Tearfund – The Raynville Rambler

Hope cannot wait

An Advent sermon for St Peter’s Bramley, Sunday 27 November 2022

I was given the title for this sermon by our new Rector. For more details of the Tearfund project referred to here, see https://www.tearfund.org/stories/2022/06/turning-guns-into-garden-tools-in-the-drc or the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xCD6z3bAas

Advent is often presented as a time of waiting. But over the next four Sundays leading up to Christmas we’re looking at four of the great themes of Christianity as found in the book of Isaiah: Hope, Peace, Joy and Love – and why actually they cannot wait. We start today with the idea of ‘Hope’.

Hope can mean different things to different people. Some of you will know Sue Davey, a member of our congregation who can’t get to church these days. She recently put it like this:

“Without hope life really is hopeLESS. We need to have hope that things will work out in the end, that things will get better. That will be different for every one of us. Hope makes life worth living.”

The prophet Isaiah lived in troubled times like ours. Fewer people were worshiping God and doing what God wanted them to do. There was an increase in crime, leaders had become corrupt, the rich were getting richer and no-one was looking after the poor. In countries all around there was war, and sooner or later war would come even to his city of Jerusalem. The situation may well have seemed hopeless.

But through this book of Isaiah with all these troubles, there runs a thread of hope like a rainbow appearing out of a dark cloud. Isaiah had a vision from God. A vision of what God would do to bring hope out of despair. A vision, as we see in today’s reading, of God breaking into human life to end war and bring peace. This striking image of swords being beaten into ploughshares, that is, weapons becoming farming tools, is a picture of what can happen when we let God make that vision a reality. But what if someone decided to take it literally?

The Democratic Republic of Congo is one of the hardest places to live on Earth. Decades of war and violence have cost hundreds of thousands of lives and forced millions of people from their homes. Tens of thousands of children have been recruited by armed gangs to fight.

The Christian development agency Tearfund has a partner organisation that seeks to take positive steps to work for peace and save these children from the physical and emotional harm of war. Last year, more than 3,300 children were rescued from armed groups.

As part of this project, the guns that came with them have been melted down and turned into gardening tools, to put Isaiah’s vision into practice. The outcome is a community that is less in fear of war, and that can better feed themselves. What can we learn from their example?

First of all, it was an ecumenical project. Not one, but many churches of different traditions got involved. Practical forms of mission like this bring Christians together on common ground to work for the good of the community.

But it was hard work. Rescuing children from armed gangs is highly risky. Melting down steel is very hot work; beating it into shape on an anvil as this pastor is doing is hard physical work. Using the tools, whether to dig an allotment or plough with oxen, is equally hard. When we work with God to bring a vision of hope into reality, it will mean hard work in one form or another.

What made it worth the hard work? It was the vision of peace and hope, the vision found throughout the Bible that God wants to redeem people from war, poverty and slavery and give them a hope that will last. it was an idea rooted in the love of Jesus and the hope that he brings. In the words of a Tearfund spokesperson:

“We cannot do what we do without the hope of Jesus.

We cannot do what we do without the power of Jesus.

We cannot do what we do without the love of Jesus.”

Those Congolese Christians realised that the vision of hope couldn’t wait for the fighting to end. They had to act even as war raged around them. As in Isaiah’s day, they heard the call to strive for justice and peace even in the face of the troubles around them.

It’s good to see what’s happening around the world. But Isaiah’s prophecy, although part of God’s plan for the world, was also for the people of his own city, Jerusalem. What might it mean for us, here and now, in Leeds?

Today’s reading also speaks of the ‘mountain of the Lord’s house’. Isaiah’s vision includes many people saying ‘come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob’. This is a theme that appears throughout Isaiah and represents Jerusalem, a symbol of the whole Jewish people, but also the coming Kingdom of God. The people who worshipped God in the Temple had a calling to reach out to the surrounding nations and participate in bringing God’s peace and justice to those around them.

A few years ago I spoke in a sermon about the problem of loneliness in our society, which is one of the particular concerns of our own MP, Rachel Reeves. I quoted from another part of Isaiah’s vision, which also draws on that symbolism of the mountain of God. In chapter 25 it says “On this mountain, the Lord of Hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines”. That prophecy may point to the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, and the communion service in which we remember that. The broken bread is the life of Christ, broken in order to be shared with everyone who needs it.

Just like turning arms into tools, the sharing of bread as a symbol of the sharing of the life of Christ, and the vision of a feast of rich food in God’s holy place, is one that can be acted out in the reality of people’s daily lives.

