What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Sermon on BBC Radio 4

    It was great fun doing the BBC Radio 4 Sunday Worship live from St Mary’s today. There’s always a bit of an adrenalin rush about being involved with the production of 40 minutes of live radio.

    If you were one of the million or so who tuned in then you’ve already heard this sermon, but the video gives you the pictures of what it looked like, including me preaching in headphones.

    Sermon preached on BBC Radio 4 – 18 January 2015 from Kelvin Holdsworth on Vimeo.

    When we follow Jesus, we follow into a whole set of traditions that remind us that God is with us – here, right here in the world.

    A few weeks ago now we were in high festival mode in this church, as in most churches. The Christmas trees are gone. The baubles are packed away. The candle-ends have been removed from the windowsills and sent off for recycling. And there is only be barest whiff of incense in the air from the feast of the Epiphany.

    But the church offers us time to reflect on what we encountered. For Epiphany is a season not a one off event. It’s a time for reflecting on what it means to live in a world that God has chosen to come into and be known in.

    Very often I talk about God being a God of surprises and say that when we get to know God we should expect the unexpected.

    But looking through the verses of Psalm 139, perhaps the big drama of the Christmas story should never have surprised us. For they too tell us that God is with us.

    Most religions have patterns of behaviour and rhythms built into them. Across many traditions, the idea of praying at the start and the end of the day is common.

    The psalms were clearly part of a cycle of prayer and they still form the backbone of daily prayer for millions of people every day. It isn’t hard to hear in Psalm 139 part of that ancient rhythm of reminding oneself early in the day that God is present.

    The psalmist sings “You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from far away.

    You search out my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways.”

    Prayer is offered here in this building every day. Whether there are just a few of us gathered in the little oratory behind me as is the case on some days, or whether it is a day when the place is packed out with people celebrating a festival or a morning like this when we share our prayer with people listening on the radio, this is a place where prayer is offered every morning.

    I remember when I was working in a university chaplaincy knowing one of the people in the mail room who, if he saw me going back to the chaplaincy would call after me, “Say one for me – don’t forget, say one for me”.

    And we do. We pray each day here for the world around us, for people in need. We remember those who mourn and those who are sick. The rhythm of prayer means that prayers are offered not simply for the peoples of the world who need it but because some are too sick to be able to pray clearly, some a travelling, some are on the run, some are anxious and find it hard to be still.

    Every time we pray, it is like a little Christmas for every time we pray we live out the truth that God is with us in the world and with us in every kind of setting that we encounter.

    God is with us in the bright days when all seems well. And God is with us on the down days too. God is with us when we know it. And God is with us when we struggle to recognise it. God is with us when we pray consoling words in a holy place. But God is with us in every other time and place too.

    “Where can I go from God’s spirit? Or where can I flee from God’s presence?” asks the psalmist. And the answer is that there is nowhere that is separate from God at all. Everywhere we go, God is already there.

    Years ago when widespread acceptance of the internet was relatively new, I got involved in a project where a church put a webpage up asking for prayer requests. The idea was that a small congregation would pray through the requests at a lunchtime service each week.

    Word got out in the press that this was available and within a few weeks the prayer requests were flooding in. Hundreds a day were coming in. Thousands. And for a time, baskets containing printouts of the prayers were being placed on the altar of the church to represent the prayers being brought before God.

    The truth is though that we are already surrounded by prayer because Christians pray for the world every day. And we are already close to God – and our psalms are amongst the many promises in the bible that tell us so.

    The world is troubling at the moment. Massacres happen on the streets of western capital cities, in Nigeria and in places far from the eye of the media too.

    It is easy to feel unsettled and troubled.

    Indeed, it is reasonable and right to feel that way.

    But I believe that peace and justice will come to our world and trust that God is collaborating in our lives to help us to bring peace to pass. We must never be cheated into thinking that trouble and violence are the way the world really is.

    For God is with us in the troubled, perplexing but ultimately wonderful world. And with God, love is always the last word on how things should be.

    , , ,

9 responses to “Another Day, Another Mission Strategy is launched”

  1. Mark Avatar
    Mark

    three diocesan wishes?
    (i) Scrap every Diocesan body, council and group; let Bishops commend and expound the Gospel, and care for their clergy.
    (ii) Devolve every decision to the locally accountable group; let priests be priests and not bureaucrats.
    (iii) Let go of the Anglican communion for the sake of the Kingdom.

    Reply
  2. Rev Ruth Avatar
    Rev Ruth

    You know, in all the years I’ve been a member of the SEC I didn’t know about the Diocesan Fairy Wands. But now you mention them I can see that there must indeed be such a thing. In the spirit of openness I would like to see them processed in at the beginning of General Synod with the candles and placed on the Table. Carried by small children, perhaps?

    Do you know if they are different colours?

    And where is The Diocese of Argyll and the Isles’ fairy wand at the moment? Is someone else looking after it and therefore has two? Or is it waiting in a dusty filing cabinet for the drawer to be flung open and set free?

    Reply
  3. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    Please allow me to jump in before anyone from the Diocese Across the Water feels obliged….

    Ruth, you should know by now. It is the Diocese of Argyll and The Isles. Not the Diocese of Argyll and the Isles. Nor indeed the Judean Peoples’ Front.

