WEBVTT 00:00:00.959 --> 00:00:04.559 May I speak in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. 00:00:05.200 --> 00:00:05.839 Amen. 00:00:11.839 --> 00:00:12.640 Good morning, everyone. 00:00:12.800 --> 00:00:14.240 Lovely to see you here today. 00:00:14.480 --> 00:00:19.120 All this month, the cathedral is observing Black History Month. 00:00:19.280 --> 00:00:30.559 And so it is particularly frustrating to me that this sermon happening right now that was supposed to be delivered by a black woman is instead being delivered by a white man. 00:00:30.960 --> 00:00:35.200 There's a cruel irony to that, and I wish I was not here. 00:00:36.799 --> 00:00:44.560 But you'll notice that the service still draws together some of these themes that we observe during Black History Month. 00:00:44.640 --> 00:01:06.079 And while it's neither my experience as a white man to kind of talk into what it is to be a person of color, nor do I have any particular academic expertise in that area, I'd like us to hold that as a context that it kind of sits in the back of our minds as we reflect on the scriptures. 00:01:06.560 --> 00:01:16.159 There is, of course, another key context for us today, which is the ongoing conflict in Israel-Palestine and in Ukraine. 00:01:16.480 --> 00:01:28.400 Again, I have no particular expertise, it's not my place to comment, but I want us to have it in the back of our mind as part of the context while we reflect on the scriptures. 00:01:29.200 --> 00:01:42.400 I hope that this week you have been asking yourself, among other things, what resources do the Christian scriptures have to bear on this situation unfolding in front of me? 00:01:42.879 --> 00:02:05.439 As atrocities are taking place in our world, and as we reflect on systemic injustice with people for people of color, what resources do I have to think about those things as I turn to the scriptures, as I look at the tradition, as I reflect on the spirit and how it's moving through this world? 00:02:05.920 --> 00:02:08.639 And so that's really what I'd like to do this morning. 00:02:08.879 --> 00:02:10.800 Reflect on the scriptures with you. 00:02:10.960 --> 00:02:17.199 And then let's see if there are things to be learnt in these contexts that we draw together. 00:02:17.439 --> 00:02:24.800 So if you'd like to turn to page nine of your service sheet, we'll be looking not at the gospel reading but at Philippians chapter four. 00:02:24.960 --> 00:02:38.080 And you'll notice at the start of the second main paragraph, Paul says this I urge you, Euodia, and I urge you, Syntche, be of the same mind in the Lord. 00:02:39.439 --> 00:02:45.439 Now this should strike us as a strange thing for Paul to take his time to say. 00:02:46.479 --> 00:02:53.280 In the ancient world, letter writing is extremely was an extremely expensive practice. 00:02:53.599 --> 00:02:57.759 Paul did not just whip out his iPhone and knock out an email. 00:02:58.000 --> 00:03:03.360 He didn't just send a quick text or send someone a message on Instagram or Slack. 00:03:03.599 --> 00:03:08.800 To write a letter in the ancient world was extremely expensive and laborious. 00:03:08.960 --> 00:03:19.280 It's almost certainly the case that Paul spent weeks, if not months, preparing these letters before eventually composing and uh putting them down on paper. 00:03:19.439 --> 00:03:25.919 Often he was in prison, and so he required the equivalent of a typist to actually write the letter for him. 00:03:26.159 --> 00:03:27.680 That costs money. 00:03:27.919 --> 00:03:33.280 Ink and paper and writing implements are extremely expensive in the ancient world. 00:03:33.360 --> 00:03:40.479 And then you have to get the letter from wherever Paul is to Philippi or Ephesus or Colossae or Rome. 00:03:40.560 --> 00:03:49.039 And there aren't any safe roads in the ancient world, and so you probably have to pay for a team of people to go to get the letter where it needs to be. 00:03:50.240 --> 00:03:54.800 And so this extremely expensive form of communication. 00:03:55.280 --> 00:04:11.599 Paul spends a number of lines asking two people in the congregation in Philippi to be reconciled, have the same mind as one another, become reconciled with one another. 00:04:13.599 --> 00:04:16.079 That should strike us as strange. 00:04:16.480 --> 00:04:32.399 And the way to understand it is to remember or to discover that the book of Philippians has a center of gravity, a kind of star that sits at the center of the book around which all the other ideas orbit. 00:04:32.639 --> 00:04:50.800 And so you can read the book of Philippians as a series of short reflections or stories about people that orbit this central theme, this big idea, this star that creates the center of gravity around everything, around which everything else moves. 00:04:52.480 --> 00:04:56.240 Here's the central idea, and it's in Philippians chapter 2. 00:04:56.480 --> 00:04:58.560 This might be familiar to some of you. 00:04:58.800 --> 00:05:00.240 Philippians chapter 2. 00:05:00.399 --> 00:05:22.800 Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality as God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking on the form of a slave and being found in human likeness, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross. 00:05:23.120 --> 00:05:39.920 Therefore, God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. 00:05:41.199 --> 00:05:52.399 This was almost certainly a hymn that the early church sang together, and so Paul makes that the center of his letter, and then all these other ideas kind of orbit around it. 00:05:52.639 --> 00:06:16.480 And so Paul, in this letter, um, sorry, this hymn that Paul is quoting summarizes the Christian good news that Jesus Christ was equal and is equal with the Father, sat in heaven above, and yet he emptied himself and humbled himself, humbled himself from heaven to earth, and then humbled himself all the way to death on the cross. 00:06:17.839 --> 00:06:26.720 He took on the weight of our sin and brought upon himself the death that we should experience, the brokenness of our world. 