Middle England Jesus
If Jesus were born in England
He’d be I think lower middle class
Beloved of grass roots politicians
But still some crisp sophistication
And know when to use a white wine glass
Tag Archives: Jesus
It’s Christmas!
Below is the script I wrote for BBC Radio Devon Sunday Service for Christmas 2016 (and I stand by every word, and many other words besides!):
I am going to be honest with you this morning.
And my honesty may cause concern, relief or perplexity in equal measure….or it may cause hope.
I don’t know when, exactly, I stopped liking what passes for a British Christmas.
I am at the stage now in my mid-40’s where I am simply tired of the whole merry-go-round.
Am I being unnecessarily melancholy; a party-pooper of Scrooge like proportions? Probably.
Not.
But also, possibly not.
I know I am not alone.
I know many people who will shop entirely online this Xmas to avoid the menacingly repetitive Christmas pop songs that blare out, over and over and over again.
To Noddy Holder, Johnny Matthis, Cliff Richard, Mud and all the others, thanks but….give it a rest!
I feel like Henry Thoreau’s line from his 19th c. book Walden hangs in the air: “The mass of [people] lead lives of quiet desperation.” The extended quote is more well known, “The mass of [people] lead lives of quiet desperation and die with their song still inside them.”
I do wish Noddy, Johnny and Cliff had kept their songs inside them!
As a Baptist Minister in Torquay, my view has been received with a degree of astonishment! Be that as it may!
“A minister who doesn’t like Christmas!” said either in actual words or, most often, facial expressions!
“Is that even allowed?”
“Don’t church ministers have training in liking Christmas, and ensuring everyone else likes it too?”
Well, although there is enormous pressure to conform unthinkingly to a system of celebration that many people dread, ministers do not undergo a module at theological college called “How to like Christmas and why you must!”
There is something in the air of Christmas, its impending approach, its imminence, its arrival, and of course the uncompromising aftermath of being full yet feeling empty.
It is a whiff of something we all smell, but keep to ourselves.
We daren’t mention it, lest we be thrown out of the party.
It is not the smell of mince pies and mulled wine, as delicious as that is.
It is the smell of a due sense of dread.
Concerning God’s Promises
J. John interviewing the brilliant Tom Wright, asks a question from the audience (the Youtube video can be viewed at the end of the post):
[Warning: Long sentence alert]!
Question:
“How do you understand the specific scriptures concerning God’s promises to the Jewish people today and also concerning the actual land of Israel?”
Tom Wright:
The Smell of Christmas
Luke 2:7-8 ‘The Smell of Christmas’
What is the smell of Christmas to you?
For the smell of Christmas, we can only go to certain places in the Bible.
We would think the obvious place is the Gospels.
Well, Bingo! in Matthew and Luke;
But not a wiff in Mark and John.
Maybe Paul will write something about Jesus coming as a baby…..er, no. Nothing!
Even Revelation starts with the Cosmic Christ walking among the stars;
but nothing of the earthling Jesus lying among the animals.
Oh wait….I hear Christmas carol…..
Maybe ‘Once in Royal David’s City’ can help us…
And, through all His wondrous childhood,
He would honor and obey,
Love and watch the lowly maiden,
In whose gentle arms He lay:
Christian children all must be
Mild, obedient, good as He.
Oh this one irks me! It really ruffles my feathers!
The writer Cecil Alexander must have been having a brain freeze.
There is something quite wiffy about this part of his song….
And, through all His wondrous childhood,
He would honor and obey,
Where on this tiny rice crisp of a planet did he get that from?
There is only one recorded instance of Jesus as a child, after the flight to and from Egypt. In fact he was 12, and in the first century, on the cusp of manhood.
Luke 2:41-50 tells us Joseph and Mary journeyed home for a whole day before they realized the 12 year old Jesus was not with them.
When they find him back in Jerusalem (that’s two days on the road not knowing where he is), in the Temple discussing theology with the professors and doctors, they chide him for “treating them [badly v.48]”. I mean, where did he sleep; what did he eat; who was he with? Who provided these things?
Jesus tells them v.49: “Why were you looking for me? Didn’t you know I would be about my Father’s business?” But they did not understand
Thus the line in the Carol that goes:
Christian children all must be
Mild, obedient, good as He.
Really gets my goat!
What manipulative Victorian manure….
Which brings me back to the question: What is the smell of Christmas?
Maybe ‘Silent Night, Holy Night’ will help us!
Silent night, holy night…… 50% right!
How can screaming birthing mothers, animals in a barn, noisy neighbours and choirs of angels singing to shepherds possibly be silent!
Everything about this would freak us out if it happened to us.
But it’s been softened, smoothed, glossed, abstracted and sentimentalized.
