Month: August 2013

Jesus, who his followers expected to bring peace to the troubled family of Israel, tells them that he will do the opposite. Jesus, who his friends saw as one who expressed love and care for those closest to him, throws a grenade into the heart of the family home. In the light of this passage, the concept of Christian Family Values is blown apart. And it would not be so daunting if it were a one-off, if elsewhere Jesus affirmed the family in conventional terms. But the reality is that he never does. […] It is clear that when it comes to traditional family values, Jesus will not affirm them. But instead he will assert the dawning of a new way of human relating, which is not a lesser way but a greater way. It is the way of the kingdom of God. The essence of Jesus’ teaching is that in the kingdom of God, loyalty to himself takes precedence over family loyalty. Why such teaching, and why so assertive?

– from today's talk, Christian Family Values – an incendiary approach.

Luke 12.49-56

Whitegate, Trinity 12, Proper 15, 18/8/2013

 

Last week I preached in celebration of the Mothers’ Union, recalling their founder Mary Sumner and her outworking of what we might call Christian Family Values. I said then that if we seek to follow her example, in being guided by scripture in working out our Christian Family Values for our day and time, then we might be surprised by what scripture says, and sometimes challenged by the sideways look which Jesus’ teachings often take. [1] But in today’s gospel passage, Jesus doesn’t take a sideways look at Family Values – he confronts them head on, and uses words which I would call incendiary:

‘I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! […] Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on, five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; […] father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.’ [Luke 12.49, 51-53]

Jesus, who his followers expected to bring peace to the troubled family of Israel, here tells them that he will do the opposite. Jesus, who his friends saw as one who expressed love and care for those closest to him, here throws a grenade into the heart of the family home. In the light of this passage, the concept of Christian Family Values is blown apart.

And it would not be so daunting if it were a one-off, if elsewhere Jesus affirmed the family in conventional terms. But the reality is that he never does. [2]

In Luke 8 [19-21] we read that

His mother and his brothers came to him, but could not reach him because of the crowd. When he was told, ‘Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, wanting to see you,’ he replied, ‘My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.’

In Luke 11 [27-28], when a woman in a crowd tells him, ‘Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!’ he replies, ‘Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!’

And in Luke 18 [29] he is quoted as saying, ‘… there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not get back very much more in this age, and in the age to come eternal life.’ 

I’ve quoted just three examples – there are many more to choose from – and just from one gospel, Luke, though I could have added similar passages from each of the other gospels. It is clear that when it comes to traditional family values, Jesus will not affirm them. But instead he will assert the dawning of a new way of human relating, which is not a lesser way but a greater way. It is the way of the kingdom of God. The essence of Jesus’ teaching is that in the kingdom of God, loyalty to himself takes precedence over family loyalty. [3]

Why such teaching, and why so assertive?

First of all, a couple of statements about what this teaching is not.

It is not a denial of family values, but a call to ‘sit loose’ to them in giving greater priority to   being a citizen of God’s kingdom.

It is not a reversal of family values, but an invitation to apply the best of them in a new way of human relating.

Why such teaching, then, and why so assertive? Because in the ancient world family loyalty was a universally recognised obligation; family loyalty was a major symbol of Jewish identity. Family loyalty was at the cultural and religious heart of the society to which Jesus belonged. His concern was not to undermine or deny the value of the family; but his chief concern was to announce the coming of the kingdom of God.

The reason he did what he did and said what he said was that he read the signs of the times, believed the kingdom was now dawning in and through his own work, and realised that some of the symbols of Israel’s worldview had become (not wicked, or shoddy, but) redundant. [4]

He made his point strongly in order to ensure it was heard – that whilst there will obviously be a place for the family in the future of God’s people, they must not make an idol  of it, and they must be prepared to reshape it in the light of the values of God’s kingdom.

And how wonderfully the gospel of Luke portrays the reshaping of the family in the light of the values of God’s kingdom. The Jesus of Luke’s gospel is well known as the Jesus who brought people together around tables, to eat. 

In Luke we often see Jesus seated around meal tables sharing fellowship with invited guests. Controversially, he ate with moral outcasts such as the tax-collectors Levi (Lk 5:27-32) and Zaccheus (Lk 19:1-7). Shockingly, for his day, women were included, among them a so-called ‘sinful women’ who, in the house of a leading Pharisee, anointed Jesus with ‘an alabaster jar of perfume’ (Luke 7:36-50). But his meals were also shared with – and often provided by – people who were not outcasts. He ate in the homes of leading Pharisees, and many of his meals were paid for by wealthy supporters such as Joanna. Jesus’ fellowship meals brought together devout Jews and the ‘outcasts and sinners’ and the poor of the land, and so deeply challenged the divisive social and religious conventions of the time. [5]

The values of the kingdom of God, or Christian Family Values if you prefer, rewrite the rules of conventional society to create a new set of relationships altogether. 

How does this impact on those who accept the invitation to be citizens of the kingdom of God today? 

