The Cleansing
Lent 3, John 2:13-22, Luke 12:32
If he came to our churches on Sunday
to be awkwardly greeted as stranger
would he fashion a whip for our cleansing
would we cringe from his anger as danger?
Would he drive out conservative? liberal?
or upend those who balance on fences?
What offence might he take, at what practice?
Would he shake up our pews or our senses?
Would he tear up my poems and sermons,
say, "You fiddle while so much is burning!"?
Would he throw out projectors or prayer books,
call for change or a zealous returning?
No, I hope he would gather us round him,
knowing how we are raw and confounded,
how we're shaken and cast down by failure,
how we fear that our death knell is sounded.
He will say, "Little flock, don't be fearful,
for the kingdom will keep coming nearer,
and your efforts and gifts won't be wasted:
what you lose is renewed and made clearer.
For the pattern of Easter is central:
out of death comes abundance of living;
that's the secret of all new creating.
Nothing's lost from our loving and giving.
See my body in people not buildings!
Know I'm with you in doubts and believing!
Stir up zeal for compassion and justice!
Learn to listen and wait for receiving!
So my brothers and sisters, keep hoping!
Seek the way and the truth, open-hearted,
and be ready for future unfolding!
I am in you: we cannot be parted!"
Barbara Messner 3/03/21
God Laughs, Weeps and Loves
God Laughs, Weeps and Loves
Lent 2; Genesis 17:1-17, Mark 8:31-38
One theological truth I affirm:
God has a sense of humour
and we are made in that image too.
Bless the Lord who laughs, weeps and loves.
God made Abraham a solemn promise
and adjusted his name to mean
"father of a multitude", so Abraham
fell on his face and laughed,
for he was ninety-nine and not virile.
God had the last laugh (at least in English)
adding "ha" to "Abram", and God said
their son would be "Isaac", meaning
"May God laugh in delight!"
Sarai became Sarah, and "I" was lost to "ah!"
She would have cried a long "ah" in childbirth,
being old and stiff. Oh she laughed,
overhearing the promise:
perhaps in the scant hope of pleasure,
or mocking the men for their dreaming.
Jesus named his offsider "Peter", meaning "rock",
rock to build a church on, but maybe also "rocky",
as in denial in the courtyard of hierarchy.
Insightful Peter named Jesus Messiah;
fallible Peter was rebuked as Satan
for tempting his friend once more
with the lure of safety, fame and power
in place of a cross outside the walls.
Jesus would have sighed, laughed, and forgiven
Peter's rockiness, but Peter's inheritors
often chose safety, fame and power
in place of cross and resurrection.
In prayer on mountain tops,
looking out at flawed beauty,
and on the plains, suffering our failures,
Jesus and God laugh, weep and love.
Though our choices endanger the world,
we are not yet too old for new birth.
Barbara Messner 22/02/2024
The Time is Fulfilled
The Time is Fulfilled
Lent 1; Mark 1:9-15
When we rise in urgent need
seeking sun and air,
from the depths enclosing us
like a womb or tomb,
heavens open; gracious life
swoops to meet us there,
naming us as family,
with the world our room.
Something divine will alight on us,
something human finds wings,
something is heard that delights in us,
something gives voice and sings.
When we wander, overwhelmed,
dazed by sun and air,
driven out to wilderness
where temptations loom,
though the dryness desiccates
hope into despair,
there's a word that calls us out
to face down that doom.
Something corrupting entices us,
something steadfast holds true,
something authentic finds words in us,
something that's timeless and new.
So the kingdom comes to us,
near as sun and air,
when we open arms to it,
and provide it room.
If we let the silence grow
'til it strips us bare,
animals and angels come,
and strange flowers bloom.
Something within us enlightens us,
something changing us leads,
something allures us in mystery,
something that reaches our needs.
Barbara Messner 17/02/2018
Healing Choices
Healing Choices
Epiphany 6; 2 Kings 5:1-14; Mark 1:40-45
If a slave girl had not shared
faith in godly power to heal,
if some servants had not cared,
spoken out with frank appeal,
would his body be restored,
soul washed clean of futile pride?
Naaman's servants saved their lord,
braved his wrath, set fear aside.
Banned from contact, yet he came
close to Jesus, begged and knelt,
knew he need not cringe in shame,
saw compassion deeply felt.
"If you choose, you'll make me clean."
Jesus touched him and then said,
"I do choose, so be made clean."
Maybe cleansing tears were shed.
Hear this! Healing power is shared:
distant prophet for proud lord,
risky touch to leper dared -
choice for both sees life restored.
Servants made the choice to speak,
Jesus let the man come near,
strong man bathed though seeming weak,
let his self-pride disappear.
Barbara Messner 8/02/2024
Woman Lifted Up
Woman Lifted Up
Epiphany 5; Mark 1:29-39
He took her by the hand and raised her up,
and then the fever left her, and the loss
of home and husband and her role and place
no longer kept her weak, confined to bed.
She felt empowered to serve them in this house
that was not hers, but where perhaps she might,
by serving him, discover who she was,
and who she might become, in Jesus' sight.
She ministered as one whom he had raised.
The hand that he had held could now reach out
to those who gathered, needy, at the door.
He healed, she fed, she risked a touch and word.
He lifted her and raises women still,
for bondage spirits keep so many bent.
Now women can stand strong to speak and praise.
He takes my hand and lifts me up again.
Barbara Messner 1/02/2024
Unsanctioned Authority
Unsanctioned Authority
Epiphany 4; Mark 1:21-28
They said he spoke with authority:
a truth more real than the words of scribes,
a truth their leaders dare not see.
The unclean spirit loudly said
both Jesus' name and holy fame.
At his command that spirit fled.
