Out of the Cocoon

'GOD WITH US AND BEYOND US' by Ian M Fraser
SAN MIGUELITO, PANAMA, EARLY 1970S

One night, when a planned engagement fell through, I wandered among the homes of the community. There I met a man I had previously talked to while he was washing down a car. Nine months before, Bill had been a hopeless drunk. Now he lived by doing odd jobs. I asked if there was anything happening which would be interesting for me to go to in the area.  He said he was a lay Pastor and was just about to conduct a liturgy of the Word, and that I was very welcome to come along.
The bare house in which the people gathered was really one small room with two partitions breaking it up.  For a good part of the service, two of the children of the household were crying intermittently; occasionally one would get up to pull back the curtain of one of the partitions and gaze at us.  Outside the dogs barked and howled, competing with a transistor radio.  On the kitchen table was a Cross with a lighted candle on either side. Over his open-necked shirt Bill placed a stole and was ready to start.  About ten neighbours, most in their early twenties or thirties, pressed in, some bringing their own chairs or stools with them.  I shared a tatty couch with an older man.
There was an introductory section in which people sang and gave responses.  Then the passage from the Acts of the Apostles, used throughout the parish that week, was taken for study.  Practically everyone participated in building up an understanding of the passage.  At one point Bill was pushing them too strongly in emphasising God's presence in the midst of life. They would not have this.  'We know God is in the thick of things where we are,' they said.  'We believe that. But that is not all. God is also beyond us, and we do not know how God can be with us and beyond us. But that's just the way it is.'
After about 40 minutes of Bible study, those who took part were asked to offer prayers and all but two responded.  Another song was sung, there were one or two more responses, and the service ended.

REFLECTION

God the father, you created and go on creating. Your will is to release the creativity in human beings, all made in your likeness. You call us to throw of our lives on the scales for a new world.  We praise and bless you who have trusted us with life, well knowing the risks you ran.
God the Son, who laid aside your glory that you might become one with us, and died that you might overcome death and secure life abundant for your human family, you stand witness to a true Way for folk to take.  We praise and bless you that we may live as those who are heirs to all the promises.
God the Holy Spirit, who brings home to us all that the Father designed and that the Son accomplished - you dwell in us, you renew us, you inspire us, you open up new paths for our feet. We praise and bless you that you conspire with us to change the earth into the world of God's promise.
In our day, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, you can do new things.  We bless you that what many prophets and righteous people longed to see and hear in their time and did not, we see and here in our time. The poor are lifted high. The despised and rejected preach and prophesy. The discarded point the important to true ways of life. Gifts are distributed among the whole human family, including the least likely. This is your doing and it is marvellous in our eyes.

PRAYER

Strengthen the foolish and weak things of this world that they may confound those that are mighty. Strengthen those who, having been downgraded by others, testify with convincing power that you are are making all things new.
Strengthen those in positions of power and authority who may feel threatened by this Church 'born from below', that they may not quench the Spirit but be themselves open to transformation.
And, Lord, look into my own heart to sift and strengthen me:
-- forgive my instinctive despising and shunning of people such as.......
-- forgive my playing safe when the risks of faith are called for, such as.........
-- forgive my unreadiness to offer my body, my being, as a living sacrifice;
-- forgive me for being deaf to unwelcome voices, blind to unwelcome sights;
-- have mercy on me who thus betrays my baptism and my calling.
Lord, I believe, help my unbelief.
Amen.

'HELP MY UNBELIEF'

