Last Sunday was Boxing Day, also related to St.Stephen’s Day. Centuries ago, there were alms boxes collecting donations for the poor in the narthex of churches; these were opened and distributed on Boxing Day. The Oxford English Dictionary notes allusions from the 1830s in Britain: “the first weekday after Christmas day, observed as a holiday on which postmen, errand boys, and servants of various kinds expect to receive a Christmas box”. A diary entry from 1663 records it was customary for tradesmen to collect "Christmas boxes" of money or presents on the first weekday after Christmas as thanks for good service throughout the year. Probably before that, wealthy people sent their servants home for a day off with their families, since the servants would have had to work on Christmas Day itself, and these servants were given gifts and perhaps leftovers to take with them to share with their respective families.

Isn’t it interesting that the celebration of the birth of Jesus is associated so closely with a day marked by a tradition of generosity? Grace begets graciousness and generosity. Is this something that gets at the heart of what Christ came for, to spark love and giving and kindness that people want to share with others?

On December 12 my daughter Emily’s family ‘unboxed’ the gospel. They drove about an hour and a half into one of the camps of homeless people in the city of Edmonton. They passed out Bibles along with Christmas Cards and Tim-Cards to those living in the homeless camps. Not a long-term solution for the predicament of the homeless people facing harsh winter conditions in a cold northern climate, no doubt, but still a well-meaning gift with the potential for someone to hear the Good News about Jesus along with a small gesture of tangible caring!

Thom Rainer is a well-known church growth and revitalization consultant who has studied that topic for years and written many books. He customarily spoke about 150 times a year. Recently I enjoyed a free eBook from his ministry called “Anatomy of a Revived Pastor: Traits of Pastors who have gone from Discouraged to Difference-making”. I was struck by the practical advice backed by experience and success of pastors whose churches have become healthy and thriving as they applied the gospel in their local context. Rainer concludes: “In this post-COVID world, there is a lot of frustration and discouragement. Pastors are clearly among those who are frustrated and discouraged. But take a look again at these pastors who moved from discouragement to difference-making. The key characteristic was their outward focus. They shared their faith with intentionality. They developed relationships with the unchurched. They kept the focus on evangelism in their churches.”

In short, they were intentional about getting the Good News out of the box!

So today I’d like to examine with you whether these same principles apply to revived CHRISTIANS not just revived PASTORS. As we look at the second letter of the Apostle Peter, we’ll see there is a lot of overlap: a growing Christian allows the Lord to flavour their relationships, resulting in outreach to the unchurched and practical expressions of love for those in their neighbourhood.

PETER’S PATH OF PERSONAL PROGRESS IN PIETY

The scope of our passage, 2Peter 1:3-11, is vast: it goes from the past into the present and peers into the future.

He starts out in the PAST. Verse 3B says God “CALLED US by His own glory and goodness.” You were PICKED, selected, called and chosen. Not because you or I deserved it, but purely ‘by His own glory and goodness’ – because of God’s own excellence, His loving nature, His sovereign choice and authority. Titus 3:5 “he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy.He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit...” Praise the Lord for new birth and the Spirit’s renewal!

You who believe were PICKED, and you were POWERED and PROVIDED FOR. Verse 3, “His divine POWER has given us EVERYTHING WE NEED for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.” The power that set the sun in place, the moon and planets in their orbits, that holds galaxies and atoms and molecules together, that keeps water flowing over Niagara Falls and winds to bring the elements – that same power has provided EVERYTHING you need for ‘life and godliness’ - how? Through knowing Him. Having a relationship with your Creator / Redeemer / Sustainer.

Also from the past, we have been blessed with God’s PROMISES. V4 “Through these he has given us his very great and precious PROMISES, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.” The Old Testament prophets foretold a Suffering Saviour who would rescue His people, in passages like Psalm 22 and Isaiah 53, not to mention other passages from which the Jewish leaders could inform King Herod that the Christ would be born in Bethlehem. Following His resurrection, Jesus was able to go back through the Old Testament Scriptures and explain to His disciples all these promises that pointed to Him, which He had brought to fulfilment before their very eyes. The New Testament in many ways is a book of promises for Christ’s followers, assurances that as we trust in Jesus He will be present with us, indwelling us with His Spirit, guiding us and teaching us what we need to know. 2 Corinthians 1:20A “For no matter how many promises God has made, they are ‘Yes’ in Christ.”

Now Peter’s passage passes from the PAST to the PRESENT, what the faithful in the church can be enjoying right now. For starters, we can be PARTICIPATING in God’s very nature. This comes about through those precious PROMISES as we begin to act on them. V4, “Through these he has given us his very great and precious PROMISES, so that through them you may PARTICIPATE in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.” The key word translated ‘participate’ is the Gk koinonia, sharing, having in common. We come to participate in or exhibit and experience God’s nature as His Holy Spirit indwells us and starts to transform us to be like Jesus. Romans 8:13 “For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live...”

By God’s grace we have already come to POSSESS various godly qualities. 2Peter 1:8 “For if you POSSESS these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” What qualities do we possess? Peter has just gone through a list of eight qualities in verses 5-7.

First, FAITH. V5a “For this very reason, make every effort to add to your FAITH, goodness...” The Christian journey starts with faith. Unless you believe Jesus suffered and died and rose again to pay for your sins and give you new righteous life, you can’t share in what He’s purchased for His people. 1John 5:13 “I write these things to YOU WHO BELIEVE IN THE NAME OF THE SON OF GOD so that you may know that you have eternal life.” Ephesians 2:8 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through FAITH— and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God...” When you hear the Gospel and commit your life to Jesus, He will come into your life and start His renovation project.

Second quality: Peter says “add to your faith GOODNESS...” Some translations put this “virtue” – in other words ‘Moral power, moral energy, vigor of soul’. The most basic table grace starts out, “God is great, God is GOOD, and we thank Him for our food.” If God were not good He would not be worthy of worship, but instead would be some kind of monster. Let God’s goodness infuse you, start to flavour your thinking and purposes.

Goodness and virtue would be the opposite of the vile lifestyle of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, architects of a lavish me-centred pleasure-driven pattern that plummeted to become parasitic on young women, a pyramid scheme that preyed on those already involved so they would in turn recruit other victims to satisfy selfish and perverted lust. Thankfully this week a court brought justice to some of those victims.

The third quality Peter mentions is KNOWLEDGE. This means insight, understanding, from the God who reveals His thoughts to humans (Amos 4:13). Peter was writing during the early period of Gnosticism: these mystery cults purported that you needed to be ‘let in on’ secret teachings, whereas in Christianity the teachings were being proclaimed publicly. Jesus wants us to know His Father’s will, and understand the Big Picture, God’s will for us. John 15:15 “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business.Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.” Christ Himself is the divine Logos, making-known or explanation, God unpacking and revealing His very nature to us.

Fourth quality is SELF-CONTROL, also known as ‘temperance’, holding oneself in. It’s the finally-listed Fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:23. Those mature Christian men qualified to be leaders in the church are described in Titus 1:8 thus: “Rather he must be hospitable, one who loves what is good, who is SELF-CONTROLLED, upright, holy and disciplined.”

Fifth, Peter says to add to our self-control PERSEVERANCE or ‘patient endurance’ (NLT). Now there’s one you can’t add in a hurry! Perseverance is developed slowly, repeatedly, over time. It doesn’t come easily. James 1:3 “because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.”

Peggy Noonan once said, “The wisest words I ever heard on the subject of patience were from a born-again Christian whose husband was an agnostic. She loved and believed in Jesus, but her husband was in turn derisive and dismissive. A Christian friend gave her this advice: 'Don't talk to your husband about God: talk to God about your husband.'” Yes, that takes patience and perseverance!

Sixth Peter lists GODLINESS. Godliness is related to reverence, respect, piety toward God; if you have a high regard for the Lord, you’re conscious of Him in everything you do, it profoundly affects your decisions. NIV Study Bible commentary puts this, “A genuine reverence toward God that governs one’s attitude toward every aspect of life.” Can we say like Paul, Acts 24:16 “So I strive always to keep my conscience clear before God and man”? Do we practise that momentary pause to submit our choices to God in spirit, so we’re not just defaulting to our fleshly preferences and appetites?

Seventh, Peter says to add to our godliness, BROTHERLY KINDNESS, NLT ‘brotherly affection’. This is the Greek word from which Philadelphia gets its name (I’m talking about the city, not the cream cheese!) - ‘city of brotherly love’. This can be described as “warmhearted affection toward all in the family of faith” (NIV SB). In his first letter Peter admonished the church, 1Pet 1:22 “Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart.” Does that describe our church? What can we do personally to make that more accurately describe our fellowship? What fences do we need to mend?

Eighth and last in this list comes LOVE, i.e.AGAPE – not romantic love, or affection for one’s best bud, but love that sacrificially loves even those who seem unlovely, toward whom we have no natural affinity. Remember, it’s agape-love that’s described in Romans 5:8 - “But God demonstrates his own LOVE for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” And it’s agape-love in John 15:13 when Jesus says, “Greater love [greater AGAPE] has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” How have you been a recipient of that kind of laying-down-life love?

So Peter says we POSSESS all those 8 qualities. But it’s not static, it’s growing! V5 “...make every effort to ADD TO YOUR FAITH goodness; and to goodness, knowledge...” (Etc.etc. - keep on adding) It’s continual, it never stops, you’re never ‘done’. And out of this POSSESSING qualities we become PRODUCTIVE: V8 “For if you POSSESS these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unPRODUCTIVE in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Show me a person who’s increasing in all those ways, bursting out in holiness – faith goodness knowledge self-control perseverance godliness brotherly_kindness love – and I’ll show you a person who’s bound to be PRODUCTIVE in their Christian walk. People will see they’re onto something REAL, something very special. “What’s your source?” “How do they do that?”

And Peter points to the future, to a reward awaiting Jesus-followers who grow in these qualities. Note the promise in verses 10-11: “Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election [YOUR BEING PICKED!] sure.For if you do these things, you will never fall, and you will receive A RICH WELCOME into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” A RICH WELCOME - not just ‘a welcome’, as in ‘It’s nice you showed up’ - but ‘a RICH welcome’, as in let’s roll out the red carpet, make ready a banquet, give this guest the place of honour, let’s really celebrate they’ve come! Which is what Jesus is getting at in Luke 15 with the parables of the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the lost son(s). A PRODIGAL welcome, a super-POSITIVE RECEPTION. As Jesus described it in the illustration of the sheep and the goats in Matthew 25(34), “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.’” Or as the Psalmist expressed it in the context of God’s priceless unfailing love for those who know Him in Psalm 36:8, “They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights.” Now THAT’S a positive reception, the warmest welcome!

A REVIVED CHURCH OF REVITALIZED MEMBERS

I mentioned at the outset Thom Rainer’s book Anatomy of a Revived Pastor: Traits of Pastors who have gone from Discouraged to Difference-making”. Rainer mentions 15 lessons learned from pastors in reaching the unchurched. What stands out to me is that several of these 15 lessons relate to the 8 qualities mentioned by the Apostle Peter. Let’s briefly touch on these.

Lesson One: Authenticity. “Over nine out of ten of the pastors interviewed told us that their own personal integrity was a major factor in reaching the unchurched “The unchurched look at leaders just like anybody else does,” said Sam P., A Methodist pastor from Texas. “if they don’t see authenticity in our own lives, how can they expect the church to be real?” I would relate ‘authenticity’ to Peter’s number 2 ‘Goodness/virtue’ and number 6 ‘Godliness’.

Lesson Two Thom Rainer calls “The Imperative of Personal Evangelism”. A formerly unchurched man from Tampa Florida said, “I thank God that my church sent people out to share Jesus with me.I thank God they were trained how to share the gospel with me.I thank God they loved me enough to be obedient to the Lord.” I would relate this to Peter’s number 7, Brotherly Kindness. If we don’t care about the lost, if it makes no difference to us that they’re bound for hell in eternity unless they receive Christ, we won’t bother to share with them the good news about Jesus.

Also related to Peter’s number 7 (brotherly kindness) is Rainer’s Lesson 3, “Relationships Again”. Rainer notes, “More than eight out of ten of the pastors we interviewed indicated their keen awareness of the impact of reaching the unchurched through relationships...Such relationships are the result of the “overflow” of God’s presence in a Christian’s life.” We could add in here Rainer’s Lesson 5, “The Pastor must model Personal Evangelism”. A Louisiana pastor said bluntly, “I think most church leaders are basically stupid about reaching the unchurched. You know what they need to do? Tell lost people about Jesus. Witness to them. I mean, what kind of idiot expects to reach lost people without telling them about Jesus?” (What kind, indeed?!)

Rainer’s Lesson 4: “An Atmosphere of Love and Acceptance.” He says, “A Nevada pastor told us: ‘The stories of hurting people who come to our church are incredible. We have no advertising budget, but people just keep coming. We do not compromise our beliefs whatsoever. But we do tell people over and over again that Jesus accepted them where they were, that He forgives sinners.” I would fit this into Peter’s quality number 8, Agape-love. An atmosphere of love and acceptance, welcoming hurting people, assuring them Jesus accepts them where they are.

Rainer’s Lesson 6: “Enthusiasm and Joy are present in churches that reach the unchurched.” I wasn’t sure where to fit this in to Peter’s list, but maybe number 1 - ‘Faith’, because trusting God brings enthusiasm and joy. Those also are multiplied when you see the Gospel working in others’ lives! An Evangelical Free Church pastor told the researchers, “It feeds on itself. A joyous church motivates people to invite the unchurched. And when the unchurched are reached, the joy grows. It’s a great cycle!”

Rainer’s Lesson 7: “Do not compromise the Essentials.” He reports, “We heard similar stories from over 60 percent of the pastors we interviewed. Not only does an unchallenging message fail to attract the unchurched, but we learned from the formerly unchurched that such an approach actually deters them from returning. The formerly unchurched are attracted to churches with a strong belief system.” So I would slot this into Peter’s number 1 (faith), number 4 (self-control - there’s discipline), and number 6 (godliness).

Rainer’s Lesson 8 and Lesson 12 relate to Peter’s number 3, ‘knowledge’. Lesson 8: “Have small group opportunities available;’ and Lesson 12: “Utilize a Discover Class to Reach the Unchurched”. In both areas, there’s opportunity for KNOWLEDGE to be shared in a group setting. That’s why small group / LifeGroup ministry is so important! The researchers found most church leaders ‘agree that some type of small-group organization must be in place both to reach and to assimilate the unchurched.’ They found there was a ‘strong desire of the formerly unchurched to learn doctrine, to know more about the church, and to learn biblical issues.’

There are several other lessons Rainer found that I would connect to Peter’s quality 8, Agape Love. These are Lesson 9 “Reaching People in Crisis”, Lesson 10 “Reaching the Unchurched through Quality Child Care”, Lesson 11 “Focus Evangelistic Efforts on Children and Youth”, and Lesson 14 “Marketing Tools Alone are Ineffective.” Think of all the energy Huron Chapel has devoted to its VBS and Heirborn midweek children’s program in the past. Those programs are a HUGE amount of work, involving a great sacrifice of volunteer time! Think of the coordination and commitment required to offer quality child care each week – a Nursery co-ordinator, Nursery Volunteers and Helpers, sign-in and Plan To Protect training - it’s a total package. It must be LOVE for the unchurched as well as those already attending that motivates our programming for children and youth. We’re making it a priority again in our Annual Plan To Protect Refresher Training coming up Monday January 17^th.

Thom Rainer comments: “In my role as a church consultant, I tell church leaders that quality preschool

and children’s facilities are imperative. Bright and safe modern rooms with new furniture, equipment, and toys, along with unquestionable security features, are demanded by discerning parents today, including unchurched parents.” [and] “Our research team’s studies indicate that 81 percent of those who accept Christ do so before the age of twenty. Whether this number is an indicator of receptivity to the gospel at a young age or the ineffectiveness of the church to reach adults, the case for focusing evangelistic resources on young people is compelling.”

I was contacted this week by a young mom with a relative newborn inquiring about child dedication. She said her New Year’s resolution (even though she lives at quite a distance) is to attend in person twice a month and watch virtually twice a month. I’m thinking to myself, ‘Will we have nursery available when she shows up? Do we have enough volunteers?’ The promise we make as a congregation when children are dedicated is to support those parents in nurturing the faith of their young ones. That takes sacrificial love.

Rainer’s Lesson 13 is ‘Find an evangelistic leader.’ The team found, “Four out of ten revived pastors we interviewed indicated that through an intentional process or by an unsought blessing, an evangelistic leader has emerged.” I would connect that to Peter’s quality 1, Faith. Who is the lay person that can be an ‘evangelistic champion’?

Last, Lesson 15 that Thom Rainer heard from revived pastors was, “Patience is Required.” Patience – that sounds like Peter’s quality 5, Perseverance or Endurance. Rainer writes, “We rarely met or interviewed church leaders who said that becoming a revived pastor was easy...Yet those who remained faithful and persistent in their places of ministry told us about breakthroughs on some occasions and slow but steady growth at other times.”

EYES ON THE HARVEST

Peter sums up his list of qualities in verse 8 in the New Living Translation, “The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” The word behind ‘productive’ has a root meaning ‘fruitful’ – we want to bear fruit for Jesus as His Holy Spirit bears increasing fruit in our personal lives. We want others to come to know this same grace we are enjoying.

Thom Rainer concludes, “There was no magic formula these pastors used to have a different outlook and a renewed focus. They simply and obediently focused more on reaching others. The key word in all they did was intentionality. And since there was no magic formula, you too can make the move from discouragement to difference-making. Remember how Jesus responded when He saw the masses of people without hope: Matthew 9:36-38 “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were confused and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. He said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is great, but the workers are few. So pray to the Lord who is in charge of the harvest; ask him to send more workers into his fields.’”

“That’s it [Rainer says].That’s the “secret.” Get into the harvest fields. Focus outwardly. Do so with intentionality. You will influence lives eternally for good. And if you are discouraged, your attitude will change. You will become a difference-maker.” Let’s pray.

Lord, this is Your church; we are Your disciples. Thank You for calling us, providing for us, empowering us, giving us everything we need, including the privilege of sharing in Your very nature. Make us increasingly productive and fruitful by means of these excellent qualities that reflect Your glory and goodness. Grant that by our witness other hungry souls may likewise taste Your goodness! Lead us on together in brotherly affection. In Christ’s name, Amen.

“Delightful Destiny: What Are You Living For?” - Jan.9/22 ~ Eph.1:3-14

SAVOURING THAT CHRISTMAS CAKE

Isn’t it fun to get gifts of baking at Christmastime? Or to see the special foods that are only available at that time of year in the store? Things like Egg Nog, and my favourite, that PC Chocolate Crackle Candy Cane Ice Cream. You can also get sugar cookies and shortbread; sugar cookies can be so light that you practically inhale them. Then at the other end of the range is Christmas cake, whether gumdrop cake or that darker raisin- and fruit-chocked traditional Christmas cake. You can’t inhale that! You have to chew it slowly, savouring the flavour in each bite, it’s not something to be hurried.

Our Scripture passage today is a bit like that. It’s not something to be hurried through. Paul the Apostle has packed it chock-full of spiritual richness and goodness, so it’s best digested slowly, thoughtfully, meditatively. Verses 3-14 of Ephesians are just one long sentence in the Greek, yet they address our past, present, and future as believers. In contrast to those who point out the word ‘Trinity’ is not found in Scripture, you can nevertheless see references to God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit with their ministries interwoven.

It’s also a good passage to meditate on given the current state of unrest and low-grade anxiety in our society. January 6 marked the anniversary of a significant protest and incursion at the US capital, and continues to expose the polarization between factions in our neighbour to the south. There is a vague feeling of DISORDER, there are divisions within families and amongst friends over pandemic policies.

Here, there is continuing UPHEAVAL due to the unsettling effect of the pandemic. New restrictions announced by the province this past Monday affect whether people go into work or work from home; students needing to stay home and study online rather than attend class in-person; you can’t go to certain places like the theater or gym as you usually might.

There is a lot of ISOLATION currently due to restrictions. Winter itself can be isolating, with bad weather closing highways, disrupting school bus schedules, trouble starting your car and getting out the driveway, and so forth. Those with Seasonal Affective Disorder can find January and February to be particularly ‘dark’ months. Then we have our physical distancing, masking, quarantining, gathering size limits, and ‘close contact’ measures that also prevent us from getting together in more friendly and intimate ways as we normally might.

In this passage Paul reminds us that Jesus addresses these upsetting factors of Disorder, Upheaval, and Isolation. Concerning Disorder: God’s purpose in the long run is to bring about cohesion through submission to Jesus, as verse 10 says – “to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ”. Concerning Upheaval: we are assured of a lasting purpose and coherence to existence – according to verse 9 God has “made known to us the mystery of His will according to His good pleasure, which He PURPOSED in Christ...” And concerning Isolation, v10 also emphasizes God’s purpose is eventually “to bring all things in heaven and on earth TOGETHER” – the Greek verb is one used for adding up a column of numbers, God will eventually ‘sum things up’ relative to Jesus. This is good to know when we look around and currently things just don’t seem to ‘add up’ or make sense.

TEN THINGS ABOUT YOURSELF – IN CHRIST

Throughout these dozen verses you will find over and over again one little phrase or variation of it that points us in one direction. Maybe you’ve driven by a car dealership and they have a couple of vehicles raised up on mounds or platforms to draw your attention, they’re on special display. Paul accomplishes the same thing here by repeating this little phrase. What’s the writer drawing attention to? Where’s he want our focus to be? On Jesus Christ. The little phrase is the two words ‘IN CHRIST’ or some variation of it that amount to the same thing. Can you find them? There are twelve altogether.

V3 ‘every spiritual blessing IN CHRIST’. V4 ‘for He chose us IN HIM’. V5 ‘to be adopted as His sons THROUGH JESUS CHRIST’. V6 ‘which He has freely given us IN THE ONE HE LOVES’. V7 ‘IN HIM we have redemption’ and ‘THROUGH HIS BLOOD’. V9 the end - ‘which He purposed IN CHRIST’. V10 ‘UNDER one head, even CHRIST’. Then right away in V11 ‘IN HIM we were also chosen’. V12 ‘we who were the first to hope IN CHRIST’. V13 ‘you also were included IN CHRIST’, and the twelfth instance, ‘you were marked IN HIM with a seal’.

So, it’s Jesus that ties this whole passage, this big long run-on sentence in the Greek – it’s HIM that ties it together. And it’s not just ‘Him’ but ‘IN HIM’ – and who’s that? Who’s the apostle saying is ‘in Christ’? We are! You are, if you have trusted in Him as your Lord and Saviour and are intent on following Him daily. So, not only is this passage about Jesus and what He’s done; it’s about YOU, too! You are here in Ephesians 1. These dozen little phrases ‘in Christ’ or ‘in Him’ are in fact pointing out ten precious truths about all believers, when you get right down to it. ‘In Christ’ Paul says we are: blessed, chosen, adopted, graced, redeemed, have purpose, are connected, have hope, are included, and marked. Bet you didn’t come here this morning expecting to read about yourself, dug deep from some first-century AD manuscript, did you?! But that’s true for everyone who is ‘in Him’, this passage is about what God has done for YOU, and Paul is praising God for it all. Let’s look at each of the ten briefly in turn.

1) BLESSED

To begin, we find we are BLESSED in v3, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who HAS BLESSED US in the heavenly realms WITH EVERY SPIRITUAL BLESSING IN CHRIST.” How comprehensive is that?! ‘EVERY spiritual blessing...’ That does not mean a new car in your driveway, or unexpected deposits in your bank account – though in general following God’s commands in Scripture such as being diligent in your work, not overconsuming substances or being a sluggard, will help you materially more than behaving the opposite. The blessings here Paul says are ‘in the heavenly realms’ – in the eyes of God, waiting for us to enjoy them when we are resurrected. Remember the Beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount? Jesus says those can consider themselves ‘blessed’ who are merciful, pure in heart, peacemakers, who are persecuted on account of righteousness and who hunger and thirst for it, those who are meek, who mourn, who are poor in spirit. Now you probably wouldn’t normally consider such people ‘blessed’! But in terms of God’s Kingdom, God is aware of them and will be responding to them, supplying comfort, filling them regarding righteousness, God will show them Himself and show them mercy, His Kingdom will belong to them. Paul notes in Galatians 3:9, “So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.” Faith in the Lord can turn your burdens into blessings.

