good morning and welcome to the dinery garden on this monday morning the 28th of september as we come to say our morning prayers it's a gray autumn day quite chilly with rain spitting a little down so we've sought some color with the dahlia bed dahlia if you're in the united states bed and there's still flowers there and maybe we'll still get a little bit of summer that will come back to us but for the moment we brighten ourselves with our morning prayers but let me say first most importantly for all our jewish friends across the world this day is yom kippur and it's a solemn day and we remember them and wish them well it's a day of reflection and of looking back at the past of repentance and of new intention so we think of them during this day it's also a day of so many anniversaries september the 28th and so we're not in any way going to try to do them all confucius the great chinese philosopher was born on this day in 551 bc and we give thanks for his philosophy we'll come back to a little bit of that later but let's use one of his statements straight away because we used it when we were doing lost and found our greatest glory is not in never falling but in rising every time we fall humanity's greatest glory perhaps on a beginning of a working week we might mention another choose a job you love and you will never have to work any day of your life well that needs a little bit of thinking about and not everyone has the opportunity to choose the job they love on this day elizabeth garrett anderson in 1865 became the first qualified woman physician in this country we give thanks for that but also in 1884 simon marks a polish immigrant and tom spencer a yorkshire man opened their penny bazaar in leeds the foundation stone for marx and spencers 1928 alexander fleming developed his penicillin he discovered it accidentally and we could say that uh until recently hazel norman one of our near neighbors and her her husband lives still next door to us cannon david norman and we love him dearly but hazel died but it she was one of the trials in her earlier years for this antibiotic so we give thanks for the way in which vaccines and antibiotics can be tried and then tested and go on because we need that at the moment during this pandemic on this day in 1871 the brazilian parliament freed all government slaves and all children born to all slaves within brazil a day of freedom also the explorer juan rodriguez cabrillo in 1542 was the first european to set foot on the west coast of america in san diego bay we have friends there as i'm sure you might on the west coast but we think in san diego of james and zara and aaron on this day and on this day too herman melville who wrote maybe dick died louis pasteur who invented for our safety pasteurization died emil zola the french novelist died edwin hubble the astronomer who was the first to announce that there were other galaxies than us died in 1953 and the composer george dyson whose music we use constantly at evensong here died in 1964. the canadian prime minister for 15 years pierre trudeau died in the year 2000 well we give thanks for all that what a spread of thinking and of action and of government and decision-making and also philosophy and so let's begin our prayers and then we'll come to our reflection oh lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise may christ the true the only light banish all darkness from our hearts and minds blessed are you creator of all to you be praise and glory forever as your dawn renews the face of the earth bringing light and life to all creation may we rejoice in this day you have made and as we wake refreshed from the depths of sleep open our eyes to behold your presence strengthen our hands to do your will that the world may rejoice and give you praise 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 as 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 psalm on the 28th morning of the month is psalm 132 lord remember for david all the hardships he endured how he swore an oath to the lord and vowed a vow to the mighty one of jacob i will not come within the shelter of my house nor climb up into my bed i will not allow my eyes to sleep nor let my eyelids slumber until i find a place for the lord a dwelling for the mighty one of jacob the lord has sworn an oath to david a promise from which he will not shrink of the fruit of your body shall i set upon your throne if your children keep my covenant and my testimonies that i shall teach them their children also shall sit upon your throne forevermore for the lord has chosen zion for himself he has desired her for his habitation this shall be my resting place forever here will i dwell for i have longed for her i will abundantly bless her provision how poor will i satisfy with bread i will close her priests with salvation and her faithful ones shall rejoice son sing there will i make a horn to spring up for david i will keep a lantern burning for my anointed as for his enemies i will close them with shame but on him shall his crown be bright perhaps a sound like that reminds us of the way in which the blind man bartimaeus in jericho when he heard that jesus was passing by shouted out again and again son of david have mercy on me son of david have mercy on me the lord's anointed [Music] here we're in the acts of the apostles on this monday morning following our sunday break with a different lesson and here is paul where we left him and we begin to read at chapter 19 at verse 8. and paul entered the synagogue in ephesus and for three months spoke boldly reasoning and persuading them about the kingdom of god but when some became stubborn and continued in unbelief speaking evil of the followers of the way before the congregation paul withdrew from them and took the disciples with him