Do Us a Favour!
Well, here we are on the last Sunday of 2024! What a privilege to be talking to you, today.
This past year has been a new experience for me as I settle into my training programme to become a Licensed Lay Minister in the Church of England – perhaps not the most auspicious of institutions to find myself a part ofright now – but, nevertheless, here with you is where I believe God wants me to be! Being part of God’s work here in Sheringham has come as a surprise, a challenge, and a learning curve this year. And we’re just getting started!
Both here in this community as well as with my colleagues and teachers in Norwich, there is a lot of encouragement and support, which makes the journey ahead less daunting - if not entirely trouble-free.
Whatever tasks we undertake, whatever cares and responsibilities we might have, whatever it is we aspire to,having good people around us to accompany and aid us, and having the right premises on which to work make all the difference.
Perspective matters.
Have you ever heard of the Pygmalion Effect? The Pygmalion effect refers to a psychological phenomenon where higher expectations lead to improved performance in others. First described by Rosenthal and Jacobson in 1968, it gets its name from the Greek myth of Pygmalion, where a sculptor’s great expectations for his statue result in it coming to life. Essentially, when teachers or leaders expect more of others, those individuals perform better. The opposite is also true: You’ll all remember Rex Harrison’s misadventures in My Fair Lady, I’m sure!
While these educational experiments helped develop teacher-training programmes, too often human nature would override even the best of intentions. Teachers given prior knowledge (or having pre-conceived opinions)of the intellectual ability – or lack of – of their students, would tailor their teaching methods (and expectations)accordingly. Not surprisingly, the students deemed more likely by their teachers to benefit from the lessons,performed measurably better than those assumed not to be up to it. Later reports concluded that “the evidence seemed to indicate that the teachers’ expectations constituted a contributory variable in the student outcomes, especially in the youngest students. The teachers had bestowed more attention on the ‘intellectual bloomers.’
No matter how subtlety the teachers had treated these students differently, Rosenthal concluded that even inconspicuous factors such as attitude and mood could impact students.
It is not just what we are taught then – and that matters, of course – but also with what expectations of us our education is provided, that makes all the difference to the outcomes in our lives.
In the Church, the Body of Christ, that actually makes all the difference to whether we are being built up into the fulness of the stature of Christ, and encouraged to stimulate one another likewise, or…not!
Too many congregations, I suspect, are kept underfed, under-watered and undernourished, so to speak, by the lowest-common-denominator (LCD) expectations of those who lead them – either through disillusionment, despair, or, perhaps, a dystopian vision of the local church and what it can be and do.
Our readings today have been about having favour: Samuel, “who grew taller and grew in favour with the Lord and with the people;” Jesus, who “grew in wisdom and in stature and in favour with God and with the people.”And, as with the prophets, so also with Jesus; as with Jesus, so also with us!
Yes! Us! Let me read the passage from Colossians again for us, and let me explain…
…
We might not read or hear the precise word “favour,” here, but we are - each one of us – described as “God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved…” Those each sound like favourable terms to me! Our destiny is the same as Samuel’s, the same as Jesus’! We are even pre-destined and predisposed (in God’s plan and purpose - if we would only co-operate!) to grow up pleasing to God and to our communities. We are salt! We are Light. Jesus said so!
It's why we are the “elect” of God; why we are chosen as servants and exemplars; as ambassadors of the reconciling King, Jesus, and the kingdom of the heavens.
This has, by any reckoning, been a pretty awful year for the world in general, and for certain parts such as Gaza, Ukraine, Yemen, Sudan and even Israel, in particular. Personally, I don’t know anyone who has got through without at least some bumps and bruises; many of us, far worse.
Nevertheless, we have this sure and certain hope that we all are beloved of God – for God so loved the world that he gave up his only begotten son for us. Whether you believe it or not changes not one wit the fact: Christ died for you – and rose again from the dead, also on your behalf! Our even greater source of hope is – Christ in us! Brothers and sisters; mothers and fathers, grandmothers and grandfathers – THIS is your sure hope and salvation – Christ, in you and as you. This is your destiny.
As we turn our backs – perhaps with relief – on 2024, let us hold fast to the Word who is Christ Jesus; and may we also let that Word dwell in us richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom and proclaim the New Year, 2025, the favourable Year of the Lord.
If you are able, would you please stand with me as I pray on our behalf, and for the coming year, a prayer from Thomas Merton:
My Lord God
I have no idea where I am going.
I cannot see the road ahead of me
and I do not know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe
that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope
that I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this
you will lead me by the right road,
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore I will trust you always.
Though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death,
I will not fear,
for you are ever with me,
and will never leave me
to face my perils alone.
Toby Perks, LLM in training