Clearly it challenges us to consider whether we have made an idol of the family, and if we find we have, then to offer any misplaced loyalties into God’s hands, for his direction and healing.

It challenges our churches to explore the language we use about ourselves – many churches say, ‘we’re one happy family here’, but if that family is only happy because it is exclusive in its difference from other ‘happy family’ churches around, or if its happiness is based solely on its occasional social activities, rather than its members’ day-to-day care for each other and their sacrificial service to the world, then it should ask itself, are we truly reflecting the values of the kingdom of God?

It challenges us to consider whether we may be denying people the opportunity to take their place around Jesus’ fellowship table, because we find their family values to be uncomfortably different to our own. (And yes, I am touching here on the current debate around sexuality and marriage).

Jesus’ incendiary comments in today’s gospel reading make clear that if you take a stance for the kingdom of God then you will meet resistance. But if you embrace the values of God’s kingdom then you will also find fulfilment in the new, enhanced, relationships which you will form. 

I’m reminded of a Christian community which gradually formed in Liverpool over the past decade, around one woman, a Methodist minister Barbara Glasson, who invited people who she met on the streets and in the shops and offices, to a rented city centre room to bake – and then break – bread together. It has become, for many, a sign of the family values of the kingdom of God. In her book Barbara describes the ‘bread-warming party’ they had on the day they opened their kitchens:

We set the room out so that it was possible to make bread as you walked around the table. People arrived, took off their coats, washed their hands and were given a bowl of flour. As their bread progressed so did they, so there was space for the newest arrival by the door. In the end 60 people made bread that night! There was a complete mix. People from Storm [a worship group for gay and lesbian Christians], some Big Issue guys, the president of the Liverpool Association of Chartered Accountants, a pension fund manager, a member of ‘Moral Rearmament’, some children, an Anglican priest, a policeman […] It was a random jumble of humanity. […] I could see miracle upon miracle as the most unlikely people were talking to each other as friends. [6]

This scene repeats every day in a Liverpool upstairs room. I’ve sat at that table myself, on one or two lunchtimes in the past. Locals call it The Bread Church. And we are connected with it, in the fellowship meal we share here week by week. As we strive towards being good citizens of the kingdom of God, our communion is a taste and a foretaste of the now-and-forever family gathering of God’s people. 

Notes

[1] Dressed for action – Mary Sumner, preached at Whitegate and Little Budworth on 11/8/2013

[2] Indebted to N.T. Wright for his discussion of Nation and Family in Jesus and the Victory of God, pp.383-407, from which I borrow heavily here.

[3] N.T. Wright, p.402 

[4] N.T. Wright, p.400

[5] From my earlier sermon, Placed among the poor, Bratton Clovelly, 17/3/2013

[6] Barbara Glasson, Mixed-Up Blessing 

Jesus said, ‘Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes’. (Luke 12. 37)

 And when Mary married George Henry Sumner, she married into the family of the great slave trade abolitionist William Wilberforce. She, like her clergyman husband and Wilberforce himself, would have struggled with some of the scripture texts which seem to heedlessly accept slavery as a given, just as many scripture texts seem to blithely demote women and describe poverty as an unalterable fact of life. But being a keen student of the scriptures Mary would have dug deeper to find the undercurrent of grace which is always there for those who read the Bible through the lens of the values of God’s kingdom.

Mary would have read on from where Jesus said, ‘Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes,’ to hear him complete his sentence, saying, ‘truly I tell you, [the master] will fasten his belt and have [his slaves] sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them’. (Luke 12. 37)

As he does so often, here Jesus turns the values of the world upside down, challenges its oppressive practices and offers a model for another way of being altogether – a way of human flourishing where both slave and master are liberated to live together in an equality and unity of grace. This is a kingdom in which both woman and man are equally valued, where poverty is challenged and overcome.

And as Mary sought to apply these values of God’s kingdom to her situation, a timid young woman finding strength in these scriptures to follow her heart and develop her vision, so now today the Mothers’ Union ‘provides a network through which women can serve Christ in their own community – through prayer, financial support and actively working at … grassroots level in programmes that meet local needs; lobbying local and national governments on issues affecting family life and campaigning to challenge legislation that neglects the vulnerable and marginalised.’ 

– from my talk for a special Mothers' Union service, Dressed for action: Mary Sumner, today.

 

Luke 12.32-40

Whitegate, Little Budworth, Trinity 11, Proper 14

 

As members, friends and supporters of the Mothers’ Union we celebrate its founder Mary Sumner, who died on this day 92 years ago – 11 August 1921. [1]

And as Mary was a devout and educated Christian woman who would have known her scriptures well, we celebrate some aspects of her life by weaving them together with aspects of today’s gospel reading, teachings from Jesus about how we should live as citizens of God’s kingdom.

