Bob Warwicker's blog

I don’t know whether it’s borne out by the words, but my early memories of church left me with an impression of singing hymns about the idyllic days of Jesus and his disciples wandering around Galilee and everyone being happy. But in Sunday’s Lectionary, the Mark reading starts like this… “Now after John was arrested…” Jesus lived in a cruel world, with dangerous political cross-currents. (And Judaea can’t have been so unconnected with Galilee.) If the good news of God and the love of Christ can survive in that world, they can survive anywhere.

It’s raining here quite heavily: I’m not going anywhere. Of course I would if I had to, but I don’t so I shan’t. Please continue to pray for people whose homes and businesses, fields and streets lie in flood-prone areas. Please pray for a beginning to the end of human-caused global climate change.

Janet pointed me to this yesterday. There’s a lot of Christians (in the UK as well as the US) who will gladly categorise those they disagree with, so as to exclude them… “For what I have come to see is exactly the point Jemar Tisby makes, that language like feminist and CRT can quickly become markers of core identity when they are used as tools of exclusion.” (my italics) …and then the label sticks.

No not the late Stephen Hawking’s book, which I have, but have not read all of… I couldn’t really understand it – somehow I was hoping for more equations to anchor the words.

…but next Sunday’s Lectionary. The word ‘time’ appears in all four readings in the English translation. Scholars of Hebrew and Greek will no doubt point out that the English ‘time’ is the translation of several different ideas. And indeed the word does different things in these readings. But it is also a common thread of sorts.

In Jonah 3:1, we read… “The word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time…” Read the story and you find that God’s message changes. It’s one thing one time, and something else another time. Later on, Jonah has just steeled himself to proclaim Nineveh’s destruction, when God sees hope in Nineveh’s behaviour and decides to spare the city. And Jonah’s not keen on being messed about like this. So? Well, consider it possible that God’s message adapts to the circumstances. The fundamentals are always there – love, justice, mercy – but what God wants to say to the first Christian communities in their world may sound different when targeted at people like us in our world. There are times to say one thing and times to say something else.

Psalm 62:8 “Trust in him at all times, O people…”, the Psalmist goes on to compare faith in God to putting your trust in transient things like wealth. God may speak differently to different circumstances (above), but is always to be trusted.

1 Corinthians 7:29… “I mean, brothers and sisters, the appointed time has grown short…” The appointed time, the pivotal moment is coming. There are turning points in history. Some of the very first Christians had already witnessed this in the life of Jesus, and there was unfinished business. It may look different to us 2000 years later, but there is still unfinished business from the life of Jesus, to be done in the life of Jesus within and among us.

And according to Mark 1:15, Jesus says… “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” The time is fulfilled – this is the moment -and the moment has come with the arrival of Jesus back in Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. And he is calling people to join him (he still is BTW). This is (0,0,0,0).

Walking. I walked in the showers this morning, because the bad news is that the next two mornings look like being properly wet and I probably shan’t go out. Please continue to pray for Calderdale and for settlements in other parts of the warning area and downriver too.

Mild this morning, no ice, no rain, not much wind. Good for walking. So did a longer stroll this morning and felt better for it. Put a face covering on to offset the feeling I’d be out for perhaps a little too long. Came back to ‘go to’ a zoom service, which was helpful. One of high edges above the valley had a white line along it – an old snowdrift.

From today’s Lectionary, we read at 1 Corinthians 6:18, “Shun fornication!” … I seem to remember that generally speaking, fornication shunned me.

Please pray for peace and justice in the USA.

Postscript: Not so good now. Just seen the warning area for next week’s rain and we’re right in the middle. More importantly, it also includes Calderdale. Please pray for Calderdale, for Hebden Bridge, Mytholmroyd, Luddendendfoot and all the other settlements in the valley. May they be spared this time.

PPS: Since the expected rain is to be spread out over two days, maybe the upstream places like Hebden Bridge will be OK this time, I’m hoping. Meanwhile, for anyone mystified about why people are still dying in such large numbers and why the virus is still spreading, look here for one of the reasons. Just the kind of attitudes that have been upheld for decades.

Lazy morning so far. Went to newsagent and bakers, came back and we tried to think of Crossword Compiler Names for each other and various other folk.

Still raining. But not icy: hurrah.

Frosty again this morning, so walking probably antisocial, given the chance of damaging a body part and using up hospital resources. Instead I attempted some pastries. Not very successful, but at least not dangerous to eat. The ingredients which should have been doing the delicious dance of togetherness had instead chosen to separate.

