On Wesley Day 2017 the Methodist Society at Newbiggin Chapel held their final act of worship in the building reputed to be the oldest Methodist chapel in continuous use.
This is the sermon I preached on that occasion:
Prayer:
At this time Lord,
In this place
May your spirit move among us
That we will be warmed by your love
And open our hearts and minds to you.
And now,
May the words of my mouth
And the meditations of our hearts
Be acceptable in your sight
Loving Lord, our strength and our redeemer.
Amen.
“The Israelites went up out of the land of Egypt
prepared for battle. And Moses took with him the bones of Joseph…”
It was Joseph of the coat of many colours who had
brought his whole family into Egypt when he became a senior member of the
government there. You may remember the story – how he was sold into slavery by
his jealous brothers but rose from being a prisoner to being the man in charge
of the grain stores in a time of famine.
Joseph was
a foreigner in the land, his family joined him there as refugees from famine,
but after his death and a change of government the situation of the Hebrew
people changed and they were made slaves. Eventually they were led out of
slavery to freedom by Moses. On the night of the exodus, the night they left
Egypt, they took with them the embalmed body of Joseph.
Why did they take Joseph’s bones?
You may, by now be asking, Why is she talking
about this ‘out of the way’ text from the Old Testament?
Why focus on this text on this occasion, in this
place?
I hope that as we answer the first questions the
answer to the second will become very clear.
Evidently, the body of Joseph was important to
Moses and the people.
In all the rush of that escape from Egypt; the
haste of cooking unleavened bread, the desire for speed as they were bound to
be chased by the Egyptian army, the uncertainty of their future and the
direction they were to take - in the midst of all this, they obtained and
carried with them Joseph’s bones. Those bones must have been special because
they certainly were an encumbrance.
And they were special.
They were special because they reminded the
people of their inheritance. They reminded them who they were and where they
had come from.
Now, I expect there were other things that Moses
and the Hebrew people would have liked to take with them when they left Egypt.
One strand of the account in Exodus tells us that they were driven out of Egypt
and could not take any provisions with them – but they took Joseph’s bones.
When the monks fled from Holy Island in fear of
the Vikings, they left in a hurry but they took with them the body of St
Cuthbert and the Lindisfarne Gospels. They took them and they carried them all
over the north of England before finally settling, 150 years later, in Durham.
They took them because they were important symbols of the identity of that
group of monks: the body of the abbot who had inspired them and brought peace
and healing to their community and the scriptures on which they based their
whole lives.
For many people this church building has been a
place of peace, a place of beauty, a place of prayer. It has been the place
where people have been baptized, married and where funeral services have been
held. It has important links to the history of Methodism in Teesdale and has
received visitors from all over the UK and all over the world.
A society of Methodist people has met here and
worshipped here for over 250 years. But now, the time has come to move on and
questions we might ask are: what should we take with us? What is our equivalent
of Joseph’s bones?
Some of you may already have noticed that a
direct answer to our question about Joseph’s bones is given in the passage we
heard read from Exodus.
Moses took the bones because, on his death bed,
Joseph had required a solemn oath from his descendants that when they left
Egypt, they would take his embalmed body with them. Moses is being true to a
solemn oath that had been made by his ancestors.
We might ask why was it so important to Joseph
that his bones were taken with the people when they came to leave Egypt. And
why, in any case, did he expect that they would move on from the country where
he had become an honoured citizen and his people were welcome members of the
community?
Listen to the account of Joseph’s death as it is
written in the very last verses of Genesis:
24 Then
Joseph said to his brothers, ‘I am about to die; but God will surely come to
you, and bring you up out of this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to
Isaac, and to Jacob.’ 25So Joseph made the Israelites swear, saying,
‘When God comes to you, you shall carry up my bones from here.’ 26And
Joseph died, being one hundred and ten years old; he was embalmed and placed in
a coffin in Egypt.
Joseph is looking back and looking forward. As he
looks back he remembers the promise God made to Abraham, a promise of land.
History had shown that God was true to his promises, that had been so in the
life of Joseph and of his ancestors and now Joseph is certain that God’s
promise of land will be fulfilled. For Joseph, Egypt was a temporary dwelling
place, it was a place where he had, ultimately, known good fortune, but it was
not the final destination. His last words are words of hope for the future.
