Sermons

We're in the period of advent, which is the period of 4 weeks running up to Christmas, when traditionally Christians prepare to celebrate the coming of Jesus.

But there’s a deliberately two-edged feel to advent. We prepare to celebrate Jesus’ first coming, his birth at Bethlehem. But we also remind ourselves that Jesus will come again, and the other focus for Advent is preparing ourselves for that great event.

And so the question for this morning is this: Are you ready for the day when Jesus will come back?

What ambitions do you have for your life?

Here are a couple of mine. I’ve never been to Australia, but I’d love to go. I’d particularly like to go to Sydney, to see the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. I have no aspirations to climb the Harbour Bridge.

One day, if I live long enough, I will retire. I’d love to have a comfortable house, and a good enough income for that to be an enjoyable phase of life.

What are your ambitions?

Worry

If you wanted a headline for the reading we had from Matthew chapter 6, it would be this: Don’t worry. Don’t worry.

If you pick up any of the Sunday papers today, you’ll find supplements and sections devoted to travel, to cars and motoring, to money, to business and to fashion. These are the things that our society lives for and treasures.

The problem with our love affair with money, clothing, possessions and travel is that we end up serving them. Like alcohol, like drugs, like so many things – we start off using them for our ends, but our money is always trying to turn the tables on us, so that it becomes the master, and we do its wishes.

Many people today think that the Christian faith is first and foremost about a set of rules. Do this. Thou shalt not do that.

The Bible contains many rules, but at its heart the Christian faith is not about the rules we obey. It’s not about what we do and don’t do. It’s about a relationship. It’s about a relationship with the God who made you.

It’s not about what you know; it’s not about what you do; it’s about who you know.

We all hate hypocrites. We don’t like the insincerity. When people only do the things they do because they know we’re watching. When people want to manipulate how we see them. We’re never sure if we’ve met the real them.

But of all the hypocrites, our society has the strongest dislike of religious hypocrites. People who claim to be devout followers of a particular religious system, but it’s all a show. Indeed, many people today dismiss the Christian faith precisely because there are so many Christian hypocrites.

Last Sunday, Felix Baumgartner broke a number of world records. He jumped out of a helium balloon from 24 miles up in the sky. There is hardly any air, the sky is black, and the earth looks like a ball. Ten minutes later, he’d broken the speed of sound, and achieved the record for the world’s highest skydive and the world’s longest free-fall.

From up there, he could see the whole earth. Take it in at a glance.

Why bother with church?

That’s our question for this morning.

I meet people from time to time who tell me that they are keen Christian people, they just don’t go to church much.

Nationally, church attendance is declining.

Anyone who’s ever applied for a job knows all about making a CV. Curriculum Vitae. The story of my life. You set out your credentials. Why should this employer like you? Birth. Education. Work history. Other interests. Sell yourself.

What would you put on your spiritual CV? If you had two sides of A4 to list your spiritual credentials, what goes on? Imagine they’re handing out the accommodation and the jobs in glory – as you’re waiting in the queue, what would go on your papers?

“The real benefit comes as you stick with it.”

That’s true in so many walks of life. It’s true in marathon running – at least, so I’m told. Keep going, and you get the satisfaction of finishing the race. If you get a stitch, run it out. It’s true in any friendship, and it’s true in a marriage – as you stick with it over many years, the friendship becomes a greater and greater blessing. It’s true for being a vicar – the longer you’ve been around, the more you’ve got to know people, the more use you can be.

And it’s true of being a Christian.

This morning’s sermon is about prayer.

And the chances are that makes your heart sink.

If you’re anything like me, you already know that Christians are supposed to pray. You don’t need a Bible passage that commands us to pray. You don’t need a sermon that tells you to pray. You know that. We know that prayer is important. And yet there’s this gulf between what we know and what we do, so Bible passages and sermons on prayer just make us feel guilty.