God’s Selection Criteria
Matthew 1:18-end

Songs of Praise
Some while ago, Songs of Praise featured a young woman with a very powerful story to tell. My memory isn’t good enough to have much of an idea just when it was, but the story itself was one of those that lodges in the mind.

Her father had committed suicide when she was quite young, and she’d grown up believing he preferred to be dead rather than to be with the family. This had damaged her to such an extent that she’d got into all sorts of trouble, finally ending up as a drug addict in prison.

All she’d taken into prison with her was a Bible, as some sort of nostalgic link with happier days. She’d never read the Bible, and believed she was the sort of awful person, whom God would instantly throw on the scrap heap. But because time was hanging heavily on her hands, she opened the Bible at random, and this is what she read:

Come now, let us argue it out,
   says the Lord:
though your sins are like scarlet,
   they shall be like snow;
though they are red like crimson,
   they shall become like wool (Isaiah 1:18).

That verse leapt out of the page and hit her between the eyes. She began to read the Bible avidly, devouring what she read, and her life was changed.

She’s now an evangelist working amongst drop-outs and drug addicts, telling them the good news that they are not rejected by God, that he doesn’t throw anyone on the scrap heap.

Humans arranging the birth of Jesus
If the birth of Jesus had been left to human beings to arrange, I wonder what we would have come up with? Probably a committee to decide on the best parents, then a selection process and a short list until we arrived at the ideal couple.

I don’t suppose an unmarried mother and her carpenter fiancé would have stood a chance. In many ways, Mary represents much that has been rejected by human beings throughout the ages. She was young, unmarried, and pregnant, and that not even by her fiancé.

At this early stage in the story, Joseph seems to represent the conventional. He was as shocked as anyone else at Mary’s pregnancy, and his instant reaction was to ditch her.

And that’s exactly what would’ve been expected by good, decent people. Although Joseph was too gentle a person to demand the stoning of Mary, as was his right by law, nonetheless it was his duty to get rid of her. He decided to quietly drop her.

Adding the God ingredient
When you take it at face value, this story surrounding the birth of Jesus is pretty sordid. But that’s because the God ingredient has been left out. Once the God ingredient is added to the story, everything changes.

The circumstances are seen in a completely different light, and Mary, far from being the villain of the piece, is seen as the heroine. Once the God ingredient is added, there’s a total change in perceptions.

I wonder how many people at the time were aware of this change in perceptions? Fortunately Joseph, although a righteous man, was also a man who was open to God. He could hear God above the roaring of conventions, and so was able to respond when God suggested he move in an unconventional direction.

After his dream about the angel, Joseph was sure enough in his own mind to continue his relationship with Mary. Nothing in the circumstances had changed, only Joseph’s perceptions. But on the strength of a dream, he was prepared to accept a wife who on the face of things, may have been unfaithful to him, and to bring up a baby who on the face of things, might have been another man’s child.

An unconventional choice
This unconventional couple are unlikely to have been chosen by the Church to be the parents of the Saviour of the world. But God often chooses unlikely people to work for him.

Back in the days of the Old Testament, he chose Joseph, the arrogant and insensitive teller of dreams. Then there was Jacob, who cheated his own brother by deceiving his father. Moses, who killed a man in anger and then ran away. Ruth, who hoodwinked an unknown relative into marrying her. And even David the greatest king of all time had a man killed in order to sleep with that man’s wife.

So the pages of the Bible are littered with people chosen by God, but who are most unlikely ever to have been considered by human beings, and especially not by the Church. And it doesn’t stop with the Old Testament.

In the New Testament, Jesus chose a most unlikely group of people to be his special friends and to carry the message of Christianity throughout the world. Many of them were virtually uneducated. At least one of them was a fanatic guerrilla. One turned out to be a traitor. They were all cowards. And one particular friend was probably a prostitute.

After the death and resurrection of Jesus, it wasn’t so much these friends who carried the message of Christianity to the rest of the world. No, God chose a newcomer — a man who had a reputation for being more than a little rigorous in his persecution of Christians!

