Synod Presidential Address 2008

THEME:

"More than anything else put God's work first, and do what he demands..." (Matthew 6:33a)

"See that justice is done, let mercy be your first concern, and humbly obey your God" (Micah 6:8b)

PRAYER:

Almighty God, who commanded light to shine out of darkness, shine in our hearts and let us know your glory, which we have seen in the face of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen."

(2 Corinthians 4:6)

Members of Synod, when I introduced the Archbishops' Council Report 'Into the New Quinquennium', (GS 1670), on 8^th February 2006, my strap-line was, "We can't go on as we are"

The first implication of that report was that we needed to recover our corporate belonging and identity. That is, getting away from an 'all or nothing' attitude.

This means building trustful relationships with one another, and building a healthy Church of England.

The second implication had to do with the "tone" of our conversations, and the need for developing a culture of appreciative conversation, which largely depends on attentive listening.

We must do this because the whole story of God's relationship with human beings – with his creation – is one of Appreciative Conversation: from the time when he walked in the Garden and talked to the man and the woman in the cool of the evening, telling them of both the blessings and fruits of creation and also of the boundaries of their ability.

After that first Unilateral Declaration of Independence from God – when love turned in on itself and away from God, God continued his appreciative conversation and invitation:

His covenant with Abraham, his accompanying of all his people throughout the generations of their journeying, his conversations with them either directly, or through his prophets. The constant renewing of his covenant, and his promises.

And then the coming of the Word, made flesh. God walking, talking and showing the human race "everything and all that can be known about God" (Romans 1:19).

Throughout these conversations, God is encouraging his people to change, to renew their thoughts, to turn again to him and away from their own ways.

His conversations are about encouraging understanding, love for himself and for one another.

The third implication of the Report 'Into The New Quinquennium', was that the Church must always be Christ-like, open to all sorts and conditions of men and women. But, sadly, too many Christians want a 'me-shaped' church instead of a 'Christ-shaped' church. We must not forget that the Elizabethan Settlement meant that the Church of England was a comprehensive church because it was both Catholic and Reformed and was by law Established.

The fourth implication was one of clarity, courage and humanity. A tenth century Chinese scholar said:

"There are three essentials to leadership: humanity, clarity and courage.

Humanity without clarity is like having a field but not ploughing it. Clarity without courage is like having a vegetable garden without weeding it. Courage without humanity is like knowing how to harvest but not how to sow."

What we need is to help one another, in the Body of Christ, in ploughing, sowing, weeding, reaping, worshipping and witnessing.

The question I pose to us all today is this: since February 2006 how have we got on? Are we still going on as we were?

Thank God there have been changes. But I believe there is still much more that we can do to be shaped into Christ-likeness.

Since my ordination to the diaconate in 1979, I have regularly reflected on the building blocks of the mission and ministry of Jesus, told to us in Matthew's Gospel, Chapters 4-6.

What were these building blocks?

The first building block for mission and ministry for Jesus was: THE KINGDOM OF GOD COMES FIRST (Matthew 4:1-11).

The most important thing for Jesus of Nazareth was to let people know about the coming Rule of God, and to get them involved in it. His constant exhortation was: "Turn back to God. The Kingdom of heaven will soon be here." (Matthew 4:17) .[1] Another was,

"Seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness"

More than anything else put God's work first, and do what he demands.

Then the other things will be yours as well (Matthew 6:33).

The key question for us is this: DOES GOD'S KINGDOM COME FIRST IN ALL THE THINGS WE SAY AND DO? As individuals, as a Synod, as the Church of England, as members of the Anglican Communion?

The second building block for Jesus of Nazareth's mission and ministry was CHANGE. (Matthew 4:12-25).

Two key verses are "Turn back to God, the Kingdom will soon be here" (4:17), and "Jesus went all over Galilee preaching the good news about God's Kingdom" (4:23).

The old phrase "God's Kingdom" is probably best translated into modern English as "God's movement of change."

Jesus proclaims God's movement of change as a movement of repentance and forgiveness for each human heart.

He also proclaims this as a movement of freedom and liberation for each human community. His followers are to let themselves be seen as a community of forgiven sinners and a community of expectation. Christianity is a forgiveness movement and a freedom movement. And the greatest miracle in us is God's constant forgiveness.

We see Jesus calling a small group of people to help inGod's movement of change. A divine society of those who are called to be saints.

