World Cup Churches: 16. Tunisia

Continuing a series of blogs heading round the 32 qualifying countries in the 2022 World Cup - I will pick out one church in each one.  I am not going to choose only churches that are to my liking.  This is an exploration not a recommendation! To see all in the series select the label 'World Cup Churches' below.

Tunisia has a very small Christian population.  But currently more freedom to worship than many Islamic countries.  It has, among many French Catholic churches, an Anglican Church.  Listening to this YouTube sermon from there I felt it was so wonderful that it deserved to replace any random blogging by me . . .

https://youtu.be/BuakOcxy-Qc

World Cup Churches: 15. Denmark

Continuing a series of blogs heading round the 32 qualifying countries in the 2022 World Cup - I will pick out one church in each one.  I am not going to choose only churches that are to my liking.  This is an exploration not a recommendation! To see all in the series select the label 'World Cup Churches' below.

Roskilde Cathedral is one of the great historic Protestant Church buildings, but I've chosen it for my World Cup blog partly because I've been there and mostly because it is peculiar in losing people who are already dead.  In a Northern Europe where Protestant churches lose the living at an alarming rate, it is a mildly concerning thought that they can go missing after being dead too.

More directly still, this blog dates from the period of the death of Queen Elizabeth II of England (and other places).  Roskilde Cathedral has been thought to be the burial place of a previous monarch of England - Sweyn Forkbeard.

Sweyn reigned for a short time in England - less than two months in fact - though he had been King of Denmark for nearly 30 years.  His short reign was not helped by London which, true to form, refused to accept him and delayed his accession when provincials like Winchester, Bath and Oxford readily, though fearfully, bowed the knee.

On his untimely death his remains were returned to Scandinavia (as we now call it) and thought to be to Roskilde.  Now, however, historians think it was somewhere else - in today's Sweden.  

Then there's his father Harold Bluetooth.  He was long thought to be in Roskilde until an attempt to actually find his bones was made - and none could be found.

During the long procession of people filing past the Lying-in-State of the late Queen Elizabeth in Westminster Hall there were few moments of mishap.  But one poor chap lunged at her (closed) coffin, apparently because he wanted to make sure she was there and dead.  Predictably he was bundled off to a Mental Health facility.  Predictably perhaps, but maybe he knew the stories of the royals of (or not of) Roskilde and had historical grounds for his doubts!

World Cup Churches: 14. Australia

Continuing a series of blogs heading round the 32 qualifying countries in the 2022 World Cup - I will pick out one church in each one.  I am not going to choose only churches that are to my liking.  This is an exploration not a recommendation! To see all in the series select the label 'World Cup Churches' below.

To many of us Australia is - in churchspeak terms - synonymous with Hillsongs, the megachurch operation who we all support by singing their copyrighted songs.  My choice is, however, a much older church from Melbourne.

Australia regularly qualifies for the World Cup and four years ago in writing about Australia in this context I drew attention to my interest in Frank Boreham (click here).  Had I ever visited Australia I would certainly have sought out his old church in Armadale, Melbourne.

Researching Armadale Baptist Church for this blog has been a little frustrating (but travelling to Australia to research it is a little expensive and time consuming . . .)  

One google reviewer - 'Just beautiful - the stain glass and the pipe organ' - sounded alarmingly like visitors to our own edifice here in London. Like many other churches in the 'Western World', Armadale Baptist  has seen better days.  Intentionally or not it gives an impression of being a Community Centre first and foremost, which would be an awkward way to live out Frank Boreham's legacy.

Outside our church here in London we have a Weapons Bin to encourage the safe removal of knives and other weaponry from the community.

Armadale Baptist has 

. . . a series of compost bins.

A quick glance around the leafy area begs the question why people cannot have their own compost bin - but this remains a mystery. As does how to open it  . . .

Psalm 23: A Sermon upon the Death of Queen Elizabeth II

1. The Lord is my shepherd 

I lack nothing  . . . and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

The psalm has two main characters.  But they are not EQUAL characters.  The well-being of one – the Psalmist – depends on the other – the LORD.

This is a Psalm the Queen – and her mother before her – loved.  It figured in the Thanksgiving Service in St Paul’s immediately after her death, in St. Giles Cathedral Edinburgh and in her funeral at Westminster Abbey. 

The familiarity of this Psalm masks a great surprise in it.  Compare for a moment the (nearly as well known) Psalm 100 –

Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. Worship the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.

Know that the Lord is God.  It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

That makes perfect sense.  We are familiar with the Shepherd and the flock of sheep (gathered in the fold or dispersed across the hills).  

But Psalm 23 is not about a flock of sheep. The Psalmist writes from the perspective of just one sheep. 'My Shepherd'; 'leads me'; 'restores my soul' etc.  An individual can know the shepherd’s love and care. 

Although she was the Supreme Governor of the Church of England, the Queen often referenced her personal faith: And as surely as it was true for King David of old and Queen Elizabeth II it can be true for me and for you.  Not a general God-Shepherd and an uncertainty about whether we are in or out of the flock.  A personal grasp that The Lord is my Shepherd.

2. I shall not want 

This cannot mean I will have no problems because most of the rest of the Psalm is exactly about those problems.  There are four that are plain to see:

a. Need for Refreshment

²  He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, ³ he refreshes my soul.

