Last week Jesus invited us to stand on “level place” with him: encouraging us to step down when we find ourselves above others and to step up when we find ourselves beneath others. This week it looks as though we are being urged only to step down, to take the lower place. In our Old Testament reading, Genesis 45:3-11, 15, Joseph is not seeking revenge, but only reconciliation with his brothers. He does not hold them responsible for their actions against him. In our gospel, Luke 6:27-38, Jesus urges us to turn the other cheek, walk the extra mile, give the shirt from our backs. Such texts need to be handled carefully. They can be, and have been, used to exhort the downtrodden to stay down. In their own context though they offer something subversive: a Roman soldier could make a Hebrew carry his pack for one mile but not two, could take his cloak but not his shirt. By giving more, Jesus' hearers were engaging in civil disobedience, revealing the injustice at the heart of the law. To be generous in the face of greed, to love in the face of hate, is to refuse to be defined by that injustice, but instead to commit to a different way of life.

Both of our readings (Jeremiah 17:5-10, Luke 6:17-26) today imagine a great reversal: the hungry are now full, the rich are now poor, the bottom is now the top, and the top is now the bottom. I can see that such a vision can be helpful: it may give comfort to those who have little with the promise of future plenty, and it may prick the consciences of those who have more to make that future happen. One thing it does is to undermine the common view (then and now) that we are responsible for our own fate, that we deserve what we get; if we are poor or in trouble we only have ourselves to blame, whereas if we enjoy security and plenty we must have earned it. I am still left uncomfortable with the idea that anyone should be on top or anyone on the bottom, and this may be where the Beatitudes are leading us: should there be a top and a bottom? Would it be possible to imagine a world in which there are no rich or poor, no powerful or powerless? What would such a world look like? What do we need to do to stand with Jesus “on a level place”?

These days everything seems to be running out: public finance, oil and gas, healthcare and social support, even wellbeing and goodwill seem to be in short supply. We look upon the world around us as a place of scarcity: whether it’s jobs, doctors’ appointments, truck drivers or natural gas – there just doesn’t seem to be enough of it. In today’s gospel, Luke 5:1-11, the fishermen at the shore have empty nets, they have worked all night and have nothing to show for it. And then miraculously, along comes Jesus and, boom, their nets are filled with a superabundance of fish. Such abundance that they can barely bear the weight of it. This seems too good to be true; the kind of miracle stories that have no relevance to us once we leave Sunday School. Looking at this familiar story afresh this week I am struck, not so much by the abundance, as by the efforts made by the community. The decision to put out to sea again, to commit yet more scarce resources to an uncertain venture, is made together. Not just by the crew of one boat but by many; the catch, when it comes, is landed by many boats. What Jesus gives to this community is the imaginative vision to take the risk but they have to do it together, all hands on deck, literally. How can this story bring us to look at the world around us as a place of abundance not of scarcity? Perhaps, the truly abundant resource here is the community. The planet may well be running dry of oil and gas and the public coffers running dry of credit, but we are not running out of people. What we need is the imagination and the vision to take the risk of pooling our resources and striving together for something better than our individual security.

Today we celebrate the feast of Candlemas which marks the end of Epiphany. This is the day we take the Nativity scene out of the church and process with candles: symbolising that God is no longer separate from us; we too can bear Christ’s light in the world. The first reading, Malachi 3:1-5, describes how when God comes to earth it will be with awe and terror. God’s presence is seen as a fire that will purify the people, burning away their impurities. In the gospel, Luke 2:22-40, however, God is no longer terrifyingly “other”. Mary and Joseph come to the temple with Jesus just like would the parents of every other new child; yet Jesus is recognised as unlike every other child. Here we have a meeting of opposites: old and young, male and female, divinity and humanity. In Christ heaven and earth meet and all things are reconciled.

This week’s scripture readings are all about reading scripture: in Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10, the word of the Lord is interpreted for the people and they weep. This is sometimes put down to remorse at their previously less than ideal behaviour, but it could be that they are weeping because the scripture has been interpreted so harshly. In the previous chapter they have been told that keeping the word of the Lord necessitates them divorcing their wives and dispossessing their children if they had any “foreign” blood. In contrast Jesus, in Luke 4:14-21, does not interpret the scriptures, instead he fulfils them. His scripture is a word of liberation. It is challenging. Yes, it questions existing structures, but in a way that leads to inclusion not exclusion, the widening not the narrowing of God’s welcome. When our faith leads to harm to human wellbeing and relationship we maybe need to question how we are interpreting God’s word. When our lives and communities lead to human flourishing and liberation then God’s word is fulfilled and Christ becomes present.

Evensong on Sunday 23rd January at 6:30 pm.

January is always a hard month for me; the excitement of Christmas is over, the days are short, the nights are long, energy and bank balances are low. So the super abundance, resources, and the excess of joy in our readings this morning feels hard to connect to. In Isaiah 62:1-5 the people of God are told of a future time when they will be a crown of beauty, renamed My Delight is in Her. But for now they are desolate and forsaken. They cannot envisage how they will get from desolation to delight and this is really the point: In John’s gospel (John 2:1-11) Jesus performs his first ever miracle by turning water, gallons of it, into the best wine, but the jars start out empty, they do not even contain water. It is often only when we have run dry, when our own resources have been exhausted, that we allow God the space to do anything at all. And that anything at all is so often more than we could ever have hoped for.

'Epiphany’ is a Greek word meaning ‘manifestation’, ‘appearing’, or ‘revelation’. Each week in this season we have a story which reveals something more of the meaning and purpose of the Incarnation which we celebrated at Christmas.

As the festive season draws towards its end and a new year begins, we reflect upon the meaning of the Epiphany. Twelve days after the birth of Christ, God revealed Himself to the Gentiles in the form of his only son.

This year the first Sunday of Christmas falls on Boxing Day. We will not be holding our usual Sunday services but we shall celebrate a short said mass in church at 10.30am.

In our last Sunday before Christmas we are given a glimpse of something truly radical. Our texts are still facing doom and disaster: in our first reading, Micah 5:1-5, the little nation of Israel is under siege, humiliated and oppressed by its mighty neighbours; in the Gospel, Luke 1:39-55, Mary, poor, disgraced and possibly in fear of her life, is running away. Yet here is hope in the face of hopelessness. And the hope comes not from the strong and the powerful but from the poorest and the weakest. In response to Elizabeth’s welcoming embrace Mary lets loose a song of revolution: if God is in her womb, then the world is truly turning upside down. A future of justice and peace will be brought forth by the little and the lowly, and Bethlehem, the most insignificant town in the most insignificant nation, will be the birth place of a new way of living with power to transform our world.