Living God’s Story

A sermon preached at St Martin-in-the-Fields on July 15, 2026 by Revd Dr Sam Wells

I want to set out what we might call the Biblical story, in terms that may well be familiar to you.

God called Abraham, and by faith Abraham responded, and set out from his native land, and came to a land that God had prepared for or him. Things were difficult for the descendants of Abraham, and they had times of hardship in Egypt and conflict in the Promised Land. But they flourished in times of plenty, and walked with God through land, king and temple. Yet they lost all three, experienced exile and laboured under other nations. But during this time they saw a new face of God, and came to realise a God who walked with them, even when that God did not always act for them in the ways they wanted.

This is the story of the Old Testament. I want you to see how it is also Yesh’s story. I see Yesh as an Abraham figure, a pioneer, who set out from the source of the Blue Nile to find the land that God had prepared for him. Like God’s people he journeyed far and wide, with his spells in the British, Norwegian and American navies. Like God’s people he knew hardship under an oppressive regime, and like God’s people he had his own exodus and time in the wilderness and journey on foot to find liberation and a place to belong. Like the patriarchs of Genesis he met his beloved in a foreign land, and like the lovers in Song of Songs Jill and Yesh could not be parted and had a love that would not let them go.

Like God’s people Yesh knew trials even in more settled times. The story of Miriam was one of love and struggle, the mysteries of God’s creation and the joy of human life yet the tragedy of suffering and early death. Just as God’s people sought the welfare of the city in which they dwelt, so Yesh worked successfully at Cummins and later began his own business and supported institutions and family back in Ethiopia. But like God’s people Yesh knew a different kind of exile, not this time a geographical one but one first described in 1817 as the shaking palsy by a certain Dr James Parkinson. Yet like God’s people in exile, he found a wonderful community and way to discover and be a blessing while under the shadow of Parkinson’s.

For Christians, the story of the Old Testament finds its fulfilment in the New. It is Jesus that finally brings us home from the exile of our estrangement and the captivity of our earthly trials. It is Jesus who himself knows the isolation of abandonment, the curse of betrayal, and the agony of the cross yet in the resurrection opens the door of eternity for us to be with God forever. For Yesh, it was Jesus that led him into the Ethiopian Christian Fellowship Church, where he found soul friends and fellow travellers, it was Jesus who led him to St Nicholas Deptford where for decades he found faith and belonging, and it was Jesus who led him to St Martin-in-the-Fields where he’d often eaten with Dan and enjoyed the peal of bells and eventually came with Jill to find faith and hope and love.

So we give thanks for how Yesh showed us the shape of God’s story, through call, challenge, exodus, travel, travail, exile, belonging and love. And we realise, even more profound than the way his story mirrors God’s story, the extent to which Yesh’s life shows us the face of God. In Yesh’s dignity we see the face of God our help in ages past. In Yesh’s gentleness we see the fruits of the Spirit, along with joy, peace and goodness. In Yesh’s capacity to listen we witness the Mary who sat at Jesus’ feet and who Jesus singled out for praise because she modelled how Jesus sits and listens at our feet. In his love for Jill, we see God’s love for God’s people depicted as in the Song of Songs. In Yesh’s love for Miriam, we see the face of the Father who loved the broken body of his son Jesus. In his ministry of clothes-sharing to those experiencing homelessness we see a living Good Samaritan. In his mimicry of Nelson Mandela, we see his imitation of a new Moses who longs to set his people free.

In Yeshiwas Demilew, God gave us a living Bible through whom to imagine the scriptural story, and a living icon through whom to see God face to face. Thank God for Yesh, God’s gift to us of faith and hope and love.