It goes back many centuries before the time
of Christ. The idea of a Jubilee Year.
It would be a year that gave people the chance
to start all over again as debts were written off and slaves freed.
It was a year to catch the imagination …
but it never quite worked!
It appears at the beginnings of the Bible
in Leviticus 25. It then appears again
in Isaiah 61. And as Jesus begins his
ministry the idea appears again.
Reading: Luke 4
“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he
has anointed me
to proclaim
good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and
recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour
Good news to the poor
Freedom for the prisoners
Recovery of sight for the blind,
Set the oppressed free
The Year of the Lord’s Favour – that’s it –
the Jubilee Year.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if that’s what the
Jubilee was all about!
It really is a special year – as much as
anything it is a celebration of the achievements of the Queen as an
individual. Not many people can claim to
have been doing a job for 60 years … and still to be going strong with the kind
of gruelling schedule the Queen has chosen to undertake in this Jubilee Year.
She has made the Christmas Day message her
very own – some have been about current affairs, current issues, some about her
family, initially idolised, latterly going through the very same strains and
stresses any other family experiences.
On the threshold of this Jubilee year it was fascinating to hear a
Christmas Day message that was such a clear declaration of the Christian faith
that has meant so much to her and continues to mean so much!
She quoted a favourite Christmas carol and
made it her prayer for each of us listening in …
In the last verse of this beautiful carol,
O Little Town of Bethlehem, there’s a prayer.
O Holy Child of Bethlehem,
Descend to us, we pray.
Cast out our sin,
And enter in.
Be born in us today.
The Queen went on to say,
It is my prayer that on this Christmas Day
we might all find room in our lives for the message of the angels and for the
love of God through Christ our Lord.
What would that mean for us? I wonder?
A chance to begin all over again?
I think there’s a clue in two visits the
Queen has made to Cheltenham. And I am choosing those visits carefully.
In 2003 she came to the races and unveiled
a bust to the Queen Mother. It emerged
then that months before the coronation the Queen mother had brought the
uncrowned Queen Elizabeth secretly to Cheltenham
– they watched the races from a landrover parked next to the Water Jump.
That wasn’t her first visit to Cheltenham. Fifty-two
years before she had come as Princess Elizabeth. It was as GCHQ was about to move to the
town, its buildings were going up. Hence
Princess Elizabeth Way
with all its flats and houses that were built for the arrival of those moving
from Bletchley Park
and London. During her visit Princess Elizabeth planted
an Oak Tree.
Sad to say when the new GCHQ building went
up the Oak Tree had to be felled. No matter, when the Queen came to Cheltenham
for, I think, the fourth time, in March 2004 to open the new GCHQ building she unveiled
a plaque in Hester’s Way
Park to commemorate the
Oak she had planted … what became of the oak.
Other oaks planted – Felicity thought in Cox’s Meadow, maybe in Hester’s
Way.
There’s a wonderfully powerful image there
of the acorn and the oak. Small things
that make all the difference. That could
be said of much the Queen has done … the small things that count and are
remembered.
It’s in doing small things that make a
difference that we bring good news to the poor, freedom for prisoners, recovery
of sight for the blind and set the oppressed free.
It is a lovely picture of the tree that has
to be felled – but from it an acorn brings new life. It is an irony of our celebrations that we
are marking not the sixtieth anniversary of the coronation, but the sixtieth
anniversary of the accession. And that
has a sadness as well as a joy to it.
For it is out of sadness that a new reign begins.
Jesus doesn’t talk of oaks and acorns … but
he does talk of a grain of wheat.
Speaking of his own death and resurrection, and of the resurrection
victory we all may share he invited us to picture a grain of wheat.
Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground
and dies it remains but a single seed.
But if it dies it produces many seeds.
Even in the sadness of dying, death and
bereavement there’s a new beginning in the eternal love of God.
The story of that original Oak planted by
Princess Elizabeth is also symbolic of the way new beginnings come from endings
too!
