In God’s Time – sample

In God’s Time

An Advent Calendar

Jan Sutch Pickard (ed)

Contents of book © individual contributors

Compilation © 2022 Jan Sutch Pickard

First published 2022 by Wild Goose Publications

Suite 9, Fairfield, 1048 Govan Road, Glasgow G51 4XS, Scotland the publishing division of the Iona Community. Scottish Charity No. SC003794. Limited Company Reg. No. SC096243.

ISBN 978-1-80432-270-3

Cover image © Jan Sutch Pickard

The publishers gratefully acknowledge the support of the Drummond Trust, 3 Pitt Terrace, Stirling FK8 2EY in producing this book.

All rights reserved. Apart from the circumstances described below relating to non-com mercial use, no part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means, including photocopying or any information storage or retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher via PLSclear.com.

Non-commercial use:

The material in this book may be used non-commercially for worship and group work without written permission from the publisher. If photocopies of sections are made, please make full acknowledgement of the source, and report usage to CLA or other copyright organisation.

Jan Sutch Pickard has asserted her right in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this compilation and the individual contributors have asserted their rights to be identified as authors of their contributions.

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Australia: Willow Connection Pty Ltd, 1/13 Kell Mather Drive, Lennox Head, NSW 2478

New Zealand: Pleroma, Higginson Street, Otane 4170, Central Hawkes Bay

Printed in the UK by Page Bros (Norwich) Ltd

Introduction, Jan Sutch Pickard 7

November 27, Pens like ploughshares, Alison Phipps 11

November 28, Waiting for the dawn, Mike Mineter 12

November 29, Memories of Biram, Norman Shanks 14

November 30, A place to call their own, Muriel Pearson 15

December 1, The art of creative resistance, Carol Morton 17

December 2, Grounds for hope, Rob Walker 19

December 3, On the road, Jan Sutch Pickard 20

December 4, A time for blunt rebuke, Ann Stedman and John Howard 22

December 5, The Sea is shrinking, Rob Walker 24

December 6, So many perspectives, Norman Shanks 25

December 7, The tree is known by its fruit, Nick Bowry 27

December 8, The one who stayed, Caro Penney 28

December 9, A good man in Nazareth, Iain Whyte 30

December 10, The key, Jan Sutch Pickard 32

December 11, Sumoud: being steadfast, Jenny Derbyshire 34

December 12, Hear – and tell – our stories, Fiona Haworth 35

December 13, Water for sharing, Iain Whyte 37

December 14, Sowing peace?, Tom Gordon 38

December 15, Because of Jesus, Warren Bardsley 40

December 16, The logic of love, David Beamish and John Howard 41

December 17, ‘We refuse to be enemies’, Elspeth Strachan 43

December 18, Sitting on the wall, Isabel Whyte 44

December 19, Room for new life, Elspeth Strachan 46

December 20, Into exile, Ros and Helen Wass-O’Donnell 48

December 21, Hope is not dead, Marilyn Shedden 50

December 22, Message and manifesto, Marvyn Mackay 52

December 23, The Word made flesh, Allan Gordon 54

December 24, Peace is the way, Colin Douglas 55

December 25, The shepherds, Jan Sutch Pickard 57

December 26, A community scattered, Colin Douglas 59

December 27, Moments of joy, Jan Sutch Pickard 61

December 28, Holy Innocents, Warren Bardsley 62

December 29, Those who survive, Fiona Haworth 64

December 30, Standing for justice, Graeme Brown 66

December 31, God’s time, Jan Sutch Pickard 68

the Advent

Introduction

This is an Advent calendar with a difference. Most of us will be familiar with the kind which is an A4 sheet of card with a seasonal picture – a Christmas tree, a snowy village street, or a landscape with shepherds and angels –and in it there will be tiny numbered doors or windows, each opening onto an even smaller scene or an object associated with Christmas. In spite of the name, only some of these calendars reflect the focus and disciplines of the Church in Advent. Many on sale now are cheerfully secular, and often there is a chocolate (in the best cases Fair Trade!) behind every door.

Alongside this, there is a tradition of Christians committing to this season as a time of preparation and reflection, being nourished not by sweets but by study – in groups or disciplined reading day by day. Wild Goose Pub lications has resourced this, year after year, with little books of daily read ings and reflections for Advent. So here is our offering: another book, but this time called an ‘Advent Calendar’ because the idea is that on each page, following a verse from the Revised Common Lectionary for that day, we will open a little ‘window’ on an aspect of life in the Land that we call Holy. We will glimpse how people in Palestine/Israel face an unjust and divisive situation with courage and often hope. Readers can respond with prayer.

