Sermon given by Revd Dr Elizabeth Welch 5th Sunday of Easter May 3rd 2026
Readings:
Acts 7.55-end; Psalm 31: 1-5, 15-16; 1 Peter 2.2-10; John 14.1-14
Introduction
I’m a bit struck by all the debates going on about artificial intelligence.
As someone whose first job was training as computer programmer, I’ve always been interested in computing and the internet, and now AI.
But when I think about the title ‘Artificial Intelligence’ it feels like it’s taking away the realities of being human, and the real knowledge and experience that comes to us from the human perspective. And it’s interesting that the Oscar awards for film writers and actors are taking the same view, and banning AI characters for putting in for awards!
In our Gospel reading today, Jesus engages in debates with his disciples, and says to them ‘I am the way, the truth and the life’.
It brings home to me that the real way, truth and life, are something more than machines or computers or remote networks. They are to do with the personal interaction we have with God and with one another. They focus on our hearts and minds and lives, whoever we are, and wherever we find ourselves.
We’re going to hear our readings, written hundreds of years ago, before there were printers or computers. The scriptures were all hand-written, and then passed on from one community to another. They spoke with great power.
The dilemma today is that there is so much that is in print, or online, it’s much harder to come to a view about what the truth really is! But as read, we pray that we may hear God speaking to us still today.
Sermon
We live in interesting times in this country in the life of the church. There is much questioning about the value of the church and of the viability of Christian believing. It can begin to feel like we are pursuing a minority interest that is rapidly dwindling. And yet when we look at the broad sweep of history, we see that the life of the church has ebbed and flowed over many centuries.
While the Resurrection and the coming of the Holy Spirit gave great power to the disciples, it wasn’t until the reign of the Emperor Constantine in the fourth century AD that Christianity became established across the Roman Empire.
In the Eastern Church, Byzantine Christianity saw a great flowering over many centuries. Yet today, in Turkey, the area which saw the heart of this flowering, there is only a tiny remnant of Christian Constantinople surviving, about 10% of the overall population.
Internationally today, there are both places where the Christian church is flourishing and growing and also places where many Christians are struggling, not because of the kind of factors which affect us in the west, but because of direct persecution, such as Iran and Bangladesh, and some of the countries across Asia and Africa.
But even if we go back to New Testament times, the picture isn’t uniformly one of a harmonious, believing, settled community.
The letters of Peter were written to a community that was being persecuted. The aim of his letters was to encourage the people of God, so that they would be reminded of the importance of their faith and be enabled to stand firm in the midst of adversity.
The encounters of the disciples with Jesus show that even though they were the people who were closest to him, those who had travelled with him on his journeys around Palestine, still they hadn’t always grasped who he was and what he had come for.
The familiarity of today’s Gospel reading can take away the sense of sharpness of the encounter. In John’s Gospel, Jesus has just spent half of the previous chapter teaching the disciples about himself, teaching that is in continuity with all that he has said during his ministry. This teaching continues in chapter 14 in the form of a dialogue – a dialogue that picks up the questioning and lack of understanding of the disciples.
Thomas, in his usual doubting way, questions Jesus’ destiny. Even though he has followed Jesus along the way and listened to his teaching, still he doesn’t understand.
Philip says ‘Lord show us the Father and we will be satisfied.’
Jesus responds in words that have a hint of irritation: ‘Have I been with you all this time, and you still do not know me?’
There is a sense in which these encounters in themselves are a source of encouragement to us today. If the disciples, who knew Jesus so well and had travelled with him along many a dusty road, hadn’t grasped the fullness of his teaching, it’s not surprising that people today come with questions.
Jesus responds to Thomas by teaching about himself as the way, the truth and the life. He responds to Philip by pointing to both the words he that has said and to the deeds that he has done. Each of these points beyond himself to God the Father.
There’s a considerable debate that goes on today in Western Europe about truth and what it is and whether it is even still possible to have an idea about what is true.
