Finding hope amongst grief and sadness
John Bentham was Coordinating Chaplain at the Academy of Nottingham at the time of his sudden and tragic expiry on sixth Baronial from a pulmonary embolism. John was well known and much loved in the Diocese of Southwell and Nottingham, having trained at St John's College, Nottingham, been vicar of St Saviour'due south in the Meadows in inner metropolis Nottingham for nearly a decade before being Clergyman for more ii decades, and had been active in the diocese including being West Bingham Expanse Dean. He was a prime mover behind persuading Mike Pilavachi to set Soul Survivor as an almanac youth festival, and locally he was a founding trustee of the Malt Cross as a Christian-led cafe and arts heart in the centre of Nottingham and the operating base of operations of the city's Street Pastors.
I knew John well; our children had been at schoolhouse together, and we had twice met up on holiday as families. John has been struggling with mental health issues around anxiety, and he had come up and stayed with united states for a peaceful Easter long weekend earlier in the twelvemonth. At the beginning of the memorial service on Wednesday, I felt an overwhelming sense of sadness at his loss, and found it hard to sing the words of the songs and hymns. This was my fourth funeral in a month, three in church and i conducting by a civil celebrant, and I had reflected on the divergence between the 2 kinds of service on Radio 4's You lot and Yours, which you can listen to here. Church services offering a message of transcendent hope—decease is non the last word over homo life. But they besides offer a structure sense of customs, where nosotros share in words and deportment that have been repeated generation after generation, and communal rituals, which provide strong containers for our loss and grief. I felt the consequence of this myself, as sadness intermingled with the hope of resurrection in Jesus—though the promise never eradicates the sadness, rather giving it a wider context as the two sit down aslope 1 another.
I reproduce here the tribute to John from Andrew Cole, the onetime Cosmic Chaplain at Nottingham who was for many years John's colleague, read at the service past the Pro-Vice Chancellor of the University. Not only is this a lovely tribute, merely it offers a wonderful articulation of the significant of our shared hope in Christ. This is followed by the sermon preached by my colleague at St Nic'south, Steve Silvester, who modelled for us a fashion of holding together our questions of God in times like this, our sadness in our loss, and our confidence in Christ.
I share these in the hope that they will be a existent tribute to John, a real comfort to those of u.s. who go along to feel sadness at the loss of such a friend, and a model to those who need to minister in similar situations.
Andrew Cole writes: I am privileged to have been asked by John's family unit to requite a curt tribute to his work as one of the many wonderful people who have served the staff and students of the Academy of Nottingham equally chaplains and faith advisers. Although I cannot be with you lot in person today I am very much with yous in spirit, and I would similar to limited my deepest sympathy to Marianne, Alice, Henry, James, Rosie and all John's family and friends, as those who know him and love him accept gathered to remember him and to commend him to Almighty God, the Father and source of all life, whom John served faithfully as a Christian, a priest and a chaplain.
I call back that John would be quietly pleased with this afternoon's proceedings, because here three worlds which he inhabited and which he held in tension are colliding – his family, the Church and the University. He would have enjoyed the frenetic activity which led to the organising of this liturgy, the phone calls, the meetings, the conversations, the bringing together of people from many different backgrounds who have all gathered in 1 place for one purpose even if they accept come by different paths.
I say this considering for v years, during my ministry equally Catholic Chaplain to the University of Nottingham, I worked with John to prepare the annual Festival of Lessons and Carols. While most people were looking forrad to the summer vacation, we would sit down down in May to discuss Christmas carols. Nearer the time, this seventy-5-minute long service would get all-consuming. Where will the coaches be? To robe or non to robe? To mull wine or non to mull vino? What readings from Sacred Scripture volition nosotros hear? What hymns volition we sing? Who will innovate the service and who will preach? What balance is there between the dissimilar Christian traditions – and, even more than trenchantly, the different musical traditions?
But that was John. He wanted this almanac service – in which academy met city on perchance the simply time of the yr when many of those who attended it would come into a church building – to exist right. He wanted information technology to be an act of worship that was inclusive and across-the-board, ecumenical and yet still rooted in the beauty of the Anglican tradition that was his spiritual home and in which he served as a priest of the Church of God, an uplifting celebration of God's beloved made real to which all were welcome.
