good morning and welcome to canterbury cathedral to the dinery garden here as we say our morning prayers welcome wherever you are in the world this is a very different morning from yesterday which you remember was a day of solid rain and the garden has responded but the sun is also out this morning making everything shine and sitting here in the herb garden with the dahlias or dahlias as they're called the other side of the atlantic beginning to flower there's a wonderful scent of mint all around me so we say our morning prayer early in the morning of this ninth day of july oh lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise may christ the day star dawn in our hearts and triumph over the shades of night blessed are you sovereign god creator of all to you be glory and praise forever you founded the earth in the beginning and the heavens are the work of your hands in the fullness of time you made us in your image and in these last days you have spoken to us in your son jesus christ the word made flesh as we rejoice in the gift of your presence among us let the light of your love always shine in our hearts your spirit ever renew our lives and your praises ever be on our lips blessed be god father son and holy spirit blessed be god forever the night has passed and the day lies open before us let us pray with one heart and mind does we rejoice in the gift of this new day so may the light of your presence o god set our hearts on fire with love for you now and forever amen our morning psalm on this ninth day of the month is psalm 46. god is our refuge and strength a very present help in trouble therefore we will not fear though the earth be moved and though the mountains tremble in the heart of the sea though the waters rage and swell and though the mountains quake at the towering seas there is a river whose streams make glad the city of god the holy place of the dwelling of the most high god is in the midst of her therefore shall she not be removed god shall help her at the break of day the nations are in uproar and the kingdoms are shaken but god utters his voice and the earth shall melt away the lord of hosts is with us the god of jacob is our stronghold come and behold the works of the lord what destruction he has wrought upon the earth he makes wars to cease in all the world he shatters the bow and snaps the spear and burns the chariots in the fire be still then and know that i am god i will be exalted among the nations i will be exalted in the earth the lord of hosts is with us the god of jacob is our stronghold so we turn to our regular reading of the gospel of saint luke the 18th chapter beginning at the 31st verse and taking the twelve jesus said to them see we are going up to jerusalem and everything that is written about the son of man by the prophets will be accomplished for he will be delivered over to the gentiles and will be mocked and shamefully treated and spat upon after flogging him they will kill him and on the third day he will rise but the twelve understood none of these things this saying was hidden from them and they did not grasp what was said as they drew near to jericho a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging and hearing a crowd going by he inquired what this meant they told him jesus of nazareth is passing by and he cried out jesus son of david have mercy on me and those who were in front rebuked him telling him to be silent but he cried out all the more son of david have mercy on me and jesus stopped and commanded him to be brought to him and when he came near he asked him what do you want me to do for you and the blind man said lord let me recover my sight and jesus said to him recover your sight your faith has made you well and immediately he recovered his sight and followed jesus glorifying god and all the people when they saw it gave praise to god so many things in those verses are so typical of luke's gospel even though both those passages if you divide them in half first jesus talking to the twelve and then jesus coming into jericho both those passages are known from matthew and lou and mark as well as luke yet there's something special about the way luke deals with it for often in luke a story ends with those who have witnessed all that has happened glorifying and praising god we shall find that even to the end and one feels that luke's own heart and inner insight though his eyes cannot see jesus for he was not there at that time yet he's one of the folk whom jesus spoke about when he spoke to thomas blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe and so glorifying and praising god for what is happening is i think also happening in luke's mind and heart as he puts together in order for us the things he is learning first and foremost once again jesus tries to share with the disciples all that he must suffer he uses the title for himself taken from old testament prophecy son of man we're used to that in english but we have to remember that that word is not gender specific and in the ancient languages it certainly isn't it speaks of the way in which he represents our total humanity and what about what he is about to do but they don't understand he has to carry this part of the journey alone with the knowledge that the 12 just don't understand yet but within himself he knows that they will and afterwards the way in which they learn that painfully and at the cost of their own lives will further his messiahship meanwhile they've arrived at the last stage of their journey they've reached jericho and blind let's say his name because we know it from mark blind bartimaeus sits at the gate of jericho hearing everything with a cute hearing because his eyesight is not there and he cries out when he finds out what's happening another title son of david the royal line already there is in the blind man's heart and his knowledge something about the one who is to come of the royal line of david son of david have mercy on me the same prayer have mercy on me as we heard the tax collector humbly offering in st luke's gospel not daring to lift his eyes and standing well well back in the temple as the pharisee exalting himself at the front prayed a different prayer have mercy on me jesus calls him and in the middle of the crowd ask him what do you want lord i want my sight