And, in most cases, there will be extra information, for further reading or action. This is a bit like the tasty ‘take-away’ tucked securely into a pocket behind each window in a conventional Advent Calendar. You’ll find these listed in day-order on the final pages. There’s added value in this ‘Cal endar’, incidentally, for it begins before 1 December, to reflect the changing dates of Advent Sundays, and runs on from Christmas Day to

the end of the year, to include that ‘in between’ week which gives more time for reading and reflecting.

This has been a labour of love, with contributions from 26 Members, Associate Members, Friends and former staff of the Iona Community. Many of us are members of the Community’s Common Concern Network for Israel/Palestine – most of us have served there, volunteered, taken part in study visits, or organised events in the UK in response to the Kairos call from Palestinian Christians. As well as listening to and learning from Palestinians and Israelis who oppose the Occupation, and supporting different organisations like Medical Aid for Palestinians or Jewish Voice for Peace, most of us are members of the ecumenical movement SabeelKairos. Sabeel is Arabic for ‘The Way’. Kairos is a Greek word, meaning a time of crisis or opportunity, God’s time when we are called to act and to share our hope. This Advent Calendar is a way of opening windows on one part of the world, in this Kairos time.

Advent prayer

God-with-us, you know that, right now, we are waiting: confused, stumbling, like people wandering in the dark; weary, impatient, like men queuing at the checkpoint; stubborn, steadfast, like those who believe in justice; expectant, hopeful, like a woman about to give birth. We are waiting, we are wondering.

We are trying to discern whether it is your time, and the signs of that time: swirling clouds, political upheaval, breaking buds or a refugee baby crying in the cold.

We are wondering, we are waiting. And, God-with-us, we know that you are waiting, too: waiting for us to see the things that make for peace: where families are still without homes in Gaza, where children are afraid to walk to school in Hebron, where B’Tselem and monitoring groups are under scrutiny, where the EU is excluded from the Peace Process –waiting for us to know the time and to seize the moment; waiting for us to recognise your presence, to hear your call and to find the courage to respond. The world is in your keeping, God, are we keeping you waiting?

God-with-us, here-and-now God, in this waiting time, which is your time, help us to know and do your will. Amen

Jan Sutch Pickard

Pens like ploughshares

… They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. (Isaiah 2:4, NRSV)

I watch the women on screen nodding, concentrating, behind them the echoes of bombing and the regular aggression of Israel against the Gaza Strip. The women are learning to write stories of peace for their children. They write with the best writers Gaza can offer. They are writing back. The women of Gaza are writing back. Here we see them studying war no more, but writing out pathways to peace. Writing with pens which are like ploughshares or pruning hooks. First tracing lines across the screen or the page, then editing, honing, pruning the text to be ready. In Arabic and in English. These women. These mothers. These daughters of mothers.

It is one thing to read the words ‘neither shall they learn war any more’ but quite another to occupy hands preoccupied by the Israeli Occupation of Palestinian Territories, in the ways of peace, and the study of peace. No amount of study of these words in times of peace prepares for what the reality is of such a task in times of war, especially when the forces used are overwhelming.

Months later I watch my screen again. The texts have become theatre plays, full of lamentation and exuding hope. And for a week Gaza sings peace with all her body and spirit.

God of the ploughshare and the pruning hook, God of the pen and the text editor, bless those who determine, under siege and occupation, to study war no more.

Alison Phipps

November 28

Waiting for the dawn

… and the dove came back to him in the evening, and lo, in her mouth a freshly plucked olive leaf … (Genesis 8:11, RSV)

At sunrise I was looking out over the Dead Sea. It was spring 2017, the day’s new light shining on our vantage point. Ancient seas had laid the cliff’s terraced rock-strata one on another as aeons came and went. The day was new, but the Palestinians are still in an unstable, dehumanising era sustained by force – the dove is not yet in sight.

Even the stones cried out in anger and brokenness: those we had walked on had been crushed by military vehicles. Now the River Jordan scarcely flows into the shrinking Dead Sea, the river to which Palestinians have no access and from which settlements, illegal in international law, benefit

abundantly. I had seen a social centre with no water; a village whose rooftop water-drums had been holed by Israeli bullets, with a checkpoint denying villagers access to water and to their fields.

I’d spent a few days tending olive trees, symbols of community and of hope for the future, as well as source of income. Across the West Bank, with increasing frequency, access is denied or farmers attacked, olives stolen or trees destroyed – ‘my’ trees now among them.

For Noah the dove, water, olive branch and all creatures were woven together in the God-given dawn of a new era. Now these life-giving threads are cut by those who seek to break the spirit of others who resist by staying in the land. And justice unravels. For now.

