How wise are we?

Matthew 7: 21 to end

'Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts upon them will be like the wise man who built his house on rock.'

We have in today's gospel, reached the end of Matthew's Sermon on the Mount and in good rabbinic tradition, he ends these teachings of Jesus with a story. The story of the wise and foolish men, one who builds his house on rock and the other who built his house on sand. No doubt if I asked you, you could sing the chorus about this story and do the actions which children seem so much to enjoy, especially when the house of the foolish man falls down into the flood because it has no solid foundations. But we should remember the point of the story is that those who are wise not only hear the solid teachings of Jesus but in their lives act upon them, while those who are foolish only hear but do not respond.

As many of you know Angela and I have just returned from visiting our son in Fiji and he gave us an incredible Fiji experience. Entering a very different cultural experience certainly made me ask what is wise and what is foolish. Where have we in our own culture, lost valuable insights into the meaning of Jesus' teachings and acting upon them? I have certainly much reflection to do on the many people we met and their priorities in life.

On one of our visits to a village, a village that has a significant place in Fijian history, we met Epi. Epi was a great story teller and a remarkable man. He was married to a lady from Sunderland who had embraced willingly the indigenous Fijian way of life. They had four children, three sons, one of whom was adopted and a daughter who had been born just six days before we arrived. They were a delightful family, Epi told us how his two year old liked to wander into the village which was on the other side of the stream from where they lived. They didn't worry when he did this. He had learnt to swim almost before he walked. And if he was hungry and it was lunchtime someone in the village would take him into their bure and give him lunch and if he were tired someone in the village would let him lie down on the floor of their bure, and if he were playing with other children in the stream there would always be somebody watching them. And at night time someone would bring him back to his own family's bure.

What amazing freedom for that child. Can you imagine what outrage there would be here if the parents of a two year old allowed him to wander the streets, to play in the stream, to enter different people's houses to eat and to sleep - oh the child protection issues! It would be impossible. And yet in Fiji it was very natural for this to happen. The whole village as well as parents, take responsibility for the children of the village. They belonged not just to their parents but to the extended family of the village.

And when that two year old grows up and hears the words of Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount 'Ask and it will be given you; seek and you shall find; knock and the door will be opened for you.' Those words will ring true for him, for that is what he experienced as a child in his village. Every request, every need, was met, every door was open to him. He was accepted and cared for by all. Throughout village life there was this sense of mutual care, mutual responsibility, mutual respect. And if a young person leaves that village to go and work in other towns and cities, then wherever they went, they knew where they belonged, where home was, where they would always be accepted and that was the village of their childhood.

Of course materially the village had little to offer. Most people ate the food they could grow. There was not much of a cash economy. Many of the bures, the homes, would only have running water, there would be few with bathrooms and even fewer with electricity. People were not materially acquisitive and whatever they did have they would share with the rest of the village. It is very hard for us to imagine the strength of community life and the lack of emphasis on personal possessions. And in the centre of the village was the Church and they heard there week by week the teachings of Jesus and they acted upon these teachings in the way they lived their daily lives and at a depth that we would find almost impossible in our far more wealthy society.

Reflecting on my limited experience of village life in Fiji makes me question the wisdom of the continual drive for economic prosperity in our Western World. Is financial well-being, the only value that we seek to promote and is that sought at the expense of more human and communal values. And I also reflect on the foolishness of giving total responsibility for the welfare of young people solely to their parents for by doing that we have undervalued the importance for young people of having other adult relationships within a community or extended family.

Whether in Fiji or in England we hear the teachings of Jesus, how wise we are in seeking to live them out in our daily lives in the community in which we are placed. I am sure we have so much to learn from people who have materially so much less than ourselves. I am also sure that most Fijians would want to share in the material advantages of running water and electricity and bathroom facilities for their homes. But it would be foolish for them in their desire for better living standards to lose their strong community bonds and relationships which brings them so much happiness and contentment. And we would be wise to look at our privatised lives and ask how can we build a stronger sense of community and belonging in our cities and towns and villages.

It is not enough to hear the words of Jesus, we have to find ways of living and acting on these words for the benefit of our world.

Now that is true wisdom.

More sermons, modern and historical, available in Norwich Cathedral Library

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