1 Sermon: God s Creative Word 13/9/15 From John s gospel chapter 1 and verse 1: In the beginning the Word already was. The Word was in God s presence, and what God was, the Word was. He was with God at the beginning, and through him all things came to be; without him no created thing came into being. The coffee mug that I use at home has a picture of a wartime poster on it. Under the image of the crown of King George VI are the words keep calm and carry on. My wife also has a mug in the same style; this time the poster is pink and the words are keep calm and carry on. shopping. And you will have seen others in the same vein, Keep calm and eat cake Keep calm and hug your dog And one spotted at this year s Fringe I m Scottish we don t keep calm! The poster on my coffee mug was actually never issued. It was one of a series of three that were commissioned by the British Government in the spring of 1939 to give the public reassurance in the event of war, which they anticipated would lie ahead. The government propaganda machine understood the power of words to change the way in which people felt, and, importantly, the way in which they behaved. Vital if the country was to be geared up for all-out war. We know instinctively don t we, that words have power. We may have learned in the school playground that sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me. But we know it s not true. Words hurt and poison and destroy. And words heal and cleanse and build up. Words of thanks. Words of forgiveness. Words of encouragement. And words create new things. When I stand at the front of a lecture theatre about to speak I have 450 individual students chatting to each other, or looking at their phones or reading the paper. When I say the words, which apparently I use at the start of every lecture, that s twenty past the hour, we ll make a start please, the chatter dies down, the papers are put away and the phones are, if not turned off, are then hidden, and a single class has been created by words spoken. The power of words..
2 1. The Creative Word in the Bible And so to our first reading, the opening verses of the Bible. In the first creation story, the world and everything in it comes into being because God speaks. God said, let there be light.. let there be a vault between the waters to separate water from water. let there be lights in the vault of heaven to separate day from night.. and the rest. God creates. God calls into being by his words or his Word. This idea runs throughout the Bible: the Word of God which calls things into being. So when the prophets of Israel declaim this is the word of the Lord they are declaring not just judgement, but God s creative purpose, God s intention. This, they say, is what God wants to happen. God s Word. Move on to the wisdom literature where the Word of God is an expression of his wisdom. God s power to create, and what he creates, reflects this wisdom. Now coming up alongside Hebrew thought we have the Stoic idea of the Word being the rational principle or the reason behind all things. So the first readers of John s gospel s opening words - In the beginning the Word already was would have understood Word to mean both the power which called the universe into being but also the rationality of the purpose that lay behind it. So far, so abstract! So before we risk getting any further out of our depth let me swim for dry land by saying that the opening words of John s gospel although deeply mystifying at one level are as plain as day at another. This Word, this wisdom, this rational principle says John, is not just something in the abstract. It s a person. The person is Jesus Christ. God in the flesh. Or more fully, this person is the perfect and complete expression of the loving purpose of God. God s mind, God s will, God s purpose in creation and this purpose is love - are in Christ himself. And this person, Jesus Christ, is the focal point of the whole story of God s dealings with mankind set out in the Bible. Jesus is the purpose of creation, summed up and expressed in a human life (cf Heb 1, 1-2). Jesus Christ is God s living Word. And more than that, says the writer of John s gospel. What I have written is written to convince you of all this. So read on whilst I try to explain and persuade you that Jesus is the son of God. Because I am convinced that if you want to know who the true God is, it you want to discern the purpose of God s creative activity, and if you want to be part of that creative activity, look at Jesus.
