Jade Goody

The Diocese of Chelmsford has published on their website the sermon from the funeral of Jade Goody, which was held at St John the Baptist Church, Buckhurst Hill, Essex. The sermon can be found here .

Jade Goody, had a dramatic rise to fame through the reality television programme "Big Brother" and frequently found herself on the front page of newspapers due to her somewhat rocky lifestyle. Her fame was further confirmed due to her recent rapid decline, and subsequent death, due to cervical cancer, leading to something akin to national mourning in Great Britain.

The sermon gives testimony that upon her death bed Jade was converted, through the reading of the Bible. It is an incredible account and exalts the glorious grace of God which is offered to sinners, no matter how sinful, nor wicked. As Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.” (Luke 5: 31, 32)
The following section shows that our "post-modern", "post-Christian" world can still understand the concept of a Righteous God, who demands satisfaction. Jade Goody, who once famously said "Do they speak Portuganese in Portugal? I thought Portugal was in Spain" understood substitutionary atonement in some small way! This is good news for all people, no matter their level of education, background, culture, and it can be understood by all people through the grace of the Holy Spirit:

"I had the privilege last week of being able to see the Bible Jade read from. Here it is, and here is possibly the most significant thing about it. She's underlined one chapter more fully than any other. It's one of the most momentous passages of the whole Bible. and it's actually in the Old Testament, in a book of the Bible called Isaiah and chapter 53. The words were written 700 years before Jesus, but speak of him and describe exactly what He came to do. They're words that lie at the heart of the Christian faith and describe the events of Good Friday that Christians will remember this coming week. Here are some of the words that Jade underlined:

All of us were like sheep that were lost,
Each of us going his own way.
But the Lord made the punishment fall on him,
The punishment all of us deserve.

"These words explain that it is possible to be confident about heaven, even though our lives are flawed. You see none of us - not you, not me, not Jade - can stand before a holy God with lives free from mistakes, from faults, from things that we regret. As these verses that Jade underlined tell us, we don't have perfect lives. But we do have Jesus, who opened heaven's doors: not for great achievers, not for those who think they are better than others, but for people like Jade, who simply reach out to Jesus and trust in him, even when all else seems hopelesss."

This testimony rebukes us for not praying for the famous as we ought, and not believing in the power of the Gospel, even to save those who have gloried in their sin.

May God be glorified because of the grace shown to Jade Goody, and may he grant us grace to believe in the power of the Holy Spirit working through the whole Bible, and the strength and courage to take the Gospel to a dying world which desperately needs it.