The Queen served us in a phenomenal way for a historic duration.  But she died at a place very dear to her and where she could relax from the hectic Constitutional life of London. Even in London she liked to listen daily to her bagpiper- a reminder of Balmoral!  Part of the secret of her longevity of service is that she did not try to do it 24/7.

What is true for our bodies and minds is true for our souls.  Many people, seeking inner refreshment, turn to a multitude of places and methods.  Yet if we let Our Shepherd lead us this will be seal peace into our souls.

b. Choosing Right over Wrong.

He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake.

Not only will life’s journey have the capacity to weary us, it also has many ways to go wrong.  It also has paths that are RIGHT. 

No Shepherd choreographs sheep!  They can have choice – but they must he headed away from what is dangerous and bad for them.  Whoever we are, we need to be led by Someone greater than ourselves. In the words of a great Scottish hymnwriter:

Thy way, not mine, O Lord, 

however dark it be;

lead me by thine own hand,

choose Thou the path for me.

I dare not choose my lot;
I would not if I might:

choose thou for me, my God,
so shall I walk aright.
 
The kingdom that I seek
is thine, so let the way
that leads to it be thine,
else I must surely stray.
 
Not mine, not mine, the choice
in things or great or small;
be thou my guide, my strength,
my wisdom, and my all.

c. Dark Times

⁴ Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

Her late Majesty said, in the year of a major fire at Windsor and of the break up of three of her children's marriages --  “1992 is not a year on which I shall look back with undiluted pleasure. In the words of one of my more sympathetic correspondents, it has turned out to be an ‘Annus Horribilis.’ I suspect that I am not alone in thinking it so.”

More recently she suffered the great loss of her husband on whom she greatly relied.

All of us know such seasons of life’s journey.  The Shepherd is the same, but the environments we travel through are wildly different.

d. Enemies

⁵ You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.

In some of the Psalms the enemies loom very large.  But in this psalm, with this trust, they are simply a background.  Like the Pharisees in the Gospels; the soldiers guarding the tomb and – at Christ’s return one day the Kings of the Earth, they serve only to enhance the central figure – or in the case of Psalm 23 the meal.

The Shepherd reduces enemies to background.

3. I shall dwell in the house of the Lord

⁶ Surely your goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.

One of the last people that the Queen met at Balmoral, on her last Sunday, was the current Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.  In his capacity, he had tea with the Queen and they talked about many things.  

In the middle of this conversation, he said, the Queen suddenly talked about the Christian hope and the meaning of our Resurrection. They discussed a while, then moved to another subject.  In the light of the last week he reflected on the fact that she began her last week anticipating life beyond death.

In Psalm 23 the Psalmist does the same.  Faith is not an endless journey.  It is a journey home. 

The Queen took many journeys in her lifetime.  She also had many homes, official and private, that she lived in throughout the UK.  But she could only, this week, have one home that actually matters.

And that’s our story too.  We all have different ‘home’ stories. Maybe we even have more than one home, we own a home, we don’t own a home, we lodge, we live in a shed (yes, someone connected to our church has done that!).

But actually in the end the issue is about whether we have this promise - I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever - I'm heading home.

Today hundreds of planes will land at London's Heathrow Airport.  Coming from everywhere, hot or cold climates, rich or poor countries, long or short distances, small or large planes - all that then matters is that they land.

Our journeys are all different; but as for Her Majesty the Queen, so for us each and all, we need a Shepherd in life and a Home in death.   

We need the Lord.

World Cup Churches: 13. France

Continuing a series of blogs heading round the 32 qualifying countries in the 2022 World Cup - I will pick out one church in each one.  I am not going to choose only churches that are to my liking.  This is an exploration not a recommendation! To see all in the series select the label 'World Cup Churches' below.

'La Porte Ouverte Chrétienne de Mulhouse' is a reminder that France is not quite as Roman Catholic - or, following the Revolution - so secularised as might be assumed.  Unlikely though it may seem, the Open Door Church qualifies - at least by European standards - as a Megachurch, the more so because Mulhouse is not a very big city.

Why choose this church for my France blog?

Partly because it revises some views of France; partly because it briefly became one of the best known churches in Europe.

For anyone familiar with the spiritual geography of France it will come as no surprise that Mulhouse is the site of this type of church.  Mulhouse is deeply connected with the Protestant Reformation and as part of Alsace - and adjacent to Germany (today) and Switzerland - it belongs in a different relationship with Protestantism than most of France (Click here to read about it).

For anyone familiar with Covid-19 (that's all of us isn't it?) this church is also known as a super-spreader.  Until the pandemic, being a super-spreader was somewhat the intention of every church, and certainly every evangelical/Pentecostal megachurch.  Regrettably an enormous church conference week yielded an enormous spread of Covid 19 in its earliest known arrival in France and the church suffered national notoriety for a while.

It did illustrate the strange reality that even apparently innovative churches find it very hard to change direction quickly - a criticism more easily aimed at traditional churches.  By the time of the event the wisdom of cramming singing, coughing people into an airless room for hours was established as unwise.  But canceling a Conference or (as we all later experienced) stopping the singing is an innovation beyond innovators.

Covid taught as all a lot about ourselves.