good morning and welcome to the dinery garden at canterbury cathedral on this saturday the 13th of november it's a beautiful autumn morning here with the sun shining in a blue sky with white clouds moving quite fast but uh they've got they're scattered so we've got lots of lovely blue sky and the sun shining down on this silver birch tree with its leaves turned gold for autumn and it's silver trunk and that's on my right hand side and on my left hand side is a continuous bush which we normally call the burning bush that takes us to our reflection later on the journey of the children of israel through the wilderness and they are of course looking forward to a promised land with all the troubles that journey is causing particularly to their leader moses and looking back to or moses himself looking back to the burning bush but they themselves looking back and they keep grumbling about how much better it was in egypt because they've forgotten what it was like to be under the slavery of the egyptians at that point looking forward looking back is part of our our message today which comes from the scriptures but also jestro makes his appearance again and jesro moses father-in-law is there to give some really good advice to moses in his leadership the cop 26 conference was due to finish yesterday and negotiations i think have been going on all night and will go into the day we hope for a good solution today but this gives us uh an interlude and a break and i think fletcher will be most well i know he is most grateful for that because all his activity in finding the right videos to show us exactly what lessons are being learned have created enormously long days for him and i for one and i hope you are grateful for all that's been shown in that to help me and you understand and learn about what the delegates there have been talking about but for now we're going on in a regular way uh and we'll come also to some dates for today of people who had a vision of looking forward but let's begin our prayers on this morning oh lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise send your holy spirit upon us and clothe us with power from on high blessed are you creator god to you be praise and glory forever as your spirit moved over the face of the waters bringing light and life to your creation pour out your spirit on us today that we may walk as children of light and by your grace reveal your presence 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 and 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 son on this morning of the month this 13th morning of the month is psalm 68 it's a long sun so i'm reading a selection of verses from that now let god arise and let his enemies be scattered let those that hate him flee before him as the smoke vanishes so may they vanish away as wax melts at the fire so let the wicked perish at the presence of god but let the righteous be glad and rejoice before god let them make merry with gladness sing to god sing praises to his name exalt him who rides on the clouds the lord is his name rejoice before him father of the fatherless defender of widows god in his holy habitation god gives the solitary a home and brings forth prisoners to songs of welcome but the rebellious inhabit a burning desert oh god when you went forth before your people when you marched through the wilderness the earth shook and the heavens dropped down rain at the presence of god the lord of sinai at the presence of god the god of israel you sent down a gracious rain oh god you refreshed your inheritance when it was weary your people came to dwell there in your goodness oh god you provide for the poor blessed be the lord who bears our burdens day by day for god is our salvation god is for us the god of our salvation god is the lord who can deliver from death we see your solemn processions oh god your processions into the sanctuary my god and my king the singers go before the musicians follow after in the midst of maidens playing on timbrels in your companies bless your god bless the lord you that are of the fount of israel at the head there is benjamin least of the tribes the princes of judah in joyful company the princes of zebulun and naphtali send forth your strength o god establish o god what you have wrought in us for your temples sake in jerusalem kings shall bring their gifts to you drive back with your word the wild beast of the reeds the herd of the bull-like the brutish hordes trample down those who lust after silva scatter the peoples that delight in war vessels of bronze shall be brought from egypt ethiopia will stretch out her hands to god sing to god you kingdoms of the earth make music in praise of the lord he rides on the ancient heaven of heavens and sends forth his voice a mighty voice ascribe power to god whose splendor is over israel whose power is above the clouds how terrible is god in his holy sanctuary the god of israel who gives power and strength to his people blessed be god it's a great song of the wilderness with many illustrations of joyfulness in music but also of god's care of those most in need as they cry to him and those themes will be much present in our reflection as we go first to the book of the exodus and i am starting where we left off yesterday at verse 13 of chapter 18. the next day moses sat to judge the people and the people stood around moses from morning till evening when moses mercy's father-in-law jethro saw all that he was doing for the people he said to moses what is this that you are doing for the people why do you sit alone and all the people stand around you from morning till evening and moses said to his father-in-law jethro because the people come to me to inquire of god when they have a dispute they come to me and i deceive decide between one person and another and i make them know the statutes of god and his laws joseph jethro said to moses what you are doing is not good you and the people with you will certainly wear yourselves out for the thing is too heavy for you alone you are not able to do it alone now obey my voice i will give you advice and god be with you you shall represent the people before god and bring their cases to god and you shall warn them about the statutes and the laws and make them know the way in which