Sermon Archive 84 Sunday 6 December 2015 Knox Church

1 Sermon Archive 84 Sunday 6 December 2015 Knox Church, Christchurch Lesson: Luke 1: 68‐79 Preacher: Rev. Dr Matthew Jack Here’s some narrative background to today’s gospel reading. Zechariah is a relatively old and childless priest who serves in the Jewish temple. One day, as he’s doing his incense burning duties, he thinks he’s caught a glimpse of an angel. It seems to him, also, that the angel is telling him to prepare for fatherhood. Moreover, it seems that the child, a boy to be called John, will take up the role of a prophet – turning the hearts of many in the nation back to God. Zechariah’s response is to say “Are you sure about this? I’m getting on in years and my wife’s no spring chicken.” The angel replies “I am Gabriel; I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and bring you this good news. But now, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur”. Immediately Zechariah finds he cannot speak. He can gesture with his hands, but words no longer come out. The people stare at him, wondering what’s gone wrong. Zechariah can’t tell them. He is a priest who has lost the capacity to speak. ‐ooOoo‐ Zechariah is a priest who has lost the capacity to speak. In his autobiography, Jack Somerville writes about his tenure as minister at St Andrew’s on the Terrace in Wellington. Jack was at St Andrews, just down the road from Parliament, from 1947 until 1964. For much of that time he was also the convener of the Presbyterian Church’s Public Questions Committee. This was the national committee that made theologically informed, publically enlightening statements for the church about social issues and current events. In Jack’s time as convener, the committee made pronouncements about what in 1958 was called the “No Maoris, No Tour” debate, about alcohol and 1 2 gambling control, about state education reform, about aid for refugees, about industrial relations and the need for reconciliation following the 1951 waterfront strike, about the rights of minorities, about social housing, about capital punishment. Jack considered his committee’s work on capital punishment to have been scale‐tipping in terms of political process. It was after discussions with the Public Questions Committee that Ralph Hanan, the M.P for Invercargill, made an impassioned anti‐capital punishment speech in parliament, crossed the floor, taking eight other National MPs with him, bringing capital punishment in New Zealand to an end. The list of committee members and politicians with whom the committee dealt over that time is like a “who’s who” of that period of history. Members of the committee included Jack Marshall (Deputy Prime minister), Alfred Nordmeyer (Minister of Finance and Leader of the Opposition), top civil servants, Newspaper and Broadcasting heads, and leading educationalists. The Public Questions Committee had tentacles stretching everywhere and a huge boldness in bending the ears of politicians. Jack wrote: There was always a line open from the minister of St Andrew’s . to Parliament House. It was a means of facilitating the work of the committee and establishing friendly links which added a great deal to the impact that the church could make. I took the view that on the whole members of any government were conscientiously trying to do a difficult job. I was prepared to support them and found them ready to listen. If I had to oppose them, as I and the committee did on occasions, opposition was firm and understood. They knew it came from a fair‐ minded source. To some, relations with the powers that be are always seen in confrontational terms. That is not only a pity, it is also counter productive.” That’s what Jack wrote. It was in the early 1990s that I had a conversation with a member of the next generation of the Public Questions Committee. I was told that the committee, by then, no longer felt that it had any automatic right to speak. Parliament, and society at large, no longer accepted church statements naturally. So the church no longer proclaimed; it shared suggestions. I think it was in 2002 that the Public Questions Committee was disbanded. Last year, Andrew Norton, our current national moderator wrote the following: Once upon a time our Church was a voice to the nation. Social reform in the 2 3 history of New Zealand was led by Presbyterians! Once upon a time we were not afraid to speak out on public issues and give prophetic leadership to our country. We have largely become silent. How did this happen? . While it might be easy to point to financial decisions or our own political in‐fighting that saw the demise of our Public Questions Committee, the reality is not only corporately but also individually, we have lost our voice. Sadly, when people do eventually hear us speak it is usually on one topic alone; we come across as a Church that is obsessed . .” Zechariah is a priest who has lost the capacity to speak. Long ago, in a parish far, far away, I found myself in conversation with a relatively elderly man. For most of his life he had expressed his faith through doing practical tasks. Some of the tasks were simple and easily done (a task finish‐able before lunch time). Other tasks could better be described as “projects” – on‐gong and quite complicated. But he was well‐skilled, had physical strength and a good mind for seeing things through. He enjoyed voicing his praise of God through work. But now his strength was diminishing – both immediate power for the simple task, and stamina for the on‐going. The sharpness of mind also was eluding him. It felt to him that the community no longer needed him. He felt hurt and frustrated – as, I guess, any one of us would if we lost our natural way of expressing our faith and couldn’t find another. Zechariah is a priest who has lost the capacity to speak. And today, in pretty much any part of the world, it is not hard to find human beings who have no voice. The poor, the politically oppressed. The deported, the militarily disrupted. The stateless. Those whose hope had been in Keytruda. He who knows that despite a “not guilty” verdict, he now has a permanently “scorched” reputation. Yes he has a voice, but what use is it when no one’s going to hear or believe it? Zechariah is a priest who has lost the capacity to speak. How did he end up like this? He ended up like this because when an angel made an audacious promise, it seemed to him unlikely that the promise would be kept. It seemed too bold to expect a child to be born. (“I am an old man and my wife is getting on in years”.) Are we also sometimes dwarfed by audacious promise: salvation from enemies, life without fear, forgiveness of sins, nations guided into the ways of peace. Is the promise unrealistically 3 4 big? In a world of refugee rivers, of bombings and air strikes, this angel‐talk makes it difficult for us to say much at all in terms of faith and praise. So the voice falters. We lose the capacity to speak. Zechariah’s voice returns. He expresses faith. He expresses hope. He, like the angel, gets audacious in his description of what has started happening. “By the tender mercy of God”, he says, “the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death”. This returned voice, this re‐discovered voice, pours out a hymn of praise and hope. It’s used to sing a song that we hear read two thousand years later. The voice truly has returned. The occasion for its return is the birth to Zechariah and Elizabeth of a child. The birth is a sign that the promise, after all, was not a flight of fancy. As signs go, it’s a small one – and a needy one. A child needs nurturing and feeding; it needs loving and protecting. In that world of air strikes and bad news, it’s a long way yet, a lot of growth and strength‐ gathering yet, before the prophet will storm onto the stage and turn the hearts and minds of the nation. But the birth is a beginning; the keeping of the promise has begun. Zechariah was a priest who had lost the capacity to speak. Now he speaks. He speaks because he has been able to see the small and nurture‐needing beginning of the promise coming true. What then of the institutions and people we know who have lost their voice? Is the key for recovery of voice, for restoring the capacity to express hope and praise, the uncovering for all to see of the small beginnings of light shining in darkness? Does our task become uncovering the small signs of light? The French widower forgiving the bomber. (That’s a voice saying something the world needs to hear!) When Pharmac says “no” to Keytruda melanoma treatment for Jeff Paterson, his community holds a gala day to fundraise. (That’s a voice saying something the world needs to hear!) Dunedin City Council says to the Minister of Immigration “send us some refugees – we will welcome them”.

Load more