2) CHOSEN

We talked recently about how God has ‘picked’ or chosen His people. Eph 1:4 says “For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.” It’s good to ask the “W5" questions to help you digest this rich Christmas cake - who what when where why and how. WHEN did God choose you in Christ? “Before the creation of the world.” Even before earth was made, before the universe existed, God the Father was loving Jesus the Son (as Jesus says in John 17:24), and if you are ‘in Christ’ God was loving you and choosing you even back then.

‘For what’ has God chosen you? There are a couple of spots in this passage that address that. V4 “He chose us in Him...to be holy and blameless in His sight.” Some ultra-reformed folks may harp on predestination and election but let’s not miss what we are chosen FOR: to be holy and blameless in His sight. How’s that going for you? On the one hand God views us who believe clothed in Jesus’ own righteousness since He was our substitute; on the other hand, we are aware of our daily ongoing battle with sin and temptation, needing to keep praying the Lord’s Prayer, ‘forgive us our trespasses’... Sanctification (holy-fication) is both positional and progressive. But He’s chosen us to BE holy!

Later in vv11-12 we’re told, “In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we...might be FOR THE PRAISE OF HIS GLORY.” What are you chosen for? To glorify God, to make Him look good, so when other people see you and your actions they will be drawn to praise God and admire how good God is. You are picked for the purpose of praising Your Maker.

3) ADOPTED

A few years back I had the privilege of attending an adoption ceremony at the local courthouse. It was a big deal! Two parents were officially bringing into their family two daughters from a completely different household. These girls then took on the family name, they call their new parents ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad’. It’s a huge commitment and something to celebrate, there’s a new family unit, they belong formally in that household from then on.

Paul describes something similar for you when you commit your life to Christ and receive Him as your Saviour. V5 “In love he predestined us TO BE ADOPTED AS HIS SONS through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will...” Those who believer are adopted as God’s very own sons and daughters! You’re part of the heavenly ‘family’. John 1:12f observes, “Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.” Adopted with the rights of God’s own sons and daughters.

4) GRACED

Through Jesus Christ, we have been adopted v6 says “to the praise of his glorious GRACE, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.” And v7, “...in accordance with the riches of God’s GRACE that He lavished on us..” Grace means you, though a sinner, are now accepted by a holy God. Mercy is not getting the punishment we deserved; grace is getting the forgiveness and inheritance we did not deserve. Paul elsewhere acknowledges that he was ‘the worst’ of sinners, having been a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man; yet, 1Timothy 1:14 “The GRACE of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.” Praise God for His grace!

5) REDEEMED

I received an offer in the email from a fuel company offering me a 20% discount if I booked a stay at a certain hotel. To take advantage of the offer I would have to ‘redeem’ the coupon. To redeem means literally to ‘buy back’. We’re quite familiar with ‘redeeming’ things that cost money because we like saving on expense. No doubt it costs the hotel company something but in return they get some advertising and promotion.

In Biblical times, the slave trade existed; even people were bought and sold for bonded labour. It was an exchange, like today you would hand over money for a grapefruit or bag of salt for your driveway. It’s this language the Bible uses to describe how Christ ransomed or redeemed us from evil, buying us back for Himself. V7 “In him we have REDEMPTION through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace...” How was our forgiveness of sins purchased? What price was paid? Was it money that was used? Bitcoin? Shekels? Denarii? No, it was redemption ‘through His blood’. That’s how Jesus bought you back for Himself – at the cost of His own life! The Apostle Peter wrote, 1Peter 1:18f “For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.”

V14 also talks of our ‘redemption’ but in a future sense: V14 “who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the REDEMPTION of those who are God’s possession— to the praise of his glory.” Here is the completion of the process for which we were bought: when we are raised from the dead to live forever in fellowship with our Lord; bought back from death to eternal life.

6) PURPOSE

This passage emphasizes Christians have PURPOSE, something to live for, it’s not just an aimless clashing of molecules with no ultimate goal or destiny. V9 “And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he PURPOSED in Christ...” There’s another little phrase that Paul repeats 3 times in this passage that informs us what that purpose might be. V12 “...in order that we...might be for the praise of His glory.” Vv5f “...in accordance with His pleasure and will – to the praise of His glorious grace...” And the end of this long winding sentence in Greek, v14 “to the praise of His glory”.

You have not been put on this planet simply to have a good time. You are not here just to use up air, water, and food. You were created and saved by faith for a definite purpose: for the praise of God’s glory, to lift Him up, extol Him, point out to others who good and gracious and loving and faithful He is. Do that and you will feel at your core your reason for existence, as the Lord pours into your gifts and abilities and expands your sphere of influence, because you’re doing what you were put here for. And He will give you more reasons to praise Him, more evidence to share with others.

7) CONNECTION

In Christ we are given new CONNECTION and accountability. V10 tells us God’s ultimate aim: V10 “to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment— to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ.” Scientists have searched for some unifying theory or principle; one website notes, “From the time that 19th century physicists...attempted to unite disparate physical phenomena, the search for a grand unified theory that would conjoin every known force and physical law has always been an implicit or explicit dream of physicists.” Well, Paul’s unifying theory is that God will bring together or ‘sum up’ all things under Christ as head. See 1Corinthians 15:24f,28 “Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet...When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.” Part of Jesus’ Lordship is our accountability, our being subject to Him; through Him we will have proper connection to other things in heaven and on earth.

8) HOPE

Sometimes listening to the news these days you get the feeling that hope is a scarce commodity. As Christians, we’ve been given a glimpse of the big picture, we’ve been able to peek ahead to the last chapter in the book, and that gives us HOPE. That hope is not in streets of gold or endless bliss playing harps in the clouds, but in a person named Jesus. V12 [we were chosen and predestined] “in order that we, who were the first to HOPE IN CHRIST, might be for the praise of his glory.” In Paul’s famous ‘love’ chapter (1Corinthians 13), hope is one of the things that abides alongside faith and love.

Our hope is tied to a historical fact, not some philosophical theory. Paul admits in 1Cor 15:17,19 “And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.” Then he adds, “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead.” (1Cor 15:20) So hope has a real basis.

9) INCLUDED

Apparently there’s an expression today to describe the angst of people who are limited not immortal and omnipotent; this is called FOMO, “Fear Of Missing Out”. You can’t be everywhere and do everything, there are often timetable conflicts, you can’t make it to every party or event you might like to go to. But Jesus takes away our FOMO in terms of spiritual things: He has made it possible for us to be INCLUDED.

V13A, “And you also were INCLUDED IN CHRIST when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation.Having believed...” Someone shares the good news with us, explaining our need of a Saviour, how God sent Jesus to die for our sins, how He rose again and is going to return, and how we can be saved by putting our wholehearted trust in Him and yielding control of our life to Him. And we believe that simple message. We hold as true and apply to ourselves verses like Romans 10:9, “That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” We’ve heard ‘the word of truth’ and it struck a chord with us, we have faith in the message so commit to Christ. That’s how we are INCLUDED in Him, how we’re saved. We become part of His forever family called the church. No longer alone, never again feel all alone in the universe, cut off from meaning and purpose; we are part of a fellowship that has existed through many countries for centuries, and that finds its focus and future in the Son of God.

10) SEALED

Finally, Paul points out that we have a sign of new ownership imprinted on us. V13b-14, “Having believed, you were MARKED IN HIM WITH A SEAL, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of THOSE WHO ARE GOD’S POSSESSION— to the praise of his glory.” Remember how we said you can see the Trinity - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - interwoven through this passage? Here’s the “Holy Spirit” segment. Paul is saying the Holy Spirit marks us, makes us identifiable, helps us stand out as belonging to God; the Spirit is a ‘down payment’ as it were assuring us of our eventual inheritance in the future – including that part about “every spiritual blessing” “in the heavenly realms” Paul started this passage referring to.

The apostle said something similar to the church at Corinth: 2Cor 1:21f “Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ.He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.” A seal in those times represented security, authenticity, ownership, and authority. As God’s children through faith, we are deepened in all those areas through the Holy Spirit’s influence in our lives.

AN INHERITANCE MISSED

In closing, we can praise God that He has indeed ‘blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.’ (V3) We can live bolstered knowing, as the New Living Translation puts it, “When you believed in Christ, He identified you as His own by giving you the Holy Spirit...The Spirit is God’s guarantee that He will give us the inheritance He promised and that He has purchased us to be His own people.”

Yet – do we live conscious of these blessings? Are we confident and assured knowing an inheritance awaits, guaranteed?

A man who had been a drunkard on Chicago’s Skid Row for many years came to a half-way house ate a meal and went to bed. That was his last night on earth. He died poverty-stricken and friendless, never to see another day.

What he did not know was that he had an inheritance of over 4 million dollars waiting for him in England. The authorities had searched for him but were unable to find him because he had no address. Here was a man who had all the material wealth he could want, but he lived and died in poverty.

Are we like that at all? God does not want us to live in poverty because we aren’t fully aware of our wealth in Christ. Let’s pray.

Thank You Father for choosing us before the creation of the world, for letting us hear the truth that can save us, for making Jesus real to us as our Saviour and Lord. How precious to know our sins are forgiven!

God, for any listening who don’t know that reality, who have not yet trusted Christ, help them take that step. Help them know for a certainty You have loved them and provided for them and drawn them to Yourself through the cross. Convict them of their need, and help them recognize the solution You have so richly and graciously provided.

Holy Spirit, empower us to live in the light of these truths. Help people to see by our behaviour and our speech that we are in fact belonging to God, sold out, blessed in the heavenlies, living on purpose. Be pleased to continue Your saving work through us. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Amos 1-2: God Holds ALL to Account” - Jan.16/22 ~ Amos 2:1-8

THE BEST OF TIMES – THE MOST UNETHICAL OF TIMES

Today we start a 4-part series on the book of the prophet Amos. So we are travelling back in time about 28 centuries – Amos prophesied about 760-750 BC. You might suppose times were very different back then. Yet there are definite parallels to our setting today, in affluent Western society. By the way did you hear that, according to US News & World Report, in 2021 Canada scored the highest ranking of the countries in the world in terms of best place to live? (We were #2 out of 78 countries in 2020.) We also placed in top spot in the categories of "Quality of Life" and "Social Purpose.”

So, with that in mind, let’s hear about the setting in which Amos came on the scene to prophesy to the Northern Kingdom of Israel in the eighth centurey B.C. It was a golden age unlike any period since King David and King Solomon back around 1000 B.C. To set the stage, here’s an excerpt from The Expositor’s Bible Commentary...

“...Elisha was able to leave behind him the promise of a new day of victory (13:17 ff.). It was in the peace and liberty of this day that Israel rose a step in civilization; that prophecy, released from the defense, became the criticism, of the national life; and that the people, no longer absorbed in their own borders, looked out, and for the first time realized the great world, of which they were only a part.

“King Joash, whose arms the dying Elisha had blessed, won back in the sixteen years of his reign (798-783) the cities which the Syrians had taken from his father. (2Ki 13:23-25) His successor, Jeroboam II, came in, therefore, with a flowing tide. He was a strong man, and he took advantage of it. During his long reign of about forty years (783-743) he restored the border of Israel from the Pass of Hamath between the Lebanons to the Dead Sea, and occupied at least part of the territory of Damascus. This means that the constant raids to which Israel had been subjected now ceased, and that by the time of Amos, about 755, a generation was grown up who had not known defeat, and the most of whom had perhaps no experience even of war.

“Along the same length of years Uzziah (circa 778-740) had dealt similarly with Judah.(2Ki 15; cf. 2Ch 26) He had pushed south to the Red Sea, while Jeroboam pushed north to Hamath: and while Jeroboam had taken the Syrian towns he had crushed the Philistine. He had reorganized the army, and invented new engines of siege for casting stones.

“On such of his frontiers as were opposed to the desert he had built towers...

“All this meant such security across broad Israel as had not been known since the glorious days of Solomon. Agriculture must everywhere have revived: Uzziah, the Chronicler tells us, "loved husbandry." But we hear most of Trade and Building. With quarters in Damascus and a port on the Red Sea, with allies in the Phoenician towns and tributaries in the Philistine, with command of all the main routes between Egypt and the North as between the Desert and the Levant, Israel, during those forty years of Jeroboam and Uzziah, must have become a busy and a wealthy commercial power. Hosea calls the Northern Kingdom a very Canaan—Canaanite being the Hebrew term for trader—...Amos exposes all the restlessness, the greed, and the indifference to the poor of a community making haste to be rich. The first effect of this was a large increase of the towns and of town-life. Every document of the time—up to 720—speaks to us of its buildings...Vast palaces— the name of them first heard of in Israel under Omri and his Phoenician alliance, and then only as that of the king’s citadel—are now built by wealthy grandees out of money extorted from the poor; they can have risen only since the Syrian wars. There are summer houses in addition to winter houses; and it is not only the king, as in the days of Ahab, who furnishes his buildings with ivory. When an earthquake comes and whole cities are overthrown, the vigor and wealth of the people are such that they build more strongly and lavishly than before. (Isa 9:10) With all this we have the characteristic tempers and moods of city-life: the fickleness and liability to panic which are possible only where men are gathered in crowds; the luxury and false art which are engendered only by artificial conditions of life; the deep poverty which in all cities, from the beginning to the end of time, lurks by the side of the most brilliant wealth, its dark and inevitable shadow.

“In short, in the half-century between Elisha and Amos, Israel rose from one to another of the great stages of culture. Till the eighth century they had been but a kingdom of fighting husbandmen. Under Jeroboam and Uzziah city-life was developed, and civilization, in the proper sense of the word, appeared. Only once before had Israel taken so large a step: when they crossed Jordan, leaving the nomadic life for the agricultural; and that had been momentous for their religion. They came among new temptations: the use of wine, and the shrines of local gods who were believed to have more influence on the fertility of the land than Jehovah who had conquered it for His people. But now this further step, from the agricultural stage to the mercantile and civil, was equally fraught with danger. There was the closer intercourse with foreign nations and their cults. There were all the temptations of rapid wealth, all the dangers of an equally increasing poverty. The growth of comfort among the rulers meant the growth of thoughtlessness. Cruelty multiplied with refinement. The upper classes were lifted away from feeling the real woes of the people. There was a well-fed and sanguine patriotism, but at the expense of indifference to social sin and want. Religious zeal and liberality increased, but they were coupled with all the proud’s misunderstanding of God: an optimist faith without moral insight or sympathy.

“It is all this which makes the prophets of the eighth century so modern, while Elisha’s life is still so ancient...With Amos we stand among the conditions of our own day. The City has arisen. For the development of the highest form of prophecy, the universal and permanent form, there was needed that marvelously unchanging mold of human life, whose needs and sorrows, whose sins and problems, are today the same as they were all those thousands of years ago.”

AN EXTRAORDINARY ORDINARY GUY

The Lord uses ordinary people. The Apostle Paul was very aware of this when he wrote to the church at Corinth. At that time people used to hide valuables in clay jars, which themselves had little value or beauty and so did not attract attention to themselves and their precious contents. Paul said, 2Cor 4:5-7 “For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.”

Jars of clay. If you’re feeling a bit like a ‘cracked pot’, the light of Christ may be able to shine out through the cracks! Paul Goes on to admit feeling hard pressed on every side, perplexed, struck down - yet sustained by the Lord. If you’re feeling a bit ‘beaten up’ or worn down by life, take heart – God’s power is available and brings Him glory shining out through folks like you when you lean into Him!

Anyway, back to Amos - who was a rather ‘ordinary Joe’. In the first verse of his book he identifies himself as one of the shepherds of Tekoa. Later in chapter 7 he admits, Amos 7:14f "I was neither a prophet nor a prophet’s son, but I was a shepherd, and I also took care of sycamore-fig trees.But the LORD took me from tending the flock and said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’” Amos’ awareness of Middle Eastern geography and politics shows he was not an ignorant peasant, but neither was he middle- or upper-class. God used a shepherd, a horticulturist, to head out of the country (the southern kingdom of Judah) to go to the worship-centre of the Northern Kingdom (Israel, the breakaway ten tribes) to deliver God’s warning and call them back to Himself.

You’ve got to admire Amos’ pluck and bravery and dedicated obedience. He was taking a real risk, challenging the prosperous and powerful national leaders of a neighbouring country to repent. Today it might be like a dairy farmer from Huron County heading to Washington DC to challenge practices there. But Amos was faithful to God’s call.

THE COMING FIRE: ENOUGH IS ENOUGH

Chapter 1 and the start of chapter 2 address the surrounding pagan nations. Amos uses a repetitive format to convey a judgment on each of them. For example, 1:3-4 “This is what the LORD says: "For three sins of ___, even for four, I will not turn back [my wrath]. Because she ___, I will send fire upon___that will consume the fortresses of ___.”

What’s this “for 3 sins, even for 4" business? It’s a rhetorical style that emphasizes the quantity he’s talking about. As in, “Three would be enough to fill it: but four means it’s going to overflow!” Thus Amos proceeds through a list of 7 surrounding nations to highlight their transgressions before zeroing on Israel as the final target. God is about to send fire upon their fortresses, their proud defences they are trusting in. Within just 3 decades, at 722 BC, Assyria would sweep through the region and Israel as a nation would be obliterated, its people exiled, foreign immigrants brought in forcibly to replace the local population. About 30 years. Think about the length of time from 1990 until now – that’s all the time that’s left for Israel to go from its greatest height of power to being (essentially) wiped off the map!

HEATHEN NATIONS NOT EXEMPT

Amos places Israel’s judgment plunk in the middle of judgment upon foreign pagan nations. 1:1-2:3 lists 6 heathen nations that do not have God’s law: Syria (capital Damascus), Philistia (Gaza), Tyre, Edom, Ammon, and Moab. God is holding them responsible even though Moses did not convey the Ten Commandments or other Jewish laws to them. God holds ALL people to account. God our Creator has wired humans to possess the faculty called ‘conscience’, which helps us know the difference between right and wrong, and signals guilt in our inner being when we’ve treated others poorly or refused to acknowledge the Creator who put us here.

The Apostle Paul in his letter to the church at Rome talks about how all people are accountable to God and subject to His judgment by virtue of what should be obvious to them because of the innate abilities God has given them. We have no excuse for going against God, we cannot plead ignorance! Romans 1:18-20 “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities— his eternal power and divine nature— have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.”

Then in the next chapter Paul identifies the special inner capacity people have to gauge ‘right’ and ‘wrong’, what we call ‘conscience’. Romans 2:14f “Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law, since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their CONSCIENCES also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them.”

So, even though these neighbouring heathen nations have not had the benefit of knowing the law revealed through Moses, God nevertheless warns them of coming doom on account of various trespasses. What have they done wrong?

In a couple of cases, they have been BARBARIC AND BRUTAL in conflict. 1:3 “This is what the LORD says: "For three sins of Damascus, even for four, I will not turn back [my wrath]. Because she threshed Gilead with sledges having iron teeth...” Heavy sledges pulled by horses were pulled over wheat and barley to separate the kernels and cut up the straw. Can you imagine heavy sledges with iron teeth being pulled over human victims? Barbaric.

Even more grotesque is what the Ammonites did. 1:13-14 “This is what the LORD says: "For three sins of Ammon, even for four, I will not turn back [my wrath]. Because he ripped open the pregnant women of Gilead in order to extend his borders, I will set fire to the walls of Rabbah that will consume her fortresses amid war cries on the day of battle, amid violent winds on a stormy day.” Absolutely BRUTAL! Not only merciless on the poor pregnant women, it totally disregards the value of the life of the unborn.

We’ve come a long way today, haven’t we? We have codes of conduct in warfare. We have the Geneva Convention to dictate how prisoners of war should be treated. We have...legalized abortion in Canada, essentially throughout the whole term of pregnancy! Brutal. Barbaric. Thankfully, where there is repentance, Jesus heals and forgives. That is grace.

Another sin Amos calls out amongst the pagan nations is lack of compassion, particularly where there should be consideration for previous relationship. Look at the judgment against Edom in 1:11. You may recall Edom means ‘red’ and stands for the descendants of Jacob’s twin brother Esau, who were neighbours of the Jews on their southern border. 1:11 “This is what the LORD says: "For three sins of Edom, even for four, I will not turn back [my wrath]. Because he pursued his brother with a sword, stifling all compassion, because his anger raged continually and his fury flamed unchecked...”

Not having compassion on our own relatives. Maybe we don’t pursue our kinsmen with a sword. But have you noticed how easy it is to be nice to those outside your home, yet reserve your moodiness and grumpiness and harshest criticism for your own family members? Can you think of any families in the community that are at odds because of estate squabbles, one party perceives things did not get divided up fairly when the parent died? Are there cases where a son or daughter has been ‘written off’ because they got into drugs, or the wrong crowd, or acted out sexually? Sometimes we may find it hard to be compassionate to those who are our own relatives. Lord, have mercy!

A couple of the nations are called out on account of human trafficking – dealing in slavery. There’s the Philistines in 1:6, “This is what the LORD says: "For three sins of Gaza, even for four, I will not turn back [my wrath]. Because she took captive whole communities and sold them to Edom...” And the nation-city of Tyre in 1:9, “This is what the LORD says: "For three sins of Tyre, even for four, I will not turn back [my wrath]. Because she sold whole communities of captives to Edom, disregarding a treaty of brotherhood...”

Human trafficking is still a big problem today. The American Civil War may have ended outright oppression of African-Americans in traditional slavery, but sex trafficking continues all over the Western world today. Prince Andrew was in the news this past week, no longer to be called “His Royal Highness”, having relegated any remaining royal privileges and honorary military positions back to the Crown on account of a civil case brought against him by a woman who was purportedly trafficked by Ghislaine Maxwell, years ago in his association with Jeffrey Epstein. Charges the prince continues to deny. Afflence and power bring with them expanded opportunities for temptation and “using” other people. We’re supposed to love people and use things, not the other way around - love things and use people.

ESPECIALLY ACCOUNTABLE IN LIGHT OF GOD’S TRUTH

By beginning with half a dozen neighbouring pagan nations, Amos makes it clear God is not unfairly singling out the Northern Kingdom for judgment. ALL people will be held to account. The Apostle Paul in his sermon before the court at Athens, the Areopagus. Acts 17:30-31 “In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands ALL PEOPLE EVERYWHERE to repent.For he has set a day when he will JUDGE THE WORLD with justice by the man he has appointed.He has given proof of this TO ALL MEN by raising him from the dead.” Note the emphasis on universality of judgment: ‘commands ALL people EVERYWHERE to repent...He will judge the WORLD with justice...He has given proof of this to ALL men...” Christianity isn’t just relevant to those who call themselves Christians. Jesus took on the form of humanness, of ALL people, to be the Judge of all and Saviour of those who repent, for whom He has purchased forgiveness from their sins.

Now Amos turns to Judah and Israel, the tribes of Israel that received God’s special revelation in the Scriptures and OUGHT to have known better. Unlike the pagan nations who had to rely on conscience not well-communicated specifics. This rejection of the law by Judah is the basis for God’s pronouncement of a warning: Amos 2:4f “This is what the LORD says: "For three sins of Judah, even for four, I will not turn back [my wrath]. Because they have rejected the law of the LORD and have not kept his decrees, because they have been led astray by false gods, the gods their ancestors followed, I will send fire upon Judah that will consume the fortresses of Jerusalem."” They rejected God’s law, disobeying His teachings, and were seduced by worshipping false gods. Still today, when we reject what God has shown in the Bible, we become more susceptible to the deceptive false gods culture at large worships – gods of sex, money, power.

