Hope, Help and Healing
Many a classic story features a moment when all feels lost and the protagonist loses hope. Lord of the Rings, Jurassic Park, Star Wars…
Star Wars – The Death Star is getting ready to fire on the rebel base. Luke Skywalker and his fellow x wing pilots appear to be the last line of defense - but as they fly down the narrow chanels of the service of the Death Star one by one they are being taken out. Now there are only three of them left. Wedge’s Xwing is damaged and he has to retreat. Then Darth Vader’s Tie Fighter kills Biggs. Luke is alone, and it looks hopeless – BUT THEN....
Meanwhile John the Baptist – after what appeared to be an incredibly successful start drawing thousands to baptism in the river Jordan and proclaiming “After me comes one who is mightier than I, I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of sandal, I have baptised you with water, he will baptise you with the Holy Spirit”
After all that – he is arrested by King Herod – he knows he going to die – but perhaps even worse it has all been in vain.
‘Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?’ (Matt 11:3)
Have you ever been in place where Hope seems lost? Many in our country are in that place right now. For whatever reason. A relationship that has gone horribly wrong. A health scare. A redundancy. A missed promotion and a sense that you have been left on the shelf and it has all been for nothing. What is the purpose of it all anyway?
And in every good story – at just the right moment Hope returns.
Luke is about to die just as his friend Biggs and all the other rebel pilots have died. All their resistance to the Empire will be for nothing - and just at that moment – the Millenium Falcon arrives - Han Solo fires the shot that disables Darth Vader’s ship – buying Luke Skywalker just enough time to destroy the death star.
And in every good story – at just the right moment Hope returns.
John the Baptist is lying in Herod’s prison despairing that everything he did has been for nothing. “”When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?’ (Matt 11:2-3)
And that just that moment:
"Jesus answered them, ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: 5the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. 6And blessed is anyone who takes no offence at me.’” (Matt 11:3-4)
And in every good story – at just the right moment Hope returns.
The Christmas message - Hope Help and healing - Jesus brings us a message that it has not all been in vain.
The baby born in a manger, God become present in human form to reveal his plan for us, the message of rescue and redemption – it brings HOPE
A recent survey – commissioned by a Church Organisation but carried out by the thoroughly impartial and professional polling organisation YouGov found [1]
a. 69%of churchgoers agree they feel hopeful about their future compared to 46% of nonchurchgoers
b. 75% of churchgoers agree their life feels meaningful compared to 49% of nonchurchgoers
c. Churchgoers less likely to feel anxious or depressed – 43% non churchgoers, compared with 31% churchgoers
Hope, Help and Healing!
“ Jesus answered them, ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: 5the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them” (Matt 11:4)
The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad,
the desert shall rejoice and blossom….
Strengthen the weak hands,
and make firm the feeble knees.
Say to those who are of a fearful heart,
‘Be strong, do not fear!
Here is your God….
He will come and save you.’
Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
and the ears of the deaf unstopped;
then the lame shall leap like a deer,
and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.
For waters shall break forth in the wilderness,
and streams in the desert;
the burning sand shall become a pool,
and the thirsty ground springs of water;” (Isaiah 35:1-7 excerpts)
We see this happening in physical terms – but it is more than that. I remember well when this was first pointed out to me when I was studying Mark’s Gospel at University.
Try it for yourself – go home and read chapter 7:31-8:26
It begins and ends with miracles.
It begins with the healing of a deaf man. A man who had physically never been able to hear can hear the bird song again, the chatter of children, the voices of friends. Then 4000 hungry people are miraculously fed from a few loaves of bread.
It begins with miracles and it ends with a miracle – a man born blind, a man who has never seen a rainbow, a man who can’t work because of his disability – restored to physical sight.
But in the middle of this chapter “The Pharisees came and began to argue with him, asking him for a sign from heaven, to test him. And he sighed deeply in his spirit and said, ‘Why does this generation ask for a sign? Truly I tell you, no sign will be given to this generation.’ And he left them, and getting into the boat again, he went across to the other side.” (Mark 8:11-13)
You have seen deaf start to hear. You have seen 4000 people fed from virtually nothing. And yet you demand a sign? Are you blind or something? Are you deaf to what is going on around you? In the way Mark’s gospel is put together The physical blindness of man healed is deliberately with the spiritual blindness of the pharisees, the physical deafness of the man healed is contrasted with the spiritual deafness of those who can’t hear what God is saying through these miracles.
Indeed on a boat in the middle of the lake Jesus lays out this very point to the disciples -
"Now the disciples had forgotten to bring any bread; and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. And he cautioned them, saying, ‘Watch out—beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod.’ They said to one another, ‘It is because we have no bread.’ And becoming aware of it, Jesus said to them, ‘Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes, and fail to see? Do you have ears, and fail to hear? And do you not remember? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you collect?’ They said to him, ‘Twelve.’ ‘And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you collect?’ And they said to him, ‘Seven.’ Then he said to them, ‘Do you not yet understand?’ {Mark 11:14-21)
The message of Christmas - The baby born in a manger, God become present in human form to reveal his plan for us, the message of rescue and redemption – bring hope, help and healing.
