Context
- Flimsy little boats taking on water, fishing boats rescuing. It used to be reasonably far away, in the Mediterranean; now it is in the English Channel. How will we behave as they arrive?
- Our Prime Minister works away at the impossible task set by the referendum, while her colleagues' letters declaring no confidence in her piled up enough to trigger Wednesday's vote. That she clung on leaves some full of admiration, others with frustration. On she goes like a doomed alchemist trying to find the magic formula to turn all to gold.
- The beautiful city of Strasbourg is wounded by a jealous gunman, distracting from the envious rioting of some hijacking the yellow vest protests around France.
- A not dissimilar deluded jealousy is displayed by racist football ‘fans’.
What a prophet might say to us in this strange context is an unsettling question, to say the least. There are difficult and sometimes distasteful tasks to be performed and we might wonder who on earth will do them.
Then, after we've wondered how badly everyone else is doing and what everyone else needs to do to fix things, the question comes back to us. What is our bearing, what is our mode of speech in this culture, this time of political dysfunction, British isolationism and deluded terrorism?
Reflection
Why ‘vipers’? (A bit harsh, John.) They are venomous and, if surprised by a threat, will strike out. If looking for dinner, they will use surprise and strike, paralyse, then eat. It is a vivid and unpleasant image of pure selfishness, pure self-preservation – and it turns our stomach. ‘Who warned you to come?’ he shouts, seeing their religious life as self-preservation rather than devotion. Most fiercely, he challenges the puffed up self-image that is made of nothing but nostalgia: ‘Don't tell me who your ancestors were. WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?’ A prophet challenges a nostalgic nation? Well, what possible relevance could this scripture have?
But suddenly, after fierce, challenging language he changes tone the moment people ask him ‘What shall we do?’, and his answers are disarmingly simple. Share if you have more than enough. Tax collectors, take only your due. Soldiers, don't bully. Very simple. What is truly shocking is that hoarding when others are cold and hungry is normalised. Taking more than your due is normalised. Bullying is normalised. Shouldn't these three suggestions be obvious? They're not a high standard. They should be the normal base line. Selfishness is normalised. That is the terrible place we are in. The second thing that is very striking is that he doesn't distinguish between those who might think themselves ordinary and those who have deeply distasteful jobs. They, too, have something very simple to be done, something perfectly manageable that will make a difference to others’ lives. The third shock is that that tax collector collaborators and even soldiers, agents of brutal occupation, are there at all, and ask the moving question: ‘What shall we do?’
There is a soldier in Zephaniah. Judah is fixated on the military power of neighbours, so the prophet casts God as a mighty warrior coming to sweep everything away (Zephaniah 1), but this greatest of all soldiers is, startlingly, a warrior who sings. His aim is restoration of a city that jolly well doesn't deserve it, a soiled, defiled, oppressing city’ (Zeph 3.1). Having lured their gaze away from the soldiers around them, Zephaniah presents a vision of a God-Warrior defining his military success as ‘saving the lame, gathering the outcast and, far from bullying, relieving people's shame (3.19) and the once ashamed city is having a party (3.18). From self-preoccupation, Judah's gaze is lifted to God, and in thankful praise, perspective is restored and the lame and outcasts find their proper place is a sign of the community's new health. Prophecy to snap a nation out of self-obsession: what possible relevance could this scripture have?
There are two soldiers in Philippians. Paul writes deeply encouragingly about what kind of bearing believers in Christ will show if they trust he rose again for them, for Jew and Gentile and all the world. He describes a kind of disciplined joy, a resilient habit of thanksgiving, a constant turning to God candid about our need and ‘gentleness,’ a refusal to meet insult with insult (4.4-6). But far from naive, he writes from prison, with a soldier (notionally at least) at his door. He knows he probably won't see his friends again. ‘Rejoice’ also has overtones of ‘farewell’. Rome wants him isolated and frightened of their brute force. Against the odds, Paul is offering an antidote to victimhood. He insists on prayer, a defiance of the limits of worldly imagination; supplication, a defiance of military machismo; thanksgiving, in defiance of scarcity and jealousy.
Most of us are not in mortal danger for our faith but, if we are gloomy about the social and political world that we have evolved, we may be deeply challenged by such spirituality and have to search our hearts to declare our vulnerability to God, and dig deep to find things defiantly to give thanks for.
The second soldier in Philippians is God ‘guard[ing] your hearts’ (4.7). How gloriously funny is that, when the soldier at the door thinks he is the guard who matters?
As we feel the soldier motif working on our hearts through each reading, suddenly there's a shock again hearing the soldiers of Jesus’ day ask: ‘What shall we do?’ The gospel is for them too. So, Zephaniah, Paul and John compel us to consider what wrong assumptions have been normalised, and who is trying to normalise limits on our imagination. Then they beg of us ‘who are we and what can we do?’ when all is chaos around us. Imagine if we all carried out our work with the question ‘How can my conduct make this role a benefit to others?’ Whatever your job or calling, what do you think would John's simple suggestion be to you?
Prayer
'Fairtrade'– 'Affordable Housing' – 'Conventional weapons'.
God, we have normalised some terrible things,
so what is obvious seems like a high standard.
Forgive and heal our defensiveness and our aggression.
Lord, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.
Gloom and frustration soon leave us politically enervated.
God forgive and heal our nostalgia and self-pity.
Christ, have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.
Fixated on what others do badly,
we assume that others need to change.
Forgive and heal our ignorance of the change you desire in us.
Lord, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.
You could read Philippians 4.4-7 as words of absolution.
Questions
See how John calls us all to stop hoarding and normalise sharing; the tax collector to normalise honesty so becoming part of the social solution that tax can provide; the solider to normalise restraint so they become protector instead of bully. Discuss together what John might say to a Westminster journalist who asks: ‘What should we do?’ Try to distil it into a short simple phrase.
Ask:
- what John might say to your MP?
- to a border agency official?
- to a prison guard?
- to a football supporter?
- to anyone doing a job you feel distasteful or compromised?
- to your church?
- to you?
All-age activity
Fill a large bowl with water and put some small toy boats. Have some small plastic figures ready nearby. Invite people to see how a boat floats with one person, with two, three and so on, continuing until it sinks. Talk together about what is happening to people crossing the sea to find somewhere safe to live and what we might do for them. Write down the children’s answers and display them somewhere in church.
We may naturally feel protective of children, but they have probably will have heard the news, especially when there is a child in one of the boats, and will be wondering about it. While careful how we describe things, whenever we address such issues in All Age Worship at All Saints, we find the children well able to engage and often soothing the fears of adults with disarming insight.
Young People
‘Vipers,’ John shouted. Play a game of snakes and ladders. Catch the feeling when you land on a snake and are made to slide back, and the undeserved joy of landing on a ladder and leaping forward. Think of examples of someone's selfishness holding someone, or indeed themselves, back. Think of examples of someone's generosity giving another person a lift. You may be able to share some of these in the group, but no one should be obliged to share anything too personal or exposing of someone else.
David Warbrick is Vicar of All Saints Kings Heath in Birmingham. He struggles to give thanks for anything in the realm of politics at the moment, but thinks St John’s first instruction to him, even more challenging, might be ‘tidy your desk.’
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