Unlikely messengers
The people chosen by God, and still being chosen today, to carry on his work seem most unlikely. Clearly the selection criteria used by God are totally different to the selection criteria used by human beings.

Somehow, God is able to see the potential within human beings long before it’s been realised, and to work with that potential.

Most human beings would find that approach far too risky. Most human beings are looking for proven qualities before they select. Many human beings are rejected, because they don’t yet have those proven qualities.

Many youngsters are rejected for jobs because the employers are looking for “experienced applicants”. The employers don’t care about potential, because nurturing potential is a difficult and time-consuming task.

God sees the potential
Fortunately for us, God was able to see the potential for good parenting within an unmarried mother and her carpenter fiancé, and was prepared to invest time and energy in nurturing that potential. At that early stage, Mary and Joseph had no proven qualities. But both of them were open to God, and it seems that that’s all that really mattered.

God never rejects anyone. He uses the most unlikely people for his purposes, and works with them and through them so that their potential is realised and they change out of all recognition.

It can be very scary being used by God, for he sometimes asks difficult things of us. How much easier it would have been for Mary if God had asked her to be the mother of his son after her marriage to Joseph!

All we have to do is trust
But anyone who is prepared to face the scariness, and wants to be used by God, only has to open their heart and mind and soul to him. God knows their potential, and will do the rest. All we human beings have to do, is to trust him and to dare to follow him.

Who is Saint Bartholomew?

Lord God, take my words and speak through them, take our minds and think through them, take our hearts and set them on fire with love for you, you who are Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Patron Saint
How can the same person be the patron saint of Armenia, of bookbinders, butchers, cobblers, leather workers, shoemakers and tanners, and of nervous and neurological diseases?

When I realized I’d put myself on the rota, and would need to prepare a sermon, for this evening’s Evensong — the First Evening Prayer of Saint Bartholomew — I thought I’d made something of a mistake. “We know nothing about Bartholomew, how can I preach a sermon about him”, was one early thought. But, there’s a saying amongst internet users, “Google is your friend”. And it was. Or, at least, in my particular case, Easysearch — the search engine that earns the parish money each time it’s used — Easysearch was my friend.

So how can the same person be the patron saint of Armenia, of bookbinders, butchers, cobblers, leather workers, shoemakers and tanners, and of nervous and neurological diseases? Each of these claim Saint Bartholomew as their patron — chosen because of events that were alleged to have happened in his later life.

Nathanael Bar Tolmai
There is very little known of Bartholomew’s earlier life. In the Synoptic Gospels — Matthew, Mark, and Luke — Bartholomew is listed among the twelve disciples who were called by Jesus. And there’s a strong possibility that he and Nathanael — who appears in the list of the twelve in John’s Gospel — are one and the same person. It’s thought that Nathanael could be his given name, while Bartholomew — or Bar Tolmai (meaning son of Tolmai) — is much like family name — making his full name, Nathanael Bar Tolmai. But, as with most things about Batholomew’s life, none of this is certain.

One of the Twelve
However, what we do know is that, as one of the Twelve, Bartholomew would’ve assisted Jesus in his mission of teaching and healing; he would’ve witnessed Jesus’s crucifixion, resurrection and ascension; and he would’ve received the tongues of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

Apostolic mission
When the disciples separated to continue their apostolic mission throughout the known world, Bartholomew is said to have gone first to India, but finding Thomas already taking the good news of Jesus to that continent he turned west to Armenia.

In those times Armenia was not the small country it is today. It was a large Roman province, which extended from the eastern region of Turkey through the countries now known as Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan into the western side of Iran. There, Bartholomew witnessed, taught and founded churches, which still flourish today. And that’s why he is the patron saint of Armenia.

Violent end
As in the case of most of the apostles, his life ended violently. The story of Bartholomew is, that his skin was flayed from his body with a butcher’s knife. And it’s that gruesome fate which has caused him to become the patron saint of butchers, as well as of a range of professions who deal in hide, skin and leather: bookbinders, cobblers and shoemakers, leather workers and tanners — someone had a sense of humour.

Lipari and Rome
The final part of the story gets even more outlandish. The body of Bartholomew was cast into the sea and carried by the ocean currents until it came to rest at Lipari, a small island off the coast of Sicily.