When Philip Smith, the vicar of St Aidan
and St Silas realised the Oak originally planted by Princess Elizabeth had been felled he rescued some of
the wood.
St Silas and St Aidan has been home to a wonderful project
that has been on the go for twenty years and more, Network Crafts. Providing word working experience initially
for people who need to develop skills, maybe in unemployment or in
retirement. They have crafted candle
holders and a table that takes pride of place in the church.
That’s the hope at the heart of the faith
that has meant so much to the Queen down through all these years.
Between that visit to Cheltenham and GCHQ
in 2004 and the next in 2009 the construction company responsible for what had
been Europe’s largest building project at the time had presented to the town a
wonderfully playful piece of public art in Hester’s Way Park.
Cheltenham’s very own stone circle.
There’s GCHQ, affectionately known as the
Doughnut.
And from it goes an avenue of stones to a
much smaller circle of stones.
What would a time team special in a
thousand years make of these two circles side by side?
Created by …, and known as the Listening
Stones, it really is a stone circle worth visiting.
It’s got all sorts of codes I don’t
recognise … but maybe some here would.
And newspaper cuttings. I am told
there are Bible texts … but you will have to find those for yourselves.
But one stone is highlighted. The Inscription is marked out in red.
It is a stone that brings me back to the
Year of the Lord’s favour, making a new start and in particular to that
Christmas Message of 2011 with its Prayer for Peace
Lead me from death to life
From falsehood to truth
Lead me from despair to hope
From fear to trust
Lead me from hate to love
From war to peace
Let peace fill our heart,
Our world, our universe
Peace Peace Peace
That prayer at Christmas 2011 is one very
much for the whole of this Jubilee Year.
It is my prayer that on this Christmas Day
we might all find room in our lives for the message of the angels and for the
love of God through Christ our Lord.
The message of the angels that is right at
the heart of that prayer is the prayer we would pray together
Glory to God on high
And earth …. Peace
It
brings to mind the words of Jesus … I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life.
For the Diamond Jubilee Philip has written
a hymn.
This morning over on Coronation Square they will be singing of
the Jubilee on Coronation Square.
We come to crown God sovereign
in Coronation Square
A time for celebration
in jubilee displayed.
We come as different people
each noble in God’s heart.
We come to serve our neighbour,
for all to play their part.
Our gracious Queen we pray for
and thank God for her care.
She rules with love and service,
her people everywhere.
A commonwealth of nations,
a family of grace.
We come as loyal kinsfolk
all equal in this place.
This day of national homage
is one of hope and cheers.
A time to honour duty,
for grace of sixty years.
We are a royal priesthood
who in our Lord we trust.
O God we raise our anthem,
please save our Queen and us!
Philip Smith 2012
We may not be other there with them, but we
can be with them in spirit and use those same words too.
In that coronation service at the heart of
the service was a moment when the Queen was anointed with oil.
That too is an ancient biblical
tradition. In the Old Testament
anointing was always for a specific person and a specific role – prophets,
priests, kings.
Jesus’ brother James speaks of the great
value of anointing with oil in times of illness when he that when someone is
ill he can call those who are senior in the life of the church and ask them to
share in anointing with oil and to share in prayer for healing and hope. Something very moving to share.
Jesus himself felt anointed by the Spirit
to bring good news to the poor, sight to the blind, freedom to the oppressed.
The wonderful good news is that this
anointing of the Spirit is not just for the one or the two, not just for those
in extraordinary positions, it is something for each one of us. We too are anointed by the Spirit to bring good
news to the poor and share that wonderful message of the love of God in Christ.
For
none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone.
May
the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that
you may overflow with hope by the power
of the Holy Spirit.
We all of us are called to live for other
people …
That’s the life we are anointed to, that’s
the hope we look and it is a wonderful hope to share.
May
the God of hope fill each one of us with all joy and peace as we trust in him,
so that we may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