He dared to heal in the synagogue:
the bent stood straight, the withered whole.
No wonder crowds were all agog.
They saw in him authority
those authorized would not confirm.
Now what does that mean for you and me?
I know I'm not Jesus, yet maybe
if I'm authentic, name what's real,
I can claim the Spirit's authority.
We still have scribes who expect respect
for guarding the rules of who may do what:
unsanctioned authority they suspect.
The powers that be still need the right
to say who may teach or interpret the Word,
so they hand out candles, avoid harsh light.
Yet how do we know that the word we say
is true of God and not unclean?
Is there a wise and honest way?
Let me be humble, yet staunchly stand
in confidence to share my gifts,
with ears attuned and practised hand.
Barbara Messner 22/01/2024
Sonnets for Ministers
Reluctant Prophet
Epiphany 3; Jonah 3
Then Jonah heard the word a second time:
he’d been regurgitated on the land.
His choice to flee had left him slick with slime,
for Nineveh was not the call he’d planned.
His journey to the depths had changed his mind:
he preached a storm to Nineveh despised,
and they repented. God of love was kind,
but brimstone and destruction Jonah prized.
This preacher did not want the wicked saved:
these foes should have to suffer as he’d said.
To see his prophecy come true he craved:
the city overthrown, its people dead.
Beneath his wilting bush, the sun’s light burned
like God’s transforming love for those returned.
Barbara Messner 18/01/2024
Sower’s Blues
Wednesday 24 January mid-week Holy Communion Mark 4:1-20
Here now the sower has a huge machine
that trundles to and fro into the night.
Sometimes the weary farmer finds, unseen,
the seed ran out, no way to put it right
but sow the field again. I think I see
a sprouting metaphor, but weed or wheat
is hard to tell until I let it be.
Here ministers look back and feel defeat.
They’ve worked exhausted, let their stocks run out.
Is something planted or the field still bare?
What yield might come from all they’ve gone without?
No midnight stint will plant a harvest there.
It’s vain to aim to reap a hundredfold
with words depleted, warmth of call grown cold.
Barbara Messner 18/01/24
You Search Me Out
You search me out (Lyrics, suggested tune Irish, God moves in a mysterious way, but can be sung to Crimond or Amazing grace)
Epiphany 2; Psalm 139:1-5,12-18; John 1: 43-51
1.You search me out and know my soul,
know when I sit or stand,
and if I fall, no longer whole,
your love will understand.
2.You watch my path and where I rest,
walk with me on my ways.
You give my life its fire and zest,
show meaning in my days.
3.So when my heart says, "Come and see!"
there Christ and I will meet.
I trust he'll see the whole of me,
with doubts, but no deceit.
4.Then if a word is on my tongue
to mock or to complain,
transform it so your praise is sung,
and love is my refrain.
Barbara Messner 10/01/2024
The Journey of the Wise
The Journey of the Wise
Epiphany; Matthew 2:1-12
There was a time when kings and queens were wise
and wisdom writings seen as Sacred Word;
then Wisdom Woman, God in female guise,
spoke at the crossroads and was widely heard.
Young Solomon had prayed for wisdom's sight;
a wisdom school was fostered at his court,
and foreign leaders came to share the light -
the Queen of Sheba found more than she sought.
But in the time of Jesus, might was right,
and power was all that Rome and Herod saw.
The wisdom schools retreated out of sight,
and pious people idolized the law.
Astrology and divination seemed
akin to sorcery, estranged from God,
and magi, led by stars and portents, deemed
as suspect, foreign, more than merely odd.
They turned from star to palace on their way,
so kings they may have been; and they were heard
by Herod, who compared what they would say
to what chief priests and scribes found in the Word.
They carried gifts of Wisdom from afar,
while Herod plotted murderous attack;
they saw and worshiped underneath the star,
and led by dreams, made hidden journeys back.
Now in our time, it seems that Wisdom's lost:
the cunning and self-serving rise to power;
intuitive discernment has been tossed
upon the scrap heaps where the wise grow sour.
Here smartness of technology is king,
and rubbish rises round our deafened ears,
and though at midnight angels swoop and sing,
we have not heard nor seen them now for years.
The Spirit fire still speaks to those grown bold,
who walk the ways of Wisdom with a star,
and humbly kneel despite the straw and cold.
They know that God is with us where we are,
and though they yet must face a weary day,
at risk from the duplicity of power,
somehow their stories show a star-lit way,
and gifts of Wisdom needed in this hour.
Barbara Messner 01/01/2021
Song for Simeon and Anna
Song for Simeon and Anna
(to tune Ebenezer by Thomas John Williams,
Together in Song 232 or 373)
Christmas 1; Luke 2:22-40
1. Spirit, come to some like Simeon,
Anna, old but strong in prayer.
We too need this Christ child’s presence!
Let us hold good news to share!
See, a baby shows God’s likeness,
dreams of prophets brought to life:
both a light to every nation,
and a victim of our strife.
2. He was destined for the falling
and the rising of the powers;
sign opposed so thoughts of many
were revealed in those dark hours.
Mary heard that love brings grieving:
sword would pierce her own soul too.
We face wounds in loving Jesus,
finding we are old and few.
3. So find comfort in this story:
two old people, wise, devout,
heard the call to meet this baby,
then in joy they were sent out.
One found peace to face his passing,
one found strength to praise and speak:
she was free now, age and gender
had no power to make her weak.
4. So for Anna and for Simeon
we give thanks now. They inspire
hope that we find gifts in ageing:
wisdom, courage, Spirit fire,
words of insight, hope and meaning,
peace to face our parting breath.
Love will hold us through the darkness;
God with us in life and death.
Barbara Messner26/12/2023
Barb, poet priest 