Trinity 7

Opening Verse of Scripture Psalm 107:1

Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever. 

Collect Prayer for the Day—Before we read we pray

Lord of all power and might, the author and giver of all good things: graft in our hearts the love of your name, increase in us true religion, nourish us with all goodness, and of your great mercy keep us in the same;

through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. CW

Generous God, you give us gifts and make them grow: though our faith is small as mustard seed, make it grow to your glory and the flourishing of your kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord. CW

First Bible Reading Hosea Chapter 11:1-11

When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. The more I called them,  the more they went from me; they kept sacrificing to the Baals, and offering incense to idols. Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk, I took them up in my arms; but they did not know that I healed them. I led them with cords of human kindness, with bands of love. I was to them like those who lift infants to their cheeks.
I bent down to them and fed them. They shall return to the land of Egypt, and Assyria shall be their king, because they have refused to return to me. The sword rages in their cities, it consumes their oracle-priests, and devours because of their schemes. My people are bent on turning away from me. To the Most High they call, but he does not raise them up at all. How can I give you up, Ephraim?  How can I hand you over, O Israel?
How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender. I will not execute my fierce anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and no mortal, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath.

They shall go after the Lord, who roars like a lion; when he roars,  his children shall come trembling from the west. They shall come trembling like birds from Egypt,  and like doves from the land of Assyria;  and I will return them to their homes, says the Lord.

Second Reading Colossians Chapter 3:1-11

If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.

Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). On account of these the wrath of God is coming on those who are disobedient. These are the ways you also once followed, when you were living that life. But now you must get rid of all such things – anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!

Gospel Reading Luke Chapter 12:13-21

Someone in the crowd said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.’ But he said to him, ‘Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you?’ And he said to the crowd, ‘Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.’ Then he told them a parable: ‘The land of a rich man produced abundantly. And he thought to himself, “What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?” Then he said, “I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.‘” But God said to him, “You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?” So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich towards God.’

Post Communion Prayer

Lord God, whose Son is the true vine and the source of life, ever giving himself that the world may live: may we so receive within ourselves the power of his death and passion that, in his saving cup, we may share his glory and be made perfect in his love; for he is alive and reigns, now and for ever.

Commentary

In today’s Gospel reading Jesus is continuing His journey to Jerusalem that he started back in Luke 9 v 51. On this journey Jesus has many interactions with the people he encounters but also continues to teach the disciples as they travel towards Jerusalem. Today, as he was teaching His disciples He appears to be interrupted by someone in the crowd who wanted Him to resolve a family dispute over inheritance. To be asked to be a mediator in any kind of dispute was an honourable role in the Jewish culture of the time and Jesus responds with dignity, humility and very wise diplomacy to this request by asking who appointed Him as judge or arbiter between the two brothers. 

Perhaps the request is based on the Mosaic Law precept that defines that an elder son should receive twice the inheritance of the younger, a concept which is backed up in the Mishnah, a book which expands the Jewish law and was much used by Rabbis in this kind of dispute. Perhaps the requestor just wanted to go 50:50 with his brother on their inheritance and was looking for Jesus to support him in his request. Perhaps he wanted Jesus to overturn the prevailing Jewish law. 

However there is clearly more to the story than this. Interestingly the man was not really asking for advice. He merely wanted Jesus to stand on his side and "tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me." There are echoes here of Martha asking Jesus to back her up when she wanted Mary to come and help her with the food preparation and hospitality when Jesus came to their home which we read of a few weeks ago. She too appeared to be telling Jesus what to do. Here the man wanted Jesus to get the money for him, ’…tell my brother…’. Not surprisingly Jesus sees through this pretence and points out to the man that what is at the heart of his request is not justice or arbitration, but greed and a desire to amass possessions. Jesus then uses the story of the farmer to illustrate the point, probably very fitting as He is almost certainly in a rural environment at the time. Life, Jesus points out, is not just about accumulating wealth and possessions for self satisfaction and enjoyment; it’s also about the relationship we have with God. When we die, our wealth and possessions will mean nothing, but our relationship with God, through Christ, will be all important. Our future is always in God’s hands, and we must trust in Him for that future.

