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Last Sunday morning, if you were here, you may remember that Frankie posed
a question: Where is your faith?" It is the question Jesus put to
the disciples panicking in the boat caught in the storm. Where is your
faith? This morning, I want to add just 1 word to that question. I warn
you that it's not comfortable, but I have been asking myself too. If you
don't want to be disturbed by the Gospel then NOW is the moment to switch
off. The question for this morning is 'Where is your faith showing?' .....'Where
is your faith showing?' . i.e What difference does your faith make to
the way you live? In a moment we will stand up and declare "We believe
in God, etc." How do the people we are with from Monday to Saturday
know that's what we believe? How do they see it in the way we live? I
am not aiming to make us squirm, but there are times when the Gospel does
make us uncomfortable. I can imagine the disciples squirming after they
had failed to deal with the boy troubled by an evil spirit. What does
Jesus say to them? 'You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer
must I be with you and bear with you?' OUCH! That makes my question seem
quite soft: 'Where is your faith showing?'
To be fair, Luke does not make it clear whether the 3 (Peter James and
John) who had been on the mountain with him, were included in the disciples
who had failed, but he is clear about the main point… The transfiguration
was preparation for engaging with the reality of the world as it is. What
were Moses and Elijah talking about with Jesus? His departure that he
was 'about to accomplish in Jerusalem'; i.e. the Cross - that ultimate
clash between the power of love by the One who created the world and the
power of evil which wants to destroy it. And immediately we see evil seeking
to destroy the life of this boy, the only son of his father. And Jesus,
the only Son of HIS father, defeats the demon head on. And he is exasperated.
He knows he will not be on earth for much longer, his departure is imminent.
So he is training up followers to continue his work. Yet here they had
failed to deal with the need before them. They didn't know how to confront
evil and defeat it.
How astonishing to witness the transfiguration. I think these are some
of the most amazing words in the Gospels: "since they stayed awake,
they saw his glory and the two men who were with him." They saw his
glory. Hmm… There may be times in our worship when we glimpse God's
glory. It may be through the wonderful music we have, through Scripture
or in silence. Our worship should renew and refresh our faith. Here the
living God comes to us and meets us. But it is not here that our faith
is revealed to a needy world. Where is our faith to show? Surely it is
down in the valley where there is evil to confront.
Now I don't imagine that this week you expect to meet many demon possessed
children and deliver them. (We could have discussion about that, but it's
not for now). Yet we do have the chance to confront a different sort of
evil, one which keeps many children and adults in a bondage which we can
help them break free from. To explain this, I want to share a little from
my own experience.
30 years ago, in 1977 I started training for the ordained ministry. As
a teenager I had accepted the call to follow Jesus and wanted others to
know the joy that brought. I was converted - or so I thought. But when
I embarked on training I began to hear that God's purpose for the world
was wider than personal salvation. I heard about His concern for the poor,
the disadvantaged and needy. It made sense but only in my head. It was
as though a veil needed to be lifted. Now Paul talks about a veil in our
first reading, and says that 'only in Christ can the veil be set aside'.
i.e. only as I was willing to see things more from Christ's perspective,
to allow Him to change my thinking, that my heart could be changed as
well. 30 years ago I heard people talk about Fair Trade. It was a nice
idea but the tea tasted awful and the coffee worse! And anyway, how did
that draw people to Jesus? It has taken a long time for the veil to be
lifted. Conversion is a long term process. I have gradually come to understand
that those who follow Christ are called to be bothered by the things that
bother Him. And did he not reserve some of his strongest language for
those who mistreat children and take advantage of the weak and powerless?
So when I found out that Western companies were taking advantage of children
in the developing world, and that I was supporting this injustice by buying
their products, I knew something had to change. UNICEF states that around
thirty thousand children a day die from poverty. There are 246 million
child labourers, about 70% of them in dangerous conditions. The facts
are not comfortable. Nor are the stories. Children under 10 working in
sweat shops so we can buy cheaper clothes or trainers. Children not able
to attend school because their parents are not paid a fair wage for the
crops they grow. Let's take one example and end with that. Do you know
which is the most valuable grocery product in our supermarkets?
It is the banana. (Canon Andy holds up two bananas) And what is the difference
between this banana (in left hand) and this banana (in right hand)? Well
one has a Fair trade mark and one doesn't.
Denise is a banana farmer from
St Vincent in the Windward Islands. She is single, with one child, and
is 35 years old. She says:
"As long as I am selling in Fairtrade I can earn enough to support
myself and my son. It is a vicious circle when you are not selling the
Fairtrade bananas. The Fairtrade banana gives you a better income. Being
in the group has brought us farmers together as a family. We look out
for each other. It has also made us more aware of protecting the environment.
Fairtrade insists on limiting the use of chemicals "Other companies
don't care whether we use chemicals or not. Please buy our Fairtrade bananas.
By purchasing a Fairtrade banana you are helping to improve our livelihood
here."
One small example: There are now over 2,000 products carrying the Fairtrade
mark. We cannot eradicate poverty overnight. But we can improve the lives
of some of the world's poorest and most vulnerable. It has often been
the multi-national companies, based in the West, which treated these workers
unfairly. This is an evil, which has damaged children directly. Today
is Poverty Action Sunday. Many of us support charities already. But Fairtrade
is another way in which our choices can, in a modest way, take action
on poverty. There will be an opportunity to find out more when Fairtrade
Fortnight starts in just over a week. And Lent starts on Wednesday: a
good time maybe, to research more deeply and reflect on 'Where is our
faith showing?' Where and how might God be calling us to confront and
defeat evil? …
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