disciples are being re-created, re-animated, re-born into a new way of being – breathed into with the peace of Christ… breathed into to live in the spirit of Christ.

But notice again: Nothing external has changed. The world is still dangerous. The powers that crucified Jesus are still in place. But something within them has changed.  The Divine breath of life and peace has entered their fear… and transformed it into a vocation.

And then comes one of the most puzzling and often most troubling of verses. Jesus says to them: 
“If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” What exactly does this verse mean?  In the Catholic and Orthodox traditions, this has been understood as priestly authority to grant or withhold absolution. 

But what might it mean here, in John’s symbolic and spiritual language? Perhaps this: To live in the Spirit of Christ is to become a bearer of reconciliation.  When we forgive - truly forgive - we release others. We loosen the chains of guilt, shame, and estrangement. But when we refuse to forgive - when we hold onto resentment, bitterness, judgment - we participate in the retaining of those chains.

In other words: The Risen Christ is reminding us that we have enormous power and responsibility.  This is part of what it means to grow to full human maturity. We the power to create worlds of freedom… or worlds of imprisonment.  Not through divine decree, but through the way we live, relate, and love. The question is how will we use that power? How did Christ use that power?

And then in the narrative we meet Thomas.  Honest, courageous Thomas. “I will not believe” he says “unless I see… unless I touch…”

And a week later, we read that Jesus comes again. And this time, Thomas present and  is invited:
“Put your finger here… See my hands… Reach out your hand and put it into my side…”
Now, what do we make of this? Are we meant to imagine a literal physical verification? 
Or is John inviting us into something deeper?

Throughout this Gospel, “seeing” is never just about physical sight. It is about perception., recognition and awakening. Perhaps what Thomas represents is this: We do not come to faith by avoiding the wounds. We come to faith by entering them.  To “touch the wounds of Christ” is to participate in his way of being, to stand with those who suffer, to love in the face of rejection, to give oneself for others.

And it is there, not in some kind of abstract belief, but in lived participation that we come to see and understand the way of Jesus. And so Thomas responds: “My Lord and my God.” Faith arises from ‘touching the wounds of Christ’, from participating in the way of Christ, sharing in his sufferings, touching, as it were, his wounds.

And what does that exclamation of Thomas mean; My Lord and my God? Earlier on in John’s Gospel, Jesus quotes from the Psalms and says: Don’t your own scriptures say: You are gods? It is the same word Theos in both instances. When Thomas says ‘My Lord and My God’, he is not just recognizing the Divine in Jesus… he is seeing in Jesus a reflection of his own true nature… he too was made to be Divine… to be a barer of the Divine Nature. 

And so the passage ends with a word for us: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” This is not a statement about blind belief.  It is an invitation.

We may not see Jesus with our physical eyes, like the early disciples who knew the historical Jesus.
We may not have dramatic encounters. But we are invited into the same path: To receive the breath.
To live the peace. To embody the love. To touch the wounds. To participate in the mission. And when we do that we too will see… not with our eyes, but with an inner knowing and an inner understanding: ‘Ah, now I see what Jesus was all about’!

And so we return to that central line:  “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

This is not just a commission, it is a calling into identity.  To be sent as Jesus was sent, is to live as an expression of divine grace and truth in the world, bringing life, shining light into the darkness.

It is to go where there is fear - and bring peace. To go where there is division and embody reconciliation. To go where there is suffering and dare to love.  And perhaps most importantly, to discover that it is in the going…in the living… in the sharing of that life… that our doubts begin to soften, and our inner vision begins to clear…That we come, in our own way, to recognise: The risen Christ is not only someone we are invited to believe in… but a life we are invited to live. Amen. 

​ What is the point of the resurrection?  Matthew 28:1–10 

What is the point of the resurrection?

That may sound like a strange question to ask on Easter morning. Surely the point is obvious?

And yet… when we listen carefully to the different voices of the New Testament, it becomes less straightforward.

Paul the Apostle, our earliest Christian writer, speaks of resurrection as transformation, a metapmorphsis into “a spiritual body”, not simply flesh and blood brought back to life. And his encounter with the Risen Christ was not with a resuscitated physical body but with a voice and a light on the road to Damascus.   Gospel of Mark, the earliest Gospel, written after Paul’s writings, ends with an empty tomb and a promise, but no appearance of the risen Jesus at all.  Gospel of Matthew written about 20 years later gives us two brief encounters, mysterious, powerful, but not over-explained. And the later Gospels of Luke and John become more physical, more tangible in their descriptions of the Resurrection of Jesus.

And then in Matthew’s telling of the Resurrection story there is a strange detail, one no one else includes: The earthquakes. At the moment Jesus dies, the earth shakes, rocks split, tombs open. And again, on Easter morning, the earth shakes once more. Why?

If this were simply about reporting events, surely all the Gospels would mention something so dramatic. But Matthew alone tells it this way. Which suggests he is not only describing something that happened… He is telling us what it means.

For Matthew, the death and resurrection of Jesus are not small, contained religious moments. They are earth-shattering. They shake the very foundations of reality. The world, as we have known it - our assumptions, our certainties, our systems - is being shaken loose. It is as though something has come into the world that does not fit… and cannot be contained.

