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| Rev. Mike Rayson, Westminster Abbey April 2012 |
Well, it was an amazing experience - being asked to participate in the Good Friday service (April 6, 2012) at Westminster Abbey - part of the annual 'Crucifixion of Victoria Street' event which began at Westminster Methodist Central Hall, moved to Westminster Cathedral (Roman Catholic) and then back down Victoria Street into Westminster Abbey.
The march certainly wasn't without drama. The paparazzi were somewhat nuts... standing on trash cans, up light poles, lying down in the middle of the road... and then there was the heckler who began to preach on the sidewalk about how we were all heading for H E double hockey sticks. As the march was silent, it was quite hilarious (and British) to hear several hundred people very insistently turn to him and utter a ... SSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. He was escorted away by a London Policeman!!
Processing through the streets of Westminster with the deputy Lord Mayor, the assembled clergy from not just the three sponsoring churches but from other congregations as well, people from the homeless ministry 'The Passage', and hundreds and hundreds of people behind was something else. If nothing else, processing with the Catholic Archbishop of England and Wales (Vincent Nichols) - resplendant in his purple cassock - was an experience in and of itself. And speaking of the Archbishop, he delivered an excellent reflection on peace at the Cathedral. Also present in the clergy part of the procession were many of my UK Methodist colleagues (Martin, Tony, Jo), the clergy of the Abbey (Michael, Canon Rob plus others), and a wide variety and assortment of others. My friend Phil was deputised as honorary clergy for the day so he could walk with us and carry my iPad - and anyways, Phil is about to go off and train as an Anglican Priest, so close enough!
Somewhere near 2000 people gathered in the Abbey for the final service. Standing nearby to Isaac Newton (how nuts is that!!!), I had the opportunity to share about Sam, and used my story to help people enter into the story and experience of Mary, watching Jesus die.
Right after the event, I met many wonderful people from all over the world - lots of people (including a bunch of - I think - Japanese tourists) wanted photos with me on the steps (my 15 minutes of fame!!! hahahaha). Several Americans made themselves known, including a United Church of Christ minister from Ohio. But the most surprising chat I had was with a young American man who bounded up to me and proclaimed... "Hey there - I'm from Fosterburg. I read about you online in the Alton Telegraph and had to come along and see it for myself". Now, for those of you not conversant with my part of the world, Fosterburg is pretty much next door to Brighton in Illinois!!
I said it before the event, and I can proclaim it even louder now. Whilst it was a great honor to be put forward for this (thanks to Martin and Tony (and Frances)), in reality it's not the pinnacle of my ministerial career to this point, nor will it be all down hill from here. Certainly, it will be a landmark for me as I look back over my life, but I feel the same sense of urgency to preach Christ crucified in places like Westminster Abbey, St Paul's Brighton, and even at Waynesville and McLean UMC's (2 small churches I preached in a few weeks back). As long as people gather in Christ's name (and sometimes even when they haven't), and as long as I am afforded the opportunity to speak of the risen Christ, I shall!
With all of that... here's the sermon.
Together in the ever continuing dance of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit... Mike
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Good Friday Homily, Rev Mike Rayson (Westminster Abbey)
Grace and peace through Jesus Christ from the Illinois Great Rivers Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church; our Bishop Gregory Palmer, and from the good people of St Paul's congregation in Brighton Illinois, where I am currently appointed to serve together with my wife, the Reverend Amy Rayson, and our children Laura and Oliver.
Since Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, it has become for us the bearer of good news and of bad. Serving a vibrant and growing congregation means that the phone in my home rings several times each day. A church member who wants a friendly chat… A troubled soul seeking guidance… A local needing assistance with food… and sometimes news of illness, hospital admission, and even death.
It was the ringing of a phone one Monday morning in May 2007 that brought such news to my family. I’m sorry… your son, 11 year old Samuel, has been tragically killed. It was the beginning of a lifelong journey of pain for me, a truly Psalm 23 experience of moving through the valley of the shadow of death.
They say a clergyperson shouldn’t officiate at the funeral of a family member… but for me, as Sam’s dad, I knew I must. He was my son, and as I had served him in his life, so to I would serve him in his death.
The most harrowing and traumatic moment of my whole life happened that day. Not when I gave the eulogy… led the gathered faithful in prayer… or read from Matthew’s gospel of the one sheep who wandered away… but when I, as pastor and as daddy placed my hands upon the body of my child and recited the words…
Almighty God, into your hands we commend your son, my son, Samuel Thomas William Rayson. Born March 28th 1996 in Port Lincoln South Australia, died May 14th 2007 in Geneseo, Illinois. This body we commit to the flames. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust
Nothing ever prepares a parent to bear the death of their child. We use the word widow for one who loses a partner… orphan for those who have lost their parents… yet our English language does not provide a word for a parent who must live and grieve for their child.
Nothing could have prepared Mary, the Mother of Jesus, for this. No broad shouldered support she received from the disciple Jesus loved at the foot of the cross could have made the events of that terrible day in Jerusalem any easier to bear, as she watched her son put to death at the hands of a blind regime who wanted to hold fast to their religious power and authority.
In the heat of the afternoon on a hill of shame, a mother watched. Whilst the world cursed and crucified the babe she had nursed at her breast, a mother grieved. As the boy who had played at the feet of his mom was tortured and terrorized, scorned and shamed, despised and denied - the light that shone in a mothers proud eyes was extinguished, leaving in its place a wounded and suffering woman.
In the death of Christ, God Almighty embraced everything Mary experienced - the worst that we could ever experience; throwing his arms around our lost-ness, our shame, our sin, our alienation, and our pain… all the while whispering a simple word…
No… No… NO…
For this son of man, sent by God, truly God, came to seek and to save the lost, to embrace the darkness with the light of life… to redeem the tears of a woman whose heart had shattered at the vision of her son’s death. ‘No’ cried God – this was not how it was meant to be for her, or for us.
In the words of theologian Dr. C Baxter Kruger, “there on the cross, he penetrated the last stronghold of darkness. There he walked into the utter depths of our alienation. There the intolerable No!, shouted by God the Father at the Fall of Adam, found its true fulfillment in Jesus' Yes! "Father, into Your hands I commend my spirit," as he took his final step into Adam's disaster. Jesus died–and the Fall of Adam died with him”.
As a Dad, grieving for a little boy, my tears have truly fallen… leaning on the arms of her son’s beloved disciple, the tears of Mary, the mother of God must have fallen… and I know your tears too have fallen in the presence of death as you have encountered it.
For it is the thief says Jesus, who comes only to steal and kill and destroy; yet it is in the cross, underscored by what C.S Lewis’ referred to as ‘the deeper magic’, that Jesus has gathered back the tears the thief has stolen from us, and proclaimed that we are made for something beyond than the cold hands of death. Something more than mere extinction or annihilation. Something above the hands of time. We are made for life and life more abundantly.
And so it is we wait… silently, painfully, expectantly… for that Sunday bloom of sheer grace and liberating life to rain again upon our broken and weary souls. For as sure as the sun will rise on the dawn of tomorrow and as certain as the daffodils bloom with the first breath of spring, so death will NOT have the last word.
Not for Mary, not for Sam, not for me, and most assuredly not for anyone who trusts in the one who died for us all.