What is in Kelvin's Head?

And the lot fell upon Matthias – a sermon

14/05/2024
This sermon was preached in St Mary’s Cathedral, Glasgow on 12 May 2024

You don’t get many stained glass windows depicting Joseph Barsabbas – also known as Justus, do you?

You get plenty of windows depicting Matthias. We’ve got one here in St Mary’s – over by the tea and coffee table. There he is with the fateful words – “And the lot fell upon Matthias”.

But if you want to exercise a devotion to Justus, you’re out of luck.

Or maybe he was out of luck in not being chosen.

Or maybe he was the lucky one in not being chosen.

But there’s no stained glass windows of him anywhere I know. There’s no statues of him. No icons of him. No holy pictures of him either.

And yet he was just as worthy as Matthias. He’d been a witness to the things that Jesus had done. They both had.

But the lot fell upon Matthias.

Isn’t it an extraordinary thought that the casting of lots two thousand years or so ago led directly to which of two men from the Holy Land would be depicted in stained glass here in Glasgow.

But the lot fell upon Matthias. Not on Justus. And so Matthias is who we have.

The problem for the disciples was that there seemed to be some significance for them in being 12 in number. (This significance is lost to us, by the way). However, they felt the need to find someone to fill the gap that was left by Judas, who had betrayed the Lord and then taken his own life.

The solution that they came up with was to find a couple of people who were worthy enough to step into the sandals of an apostle and then they prayed and then they cast lots to decide who should get the job.

One of the most fascinating things about this is how seldom Christians have wanted to replicate what they did in order to choose a new apostle.

It isn’t completely unknown for people to be chosen for posts in the church by lot but it is unusual. The Coptic Church in Egypt selects a few likely candidates when they are choosing a pope and then a choirboy is chosen at random to pick a name out of a mitre.

And those with long memories going back about 20 years might remember that the bishops of the Scottish Episcopal Church chose our Primus by casting lots, when the votes kept being tied in every vote for weeks.

But it isn’t often done.

But pretty much the first time the early Christians needed to choose a new leader that’s what they did. They picked two worthy candidates and drew lots – allowing fate, or God, or chance or – well we’ll come back to that in a minute, to choose.

And the lot fell upon Matthias.

But I have to admit. I have a sneaky devotion to Justus, the one on whom the lot didn’t fall.

Maybe the next time I find someone who paints icons, I’ll get them to paint me an icon of Justus.

You see, life hasn’t always turned out as I expected it to do. Or even as I might have hoped it would do.

Justus represents the road the church didn’t travel. The apostle never picked. The disciple unpreferred.

I find him really rather fascinating.

I’ve stood in quite a few elections for things – for parliament, for the diocese, for a council seat, for being the rector of a university and one or two things whilst I was at university. And I have more often had the experience of Justus than of Matthias.

Losing elections is one of my best skills.

It is one of those hobbies you get better and better at the more you do it. And I find the one unchosen rather fascinating.

But less about me, what is it that the early Christians are up to and is there anything to learn from it.

I think there’s a few things I think I have to say about this little incident.
- Firstly they didn’t trust God with the choice completely. And that’s really important and we should learn from it.
- And secondly, vocation is something for everyone and is about letting the gifts and skills that God has given us respond fully to the place in which we find ourselves.
- And thirdly, providence, if it works at all, works better when you look backwards rather than forwards and maybe for this last week of Eastertide, we should try doing that.
Let us just run through those. Firstly, it is clear that the disciples thought that God needed some help in making this decision. They only allowed two names to go forward and it is clear that both of them were regarded as eminently suitable candidates. I take from this that common sense is God’s greatest gift in trying to practice discernment. Far more important than spooky revelations or even tossing a coin. Common sense did most of the work here and common sense should be seen as God’s greatest spiritual gift. Holy Wisdom you can call it if you like. But it mattered to the disciples and it should matter to us, whatever decisions we are trying to make.

Secondly, I do think that vocation is about thinking about the gifts and skills that we have and then allowing them to be used as fully as possible in the situation that we find ourselves in. The community seemed to have discerned that both Matthias and Justus were wise enough and sensible enough. They had been present enough. And they were trusted enough.

That’s the stuff of vocation. Often much more so than mystical callings in the night.

These were people with great gifts and they were in the business of trying to recognise them as gifted people.

This congregation is a gifted group of people. I often think about that. And it is God’s business not only to have gathered us here to encourage one another and egg one another on but also it is God’s business to have placed us each in a world which needs the love of God preaching from Monday to Sunday.

As I think about my own gifts and skills and the extraordinary ways my life has turned unexpectedly, I am pretty sure that I don’t believe that there is just one path that God has laid out for me to follow and somehow have to try to get right all the time.