reasoning daily in the hall of tyrannous this continued for two years so that all the residents of asia heard the word of the lord both jews and greeks and god was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of paul so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick and their diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them then some of the itinerant jewish exorcists undertook to invoke the name of the lord jesus over those who had evil spirits saying i adore you by jesus whom paul proclaims now seven sons of a jewish high priest called skiva were doing this but the evil spirit answered them jesus i know and paul i recognize but who are you and the man in whom was the evil spirit leapt on them mastered all of them and overpowered them so that they fed out of that house naked and wounded and this became known to all the residents of ephesus both jews and greeks and fear fell upon them all and the name of the lord jesus was extolled also many of those who were now believers came confessing and divulging their practices and a number of them had practiced magic and they brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all and they counted the value of them and found it came to 50 000 pieces of silver so the word of the lord continued to increase and prevail mightily so this is a long time in paul's ministry for three months and then two years so we think of him day by day and luke has given us a conflated amount of that time in in two paragraphs really paul begins just where you would expect him to begin in the synagogue reasoning there with his own people and using the foundation stone of the law and the prophets and the psalms which they knew and then when and notice they're still called followers of the way when the christians there are not believed and things begin to get hostile then paul leaves and instead goes to the hall of tyrannous which was shall we call it neutral space greek philosophers taught there in the mornings usually in the afternoons when physical exercise and everything else was being done the hall was free in its spaces and paul went there and we're told for two years he taught and argued and discussed the faith with those who were there and one notices in his epistles how his faith develops by experience and of course that's how we all learn bit by bit we confront an experience and then we shape things in our reflections in our prayers and are given new revelations and new truths as we read the gospels it's hardly surprising in this circumstance with so many completely different kinds of thinkers all around him but remember he's not without friends for we're constantly reminded by saint luke that the believers are around him and prime amongst those for the moment are priscilla and aquila and they are of the same trade as in paul as we've had they are tent makers or leather workers whatever the word means in its widest sense and one can imagine that they worked profitably together and paul would be talking to these people these wiser folk who had come from rome as we saw when claudius expelled them and had been in both corinth and now with him in ephesus so here are wise friends which we all need to talk about new ideas with new developments to pray with in an intimate way to break bread with in their homes the lovely thing is that in the end priscilla and aquila will go back to rome and in paul's letter to the romans he greets them there so when he himself gets to rome at the end there are friends there waiting for him all these things we remember and the temptation in the acts of the apostles is to skip through the sentences so fast that you don't realize how much time is passing and what amazing developments are happening so in the next few days we shall see much of that but let's turn to something else today for the moment for we'll go back to the facts first of all of confucius and i put down one or two of his statements but one of the best is i hear and i forget i see and i remember i do and i understand the last time we were visiting our king's school in shenzhen at the occasion there when i had been speaking to the people afterwards a young man stepped forward and gave me with a smile something that i would not only see and remember but actually carry and also not fully understand for who can with philosophers this little comic representation of confucius so now you can see and remember for he was born on this day in the year 551 bc and i carried him back and the very journey when we were carrying our bags was quite a heavy one he's he's not light but notice the wink in his eye as a sign of the humor of giving him to me so i put him down here at my feet and remember once again that confucius said never do to others what you would not like them to do to you the philosophy of confucius emphasized personal government morality correctness of social relationships justice kindness and sincerity and those qualities we need very much as we embrace the good news of jesus christ and read the gospels and the acts of the apostles and the epistles together but on this day also w.h ordon the poet died in 1973 his words have given us so many different kinds of thinking and when set to music by william walton or benjamin britton or so many others then we remember what a great poet he was in rhythms as well as thought his hymn to sin cecilia which britain set to music is an invocation for the musical saint to help all musicians and that lovely little four lined uh verse which keeps reappearing blessed cecilia appear in visions to all musicians appear and inspire translated daughter come down and startle composing mortals with immortal fire but perhaps best of all for this morning we remember that he wrote a poem about the twelve the apostles we've referenced it before it