Sermon preached at Christ Church, 4^th June 2000

John 17:6-19

We need to choose our words carefully in life. The advert says “talk is cheap”. Well, I don’t know if I agree with that. Phone lines might be cheap, but the right word at the right time or even the wrong word at the wrong time can either build us up or completely confuse or destroy us. For example, here are a few items from church news letters I have found.

For those of you who have children and don't know it, we have a nursery downstairs.

Remember in prayer the many who are sick of our church and community.

Don't let worry kill you off - let the church help.

Vicar is on holiday. Massages can be given to church secretary.

The choir invites any member of the congregation who enjoys sinning to join the choir.

Weight Watchers will meet at 7 p.m. Please use large double door at the side entrance.

Once they are out, words can mean life or death for who we are. We can guarantee that for Samuel, Holly, and Breah, the words that will be said to them will mean so much in developing them as people.

I wonder what you think the most important words you have said, or you could say, might be?

“I love you?” Well it is certainly important to say that to your family and friends as often as you can, even perhaps when you don't feel like it.

“I do?” I expect that if you have said those two little words you realise that they have had more impact on your life than you could possibly imagine.

And how about these words? “I submit to Christ. I turn to Christ. I repent of my sins?” They are certainly big words which we have heard today. In fact, they are words that if you had spoken them about 1900 years ago in Rome, or spoken them in Afghanistan today, they might well have cost you your life.

So some words are more important than others. Even when we are surrounded with more words than we can cope with – from TV, radio, newspapers, internet, advertising, we need to be careful with our words. Because there are some words that we say that can change our lives for ever.

But today, it’s actually more important for us to listen to some words that have been said about us. If you are like me, you are always very keen to know what people are saying about you. I wonder what you think the most important words that have been said about you are?

What we heard today from the Bible were words that Jesus said 2000 years ago. But they weren’t just said about people who were alive then. They were said to reach us today. These are probably the most important words that have ever been said about you or I.

These are the words of Jesus’ prayer for his disciples, just before he was about to leave them. If some of Jesus’ words are more important than others, then these are the ones at the top of the pile. These are the ones we need to listen to. They tell us who we are, and they tell us what he wants for us.

Jesus sounds a bit like a parent. It's a difficult job parenting isn't it? We know that our children have to grow up and face the world, but we want to protect them from the things that might harm them as well.. Well, that is exactly the feeling that Jesus has when he prays here. My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. He doesn't want God to take us out of his world-after all its his world and he wants us to enjoy it. But he does ask that God would protect us and keep us so that we may be his.

Protection is important, but it’s not only what is going on here. Because most importantly in his prayer Jesus reveals to us who we are to God. These are the most important words that have ever been said about us, about who we are. They answer our biggest need.

I've just been to see the film "Gladiator". It is certainly a violent one, and I wouldn't recommend it if you have a queasy disposition. But the point is that the hero, Maximus, only has one aim throughout the whole thing, only one thing he really wants. He is a general on the front line who ends up having to become a gladiator. But all the way through his adventures, he only wants this: to go home. To be in a place where he feels loved and accepted.

What is our greatest need? What do these children need in life? To know where we belong, not just which house we live in, but where we belong in the story of life, to get to our home, to know the place where we are fully loved by God.

If we don’t know this, even if we seem outwardly successful, and people say many fine words about us, we will never get the point of being alive. An American cartoonist, Ralph Barton, left a note on his pillow before taking his own life. It said this "I have had few difficulties, many friends, great successes; I have gone from wife to the wife, from house to house, visited great countries of the world, but I am fed up with inventing devices to fill up twenty four hours of the day."

Underneath everything, we need to know where we belong, where we can find a home. These last great words of Jesus tell us where. They tell us who we are. “I'm praying for those you have given me, and they are yours. All I have is yours, and all you have is mine."

The problem is that we have got too used to people saying things like “I am yours and you are mine.” They are the standard fare of love songs. And the thing about love songs is that while the words can often sound great, they are in fact words which are cheap. How about these lyrics: do they describe real life, or real love?

It's the way you love me

It's a feeling like this

It's centrifugal motion

It's perpetual bliss

It's that pivotal moment

It's (ah) unthinkable

This kiss, this kiss

Unsinkable

This kiss, this kiss

You can kiss me in the moonlight

On the rooftop under the sky, oh

You can kiss me with the windows open

While the rain comes pourin' inside, oh

Kiss me in sweet slow motion

Let's let everything slide

You got me floatin'

You got me flyin'

Well I don't know who this person has been kissing, who but if anybody here does know then I'd quite like to see you after the service. But I’m sure that those of you with small babies would agree that love ain’t really like that. And we would probably all be pretty insufferable if it was! The point is that if when Jesus says “they are mine” he sings a love song about us, then his song puts the soppy twaddle that we like to listen to in to the shade. And it does this because Jesus’ love song was written not on a computer or to the sound of violins, but with his own blood, sweat, and tears.

Today, 2000 years after Jesus prayed his great prayer, we have said some very important words on behalf of Samuel, Holly, and Breah. And it is very important that we have done so. But the Jesus who who prayed for us before he died was raised by God and is here with us now. And he says to these children as they grow up, and to all of us, “I have prayed for you. I protect you. I am yours and you are mine. You belong to me. Come home." Don’t think these words are cheap. Nothing richer, more beautiful, or more wonderful has ever been said about you, or will be said by anyone.

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