Dear Friends,

I wonder if you know the story in the bible about Lot’s wife? With her husband and children she was rescued from the town of Sodom, and told not to look back as Sodom and Gomorrah were being destroyed. But she did look back and was turned into a pillar of salt. A Sunday school teacher was telling the children this (rather horrific!) story and one child piped up: “My mum was driving to Sainsburys yesterday and she turned into a tree!”

Jokes and scary bible stories aside, we do well to look back. Soren Kierkegaard, the Danish philosopher, said: “Life can only be understood backwards but it must be lived forwards.”

Towards the end of the day is a great time to spend a few minutes reflecting on the day, replaying the parts we can remember. I often understand things better looking back, playing the scenes over in my mind, and sometimes notice things I haven’t noticed during the day.

I might recall that Gerald was unusually preoccupied when we met, or wonder why Jenny wasn’t at her desk, or suddenly realise what I’d said to Chris on the phone that made him so frosty. It’s a good thing to do as a regular way of prayer – reflecting on the day with God, thanking him, asking help, praying for people I’ve met and noting tasks to do – like saying sorry!

It’s the same only bigger looking back on a year. Reflecting on what I’ve made time for, what or who I’ve neglected, how much holiday or retreat time I’ve taken, how much I’m drinking, how much I’ve given to charity – all in all a sort of (gentle!) audit.

And it’s the looking back, the real experience of life, that helps us look forward and know we can live a bit differently, think about changing jobs, spend more time with children, go to the gym, use up less of the planet’s resources…

We are constantly having to ‘move on’. We’re growing up, leaving school, learning to live independently, in a new job, a new relationship, we’ve become parents (again), we’re learning to live with limited mobility or without a loved one by our side. Life always comes as a package, some of which we shape and some of which simply happens to us.

I think experience teaches us (mostly!) that we are far stronger than we think we are; we cope with situations that we would have found it hard to contemplate. We have deep resources. God has given us deep resources, not least that he walks alongside us and gives us one another.

I think experience teaches us that we can embrace the new things, and the gradually changing things, in life, with hope and trust in the good purposes of God. Our package of life will contain some hard things, and will bring us into some seriously hard times, but St Paul gives some good advice to the Christians in Philippi:

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

Paul goes on to urge us to fill our minds with whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely and admirable… That is probably the best way to a happy new year for each of us and the people who live with us.

As Dag Hammarskjold famously said: “For all that has been – thanks. For all that will be – yes.”

With love,

Graham

Dear Friends

Advent is not just a time of waiting for Christmas, it is a time of preparation so we can be ready in our hearts and minds and spirits to celebrate the coming of God as a human being into our world.

But we are not good at waiting! The people of Sudan and Uganda are much better at waiting than we are in this part of the world. That is perhaps because there is much waiting to be done there!

It’s not a joyless waiting, in spite of the difficulties. Singing and dancing, smiling and laughter, coming together to celebrate and share food, are all things that come naturally to the Ugandans and Sudanese whom I know. For all our plenty we celebrate a lot less and complain a lot more!

For those who have the resources here, almost everything can be had immediately, next day delivery. Christmas can be the culmination of a period of indulgence rather than abstinence.

Any yet, like it or not, understand it or not, the world is waiting, waiting, waiting for an end to darkness and chaos. It waited a very long time for Jesus to come the first time. We’ve only waited 2,000 years so far for Jesus to come back. But he will. God is making us wait for the new heavens and the new earth. Advent is a time to remember that all of creation is waiting, with a hope that is steadfast and certain. And a time to remember (and reach out to help) those whose waiting is particularly dark and painful.

Amidst our plenty there is still real poverty, isolation and mental torment right on our doorstep. We reflect on these things NOT to limit our joy or our celebration, but to make it more real and expand it to include more people. We offer back to God our time and our prayers and our money so more people can know they are blessed this Christmas.

