Sermon: St Michael's, Llandaff

Preacher:

Date:

Tuesday 17th March 2015

Venue:

St Michael's, Llandaff

Readings:

Psalm 35: 1-3 (4-8) 9-28

Jeremiah 16: 10-17:4

Romans 7: 13-25

Laura?

Yes, dear.

Whatever your dream was, it wasn't a very happy one, was it?

No.

So begin the closing moments of Brief Encounter. It evokes an era which feels remote to us now. The defined gender roles, social conventions, style of dress and clipped RP accents become the stuff of parody. Yet it's a film which evokes the intensity of human feeling: the longing of Laura and Alec from their serendipitous meeting until their disrupted parting moment is captivating.  The Rachmaninov stirs us as we are swept up in their smouldering passion; the romance of steam trains and the desolation of lashing rain; the ordinariness of routine and the ease with which we do what we do the very thing that we hate and regret.

I ran until I couldn't run any longer. I leaned against a lamp post to try to get my breath... I know it was stupid to run but I couldn't help myself. I felt so utterly humiliated and defeated and so dreadfully dreadfully ashamed.

Having fled the apartment, Laura's voiceover reflects on her response to the interrupted rendezvous with Alec. She rings her husband, compounding her guilt and shame, saying It's awfully easy to lie when you know you're trusted implicitly. She finds herself at the foot of the War Memorial and sits down.  The disruption of her personal and family life and her inner turmoil are evident.  A policeman approaches - her guilt is magnified as he eyes her suspiciously. Confronted by this tangible representation of law enforcement, she feels like a criminal. She is no longer law-abiding.

The dramatic narrative of Brief Encounter draws us into exactly the dilemma that Paul finds himself wrestling with in Romans.  A few verses earlier he acknowledges that the commandments are good and holy; the law itself is of spiritual value. Yet, like the archetypal bobbie, who asks Laura if she's feeling alright, the law reveals our human frailty. It reveals our propensity to make a mess of things. We know what is right - and we long to do it. Yet we don't do it.  Our own actions are a mystery to us. 

Laura reflects on her relationship with Alec, describing what they have done as being cheap and low. Alec himself says The feeling of guilt is and doing wrong is too strong isn't it. The prospect of separation also brings a violent wretchedness, even to the point of Laura wanting to die. Trembling on the platform edge, she faces the overwhelming desire not to feel anything ever again.

The noise of the train roaring and screeching through the station; the flickering lights in the carriages; the clattering wheels: there is no other sound track to this moment of despair.  I am of the flesh sold into slavery under sin. I do not understand my own actions. I do the very thing that I hate... I do not do the good I want.

Such moments of crisis are not unknown to us - personally, pastorally, collectively.  Perhaps they are less dramatic: the inability to delight in others, but rather to undermine them; the moments we lose patience with the person who frustrates us; our persistence in pursuing desires which end up possessing us; our institutional anxiety that makes us desperate, undermining our capacity to tell the compelling good news of salvation.

Paradoxically, this expression of our embodiment - our very fleshly nature - is a consequence of the overflow of love and freedom in creation.  Our creatureliness is good; yet we get caught up in 'stuff' that redirects our desires.  The priest and theologian Dan Hardy has a word for this: he calls it extensity. The risk of the gift of creaturely freedom is that as we are sent forth, we are drawn outward; this 'spread-out-ness' means we are in danger of losing the sense of God's presence with us.

We are overwhelmed with choice and our desires are ignited by new and exotic things.  Our increasingly dispersed lives, no longer fully centred on God, leaves us feeling at the mercy of the law of our minds. Lest we think that consumerism, promiscuity, fragmentation and injustice are twenty-first century concerns, we only have to revisit our first lesson.  Jeremiah challenges God's people over their abandonment of God's law, their stubbornness and refusal to listen. Rather than worshipping the Lord their God, they worship other gods, indeed any gods.

The consequences of this 'spread-out-ness' are dire: Jeremiah gives voice to a very physical disruption of life in terms of the loss of land and heritage. This expresses a spiritual dislocation. The people called to be holy and beloved, the people called to bring light to the nation, are cast adrift. How can they retain their identity and purpose apart from the God who is holy?

The response of a faithful God, a God of covenant and promise, is to seek out his people. He will bring them back - like a fisherman or a hunter.  God reaches out to us.  Our iniquities are not concealed, nor can we hid from God's love. Dan Hardy has a word for this too. He calls it intensity.  By that he means God's self-movement of love towards the world - in creation and redemption, in the ongoing perfection of human life in the world.  Such love is attractive and compelling; we are drawn to the light.  We are gradually turned away from self-absorption back towards attentiveness to God, and to right relationship with others.

Jeremiah's exhortation affirms that nature of God offering strength and refuge in the midst of trouble. Alongside the hope of restoration of God's people, we glimpse a vision of universal scope.  To you, O Lord, shall the nations come.  The consequences of sin are corrosive on human hearts and within communities. But this extensity is met by intensity.  Wretched man, writes Paul, who will rescue me from this body of death?   Wretchedness turns to praise: thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord.  In him there is no more condemnation.

In Christ, God dwells with us.  In his life, death and resurrection, the power of God breaks in.  In face to face encounters men and women find healing, purpose and dignity.  In teaching and proclamation, in acts of justice, compassion and reconciliation,  the proximity of God's Kingdom is made known. Our human brokenness is named; our failure to fulfil the demands of the law is evident.  Yet, that failure is not the final word.

Rather in the midst of the complexity of our lives - our loves, joys, sorrows and burdens - we are assured of forgiveness. We are called to respond to this in a spirit of repentance: returning and resting in God's love. On the cross God's Son defeats the power of sin and death; in the resurrection the promise of new life and abundant life is revealed.

As T. S. Eliot expresses it:  we become renewed, transfigured, in another pattern./Sin is Behovely, but/ All shall be well, and / all manner of thing shall be well... All manner of thing shall be well / By the purification of the motive / In the ground of our beseeching. 

As God's people that hope of being redeemed from fire by fire is expressed in our worship: as we share in praise and prayer, bread and wine our humanity is transformed because we are confronted with the holiness of God - in power, might, strength and love. Our appetites and longings become desire for God and for the well being of the other. We are caught up in God's involvement in the world - not in our own strength, but in the power of the Spirit. Paul goes on to dwell on this new life in subsequent chapters - knowing that all creation groans with longing for the fulfilment of this promise; knowing that whatever assails us, nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.

That love is the source of our values.  Sometimes we speak about them in terms of the fruit of the Spirit - love and joy, patience and self-control.  On other occasions we explore the particular charisms of an institution - perhaps a corporate commitment to the formation of a diverse community, which handles disagreement by means of honest, generous and transformative conversation.   Day by day, we are called to pay a deep attention to God in prayer and worship, and we are also called to deep engagement with the world.

Our work, hobbies, relationships and passions will draw us into a range of networks and responsibilities. Wherever we find ourselves, we are to speak and act with integrity and creativity; improvising on the love of God within which we abide.  We are to be a sign of God's love in a world in which disrupted desires are not as romantic as Laura's passion, but the heart break as great.  In the face of human fears we bring the promise of peace.  With joyful hearts proclaim afresh in this generation the good news of salvation.