I feel like recently I’ve been starting a lot of sermons with references to TV programmes. I wonder if that’s anything to do with lock down? Anyway, I wonder if there are any other fans of the The Great Pottery Throwdown out there? For those of you not in the know, it’s like Bakeoff, but instead of cooking the contestants make things out of clay. Perhaps it’s the fact that I served my curacy in Stoke, and the programme is filmed there, but this is one of my favourites of the genre.
Each week there are a couple of tasks, but almost all of them involve the pottery wheel at some point. Has anybody here ever had a go on a pottery wheel? I did once. It didn’t go well. The potters create a whole range of different things on the wheels, from tiny porcelain cups to huge great amphora, using a variety of skills, tools, and parts of their bodies – thumbs, fingers, elbows. But one thing is common to all of them. They always start by getting the lump of clay centred. With big bits of clay this can take a while, but unless they get it properly centred, they’ve never going to get any where with their creation.
It seems to me that this principle carries on into all kinds of other areas of life. Mechanical, emotional, spiritual. When things are spinning round, if we don’t get centred, things start going wrong.
If we do get centred correctly then beautiful things can be created.
When things are spinning round, if we don’t get centred things start going wrong. If we do get centred correctly then beautiful things can be created.
Over the last month or so we’ve been looking at the accounts of the return to Jerusalem of the people of God following the exile in Babylon. They returned to rebuild the city under the leadership of Ezra and Nehemiah. We’ve been thinking about what insights we can gain for the rebuilding that we are doing as we come out of the emergency state of the last 18 months. We’ve talked about the foundations of worship, about the importance of working together, and the need for rebuilding with patterns of life that address social injustice. These are expressed in our Church Values of Celebrating, Loving God, Loving Each Other, and Loving our neighbours.
This morning we are thinking about the importance of being centred on the word of God, and the fact that this means setting our lives to revolve around what God says to us. Again, this fits in with our church value of Loving God, as part of which we say that we value being rooted in the Bible.
So, let’s turn to our readings and see what they have to say to us this morning. I don’t often preach, going through a passage verse by verse, but it seemed appropriate this morning.
V1 The people gathered together with one accord and told Ezra to bring out the book of the law. Two things strike me about this. If there was one thing that the people of God had not been good at in their history, it was gathering together. They had been quite tribal, they’d fallen out with their leaders when things had gone wrong, they’d split up and been divided more often than out in their history, but now they are of a common mind, agreed, gathering around God’s word. And it is a grass roots, bottom up movement. That’s the second thing. It’s not Ezra telling them that he’s going to get the book, and that they should gather round. They gather round and ask their teacher to bring out the book. There is a hunger for the word of God, and a good understanding of it.
Unity. Hunger.
V2 The assembly was made up of men and women and all who were able to understand. Everyone was there, whole families. No division of age or gender. There was equality of access to the word of God and teaching about it.
Equality
V3 He read from daybreak until noon – and all the people listened attentively. That is about six hours. I’m not sure that I could stand and read for six hours. That is a long time. I know for certain that I couldn’t listen attentively for six hours. It’s a really long time. But these people showed perseverance and dedication to the word of God. They wanted to soak it all up, to soak it all in, to know the great story of God in which they saw themselves.
Perseverance. Attentiveness.
V5 -6 Ezra opened the book. The people stood up. Ezra praised the Lord. Everyone worshipped. We talked about worship at the foundations of any rebuilding, a few weeks ago, and here it is again. When we meet with God, encounter God, in the Word, it draws out our worship, it inspires our worship, it gives us words to worship. How many of our songs and hymns are drawn from the words of Scripture. Most of the liturgy of the Church of England is Scripture. Our prayer and worship is shot through with the Word of God.
Worship
v7 The Levites instructed the people in the Law … making it clear and giving the meaning so that the people understood what was being read.
Now there are a couple of different ways of understanding this. It is likely that the book that was being read was written in Hebrew, and so Ezra was reading Hebrew. However, during the exile it is likely that Hebrew fell out of use in normal conversation, and most of the people now spoke Aramean instead. They didn’t know Hebrew, so they needed it to be translated for them. In addition to this, it is likely that they would have needed it explaining, helped to see how they could live it out.
Translation. Application.
V9 Do not mourn or weep … for all the people had been weeping.
Why do we think the people were weeping as they heard the words of the Law of Moses explained to them? What was in there to make people cry? Maybe as they heard the story of the rescue from slavery in Eygpt and the entry to the promised land, they recognised their story as those who had been rescued from exile and brought to Jerusalem. Maybe they wept over the sins of their ancestors who had been faithless to the covenant they were hearing about, and the God who had brought them into the promised land. Maybe they recognised their own half heartedness and failure to live in God’s way and follow God’s command. Maybe they were weeping for the lost years. Whatever it was, Nehemiah steps in and comforts them. He reminds them that the Holy God has brought them back, and given them this new understanding, so they could do forward with hope and joy. Their weeping was turned to joy, it became celebration. Not because there weren’t things that needed mourning, but because in the midst of mourning there was a light of hope.
Weeping. Joy.
So, here we find the Word of God centering the people of God as they reform their community. We find the word of God being central in unity, hunger, equality, perseverance, attentiveness, worship, translation, application, weeping, and joy.
As we seek to rebuild, as we look to understand what we should build back the same, and what we should build back different, how might we centre ourselves on the Word of God, how can we make God’s Word central to our lives?
I’d like to take these words in a slightly different order.
Let’s begin with hunger, perseverance, and attentiveness. It seems to me that these things deal with our attitude towards our engagement with God’s word. Do we want to read it? Do we want to learn more from it? Are we hungry, do we persevere, are we attentive? If the answer to these questions is “no”, then our lives won’t be centred on it. There are loads of resources out there to help us. There are audio Bibles, internet Bibles, Lectio365 apps for our phones, paper Bibles. The Holy Spirit is here to help us, to give us that hunger, perseverance and attentiveness if we ask for it. As we centre our wills on the Word of God, so our lives will be centred there as well.
Then unity, equality, translation, and application. These seem to me to deal with how we read the word of God. We are meant to read it together, to work on understanding what it says to our contexts, and to put it into practice. At All Saints we do this in a variety of ways – but small groups are probably the most effective and important way of doing this. As we centre our minds on the Word of God, so our lives will be centred there as well.
And what about worship, weeping, and joy. These seem to deal with our emotional response to God’s Word. It shows us who God is and draws us into worship. It can fuel and equip us to worship. Sometimes it will make us cry, as we realise how far we fall short of God, as our hearts are broken for the world, as God’s heart breaks, as we lament the pain we are experiencing. Sometimes it will fill us with joy, as we see the wonder of creation, as we experience the healing touch of God, as we are encouraged. As we centre our emotions on the Word of God, so our lives will be centred there as well.
So, as we rebuild after Covid, learning from Nehemiah and Ezra, let’s centre our wills on the Word of God in hunger, perseverance, and attentiveness. Let’s centre our minds on the Word of God in unity, equality, translation, and application. Let’s centre our emotions on the Word of God in worship, weeping, and joy. Let’s centre our lives on the Word of God so that beautiful things can be created.
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