In Advent, we do a lot of publicity about Christmas services and events. It’s amazing how much publicity (not ours obviously!) either omits basic details (such as the time of an event) or makes them hard to read because they are too small or the poster is cluttered or the words blend in with the background.

At our recent Prayer Day Bishop Helen-Ann of Ripon reminded us that from ancient times Jewish scholars have described scripture as written with BLACK fire and WHITE fire. The BLACK fire is the actual words on the page or scroll written in black ink. The WHITE fire is the spaces behind and in between which give a context, a background against which the words are read and understood.

There’s much to be reflected on in this analogy, but one thought came strongly to me at the Advent Day of Prayer. We, individually and together, are the background against which the ‘Word made flesh’ Jesus Christ is seen in our town.

So at Christmas many people hear the reading of scripture, see nativity plays and join in the singing of carols. Through this they may see Jesus. They do that in a context, against a background. We are that background. Does who we are help people to see Jesus and the true meaning of Christmas? Or do we distract from the main message by not framing the word clearly. Maybe we put in too many other words and they distract from the Word himself.

The BLACK letters of scripture stand out because they are clear against a WHITE background. To be this kind of background we need to “cast away the works of darkness and put on the armour of light”(from the Advent Sunday collect). That’s about using some of our waiting time to let God shape and mould us more into the people he wants us to be – more loving, more resistant to the selfish desires that come from without and within.

May we all use the waiting, reflecting time of Advent to be a better background against which Jesus can be seen!

And when it does come, have a wonder-filled Christmas!

With love

Graham

Dear Friends,

Janet and I brought our son Tim to Bath last week for the start of his second year. We drove to Sainsbury’s to do some shopping.

Like they do in Otley, Sainsbury’s have a camera which records your car’s number plate as you enter the store’s car park. You have 90 minutes allowed before you become liable to a fine for staying too long.

We were in a queue of cars moving very slowly. I let the car ahead drive on and watched its number plate appear on the screen overhead. Once it was through I accelerated a bit so that I passed quickly past the camera’s view. Our car’s number plate did not show on the screen. We watched the car behind us pass through and its number appeared as normal. We had got through undetected!

I’m not telling you this so you can try it out on the camera as you enter the Otley Sainsbury’s! It made me think about getting in under the radar. About doing something and not being noticed.

At the time I was thinking about the sermon for last Sunday from Mark 9. The disciples are travelling with Jesus and arguing about who is the greatest among them. They must have been confident he was out of earshot. I imagine it was a rolling conversation – a recurring thread in many conversations throughout the day, with plenty of banter. At the end of the day in Peter’s house, there is silence as Jesus asks them what they were discussing on the road. But of course he knows. He always seems to know.

A favourite Psalm which I often reflect on is Psalm 139 which begins:
“You have searched me, Lord, and you know me.”

The psalm speaks of God’s intimate knowledge of each one of us from the moment of our conception, and every moment of every day. So verse 2:
“You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.”
There’s no getting under God’s radar. And that’s a bit scary. So verse 7:
“Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?”

But God is love. He may be grieved by our behaviour, but Jesus shows us how extraordinarily patient and kind he is. Instead of condemning the disciples, Jesus teaches them a better way: the one who would be first (the greatest) must be the servant of all. He puts a small child in their midst  as an example of those they must particularly serve – the ones society considers least important and who cannot repay or reward them.

Two things particularly help us to live with the fact that we can never do anything under the radar with God. The first and most important is that God knows us and loves us. There is nothing we can say or do to make God love us any less.

The second is to learn to love ourselves ‘warts and all’, the way God loves us. This enables an honest humility about the fact that we frequently ‘get it wrong’. Which in turn enables us to stop our anxious self-justification or denial and accept correction. And in this way we allow God to help us grow and gradually become more fully the people he intends us to be.

Every blessing

Graham

Dear Friends,

I am intrigued by a book I was given to read by my son, Mark. Its title is Feral by George Montbiot (published by Penguin in 2014). Some of it is an easy read, some not.