Jesus said, ‘where your treasure is, there your heart will be also’. (Luke 12.34)

And Mary was the daughter of Thomas Haywood, a partner in the family banking business, a successful magnate of the Georgian and Regency eras. Undoubtedly Haywood’s financial treasure resided in the bank’s vaults at St Ann Street, Manchester – but Thomas‘s biographies suggest that his heart lay elsewhere – he gave up banking early, and his passion was in collecting books of local history, developing a major library and publishing various papers related to the life, society and religion of North West England. Thomas helped to found The Chetham Society, one of Britain’s earliest-established antiquarian and historical societies, and undoubtedly her father’s enthusiasm would have impressed on Mary the value of learning and the dissemination of knowledge. [2]

And as Mary treasured these things, so now today the Mothers’ Union has her heart for engaging with the issues of our society and sharing with others a passion for ‘tackling the most urgent needs challenging relationships and communities’. [3]

Jesus said, ‘Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes’. (Luke 12. 37)

 And when Mary married George Henry Sumner, she married into the family of the great slave trade abolitionist William Wilberforce. [4] She, like her clergyman husband and Wilberforce himself, would have struggled with some of the scripture texts which seem to heedlessly accept slavery as a given, just as many scripture texts seem to blithely demote women and describe poverty as an unalterable fact of life. But being a keen student of the scriptures Mary would have dug deeper to find the undercurrent of grace which is always there for those who read the Bible through the lens of the values of God’s kingdom.

Mary would have read on from where Jesus said, ‘Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes,’ to hear him complete his sentence, saying, ‘truly I tell you, [the master] will fasten his belt and have [his slaves] sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them’. (Luke 12. 37)

As he does so often, here Jesus turns the values of the world upside down, challenges its oppressive practices and offers a model for another way of being altogether – a way of human flourishing where both slave and master are liberated to live together in an equality and unity of grace. This is a kingdom in which both woman and man are equally valued, where poverty is challenged and overcome.

And as Mary sought to apply these values of God’s kingdom to her situation, a timid young woman finding strength in these scriptures to follow her heart and develop her vision, so now today the Mothers’ Union ‘provides a network through which women can serve Christ in their own community – through prayer, financial support and actively working at … grassroots level in programmes that meet local needs; lobbying local and national governments on issues affecting family life and campaigning to challenge legislation that neglects the vulnerable and marginalised.’ [5]

Jesus said, ‘If the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour’. (Luke 12.39)

And we can be fairly sure that Mary would have struggled, as we do, with this unusual passage, in which Jesus portrays himself as a thief, a housebreaker; a passage which sits uneasily alongside Mary Sumner’s dedication to the protection of family life, the promotion of homes which are safe for their children to live in. But then Mary the student of scripture would be aware of the New Testament metaphor of the thief in the night, always used in connection with the coming of Christ, the fulfillment of the kingdom of God on earth. ‘This is … not an image of Jesus coming to take what is not his own … [but an image] intended to inspire wakefulness and preparation [in his followers]’. [6]

Jesus said, ‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit’. (Luke 12.35)

And Mary Sumner’s readiness to live out the values of God’s kingdom in her place and time  continues to galvanize the Mothers’ Union members in their mission today, ‘to show [their] Christian faith by the transformation of communities worldwide, by promoting stable marriage, family life and the protection of children’. [7]

When Luke wrote his gospel believers were still expecting Christ to return sometime soon, influenced by apocalyptic expectations of a judgemental God coming in revenging power to enforce his just rule on the world. But Jesus’ words as recorded in Luke suggest that believers put apocalyptic thoughts aside to embrace Christ coming in the here and now, to play a part in the growing of the kingdom of God here on earth today. To be always ‘dressed for action’ in the work of sharing God’s love in the world. 

In this spirit Mary Sumner did not spend her time passively awaiting the Day of the Lord ‘as a certain moment to come’, she was instead struck by Jesus’ revelation of God’s kingdom as ‘a certain sort of continuity between this world and the next’ [8], and sought to spend her days living in the light of his teachings. 

In an ever-changing world institutions such as marriage and family life are in flux, and the Mothers’ Union struggles at the forefront of those who seek to apply the values of scripture to the conversations taking place about these things. Like Mary Sumner we will often be surprised by what scripture says, sometimes challenged by the sideways look Jesus’ teachings seem to take, but if we share her intention to be ‘dressed for action’ in the work of sharing God’s love in the world, then we will not be disappointed by where scripture leads us, but energised by Jesus’ teachings about how we should live as citizens of God’s kingdom.

 

Notes

[1] Wikipedia: Mary Sumner

[2] Wikisource: Thomas Heywood 

[3] The Mothers’ Union: About Mothers’ Union

[4] Wikipedia: George Henry Sumner

[5] The Mothers’ Union: About Mothers’ Union

[6] ‘Thief’ in Ryken, Wilhoit, Longman, Dictionary of Biblical Imagery, p.863

[7] The Mothers’ Union: Our Vision: Purpose, Aim and Objectives

[9] For a far more in-depth exploration on this concept see ‘The Eschatological Imagination’ in James Alison, The Joy of Being Wrong: Original Sin Through Easter Eyes, pp.212-21