One of the enemy’s chief and most powerful lies is that only certain people, people with a certain history or gifts, are of use in the Kingdom of God. The majority of people, he would claim, are of little value, if at all. And certainly not people who are weak or fallible or prone to error, ‘crack pots’, like most of us. But all of this is false. God values each and every one of us, and can use us no matter who we are, or what we ‘bring to the table.’ In fact, it is the varied gifts and experiences that we bring to the table that make us particularly useful. So, let me encourage you to believe that God has a unique and important place and role for you--even if you are scarcely aware of it right now. Just believe, and be open to His leading, and eventually you will know. And then--this is the hard part--let Him lead you.

It has often been said that the church is only one generation away from extinction, and probably at few times in history has this been truer than today. I say that because there are fewer residual, society wide remembrances of God’s action in our world, meaning that far too often the younger generations simply don’t know much about God and what He does and has done. And so the telling of our stories, personally and corporately, of God’s goodness is absolutely essential. But then, if someone, perhaps a parent or grandparent, or perhaps a pastor or priest or Sunday school teacher, or perhaps a friend or camp counsellor, had not told us their story, would we, you and I, ever come to adopt the Christian faith for our own and decide to follow Christ? This mere fact simply underlines just how important the telling of our stories is.

But then, the crunch comes: just how do we do this? Most of us are singularly shy and ill-equipped to do so. It seems so personal and sensitive, and we do not want to barge in willy-nilly where not wanted or welcome. So, let us pray for opportunities or openings. We do not have to be overly articulate, but if the questions arise, we can indeed share what we believe and have experienced. And so my prayer is this: “Lord, help us all as we try to do this. Amen.”

Today we celebrate Pentecost, what has often been referred to as the birthday of the church. And, indeed, it is very much like the earthly, human birthday celebrations that we are accustomed to, in that there were gifts distributed. The gift (or gifts) was the Holy Spirit, and what was so spectacular about it was that how it manifested or expressed itself was totally individualized. In other words, each person received a manifestation of that Spirit that was unique to that person and that enabled that person to carry out a ministry that was unique to him or her. So, no one was given all the gifts. In fact, the entire idea was that by many individuals contributing their unique and individual gifts the church would be built up and the world blessed. That is why each of us is so important to God’s overall enterprise. So, let us each do our part: we are needed!

There seems to be no end of questions or controversies that wrack the Christian church but two interrelated ones that never seem to go away are the questions, ‘what is the church? and ‘how (and, of course, where) should a person worship God?’

After we lost our intimacy with God in the Garden of Eden, God has been yearning for ways to be with us. First off, He made it known that He was ‘a portable God’, that is, He was not glued, fixed, to just one place or time. He was knowable anywhere, which was a great and surprising change from the territorial gods that most nations and peoples had. Furthermore, He revealed Himself to be a personal God, one that could be known and related to, and not just those of a certain calling or character. One didn’t have to be a priest or sage or prophet or holy man (or woman) to know and relate to God. Ordinary people could apply. And neither did you have to be of exemplary character or holiness. That meant that sinners could also apply. And, then through the prophets and above all, through Jesus, we learned that a relationship with God was available to all cultures and peoples, and not just the Jews! Wow.

Furthermore, through Jesus, we learned that God could dwell in each of us, and through the Holy Spirit, this indeed became possible. It was like the branches of a tree, Jesus said, ‘we are engrafted into the trunk and become part of, and nourished, by that trunk.’

But, as we came to realize, this was more than just an individual thing, but also a corporate thing. All of us together as Christians, as the Church, was the body of Christ. And so, we were enjoined to come together as the various parts of that body, build up each other, support each other, contribute our various gifts to that body, and worship together. Indeed, as one of the New Testament writers said, ‘we ought not to neglect the assembling together.’

But, there’s the rub--and the controversy: how and where do we do this? And, central to this question is whether a designated location, a place of worship, is really necessary? Yes, indeed, we can (and do) worship God just about anywhere, but is there a place (and a time) for a particular focus to that worship, that assembling together? In spite of the fact that each of us can individually know and relate to God, God seemed to think that getting together was important, even vital. That’s why He ordained a particular day of the week for worship and why He set aside festivals as ways of remembering and celebrating past events in salvation history. And why, He designated an earthly Temple to be His earthly dwelling place and place of engagement, place of encounter.

So, there we have something of a paradox: while we certainly can (and should) encounter and fellowship with God on our own, we also need to do it together. God knows that we need it, and so ordained it. So, let us not forsake the assembling of ourselves together.