they must walk and what they must do moreover look for able people from all the people those who fear god who are trustworthy and hate a bribe and place such people over the people as chiefs of thousands of hundreds of fifties and the tens and let them judge the people at all times every great matter they shall bring to you but any small matter they shall decide themselves so it will be easier for you and they will bear the burden with you if you do this god will direct you you will be able to endure and all this people also will go to their place in peace so moses listened to the voice of jethro his father-in-law and did all that he had said moses chose abled people out of all israel and made them heads over the people chiefs of thousands of hundreds of fifties of tens and they judged the people at all times any hard case they brought to moses but any small matter they decided themselves then moses let his father-in-law depart and jethro went away to his own country nevertheless a very very profitable visit in terms of the wisdom and comfort and encouragement that jethro has brought we saw all that yesterday and also the way in which he encouraged moses to give thanks for all that was being achieved with this new community going forward jethro first came to our attention at the time of the burning bush for it was the flock of sheep that jezreel was giving moses to take out into the wilderness to to find pasture of any kind he could and it was when moses was actually leading that flock of sheep of jethro the shepherd priest of midian that he was confronted by his own vocation in a burning bush but now that's in the past and here they are in the middle of the wilderness and at just the point where moses was losing heart in body mind and spirit as we've seen after one thing and another jethro arrives and brings enormous vision again and encouragement and the sense of family and community life and now the wisdom of someone much older who has led people himself but also had to represent divine things to his own people then he is now saying to moses let me give you really good advice otherwise you're going to wear yourselves out and i'm going to actually add to the uh encouragement of these people below me [Applause] and feed them not with manner but with mealworm here we are darcy all of you it's extraordinary how meal worms are wherever we go the staple food of any small creature these are dried meal worms and they're giving nourishment and joy to this little flock a diverse flock we don't always get on but at the moment they're at peace with one another largely speaking they do and the guineas aren't here today so there's a dimension missing let's let's carry on i wanted to say that this advice that jethro has given to moses jesus himself took when he went up into the mountain and spent all night in prayer and then came and chose the twelve so that the burden would be shared in the end moses himself on mount nebo has the same loneliness when he looks at the promised land into which he will never go and jesus has to face on the mount of olives that same sense of carrying the burden alone again but for the moment he is taking jesus advice and on the mountain he comes down after a night in prayer and chooses the 12. and later then the 70 spreading out as jethro said small cases but every great case the 12 constantly come back to jesus as they travel but later on this is the story also of the early church which we read in the acts of the apostles and in the letters how responsibility for leadership and different gifts and uh gifts of wisdom gifts of teaching gifts of administration all of that are shared out it's not good to do anything alone says jethro you'll wear your self out and the original vision will be clouded so we allow the old prophet priest and shepherd to go back now to his own home his task is done he's restored a sense of family life for moses which then will generate the same kind of family life in the community which is going on through into the desert there are many challenges ahead before that vision which this morning the silver birch was giving us in its golden leaves with the autumn sun on it but meanwhile we take as our lord did himself the advice of jethro not good to do anything alone if there are those who can help use them rely on them and that means a saving of resources in our own selves not just for the planet as we step forward and achieve the vision that god is giving any of us day by day sometimes small sometimes great let's look at some dates now 2015 on this day november the 13th the awful terrorist attack coordinated terrorist attack happened in paris the largest one of them at the battleground theater and concert hall we remember that with shock and sadness and remember again what measures especially cities have to take for the protection of their people as we look back in the catalogue of terrorist attacks it's just one in a number but the date causes us to reflect on that day six years ago when those terrorist attacks just were over the city of paris coordinated sought out first so the cities have to be absolutely careful as to how they react but we say our prayers this morning for those who still suffer grief or were injured in that attack and then the dimensions i was talking about i'm going to begin with november the 13th 1868. it was the day on which giorgino rossini the composer died he died in fairly old age he'd lived a long life but at the age of 39 he stopped writing operas and his last great opera we know so many of his operas the barber of seville and from his overtures the silken ladder the thieving magpie gaza ladra as well so many of them we know the overtures but his last great opera was not a comic opera but an historical opera and it was performed in 1829 in paris and it told the story of guillaume tell william tell long opera and rossini porge all his musical gifts and talents into it using huge resources for the time and as he did so and saw it performed others also came and wondered if he's killed donitzetti said acts 1 and 4 may have been created by rossini the center of the opera was created by god well from donizetti that's quite a compliment and rossini everyone thought would then go on to greater and greater and greater