Sermon 40th Kew Festival Ecumenical Service 19/03/2017 Carmelite Monastery Kew (St Paul’s Letter to the Phillipians 4: 4-9) I heard a story told to me many years ago about Mora Naba, a Mossi emperor in Burkina Faso West Africa who had conquered a powerful ethnic group in the south called the Kaesena. He extracted tribute from them once each year. One year, at tribute collecting time, the emperor made the mistake of sending his son, Nabiiga, a prince and his heir apparent. When the Kaesena saw Nabiiga with only a very small entourage of guards, they overpowered the group and took the prince hostage. His kingly robes were stripped from him, and he was forced to walk around in only a loincloth. The prisoner received only one meal per day and was forced out into the fields each morning to work. Normally, manual labour would be beneath the dignity of royalty, so the Kaesena made great sport of him. The women would pass by and belittle him. While he was working in the fields, the children would throw pebbles and stones at him. But, to the great surprise of all those watching from day to day, the Mossi prince would work and sing. He sang cheerfully with a loud voice as he worked from sun up to sun down. At first his soft hands blistered and then bled as he was unaccustomed to using farm equipment. He lost significant weight, but he continued to be cheerful and to sing. The elders of the Kaesena were much troubled by his singing and buoyant attitude. “How can he possibly sing,” they would continually ask, “since we make him sleep on the ground and make sport of him each day? We give him very little food, and he is forced to labor from sun up to sun down. Our women and our children mock him, but he continues to sing!” After a month of watching, they finally called him before a council. He stood in his loincloth straight and proud in their midst. The elder spokesperson for the Kaesena people asked the Mossi prince about his behaviour: “Why do you sing?” Nabiiga answered, “It is true. You’ve taken away my fine clothes. You have made me work, you give me very little food to eat, and you make me sleep on the ground in a common hut. You have tried to take away all my pride and all my earthly possessions. You have brought great shame upon me. Now you ask me why, in spite of all this, I can sing. I can sing because you cannot take away my title and who I am. I am Moro Naba’s first son. I am proud of that and will never react to your shameful behaviour!” The Kaesena people learned that they could not bring shame upon the Mossi prince because he was at peace and, therefore, could continue to sing. The peace that the prince felt inside was an active virtue manifest in his behaviour; peace was not simply the absence of violence and war in his life. We all know how to rejoice with great fervour when things go right, and we are in control and on top of the situation. This is a rather natural reaction when our success is personal, that of one we know and love, or even that of an organisation to which we have loyalty. We rejoice in our personal and family successes, the triumph of a friend over obstacles or disease. We rejoice when our favourite footie team wins the big game or even a premiership. Saint Paul tells us today that there is another element of rejoicing. He suggests we need to eliminate our propensity to worry and replace our anxiety with prayer and supplications to God. As a society we like to worry. In fact, we have a whole industry associated with it. When we worry we seek resolution through medications and various professionals. Certainly what medical science collectively has done for us with respect to our penchant to worry is laudable and generally helpful, but we worry far too much. Naturally we worry about our family: our children, our finances, our health, and our future. But, as we know, there are some people who prefer to worry; they do not seem content under any other mode of operation. Anxiety is turning into the disease of our age from young school children to octogenarians. I heard a story once that went: Fresh out of University, a young woman applied for various accountancy jobs. She got a job interview with a very nervous man who ran a small business that he had started himself. "I need someone with an accounting degree," the man said.” But mainly, I'm looking for someone to do my worrying for me.” “Excuse me?” the accountant said. "I worry about a lot of things," the man said. "But I don't want to have to worry about money. Your job will be to take all the money worries off my back.” "I see," the accountant said. "And how much does the job pay?” "I'll start you at eighty thousand.” "Eighty thousand dollars!" the accountant exclaimed. "How can such a small business afford a sum like that?” "That," the owner said, "is your first worry.” Paul suggests we must cast our cares on the Lord by substituting prayer and supplication to God instead of manifesting our worries and concerns. This sounds good, but we know it is not easy to accomplish. We want to Page 1 of 2