But until we turn to Jesus we are blind to the hope that brings
a. 69%of churchgoers agree they feel hopeful about their future compared to 46% of nonchurchgoers
b. 75% of churchgoers agree their life feels meaningful compared to 49% of nonchurchgoers
c. Churchgoers less likely to feel anxious or depressed – 43% non churchgoers, compared with 31% churchgoers
“Strengthen the weak hands,
and make firm the feeble knees.
Say to those who are of a fearful heart,
‘Be strong, do not fear!” (Isaiah 35:3-4)
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Hope, Help and healing.
The Hope that Christians have experiences motivates us to bring practical help to those around us.
For that man who was blind, being healed wasn’t just a nice thing. It wasn’t just about the rainbows, beautiful as they are. It was practical. As a blind man 2000 years ago he could not work. He could survive only by begging, he would never marry, never experience love, never experience Children. His healing is practical help to him as dramatic as a desert bursting into flower.
Like the Millenium Falcon turning up to save the day at the death star, this was practical help for the blind man.
And the Hope that Christians have experiences motivates us to bring practical help to those around us.
Just in this borough of Ealing – probably half the churches run some sort of drop or community café or old people’s lunch club. Almost all the parent and Toddler groups run in the borough are run by churches. Sisteen churches run official “warm spaces” for those who can’t afford to heat their houses, St Barnabas Pitshanger and St Mary’s Northolt each run a memory café for those with Alzeimhers. St Paul’s Ealing runs a low cost language school to help newcomers learn English.
Two projects help the hungry. The Eling Soup Kitchen based at St Paul’s Ealing has provided hot meals to 100-150 people a week since 1973 while the Ealing Food Bank founded in 2013 by a group of 40 churches provides emergency food supplies to residents across Acton, Southall, Northolt, Hanwell and South Ealing.
Since 2011, Ealing Churches Winter Night Shelter (ECWNS) has delivered a truly unique service to the borough’s homeless by providing food, a safe and warm space to sleep, and, importantly companionship, every night to 14 people from November to March each year (20 weeks). It is a project working with 20 churches and over 200 volunteers.
Peter Wyatt, vicar of St Francis C of E, Selsdon examined the effect of church-led social action projects on crime and antisocial behaviour (ASB) in deprived council estates, focusing on Monks Hill in Croydon, UK. The research compares Monks Hill, where churches have actively run social projects, with three similar estates lacking such initiatives, over the period 2010–2023.
Monks Hill is a small council estate of about 3,000 people, ranking among the 14% most deprived areas in the UK as of 2019. Since 1999, two churches - Croydon Jubilee Church and St Francis - have implemented various social action projects, including youth work, food pantries, community lunches, a Men’s Shed, vegetable growing, and cooking classes. These initiatives intensified after 2019, culminating in a new community hub in 2021.
The estate’s transformation is notable: once considered the worst in Croydon, it is now regarded as one of the best, a change attributed by local leaders to the churches’ involvement. From 2010–2022, Monks Hill saw only a 2% change in reported crime, compared to increases of 18–36% in the other estates and a 50% rise nationally. Violent crime in Monks Hill rose by a half to a third of the amount it did in the comparison areas.
" the burning sand shall become a pool,
and the thirsty ground springs of water;
the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp" (Isaiah 35:7)
"Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer,
and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.
For waters shall break forth in the wilderness,
and streams in the desert;" (Isaiah 35:5-6)
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Hope, Help and Healing
In a world with no NHS and no benefits system, Jesus’s miracles are practical help to those around them. They are also a pointer of HOPE. He can send the message back to John the Baptist locked up in jail – it has not been all in vain. “the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them” (Matthew 11:5) – However bad things God is active. God is coming to the rescue.
Not everyone was healed in Jesus day. But people were healed – and like the baby being born in a manger it shows there is hope.
And those healings still happen today.
Let me tell you about Sarah (not her real name). I was at Uni with Sarah. She was amazingly double jointed in all her joints – naively it seemed quite cools at the time – but it wasn’t cool. The bones not being properly in their sockets led to major arthritis and huge mobility problems. By the time she was 40 Sarah could not walk without crutches and often had to use a wheelchair.
She’s now 54. Last month I had a phone call with her. She was asking if I as a priest could legally verify her child’s identity which they needed because they had lost their passport and needed get get a new tenancy agreement. At the end of the conversation I asked Sarah about her health. “Oh didn’t I tell you – I had a miracle. Last year at church I was prayed for – all the pain went away immediately and I have been able to walk perfectly fine since then”.
Now I don’t know why it happened last year – Sarah will have been prayed for many times over many years – but suddenly it happened. I no more understand that than I understand why other people are not healed but Sarah was.
But God is at work. And this is a sign of that.
“the lame shall leap like a deer,
and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy”
In Star Wars the Death Star was destroyed, the forces of the Empire pushed back, and the film later renamed “A New Hope”
In reality - the baby born in a manger, God coming among us in human form, brings us true New Hope.
Hope Help and Healing
‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: 5the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. 6And blessed is anyone who takes no offence at me.’ (Matt 11:4-6)