opera it was the last opera he wrote the one before coincidentally was called moses and pharaoh or sometimes in its earlier version moses in egypt but let's think of william tell and begin to question why we think that william tell was his last opera because i feel that it it meant that this was the summer of his work he could go no further others could carry that torch from then on his music was of a different kind but if we look at the opera itself his gift to us then the best known bit of course the the best section of the opera in terms of our memories is the overture in its four parts and first of all it expresses rasina's delight in the um dawn the prelude the sense of dawn breaking across the world and as that dawn breaks then hi tiger good morning um that dawn breaks a storm arises now all these things are going to be significant in the opera itself as overtures very often are they're giving us themes of the opera before it starts so here we have a dawn as a prelude to the day and then the storms that the day and the historic situation are going to bring and then that follow that's followed by the most beautiful uh what would you call it really and a meditation on what is called the calling of the dairy cows and as those pastoral creatures are led in then there is a most lovely lovely orchestral piece with an english core english singing uh playing at that time and a a quiet backing because these are gentle creatures and then finally of course the bit we know best of all and those of us who are growing up at the time when the lone ranger was always on we know the beginning and those trumpet calls very well the march of the swiss soldiers which actually is a cavalry gallop but it shows the way forward at that point that overture gives us a sense of what rossini was trying to recapture in the sense that the austrian occupiers of switzerland at that time are the enemy and the swiss are fighting for their freedom and it's the centenary of the beginning of austrian imperial rule in uh switzerland at that time and william tell becomes the great hero of that that struggle but in it there are beautiful love songs and there is almost like a romeo and juliet theme because the son of william tell arnold is in love with a princess of the austrian empire matthieud and so there's that theme and whether that love is possible and whether arnold shall actually uh be um uh ready uh for for the fight in the of the liberty of the swiss and at the same time there's the heroism of william tells little son jamie and the great story of the the the landsberger the austrian landberger gessler making him shoot the arrow through the apple on his son's head you'll know all those things but rossini is giving us a landscape of vision of freedom and his vision of a world of mountainscape and pastoral scene of shepherd's songs and bridal couples of festivals in may with flutes playing all these things he's reaching for and striving to protect in a europe which is becoming more and more and more industrialized and all of those things in the romantic settings on the stage and that by the look of the the the original sets they are really romantic settings then all of those things in this very long opera rossini sets out before us with all his skill i think he felt he couldn't go further and everything else from then on becomes either religious music or or music written for his friends in salons where he could talk to them allow them to play write something for them and go on the last 40 years of his life whether in italy or in paris was taken up with that but his gift his last gift to us of the petite mess solonel which is a lovely orchestral coral and and quartet of soloist mass very rossini rather like his starbuck marsha with operatic arias no nothing more uh operatic than the tener solo in the starbuck marta um but uh kuya-san imam jamantum uh you'll know it probably the minute it it pays but in the opera it's the william tell it says pastoral scenes that he is saying this is what william tell is striving to liberate and protect step by step towards that vision which is represented for us in our vision of the earth restored to beauty but with the resources being used in a sustainable and lovely and clean way restoring and taking action now now the next person i wanted to think about and the next two each give us a short poem and they're beautiful poems um first and first and foremost a poem about struggle and a sense of despair that can come if the struggle is is not actually seeming to be successful these are voracious for the mealworms here we are come on there we are um and uh so um [Music] let me go around to ducky as well not you tiger we are the first is by arthur hugh clough and i'm going to read it it's not very long but it's talking about the way in which a struggle here is is uh a struggle is looking as though it's not successful and the poem is saying don't lose heart because the results of a struggle very often are in areas which are unseen and he uses a beautiful image for that here it is it's just four verses say not the struggle not availis the labour and the wounds are vain the enemy faints not nor phaleth and as things have been they remain if hopes were dupes fears may be liars it may be in yon smoke concealed your comrades chase in now the flyers and but for you possess the field for while the tired waves vainly breaking seem here no painful inch to gain far back through creeks and inlets making comes silent flooding in the main and not by eastern windows only when daylight comes comes in the light in front the sun climbs slow how slowly but westward look the land is bright it's it's as a poem i always like to think of when i'm watching the sun come through an eastern window because the light is also pouring in through western windows and sometimes through focusing on what we think is the goal we miss the fact that victories are happening in different ways everywhere this is an anniversary i should have said of arthur hugh clough and uh clough himself you see where clough died but uh he is one we're remembering today he died on november the 13th 1861 and for me that poem say not the struggle naught of alias is often a comfort when i'm thinking are we making progress and then suddenly