I have often thought that people would be well advised to borrow a page from AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) and similar groups. One of their fundamental principles is that we humans are powerless to help ourselves, that all of us, if only we would admit it, need help from outside ourselves, most fundamentally from God (or, ‘their higher power’ as some chose to say).

I know that we humans are strongly disposed not to ever admit that we can’t do it all, that we can’t do it by ourselves with our own strength and wisdom--even a brief glance at the world scene would give evidence of that--but the reality is that we fail miserably when we try to do so. Humans, be they family or friends or neighbours, or governmental leaders, or world-class experts, simply can’t do what only God can do. So, it is best to let Him do just that.

Rather routinely, as part of our Sunday worship, we recite the Summary of the Law, ‘you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself. In these hang all the Law and the prophets’, but do we often pause to think what this means.

The first part is about loving God with all your being, and the second is about loving, caring for, respecting, working for the best of one’s neighbour, just as you would for your very own self. Whether we succeed in loving God with our entire beings is up for discussion, as I suspect that we all fail on that count. So, what about loving our neighbour? That is the issue that Jesus deals with in today’s passage, and it is one that I must admit that I have trouble with.

No, I have no problem with my literal neighbours, those wonderful people who live in my neighbourhood. They are, without exception, a great bunch of people. However, with some others that I ‘rub shoulders with’, I do have some issues--with those, over the years, who came to the church with a sense of entitlement, thinking that I was ‘obligated’ to give them whatever they wanted, no questions asked, simply because I was a pastor and this was a church. Or with those, whether in church circles or in public debates, refused to listen to anyone else and who called down abuse and nasty labels on anyone who disagreed with them. I have to admit that I am not so inclined to be very neighbourly to this kind of folk. And so, I guess that I have some work to do--as probably do all of us.

I’m thinking that pride impacts all of us, even if quite unconsciously. For instance, we pride ourselves in our opinions and thoughts, thinking that they are quite obviously ‘superior’ to what others might hold. Or we might pride ourselves for our talents or our ethnic or national background or for our life skills or experience. And, we might pride ourselves in our choice of church or denomination. All of this is only natural. I mean, why would a person not be proud of these things if they are near and dear to us and have proved to be of value to us.

Unfortunately, sadly, however, such an attitude can put up barriers between us and others, and, as was the case in Ezekiel, lead us into thinking that we are somehow better or more privileged in God’s eyes, than others. And, certainly such an attitude can stop us from taking other people seriously and listening to them and learning for them. It is something, I suspect, that we all need to work on.

I am glad to say that God is in an entirely different ‘class’ than any of us humans. When He makes promises to us His people, He is not only ‘bound’ (by His own nature) to carry them out and knows all possible circumstances and eventualities and can take them into account, but also has the power to fulfil them. That means that He can always be trusted. When so much else in life can (and will) let us down at some point or other, it is good to know that this will never happen with God. And so, we can be quite confident and at ease when we entrust Him with our lives.

Here’s a question, a challenging one for all of us: when we plan out our day, do we consciously ask God what His plans are for us that day? I ask that, because, if you are like me, I simply jot down a ‘to-do’ list of things that need to be done--and that, without consciously or deliberately asking God whether this is what He wants or not. I say that because we are ‘supposed’ to be travelling with Him and doing what He wants rather than just the other way around. Anyway, I ask these questions as a way of getting all of us to think about this.

One of my former neighbours, an ardent Ukrainian Catholic, once remarked to me that what the church always needs is a bunch of new converts, people who remember all too vividly what it was like to be without Christ. She asserted that far too many of us can’t remember that far back--or don’t even remember a time that they did not know and follow Christ. So, she suggested, hearing this good news about what God can and does do in a person’s life would be good for all of us.

In today’s psalm we hear something of that, which serve as a great reminder to relook at our own lives, consider what difference Christ has made, and then to celebrate and thank Him for it.

When Moses speaks of ‘stiff-necked people’, he’s not talking about people who have to wear neck braces. He’s talking about stubbornness, which, sad to say, runs rampant in pretty well all of us. Our reading from Ezekiel speaks about stubborn people, but in two senses. One sense is about the listener, people who refuse to listen and take it and change, which amounts to most of us at some or other. The other sense is about the prophet, who is to be hard-headed, consistent and reliable in saying and doing exactly what God wants. Maybe a bit more of that kind of hard-headedness is what God wants from all of us.