jesus could have said you're crying out son of david have mercy on me shows more sight than any that i've found but receive human sight as well as the divine insight that you have been given the grace to receive and bartimaeus follows jesus with his new found mortal sight as well as his divine inner sight of realizing just who this is who has blessed him in this way well here we are on the 9th of july and it causes me to ask a question about our calendar because it's the day on which archbishop stephen langton died in 1228 he'd been archbishop of canterbury for 21 years and in that time he affected so many things here it was who having been elected and chosen by pope innocent the third one of the great popes and the pope called the chapter of canterbury to rome and they elected beckett and the king wouldn't accept it and you remember the pope had to place england under interdict outside the sacraments of the church until the king accepted langton for langton came and he took leadership in the process of magna carta so that in 1215 he was the prime mover of the ceiling by the king of magna carta on the island of runymed and that we would call important for so many liberties which nations know throughout the world and is a sign of so many liberties which we enjoy but there was much more that langton did and in his time of course the 12 1220 coming together of everyone to the new shrine of beckett was under his archaea piscopet he was the archbishop who oversaw that massive ceremony and the life of the holy shrine and pilgrimage began at that time he too is credited with having he was a a man of scholarship divided the scriptures into chapters the chapters which we all know and use to make it easier to find what is where now i'm sitting in a garden which is divided by box hedges they're beautifully wet this morning and the sun is making them shine but the herbs on my left and your right as you look at me the mint and the sage and the rosemary and the thyme are divided from the dahlias which are now coming into flower and beyond that more box hedges divide the vegetable gardens and the vines and so on that kind of division is useful for our human minds and the way in which langton divided everything is an important one the calendar divides different days and different seasons just as the garden shows us different days and different seasons and in these three and a half months that we've been worshiping together morning by morning we've seen how the seasons divide themselves we give great thanks for stephen langton he is buried here in canterbury he was buried in the open ground beside the south transit but since then a chapel has been built over that the st michael's chapel we give thanks for him but he's not in the calendar so i put him in the calendar for today as we think about him and also not only was magna carta a charter of liberties which he saw through as archbishop but also he was a great hymn writer and one of his hymns to me is a spiritual magna carta a charter of our graces of the spirit it's a hymn we sing at pentecost and here is one translation of it in the latin it begins veni sancte spiritus come thou holy spirit come and from thy celestial home shed of ray of light divine come now father of the poor come thou source of all our store come within our bosom shine thou of comforters the best thou the souls most welcome guest sweet refreshment here below in our labor rest most sweet grateful coolness in the heat solace in the midst of woe almost blessed light divine shine within these hearts of thine and our inmost being fill where thou art not we have naught nothing good in deed or thought nothing free from taint of ill heal our wounds our strengths renew on our dryness poor thy dew wash the stains of guilt away bend the stubborn heart and will melt the frozen warm the chill guide the steps that go astray on the faithful who adore and confess thee ever more in thy sevenfold gifts descend give them virtues sure reward give them thy salvation lord give them joys that never end on this day we give thanks for the insight and ordered mind of stephen langton in law and in the graces of the holy spirit and we give thanks for the sight of blind bartimaeus spiritual insight and restored human insight to follow jesus on the way towards jerusalem so this day we pray in our anglican communion for the diocese of northern california in the episcopal church of the united states and pray for barry baezner the bishop there and his people we pray for the diocese of badagri in nigeria and for joseph adeyemi the bishop there and all his people and the diocese of ballarat in australia and gary weatherill and his people is constitution day in australia today so we remember the australian people with thanksgiving and here in this diocese we pray for justin archbishop of canterbury in our day and pray also for rose bishop of dover tim bishop at lambeth and throughout our diocese today we're not praying for a specific parish we're praying for those whose mental health has been affected by the kovid 19 pandemic and pray for those who are caring for them at this time so then we pray the special prayer for this week oh god the protector of all who trust in you without whom nothing is strong nothing is holy increase and multiply upon us your mercy that with you as our ruler and guide we may so pass through things temporal that we lose not our hold on things eternal grant this heavenly father for our lord jesus christ's sake amen and the sound collect for psalm 46 which causes us to be still and know that he is god god of jacob when the earth shakes and the nations are in uproar speak and let the storm be still through jesus christ our lord amen so in whatever language we like to use and in whatever style we are used to saying the prayer that jesus taught her we join in it together from all over the world our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom the power and the glory forever and ever amen moment of silence for your own prayers this morning in the peace of god which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of god and of his son jesus christ our lord the blessing of god almighty the father the son and the holy spirit be upon you upon those whom you love and those whom you would pray for today and always amen