reminds us as it begins of what kind of men and women later the apostles were if we think of an apostle as carrying the faith in that way and in terms of leadership but the 12 are specific apostles but in our thinking at this time we might also add barnabas and paul and apollos those carrying the gospel at that time here's the beginning of this poem talking about the twelve from the calling of jesus without arms or charm of culture persons of no importance from an unimportant province they did as the spirit bid went forth into a joyless world of swords and rhetoric to bring it joy when they heard the word some demurred some mocked some were shocked but many were stirred and the word spread lives long dead were quickened to life the sick were healed by the truth revealed released into peace from the jinn of old sin men forgot themselves in the glory of the story told by the twelve and then the dark lord adored by this world perceived the threat of the light to his might from his throne he spoke to his own the loud crowd the sedate engines of state were moved by his will to kill it was done one by one they were caught tortured and slain but beautiful still are the starry heavens but our fate is not written there holy still is speech but there is no sacred tongue the truth may be told in all by that i think gordon means the truth may be told in all languages in every tongue and i would say communicated by so many different images it was a lesson that our lord taught us as he walked about and looked around and used everything within his sight i want just a reference for fun two poems of ordnance are well known very well known one of them was used in the film four weddings in a funeral it's called funeral blues and starts stop all the clocks cut off the telephone prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone but it is actually a very profound song of grief and the last two verses particularly speak of that in speaking of the dead one and the first pronoun could be he or she he was my north my south my east my west my working week my sunday rest my noon my midnight my talk my song i thought that love would last forever i was wrong the stars are not wanted now put out every one pack up the moon dismantle the sun pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood for nothing now can ever come to any good no wonder the news was so needed of resurrection and new life for that sadness is there for all certainly the first verse of that is known it's been used even in gavin and stacy the comedy program as they they read it orton had a way of giving common speech but if you haven't recently looked at the 1936 black and white little documentary about the night male steaming from london to scotland then that poem with britain's music is fantastic and it's orton this is the nightmail crossing the border bringing the check and the postal order letters for the rich letters for the poor the shop at the corner the girl next door pulling up better a steady climb the gradients against her but she's on time past cotton grass and moreland boulder shoveling white steam over her shoulder letters of thanks letters from banks letters of joy from girl and boy receipted bills and invitations to inspect new stock or visit relations and so it goes on and his rhythms are so wonderful because they slow as the train is going uphill and they speed as it clicks along on the railway travelling well what creativity and we give thanks for him i have a very vivid memory of time with him in when he came back to oxford and used to sit in the coffee shop opposite christchurch and would invite people to come and talk to him and with trepidation we did before we realized then what an enormous profound thinker poet philosopher he was we give thanks for such memories as those well let's say our prayers on this particular morning as the rain again begins to overtake us and here we're praying for the diocese of patna in north india and for the bishop there philip marandi and also the diocese of chandigarh in north india and the bishop eunice massey and his people and in this diocese on this day as we pray for justin our archbishop rose bishop of dover tim bishop at lambeth we pray for the recover deanery its clergy and people under their area dean of that whole area carol smith that's the area of kent around whitstable and hearn and recover and over the next few days we shall pray for the parishes one by one but you will bring your own prayers today to our morning prayers and your own concerns on this day when more and more of our country goes into lockdown i think something like two-thirds of the people of wales were are now under lockdown the population of whales in different areas of wales and we think of those in so many other areas of of our country so let's say our prayers and as we pray for government we remember that in 1745 on this day in the dreary lane theater thomas ahn writer of rural britannia conducted for the first time that which is our national anthem god saved the queen it was god save the king in those days george ii it's funny to think of it being sung for the very first time but it causes us to pray for all governments the world over knowing the hard decisions they have to make during this pandemic here's the prayer for this week o lord we beseech you mercifully to hear the prayers of your people who call upon you and grant that they may both perceive and know what things they ought to do and also may have grace and power faithfully to fulfill them through jesus christ our lord amen so each in our own way and each in our own language we say the prayer our savior taught us 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 on this monday morning for our own prayers 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 you