Nevertheless I progressed through to  Robin Hood, Robinson Crusoe, and Dr Who. But a firm favourite remained a hero from across the Atlantic – The Lone Ranger. If you have forgotten the basic plot – let me remind you. The Lone Ranger was a Texas Ranger left alive after the death of his family and friends. He was determine to counter the evil of this experience by righting wrongs when ever he encountered them. The Lone Ranger was a quiet, understated hero. He did have help – his famous horse Silver. When we first meet Silver he is not only unbroken, untamed but is assumed to be to hard to ever ride. Tonto, the Lone Ranger’s other Indian friend declares Silver to be out of anyone’s reach. But the Lone Ranger is not one to give up. This horse is for him. And so through some mysterious whispering in  the horses ear, magic happens and the horse and the Long Ranger are inseparable. 

I want you to hold that story for a moment- as I tell another. This time it’s a new story from last week .Police in Israel have arrested a gang who have been responsible for obscene graffiti, vandalism and attacks on elderly orthodox Jews. This sounds all too familiar. But this gang were different. They were Jewish men who had become neo-Nazi’s, denying the holocaust, dressing in brownshirts and swastikas and idolising Adolf Hitler.  It took a year to catch the gang – partly because the Jewish police could not believe this could happen in Israel. 

So how do these stories help our understanding of this passage. Paul feels that before he met with Christ he was wild and untamed  - perhaps we should view him rather like Silver. He was a hard case to crack. It wasn’ t a whisper but  a dramatic light on the road to Damascus which turned  him around. 

But it is more than this. Paul calls himself in verse 15 the chief sinner. Looking back he is appalled that he enjoyed persecuting Christians in the way he did. He was doing to God’s people what the wicked pagans had done to Israel in past times. His judgement of himself is that he was beyond the  pale. Perhaps like it might be for one of those Jewish lads who finds faith and becomes a Rabbi in later life looking back in horror at the crimes committed in his youth. 

Yet nobody is beyond God’s loving reach and Paul is presenting his life as a model to us. He is saying “I was the scum of the earth. Nobody could sink lower than me yet God found me and turned me around.” 

And Paul became a central agent for spreading the Good News of Jesus.

God’s love is built on trusting us and because we all fall short -it is strange to think that. It seems terribly risky of God building his kingdom on fail fallible mortals. But that is God’s strange way of love.

So although this passage seems to be about Paul it is really about God and how God works. In fact Paul ends this passage with words made famous by the hymn God  - immortal , invisible, God only wise.  Paul is developing  the truth. A Kingdom or Empire built on the ideals of Good men will always fail. It always has. It always will. So God’s Kingdom is built on sinners who have been to the depths  - who know their dark places, who are aware of their weaknesses and faults, will grow because  it is these people who can speak to others in this fallen world. 

Two weeks ago a parishioner of mine came up to be and said how shocked she was that she had read recently that Mother Teresa had had deep and profound doubts at certain times in her life. It was a real shock to her - It came as no surprise to me. God trusts those to feel not worthy of knowing him. He builds his kingdom by trusting frail, thin poor women living in the slums of India. He builds his kingdom on hotheads like Paul who enjoy inflicting pain and death, he builds his kingdom by trusting Fred Lemmon , a convicted and hardened criminal who was touched by and angel in a cell, Fred wrote a book of his experiences which spoke powerfully to my neighbour – an ex-convict too and brought him into the Kingdom. 

And the Good news is that however inadequate and despite you feel God loves you and if you let him, he will use you to build his kingdom. 

I began with two stories. Let me end with a third.  I admire Billy Graham. God has certainly trusted him with the building of his kingdom. Maybe this is because Billy never holds back from sharing stories when he got it wrong.

This is my favourite. Billy Grahame was on a whistle stop tour of the states when he was a young man. The tour was intensive and tiring. Collecting and receiving mail became a vital part of Billy’s life to keep him in touch with home.  One day he found himself at a station in small town miles from anywhere. He had just written those precious letters and thought the first thing I’ll do is find a mail box. On the platform however the mail box was know where to be seen. There was however a young boy, about eight, big hat on his head to shelter himself from the piecing son.

Billy went up to the boy  and said “Hody little feller. Can you tell me the way to the mail box”

The boy fixed Billy with a stare. “You go down that cotton picking road. Yer come to the drugstore Mister . The mailbox is in there."

“Thanks kid” said Billy and with a big toothy evangelists smile said ”Yer  wanner come with me to the big tent tonight to find Jesus.”

I ain’t coming with you mister – said the boy “you don’t even know where the mailbox is.” 

The kingdom of God is built on those who get it wrong like St. Paul, Mother Theresa, Billy Grahame  me and you. The immortal invisible God only wise God knows that it is the only way the Kingdom will come and the only hope for mankind.

Rod Corke is the Priest in Charge of St. Mary Magdalene Church, Taunton.