We have just listened to a very familiar text from Matthew 28:16–20 as we reflect on God as Trinity, following on the Day of Pentecost.  It is the great climax to Matthew’s Gospel laying out Jesus’ invitation, plans, direction and reassurance until the end, but it’s so familiar we often miss how radical it is. It is known as the Great Commission and it is a counter-imperial announcement from the margins of occupied land, spoken to a powerless community which still includes the doubters.  It is not simply a call to institutional church expansion.

We celebrate today – a joyful day as we rejoice in the gift of the Holy Spirit and share the joy with those who gathered 2,000 years ago at the birth of Christ’s Church.

 There are two stories told today in our readings about what happened at the Day of Pentecost, the day the Church became visible, as the Holy Spirit came among us, gathering us into the body of Christ.  Most of us know both stories, from Acts 2 and John’s Gospel.  The story in Acts 2 stirs our minds and hearts, gifting us a wonderful, joyful, enlivening sense of the Holy Spirit, as she made her presence felt with wind and fire; with flames everywhere and three thousand people talking and sharing the news of God’s deeds of power in all the known languages of the world. It is an unstoppable story as we hear it two thousand years later. 

For almost three weeks I haven’t watched television, seen the news, read emails or engaged with world events, except with prayers and in church.  The noise of the world beating on the doors became quieter and I had time to breath.  It made a difference that I was in a foreign country with a different alphabet, so I couldn’t read or understand what was being said. So, I heard with greater clarity, the words of Jesus speaking with God and his disciples in John’s Gospel, reminding them they are in the world, even as he is leaving it.  Jesus is speaking with the disciples in the shadow of the cross and his crucifixion, the night before he is arrested. This is not a comfortable, comforting conversation. We need to hear it clearly.

Last Sunday the Gospel reading concerned Jesus telling his disciples that those who followed in his footsteps would find a new way to view God that was different to that which was taught by the Jewish faith, from which they were beginning to extricate themselves.  In fact the Jesus view of God was different to all other visions of God. 

There’s a poem by Leonard Cohen which starts: ‘You who pour mercy into hell’… it is from this perspective I start my reflection on today’s readings which bring together Peter’s instructions to the early Christians to be obedient to the authorities (1 Peter 2:11-25); Stephen’s martyrdom (Acts 7:55-60); and Jesus’ final teachings to his disciples as he prepares to step into the hell of betrayal, denial, torture and state sanctioned death (John 14:1-14).

Good Shepherd Sunday, the name that this Sunday usually goes by, has a special place in my memory.  Two things make it so.  The first thing that gives it a special place results from an occasion I preached on the theme in the Parish of Cooma, in southern NSW.  Cooma was my first appointment after ordination. 

This week we have had a funeral for a dear friend in the parish, and I am reflecting on how after a funeral, we focus on going back to our own homes, to try and pick up our daily lives.  The story of our loved one and friend is now finished.  The practical matters of organising a funeral, a burial or cremation is completed.  Paperwork is done, a home, or perhaps simply a room, is emptied of belongings, stuff is given away, shared out and memories held tightly for a little while, until we get into new ways of living and behaving, which shift the emphasis of our lives.  Grief is there, but life is continuing, whether we like it or not.  New meaning has to be found to make sense of the absence. We might even ask, ‘where is God in all this?’

We believe we’re hard to deceive.  We tell ourselves we can see the usual cons and when it comes to fancy stories and fake news, we can spot it quickly.  So, the story about Thomas and his reaction to the disciples’ news, ‘Jesus has risen’, is understandable.   He will not accept secondhand news. (John 20:19-31)

We read Matthew’s gospel story of the revelation of Jesus’ resurrection with joy, excitement and delight. After the pilgrimage of the last few weeks and days, it is an extraordinary, hope-filled story.  So much happens, it is hard to keep up as we react to the impact of what has and is taking place.

Less than two months ago, we prayed with grief on the 4th anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. Four years of unspeakable horror and corrupt leadership and gross misinformation.  To paraphrase Oleksandr Mykhed, a Ukrainian writer, we pray ‘about things one can never forget.  Or forgive.’ (Mykhed 2024:xi).  It seems like this is also the story for the illegal war between Israel, Iran and its proxies, supported by the US and dragging in the rest of the Middle East as we confront rising civilian deaths, and the killing and maiming of far too many children.  The war rolling on in South Sudan, testing ancient enmities has its own echoes of hell and matching genocide as well, while the Western World looks the other way.