3 2. We create by our words Back to words of speech again, and now the passage from the letter of James. In it the writer notes how small the tongue is, but how great the capacity and potential it has to do untold harm. In chapter 3 and verse 7 we have, All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison, [James ch 3 v 7-8 NIV] Martin Luther was famously lukewarm about the letter of James. He labelled it an epistle of straw because, compared to the other epistles, it did not really have punch in the way it set out the gospel. Even Luther, however, regarded it as a good book, written by a good person and a book which would balance those who focussed on faith to the exclusion of works. And the point that is made by James needs little expansion. Which of us has never, by unconsidered or intemperate use of words, hurt or harmed or undermined other people? Which of us has never been taken aback by the harm that has come about by a few ill-judged words spoken in the wrong place at the wrong time? Which of us has not wished that we had thought before we had spoken? I cringe to recall the number of times I have walked into a staff room or been at a meeting where something has been said by myself or others, people have been hurt or angered or offended, and from that point on, as the saying goes, you could cut the atmosphere with a knife. That is the downside. That is the warning in the epistle of James about the use of words. Indeed sometimes it might be best to use no words at all. Discretion in Speech The former Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks in his book Celebrating Life has this to say about words, Words have power, and power without restraint eventually destroys those who wield it, as well as those against whom it is wielded. Not everything we think is something we should say. Not everything we say in private should be reported in public. [Sacks, Celebrating Life, p 127-8] Why should we be discrete and careful in our use of words? Why is it right not to speak but to remain silent sometimes? Because, he argues, we wish to protect people, reputations and institutions. This is not a call for censorship, to hide things that should be out in the open, or an end to freedom of speech. It is a recognition that as human beings we are all flawed and it is not helpful if every one of these flaws, major and minor, is held up for all the world to see.
4 But that is what we are seeing more and more as our social media Facebook, Twitter, Youtube takes our words and spreads them further and faster than we could ever imagine. And words out there on social media have the potential to hang around for a long time. Advice given to students looking for their first job now includes clean up your social media profile. It might have been fun to slag off your school friends, other students, or the waiter who served you at the pizza place last night on Facebook. It might have been a laugh to post pictures of yourself at a party, or the day after, looking worse for wear. But guess what - prospective employers also have access to Facebook and they really don t want to see your drunken antics or read the musings of the young teenager on life. There is only so much our well intentioned email guidelines and our regulations and the law can do. The rest is up to us. The words of the letter of James are apt, are they not, for the Facebook and Youtube user? The tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. [James ch 3 v 5 NIV] Think before we email or text or tweet or upload to Youtube or comment on Facebook think before we speak. Words create our social world The upside is, of course, that words can heal and build up and create. And what we create by our words is our social world. I am old enough to recognise some pretty significant changes in the language used in our press and by the broadcasters about people of differing race or sexual orientation or background. Words that were common place in polite society in the 1960s and 1970s are now rightly regarded as totally inappropriate and out of place especially in a sermon. Capability Scotland has an excellent leaflet entitled Plain talking which sets out some words that were used in the past and suggestions for ones we should use now. And when I first picked up the leaflet my instinct was to say, surely this is just political correctness gone mad. But on reflection I don t think it is. This is a thoughtful and considered reaction to the casual stereotyping and low level abuse which, in the past, underpinned casual discrimination. The words we use matter. The words we use create our social world. So if we want to create a social world in which all are respected and welcomed, then the words we use must express that intention. Because Words have the power to change how we regard each other and relate to each other. Ultimately words have the power to change how we treat each other. And words have the power to change us
5 3. We can be re-created by God s living Word - Jesus And change is what we, as people who seek to follow Christ, are about. We know we mess up. We know we aren t all that God would have us be. We know that our thoughts and our words and our deeds are not as loving as they should and could be. We know we sin. And we know the answer to changing who we are lies not in ourselves but in Christ. Christ, God s living word. Christ who embodied most fully and completely the creative purpose of God. That creative purpose was love. God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever has faith in him may not perish but have eternal life. [John 3 v 16] We believe that something can happen to people in this life which causes them to be new people. The potential to become new people is something we all share. Our faith, our trust in Christ our determination to learn from his life and teachings and work with other people, our decision to follow him, begins that process of change. First, we are opened up to the possibility and our need for change. And second, we experience that change as God s love gets to work on us. Change isn t the spiritual version of a quick coat of paint to cover up the bad bits. It is something that goes to the heart of who we are and how we treat other people. Change isn t an instant quick fix. It s the work of a lifetime. But be in no doubt, such change can be quite complete. It has the potential to perfect us in love. Thanks be to God for his Word. His loving intention revealed in Christ, which has no beginning and no end. Amen John Sawkins