Making church attractive

Matthew 4: 12 - 23 

Simon, Andrew, James and John immediately left their nets and followed him. Jesus walking by the sea of Galilee simply had to call and these capable fishermen, who knew their trade, learned from their father's hands came straight away

For some years I was a vocations advisor for St Alban's diocese, part of a tiny team that shepherded people from initial wondering to becoming ordinands, training for the priesthood. In the way of central organisations the Church sprang up a target, that we should double the number of people going forward for training. You know the sort of thing, a strategist in Church House sees that there are many priests coming towards retirement so tells the far away churches to double the new candidates and naturally to halve their average age as well. Pressure soon fell on us, there were fewer than eight of us, so we began to think again about how people might be called.

Jumping ahead, I want to tell you that people are coming forward in greater numbers so please be encouraged. Be encouraged too by the quality of candidates. My role was to see those who were at the earliest stages of questioning. They came from all walks of life, several standing out but let me illustrate with one example. Min Min, British of Chinese heritage had excelled at Oxford, gone on to take a doctorate, joined a prestigious biochemical research centre and in between times had trained as a professional soprano. Now she was in my front room timidly sharing her sense of being tugged towards becoming a priest so that I could recommend her to others in the diocese. She knew her trade, was prepared to leave it and by the way did go on to be ordained. She left her nets.

I have to say though that her initial call was nothing to do with the vocation team. We did of course mount road shows, travel to preach in likely places, we worked to drum up interest but this is such a minor part of the story.

Returning to the shores of Galilee Jesus must have been astonishingly attractive, his just walking by ignited a spark in those fishermen who said to themselves "I want to know more about this, there is something interesting here for me, let us see.

Before the many who came to see me on my sofa, they had been attracted to church in some way. In my experience this always comes first, I have not seen a full sudden out of the blue conversion from nothing to fervent activity, even these first disciples had years of learning before understanding. 

Above all then today's church needs to be attractive. Jesus was.

For The Saxon Shore Kirsty, Rachel and James certainly have a part to play by their leadership but the attraction of All Saints Thornham will be more than that, it will be created actually by you. In your community your neighbours when meeting you will notice what you show from being a part of this place, in the way you are individually and the way we are as a congregation.

Frances and I have recently been exploring churches in Bedfordshire, concentrating of course on those with churchmanship that we prefer, and in fact on the smaller rural ones. We have landed on one where we find the congregation friendly and warm, where the village concerned seems to have a good connection, in short one that we find attractive. It is a subtle blend of sufficient attentiveness and visible relationships. This is what I would encourage you to continue to develop your way of being together so that those you meet and who live here say to themselves "I want to know more about this, there is something interesting here for me, let us see. “   Amen

The Flying Scotsman

You will have heard many a clergy person contrast the hurly burly pressure filled advertisement soaked run up to Christmas with the true nature of the Advent season, which to remind you is reflective, penitent, peaceful the season of waiting. But I wonder has it done any good? There is an upside down feeling about the church’s calendar and the one the world is on. I once had a parish where church services were held in a building that doubled as a community centre and village hall. At this time of year the hall would be fully crammed with tinsel and parties for everyone from the buggy group to the old age pensioners and many in between. We of course in our purple are in the season of fasting, Christmastide our season of feasting begins on Christmas day and continues for a few weeks afterwards - by then the hall was booked out with weight watcher meetings. 

The world turns, the Christmas engine is running at high speed (We enjoyed last year’s television broadcast of all the preparations which are made here for example) so let’s just accept that this is the way it is, we ARE in the season of rush not the season of waiting.

My wife Frances among other things is interested in trains while as everyone knows I am interested in old books. In a rare confluence of interest I was reading about the Flying Scotsman in a 1936 account in its heyday. The article was called “The Great North Road of Steel” and is starry eyed about the efforts made to make the journey in the announced time. The train left Kings Cross at 10.00 a.m. precisely, while its sister simultaneously left Edinburgh. So well tuned was the system that the point where the trains passed one another, near Tollerton, could be pinned down to within a yard or so. To manage the non stop trip there was a relief crew on board.

