We owe a great deal of thanksgiving that the Church has, from the very beginning of its life taken mission seriously. Had it not done so, we in England would never have heard the Gospel and Christianity would never have reached these shores.  Though it is a well known myth that God is an Englishman and that we have a monopoly of ownership when it comes to Christianity, the truth is that Jesus did not, despite the well known Hymn of William Blake, walk upon England’s mountains green nor was the Holy Lamb of God, on England’s pleasant pastures seen.  Like all the countries outside the Holy Land, we received the Gospel and the knowledge of Jesus Christ because of unknown missionaries who travelled across Europe or, more likely, sailed around its shores, to bring the Good News to our ancestors.

We know nothing of who they were. As an historian of the Celtic Church in Britain wrote:

Christianity tiptoed into Britain. It left no written records of its entry, but here and there its footprints may be traced in the soil of these islands.

We need only go a little way along the M25 to see one of these footprints which since the 3rd Century has marked  one of the birthplaces of the Christian faith – and where the great abbey of St. Alban now stands. A footprint placed long before St. Augustine was sent by Pope Gregory to Canterbury.  Yet we know virtually nothing about the early Christian missionaries. It is of no consequence for, like all true missionaries, they preached Christ Crucified and Him alone they glorified. Mission is rooted in telling the story of Jesus Christ and it matters not who tells it.

But tell it we must for that is to obey the direct command of the Risen Lord who, at the end of the Easter period, just before his Ascension, gathered his disciples together and told them:

Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit…

In this command Jesus is making a revolutionary departure from his birth religion of Judaism which, on the whole, is the religion of a particular people who are generally born into it. Though it has attracted non-Jews it is not a religion which is marked by a missionary zeal. It does not have a programme of conversion in the way that Christianity or Islam have.  Though Jesus, in his earthly ministry confined his activities to the Jewish communities of the Holy Land – with a few notable exceptions - by the time he was preparing to Ascend to his Father the Divine plan for the salvation of all humanity had unfolded. It was now to be a religion to the Gentiles, the non-Jewish world. This was underlined dramatically at Pentecost when the Disciples, visited by the Holy Spirit, began to speak in tongues of nations which so often leave the lesson-reader tongue-tied!

The foundation for this Mission can be found hinted at in the earlier part of the Gospel and more specifically  in the New Testament writings, particularly The Acts of the Apostles.  In today’s Gospel, Philip makes the plea which is at the heart of all who are seeking God – ‘Lord, show us the Father’ to which Jesus makes the reply that to see Himself is to see the Father. Everything that Jesus has said and done whilst on earth is a showing of the Father’s Glory and this glory can be seen as much in the deeds as in his teaching.  But Jesus goes on to predict the disciples’ future – they have seen great works but they will do greater works.  And not just them but any who believes in Jesus.

These greater works are emphasised in the lesson we heard from the First Letter of Peter where, in that gorgeous passage which begins by calling us, Christ’s followers, 'a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation', God’s own people we are told that we are all these things in order that we might 'proclaim the mighty acts of God'.  Greater Works and Mighty Acts are the centrepoint of Mission.

We are called to  proclaim the Mighty Acts of God in Jesus Chris, and in so doing share in the Greater Work of converting to human heart to God – the very stuff of discipleship and of Mission.  It is in responding to this call that the unknown missionaries landed upon the shores of Britain and witnessed to the Gospel with such zeal that this Nation was gradually claimed for Christ.  It is also what sent Christians out – from Celtic times to the Twentieth Century – to take the Gospel from here to other lands.

In this, the Church of England played a major part, not least in taking the Gospel to the countries of first, the Empire, and then latterly, the Commonwealth.  We have only to read the story of our great missionary societies and of those named and unnamed individual Christians who tirelessly worked for the Lord overseas to be proud of our missionary heritage.  But today it is not quite such a glorious story for today it is England that stands once more in need of re-conversion.

Some years ago, in the North East of England, a group of Christians came from other countries to visit a part of the land which could justifiably lay claim to being a cradle of English Christianity. It was from the great and ancient Celtic Christian Kingdom of Northumbria that the Gospel was taken to other parts of the land, including here in Essex.