I can only really make sense of the providence of God when I look back at my life and think about where my gifts and skills have been used and where they have been recognised. I can see places where I may have been nudged and cajoled by God and by God’s people that have ended up with me being here, fully present in the now.

We’ve just got one more glorious week of Eastertide left. And in it, I invite you to look backwards at the providence of God. Maybe think about what you’ve seen of new life since we heard the news on Easter day. (Or maybe even since you heard the news of new life for the first time). In what ways has that new life been glimpsed?

For it is all still true you know? For if Christ had not been risen from the dead, the disciples would not have been gathered there. And if Christ is not risen from the dead, we would not be gathered here now. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Amen.
losing elections, Matthias

11 responses to “Providence and Vocation for Liberals in Public Life”

David Evans

29/06/2015

I was one of the Lib Dems who did foresee the calamity in 2015 and actively campaigned to get the party to change leader – after 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 it wasn’t difficult for anyone to see, but it was difficult for many nice Lib Dems to own up to the fact that they had allowed it to happen. I failed, but I don’t think it was part of anyone’s plan that I did (except possibly Ryan Coetzee and a few other true believers).

There’s a lot in your points I can agree with, particularly regarding the naivety of referring to God’s plan, when many Christian’s have a view that his/hers/its plan is to let us get on with it and find our own way to salvation. However, the most interesting question is when you say “The trouble is, these are not side issues, these are my rights.” Do you really mean that you have the right to force someone else to marry you who doesn’t want to and believes it is wrong, even though you have the right to and can get someone else to do the same job for you? Do individuals have the right to insist on being married by the registrar of their choice, or just the right to get married? Are you not perhaps just a bit assuming that your tree is that bit taller than the other guy’s?

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  29/06/2015
  
  I think that people should be able to expect individual people who represent the state not to discriminate against them in any of the protected categories. I think that the equal rights tree is bigger than my tree and the registrar’s tree.
  
  I don’t claim that individuals should be able to force registrars of their choice to marry them, not least because I don’t think it is a very real question – few people want to be married by someone who doesn’t want them to be married. I do think that local authorities have not simply the right but the duty to remove public officials who can’t serve every member of the public due to their personal prejudices.
  
  Reply
  1. David Evans
    
    30/06/2015
    
    I think you are rather changing your ground here from your original piece. You started with “The trouble is, these are not side issues, these are my rights.”
    
    You have now moved onto “I think that people should be able to expect individual people who represent the state not to discriminate against them in any of the protected categories.” So we now have a right to expect, but only against a person who works in the public sector, and even if it is against that person’s conscience and only if you are in a specially protected category.
    
    It gets even more tenuous then as you accept when you then say “I don’t claim that individuals should be able to force registrars of their choice to marry them.” So the right is not to a person wanting to be married at all.
    
    Finally we get “I do think that local authorities have not simply the right but the duty to remove public officials who can’t serve every member of the public due to their personal prejudices.” So the right is not to an individual at all, so definitely not “your rights” but to a public sector organisation. Hardly a human right, more of an employer’s right by your own statements.
    
    I rather think that your equal rights tree, however high you think it is, has decidedly peculiar roots.
    
    Reply
    1. Graham Evans
      
      05/07/2015
      
      David, I thought most liberals accepted the view that in the provision of services to the general public, whether provided by the public sector or private sector, a policy of non-discrimination was an essential ingredient of a progressive society. I accept that there is a notable exception to this rule in terms of the provision of abortion, but this arises from the broad range of medical procedures undertaken by one type of doctor or another. Surgeons are specialised medical practitioners, as are nurses who assist them, so it is most unlikely then anyone who opposed abortion on conscience grounds would actually be faced with having to refuse to conduct an abortion. The provision of most services to the general public is also a specialist activity, and no-one forces people to engage in any particular activity. The idea that a registrar should be able to opt out of undertaking a civil gay marriage represents the thin edge of a dangerous wedge. If such people wish to opt out of doing so, then they should act as part of a religious community, such as a deacon in Anglican Church, which has the legal power to conduct religious marriages, are still recognised by the State.
      
      Reply
      1. David Evans
        
        18/07/2015
        
        Quite simply Graham I disagree with your view that this is a level of discrimination in the provision of a public service of anything like the scale you imply makes it essential that every individual has to comply with it. The “go with it or get out” philosophy demanded of the state by so many in pursuit of their personal view of their rights is to my mind a greater threat to liberty than the fact that Fred or Freda don’t agree with something and don’t want to do it but George, Georgina, Harry, Harriette etc etc etc etc can do it instead. Ultimately you aren’t stopping someone from exercising their right; you are preventing someone from imposing their requirement on someone else.
        
