We have a General Election in this country
in just over a month. We hear the voices wanting us to choose them. This
election more than any I can remember, is less about policies and more about
leadership and who you choose to listen to. It’s also about soundbites. Mrs May
tell us we need “strong and stable leadership in the national interest”; Mr
Corbyn tells us we need “an agenda for the many not the few”; Mr Farren tells
us we need a strong opposition; and Mr Nuttall tells us well, I’m not sure what
really, his lot have done their job. He’s standing in Boston in Lincolnshire
and on Sky News the other day they played a game showing him pictures of towns
in Britain and he was asked “is it Boston or not Boston?” He got most of them
wrong. Elections are about who, with our own deeply held convictions, we choose
to listen to. Perhaps disillusionment is why only 36% of us chose to vote in
the local elections on Thursday.
Whose voice do you trust today?
My Mum doesn’t now listen to the radio or
watch the television very much. The only voice she trusts is the one telling
her it is dinnertime or who brings her her medication in the nursing home.
But growing up she would come out with
stuff and you’d say where did you hear that, and she’d say “on Jimmy Young” and
then later on television “on Loose Women!” The authoritative voice.
Is the Church a voice you can trust?
Sometimes we don’t say much to be listened to outside our own private club but
we are getting better at being more confident with our message. People expect
the Church to say something even if it is disagreed with. A voice about injustice
and respect and worth and how you live in community, a voice that speaks about
the social evils of this age, a voice that says there is a different way.
Perhaps there are three voices we can trust if we listen for them.
The first voice is that of Jesus.
The Church grew after Pentecost by spending time remembering Jesus,
praying, searching the Scriptures, supporting each other, putting Jesus at the
centre before they did anything else. Perhaps the modern Church problem is that
we don’t spend time listening for the voice. We don’t trust it because we don’t
hear it.
The second voice is the voice of the
Church.
So many voices have resorted to behaving
like the ‘thieves and bandits’ condemned in today’s Gospel (John 10: 1 - 10)by Jesus. Where the
passage comes in John’s Gospel he’s just had a run in with other voices – the
Pharisees – they’ve called him names and he says it is all words – they don’t
really care for the people around them. They sneak in among them. Whereas Jesus
cares and the sheep he cares for know his voice and find comfort in hearing it.
Remember just after the crucifixion the disciples huddled in a room in fear, now in
perhaps the same room they found confidence in the divine voice, and safety in
the person who showed them the immense of love of God. What is the voice of
Calvert saying today? What are we saying to each other, to Messy Church
families, to toddlers, to CAP partners, to those who pass by and drop in? What
are people hearing from us? What is the thing that matters we need to talk
about at an AGM.
What are we saying and can our voices be
trusted? Will people know our voice and feel safe and loved? We can make a
difference.
Then finally, the voice of God.
There is a lot at the moment that is quite
mad. I have a lot of voices competing for my attention and sometimes I just
want some space from them, politicians, media, personal, church. I sat on a
visit back to Peterborough Cathedral on Friday afternoon and gazed up at the crucifix
with Christ there and the Latin on it – now I failed Latin spectacularly at O
Level. I got ungraded. You only need to write your name on paper and walk out
of the room to get ungraded. Anyway - stat
crux dum volvitur orbis, Latin for "The Cross is steady while the world is
turning." And that’s God’s message I think for today. Keep listening, keep
focusing, I am here, in the midst of Brexit and elections and violence and
hatred and uncertainty in life, all that we face. Stat crux dum volitur
orbis. In Psalm 23, the shepherd is diligent in
providing the best resources to hand, as in ‘green pastures’ and ‘quiet
waters’, and in providing a restful environment free from fear of danger, the
irritation of flies or parasites, disturbance within the flock, and too little
food or sustenance.
We need to listen, to hear, and to share
what we experience of Jesus, of each other journeying and of the awesome God
who has it all under control. At Rye Primary the other day the children put an
Ed Sheeran track on the music player to come in and walk out of assembly to –
Galway Girl: she played a fiddle in a Irish Band, she fell in love with an
English lad. The children were word perfect. An exasperated teacher standing
next to me said in despair: “I wish they’d learn their times tables so easily!”
Sometimes we are as bad remembering the spiritual support we have heard. Let’s
be renewed today.
Whose
voice do you trust? 