How often have you sat in a room with a group of friends and realised that you’ve no real idea what they’re talking about? Like you’ve dozed off for a bit and the conversation has dramatically changed direction. How did you feel? It can be a quite lonely or confusing experience.

Sadly for some, Manchester UTD have not had the best of seasons. Others might be quite pleased! I don’t have many UTD memories, being an Arsenal supporter, how could I! But there is one that sticks in the mind. Nearly 15 years ago, on Wednesday 26^th May 1999  – I’d been watching the United/Bayern Munich Champions League Final on TV. I had to go out to do a Baptism visit, there was perhaps only minute or two to go and United were losing, they were on the rack and going nowhere. The result was a foregone conclusion – Bayern Munich had obviously won the cup.

I wasn’t out that long, but I missed the key last minutes of the match. When I got back, I couldn’t believe what people were saying. United had scored twice in the last minute – they’d won. I wasn’t there – and if there hadn’t been independent accreditation of the victory, I would not have believed what people were telling me!

Whether we wake after having dozed off in a crowded room, or we were just not there when a key event happened – we easily feel ostracised and left out. No matter what anyone says, it still feels that way.

We’re not told why Thomas wasn’t in the upper room that first Easter evening when Jesus visited his disciples. We could spend time trying to imagine where he was – but we won’t! Suffice to say, he missed the key event, the turning point, the moment that changed defeat into victory. And how did he respond? In exactly the same way as most of us would have done. … Thomas couldn’t believe what the others told him. I doubt any of us would have done under those same circumstances.

Seeing is believing – but so is sharing in an experience with others. Thomas not only didn’t see what happened, he was left out of the experience that everyone else shared. He was in a lonely place, wanting to believe, wanting to share in everyone else’s happiness, but unable to do so. He hadn’t been there, he hadn’t seen Jesus.

Thomas’ reactions and feelings are understandable, and as we read the story we can see that Jesus thought so too. He provided a repeat of the same encounter – one in which Thomas could share; he gently reminded Thomas of his outburst – no indignant rebuke, just words which drew Thomas back to faith. Thomas’ response is one of the clearest statements of Jesus’ divinity in the Bible. Having seen the truth of the resurrection he cannot but exclaim, “My Lord and my God!”

The next 3 verses are important, and they are pivotal to John’s message:

Jesus said to Thomas, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” ….  Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

John has led his readers through a story – a story which allows those readers to meet Jesus and begin to understand who he is. It’s a journey of discovery, one in which we can identify with the different characters, feel their emotions, struggle with them to understand what Jesus is doing and saying. Thomas’ words are the culmination, the pinnacle of the story – the point where even the strongest of doubters expresses faith. Jesus response is not just for Thomas’ ears, not just for the disciples, but for all who read John’s Gospel in coming generations. “Don=t think,” says Jesus, “that the disciples were in some way special because they saw all these events first hand. Rather, blessed are those who read the stories and encounter Christ through the work of his Spirit in their lives and the lives of those around them.”

“Blessed,” says Jesus, “are all who read this Gospel, who struggle with doubts and come to believe that he is the Son of God.” We’ve not missed out on the party, we can still be part of the events which changed defeat into victory. We too can own the risen Jesus as our Lord.

This is good news – particularly for those of us who struggle with doubt; for those of us who’d like to believe more strongly than we do; for those of us who see other people’s faith, or the joy they seem to experience in their Christian life, and feel that we are somehow missing out.

The story of Thomas is important because it embraces doubt.

The story is also important because it embraces change. Everything is different, Jesus was dead and is now alive. This changes everything – nothing can now be the same. Thomas struggles to accept the new situation. For so many of us change is difficult to handle, yet it is happening all the time. We need to continue to engage with the communities around our churches, looking for new ways to serve, new ways to make Christ known and to bring hope where there is despair. We need to accept that the future for the Church of England is one with significantly less stipendiary clergy – perhaps one third less in numbers in ten years time – and we need to imagine new forms of ministry both lay and ordained, new ways of being church. Nothing is the same as it was, nothing will be the same as it was, and we want to shout out the loudest “No!” that we can manage.

