Skip to main content

Deliberately Missing The Point

The man replied... "All I know is that I used to be blind, but now I can see!...I have already told you once, and you refused to listen. Why do you want me to tell you again?" (John 9.25b & 27a NRSV)
Just before the current COVID-19 lockdown all of us had been asked to make only essential journeys. That begs the question, when is a journey really essential? We decided, after some hesitation, that taking some food to Helen's father and making sure he was all right was an essential journey.
Driving along the highway network was a surreal experience. It was like travelling in a time machine back to the 1960s. Everywhere the volume of traffic was what people giving travel bulletins on the radio sometimes call 'light'. 
Occasionally, when there was scarcely a car in sight on both sides of the dual carriageway, we would say to one another, 'Look! The road is virtually empty.'
It was clear that a lot of people are heeding the official advice. Perhaps they are like the man who - on meeting the one who is 'the light for the world' (verse 5) - found he could see.
But some people remained in the dark. Feeling exasperated at their persistent questioning, the man who had regained his sight accused them of refusing to listen. There was no point in continually repeating the same message if they didn't choose to hear it.
Does this explain the 'Skegness Effect'? At a loose end on the first day of Spring, thousands of people descended on Skegness, and there was a similar mass migration to Bridlington, Brighton and other seaside resorts. Others have taken themselves off to the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. Were these journeys essential? 
Where they trying to outrun the virus or just enjoy themselves after a week of bad news? There has never been a more important time for us all to listen and make sure we are seeing clearly what needs to be done. Refusing to listen to the experts is not a viable option.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I don't believe in an interventionist God

Matthew 28.1-10, 1 Corinthians 15.1-11 I like Nick Cave’s song because of its audacious first line: ‘I don’t believe in an interventionist God’. What an unlikely way to begin a love song! He once explained that he wrote the song while sitting at the back of an Anglican church where he had gone with his wife Susie, who presumably does believe in an interventionist God - at least that’s what the song says. Actually Cave has always been very interested in religion. Sometimes he calls himself a Christian, sometimes he doesn’t, depending on how the mood takes him. He once said, ‘I believe in God in spite of religion, not because of it.’ But his lyrics often include religious themes and he has also said that any true love song is a song for God. So maybe it’s no coincidence that he began this song in such an unlikely way, although he says the inspiration came to him during the sermon. The vicar was droning on about something when the first line of the song just popped into his ...
14 comments
Read more

Luther and Loyola

James 1:17-27 Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23 Within Christianity there has always been a tension between two poles. At one end of the spectrum stands Martin Luther, who said that Christian faith is about trusting in God to put us right - or make us righteous - through the saving death of Jesus. Luther came to this conclusion when he was a professor of New Testament studies in a little town in Germany called Wittenberg. One year he decided to teach his students about Paul’s letter to the Romans and that’s when it suddenly dawned upon him that Christian faith is all about trust. At the other end of the spectrum , stands someone like Ignatius Loyola the founder of the Society of Jesus. He spent a lot of his later life in crisis, first struggling to overcome severe wounds that he had suffered when he was a soldier and then during two short periods locked up in a cell by the Spanish Inquisition. He came to believe that the Christian life is a similar sort of struggle, a lifelon...
Post a Comment
Read more

Sharing the Good News With People of Other Faiths

Together with other local Christians, clergy and lay people, I find myself – from time to time – giving thought to how we share our Christian faith with people from other religious backgrounds. It is a ticklish issue, because converting from one faith to another is a huge decision to make and it may not be appropriate for everyone. Becoming a Christian is always a life changing event, but for someone from another faith background it can sometimes cause immense dislocation and hardship, including estrangement from family members and friends who cannot accept their decision. It may even cut a person off from their entire cultural heritage, so it is not something that we can expect people to enter into lightly or thoughtlessly. Nor is it likely to be easy for them to make a gradual progression or pilgrimage to Christian faith. At some point they may have to choose whether or not to make a radical break with their past, unless they decide to be secret or closet believers. And they may deci...
2 comments
Read more