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All Saints, Margaret Street, London, W1W 8JG, UK

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THE TRANSFIGURATION, 2006
The Sermon preached by the Vicar at Evensong & Benediction

“When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, with the two tables of the testimony in his hand as he came down from the mountain, he did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God.” Exodus 34.29

This morning Fr. Neil was amusing us with the story of his relegation to the remedial New Testament Greek class at King’s College years ago. At a similar stage in my ministerial education at New College in Edinburgh one of the courses I had to take was on the great 19th century opponents of the Christian Faith: Feuerbach and Marx, Freud and Nietzsche.

I won’t bore you with a rehash the Revd. Dr. Bill Shaw’s lectures on these characters. But I do remember one saying of Nietzsche:

“The trouble with Christians is that they don’t look redeemed.”

Nietzsche was the son of a Lutheran manse and this might explain his somewhat jaundiced view of the Christian Church and faith. He saw Christianity as a creed fit only for slaves; unsuited to the free spirits he saw himself as one of. Before he died Nietzsche was to descend into insanity, and so in turn was the Germany which took his ideas of a superman too seriously.

Years later Nietzsche was to be the inspiration behind what was known as the “Death of God” school of theology. This was fashion I also had to study but which I never really bought into. Fad it may have been, but that does not mean that there is no truth in Nietzsche’s critique of Christianity; that it is a religion for the servile and unadventurous; a faith which might help people cope by giving them hope of something later, but does not transform people now.

Evensong and Benediction on an August Sunday evening might not be Mount Sinai. You do not get the Patriarch clutching the tablets of the testimony, face glowing with spiritual ardour. Only a sermon from the Vicar. But it is an encounter with God, an occasion when we talk with God, when we enter the sacramental presence of the risen and glorified Christ.

Will it show? Will our lives be any different? Do we want them to be?

Those Israelites in the wilderness were in two minds about getting too close to God. They rather preferred Moses to go up the mountain on their behalf. Getting close to God could be a transforming thing, but it could also be a dangerous one: “It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” They guessed that the contents of the those two tablets of the testimony would make demands on their lives which it might be much more comfortable to avoid.

Paul, speaking of his fellow-Jews in tonight’s reading, says of them that they read the scriptures with “a veil over their minds”. All very comforting for us, we might think, in an “I’m all right Jack mood.’ But should we not rather be asking ourselves whether we do not read the scriptures with a veil over our minds; a veil we deliberately put on. We can use religion as a means of keeping God safely at arm’s length, lest he actually get into our lives and start to change them. Religious people tend to be a conservative lot. Something of this is right. We seek to conserve and to hand on things which have meant much to us. We do not want them to be swept away on the tide of fashion. But our conservatism can also be a way in which we avoid the challenges of God to be transformed, renewed, glorified.

A few days ago, I was coming up the escalator at Oxford Circus when I noticed that the girl standing in front of me was wearing a t-shirt which bore the words: “Jesus died for his own sins, not for mine.”

That slogan has stuck in my mind ever since. It seems to me to illustrate a gap in comprehension which we who proclaim the gospel need to keep at the forefront of our mind. A lot of traditional religious language fails to “touch down”, as the late Bishop Ian Ramsey of Durham used to say, in people’s experience and understanding.

One approach to the young lady in the tee-shirt would be to engage in an intellectual explanation of the atonement. But somehow, I suspect, starting there would not get very far in penetrating her cynicism. The sort of juridical arguments about what difference Jesus makes to us, don’t seem to “touch down”. with people like her. Many people think that they are fundamentally “in the right” anyway, and so do not need redeeming. Others they do not understand how someone’s death on a cross two thousand years ago can help with the manifold evils of human life.

Intellectual argument without life-changing and enhancing faith simply becomes judgemental legalism or an arid and sterile rationalism. The Church dominated by such does not generally “look redeemed”. It does not appear to the outside observer to be the place to look for the that transformation of the whole personality, of community, of the world, of creation, which the Transfiguration stands for in the life of the Church. It seems only a refuge for the fearful.

