08.05.05 Jill Acts 1:6-14 Living In The Real World
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Jacob, my four year old grandson, is very clear about the imperfections of the present world and he has a very clear vision of a future Utopia. It’s also very practical and rooted in the everyday. It goes something like this… After we have missed the Number 7 bus in the morning and then caught an 11 which means we have to change buses in Princes Street to get to Nursery we’re sitting on the bus, catching our breath and Jacob says:
“In my world, when I grow up, the buses will pick you up when you’re walking in the street and take you where you want to go” and when he’s finished eating the sandwich I’ve brought with us to eat on the bus … “In my world, when I grow up, jam won’t be sticky”. If you want to know more and question him more closely about his world. Who will live there, for example, you’ll find that the buses are shaped like hamburger boxes and get a picture of a world populated by knights and samurai warriors with ingenious devices for producing exactly the clothes and food you want.
As adults we are also acutely aware of the gap between how things should be and how they actually are. As part of my job I need to put together English language training programmes for business professionals. In order to do this I’ll conduct what is known as a Needs Analysis. Briefly, this means getting a grasp of the future contexts in which my learners will need to use their English and assessing their present situation. What they can do now and what they need to be able to do in the future. The gap between the two is known as the learning gap and this is the area my course needs to fill. Simple! Or not?
As T.S.Eliott wrote so tellingly:
Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the shadow.
This theme is found in our readings today: the tension between the reality of life as we face it now and the way we would like the world to be. I’d like to focus a little, if we may, on the reading from Acts. What struck me initially when reflecting on this reading from the first chapter of Acts was the fact that the apostles appeared to have got it wrong and misunderstood so radically. They had been with Jesus throughout his ministry. They’d seen the crowds gather to witness miracles and healings. They had been privy to his thoughts and ideas and had been part of an intense, loving community with Jesus at the centre, sharing all the minutiae of daily living. They’d seen him die and had come to know him again in his risen form, learning more from him in the 40 days, according to Luke here, between his resurrection and ascension. Yet, they still clearly think that the mission of which they are part is, at least in part, a political one to release the Jews from Roman dominion, the restoration of the Kingdom of Israel. “Is it now?”, they ask, “ when you’re going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” Jesus doesn’t tell them their interpretation is wrong, or even not wholly accurate. He simply tells them it’s not for them to know the time or place, this is God’s business, not their’s. And then he leaves … suddenly and unexpectedly, leaving the group looking up in expectation of his imminent return. But two men in white robes (angels?) ask them why they’re standing there gawping, He’ll return in the same way he went.
“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up towards heaven? This Jesus who has been taken from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven”. So is the drama not to be played out to its victorious conclusion? After the pain and despair of the Crucifixion and the sudden reversal of events in the Resurrection, did they hope things could only continue to get better – and without any need for action on their part? They’d been promised an outpouring of the Spirit and might well expect this to be accompanied by more signs and wonders leading to the righting of all wrongs. But suddenly He’s gone. What now? Jesus’ followers, Luke shows us in this scene, are clearly not to spend their lives in expectation of an imminent end to the world, They must find a new relationship to this world in which they must continue to live. And so they return, to the upstairs rooms in Jerusalem (an inspiration perhaps to those of us who live/or have lived on the upper floors of Leith and Edinburgh tenements?) where, Luke tells us, Jesus’ family and “women” are part of this community, the early Church (we know in retrospect), gathered and joining in prayer together, still raw from Judas’ betrayal, yet waiting for the Holy Spirit which, they’ve been promised will empower them to be Jesus’ witnesses at home (in Jerusalem); in the wider community (Judaea) to those with whom they disagree (in Samaria) and throughout the whole world. Not really what they’d expected perhaps. And here we are today, gathered, because they were.
Does this have anything to say to us in our situation now? That age-old question reappears: How are we to live? What is our relationship to the world in which we find ourselves? Sometimes, at certain phases of our lives, maybe lasting for many years, we’re so busy: bringing up children maybe, finding a way of coping with the crises life continues to surprise us with or just making a living – that it’s enough for us to even simply trust that God will be with us in our lives and the decisions we make every day, sometimes without even realising it, when we have little time or inclination to reflect on the bigger questions. However, there are other times, I think for all of us, when we become aware of the questions and the need to take responsibility for our choices. You’ll recall the bit, perhaps, in Lord of the Rings when Frodo says he wishes he’d never set eyes on the Ring and Gandalf appears to tell him that all he has to do is decide what to do with the time that’s been given him.