People probably wonder about their clergy at times, especially on those occasions when they seem to ‘stumble’ in the liturgy or seem to pause for no apparent reason--especially if it seems sustained. I can’t answer for anyone else, but I can testify to the fact that sometimes this happens because the liturgy (which basically means God) has spoken to the priest in some remarkable and unusual way.

This happened to me once during the BCP (1959) service of Holy Communion. I was partway through reciting the Prayer of Consecration on page 82. Just a few lines into that prayer it reads, “who of thy tender mercy didst give thine only Son Jesus Christ to take our nature about him, and suffer death upon the Cross for our redemption; who made there, by his one oblation of himself once offered, a full, perfect and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world...”.

What struck me, yes, literally speechless, was two things--firstly that Jesus had truly taken our nature, all of it, upon Himself. That means that there is nothing we experience, nothing we go through, nothing that we are tempted with, that He has not already been part of. So, He truly understands. And, then, secondly, that He has dealt with all of it, all of our sin and failings and weaknesses, once for all, upon the Cross. A full, perfect and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction with nothing left out.

So all that means that He is a Saviour like none other, someone who not only understands, but also acts. A fully sufficient, fully adequate Saviour, one that we can certainly put our trust in.

Sometimes avoidance is the name of the game for us humans, including, sad to say, us Christians. What I mean by saying this is that sometimes we get hung-up on some minor, relatively unimportant point or issue in God’s word or commandments, and avoid dealing with and acting upon what is relatively straightforward and unambiguous. A point in question is the Ascension, which we celebrate today. Some people get all ‘hot and bothered’ about it, and fail to remember the more important fact, namely that we have been given a job to do--and along with it, the power to carry out that job. We are to show Jesus to the world by word and example, and so we should give ourselves whole-heartedly, and not worry about ’the little stuff.’

I happen to think that worrying is one of the worst, and most frequent, habits that ‘infest’ us human beings. And yet it is so very unproductive. My mother was a tried and true worrier, and with my brother and I, there was good reason. But pretty well all of her worries were for nothing. What she worried about not only did not happen, but was far out of the range of ‘ever’ happening. And isn’t that often the case.

The antidote to this is trusting more fully in God, which comes from knowing Him more fully and deeply, but that isn’t achieved overnight. But maybe that could be our resolve in this special Easter season--to draw closer to God and come to know Him more fully.

Wouldn’t it be nice if life was one continuous ‘bed of roses’, all sweetness and light and no problems or issues? At least, that is what I like to tell myself. But that isn’t what life is about, what it is like. We all face problems and difficulties from time to time--and sometimes more often--whether we like it or not. It seems to be a fact of life.

And seemingly also as a fact of life is our wonderment at where God is in all this. Quite naturally, when everything is going badly, we can wonder if God is absent or has withdrawn His love and support. It is easy to doubt God at such times.

But know this: God is never absent. After all, one of Jesus’ titles is Emmanuel, God with us. He is most surely with us, just as the sun is with us even when obscured by heavy cloud. Surely, the ‘clouds’ are temporary and we will once again ‘see' and experience God’s presence and trust. For now, all we can do is trust Him and His love and continue the way He has set before us.

Today’s account of St. Paul’s encounter with the Greek philosophers in Athens has long intrigued me, but even more so after standing on the very spot, the very rock, where Paul would have faced off with these learned and erudite folks. The hill--which now can barely even be called a hill--is a barely known or observable nub of rock just slightly north of the much more famous Acropolis. In the Biblical account it is called the Areopagus (Mars Hill in English) and was much more prominent in Paul’s time. In fact, it was occupied by an important building.

What was especially memorable for me is that I was able to stand on that very spot when I was in Athens and imagine myself preaching to that same lot of enquirers. But, I was quite sure that I wouldn’t have done even as well as Paul. We all have ups and downs: such is life. But, nevertheless, that doesn’t stop us from needing to share the Gospel, whether by word or by deed. It is something that all of us need to be engaged in, no matter who we are.

One of the surprising learnings that I took away from the Camino, the Way of St. James in northern Spain. was one simple thing. I had embarked on this pilgrimage with a whole list of things that I anticipated that God might want to deal with me about. Guess what? He ignored the entire list. His one and only message consisted of just two words, ‘trust me.’ In other words, don’t think about or much less worry about the future, just trust me moment by moment and let me take care of the rest.

That, sort of, is the message of today’s psalm and meditation as well. Trust God for our direction and protection, let Him have His way, and leave the rest to Him. Easier said than done, but that’s it.