As for the Northern Kingdom of Israel, the northern ten tribes that broke off from Solomon’s son Rehoboam and formed a distinct political entity, Amos provides a short list of ways they’ve broken God’s laws and failed to love their neighbour. He’ll expand on this in later chapters, but here’s a broad overview. Amos 2:6-8 “This is what the LORD says: "For three sins of Israel, even for four, I will not turn back [my wrath]. They sell the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals. They trample on the heads of the poor as upon the dust of the ground and deny justice to the oppressed. Father and son use the same girl and so profane my holy name. They lie down beside every altar on garments taken in pledge. In the house of their god they drink wine taken as fines.”

Remember the historical setting here: business is booming! People are building private palaces, adding cottages to their regular homes, merchants are maximizing profits from the lucrative trade routes over which the government has control. But riches have not translated into righteousness. Instead, it’s just like Moses warned the Israelites back in Deuteronomy 8 when they were standing at the brink of the Promised Land: Deut 8:11-14 “Be careful that you do not forget the LORD your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day. Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.”

When times are tough, we are more inclined to turn to God, to cry out to Him. But when times are easy, when the money’s flowing and affluence is building and our assets are increasing, it’s easy for our heart to become proud, it’s all too easy to FORGET God and suppose we can do it on our own. Is that true for any of us today? What’s our ‘need of God’ gauge reading?

And when we become proud and self-satisfied, we become selfish, less generous, less caring. The northern kingdom saw justice and righteousness being eroded. Bribes greased palms and swayed verdicts. Debtors were sold into slavery for the mere price of a pair of shoes. Poor people were ignored in court; judges pandered to the wealthy and were rewarded for it outside the courtroom. Fertility cult worship was popular; the ancient Baal religion taught that sex with shrine prostitutes helped guarantee a fertile harvest in the field, so many males used the same woman sexually as part of the fertility cult rituals. The law of Moses taught a poor person’s garment taken in pledge was to be returned to them by nightfall, and a widow’s garment was not to be taken under any circumstances, but this rule was ignored – and then those garments were used as bedding beside the altars to the fertility gods. Fines were extorted from victims in corrupt court processes, then that money used to buy wine to drink as part of pagan worship – a sort of double slap in the face against the Lord.

ARE WE FORGETTING GRACE?

At this point in the pandemic, seeming ‘round 2', it’s easy to have a case of the COVID Grumps. The darkness and coldness of this time of year doesn’t help. It’s easy to be less patient with people, to snap at them, to feel those who don’t see things our way are our enemies. It’s easy to forget God’s GRACE and be grumpy instead of grateful.

I close with some verses in which Amos reminds the unfaithful nation of the ways God has been their Saviour and shown them much grace. Amos 2:9-11 “"I destroyed the Amorite before them, though he was tall as the cedars and strong as the oaks. I destroyed his fruit above and his roots below.I brought you up out of Egypt, and I led you forty years in the desert to give you the land of the Amorites. I also raised up prophets from among your sons and Nazirites from among your young men. Is this not true, people of Israel?" declares the LORD.”

Today we might say after making our point, “Isn’t that right?” Totally true! God had brought them out of slavery, into this fruitful land, and raised up leaders who gave them spiritual guidance based on His laws. They had received much grace; they owed Him their obedience. It was an indisputable fact.

From our vantage point in history, how much more grace have we been the recipients of? God sent Jesus to teach us His Great Commandment and Great Commission and a wealth of other divine truth by which to live our life. God raised up Jesus from the dead to give us righteousness in His sight to replace our guilt and rebellion. How much more grace have we obtained as sheer gift! What response does such an abundance of grace call forth? Let’s pray.

Righteous God, in Amos’ prophecy we see a mirror held up to our own society. We have been intent on building our palaces instead of protecting the poor. We have overlooked shabby treatment of justice as long as it meant we could get ahead, whether wearing clothes made in sweatshops or getting our manufacturing done overseas so we didn’t have to breathe the fumes. We tolerate a little bit of immorality in our entertainment as long as the kids aren’t around to watch it. We show disregard for Your day and Your laws then wonder why society is falling apart. Forgive us, Lord. Thank You for Your grace made so very real in Jesus Christ and by Your Holy Spirit coming into our lives, pricking our conscience, turning us to You. We want to heed Your warning and wake up to Your call, and the needs of others around us. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Amos 3-4: Finding Purpose in Our Problems” - Jan.23/22 ~ Amos 4:6-13

THE TROUBLE WITH TROUBLES

In case you hadn’t noticed – life has its troubles. Some troubles are of our own making. Some are not. How can we make sense of our troubles? Is there a purpose in our problems? In the book of Amos we find that the nation of Israel was about to bring a lot of trouble on itself, and God was trying repeatedly to get their attention so they would be spared that pain.

Speaking of troubles...Tommy Lasorda, former coach of the Los Angeles Dodgers, once said, "I found that it's not good to talk about my troubles.Eighty percent of the people who hear them don't care, and the other 20 percent are glad you're having trouble."

Maybe that’s part of the problem with troubles? People are either indifferent, or secretly take delight that you’re in difficulty? We’ll see the hardness of the human heart had a part in the troubles into which the Israelites were headed.

WHY THE LION IS ROARING

You may recall that last Sunday we introduced the prophet Amos, who was not a prophet by way of career – he’d been a shepherd in the southern kingdom of Judah, who also tended sycamore-fig trees. Your down-to-earth kinda guy. Judah and Israel were enjoying times of relative prosperity and expansion during the long reigns of their kings Uzziah and Jeroboam II, respectively. Amos responded to God’s call to go prophesy at the political centre of the northern kingdom, about 30 years before the Assyrians would invade and destroy it in 722 BC. So, the clock is ticking. Amos’ prophecies are blunt and vivid, but will the flourishing northerners pay any attention before it’s too late?

As a shepherd, Amos had likely had to fend off wild predators from the flock he tended. So it’s not surprising to hear him use the analogy of a lion roaring. 3:4 “Does a lion roar in the thicket when he has no prey? Does he growl in his den when he has caught nothing?” It would have been a sound that made the hair stand up on the back of your neck if you were tending sheep and you heard a lion roar and all you had was a stick or a club! But in this case, the lion that’s roaring is much more powerful than any earthly creature. 1:2 “The Lord roars from Zion and thunders from Jerusalem...” 3:8 “The lion has roared— who will not fear? The Sovereign LORD has spoken— who can but prophesy?” It’s God Himself who is roaring and threatening destruction, so Amos’ hearers had better pay attention.

Why is the lion roaring? Because God cares about His people and wants to warn them to change their ways and be spared disaster. God is not like those 80% the Los Angeles Dodgers coach was talking about, who don’t care about your troubles! God does care. The Lord has an investment in your past and your future.

Amos 3:2 gives a clue why God even bothered to send Amos miles and miles from the southern kingdom of Judah up to the north, to Israel. Amos 3:2 “You only have I chosen of all the families of the earth; therefore I will punish you for all your sins.” See the investment, the ownership, the taking responsibility there? “You only have I chosen of all the families of the earth...” God explained through Moses, back before they even received the law at Sinai, that they were to play a particular role among the other nations. Exodus 19:5-6 “Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession.Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” Holy; a kingdom of PRIESTS – not existing for themselves, but to be mediators, priests for other nations, interceding and ministering as liaisons to the Divine.

They were a chosen people, which was a high privilege – but that also entailed a responsibility. Their family ALONE had God chosen of all the families of the earth – so He was paying close attention to their conduct. And it seemed lately Israel had forgotten their special role, forgotten God’s laws, and were living only to please themselves. So, v2, God says: “Therefore, I will punish you for all your sins.”

But not just for the sake of punishment. God had a purpose in roaring: He wanted them to return to Him. Five times in 4:6-11 God identifies disciplinary actions He has taken – empty stomachs, lack of bread, withholding rain, striking the gardens with blight and mildew and locusts, sent plagues, killing their young men in conflict, overthrowing them – but what’s the constant refrain each time? 4:6-11 “...yet you have not returned to Me.” The purpose of the prophesying and punishments is to draw the people back to Himself, to win their hearts back into relationship with the God who initially delivered them out of slavery in Egypt.

EVEN PAGANS ARE SHOCKED

Behaviour - who we are on the outside, how we act – has a lot to do with who we are on the inside, our inner being. The Israelites were behaving so badly at this point in their history that even surrounding pagan nations would be amazed at how low they had sunk.

During Laura Schlessinger's syndicated call-in show, some fifty thousand people attempted to consult her on the air while an additional seventeen million tuned in to listen. Her poke-at-the-conscience style was part of a revival of the notion that how you behave says something about who you are. Dr.Laura exhorted her followers to abandon self-indulgence. "You don't lower the bar because you are human," she says. "You rise to the occasion – that's what elevates you to full humanity."

However the Israelites ‘lowered the bar’ and caved in to self-indulgence at the expense of others. The Lord beckons other nations to come watch His indictment of His people. These other pagan nations didn’t have the advantage of God’s revealed law given at Mount Sinai. You might recall from last week how in chapter 1 Amos pronounced God’s judgment on surrounding nations: they only had the natural ‘law of conscience’ in contrast to Judah and Israel which also had the law of Moses. Yet God held them to account on the basis of their conscience.

Note verses 9-10 in Amos 3: Amos 3:9f “Proclaim to the fortresses of Ashdod and to the fortresses of Egypt: "Assemble yourselves on the mountains of Samaria; see the great unrest within her and the oppression among her people.

"They do not know how to do right," declares the LORD, "who hoard plunder and loot in their fortresses."”

Here “Ashdod” is one of the cities of the Philistines; Egypt is invited to watch as well. These old enemies of the Israelites, even though they were pagan, were shocked at some of the behaviour of the Israelites. Verse 9 mentions “unrest” - the word can also be translated ‘tumult, confusion, disturbance’. As time progressed, kings were assassinated and coups became commonplace. There was not respect for authority. Our society today risks becoming more fractured and polarized due to disagreement about news sources, what’s your preferred social media ‘echo chamber’, whether we can trust the government, do institutions really have our best interests at heart? Younger generations may be more suspicious of organizational authority than previous ones. There are protests, rallies, division, unrest.

Verse 9 “See the great unrest within her and the OPPRESSION among her people.” And 4:1 talks about those (4:1) “who oppress the poor and crush the needy...” Oppression happens when ‘might makes right’, when the economic heavyweights are free to throw their weight around, squeeze out the little guy. Canada is currently experiencing high inflation rates; that can make it hard for lower income earners to afford groceries or necessities. A ‘connection centre’ for the homeless is being looked into as a possibility for Wingham, because homelessness is becoming more apparent even in our rural area – during a pandemic, people are more hesitant to let others couch-surf.

Big business does not always look out for the interests of its workers. An article about legal challenges arising over vaccine mandates noted cases are more likely to be looked on favourably by the court in the particular instance where workers that lost their job because they chose not to be vaccinated were denied severance. Oppression tries to take advantage, not give someone their due.

Amos 3:10 “"They do not know how to do right," declares the LORD, "who hoard plunder and loot in their fortresses."” These people were well enough off to be able to afford ‘fortresses’ yet apparently they cheated and stole from others in order to acquire such wealth.

And perhaps those who tend to laziness and love of being ‘at ease’ are referred to in 3:12, “those who sit in Samaria on the edge of their beds and in Damascus on their couches.” Ethics questions were raised this past week about one federal leader who accepted the gift of a rocking chair worth a couple of thousand dollars then posted to social media a photo of their family sitting in it and tagged the donor company. A rocking chair became a bit of a hot seat! (Generally parliamentarians are advised NOT to accept gifts.) Sigh – we do love our Lazy Boys! “Hand me the remote and the bowl of chips, please!”

In chapter 4 the shepherd-prophet denounces some of the wives of the rich; these women are compared in a most uncomplimentary fashion to livestock that grazed in the lush pasturelands of northern Transjordan. Amos 4:1 “Hear this word, you cows of Bashan on Mount Samaria, you women who oppress the poor and crush the needy and say to your husbands, "Bring us some drinks!"” Their priorities were living a consumer lifestyle, not caring about the rights of the have-nots. “Bring me another beer from the fridge, Freddie!” But is that not the general direction of an affluent society – after a certain point, you’ve got your winter house and your summer house checked off, you start to live for the pleasures you consume day-to-day? The alcohol and drugs take the edge off the ‘ennui’. Scripture holds a mirror up to that emptiness, that vacuity – our souls were designed for more than that! Jesus calls us to discipleship not dissipation.

Their sin extended to the realm of worship, which had become insincere, more a formality, for show. Amos 4:4f “"Go to Bethel and sin; go to Gilgal and sin yet more.Bring your sacrifices every morning, your tithes every three years. Burn leavened bread as a thank offering and brag about your freewill offerings— boast about them, you Israelites, for this is what you love to do," declares the Sovereign LORD.” Bring, burn, brag, boast – these are said as commands but in an IRONIC way: the worshippers were performing the rituals in order to show off, to look good in front of others, to be able to boast. Even though the bread was actually supposed to be UN-leavened. They were not trying to ascribe worth or value to the Lord: they wanted to look worthy themselves, big-shots. The Lord wasn’t fooled, He could see the real motives of their hearts.

ON WHAT TERMS WOULD WE MEET GOD?

How can we find purpose in our problems? Sometimes as in the case of the book of Job, God has His own inscrutable reasons, which we can’t see at the moment. Sometimes our problems are the result of sin, whether our own or others, even stemming back to Adam and Eve and eating the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden. When we yield to temptation, we may end up reaping what we sow: part of the perverseness of sin is that temptation never delivers what it seems to promise. Sometimes problems are God’s way of growing us, helping us mature in our character. James 1:12 “Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.”

Here in Amos though, the Israelites had been encountering a whole host of problems, with the purpose of being drawn to RETURN TO GOD. Five times in 4:6-11 God is identified as sending significant problems that should have caught their attention, “‘...yet you have not returned to Me,’ declares the Lord.”

What’s your attitude when problems arise? Do you allow them to become a wedge which would intrude BETWEEN you and the Lord, creating distance, widening the gap? Or do you position yourself so that the problem forces you closer to the Lord, causing you to rely on Him even more?

Chapter 4 ends on kind of an ominous note. The people of Israel have ignored the famine, the drought, the blight, the mildew, the locusts, the plagues, the military defeats – nothing has worked to induce them to call out to God. Their options have been exhausted. All that’s left now for them is the option of obliteration.

Sidebar: Never waste a good PLAGUE! What has the pandemic been teaching you? Has it caused you to lean into God more, or instead made you bitter, resentful, impatient, questioning whether God really knows what He’s doing? Problems can precipitate repentance. Jesus takes on our pain, in healing the leper He becomes the outcast.

Amos’ words are both vague and ominous. 4:12 “"Therefore this is what I will do to you, Israel, and because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel."” OH! What could that mean?! They would find out soon enough, when the Assyrians led them out as captives by ropes tied to hooks through their lips and noses. Yikes.

4:13 reminds Amos’ hearers this is not some trivial deity they are dealing with, like one of the local Baal fertility gods. Throughout today’s passage the prophet has referred to God as “the Sovereign LORD” (3:7f,10; 4:2,5) or “the Lord [Adonai], the LORD [YHWH] God Almighty” (3:13) – both titles which emphasizes God’s supreme power and control and accountability. But 4:13 is epic in describing God’s power and depth and intelligence and majesty, in just a few simple phrases. Amos 4:13 “He who forms the mountains, creates the wind, and reveals his thoughts to man, he who turns dawn to darkness, and treads the high places of the earth— the LORD God Almighty is his name.”

‘Forms the mountains’ - did you see some of the photos of the volcanic explosion in Tonga this past week? Before the explosion, there was this huge crater, which then sank under the ocean’s surface before exploding in a huge thermal/chemical reaction, leaving just the highest parts of the land mass remaining afterwards out at the two extreme ends.

God ‘creates the wind’ - sovereign over invisible forces as well as the ones we see.

God ‘turns dawn to darkness’ - He is in charge of solar and universal and cosmic powers. Gravity and Kepler’s laws that govern the heavenly bodies are God’s idea.

God ‘treads the high places of the earth’ - far greater and more immense than our mere limited mortal human frame, like some giant wearing seven-league boots.

Yet also God ‘reveals His thoughts to man’ – this one stands out in contrast to the other descriptors. God is relational, communicating, talking to us, making it possible for us to even understand and contemplate Him! In Jesus God has come among us in human form, a person like us, someone we can relate to (not just some impersonal cosmic force). He loves us and invites us to repent, to receive Him, to have fellowship with Him. Revelation 3:20 [Jesus says] “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.” And John 14:23, “Jesus replied, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching.My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.”

Can an Almighty God who rules the cosmos and treads earth’s high places also “make His home” with us? Absolutely! The Lord Jesus calls you to believe, repent, and obey. He will prove His promises to you.

ONE FOR THE ROAD

Unfortunately the women of Samaria, the so-called ‘cows of Bashan’, did not give up on oppressing the poor and calling their husbands to bring them another drink. Before many decades passed, they were being cast out through breaks in the wall they had trusted in for security. When you hear God calling, warning you to repent and receive Him, don’t delay.

In George Whitefield’s journal, he records that during his first voyage to Georgia, the ship’s cook had a bad drinking problem. When the cook was reproved for it and other sins, he boasted that he would be wicked until the last two years of his life, and then he would reform.

Whitefield ads that within six hours of the time the cook made his boastful statement, he died of an illness related to his drinking. He had left reform too late. Let’s pray.

Lord, we don’t want our worship here today to be fake – bringing offerings so we can brag and boast and congratulate ourselves on being religious. We need you to poke a hole in our self-righteousness, as Amos rebuked the people of Israel, calling them out on their oppression, their uncaring, their idolatry, their empty lifestyles. Let’s not go home today without inviting You to make Your home within us, loving You who have spelled out Your commitment to us at the cross of Christ. In His name we pray, Amen.

“Amos 5-6: Luxurious Living or Rewards for the Righteous?” - Feb.6/22 ~ Amos 5:6-15

MY, WHAT A STRONG FAMILY RESEMBLANCE

If there’s one thing the younger generation is hungry for these days, it’s authenticity. We want people to be real, not fake. We have no time for people who lie to us, try to put one over on us, aren’t being genuine and truthful with us. Deceit destroys relationships.

Unfortunately it’s all too easy to ‘fake it’ convincingly these days. We sort through our photographs carefully and post only the complimentary ones to social media. That way people only ever see the ‘best’ side of us. Meanwhile our family and closest coworkers we’re around most of the time get the joy of putting up with the REAL ‘us’.

Comedian Tommy Smothers was a great actor – which comes with its own level of professional phoniness. He once observed, "The best thing about getting older is that you gain sincerity.Once you learn to fake that, there's nothing you can't do."

French student Jean Louviot traveled for several months through Europe with a fake photograph on his passport. He was never detained, even though the photograph was of his cocker spaniel. Said a red-faced border official: "It's the way kids wear their hair these days."

And did you hear about the restaurant in Alberta that last month was forced to close for a few days? Public health inspectors say some of its staff accepted photos of patrons’ dogs instead of their vaccine passports to dine inside. Yes, that’s right – two test shoppers were allowed to dine inside the restaurant at separate times after showing a photo of a dog and personal identification. In both instances, a staff member made it appear as if they were scanning a QR code before checking ID. Apparently the underage host would be getting some mandatory ‘retraining’ before the restaurant reopened.

“Wow, Mrs Smith, your hair has certainly been getting pretty long and shaggy lately, hasn’t it? Must be that new shampoo you’re using.”

Jesus reminds us that Satan is a deceiver, there is no truth in him. John 8:44b “When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” Jesus accused those who opposed the truth He taught of being children of the devil, sons of Satan. When we ‘fake it’ and are hypocritical, we are showing a resemblance not to God but to the evil one.

In our passage today from Amos chapters 5 and 6, the prophet points out how fake the Israelites were being in their worship, and how falsely and corruptly they were treating their neighbours. Yet the Lord was beckoning them back to follow Him with truth and repentance.

IT’S YOUR FUNERAL!

Amos begins this section as if he were preaching a funeral sermon for the Israelites, as if they were already lying dead there in the casket and he were preaching mournfully about their demise. I don’t think Robert Schuller would have invited Amos to speak at the Crystal Cathedral – not really the most positive approach!

Amos 5:1f “Hear this word, O house of Israel, this LAMENT I take up concerning you: "Fallen is Virgin Israel, never to rise again, deserted in her own land, with no one to lift her up." This is what the Sovereign LORD says: "The city that marches out a thousand strong for Israel will have only a hundred left; the town that marches out a hundred strong will have only ten left."” It’s a LAMENT, a funeral dirge. The northern nation is FALLEN, done for, never to rise again. It’s DECIMATED: from a thousand to 100, from 100 down to ten. And that’s exactly what would happen a few short decades later: Samaria the capital would fall in 732 BC, the whole nation exiled in 722 BC.

Remember Amos is predicting this when everything’s rolling along great guns, the economy is booming, Jeroboam II has succeeded in recapturing cities and restoring the country’s boundaries to the greatest extent it ever had, back to Solomon’s time and its Golden Age. So predicting a funeral makes quite a contrast. Amos’ word ‘Woe’ seems not to fit: Amos 6:1 “WOE to you who are complacent in Zion, and to you who feel secure on Mount Samaria, you notable men of the foremost nation, to whom the people of Israel come!” They were feeling secure in their mighty fortresses and huge mansions, they had lots to eat and drink so thought they could afford to be complacent.

But Amos’ vivid word pictures present a different time, one that would come true after the Assyrians invaded. Amos 5:16-20 “Therefore this is what the Lord, the LORD God Almighty, says: "There will be wailing in all the streets and cries of anguish in every public square. The farmers will be summoned to weep and the mourners to wail. There will be wailing in all the vineyards, for I will pass through your midst," says the LORD. WOE to you who long for the day of the LORD! Why do you long for the day of the LORD? That day will be darkness, not light. It will be as though a man fled from a lion only to meet a bear, as though he entered his house and rested his hand on the wall only to have a snake bite him. Will not the day of the LORD be darkness, not light— pitch-dark, without a ray of brightness?”

Sounds like a nightmare, doesn’t it? You escape from one thing only to fall prey to another – escape the lion but meet a bear; arrive at your house breathless only to be bitten by a snake. The “Day of the Lord” they supposed would bring victory for them would turn out to be quite the opposite. Wailing, cries of anguish all over town, farmers weeping, even sadness in the vineyards.

God would ‘pass through’ their midst (5:17). Israel’s foundational story was the Exodus from Egypt at the time of the Passover; back in Ex 12:12 God ‘passed THROUGH’ the Egyptians in judgment and struck down the firstborn, but ‘passed OVER’ the Hebrew slaves. This time would be different, He would ‘pass THROUGH’ them bringing death and exile.

The gloomy prediction continues in 6:8-11 - “The Sovereign LORD has sworn by himself— the LORD God Almighty declares: "I abhor the pride of Jacob and detest his fortresses; I will deliver up the city and everything in it." If ten men are left in one house, they too will die. And if a relative who is to burn the bodies comes to carry them out of the house and asks anyone still hiding there, "Is anyone with you?" and he says, "No," then he will say, "Hush! We must not mention the name of the LORD." For the LORD has given the command, and he will smash the great house into pieces and the small house into bits.”

That sounds like some scene out of a Zombie movie. Normally bodies were buried in Israel, not burned; but if all ten in a house were killed, and that was happening everywhere, it might be necessary to burn the bodies because there wasn’t time or labour available to give them proper burial. Rotting corpses could bring disease and epidemic. And when the collector comes, the warning is not even to mention God’s name even in prayer, because the judgment is so severe.

The disaster would overtake the whole northern nation. Amos 6:14 “For the LORD God Almighty declares, "I will stir up a nation against you, O house of Israel, that will oppress you all the way from Lebo Hamath to the valley of the Arabah."” In other words, all the way from your northern to your southern extremities, the entire territory!

FLOURISHING BY FORCE

Amos painted such a dire picture! Was this funeral necessary? How come the nation would go from flourishing at its historical best to total destruction in just a few short decades? For you mystery-lovers, what’s the anatomy of this crime? Whodunnit? How could this grisly death have been averted?

Our passage sums it up in three broad areas: Flourishing by Force; Fake Worship; and, Fouling what’s formed for good.