It’s very easy for us to be critical of the man who comes to Jesus, but it’s also very easy for us to begin to fall into the same category as him. It would appear that the man is not a bad man, and might even not be particularly greedy, he just wants what he believes to be his fair share. A familiar sentiment often inwardly expressed as, ‘Will there be enough for me?’ But as we’ve seen, at the centre of today’s readings is not so much the theme of wealth and possessions but more our attitude to and pursuit of our material security. In today’s materialistic world we can so easily get side-tracked into thinking that wealth and possessions are the ultimate route to security and independence. It’s easy to believe that if we had a bit more money in the bank, if the mortgage was paid off, if our pension was a little larger, if we didn’t have to pay so much tax and so on, that everything would be better as we would be better off. (it’s interesting that the topic of tax is so prevalent in some leadership debates!) It’s true that wealth does appear to protect some people from the normal everyday vulnerabilities to some extent, and that lack of wealth can cause significant social and economic problems on a personal, local, national and international scale. But the reality is that we are created in God’s image and are therefore not dependent on our individual or national wealth but on each other and most particularly God Himself. It’s not so much a question of what we possess, but what possesses us. 

In terms of the world as a whole, we are all wealthy in relative terms, and few, if any of us, live in real poverty. So it’s easy to believe our security is to be found in the things we have worked hard for or inherited, and its equally easy to be consumed by ensuring we have ‘just a little more than’ enough to get by. In one sense there is nothing wrong with wanting to have material possessions and security. God wants us to be wise stewards of the wealth and possessions He has given us. But we should not confuse being wise stewards with people who are consumed with the pursuit and protection of our own personal wealth.

Ultimately, we will answer to God when we die, as the final verse from our reading in Luke points out. One of the other readings which can be used today comes from Ecclesiastes. The writer of Ecclesiastes had experienced all that money can buy and ends up calling it ‘vanity of vanities’. Other words that have been used to translate this phrase are ‘Meaningless’, ‘Fragile’, ‘Symbolic’ or more colloquially ‘Scotch Mist’. For him riches and possessions bring no real gain, cause hard work, and must all be left behind when he dies.   

Ancestral inheritance was one of Judaism’s central symbols and getting it right was part of obedience to God’s will. The nation of Israel had traditionally prided itself on national identity and security, claiming for itself more and more ‘ancestral’ territory.  In Hosea we read that Israel had lost the true focus of their inheritance; an inheritance which was based on a covenant relationship with God, not just in promised lands and possessions. God wants us to enjoy life, but not without a relationship with Him. In the epistle reading Paul exhorts all followers of Christ to ‘set your minds on things above, not on earthly things’. And it’s as we set our minds on Him that we achieve the balance between current and future needs and using our money, and all that God has given us, wisely. And in so doing we come into our ultimate inheritance, the promise of eternal life.   Sam Cappleman 

