We learn in our reading from Ephesians that Jesus came ‘to bring the good news of peace to those who were far off and to those who were near.  He came to bring reconciliation, unity and love.  Holy Trinity in Heaven.  Jesus became the link between earth and heaven and thus brought healing and wholeness, as our reading from Mark tells us.   He brought the good news to the poor of the world.   Jesus, the humble person, who emptied himself, who gave everything, still comes and still longs for the qualities of the Kingdom of God, love, joy and peace, to be ours on the earth.  And Jesus the Christ is still with us, from the beginning to the end of time, ever challenging us to do the things he did and continues, through us, and with us, to do.  He calls Christians to be links and healers in our world and to bring the good news to the poor. 

The challenge of the Gospel is to recognise that we can all do the things of God, we can all bring good news to the poor.  And our world of suffering, violence and poverty needs

this as never before.

It may help to remember the woman of Samaria who gave water to Jesus.  Like the woman at the well and many others Jesus met, we are challenged to give.  We are also challenged, as the Church, not to keep the giving and sharing to ourselves but rather to ‘Give the gift of giving.’   Those of us who have been teachers will know that a popular essay subject is ‘If a thing is worth doing its worth doing badly.’   The hope is that the essays will be all about enabling the pupils to do things themselves, even though we, the adults, could do them so much better.  It is the same in our Christian discipleship.  Our challenge, like that of Jesus the Christ, is to enable those we meet and work with to go on to bring good news themselves, to work for love, compassion, kindness, unity, humility and peace to become ascendant in our world today. 

There is a clue in some words of DH. Lawrence, “As we live we are transmitters of life.  To transmit life is to pass it on from ourselves to others, and not to keep it and use it to make others feel grateful.

When I visited the hilly coastal region of Tanzania the bishop there knew all about transmitting life to others.  When our CA group arrived in Tanzania he had recently been to England and had been given a huge bell, which had been shipped out and put into the church, where it was rung every day.  In this way he said that all the local people, all over the mountain, would hear it and know that they were welcome in the church.  I know that your bells will be heard by everyone in the region.  When we joined in the building of a fish tank in the mountains of Tanzania, we did share the task with people from all over the vast area, who were Christian and Muslim, and who all gave towards the new life the fish would bring.

When I attended the Lambeth conference last year I met many people who were living hard lives and yet working to bring new life.  Many are teachers, with 100 pupils in the class, many help people to start small businesses and many work with the sick and dying.   There are those working with HIV/AIDS sufferers and with refugees.  One person I met said that the refugees had said to him ‘God has forgotten us.’

I learnt a lot about Burundi where the problems are great, including malaria, TB and a life expectancy of 39 years, terrible grinding poverty, HIV/AIDS and 2,000 refugees coming home every month.  One of the wonderful projects I was told about was a home for babies and children called ‘arms of love,’ where the children are supported in every way and eventually adopted, so that other babies can come into the home.

One event at the Lambeth Conference was the London Walk of Witness which offers on-going tasks for us all.   There are three main areas of work based on the Millennium Development Goals, -  to keep the promise to tackle health and education, to halve world poverty by 2015 and to ‘do justice and love mercy.’

What better challenge is there than, following Jesus the Christ, to tackle these areas of life, both here in Britain and also around the world, and thus to bring love and justice.  There should be nowhere in our world where people can say ‘God has forgotten us.’  We, as Christians, may be living reminders that God is always with us and that new life is always possible.