Economically, the nation was flourishing at this time, under the long and successful reign of Jeroboam II. But the ‘little guy’ at the bottom of the economy was footing the bill. Amos 5:10-12, “you hate the one who reproves in court and despise him who tells the truth. You trample on the poor and force him to give you grain. Therefore, though you have built stone mansions, you will not live in them; though you have planted lush vineyards, you will not drink their wine. For I know how many are your offenses and how great your sins. You oppress the righteous and take bribes and you deprive the poor of justice in the courts.”

Yes, they lived in impressive mansions made of stone, and drank freely from lush vineyards, but they twisted justice in the court system, accepting bribes, grinding the poor to extract grain even though the rich were already living lavishly. They despised anyone who was truthful, and oppressed anyone who tried to live in a righteous way. They ran roughshod over justice. Their motto in managing their affairs might have been, “Just get’er done” – regardless of how many bodies were thrown under the bus.

See a further description of their lifestyle in 6:4-6, “You lie on beds inlaid with ivory and lounge on your couches. You dine on choice lambs and fattened calves. You strum away on your harps like David and improvise on musical instruments. You drink wine by the bowlful and use the finest lotions, but you do not grieve over the ruin of Joseph.” Hm - ‘drink wine by the bowlful’? Today we might say they drank it ‘by the bucket’! Well, why not – when all your physical needs are looked after and you’re ‘set for life’, why not ‘live it up’ and sink into the anesthetic of liquid pleasure? ‘Finest lotions’ would hint at slaves satisfying every whim in massage parlours. Chomping on choice lamb, sleeping in on beds inlaid with ivory, spending your day idly listening to the Top 40 – these fat cats ‘had it made’!

But their consciences were inoperative; they did not ‘grieve over the ruin of Joseph’ – it didn’t bother them that the courts were so corrupt, or that the lives at the other end of the economic ladder were tangled in such misery. Consequently these in ‘first class’ would be first to go when judgment happened: 6:7 “Therefore you will be among the first to go into exile; your feasting and lounging will end.”

FAKE WORSHIP

Part of the reason they didn’t grieve over the country’s ruin, and were so oppressive to the lower classes, was because their worship was off-base. Worship anchors values. What we worship, we treasure. If we worship a righteous and holy and loving God, we’ll want to be like that. Worship informs values, which inform choices, daily decisions.

When the northern kingdom split off from the south, from Solomon’s son ruling Judah, the first king Jeroboam created alternate worship space at Bethel, calf idols that would be a focus for religious ceremonies, so people wouldn’t have to travel to Jerusalem in the south. Subsequent kings drifted even further into idolatry. Think, for example, of the notorious King Ahab, who interacted with the prophet Elijah about a hundred years before Amos. 1Kings 21:25f “(There was never a man like Ahab, who sold himself to do evil in the eyes of the LORD, urged on by Jezebel his wife. He behaved in the vilest manner by going after idols, like the Amorites the LORD drove out before Israel.)” The viler the better – maybe he excused it under the banner of ‘entertainment value’?

So by Amos’ time, religion was a formality, for show, not sincere. People were hypocrites, faking it. But they weren’t fooling God for one minute! Amos 5:21-23 [God speaking] “I hate, I despise your religious feasts; I cannot stand your assemblies. Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them. Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps.” Their behaviour and attitudes when they WEREN’T at worship undercut anything they might try to do in religious ceremony. God hated it! He DESPISED their religious activities, He couldn’t stand the hypocrisy any longer. Even the songs were just ‘noise’ to Him.

We see their duplicity and deceitfulness pointed to in 5:25-26, “Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings forty years in the desert, O house of Israel? You have lifted up the shrine of your king, the pedestal of your idols, the star of your god—which you made for yourselves.” They had made god in their own image, so essentially were bowing down to and worshipping themselves. The nouns in the original language may refer to actual gods in the Middle East: Molech was associated with the worship of Saturn and the stars, and the sacrifice of children.

Here in Canada we tend to be critical of the so-called “American Dream” – but do we buy into it nonetheless? What cloud are we chasing? Do we think to ourselves, “If I only do this or attain that, I’ll be all set, then I can sit back and take it easy?” Pay careful attention to any little-g ‘gods’ you may have picked up along your journey. We become what we worship! Any lesser gods will consume you and leave you bankrupt, enslaved, without hope. Revere Jesus as Lord: He calls you to costly discipleship but delivers eternal life already in this mortal life through a relationship with His Heavenly Father through the Holy Spirit. Jesus still calls out to us: John 7:37b-38 “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.”

FOULING WHAT’S FORMED FOR GOOD

The third area Amos takes aim at in this passage, besides the Israelites enriching themselves at others’ expense, and practising idolatry, is their polluted attitude toward what matters in life. They FOULED what was ethical, they couldn’t stand what was right, they had to muddy things and twist it to their advantage. Note the words “turn into”: what effect did they have upon what was going on around them? Amos 5:7 “You who turn justice into bitterness and cast righteousness to the ground...” See also 6:12 “Do horses run on the rocky crags? Does one plow there with oxen? But you have turned justice into poison and the fruit of righteousness into bitterness...” They turned what SHOULD have been good into something bad, they spoiled it, they fouled the pure waters and made it evil. To review: they turned justice into bitterness, they cast righteousness to the ground, they turned justice into poison, they turned the fruit of righteousness into bitterness. Part of evil’s deceptive depravity, its inner twistedness and corruptness, is that it can worm its way into something meant for good and turn it to its own selfish advantage. Courts didn’t deliver just decisions because judges accepted bribes. Rich landowners somehow extorted grain from poor tenants who were near starvation.

One of Amazon’s free eBooks this month was a memoir about a man from Ghana who succeeded eventually in making his way to Spain. But at one point, the human smugglers that were guiding them abandoned them in the desert. Out of forty people who started out, only 6 survived. That is evil at its vilest that manipulates and steals from those who are refugees, migrants, who have very little to start with – and abandons them to fend for themselves in a hostile environment.

Foul indeed! Yet when we examine our own heart, we can find inclinations that are likewise unloving, uncaring, words blurted out that attempt to bolster our own status even if they leave others looking or feeling bad. Business dealings that aren’t exactly a ‘win’ for both parties – maybe we didn’t quite tell the whole truth about that item we sold on Kijiji. We get infuriated when others don’t keep their appointments yet let ourselves off the hook rather easily when something comes up last minute and we have to cancel on someone else. It’s part of evil’s deceit that it never seems quite as bad when it’s US doing the action compared to when someone does it to us. So the perversion of the Golden Rule, our self-preserving unspoken approach becomes, “Do unto others BEFORE they can do it unto you.” Ethics fouled up.

By contrast, this passage highlights what God has power to TURN things INTO. 5:7 talks about humans turning justice into bitterness, but 5:8 shows God’s goodness opposing such fouling: “(he who made the Pleiades and Orion, who TURNS blackness INTO dawn and darkens day INTO night, who calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out over the face of the land— the LORD is his name...” God is the one with REAL transforming power! 2Cor 5:17,21 “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! ...God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” Through Christ, God turns our fallen sinner selves into righteous new creatures.

FINDING GOD BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE

The clock is ticking towards doomsday for the Israelites, the ‘Day of the Lord’ when they would be overrun by the Assyrians. Yet even in this passage we find God’s appeals for them to turn back to Him. It’s not too late to repent and change and get right with their Maker.

Amos 5:4,6 “This is what the LORD says to the house of Israel: "Seek me and live...Seek the LORD and live, or he will sweep through the house of Joseph like a fire; it will devour, and Bethel will have no one to quench it.” When they seek and find Him, it will affect how they treat others! Amos 5:14f “Seek good, not evil, that you may live.Then the LORD God Almighty will be with you, just as you say he is.Hate evil, love good; maintain justice in the courts. Perhaps the LORD God Almighty will have mercy on the remnant of Joseph.”

If they seek the Lord, they will live; when they seek good instead of evil, God will be with them, and have mercy. Their seeking Him will be evidenced by court proceedings that are just and fair, not tainted by bribes and corruption.

The classic verse in this passage reveals that God at His core is passionate about justice and righteousness, rather than formalized worship routines. Amos 5:24 “But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!” What a vibrant word-picture! Torrents of truth, a river of righteousness. You can keep your stone mansions, your summer and winter houses, your fancy beds decorated with ivory. Justice and righteousness are beautiful and impressive in the eyes of the Lord.

JUSTICE – AND MORE

In closing, here’s a story to illustrate justice, mercy, and grace in a courtroom setting – probably not like what went on in Amos’ time!

A man was caught and taken to court because he had stolen a loaf of bread. When the judge investigated, he found out that the man had no job, and his family was hungry. He had tried unsuccessfully to get work and finally, to feed his family, he had stolen a loaf of bread. Although recognizing the extenuating circumstances, the judge said, "I'm sorry, but the law can make no exceptions. You stole the bread, and therefore I have to punish you. I order you to pay a fine of ten dollars."

The judge continued, "But I want to pay your fine myself." He reached into his pocket, pulled out a ten-dollar bill, and handed it to the man. As soon as the man took the money, the judge said, "Now I also want to cancel the fine and remit the sentence to time served." That is, the man could keep the money and go free. "Furthermore,” said the judge, “I am going to instruct the bailiff to pass around a hat to everyone in this courtroom, and I am fining everyone in this courtroom fifty cents for living in a city where a man has to steal in order to have bread to eat." The money was collected and given to the defendant.

Here, justice was meted out and paid in full—while mercy and grace were also enacted in full measure. We sinners were condemned in the pure eyes of heaven’s court: yet Christ paid the price of our forgiveness on the cross. Now His Spirit empowers us to likewise live lives of grace and mercy! Let’s pray.

Holy God, we see ourselves to some degree in Amos’ accusations – lounging about on couches, investing in our beds, trying to take advantage of others in our dealings, not having our heart totally ‘in it’ when we gather to worship. Have mercy on us! We know we’ve fallen short in many ways. Help us seek You that we may live. Pour out Your Holy Spirit that we may live Christ-shaped lives full of justice and righteousness, a passion for doing what’s right and honouring to You in every situation. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Pictures of Peril: The Danger of Spurning God’s Love” - Feb.13/22 ~ Amos (chapters 7-8) 7:1-9

LOOKING THROUGH THE LENS OF LOVE

It’s St.Valentine’s Day tomorrow. Historically it may be that more than one man named Valentine was martyred on February 14 in various years before 500 A.D. The Christian Church in promoting this date may have been attempting to civilize the customs associated with the pagan festival of Lupercalia. At any rate, February 14^th has become associated with celebrating love. Now, love Biblically understood is quite different from romantic love, in which you become ‘smitten’ or ‘twitterpated’ frequently due to attraction based on rather superficial features such as physical beauty and rampaging hormones.

Love understood Biblically has more to do with one’s sacrificially giving of oneself on behalf of the one who’s loved. Let’s let the Lord define our categories regarding love! Such passages as John 3:16 come to mind - Jn 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” Love GAVE, love made FORGIVENESS possible. Or take the same reference in the Apostle John’s first letter: 1Jn 3:16 “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.” Doesn’t that sound like a definition? “This is how we know what love is...” Love lays down its life for the beloved. Jesus gave His life for sinners; when we follow Him, we come to lay down our lives, make sacrifices for, our sisters and brothers in Christ.

Of course there’s the ‘love chapter’, 1Corinthians 13, especially verses 4-7 - 1Cor 13:4-7 “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” Not a word about being bowled over by the other person’s sex appeal! Somehow it doesn’t seem to have to be anchored in the other person’s meriting or deserving it at all. In fact it OVERLOOKS the other’s shortcomings, it’s not based on or powered by physical chemistry.

One of my favourite verses about what love is comes from Romans 5:8 - “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” A person’s being sinful does NOT attract God to them: yet God’s agape-love gets past the chasm of that objectionableness and through Christ’s costly atonement makes the sinner holy through their repentance and faith or ‘ownership’ of what Jesus accomplished for them at the cross.

So let’s take this lens, these ‘spectacles’ (if you will) of the Biblical understanding of love, and see what we can find about love in today’s passage, Amos chapters 7 and 8. It’s probably not a passage you would normally pick for a sermon near St.Valentine’s Day! But nevertheless we can see, with our New Testament eyes, hints that love TREASURES; love COMMUNICATES; love LISTENS; love FORGIVES; love is TRUTHFUL; and, love LIFTS UP.

LOVE TREASURES

Love VALUES the other, it treasures them, cherishes them. In a passage giving instruction about marriage in Ephesians 5, Paul writes: Eph 5:25f,28f “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word...In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he FEEDS AND CARES for it, just as Christ does the church...” Usually we protect and look after our bodies pretty well because we depend on them, we want to live a long time. New American Standard translates ‘feeds and cares’ as “nourishes and cherishes” - the second verb ‘thalpo’ means “to cherish with tender love, to foster with tender care”.

What we love we value, we care for and cherish, we attribute worth to and prize especially. In Amos 8 we see the Israelites being condemned for prizing false gods, they treasured idols. Amos 8:14 “They who swear by the shame of Samaria, or say, ‘As surely as your god lives, O Dan,’ or, ‘As surely as the god of Beersheba lives’— they will fall, never to rise again."” The first king Jeroboam had erected calf idols at Bethel in the south and Dan in the north. Here the phrase “the SHAME of Samaria” is in contrast to Amos 8:7 - “The LORD has sworn by the Pride of Jacob: "I will never forget anything they have done.” The Lord is supposed to be Jacob’s PRIDE, the One in whom they boast, the One they prize.

Because the Israelites worship idols and don’t value the Lord, they begin to DEVALUE other people, they cheat and oppress and sell into slavery those who are poor. They don’t treasure their neighbour. Amos 8:4-6 “Hear this, you who trample the needy and do away with the poor of the land, saying, "When will the New Moon be over that we may sell grain, and the Sabbath be ended that we may market wheat?"— skimping the measure, boosting the price and cheating with dishonest scales, buying the poor with silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, selling even the sweepings with the wheat.” What are they valuing? Making money! They can’t wait for the religious festivals to be over so they can open up shop and start selling goods, shortchanging buyers, selling chaff with the wheat to lower the cost per unit weight, even selling poor people into slavery for minor amounts they can’t repay on a loan or come up with for a pair of shoes they bought.

Real love TREASURES. A wealthy old man had just recently married a lovely young lady and was beginning to wonder whether she might have married him just for his money. He asked her, "If I lost all my money, would you still love me?" She said reassuringly, "Oh honey, don't be silly.Of course I would still love you.And I would miss you terribly."

LOVE COMMUNICATES

Next, love communicates, it gives expression to its thoughts, it articulates meaningfully with the other person. Jesus is God’s supreme self-revelation, God’s ‘making known’ of God’s very being. John 1:14 “The Word became flesh...” Jn 1:18 “God the One and Only...has made him known.” Jesus prayed in John 17:6,26 - “I have REVEALED you to those whom You gave me out of the world...I have MADE YOU KNOWN to them, and will continue to MAKE YOU KNOWN in order that the LOVE you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.” Love expresses itself, love communicates, it shares itself verbally and opens up to the other person.

In Amos 7-8 God shows the prophet various visions that communicate God’s plans, or at least the threat of judgment that may be coming. At the beginning of chapter 7 the Lord shows Amos swarms of locusts He’s preparing; then (v4) a vision of judgment by fire that “dried up the great deep and devoured the land”. At the beginning of chapter 8 the Lord shows Amos “a basket of ripe fruit” indicating “the time is ripe” (v2) for judgment upon them.

Yet, the Israelite leaders are not receptive to the messages God is communicating to them. About the middle of chapter 7 the priest at Bethel accuses Amos of raising a conspiracy against the king, and tells Amos harshly to get out and go back to the southern kingdom of Judah where he came from. They don’t want to hear God’s warnings!

Consequently, the Lord warns that a time will come when His loving communication will be withheld. Amos 8:11-12 “"The days are coming," declares the Sovereign LORD, "when I will send a famine through the land— not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the LORD.Men will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the LORD, but they will not find it.” He had sent them messages before, but the people rejected the messages, so they would be exiled and not hear words from the prophets anymore. Love communicates.

Sometimes the simplest things we say convey the strongest messages to loved ones, says Boston marriage and family therapist Ellen Dunn, Ph.D. Some of these powerful words and phrases are: “Nice going! - Terrific! - I'm proud of you! - Wow! - Way to go! - I really appreciate your help - You're the best! - Awesome! - Great job! - I know you can do it! - Most excellent! - Couldn't have done it better myself!” Let’s try some of those on for size this week, shall we? And communicate our love to the other person. Not be like the stiff-lipped old Englishman who at long last confided to his wife, “Darling, sometimes I love you so much, it’s all I can do to keep from telling you.” (!)

LOVE LISTENS

Next, love not only communicates by venturing to share words out loud in speech, love also LISTENS, it heeds what the other person is trying to convey. We have two ears and one mouth for a reason. Proverbs 18:13 “He who answers before listening— that is his folly and his shame.” And James 1:19 “My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry...” It’s all too easy when in conversation with someone to be trying to think up what you’re going to say next instead of actually listening to what the other person is saying! How be we first respond in a way that lets them know we really HEARD what they said? Love LISTENS.

At the beginning of Amos 7 we see two remarkable instances of God LISTENING to the prophet, a mere man. First there’s that vision of swarms of locusts. Amos 7:1-3 “This is what the Sovereign LORD showed me: He was preparing swarms of locusts after the king’s share had been harvested and just as the second crop was coming up. When they had stripped the land clean, I cried out, "Sovereign LORD, forgive! How can Jacob survive? He is so small!" So the LORD relented. "This will not happen," the LORD said.”

Isn’t that remarkable? The Lord ‘relented’, didn’t carry through, because Amos protested – Amos saw how devastating that would be to the people.

Next comes another instance of the Lord LISTENING. Amos 7:4-6 “This is what the Sovereign LORD showed me: The Sovereign LORD was calling for judgment by fire; it dried up the great deep and devoured the land. Then I cried out, "Sovereign LORD, I beg you, stop! How can Jacob survive? He is so small!" So the LORD relented. "This will not happen either," the Sovereign LORD said.” Consider the power of intercessory prayer: God hears and responds.

LOVE FORGIVES

In these same verses we can see how LOVE FORGIVES. It says, ‘the Lord RELENTED’, He didn’t carry out the planned judgment – at least not yet. It would happen eventually, several decades later, in 722 BC when Assyria conquered the northern kingdom. But in the meantime came a period of grace, God was showing mercy.

In Scripture God’s love is associated with His forgiveness, not requiring payment from us for sins committed insofar as they are shouldered by Christ instead. We see this in John 3:16, “"For God so LOVED the world that he gave [Jesus] that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” Psalm 86:5 “You are FORGIVING and good, O Lord, ABOUNDING IN LOVE to all who call to you.” Or as Nehemiah confessed in Neh 9:17 “They refused to listen and failed to remember the miracles you performed among them.They became stiff-necked and in their rebellion appointed a leader in order to return to their slavery.But you are a FORGIVING God, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and ABOUNDING IN LOVE. Therefore you did not desert them...” Peter wrote, 1 Peter 4:8 “Above all, LOVE each other deeply, because LOVE COVERS OVER a multitude of sins.” Love FORGIVES.

Parenting requires a lotta love, because our children mess up and tax us in many ways, requiring patience and forgiveness. One night a two-month-old baby kept his mother and father awake with his fussing and crying. The father was at wit’s end and had lost all patience. The mother, though, in her deep maternal love, picked up her son and, cuddling him, said, “That’s all right. I’m sorry you don’t feel better!” What an object lesson in self-giving love.

I understand later today many will be watching SuperBowl 56. I couldn’t find any Bible verses with sheep and tigers – there are no tigers mentioned anywhere in the Bible! So I guess it’s the LA Rams for the win, huh? Just kidding! Anyway, I did find an illustration connected with an earlier SuperBowl – one that illustrates love’s forgiveness or at least overlooking failure...

During the season of the first SuperBowl, the great quarterback Bart Starr really felt bad about how he had played. He had a little system of encouragement for his son: every time his son brought home a perfect paper, Bart would give him a dime. After returning from a rough game with St.Louis where he felt he had played very poorly, he was tired and discouraged, he felt battle weary until he got to his bedroom...There on his pillow was a note from his son that said, “Dear Dad, I thought you played a great game, love. Bart Jr.”...with it was taped 2 dimes! That lifted his spirits tremendously!

LOVE IS TRUTHFUL

What do we have so far? Love treasures; love communicates; love listens; love forgives. Yet, love is also TRUTHFUL, it doesn’t ignore what needs to be said. If someone won’t be up-front and truthful with us, if they dance around the bush and won’t let us know what they’re really thinking, or worse still if they’re using flattery towards us and being deceptive about what they really feel – that’s not loving. Ephesians 4:15 “Instead, SPEAKING THE TRUTH IN LOVE, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ.” Likewise, Paul emphasizes in Romans 12:9a, “Love must be SINCERE.”

God had some strong medicine He needed to deliver to the wayward Israelites, and Amos was the messenger He chose to speak the truth to the northern nation. In chapter 7 after the visions of the locusts and the fire which did NOT happen after all, there’s another vision that ‘sticks’. Amos 7:7-9 “This is what he showed me: The Lord was standing by a wall that had been built true to plumb, with a plumb line in his hand.And the LORD asked me, "What do you see, Amos?" "A plumb line," I replied.Then the Lord said, "Look, I am setting a plumb line among my people Israel; I will spare them no longer."The high places of Isaac will be destroyed and the sanctuaries of Israel will be ruined; with my sword I will rise against the house of Jeroboam."”

God was being ‘on the level’ with His people. Their actions weren’t ‘squaring up’ with His divine teaching. They had gone off-course, off-kilter. So He would spare them no longer, their sanctuaries and high places where they worshipped idols would be destroyed.

We need people in our lives who can tell us the hard truth we sometimes need to hear. Hopefully lovingly and gently. They are really doing us a service. The bonds of trust and caring in a church should be so strong and lasting that Paul’s counsel in Galatians 6:1 can be carried out: Gal 6:1 “Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted.” Do we have that kind of true friend in our life? Who feels ‘safe’ that they can be completely honest with us – and vice-versa? Always, always, ALWAYS in love!

LOVE LIFTS UP

Finally, love builds the other person up, lifts them up, so they feel strengthened and supported rather than constantly criticized or cut down. Paul wrote to the church at Corinth concerning a topic about which there was some variance of opinion (and doncha know our world is rife with ‘disputable matters’ these days!), 1Cor 8:1 “Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but LOVE BUILDS UP.” The Greek verb means literally to build a house or erect a building. If someone feels more torn down after we’ve interacted with them rather than built up, even if it’s a matter of correction, somehow there’s love missing.

In Amos 7 we see the priest of Bethel, Amaziah, trying to cut down Amos the prophet, telling him to get lost, go away, head back home where he came from, accusing him of plotting conspiracy against King Jeroboam II. But Amos responds by recounting God’s goodness in lifting him up from menial tasks down on the farm to become God’s spokesperson to royalty: Amos 7:14f “Amos answered Amaziah, "I was neither a prophet nor a prophet’s son, but I was a shepherd, and I also took care of sycamore-fig trees.But the LORD took me from tending the flock and said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’” The Lord LIFTED UP Amos for the special task He had for him, warning the Israelites about their impending doom. Amos was secure in God’s love for him, because it was the Lord who had chosen him and lifted him up for the task.

Our love for each other as Christians should be lifting each other up and helping others in such a positive way that outsiders are drawn to that kind of fellowship and community. Tertullian was an early Christian apologist who lived about 155-220 AD. He wrote, “It is our care for the helpless, our practice of lovingkindness, that brands us in the eyes of many of our opponents.‘Look!’ they say, ‘How they love one another! Look how they are prepared to die for one another.’”