There are two key things we can take away from this passage.

First – it’s OK to be honest – don’t pretend that everything is OK when it isn’t, don’t manufacture faith if it isn’t there. We can express our fears and we can express our doubts. In fact expressing our fear and our doubt is often, like it was for Thomas, the first step to faith.

Second – this story of doubt and faith is made the crowning moment of John’s Gospel – the pinnacle – Jesus reaching out to his loyal but doubting and fearful follower, not in anger but in love. Thomas’ exclamation, “My Lord and my God!” is the point at which John chooses to rest his case. … Honest struggling with change, honest struggling through doubt towards faith is given the highest honour in John’s Gospel.

So, don’t be discouraged if the pace of change or the circumstances we face are a struggle. Don’t be discouraged if believing is a struggle. For many football fans winning or losing is a life or death issue. But here we go beyond issues of life or death, we’re concerned with eternity. Be encouraged as you struggle to be faithful in an ever changing context, when at times everything you hold dear seems threatened. Be encouraged as you struggle to believe, for the story of Thomas makes it very clear that God loves the open and honest doubter.

Most of us want to succeed, none of us likes to be seen as a failure.

How do you measure success? Climbing to the top of the social ladder? Keeping up with the Jones’s? Getting promotion at work? Moving to live in the better area of town? Being liked by everyone?

And once you’ve decided what success means – how do you achieve it?

Isaiah, a couple of chapters before the Old Testament reading set for today in the Revised Common Lectionary – in chapter 50 – says these words, words which are often thought, like our reading from Isaiah 53, to point forward to Christ as the suffering servant:

I gave my back to those who struck me, and my cheeks to those who pulled out the beard; I did not hide my face from insult and spitting. The Lord God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced; therefore I have set my face like flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame; he who vindicates me is near. (Isaiah 50:6-8)

Isaiah uses the phrase: “I have set my face like a flint.” How might we rephrase that in today’s language if we want to talk about being successful?

“Go for it, no matter the cost.”

“Climbing over dead men’s bodies.”

“The end justifies the means?”

Or what about a picture that I find quite vivid – that  of the powerboat moving at such speed towards its destination that its wash overturns everything in its wake.

Ambition, determination, whole-hearted commitment to our goals. Quite good things in themselves. Often, however, when our hopes for ourselves conflict with the interests of others we can produce all sorts of justifications for less than generous attitudes and actions.

Isaiah in that reading talks of whole-hearted commitment, of being determined, even when shamed, made fun of, disgraced. A determination to see things through.

We start Holy Week by marking the events of Palm Sunday as Jesus rides into Jerusalem on the donkey. Jesus on Palm Sunday sets his face like a flint towards Jerusalem, nothing is going to stop him fulfilling God’s will – nothing will deflect him from the path of the cross.

The adulation of the crowd – could easily go to his head, but it doesn’t. On that first Palm Sunday, Jesus is lonely, he is alone in the midst of the crowd. No one else understands, no one really knows what is happening. The clues are all there, the donkey ridden through the gates of Jerusalem is one of the biggest. Jesus is no ordinary king, yet people ignore the signs, they want him to be their King, a King in their mould, a real King!

But success for Jesus as King is not measured by the standards of the crowd. Success for Jesus is measured in terms of apparent personal failure. In his weakness, God’s purposes will be fulfilled.

In Isaiah, the Suffering Servant, sets his face like a flint into the suffering that is coming his way – confident of God’s help to endure. There’s no disgrace, no shame, in the torture he faces because he knows that he can trust God for his future, for his ultimate vindication.

How different these attitudes are to our own? We struggle and strive to protect ourselves. We’ve taught ourselves to be self-reliant. “Look after number one – no one else will!”

We’ve learnt to see failure and weakness as shameful. Success in the world’s terms is important to our sense of self-worth. We cannot be seen to fail, even if that means that we need to put others down.

Isn’t this all being a little harsh. …. Perhaps I’m being unfair?