They reached the footplate through a specially constructed passage that made its way through the tender where they could swap with the first team without stopping the train. The engine began with 5000 gallons of water in its tank which needed replenishing, so the tender as well as this secret passage was fitted with a device for filling the tank while the train travelled. For this purpose long water troughs were laid between the rails - at Stevenage, Peterborough, Newark, Scrooby, Northallerton and Bedford - and at the appropriate points the engine driver operates a control lowering a scoop up which the water is forced by the speed at which the train is travelling. By this method an additional 8000 gallons is picked up; every pick up had to be timed to the instant since the scoop was in the water trough for only a few seconds. 

So here we are rushing towards the 25th December and I suggest we too need replenishing. Maybe we can learn from the non-stop Flying Scotsmen and replenish on the move?

Prayerfulness is most often characterised as times of stillness, of quiet, times set aside to be with God and these is important , valuable, I would say vital practice. But what if we during our headlong business lower a  scoop and pick up nourishment as we go along? Well we can, in all our days there are moments in between for example when we turn from one thing to another or occasionally when we have to wait for someone or something. However brief these are moments for effective praying, maybe about your next task, about someone, about your present anxieties, about the world - God will hear, his troughs of spiritual blessing are not limited to Peterborough or Newark but are there for us to dip into all the time and even if only for a few seconds we will find refreshment.  

Amen

Being With

“Rabbi, where are you staying?” and He said “Come and See.” They came and they remained with him that day.

Which reminds me of an exploratory trip I made to see my school friend Charles then already up at St. Catherines who invited me and two people I did not know to his college rooms. We spent the afternoon there, talking of fine things, I mostly listened being only a lowly sixth former, but I remember our talking about William Golding’s novel The Spire, watching abortive attempts to toast crumpets on the wall mounted electric fire and discovering another way of learning, by coversation, by sharing, by being with. 

Andrew and his companion are alerted by John the Baptist that Jesus is worth getting to know; so they already recognize his potential as a teacher. “Rabbi” they say and Jesus invites them, two people he has only just met, to his lodging. This account of the calling of Andrew is so very different from those in Mark’s and Mathew’s Gospels where the fishermen immediately leave their nets as Jesus calls them to be fishers of men. Here in John’s Gospel we find an encouragement for us: The stories of sudden conversion, by the sea of Galilee, those abounding in the book of Acts and more recent ones for example that of John Newton, author of Amazing Grace, converted when saved from imminent shipwreck, perhaps leave us looking for and expecting moments of brilliant revelation. But it is not always the case, actually I suggest more rarely the case. The number of blinding flashes on the road to Damascus are outweighed by stories of a gradual dawning of understanding and a deepening of belief from the faithful imbibing of God’s teaching, from scripture, from theology and yes from conversation with and participation with others.

Andrew’s perspective is so changed by his long afternoon with the Lamb of God, the presence, charisma and astonishing attraction of Jesus must have been there, but Andrew gains far more from being with him - now he has a depth of belief which leads Andrew to “straight away” find his brother and tell him (he cannot keep it in) “We have found the Messiah.” From Rabbi to Messiah in an afternoon is a big jump, a huge learning. John, who was himself a leader of a learning community, seems to be telling us not to simply wait but to actively take the chances to be exposed. We heard this New Year in the census that the number of people  declaring to be Christian has again fallen - one of the things that I have been noticing for a long time is the paradox that our multimedia world narrows rather than widens our knowledge. It is just so easy to find a group or a programme which conforms to one of our interests or point of view that we do not find the others. How will secularists discover Christianity?

Which brings me (at last you say) to Jesus. You notice ini the account that he is walking by. He is on his way somewhere but when Andrew and his friend call he stops. He makes time for them, so much so indeed that he invites them, two strangers, to his room to spend time together. We can imagine them discussing the world, studying scripture, toasting crumpets maybe, in any case getting to know one another. That is after all the reason to meet with people, to get to know them better. When did you when you were walking by last begin a conversation with a stranger, someone you meet in the supermarket, the post-office, the pub, the marketplace?

To get to know God better we need to copy Andrew, and spend time with him

To bring others to know God we need to copy Jesus and invite them into the conversation.

Amen