Month: November 2020

1 Thessalonians 5.1-11, Matthew 25.14-30 

Second Sunday before Advent, Sunday, 15^th November 2020- online

The most important question facing humankind this week is this: will Donald Trump now go back to hosting American TV’s The Apprentice?

This is on my mind today because I’m thinking of the Parable of the Talents as being Jesus’ version of The Apprentice for a first-century audience.  It’s an initiative test given to young business hopefuls, to see what they can do with the resources entrusted to them. It’s a tough test, and the man in charge is the hardest sort of boss imaginable. You can easily see the  Alan Sugar or the Donald Trump in him. 

Now I’ve never watched The Apprentice, preferring Ant and Dec to Alan and Donald, but I seem to know quite a bit about it, for it’s an influential show. The Sun newspaper called it ‘The thinking man’s reality show’, and The Mirror described it as ‘jaw-dropping viewing’. The Telegraph called it ‘The most addictive show in years’, and The Guardian said that it provided ‘A salutary lesson in aggressive buying and selling, hiring and firing’. [2]

‘Salutary’ is a good word to describe it – for it suggests something which produces good effects but in an unwelcome or unpleasant way. In his first-century version of The Apprentice, the Parable of the Talents, Jesus portrays his businessman as a character quite unlikeable, brusque and brutal. In fact, he provoked such fear in the third servant that this man was paralysed into doing nothing with the talents entrusted to him. The big boss treated this servant uncompromisingly. Being thrown into the outer darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth is like having Sugar or Trump in your face shouting: ‘You’re fired’ and being shown the door to face the frenzied reactions of the press and social media.

This Parable of the Ruthless Businessman is very uncomfortable reading for those who want to draw parallels between the businessman and God, as many do. But what if Jesus intended it to be received as a parable about leadership, a story which is in the bible to help us contemplate the nature of leadership today? [3]

In the parable this business leader was brutal, but he did do three good things for those he employed: first he entrusted them with his property, expecting them to develop it in his absence; then he resourced them, with some talents; and on his return he variously disciplined or rewarded them, according to their performance, thus giving each of them the opportunity to learn and grow from the experience.

The boss in Jesus’ parable might remind us of people who’ve crossed our path in life, straight-talking leaders who took us down a few pegs; unsparing bosses who demoted us, or whose harshness may have shaken and demoralised us. Maybe we’re all the stronger for having had these encounters, or maybe we’re scarred for life. Thankfully, I imagine that we have also each been influenced by good bosses, gentle, humane leaders. Think for a moment of one who has played a special part in your life, whose character and example helped you learn how to follow in his or her good ways. Maybe it was an influential parent or other family member, a teacher, a friend, a colleague, an officer in command, perhaps a member of the clergy… someone whose guidance and encouragement helped you to grow in confidence and effectiveness. It is good and right that we should often remember these people, and in giving thanks for them, renew our commitment to follow the good lessons in life they taught us.

Let’s be clear that leaders aren’t just those who make judgements in a TV studio or occupy the White House or Downing Street or Parliament. The leaders who carry most influence are people like you and me – the ordinary parents, grandparents, friends, and neighbours; the teachers, the everyday mentors. People of all generations who, by our example and our words can help and influence others along the way. Jesus calls you and me to be people like this. People who can teach deep values to others around us.

Followers of Christ, says St Paul, are ‘children of light and children of the day’ – so we can share our light with others, and lead them out of their darkness. St Paul teaches that followers of Christ are to live each day ‘with him’, led by our good leader Christ, to be everyday leaders ourselves; in our own way, influencers of others in what we do and say. If like me you fear you’re hardly up to such a task, and paralysed into doing nothing with the talents gifted to you, then hear St Paul’s reassurance that ‘God has destined us not for wrath – (not for weeping and gnashing of teeth) – but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep we may live with him.’ 

In other words, in the version of The Apprentice which is the Kingdom of God you’ll never have him point the finger at you and show you the door saying ‘you’re fired’. God makes it his business to open his hands to you, to beckon you close, and say, ‘you’re loved’. God wants us to be his partners in the business of bringing good news to the world. He doesn’t judge us on our merits to be worthy of this work, but invites us by his grace. 

Christ is a leader we respect and love, for all the love and talents he gives to us. He will not paralyse us by fear, but release us into lives of fulfilment. Christ is a leader whose ultimate act of self-giving has influenced so many over the centuries to give of themselves wholeheartedly, completely, to lives of generosity and light. Christ is a leader who wants us as his apprentices. If we read the rest of Matthew 25 it’s clear that this means us spending our lives living graciously and generously towards others, particularly the poorest and most-struggling among us.

‘Therefore encourage one another and build up each other,’ says St Paul. This is the way God goes about business. It is our calling, our mission, and our joy. 

 

Notes 

[1] A rewrite of In search of leadership in a time of darkness, preached in Somerset, 2017 and Devon, 2011.

[2] Wikipedia: The Apprentice (British TV series), The Apprentice (American TV series). 

