Some of you will remember the 70’s TV satire The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin. In it, the late Leonard Rossiter played the role of a man in the midst of a mid-life crisis, desperate to escape his dull and dreary life. It was full of dark humour and memorable one-liners, like those of, Reggie’s boss, C.J.
‘I didn’t get where I am today’, he would say repeatedly.

‘I didn’t get where I am today by… telling the truth; caring about people; changing nappies; shaking hands with the person on my right.’
The series captured the mood and the imagination of the time. It reflected back to the viewer what many were actually feeling. Our lives can become dull and disappointing and often we don’t know how to make them any different. And a key question this raises for us is ‘how did we get to be where we are today?’
Of course, we can answer this question in a multitude of ways.
We can talk about the genes passed down, generation by generation, which make us who we are. We can talk about the places we’ve lived and the people we’ve known, that have shaped our identity and our perception of the world. We can talk about the choices we’ve made and the opportunities we’ve taken.
But though these are correct, our genes, the environment, and our choices, do make us into the people we are today, our Christian faith says there’s more.
Today’s gospel tells of three encounters Jesus has. Each is different. The people we meet are from very different walks of life and this is what makes the stories so powerful. They resonate with us because they speak into our experiences.
One of those Jesus meets is a man named Matthew, or Levi as the writers of Mark and Luke call him. Matthew is a tax collector. Now, in our society, the ‘taxman’ isn’t the most popular person. This is especially true at this time of the year. But in Jesus’ day, the taxman wasn’t just unpopular, he was detested. His job was to collect taxes for the opposition, the Romans, and on top of this he made his living by charging a bit extra for himself. Sometimes a lot extra!
So, Matthew is much like those in our day who act in unscrupulous ways, who make deals behind backdoors, who compromise their own beliefs and hurt others in the process. He is the kind of person you might hear say, ‘I didn’t get where I am today by considering how my actions affect the lives of others!’
But Jesus comes to him in his booth. He sees Matthew for what he is, and he doesn’t turn away or condemn his behaviour. Instead he says, ‘follow me’, and what is amazing is Matthew does exactly that. He doesn’t ask questions, or try to wriggle his way out of the situation; he puts down his pencil and follows.
I suspect if Matthew was asked in later years, ‘how did you get to be where you are today?’ he wouldn’t reply by drawing attention to his pedigree or to the things he had done or not done. He’d simply say ‘it was an act of grace. In my unlovable, selfish state, Jesus came and showed me who I truly am.’
So, the first of our stories tells us about Jesus – what an amazing man he must have been. Crossing the boundaries of respectable behaviour, sharing meals with outcasts and sinners, he demonstrated God’s love for all. But the story also tells us much more about ourselves. ‘No matter what we’ve done’, it says, ‘no matter where we find ourselves, there’s always the possibility of forgiveness and a fresh start.’ Jesus reaches out and he says to us ‘follow me’.
In the next encounter a senior figure in the synagogue approaches Jesus. His daughter has just died, and the words on the page don’t do justice to his feelings. He’s desperate and grieving. Anyone who has experienced the death of a child or knows someone who has will know that. A parent gives so much to their children. They’re our future and a source of immense joy. And to lose a child must hurt so much. ‘Where is God?’ ‘Why my child?’ we ask.
But the answers to our questions are never fast coming. We might blame our genes. We might blame the health system. We might blame God. But does it really help? A child is dead, a father is in agony, and in a final attempt to save his daughter’s life he begs Jesus to lay his hand on her and make her alive.
There’s a scene in The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin when C.J. collapses. His doctor pronounces him dead and C.J. opens one eye and says ‘you’re fired!’
But the same doesn’t happen here. This girl is dead. She’s not simply in a state of shock. The mourners have come and the funeral preparations have begun. And again Jesus crosses boundaries. He ignores the ridicule of those gathered. He doesn’t think of being pronounced unclean through contact with a corpse. Instead, entering the girl’s room, he holds her hand and helps her to get up.
I think, for most of us, if we’re honest, such stories are beyond us. We don’t understand them. Our enlightened minds dismiss them as fiction or seek to interpret them in ways which fit with what we know of the workings of our world. But even though I struggle with the miracle stories in the gospels - I’ve never met a person who’s been raised from the dead – I do believe they give us an insight into the nature of God. They’re acts of grace reminding us that not even the darkness of death can separate us from the love and the life of God.
And if this young girl was to be asked in the years to come, ‘how did you get to be where you are today?’ I suspect she wouldn’t say ‘my father was a man of influence’, but rather ‘Jesus touched me and so I live!’

So, we come to the third encounter. This takes place in the midst of the last. A woman, who has suffered for twelve long years internal bleeding, sees an opportunity. Excluded from the community because of her debilitating illness, she risks further shame and disappointment by seeking out Jesus and touching his garment. ‘If only I touch his cloak’ she says, ‘I shall be cured’.
Again many will identify with her situation. We all know people in urgent need of care and attention. And some have been pushed to the margins of society because of their mental and physical state. ‘I didn’t get where I am today’ they may well say, ‘by being looked after by our health system.’ Or is it because of the failure of our health system they are where they are?
But such questions aren’t on the mind of the woman in our story. She sees Jesus and knows he can cure her. And because of her determination and her faith, when Jesus does see her, he says, ‘your faith has cured you.’
This is another moment of grace. Not only is she healed from a long-suffering illness, but her wellness has also restored her to the community. In later days, I’m sure if someone asked her, ‘how did you get to be where you are today?’ she would’ve looked back at this moment and spoken of an act of grace.
‘How did you get to be where you are today?’
Soren Kierkegaard speaks of people being a synthesis of the Eternal and the temporal. The problem is most of us live in the temporal alone. We neglect or reject the Eternal’s claim on our lives. We think we can build a life without God, but a deeper yearning remains unfulfilled. The result is despair.
Despair is also a theme of The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin. Each week opened with a naked Reggie walking out into the sea ready to end it all, only to change his mind and to return to shore. Unhappy in his work, and dissatisfied with his relationships, he questions the meaning of his life.
But despair isn’t the end for those we encounter in our gospel. In their own way each has been there. Disloyal or desperate or diseased, they’ve known the hard realities of life. But they’ve also experienced an act of grace. They’ve each come to know what gives life its meaning is the presence of God in our lives.
It’s God who creates us to be everything we can be.
It’s God who reaches out to us when our lives go astray.
It’s God who alone can fill our deepest needs.
It’s God, as C.J. and Reggie and the Pharisees fail to acknowledge, who’s the reason we are where we are today, and the source of hope for our tomorrow.
It’s ‘the God-relationship’, as Kierkegaard says, ‘which makes us truly human.’

A sermon preached at St Alban’s on Sunday 8th June 2008, by the Ven. Damon Plimmer