Thank God for the Helpers

It’s never easy deciding what to speak on on Thinking Day/Founder’s day. Should I do something around  the Scout and Guide Motto – Be Prepared.? Or the Thinking Day Theme which this year is ‘connect’? There’s the centenaries of the Cubs and the Senior Section of the Girl Guides to celebrate. We started a new sermon series on Hebrews a couple of weeks ago and today we’ve had Donna along to tell us about the work of Compassion.

So you’ll understand that it took me a wee while to settle on what I wanted us to think about this morning; but as I thought about it I realised that helping others was a common theme in all the different strands of this morning’s worship. And with that in mind it didn’t take me long to land on the Bible passage that we heard read earlier from Luke’s gospel.

You have to admire the persistence of those men who helped their paralysed friend get to see Jesus.

People had got word that there was a healer in town and crowds had gathered at the place where Jesus was teaching. The paralysed man’s friends tried to get him in the front door, but it was a bit like going to see your local GP – the place was so full of folk looking for paracetamol on prescription that the folk in real need struggled to get a look in.

So they decided they had to be a bit more ruthless about things. Or maybe that should be roofless.  Before long they’d clambered onto the top of the building and started taking off the tiles to make a space big enough to lower their friend down. And I’d love to know what he was thinking at this point. Maybe he was urging them on, thinking this might be his one and only chance to see Jesus and be healed.

Or maybe he didn’t want to be here at all; didn’t want any fuss. And now bits of tile and straw were falling into the room below, people were getting angry and shouting at them, somebody was already Googling Direct Line to see if the house insurance covered this kind of thing…..

…and before he knows it, in all the chaos, he’s being shakily lowered down into the room until folk lift their hands to grab the stretcher, more out of necessity than any great desire to help. And as they lower him to chest height, he finds himself surrounded by a sea of faces: some angry, others curious; several laughing at the audacity of his friends. Can you imagine how utterly helpless and vulnerable he feels?

But from behind him, unseen, comes a voice as clear as day; and a reassuring hand is placed on his shoulder. “Your sins are forgiven my friend” says the voice. And he knows in his gut that this man isn’t just speaking the truth; he’s making the truth. Right then and there, in that very moment.

And there’s more to come, of course. He gets healed in body as well as soul.  But we’ll pause there for a moment because there’s something in the text at this point that’s crucial but easily overlooked.

Whose faith is Jesus responding to here? The faith of the paralysed man? Well, perhaps. But the text is very clear that it’s more than that. Matthew, Mark and Luke all tell this story and they all say that it was their faith – the faith of the friends as well as the man – that Jesus responded to.

The helpers made all the difference in this case. Their concern, their determination, their persistence, their faith in Jesus is a big part of what makes this healing possible.

So the first thing we need to do this morning is thank God for those in life who are willing and able to help.

It doesn’t sound especially spiritual, does it? But when Paul writes to the church in Corinth to correct some of their spiritual excesses, he says that the willingness to help others is evidence of a mature faith. Some folk were arguing that speaking in tongues was the ultimate spiritual gift, and if you didn’t speak in tongues you weren’t a real Christian. To that Paul says – “In the church God has appointed first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, also those having gifts of healing, those able to help others, those with gifts of administration, and those speaking in different kinds of tongues.”

Helping others is halfway down Paul’s list; speaking in tongues comes right at the end. I think he’s making a point here. Don’t belittle those whose spiritual gift is the selflessness that allows them to help and serve others. Where would we be without people who are willing and able to help?

Thank God for the helpers.

The folk like Donna, who give their time and energy to raising awareness of the work of agencies like Compassion. The folk who work in their programmes, and sponsor children so they can move out of poverty.

The leaders in the uniformed organisations here today, who spend many unseen hours getting ready for meetings week by week and  more hours running them; always trying to strike a balance between having fun and doing things that are worthwhile and going to help raise a new generation of boys and girls who will be prepared. Prepared to help.

You could think of the folk in this church, and all other churches. Where Sunday’s just the tip of the iceberg and all the other stuff that goes on day in day out in terms of pastoral care, worship, service and administration, relies on the goodwill of folk who are volunteer helpers.

And the folk in our communities who work hard to make them better places for all of us to live by running coffee mornings and litter picks. Planting flowers and putting up Christmas lights. Small things, but things that make a difference.

We thank God for the helpers this morning. And we remember too that those who choose to help also pay a price; sometimes a very heavy one.

A couple of years ago I came across a lovely poem by Seamus Heaney which makes that very point. It’s based on this Bible Story and he wrote it after suffering a stroke in 2005. It’s called Miracle.

Not the one who takes up his bed and walks
But the ones who have known him all along
And carry him in —

Their shoulders numb, the ache and stoop deeplocked
In their backs, the stretcher handles
Slippery with sweat. And no let-up

Until he’s strapped on tight, made tiltable
And raised to the tiled roof, then lowered for healing.
Be mindful of them as they stand and wait

For the burn of the paid-out ropes to cool,
Their slight lightheadedness and incredulity
To pass, those ones who had known him all along.

I remembered that poem this week as I watched a family lower a coffin into a grave, feeding the taut, thin black cords carefully through their hands. Laying a man to rest who’d needed intense care for the last few years of his life.

I remembered those called to care for people in utter dependence; newborn children, the sick and the elderly; people with profound disabilities and care needs.

I remembered those remarkable folk who find it within themselves to care not just for their own, but have the largeness of spirit to look after the other, the different and the stranger in their needs too.

Thank God for the helpers; may he strengthen them in their work, and inspire us by their selflessness, which – whether knowingly or unknowingly - reflects something of his own.

Because the man who taught and healed that day in Galilee was selflessness personified. He was God, setting aside all his divine glory, to come and share life with us in Christ. Our God, contracted to a span, incomprehensibly made man as Charles Wesley put it.

2000 years on, we still struggle to grasp it, but it’s never been better expressed than in these words from the Apostle Paul to the church in Phillipi.

⁵Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:

⁶    Who, being in very nature God,

    did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,

⁷    but made himself nothing,

    taking the very nature of a servant,

    being made in human likeness.

⁸    And being found in appearance as a man,

    he humbled himself

    and became obedient to death—

    even death on a cross!

⁹    Therefore God exalted him to the highest place

    and gave him the name that is above every name,

¹⁰    that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,

    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

¹¹    and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,

    to the glory of God the Father.

Thank God for the Helper who came to earth to live our life and die our death; and say to all who would look to him in faith “Your sins are forgiven, my friend. Get up, pick up your bed and go in peace.”

Amen