Homily For Epiphany 2 Year B 2009

Epiphany 2

Year B

Eucharist – 18.i.2009 (1 Samuel 3.1-10; Revelation 5.1-10; John 1.43-51) As well as it being the 2nd Sunday of the Epiphany season, today is also the first day of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. I‟m sorry that nothing at all has been arranged by our local churches to mark this Unity Week - that‟s a statement in itself, I‟m afraid to say. So by way of an apology - and perhaps to cheer you up - here are some light bulb jokes with an ecumenical flavour: How many Charismatics does it take to change a light bulb? One, since his/her hands are in the air anyway. How many Baptists does it take to change a light bulb? The whole congregation needs to vote on it! How many Anglo-Catholics does it take to change a light bulb? None. They always use candles instead. How many conservative Anglicans does it take to change a light bulb? Three. One to change it and two to storm out in protest if the person changing it is a woman. How many Brethren does it take to change a light bulb? Change????? How many Evangelicals does it take to change a light bulb? Evangelicals do not change light bulbs. They simply read out the instructions and hope the light bulb will decide to change itself. How many Atheists does it take to change a light bulb? You can ask them to change it as often as you like, but they'll still remain in darkness.

Perhaps if we‟re to be really serious about Unity, we simply need to be less serious about ourselves. I‟m afraid that our local Churches Together group 1

simply hasn‟t met for over a year, and when it does meet it never seems to be able to organise much that will actually register on the calendars of the individual churches of our area. It‟s difficult even to get the clergy together. When we do meet the gathering can be convivial enough, but once we start to talk business we seem to be more aware of the problems than the solutions - a bit like changing light bulbs. So at our last meeting we considered the opinion that not as many people as we would wish come to united services - and the end result is that we haven‟t organised any. Perhaps we will do a bit better with meetings in Lent? Watch this space… What does Jesus do? He simply goes up to people - as he does in today‟s Gospel reading - and says “Follow me.” What‟s more he does it in such a way that the people he speaks to go off and tell others. First Jesus invites Andrew and a friend of his to find out what he‟s doing. It‟s a simple invitation: “Come and see.” Simple - but it‟s enough for Andrew to go off and tell his brother, Simon Peter, and that‟s how the band of Twelve Disciples gets started. Now Jesus calls to Philip: “Follow me.” And the word really starts to get around. Philip goes off and tells Nathanael: “Jesus is the one we‟ve been looking for. Come and see.” It‟s at this point that the Gospel message is re-buffed for the first time. Nathanael can‟t get enthusiastic about Philip‟s invitation. He only sees the reason not to do things. How can Jesus have anything to say? He‟s just from that backwater town of Nazareth. “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip can only tell him, “Come and see.” And fortunately he does. It‟s when Nathanael meets Jesus, that he realises 2

who this man really is. It‟s the personal encounter that makes the difference. And that‟s how it is for us. If you want you can raise all the arguments you like about why you shouldn‟t take the Christian faith seriously. Some people just like to argue. Most - rather like Nathanael who‟s quite comfortable sitting where he is - just can‟t be bothered to get up and find out. But the Christian faith is not something for arguing over. It‟s faith in God - and we find God in Jesus. It‟s when Nathanael stops arguing and gets up and meets Jesus that the penny drops. From the same source as the light bulb jokes, here‟s a story that may shed some light on our Old Testament reading: A vicar in a small country church was looking forward to an important visit from his bishop, which would involve the bishop staying overnight at the vicarage after the service. His young son became very excited, as he had never spoken to a bishop before. The vicar decided that his young son should be allowed to knock the bishop’s door in the morning, and bring him in his morning tea. His father gave him instructions: “First, knock on the door of the bishop’s room and then say loud and clear: "It's the boy, my Lord, it's time to get up." The young son was very excited and rehearsed his lines, repeating them over and over. Finally the bishop came and spent the night. Next morning day came and the young lad went to the door and knocked. He cried loudly: "It's the Lord, my boy, and your time is up!"

And so it is… The story of the boy Samuel in the Temple is one of the earliest that I can remember. How do you know when God is speaking to you? Samuel hears a voice - he hears his name - and he gets up to find what is asked of him. Three times he hears the call, “Samuel, Samuel,” and three times he gets up and goes to the old priest Eli in the next room. It takes those three occasions for Eli himself to realise what is going on. Stay where

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you are, he tells Samuel, and ask God to speak to you where you are - and then listen… Now the LORD came and stood there, calling as before, „Samuel! Samuel!‟ And Samuel said, „Speak, for your servant is listening.‟ Or put it a different way: “It‟s the Lord… and your time is up…” Will we be ready to listen? Can we imagine that God comes to us, just as we are and where we are? Are we ready to make our response? “Follow me,” Jesus says to the first disciples. “Come and see,” is the invitation he makes to them. It‟s the same for us. We need to take the opportunities for prayer and growth in understanding so that we can really follow Jesus - a bit of effort on our part, but already he has made the first move. And here, Sunday by Sunday - other days too - Christ comes to us as we take bread and wine and he offers us his Body and his Blood. “Eat this…” “Drink this…” It‟s as simple as that. We can argue about all the problems about saying “Yes.” Or we can say that we‟re quite comfortable where we are. But Jesus will keep coming back to us: “Come and see.” “Follow me.”

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