Am I? … I don’t think so. I only need to ask myself a few questions to see how true it is of me. How willing would I be to embrace apparent failure, like Jesus did, for the sake of people I don’t know? … Would I be prepared for you to think bad of me, to reject me – if I only knew that I was doing what God wanted?

In the end, though, it is hardly ever as obvious an issue as that. Things are never that clear-cut. It’s in the smaller things that I need to learn to place the needs of others above my own, in the smaller things that I need to learn to set aside self-protection and look to the interests of others.

It was because Christ was open to others, vulnerably sharing himself with them listening to their needs, that he set his face like a flint to the cross. Because he was aware of others – he chose suffering and death.

Jesus’ actions and his words call us to set aside our well-being, our comfort, so as to meet the needs of others. So, how do we succeed? Jesus answer would be, “By becoming vulnerable. By being willing to die, by being willing to embrace failure.”

By accepting the Palm Sunday’s adulation needs to give way to Good Friday’s rejection. A very different measure of success!

Jesus sought his own honour not in the eyes of those around him but in the eyes of God. Success was measured by faithfulness to God’s plan for him. What seemed to the world to be shameful became his greatest success. Jesus greatest shame in the eyes of his society became his greatest honour in the eyes of God. The shameful cross became the place of glory, the place of salvation.

Take time to think about how we measure success, what is honourable and what is shameful for us. How can we … ? How can I serve God most faithfully?

A Poem by Shashikant Nishant Sharma (an Indian poet)

Success lies in being happy
After losing the game
Success lies in giving credit
And taking the blame
Success lies in doing good
Without thinking for name and fame
Success lies in winning friends
Sharing goods and claim
Success lies in the fair means
Not in anyhow achieving the aim
Success lies in team spirit
Making efforts jointly for the same
Success lies in enjoying the journey
Not in reaching the hall of fame.

These are lovely words. We could aspire to this kind of measure of success. ‘Very Christian,’ we could say. And perhaps they are. Perhaps they are the most pragmatic way we can find to emulate Christ in today’s world.

It is, however, Christ’s shameful death that is meant to be the measure of success for us. We are called to take up our Cross and to follow him. We are called to follow Christ through shameful death to resurrection. And, even if we find that following too difficult, we are called to accept that it is only through that shameful death that salvation is possible.

Salvation can only be won for us by a God who is prepared to take onto himself all that separates us and our world from God, all that divides us as God’s people, all of the pain and hurt that we impose on each other. It is at the cross that God in Christ succeeds, he triumphs, he is enthroned as King, he is glorified, but his triumph, his success, is not a battle won but relationship restored. His success is measured in the depth of his identification with us and in the strength and reality of his divinity. His success comes in the midst of apparent failure.

The cross is the centre of our salvation, the resurrection God’s seal of approval. It is not after his resurrection, but on the cross that Jesus says in triumph, ‘It is finished!’

Almighty Father, look with mercy on this your family for which our Lord Jesus Christ was content to be betrayed and given up into the hands of sinners and to suffer death upon the cross; who is alive and glorified with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Our worship is central to our lives as Christians, and perhaps because it is so very important it is often something that fuels heated discussion and even division. I’m sure you’re familiar with many of the arguments.

We’ve special societies ‘protecting’ ways of worshipping. One, The Prayer Book Society seeks to defend and uphold the BCP. There was for a short while, an ASB Society fighting to hold on to the ASB (do you remember that). On one hand we have people arguing for BCP or Hymns Ancient and Modern and on the other, those who can’t imagine how anyone can worship without singing choruses more than 3 or 4 times – those who sometimes argue that everything old has to go – only the new is of value.

Now I know these are parodies, but unfortunately they are so very close to reality, for if it isn’t the forms of service we use, it’s the version of the bible they use or their churchmanship that seems to matter so much and make it impossible for us to share fellowship with them.

It is natural that we’ll have our own commitments to styles, forms and the substance of worship. But it isn’t styles or patterns that matter to God. ‘What matters,’ says Jesus, ‘is that those who worship God, worship in spirit and truth’. That worship is from our hearts and has integrity.

It was these kinds of arguments that separated Jews and Samaritans. Oh, there were a few age old grudges as well, but it was the arguments about worship that were most often used to maintain their divisions.

