Month: December 2012

Jeremiah 33.14-16, Luke 21.25-36

Sourton, First Sunday of Advent, 2/12/2012

 

‘Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away’.

That’s what Jesus said, and who are we to disbelieve his promises?

Well, we are people of our time, and in our time people are inclined to disbelieve promises. 

The promises of politicians: not a week goes by without our hearing of another so-called election pledge u-turn.

The promises of sportsmen: the footballer kissing the badge on his shirt to display his undying loyalty to that club, who then next month signs for a higher-paying rival.

The promises of celebrities: awful to think of the terrible associations which the phrase Jim’ll Fix It now carries, compared to what it once meant…

In an era of mass-communication where words come too often and too easily, promises are cheap. 

And yet we understand the power of words to transform, to form new worlds from promises made. 

We have heard such words of promise from politicians: Churchill’s promise to the 1940 war government of ‘nothing [..] but blood, toil, tears and sweat’, but ultimately ‘victory’; Martin Luther King’s Promised Land speech.

We have heard such words of transformation from celebrities and sportsmen too: such as Paralympic volleyball player Charles Walker’s description of how the Paralympic Games changed people’s attitudes: ‘People [now] realise that athletes are athletes and people are people,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t matter if you’re Usain Bolt or in a wheelchair, we’re all people’.

Such words have the power to transform the world of those who hear the promises they carry, and believe them.

And there are moments in our lives when we speak such words of promise. Our marriage vows are the obvious ones, or the words spoken for us or by us at our baptism, the oaths we make in a court of law. Words freighted with deep and heavy meaning, words we don’t speak lightly, words which express our promise that the people we once were, will be transformed into different people for the future. Isn’t it interesting that however little we regard ourselves as religious, so many of us feel the need to utter such words of promise in a church or on a bible, in the presence of God.

Recalling these sorts of promises puts us in the right frame of mind to consider the words which Jeremiah recorded:

‘The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will fulfill the promise made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah…’

Our God is a God of certain promise. The hearers of Jeremiah’s words would remember the earlier promises of God, fulfilled – his promise to Noah of mercy and new beginnings for a broken world, his promise to Abraham of a new nation, to Moses and his people of a promised land. And now, they hear God make the promise of a righteous branch to spring up – one who would bring justice and righteousness to an unjust and unrighteous people, one who would bring salvation to Judah and safety to Jerusalem – one they would call The Lord, our righteousness.

For us, that man of promise is Jesus. For us, Jesus is the source of all that is just and right. For us, Jesus is the one who brings salvation and keeps us safe. 

We have heard the words of Jesus, week by week in our churches and read them day after day in our homes, and we understand them deeply as words of promise. The Book of Common Prayer repeats one of Jesus’ great promises to us in these lines:

Hear what comfortable words our Saviour Christ saith unto all who truly turn to him. Come unto me, all ye that travail and are heavy laden, and I will refresh you.

There will be other words of Jesus which are especially helpful or comforting or inspirational to you. In this prayerful time we share this morning, you might bring those special words to mind.

‘Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away’.

So today, again, with confidence, hold on to Jesus, and his words of promise to you. 

Launch of The Friends of St Bridget’s Church, Bridestowe

1st December 2012

 

‘Is it absolutely necessary to appoint an architect? … We have not the money to do it’, wrote the Reverend Charles Clarke, Rector of Bridestowe,  in 1865, in an appeal to the Incorporated Church Building Society (ICBS), the agency responsible for distributing funding to churches seeking financial support for fabric projects. Clarke wanted to build a new vestry on the north side of the Chancel, to re-floor the Nave and tile the Chancel and to remove some box pews which, he said, ‘are so high that they are often hiding places for noisy children’. 

Clarke’s protestations seemingly cut no ice with the ICBS, as John Haywood, an Exeter architect, was duly employed, and we see the results of that particular project around us today. [1]

Haywood later oversaw the re-roofing of the church, and in the century which followed subsequent rectors, vicars and architects oversaw various projects which shaped St Bridget’s as we see it today.

And it has always been so, this work of shaping and re-shaping the parish’s place of worship, since the first of (probably) three churches dedicated to St Bridget on this site was built way back as early as the 6th century. The second church was a Norman chapel, which the Reverend Coryndon Luxmore, Bridestowe’s Rector from 1786-1845, subsequently  converted into a poorhouse – the archway which forms the gateway on Fore Street being the only remaining relic of that construction. By the time he did that, this particular building had been at the heart of the village for over 300 years. [2]

By our connection with the village of Bridestowe we find ourselves woven into this story of shaping and re-shaping of the parish church, of its creation and re-creation. The History and Guide of Bridestowe Parish Church published in 1990 by Kathleen Tudge ends with this comment:

In the past great efforts were made by villagers and others to restore and preserve St Bridget’s for future generations; it is hoped that we, our descendants and visitors will continue to support the church in the same way. [2]

 

I believe that you are here today because you feel the connection between yourself, the village and its parish church, and are willing to consider positively the plea heard so often over the centuries, stated by Kathleen Tudge and repeated by the current officers of the church here, and myself its Team Vicar, to play a part in the church’s maintenance and development. And I stand here keenly aware of being on the same ground as the Reverends Charles Clarke and Coryndon Luxmore, and so many others, to thank you for your interest and support.

St Bridget, or Bride, whose missionaries founded the church which gave this village its name, was, among other things, a weaver – hence the woven cross which is her special symbol. 

In Bridget’s time, societies were held together by fragile threads, and weaving tools signified a key responsibility: that of weaving the precious webs of life and tending the bonds of community. Weavers were wise women whose advice was ignored at one’s peril. [3]

 

We might fancy that Bridget is still at work here, weaving us together in this new formation, the Friends of St Bridget’s, whose purpose is to financially support the upkeep of this building, but whose effects, I suspect, will be to play a special part in weaving the web and tending the bonds of this village community.

There is much work to be done here: urgent work to the roof, ceiling and internal walls, less urgent but highly desirable works of decoration and general maintenance, and wish-list projects which are still at an early stage of discussion including ideas about the installation of a toilet facility, a kitchen or catering area, and something which takes us back again to where we began, with Reverend Charles Clarke, ideas about enhancing the chancel area for the use of those who visit St Bridget’s on weekdays for private prayer, as well as those who meet here more regularly and could use that area creatively for smaller acts of prayer and worship.

I hope you will become a member of the Friends, and become part of the ongoing conversation about these things, helping them to come to fruition. I’m excited by the prospect of the formation of the Friends, and I look forward to our now carrying this forward together.

 

Notes

[1] Michael Weller, Gothic Revival in North-West Devon – Some Examples of Victorian Church Restoration. Part One, in The Devon Historian No. 66, April 2003, p.4-6.

[2] Kathleen M. Tudge, Bridestowe Parish Church, A History and Guide, 1990.

[3] Mary Condren, St Brigit: no better woman for the times we live in. The Irish Times, January 1, 2011.