Preacher: Canon Karen
Date: 27/08/2023
Isaiah 51. 1-6
Romans 12.1-8
Matthew 16.13-20
For those of us of a certain generation, more precisely when the age of majority was 21, did you receive the key to the door on that milestone birthday? I’m not sure 18 year olds do today and in any case 18 wouldn’t fit with “I’ve got the key of the door, never been twenty one before.”
Keys are a vital part of our life, whether the traditional metal variety or plastic cards or key fobs. Their purpose remains the same – they unlock something. Without them we are forbidden entry, excluded from somewhere. I had that very real experience on one of my return trips from America, visiting my family, a couple of years ago. On reaching home I searched for my front door key only to find that it was not in my bag. I searched high and low for the pouch which contained all my keys – without success. So there I was standing in front of my house with no means of getting in until my daughter appeared with the spare key. And then I had to set about obtaining replacements so that I was allowed back in to all the places to which the keys related including this building.
It was a very real experience of being a literal outsider. Being given, perhaps, your own key to the front door on your 21st birthday, or acquiring keys along our life’s journey, means being let in, and being entrusted with something essential.
Peter was entrusted with the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Jesus was about to embark on his journey to Jerusalem and the end of his earthly ministry. Having heard Peter’s declaration that he knew Jesus to be the Messiah, the Son of the living God, an understanding imparted to him from God, Jesus could now be confident in handing over the work that must be continued after his death and resurrection in unlocking the doors of unknowing to future generations – doors of unknowing the nature of God’s kingdom. Peter was to lead that band of disciples in spreading the word; in growing a community of believers in furthering a kingdom like no other – God’s kingdom, a new way of life for the individual and their community, a way of life to unlock the possibilities God sees for us.
In these dark times in our country with great divisions between different sections of our society, industrial unrest, people struggling to make ends meet, many without a home let alone the key to the door, what a vision Isaiah holds before us. I think many today, reading today’s passage, would say, “dream on”. And it’s therefore our task as recipients of the keys of the Gospel to do what we can to bring that vision closer to people’s experience. The seemingly impossible is only seemingly impossible if we look at the world through human eyes, if we seek to order our lives and our communities by human standards. But God sees things differently. He sees the bigger picture. He saw that an elderly couple past child bearing age could found a nation. God sees that it is possible to turn wastelands into gardens. God knows that those who sit in the darkness of despair will know justice, he knows that his deliverance will never be ended.
Jesus had confidence in Peter and he has confidence in us as people who have come to understand his nature, who profess Jesus Christ the Son of the living God. Or do we? Because if we are to bear the responsibility of carrying the keys of the kingdom, we need to be certain in ourselves of who we say we are, who we know ourselves to be and in our relationship with Christ. The critical question Jesus put to Peter was “but who do you say that I am?” You don’t give the keys to unlocking a new life for someone to a person who isn’t too sure themselves who the author, the creator of that new life is.
Being given, with Peter, through God’s mercy and grace the gift of the knowledge of Christ’s nature, we are then entrusted with the keys with which to unlock that knowledge for others. And there is no single way of doing that because although we are all made in God’s image we are each given different gifts. Paul gives us some examples, but there are many more gifts. Just look around you and see what each of you has been given. No gift is superior, more fitted to the task, than another.
In another context I hope that’s what the students who have received their A level and GCSE results these past two weeks know. For some, in the light of their results, their path will be plain. For others, they may need to rethink their plans. Keys open doors but they also lock doors. For some students the door may seem to have shut, but God doesn’t waste gifts as he sees and knows what we don’t always see for ourselves. He may sometimes divert us in the direction in which he knows we can best flourish. May those disappointed students see those different paths opening up before them. And may we recognise that, wherever we are on life’s journey, that what we may see as the right path ahead isn’t always what God has in mind for us.
God has entrusted each of us with the key to unlocking his good news to our world, to our community and we must each discern how we can do that. The task may appear beyond our reach. Where to begin? How do our gifts match the task? It could all begin with a letter.
I heard a lovely story on radio 4 yesterday morning on the Saturday Live programme from Rory Cellan-Jones, the BBC former technology correspondent who is about to publish a book of letters and papers from his late mother which he found when clearing her flat after her death in a box marked “For Rory”. Rory was brought up by his single mother, knowing that he was illegitimate and with no contact with his father until he was an adult, but not knowing his parents’ story or why that story so tested his relationship with his mother and half brother living in very humble circumstances.
It was as he read the letters left for him that the key was turned and Rory came to see and know his mother for the remarkable woman she was, living with prejudice and strained relationships in her own family, working to support her family in jobs which did not use fully her skills and gifts and enabling Rory to see the bigger picture and where he fitted in.
The key to that box of letters and papers unlocked a vital part of Rory’s life. The key to the good news of Jesus Christ has the potential to unlock the lives of so many today who yearn for something of Isaiah’s vision, who long, whether they are able to admit it or not, to be able to profess with Peter that Jesus is the Son of the living God who has transformed their lives.
We have been entrusted with the keys of the Kingdom. How are we going to use them to unlock doors in our community?