Sermon - Sing that Bittersweet Symphony

Marian Anderson by William H. Johnston, 1945 (Smithsonian Museum)

A sermon given during Holy Communion (BCP) at St Giles-in-the-Fields on Sunday 21st April 2024 (The Third Sunday after Easter) based on the text of 1 Peter 2.11-17 and John 16.16-22. You can listen to an audio recording of this sermon at this link.

“This may be the last time,
May be the last time children I don't know

May be the last time we stay together
May be the last time I don't know
I'm goin' home to meet my mother
May be the last time I don't know.”

 

It has been said that African American slaves lived their lives in a minor key. They knew that both suffering and joy were part of life’s melody. Their songs - or spirituals - famously - and uncomfortably express both sorrow and joy with candor.

 

In 1955, the Motown group ‘The Staple Singers’ released a blues version of the spiritual “This may be the last time” adding their own verses to the chorus. Words which seem to call to mind the attempts of the disciples to keep watch with Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane after the Last Supper - and not just to my hearing:

 

“Maybe in the mornin'

Well,

Lor' I

How

Woooah, lord

Maybe until midnight

I don't know.”

 

“This may be my last time children

Maybe my last time, I dont know.”

 

 

Bernice Johnson Reagon realized the power of that song as a means of unifying the black community and giving voice to its concerns. She founded the Freedom Singers in 1964 and the group performed at Civil Rights marches, often ending up in jail as a result. In a radio interview several years later she explained how that melody helped to express their own Gethsemane moments:

 

“…many times in the movement, one of the strongest things was a song called "This May Be The Last Time." It's a song that is a powerful mood setter. You can't really sing the song without thinking about the statement you're making. And it says, this may be the last time, maybe the last time - I don't know - maybe the last time we all sing together, maybe the last time we all pray together. Many times, that song would be done just before a march. And it would make you know something of the potential cost that you were going into in taking the stand you were taking.”

 

Inspirational Civil Rights activists like Bernice Johnson Reagon and her Freedom Singers embodied the words of Peter’s letter that we heard in our first lesson. “For so is the will of God, that with well-doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men: as free, and not using your liberty for a cloke of maliciousness; but as the servants of God. Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king.”

 

In the same year that The Freedom Singers started to make their stand, The Rolling Stones laid down their debut studio album just up the road here at 4 Denmark Street. 

 

While promoting that record in the United States, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards’ picked up a copy of The Staples Singer’s version of “This May Be The Last Time.” 

 

In his autobiography, Richards’ recalls how he and Mick Jagger listened to the record for the next ten months - trying to learn the chords on the guitar as they toured around with - in his words - little else to do. (Although I'm sure they found something!)

 

Eventually this gave birth to the first song that they felt confident to present to the rest of the band. Richards’ has said that “The Last Time” was a bridge to a new era of songwriting for the Stones. 

 

Not known for profound statements about the civil rights cause - or faith for that matter - The Rolling Stones have publicly acknowledged the gospel inspiration for their version of the song. 

 

“Well I told you once and I told you twice

That someone will have to pay the price

But here's a chance to change your mind

'Cause I'll be gone a long, long time

 

Well this could be the last time

This could be the last time

Maybe the last time

I don't know

Oh no.”

 

The Stones’ producer and manager, Andrew Oldham, created an ‘easy listening’ version of ‘The Last Time’ which was released in 1966. 

 

Thirty years later, a four chord orchestral riff from that track was sampled by Richard Ashcroft who turned it into a six minute Urban Hymn for his band, The Verve, adding his own lyrics:

 

“Well, I've never prayed but tonight I'm on my knees, yeah

I need to hear some sounds that recognize the pain in me, yeah

I let the melody shine, let it cleanse my mind, I feel free now”.

 

Centuries after that song of freedom was sung by African-American slaves, and probably not for the last time, it gave birth to a new sound - the Britpop anthem “Bittersweet Symphony”.

 

 

This may be the last time,

The last time in a little while we stay together, friends.

I’m goin’ home to meet my Father.

You will weep but the world will rejoice.

This may be the last time.

You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned to joy. 
A little while and you will see me again.”

 

 

A précis of today’s gospel reading. Which, with all its repetition sounds rather like the chorus of a song. One played in a minor key. It’s part of Jesus’ “Farewell Discourse”. The speech he gives to the disciples after what we call the Last Supper and before they follow him out to the Garden of Gethsemane and witness the arrest which Jesus had foretold. 

 

“This may be the last time,
May be the last time children I don't know

May be the last time we stay together.”

 

Jesus’ swansong is at the root of that African-American spiritual and the sequence of songs and symphonies that it gave birth to. In each, as in the original, sorrow and joy are found side by side - expressed with candor. Part of the melody of life. 

 

But the disciples don’t seem to hear that Jesus is singing a song of new life. Perhaps they’re listening to the tune and not the lyrics?

 

“Well I told you once and I told you twice

That someone will have to pay the price”

 

in the words of the Rolling Stones. 

   

Maybe the disciples can’t bring themselves to acknowledge such a life? A life of joy brought into being through suffering? Even more suffering than they had already endured together? A new life born through the death of Jesus. The resurrection life - the foundation of our faith.

 

In a few moments we gather and kneel at the altar. We get to taste that bittersweet symphony as we receive Holy Communion. A melody so powerful that it unites Stones and slaves. A melody so powerful that it has survived translation through the generations - often in spite of the awareness and motivation of the singer.

 

“I'm on my knees, yeah

I need to hear some sounds that recognize the pain in me, yeah

I let the melody shine, let it cleanse my mind, I feel free now”

 

Singing those words as he walks down a London street in his music video, intentionally barging into anyone and anything that crosses his path, it seems hard to believe that Richard Ashcroft of The Verve was close to understanding the sacrificial love of Jesus. That there can be no joy - no new life - without pain and suffering?

 

But perhaps he had a head start over the disciples - because he was singing that song - not just listening. Like the African American Slaves. The Staple Singers. The Freedom Singers and The Rolling Stones. As Bernice Johnson Reagon said - you can't really sing that song without thinking about the statement you're making. Freedom Singers know depths of their own pain. They know that Christ shares it. And their song proclaims the reality that this sorrow will be turned into joy when he comes again.

 

We can begin to understand that reality by taking a stand, gathering to kneel at the altar together, taking a  deep breath and singing with the same candor. The same faith. By allowing those words to become flesh in us. A song that is authentically, uncomfortably, wholly and joyfully ours - and a divinely inspired melody of hope. That our sorrow will be turned into joy. In a little while. 

 

Let us sing our song with such meaning, such passion as if this may be the last time we stay together, the last time we pray together. So that the world may hear the bittersweet symphony of Christ’s death and resurrection through the voices of all those who have tasted it. Including you and me. His Freedom Singers. 

 

 

Image : Marian Anderson by William H. Johnston, 1945 (Smithsonian Museum) 

Music : 
This May Be The Last Time - The Staples Singers, 1955
The Last Time - The Rolling Stones, 1965
The Last Time - The Andrew Oldham Orchestra, 1966
Bittersweet Symphony - The Verve, 1997