Archbishop’s address at Cowper Thanksgiving service

Thanksgiving service for Archdeacon William Cowper on 18 August, 2009 at St Phillip’s, York St, Sydney

Address by Archbishop of Sydney Dr Peter Jensen

2 Timothy 4:7,8 "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. From now on there is reserved for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord the righteous judge will give me on that day, and not only to me but also to all who have longed for his appearing.'

It was this text that Bishop Barker chose for the funeral sermon of Archdeacon William Cowper in July 1858. It was an apt summation of a great man, a man who helped lay the foundations of our national life and lay them strong and true. He had a vision of what it is to be human and Christian, a vision which still offers us a challenge as to who we should be in our generation. Our city owes a huge debt to Cowper, his family and his friends for modeling the Christian life and summoning their contemporaries to a fervent and practical Christianity. That Christianity persists in this place today because under God they called it into existence. They prayed for the cause of Christ though evangelical Christianity, and their prayers have been richly answered. The shape of much of the Christian faith in Australia today, particularly in Sydney, is a direct result of the work of William Cowper.

Modern Sydney, modern Australia would be unthinkable without him. We need only think of such institutions as the Benevolent Society, the Bible Society and the Bank of New South Wales " but the list is endless. One cause for which Cowper always stood was the cause of the indigenous people of New South Wales. At a time, believe it or not, when many people regarded the aboriginal people of our land as though they were merely a link between the animal and the human kingdom, extermination and murder were practiced, Cowper stood valiantly for truth and love. Here is a part of his vision for who we should be, that is yet to be fulfilled. The original people of Australia must always be given a special place of honour and affection. In word and deed, Cowper testified to that in his day and he still speaks to our consciences. 

By today's standards, however, it was a somewhat strange funeral sermon. Today we concentrate on the deceased and there is an endless multiplication of eulogies. But Barker intentionally stuck to his text. He wanted to remind his audience not so much of Cowper, but the source of Cowper's energy, wisdom and goodness. Yes he did speak about the Archdeacon " but he actually apologized for doing so. He wanted to honour the old man, not by talking about him, but by using the opportunity to speak on Cowper's behalf, as it were, to say one more time what it was that Cowper would want us all to hear. And again today, Cowper has that opportunity.

There is a deep clash here between the present and the past: we spend all our time praising the dead as though by so doing we can extend their lives through our imagination. The result is that we are depressed because we can never be as good as they were, and we have no certain hope for those who have passed away. Barker and Cowper never though that they were good men; the Bible told them that like us they were sinners. Their business was not to draw attention to themselves; their business was to announce that Jesus Christ has died for our sins and that in his resurrection death has been defeated. They do not want us to dwell on their goodness but on the impact that Jesus Christ had on them and the impact he can still have on us and on our community.

What has William Cowper still got to say to us?

Three visions of his identity struggled for and within the soul of every Christian minister in the penal colony of New South Wales.

What was he to be? A moralist, an official, or a preacher?

He could be a moralist. The authorities certainly wanted this. They wanted him to help control the unruly and to teach the convicts the law of God and man. They wanted him to attend to the behavior of their charges to reform their morals and their manners. Any Christian minister could see the need for this " he would want to see a community in which there was compassion, benevolence, transformation of lives, the lifting up of the downcast, the love of justice and truth and all the other good things which flow from the teaching of the Bible. But was this his chief task?

He could be an official. He was in the first place a chaplain under the control of the Governor. He was needed to provide some of the administrative and even judicial help in running the colony. Christian ministers were committed to civilization and to building the new nation in collaboration with the government. But was he to be simply a government man, a member of the establishment?

He could be a preacher. He was a pastor of men and women. He could use the pulpit, visit the sick and suffering, distribute literature, talk about Christ to those who were about to die. He could say that his highest and chief duty was to point his contemporaries to the way of salvation and to preach about Jesus Christ as their Saviour. Was this not in fact the stated choice of both of the first two chaplains?  Was this to be his ministry?

Like the first two chaplains, Johnson and Marsden, Cowper was in fact deeply committed to raising the standards of the colony. Like them he did not merely preach against sin; he acted throughout his career to lift up the fallen, to support the weak, to care for those on which injustice had fallen. In particular he gave himself unstintingly to the cause of the aboriginal people.

Like the first two chaplains, Cowper was involved to some extent in the work of government. Thus for example we hear of him assessing convicts and providing the testimonials which they needed to achieve a certain degree of freedom within the colony. He assisted Governor Macquarie in achieving Macquarie's aims.

But also like the first two chaplains with whom he stood in a wonderful evangelical succession, Cowper believed that his chief task was to preach that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners and that is what was the centre point of his long and immensely fruitful ministry. As was clear from his very first sermon, he determined to do so whatever it cost by way of influence or prestige. He would belong to no man, except to Jesus Christ; he would be the servant of no man except Jesus Christ; he would exalt no man except Jesus Christ.

Why? Why was this his chief business and how did it connect with a life so active in the good and practical works for which he is still remembered?

Remember the text of his funeral sermon, in which Barker quoted from the Apostle Paul -

"From now on there is reserved for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord the righteous judge will give me on that day, and not only to me but also to all who have longed for his appearing.'