Meditation

Last week the Old Testament reading was from the beginning of Hosea, this week’s is towards the end of his writings. Hosea is the first of the 12 Minor Prophets we encounter in the Old Testament, and he also the longest with his book stretching to 14 chapters. The Minor Prophet writings are known as a collective work in the Hebrew Bible called ‘The Book of the Twelve’. Hosea was a contemporary of Isiah and was a northerner, his message being primarily for the Northern Kingdom of Israel, although he does occasionally refer to the Southern Kingdom of Judah. He was active in the 40 years just prior to Samaria falling to the Assyrians around 722 BC. During his time he witnessed the Kingdom of Israel reject God and adopt wholesale pagan practices, which in turn brought about rapid moral and political decline. Hosea’s message is no less relevant to our times than it was all those centuries ago. He speaks of God’s covenant and unending love for His people in the face of rejection, God’s judgement and the hope and restoration that we can have in a God who does not change. Hosea experienced what it must have been like for God as His people rejected Him and His covenant love and the desire that His people would return to Him in that Hosea’s own wife, whom he loved, deserted and betrayed him too. At the beginning of the book, Hosea is instructed to take an unfaithful wife, a woman of harlotry and Hosea’s pleading with his unfaithful wife parallels God’s voice to an unfaithful Israel. Today’s reading reveals the parent heart of a God, described through the words of a mother’s unfailing love, who will not give up on His people. In our reading today it seems God is torn between throwing the unruly and disruptive children out of the house and have nothing to do with Gods them, or protecting and comforting them the way a mother does to her children. Our own human instinct is to react and lash out with anger and retribution when we have been let down and betrayed, deceived and ignored but Hosea writes of a God who responds in a completely different way, a way of unending of holiness and faithfulness, and ultimately of restoration. Exile will come but the roaring lion that is Yahweh will call them home, just as Jesus, through His unfailing love and unending holiness and faithfulness, made real in His death and resurrection, restores us and calls us home.

Sam Cappleman

Hymns

• Sing to God new songs of worship
• Be still for the presence
• As the deer pants for the water
• Love divine (Tune Blaenwern)
• O for a thousand tongues to sing
• Immortal, Invisible, God only wise
• Stand up and bless the Lord
• Sing of the Lord's goodness
• Now thank we all our God
• Love divine
• All creatures of our God and King
• Jubilate everybody
• All people that on earth do dwell
• As the deer pants for the water

Prayers for Sunday and the week ahead

Guide and rule your church forever, Lord, that it may walk warily in times of quiet and boldly in times of trouble. Through our Lord, Jesus Christ. Franciscan Breviary 

Lord Jesus Christ, as those who are sick we come to the physician of life; as unclean, to the fountain of mercy; as blind, to the light of eternal splendour; as needy, to the Lord of heaven and earth; and as naked, to the king of glory. Amen. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274)

May we see your glory, O God, in all your works. May we feel your presence in all circumstances and may we hold to you through times of good and ill; through Christ our Lord. Amen George Ridding, 1828-1904

Strengthen us, O God, to relieve the oppressed, to hear the groans of poor prisoners, to reform the abuses of all professions; that many be made not poor to make a few rich. For Jesus Christ’s sake. (Oliver Cromwell 1599-1658 adapted from letter after battle of Dunbar)

Father of everlasting goodness, our Creator and Guide, be close to us and hear our prayers. Forgive us when we forget to trust You to provide us with every blessing in this life. Giver of all good gifts, help us not to seek things for ourselves, but to seek ways in which we might be of service to others

Teach us to treasure Christ and His grace above all earthly possessions. Help us to continually cast our lot with life and not with death; with grace and not with judgement, with love and not with hate, with giving and not with receiving, with praising and not being praised., with trusting and not with fear

As we pray for ourselves, we pray also for blessing to be upon others, bring to pass that which they most need in their lives right now:

Lord, I pray for all who suffer from hatred and prejudice, from abuse and ill-treatment, and for all who are victims of what others do. I pray, too, for the people of violence, that they may change their ways and learn to respect others. I pray for myself, that when I face what is negative or evil I may have the courage and generosity to break the cycle of violence, hatred, fear or distrust, and make my own choices and take responsibility for the direction in which I want my life to go. I pray that I may always do to others as I would wish them to do to me. Amen.

O God, the King of Righteousness, lead us we pray, in the way of justice and of peace. Inspire us to break down all oppression and wrong, to gain for everyone their reward, and from every one their due service; that each may live for all, and all may care for each, in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

Almighty God, the fountain of all wisdom, you know our needs before we ask, and our ignorance in our asking; have compassion on our weakness, and give us those things which for our unworthiness we dare not, and for our blindness we cannot ask, for the sake of your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

Lord, Jesus Christ, let me seek you by desiring you, and let me desire you by seeking you. Let me find you by loving you, and love you in finding you. Amen. St Anselm

Additional Material

Commentary

People often called upon rabbis to settle disputes. In this case a man asks Jesus to help settle an issue where a brother had failed to divide an inheritance. The eldest son would always receive double what the other sons would receive. The proportion was therefore fixed and the man has a reasonable expectation that the brother should give him his fair share. Jesus uses the opportunity to issue words which deal not with the fairness of the distribution but a harsh warning against possessions. 