Bartholomew’s body rested in the Cathedral at Lipari for more than 900 years until the Holy Roman emperor, Otto the Second, transferred it to Rome and placed it in the Basilica of San Bartolomeo all’Isola — I probably said that wrongly.

Since this basilica was erected on the site of a medical centre, Bartholomew also began to be honoured as a patron saint of medicine — not of doctors, because that’s the province of Saint Luke, but of nervous diseases and those who seek to heal them.

A piece of Bartholomew
It seems that everyone wanted to have a piece of Bartholomew — literally. His skin and many of his bones are still at the Cathedral in Lipari; while the rest of his body rests at San Bartolomeo in Rome; except for a part of his skull which is in Frankfurt Cathedral; and one of his arms, which is kept at Canterbury Cathedral, having been presented there by Emma, the wife of King Canute.

Bartholomew’s influence
Such a worldwide influence has come from one whose aspirations during his lifetime were simple and straightforward: to serve his Master as best he could, to go where he was called and to be faithful.

Bartholomew didn’t seek to promote himself or to establish for himself a reputation or a legacy. Yet his legacy has been profound, and he’s invoked all over the world many centuries later.

Bartholomew is a perfect example of the principle set out by Jesus, when he was faced with an unedifying dispute among the Twelve, as to which one of them was to be regarded as the greatest. If you are to be truly great, Jesus advised, aim for the opposite. The greatest of you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves.

One who serves
So Bartholomew followed his Lord and became like one who served, even to the extent of serving himself up to the knives of those in ancient Armenia who rejected the Gospel.

The legend goes on to say, that when the body of Bartholomew was washed up on the shore of Lipari, the Bishop ordered many men to go out and take it to the Cathedral. So heavy was the body that the men couldn’t lift it. So the Bishop sent out the children, who easily lifted the body and brought it ashore.

Again the story of Bartholomew exemplifies the teaching of Jesus, that true strength, true goodness, true power, are to be found in exactly the opposite place to that in which the world looks.

A hard lesson
For every generation this is a hard lesson to learn. Even for the Church it’s a difficult path to follow. The desire to be popular, the quest for a good reputation in the eyes of the world, the temptation of power, is sometimes irresistible.

It takes a lot to keep our eyes fixed upon Christ and to stay true to his values. If we live them out constantly, it will cost us. It cost Bartholomew his skin, yet his name is praised today in all corners of the world; and more than that, he’s clothed with the body of glory in the fellowship of Christ and his saints.

Amen

Speak, for I am with you
Acts 18:1-16

Lord God, take my words and speak through them, take our minds and think through them, take our hearts and set them on fire with love for you, you who are Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Athens
Paul and Silas have set out on a second missionary journey, picking up Timothy along the way. But after being pursued from city to city by some troublemakers, who wanted to harm Paul, he’d gone ahead of the others into Athens, while they stayed a while with the believers in Berea. Paul spoke to a group of philosophers in Athens, but didn’t get a particularly enthusiastic reception. So he moves on to the next town: Corinth.

Corinth
Athens is the more familiar city to most modern ears, but in Paul’s day, Corinth had surpassed it in importance. The Roman military had attacked and destroyed major portions of the city in 146 BC, after its citizens had taken part in an anti-Roman uprising, and it had remained in ruins for a century. But in 46 BC, Julias Caesar passed through, and saw its potential as a Roman colony, so the city was rebuilt.

By the time Paul passed through Corinth, it was probably the wealthiest city in Greece — a major multicultural urban centre, with a population of some 750,000 people. It was a bustling seaport on the narrow strip of land that joins the southern part of Greece to the northern part.

In addition to the financial wealth of Corinth, it had a wealth of religious options as well — most of them pagan. A noted temple to Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love, was there. Prostitution was so rampant in the city, that the Greek word meaning, “Corinthian girl”, came to be a slang term for a promiscuous woman. Corinth was also a centre of homosexuality, with a temple to Apollo, the epitome of male beauty.