    Reply
  4. Scottish Roundup

    […] To wrap up Kelvin Holdsworth, Provost of St Mary’s Cathedral, Glasgow explains that as a new day dawns a new mission statement is launched […]

    Reply
  5. Kenny Avatar
    Kenny

    As the Chair of a Regional Council, and a member of Diocesan Council, I feel well and truly “whupped” by your words, Kelvin. If I were the MDO or the Bishop or Dean, I would feel similarly put down. There are folk who are genuinely trying to put together a strategy for mission that works and is not smothered by cynicism from the outset. I think a bit of support or a word of encouragement or advice may have been a bit more helpful.

    It is true that some Regional Councils may not be working, but that certainly isn’t helped by clergy staying away from them because it’s bad for their health. On the contrary, it needs these priests to be there, to stand up and question what’s going on or not going on and help shape them into a body that works. The theory is a good one, but Regional Councils will fail simply because some folk will share your attitude towards them. As a member of the Bishop’s Staff Group and a member of Diocesan Council, I find it totally incredible that you choose not to attend and disseminate information from these two bodies, and indeed incredible that you have not taken your Regional Council by the scruff of the neck and shown it how it can be more productive and engage more dynamically in current Diocesan policy.

    I sit on Diocesan Council too, and am amazed at the power you think it has! Very often, it seems to me, we cannot make any decisions until they are ratified by the Bishop’s Staff Group, or things come from the Staff Group that we are told to ratify. Debate is sometimes rare and I feel Council is a pretty toothless being, and exists only to ratify what others in more lofty positions want to happen. (Paisley was a prime example of this).

    It’s dead easy to sit there and snipe at those who are trying their damndest to wake the sleeping and encourage growth and life. Instead, we need to pull together and make sure something is put in place that is effective and that we can all buy into.

    Maybe the Clergy Conference will give us a start, but banging in and damaging the process before it has begun is perhaps not the most constructive thing you’ve done of late.

    Reply
  6. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    Hi Kenny – thanks for your comments. I think you are quite right in some of the things you say, though not in others.

    I agree that it was not a constructive way to engage with this to put all of my grumpiness into a blog post and wish now that I had kept quiet.

    There are some things which you’ve not got entirely right though. I’m not a member of the Diocesan Council, as it happens. Also, your assumptions about the way in which decisions were made about Paisley are not quite right. However, learning from what you’ve said, I’m not inclined to post more about that on here, but I will be saying more about it in meetings as appropriate.

    My comments about Regional Councils are influenced by two things only – the local ones which I have been to and the reports from the Regions which are given at Diocesan Council. (I usually find these quite shocking).

    As it happens, I disagree with you about clergy health. Should regional council meetings ever affect the health of clergy, its certainly time to stop going. We don’t think nearly enough about one another’s wellbeing.

    I do however take the general point that my blog post was unhelpful. Though it does still represent my views, I’m sorry that I posted it online in the first place and wish I had thought twice about it.

    I guess lots of us who keep blogs sometimes make mistakes and this one was one of mine.

    Reply
  7. Kenny Avatar
    Kenny

    Now I feel like a heel! I’m lucky inasmuch as what I post is largely ignored or unread, so I can rant when I like without too many consequences, unless it annoys or causes hassle for the upper echelons in our little Church.

    I know, of course that you are not a member of Council, but you do attend as Provost of the Cathedral and are allowed to contribute.

    You did say that Regional Council were bad for your health and well-being. I am concerned about that, and yes, I wish we were all a bit more concerned for each other, but my suggestion was that you took steps to ensure that these meetings were a little more constructive and actually did what they were set up to do. I agree that reports back to Diocesan Council are often dreadful. I shiver when I hear reported that the highlight was a Coffee Morning held in Little St Reubens, but how do we change that?

    I often think that the old RCC was much much better at disseminating information down to parishes, and every parish felt part of the processes of Church Government, but new models are indeed needed. I think new processes may well emerge from this new initiative.

    I wouldn’t worry too much about the negativity in this particular post. You seem to be redeeming yourself in subsequent jottings.

    The truth is that we need you, and your vision, on board, and the Clergy Conference may well be a good place to begin.

    Reply
  8. Kelvin Avatar
    Kelvin

    And we’ve got yet another Mission Strategy document to get our teeth into at General Synod! Hurrah!

    And you know what I think of that one?

    Well, let me tell you, I think………

    No, maybe I’ve learnt my lesson.

    For now, anyway.

    Reply
  9. Kenny Avatar
    Kenny

    I just can’t wait… and I hope tou DO say what you think!

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Previous Posts

  • Equal Marriage – Prop 8 Ruling in California

    So, the anti-gay Prop 8 has been ruled unconstitutional in California. [Here’s the catch-up if you’ve not been paying attention – California allowed some same-sex couples to marry, then there was a people’s poll on the same day as the Obama election which was passeed by 52% to 48%. It determined a new amendment to…

  • Sermon preached on Lammas Day – 1 August 2010

    Today is 1 August and that is a traditional day in Scotland which has a name and a heritage and a series of traditions around it. And I bet most people these days don’t know what it is. Today, 1 August is Lammas Day – one of the Scottish Term Days, similar to the English…

  • Inclusive Language

    Ruth has the skinny on the Inclusive Language amendments that the College of Bishops has licensed for permitted use. The paper proclaiming these amendments has not reached these parts and I’m not sure what that situation means liturgically. Most of the amendments are not particularly surprising, and indeed, some of them have been in use…

  • St Paul’s on the Green, Norwalk, CT

    We had a great day on Sunday at St Mary’s. The Feast of St James in the morning was a lovely interlude into the usual summer Sunday calendar and then a special Choral Evensong sung by the Choir of St Paul’s on the Green, Norwalk, Connecticut. They had been in Lincoln for a week singing…