Good living and earthly outcomes

Sermon preached at 6.30pm Choral Evensong at St Alphege Church.
Sunday 12th July 2009, Trinity 5

Readings: Deuteronomy 30: 9-14 Luke 10: 25-37

In 1993 my wife, Elaine, and I went, with our son Thomas who was then a baby, to visit my brother who was doing Voluntary Service Overseas in Zimbabwe. He was teaching “A” level maths and physics at a school in the village of Sanyati near the town of Kadoma, about 150 miles west of Harare. The school had been founded by Baptist missionaries and was strong on Christian values. By our standards the school was very old fashioned and traditional. Facilities were simple. Resources were limited. Class sizes were large. Discipline could be harsh. The headmaster, Mr Gundu was a big character who was good at promoting the school to anyone who would listen.
Despite the lack of resources, it was clear that the school was extremely successful and extremely important to Sanyati and to the area around it. Through the school children became both literate and numerate. Their ability to take care of themselves and to work constructively with others was immeasurably increased. Because of the school, Sanyati was developing an ability to prosper in a way which was quite unimaginable a generation earlier. The value of this was widely recognised. Parents would go to extreme lengths to afford the school fees. Children would often walk several miles to get to school and back each day.
The thing that struck me about Sanyati was that good behaviour and Christian morality really did seem to help people to get on in life. Children from good families or people who behaved well got good reputations. They were trusted more readily and offered better opportunities by the school and by wider society. They had a better chance of securing a job. Life seemed like to work like a game of snakes and ladders. Virtues really did lead to ladders that helped people to get on in life. Vices really did lead to snake like disasters and setbacks. Raising a child with good Christian values really did seem to help the child and to help the whole of society.
This seemed to contrast very dramatically with my own experience of being brought up in England where, at first sight, Christian values appeared to bring with them very few advantages, and many disadvantages. From this it is almost possible to construct a world view whereby Christianity is a good thing in Africa, but a bad thing in England. Matthew Parris, the Times columnist appears to subscribe to this view. Certainly he has many criticisms of the church, but in the Times on 27th December he wrote this:
Now a confirmed atheist, I've become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa: sharply distinct from the work of secular NGOs, government projects and international aid efforts. These alone will not do. Education and training alone will not do. In Africa Christianity changes people's hearts. It brings a spiritual transformation. The rebirth is real. The change is good.
In our Old Testament reading today we heard a strong affirmation from God that being good would lead to good outcomes. It is a long passage and we only read a small part of it today, but God is talking to the Israelites after fourty years of wondering in the wilderness. They are about to cross over the River Jordan and take poscession of the promised land, the land flowing with milk and honey. God chooses this moment to set before them a very clear choice. He say to them, “If you obey me, and keep all your commandments then you shall greatly prosper. Everything will go well for you. On the other hand, if your hearts turn away from me and you worship other gods then you will perish, and you will not hold pocession of the land.” It all seems very simple and good and like Zimbabwe in 1993; do good and things will go well for you, behave badly and things will go wrong for you.
This contrast between the fortunes of the wicked and the good is a theme of the psalms. Psalm 37 is extemely confident that good will happen to those who do good, and evil to those who do evil. It starts, “Fret not because of evildoers; be not jealous of those who do wrong. For they shall soon wither away like grass and like the green herb fade away.” Later it assures us that the wicked will disappear, “But the lowly shall pocess the land and shall delight in abundance of peace” (v11). This confidence of psalm 37 is typical of the psalms which are often discuss good outcomes for people who walk with God, and talk of the wicked fading away.
But this is not the whole story. Psalm 44 has a different tone. It reflects on the great miltary triumphs of the Isreal of old, and does not hesitate to attribute the victories to God. It them bewails the rccent miltary defeats suffered by Israel, and it attributes these to God. Then in verse 18 there is a mounful reflection on the defeats, “All this has come upon us, though we have not forgotten you and have not played false to your covenant. Our hearts have not turned back nor our step gone out of your way. Yet you have crushed us in the haunt of jackels, and covered us with the shadow of death.”
It seems that, generally speaking, beaving well before God leads to good earthly outcomes. But is is not aways like this. There are times when good behaviour seems to carry no earthly advantages, and perhaps even disadvantages. We only have to look at the life of Jesus. His exemplary behaviour led him to his passion and death. And this observation could be very depressing; it could make us think there there is no point is seeking to do good because evil is just as well rewarded. But of course such thinking is false because it ignores the power of the resuurection. Jesus’ goodness was tested to the extreme and appeared to die, but ultimately Jesus could not simply die. He is the resurrection and the life. He had to rise again. In fact it was sin and death that were defeated.
Its my belief that the church in the North West Europe is currently living through one of these freightening but extordinarily valuable periods where good behaviours do not seem to lead to good outcomes. It seems that when the church behaves well it does not benefit and the Church suffers the temptation to behave badly to succure better worldly outcomes. Just as the Christ died on the cross, so we might perceive that the Church, the body of Christ is dying in our present western world. Certainly if you were to look at evensong attendance you might think this! But just as Christ could not die, without being raised to new life, so the body of Christ, the Church, cannot die without being raised. Like Christ dying on the cross we need to be faithful to God; we need to continue to love and to forgive. Like Christ we can ask God “Why have you forsaken us?” But like Christ we must continue to trust God and to commend our spirit into his hands. Trusting God is essential. We need to believe in the resurrection. In time, we will see that there will be new life. There will be restoration. Evil will be defeated and Love will triumph. Amen.