you look round and in the most unexpected place or the most unexpected per person there are new shoots and flowers and everything else occurring using metaphors of that the next person who also has an anniversary today is another english poet a mystic parrot a catholic poet in london and he died on this day in 1907 november the 13th his name francis thompson many of you will know his long poem the hound of heaven in which he has an image of god step by step and patiently like a hound tracing ascent following the soul in order in the end to enfold it and wherever we might fly like jonah or like the psalmist if i climb up into heaven out there but if i go down into hell there also the hound of heaven follows step by step it's a very long poem it's what he's best known for it's not the one i'm wanting to read this morning the one i wanted to read this morning again is something about what a vision might be even here and now and also the fact that we are at home in the spiritual dimension of the kingdom of heaven at home and the poem is called in no strange land it's looking at the golden vision which the sun on the silver batch is giving giving us as we look forward but saying that golden vision isn't always found in the treetops it's sometimes found in the most unexpected and desperate places of our life and poorclough died fairly young from from his his decreasing health but here is his poem in no strange land and it's full of the vision of angels wings in the most unexpected places it's another great favorite a world invisible we view thee a world intangible we touch thee a world unknowable we know thee inapprehensible we clutch thee does the fish soar to find the ocean the eagle plunge to find the air that we ask of the stars in motion if they have rumor of thee there not where the whirling systems darken and are benumbed conceiving sores the drift of pinions we would hearken beats at our own clay shuttered doors the angels keep their ancient places turn but a stone and start a wing tis ye tis your estranged faces that miss the many splendid thing but when so sad thou canst not sadder cry and upon thy so-so loss shall shine the traffic of jacob's ladder pitched between heaven and charing cross yea in the night my soul my daughter cry clinging to heaven by the helms and lo christ walking on the water not of jenezeret but thames finding god in the most unexpected places but at home in the spiritual dimension thank you francis thompson for those images of jacob's ladder and jesus walking on the water threatening to overwhelm us but walking towards us and actually in our own situation and finally and this is a character we've used so much in the past and his books we've read last year the birth of robert louis stevenson happened today on the 13th of november 1850. and of course we read last year his travels with a donkey and i always loved reading that aloud his child gardener versus in the same way he's well known for other novels dr jekyll and mr hyde and kidnapped and katrina and all of those but master balancer great storyteller but the one that i know almost by heart from earlier years and love from time to time to dip into again with its map at the beginning is of course treasure island and just as jethro says you can't do anything alone then that little group which set out in a ship to find the island and find buried treasure and the fact that their quest quite often takes them in the wrong direction and causes great how that the the treasure itself causes great dissension and violence amongst the crew all those things and how the crew mutiny and everyone has to um help each other and they find the stockade all those things if you know the the story it's an adventure story but also it's an adventure story which i think gives a clue to stevenson's own life he suffered badly from consumption and needed really to find somewhere else to be and his own search for treasure shall we say and that little treasure map which you'll find at the front of your copy of the treasure island narrative by young jim hawkins but taken over by dr libsy said we can go backwards and forwards with the community on the way through and the way in which they were faithful to one another and also the duplicity of long john silva in the middle of all that one of the most wonderful characters of the pirate character with his crotch and and his lost leg um but what i think stevenson was looking for in vision he actually found in the end not in digging up gold treasure on an island but actually by going because of his health to the island of samoa in the pacific and living his life there until it ended and finding there in the community of samoa and the uh the the the life around him the plant life the ocean surrounding him the life of creatures and the community life of the people and the advice he gave them to treasure everything about their island because if they didn't treasure it someone else would come and treasure it in a way that was not good for them and he when he died he died as a hero of that community and is buried there on that island so that in going there and lifting his whole family life lock stock and barrel right across the world and living on the island of samoa and remember that wonderful speech that was made at cop 26 by the young woman from samoa talking about the dangers they were already in and the way in which help must be given from other nations to save samoa and the other islands from the rising oceans and the storms but stevenson gives us an image of finding that treasure of walking in a different world if you like a spiritual world there in samoa which was the summer of his own life and that i think is why i find treasure island such a touching book because it's reaching out before he ever went to samoa reaching out for that island and then going there himself with all its many dangers at that time and actually living the life there not with any kind of western accompaniment of of the the kind of of of things he had grown up with in civilized situations he formed a completely different kind of life and found happiness there and they also found happiness with him the community there and the precious quality of that island was given a new dimension in that way and long john silver