I was struck the other day, watching with Rebecca, one of the interminable so-called reality TV programmes, how much our culture encourages us to live in a fantasy world of “How things should and could? be”
The perfect homes and life styles of Grand Designs – so seductive and even eco-friendly, involving focused effort so we think it’s all OK – and the only downside, when you become aware of the momentary flicker of the eyelids, is the £100, 000 or so extra it cost (but it was worth it – you can’t compromise on quality after all); the home and garden makeovers; the myriad programmes about out-of-control teens and tweenies requiring simple behaviourist techniques to make things alright after all. From the present reality to the future dream in several straightforward steps.
What messages are we getting from all of this? And is this really what it’s about? Is this how we are to live? The programme we watched was an extreme example of the genre. This was a surreal account of a poor American family whose house was remodelled in two weeks, adding an extra storey, a top of the range kitchen, fantasy bedrooms for the children and a garden incorporating a river and camping site – and it could happen to you, your time will come. Friends who’ve known friends who’ve had the teams in to remodel the house and garden have told me what’s obvious really. The gardens don’t last- it’s all been planted too quickly, no roots you see. And we all know that maintaining our houses to that level of perfection means we wouldn’t have time to do anything else. Maybe part of the fascination is simply the very human need to see how other people live. The successful and the not so successful. In the absence of real community we resort to the TV to give us access to other people’s living rooms. And there’s no denying that some of this can have some far-reaching effects which are by no means bad or necessarily contrary to Christian values. Think of Jamie Oliver’s school dinner crusade for example. Presumably if Jamie had been standing for PM he’d have won it with a landslide!
So back to the question. The answers to the question “How are we to live?” are not simple ones. Our Christian faith does not provide us with formulae with easy application although some of us have, perhaps, at different times in our lives, thought it did. But this story from Acts points us in a very different direction from the cultural messages we have consciously or unconsciously absorbed. We’re not reaching for dreams. Although not eye witnesses as the apostles were, we too have seen Jesus. We are a diverse group of people and we have encountered him in many different ways and places. Some through encounters with men and women of God who influenced us at crucial points in our lives; some through their work with poor and marginalised people here in Scotland or overseas; some through prayer and reading the scriptures or silent contemplation and reflection; through the natural world as well as in the lives of the people we meet each day - and we continue to meet Him together in the Eucharist. We too have been inspired by our encounter. We don’t always understand exactly our part in the story and are taken by surprise, often. Sometimes our interpretation of events and even our understanding of how we should be living turns out to be the wrong one but Jesus’ prayer that his disciples should be one, not removed from the world, but protected, can be claimed by us too as we attempt to live as Christ’s body in and for the world. The good news is that, unlike Frodo, we don’t have to go it alone. However we live, it seems, we’re meant to be doing it together, not in isolation, either as individuals or individual families.
And we have advantages that those early followers did not have. We can benefit from the wisdom of the Church through the centuries since those beginnings we read about which can bring rich insights and strong help to today’s concerns. Wisdom that is, not in the form of dogma, but Christian practices, ways of connecting faith with daily life, which have been shaped by Christian communities in different parts of the world over the centuries in response to God and which find new and vital forms as groups of Christians seek to reengage with this wisdom as it applies in their own different situations in the present. By Christian practices, I am thinking of shared activities that address fundamental human needs - for example, in our eco-congregation series here at St James we began to look at some of the practices related to living in right relationship to the natural world: living simply and sustainably, eating well.
There is, I believe, a desire amongst many people to make the right choices and live meaningful lives both inside and outside faith communities. For example, a recent survey showed that over 50% of new graduates going into business would prefer to work for companies following ethical policies. More and more people, given the means and the choice, opt for fairly traded products. Many are looking for ways of living their lives in a right relationship to other people and the natural world realising that our very survival may depend on this.
Like the first Church we are called to continue to find practical ways of being witnesses to Jesus in the present times. So how are we to live? Together, as the Church in the world, sustained by prayer, our worship together, our reading of the scriptures and loving and forgiving relationships with each other and God, discovering and rediscovering together how to practise our faith in ways which reach out to others in the world as it is, not how we’d like it to be. I’d like to finish by reading from a book I came across recently I found both inspiring and exciting – in fact so much so, that I’m proposing to use it as the basis for our next set of Home Group meetings. It doesn’t claim to give easy answers but to initiate a conversation rooted in Christian faith and tradition:
How can we live faithfully and with integrity here, where the pace of existence is so fast and life’s patterns are changing all around us? Can we conduct our daily lives in ways that help us not just to get by but to flourish –as individuals, as communities and as a society, in concert with all creation and in communion with God?
And as a result of the conversation perhaps we too, like the early Christians in Luke’s story, must expect to have our assumptions about God’s plans for the world set aside in order to take unexpected paths and journey into strange territory with the Holy Spirit’s guidance.