Such love builds others up, as in Christ together ‘the whole body...grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.’ (Eph 4:16)

LOVINGLY ANTICIPATING

I’d like to close today with a quote, not from St.Valentine, but from Mother Teresa, whose life and influenced towered over the last part of the twentieth century. She recalls the love she witnessed between her parents in her own home growing up. It speaks of the way love TREASURES the beloved. She said: "My own mother used to be very busy the whole day, but as soon as evening came, she moved very fast to get ready to meet my father.At that time we didn't understand; we used to laugh; we used to tease her; but now I remember what tremendous, delicate love she had for him.It didn't matter what happened that day; she was ready with a smile to meet him." Let’s pray.

Thank You Sovereign God for Your vast love for us, expressed most clearly in Jesus’ self-giving for us! Where would we be without Your forgiveness, without Your truth revealed to us in Scripture and shown so clearly in the life and teaching of Your Son? Lord, forgive us for treasuring the wrong things in life, for cherishing idols. For not loving other people or according them value. Your plumb line hangs beside our life too, and we freely confess we have done crooked things. Thank You that Jesus has taken our punishment already at the cross. Help us get in line with Your Holy Spirit. Embed Your truth and love deeply in our lives, we ask in Jesus’ name; Amen.

Amos 9: “Shaken in God's Sieve, to be Restored” - Feb. 20/22 (Amos 9:5-15)

DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?!

Today we complete our series on the book of Amos. In previous weeks we’ve seen how this Shepherd / Sycamore-fig-tree-tending working class guy from the southern kingdom of Judah was called by God to travel north and warn Samaria’s elite that the northern kingdom would be destroyed unless they made big changes; that destruction happened about 30 years later, when the Assyrians overthrew Israel in 722 BC. They rebuked him for bothering to come and warn them, and basically told him to get out of there, go back home, back to the farm where he belonged. They were too proud and arrogant to heed God’s warning. This happened at a time of great national prosperity, when Jeoboam II had extended the country’s borders to its furthest-ever extent, and business was booming. Who needs a prophet of doom at a time like that?

Pride makes people want to put themselves first, makes them feel they can throw their weight around, that they deserve priority over other ‘regular’ people.

A heavily booked commercial flight out of Denver was canceled, and a single agent was rebooking a long line of inconvenienced travelers. Suddenly an angry passenger pushed his way to the front and slapped his ticket down on the counter. "I have to be on this flight and it has to be first class!" he insisted. "I'm sorry, sir," the agent replied. "I'll be happy to help you, but I have to take care of these folks first." The passenger was unimpressed. "Do you have any idea who I am?" he demanded in a voice loud enough for the passengers behind him to hear. Without hesitating, the gate agent smiled and picked up her public-address microphone. "May I have your attention, please?" she broadcast throughout the terminal. "We have a passenger here at the gate who does not know who he is.If anyone can help him find his identity, please come to the gate." As the man retreated, the people in the terminal burst into applause.

The people of the northern kingdom had that same “Do you know who I am?” arrogant attitude. Probably because they didn’t know who God was.

CHECK ON PRIDE: GOD IS BIGGER THAN WE THOUGHT

There was a popular book years back by JB Philips called “Your God is Too Small”. The Israelites would have benefited from reading it! Amos at several points seeks to explode their diminished view of God, they had made Him small enough to safely be ignored. When we get a better appreciation of how great God is, it helps protect us from the downfall of pride, becoming overconfident in our own high estimation of ourselves.

These short descriptions of Amos’ great God pop into the text almost parenthetically, as if they’re sidebars or interruptions in the general flow. Look for example at Amos 9:5-6: “The Lord, the LORD Almighty, he who touches the earth and it melts, and all who live in it mourn— the whole land rises like the Nile, then sinks like the river of Egypt— he who builds his lofty palace in the heavens and sets its foundation on the earth, who calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out over the face of the land— the LORD is his name.” The Lord, the LORD Almighty - Adonai, Yahweh, the divine titles pile upon each other, ‘God of hosts’ or ‘God of heavenly armies’. The earth melts at His touch! He can make the land rise and fall as in devastating earthquakes. He spans the vertical dimension: His palace is in the heavens but its base or foundation is on the earth. He designed and set the natural laws in place that govern the water cycle, wherein the waters of the seas are drawn up to the clouds and poured out on the land, providing fertility to crops and saving people and animals from dying of thirst. Yahweh is His name - the God who brings things into being, is in charge of all that happens.

Does this great, almighty God factor into our daily planning? Do we orient our lives around the fact we will stand before Him one day and give an account? Or do we just ignore Him and go our own way, to our peril? Rev 20:11f “Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it.Earth and sky fled from his presence, and there was no place for them.And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened.Another book was opened, which is the book of life.The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books.” John who wrote Revelation also had a big picture of God!

There were a couple of instances earlier in the book where Amos inserted some asides about this great God he served. Amos 1:2 “The LORD roars from Zion and thunders from Jerusalem; the pastures of the shepherds dry up, and the top of Carmel withers.” 4:13 “He who forms the mountains, creates the wind, and reveals his thoughts to man, he who turns dawn to darkness, and treads the high places of the earth— the LORD God Almighty is his name.” And 5:8-9 “(he who made the Pleiades and Orion, who turns blackness into dawn and darkens day into night, who calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out over the face of the land— the LORD is his name— he flashes destruction on the stronghold and brings the fortified city to ruin)...” This cosmically great God who forms our topography, fashions the distant stars, and is quite at home hiking earth’s highest spots – this same God nevertheless reveals His thoughts to us, He makes His ways intelligible for us that we may understand and get our lives in line with His purposes.

Pride can trip us up because it’s hard for the proud person to admit any shortcomings. In Charles Colson’s book Born Again, which details his experiences related to Watergate, Colson shares one of President Nixon’s problems — he could never admit he was wrong in anything. In fact, Colson says, even when Nixon obviously had a cold — nose running, face red, sneezing, all the symptoms — he would never admit it.

CHECK ON PRESUMPTION: GOD WILL PURSUE HIS OPPONENTS MINUTELY

Not only does Amos serve a BIG God; this immense deity that fills the universe to its greatest extent also knows every little nook and cranny, there is no escaping Him, no hiding from His accountability. Chapter 9 begins with a startling vision of God’s impending judgment: He’s ready to smash the worship-space at Bethel on those who were sacrificing to idols. Amos 9:1 “I saw the Lord standing by the altar, and he said: "Strike the tops of the pillars so that the thresholds shake. Bring them down on the heads of all the people; those who are left I will kill with the sword. Not one will get away, none will escape.” As if that picture of calamity isn’t startling enough, the passage goes on to describe how there’s no hiding ANYWHERE from this all-knowing God. Amos 9:2-4 “Though they dig down to the depths of the grave, from there my hand will take them. Though they climb up to the heavens, from there I will bring them down. Though they hide themselves on the top of Carmel, there I will hunt them down and seize them. Though they hide from me at the bottom of the sea, there I will command the serpent to bite them. Though they are driven into exile by their enemies, there I will command the sword to slay them. I will fix my eyes upon them for evil and not for good." Can’t escape His pursuit anywhere! Not in the grave or the heavens, not in the caves and forests of the Carmel mountain range that rose 1800 feet above the Mediterranean. Even if there were a mythological sea serpent which in legend opposed the Creator, God has control even of it and could direct it to carry out His sentence.

We see the INTENSITY of God’s being as well as His IMMENSITY - the God of the furthest stars, of the Pleiades and Orion, is also the God of the smallest atom and molecule, the subatomic forces. Amos’ God is not only BIG, He is PERVASIVE. Much better to have Him ‘fix His eyes’ upon you for good, not for evil!

Jesus was getting at something similar about how God knows us down to the most intimate detail and we are accountable to Him in Matthew 10:28-30, “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.” God’s knowledge of the universe He created is PERVASIVE. That acts as a check on our PRESUMPTION, we can’t assume we will escape His scrutiny.

CHECK ON PRIVILEGE: GOD CARES ABOUT OTHERS TOO

People who are proud may also be susceptible to prejudice, considering themselves superior to others. The humble person doesn’t count themselves better than others, but is ready to serve them, build them up, help them however they can. When we have a proper estimation of who we are in light of God’s grace, it helps us have a posture that’s ready to bless our neighbour instead of look down our nose at them. As Paul admonished in Philippians 2:3f, “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.”

Some people seem to think they automatically rate privilege and perks. Ivor Spencer manages a butler placement service. He teaches young butlers-to-be how to iron a newspaper and serve salmon, and all the other details of the profession. He has placed butlers with some of the richest and most powerful people in the world. He tells a story of when Leona Helmsley was an American businesswoman whose flamboyant personality and reputation for tyrannical behavior earned her the nickname ‘Queen of Mean’. She once called Mr.Spencer to request a butler. She did not want to pay his commission. Instead, she said to him, "Think of the prestige you'll get from placing a butler with the Queen of New York." Spencer replied to Ms.Helmsley, "Madame, I have placed butlers with real queens, and they always paid me." He then hung up.

The Israelites viewed themselves as God’s “Chosen People”; in fact, He had chosen them to be His witnesses to other nations – but that did not give them licence to transgress against Him. Some apparently figured they had a ‘get out of jail free’ card, that God would never punish them. Amos 9:10 “All the sinners among my people will die by the sword, all those who say, ‘Disaster will not overtake or meet us.’” That’s presumptive, they’re assuming they have a privilege that puts them out of reach of condemnation.

But see how God brings them back to ground level. Yes He had brought Israel out of slavery in Egypt under Moses; but their disobedience put them on the same footing as any other people. Amos 9:7f - “"Are not you Israelites the same to me as the Cushites [Ethiopians]?" declares the LORD. "Did I not bring Israel up from Egypt, the Philistines from Caphtor [Crete] and the Arameans from Kir? Surely the eyes of the Sovereign LORD are on the sinful kingdom. I will destroy it from the face of the earth— yet I will not totally destroy the house of Jacob," declares the LORD.”

Just because you call yourself a Christian doesn’t mean you are exempt from keeping God’s laws. When you trust in Him, your past sins are forgiven, and the Holy Spirit comes into your life and begins to transform your sinful tendencies. But we stay accountable to the Lord for our actions. His grace ought to empower us to live on a higher plane, not receive an automatic exemption. His love motivates us to please Him instead of just pleasing ourselves. 2Cor 5:9f “So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.”

CHECK ON PURPOSELESSNESS AND DESPAIR: GOD HAS A BETTER DAY COMING

So you’ve hung in there for 9 chapters of warnings of imminent judgment on prosperous, profligate Israel. Yet even though they’ve been behaving so cruelly towards the poor and needy, even though they’ve built mansions with ivory carvings through swindling common workers and have drunk so much wine they can hardly drag themselves off their comfy couches, Amos still has a message of hope for the repentant. The last 5 verses in this last chapter hold out definite hope.

Amos 9:11-12 “"In that day I will restore David’s fallen tent. I will repair its broken places, restore its ruins, and build it as it used to be, so that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations that bear my name," declares the LORD, who will do these things.” Here we see God will rebuild after the destruction that’s coming. David is referred to; in Jesus “the root of Jesse” we see David’s descendant according to human reckoning. When Jesus comes back and brings in His millennium reign, we can expect to see a restoration of Israel.

The picture of prosperity and fruitfulness that can happen at that time is practically miraculous. God repeats “I will...I will” about 5 times in these verses emphasizing He’s bringing about something very special. 9:13-15 “"The days are coming," declares the LORD, "when the reaper will be overtaken by the plowman and the planter by the one treading grapes.New wine will drip from the mountains and flow from all the hills.I will bring back my exiled people Israel; they will rebuild the ruined cities and live in them.They will plant vineyards and drink their wine; they will make gardens and eat their fruit. I will plant Israel in their own land, never again to be uprooted from the land I have given them," says the LORD your God.”

What a startling picture of fertility and fruitfulness! The seasons bumping into each other so that while the farmer’s still plowing the previous crop, it’s time to get the next one in the ground. Wine ‘dripping’ and ‘flowing’ from the mountains and hills. God can heal the land even after its ‘scorched earth’ discipline under the Assyrians.

So, is this all just about Jewish people, or do we find ourselves here, too? Does this passage point to us at all? The Apostles in the New Testament apparently thought so. The Jerusalem Council in Acts 15 was a critical moment when early church leaders were deciding whether Gentiles could rightly be part of this move of God, as Peter, Barnabas, and Paul had been witnessing non-Jews receiving the Holy Spirit. At a crucial moment, James, the Lord’s brother, reaches way back in his memory of the Hebrew Scriptures and sees in Amos’ prophecy God’s endorsement, that Gentiles who were turning to God should be welcomed into the church. James said, Acts 15:15-18 “The words of the prophets are in agreement with this, as it is written: "’After this I will return and rebuild David’s fallen tent. Its ruins I will rebuild, and I will restore it, that the remnant of men may seek the Lord, and ALL THE GENTILES WHO BEAR MY NAME, says the Lord, who does these things’ that have been known for ages.” There James was quoting Amos! And, THERE YOU ARE! God’s promises are for you, too, as you trust in Jesus, the Messiah, David’s descendant.

This pandemic has been a long, grinding two years! We are VERY ready to be done with it. But ultimately our hope is not in timing of pandemics being over and restrictions lifted. Our hope is ultimately in Jesus, the New Order He will bring, and the New Life His Spirit is already awakening and growing in our lives. There will always be trials as you go through life; you need a hope that transcends this fallen order to keep you going. This vision of wine flowing and the plowman overtaking the reaper hints at the wonderful things God is waiting to bring about in our experience, and through our trusting Him through even the toughest times.

THE DECEITFUL ART OF BEING A BIG SHOT

In closing, Howard Butt was a prominent Christian businessman who wrote an article titled “The Art of Being a Big Shot”.Among many other insightful things he said were these words:

“It is my pride that makes me independent of God. It’s appealing to me to feel that I am the master of my fate, that I run my own life, call my own shots, go it alone. But that feeling is my basic dishonesty. I can’t go it alone. I have to get help from other people, and I can’t ultimately rely on myself. I’m dependent on God for my next breath. It is dishonest of me to pretend that I’m anything but a man—small, weak, and limited. So, living independent of God is self-delusion. It is not just a matter of pride being an unfortunate little trait and humility being an attractive little virtue; it’s my inner psychological integrity that’s at stake. When I am conceited, I am lying to myself about what I am. I am pretending to be God, and not man. My pride is the idolatrous worship of myself. And that is the national religion of Hell!” Let’s pray.

Heavenly Father, thank You for calling Amos to warn the proud northerners of their shortcomings, most of all that they had forgotten who You are. Forgive us our pride, our trying to do it all ourselves, our failure to realize life itself is a gift and we depend on so many others. Save us from our self-delusion. Help us have a big view of Who You are, to bow our knee before You as the Lord Almighty, God of heaven’s armies – and in that awareness to yield our whole life to pleasing You and reaching others with Your love and goodness. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Redeemed & Reborn: Obedient Love that Bleeds” - Mar.6/22 ~ 1Peter 1:17-25

INTRODUCTION: PEP TALK TO A PUMMELED TEAM

Imagine you’re the coach of a minor league baseball team. Your team has played hard but they’re up against some stiff opposition. Sure there have been a few slip-ups: a couple of overthrows that resulted in unnecessary runs for the other team; your pitcher has been having an off day, though trying their hardest; and your best hitter has only managed to connect for a base run at best. So your team is down a few runs by the bottom of the seventh. The outcome of the game is not a foregone conclusion - yet! – but your team has got to pull it together for there to be any hope of them to come out on top. You gather the players for a pep talk. They gather around you, panting heavily, faces streaked with sweat and dust, tiredness from exertion starting to show. What are you going to say to encourage them?

This has not been an easy week. Yes we are thankful FINALLY for the easing of some restrictions regarding COVID measures. We don’t have to physically distance any longer. Capacity limits have been lifted. Vaccination passports are going away in many instances. And we can once again actually SING OUT LOUD in church! Hurray!

But it’s been a heavy week in other respects. The news is dominated by reports of Russian advance in Ukraine, bringing death and destruction, forcing over a million refugees to flee to neighbouring countries. From this distance we feel kind of powerless to intervene, apart from trade measures and other economic sanctions. Perhaps like me you know someone who is related to someone of Ukrainian background. In Ontario only 3% of the population is Ukrainian, but in Alberta it’s 9%, Saskatchewan 13%, and Manitoba almost 15%. You can’t help but feel sympathy for people fleeing for their lives, or sheltering in place despite constant bombardment.

There are other hardships. Inflation is very high, with costs of some essentials like food and fuel shooting up. The Bank of Canada is raising its prime lending rate to counteract inflation, but that means mortgage rates will also rise. Stock market volatility has negatively impacted people’s long-term investments. One day-trader I know figures he saw his last three year’s earnings suddenly wiped out.

The Apostle Peter was writing in a different time and place, but sought to write a letter of encouragement to his fellow-believers who were suffering. Their hardships were different than ours, but they were hardships nonetheless. So it’s as if a coach is delivering a pep talk to a pummeled team, as it were.

Peter tells us his purpose in writing in 1Peter 5:12, “With the help of Silas, whom I regard as a faithful brother, I have written to you briefly, ENCOURAGING YOU and testifying that this is the TRUE GRACE of God.STAND FAST in it.” See that? He wants to encourage them. How? By helping them appreciate God’s grace, so they can stand fast in it, be strengthened, anchored, supported knowing how much God has done for them.

Guest speaker Keith Elliot got us started in this letter of 1Peter last week, pointing out the HOPE God has for Christians - past, present, and future. Let’s review who Peter was writing to. The first verse lists several regions in Asia Minor, to which believers had scattered following the initial persecution in Jerusalem and Judea. Peter calls them “God’s elect, strangers in the world, scattered” – if they had fled persecution, they probably felt like refugees, displaced people, having had to uproot from their original homeland in order to escape to safety. Some of them maybe had been through trauma, when hyper-Jews like Saul of Tarsus had sought them out and thrown them into prison. Perhaps some had watched in horror as Stephen was stoned before their very eyes, or others were beaten and dragged off to jail. They had been hurting.

We know historically Christians were persecuted during the reign of Roman Emperor Nero (54-68); Peter himself was martyred during that time. So this letter was probably written between AD 60-67. A prominent theme is suffering. That will come up repeatedly in the latter half of chapter 3 and through chapters 4 and 5, but you can also catch glimpses of it earlier. 1:6 “In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to SUFFER GRIEF IN ALL KINDS OF TRIALS.” 1:11 “...He predicted the SUFFERINGS of Christ...” And 2:19-22a, “For it is commendable if a man bears up under the pain of UNJUST SUFFERING because he is conscious of God. But how is it to your credit if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But if you SUFFER for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. To this you were called, because Christ SUFFERED for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.”

So, you can see the coach acknowledging the hardships the team is experiencing. They’re getting pummeled. How can he encourage them to keep on trying? What would you include in your ‘pep talk’ in such a situation?

Peter takes 3 approaches. He helps them perceive A REVOLUTION IN VALUES. Next he seeks to GROUND THEM IN GRACE – to see how much they already have going for them. And he injects them with energy by helping them recall they are NEWBORN and empowered to keep on loving.

A REVOLUTION IN VALUES

It seems Peter may have been addressing refugees, Christians who had been scattered to various foreign lands through persecution for their faith. It’s sobering to see pictures of Ukrainian refugees, some having traveled for 5 days on a journey that normally takes just 8 hours, sleeping in their cars as they wait to cross the crowded border, walking on foot carrying their worldly possessions on their back, some even carrying their precious pets. They must be feeling such a sense of loss and being uprooted.

Peter challenges his readers to recognize that God has upended this world’s normal scale of values. What’s most treasured in human eyes can actually be of little worth eternally. Paul warned Timothy, 1Tim 6:10,17 “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil...Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.”

Likewise Peter warns that money is not the be-all and end-all. That can be taken away from us – and in fact many of his hearers maybe had suffered considerable financial loss when they were forced to relocate in a foreign land. But they still had something of much greater worth that no one could take away. 1Peter 1:18-19 “For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.” Hear that? What’s precious, and what’s perishable? The blood of Jesus is precious, because He’s our Passover Lamb, spotless, unblemished, innocent of all sin. What’s perishable? Silver and gold. Money and worldly wealth cannot make a person innocent in God’s sight. It’s Christ’s sacrifice in our place that alone can justify us, put us in right standing before God when we confess our sins and believe in Him as our Saviour.

It’s understandable to fear soldiers and armies. Yet Peter also points out to these persecuted folks, these trauma survivors, that the most important One to fear is God not people. V17 “Since you call on a Father who judges each man’s work impartially, live your lives as strangers here in reverent fear.” Yes, you heard that right – FEAR. God is our Judge, and has no favourites; He is impartial, His judgment is absolutely just and right. It’s not something to be flippant about or take lightly, but to have an attitude of ‘reverent fear’. While in love we call on Him as ‘Father’. Jesus said, Matthew 10:28 “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.”

Peter, like Jesus, calls us to a revolution in values. To treasure Christ not wealth. To fear God, not people. And, to glory in what lasts, not what’s temporal. In v21 Peter notes in passing that God ‘glorified’ Jesus after raising Him from the dead. What do people commonly ‘glory’ in? A nice house? A fast car? Shiny jewellery? Becoming a celebrity? What do you ‘glory’ in?

I’ve been enjoying Nicky & Pippa Gumble’s Bible In One Year with commentary. In Wednesday’s introduction to the daily readings, Nicky Gumble said this...

“In one of his last songs, Freddie Mercury, the lead singer of the rock group Queen, asked the question: ‘Does anybody know what we are living for?’

“In spite of the fact that he had amassed a huge fortune and had attracted thousands of fans, Freddie Mercury admitted in an interview shortly before his death in 1991 that he was desperately lonely. He said, ‘You can have everything in the world and still be the loneliest man, and that is the most bitter type of loneliness. Success has brought me world idolisation and millions of pounds, but it’s prevented me from having the one thing we all need – a loving, ongoing relationship.’”

Some might glory in becoming a rock star and getting fabulously wealthy and well known, but that man found it was a road to loneliness.

Peter compares this world’s type of glory to that of cut flowers that you buy at Valentine’s but a few days later they are no longer attractive and have to be thrown in the compost. 1Peter 1:24-25a, “For, "All men are like grass, and all their GLORY is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands forever."”

What do we glory in? Is it going to wither quickly, or be like the glory the Father vested in the Risen Son who obeyed God’s will to the point of yielding His very life?

GROUNDED IN GRACE: RISEN CHRIST, LASTING WORD

Missionary Keith Elliot pointed out that much of Peter’s letter consists of IMPERATIVES, commands or orders that we are to obey. There is a side of us that is naturally suspicious of authority, of other people telling us what to do. Peter will address what our attitude should be to humans in authority in government later in chapter 2(13-17). Spoiler alert – he uses words like ‘submit’ and ‘respect’! But for now, think about the typical way a two-year-old might respond to an ‘imperative’. Such as, ‘pick up your toys’. At some point in their development an invisible threshold is crossed and your son or daughter may look up at you with a defiant look on their face and say, “Why?” Or maybe even that other word characteristic of terrible twos: “No!”

It’s probably an aspect of fallen human nature that we just automatically get our back up whenever someone lays an imperative on us. So Peter doesn’t just write orders and things like ‘do this’ to the early church. He supplies several justifications, arguments, reasons WHY we should obey such imperatives. He anticipates our toddlerish ‘Why?’ in advance. Recall that in 5:12 he said he was ‘testifying that this is the true GRACE of God’ then adds, ‘Stand in it.’ Acknowledging the GRACE makes it easier to OBEY.

In our current passage, two aspects of God’s grace are highlighted: Christ crucified and risen; and the lasting WORD. We can be grounded in Christ and the Word.

We already saw in verse 19 Peter emphasize the preciousness of the blood of Christ – Jesus’ crucifixion and suffering and painful death. Verse 20 emphasizes the timelessness of this self-giving, and for whom Christ gave Himself. 1Pet 1:20 “He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.” This reaches way back to before the world was made. Like in John 17:24 where Jesus prays, “"Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because YOU LOVED ME BEFORE THE CREATION OF THE WORLD.” You just can’t get EARLIER than that!