From this Sunday’s Lectionary... According to John’s gospel, Jesus comes to Philip and says, “follow me”. He doesn’t tell him, “do what I say”, but “follow me”. Now Jesus calls many people, you and me, to follow him and embark on a shared journey. That’s something to think about. Another thing to think about is what kind of leadership Jesus is showing, by saying “follow me”; it only works if the leader sets an example and shares the journey to which she’s inviting people. How many times have we been told, in effect, “don’t do what we do, do what we say”. We may still do what we’re told, because we know for other reasons that it’s right, but we do it with a heavy heart. Jesus is not that kind of leader – he says “follow me”.

My morning walks have been getting shorter lately – don’t really want to be outside. And this morning I started earlier to avoid other people. It was raining. The front gate was icy. And sure enough, there were some patches on the footway of that dangerous kind of ice you get when supercooled rain falls on wet ground. So back I came, the shortest walk of the lot.

From Sunday’s Lectionary, Psalm 139. Just read this selection – I can’t think of anything to add…

Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18
139:1 O LORD, you have searched me and known me.
139:2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from far away.
139:3 You search out my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways.
139:4 Even before a word is on my tongue, O LORD, you know it completely.
139:5 You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me.
139:6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot attain it.
139:13 For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
139:14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; that I know very well.
139:15 My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
139:16 Your eyes beheld my unformed substance. In your book were written all the days that were formed for me, when none of them as yet existed.
139:17 How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!
139:18 I try to count them — they are more than the sand; I come to the end — I am still with you.

This morning a shorter walk – feel it may be antisocial to be out for too long. The weather is clearing, although a little cooler. Now it is lovely.

In next Sunday’s Lectionary, there’s a reading from the first book of Samuel. The writer sets the scene; “The word of the LORD was rare in those days; visions were not widespread.” This phase in the story of God’s relationship with the human race starts in a thin time, a time of God-drought. I’m not particularly wanting to assign blame for this state of affairs – I just want to note that these thin times are also part of the story – and probably will continue to be: it doesn’t mean that God is dead. Even if hardly anyone seems to hear God speak, even if there’s a great flowering of lies and bullshit told in the name of Jesus, even if the drums of violence beat louder and louder, even if we feel total desolation; don’t give up, for this too can become part of the story of God’s love for us.

I can’t think of anything good to say about the weather today. It is simply miserable. A little warmer, yes, but miserable. It didn’t even have the advantage of putting off the dog-walkers: the dog-walkers around here are way too hardcore to be put off by rain and the invisibility of the hills.

Nevertheless, it is all part of a wonderful system that circulates the water and nourishes the land, and I praise the Creator for that!

Meanwhile, our government is delaying the decision about increasing restrictions. In a way they are right – we can’t know for sure what effect the current restrictions are having for a while yet. In a way they are wrong, because any delay is going to cost more lives. There are two reasons they have chosen the delay route – one is that unfortunately our Prime Minister is an optimist. Optimism is fine, but as I already mentioned, you wouldn’t want an optimist driving your bus, would you? Second reason is that he has to ask permission from a few dozen right-wing MPs before he does anything. I wonder what new restrictions would look like. Already I am going beyond – we’re experimenting with getting deliveries from our nearest Co-op. I just hope it isn’t keeping someone else from using this option – I’d know though, by the lack of delivery slots – which are all free at the moment.

Please pray for the NHS/GIG* and everyone who works there…

* Forgive my poor Welsh, but it’s something like Gwasanaeth Iechyd Genedlaethol.

In today’s Lectionary, both the story of Jesus and the book of Acts associate baptism with the coming of God’s Spirit. When Paul baptised some believers in Ephesus, the Holy Spirit “came upon them”, mirroring what happened to Jesus. ‘Following’ Jesus also means entering that experience which he pioneered. His life lives in us. Those believers “spoke in tongues and prophesied” – something amazing had happened. But not all people who get baptised speak in tongues. How do we know the Spirit of God has influenced us? How can we trust what someone might say in that altered mental state – if it even makes sense? I believe there are things God’s Spirit can do in us that might seem rather more prosaic, for instance give us altered priorities – and the kind of wisdom which comes not from knowing lots of stuff, but from knowing what’s important. As for this thing of what utterances to trust – there are tests – what are the ‘fruits’, the real-world outcomes? Has this person, this speech brought people closer to Christ, furthered love and mercy and justice? Another test is something that I find it really hard to do, which is listen to sisters and brothers who believe different stuff about Jesus and have different life experiences. The early Christians struggled to do this, but they did do it. They had councils, they worked out together which way to go next. It is one of the downsides of social media that they prevent us from hearing alternative voices, and act like a great big echo chamber for our own prejudices. But until we can get at least some idea of the scope of Christian belief, we’re in no place to say “listen to such and such” or “don’t listen to such and such”. This is not just an academic issue: there are real Christians out there who believe fervently that they have a God-given right to treat huge sections of the human race like dirt, including some of their own brothers and sisters in Christ.