You could say that Archdeacon Cowper had two visions of the future. In the first he worked tirelessly for the benefit of the people of the colony. He had a vision of a society of just and compassionate people.  But he had a greater vision of the future. He believed, preached and lived by a message which looked beyond this life into eternity. He saw that there is eventually to be an end to history; he saw that the end of history would not consist of the destruction of our planet in the endless story of a frozen universe, but a proper end, an end brought about by the re-appearing of Jesus Christ, the righteous Judge. That is, the end of history is not the end of meaning and purpose. On the contrary, the end of all things is a moral and spiritual End. When the End comes we will be judged for our words and our thoughts and our deeds, by an absolutely righteous judge and an absolutely righteous judgment. Before that judge we must all appear to give an account of our lives. The Archdeacon was above all deeply concerned about the fate of men and women passing into eternity without hope or help.

You would have to agree that this is a fearful prospect. It is not that we can appear before the judgment throne covered with righteousness and innocence. What we bring to that throne is guilt and sin and confusion. God takes us with absolute seriousness; we are not the dust of the universe, but part of its crowning glory. But as creatures of such significance we must also accept the fact that we will be weighed in the balance and found wanting. That is how significant we are. We are significant enough to fall under God's judgment.

And yet, of course, that is not what the Bible says at this point. Instead it speaks of a grand reward, "the crown of righteousness, which the Lord the righteous judge will give me on that day, and not only to me but also to all who have longed for his appearing.' It seems that some at least are righteous enough to receive his reward. Who are they? Is it those who labour long and hard for God, who cover themselves in enough righteous activity to survive the judgment unscathed? Was Cowper an energetically good man because he hoped to earn an eternal reward?  Is it that people as saintly as Mr Cowper can have a hope denied to the rest of us simply because they have accomplished so much good in their lives? 

God forbid that we should think so even for a moment. That is the exact reverse of what the Archdeacon himself believed and what he worked so hard to explain. Indeed that is why the Bishop's sermon was more about Jesus than about the Archdeacon.

Let me explain. Archdeacon Cowper was a man of hope. He longed for the appearance of our judge, Jesus Christ. But it was not because he was a good man. It was because he had long before placed his trust and confidence in Jesus Christ as his Saviour. He did not have confidence in the good works he did. He had confidence in Jesus because he believed that Jesus had died in his place on the cross and that as a result his sins were forgiven and that he had been counted righteous in the sight of God. In short he believed that God was a God whose love covered over sin. Archdeacon Cowper was a man of hope, in a colony in which hope was in short supply.

Now you may think that such a "beyond this world' hope would make him passive and useless. You may say, "just give us the good he did here with the Christian bits shaved off. They are not integral to his vision of a society of compassionate and just people.' Even the motive of doing good in order to secure your own salvation was removed. But you would be exactly wrong. The assurance that he was loved by God and that his hope was secure galvanized him to do what good he could in this world. It was because he had turned to Christ for salvation and never regarded himself as a good man that he was energetic in good works for the benefit of others. The fact that he was loved made him a loving man. In return, he was loved in his community; he was no wowser, but a champion of the poor and dispossessed. Listen to some of what Bishop Barker had to say about his life:

"When he had learned to love the Saviour, he never ceased to serve him with all good fidelity. In the spirit in which he came out to Australia, he lived and died here. When it was first proposed that he should go out to this colony the difficulties, trials, and even dangers of such a step were strongly represented to him. His reply to every statement of this kind was, "no matter if I can only be the means of winning one soul to Christ I shall be amply repaid." In labours for this end he was most abundant. The only minister of religion at a period when living freights of vice had been cast upon these shores and left to corrupt and infect the moral atmosphere with hardly an effort to stay the plague, when few were married, when ardent spirits formed the circulating medium, when on one Lord's day only three free persons attended divine service, while every week groups of wretched criminals were launched into eternity with far less concern than men would kill an animal for food.

"In this unpromising field he laboured forty-seven years, painfully, prayerfully, most diligently and successfully.

"His ordinary Sunday labour would now be deemed sufficient for three clergyman. He conducted three, and often four, full services in the Church. The military and civil hospitals and schools and the sick were visited, and at the close of a laborious day, in which every moment had been occupied, he failed not to enter the condemned cells and to carry the message of mercy to numbers, sometimes twelve, or even twenty, whose sun was about to set for ever.

The Bishop made sure we understood this: in apologizing for praising Cowper too much he says: "whatever of good was found in his character and life, my beloved friend would have been the first to ascribe to the love and mercy of God; his language would have been, "By the grace of God I am what I am" And then, in case we miss the point, the preacher goes on to suggest to his listeners that they make sure that they heed Cowper's message first and foremost and make sure that they are reconciled to God. It is from the fact that he had peace with God through Jesus Christ that there came that vast energy to be a blessing to his fellow citizens and especially the poor and the lost.

We are right to be grateful to God for this man and for his family. He was a sensational nation-builder, making sure that the true Christian gospel was written into the title deeds of the new nation which was coming to birth. No wonder he was both beloved by the poor and a hero of the evangelical Christians who even then were struggling for the soul of their church. And yet our gratitude will be an empty formality if we do not follow the advice which he himself would be giving us if he were present. He would be saying this: I thank God for what he may have achieved through me by his grace and mercy, since I am unworthy to be called his servant. But once more and again I say this to you: that Jesus Christ is the Saviour of the world and the one true mediator between God and man. Delay no longer: commit yourself to him; place your life in his hands; receive the hope he offers and then live in this life for him, energetic to do the good works which he has called on you to walk in.

Cowper's life shows that this simple message, the message of the gospel and the Bible lies at the very heart of the history of this nation. To this day there are abundant testimonies to it around us. But we are in grave danger neglecting, scorning or even suppressing it. Today in this occasion, Cowper is allowed to speak again and he would say to us " as you love your nation, seek its spiritual renewal. Attend to the foundations: trust in Jesus Christ, listen to the Bible, walk in love, be strong in hope.