In Sepphoris, one of the largest Jewish cities in Galilee, archaeologists have found large grain silos on farms where wealthy absentee landowners lived. Jesus uses the image of one of these huge barns, which his listeners would have marvelled at, to make an important comment on wealth. Just like other times throughout history and indeed today there were some people who had extraordinary wealth. At the time it was about 1% of the population. These rich and famous people have always provoked envy and desire. Jesus makes the point that it really doesn’t matter how rich these folks are now, shrouds do not have pockets, and one day we will all have to give an account to God of how we used our earthly material resources. If this life alone was important, then eating and drinking and being merry might be the best that mortal life could offer. However we need to contend with God’s demands. Many Jewish texts were critical of self sufficient people who thought that they had it all and did not reckon with their own death. 

There are three reasons why the man in the parable is considered by Jesus to be a fool. 

The first reason was that he hoarded his wealth for himself, he did not care or give to others because he failed to realise that everything belongs to God. He thought that materials things were his own. He thought to himself, '

What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.' "Then he said, 'This is what I'll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I'll say to myself, 

"You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry." 

It is all about ‘I’ ‘my’ and ‘myself’ but our stuff is not our own. The earth is God’s, we are entrusted to look after it and to look after one another, not to think that the purpose of life is to get more and more for ourselves. This was God’s ground and God’s crops. When God created the world Adam was not given ownership he was asked to look after it. It was not ownership it was stewardship. However the man never thought about God, he never considered that the stuff we have is not our own. 

The second reason the man was a fool was because he was greedy. Jesus says 

‘Watch out ! be on your guard against all kinds of greed’. The rich man was a fool because he thought that if he was greedy he would be happy. The fact is that for a greedy person to be satisfied they will always need a little bit more. No amount will ever be enough. Greed is a thirst which can never be satisfied. If we keep wanting more then we will never have enough. Greed is like drinking saltwater, saltwater can never satisfy our thirst, we will just become thirstier and need to drink more and if we keep on doing it eventually it will kill us. 

The third reason why the man was a fool was because he thought that things could bring happiness. There is a tendency to think that possessions will make us happy, but life is not helped by having lots of possessions. There is within each one of us a spiritual part. In the parable Jesus said that one day that spiritual part of us will be called to meet with God. At any moment any one of us could find that our bodies die and God calls our spiritual souls. So we have to make sure that we look after our souls. We need to stop thinking about earthly things and think about heavenly things. This rich man was a fool because he thought that a man made in the image of God could be ultimately satisfied with eating, drinking and worldly pleasure. In Psalm 42.1-2 we read that the soul of man thirsts for God just as the soul of a deer thirsts for water. Augustine famously stated ‘my soul is restless till it finds it rest in thee.’ 

The man came to Jesus because he was concerned about his material wealth, he wanted money out of the will. Jesus said he should be concerned about his spiritual health. We care for our souls when instead of gathering for ourselves we learn to give. Instead of spending time on our leisure we learn to serve others. God needs neither our good works nor our wealth, but our neighbour does. We live in times which are full of fear and increasingly we need to care for each other and our neighbour. Living together is not easy it means getting on with people we find difficult or who have perhaps hurt us, which is why forgiveness lies at the heart of our faith. Nevertheless it is God’s will that we care for and share with others and this is the message which the rich farmer never understood. Charles Royden 

Commentary Balancing Values

Jesus was teaching His disciples when He was interrupted by someone who wanted him to resolve a family dispute over inheritance. He was not really asking for advice. He wanted Jesus to stand on his side and "tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me." He wanted Jesus to get the money for him, but Jesus saw the true problem in his heart - greed. And He uses the opportunity to warn the people of the danger of greed and placing one’s confidence in earthly possessions. Ultimately Jesus did act as judge for the family member; He pointed out to him the danger in his request to settle the family dispute! 

