As seen in the photo some of us joined hundreds of other people from across Blackburn Diocese for a day of celebration and worship at Blackpool, Fr Joe drew a parallel with the disciples gathered in the Upper Room prior to the first Pentecost.

While preaching at Holy Trinity, Tarleton on May 17th( Easter vii), Fr Joe said;:

Yesterday was the Diocesan Centenary Big Day Out in Blackpool – and despite the rain and the wind and the cold, it really was a wonderful day.

For the first couple of hours, the children went off for games and activities while the adults enjoyed some music and a bit of comedy in St. John’s Square. After that was the hog roast which was very tasty indeed…

But the best bit of the day, without a doubt, was the celebration worship at the end. Rejoined by the children, there must have been a few hundred of us from parishes all across the diocese.

We sang modern worship songs and traditional hymns. We heard the word of God proclaimed in the parable of the Lost Sheep. We listened to the inspirational words of Bishop Philip explaining the Year of Mission tagline – “All for Jesus” – we are “all for Jesus” because Jesus is “all for us”. We are each that lost sheep that Jesus has come to find, and he will stop at nothing to find us.

And then, after a few more songs, we prayed. We prayed for the Holy Spirit. We prayed that the Holy Spirit would be poured out across Lancashire – poured out into the hearts of everyone in this Diocese.

And as the day drew to a close, and we prepared to all go our separate ways, we prayed for our Mission Weekends in September… We prayed that through them, Christ’s Love would be made known in every corner of our Diocese, and that the Holy Spirit would make us bold in sharing the Good News of the Gospel – bold in sharing the sure and certain hope that we have because of Jesus.

As one of the worship songs we sang proclaimed:

“I won’t keep quiet – my God is alive – How could I keep THAT inside?”

Come Holy Spirit…

And on the train journey home, I was thinking about today’s reading from Acts and reflecting on the Big Day Out in light of this…

Think about the disciples… Over the past few weeks, the disciples had watched Jesus crucified on Good Friday, encountered him risen from the dead on Easter Day, and then, as we celebrated on Thursday at the Feast of the Ascension, they watched as Christ returned to the Father in glory.

But before he ascended, Jesus entrusted his disciples with a mission.

“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations…”

The Gospel was not to remain hidden away in Jerusalem. The disciples were to go out into the world proclaiming the Good News of Jesus Christ.

But they had to do something first. They had to wait…

Luke tells us the disciples stayed together – and that:

“they were constantly devoting themselves to prayer.”

Jesus told them that he would send a helper, and the disciples knew that the task before them was too great to accomplish by their own strength alone.

They had seen the risen Christ and heard his teaching, yet still they were told to wait for the gift of the Holy Spirit – And so they gathered together.

The disciples came together as a community. They prayed together. They waited together. They hoped together.

And perhaps this is one of the reasons I was touched by yesterday.

Yes, there was music and comedy – fellowship and good food. But the most important thing was that Christians from across the Diocese gathered together in prayer before being sent out into their own communities.

But of course, that is also what we do here every Sunday.

Week by week we gather together before God. We hear the Scriptures proclaimed. We pray alongside one another. We receive strength from Christ and encouragement from one another. And then we are sent back out into the world to bear witness to him in our homes, workplaces, schools, and communities.

That communal dimension of prayer is deeply important, particularly in our own age where faith is so often treated as something private and individual. Of course, there is a deeply personal dimension to prayer. Jesus himself withdrew to lonely places to pray.

But the New Testament says nothing of a Christianity which can be detached from the worshipping community. The disciples in Acts do not scatter into isolated spiritual lives. They gather together constantly in prayer, and when equipped with the Holy Spirit, go out and establish new worshipping communities.

There is strength in that.

Because there are moments in life when prayer comes easily. And there are moments when it does not.

There may be times when grief, fear, illness, or exhaustion leave us struggling even to find the words. Most Christians experience times where prayer feels difficult.

Yet one of the great gifts of the Church is that when our own prayers feel weak, we are carried by the prayers of others.

And perhaps that is part of what Jesus is teaching us in today’s Gospel.

On the night before his Passion, knowing what lies ahead, Jesus lifts his eyes to heaven and prays for his disciples. He prays for those who have followed him, for those who will soon be frightened, confused, and uncertain of what comes next.

And the Church’s life of prayer begins within the loving prayer of Jesus himself.

Before the disciples begin their mission to the world, Christ first commits them to the Father in prayer.

And even now, the risen and ascended Christ, seated at God’s right hand, continues to intercede for his Church.  He prays for us…

That means the mission of the Church ultimately rests not upon human strength or cleverness, but upon the grace and power of God.

And perhaps this is especially important for us to remember as we look ahead to the Mission Weekend in September.

There is rightly a great desire to share the Gospel afresh and invite people to encounter Jesus Christ. But today’s readings remind us that mission begins not with planning and meetings, but with prayer.

Even the apostles — those who had walked with Jesus, listened to his teaching, and witnessed the resurrection — still needed the gift and power of the Holy Spirit.

And so they prayed.  They constantly devoted themselves to prayer.

So as the Church waits between Ascension and Pentecost, these readings invite us to become, once again, a praying people:

  • people who do not neglect to gather together, regularly and faithfully in worship,
  • people who hold one another in prayer,
  • people who wait upon the Holy Spirit,
  • and people who recognise that every true work of mission begins in dependence upon God.

For it was through a praying Church that the Gospel first spread throughout the world.

And it will be through a praying Church that Christ continues to draw men and women to himself today.  Amen.