[3] My take on the parables is influenced by William R. Herzog II, Parables as Subversive Speech: Jesus as Pedagogue of the Oppressed. Herzog demonstrates how the parables were a form of social analysis, as well as a form of theological reflection. Their focus was not on a vision of the glory of the reign of God but on the details of how oppression served the interests of the ruling class.

Wisdom of Solomon 6.12-16, Matthew 25.1-13

Remembrance Sunday 8th November 2020 – online

Of all the demanding tasks for the soldiers on the Western Front, surely one of the hardest was being on sentry duty.  At all times of day, sentries were posted to keep watch for enemy movements. Sometimes small trenches, called ‘saps’, were driven under the barbed wire into No Man’s Land to watch and listen to whatever the enemy was up to. Being vigilant was essential: for it  was seldom quiet on the Western Front. In the six months leading up to the Battle of the Somme in July 1916, although there was no major battle in progress, the British Army still suffered well over 107,000 casualties. 

At all times, a sentry’s duty was maximum alertness – and falling asleep on the job was potentially a capital offence. Sentries were forbidden to smoke, as it could attract unwelcome enemy attention. The writer ‘Saki’, H. H. Munro, a lance sergeant in the Royal Fusiliers, died at the Somme in 1916. It is said that his last words were ‘Put that bloody cigarette out!’ before he was shot by a sniper.

At dawn each day, everyone was put on high alert, in total vigilance, in a daily ritual called ‘Stand To’. As the sun was rising, every man had to turn out and stand on the ‘firestep’ of the trench with guns and grenades at the ready, in case the Germans, masked by the rising sun in the east, should choose that moment to launch an attack. It was the most nerve-shredding time of day. Once the sun had risen, the danger was deemed to have passed and the men ‘stood down’ to cook and eat their breakfast. [1]

Alertness, vigilance – these were essential qualities of every soldier on every side in World War One, and remain so for everyone involved in armed conflict today. This is what Laurence Binyon alludes to in his poem ‘For the Fallen’, when he describes the young soldiers as ‘Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow… staunch to the end against odds uncounted, They fell with their faces to the foe’.

Alertness is of course a universally useful quality – for humans and all other living beings. It is described as the state of active attention by high sensory awareness such as being watchful and prompt to meet danger or emergency, or being quick to perceive and act. It is related to psychology as well as to physiology – in other words, it involves our bodies and minds working together. The word “alert” comes from the Italian “all’erta”, meaning ‘on the watch’.

Of course, being constantly alert is more or less impossible. This is why during the Second World War, soldiers and aviators were given drugs to increase their alertness during long periods on duty. British troops used 72 million amphetamine tablets in the Second World War and the RAF used so many that according to one report, ‘it was Methedrine that won the Battle of Britain’. [2]

A lack of alertness is a symptom of a number of conditions, including narcolepsy, attention deficit disorder, chronic fatigue syndrome, depression, or sleep deprivation. But morally, as communities and nations, it is hubris which perhaps most often causes us to lose sight of what is happening around us. Hubris, meaning excessive pride or self-confidence: being so self-assured in our own ways that we get taken by surprise by events which, if we’d been more watchful, we might have seen coming and avoided. The hubris among economists was shaken in 2008 when the banks collapsed; the coronavirus crisis challenges our over-confidence in our abilities to limitlessly manipulate nature for our own gain. In Greek tragedy, hubris leads to nemesis – excessive pride towards or defiance of the gods leads inevitably to the downfall of a god, a person or a people. [3]

Is this why our Judaeo-Christian scriptures so elevate the need for us to be alert? Solomon wrote that “To fix one’s thought on wisdom is perfect understanding; those vigilant for wisdom will be free from care.” Jesus concluded the story of the foolish bridesmaids by entreating his listeners to ‘keep awake therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.’ And elsewhere he famously told his followers to watch and pray: “Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak,” he said. [4]

It may be hyperbolic to say that we are living in dangerous times, for every time in history has carried its own dangers. But we certainly should be ever-willing to learn from those who would teach us how to be alert, how to practice wisdom in the way we think and exercise it in the way we act. For the hostile tribalism and pernicious forms of nationalism which stirred the world to such excessive violent conflict in the Twentieth Century never went away in peacetime. These forces are powerfully present in altered but recognisable forms today, and we should be on lookout for them creeping into our own hearts and minds, or gathering influence in our own community. 

We should be ready to protect against these powers by paying close attention to the voices of goodwill in our world; by attending to the wisdom in our scriptures and other inspirational writings; by offering prayers for protection and direction; by purging the evil from our hearts in penitence when we find it there; and protest it when we see it in the world around us.

Like those whose sacrificial ways we commemorate today, let us also work for the well-being of our world. As our day begins each morning, let us share the practice of ‘Standing To’.

 

Notes

[1] John D. Clare, Colour Photos of World War One;  Wikipedia: Saki.

[2] Wikipedia: Alertness.

[3] Apple online Dictionary: Hubris.

[3] Matthew 26.41.