The city had no time for a little Jewish tent-maker called Paul, who wanted to tell them about another Jew, called Jesus. Things didn’t look very promising for him, but he persevered.

Friends and enemies
Paul made many friends in Corinth, and many enemies. He stayed with a Jewish husband-and-wife team, Aquila and Prescilla, with whom he shared the trade of tent-makers. They were in Corinth because that’s where they’d gone when, along with the rest of the Roman Jews, Claudius ordered them out of Rome.

It was a custom in New Testament times to teach every Jewish boy a trade. Jesus had been trained as a carpenter. Paul learned the craft of tent making, which involved working with leather, hair and wool. It may be that it was Paul’s shared trade with Aquila and Prescilla that brought them together at first — not necessarily a shared belief in Jesus. That may have come as Paul sat cross-legged in their shop and gossiped the gospel to the customers as he plied his needle.

Evangelising the Corinthians
Paul begins his evangelisation of the Corinthians, by getting involved with the local Jewish community, and its weekly worship. He engages in dialogue with Jews, and with Gentile sympathisers. When Silas and Timothy arrive from Macedonia, they find Paul already fully engrossed in the business of the word, busy testifying to the Jews that the Christ, the life-changing and world-changing Messiah of Jewish expectation, is Jesus.

But he failed to persuade the whole community; Jewish resistance became so strong that Paul gave up on them. Shaking out his garments was akin to shaking the dust off one’s feet, as Jesus had previously instructed his disciples to do when they encountered resistance (Luke 9:5).

Depressed by the attacks of his enemies, and the resistance of materialistic Corinth, to any talk of spiritual things, he went to bed miserable. Then in the night he had a dream. He saw Jesus, who told him to cheer up: “Don’t be afraid, but speak out and don’t stay silent; for I, Jesus, am with you, and . . . there are many in this city who are my people”.

Sharing good news
Well, Jesus was right. There were many in Corinth who belonged to Jesus, though they didn’t know it yet. The church grew there until there were several different congregations, in different parts of the city. Eventually it was one of the biggest churches in the country, and the good news about Jesus fanned out from there to build growing congregations all over southern Greece.

This wouldn’t have happened if Paul had given up when things were hard. But the story of Jesus was like a fire blazing up in his heart. He just had to share it. You can’t keep good news bottled up inside you.

The siege of Samaria
We’ve just heard a perfect illustration of this in the Old Testament story of the siege of Samaria (2 Kings 6.24-25). All the people were trapped inside the city, while the army of the King of Aram was camped round it, waiting for them to starve.

The only people who weren’t inside the city were four men, and they weren’t allowed in because they were lepers. They squatted outside the city gate, starving like everyone else. Eventually they said to one another, “If we sit here, we die. If we go to the Aramean army camp, they might feed us, in which case we live a little longer; or they might kill us, in which case we die a little sooner. Might as well take a chance” (2 Kings 7:4).

So they hobbled up to the Aramean camp and found it empty — all the soldiers had done a bunk the previous evening, when they heard of an Egyptian army coming to attack them. The people inside Samaria didn’t know this, but the four lepers found food aplenty in the abandoned camp, and started to gorge themselves. But soon they realized they’d have to go back to the city and tell the others. You can’t keep good news bottled up inside you.

Don’t be afraid
You and I have some good news. It’s the good news that God loves us, every one of us, and that Jesus died on the cross to show his great love for us. You can’t keep good news like that to yourself, any more than the four lepers could’ve kept the good news of free food a secret from those who didn’t know about it.

There are many ways of sharing good news. God may be calling you to study until you can proclaim it from the pulpit. Or you may be called to gossip the gospel with your family, friends, and workmates. Or you may be one who proclaims God’s love, by showing love for your family and friends, your neighbours and people who are needy, until they can see the love of God shining out of you.

Whichever way God calls you to, don’t hold back because you think the task is impossible. Jesus says to you, as he said to the Apostle Paul, “Don’t be afraid, but speak out and don’t stay silent; for I, Jesus, am with you, and no one will harm you, for there are many in this place who are my people” — though they may not realize it, until you tell them, that Jesus loves them.

Amen.