Ancestral inheritance was one of Judaism’s central symbols and getting it right was part of obedience to God’s will. The nation of Israel too had traditionally prided itself on national identity and security, claiming for itself more and more ‘ancestral’ territory. But all the time God was calling both individuals and the nation back, not to be a people with great wealth and land but to be a holy community who could be a light to the world. It’s a task that the Jews never came to fulfil and one which according to Luke in the Nunc Dimitus, is passed to Jesus who is ‘a light for revelation to the Gentiles and the glory to your people Israel’. Israel had lost the true focus of their inheritance; an inheritance which was based on a covenant relationship with God, not just in promised lands and possessions. 

The gospel reading forces us to think about our values and the balance we need to maintain between our earthly and our heavenly inheritance and birthrights. A balance between seeing wealth as evil and seeing it useful to fulfil the purpose of God. Indeed, Luke doesn’t say that money is sinful, but rather that greed is the problem. What do we do with our worldly riches and, in particular, what do we do with the surplus each one of us enjoys? Do we keep the surplus for ourselves, storing it up for a rainy day, or do we share our wealth openly and generously with others, especially those in need? Do we focus on our ‘lands and possessions’ or do we focus on our covenant relationship with a generous God who calls us through Christ to be lights to the world and to be rich towards God? Selfishness in God’s communal world is destructive to all, leading to violence and to war, in families, communities and even nature itself. Jesus reminds us that He wants us to invest in things that have eternal value not just earthy possessions. 

God wants us to enjoy life, but not without a relationship with Him. In the epistle reading Paul exhorts all followers of Christ to ‘set your minds on things above, not on earthly things’. And it’s as we set our minds on Him that we achieve the balance between current and future needs and using our money, and all that God has given us, wisely. And in so doing we come into our ultimate inheritance, the promise of eternal life. Sam Cappleman 

Commentary 

For thousands, of years there have been examples of people from all religious faiths who have renounced the world in order to devote themselves to the spiritual life, without the distractions of material possessions. We might think immediately of Saint Francis and many who have entered into religious communities. 

This tension between material possessions and spirituality is even more of an issue today, because we live in a society which is incredibly materialistic and enjoys unparalleled material prosperity. It is interesting that there has been a slight shift of late towards a more responsible attitude towards consumption. People are being encouraged to think about whether we are consuming the world’s precious resources too fast and without proper responsibility. But this change has not been brought about by religious people, more by politicians and the green lobby. These people are not so much concerned about the damage which materialism can do to the soul, but rather to the planet. The problem which is faced by us all as we struggle to restrain industrial growth and its effects is that other countries are not so pleased with our new found global conscience. We enjoyed the fruits from the industrial revolution, now other nations are discovering their appetite and consider it unfair that at this time they should be told to cut back. 

It is clear from the teaching of Jesus that he did not consider wealth or possessions in themselves as either inherently good or bad. Rather he set out clear choices which make it abundantly clear that we should develop a dependence on the goodness of God, not a dependence on material, created goods. Jesus wanted this not because he wanted to stop us from enjoying ourselves, clearly he was accused of being a party guy. Instead Jesus knew that pursuit of fulfillment through materials, wealth and greed, was utterly self-destructive. 

The challenge facing us all is to strike the right balance between using our hard work and God given creativity and becoming consumed by consumerism. There is nothing great about being poor, Christians should work to alleviate all kinds of poverty. However if we are all concerned with our own wealth creativity, and fail to be mindful of the needs of others, then that greedy attitude will inevitably cause others to be poor. 

The manner in which we create wealth is important, we should not be mean, cheating or exploit the vulnerable. 

The way in which we use wealth is important, we should be considerate of the needs of others and not just spend it on ourselves. 