The Old Testament scholar, Walter Brueggemann,
calls it hope for an exile-ending-intrusion of God in history. Joseph is sure
that there will be a new beginning for the people, that God will be true to the
promises made and they will go on to their proper destination. When Moses takes
the bones of Joseph with him, it is an act of faith and trust, trust that God’s
promises will not fail and that God will be with them.
So Joseph’s bones are a symbol of God’s
faithfulness in the past, God’s presence now and of hope for the future. Much
the same could be said of the body of Cuthbert and the Lindisfarne gospels,
which together spoke of God’s faithfulness in the past, enduring presence and
hope for the future.
This evening we look back with great thankfulness
to God’s faithfulness in the past. When Mr Wesley came to Teesdale he found
that his travelling preachers were already at work here. Jacob Rowell, Matthew
Lowes and Christopher Hopper were among those who signed the indenture for the
purchase of the land on which this chapel was built. Here, there was a thriving
lead mining community and people open to hearing the gospel and responding to
it. The decision to build this meeting
house was an act of faith and a commitment to serve the needs of that time in
this place. It was a good decision, the society thrived and
Mr Wesley preached here or nearby on a number of occasions.
From here the gospel was preached and people were
brought to Christ.
John Wesley wrote:
“You
have nothing to do but to save souls. Therefore spend and be spent in this
work. And go not only to those that need you, but to those that need you most.
It is not your business to preach so many times, and to take care of this or
that society; but to save as many souls as you can; to bring as many sinners as
you possibly can to repentance.”
By building a
chapel here those ancestors of ours were going to those who needed them most
and were being spent in the work of saving souls.
In more recent
times we can give thanks for the faithful friends who have continued to strive
for a vision of this place as a centre of worship, a place of pilgrimage, and a
community and visitor resource. You have done well, you have been faithful and
this place has served its purpose on the way to the final destination.
When
the Hebrew people left Egypt they were promised that God would go before them
as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. God would guide them
to their final destination.
For the
Celtic Christian monks travelling around the north of England, the presence of
the Lindisfarne Gospels was a sure reminder that God was present with them.
They did not know where they were going but they knew that God was always with
them.
Earlier
this evening we heard the words of the great commission from the end of
Matthew’s gospel. In Jesus, we see the
ultimate exile-ending- intrusion of God in history. Those who had been
separated from God were brought close again and Jesus promised, “I will be with
you always.”
We can
be sure that the risen Christ is always with us and his presence is not linked
to any particular place or time, God cannot be confined by walls of stone or
brick. God continually breaks out with resurrection power. Nothing can separate
us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
As we
sing our final hymn this evening, the doors of the chapel will be thrown open
and, after the blessing we will leave without delay certain that God goes with
us, and in that is our confidence and strength.
This is
not the end of the story, this is a new beginning. This is another
exile-ending-intrusion of God. This is full of promise and hope, this is
exciting!
Joseph and the Hebrew
people could not remain in Egypt, it had become a place of slavery and they
were called elsewhere.
The community in which
this chapel is set has changed and this is no longer a place of growth and hope
and promise. The miners are long gone, there are few people here and they do
not look to this place and what it offers for sustenance. It is still a
beautiful setting but now people want to travel here by car and not on foot and
the roads are simply not adequate for that.
Jesus said, “Go
therefore making disciples of all, baptizing them and teaching them” That is
our calling and this is no longer the right place to be a focus of that
calling. To remain here now would be to make this place the centre of all that
we do and are. We are followers of Jesus and Christ must be the centre. To
remain here now would be unfaithful to those who have gone before us and
engaged in mission among the miners and others in this part of Teesdale.
Mr Wesley wrote these
words in his notes on the Bible and in relation to the passage we have read
this evening from the book of Exodus:
They need not fear missing their way who were thus led, nor
being lost who were thus directed; they need not fear being benighted, who were
thus illuminated, nor being robbed, who were thus protected. And they who make
the glory of God their end, and the word of God their rule, the spirit of God
the guide of their affections, and the providence of God the guide of their
affairs, may be confident that the Lord goes before them, as truly as he went
before Israel in the wilderness
(Wesley J Notes 13:21)
It is time to move on
from this place and we take Joseph’s bones with us. We take with us the
commission of Jesus that was the reason for establishing a chapel here in 1759.
We take with us the certainty that God is with us wherever we go, and we take
with us the hope of making disciples of all and the hope of new life in Christ.
We go without fear of
missing our way, we make the glory of God our end and we are confident that God
goes before us.
The best of all is God
is with us!
