26th July, 2020.
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My dear friends,

In odd moments over the past five years, I have been working on another book. I have been editing the diaries kept between 1931-1946 by Alan Don, who was chaplain to Archbishop Cosmo Lang of Canterbury and later became the Dean of Westminster. The book is due to be published on 17th September and I have just sent off the proofs to the publishers, SPCK. I feel both sad that the project has come to an end after five years, for it has been a fascinating hobby, and yet rather relieved to have got to the end (Note to budding authors: you will experience ‘radio silence’ from your publisher for months and months, and then a sudden flurry of mad activity and tight deadlines just before publication – be prepared!).

            Both Alan Don and Cosmo Lang were connected with the Order of St John. Archbishop Lang was Prelate of the Venerable Order for several decades. Alan Don was a Chaplain of the Order of St John, and I managed to find a photograph of him with King George VI and Queen Elizabeth in which he wears his St John insignia.

            It may not entirely surprise you to know that whilst I had to be quite strict regarding which diary entries I included in the book, several entries about the Order of St John and a footnote made it into the final selection for publication. Several relate to the Second World War. Between 1939 and 1945, the Order of St John worked with the British Red Cross to provide practical humanitarian help in many ways, ranging from first-aid in air raid shelters to caring for Jewish prisoners in 1945 in the newly-liberated Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany (if you haven’t been there already, there is a small but fascinating museum at the Order’s headquarters at St John’s Gate, with an exhibition about the Second World War – admission is free and it is well worth a visit).

            Needless to say, all this work cost a great deal of money to run, and during the Second World War the Order of St John and the Red Cross raised around £50 million, which my computer helpfully tells me is the equivalent of £2,172,220,154 today. As we undertake our work during the present Coronavirus pandemic, we follow in the footsteps of some very distinguished and devoted men and women. It would be fascinating to hear the stories of older members of St John who can remember working and fund-raising in the Second World War.

With continued prayers and kindest regards,

The Rev. Dr ROBERT BEAKEN, County Chaplain
TRINITY 7 – 26th JULY 2020.
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Gospel: St Matthew, chapter 13, verses 31-33, 44-52.
I had a funeral at St Katharine’s, Little Bardfield, a while ago. The deceased was an old man from Braintree with no family. I was told that the only mourner at the funeral would be his solicitor, who wanted me simply to read the burial service beside the grave – without a service in the church – and then to bury the old man in the same grave as his father.
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            Well, when I arrived at St Katharine’s, there were hordes of people from Braintree milling about outside, many clutching bunches of flowers. They turned out to be the dead man’s neighbours. All change. I met the undertaker and said I had decided that we should after all be going into the church first for the funeral service, and then coming out to the churchyard for the burial. I felt it was more seemly.

I hadn’t prepared a sermon and I had to think on my feet pretty fast. Most of those people from Braintree had never been into a church before, except for things like funerals, weddings and baptisms. They were not ill-disposed, but the Church and Christianity were largely unfamiliar to them. Fortunately, I discovered from talking to his neighbours before the service that the old man had been a gardener, and so I was able to talk about St Paul’s image of the seed dying in the ground in order to grow and become the blade of wheat: a good image of death and resurrection to eternal life.

            I quite often travel on trains and buses, and as I do so, I find my gaze wandering over the other passengers. I ask myself the question: ‘How can I reach out to you with the Gospel of Jesus Christ? How can I share with you what makes me tick, that which quite literally means the world to me?’ Answers are not easy.

When I visited Poland a few years ago, I quickly realised that I was in a consciously Christian country, where a large proportion of the population regularly went to church on Sundays, and where the vocabulary of Christianity was widely understood. England, I am sorry to say, is not a Christian country like Poland any more. English society has been edging away from Christianity since the industrial revolution and this process has speeded up greatly since many of the cultural shifts of the 1960s, which involved a de facto rejection of Christian teaching.

            We Christians have a hard task ahead of us when it comes to winning England for Christ; but we should not despair, because God still loves the people on the bus and in the train who don’t know very much about Him, just as He loves the good folk from Braintree who didn’t really understand Christianity but who gave up a morning to attend the funeral of a lonely old man with no family. What we – we who know we are loved by God – have to do, is somehow to get the message of God’s love across to them.

            Part of the difficulty when it comes to spreading the Gospel is that modern society has no language for the sacred. The average teenager, for instance, has no words for the holy, because the holy is not part of his or her everyday consciousness. That is the big difference between the world of today and the world of the Bible, when most people were aware of religion. Don’t blame the teenager for not knowing: blame the three generations before him, and blame the secular, materialist culture in which he lives.

            I think there are two very important things to remember when it comes to spreading the Gospel. Firstly, we must firmly believe in the truths and importance of Christianity. We aren’t going to be very good ambassadors for God if we don’t trust Him ourselves – and that means allowing God to change and shape us as we journey through life on earth. If we pray ‘Thy will be done’, and we truly mean it, God will use us in His service, whether we are conscious of being used by Him or not. Most of us are Christians because of the Christian people we have encountered in our lives. Something of their faith has rubbed off onto us.

            Secondly, I never underestimate the power of words. This was something that Jesus understood only too well: tell a simple story with a deeper layer of meaning, and it will be more easily remembered and pondered than a complicated theological point.

            We see some such very powerful tales in today’s Gospel. Jesus is telling his followers about the kingdom of Heaven, where everything will be as God wants it. Our way into Heaven is through Christian faith.

            We can just imagine the ploughman who is sent to plough some small farmer’s field. The plough hits a pot of coins, buried by someone in a hurry, long ago, before the Assyrians or Babylonians or whoever came along. The man rushes off to buy the field with his savings. It is a bit like you or me discovering a rare book or stamp somewhere, and hurrying off to scrape together every penny we possess to pay for it, because it is far more valuable than its price.

            Again, Jesus imagines of a collector of pearls – the most precious gem known in the first century. He hears of one of wonderful size and purity, and sells his entire collection in order to buy it. However wonderful all his other pearls, they fall into insignificance beside this one. He cannot ignore it. He must possess it.

            Jesus tells us that being a Christian and knowing God is a bit like this. It is more wonderful and valuable than we can possibly imagine. But, the point is, we must make some effort and some sacrifices. One man sold everything to buy a field. Another sold all his pearls to buy just one. We, too, must give our all to Jesus Christ.

I have found myself in recent weeks thinking more and more about Simon Peter and his brother Andrew, walking away from their boats, fishing nets, from everything that was dear or familiar to them, and just following Jesus, who called ‘Follow me’ to them. Well, if we all simply walked away from our earthly responsibilities, we should be in a fine old mess. But, in a sense, whilst still earning our daily bread and caring for our families, we are called to do just that. To follow Christ. Not to be held back by the things of this world. To be in the world, but not entirely of it.

            The trouble for many people is that they only see the outward form of religion, and not its inward, transformative power. Christ reflected on this inner power of faith with his parable of the mustard seed. It is the tiniest of seeds, but it shoots up into a tall bush, and even the birds can nest in it. The tiny seed represents our faith. Not much to begin with. But it grows enormously inside us, and, during the course of our lifetime, faith transforms and enriches our lives more than we can ever imagine. For we know that whatever may happen to us during our time one earth, God loves us, cares for us, and delights in our prayers and company. And when this earthly life is completed, we shall be with Him forever. That is what we must enshrine in our hearts, and that is what we must try to help those kind-hearted mourners from Braintree, or the man and woman on the bus, to experience for themselves