In St Paul's letters to the Romans, Corinthians, Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians, all members of the Body of Christ are described as 'saints', including those whose way of life was dishonouring to the Lord.

For they were all brought by faith and baptism into the family of Christ, and received the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of saintliness, to be used or to be quenched, by their subsequent response to Christ's invitation.

These Christians belong to a divine society as well as to countries, to civilisations, and to the world's organised life. Hence backslidings and compromises and an immense variety amongst the Church's members.

It includes those who try hard, with a patience and a humility which shine through their weaknesses. It also includes those who have ceased to try and whose membership is merely formal.

Archbishop Michael Ramsey, in a chapter on "The Church: its Scandal and Glory", writes:

"Often in history the idea has arisen of purging the Church by drastic action, turning out of the Church those who do not conform to a certain standard and so getting "a real Church of the Godly". But what standards? What measurements shall be used? It is all too possible, as Puritan and exclusivist movements have proved, to turn out fornicators and persons otherwise visibly scandalous, and yet to keep in the respectable, the proud, the smug.

No! The Church is not the society of those labelled 'virtuous'. It is the mixed community of sinners called to be saints.

So when we say in the Creed that, "We believe in One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church," what we are saying is that we believe that there is a divine society, the risen Christ is the glory in the midst of it, the Holy Spirit is at work within it.

The humility wherewith you put yourself alongside your fellow members in the Church, especially alongside those whom you are inclined to think poorly of, is part of the humility whereby you may become yourself less a part of the Church's scandal and more a part of the Church's glory".[2]

All those called to be saints are the body parts of Christ, and can never sever themselves from the Body, either by their pursuit of pure doctrine or by living lives that are still in need of the gracious redemption of Christ – of which I, Sentamu, am the most unworthy servant of the most worthy Lord.

We are all the body parts of Christ.

I have recently heard a story from Kenya following their election crisis. The Revd Rhoda Dzombo wrote, saying:

"I visited a village where people were waiting for seeds to replant crops. The whole marketplace area had been burnt. A man whose shop had been burnt took me round and showed me the rubble and cried as he told of the pain this had brought. There was nothing I could do directly for him but listen and share the pain. Then I was asked to speak.

"Why are you fighting each other?" I asked them. "Kenya is like a body. If the body bites its own finger it can't function normally. That's why I have come up here from the coast to suffer with you. You are part of me."'

Over one hundred members of this Synod gave £5,000 to the Kenya Appeal last February. (A further £10,000 was given following the appeal in the papers). Thanks to all who gave.

Many provided much help to the body parts of the Body of Christ in Kenya. For we are all One in Christ.

And that's why it is not possible for me to ignore some of the reports and comments around the GAFCON meeting in Jerusalem and Jordan, and also All Soul's Langham Place. There is much in the Final Statement to which I say a loud Amen – especially the 'tenets of orthodoxy'. However, it has grieved me deeply to hear reports of the ungracious personalisation of the issues through the criticism and scapegoating of Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury. The accusations and inferences of what has been said by some are not only ungenerous and unwarranted but they describe a person I don't recognise as Rowan. He demonstrates, in his dealings with others, the gift of gracious-magnanimity.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, in the current contested debate on sexuality, is a model of attentive listening, interpretative-charity, and exemplifies a Christian - occupying the seat of St Augustine - who is deeply committed to Scripture, Tradition, Reason, Christian-lived Experience, and the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral.

Working closely with him, I have experienced the echoes of that wonderful hymn of Ephrem of Syria: [3]

Truth and love are wings that cannot be separated,
for truth without love is unable to fly,
so too love without truth is unable to soar up:
their yoke is one of harmony.

Your fountain, Lord, is hidden

From the person who does not thirst for you;

Your treasury seems empty

To the person who rejects you.

Love is the treasure of your heavenly store.

Rowan Williams exemplifies that quest of holding together holiness, truth, love and unity. His many writings, from Arius to The Wound of Knowledge tell us so.

For example, in The Wound of Knowledge, in the Chapter entitled 'The Passion of My God', he writes, "It is the intractable strangeness of the ground of belief that must constantly be allowed to challenge the fixed assumptions of religiosity; it is a given, whose question to each succeeding age is fundamentally one and the same. And the greatness of the great Christian saints lies in their readiness to be questioned, judged, stripped naked and left speechless by that which lies at the centre of their faith."[4]

His desire and delight in the life of the Blessed and Glorious Trinity is self-authenticating. Forever going into God before he goes into the world, clearly evident if you went on a mission with Rowan Williams and prayed with him, as I have.