Along with other churches and charities in Bramley, we aim to bring some hope this Christmas to families who are struggling to afford food, by giving them a full Christmas dinner. In line with Isaiah’s vision of God’s feast – one of rich food and well-aged wine – we offer not just meat and veg, but all the trimmings, the crackers and the sweets to make the day enjoyable.

In sharing with our neighbours in this way, we want not only to feed them, but also bring the hope that comes from feeling part of a wider community and of participating in the joy of Christmas. If this is what hope looks like for the people of Bramley this Christmas time, hope cannot wait.

Amen.

Singaravelan

This is a supplemental post to my sermon of 5th December. It is converted from a HTML web page, one of several that I created after our trip to India with Tearfund in 2006.

Tearfund’s principal Indian partner is the Evangelical Fellowship of India Commission on Relief (EFICOR)

We had been told to look forward to this event all week: instead of just a group of us from the UK visiting yet another village, we would be part of a much larger gathering to celebrate the official handover of the 104 houses that EFICOR had built in two villages after the tsunami. These had been among the worst hit villages in the area. The new houses have been built 1km from the sea in a wooded area. In this instance, EFICOR were not involved with replacing fishing boats – another NGO did that.

Revd Dino Touthang (right), Director of EFICOR

Everyone then made their way to where a podium had been set up in fromnt of rows of chairs with an awning to keep the heat off. Most of the speakers at the ceremony spoke in Tamil or Malayalam, but Dino Touthang, the Executive Director of EFICOR, spoke in English. He spoke to the community of the need for them to take responsibility for the maintenance of their new houses, and that it was also their duty to build families in joy and peace and free from violence (we had been told in many places that domestic violence is a major problem in Tamil society). He spoke of the benefits of many NGOs working together.

After the speeches, representatives of the supporting agencies were presented with awards, and Phil Bamber accepted one on behalf of Tearfund. Our other leader, Katy Hands, was given the opportunity to cut a ribbon to declare a house open – the householder’s name was Caspar. One of the householders was presented with a large mock key to symbolise the handing over of the properties to the people.

Beauty for brokenness

Today’s hymn from Sing Praise is “Beauty for Brokenness” by Graham Kendrick. I’m not sure whether this song was written specifically for the development charity Tearfund, but it was published around the time of their 25th anniversary and they certainly adopted it as being a perfect description of their work and their theological stance.

Let’s look at the chorus first, which to save the song being overly long is usually sung after the second, fourth and fifth verses only. “God of the poor, friend of the weak, give us compassion we pray”. That is Tearfund in a nutshell: supporting churches around the world to respond to the needs of the poor and weak in their communities, with the love of God and the compassion that can only really be shown by those who live alongside them.

It goes on, “melt our cold hearts, let tears fall like rain, come change our love from a spark to a flame”. I admit to feeling ‘compassion fatigue’, the thought that all the money, time and prayers I have given over the years to the work of Tearfund and similar agencies is in vain, when there is still so much need, so much discrimination and structural injustice in the world. But the words and works of Jesus suggest that however little we achieve, it is still recognised by God: “whatever you do for the least of these, you do for me”.

The first of the five verses starts with the vision of what development work can achieve: “Beauty for brokenness, hope for despair”. It’s not just about the day-to-day practicalities that follow (“bread for the children”) but about a message of the hope of God’s kingdom that can transform lives. “Sunrise to sunset, your kingdom increase”.

The second verse reflects the reality that war is behind much suffering: “Refuge from cruel wars, havens from fear, cities for sanctuary, freedoms to share, peace to the killing fields, scorched earth to green”, but finishes with a specifically religious vision, “Christ for the bitterness, his cross for their pain”.

The third verse speaks of medical work and provision of training and trade opportunities and land for farming, programmes that help local communities become self-sufficient, and also the advocacy work that forms much of Tearfund’s success (“voices to plead the cause of those who can’t speak”).

The fourth verse speaks of the ecological emergency that has only become a mainstream concern in the last few years, though the song was written in 1993. “Rest for the ravaged earth, oceans and streams, plundered and poisoned, our future, our dreams”. We pray “Lord, end this madness, carelessness, greed, make us content with the things that we need”.

The final verse turns clearly to Jesus who is the only one who can truly change the world. “Lighten our darkness, breathe on this flame, until your justice burns brightly again, until the nations learn of your ways, seek your salvation and bring you their praise”. If verse 4 could have been written by Greta Thunberg, verse 5 could have come from the mouth of Isaiah.

You might gather from this lengthy commentary that this is one of my favourite hymns, for the music as well as the words. It deserves the classic status it has won in the churches. If you wish to donate to the work of Tearfund, they are currently appealing for support for their work in Afghanistan and you can donate here.