His basic argument is that the world, especially the more ‘developed’ world needs rewilding. The environment has been woefully depleted by clearing forests and the countryside for farming. (He has a particular dislike for sheep and their destructive grazing habits.)

But the longing which he expresses for a world where nature is allowed to run its course less hindered by human intervention, is not just about the ecology of land and sea. It is about how we human beings live and interact with our environment in a fulfilling way. Our lives need rewilding!

Environmentalists tend to focus on changing our behaviour to do less damage, to pollute less, to waste less, to travel less, to leave less of a footprint. While all these things are good they do not address the ‘tameness’ of our lives. Possibly quite the reverse. We were meant for a closer engagement with nature than feeding the ducks!

In the 18^thcentury North America, there are many recorded instances where ‘white’ people of European descent were captured and ended up living freely among Native American communities, and also where Native American (Indian) people were captured before living freely among white communities.

Whenever given the choice to return to their own people, Europeans (men and women) chose to stay with the Native Americans and Native Americans chose to return to their own communities (pages 44-46). The more confined, settled life of the people of European descent was almost universally rejected in favour of a more mobile, free and uncertain life – a more fulfilling life. I think we suffer from thinking our way of life is better than others.

250 years on, more than ever, we suffer from “spirits oppressed by pleasure, wealth and care” as Timothy Dudley-Smith writes in his hymn ‘Lord, for the Years’. The spiritual malaise that comes from too much time and resources spent on our entertainment, while much of the world around us suffers from deprivation.

It’s true that our lives can be suddenly upended by a medical diagnosis, a tragic accident or life-changing event, but mostly we have stable lives. Safe even. We may not always feel ‘safe’, but in comparison with the rest of the world it is surely so.

George Montbiot convinces me that the ecology of land and sea needs rewilding, not least because human beings need it. Our lives need physical and other challenges that are worthy of the people we are made to be. We need bigger challenges than a video game.

We behave as if some things in our world are extinct when they are not. We (men and women!) need to become the hunters we once were. Together we need to hunt and destroy poverty, prejudice and exclusion. We need to hunt and destroy corruption. We need to hunt and destroy loneliness and isolation, mental and physical diseases and much much more. Everyone who takes up the hunt will find it challenging and rewarding.

For me this is abundant life. The life Jesus calls us to. Costly, risky, swimming against the current, free and fulfilled.

With my love and prayers,

Graham

Dear Friends

I don’t have too many memories of my mother. She died when I was 12. But one memory was stirred by the royal wedding.

I must have been about 9 years old when a BBC documentary was made about the royal family. Being Irish, we were hardly royalists, but watched the programme at our home in Dublin anyway.  I barely remember anything about it except that I ended up thinking how lucky the royal children were and that I’d very much like to be a prince!

When I told my mother that I’d like to be a prince, I remember being surprised by her response. I can’t recall in detail what she said except that she helped me imagine what it would really be like to be a prince, and basically how hard it would be. She certainly shattered my illusions and I can remember feeling a little bit sorry for the princes – though still slightly jealous of them.

I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with boys or girls wanting to be princesses or princes, or dressing up and acting out roles. We need to encourage imaginative play among children and perhaps among adults too.

Imagination can lead one astray, or make one fearful, as happens to Will Thacker when he turns down Anna Scott in the film “Notting Hill”. Julia Roberts plays Hollywood film star Anna, who asks Will (Hugh Grant) to look beyond his anxiety about the Hollywood razzamatazz and see who she really is: “.. just a girl standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her.” (Still brings tears to my eyes!)

A disciplined and adult imagination helps us understand many situations. When we imagine what it is like to be in someone else’s shoes it can change our attitude and draw us into prayer and action.

Understanding someone’s situation leads to a natural empathy, but we may have to work hard at it. Just as a prince isn’t defined by being a prince, so many of the labels we give people do not define them but we can be lazy and not look beyond them. Hatred and prejudice is so often a failure of the imagination.