I was reading the results of a recent survey about who we trust. (Quote: we trust – nurses, doctors, teachers, scientists and museum curators; and we don’t trust – politicians and media and advertising) It said that only about half of us trust what we read in the newspaper, but perhaps surprisingly, more of us trust what we see on TV. It went on to highlight the way in which the amount of trust that people place in politicians is on a gradual decline. Is this a surprise in all that we read about the forthcoming elections in this country and all that’s going on in the USA?
It’s not only a matter of who we trust to tell the truth, it’s also a matter of what we believe truth is. There are those who say that as long as enough people believe something, then it’s true – which raises interesting questions about minority beliefs. There are others who say that truth is purely an individual subjective matter – whatever anyone thinks for him or herself is sufficient, there is no wider truth than this.
All this places a responsibility on the church for us to be clear about what we mean when we talk about truth. What emerges from today’s Gospel reading is that truth has its roots and origins in God and is seen most clearly in the one who has come to reveal God, that is Jesus. Truth isn’t about a philosophical proposition or a set of ideas remote from daily life, but is about an integrity of words and deeds, flowing out of the God whose essential nature is love.
The church, as the body of Christ, has this truth entrusted to it. This is a high privilege, which brings with it a considerable responsibility.
This sense of privilege and responsibility is well conveyed in the letter of Peter: “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.”
Being God’s chosen people is a free gift from God which we do nothing to merit, but comes to us graciously out of his love. However, it does place a responsibility on us, to go on proclaiming his light which has shone in the dark points of our lives and will go on shining in the darkness of the world.
The truth about Jesus is reflected in who he is, what he says and the deeds he does. For us to reflect his life in the world, means looking at who we are, what we say and the actions we take to see the ways in which these hold together and speak of the one who gives us life. And it means doing this in our lives as individuals and in our life in the community of Christ’s body.
For the church to speak of truth in a world in which there are many different truths, we need to have confidence in the one who gives us truth and an ability to live in the way of truth in the words we say and the deeds we do.
Truth is revealed in three aspects of life: being, speaking and doing, and the way in which these three aspects hold together in our life in the body of Christ.
Firstly, truth is about being. Being is fundamental and is about who we are as persons and who we are as the church. In Christ we are set free from the burdens of sin and guilt to be fully human – to be people who are loved and therefore who can love. In Christ’s body, the church, we are called to live as a loving, believing community, bound together with all those in heaven and on earth who are called to be God’s people.
There are times when we can succumb to the temptation to put up boundaries around ourselves and cut ourselves off – whether from those with whom we disagree in the congregation or the wider church or our ecumenical partners in different traditions of the church. When we do this we cut against the truth of whom we’re called to be when we live in Jesus’ way.
Secondly, truth is about speaking. I sometimes hear people use the phrase from scripture ‘speaking the truth in love’. I’m especially interested when it seems to carry a sub-text along the lines of ‘I’m going to use this opportunity to tell you off’.
When we live in Jesus’ way, our words are to reflect the speaking of Jesus. We have a particular responsibility on us in the life of the church in these changing times to speak out about our faith and to respond to the challenging questions which people around us are asking. But we have a responsibility to do this in a way which listens and speaks humbly of ourselves.
Thirdly, truth is about doing. I put this at the end to underline the importance of our actions, but also to speak a word of warning about being consumed by doing. It can seem like we belong to a very activist tradition of the church – ‘if you’re not busy, you’re not justified’. It is important that our actions reflect our words, but our actions are not the whole of who we are or what we’re called to be as God’s people.
As we seek to follow Jesus, and witness to the one who is the way the truth and the life, we have an important word to say to our society, a society which can seemed consumed by soundbites and partial truths. This word is about ultimate truth, lived out in lives of integrity where words and deeds are held together in a lifestyle that is characterised by love and which embraces all people.
In an age in which Christian believing is under question and Christian living often seen as having past its sell-by date, we need to go on being renewed in the truth that we believe comes from God and is shown in his son, Jesus Christ. He is still the way, the truth and the life, – for his people today, for a troubled world and to all eternity.
May God embrace us with love today, and help us to live in this way.
To God be the glory, now and forever. Amen.