00:06:28.800 --> 00:06:33.199 And now he's exalted, he's been raised to new life. 00:06:33.920 --> 00:06:56.639 Now, did you notice at the start of the hymn and at the start of what Paul says to Eudekai and Syndechi, he uses the same phrase, be of the same mind in the Lord, Eudekai and Syndicai, Syndechi, and in Philippians 2, be of the same mind that was in Christ Jesus, who though who was the very nature of God, etc., etc. 00:06:58.800 --> 00:07:08.079 Paul is inviting Eudeki and Syndicate to live the same life that Jesus lived, a life of humility. 00:07:08.560 --> 00:07:20.879 And this way of Jesus is completely opposed, completely backwards, completely upside down to the way of the world that was the case in the Roman Empire and continues to be the case today. 00:07:22.240 --> 00:07:29.120 When we are in conflict with one another, we make ourselves big and we make other people small. 00:07:29.279 --> 00:07:37.759 We puff up our own achievements and our own position, our own point of view, so that we can dominate and beat the other person or people. 00:07:38.399 --> 00:07:47.360 We grasp at our power and take advantage to keep ourselves safe and get ourselves in front of others. 00:07:49.759 --> 00:07:51.519 What happens when we do that? 00:07:51.839 --> 00:08:06.000 Well, Jesus is at pains to remind us that the first shall be last and the last shall be first, that those who try to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for his sake will ultimately find new life in him. 00:08:06.639 --> 00:08:14.800 And that, as I have often said, resurrection is only and always found on the far side of death. 00:08:15.199 --> 00:08:25.199 If you want to live new resurrection life, the only life that really matters, it can only and always be found on the far side of death. 00:08:26.959 --> 00:08:33.919 That's the idea at the center of this book, the star around which all these other ideas orbit. 00:08:34.320 --> 00:08:49.200 And Paul quotes the book, quotes the hymn, and then reminds Eudekai and Syntachi live like that, live that way, be reconciled to one another by living the life that Jesus lived. 00:08:51.120 --> 00:08:52.799 Here's a question for us this morning. 00:08:52.960 --> 00:08:55.200 How does that work itself out in practice? 00:08:55.360 --> 00:09:02.000 Particularly bearing in mind these contexts that we referenced at the start of the sermon. 00:09:02.320 --> 00:09:06.559 Well, let me introduce you to someone who I think is very helpful in this regard. 00:09:06.960 --> 00:09:15.840 Moroslav Wolf in uh 2002 wrote this book, and it's a book called Exclusion and Embrace. 00:09:16.240 --> 00:09:19.440 Exclusion and Embrace by Moroslav Wolf. 00:09:19.519 --> 00:09:23.200 Moroslav was born in 1956. 00:09:23.600 --> 00:09:33.200 He was a Croat who was born in what was then called Yugoslavia, and that means that in his mid-30s, war broke out. 00:09:33.360 --> 00:09:48.240 He was in his mid-30s when war broke out, a series of independent wars across Yugoslavia that lasted about 10 years from 1991 to 2001, across Slovenia and Croatia and Bosnia and Kosovo. 00:09:49.279 --> 00:09:56.159 At the time, that war was considered Europe's deadliest armed conflict since the Second World War. 00:09:56.240 --> 00:10:06.000 And it was marked by many war crimes, including genocide, crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing, to name just a few of the horrors. 00:10:06.559 --> 00:10:10.000 And Moroslav was uh involved in that conflict. 00:10:10.080 --> 00:10:19.840 He was called into active service during the uh during the um during the wars, and he was also a theologian. 00:10:20.240 --> 00:10:39.279 And so he wrote this book, Exclusion and Embrace, reflecting on the wars that went through his homeland, and reflecting on what we've just been describing, the mandate to live as people who follow Jesus, who lay down their lives for the sake of their enemies. 00:10:39.600 --> 00:10:45.360 At the center of this book is a metaphor that I'd like to share with us this morning. 00:10:47.600 --> 00:10:53.600 Moroslav describes an embrace or a hug in four stages. 00:10:54.399 --> 00:10:58.159 He says, Stage one is opening up your arms. 00:10:58.720 --> 00:11:05.440 In opening up your arms to the other, you're creating space for them, literally, physically, here. 00:11:06.240 --> 00:11:14.240 You wait, that's stage two, with your arms open wide, hoping that they will come and embrace you. 00:11:15.120 --> 00:11:25.519 Stage three is the act of embrace, where suddenly there are not one people but two people reconciled together, embracing one another. 00:11:25.679 --> 00:11:29.039 So I'm embracing you and you're embracing me. 00:11:29.679 --> 00:11:44.879 And stage four, the opening of the arms again, the separating out, so that we don't assimilate each other into one space, but we find opportunity for people to live independently and together. 00:11:46.559 --> 00:11:51.919 It's a very potent way of describing the process of reconciliation. 00:11:52.399 --> 00:12:00.720 Arms open wise, waiting, embracing, and then opening up once again. 00:12:07.360 --> 00:12:18.080 That I think is a way of thinking about the way of Jesus, the way of humility and love in the midst of awful situations. 00:12:20.799 --> 00:12:34.960 I hope that as we're reflecting on these things, you are bearing it in mind in the contexts in which we live, in our hopes for our relationships with other ethnicities, as we work together for a fairer society. 00:12:35.759 --> 00:12:43.360 Our hopes and prayers for some awful conflicts that are in the world that are happening right now, today. 00:12:44.720 --> 00:12:56.720 Perhaps also in conflicts in your own life, as you think about your relationship with your spouse or your children or your partner or the people that you work and live with. 00:12:58.320 --> 00:13:15.679 And of course, as an image of Christ on the cross, who opens wide his arms and waits, waits for you and I to draw near, to be embraced, to find a way of living with him, following him. 00:13:19.679 --> 00:13:20.320 Amen.