V20 also says Jesus “was revealed in these last times FOR YOUR SAKE.” The word ‘sake’ isn’t literally there in the Greek; Bible in Basic English translates, “was caused to be seen in these last times for you.” FOR YOU! Jesus is the Man for others, Jesus is the Man for me – for you! He was nailed to that cross NOT for His own sin – He was, after all, ‘a lamb without blemish or defect’ (v19) - it was His love for you and for me that held Him there, not the nails.

1Peter 1:21 continues, “THROUGH HIM you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are IN GOD.” Our faith is not ‘in God’ without going ‘through Christ’, there is no other mediator, it all depends on Him. The resurrection and ascension and enthronement of Christ are God’s ‘stamp of approval’ endorsing what Christ accomplished, which was obtaining salvation for those who believe in Him. So Jesus is the basis of our faith and hope in God. We are GROUNDED IN CHRIST, even when the bombs fly, even when friends betray us and the economy seems to be falling through the floor.

Christ is our surety from before the creation of the world; next Peter points to something that will last forever, God’s WORD. V23 “For you have been born again...through the LIVING AND ENDURING word of God.” V25 “‘...but the word of the Lord STANDS FOREVER.’ And this is the word that was preached to you.”

God’s word is not like our mere human words. It is ALIVE, empower us to become regenerated, born anew, born from above. Hebrews 4:12 “For the word of God is LIVING and ACTIVE.Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.”

Besides being LIVING, it is ENDURING, it STANDS FOREVER Peter says. When God makes promises to the patriarchs in the Old Testament, He swears by Himself, for there’s nothing greater! He backs His word, permanently. How did Jesus express this? Matthew 24:35 “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.” Think about that. Isn’t that a sentence to take your breath away? His words are more permanent than heaven and earth. Stay grounded in God’s truth, God’s promises.

SIGNS OF A NEWBORN: HOLINESS AND MUTUAL LOVE

Have you ever seen a newborn baby up close? How can you tell a baby’s just been birthed, freshly hatched? We smile when movies show us what are supposed to be babies just born but it’s obviously not a REALLY new-born child.

I was privileged to be present for the births of 3 of my 4 children (one came prematurely when I was halfway across the country in Congo on mission work). As I recall, newborns tend to be rather red; sort of wet and slimy; kind of wrinkly; and there’s usually an umbilical cord attached. (You mothers are welcome to correct me or add other characteristics afterward!) Oh, and back in the day they were often wailing, because the doctor or midwife tried measures to get their lungs working once out in the open air.

Christians are ‘newborns’ when it comes to putting their faith in Jesus as Lord and Saviour. The Holy Spirit comes into our lives and begins to re-fashion us, so the old self is crucified, and we are re-made more and more in Christ’s likeness, complete with the Holy Spirit’s fruit and gifts. In this passage Peter suggests there are at least two things that are characteristic signs of newborns: HOLINESS and MUTUAL LOVE.

Let’s look at verses 22b-23a, and pay attention to the logic behind what’s being said. “Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart.For you have been born again...” Think about the structure there. The preposition “for” at the beginning of 23 is significant; you could substitute ‘because’. So we could sort of flip the flow and take it to mean, “BECAUSE you have been born again, (A) you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, (B) now go further and love one another deeply, from the heart.”

Peter implies that those who are born again, who believe in Jesus, will (A) purify themselves and (B) love each other deeply. So we might say HOLINESS and MUTUAL LOVE are two signs of newborns in Christian faith. Perhaps as an aside or corollary, we shouldn’t be surprised if non-Christians either don’t act in holy ways OR aren’t very loving. They don’t have the Holy Spirit inside them empowering them to do either.

But if we’re born again, we should know better! God’s word here is saying both holiness and mutual love are possible for us. Let’s take these individually, one at a time.

V22 “Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth...” In other words, when we hear the Good News about Jesus, we will ‘obey the truth’, we will repent and confess and submit to the reality of what God’s word says we are, sinners in need of a Saviour. It’s not a matter of “I’m okay, you’re okay.” If that’s the case, what’s HE doing up there on that cross?

We obey the truth, we confess and humble ourselves and seek God’s forgiveness and endeavour to live a new life. We leave behind the old sinful ways. We “purify ourselves” as Peter puts it. That means learning to be holy. Back up to verses 14-16 that Keith Elliot covered last week: 1Pet 1.14-16 “As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: "Be holy, because I am holy."”

The Bible is blunt about the importance of holy living. Hebrews 12:10,14 “...God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness...Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.” Peter was not being any more radical about this than His Master, because Jesus called people to be tough with themselves in avoiding sin – using hyperbole such as talking about cutting off your hand or plucking out your eye if it causes you to sin (Mt 5:29f).

Recently a young man struggling with porn asked me if I would be his accountability partner, which I was honoured to do. We need more young men like that who are honest and willing to humble themselves and ask for help with what is a rampant addiction in today’s culture. Porn is so prevalent these days, it practically throws itself at you, it’s not like the old days when the magazines were kept high on a shelf behind brown paper. Nowadays it’s practically ‘baked into’ our social media apps, it’s everywhere, and free. But it will cost you horrendously in other ways. Asking someone to help hold you accountable is a big first step in winning the battle over temptation. All part of what Peter calls “purif(ying) yourselves by obeying the truth.”

The other sign of a newborn Christian Peter highlights is MUTUAL LOVE. V21 “...you have sincere love for your brothers” – NRSV ‘genuine mutual love’, literally ‘philadelphia’ from the Greek word ‘phileo’ or friend-love. Peter urges his readers to rack it up one more notch, “love one another DEEPLY, from the heart” - KJV ‘fervently’. The verb for love used here is ‘agape’ not ‘phileo’ - ‘agape-love’ is the type of love God has for sinners, love where there’s nothing that would attract you, love IN SPITE OF whatever would stop you from wanting anything to do with that person. Love that Christ showed for us, for those who ridiculed Him on the cross. Can we learn to love like that?

LOVING THE STRANGER

Rosa Hwang (a CTV News correspondent) tells the story of Bartek, a young Polish man who drove to the border with Ukraine 3 hours in order to drop off relief supplies. But once there, he saw a greater need amongst the refugees fleeing the war. After calling his father and grandmother (with whom he lived) for permission, he wrote on a cardboard sign he had room for 3 people to live in Krakow. He came home with SIX - a Ukrainian mother and her five children, ranging in age from 17 to six months; the father had stayed behind in Ukraine to fight. So the small Polish household of 3 suddenly ballooned to 9 people!

Isn’t that amazing love? Love that is genuine, willing to pay a price, love that goes deep, to the very heart.

Aren’t you glad God loved us so much that He has made a home for us sinners in heaven?

You were cleansed from your sins...How might He now be prompting you to show sincere love to each other? Let’s pray.

Precious Lord, we are blown away by Your grace and mercy. Jesus, You are our precious Lamb, slain before the foundation of the world, You gave it all for US. Forgive us for treasuring silver or gold more than You. Help our hope be focused in God and what will last, not the passing glories of this age. Show us how You want to be leading us in paths of holiness and love – even to those who are unlike us. Thank You for taking us strangers into Your Kingdom! In Christ’s name, Amen.

March 13, 2022 (2d in Lent / Daylight Savings) 1Peter 2:1-10 “The High Calling of Being a Royal Priesthood”

NOT ALL ALONE

In today’s passage from 1Peter 2, there’s an emphasis on being a royal priesthood. One aspect of being a priest is making intercession for others. In Prayer Meeting lately we’ve been working through the book of Exodus, and we saw Moses ‘stand in the gap’ for the rest of the people when they sinned by worshipping a golden calf – he pleaded with God for their forgiveness, even to the point of offering to have his own name blotted from the book God had written if they were not to be forgiven (Ex 32:32). He was willing to be associated with their sin, if it would mean they could be forgiven. Although his brother Aaron was technically the high priest, Moses’ action was priestly in terms of interceding for others who had sinned.

As Christians, part of our priestly role is to sympathize with others, to come alongside them and plead to God on their behalf. Jesus died, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring us to God (1Pet 3:18).

Here’s a humorous story that sort of gets at this aspect of standing with others so they’re not left all alone... A priest was giving his homily, preaching to his congregation concerning heaven and hell. To emphasize the difference between the two, he asked that all who wanted to go to heaven to stand up. All the congregation rose. He then asked all who wanted to go to hell to stand up. No one stood up. For full dramatic impact he waited for several seconds before continuing. But during that pause a small boy slowly rose to his feet. The astonished priest spoke to the boy: "Surely a fine young man like yourself doesn't want to go to hell." The boy answered, "Well of course not, but I just couldn't stand the sight of you standing there all alone!"

SEEKING THE AUTHOR BEHIND THE LETTER

We live in an era of instant communication. You send a text or a Direct Message and, ‘boom!’ the other person receives a ding and can read it right away. It wasn’t always thus. Back in the old days people used to have to take a pen and a piece of paper, laboriously write out what they wanted to say, put it in an envelope, address it, walk it out to the mailbox, and wait for the mail carrier to pick it up. Some days later the other person would receive it. Then you’d have to wait until they went through the reverse procedure to get your reply.

If you were in love, those letters became very precious to you, especially if you were far away and the mail took a long time to come. We treasured the letters from our loved ones. It’s not that the letter itself was that valuable, but it represented your girlfriend or boyfriend or relative that couldn’t be there with you.

Peter begins chapter two by describing how this applies in our relationship to the Lord. Why do we read the Bible? Is it just to tank up on spiritual information? The internet is crammed full of spiritual information from all kinds of sources, much of it not from God. Do we read our Bibles solely to learn more ancient wisdom? There are many other ancient writers, so that alone wouldn’t be motivating for a daily quiet time. We read the Bible to connect with its Author. Note verses 2-3: 1Pet 2:2f “Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good.” Take that piece by piece, backwards.

First, we have ‘tasted that the Lord is good’. Before we were saved, our appetite for the things of Christ was lacking. The Holy Spirit awakened in us spiritual ‘taste buds’ so our yearning for God came alive, we could actually ‘taste’ that He was GOOD, He alone had the words of life, we came to see Jesus alone was the Way, the Truth, and the Life (Jn 14:6).

Next, because we’ve tasted He’s good, we then ‘crave pure spiritual milk’ as Peter puts it. The tasting feeds the craving – we want more. The phrase ‘spiritual milk’ can also be translated ‘milk of the word’, rational feeding, we want to know more about Jesus and the Christian life, how practically to live day to day, there’s a logical worldview presented in Scripture about origins, destiny, morality, and meaning. That takes time to understand and gradually it begins to come together to form a meaningful worldview. We’re reading devotionally as well as intellectually, getting to know God personally, hearing His voice, picking out His promises for us. Peter says in this phase we’re like ‘newborn babies’ - we need desperately to be fed and nurtured.

What’s that enable? Peter says at the end of verse 2, “so that by it” (the pure spiritual milk) “you may GROW UP in your salvation.” We don’t stay babies, spiritual infants; God wants us to be more mature than tipsy toddlers. His Holy Spirit is transforming our character to be more like Jesus. So craving the word is instrumental in making verse 1 possible – 1Peter 2:1 “Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind.” That’s real behaviour change. We become more real, less hypocritical, fake, deceitful, putting on a false front. Craving Scriptural truth as a means to get to know God results in less envy, jealousy, wanting things that aren’t for us. Taste that the Lord is good – crave His pure milk in the word – thus satisfied in our core, we won’t need the ‘stuff’ other people have to try to make us feel like we’re ‘enough’, because we’re already treasured by God.

GROWING STONES: SUPPORTIVE, NOT STATIC

Ah, spring! It will officially be here in about another week. Today the clocks did their ‘spring ahead’ an hour to take advantage of lengthening daylight. We anticipate seeing robins return soon (we hope).

On the farm growing up, one job that came around every spring was picking stones. Dad had named our farm “Marlefield” from a Scottish term meaning “stony field”. So every year us three boys and Dad would walk the fields behind the old blue flatbed truck, tossing stones and larger boulders onto it to dump over by a ditch or culvert. No matter whether we’d just done it the year before, every year there were fresh stones to pick! Dad used to talk about one of his uncles who once asked with incredulity, “Don’t you know stones GROW?!”

In verses 4-8 the Apostle Peter uses this imagery of stones to communicate the stability and support Jesus gives to our lives when we trust in Him – and in turn the substance our own lives can bring to Christ’s church. Peter’s basing it on the Hebrew Scriptures, and Jesus’ own self-understanding informed by the prophets. In verse 6 Peter quotes Isaiah 28:16 - 1Pet 2:6 “For in Scripture it says: "See, I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame."” In this passage Isaiah is referring to the Messiah, Jesus Christ; God the Father says Jesus is ‘chosen’ and ‘precious’, like the most important stone in a house’s foundation, with reference to which all the other stones line up and depend upon. Knowing Jesus, we can be assured our sins our forgiven through His accomplishment at Calvary; in Him we have confidence, we will not be ashamed or condemned.

Is Jesus the bedrock, the foundation of your life? If not, what else are you trying to depend upon?

Peter goes on to quote Psalm 118:22, which the Lord Jesus Himself cited when confronting those who opposed Him. Peter adds Isaiah 8:14 which depicts the problems those who do not put their faith in Christ will have. 1Pet 2:7-8 “Now to you who believe, this stone is precious. But to those who do not believe, "The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone," and, "A stone that causes men to stumble and a rock that makes them fall." They stumble because they disobey the message— which is also what they were destined for.” (It’s the stumbling for all who disobey they were destined for, not necessarily the disobedience itself.)

Now, the picture we have in our minds of a stone is probably STATIC – unmoving, a stone just kind of ‘sits there’. If you walk into it in the dark you would stub your toe, if not stumble and fall. That’s the connotation of strength and stability Peter’s conveying by talking about a ‘cornerstone’. But Peter refers to Jesus AND us in a way that doesn’t stop at being static: he talks about ‘LIVING stones’. Yes, that’s right. It may take a moment for you to accept that combination mentally. A STONE that’s actually ALIVE? (No, we don’t mean Dwayne Johnson!)

Such stones are more SUPPORTIVE in their liveliness, meant to come alongside and be together, helping others, making a contribution. See 1Peter 2:4-5 “As you come to him, the living Stone— rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him— you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” Jesus is ‘the living Stone’ we come to by faith. He makes us to be ‘living stones’ – not to remain on our own, alone, isolated, but to be put together, assembled, “built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood...”

When stones are put together by a mason into a building, they become a unit, working together, each one lending strength and stability to the structure. The building becomes stronger because of the many stones than it would be with just one stone. Think of the great cathedrals in Europe and the UK.

Now back up a moment and think about the ‘capstone’ or ‘keystone’ the Psalmist referred to, which Peter quoted in verse 7. Consider the stone arch above a gothic stained glass window. The capstone at the top of the arch is a weird shape, it’s not ‘square’ like many of the other stones. It’s unique. Jesus didn’t fit the expectations many of His contemporaries had of what Messiah would be like. They hoped for a conquering king to restore ownership of their homeland; He came as a non-political Suffering Saviour, very different from what they had been hoping for. Yet His resurrection confirmed He was in fact the Messiah sent to deliver us from slavery to sin.

This weird-shaped capstone is at the top of the arch. Imagine it from a load-bearing point of view, like you have a roof above with a heavy accumulation of snow or ice pressing down on the building, or a high wind threatening to push the building over. What does the capstone do? It distributes the load. The stones above it just have to transmit the load pressing on them down to the next layer below, but the capstone has to divide the load, distribute it sideways to the stones heading down the side of the arch, without crumbling or getting budged this way or that.

Jesus bore the penalty that should have come to us sinners, diverting it, sparing us the full weight of God’s wrath. A most unique and irreplaceable role.

Head back now to verse 5 – 1Pet 2:5 “you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood...” We’re to be ‘living stones’ like Jesus is. We’re ‘being built into a spiritual house’ – we’re not just in it for ourselves! How can we help others ‘bear the load’? What’s our role in ‘distributing the weight’ so the building doesn’t crumble? Does the capstone imagery give you a more dynamic understanding of what it means to be built together with others into a ‘spiritual house’?

What’s Paul getting at in Galatians 6:2, “Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ”? Are we helping them shoulder their load somehow – or just concerned about ourselves, ‘that’s their own business’? Consider Romans 15:1, “We who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak and not to please ourselves.” Ouch! “But - but - but - pleasing ourselves is what this culture is all about!”

“Bear with the failings of the weak...” Isn’t their weakness their own fault? That’s not the point. The apostle is saying we should be using our strength to BEAR WITH others’ failings. To me that sounds like capstone work, distributing the load, bearing more than just my own ‘share’ at times.

We all have our own weak moments, and we sure appreciate help then. An exhausted housewife dragged herself to the telephone when it rang and listened with relief to the kindly voice on the other end, which she took to be her Mom. "How are you, sweetheart? What kind of day are you having?" "Oh, Mother," said the woman, "I'm having such a bad day. The baby won't eat, the washing machine broke down, the house is a mess, we're having two couples over for dinner tonight and I haven't had a chance to go shopping yet, and to top it off, I just sprained my ankle."

The mother was overwhelmed with sympathy. "Oh, honey," she said, "sit down, relax, and just close your eyes. I'll be over in half an hour. I'll do the shopping, clean the house, and cook your dinner for you. I'll feed the baby and I'll call a repairman to fix the washing machine. Now stop crying. I'll do everything. In fact, I'll even call John at the office and ask him to come home and help out."

"John?" said the housewife. "Who's John?" "Why, John! Your husband! . . . Isn't this 555-1265?" "No, it's 555-1264."

"Oh" said the kindly person, "I must have the wrong number."

There was a long silence. Then the overwhelmed helpless woman asked, "Does this mean you're not coming over?"

YOU ARE ON GOD’S “WANTED” LIST!

Remember those “Wanted” posters in old Western movies – “Wanted, dead or alive, for robbing stagecoaches” etc? Did you know YOU are on God’s ‘most wanted’ list?!

In v4 Peter notes Jesus the living Stone is “rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to Him.” Chosen and precious. Chosen means picked out, selected especially; the other word can mean “held in honour, prized, precious”. Do you have any ‘prized possessions’ that are most dear to you? (I know what Gollum would choose!) What’s your ‘precious’? Jesus was most dear to the Father; at His baptism God announced, Mt 3:17 “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” And at the Mount of Transfiguration Peter and the other two disciples present heard God say, Mt 17:5 “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!” The Father seemed to be loving on the Son verbally whenever there was opportunity.

But then Peter starts talking about US who believe in Jesus in the same way – that we are God’s chosen ones, special to Him. 1Peter 2:9f “But you are a chosen people...a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.”

Hear that? You are ‘chosen’, selected, picked especially. You ‘belong to God’, you are ‘God’s people’, having received His mercy. When you are IN Christ by faith, the same love God the Father has for Jesus becomes yours as well, in Him. Why? To what end? Peter says, “that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” Declare His praises - declare how PRIZED and PRECIOUS He is to you!

What’s it like being in His light, compared to former days being in the darkness, without forgiveness, without grace, fighting to survive in the world just on your own merit? Paul wrote in Ephesians 5:8-10, “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord.” We have tasted that the Lord is GOOD, and righteous, and true – now we are ‘light in the Lord’, empowered to show forth His qualities to those around us.

PRIESTLY PRIVILEGE AND SACRIFICES FOR THE ERA OF GRACE

We began with the story of the little boy standing up so the priest wouldn’t be going to hell on his own (he thought). The boy’s impulse was priestly, wanting to ‘be there’ for the other person, moving toward them in their plight.

We saw in verse 5 that, according to Peter, we are being built into a spiritual house 1Peter 2:5b “to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ.” Peter comes back to this in verse 9 when he says, 1Peter 2:9a “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood...” What’s he getting at here? We know Jesus is our Mediator, our great High Priest (see the letter to the Hebrews) – but what’s OUR priestly role? What’s this business about ‘offering spiritual sacrifices’ he’s getting at in verse 5?

Peter’s not alone in using these terms. John writes in Revelation 1:5b-6, “To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood, and has made us to be a KINGDOM AND PRIESTS to serve his God and Father— to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen.” Peter’s phrase ‘a royal priesthood’ could also be rendered ‘a kingdom of priests’ – what would our priestly duties be?

In the Old Testament, the priest accepted the sacrifice from a worshipper and offered it at the altar on their behalf. The High Priest once a year entered the Most Holy Place to make atonement for the people, sprinkling blood at the Ark of the Covenant, specifically its lid the ‘Atonement Cover’ or ‘Mercy Seat’. Priestly duties also included tending the lamps in the Holy Place, burning incense, and placing fresh show-bread on the table daily. Priests pronounced blessings in God’s name, and declared people clean when they were healed of skin diseases. So priests interceded for the people and represented them, acted in their stead as go-betweens between the people and God.

How might the Lord be wanting us to act as go-betweens for our neighbours? To be interceding for them? To be representing God to them in a world where media seems to avoid mention of God like the plague? Do we even know our neighbours well enough to be aware of what their concerns and fears might be? Are we there for them, or just preoccupied with pleasing ourselves?

Peter says as priests we are to be ‘offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ’. He doesn’t mean burning livestock, does he, like they used to do in the Tabernacle and at Jerusalem? No. Consider what Paul writes in Romans 12:1-2, “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to OFFER YOUR BODIES AS LIVING SACRIFICES, holy and pleasing to God— this is your spiritual act of worship.DO NOT CONFORM ANY LONGER TO THE PATTERN OF THIS WORLD, BUT BE TRANSFORMED by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is— his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

Here one sacrifice we offer as ‘a royal priesthood’ is our BODIES – living sacrifices! We put all we are on the altar, figuratively. “I am Thine, O Lord...”

Another sacrifice is our THOUGHT-LIFE – not conforming to the world’s pattern, but having our mind renewed by reading and meditating on His word, in the Bible. Learn to think the way Jesus would think. How would Jesus approach this situation? What’s most important to Him in this scenario? What impact would ‘goodness, righteousness, and truth’ have?

Another helpful verse is Hebrews 13:15, “Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise— the fruit of lips that confess his name.” PRAISE is a sacrifice. Not just when things are going well; it’s when things aren’t going the way you want but you can still praise God anyway that it becomes a real sacrifice, very special to your Heavenly Father, because it shows you’re trusting Him to bring you through.

People’s New Testament Commentary summarizes, “The sacrifices of the Christian priest are prayer, praise, good deeds, the consecration of our bodies and substance to God’s service.”

YOU PUT YOUR WHOLE SELF IN

A couple of quick illustrations as we close...

In a church service one Sunday, the offering plate came to a little girl at the end of a row. She took the plate, put it down on the floor, and stood in it. When the usher asked her what she was doing, she responded, "In Sunday school I learned that I was supposed to give myself to God."

She was illustrating Romans 12:1, offering her body as a living sacrifice!

And here’s some encouragement to be carrying out the ‘priestly duty’ of prayer right in our own homes. Chaplain Richard Halverson of the United States Senate told the story of a time when the subject of prayer in schools came up just before a Senator was to give a speech to several hundred men at a church's annual men's dinner. In response to the Senator's question about how many of the churchgoers believed in prayer in the public schools, nearly every man present raised his hand in the affirmative. Then the Senator asked, 'How many of you pray daily with your own children in your home?' This time, only a few hands were raised.

Let’s pray. Lord, we have tasted, and we know You are good! Thank You for making us a royal priesthood, for breathing life into these stony hearts so we can become living stones. Help us keep our lives built upon Jesus Christ, the only really reliable cornerstone. Help us see how we can ‘bear the load’ of others, rather than just pleasing ourselves. Make us more conscious of our priestly privilege - forgiven and counted worthy to access Your Most Holy Place. Give us hearts that care about others and yearn to bring them to you. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Domestic Dynamics: Consideration, Respect, and Reverent Co-operation” - March 20, 2022 (3rd in Lent) 1Peter 3:1-7

HAPPILY INCOMPATIBLE

Relationships require navigation. They’re not always smooth sailing, because people DIFFER from one another: we each have our own preferences, our own likes and dislikes, our histories and upbringing can be very different. So getting along with another person requires navigation and often negotiation. Today much of the message focuses on a marriage relationship, but much of it would also apply to other relationships, such as friends and coworkers. Respect and a willingness to cooperate go a long way toward getting along with those around us.