John served as clergyman for twenty-i years, from 1998 until his death; for much of that fourth dimension, he was Coordinating Chaplain, the get-go amidst equals – a patriarch rather than a pope, representing the chaplaincy to the Academy and the University to the chaplaincy. He would gather us together for regular meetings – they were possibly besides regular for some of united states of america who really do see them as a practical culling to work, specially when we did not get by item one on the agenda, simply John could come across the value of bringing people together to talk over and eventually to decide how we could work together for the common good of those whom we were chosen to serve. He worked hard to integrate the chaplaincy into the wider network of educatee services while maintaining the chaplaincy's unique mission and ministry, which was ofttimes misunderstood. But he made sure that we were there and we had our rightful place.
During his time, the ecumenical and multi-faith dimension of chaplaincy flourished; I volition e'er remember with gratitude his coming to preach at Sunday Mass in the Great Hall, and he was always grateful that I invited him to give the approving with me at the stop of Mass. Such gestures meant a lot to John because through them we could seek together to discern God's will for us and come up closer to 1 another in common understanding and appreciation of each other's traditions and journeys.
John's journey hither on globe ended on vithursday August this twelvemonth, when he was called from this life to the eternal glory that God, in his goodness, has prepared for us; this date is pregnant, because it is when many Christians within the Anglican and Cosmic traditions which John and I represent celebrate the Transfiguration of Jesus, when he revealed his glory equally the Risen Lord in our midst. I believe that John, having worked so hard to transform the lives of so many people for the better, will himself take been transformed, 'changed from celebrity into glory' and so that he can rest and savour the Kingdom of Heaven.
I shall miss him, because we became great friends and we nourished each other in faith. I last saw him in Grimsby, where I am parish priest, when he came to stay for the weekend, some months ago now. I did not know then that I would non see him again until we meet in the Kingdom of Heaven. It saddens me that he has gone earlier me, marked with the sign of religion; only information technology fills me with slap-up hope that he has been caught up inside the all-embracing and all-inclusive love of God, who only has one item on his agenda for all of usa – that we may have life, and have information technology to the full.
John, cheers. Rest in peace. Amen.
Male parent Andrew Cole, Cosmic Chaplain to the University of Nottingham 2011-2017, 4thursday September 2019
Steve Silvester writes: Information technology is an honor to speak at this service. I know that there are many hither who are more capable than me, those who have served alongside John over the years, and those whom John encouraged into ministry.Like John, I have ministered in this great metropolis of Nottingham for a long time, and for significant stretches of time we served together – as Trustees of The Malt Cross, as Area Deans, on Bishop's Council, and as honorary canons of Southwell Minster.
When yous are installed as a canon, you are given a psalm, which is associated with your detail stall in the cathedral. Mine is Psalm 27; John's is Psalm 91, the psalm we take simply heard read.
iv 'Because he loves me,' says the Lord, 'I will rescue him;
I will protect him, for he acknowledges my proper noun.
15 He will call on me, and I volition answer him;
I will be with him in problem,
I will deliver him and laurels him.
16 With long life I will satisfy him
and show him my salvation.'
I wonder how you felt when Colin read those words. Speaking personally, I feel such a sense of stupor and sadness around John'due south death. With long life I volition satisfy him – rubbish! He was 60, for goodness sake. He will call on me, and I volition answer him. Well, where was your reply, God? John died at the weakest point in his life, when he was so fragile and solitary on a psychiatric ward, before he could hold the grandchild that Alice volition soon bring into the world. Call that 'rescue', 'deliverance', 'honour'??
Every bit a catechism you are meant to pray your allotted psalm every solar day. I don't know whether John managed this. I haven't – non every solar day. Notwithstanding, your psalm does go part of you, and I take no doubt that phrases from this Psalm would take featured regularly in John's prayers, specially when life was a struggle.You see, you don't need a psalm similar this when life is running smoothly. You need a psalm like this when yous feel insecure, when yous know all too well 'the terror of the night', and when y'all sense that the cobra is about to strike.
Interestingly, words from this Psalm characteristic in that very dark and dangerous fourth dimension in Jesus' life, when he was tempted. Mockingly, Satan says to him,
'If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down. For it is written (in Psalm 91): '"He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift yous up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone."'