The Christians from overseas did a kind of spiritual OFSTED on the North Eastern Churches and then wrote a document in the form of 7 letters, giving their impressions. Overwhelmingly they noted that Christianity was tired and Christian practice lethargic. In one telling comment, which has stuck in my mind, one of them wrote that it would not be long before the Overseas Church would once again have to send Missionaries to England to proclaim the Gospel afresh.  That was a quarter of a century ago and it is a prophecy that is chillingly true. Increasingly, not just the North East, but the whole of England is in danger of becoming a spiritual wilderness. The slow but steady march of secularisation is turning England into a post-Christian culture and bringing with it a climate in which churchgoing and Christian belief is the practice of the few, and not as before, the many. There are all sorts of reasons for this but the truth is that we can no longer claim England to be a Christian country. Its present culture does not naturally provide a seedbed for Christian growth. Only 10% of the population claim to be regular churchgoers though there are a significant number who have some experience of Christian influence in their lives somewhere. More significantly 40% of the population have never been influenced by Christianity at all. It is for them an alien culture.

We experience this, increasingly at funerals where the words of the Lord’s Prayer, even in its traditional form, are not always known and where, in the Crematorium at least, even hymns like ‘Abide with Me’ and ‘The Lord’s my Shepherd’ are more likely to be replaced by Frank Sinatra’s ‘I did it my way’ – in itself a telling comment!  The Christian Church bears some responsibility for this decline. In my thirty years of ministry I have been wearied by the many destructive campaigns within the Church which cause internal wranglings to dominate our national and diocesan church agendas. Who would be attracted to a church which constantly attacks itself?

At a recent meeting chaired by our Diocesan Bishop John, he argued that we have to stop being so self-absorbed. He said that what must get back onto our agendas is Mission, Mission, Mission.

Which is why the coming week in this Deanery is so exciting because that is what will be happening. The Week itself  offers us the opportunity to take part in a number of things but what it really does is create a space in which we might reflect on this important matter. For it is not what we shall be doing which is important but why?   The Week is an opportunity to begin to create a climate of Mission that will turn us round away from self and back towards God.

There is already much Mission going on in this Parish – of which the new Koinonia venture is a new exciting part. But each of us is being challenged to look afresh not only at how our Church can be more effective but how each one of us can be Missionaries – people for whom Christ matters so much that our lives speak of him constantly.  As Carol reminded me this week, Mission is about seeing what God is doing and joining in and where better to begin that process than by seeing what God is doing in our own lives, in our own Church.

It is when we celebrate the Mighty Acts of God in our own lives that we will be compelled to do Greater Works in Christ’s name.  The foundation of all Missionary activity is to recognise God’s great love for us and so gift our lives back to him for Him to use in drawing others into His Gospel net of love.

The challenge before us is to answer the questions about life which the Mission Title poses:

 DEAD? [question mark] OR ALIVE ! [exclamation mark]

Is your faith sleeping as one dead or is it alive as one who is a child of the Resurrection?

• Does Christ really matter?

• Does He make a difference?

• Do you believe in Him with all your heart?

• Does that Show?

If the answer is Yes, Yes, Yes and Yes then you are already engaged in Mission – you already know what Mighty Acts He has performed in you.  Now go out and do Greater Works because God is with You.

I love the story of three Celtic Christians who set sail one day from Ireland. They allowed the sea to take them wherever it willed and eventually they landed up on the coast of ancient Wessex. The coastal watchers arrested them, thinking they were spies, and they were brought to the King who asked them why they had come.  'We set sail, we knew not where', they said, 'for the love of God'.  In their leather satchels they brought their prized possession – copies of the Gospels. Not only that but through constant reading it was etched in their hearts.  They were true missionaries and they were part of that unknown group who brought the faith to this land.  May we be walking copies of that same Gospel.

If we are then, like them, we shall share in the conversion of England – a conversion which begins for us in Epping – Here and Now.