Brokerswood: All Saints

White Horse Team anniversary celebration 13/3/22 The Right Reverend Andrew Rumsey

Ephesians 4:1-5; 11-16 NRSV; Matthew 7:24-27 NRSV Read Matt 7:24-26.

Now it won’t surprise you to learn that I’ve never built a house. But I suspect the task must feel like a scaled-up version of how I feel when faced by a flat pack from IKEA, which is a kind of limpness in the limbs and a sense of impending doom. This happened recently when I bought a desk for my daughter’s bedroom – or rather I thought I bought a desk, but it turned out I bought a flat pack that comprised an impossible jigsaw of random shapes and myriad unrecognisable screws, bolts, and washers, with a sheet of instructions apparently written by an imbecile. Is there anything quite like the sad, sapping feeling of gazing at a pile like this as you think ‘how on earth am I going to make something of this?

How do we build something of the church, so that it not only withstands the storms of life and society, but also becomes a spiritual house that is glorifying to God, in which each member plays their part and finds their place? Several things suggest themselves from our two wonderful readings in scripture, but the first and most important is this: that the building is founded upon the rock which is Christ, the church’s one foundation. The New Testament finds different ways to describe his fundamental place in building the church – indeed in our epistle reading St Paul rather mixes his metaphors, so keen is he to stress the centrality of Christ: read vv14-16 – myriad images! Elsewhere St Peter, who also likens the church a to a building, teaches that we must allow ourselves to be built by Christ, as he were the master craftsman and we his bricks and beams.

All of which stresses that before it is a task performed by us, the work of building the church is first of all something that God does in and through us, by his Spirit. That is the building project of the church before all others – the work of perfecting you and me, so that we might fit together, and stay together and support the whole structure. Now this is an admirable but at times seemingly impossible project.

We are a mixed load of rubble (not rabble - rubble!) and sometimes we knock each other into shards. It can feel as if the mortar which ought to hold us together is dry and crumbly and simply not up to the task. Like the wonderful and eccentric inside structure of Old Dilton church, we can look at it and say – how on earth does this stay up; how does it even make sense? But the strength of our building rests not first on our own strength, or our deign, but that of our foundation, and this is secure in Christ. When asked whether he felt positive or negative about the future of the church, the great missionary Lesslie Newbigin replied ‘Christ is risen, so far as I’m concerned, the question doesn’t arise’.

Now different churches take different forms, but the Christian Church is defined in the NT by two things alone – being in Christ and being of the place where it is set. Which is why Ephesians begins (as many of Paul’s letters) ‘To God’s holy people in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus’. Christ, place, and people – these are the vital ingredients of the church.

And in the White Horse team, as you celebrate your life together, your priorities must above all to remain in Christ, in place (I shan’t say ‘in your place’!) and as a holy people, just like the Ephesians. Remaining united as God’s holy people requires great patience as we bear with one another, but the heart of this is, as you know, a recognition that our difference from one another is a gift. And that a flourishing church needs all its members to find and be encouraged in their unique contribution, which is likely to change over time, as we grow. The role you have had in church for the last ten years might not be the one you are now called to. There may be some that need to set down your current role and do a new thing.

After 25 years of marriage, I have finally conceded that my wife is far better at building things than I am - so we have agreed that now she does this and I will loiter about sounding encouraging, offering cups of tea, and getting in her light. In this task, it is by far the best place for me. Whatever your role within this team of churches, let us offer ourselves anew to him today and ask him to make something of us. When we do this, something really rather wonderful happens: the minor miracle of the English parish church. May God continue to bless your life together. Amen. Bishop Andrew

Brokerswood: All Saints

Brokerswood: All Saints

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