Trinity 1 – ‘Mission impossible?’

(St.Mary's 14^th June 2009)

Psalm 107: 1-9: Hosea 11: 1-4, 8; Ephesians 1: 3-10: John 3: 16-17

Loving Father, please teach us through your Word about your mission of love. We make this prayer in Jesus’ name. Amen.

“Our God is a great big God, our God is a great big God, our God is a great big God, and He holds us in His hands.” (WITH ACTIONS) That’s good, because today we start a sermon series called ‘Mission impossible?’ And we don’t have Tom Cruise available to come to the rescue, despite the fact that it has just been announced that the film star has joined forces with producer JJ Abrams to bring out ‘Mission Impossible number 4’!

The final verse of our first hymn finished with a prayer ‘Make a world where light is shining, and no darkness is concealed; pain and loss and sorrow fading, love and joy and hope revealed.’ A ‘mission impossible’ for any film star, or politician, or king or queen: a ‘mission impossible’ for any human being. Any day, watch the news on TV or listen to the radio. For me, the reports this week on Radio 4 about the current situation in Zimbabwe have been particularly distressing. And I cannot imagine what parents of children in Portsmouth are feeling at present, wondering if their son or daughter has been abused. Our world needs rescuing. But is it ‘mission impossible’?

Our gospel reading from John tells us that God sent his Son to save the world (John 3:17), to bring ‘salvation’. Salvation comes from the Latin ‘salve’, which means to bring healing. God’s intention for the world - for creation and for humanity - is for wholeness and harmony. He wants his kingdom to grow and grow. How do we know?

I enjoy finding the right card to send to someone for a particular special occasion. Sometimes the words are just right, and all I need to do is to write inside ‘The words say it all.’ and sign my name. In our sermon series over the next few weeks, we are not following the set readings, the lectionary, but each person preaching is choosing their own. So I have chosen our Bible readings today, as well as the hymns, and for me ‘The words say it all.’ The words speak eloquently of God’s love for the world he created, and for every person in it throughout eternity. I hope that those of you who have had a chance to read the Bible passages during the week have been blessed; because that is God’s desire – that we should be blessed.

Our OT reading from Hosea gives us a picture of God as a parent caring for their child and the commitment of love involved. He calls, or ‘summons’ the Israelite people into a relationship with him, as his son. In the relationship there is tenderness, as God takes his son in his arms, as he teaches him to walk, as he lifts up his son to his cheeks and as he bends over to feed him. And all this despite the fact that the son keeps going off and doing his own thing. (Hosea 11:1-4) And we hear of God’s compassion for his son, despite the suffering agony Israel’s faithlessness causes him. (Hosea 11:8) God is love.

Paul’s letter to the Christians in Ephesus brings to us the good news that we have been chosen by God, before the world came into being, to be adopted as his children. Adoption was a serious step under Roman law. Once all the legal procedures had been followed the person who had been adopted had all the rights of a legitimate son in his new family and completely lost all rights in his old family. He was a new person. So much so that even all his old debts and obligations were wiped out. That is what Paul says God has done for us. We were absolutely in the power of sin and darkness. God, through Jesus, has taken us out of that power and through adoption into his family we are enabled to walk in love as children of the light. (I John 1:7 & 4:12) God blesses us and lavishes upon us grace and forgiveness of sins. And not only us, God plans ‘in the fullness of time, to gather up all things in [Christ], things in heaven and on earth.’ (Ephesians 1:10) And all for love.

What has that got to do with ‘mission impossible?’? What do we mean by ‘mission’? A definition from David Bosch, who was missionary, lecturer and theologian gives us a clue to the answer -

“Mission…is a movement from God to the world; the church is viewed as an instrument for that mission. There is church because there is mission and not vice versa.” Transforming mission David J. Bosch 1991

So God was the first missionary, because God is a missionary God and has been since before the beginning of time. Mission is derived from the very nature of God and the missionary initiative comes from him alone. Some more Latin! It’s all about missio dei’ which can be translated the ‘sending of God’. And the church is part of that sending. The classical doctrine of missio dei’ is ‘God the Father sending the Son, and God the Father and the Son sending the Spirit’. That was later expanded to include another movement: ‘The Father, Son and Holy Spirit sending the church into the world.’ So we, as the church are part of God’s mission, although not the entirety of God’s work in the world.

If we are to be partners with God in his mission, what is it we are about? Another definition, this time from a Church of England report ‘Mission-shaped church’ published in 2004 –

God’s missionary purposes are cosmic in scope, concerned with the restoration of all things, the establishment of shalom, the renewal of creation and the coming of the kingdom as well as the redemption of fallen humanity and the building of the Church.

Wow! Here at St.Mary's we are team players with God in that? We are! Scary? Yes! Exciting? That too! As the church, we are people whose lives have been turned round, as we have become children of God. We have been blessed with the knowledge of his love for us. We believe that Jesus is alive and offers new life and a peace that passes all understanding. As Christian’s, God’s mission is part of our DNA. We need to live and share what we have received. God showers on us gifts – different gifts to each person to equip our church for his mission. Later on in his letter to the Christians in Ephesus, Paul lists many of the different gifts that God gives. We need to discover and use the gifts God has given us because we are his hands and feet in the world today, through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Because of Jesus, God’s kingdom is now. If we have eyes to see, there are signs of the kingdom every day. For me, just a few this week have been a mother and daughter I saw walking along hand in hand on Thursday, smiling and chatting; the wonderful news in a phone message that Baby Iris, who had a deadly cancer diagnosed at age 6 months, and for whom we have been praying, has been given a clean bill of health. Then there has been Springwatch and the wonder (and tragedy) of nature. And ‘Thought for the day’ with the Revd. David Wilkinson included these words:

While visiting Rio I was taken to a favella, a home to the poorest of the poor. Here amongst the shacks, poverty, drugs and shootings, I met young Christians who were reflecting God's concern by offering education, health care and hope. I shared in a joy filled three hour worship service, during which they sang one song where everyone pointed at each other. As it was in Portuguese I asked for a translation of the song. It contained the line 'You are special. You are created by God.' There in a context where people had no worth in the eyes of the rich and powerful, these young people had found and were sharing self worth in a relationship with God.

But there are many signs that the kingdom is still to come. Because the kingdom is ‘now but not yet’ and because our minds are limited, we can have no real conception of what God has in store. But I believe it will be good. The ‘mystery of God’s will’ for the future (Ephesians 1: 9) – God’s transforming mission - is on a cosmic scale: to bring all creation and people from every race and nation into his light and love, into eternal life: the life of this age and the life of the age to come.

It is not ‘mission impossible’ because our God is love and ‘a great big God’ and there are no boundaries with him! As children of God let us continue to pray each day ‘Father……..your will be done, on earth, as in heaven.’ and to remember that – if we do not play our part as co-workers in God’s mission of love - we betray our trust that we are chosen in order to be sent. Amen.