Words for Worship

Ministry Today

Texts:

 

Genesis 1.1-10

 

On Wednesday

the various chaplains

the local secondary school

had a series of

question and answers sessions

with the

first year pupils.

 

However,

having  the local Christian youth worker

on the team,

was a bit of a dent

to the ego.

 

The reason being is

she is huge wrestling fan.

 

And so her meeting

of such characters

as the Terminator

and John Cena

created

an insatiable interest

which overshadowed

the rest of us.  

 

My regular question,

on the other hand,

was –

why did you wear that tie?

 

Nevertheless,

favourite colours

and footfall teams

were all enquired after, several attempts

were made

to find out

my bank pin number

and Millie

my dog was discussed.

 

But there were persistent questions

about creation too.

 

Now obvious

the CERN project

we mentioned last week

has caught

younger imaginations.

 

Nevertheless

the place of the bible

as an explainer

of creation

was on their minds as well.

 

I suppose that is

not too surprising.

 

For, after all,

most of us

find tensions

between the biblical account of creation

and what scientists tell us.

 

However, it is in resolving these difficulties

we not only expand our faith

but we also

find something else –

we discover

some joyful aspects

in creation –

we discovery

the delightful harvests

of creation.

 

Now when we read

the bible’s creation story, we must remember

we are hearing

what people

over thousands of years thought was important about creation.

 

Clearly it is not

a scientific treatise.

 

But, on the other hand,

it is not

a fanciful piece

of make believe

either.

 

Rather it is the ‘why’

of creation

that compliments

science’s ‘how’ of creation.

 

And as a result

the Bible talks to us

as flesh and blood humans with real concerns

rather than

detached observers

of a mathematical universe.

 

Or as John Paul II

famously remarked,

the bible

doesn’t tell us

how the heavens

were made

simply how one

goes to heaven!

 

So let’s start that journey

by considering

those first few verses

of Genesis.

 

The ones that tell us

about the creation

of the very ground

we are all standing on.

 

And the key in finding

their harvest for today

is the mentioning

of light and dark,

day and night

and the sun and moon.

 

For, in these simple words, is the most basic gift

of creation –

and that

is God’s endowment of rhythm;

the turning

from ebb to flow tides,

the dawn of new days

into the darkness of night; the return of seasons

within the rapidity of years.

 

Indeed, for this Sunday,

the breathing in

of planting time

and the breathing out

of harvest time.

 

Rhythms, rotations

and recreations then

are as old

as time its self.

 

However, our modern world has sublimated

these life pulses.

 

We no longer

go to bed at dark

and rise with the sun because

light and heat

adorn our houses.

 

Foods are available

out of season

and seem divorced

from their crop cycle.

 

Winters can be escaped

to warmer

and less seasonal climes.  

 

Our community life

is no longer

governed

by agricultural happenings but is locked

to school holidays,

sporting events

and credit card statements.

 

Our individual lives

are no longer ordered

by the preparation

and enjoyment

of Christian festivals.

 

Instead we are constantly driven hither and thither

by entertaining distractions and frivolities.

 

 But all of these,

in turn,

break our disciplines, routines and practices.  

 

They rob us of the pleasure in the rotation of the year.

 

Worse still, we lose

joyful touch

with God’s creation.

 

The net outcome is

we are weakened

in our desire

to say and do –

thank you.  

 

Therefore today

let us reconnect

with creation.

 

Let us feel again

its pulse of repetition.

 

Indeed let us participate

in God’s harvest.  

 

For in its

repeating generosity

is the joy

of God’s love given;

the pleasure

of

our returning thanksgiving and the satisfaction

of our giving

to and

receiving from

others.

 

Now there is

an old rabbinic parable about a farmer

that had two sons.

 

As soon as they were

old enough to walk,

he took them

to the fields

and he taught them everything t

hat he knew

about growing crops

and raising animals.

 

When he got too old

to work,

the two boys took over

the chores of the farm

and when the father died, they had found

their working together

so enjoyable

that they decided

to keep their partnership.

 

So each brother

contributed what he could and during

every harvest season,

they would divide equally what they had

corporately produced.

 

Across the years

the elder brother

never married,

stayed an old bachelor.

 

The younger brother

did marry a

and had eight children.

 

Some years later

when they were

having a superb harvest, the old bachelor brother thought to himself

one night,

"My brother has ten mouths to feed.

I only have one.

He really needs more

of his harvest than I do,

but I know he is

much too fair

to renegotiate.

 

I know what I'll do.

 

In the dead of the night when he is asleep,

I'll take some of what

I have put in my barn

and I'll slip it over

into his barn to help him feed his children.

 

At the very time

he was thinking

down that line,

the younger brother

was thinking to himself, "God has given me

these wonderful children.

 

My brother hasn't been

so fortunate.

 

He really needs more

of this harvest

for his old age

than I do,

but I know him.

 

He's much too fair.

 

He'll never renegotiate.

 

I know what I'll do.

 

In the dead of the night when he's asleep,

 

I'll take some

of what I've put

in my barn

and slip it over

into his barn."

 

And so one night

when the moon was full,

as you may

have already anticipated, those two brothers

came face to face,

each on a mission

of generosity.

 

The old rabbi said

that there wasn't

a cloud in the sky

yet a gentle rain began

to fall.

 

You know why that was?

 

It was God weeping for joy because

two of his children

had got the point.

 

So let us this harvest Sunday get the same point;

the point

that generosity

is the deepest characteristic of God;

the point

that creation’s repetitions above all

highlights

that unfailing generosity.

 

And the point

that by receiving joyfully

his harvest,

by giving fulsome thanks

for his harvest

and then sharing

that harvest out –

we re-enter creation –

we are re-created

in ourselves

and we again

come face to face with God.

 

And hopefully

in that wonderful visage

we will see

something familiar –

we will

unquestionably

see ourselves.

 

Amen

 

Offering

 

HYMN………………

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Creation’s Pulse