One of my favourite flowers is the Nasturtium.  Not only do like its vibrant colours but it is happy to grow in the oddest and sometimes most inhospitable places.  My love for this flower goes back to my childhood when I wanted to garden and my grandfather made me a little garden out of an orange box. He gave me several packets of seeds including nasturtiums. When they grew and filled my little garden with splashes of colour I was the happiest boy alive.  I am certain that it was this experience which itself sowed the seed of my lifelong love of gardening.

Sowing Seeds is a central theme of today, Rogation Sunday.  The word ‘Rogation’ means ‘to ask for’ and traditionally this has come to mean asking for God’s blessing on the crops of the land so that an abundant harvest might follow. In country areas still there is the ceremony of the ’Beating of the Bounds’ which is not quite the violent exercise it sounds like but rather a procession around the boundaries of the parish with ‘prayer pauses’ to ask for God’s blessing on the fields.  The ceremony has its origin in Celtic pagan practice. May began the season of Beltane when the gods were invoked to prosper the harvest. When Christianity arrived the old custom remained but with a new meaning. Christianity, in its wisdom did not seek to overthrow ancient customs but to re-interpret them by giving them a Christian meaning.

Change is always better if it grows out of current practice rather than seeking to impose an entirely new thing. Organic growth is always more nourishing and acceptable that force-feeding!  In the Celtic Christian tradition actions were generally accompanied by prayer and the sowing of seed was no exception. From the Western Isles of Scotland, there is a prayer which begins:

I will go out and sow the seed,

in name of Him who gave it growth;

I will place my front to the wind,

and throw a gracious handful high….

The prayer begins by acknowledging God’s creative activity – God is the provider of everything and the farmer becomes involved in God’s providence. So the seed is thrown graciously but there is also a practical point.  I will place my front to the wind is a posture which will ensure a good distribution of the seed. The wind is harnessed in the work of sowing.  Of course, such a way of sowing will not guarantee that some won’t fall on rocky ground. The prayer continues:

Should a grain fall on bare rock,

It shall have no soil in which to grow.

Echoes here of our Lord’s parable of the Sower.

Taking my cue from the Celtic farmer I want now to throw high a gracious handful of seed with the hope that it won’t fall on rocky ground.  My first Seed is that of FAITH.  Now I make the presumption that all of us here this morning have, in various measures, Faith.  We have Faith in God, in Jesus Christ and in the Gospel teaching and example that Jesus gave to us which are nourished within us by the action of the Holy Spirit in our hearts and by God’s grace. 

But my seed is labelled MORE FAITH..  Our Team Ministry, along with the whole Church of England is undergoing much change.  We know that before too long the ministry available to us will be different – in one sense there will be less of it and yet in another sense there may be more.  The Upfront Initiative and the forthcoming Pastoral Care Course are both designed to empower us all in a joint venture of ministry which is a true partnership between those called to a ministry of leadership and the laity – a partnership of ALL the people of God in our Team churches.

Mother Teresa of Calcutta once said that God loves the world so much that he has provided you and me to love the world and our ministry together must always have that aim – together we must love the world – and in particular that part of the world where God has placed us – the area of the Epping District Team Ministry.

In some ways what we are facing is quite a daunting situation and my prime concern is that the ministry we need will be delivered. I believe strongly that it should be a shared ministry just as it is a shared mission. I believe this not because it makes pragmatic sense because we are losing ministers but rather because the Royal Priesthood of All believers spoken of in the first Epistle of Peter, binds us all into a united work for the Gospel in which all are equal and all, absolutely all, have a part to play. 

But that takes a lot of Faith and a new attitude of how that faith is to be worked out in action.  It would be so easy to bemoan our lot, berate the diocese for not providing us with more ministry and so become victims rather than authors of change.  Even if we feel we are working against the odds I would rather that we took the line of some Jews in a little story:

It was announced in Tel Aviv that God was going to send a tidal wave thirty-three feet high over the city because of its sins. Muslims went immediately to their mosques for a speedy translation to the Paradise of the Prophet. Christians went to their churches to pray for the intercession of the saints; but the Jews went to the synagogues and prayed, ‘Lord God, it’s going to be difficult living under thirty feet of water!”

What will make our own task less difficult is my second seed – the seed of GENEROSITY.  Being a Team Ministry has certain obligations – not least that we are looked after by a shared Leadership but we all know that ideally we would like our own Vicar running our own show. This is perfectly understandable and the reason why, as much as possible, there is a designated minister for each Church – even if that minister is shared by others.  Having come here from a United Benefice of 2 parishes I am well aware how easy it is for one or other group to feel they are being short-changed.  Also, we each have our own tradition and stance on things and these do not always sit easily together.  Sometimes too we feel that we put more into the common pot – be it Parish Share or contributing our talents and gifts to the Team.  But what I plead for is a Generosity of Spirit which whilst acknowledging our differences also celebrates and affirms what we have in common.

And what, most of all, we have in common is the Love of God acting upon us graciously and generously. It is God’s love that unites us. Everything we do – including our dealings with each other – must be done out of love – not simply our love for each other which, if we are honest, can blow hot and cold, but much more because we are held together in the love of God.  We can be generous with each other because God is generous with us.  Generosity is not something we have to learn – it is something that we have already received and one of the reasons that God is good to us is so that we can be good to and with each other and so reach out to others.

At a time when not only this team, but also the Deanery and even the Church of England, are being forced to make uncomfortable decisions about what shape the ministry will take, we need to be generous in our sharing of a common life – what at Pentecost was called ‘Koinonia’ or Holy Fellowship which led to a generosity of spirit. To give generously of ourselves to each other never diminishes us but always enriches us. 

I love that thrilling passage in Ephesians 4 which talks about how we are called to interact with each other as we are drawn to a maturity of faith which when we are working together builds up the body’s growth (The growth of the Church and therefore of each other) in Love.  Generosity with each other is but a statement of how we must seek to love and cherish each other in our 4 congregations and in the team.  That would Rejoice the heart of our Lord God.

And that word rejoice brings me to my final seed this morning – the Seed of JOY.  We can so easily make heavy weather of things and become over-serious. There is nothing more destructive than taking ourselves too seriously. Take God seriously by all means but leave it at that.  I do not doubt the magnitude of the task before us but I also believe we are on the threshold of discovering not a new way of being the Church (as the prevailing jargon asks of us) but rather we are being recalled to an old way of being Church – a way which is rooted in the Pentecost Church. A Church which is a ‘together’ sort of church and a church which because it is faithful and generous is also Joyful.  So let us learn to enjoy being together and maybe have a little fun too!

There is so much to hope for, so much to gain and so much to work together to achieve. We need to become once again a Church which joyfully shouts the Gospel from the rooftops in lives that are renewed and changed by the Gospel love of Jesus Christ – our Risen Lord who draws from our souls a joyful Alleluia.  In our Leviticus reading we heard of the Year of Jubilee – a time of liberty and joy – a time of celebration and of thanksgiving for God’s mighty goodness towards us.  I urge you all, therefore, to live a life of Jubilee – a life of joyful celebration, of hope and of determination that in all we do together, we show that God is real for us and that we can - and will make Him real for others.

When I planted my Nasturtium seeds, I watched every day with eager anticipation for the moment when the tiny leaves burst through the soil.  When, those leaves became vibrant flowers, it was a moment of sheer joy.

God has planted seeds in our lives. He watches over each one of us with tender and total care and nothing will rejoice Him more than if we flower as a Team in a new way full of faith, generosity and joy. When that happens God will shower us with his blessing. 

That alone makes it all worthwhile.