In the Second Letter to the Corinthians, Paul is having to defend himself against rivals who seek to undermine his authority as an apostle by casting doubts on his gifts. Paul was quite aware that his critics did not think he cut the right sort of a figure for a successful Church leader. Nowadays we would say “he does not look good on the television”. And those of us who have to listen to his letters being read in church Sunday after Sunday know that he was no master of the snappy sound-bite.

Paul is not arguing for that slick and superficial grinning Christianity encountered in some circles. In this epistle we hear him forced into boasting of his apostolic gifts and achievements, but in the end he returns to what really counts, his bond with Christ crucified. Glory for him is real but it is not superficial.

He speaks of the Corinthian Christians as his letter of recommendation, “written on your hearts, to be known and read by all men….a letter from Christ delivered by is, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.”

How might we look more like a letter written on human hearts to the girl on the Oxford Circus escalator? How might we show that sin is real, that it means separation from God and our neighbours, that it does need forgiveness, a reconciliation found in Christ, that while it speaks of our shame, it also speaks of the glory for which we have been made. Well, I suspect., most effectively by the difference it makes to our lives.

At perhaps the most superficial level, it is perhaps about our faces as we leave church tonight. Do people see in us the light of faith and hope or that anglo-catholic “I’ve just sucked a lemon look”.

Now, I don’t want to finish with a negative “I’ve just sucked a lemon” look but on a positive note. This morning, on duty at the gate after mass, I spoke to several people who were new to all Saints. They testified in different ways to the powerful impression that being here, the worshipping with us, encountering liturgy and music, preaching and prayer, speaking to friendly people in the courtyard, people who clearly did look redeemed, being there for something unexpected like the 90th birthday of a remarkable lady, had made on them.

We can take heart from our experiences of the Mount of Transfiguration and realise that they are occasions when we are truly with God; means by which God makes something of us and does something through us. Then we become a letter written by God on human hearts. A letter addressed to people like that girl on the escalator.