The Samaritan woman brings up the debate to change the subject. The conversation with Jesus has got too personal and she tries to deflect Jesus’ attention away from herself. Jesus generously accepts that change of direction, and, as they talk, he makes it clear that place and practice will soon no longer matter. ‘What’s important,’ says Jesus, ‘about worship is the heart of those who worship.’

How I wish that down the centuries we’d listened to Jesus. Many awful acts have been done in the name of the Church. We’ve even burnt people at the stake to protect our ways of doing things. We’ve refused burial rights in our cemeteries, we have ostracised and vilified those different from ourselves. I have seen the speck in their eye and ignored the plank in my own. We have been so concerned with the peripheral and the unimportant that we Christians have separated into thousands of denominations the world over – and we continue to condemn each other over the outward forms of our religion.

So, what does it mean to worship in spirit and in truth? Is there a particular way of worshipping that we can latch onto, that will ensure that we don’t worship in error and without the spirit rather than with the Spirit and in truth? …… Clearly the answer is, ‘No!’ Each generation, each community has to explore for itself what it means for that generation or that community to worship in spirit and in truth.

The world is constantly changing and our understanding of God is always developing. God may not change, but in every generation people have had to find new ways of expressing themselves to one another and to God … new forms of expression – in order to remain faithful to the revelation of God that we have received.

So, please let’s not allow the peripheral, the ultimately less important, to become the central and most important things. Let’s begin to believe that others are at least as sincere as we ourselves are, in our efforts to honour God in our worship.

Let’s focus with Paul in Romans on what is important and what we all share – the death and resurrection of Jesus – through which we have peace with God – through which, and through whom, we live by faith in the grace and love of God. No longer enemies of God but friends, no longer at odds with each other but reconciled as friends.

Do outward forms of worship matter? Are they important? Of course they are, for they’re the framework, the place where we are set free to worship in Spirit and in truth. They’re also the space where the other person is set free to worship. But worship itself is not about those different ways of doing things. Worship in spirit and in truth is about our hearts and wills focussed on the grace of God.

Worship in spirit and in truth brings us face to face with the love and grace of God in Jesus, our hearts focussed on God, drawn to him through the love shown to each of us in Jesus. Worship in spirit and in truth brings reconciliation and not division because ultimately our focus is not on ourselves but on the love which shines out from the face of Jesus.

The Sermon on the Mount, of which today’s gospel is a part, is subversive. It’s values are not the values of the world. Things were just as bad in Jesus= day as they are today. And Jesus’ teaching in the face of all that is wrong with the world is consistent: have faith, and do something about the bad things by doing all the good you can.

Today’s gospel is part of a larger message, part of Jesus’ challenge to to us: Life in the kingdom of God has different values from the world. Life in the kingdom of God includes the poor, the merciful, those who mourn. Life in the kingdom of God is about bearing light to the darkest parts of the world, it is about salting the world with mercy and justice. Today’s gospel, taken outside this context, sounds unrealistic to someone who is suffering. In the larger context of Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is reminding us of God’s profound love for everything and everyone God has created. And encouraging us to focus on the kingdom of God.

For all human beings it is very easy to worry about the basics, about how we’ll pay the electric bill or what we are going to do about the heating system. Being good stewards of what we’re given is important. But there is at least one other thing of equal, if not greater, priority. We must ask: “How are we serving the kingdom of God? What are we doing that meets the needs of others? How are we being Good News to the poor?”

What Jesus proclaims, to refugees around the world, to the poor in the UK, and to comfortable British citizens alike, is that the kingdom of God is at hand. Grace and mercy are available to all. …And, for those us who already have much, which is the majority of us; perhaps we are meant to be the instruments of God=s grace and mercy. Perhaps it is through us that God intends to reach out to those in the deepest need. Perhaps God’s kingdom will only be real in Syria, the Gaza strip, in the Sudan of the Central African Republic, to those in need in our own community, if it comes to them through us. As we seek the kingdom of God, perhaps we will be God’s answer to the painful worries of others.