A little knowledge and a bit of imagination might cause us to look out for someone who’s just had a baby, or someone who is new to our neighbourhood. It may lead us to support a foreigner seeking asylum, or pray for our government, or for a just peace in Syria, or lead us to give money to the work of Joanna among prostitutes in Leeds

Our own imagination, our own ability to visualise any situation will be limited in many ways, but other people can help us see our blind spots and fill in some of our lack of experience or knowledge. It’s good to have friends and be part of a broad community that does that.

As a child I made a superficial judgement about other people’s lives. I fear that I still sometimes do that! But I am constantly challenged by Jesus’ command to love one’s neighbour as oneself. That requires a lot of imagination.

With love,

Graham

Dear Friends,

A member of our congregation recently said these or similar words to me: “I can accept all the stories of Jesus up to the crucifixion, but I’m really not sure about the resurrection.”

I suspect that there are quite a few people who think the same, from within our Church and from the wider community. The reasoning for this is simple. People don’t rise from the dead, so the resurrection couldn’t have happened.

What is strange is that I’m fairly sure this person believes in God. Not some little god, but God the creator of heaven and earth. A supreme being, shrouded in mystery certainly, but nonetheless ruling over all things.

If there is such a God, then nothing is impossible for him / her. Raising up someone from death to new and eternal life is only strange to us because God doesn’t usually do it. Presumably the one who is responsible for creating our massive universe, possibly many universes, is capable of far more than we can ask or imagine.

So, why did God intervene to do this extraordinary thing? Why would he break all the laws of nature which he had set up? Obviously it was for something very important.

The resurrection of Jesus to a new and eternal life is the foundation of our Christian faith. It is the guarantee that we are not trapped in a closed world, a world inevitably ending in death and destruction. It is the triumph of love over evil and death.

The resurrection of Jesus is the vindication of all he said and did, declaring with power that he is the Son of God. It is the assurance that we are destined for life forever in a healed universe. Jesus is the firstborn into that new creation, and there is a place for us all there.

When I was visiting a Masai village in Kenya, I heard how the President of Kenya had visited the village a few weeks before. All the children were very excited that day, as well as the adults. But the adults kept the children away from the President, until it was time for them to sing their song.

Having sung their song, the children were supposed to wave farewell and retreat to the outskirts of the gathering. But one brave boy ran to where the President was seated and put his head down to be greeted. (Masai children approach you and bow their head expecting you to bless them by putting your hand on the top of their head. If you don’t they gently head-butt you!)

When the President put his hand on the child’s head in a friendly and welcoming manner, all the children rushed forward and queued up to be similarly blessed by the President.

This is an illustration of what Jesus has done for us. Jesus the Son of God, risen from death, goes into the presence of God the Father, pioneering the way for all of us. So we follow him boldly, assured of our welcome.

Graham

Dear Friends,

Last century (!) I arrived as vicar in Otley. It was 1999. At the end of that year, to mark the beginning of the new millennium, the Chevin cross was first erected. It was the first time the new cross (crafted by Brent Thompson) had been raised on the Chevin, and it was the first and only time it has been raised up for New Year. Normally it only goes up over the Easter period.

Before coming to Otley, my family and I had been living and working among Sudanese refugees in Northern Uganda. One of the things that amazed us, again and again, was how there were always plenty of stories of hope in the bleakest of situations. For all Christians, the cross is the great symbol of hope, but especially for those experiencing great suffering. It tells the story of a God who made us and loves us and suffers with us. A God who shares our life and death.

The wood that made the Chevin cross was rescued from the debris of the massive IRA bomb of 1996 in Manchester. A symbol of hope emerging from the bleakest of situations. And drawing together, for me, the very different worlds of Sudan and England, because we all need light in the darkness whether we are grieving over the death of a loved one here or in a refugee camp in Northern Uganda.