This is Maundy Thursday, we encounter Jesus Christ, the servant Messiah, anointed by God, blessed by wise ones from the east, checked out by excited shepherds, watched over by weary parents, claimed by seers in the temple, ancient ones who saw God’s work alive and eternal in the life of a small babe and the joy of his mother and father.  Strong words spoken, prophesy and wisdom wrapped up in blessings and in the breath of life and death. But now, as we come to the final meal together, we see Jesus has spent a lifetime casting off, shedding old traditions, customs and practices, challenging them, and then a few short years in which to pack in all the teaching, grief, joy, peace, hope and love, forgiveness and mercy, he wanted to share and show: far too much for our short lives. 

The story of Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem and then, the obscene swiftness with which he was deliberately betrayed, arrested, denied, tried and crucified, is horrifying.  We encounter the worst and best of humanity when we are under pressure, just as it is happening for so many people today and just as it has happened throughout human history. 

How do we tell this extraordinary story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead, exposed from a tomb.  He stinks. He has been dead 4 days.  He is covered in a burial shroud, saturated with death as he steps out of the tomb into daylight.  Life has changed forever for his sisters, now living after his death, filled with grief at his death.  The suddenness of it all, the overwhelming loss and absence of a loved one has pulverized the family. 

The story about the man, blind from birth whom Jesus healed and which we read in John 9:1-41 is both joyful and sad.  You would have thought such a miracle would have everyone rejoicing, but we notice it is only the man whose sight is restored who is joyful and giving thanks to God.   So why is this the response? Perhaps we might reflect on the prophet Samuel who anoints young David fresh from the fields, as the next, unlikely, king of Israel who is told: 

The Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.’ (1 Sam. 16:7)

I’ve often wondered about this unnamed woman in John’s Gospel 4:5-42, who is labelled ‘the Samaritan woman’, a term which is used in many early bible commentaries as a code for a sinful woman who had poor judgement, has been married multiple times, and is now living sinfully with someone. Yet she’s forthright, courteous, mistrustful but not cynical, she is curious and informed; and understandably wary of social and cultural religious rules which have labelled her, categorized and dismissed her.  She’s clearly learned to protect herself. She is like many women still today who are marginalized by the judgement of others.   

I have been wondering where faith starts, as we journey through Lent, and as we reflect on our lives in God and in this community and family of God. Jesus tells us we are born from above, born of water and Spirit, blown like the wind, not knowing where it has come from or where it is going.  So, I feel a bit like Nicodemus and thoroughly empathise with him and his confused response when Jesus asks the question: 

Are you a teacher yet you do not understand these things? (John 3:10)

Temptations come in sneaky ways!   The Gospel story this week tells us about Jesus’ wilderness experience when he was tempted.  I have wondered what his wilderness was like during those extraordinary 40 days and nights; what demons harassed him as he thought through what was being asked of him and how he would respond following his baptism. 

I recently attended training on restorative practices – which is about making and building peace and justice with one another and across the world – and one of the sessions explored our emotions and how they are reflected on our faces. 

Last week we heard God’s heartfelt wish for all of us from the prophet Micah, who reminded us what God requires of us: to act justly, love tenderly and to walk humbly with God (Micah 6:8). It’s an extraordinary expectation of each of us and is without any ambiguity.  This week Isaiah speaks similar words as he urges his listeners, to hear God say clearly:

 Is this not the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?’ Isaiah 58:6

I read a story recently about a woman who had lived in one of our major cities, was well educated, ran her own business and was doing well.  Life became complicated in Covid times, and in the end, she had to sell, and within three years, she had lost her work, her home, her income and she is now homeless, living in her car.   As our parishes try to work out how we might help homeless people this winter, some ask councils to move them on instead, blaming the homeless for creating this dilemma as their neighbours feel unsafe.  But if you had been treated badly and tipped out of society because of unjust laws, insufficient welfare, inequitable rents and housing policies, rising prices, domestic violence and insufficient mental health services, do you think you would continue to behave politely in such circumstances?