His ain folk didna ken Him

He came unto His own and His own received Him not. John 1:11

I was considerably interested a week or so ago when I found this text translated “He came… and His own did not recognise Him.”

And then when I found a Scottish version of it which read “He cam unto His ain folk and His folk did’na ken Him.” I was distinctly intrigued.

It is one of the most chilling experiences of life to deserve and expect a warm welcome from strangers and yet to receive none. But to be greeted coldly and slightly by our relatives is even worse. None of us is immune from the hurt that come from being deliberately avoided and cold shouldered by those who know us.

That is the tragedy that lies behind this text. And it runs right through the Gospel -

John commences His Gospel with the pathos that this text lends it and strangely enough he closes it with a story equally as tragic “And when the morning was come Jesus stood on the shore but the disciples knew not that it was Jesus.” Once again “He cam unto His ain folk and His ain folk didna ken Him.”

It is the SUPREME TRAGEDY of the New Testament.

MESSIAH came to OWN PEOPLE – (carefully prepared) Failed to recognise Him.

Reminds me of two stories – Ulysses

                                               Lost son.

THAT WAS HIS HEARTBREAK -

AND WHY DID IT ALL HAPPEN? Why so carefully instructed did they fail to recognise their King -

TOO CAUTIOUS!

TOO ORTHODOX – Dr Stalker

“Life of Christ” at time of Advent Jewish Nation had attained a degree of orthodoxy unprecedented in its history -

Free of idolotry – priests recognised and honoured – Temple Services attended Feasts observed with strictest regularity.

But FAITH had become STEREOTYPED – no room for new light – so failed to recognise their Lord.

(3) LANGUAGE – Masters of the letter – but strangers to the spirit of the prophecies.

R.L.S. used to tell of a beggar who often sought his company, Could recite noblest passage in English Poetry – could not DISCUSS -

Dr W.L. Watkinson – tells of student of his acquaintance – extraordinary genius for acquiring book-knowledge.

That was the tragedy – The Jewish leaders mastered the prophets - but all words.

Ye search the scriptures thinking that in them ye find eternal life; but they merely testify of me, and ye will not come to me that ye might have life.

(DETAIL) pay tithe 7 mint & cumin & have omitted the weightier matter of the law, judgement mercy and faith. These ye ought to have done and not left undone.

He came unto His own folk etc. It is the most ancient of tragedies - & Most MODERN – HOW CAN I PUT IT RIGHT?

Story from early days of American history. The animosity between red and white men had reached such a pitch that no home was secure – Resolved great Yeoman Army – BANCROFT described lovliest scene witnessed in Western World.

Beneath bower erected on green river bank – chiefs and warriors, Sencas, Delewares, Shawness sued for peace -

Surrendered captives – reunion.

But many remained unclaimed – someone suggested lullabies -

God knows every move of the soul to-wards Himself and will go out to meet them.

To those who know and receive He gives the right to be called His sons.

Preached in Horninglow Methodist Church. Year unknown.

Good Friday

“Now in the place where He was crucified there was a garden” John 19:41

I made a discovery when I found this text – that though three other writers of the gospel tell us about the crucifixion of Christ, John, who writes his story last is the only one who supplies us with the fact that in the awful place where it happened there was a garden. I said I found the text – I did in so far as I was browsing at the time amongst the readings of the passion story;- but perhaps the reverse is true that the text really found me and turned the musing of my mind from the shadow of the cross to the glory of a garden. And yet – without eliminating the cross.

Why was it I wonder that John saw something worth recording in the fact?

Was it that in later years he saw, what perhaps the others missed. How appropriate it was. That though the cross stood for the apparent end of Joy, and hope and life, the GARDEN was the symbol of things ever being renewed. It wouldn’t be one of those trim tidy little gardens which we know, with careful set out beds and prescribed places in which to walk. It would be a plantation of trees and shrubs, olives, vines and maybe figs, thick with foliage and blossom. A place where the breezes blew and the sun shone. Yes I think that John saw that out of the place of death life rises anew in the beauty and blossom of the garden. And when we linger near the cross, that has been described as the deadly tree, what fragrance blossoms even from its rude bareness. One of truly amazing things about the tragedy of the cross as Jesus never lost for one moment the beautiful and delicate point of his own self and soul.

