Preaching his final Sermon after over two and a half years on Placement with us Danny Abraham addressed it as an Epistle to the churches in Rufford & Tarleton

The sermon in full.

To the churches in Tarleton and Rufford,

Grace, mercy and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ be with you.

Brothers and sisters, I write this letter with my own hand to give thanks to God for each and every one of you and for the way you have embraced me as one of your own during my time with you. Whenever I speak of you to others, I speak as a father would about his own child, proud of my association with you and how your faith is visibly demonstrated in your communities as you seek to make the person of Christ and the Kingdom of God known in your communities. By this, I am greatly encouraged, and plead with you to persevere, in the knowledge that your Father in heaven both sees and knows your efforts and will reward them as and when He determines is the right time.

The context of my letter sees this being read out on the festival of the most blessed Trinity Sunday, a festival where the Church comes face to face with one of the most profound mysteries of our faith—the mystery of the Holy Trinity. Any attempts to try and comprehend the incomprehensible is nothing more than a futile exercise, and so instead, let us be reminded brothers and sisters that our triune God cannot be confined by our limited understanding. Let us instead embrace the mystery, marvel at the vastness of God and dwell joyfully in the awesome truth of a God who gives Himself away again and again for our benefit.

As we contemplate these unfathomable truths about our God, the God who is always moving toward His people, let us rejoice firstly in a Father whose wisdom is infinite and whose love for His whole creation is deeper than words can aptly describe, so much so that He sent His only Son Jesus Christ into the world to die for our sins and to redeem the whole of creation from the power of sin and death.

And as you think on this wonderful and yet mysterious truth that we call the Gospel, allow it to take hold of your heart, letting it also influence your discipleship to Christ. Be willing to give yourself away again and again for the sake of this Gospel. Just as Christ himself laid aside his equality with his Father in order to take the form of a servant for the benefit of humankind, let your discipleship to him be one that reflects the humility of Christ as you give yourself away for the sake of others and so mirror the self-sacrificial nature of our Lord. Through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, we are all able to know with more understanding and clarity the radical extent of God’s love—a love that knows no bounds, that embraces the broken and the lost, that offers redemption and salvation to all who seek it as the embodiment of divine grace and mercy.

That same God, the God of love, gave himself away yet again, this time after he ascended into heaven and in doing so, sent the the gift of the Holy Spirit, who is of course the third member of the Holy Trinity, and whose divine presence dwells within us, guiding, empowering, and transforming us from within as we live out our faith. As the Spirit moves among us and breathes life into our discipleship and our prayers today and all our days, I pray that you will also take comfort and strength in the knowledge that it is the Spirit who comforts us in times of trial and who empowers us to bear witness to the love of Christ in the world. Without the Spirit, we can do nothing, which makes the need of Him both pressing and perpetual. Therefore, pray earnestly for the Spirit to dwell in you and empower you to the ministry God has called you to through His son Jesus Christ.

Incredibly, the eternal and triune God of Father, Son and Holy Spirit is not distant from His creation, but is ever present within it and He mercifully invites those He encounters to be united to Him and to participate in His divine life through faith and through baptism. The eternal life that they have, have always had and always will have is wonderful yet mysterious, but is also the same life we are drawn into through faith. As we each choose to embrace their love, knowingly and never against our will, we become channels of God’s grace and mercy in the world. We are therefore called to invite others to encounter and embrace the one and true triune God whom we worship and so join the eternal and divine dance of love and grace that has its true existence in the triune God of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Brothers and sisters, I cannot end this letter without mentioning the biggest passion I have in my ministry; sharing the Gospel with Children and youth and empowering them to do likewise. If I could choose to leave any sort of a legacy behind, this would be it, and therefore I pray for a harvest of abundant Kingdom fruit in the years to come in this particular area of your communities of faith, work I am proud to have kickstarted and work I would be devastated to see fall away in my absence.

Beloved, if you do not view and treat children as God does; important, loved and valuable, then your churches will simply be impoverished and malnourished through their absence. Therefore, I encourage and exhort you to work hard to break down the barriers that prevent you as communities of Christ from celebrating their gifts, the barriers that do not permit them to be children in your presence and the barriers that expect them to behave like adults. Rather, allow their authentic God-given identity to shine through and so give life to the churches, and in so doing, your discipleship too. By tailoring services and worship to accommodate them, as well as giving them opportunities to serve, young people and children will naturally be drawn into the full worshipping life of the church, allowing them to both hear the voice of God from you and for you to hear what God has to say to you through them and their witness. I promise that you will be a richer church through such actions, perhaps not financially, but certainly spiritually.

I pray fervently that you will truly embody the belief that Jesus loves all children and young people as equally as anybody else, and so be committed to creating environments that encourage spiritual growth and that create spaces for encounter with the Lord Jesus for the youngest people in your parishes, helping them to grow in their discipleship and so feel equipped to share the Good News and transform the world in which they live.

And for those children who are hearing this letter with their own ears, know that I am heartbroken to be saying goodbye and I will miss you all every single day. Be strong and courageous and don’t give up on your faith, but rather work hard to feed it and enjoy it; it is the greatest gift you will ever own.

 

And so now as me and my family get ready to take our leave from here and take our first steps into ventures new, I knew that this goodbye would be one that would be difficult for many reasons, and so it is proving. I am sure that we both knew that this relationship and its dynamic would necessarily change as I walk in obedience to Christ and so fulfil Gods calling on my life to share the Good News of Jesus with new people and in a new place as an ordained minister in His Church, but that doesn’t mean that this isn’t hard.

I pray that you will continue to listen to and learn from Fr Mark, one of the nicest, most genuine, God-fearing and gentle people I have ever had the opportunity to meet and work with, and whose impact on my faith and my journey is immeasurable in many ways. You have an amazing leader, and one I will miss incredibly. In fact, I will miss you all dearly, for a whole variety of reasons and I will treasure the memories I have made during my time with you, committing myself to pray for you all regularly. I humbly ask that you pray for me, for Georgia and Levi as we step into the unknown, and that God will equip us for the tasks that lie ahead of us.

Finally, I am confidently hopeful that you will continue to allow yourself as churches of Christ to be formed by the work of the Holy Spirit into being a more Jesus-shaped community that honours God the Father in everything you do and say. I implore you to live out the Gospel and be unafraid to share it with those you meet in both your words and the way in which you live your life; it is a treasure to give away and not to store selfishly, and the more we share it, the more Kingdom-like this world will become as the glorious truth of Jesus filters down and embeds itself into peoples hearts and minds, transforming lives aplenty.

Now may the God of peace and eternal love fill your hearts and minds with the knowledge of His near presence, the strength you need to walk the pathways of faith and the courage to keep going. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you now, and always.

Amen.

 

Dany will be Ordained Deacon at Blackburn Cathedral on June 29th