        However, I note Kelvin hasn’t responded to my substantive point and I await that with interest.
Iain Brodie Browne

02/07/2015

Firstly thank you for your posting.
I have been expressing my concern elsewhere that the main voices we have heard in the debate about Tim’s faith have been firstly from those who think that it wholly a private matter and because his opinions are sincerely held and are derived from his faith the rest of us should back off and secondly those who seem to imply that having a religious faith at all is a negative factor. Until your contribution I am not aware that anyone has directly addressed the issue from different Christian understanding.
I cut my political teeth at the end of the 1960s opposing the all ‘white’ rugby and cricket tours from South Africa. The dominant voices from the churches were from Trevor Huddleston and David Sheppard. They effectively contested the assertions of those who told us (and they did) that apartheid was part of God’s plan.
Earlier in that decade Michael Ramsey spoke up clearly in support of what was then called homosexual law reform. David Steel, who pushed through the 1967 Act did so at a time when he was regularly introducing Songs of Praise.
I regret that equal marriage and the removal of other discriminations against gay people –including the issue you raise about Registrars- have not been as effectively championed by Christians as those earlier reforms. It is fair to say that in the minds of those who you describe as ‘decent people in society’ Christians are seen as opposing these reforms. The priority for the churches appears to be to gain protection for those who oppose such reforms. Imagine if that had been the approach to apartheid.
My own experience gives me hope that things are changing. Our local church got a new vicar who immediately began to pray for the defeat of the Equal Marriage legislation, got up petitions and lobbied. His views on women priests were no more in tune with ‘decent society’. In common with many churches these matters had not really been properly discussed. It was heartening how many members did openly contest his views and a significant portion of the congregation felt so strongly the eventually relocated to other churches. There is a good deal more support for liberal values amongst church goers than is popularly conceived.

My view is much the same as expressed in the Independent’s editorial this morning which endorsed Tim but added the rider that : ‘It will be for Mr Farron to make clear to party members, the public at large, and this newspaper, that his faith can indeed be reconciled with a liberal view on matters of birth, marriage and death.’ If faith is the opposite of certainty then I have enough to believe that can be achieved but if would be of assistance not only to Tim but to others struggling to reconcile their faith with liberal views if more church leaders provide a Christian narrative as effectively as did Michael Ramsey and Trevor Huddleston did in their day.

http://birkdalefocus.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/influencial-divine-former-libdem-ppc.html

Reply
Andy

18/07/2015

Personally, as a non-Christian, I find the attack on Tim Farron’s Christian faith distasteful, even disturbing. With the issue of gay marriage, something I wholly support, it is clear to me that Farron was trying to protect freedom of religious thought whilst also legislating for LGBT equality. There is nothing illiberal about that. Freedom of religion is one of the most fundamental human rights, and something liberals should defend. Any definition of liberalism which does not include freedom of conscience, is one I have no interest in supporting.

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  18/07/2015
  
  Thanks for commenting, Andy.
  
  I’m not aware of people attacking Tim Farron’s faith. I am aware of people questioning whether someone who apparently has anti-gay views is an appropriate person to represent the Lib Dems as leader.
  
  When it comes to the vote about the registrars, that can either be interpreted as defending religious thought or as defending discrimination. I come to the latter view because if I substitute a couple who are gay for a couple being say mixed race (something many people would once have objected to on religious grounds) then I see clear discrimination at work.
  
  It is a strange day when people are arguing (as some are) that the leader of the Liberal Democrats has the right to hold distasteful views about gay people in private so long as he defends their rights in public. He does have that right but not the right to be taken seriously as well.
  
  Reply
  1. David Evans
    
    18/07/2015
    
    Sadly there have been many who have been attacking Tim’s faith, some directly and some more with disdain. Comments such as listening to his sky fairy are not uncommon. Also portraying his views as apparently anti-gay are without doubt over egging it massively as opposed to the simple fact that as a liberals we should all have views which take into account the “balance of fundamental values of liberty, equality and community” and that this inevitably leads to differences of judgement on lots of individual issues, but do not undermine the fundamental decency and liberalism of many people like Tim, who have proved it over a great many years.
    
    Reply
David Evans

13/11/2015

Kelvin,

It is a great disappointment to me that you have not come back to me with any further reasoning in response to my post on 30 June 02:19. Have you changed your views, reinforced them with new vigour or simply moved on?

Reply
1. Graham Evans
  
  13/11/2015
  
  David, perhaps you could clarify what your substantive point is. Having reread the whole thread it’s certainly not clear to me.
  
  Reply