good morning and welcome to the dinery garden and canterbury cathedral on this tuesday the 21st of september it's not only saint matthews day which we will certainly talk about and reflect on it's also the equinox so autumn has begun the fall has come and we are here in under a blue sky an autumn sky a beautiful morning but it was also a beautiful evening with a full moon shining and the flowers which are behind me now looking luminous in the evening light and now looking beautiful in the morning light as the sun comes up not a breath of wind but a slight mist when we got up but now things clearing yet definitely the scent of the air is the scent of autumn we remind ourselves that in older times in western christendom the four sections of the bravery the books of prayers to say the morning and evening offices and the other offices of the day were divided not by liturgical seasons but by natural seasons so it had one had one book for winter one book for spring one book for summer and one book which began at about this time of year for the autumn that of course meant that the seasons were linked with the northern hemisphere and so that has changed but it's good to remember as the seasons change in both hemispheres just how we enjoy them in completely different ways and so this morning we are enjoying this first day of autumn but we're also enjoying the fact that this is the feast of saint matthew apostle and evangelist that's a title which also goes to the fourth gospeler saint john apostle and evangelist and we shall be thinking not only of those two roles of the apostolic role and the role of an evangelist in us a specific role of writing down the gospel the news that they have so that that good news can be passed on to us the evangel can be passed on at the same time the apostolic ministry the role of an apostle a completely different kind of vocation but both we all share in and this day also because of st matthew's particular calling as uh sitting at the tax desk in his gospel when jesus calls him uh because of that we've got the question mark what is a value in human life and that will be part of our election uh our reflection too as we come to that part of our service but let's begin our prayers today as we keep this happy feast of saint matthew apostle and evangelist as autumn begins oh lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise your faithful servants bless you they make known the glory of your kingdom blessed are you sovereign god ruler and judge of all to you be praise and glory forever in the darkness of this age that is passing away may the light of your presence which the saints enjoy surround our steps as we journey on may we reflect your glory this day and so be made ready to see your face in the heavenly city where night shall be no more 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 psalm on this 21st morning of the month is psalm 105. we won't read all of it but we will read a significant portion of it it reflects back on our normal daily reading of the story of joseph and we come to that verse which i mentioned the other day which has a very different translation in modern times than the translation that we were always used to a phrase of which has passed into the english language oh give thanks to the lord and call upon his name make known his deeds among the peoples sing to him sing praises and tell of all his marvelous works rejoice in the praise of his holy name let the hearts of them rejoice who seek the lord seek the lord and his strength seek his face continually remember the marvels he has done his wonders and the judgments of his mouth o seed of abraham his servant o children of jacob his chosen he is the lord our god his judgments are in all the earth he has always been mindful of his covenant the promise that he made for a thousand generations the covenant he made with abraham the oath that he swore to isaac which he established as a statute for jacob an everlasting covenant for israel saying to you will i give the land of canaan to be the portion of your inheritance when they were but few in number of little account and sojourners in the land wandering from nation to nation from one kingdom to another people he suffered no one to do them wrong and rebuked even kings for their sake saying touch not my anointed and do my prophets no harm then he called down famine over the land and broke every staff of bread but he had sent a man before them joseph who was sold as a slave they shackled his feet with fetters his neck was ringed with iron until all he foretold came to pass the word of the lord tested him well that psalm goes on it's a long historical psalm but that passage traces what we have been doing in our readings in genesis through that journey and the verse that i mentioned they shackled joseph's feet with fetters his neck was ringed with iron that last line used to be translated the iron entered into his soul and that passed into the english language that one would say about someone that experience was so desperate that the iron entered into their soul so let's remember that historical story which we will return to but we're not doing that today because this is the feast of st matthew the gospel at the eucharist will be the story of the calling of saint matthew but i'm not going to use this as the matins lesson this morning we are going to the first letter of paul to timothy and going to chapter 6 and we're going to begin chapter six at verse three let me just get to that in a moment my book is sticky this morning there we are so chapter six of the letter of paul to timothy and we're starting at verse 3. timothy teach and urge these things and if anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our lord jesus christ and the teaching that accords with godliness well they are puffed up with conceit and understand nothing they have an unhealthy craving for controversy and for quarrels about words which produce envy dissension slander evil suspicions and constant friction among people who are depraved in mind and deprived of the truth imagining that godliness is a means of gain but godliness with contentment is great gain for we brought nothing into the world and we cannot take anything out of the world but if we have food and clothing with these we will be content but those who desire to be rich fall into temptation into a snare into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction for the love of money is the root of all kinds of evils it is through this craving that some have wandered away from the face and pierced themselves with many pangs but as for you timothy man of god flee these things pursue righteousness godliness faith love steadfastness gentleness fight the good fight of the faith lay hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses i charge