	ALL SAINTS MARGARET STREET
	All Saints, Margaret Street, London, W1W 8JG, UK
Welcome Worship and visitor information Diary dates History and architecture Music The life of the church Sermons Support All Saints Get in touch	THE TRANSFIGURATION, 2006 The Sermon preached by the Vicar at Evensong & Benediction “When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, with the two tables of the testimony in his hand as he came down from the mountain, he did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God.” Exodus 34.29 This morning Fr. Neil was amusing us with the story of his relegation to the remedial New Testament Greek class at King’s College years ago. At a similar stage in my ministerial education at New College in Edinburgh one of the courses I had to take was on the great 19th century opponents of the Christian Faith: Feuerbach and Marx, Freud and Nietzsche. I won’t bore you with a rehash the Revd. Dr. Bill Shaw’s lectures on these characters. But I do remember one saying of Nietzsche: “The trouble with Christians is that they don’t look redeemed.” Nietzsche was the son of a Lutheran manse and this might explain his somewhat jaundiced view of the Christian Church and faith. He saw Christianity as a creed fit only for slaves; unsuited to the free spirits he saw himself as one of. Before he died Nietzsche was to descend into insanity, and so in turn was the Germany which took his ideas of a superman too seriously. Years later Nietzsche was to be the inspiration behind what was known as the “Death of God” school of theology. This was fashion I also had to study but which I never really bought into. Fad it may have been, but that does not mean that there is no truth in Nietzsche’s critique of Christianity; that it is a religion for the servile and unadventurous; a faith which might help people cope by giving them hope of something later, but does not transform people now. Evensong and Benediction on an August Sunday evening might not be Mount Sinai. You do not get the Patriarch clutching the tablets of the testimony, face glowing with spiritual ardour. Only a sermon from the Vicar. But it is an encounter with God, an occasion when we talk with God, when we enter the sacramental presence of the risen and glorified Christ. Will it show? Will our lives be any different? Do we want them to be? Those Israelites in the wilderness were in two minds about getting too close to God. They rather preferred Moses to go up the mountain on their behalf. Getting close to God could be a transforming thing, but it could also be a dangerous one: “It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” They guessed that the contents of the those two tablets of the testimony would make demands on their lives which it might be much more comfortable to avoid. Paul, speaking of his fellow-Jews in tonight’s reading, says of them that they read the scriptures with “a veil over their minds”. All very comforting for us, we might think, in an “I’m all right Jack mood.’ But should we not rather be asking ourselves whether we do not read the scriptures with a veil over our minds; a veil we deliberately put on. We can use religion as a means of keeping God safely at arm’s length, lest he actually get into our lives and start to change them. Religious people tend to be a conservative lot. Something of this is right. We seek to conserve and to hand on things which have meant much to us. We do not want them to be swept away on the tide of fashion. But our conservatism can also be a way in which we avoid the challenges of God to be transformed, renewed, glorified. A few days ago, I was coming up the escalator at Oxford Circus when I noticed that the girl standing in front of me was wearing a t-shirt which bore the words: “Jesus died for his own sins, not for mine.” That slogan has stuck in my mind ever since. It seems to me to illustrate a gap in comprehension which we who proclaim the gospel need to keep at the forefront of our mind. A lot of traditional religious language fails to “touch down”, as the late Bishop Ian Ramsey of Durham used to say, in people’s experience and understanding. One approach to the young lady in the tee-shirt would be to engage in an intellectual explanation of the atonement. But somehow, I suspect, starting there would not get very far in penetrating her cynicism. The sort of juridical arguments about what difference Jesus makes to us, don’t seem to “touch down”. with people like her. Many people think that they are fundamentally “in the right” anyway, and so do not need redeeming. Others they do not understand how someone’s death on a cross two thousand years ago can help with the manifold evils of human life. Intellectual argument without life-changing and enhancing faith simply becomes judgemental legalism or an arid and sterile rationalism. The Church dominated by such does not generally “look redeemed”. It does not appear to the outside observer to be the place to look for the that transformation of the whole personality, of community, of the world, of creation, which the Transfiguration stands for in the life of the Church. It seems only a refuge for the fearful. In the Second Letter to the Corinthians, Paul is having to defend himself against rivals who seek to undermine his authority as an apostle by casting doubts on his gifts. Paul was quite aware that his critics did not think he cut the right sort of a figure for a successful Church leader. Nowadays we would say “he does not look good on the television”. And those of us who have to listen to his letters being read in church Sunday after Sunday know that he was no master of the snappy sound-bite. Paul is not arguing for that slick and superficial grinning Christianity encountered in some circles. In this epistle we hear him forced into boasting of his apostolic gifts and achievements, but in the end he returns to what really counts, his bond with Christ crucified. Glory for him is real but it is not superficial. He speaks of the Corinthian Christians as his letter of recommendation, “written on your hearts, to be known and read by all men….a letter from Christ delivered by is, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.” How might we look more like a letter written on human hearts to the girl on the Oxford Circus escalator? How might we show that sin is real, that it means separation from God and our neighbours, that it does need forgiveness, a reconciliation found in Christ, that while it speaks of our shame, it also speaks of the glory for which we have been made. Well, I suspect., most effectively by the difference it makes to our lives. At perhaps the most superficial level, it is perhaps about our faces as we leave church tonight. Do people see in us the light of faith and hope or that anglo-catholic “I’ve just sucked a lemon look”. Now, I don’t want to finish with a negative “I’ve just sucked a lemon” look but on a positive note. This morning, on duty at the gate after mass, I spoke to several people who were new to all Saints. They testified in different ways to the powerful impression that being here, the worshipping with us, encountering liturgy and music, preaching and prayer, speaking to friendly people in the courtyard, people who clearly did look redeemed, being there for something unexpected like the 90th birthday of a remarkable lady, had made on them. We can take heart from our experiences of the Mount of Transfiguration and realise that they are occasions when we are truly with God; means by which God makes something of us and does something through us. Then we become a letter written by God on human hearts. A letter addressed to people like that girl on the escalator.