“You will see heaven opened”
Sermon on the Feast of Michaelmas
St Michael’s Church, Camden, at their Patronal Festival Mass
Genesis 28:10–17; Psalm 138; Revelation 12:7–12; St John 1:47–51
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And Jesus said to him, “You will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man”
Eighty years ago this very weekend, on Michaelmas Eve 1939, twenty five days after the declaration of War on Germany, the statue of St Michael that still stands here at the front of the nave, was first revealed and dedicated.
Amid the shabby-chic of today’s St Michael’s Camden Town, there the Archangel Michael is, restored and gorgeous, seen as he would have been seen by our forebears that Michaelmas Eve eighty ago.
The statue was presented in memory of Fr Arthur Baldwin Davis, who had been curate of this parish since 1927. Fr Davis has been unwell for most of his curacy, but “stuck to his post,” said the Vicar at his funeral, “so long as he was able to drag himself to the altar.”
How poignant, how remarkable that his widow chose as a memorial for sickly Fr Davis this upright, forthright, vibrant statue. What an act of faith and courage to place, as a memorial to a man whose life was marked by pain and sacrifice, this gleaming image of the glory of God’s archangel.
And, indeed, what an act of hope and tenacity for a congregation, for a generation, facing in September ’39 far worse than our own melodramas of Trump and Boris and Brexit — what an act of hope and tenacity, as they prepared their air-raid defences, to dedicate to memory and glory this splendid reminder of the war that is forever fought in the hearts of men and women and in the highest places between good and evil, this splendid reminder of the eternal triumph in that war of love and light and life.
“You will see heaven opened”
For eighty years, your St Michael has stood faithfully at his station gazing westward.
Gaze back at him with me today. Look at him.
Gaze at him with the open eyes of Jacob, searching for signs of God’s mystery, for an understanding of his place in God’s holiness.
Gaze at him with the intensity of Nathanael, wanting to fathom the meaning of God’s immanence, needing to hear the accents of God’s call on his life.
Gaze at your archangel with me this afternoon. Gaze and see something of the depth and power of the Son of Man.
Gaze at St Michael’s feet, at his hands, at his wings.
Gaze at his feet, as they stamp underfoot the devil, the serpent, the powers and principalities that speak to us of the anxiety of fate and finitude.
Gaze at his feet, as they stamp underfoot the devil, and see there a sign of that courage we receive when we are close to God — that courage that allows us to endure the sting of pain and death in our lives.
That victory of St Michael over Satan’s powers speaks to us of that courage, that strength and protection, that we can all receive from God when we dwell in God’s depths.
And ask yourselves when you last spent time in God’s deep company — in silence, in prayer, in study, in stillness. When did you last dwell in God’s depths, and know there the assurance of God’s strength and protection?
And make it, perhaps, you Michaelmas vow to dwell in that place more often this coming year.
Gaze at St Michael’s feet, and know that you are saved.
Gaze at his hands, as they hold the scales in which our souls, our lives, will be weighed and judged.
Gaze at his hands, as they hold those scales, and see there a sign of that forgiveness we may receive when we are close to God — that forgiveness that wipes away our fear of sin and guilt.
And ask yourselves when you last made your confession and held your weaknesses before God for reconciliation and healing. When was the last time you forgave somebody else for the hurt they caused you, sharing in the abundant, overflowing economy of God’s mercy and grace?
And make it, perhaps, you Michaelmas vow to confess and to forgive more this coming year.
Gaze at St Michael’s hands, and know that you are forgiven.
Gaze at his wings, their majesty reaching upwards to the heavens.
Gaze at his wings and see the assurance that the same majesty is deep within each one of us — that we are children of God, that we are the risen body of Christ, that we are the bearers of God’s image and likeness; that the angels tremble when they see how changed is our humanity.
And ask yourselves how you give thanks for the wonder that is within you, and make it, perhaps, you Michaelmas vow to be more thankful this coming year.
Gaze at his feet, and know that you are saved. Gaze at his hands, and know that you are forgiven. Gaze at St Michael’s wings, and know that you are adored.
And Jesus said to him, “You will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man”
Paul Tillich, one of the last century’s greatest thinkers about our relationship with God, writes that our human condition is such that we are always aware of the end of things, of the weakness of life, of the brittleness of our existence. We experience that awareness as anxiety about pain and death, anxiety about guilt and condemnation, anxiety about meaning and emptiness.
But though we know the weakness and brittleness and anxiety of life, Tillich writes that we also know the depth of life. We yearn for that power of being that overcomes all those anxieties. That depth and power is God — the Son of Man who saves, and forgives, and adores — the Son of Man who yearns for us to spend time in God’s deep company, the Son of Man who yearns to reconcile us and forgive us our sins, the Son of Man whose glorious light shines from each one of us.
And so when all seems dark and lost, as sometimes it does and will for all of us, as surely it did for Fr Davis, as surely it did for the congregation gathered in this church that Michaelmas Eve eighty ago — when all seems dark and lost, look, gaze, like Jacob and Nathanael, and see the signs of heaven opened for you.
And listen, listen, for something no louder than the fluttering of an angel’s wing, and hear in that sound the assurance that you are saved, that you are forgiven, that you are adored.
