tthat sermon by jeffrey john

That sermon by Jeffrey John

There are days when I think that sections of the church are on a self

destruction mission without needing any help from Dawkins et al. A

recent example is the statement by two Bishops released at Spring

Harvest attacking a sermon preached on radio by Jeffrey John. The

Bihops of Lewes and Willsden offer this critique;

"Jeffrey John ... is saying that the cross is not about anger or wrath

or sin or atonement, but only about God's unconditional love. There

is, he says, nothing to understand in the cross which is anything to

do with sacrifice or Jesus dying for our sins - and we say No. You've

got it wrong."

I might take these two men in purple seriously in normal circumstances

but when they admit to Ekklesia that they have not read the sermon but

instead rely on a brief radio interview and an article in the Daily

Telegraph, I wonder what their agenda is.

But I feel that their attack on John is not just a case of yet another

manifestation of poisonous religious feuding. It is quite simply a

case of bearing false witness. I have taken the trouble to read the

sermon and would suggest that readers take this opportunity to do the

same.

The sermon deserves to be read in its entirety but regarding the slur

thatJohn suggested thatthe cross has nothing to do with Jesus dying

for our sins, the lie in this accusation is shown in the following

extract;

The cross, then, is not about Jesus reconciling an angry God to us;

it's almost the opposite. It's about a totally loving God, incarnate

in Christ, reconciling us to him. On the cross Jesus dies for our

sins; the price of our sin is paid; but it is not paid to God but by

God. As St paul says, God was in Christ reconciling the world to

himself. Because he is Love, God does what Love does: He unites

himself with the beloved. He enters his own creation and goes to the

bottom line for us. Not sending a substitute to vent his punishment

on, but going himself to the bitter end, sharing in the worst of

suffering and grief that life can throw at us, and finally sharing our

death, so that he can bring us through death to life in him.

Like Jeffrey John, I grew up in an environment in which penal

substitution and the wrath of God were regularly preached. Like him, I

find that such an emphasis often takes us away from appreciating that

love is the nature of God. This Easter I will be preaching on the love

of God which is seen at its fullest on the cross and which offers me

the forgiveness I need. But I will not preach of a vengeful father.

In his final pragraph, Jeffrey John sums up our hope quite

beautifully;

On the cross God absorbs into himself our falleness and its

consequences and offers us a new relationship. God shows he knows what

it's like to be the loser; God hurts and weeps and bleeds and dies.

It's a mystery we can hardly glimpse, let alone grasp; and if there is

an answer to the problem of suffering, perhaps it's one for the heart,

not the reason. Because the answer God's given is simply himself; to

show that, so far from inflicting suffering as a punishment, he bears

our griefs and shares our sorrow. From Good Friday on, God is no

longer "God up there", inscrutably allotting rewards and retributions.

On the Cross, even more than in the crib, he is Immanuel, God down

here, God with us.

This Easter I am grateful to Jeffrey John for this offering. As for

the two Bishops who have misrepresnted him, I suggest P45s are in

order.