May God help us, as members of the Anglican Communion, to rediscover and live the reality of the Body of Christ.

For the 'bonds of peace' are not a straightjacket, but an encouragement to loyalty and love 'in Christ'.

As St Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12:13 "Entry into the communal reality of being 'in Christ' through the agency of the Holy Spirit is what makes Christians Christian, and all stand on the same footing as 'members' incorporated in Christ."[5]

We are part of the Body of Christ. We exist to worship God. We preach the gospel to the world and bring people into fellowship with God. We infect the world with righteousness; we speak of divine principles on which the life of humanity is ordered. Archbishop Rowan Williams does this admirably. Members of Synod, behold a Seeker After Truth and Love.

In the Epistle to Diognetus, written around 124 AD, we read a description of 'Christians Passing Through the World': [6]

"Christians are indistinguishable from other men either by nationality, language or customs. They do not inhabit separate cities of their own, or speak a strange dialect, or follow some outlandish way of life. Their teaching is not based upon dreams inspired by the curiosity of men.

Unlike some other people, they champion no purely human doctrine. With regard to dress, food and manner of life in general, they follow the customs of whatever city they happen to be living in, whether it is Greek or foreign. 

And yet there is something extraordinary about their lives.

Any country can be their homeland, but for them their homeland, wherever it may be, is a foreign country. They live in the flesh, but they are not governed by the desires of the flesh.

They pass their days upon earth, but they are citizens of heaven. Obedient to the laws, they yet live on a level that transcends the law. They suffer dishonour; they are defamed and a blessing is their answer to abuse, deference their response to insult.

We may say that the Christian is to the world what the soul is to the body. As the soul is present in every part of the body, while remaining distinct from it, so Christians are found in all the cities of the world, but cannot be identified with the world."

So, GOD MUST COME FIRST.

Secondly we are CALLED TO CHANGE.

As John Henry Newman said: "To live is to change and to be perfect is to have changed often".

The Third Building Block of Jesus' mission and ministry was OUTREACH (Matthew 5: 1-6)

We find the qualities he looked for in his Agents of Outreach in the Beatitudes:

Expectation (5:3, 6)

Commitment(5:8)

Compassion (5:7).

Unassuming ways of working (5:5)

It is interesting to note that the second half of each of the Beatitudes carries the promise of change.

We are commissioned to go out and reachout to our neighbours with God's message of love in Jesus Christ.

We are called to reach out to people who are desperately searching for identity, meaning and belonging.

When crime involving the use of knives by young people is on the increase, we can stem the tide by our outreach to young people.

A young person said to me recently, at the 'Bringing Hope' event in Birmingham,

"Knives in themselves should not be the primary target. As a Scout, I used to carry a knife, but I have never had the intention of using it to injure anyone. What should be the primary target is the intention. The intention of those who carry them and use them to injure others.

Attempting to change the behaviour of young people by tough talk will not solve it. Archie", he said, "what you must do is to get us, young people, to feel better about ourselves. Help us to achieve confidence about ourselves without needing the dangerous prop of a knife. Help us not to judge ourselves in the eyes of others. Stop viewing us through the eyes of failure. Help us to overcome self-loathing. Your job is to stop the merry-go-round of our culture of immediacy by providing us with hope and long-term solutions to our longing for belonging. To us all the brave talk and actions of adults towards young people are similar to the gang culture. We are not all bad."

Given such a challenge, how should we reach out to young people who are intent on using knives to kill?

The voice of that young person calls us to become The 18^th Camel. The eighteenth what?

You will know the story of a Bedouin father who had three sons and seventeen camels. In his will he left a half of his seventeen camels to his elder son. One-third to his second son; and one-ninth to his youngest son. The father died and the children attempted to divide the camels according to their father's will. They had great difficulty in dividing 17 camels into one-half, a third and one-ninth. So they went to consult a wise old man. He said, "Very simple. I will lend you my camel – it will be the eighteenth and you can each get what your father wanted you to have". Eureka! A half of 18 is 9; a third of 18 is 6; a ninth of 18 is 2 – making a total of 17.

The wise old man then took away his camel.

Be that eighteenth camel, that is part of the answer of being a member of the Body of Christ and not its problem or thorn in its flesh.

(Please tell the person on your left and on your right:

Be that eighteenth camel).

