Skip to main content

Give!

It's been a while. I've been busy. But I'm back... at least for the next wee while as a number of people have asked me to post a couple of things', beginning with some who asked for me to post the conclusion of my sermon today... so here it is in a slightly edited form, together with the Gospel passage that prompted it...

Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. 42 But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few pence.
43 Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, ‘Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. 44 They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything – all she had to live on.’
Mark 12: 41-44 (NIVUK)

On Friday I was meeting Louise Ferguson, the manager of the Larder foodbank in East Belfast, in preparation for the 4 Corners Walk on Saturday 11th February which we hope will finish up there… I will blog about it closer to the time… 
For those who don’t know The Larder is based in the old St. Christopher’s Parish Church on Mersey Street, in the shadow of the Oval Football Ground… There is no traditional congregation there any more… instead it houses the Larder Food Bank and a range of other faith-based social outreaches seeking to make a practical difference  in that particular corner of Belfast… As we were talking we were interrupted a number of times for various reasons… And during one interruption I was reading a series of quotes scribbled on the wall…
One of them particularly struck home as I had been preparing for today’s Homelessness Sunday service, which had the above Gospel reading as one of its recommended readings, but was also aware that Saturday was Holocaust Memorial Day…
They were words attributed to Anne Frank who died in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in 1945:
 “No-one has ever become poor by giving.”
Anne Frank (attr.)
This seemed the perfect quote to tie the themes together… But when I got home and checked them out I discovered that like far too many popular quotations, there is no citation for Anne Frank ever having said this… The closest I got to any sort of an attribution was the suggestion that they occurred in a play about her life.
However, I also discovered that she did write an essay called “Give!” on 26th March 1944 whilst in hiding, in which she said:
How wonderful it is that no one has to wait, but can start right now to gradually change the world! How wonderful it is that everyone, great and small, can immediately help bring about justice by giving of themselves!
You can always — always — give something, even if it's a simple act of kindness!
Anne Frank "Give!" (26 March 1944)
And with those words I finished my sermon today… Anything else seemed superfluous.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Living under the Empire... (2) Where is Babylon?

We were driving back from school last week, talking about books that we had been reading and my younger son, Ciaran, asked me "Where is Babylon?" I have to confess that my history is better than my geography, and I said that it no longer exists as an inhabited city, but its ruins were to the north west of the current capital of Iraq, Baghdad. When I checked however, I discovered that it is actually about 50 miles south of Baghdad and the modern town is the administrative centre of the province of Babil... But just as the modern city is but a shadow of the historic capital of 2 ancient empires, first under Hammurabi in the 18th century BCE and then the "Neo-Babylonian" empire (under Nebuchadnezzar etc) in the 6th century BCE, so the earthly Babylonian empire/s was/were fleeting in comparison to the enduring metaphorical idea of Babylon. The original Empire under Hammurabi was probably the ultimate origin of some of the early Biblical stories, including the ...
2 comments
Read more

A Woman of no Distinction

Don't often post other people's stuff here... But I found this so powerful that I thought I should. It's a performance poem based on John 4: 4-30, and I have attached the original YouTube video below. A word for women, and men, everywhere... "to be known is to be loved, and to be loved is to be known." I am a woman of no distinction of little importance. I am a women of no reputation save that which is bad. You whisper as I pass by and cast judgmental glances, Though you don’t really take the time to look at me, Or even get to know me. For to be known is to be loved, And to be loved is to be known. Otherwise what’s the point in doing either one of them in the first place? I WANT TO BE KNOWN. I want someone to look at my face And not just see two eyes, a nose, a mouth and two ears; But to see all that I am, and could be all my hopes, loves and fears. But that’s too much to hope for, to wish for, or pray for So I don’t, not anymore. Now I keep to myself And by that ...
2 comments
Read more

Psalm for Harvest Sunday

A short responsive psalm for us as a call to worship on Harvest Thanksgiving Sunday, and given that it was pouring with rain as I headed into church this morning the first line is an important remembrance that the rain we moan about is an important component of the fruitfulness of the land we live in: You tend the land and water it And the earth produces its abundance. You crown each year with your bounty, and our storehouses overflow with your goodness. The mountain meadows are covered with flocks and the valleys are filled with corn; Your people celebrate your boundless grace They shout for joy and sing. from Psalm 65
3 comments
Read more