I don't have a great stomach for sailing. I shortly feel queasy. Only I have learned that when there is a keen, and when the waves toss you around, you accept to keep looking at the horizon and that constant, thin flat line will keep you from being ill. And a psalm like this acts every bit the horizon. Look at the waves and you volition be sick. You take to set up your optics on something that is constant, unchangeable, and around which you can orientate your mind. God is proficient. God is true-blue. God is trustworthy.
1 Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High
will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
2 I volition say of the Lord, 'He is my refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust.'
Wait at the horizon! Barbara Brown Taylor, in her beautiful book Learning to Walk in the Dark writes these words:
I have learned things in the nighttime that I could never take learned in the lite, things that saved my life over and over once more, so that there is really but one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much every bit I demand calorie-free… There is a lite that shines in the darkness, which is only visible there.
… I wish I could turn to the church for help, just so many congregations are preoccupied with keeping the lights on correct now that the last thing they desire to talk about is how to befriend the dark.
Well that'due south why we're talking near the darkness now, here in church.I often think about those lovely words of invitation that we sometimes use in our communion services.
Come to this table, not because you must but because you may,
not considering yous are strong, simply because y'all are weak.
Come, non because any goodness of your own gives y'all a right to come,
but because you lot demand mercy and help.
Come, because yous beloved the Lord a niggling and would like to love him more.
Come, considering he loved you and gave himself for you lot.
Similar me, you may experience a great sadness when you think of John'southward decease, only the truth is, the simply way we can come to God is equally weak and in need.
John did great things in this city, as Bishop Tony has said. His practical wisdom rescued many a Trustees' or Council meeting. He served with diligence and courage. He battled to bring the practiced news of Jesus to people – especially young people – in ways that they could understand, that made sense, that were real. He was a blessing to and so many people in the churches and university that he served.And John was a very proud father. To his children – y'all are your father's greatest legacy! You may not know many of u.s., just we know all about you! He loved you and then much.
Simply we don't come to God presenting our achievements. We come needing shelter, refuge, protection and mercy. And that is what He gives.'Do non allow your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe besides in me' says Jesus (John fourteen.1). The horizon that looks and so flat proves to exist curved, and the way to the God Nearly High, who is our dwelling, proves to be Jesus. "I am the way and the truth and the life. No-1 comes to the Male parent except through me" (John xiv.6)
Nosotros're hither today to thank God for John and to gloat his life. I am pretty certain that John would not accept called for his gift to us at this service to be a message about darkness or that he would exist transfigured through weakness. But that is what he has given us.
It is i of the near profound paradoxes of the Christian faith that we are strong when nosotros are weak and that hope is birthed in darkness. At the centre of the Christian religion is a man who died a very sad and solitary expiry, in weakness and shame, simply Jesus has become the way through death to life. Without the cantankerous and tomb at that place is no resurrection."New life," says Brown Taylor, "starts in the nighttime. Whether information technology is a seed in the footing, a infant in the womb, or Jesus in the tomb, information technology starts in the nighttime."
It may be for some of you here today, that you came with great sadness but you tin can leave with hope. You came with cynicism, but you tin can get out with organized religion. Yous came solitary, but y'all can go out with Jesus. Come and talk with me afterwards if that's you.
I desire to terminate, if I may, past addressing John's family and closest friends. You lot will probably feel a whole range of emotions – sadness, anger, guilt or numbness. These are normal emotions in whatsoever bereavement. You lot may be cross with John for how he tried to cope, for decisions he made. You may be left with questions and things that you wish y'all'd been able to say to him or do with him. It will have time for these things to piece of work themselves through.Just I hope y'all will also exist feeling 3 other things.
Firstly, love and compassion. The more you lot feel compassion for John the closer yous will be to the heart of God and the kinder y'all will exist able to exist on yourself.
Secondly, gratitude – gratitude for a good man, a human being of God, a man of integrity, a man with faults, among them supporting West Ham, a man with weaknesses just similar you, but who loved you lot and wanted the best for you.
Finally, freedom. Y'all don't have to carry John. Jesus has gone ahead and prepared a place for him. John dwells in the shelter of the Most High. Let him rest in the shadow of the Omnipotent.
Revd Steve Silvester, Rector, St Nic's, Nottingham.
John had e'er loved U2, and after the sermon we listened to U2's version of Psalm 40.
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