The sermon-
I'm going to start by talking about politics partly because I'm one of those dreadful political priests but I'm not going to end with politics. You may be glad to know Rory Stewart when he left politics said that he was glad to leave because politics is not good for the soul.
We live our democratic world is a world of accusation. It's always been a world of accusation. That's the cost of democracy. Horrible to live in a country where accusation is suppressed totalitarian regimes. But the world of accusation also has its problems. And I think with the rise of social media, the voice of accusation in politics is getting shriller and shriller and shriller.
So the world of politics is a kind of courtroom where the person who is in power all the time is always found guilty. John's gospel is also a courtroom. The world judgment comes into go John's gospel a lot Jesus says that I have come into the world for judgment and then at another time he says that he's not a judge so it's very confusing but just consider the courtroom of politics the courtroom of John's gospel and the courtroom of our lives.
In this courtroom, there is a prosecuting council and the prosecuting council has a name and his name is Satan. And Satan is simply the Hebrew word for the prosecuting council. And in the book of Job, , Satan isn't this horrible devil with horns. is simply the prosecutor. And the Greek word which means exactly the same thing the diabolos the devil is also the prosecutor.
There is also the council for the defense. Thank God. And the council for the defense literally is the Paraklete. The one who is called to the defense or in Latin the word is advocate.
The Holy Spirit is the council for the defense. So the accusing voice is there in Jesus's world and it's also there in our souls. You don't have to be a charismatic to be defended by the Holy Spirit. All you have to do is keep faith. If you love me, you will keep my commandments. to pay loving attention to your own life and the lives of those around you. And the advocate, the Holy Spirit, will just turn up.
He may turn up in your life as an angel. Somebody or something that came to your help exactly when you needed it. And that person who turned up as an angel may not even have known that they were helping you, but they were. God sent them. They may turn up as grace. Grace being that I don't even know what it is, but it just comes into our lives and everything is all right again. Just when you are at the end of your tether.
Don't go searching too hard for God.
Listen to the words of a great Swiss mystic theologian Maurice Zundell who died in 1975. He wrote, "There is something in me greater than me. Anyone who knows this has no need that anyone should show him the existence of God." Don't worry if you don't even know whether God exists. God is the light and when a person pays attention to his own life, he will bump into this marvellous invisible presence. Whatever name we give it, it is an infinite presence which exceeds us infinitely and is closer to us than we are to ourselves.
You see, when we surrender to this greater and more intimate presence, the voice of accusation will cease. and be replaced by the voice of peace.