Each one of us needs to examine our attitudes towards wealth and materialism. If we devote ourselves to amassing material things, neglecting moral, spiritual and intellectual well-being, then we will eventually destroy ourselves—and coincidentally also the planet. Charles Royden 

A reading from Peter Abelard

From somewhere near them in the woods a cry rose, a thin cry, of such intolerable anguish that Abelard turned dizzy on his feet, and caught at the wall of the hut. ’It’s a child’s voice,’ he said.Thibault had gone outside. The cry came again. ‘A rabbit,’ said Thibault. He listened. ‘It’ll be in the trap. Hugh told me he was putting them down.’ ‘O God,’ Abelard muttered. ‘Let it die quickly.’ But the cry came yet again. He plunged through a thicket of hornbeam. ‘Watch out,’ said Thibault, thrusting past him. ’The trap might take the hand off you.’ The rabbit stopped shrieking when they stooped over it, either from exhaustion, or in some last extremity of fear. Thibault held the teeth of the trap apart, and Abelard gathered up the little creature in his hands. It lay for a moment breathing quickly, then in some blind recognition of the kindness that had met it at the last, the small head thrust and nestled against his arm, and it died. It was that last confiding thrust that broke Abelard’s heart. He looked down at the little draggled body, his mouth shaking. ’Thibault,’ he said , ’do you think there is a God at all? Whatever has come to me, I earned it. But what did this one do?’ Thibault nodded. ’I know,’ he said. ’Only I think God is in it too.’ Abelard looked up sharply. ’In it? Do you mean that it makes him suffer, the way it does us?' Again Thibault nodded. ’Then why doesn’t he stop it?’ ’I don’t know,’ said Thibault. ’Unless it’s like the prodigal son. I suppose the father could have kept him at home against his will. But what would have been the use? All this,’ he stroked the limp body, ‘ is because of us. But all the time God suffers. More than we do.’ Abelard looked at him, perplexed. ‘Thibault, do you mean Calvary?’ Thibault shook his head. ‘That was only a piece of it - the piece that we saw - in time. Like that.’ He pointed to a fallen tree beside them, sawn through the middle. ’That dark ring there, it goes up and down the whole length of the tree. But you only see it where it is cut across. That is what Christ’s life was; the bit of God that we saw. And we think God is like that, because Christ was like that, kind and forgiving sins and healing people. We think God is like that forever, because it happened once, with Christ. But not the pain. Not the agony at the last. We think that stopped.’ Abelard looked at him, the blunt nose and the wide mouth, the honest troubled eyes. He could have knelt before him. ’Then, Thibault,’ he said slowly, ‘you think that all this,’ he looked down at the little quiet body in his arms, ’all the pain of the world, was Christ’s cross?’ ‘God’s cross,’ said Thibault. ‘And it goes on.’

Commentary 

We have today from the Old Testament a reading from the Book of the prophet Hosea. Throughout the writing Hosea uses symbolism to tell of the way the people of the northern kingdom of Israel have forsaken God's ways: they have deserted God and their covenant with him. Much of the book of Hosea warns of the consequences they will suffer for their waywardness. They have insisted on worshipping pagan gods ("kept sacrificing for the Baals", v. 2). (Baal was a god in the religions of both Canaan and Tyre.)

Hosea knew about waywardness, he was married to a woman who went off with other men and through the bitterness of his own disappointment was able to see how God too would have felt betrayed..

Hosea recalls the Exodus from Egypt (vv. 1-4). He compares God's loving leadership of the Israelites with a parent nurturing a child. Off worshipping other gods, they are unaware that God cared for them, healed them, and fed them. ( "Ephraim", v. 3, means Israel: this tribal territory was a particularly important part of the north.) Verses 5-7 tell of the punishment which the people will suffer for their rebellion, they will be exiled to "Assyria." Since they did not return to God, they will be in bondage, as they were in "Egypt". There will be fighting "in their cities" (v. 6); their priests will be killed. Even though they will call upon God for help, he will not hear them (v. 7).