“Father forgive them etc” - Love triumphant over hate.”Today thou shalt be with me in paradise” - Goodness overcoming evil. Beauty out of ugliness. A garden at the foot of the cross.

It reminds me of those lines of Matheson the blind poet,

“O cross that liftest up my head

I dare not ask to fly from Thee;

I lay in dust life’s glory dead,

And from the ground there blossoms red

Life that shall endless be.”

Blossoms from the ground. A garden in the place of the cross.

In “The Everlasting Man” G.K.Chesterton declares that life is a great game of noughts and crosses – place in a new way. The NOUGHTS stand for the ordinary routine of life – the round, the grind, the treadmill, conformity to established tradition. The cross of the game, to be place with success, is placed inside the nought so that its points pierce the circle – and shatters its monotony for ever.

That is a remarkable and suggestive truth. It says in another way what John implies in this text, and what men like Matheson realised, out of their bitter experience, that the cross which on the one hand disturbs, and shatters life, may on the other hand save it and restore it. The cross always means hardship and sorrow and pain but there is no real progress without it. The saints of old realised it and deliberately chose it. In one of his essays Dr Boreham relates a story from the life of St Francis of Assisi by Prof Heckless. St Francis found a terrible conflict raging in his mind. He longed to be a monk but he loved a beautiful woman. He was not the type of man to pour scorn on the happiness of married life. But he chose the monastery. One moonlit night when the ground was covered with snow his fellows saw him step out into the garden and there with clever hands, he fashioned in the snow the forms of a beautiful woman and a group of children. Then giving rein to his fancy he experienced the joys of the family. Then he kissed them one by one broke up the snowy forms and returned to his cell. Once and for all he crucified part of his warm nature; but there was no bitterness or resentment. He turned the place where he was crucified into a garden and ever since men have gathered, the “Little Flowers of St Francis.” Life can bring us to difficult crossroads and terrific problems but no experience can come to any one of us that cannot be dealt with in such a way that we can have a garden in the place where we have the cross.

But there was another truth, so many of us are afraid of the cross. We prefer to get all the pleasure and comfort out of life we can without any thought of others. We turn away from any suggestion of sacrifice. The world to-day seems to be in the agony of its crucifixion, there is more sorrow, more trouble, more fears and forebodings than ever. It is so bad that sometimes I wonder if it could be much worse. Yet I remember that it was out of a darker more evil situation that the first ray of hope shone. Those that were about the cross thought that evil had conquered – had got away with it. But there was a garden in the place where He was crucified and it’s bursting bugs and blossoms refuted the lie.

England isn’t going to be the garden you and I want it to be though,

“By singing Oh how beautiful and sitting in the share, while better men than we go out and start their working lives at grubbing weeds from gravel paths with broken dinner knives” This is an old legend about St Peter fleeing from Rome – on the Appian way he met his Lord “Quo Vadis” Whither goest thou? - Peter went back and accepted the cross. - “He that cometh after me said Jesus, and this is no legend – let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”

Right deep down in my heart I know I don’t despair for the world because in the place where we has crucified there was a garden and it assures me that in the great encounter with evil God- took steps to ensure that goodness will triumph – it shall win the day. The empty tomb in the garden is the greater guarantee of that. But victory waits for folks like you and me to take up the cross. To set it up willingly in our own lives and let it’s points pierce our complacency and smug satisfaction. Our easy going selfishness and unconcern for anything but out own pleasure and comfort.

Yes! The kingdom of God awaits your choice to take up the cross. From the says of the early persecution the sign of the cross was the secret-mark of the Christians. It still is. No life can be truly Christian without it.

Dated 7th April 1946 at Sidney Street Methodist Church, Burton-on-Trent, Good Friday 1947 at Rolleston Methodist Church and Good Friday 1952 church unknown.