Third Hebrews Sermon

“A go between” is someone or something that acts as an intermediary, or as a messenger between two sides.

Someone who despite themselves acts as a communicator or connector.

The High Priest was a go between. The people on one side and God on the other. The people chose the priest they elected him, they gave him the authority and representative powers, and in turn the priest on their behalf was able to enter the Holy of Holies and make sacrifice for their sins. Make atonement… to make “at one ment”. To bring together that which had been separated.

Jesus was “The High Priest”, one like no other, elected indeed by God himself. A priest if you like “from the other side”. The mysterious priestly character of Melchizadeck being the forerunner.

Jesus is now seen as the High Priest in the heavenly places, as we have seen connecting “earth to heaven” connecting Man to God.

Becoming whole again, being made one with God was the purpose and work of Jesus, and this invitation is seen as open to us all, regardless of Jew or Gentile, Greek or Slave Male or female.

Such open invitation is strange even to us in this day and age. We still feel that we want to deserve something or that we don’t deserve something. We still live a life according to rewards and punishments, reward and guilt. The idea that the first will be the last still grates on our sensibility.

Little wonder therefore that we get the story from Mark’s gospel where James and John ask a big favour from Jesus. Does the story sound a little better if it was their mother asking the favour on behalf of their son?

This week we have seen one such request from the mother of Gary Mackinnon, and her request after over ten years has been upheld and she was overwhelmed by the result. Some have said that they also wept as they heard the mother speaking on behalf of her son.

In which case maybe putting the request to Jesus for James and John to have what appears to be preferential treatment in the new Kingdom, in the mouth of their mother makes it a moving story perhaps, but to see the disciples themselves making the request seems to be “wrong” or “greedy”.

They (or their mother) clearly had not been paying too much attention to what Jesus had been saying about children inheriting the kingdom, or that the first shall be last and the last will be first!

This having been said it is perhaps sad to realise that the offer of being able to share the same cup was not wholly fulfilled, for although they shared the last supper together the final cup in the Garden of Gethsemane proved too much for them and they ran away and fled at a crucial moment.

Was their mothers confidence in her sons over exaggerated, or was their own confidence in their own ability simply human pride over stretching itself?

Needless to say we may often put ourselves in the same place. We think we deserve something and we can usually justify it quite well. Whether it be a glass of wine at the end of a hectic day or week, or a chocolate bar in the middle of Lent!

We may just think we deserve something because we have been waiting the longest, or most patiently.

This week saw the church remembering Ignatius of Antioch, an important and early martyr of the Christian church. He wrote many important epistles to congregations encouraging people in their faith. In one letter however I have noticed him writing to the Church in Rome word to the effect of “don’t get in the way of my martyrdom, I want to serve God in this way..”

Is this another case like James and John?

Ignatius however was seen to suffer and die, just as Jesus was seen to suffer and die. This suffering is key to understanding the way to God, and it was what James and John, (or their mother) failed to actually recognise.

The suffering of Jesus became the key. This is why it is such a vital part of Easter.

The writer to the Hebrews lays great weight on this too, not just in todays epistle but all the way though. We suffer as human, and Jesus knew what this felt like. He died, we die. He changed death for us precisely because he was human like we are.

Jesus was a man of sorrows. Jesus calls us to be with him in the Kingdom and to live this kingdom here. It is NOT a kingdom of reward, punishment, or even just deserts. It is a Kingdom of Loving and of Love, and it is where those of us who feel we should be up at the front are actually at the back. It is a Kingdom where those who suffer are most blessed, where the poor are the richest, and where the grieving get the greatest joy.

A kingdom perhaps worthy of this topsy turvy world… what do you think?