Characteristically however the later part of the passage in verses 8-9 is in a very different tone. God speaks in a human, emotional way, his anger (unlike human anger) does not last; he will again be compassionate. He will not cause the utter destruction of the cities and their inhabitants. Many commentators find it hard to reconcile the messages of doom and destruction found in the prophets alongside the messages of hope and reconciliation. This is however a recurring theme, God loves his people and cannot desert or punish them ultimately, no matter how much they deserve it. God will forgive and does always love, just as Hosea forgave and took back his wife in spite of her waywardness. If Hosea found it in his heart to overlook the sin and forgive, how much greater was the compassion and grace of God.

Meditation

Saints Anne and Joachim

In the Church’s calendar, we have recently celebrated the Feast Day of Saints Anne and Joachim. Many Christians will ask, 'Who are Anne and Joachim?'! These are the names that, traditionally, have been given to the mother and father of the Blessed Virgin Mary - in other words to the grandparents of our Lord.

Now, we have no way of knowing if these were their names. Probably they weren't. But Jesus would certainly have had grandparents, so these are as good names as any for them. It also reminds us that Jesus 'shared at Nazareth the life of an earthly home' and shared it for many years.

Nazareth was small Jewish village in which family life would have been an important and central feature. We forget that Mary, when the angel Gabriel appeared to her, would have been living with her family - with 'Anne and Joachim' - to use their traditional names. How did they react to the news that their young daughter was pregnant outside of wedlock, I wonder? That Mary and Joseph went back to Nazareth and settled there suggests that, whatever their original reaction, they were supportive.

It is also a reminder to us that Jesus did not just appear on the scene. The incarnation, the Word becoming flesh, meant that our Lord really did become one of us and grew up in the way we grow up with all that means - good and bad. He would have known and experienced both the joys and sorrows of family life. Joseph, it seems, died when Jesus was still young, leaving him, as the eldest son, to care for his mother and family.

Remembering 'Anne and Joachim' is to remember the importance of family life. This is how God wants children to be brought up. In remembering them, we pray for all families that they may be places where children can be brought up in the 'fear and nurture of the Lord'. For our greatest responsibility as parents is not to make sure that our children pass tests and exams, but that they have every opportunity to know God in their lives and be able to serve him.

The main responsibility for this falls, inevitably, on a child's mother and father, but it also falls on all of us who part of the child's wider family. Grandparents often get forgotten in all this, but in an age when both parents often have no choice but to work, grandparents are frequently involved in the day to day care and rearing of children. Ánne and Joachim’ remind us both of the importance of grandparents and of the need to pray for them. Ross Royden

Meditation

Thought for the day - Anne Frank by Ross Royden 

Anne Frank was born in Germany in 1929. She had a sister Margot who was three years older. This was when Hitler and the Nazi party were rising to power in Germany after the first world war. Central to Nazi ideology, as expounded by Hitler, was a deep hatred of the Jews. Anne and her family were Jews. Seeing events, Otto and Edith Frank, Anne’s parents, moved to Amsterdam and Otto founded a company.

They settled into life in Amsterdam and were doing reasonably well, and then on September 1, 1939, World War 2 broke out. On May 10, 1940 the Nazis invaded the Netherlands and five days later the Dutch surrendered. Slowly at first, but surely, the Nazis introduced anti-Jewish measures as they did everywhere they went. Anne’s father lost his business. Jews had to wear the ‘Star of David’ to mark them out as Jews.

In the Spring of 1942, Anne’s father, realizing what was coming, started preparing a hiding place for his family. This was in the annexe of his business premises. Otto was fortunate in receiving help from former colleagues. When the time came for them to use the hiding place, they were joined by 4 more people.

On her 13th birthday, just before the family went into hiding, Anne was given a diary. During her time in the annexe, she wrote about her life there, describing her thoughts and feelings. Those in the annexe kept in touch with what was going on in the outside world through those who were helping them and by listening to the radio. One day, Anne heard the Dutch Minister of Education, who had escaped to England, appealing to people to keep hold of any diaries or documents they had for use after the war. Anne was inspired to go over her diary and rewrite it into one running story of her life in captivity, hoping it would be read when the war was over.

