Sermon by the Rev. Dr Anne Tomlinson

May I speak in the name of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

This is the year in which the Growth Strategy in the diocese really takes off. Last year was one of preparation; of getting the pieces in place – paperwork, policies and people. But here at the start of

2012, we are poised to get stuck in to the reality of it all. 17 charges have already signed up to engage in Mission Action Planning, of whom you, of course, are one. And yesterday we spent a useful day doing just that. So today’s readings could not have come at a better time, because in essence they are a blueprint for the missional task you have pledged yourselves to engage in this coming year. They speak of three attitudes or behaviours that you need to adopt if such

missional work is to be both faithful and fruitful: the attitudes of preparation, dislocation and proclamation.

First preparation. We cannot, must not, assume that we know what God wants us to do. All too often churches, congregations, individual Christians do just that. They embark upon a programme of

good works with plans of their own (energetic and enthusiastic) making, often repeating age-old patterns which even if they worked then (which is doubtful), certainly will not do so in today’s world. In

other words, ‘they do their own thing’, spreading, as Merton said so astringently, ‘the contagion of their own obsessions’. That is not mission.

True missional engagement needs to begin with prayer; with listening to what God is actually saying to us, asking us to do. It is about clearing the mind of our dearly-held preconceptions and

listening, listening, listening with the ear of the heart to what God desires of us. Last week I spent three days sitting at the feet of a Benedictine monk, the Superior of Rostrevor Monastery in Northern

Ireland, who reminded us that the word ‘obedience’ comes from the Latin verb ‘audire’, ‘to listen’. We need to spend time listening hard to God if we are to be obedient disciples.

The two servants of God that our readings speak of today did just that, and in very dark places. Jonah, you’ll remember, had initially run from God’s call to go to Nineveh, believing the capital city of the Assyrian Empire to be an unlikely place for the declaration of God’s work; he thought he knew better than God and fled in the opposite direction. So God offered him some ‘retreat time’; 3 days and 3 nights in the darkness of a fish’s belly. And such was the experience there that when God speaks to him a second time, Jonah responds obediently and sets off for Nineveh. Similarly we meet Jesus today immediately after time spent in solitude and darkness, not of whale but of wilderness. Baptism in the Jordan has been followed by 40 days and 40 nights of contemplation and of wrestling with the demands of that call and that commitment; days and nights of obedient listening in the desert. We likewise cannot do God’s work without first inhabiting the desert, immersing ourselves in His word and listening attentively. Prayerful preparation comes first.

Secondly our readings speak of the dislocation that all true missional activity requires of us; of being asked to let go of our props, give up the idols that we cling to and move from our comfort zone. Only when we have released ourselves from all that ‘encumbers us about’ will we be free enough, fleet of foot enough, to go wherever God calls us. It’s easy to speak of God with our friends here in church; we share a common language, after all; understand each other and inhabit the same world view. But it is not so easy outwith these walls in a society with a different take on life. We can feel like a fish out of water or a throw-back to some earlier age; we fear that our message will be unwelcome or misunderstood; that we will appear peculiar, our words mocked or just plain ignored. So why bother?

That’s just what Jonah felt about Nineveh; that sophisticated, flashy city with its renowned army, huge technical skills and administrative prowess - the very model of metropolitan chic. But dig a little deeper and one sees that the people of Nineveh, for all their urbanity and modernity, had a keen sense of the ultimate reality; an active respect for the awesomeness of the transcendent. You have only to look at the artwork of this period, the seals and reliefs depicting the god Assur, to become aware of their sense of divine otherness. And it does not take much for them to recognize their impoverishment before Divine Reality; Jonah preached ‘and the people of Nineveh believed God, proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth’.

We too must believe that of the world in which we live. For all its flashiness, its hankering after the false gods of consumerism, choice and competition, there is within it – often not far from the surface -

an awareness of the transcendent. We need to connect our Story of the Divine, the Word of life, with its seeking for Otherness in life. And we won’t do that by staying put in Tarshish. Just listen again to

those first verses from our OT reading. The word of the Lord came to Jonah saying, “Get up, go to

Nineveh .. So Jonah set out and went to Nineveh .. Jonah began to go into the city, going a day’s walk. We can’t fail to notice that sense of movement, of being propelled by God, of leaving home behind and setting out in faith. Just as Simon and Andrew and James and John left their nets and their loved ones and set out upon the adventure of faith.

The call to mission carries the cost of letting go of treasured things and being willing to move forward into unknown. It takes us out of our comfort zones in order that we might experience the redemptive

work of God in places and with people that we ourselves, if we are honest, do not expect to be included in God salvation. Discipleship breaks open our defences and shatters those safe-boxes in which we have cocooned the divine. This is what mission asks of us; that we leave behind the yearning for the way things were ‘in the good old days’ and respond to the insistent prompting of God that we leave for a new country. Mission requires us to travel and change in order than we might connect.

Preparation, dislocation – and thirdly proclamation. Jonah had a message, and not a palatable one at that. “Forty days more” , he cried out, “and Nineveh shall be overthrown”. And Jesus too came

with a similarly apocalyptic message; “the time is fulfilled”, He said, “and the kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the good news”. Both offer messages that are about change and

repentance; about turning aside from present behaviours to embrace a new future. The disciples on the lochside find themselves immediately caught up in the sharing of the message that God’s reign is at hand. A message of hope and of change that will challenge the status quo and lead, as we know, to conflict. A message that it involves difficult and painful work. But a message that has results. Jonah obediently cried out the message that God had given him “and the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast and everyone great and small put on sackcloth”. Jesus said to fishermen on the Sea of Galilee “follow me and I will make you fishers of men. And immediately they left their nets and followed him”. This message which invites people to wholeness and newness of life, if proclaimed boldly and faithfully, gets heard and is responded to.

Sharing that message of new life, that good news, is scary stuff. It’s not an easy option. It’s not even optional. It’s what we are called to by virtue of our own Baptism: “Will you proclaim the good news by

word and deed, serving Christ in all people?” we were asked. With the help of God, I will, we answered. And that is the only way we can do it. Not for nothing is our diocesan strategy entitled

“Growing with God’s Grace in Glasgow and Galloway”. Such a task of proclamation, of growing the Kingdom, can only be done in God’s power and by God’s grace. The pathway you have identified for

yourselves for this coming year can only be followed in God’s power and by God’s grace.

So as you pledge yourselves to engage in the task of mission in 2012 by means of prayerful preparation, faithful dislocation and courageous proclamation - as you respond to God’s call to be faithful missionaries in this part of Glasgow - be assured that ‘the One who calls is faithful’. Listen again to the psalmist’s words and hear them spoken to you, the obedient people of St Aidan’s, beloved children of God and fellow disciples with those whom He called beside the Galilean lake.

God alone is our rock and salvation. Truly our hope is in Him. He alone is our rock and our salvation, our stronghold, so that we shall not be shaken. In God is our safety and our honour; God is our strong rock and our refuge. And power belongs to God.

To whom be all glory and honour, now and for ever. Amen.