Jesus’ cry from the cross (“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”) is his own cry, but it is also humanity’s cry from around the world and through history. It is a cry we have probably all made at some time from the depths of our pain. We experience the apparent triumph of evil. It seems that God is defeated. Darkness and death have overcome. But the triumph of evil is short-lived and ultimately an illusion. On the third day Jesus rises to new life. The cross is empty because Jesus is alive.

So the cross reveals much more than ‘God with us’ in our darkness. It is a symbol of his victory over death and evil. Jesus rose to new life with a resurrection body, the first-born of a healed creation. He has pioneered the way to heaven, the kingdom of God, and promises to prepare a place for us.

Throughout my time here I have met countless people who have found the cross on the Chevin an inspiration. Many of those people are not ‘churchgoers’, but the cross speaks deeply to them and they respond. Many of the folk who turn up to put up the cross or take it down are not ‘churchgoers’ either. But each one is known and cherished by God.

Thus the cross draws us to God and draws us together from all our various ‘worlds’, lighting our darkest places and inviting us to face the future with hope. Always with hope.

With much love,

Graham

Dear Friends,

I went to see the latest Star Wars film with my son Tim a few weeks ago. He got the student rate of £7.00. I was surprised to find that the total cost for our tickets was £14.00. The mathematicians among you will quickly work out that I paid the same price as Tim. But I’m not a student.

When I looked at the ticket I had been given it said ‘SENIOR’. Apparently, you need to be over 60 to get this discount at a regular showing. I’M NOT ANYWHERE NEAR THAT AGE I screamed inside. Not quite truthfully. And not loud enough for the man behind the counter to hear. I’m not opposed to a discount. But at the cost of being an OLD AGE PENSIONER???

I was immediately reminded of the last time I can remember being humiliated about my age with Tim. It was a long time ago and he was a toddler. We were on a ferry crossing to France, and Tim was on my shoulders as we watched a magician doing a kids’ show. When volunteers were asked for, Tim’s hand went straight up (just as it has done ever since in any situation where volunteers are asked for!).

The magician pointed and called him out: “Yes, you on your grandad’s shoulders”. Grandad? GRANDAD??? I may have had grey hair but I wasn’t a day over 40. Well, maybe 43. Okay I was 44.

One much-loved elderly member of our congregation used to say “The best is yet to come.” She meant eternal life. On other occasions, feeling the frustrations of old age, she would say “well, at least it’s better than the alternative.” Obviously, there is a conflict between these sentiments but they are both real, and in different ways they both express optimism and humour. Great qualities in the face of any struggle.

When Mary and Joseph bring the baby Jesus into the Temple in Jerusalem, they meet Simeon and Anna. Two elderly people. Both are faithful, patient and deeply spiritual. They recognise who Jesus is. They honour him, and they have an honourable place in his story.

By the end of 2018, if we are spared, we will all be a year older. We will also have had many opportunities to grow spiritually. Could we grow a year wiser, a year more secure in God’s love? What can help that happen?

We have many examples to learn from in Scripture and in our community today. A good sense of humour and some words of St Paul may help all of us who are feeling our age:
“Therefore, we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.” (2 Corinthians 4:16)

With much love,

Graham

Dear Friends,

One evening recently, Janet and I decided to relax and watch a film at home. That was the easy decision. As usual, it got a bit harder when we asked each other, “What would you like to watch?”

We had a few new DVDs to choose from and settled on what looked like a good love story (“fabulously romantic” the cover proclaims) called ‘United Kingdom’ about a black man and a white woman and “a love that shook an empire”. We didn’t read the blurb on the back of the box, but with the lovely Rosamund Pike on the cover we thought were onto a winner.

A winner it proved to be but not quite as we imagined it. ‘United Kingdom’ is a wonderful film based on a true story and set in the late 1940s and early 1950s. But we were watching anything but light entertainment. Rosamund Pike plays Ruth Williams, the London office worker who falls in love with black student Seretse Kharma, played by David Oyelowo. Seretse turns out to be king of Bechuanaland (modern Botswana) which rather complicates their relationship!