In the 1950s, when I had just become Parish Minister of Rosyth, and was visiting people in one area, I went to a door, and when it was opened I recognised the secretary of the local Communist Party.
He said to me, roughly, 'What are you doing at my door?  I'm not one of your lot.'  I said that I had been appointed to serve the whole Parish not just a congregation, and, since he was in the parish, I was visiting him as I visited others.  He looked at me darkly as if my visit were an intrusion.  I went on, 'You can shut the door in my face if you want to. What you can't do is prevent my knocking on it.'  Reluctantly, maybe conceding that I had a point, he talked to me for a few minutes and then indicated that was enough personal contact as far as he was concerned.
The area took a long time to visit and I went back some weeks later for a second time. He seemed to have softened a bit and was ready to talk with me about justice and injustice in the area.  The third time occurred when neighbours told me that he wanted desperately to see me.  He grabbed me and pulled me inside.  His wife was in hospital.  He loved her deeply and was very concerned.  He went into detail of how the trouble had developed, and how she was.  At the end, he asked if I would pray for his wife and himself, there and then.
I replied that we had begun to respect one another and to understand one another. There was no need for him to 'act religious'.  He should feel free to keep the integrity of his own genuine position.  His response was immediate: 'Nane o' your bloody nonsense.  Get doon on yer knees wi' me and pray for my wife and mysel'.'
So I got down on my knees with the secretary of the Communist Party in Rosyth and we held up in prayer the woman he loved to the God in whom he did not believe.

PRAYER

Lord God, you search our hearts. You know what is deep in us. You know where we really stand.
We praise and bless you that you are not taken in by appearances, by professions of faith which find poor expression in the way we live our daily lives, by professions of unfaith which actual actions contradict;
-- and confess to you the fear in our hearts that you who see through us cannot abide the half-hearted way in which our public lives testify to you.
We praise and bless you that you stay with those who are put off by our language and habits and unpreparedness to stand up and be counted on the side of justice;
-- and confess to you the fear in our hearts that we who are called to reveal you to the nations have hidden your true face from them.
We praise and bless you that you accept people as they are, in love for the world to which Christ came; and look to all kinds of people to respond to you in their own time and manner;
-- and confess to you the fear in our hearts that we bring shame upon you, by our conduct towards some people, declaring them to be unacceptable, cutting them off as if that were your verdict upon them.
We praise and bless you for the integrity which marks the lives of so many women, men and children who may not be aware that they are living to your glory;
-- and tell you of the joy in our hearts that, above and beyond everything we do which might obscure your face, you keep faith with people would do not know your name and you honour their straight and honest ways.
Look in mercy on us Lord. We have no excuses. We have nothing to turn to, nothing to hold on to but that love in Jesus Christ which forgives and restores. Grant us new opportunity, by amendment of life, to testify to your transforming presence in the world.
In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit
Amen.

'DISUNITY DISFIGURES'

The partitions of Japanese houses can be removed to provide a substantial meeting place in even quite small houses.  One Sunday morning, some 40 or 50 people gathered in such a home.  Most of them were young adults.  Some Western hymns were sung and some of Japanese origin.  The readings were followed intently, and people really worked on the exposition of four different Bible passages although they did not discuss the interpretation aloud with the young Pastor.  I did not need to know the language to be part of a vitalizing and refreshing act of worship.
'A pity about that,' said my guide as we left.
'A pity?  Far from it! An exhilarating experience -- even for a foreigner!'
'I mean, it's rather a pity that this Church grew as it did.'
'How did it grow then?'
'Well, one for two Christians moved into this area and discovered one another. They started to meet for Bible study and worship.  Then the quality of their lives began to attract others.  Most of the people you saw there are came from Shintoism, or some other faith, or no faith at all.  It was the sheer quality of life of the original group which produced this Church.'
'But that is all good -- what worries you?'
'Well, you see, the original group was simply the Church of this Place, the Christians who happened to be here and who were drawn together by the common faith they were living out.  But, unfortunately, they were all kinds: Roman Catholics, Baptists, Salvation Army, the lot.'
'But isn't that a good thing?'
'In one way.  But, we have not only learned the gospel from you Westerners, we have received your divisions.  The people who have joined this House-Church cannot be baptised.  There is no one tradition into which they all may enter.  The Church cannot grow into its fullness.'

