The Parish of Birstall and Wanlip

Sermon preached at St James’ Church to celebrate its Patronal Festival, on 26^th July 2009.

The theme is ‘Following our Pilgrim God’ - suitable for meditation on our Church’s future calling.

By Revd James Shakespeare, Rector

“God never resigns himself to the fact that creation is floundering; he enters the world to trace a path for lost and wondering feet.”

It was with these words - found in a book about the Bible - that I began a reflection that was to stay with me throughout my sabbatical. And the reflection was this: that life in general and Christianity in particular is all about pilgrimage – being on a journey. A journey made possible by a pilgrim God, who out of his great love, traces a path for lost and wondering feet.

We are all searching, all of our lives are a journey, and it is into this common human experience, not least that we are (so often) lost, that faith speaks. For God, who is beyond our imagining, does not leave us alone, but he enters our world, tracing a journey for lost and wondering feet. And God does not leave it there, for he invites us too, to become fellow pilgrims, to trace that journey also, through the scriptures and on in the way of faith – following Jesus, the pioneer of our faith.

It was, for me, the adventure of a lifetime, as I set out on my pilgrimage, with these thoughts in mind – hoping that out of this experience, walking the St. Cuthbert’s Way, God might lead me on, in my journey of faith. I did not know what would happen, events would be outside of my control, but (like other pilgrims) I was seeking to be changed: to meet God afresh, and to gain new insights along the way.

And I am happy to say, through all the joys & trials of my journey – the invigoration of the Northumbrian hills & the sense of God’s presence on Holy Island, as well as the wounded feet - I was not disappointed, because God did deepen my vision & refresh my experience. With or without lost and wondering feet, I rediscovered a way in which to place my footsteps, following our pilgrim God. And in spite of my needs, I was met by a God who ministered to me, as I opened my hands to receive from him.

You may be wondering what all this has to do with today, our Patronal festival, as we celebrate the witness of St James, our patron? Well the answer is everything! Because St James is the patron saint of pilgrims, and his symbol, the cockle shell – which is all around us in this Church – is a reminder that Christian life is, for all of us, a pilgrimage: a journey of faith, from death to life. And I have brought with me, to share with you, some of the special shells I have acquired on my journey, because they are reminders of the pilgrim’s way……. on which all of us are invited to travel.

The Bible, from start to finish, is rich in wisdom about this pilgrim way. A way of living and journeying that is relevant to each one of us, whether we have the opportunity of going on pilgrimage or not. For alongside our human desire for stability and fixed places of abode (the desire for structures & Temples & borders, as Stephen reminded us last week), we find a God who calls his chosen people to journey with him: a God who invites them to give him their trust, and to journey forward, from the familiar to the unfamiliar, with the promise of a better future.

Abraham, Joseph and Moses, all left their homeland to journey to a new place… The people were summoned, annually, to journey to the Temple in Jerusalem, to recall the great journeys of old, of Passover and Exodus and wandering in the wilderness… And later, the prophets spoke to a people again in exile, in Babylon, saying that God would open up a new way - in the wilderness - a way back to the wellsprings of hope. Despite the best hopes of Kings and priests, their people’s way was never static, but always on the move, following a God who is always on the move.

And in Jesus we find the pilgrim faith revealed in all its fullness and power, as He journeys on to wherever God’s people need him and wherever the Kingdom needs to be proclaimed: from village to village, from town to town, and (finally) to Jerusalem, to complete the work of our salvation: from the deserted garden of Gethsemane to the desolate cross of Calvary, from the stone cold tomb of Good Friday to the life-giving garden of Easter Sunday. Christ, our Lord, is never one to stay put, but is always on the move, tracing a way from death to life, from fear to trust, from despair to hope, into new horizons and beyond our wildest dreams. He is the archetypal pilgrim.

For us, as Christians, the saints, including the apostles (St James, among them) are those who remind us of the pilgrim way of faith. In place of the tendency to stay put, either to resign ourselves to our human condition, or (as Christians) to become over protective of any one way of being the Church – any one kind of church building, any one way of worshipping or any one set of priorities – the saints remind us that to be true to our Christian vocation, we need to be a pilgrim church: a church on the move; because our God is on the move.

We need to worship and to search the scriptures, so to be changed: to have the courage to follow God - the God who always goes ahead of us. We need to have the courage, rooted in Christ’s living presence, to be a pilgrim church; a church on the move – always looking to go deeper, to see wider, to gain new insights, and to draw new people in; never to be comfortable or complacent. For the church is like a life-giving stream – if it stays still too long it stagnates and dies, but if it keeps flowing, it gives life.

As the great Church Council, Vatican 2, noted: ‘The Church, by its nature, must be a church on the move, a searching church… She betrays herself if she stops searching, settles down and thinks she has arrived. The Church is provisional, led by the Spirit of a Transcendent God, who cannot be enclosed in definitions or Temples made with human hands.’ The church is always, more than buildings, people – and we need to be ready to see God not only amongst ourselves, but in those outside, whom we may not yet know or understand: for they are God’s people too.

In our Gospel today we get a glimpse of the disciples, on the eve of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, struggling to understand what following this pilgrim God really means. So we find James and John, effectively asking (via their mother’s stage managed intervention) for positions of influence in the church. They seem to be after the tops jobs: they are looking for a guarantee of their future status: as members, if you like, of the board of directors or the bench of bishops. A desire some might relate to at a time of growing unemployment and economic insecurity.

But Jesus, patiently challenging their lack of faith, reminds them that their life will not be about resting in such human securities, but following the way of self-giving and risk – serving and not counting the cost, knowing that in him they will have all that they need. It would be a hard lesson for them to learn, and yet (as tradition tells us) learn it they did, St. James being one of the first servants of the church and its first martyr…. It is St Paul, however, who best speaks for the post-Easter & post-Pentecost experience of the apostles, those refreshed by the experience of Jesus’ life-giving resurrection & the promised Holy Spirit, committed (now) to his pilgrim path. Because Paul, proclaiming (at every turn) the pilgrim way of Jesus, reminds us –   in 2 Corinthians – of the life that comes through walking the way of the cross: a life lived not in own strength, but through the God who journeys with us. Our pilgrimage is never without hope, nor does it rely on our own strength, but following the way of Jesus, his death and resurrection, we become witnesses to his life breaking through, his ‘treasure in clay jars’.

So St James helps us to deepen our vision as a pilgrim Church. He helps us to trust in the God who traces a path for lost and wondering feet. And he points us to the one who goes before us, and leads us on: from the old to the new, in hope of transformation and life. The question is will we have the courage, rooted in Jesus, to take up our pilgrim’s shell - and follow wherever he leads? Amen