Birthing mothers are not silent.
I’ve attended 4 births……..my own three……and of course, my own!
My first words were: “What’s wrong mum? Why are you screaming and why has dad fainted?” Not bad for a 10 second old baby!
Animals don’t respect human social conventions.
They can’t read; They weren’t there when the angel told Mary she would have a son.
They might have thought it was ‘a bit odd’ that big humans were releasing little humans into the barn, but other than that, their toilet habits (for example), would have remained the same.
But we really must avoid this blandness that doesn’t reflect human reality, and therefore, biblical reality.
We need to defy the fantasy makers.
Not just out there in a culture that would see you spend so much in December it wouldn’t even care if your home got re-possessed in January.
That’s why credit cards really should be called debt cards. It’s words; words; words.
And defying the fantasy makers is why one theologian (Don Cupitt) has famously called Christmas: “The Disneyfication of Christianity.” (NB. At least he got that right amidst a whole career of re-imagining Christianity in the extreme. Anthony Thiselton has a masterful couple of chapters in response to Cupitt’s theological vision in Interpreting God and the Postmodern self….but I digress…).
Maybe Cupitt’s phrase inspired the song ‘One God’ by the pop group The Beautiful South in the late 1990’s (or maybe vice-versa), with their prophetically provocative lyrics:
The world is turning Disney and there’s nothing you can do
You’re trying to walk like giants
But you’re wearing Pluto’s shoes
[Chorus]
And the answers fall easier from the barrel of a gun
Than it does from the lips of the beautiful and the dumb
The world won’t end in darkness, it’ll end in family fun
With Coca Cola clouds behind a Big Mac sun
Sweeter to your taste
I came across this wonderful reference from a 12th century sermon in the excellent book ‘The Art of Reading Scripture’, page 208.
The quote is by Guerric of Igny, Liturgical sermons, vol. 2, translated by ‘Monks of Mount Saint Bernard, CF 32, 1971, page 81.
“What I have placed before you brethren, is like an egg or a nut; break the shell and you will find the food. Beneath the image of Joseph you will find the Paschal Lamb, Jesus, the one for whom you yearn. The great depth at which he is hidden and the diligence necessary in seeking him and the difficulty you will have in finding him will only make him sweeter to your taste. . . . And so here is the explanation in a nutshell: If we think with faith and reverence about the meaning of his name (Gen 30:24 : Joseph=”May He Add”; sounds like Heb. ”He has taken away” – my comment). . . . That after he had been sold by his own he redeemed his own from death, that he was humbled even to imprisonment, then elevated to a throne, and was rewarded for his work by being given a new name among the nations (Gen 41:45) – ‘The Saviour of the World’ – if we think about all these things reverently and faithfully, we shall surely recognize how truly it was said by the Lord (Hos 12:10), “Through the prophets, I gave parables.”
God chose Judas when he could have so easily chosen me!
“So after recieving the morsal of bread, [Judas] immediately went out. And it was night.” John 13:30
“Then Judas Isacriot, who was one of the twelve, went to the chief priests in order to betray [Jesus] to them. And when they heard it, they were glad and promised to give him some money…” Mark 14:10-11
“Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.” Matthew 26:46
“Judas, would you betray the Son of Man with a kiss?” Luke 22:48
“And throwing down the pieces of silver into the temple, he departed, and went and hanged himself.” Matthew 27:5
The name ‘Judas’ is now more than a name. It is synonymous in many cultures with a term of insult, the lowest form of slander, the highest charge of wrong-doing. It is not a name we choose for our children, nor our dogs. We don’t like Judas.
Doormat Theology
Some random aphorist thoughts – the product of walking my dogs!
Grace as ‘Great Riches At Christ’s Expense’ is nearer to pietistic wish-wash rather than ‘God’s holy love hating sin and redeeming it in Christ’s cross, and creating in the penitent sinner new life and moral amendment.’ Though as an acronym the latter is rubbish.
Atonement is not only a film starring Kierra Knightly but the great power of God working salvation for the entire cosmic order.
Love is not merely anthropic love for another person (who we’ve already decided we like and therefore ‘will love’).
Salvation is not a meagre ‘tipping in’ to ‘heaven’. The older son had an ‘I’m in’ theology, and look at the state of his heart!
Pastoral Care is not the flip or flop of a liver lilied do-gooder or crowd pleaser (who actually never really does ‘do good’ nor ‘please crowds’).
Sin is not ‘other people or countires’ nor is it a meaningless philosophical abstraction, even if you really do believe the comfy suburban mantra: I’m not that bad thank you very much.
Prophecy is not sloganeering, be it political or religious. Oh, and prophets actually know their Bibles, especially Obadiah chapter 2.