you in the presence of god who gives life to all things and of christ jesus who in his testimony before pontius pilate made the good confession keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our lord jesus christ which he will display at the proper time he who is the blessed and only sovereign the king of kings and lord of lords who alone has immortality who dwells in unapproachable light whom no one has ever seen or can see to him the honor and eternal dominion amen and as for those who are rich in this present age charge them not to be haughty not to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches but to set their hopes on god who richly provides us with everything to enjoy they are to do good to be rich in good works to be generous and ready to share thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future so that they may take hold of that which is truly life oh timothy god the deposit entrusted to you avoid the irreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge or for by professing it some have swerved from the faith and grace be with you it's a wonderful instruction from saint paul to his disciple who had heard the call and followed him just as matthew in his gospel sets out the way in which he was called from the tax desk to follow jesus and rose to that call immediately leaving behind what had been his interest and going out to the apostolic ministry that came first that experience and the hearing of the story of jesus from other sources too of course and how much matthew wove into that gospel which has become his gospel according to the name assigned to it by the early church we don't need to speculate this morning what we need to speculate on is what value it is to be apostolic a minister of that good news which each of us having had the faith handed on to us and praying each day for grace to know which what is a value each of us can join in with in the most simple ways but then afterwards matthew's name becomes associated with that first evangel that first gospel which tells the story of the human ministry of the word made flesh the epistle to timothy talks about the infinite glory of god so bright that as we glimpse the morning sun we we can't we have to shield our eyes from it and he is imagining that is an image of god unapproachable light but the image is so great it's giving light and life to all things but no one has ever seen or can see that directly in humankind and yet god has by grace given us the image of all of that in the person of our lord jesus christ and that is what paul is expressing to timothy once again saying hold on to that which is valuable and do not be enticed and help your people not to be enticed away by the uncertain value of what people call wealth riches things of value and as for those who possess them show them how to use them and at the same time don't let them discount your youth because it matters not whether young or middle aged or old or very old that apostolic ministry and that role of the evangelist can be carried out in a multitude of different ways and shared body mind and spirit with others with the grace given day by day so today we give thanks for the story of saint matthew but also the not only the evangel he gave us the good news with the teaching of jesus and we think of saint matthew's gospel as the gospel which gives us the sermon on the mount but it originally gives us also the journey of the magi and that particular strand of that joseph's dreams when joseph by the angel is given his vocation of being the guardian of the holy family and of naming the holy child and protecting them as they went down into egypt all of that from matthew's gospel and at the same time we think of him as an apostle sharing the good news and the good news of the evangel so we think of matthew on this turning of the year here in the northern hemisphere the equinox and turning of the year in the southern hemisphere in a completely different way and journeys across the world now so swift can take us from one hemisphere to the other in a single day but we find that whether we are in the northern hemisphere or the southern hemisphere beginning autumn or beginning spring it means that we can preach that gospel which matthew gave us and find that which is of value in ourselves that we can share and bring out that which is of value in others with their particular gifts think of just one or two things which have happened on this day this 21st of september well first of all uh let's see one of the the things which is uh quite amusing of a false value uh in 1915 mr c h chubb for the price of 6 600 pounds bought stonehenge and that world heritage site of infinite value of people coming to to just see it try to understand it and it's become of course a symbol to the whole world well mr chad bought it for 6600 pounds he bought it as a present for his wife but three years later mr chubb gave it to the nation because his wife said the present didn't suit her what is a value what is not of value completely different to different folk and in 2012 this is uh another short memory in 2012 jessica harper was jailed for five years for fraud she in her work had submitted 93 false and doctored invoices to pay herself two million four hundred and sixty three thousand seven hundred and fifty pounds and today she in 2012 she was imprisoned for that searching after those riches what is the value what is not this is the day also that the emperor charles v the holy roman emperor who died two months before elizabeth the first came to the throne he died in 1558 and she came to the throne in 1558 he died in september she came to the throne in november but at the same time charles the fifth had been the most powerful emperor that europe and really the world at that time had had ever seen for his lands and he'd been born in 1500 but become emperor in 1530 his lands stretched across spain where his capital was the beautiful city of toledo at that time right across germany for he was the holy roman emperor right across austria to vienna and on that side of his kingdom he was striving against the ottomans as they attempted to push into europe right across the netherlands down into italy both the north and the south not the papal states themselves but down to naples and also uh into burgundy and at the same time all the spanish possessions on the other side of the atlantic an enormous heritage and an enormous empire it was the first european empire and of which it was said on it the sun never set and there was truth in that for it went right around the world in one way and then came the other side as it it touched at the east and at the west so we think of charles v and he himself spent his life journeying from one place to another to another shall we say also fire fighting there was an enormous