As we make a new start in Advent, we ask you, Lord, to give us empathy with the whole Earth of which all people are a part. Inspire us in our work for justice. Amen

Mike Mineter

Memories of Biram

Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

(Psalm 124:8, NRSV)

In the very north of Galilee, close to Lebanon, lies the village of Biram, birthplace of Archbishop Elias Chacour, author of the best-selling book Blood Brothers. In 1990, I visited Biram and the memory remains vivid –of ruined buildings, and tranquility in a beautiful wooded setting, disturbed only by the humming of insects and the noise of Israeli helicopters patrolling the border.

In 2017, Ruth and I were part of a Church of Scotland group that saw a few of the ‘holy sites’ but more significantly met organisations and indi viduals working for justice for Palestinians. Our programme included a chance to visit Biram again. It is now part of an Israeli national park, and an information board told the village’s story. We went to a little church, lovingly restored by Arab Israelis (who prefer to identify as Palestinians), where we met with four local people. They said that what was on the board was a bundle of lies – that in fact when the state of Israel was created in 1948 the villagers were moved out, supposedly ‘for their own safety’, and assured they would return in a few weeks; but of course it never happened, and their homes were destroyed. Now a faithful few come back here each Sunday to worship.

Worship finished with a young girl singing the Lord’s Prayer in Arabic. We were immensely moved, challenged and inspired. It was the Nakba in

miniature – dispossession and displacement; house demolition; the deep desire to return; a story of non-violent resistance, remarkable courage and unquenchable hope.

Living God, we remember the people of Biram and all Palestinian refugees. May they continue to be blessed with steadfast commitment and inspiring resilience. May they know your peace that passes understanding and your justice that rolls down like an ever-flowing stream. Amen

Norman Shanks

A place to call their own

For you will spread out to the right and to the left, and your descendants … will settle the desolate towns.

(Isaiah 54:3, NRSV)

Israeli forces came in the night on 19th January, 2022 and cleared 15 members of the Salhiyya family from their home in Sheikh Jarrah, East Jerusalem. Then the house was demolished. Newspaper images the next day showed schoolbooks and personal belongings churned up in the dirt. The Salhiyya family had lived there for 40 years.

The land now known as Israel/Palestine was never ‘a land without a people for a people without a land’. As the State of Israel was formed in 1948 there were removals and atrocities on all sides, leading eventually to the current contested situation. Occupied since 1967, East Jerusalem

and the West Bank are under Israeli planning laws which prevent most Palestinians from building. Illegal Zionist settlements in the West Bank continue to spread. Many Palestinians are in refugee camps or have emi grated. The situation is very unbalanced. Yet what is shared is a longing for somewhere to call ‘home’.

Everyone needs shelter and safety and equal treatment. Israelis and Pales tinians should all have access to the same rights, the same protections from the courts, the same treatment as citizens. But they don’t. It is hard to imagine peace in the Holy Land until they do.

The exiles in Babylon, addressed in Isaiah 54, longed for home. If read literally today this text does great violence to the human rights of Pales tinians. But read from the point of view of the Palestinian exiles, it expresses the desire of all people to have a place to call their own.

God who is our shared home, help us to redefine ourselves in relationship with those we do not recognise as ‘us’; especially those pushed to the margins, their rights trampled and their future uncertain. We long for peace with justice – for all. Amen Muriel Pearson

The art of creative resistance

Give the king your justice, O God …

May he defend the cause of the poor of the people, give deliverance to the children of the needy, and crush the oppressor!

(Isaiah 72:1a, 4, ESV)

Imagine a display of traditional Palestinian dresses, beautifully embroidered. Imagine the skilful hands that did the work. For centuries Palestinian women have embroidered as part of their culture. Since the First Intifada in 1988, embroidery has become a means of income generation for those seeking a way to feed their families when men were imprisoned, disabled, deported, killed.

I think of Suha, working with Surif Women’s Cooperative in the West Bank, her handiwork being the only source of income for 12 people: her eight children, her mother, mother-in-law, her husband and herself. I think also of Rima, whose embroidery paid her fees through Bethlehem University. But after two years of Covid, Bethlehem’s tourist-dependent economy has the largest Palestinian unemployment rate outside Gaza.

Like ‘the poor of the people’ in the psalm, these women deserve economic justice – they need work and a just return for their labour: Fair Trade.

‘When you give us work you give us life.’ (Julia Dabdoub, Bethlehem Arab Women’s Union)

Deliverance also involves cultural identity. As well as poverty relief, Pales tinian embroidery has become a strong form of resistance: sumoud, stead fastness, remaining rooted in the land. Images of olive trees, kufiya patterns and flag-shapes now abound, replacing the traditional abstract and more formal floral themes.

‘Where there is occupation, there will be resistance. The question ... is not to resist or not, but how to resist … Culture is the art of becoming an actor rather than a spectator. This is the art of creative resistance.’ (Rev. Dr Mitri Raheb)

God of justice, beauty and creation, deliverer of the poor and needy, give all people meaningful, just and fair work. Be with them and us in work and worship.

Carol Morton

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