well he is a character too to think of and uh you will have heard in one of our our um videos or one of fletcher's videos yesterday uh the the group it's a bristol group and that's good too because of course it's bristol that the group set off from and it's bristol that they first meet long john silver in before that duplicitous cooks uh a ship's cook goes off with them and of course bristol is one of the cities bristol and bath i was born between the two of them in south gloucestershire bristol is to me heartland of home but this is a bristol group and they're called the longest johns and we've played some of your music it's a favorite group of fletchers and uh we are using some this morning a song which we've broadcast before oaken ash and thorn but they're a group also that delight in sea shanties bristol was the great port of course from which the treasure island expedition began and also english folk songs and there's a lovely sense of being rooted in the communities of the united kingdom as they sing just four voices andy yates dave robinson jonathan darley generally known as jd and robbie satin and that folk music and sense of sea shanties will give you a taste of because that brings us back to the oceans but also the kind of voyage that stevenson and his family would have had to make to follow their vision to treasure island and find the treasure of the island of samoa which transformed their life and helped the culture there with the the outside view of a foreigner stevenson himself who became so much one of them a valued member of their own community so let's say our prayers on this particular day and we are thinking this morning in our prayers for the anglican communion of the diocese of hokkaido in the anglican church of japan nippon seiko kai and in our own diocese continuing to look forward to the results of all that happened in glasgow at the climate change conference pray though for archbishop dustin and for bishop rose of dover and for bishop emma at lambeth so we're going to say and bring your own prayers to this we're going to say the collect for the third sunday before advent which is the last time we shall use it almighty father whose will is to restore all things in your beloved son the king of all govern the hearts and minds of those in authority who bring the families of the nations divided and torn apart by the ravages of sin to be subject to his just and gentle rule who is alive and reigns with you in the unity of the holy spirit one god now and forever amen so we say each in our own language the prayer that 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 now as the bell rings for your reflection uh [Music] is [Music] so [Music] is [Music] foreign [Music] we've been looking back and we've been looking forward using the images of the burning bush and the silver birch and as we do that we also remember jethro's advice try and do nothing alone you need support particularly in your vision and look around in the most unexpected places to find results so we take those lessons to heart the peace of god which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of god and if his son jesus christ our lord and the blessing of god almighty the father the son and the holy spirit be upon you and upon those whom you love and would pray for today and always are men so this is an occasion when we're going to use the music of the longest john's there was a typo yesterday for which we apologize i think it comes from our thinking of long john silva and they were just called the long johns they're not they're called the longest john's and we give thanks for their music there's a wonderful song which can remind you of ducky here which is called moby duck and it's in the form of a sort of sea shanty so all those things we should look forward to as well as of course the oaken ash and thorn which you may remember already fletcher has a treat later on after all his work this week and last because england are playing australia in rugby at twickenham so i think the afternoon for him will be taken up with that and um we don't need to guess who he hopes is going to win enjoy your own day as it proceeds [Music] of all the trees that grow so fast [Music] you that is old in churchyard old he breedeth the mighty bow all the fish shoes do wisement shoes and peachy four cups also but when you have killed in your bowl [Music] [Music] [Music] she hates mankind and waits till every gust be laid to drop a limb on the head of him that anyway trusts her shade but whether a lot be sober or side or mellow with hell from the horn you'll take no wrong way to lie at the long knee though kardashian thorn sing o ganache and thorn goods [Music] [Music] now tell the priesthood for he would call it a sin but we've been out in the woods all night conjuring summer in we bring you good news by word of mouth good news for cattle and corn sure as the sun come up from the south by oak and dash and thorn say no kardashian thorn gets us all the limits on us born surely we'll sing of no little thing in old kardash food [Music] after 14 years i left the sea for a life upon a lake after all the storms i'd seen i needed a good break i thought still waters would mean peace for me but that was a mistake for the place i chose was bedeviled by a giant evil drake a mallard of such malice twice the size of any man a bill to give you nightmares and a monster a swingspan you cannot hope to fight it so avoid him if you can that terrifying waterfowl the beast beyond the damn [Music] [Music] i'm not one for surrender so a vengeful oath i swore i gathered up me hearties like so many times before we shot our ship with weapons and prepared to go to war till the feted feathered fearsome flying duck will breathe no [Music] jack who stuck attack left him without an eye the darby twins with one leg each on deck was standing by only a couple dozen limbs between a crew of [Music] movie duck the fight raged on for several hours defend and then attack with beatings from those wicked wings our boat began to crack the beast rid up to finish the job [Music] broken body back and roast it on and all right barbecue the beast with oyster sauce and pancakes we will have the biggest feasts with all our bites we've rolled with [Music] duck