find some answer to our concerns, to our lack of peace, but Paul suggests that if we trust God and let our prayer take the place of our worry, the elusive peace we ultimately seek will be ours. The author of the book of Proverbs was correct when he wrote: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight” (Proverbs 3:5). Paul says that the peace of God, which surpasses all our understanding, will guard our hearts and minds. This peace is certainly a reality we all seek — to feel at peace and know that God will guard our hearts and minds to the attainment of this goal. God’s peace is promised to guard those who pray—with thanksgiving—about everything. This peace will transcend our ability to understand it- beyond all understanding. A person who places his or her full confidence in a loving God and is thankful in every circumstance will possess a supernatural peace. An inner calm will dominate their heart. The faithful believer will know peace— their heart and mind are “guarded” by it—despite the tempest raging without. To most, it will remain a mystery how someone can be so serene in the midst of turmoil. The peace that comes from being in a right relationship with God is not the peace of this world. The world’s peace depends on having favourable circumstances: if things are going well, then we feel peaceful; when things go awry, the peace quickly dissipates. God’s peace will only come when we actively seek it. The apostle Paul today suggests that the way we can bring peace is by being joyful people. Rejoicing truly can bring peace. Rejoicing must become a way of life, not simply a momentary respite from our general worrisome and dour countenance. We cannot win every game; we don’t always score goals. But, if we continue to play the game, if we never give up, we can rejoice that God is with us. “I want you to be happy, always happy in the Lord; I repeat, what I want is your happiness.” Finding peace can be a challenge when our lives have been turned upside down through painful circumstances. Lack of peace can drive us towards making situations worse as we can become argumentative, anxious and moody. Here are five P’s to finding your peace that passes all understanding: 1) Pursue a relationship with God: True and lasting peace will allude those who don’t have a relationship with God. 2) Put away anxious thoughts: We can struggle with doubt, fear, and unbelief leading to anxious thoughts. However we are clearly taught that we aren’t to be worried about anything, meaning nothing at all—no matter the challenge! By praying to God and giving thanks to him for all he’s done in our lives will allow the peace of God to drench our spirits. 3) Place your trust in God: Sometimes our peace crumbles because we’ve placed our trust in people, jobs, material things, or anything except completely in God. Watching your world crumble around you brings to light where you’ve really placed your peace. Begin to trust God on the smaller things so that you can build a strong trust relationship with him that will restore and protect your peace. 4) Prioritise your spiritual journey: Peace can be difficult to find when one becomes distracted with the cares and worries of this world. Many times people fall away from their spiritual journey—not in a giant leap away from —but rather in a series of small compromises of faith that slowly drain peace from your life. Making your spiritual growth a priority is essential to having a life of peace to sustain you through hard times. This may mean that you need to step back and reassess your spiritual journey: how’s your prayer life? What are you studying in the scriptures? Do you worship regularly with others? 5) Push past your present situation: It’s easy to get stuck in our present situation and miss the glory that God wants to reveal in us. Our peace evaporates just like it did for Peter when he stepped out on the water to walk towards Jesus. (Matthew 14:29-31) Peace isn’t the absence of a stormy situation—it’s the ability to remain calm and faithful in spite of the uncertainty. We must practice on a daily basis to look past our present circumstances to see God’s hand at work. “Peace, be still…” The disciples were afraid for their lives and woke Jesus in a frenzy because of the fierceness of the storm. He said three simple words, “Peace, be still” and we are told the entire weather system complied. (Mark 4:39-41). Can you imagine the amazement of these tough and experienced fishermen? He knew about the storm brewing while he slept on the boat and he knows about the storms hovering over our lives even today. And yet he still says, “Peace be still”. He tells us right now, right in this place “Peace, be still” to all of us. May we as faithful people demonstrate that peace of God that passes all understanding every day so that others may see it in our lives and seek it for themselves. Amen Fr Robert Newton Vicar Holy Trinity Kew
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