And that brings us back to the question: What is the point of resurrection?

Perhaps it is, first of all, this:  Resurrection is the announcement that death is not the end. That life is stronger than death. That what we see is not all there is. For people who live with the quiet fear that everything ends in loss… everything fades into nothing… Resurrection speaks a word of deep freedom:  You do not need to live in fear. Life is larger than you imagined. The story is bigger than death.  And perhaps that is why in Matthew’s telling of the story the first words of the Risen Christ to the women are the words: “Do not be afraid.”

But that is only part of it.

Because if resurrection were only about life after death, it could remain something distant—something for the future. Matthew will not let it stay there because the one who is raised is this Jesus. The one who taught love of enemies. The one who refused violence. The one who ate with prostitutes, tax collectors and sinners. The one whose radical love challenged both religious and political power. The one who embodied a way of being human that seemed, to many, naïve… impractical… even dangerous.

And what did the world do with that way of being? It rejected it. It silenced it. It crucified it.

Why?

Because the way of Jesus exposes something. It exposes how much of our world is built, not on love, but on fear. Not on truth, but on control. Not on trust, but on the anxious grasping of the ego.

And so here is the second meaning of resurrection:

It is God’s yes, the Divine yes, to the way of Jesus.

Where the world says, “This way cannot work,” Resurrection says, “This is the way of life.” 
Where power says, “Strength comes through domination,” Resurrection says, “True power is revealed in self-giving love.”  Where fear says, “Protect yourself at all costs,” Resurrection says, “Lose your life, and you will find it.”

And now, perhaps, we begin to understand the the deeper significance of the earthquakes in the story.

If Jesus truly lived in tune with the deepest reality, if his way is aligned with the very grain of the universe, then everything that stands against that way is, in some sense, unstable, out of alignment, built on shaky ground. And when that deeper truth is revealed - fully revealed in the crucifixion and resurrection - then the ground begins to move, the rocks split, the tombs open, the old world begins to crack. Because the resurrection is not just about what happens after death, it is about what happens when truth meets illusion, when love meets fear. When the way of Christ meets the ego-driven structures of the world, something has to give.

And Matthew tells us that it is the world, as we have known it, that begins to tremble. This is why the resurrection is not just comforting, it is also deeply unsettling. Because if it is true, if the way of Jesus is not just a beautiful ideal, but touches the deepest truth of reality, then it calls everything into question:  The way we live. The way we relate. The way we build our lives around control, status, security. All of it stands on ground that is not as solid as we thought.

And yet, this is not a message of destruction. It is a message of liberation. Because what is being shaken is not what is real - it is what is false. It is what cannot ultimately endure, so that something deeper… truer… more alive… can emerge.

And this is where Matthew leads us. The women meet the risen Christ. And what are the first words they hear? “Do not be afraid.” And then: “Go and tell…”

And at the end of the Gospel just a few verses later:  “Go and make disciples…”

This is the point of resurrection in Matthew’s Gospel. Not simply that Jesus is alive, but that a new way of being human has been revealed as true. That love is stronger than fear, that life is stronger than death. And that we are now invited, not just to believe it, but to live it, to become disciples of this risen life. And perhaps that is why Matthew describes the women falling down in worship and holding onto his feet.

What does worship actually mean?  The old English comes from two root words:  Worth and Ship  / Shape… and means to give worth or value… As they fall in worship and hold onto Jesus feet, they are affirming that in Jesus they have seen their highest value… holding onto his feet.

To worship Jesus it to declare that in Jesus we see our highest worth, to see in Jesus what is most valuable in life, To worship is to dedicate oneself to the way and the values of Jesus. It is not so much to put Jesus on a pedestal and constantly say how much better than us Jesus is. It is to commit ourselves to becoming like Jesus… discovering our own inner Christ-like potential and bringing it forth into the world, becoming who and what Jesus is. It is to put his teachings into practice. 

And perhaps that takes us to the symbolism of woman grasping Jesus feet? Firstly, it is a sign of deep respect. In the east, particularly in India to greet a great spiritual teacher one bends down and touches their feet.  It is a sign of humility, but also more than that, it is a symbolic way of expressing a desire to follow in the footsteps of the teacher, Feet are the means by which we walk through life, they represent the path we walk, to grasp Jesus feet is symbolically to affirm the way of Jesus. 

Resurrection message of Matthew is not just a message of admiring Jesus, it is in fact a call to follow Jesus. What t is the meaning of the Resurrection for Matthew?  It is a call to walk in the way of Jesus, to make the way of Jesus our own, it is to make his values and teachings our own, so that the Way of Jesus lives on in us -  love of enemies, being true to our word, loving our neighbours as ourselves, reaching out in compassion to the poor, the hungry, the thirsty, those in prison. 

And when that happens the earth is once again shaken… 

And so perhaps the question for us this Easter is this:
Where in our lives is the ground beginning to shake?
Where are the old certainties cracking?
Where is the way of Jesus quietly, persistently, unsettling the way we have learned to live?

Because that shaking… is not the end. It is the beginning. The beginning of resurrection.

Amen.