REFLECTION

The challenge to ecumenical advance today is being quite misread.  It is so often represented as a search by the Churches for, the ground on which they may stand and common fields in which they may co-operate.  It is, rather, to be so engaged in bringing the world towards the purpose for which God created it that the risks are taken of the Church's being torn apart.
Christians will take different sides when they get into battles to change the present world into the order of God's promise.  They will split the Church down the middle on how to handle different issues.  The big ecumenical question is not whether they can develop more harmonious relationships.  It is whether they have enough in Jesus Christ to hold them together against all the odds when they get engaged where it matters.  Similarly, in direct relationships with one another, they must respect one another so deeply and sincerely that they can take one another to task about the beliefs and practices.  It is a mistake to believe that Christians should be polite to one another.  What they do owe to one another is courtesy.  Courtesy has been an honourable word in the English language, at least as far back as Chaucer.  It means having deep regard for other people  -  so deep that you are prepared to tell them openly and honestly what they need to know for their own good instead of glossing that over to smooth things out.  The bond between Christians should allow for honest and open speech which is humble and yet unvarnished.  So Jesus spoke.  So Paul took Peter and the young Church to task.  What mattered was the kingdom.
The options are these:
-- You have an unrenewed Church which is split apart and cannot function as the bearers of healing; a Church in which different denominations are drawn together on the understanding that awkward issues will not be raised.  Unity becomes a security-device to preserve ongoing church life.  A church at peace with itself in a world of disorder is a testimony against the gospel.
-- You have a Church which is radically engaged in the struggles for a new world.  A Church committed where it matters, prepared to be broken for the healing of the nations is a sign of hope and of ecumenical maturity.
Is not the sacrament which nourishes the Church in its ongoing life a sign that it is through brokenness that humanity might reach out to wholeness?

'FORGIVENESS HEALS'

There was a young lass in Rosyth who was a bit wild but very likeable, and she was known as 'one for the boys'.  She came to Church quite often and her family was part of the congregation.  One day she sought me out.  She did not say what the problem was but I think it had to do with giving in to sexual advantages which she might well have invited in the first place.  She was an attractive, lively girl.
We met and she told me that something had happened in her life which meant that she wanted to ask God for forgiveness of things which she now felt ashamed about.  She wanted a clean start.  Would I, without probing any further, allow her to confess her sinfulness and pronounce over her God's absolution so that she could make the fresh beginning which she longed for?
At an agreed time we met in the vestry.  I told her that, for an act of this kind, there needed to be a second element.  Would she agree that I make a general confession in her presence of the sin which infected my life and that she pronounce God's forgiveness over me?  Then I would hear her confession and pronounce God's forgiveness over her.  She was startled.  She had put me on a different plane.  I had to get her to see that there is no category of people so good that all they need to do is to assure others of the forgiveness of God to release them from their sins.  We ordained people are as human as they come.  As we talked it through, she came to see my point.
We went into the front of the Church. We heard one another’s confessions.  We declared God's forgiveness and absolution over one another.  We rejoiced together. Both of us received a clean start.

PRAYER

' Do you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?  For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body.'
(1 Corinthians 6:19-20)
Consider young people who become sexually mature, who know new powers and new yearnings.  Let us pray that they may honour their bodies as gifts from God; not shy away from but welcome the new possibilities which maturity brings, and discover the freedom to remain in charge of what they do.
Think with understanding and sympathy of pressures on them to conform to the standards and tastes of their peer group and of the difficult test of coping with their continuing dependency on elders and balancing that with the need to find personal identity and assert independence.
Pray especially for those who have had no framework of family discipline against which to work out new freedoms; and those whose lives have been so tightly controlled that they are tempted either to conform tamely or rebel outrageously.
Pray for parents in the difficult task of helping young people through this stage.  Pray for the Church that it may give young people space and voice, imaginative support, and uphold them by prayer and sensitive understanding.
Examine yourself concerning.:
-- your ability to delight in your sexuality, expressing it so that it is a blessing, not a curse to others;
-- your ability to empathize with young people, giving them the space they need and still be someone they can turn to.
'Search me, 0 God, and know my heart, try me and know my thoughts; and see whether there is any wicked way in me: and lead me in the way everlasting.' (Psalm 139. 2 3-24)
 Amen.

Ian M Fraser 

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