They marry in 1948 in the face of fierce opposition from both their families and despite attempts by the British government to prevent it. They soon move to Bechuanaland, for Seretse to take up his rightful position as king. But this too is fraught with difficulty and opposition. Seretse’s uncle opposes his being accepted as king. The British government opposes it because Seretse is married to a white woman and in neighbouring South Africa apartheid is raising its ugly head and Britain has economic and political reasons to keep South Africa happy.

What on earth has this got to do with Christmas?

At first glance, the Christmas story can also look like a lovely heart-warming story – a young couple in love on an exciting journey to the man’s home area, some fluffy farm animals and a chubby baby who gets lots of lovely and mysterious visitors. Delightful, unchallenging entertainment.

However, the Christmas story turns out to be about a severe testing, and the ultimate triumph, of love in the most difficult and sometimes brutal circumstances. It too is about a king as yet unrecognised. It too takes place amid the machinations of local politics and of a colonial empire. Like Ruth Williams, Mary is a young inexperienced girl who says ‘yes’ without any real idea of what saying ‘yes’ means, and finds herself thrust from her sheltered life into a story that will cause “the falling and rising of many”.

Our society would like to put Santa Claus at the heart of Christmas and sideline the birth of Jesus to a lovely undemanding story such as we enjoy in many a nativity play. But it’s not entertainment.

So this Christmas let’s enter into the extraordinary tale of Jesus’ birth in a way that’s faithful to the original reality. It won’t be so comfortable but it will surely be inspiring.

Have a great Christmas!

Graham

Dear Friends

You may have heard a story like this of one elderly couple who were troubled by hearing problems….

John was becoming increasingly frustrated with his wife’s inability to hear what he said. “I can hear you quite well thank you” Ada would say.

So John told her he was going to test her hearing. Later that day, when Ada was in the kitchen, he went into the hall and asked in his normal voice “What are you cooking for tea, my love?” No reply.

John moved into the sitting room nearer to the kitchen and asked in the same voice “What are you cooking for tea, my love?” No reply.

Finally John stood at the door of the kitchen and repeated “What are you cooking for tea, my love?” Ada replied “For the third time, John, I’m cooking chicken casserole!”

A friend of mine was talking recently about the US Presidential election, pondering how Donald Trump came to be elected. He told me Hilary Clinton had written a book reviewing what happened. He hadn’t read the book but he had read several reviews of it in the press. He said the reviews could be summarised as “Why everyone else was to blame for my failure to get elected.”

I don’t know if that is a fair summary or not. But I do know that both these situations illustrate a common human failing which we probably all share to some extent. We find it hard to admit our own weaknesses or failings. We can be very good at justifying ourselves, and letting others bear the blame. We can often think that the problem is with someone else when we may actually be the problem ourselves. Sorry may indeed be the hardest word.

On a personal level this is destructive, since good relationships can only be built on honesty and a degree of self-awareness. On a bigger level, as a society, when we are blind to our own failings we find scapegoats, classes of people to blame. Usually people who are ‘not like us’. People we can label, make generalisations about, and readily de-humanise.

In this scenario, where people lack the humility, or the wisdom, to acknowledge their failings, it is perhaps inevitable that people blame God for the bad things that happen in the world, while failing to credit him with all the good things. God is ‘in the dock’ and we are pointing the finger at him.

A greater humility and honesty about our own failings allows us to receive the mercy of God. It enables us to discover that the fault lines in our own hearts and minds and souls are connected to the fault lines we see in other people, and in creation itself. All is in need of healing. And in discovering the healing mercy of God for ourselves, we are re-connected to the source of healing for all of creation.

God is speaking to us all the time. Until we acknowledge that the problem of hearing him is with us not him, we can’t progress in the relationship, nor have we much to offer a world which is deaf to his voice.

As Jesus said: Whoever has ears to hear – let them hear!

Graham