You might be surprised to find out that such a revered and admired Christian as Billy Graham did not have a marriage that was absolutely unruffled. In his autobiography Just as I Am, Billy Graham wrote: “Ruth and I don't have a perfect marriage, but we have a great one. How can I say two things that seem so contradictory? In a perfect marriage, everything is always the finest and best imaginable; like a Greek statue, the proportions are exact and the finish is unblemished. Who knows any human beings like that? For a married couple to expect perfection in each other is unrealistic. The unblemished ideal exists only in happily-ever-after fairy tales. Ruth likes to say, 'If two people agree on everything, one of them is unnecessary.' The sooner we accept that as a fact of life, the better we will be able to adjust to each other and enjoy togetherness. 'Happily incompatible' is a good adjustment."

In today’s passage from 1Peter 3 we look into the dynamics that help a Christian’s marriage function better. Keeping God in view goes a long way to helping us deal with others’ imperfections.

CONTEXT #1: BOLSTERING ORDER IN OUR RELATIONSHIPS

Last week we looked at the beginning of chapter two in Peter’s first letter, how believing in Christ draws us to crave the pure milk of the word like newborn babies; thus we are transformed to become living stones being built together in to a spiritual house. We are also made a kingdom of priests: we’re no longer in it just for ourselves, but conscious of living lives as God’s own people, declaring His goodness to others.

I’m skipping the last part of chapter two because I’d like to save it for Good Friday, as it ties in so well with Jesus’ suffering for us at the cross. But we should reference it briefly because it begins a section with three parts describing how Christians can be flavouring society by the way they get along with others. And today’s passage points back to this larger context.

In all three areas, accepting others’ rightful authority is key. 2:13-17 talks about submitting to civil officials in authority over us; not because they are the ultimate authority – only God can be in that role! – but God is always in view as we submit to human authorities. See 2:13,17 “Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake to every authority instituted among men: whether to the king, as the supreme authority...Show proper respect to everyone: Love the brotherhood of believers, fear God, honor the king.” We give respect to those to whom respect is due. We ‘fear God’ foremost and chiefly – all will in the end give account to Him. Putin and NATO leaders alike will have to answer on the Judgment Day for their decisions.

Did you catch that little phrase in 2:13? “Submit yourselves FOR THE LORD’S SAKE to every authority instituted among men...” That’s important, don’t skip over that. Our ‘submitting’ or deference to authorities is ultimately because we want to please the Lord. When we make a turn and drive down the right side of the road instead of the left, we’re doing it partly for the Lord’s sake, it’s the right thing to do. When we slow down coming into a residential setting, same thing. When we pay our taxes, we’re again submitting to human authority, but it’s also ‘for the Lord’s sake’ – part of ‘living good lives among the pagans’ (2:12) for the purpose of honouring the Lord because we’re His people.

In 2:18 Peter switches to the relationship between workers and bosses, though back in that day slavery was still practiced. 1Pet 2:18 “Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect...” A worker’s cooperative conduct, acknowledging the boss’ authority, could be commendable before God.

That brings us to chapter 3, which turns to relationships within the family, specifically that of a husband and wife. Note the little phrase ‘in the same way’ in 3:1 and 3:7 - this is a connector pointing back to 2:13, “Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake to every authority instituted among men”. How a wife and husband relate to each other is part of this bigger picture of how Peter exhorts believers in general to honour God by their cooperative behaviour, enhancing the social order, living what others in society would consider to be ‘such good lives’ (2:12).

CONTEXT #2: EGALITARIAN WITH RESPECT TO WORTH

In discussing relationships between women and men, evangelicals fall largely into two camps. Egalitarians tend to view both genders as equal; complementarians insist there are important differences between women and men, you can’t treat them exactly the same.

Some cultures have been repressive toward women, for example in some Islamic countries they are forced to dress a certain way, can’t go out in public by themselves, can’t drive a car, and so on. Generally Christianity has had a liberating effect for women bound in such cultures. A classic egalitarian text is Galatians 3:28, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, MALE NOR FEMALE, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” This verse emphasizes that, in God’s eyes, there is no difference in intrinsic worth between men and women, one is not better than the other, we’re not inherently superior or inferior just because of our gender. John 1:12 says, “Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—” to ALL, regardless whether you’re a girl or a boy, a woman or a man, you can become God’s daughter or son through trusting in Christ.

Egalitarians could also point out that there are no caveats with regard to gender in Christ’s command to ‘love one another’ - John 15:17 “This is my command: Love each other.” If we find ourselves treating a fellow believer in a way that’s not loving, especially if they’re the opposite gender to us, we’re not being true to Jesus.

When it comes to cooperation and mutual submission, learning to get along and work together following common leadership, egalitarians could also point to Ephesians 5:21, “Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Note the ‘out of reverence for Christ’ bit: because we acknowledge Jesus as Lord, that helps us accept other Christians’ authority. Same could be said for the many other ‘one another’ passages in the New Testament - they are ‘gender-blind’.

CONTEXT #3: ADAM’S FALL, MALE ABUSIVENESS

Before I go further into the complementarian aspects, it’s important to proceed with caution, given fallen human nature. It’s all too easy for men to grab a proof-text and try to twist it into a weapon to try to coerce women, to get or claim some advantage over them.

This goes all the way back to the first sin in the Garden of Eden, when Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit. God had done a mysteriously beautiful thing by taking one of Adam’s ribs (from his side) and fashioning ‘a helper suitable for him’ (Gen 2:18). But when God calls Adam up on the carpet to account for the misdeed of eating from the one single tree He had forbidden, Adam is quick to blame and distance himself from the woman he had previously called “bone of my bone”. Genesis 3:11f “And he said, "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?" The man said, "The woman you put here with me— she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it."”

Centuries later, before 2000 BC, the esteemed patriarch Abraham - yes, Abraham, who made it into the Hebrews 11 “Faith Hall of Fame” - was all too quick to throw his wife Sarai under the proverbial bus when it suited him. Fleeing to Egypt during a severe famine, Abram persuades Sarai to lie and say she’s just his sister, because Abram is afraid for his hide; this results in her getting taken briefly into Pharaoh’s harem! Genesis 12:11-15 “As he was about to enter Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, "I know what a beautiful woman you are. When the Egyptians see you, they will say, ‘This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me but will let you live. Say you are my sister, so that I will be treated well for your sake and my life will be spared because of you." When Abram came to Egypt, the Egyptians saw that she was a very beautiful woman. And when Pharaoh’s officials saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh, and she was taken into his palace.” Thankfully the Lord intervened before anything worse happened to Sarai, so Pharaoh gave her back to Abram. But Abram comes off looking pretty shabby in this episode, demeaning his wife, treating her like some widget to be manipulated for his own self-preservation.

COMPLEMENTARIAN WITH RESPECT TO ROLE

With those 3 contexts in mind, let’s consider what the New Testament sets forth as the differences between the genders – NOT (mind you!) in regard to inherent worth, as if one’s better than the other or superior in any way or more valuable to God – but in regard to ROLE, the functions we play in co-operative and stable relationships. Remembering the injunction to love one another; to submit to one another; to, as 1Peter 2:17 puts it, “Show proper RESPECT to everyone: love the brotherhood of believers...”

In 1Corinthians 11 the apostle Paul sets forth a chain of accountability: 1Cor 11:3,11f “Now I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God...In the Lord, however, woman is not independent of man, nor is man independent of woman.For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God.” There is a flow of leadership and accountability. But Paul is quick to remind men that it’s not about independence; and that men have an awe-inducing accountability themselves, because Christ is their head.

Paul writes in other passages about the relationship between wives and their husbands, so this is not a one-off statement. Ephesians 5:22 “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.” Colossians 3:18 “Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.” Titus 2:4f “Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.” He seems pretty consistent about this differentiation of roles.

THE CHRISTIAN TWIST ON AUTHORITY

Mention of the word ‘headship’ can cause dread for some, because it’s been so badly misused in the past, forced into an excuse for wielding power and pain over one’s spouse. Our Lord Jesus was quick to emphasize that “authority” in the Christian family is meant to be exercised very differently than it is in the world at large. Even Jesus’ disciples fell into spats about who was the greatest. Jesus seized these as teachable moments to instruct them that being ‘chief’ was really about SERVING. Mark 10:42-45 “Jesus called them together and said, "You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. NOT SO WITH YOU. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did NOT COME TO BE SERVED, BUT TO SERVE, and to give his life as a ransom for many."”

Luke records a similar instance, but with an added illustration of a waiter serving a table as in a restaurant. Luke 22:25-27 “Jesus said to them, "The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those who exercise authority over them call themselves Benefactors. BUT YOU ARE NOT TO BE LIKE THAT. Instead, the greatest among you should be like the youngest, and the one who rules like the one who serves. For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.”

Are you catching His drift? Authority is not something to be wielded like a club, it’s not a matter of throwing your weight around or bullying in order to get your way. How can you best SERVE those in your care? This may mean subordinating YOUR needs to THEIR needs.

THE CONSIDERATE HUSBAND WOWED BY HIS CO-HEIR

With those caveats in place, MAYBE we’re ready to take a look at today’s short reading without jumping to conclusions and not actually hearing the intent of the text. Let’s back into it, beginning with Peter’s counsel to husbands in verse 7. 1Pet 3:7 “Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers.”

Why take this approach? Because God is watching all we do! Our believing wife is His daughter, so that makes Him the protective father-in-law. If we want Him to hear our prayers, we will treat our wives properly. Our wife will be more inclined to support our prayers and be willing to pray WITH us if we’re dealing with her in a loving way.

Peter says our wives are “heirs with you of the gracious gift of life...” It’s one big composite Greek word, ‘fellow-heir’ or ‘co-heir’: that hints again at mutuality, equal footing, a sister in the faith. It harks back to 1:4 where God has given us new birth into a living hope, 1Peter 1:4 “and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade— kept in heaven for you...” Your wife’s faith will result in ‘praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed’ (1:7) – can you begin to imagine how splended she will be in her eventual glory?!

Peter tells husbands “be CONSIDERATE as you live with your wives...” Do you have a ‘box’ for that? Is it automatic to consider her needs, her preferences, can you put yourself in her shoes for a minute? The Greek phrase is literally ‘according to knowledge’. Have you read any good marriage books lately? Yeah, I know, you’d rather read your technical manual. But study your wife from time to time. What makes her tick? Do you know her favourite things? How she likes her back rubbed?

Peter exhorts husbands, “Treat them with RESPECT as the weaker partner...” Emphasis is on the ‘respect’ not the ‘weaker’ bit. Yes, it’s a fact of life that the Olympics and professional sports have separate categories for men and women for a reason. But as NIV Study Bible commentary puts it, “Not a reference to moral stamina, strength of character or mental capacity, but most likely to sheer physical strength.” Us guys can tolerate a bit of roughhousing – boys are often seen jostling each other, and into contact sports – perhaps like a rough clay flowerpot will stand a tipping over or a fall from a short height. Whereas the fine antique teapot may be a ‘weaker vessel’ but is actually far more valuable, it warrants being handled with particular care. Key phrase is “treat them with respect”; NRSV “paying honour to the woman”; NLT “Treat your wife with understanding as you live together.”

A WIFE ADORNED BY HER INNER MANNER

Verses 1-6 in chapter 3 are addressed to wives who are believers. Peter was aware some of them had become Christians since getting married, while their husbands had not; a goal in that case would be to demonstrate Christian living so convincingly that their husbands would want to become followers of Jesus, too. 1Peter 3:1-2 “Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, when they see the purity and reverence of your lives.” To ‘be submissive’ does not mean being a doormat, but being subject to, to accept the other person’s authority. But John MacArthur points out there are limits. God is still supreme, the husband is not to coerce her into doing anything against conscience. MacArthur comments: “This precludes any coercion to sin, disobedience to God’s Word, or imposition of physical harm.” There’s no excuse for wife abuse. Get to safety; protect your kids; seek counseling, and supports that may lead the abuser to consider the error of their ways. Sharon Dowd writes in Women’s Bible Commentary, “Today many congregations understand the provision of options for healing for the abused to be part of their mission. Rather than encouraging victims to suffer passively, they support shelters and counseling services to encourage movement toward wholeness.”

Verses 3-4 outline what true ‘beauty’ is about as the apostle understands it. Not expensive jewellery or costly clothing with the latest fashions or an over-the-top hairdo to turn everyone’s heads. 1Peter 3:4 “Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight.” Now, there’s enough to turn the fashion industry on its ear! Can we turn off the advertisements vying for our attention long enough to hear what Peter’s saying? Your real adornment is an inside job, a type of beauty that will never fade even when you’re 90; as God sees it, what’s ‘of great worth’ - NRSV ‘very precious’ - is ‘a gentle and quiet spirit’.

Now, he’s not meaning timid and mousy! See the end of verse 6 - 1Peter 3:6b “You are her daughters if you do what is right and DO NOT GIVE WAY TO FEAR.” NRSV “...do what is good and never let fears alarm you.” These gals are fearless as lions! How? Because they are trusting God most of all, and fear Him more than any mere human. Remember Deborah, and Jael, and Queen Esther, who faced enemies and death without flinching. Fearless.

Peter adds concerning having a gentle quiet spirit, 1Peter 3:5 “For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful. They were submissive to their own husbands...” Then he holds up Sarah as an example, who referred to Abraham as her ‘master’ or ‘lord’. When you look at Genesis 18:12 it’s what John Piper calls “a throw-away line”, yet it shows Sarah’s default way of referring to her husband was as ‘my lord’, showing deference to him (even AFTER the Pharaoh incident).

In Scripture, it’s not external appearance that matters so much – that can be very superficial! – compared to internal character. Jesus emphasized that God sees our inner being, what’s happening in secret. Matthew 6:4b Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”

MARRIAGE IS WORK

In closing, here’s a poem called ‘Marriage!’ by Ruth Harms Calkin. I realize this isn’t everyone’s story - I’m sorry – but in many ways it represents what Peter has in mind when he emphasizes consideration, understanding, treating the other person with respect. Let’s learn and pray for better marriages (and other relationships) as we listen...

MARRIAGE!

It's rough. It's tough. It's work.

Anybody who says it isn't

Has never been married.

Marriage has far bigger problems

Than toothpastes squeezed

From the middle of the tube.

MARRIAGE MEANS…

Grappling, aching, struggling.

It means putting up

With personality weaknesses

Accepting criticism

And giving each other freedom to fail.

It means sharing deep feelings

About fear and rejection.

It means turning self-pity into laughter

And taking a walk to gain control.

MARRIAGE MEANS…

Gentleness and joy

Toughness and fortitude

Fairness and forgiveness

And a walloping amount of sacrifice.

MARRIAGE MEANS…

Learning when to say nothing

When to keep talking

When to push a little

When to back off.

It means acknowledging

"I can't be God to you-

I need Him, too."

MARRIAGE MEANS…

You are the other part of me

I am the other part of you.

We'll work through

With never a thought of walking out.

MARRIAGE MEANS…

Two imperfect mates

Building permanently

Giving totally

In partnership with a Perfect God

MARRIAGE, MY LOVE, MEANS US!

Let’s pray. Lord, we need you SO MUCH in all our relationships. Forgive us for struggling with accepting others’ authority. Forgive us for abusing our own authority when others depend on our care and we fall short or lose our temper or are just plain negligent. Help us submit to You foremost so that we can have a right attitude toward others, recalling Your grace in Jesus, seeking to please You in secret whatever others may think of us or misunderstand us. Keep us hoping in You, that we may share Your love with others, especially those with whom we ought to be closest. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

"Heart Condition: The Secret for Being a Blessing" - April 3, 2022 - 1Pet 3:8-16

TO DWELL WITH SAINTS WE KNOW

We’ve been studying the Apostle Peter’s first letter to the early church, particularly those scattered throughout the region of Asia Minor. We sometimes idealize the early church, imagining them to have been perfectly joined in unity, but there are indications this was not always the case. Apparently believers could disagree on various topics, back then as now. So today’s section in 1Peter 3 begins with an admonition to “live in harmony with one another”.

In Paul’s letter to the Philippians, two women are named who could not get along with each other, Euodia and Syntuche – or, has sometimes been rendered, “Odious” and “Soontouchy”. Obviously they must have had some trouble working together. Then and now, the church is too often described in this little jingle:

“To dwell above with saints we love,

O that will sure be glory...

But to dwell below with saints we know,

Well, that’s another story!”

Another example... Three churches – Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian – worked together to sponsor a community-wide revival. After the revival had concluded, the three pastors were discussing the results with one another. The Methodist minister said, "The revival worked great for us. We gained four families as new members of our congregation." The Baptist preacher said, "It turned out even better for us – we gained six new families for our congregation." The Presbyterian pastor in his turn beamed broadly and reported, "Well, we did even better than that! We got rid of ten of our biggest troublemakers!"

In chapter 3 of 1Peter, the apostle admonishes getting along with each other, fuelled by humility and the desire to be a blessing. Honouring Christ in our hearts helps us not only get along with other church members, but also even with those outside the church who may direct insults toward us.

THE LUBRICATION OF SUBMISSION IN RELATIONSHIPS

Verse 8 packs a lot in, it could be a sermon in itself. 1Peter 3:8 “Finally, all of you, live in harmony with one another; be sympathetic, love as brothers, be compassionate and humble.”

The word “finally” at the beginning does not mean he’s getting to the end of his letter; it means it’s the final part in a series of instructions that began back in 2:13, a series in which “submission” plays a strong role right through to the end of chapter 3. 2:13-17 emphasizes submission to governing authorities. 2:18-25 advises submission of slaves to their masters. 3:1-7 enjoins husbands and wives to get along – wives submitting to their husbands, but similarly husbands being considerate and respectful toward their wives. This last section in the series, 3:8-22, talks about submission in general to other believers, and gentleness and respect toward outsiders who ask us to explain why we have hope in Christ; the closing words of chapter 3 speak of “angels, authorities and power IN SUBMISSION TO Christ.” So the individual verse in this section are part of an overall approach to relationships in various spheres of life grounded in SUBMISSION, humbling ourselves to properly and humbly relate to others, seeking to serve THEIR needs rather than advance our own interests. It’s instruction on how to get along, how to cooperate, to put the other’s needs first.

Peter says, “Finally, ALL OF YOU...” - addressing the whole church, whether slaves or masters, husbands or wives, seniors, singles, everyone. He’s not aiming at anyone in particular, these are admonitions for ALL of us who call ourselves ‘Christian’.

He says, “Live in harmony with one another”; NRSV “Unity of spirit”; literally, “Of the same mind”. Adopt the same outlook. Jesus prayed in John 17 that the church would have unity and be one, even as He and the Father are one. In fact this would constitute an important part of our witness, if we’re united. John 17:23b “May they be BROUGHT TO COMPLETE UNITY to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.” Church squabbles and division hurt our witness to the community.

Peter says next, “Be sympathetic.” The word in Greek is very similar to our English rendering, meaning ‘to feel with’, to suffer or feel pain together. Are our hearts sensitive enough to allow ourselves to be affected or impacted along with them? Or do we shield ourselves, erect boundaries, say inside “that’s their problem, not ours”?

Next Peter says, “Love as brothers” (today we would add “and sisters”). Phil-adelphos (like in Philadelphia). Family members can be pretty strong in standing up for one another. Jesus taught His followers in John 13:35, “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” That’s supposed to be SO BASIC for Christianity; again, our witness to those outside the church is hindered if we’re not practising love to those inside the church fellowship. Paul put it in Romans 12:10, “Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves.” Hear that ‘submission’ element coming through in connection with loving? Honouring the other person above myself, giving them preference. Love does that.

Next Peter says, “Be compassionate and humble.” “Compassionate is literally ‘well-spleened’, NRSV ‘a tender heart’, today we might say if the other person is hurting we’re ‘gutted’ on their account. Are your innards moved, your gut wrenched because of how they’re hurting?

And ‘a humble mind’ (NRSV), ‘lowly spirit’ (Prov 29:23). To the Philippians Paul pointed to the example of Jesus’ self-emptying, coming down from glory, taking the form of a servant, humbling Himself even to death on a cross. (Php 2:6-8) Can we come down off our ‘high horse’ long enough to actually relate to and help out the sufferer? Paul wrote in Romans 12:16, “Live in harmony with one another.Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position.Do not be conceited.” See the importance of humility instead of pride or conceit when it comes to putting love into action.

I’ve titled this particular section ‘The Lubrication of Submission in Relationships’. In our machinery, oil is an important lubricant: if your engine runs out of oil, it will soon come to a screeching halt! (As one of my daughter’s potential boyfriends found out when he drove up from Indiana to Sault Ste Marie in his fancy Lexus sports car.Oops!) This passage on living in harmony with one another reminds me of a Psalm involving oil: Psalms 133:1-2 “How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity! It is like precious oil poured on the head, running down on the beard, running down on Aaron’s beard, down upon the collar of his robes.” Unity is like oil, a lubricant, everything just seems to work better, you mesh and cooperate.

SPEAK AND ACT IN WAYS GOD SUPPORTS

A fair chunk of today’s passage consists of Peter quoting from Psalm 34 in the Septuagint, altering it slightly from second person to third person (‘you’ to ‘he’). Here we find the motivation to speak and act rightly – to live in harmony and love one another, be sympathetic and compassionate. Notice the word “for” at the beginning of verse 10; verses 8 and 9 are empowered by verses 10-12, we love others BECAUSE we’re seeking to please God by doing and speaking what’s right. Here’s Peter’s rough quoting of the Psalm.

1Peter 3:10-12 “FOR, "Whoever would love life and see good days must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from deceitful speech. He must turn from evil and do good; he must seek peace and pursue it. FOR the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil."”

There’s poetic Hebrew parallelism here. We keep our tongue from evil, our lips from deceitful speech – that’s the TALKING part. We turn from evil and do good, we seek peace and pursue it – that’s the ACTING or behaviour part, our DOING. Why? Because – see the second ‘for’ at the start of v12 – ‘FOR the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and His ears are attentive to their prayer’... God is watching, He’s listening, He’s seeking to be supportive to those who are trying to please Him, He’s ready to answer their prayers and grant their requests, in line with His will.

So, if you follow the logic - the ‘fors’ or ‘becauses’ in Peter’s quote of the Psalm - we ‘love our sisters and brothers’ and ‘live in harmony’ with one another, sympathetically, humbly, not because we want to draw attention to ourselves in a ‘look at me / pat me on the back’ kind of way, but because we know the Lord is paying attention and rewards those who do what’s right. Conversely, His face is “against” those who do evil, He opposes them, He’s foiling their plans and preparing judgment for them.

The Psalm Peter’s quoting is telling us to speak and act in ways God supports – Peter extends that to apply to how we get along with our fellow believers. ‘The Lord’s eyes are on the righteous, His ears are attentive to their prayer’ - do we really bear that in mind, moment to moment, that the Lord has us in view and is keenly interested in us?

JI Packer writes in Knowing God... “What matters supremely, therefore, is not, in the last analysis, the fact that I know God, but the larger fact which underlies it—the fact that he knows me. I am graven on the palms of his hands [Isa.49:16]. I am never out of his mind. All my knowledge of him depends on his sustained initiative in knowing me. I know him because he first knew me, and continues to know me. He knows me as a friend, one who loves me; and there is no moment when his eye is off me, or his attention distracted from me, and no moment, therefore, when his care falters. This is momentous knowledge. There is unspeakable comfort—the sort of comfort that energizes, be it said, not enervates—in knowing that God is constantly taking knowledge of me in love and watching over me for my good. There is tremendous relief in knowing that his love to me is utterly realistic, based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery now can disillusion him about me, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself, and quench his determination to bless me.”

The Lord is attentive to you for the purpose of blessing you, supporting you as you speak and do what’s right, what will further His goals.

RIGHT REVERENCE EMPOWERS BLESSING WHEN BLASTED

On either side of this quote from Psalm 34, Peter tackles the problem of how we respond when others mistreat us. How can we turn the situation around, and instead of taking revenge or being hurtful in return, instead respond in a way that blesses the other person?