Before Anne had completed her rewriting, however, on this day, August 4 in 1944, Anne and her family were discovered in a police raid on the building. To this day we do not know what led the police to raid the building. It is possible that someone informed on them. We don’t know. What we do know is that Anne was taken to prison and then transported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration camp. Otto was sent to the camp for men. Anne, Margot, and her mother to the labour camp for women. In 1944, Anne and Margot were deported to the Bergen-Belsen camp where they died.

Anne’s writings were discovered and looked after by those helping the Franks. Her father, who alone survived, published an edited version of her diary after the war. It was an immediate success. Later a fuller version was also published. The diary has made Anne famous and the place where they went into hiding is now a major tourist attraction. A quote from Anne’s diary is well-known: ‘I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart.’ This positive outlook in the face of adversity appeals to us and Anne’s story has been made into a general story of youthful optimism and the triumph of the human spirit. This, however, will not do.

We like to think of Anne in the annexe full of life and hope. But hers is not a story of any girl, it is a story of a Jewish girl who suffered like millions of other Jews for no other reason than that they were Jews. Her final diary entry reads: ‘if only there were no other people in the world.’ But there were. And many of them were anything but ‘good at heart’. We pass over the awfulness of Anne’s death in our desire to read of her life, but as we read in her diary of her life, we need also to remember how it ended. This is a description from an eye-witness at the Concentration camp:

‘I saw Anne and her sister Margot again in the barracks … It was winter and you didn’t have any clothes. So all of the ingredients for illness were present. They were in bad shape. Day by day they got weaker … You could see that they were very sick. The Frank girls were so emaciated. They looked terrible. They had little squabbles, caused by their illness, because it was clear that they had typhus … They had those hollowed-out faces, skin over bone. They were terribly cold. They had the least desirable places in the barracks, below, near the door, which was constantly opened and closed. You heard them constantly screaming, “Close the door, close the door,” and the voices became weaker every day. You could really see both of them dying …’

Anne and Margot may have died of typhus, but it was antisemitism that killed them. As we see antisemitism on the rise again in our world, we need to read these words, heart-breaking though they are, and make a simple promise: Never again.

Meditation

Lord, our God and King, your greatness is seen throughout the earth. When I gaze at the heavens which your fingers have formed, and look at the moon and the stars which you have set there, I realise how small we are in the magnificence of your creation. Yet you treasure us above all that you have made, and you give us control over all the works of your hand - animals both wild and tame, birds in the air, and the creatures of the sea. Lord, our God and King, your greatness is seen throughout the earth.

Meditation

In one of his books Leo Tolstoy tells the story of a young Russian who inherits his father’s small farm. He immediately starts dreaming of how to expand his property when one morning a well-dressed stranger visits him and makes him an offer that is too good to be true - he could have free of charge all the property he could walk around in one day. The only condition was that he returns to the same spot from which he started, the grave of his father, before the sun went down. Seeing the rich fields in the distance, he sets out without taking any provisions or saying goodbye to his family. He figured he could cover six square miles in a day. After a short while he decided to make it nine, then twelve and finally fifteen square miles. By noon he makes it to the halfway point. Though hungry with his legs aching he continues. He was near the point of exhaustion but the obsession to own the land drives him on. With only a few minutes left before the sun went down, he gathers all his strength, stumbles across the line, the new owner of fifteen square miles of land, and then collapses on the ground, dead. 

The stranger smiles and said, "I offered him all the land he could cover. Now you see what that is, six feet long by two feet wide, and I thought he would like to have the land close to his father’s grave, rather than to have it anywhere else." Having said that, the stranger whose name is Death vanishes, saying "I have kept my pledge." Sam Cappleman 

Meditation

Ordinary riches can be stolen, real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you. Oscar Wilde, 19th century