threat to the breakup of his empire his holy roman empire because of the growth of protestantism in in the northern he a very firm catholic as the holy roman empire emperor who saw himself as the guardian of christendom but at the same time he would go from capital to capital to capital and he said my life has been one long journey and then in 1556 he suddenly abdicated and decided to go to a spanish monastery and see out the days of his life there in seclusion it was not a total seclusion he wrote constantly to people but he also attended the offices of the day and had simple rooms though around him were some of the paintings of titian but he also surrounded himself with ticking clocks to remind himself in his apartment that human life was finite and the things of value were not what people often thought they were this emperor who had then divided his empire into different heirs and already his son philip ii was ruling in spain where charles the v was we think of that in that great emperor deciding that what was really of value was something quite different and going off to that life of rhythmic seclusion in the monastery just reflecting on his own mortality his life and embracing the concept of a spiritual life which would take him onward into the infinite realms in which he believed in which those offices of the monks around him were helping him to realize well let's then think of that the last thing of today for in 1874 a gustaf host the composer was born he was born in cheltenham in gloucestershire here in england and i don't want to deal too much with his life because host we've looked at quite recently i wanted to look at his most popular work the planets the seven planets that he in looking up at the sky and thinking and musing on them found an inspiration for his music host said always i take an interest really only in things that inspire and suggest music and the planets which have become intensely popular but were written in the middle of the first world war between the years of 1914 and 1917 and you can imagine what the world felt like then and those planets give different characteristics of human characters mars starts it off the bringer of war and those clashing sounds which it first made audiences sitting up and sit up and wince the first public performance in full was given at the end of the first world war in 1920 in the queen's hall by the london symphony orchestra but parts of them were conducted by the composers before that and at the time people found them quite hard going at the same time they realized the genius in it and the times correspondent at the first public performance was pretty downbeat about what he heard and then it was only a few years later that the times was lording this piece of composition as something of pure genius helping people reflect on that mars the bringer of war and then that massive sound of brass and chords clashing against each other in different keys goes to venus the bringer of peace one of the most tranquil movements that host is wanting to share that gift with humanity mercury fast the winged messenger racing from place to place with the instrumentation doing all of that and then the magnificent and majestic jupiter which starts with a dance the bringer of jolity and it was said that when this was performed in the queen's hall the ushers outside found themselves up skipping around because of what was going on it was performed in the afternoon and and there was a sense of jolity when the jupiter version was but in the middle of course there is that majestic piece which now we know all too well as the hymn tune for the hymn by spring rice i vow to be my country and the juxtaposition of the two kingdoms the earthly kingdom requiring loyalty but at the same time the heavenly kingdom requiring a larger loyalty even now there's another country i've heard of long ago and all of that and and you get the we may not count her armies we may not see her king but all of that goes into that lovely line and so by soul and silently her shining bounds increase and her ways are ways of gentleness and all her powers are peace going with that majestic tune in the middle of jupiter bringing out of jolity saturn bringer of old age and full of ticking clocks in the orchestral accompaniment but at the same time we think then of charles v leaving what he had had to do to find what he thought was of infinite value but reminding himself of the passage of time in this life by ticking clocks all around him uranus the magician where amazing and wonderful things can happen even here and now and finally neptune the mystic passing from this life to that which is infinite and how did host do that by an amazing thing of a women's choir standing outside the orchestral hall in which everything is being conducted with the door open between them no words simply the sound of their voices and at the end dying away and ending with the door between the two halls quietly closing and an infinite silence different scenes which can be embraced even now on a day when we both welcome autumn and all it brings or in a different hemisphere begin to welcome spring and at the same time we give thanks for the role of apostle and evangelist in which we ourselves may take part and share so let's use the colit for st matthew's day and at the same time this morning we remember the diocese of full spay in the anglican communion the anglican church of southern africa that the province there's a very different hemisphere for this than this northern hemisphere where autumn or the fall is beginning and here in this diocese as we pray for archbishop justin and for bishop rose of dover bishop tim at lambeth pray for all churches dedicated to saint matthew and at the same time we pray for the parish of hedcorn and the suttons here in the diocese and the ministry of fiona haskett in those parishes here's the conic for saint matthew bring your own prayers and intentions from right across the world oh almighty god whose blessed son called matthew the tax collector to be an apostle and evangelist give us grace to forsake the selfish pursuit of gain and the possessive love of riches that we may follow in the way of your son jesus christ who is alive and reigns with you in the unity of the holy spirit one god now and forever are men so we say each in our own language 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 now for your own prayers so god give you grace to follow sin matthew evangelist and apostle and all his saints in faith and hope and love and 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 [Music] [Music] oh [Applause] [Music] is [Applause] [Music] oh [Applause] [Music] is [Applause] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] oh [Applause] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Applause] [Music] you