We have the responsibility, and at times the joy, of being the conduit through which the love of God reaches out into God’s world. “And,” says Jesus, “Even Solomon in all his glory didn’t shine as brightly as those who share and give and work for the kingdom of God.”

Luke 2:22-40

Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace
according to thy word.
For mine eyes have seen thy salvation,
Which thou hast prepared before the face of all people;
To be a light to lighten the Gentiles,
and to be the glory of thy people Israel.

This is one of the lasting legacies of the story of the Presentation of Christ in the Temple, the Song of Simeon, the Nunc Dimitis. Countless Christians over the centuries have felt a great deal of comfort when the Nunc Dimitis has been said or sung. It forms the central canticle of Vespers or Compline and is an integral part of Evensong.

The ‘Feast of the Presentation of Christ at the Temple’, or ‘Candlemas’, falls on 2 February, at the very beginning of this month. It celebrates a very early time in the life of Jesus – when his parents brought him to the temple in line with their customs to present Jesus to God as their first born.

John Pridmore, who used to write regularly for the Church Times suggested in an article some years ago that the Song of Simeon, the Nunc Dimitis, is almost the equivalent of a mug of Ovaltine. A nightcap guaranteeing a good night’s sleep. So he said, “When it is sung at Evensong or said at Compline – its familiar cadences are like gentle lullabies, easing us into dreamless slumber!”

“Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.” Simeon is satisfied that all he has longed for is fulfilled in the child that he takes into his arms. And the Nunc Dimitis over the centuries has signalled the end of the day, the fulfilment of our activity; the time for rest and sleep.

As wonderful as this is, we miss something absolutely crucial, if this story only provides us with the equivalent of a beautiful lullaby.

For Simeon, this is a time of change, everything he longs for is being fulfilled. Something new is happening. Simeon no longer needs to look back at God’s promises, for the Messiah is now in his arms. The future begins at this point and Simeon looks forward, perhaps to his imminent death, but crucially to the fulfilment of God’s promises.

Candlemas is a time of change for us too. Up to now, as we have been reading from the Gospels each week we have been looking back towards Christmas. Epiphany is the time in which we hold onto the story of Chris’s birth, savour the truth of it, grasp once again that this is the Messiah not just for the Jews but for the whole of creation. Candlemas is the moment when we turn our gaze away from Christ’s birth and begin to contemplate what is ahead. The fulfilment of all that Christ’s birth means, happens in the coming weeks of our Christian year.

At Candlemas, we are at a turning point. Christ’s ultimate destiny intrudes now on our celebration of Christmas and Epiphany and we are called to turn our backs on Christ’s birth and begin the long journey to the cross.

How does Mary feel hearing the words of Simeon that follow the Nunc Dimitis spoken directly to her: “This child is destined for the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed, so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed – and a sword will pierce you own soul too.”

What does it feel like for Mary to hear her Son’s death sentence? How hard is it to live with that knowledge for 30 years or more? How much harder is it to stand watching as it is carried out? How did she feel? Was her faith sorely tested? How did she cope? At times, we face pain that is beyond consolation. Nothing can deaden the overwhelming pain. C.S. Lewis is his book ‘A Grief Observed’. Tries to convey his own grief at the death of his wife and in the midst of his grief he writes:

“Talk to me about the truth of religion and I’ll listen gladly. Talk to me about the duty of religion and I’ll listen submissively. But don’t come talking to me about the consolation of religion or I shall suspect that you don’t understand.”

The pain of the Cross for Mary could well be like this. Pain and grief can overwhelm everything – and pain and grief do overwhelm us.

Candlemas, calls us to turn our eyes away from Christ’s birth and to begin a long walk towards the Cross. In the next few weeks we will begin to prepare for Lent. The story of the Presentation of Christ in the Temple reminds us of the pain of the cross and asks us take the first steps down a road that leads through Lent to Holy Week and Easter.

I guess that the Nunc Dimitis in its context in Luke’s Gospel is a lot more than a gentle night time canticle, for it hides within it the truth of the Cross, the place of our salvation. It calls on us to prepare for the coming of Easter.