The remarkable thing about the eighteenth camel is that it is volunteered and responds willingly. To be a servant in the Church of God, you too are volunteered.

The call is addressed to people who are not expecting to be invited – and not those who have become their own good cause! The Church of Jesus Christ is a community where earning your place is not on offer – buying your way in isn't an option. We are called to reach out.

The Fourth Building Block for the mission and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth was LOVE. (Matthew 5:17-48, especially 17-25, 38-48)

The meaning of Christian love, Agape, is the power to love those whomwe don't like and who may not like us.

But we can only have agape, Christian love, when Jesus Christ enables us to conquer our natural tendency to anger and bitterness, and to achieve God's invincible goodwill to everyone.

Jesus Christ forbids hate altogether, and will not allow it any rightful place in our hearts.

As Yoda said to Luke Skywalker in Star Wars, "Fear leads to anger, anger to hate, and hate to the dark side."

There are two verses of scripture which begin with, "No-one has ever seen God".

The first is John 1:18 "No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known".

The second verse is 1 John 4:12. "No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us."

Two thousand years ago people saw God revealed in Christ. Today people ought to see God revealed in the life of his Body the Church. Together we ought to make visible the life of God revealed in Jesus of Nazareth.

The quality of our relationships and our worship and life in the Spirit is key. People read our lives daily. Do they see Christ – who has made God known?

We are bidden to love because Christian love makes a person act like God would act, and Christ says, "You must always act like your father in heaven" (Matthew 6:48).

'Be perfect as your Father in Heaven is perfect'. We are creaturely-made, designed and wired to act like God. That is our DNA.

The Greek word for perfect is teleios (teleios).Telos (telos) means an end, a purpose, an aim, a goal. A thing is teleios if it achieves the purpose for which it is planned.

Human beings are perfect, teleios, if they achieve the purpose for which they are created and sent into the world, with the characteristic of God, which is universal benevolence, unconquerable goodwill, constantly seeking the highest good for everyone – loving saint and sinner alike. No matter what people do to God he seeks nothing but their highest good.

Love is due to all, good and evil, just and unjust. Therefore our duty doesn't depend on theirs, neither is our spirit to be regulated by theirs.

We are, in word and action, to act like our Father in heaven. For "God makes his sun to rise on the good and the evil; he sends his rain on the just and the unjust." (Matthew 5:45)

Tell me, have you ever noticed that the sun shines on Nelson Mandela, who is loving and forgiving, and also on Robert Mugabe, who is unjust?

That's why I love Edward Denny's hymn which begins :

"What grace, O Lord, and beauty shone

Around thy steps below."

Let us stand and sing the hymn on the back of the Report on Kenya, which was put on your seat.

1. What grace, O Lord, and beauty shone
Around Thy steps below!
What patient love was seen in all
Thy life and death of woe!

2. For, ever on Thy burdened heart
A weight of sorrow hung;
Yet no ungentle, murmuring word
Escaped Thy silent tongue.

3. Thy foes might hate, despise, revile,
Thy friends unfaithful prove;
Unwearied in forgiveness still,
Thy heart could only love.

4. O give us hearts to love like Thee!
Like Thee, O Lord, to grieve
Far more for others' sins than all
The wrongs that we receive.

5. One with Thyself, may every eye
In us, Thy brethren, see
The gentleness and grace that spring
From union, Lord, with Thee.

Edward Denny 1796-1889

145 The Methodist Hymn Book

Finally, Jesus of Nazareth's building block for mission and ministry was PRAYER (Matthew 6: 1-33)

Prayer (verses 1-8) and the commitment and trust that go with it (19-24; 25-34) are vital factors without which the mission and ministry building blocks of Change, Outreach and Love, can go wrong.

We are told that one of the greatest Christian prophets of change and social action in the world that ever lived, Archbishop Helder Camara of Brazil, used to spend between two and four hours every morning in prayer.

NO CHRISTIAN IS GREATER THAN THEIR PRAYER LIFE.

We are called to let God's Kingdom come first;

we are called to change;

we are called to outreach;

we are called to love;

we are called to pray.

Let us respond to God's call wholeheartedly.

Blessed Lord

Suffer me never to think that I have knowledge
enough to need no teaching,

wisdom enough to need no correction,

talents enough to need no grace,

goodness enough to need no progress,

humility enough to need no repentance,

devotion enough to need no quickening,

strength sufficient without Your spirit;

lest, standing still, I fall back for evermore.

Eric Milner-White

Thank you for listening.