Verse 9: “Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult, but with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing.” It’s hard not to hit back, isn’t it? It’s almost an automatic reflex to want to defend yourself by reacting in like manner. Retaliation can be unthinking. Friedrich Nietzsche observed, “Revenge is the greatest instinct in the human race.”

What is the “this” Peter says we are called to? To respond with blessing instead of evil or insult. New Living Translation puts it, 1Peter 3:9 NLT “Don't repay evil for evil. Don't retaliate with insults when people insult you. Instead, pay them back with a blessing. THAT is what God has called you to do, and he will grant you his blessing.”

Hm... We are CALLED to pay back evil with a blessing? Do you think Peter was maybe echoing His Master on the subject of retaliation? Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5:38-40 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well.” Easy to say, hard to do! But that’s the path of blessing. That’s just like our Father in heaven; Mt 5:45b “He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” A blessing God, even toward those who don’t deserve it.

Not that outsiders should have any justification for hurting us. Peter notes in v13, “Who is going to harm you if you are eager to do good?” This rhetorically expects the answer “nobody”. But verses 9 and 14 obviously concede and acknowledge that this may sometimes happen. Our best behaviour and good intentions may be misunderstood, misinterpreted, even resented and opposed by those who are in darkness. Verse 14, “But even if you SHOULD suffer for what is right, you are blessed. "Do not fear what they fear; do not be frightened."”

Huh? I’m suffering, getting insulted, having evil done to me, getting beat up for no reason, yet I’m not supposed to retaliate?! That’s hard! But Peter assures us there is blessing in responding with grace not grudge. God is keeping score so we don’t have to. Our job is to bless in return, to show them a better way. God, not other humans, is the One we are to fear and revere.

Peter here is quoting Isaiah 8:12-14a, “Do not call conspiracy everything that these people call conspiracy; do not fear what they fear, and do not dread it. The LORD Almighty is the one you are to regard as holy, he is the one you are to fear, he is the one you are to dread, and he will be a sanctuary...” Isn’t that great? He is our sanctuary, our safe place – He whom we regard as holy, fear, dread, revere, hold in highest regard and absolute awe. Next to Him, compared to His sovereign almighty power, other opponents pale by comparison.

Which leads into this awesome phrase Peter gives us at the beginning of verse 15: “But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord.” NRSV ‘sanctify’, BBE ‘give honour to’, lexicon ‘to make holy, consecrate, sanctify’. We designate and regard Jesus with highest honour as Lord. He is our ultimate point of reference. He will be on the judgment seat, we will render account for our actions to Him (2Cor 5:10).

So, revenge is a powerful instinct, but He helps us respond with blessing instead. We just passed April 1, when April Fool’s practical jokes may have tricked some and even tempted them to take revenge somehow.

Chuck Swindoll relates) Some fellows were stationed in Korea during the Korean War. While there, they rented a home and hired a local boy to cook and clean for them. These troops were a bunch of jokesters, and they soon began to take advantage of the young boy’s naiveté. They’d smear Vaseline on the stove handles so that when he’d turn the stove on in the morning he’d get grease all over his fingers. They’d put little water buckets over the door so that he’d get deluged when he opened the door. They’d even nail his shoes to the floor during the night. Day after endless day, the little fellow took the brunt of their practical jokes without saying anything. No blame, no self-pity, no temper tantrums. Finally, the men felt guilty about what they were doing, so they sat down with the young Korean and said, “Look, we know these pranks aren’t funny anymore, and we’re sorry. We’re never gonna take advantage of you again.”

It seemed too good to be true to the houseboy. “No more sticky on stove?” he asked. “Nope.” “No more water on door?” “No.” “No more nail shoes to floor?” “Nope, never again.” “Okay,” the boy said with a smile, “No more spit in soup.”

THE WITNESS’ REASONING WITH RESPECT SPEAKS VOLUMES

As we interface with others who are not believers, our character and our content are important factors in how we interact so as to make Jesus and the Gospel appealing to them. Peter touches on this as we come to the end of today’s passage. He talked earlier, quoting Psalm 34, about the importance of keeping our tongue from evil, and doing good and seeking peace. In v16 he mentions - 1Pet 3:16 “keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.” Don’t give opponents any reason to accuse us of wrongdoing! Keep your behaviour good, then they won’t have any ammunition. “TURN FROM EVIL and do good” as the Psalmist put it. The apostle Paul in his trial before Governor Felix could attest in Acts 24:16, “So I strive always to keep my conscience clear before God and man.”

What if your conscience isn’t clear? Join the club! Practice 1John 1:9. Confess it, repent of it, turn from it, and renounce it. Don’t be a re-offender. Lean into God, depend on the Holy Spirit to help you resist that temptation the next time, find others to support you and help you be accountable and pray for you. For prevention, take into account Psalm 119:9,11 - “How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your word...I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.”

In v15 Peter enjoins us to give testimony about our faith, then adds, 1Peter 3:15c “But do this with gentleness and respect...” When we witness to others, it can’t be in a conceited or “I’ve got this all figured out” manner. It’s one beggar telling another beggar where to find food. Gentleness, respect. Humbly. Praying for them to have a receptive spirit.

That’s our CHARACTER; there’s also CONTENT to our witness. V15b “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.” Can you share your faith-journey in a few sentences? Nicky Gumbel of the Alpha course sums it up in 3 parts: a bit about your life before you came to know Jesus; how you became aware of your need and received Jesus as your Lord and Saviour; and finally, what difference Jesus has made in your life since you became a Christian.

Another approach in sharing our faith is the “bridge” illustration – guest speaker Henry de Roos actually used this last week as part of his drawings. You can draw this on a serviette at a restaurant. God is on one side of a chasm, and Humankind is on the other side of the chasm, separated by sin from His holiness. We try different ‘ladders’ to bridge the chasm but none will reach across; ladders of accomplishment, works, trying harder, or ladders of pleasure and sin to try and fill that void we feel. All fall short. But Jesus came from heaven and gave Himself to be a bridge which we cross by faith, not works, and come into fellowship with God.

Another more recent way to present our Christian faith to someone uses a tiny app on your phone called “3Circles”. (Here’s a brief video describing how it works.)

The main thing is, by any means that’s most user-friendly for us, to share how we have come to know Jesus as our hope, how He now is Lord in our heart.

HIS COMPASSION MARKS A CHRIST-FOLLOWER

“Sympathize with each other, Peter admonished the early Christians; “Love each other as brothers and sisters. Be tenderhearted, and keep a humble attitude.” (NLT)

In closing, here’s a short story that’s an example of someone witnessing without words by simple caring; yet something in the action pointed the other person in the direction of Jesus. It’s by Olga Wetzel in Eternity magazine (Feb.1977).

The Greyhound Bus slowed – then stopped. It was just a wayside stop with a garage and a small store. A young [Native] stepped aboard and after he had paid his fare he sat down behind me. It was February. We were traveling from Flagstaff, Arizona, to Albuquerque, New Mexico. The night was cold. In the warm bus the tired youth was soon asleep. But after about 20 minutes he got up and walked to the front of the bus to ask if we were near his destination. "We passed there a long time ago," the bus driver snapped. Acknowledging he had known the boy was riding beyond his stop, he ask angrily,"wh didn't you get off?" The quiet passenger's shoulders drooped. He turned and came back to his seat. Barely had he sat down, when he rose again and went to the driver. "Will you stop and let me off?" he asked. "I'll walk back." "No! It's too far and too cold. You'd freeze to death. You'll have to go into Albuquerque and then take a bus back." Disappointment showed in his walk as he came back to his seat. "Were you asleep?" I asked him. "Yes, and my sister was waiting for me there." He dropped into the seat behind me. I was returning to Wisconsin after serving a quarter term as a volunteer teacher in a [Native] mission school. This experience had taught me the hard living conditions of the [Natives] in the area. The small adobe houses with earth floors, the lack of privacy in those little one-or-two-room houses. The role played by teenagers was very hard. There was no room for them at home, yet they were not really ready to go out on their own. All the while we were nearing Albuquerque, a large and strange city. I thought he must be wondering what he would do after he got there. I turned to him and asked, "Are you afraid?" "Yes," he said, in a "hate-to-admit" way. "Stay with me," I said, "and I'll help you get on the right bus back." I talked to the driver: "Will you please check with the return driver, so he need not pay return fare?" "OK," the driver reluctantly agreed. "Everything will be all right," I told the boy. "You need not worry about anything." His eyes said, "Thank you!" We rode on for possibly ten more minutes. Then a hand tapped my shoulder. I turned to see my young friend leaning toward me. In a reverent voice he asked: "Are you a Christian?"

Let’s pray. Lord, we praise You that Your eyes are on Your people and Your ears are attentive to our prayer. Thank You that our insults and scoffing to Jesus on the cross were not answered with wrath but mercy, that You cause Your sun to shine on the evil and the good alike. God, grant us attentive eyes to the needs of those around us. Soften our hearts so they are sympathetic and tender toward our brothers and sisters in Christ. Grant us mutual understanding so we can live in harmony together, and so be a better witness to the world of Your Son. And help us always be ready to give the reason for the hope we have in Christ! In His precious Name we pray, Amen.

“The Great Swap - and Reversal” (1Pet 3:17-22) - Palm/Passion Sunday April 10, 2022

LIFE IS TOUGH...BUT FOR THE RIGHT REASON?

It was one of those times when you thought things couldn’t get any worse – and then it did. Have you been there?

I was just in the process of making myself a hot chocolate with some skim milk powder. I was taking the round plastic Tupperware container of skim milk powder back to the cupboard when the phone rang. Just then the lid, by which I was holding the container, decided to unsnap from the bottom, which dropped to the floor and spilled out milk powder. I could see from the phone number it was an important call, the Fire & Safety inspection company from the church returning a message I left. As I answered the call on my cell phone, our nearly-blind-and-deaf 14 year old dog decided to get off her pillow in the next room and come over to start licking up the milk powder before I could sweep it up. So I scooped her up in my free hand and walked back to the pillow to attach her to her lead, but how to do it? Cell phone in one hand, dog in the other, and no third hand to fasten the lead. I had to beg the caller’s indulgence while I put the phone aside and fiddled with the lead.

Trivial example, I know. Non life-threatening. I was even able to salvage most of the milk powder! But it’s an example of those vexing times when things aren’t going right to start with, then something else comes along and piles on top. It seems overwhelming.

We live in a fallen world, far from Eden or Paradise, where suffering seems to be part and parcel of our existence. Peter says in v17, 1Peter 3:17 “It is better, if it is God’s will, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil.”

It is bad enough to suffer when you’ve done something wrong, or deliberately set out to make life difficult for others. But what about suffering for doing good? How is that fair? Life can seem so twisted and unjust at times.

Examples abound from the global to the local level. The war in Ukraine drags on, including war crimes against civilians that become apparent as the invaders shift their forces from one area to another. A pastor in Eastern Ontario I know posted a photo of the President of an evangelical seminary in Bucha that was executed. That kind of person is no military threat!

Closer to home, an older couple in Brussels is found shot to death by the man’s own grandson. Unthinkable. And then there is premature death brought on by sudden illness, as in the tragic loss endured by Sandy Garnet’s family. Such things leave us in shock, asking ‘Why?’ Trying to make sense of it. How can there be meaning in existence when such bad things happen?

Christianity is a realistic religion, in that the doctrine of the Fall takes seriously the warpedness of our human immorality. Temptation can be enticing in the short term, but its long term effects can be devastating. Romans 6:23a “For the wages of sin is death...” And at some point, sin had a hold of all of us. Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God...” We know we’re far off the mark in terms of the ideal God planned and created.

But it’s not that Peter’s readers were wrestling so much with the effects of sin that were the result of wrong choices. Their problem was, they were being persecuted for their faith. Christendom had not arisen; it was not ‘the norm’ to go to church on Sunday, or to follow this strange practice called The Lord’s Supper that seemed to outsiders to have parallels to cannibalism. These early Christ-followers were doing their best to live good lives amongst their pagan neighbours, lives that rang with honesty and kindness and gentleness and patience. Yet they were being ridiculed and slammed for their virtuous living. How could the world be going so wrong and yet God be sovereign?

Peter seeks to reassure them that Christ is in fact on the throne, and there is meaning to their misery, their suffering for doing good. To do that, He points back to the events of the first Easter, and even further back to a time when God miraculously delivered a few souls from global judgment.

PURPOSE IN THE PASSION OF CHRIST

It really COULD be God’s will, Peter says, to suffer for doing good. What’s the prime example of that? What was the morally worst event ever to happen in the history of humankind? Not war crimes such as at Bucha or Maripol. Not the genocide of Hitler or gulags of Stalin. No, the worst crime of all time was the crucifixion of the perfectly innocent God-man, Jesus, the unique Son of God, through whom the world was made – yet the world rejected its Maker and strung Him up to die on a rough wooden cross at Golgotha. “Save yourself!” they jeered. “Come down now from the cross, and we’ll believe then you’re the Messiah!” Not knowing that if He saved Himself, that would undo the exact thing He had come for.

The first part of v18 is chock-full, rich in theological meaning. 1Peter 3:18a “For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.” No other event in history compares with the dastardliness, the sheer evil of the crucifixion of Jesus the Saviour, the miracle-working Son of Man. Yet in this prime example of suffering for doing good, God was working a supreme purpose: the salvation of those who would believe.

“Christ died FOR sins” – not His, but your sins and mine. Hebrews 4:15 says He “has been tempted in every way, just as we are – yet was without sin.” Why then was He suffering there on the cross? Romans 3:25a “God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.” Our sins demanded a payment, which Jesus stepped up and provided in our place. Christ died for sins “once for all” - in contrast to the daily, weekly, monthly, annual sacrifices offered over and over again at the Temple. Jesus fulfilled the law, He put a stop to the need for sacrifice by His perfect offering.

He died ‘the righteous for the unrighteous’ - He the righteous and blameless One took the place of us unrighteous sinners, He became our substitute. Yes He’s our moral example, but much more than just an example: He materially and willingly did the thing only He could do, that we needed. No other human that ever lived was qualified. Romans 3:12 “All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.”

And it was all for this purpose, Peter says: “to bring you to God.” The word “to” indicates purpose, what this most-evil-deed-of-all-time was FOR. Jesus suffered on Good Friday so our sin problem could be solved, so the gap between us sinners and a holy infinite totally righteous Creator could be bridged, that we might enter God’s very presence when we’ve received Christ’s forgiveness.

Evil is absurd. There’s no making-sense of it. There is no rational justification for the atrocities we read about in the daily headlines. Yes we sort of see the motive behind it, but it’s despicable. Evil has a perverseness to it, an ‘ought-not-to-be-that-way’. Yet as we stand agog at the blatant evil others do, we are at the same time confronted by our own moral failures, our own lapses of judgment, the times we’ve broken the Ten Commandments ourselves. The Russian dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn observed, “The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either — but right through every human heart.”

We can’t make sense of it now. But we DO see that God used the most evil event of all time - our outright blatant miscarriage of justice, our joke-of-a-trial murder of His Son – God used that most perverse event of all time to bring about a stunning purpose: the reconciliation of wayward humankind to Himself. “To bring YOU” (Peter says) “to God.”

WHO’S IN THE ARK? SAVED FROM THE FLOOD OF DISOBEDIENCE

Next Peter reaches WAY back in ancient history to about the most evil example of behaviour he can think of: the story of the world at the time of the flood and Noah’s ark. Evil was so bad that God was pained severely, and felt the best option was to start over. There seems to have been particularly evil influence from overlap between the spirit and physical worlds. Genesis 6:4-6 “The Nephilim were on the earth in those days— and also afterward— when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown. The LORD saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time. The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain.”

And so came the flood over the known world at that time.

The general state of wickedness at this epoch seems to have been so bad that it warranted wiping out all humanity -- any who didn't turn to God in repentance and heed Noah’s summons to enter the Ark. However a special case is the so-called "sons of God" or probably fallen angels interacting with women to produce a unique race called The Nephilim, and this was so perverse that we understand from Peter and other books such as Jude that these fallen angels were sentenced by God to be bound in the abyss until the time of final judgment. The ultimate victory of Jesus is hinted at in that the text says after he was crucified, he went and preached in the spirit to these beings that were bound in prison, announcing His victory over sin and death.

The flood then with its waters of judgment becomes a symbol of our human judgment, the punishment due to our sin, a judgment from which we are saved through Christ's death as the Ark floated Noah and his family safely above the waters of judgment and doom.

Now, it's not a perfect parallel to water baptism because the waters in baptism signify cleansing, whereas in the time of Noah the water signified judgment and death! However the point is that we are being baptized or immersed or ‘sunk’ into Jesus Christ through the act of baptism, identifying with Him in His dying and rising. We are declaring our allegiance to him; Peter calls it in 3:21 “the pledge of a good conscience toward God.” The word means literally a pledge or a commitment or an agreement as one might make in a solemn contract so it is a response of our soul to God. We are saying, "Yes, Lord, I am yours."

BAPTISM’S SAVING SIGNIFICANCE

We rejoice today that we have a couple of candidates who are declaring their faith in Jesus through the ordinance of baptism. You see in Peter's letter that it is not the element of water itself that is effective (as if it were a magic potion) but we see the power of baptism originating with Christ: as Peter puts it, 3:21b “It [baptism] saves you BY the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” The power is not in the water, the power is in the event that happened 2000 years ago when Jesus rose from the dead and Jesus carries this power with him today to renew our lives.

This power is reflected in verse 22 where it says, 3:22 “[Jesus] “has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand— with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him.”

Jesus Christ is at the right hand of God in the ‘control room’, the position of power so whatever is happening in the world – even if something seems to be going awry – we still understand that Jesus is ultimately in control and we can trust him to work things out, to redeem our mistakes when we repent, to work His sovereign plans despite human rebellion.

You see from this passage also that baptism has SIGNIFICANCE, it’s a pointer, a sign – a promise or pledge that we are committing ourselves to live for Christ from here on. The event of baptism is a an outward sign to other people of this inward faith or trust we have, and we declare to them that this is our line in the sand: from now on we're not going back into the old ways, the old self, the old sins – but instead by the power of Christ we are moving forward into newness of life and a fresh start. We become plugged into His Lordship.

In closing, these words that Philip Henry, father of Matthew Henry, wrote for his children became their baptismal statement:

“I take God to be my chief end and highest good.

I take God the Son to be my prince and Saviour.

I take God the Holy Spirit to be my sanctifier, teacher, guide, and comforter.

I take the Word of God to be my rule in all my actions

and the people of God to be my people under all conditions.

I do hereby dedicate and devote to the Lord all that I am,

all that I have, and all I can do.

And this I do deliberately, freely, and forever.”

Can we make those words ours today as we witness individuals making the pledge of a good conscience toward God? Do we take Him to be our Prince, our Saviour, our sanctifier? Let’s pray.

Lord Jesus, thank You for dying for our sins, once for all, that we the unrighteous might attain Your righteousness in God’s eyes. Oh what a wonder that You have managed to bring us to God! Let us never take that for granted, or forget the price You paid. Embolden us Lord to suffer for doing good; and in that suffering to know we are identifying with You who suffered so much on our behalf. You are in control. We wait with expectation to see Your coming to rule among us. In Christ’s name, Amen.

"A Stitch in Time" - Funeral of Sandy Garnet - April 11, 2022 - Mark 2:18-22

(Eccles.3:1-11; John 10:14-18,27-29)

I had most cause for contact with Sandy in connection with mending we needed done. Her talent as a sewer brought us to her doorstep more than once with items that needed patching, or a new zipper put in, or other miscellaneous repairs.

When I was preparing for this message, I looked up the word ‘sew’ in a Bible search, and it came back with two passages: Ecclesiastes 3 and Mark 2. Did you realize our Lord Jesus even touched on the topic of sewing? Not ‘sower and the seed’ sowing, but needle-and-thread sewing? At first you might not think it’s a passage for a funeral, but as we meditate on it, three things emerge that are relevant.

First, we’re in a time of tearing, it feels like Sandy has been suddenly torn away from us. Jesus said in Mk 2:21, “No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the new piece will pull away from the old, making the tear worse.”

Sandy’s death has happened all too suddenly. That afternoon she was feeling great. Brian headed off to work a couple of blocks away, only to be called back within about an hour by a message saying EMS was headed to his house. He hustled home and Sandy was still communicating at that point, but by the time the ambulance got there she couldn’t speak. A brain aneurysm happens so suddenly. We feel the pain and shock of her having been taken quickly.

The new piece has pulled away from the old. As Christians we understand Sandy has left the ‘old garment’ or ‘tent’ of her temporal physical body behind. The Easter appearances of Jesus demonstrated He was raised with a new, glorious, spiritual body. With Paul we believe in 1Corinthians 15(42bff), “The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body.” The new is different from the ‘old garment’.

Second, there is a newness that has energy and power. Jesus goes on in Mark 2 to change the metaphor: “And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, he pours new wine into new wineskins.” Jesus was introducing Good News, the Kingdom of God was coming into being in His presence, miracles of healing and deliverance were happening, those who trusted in Him were being forgiven and stepping into eternal life. At Pentecost the Holy Spirit would be introduced, indwelling believers. Sandy had loved the Lord a long time, and savoured His companionship – that was the start of this ‘new birth’. At death we understand she has fallen asleep in the Lord and will be with Him forever. It’s a new phase of spiritual life that cannot be contained within these mortal bodies subject to physical breakdown and wearing-out.

But, third, the principal point Jesus is emphasizing in this passage is that being with the bridegroom is cause for celebration! Note the context – some joy-suckers and critics had come and pointed out that John’s followers and the Pharisees were fasting, so why weren’t Jesus’ disciples fasting? In response Jesus asks, Mk 2:19 - “How can the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? They cannot, so long as they have him with them.” In other words, where the bridegroom is, there is celebration, it’s justification for a party!

We do mourn Sandy’s death today, as she’s been torn away from us, it seems far too early. But faith understands that being with Jesus is better by far, compared to even our most delightful earthly experience. The Apostle Paul explained to the church at Philippi he was fairly certain he would be freed from his captivity to minister among them again, even though if he were killed for his faith in Christ, that would be better by far: Philippians 1:21, 23 “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain...I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far...” Where the bridgroom is, there is no reason to mourn and be fasting; instead, there is celebration! Sandy is getting a taste of that ahead of the rest of us. I think she will love celebrating; she loved music.

We have the promise of Jesus our Good Shepherd from John 10:27f, “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand.”

Our Ecclesiastes reading also mentions sewing. “There is a time to mourn and a time to dance...a time to tear and a time to sew [mend]...” As someone who sewed, Sandy was expert in fastening things together. Sewing matches up two pieces of material. It seems to me Sandy was a ‘connector’ in terms of human relationships: she got to know and serve lots of people, between her sewing and her business enterprises. Made In Huron is itself a sort of co-operative project, involving many people. Sandy was caring and compassionate, she loved to serve and help others, people felt they could share confidences with her, she was a ‘safe’ person they could trust. She put into practice her Lord’s command to “love your neighbour as yourself”, she connected.

Jesus is a sewer or connector of sorts too. He died to bring us to God, to bring us together. God ‘has set eternity in the hearts of men’ said Ecclesiastes (3:11), yet it was Jesus whose death on the cross made it possible for sinners to be reconciled to a Holy God. He ‘patched up’ our relationship with His Heavenly Father, when we repent and trust in what He’s done for us. In that ‘Good Shepherd’ passage, He said, John 10:16 “I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen.I must bring them also.They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd.” He has brought together Jews and Gentiles, reconciled races, sewn us together despite different racial backgrounds. Through faith in Him we become brothers and sisters in Christ, whatever our roots. The Master Sewer mends our deepest rips and tears. We can entrust our deceased loved ones into His care.

As St Paul wrote, "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him" (1Corinthians 2:9) —Thanks be to God!

“Called to Follow our Suffering Healer” - 1Pet 2:15-25 Good Friday April 15, 2022

LIKE SHEEP WE HAVE GONE ASTRAY

[INTRO MINI-MOVIE: “He was Crucified” [Beamer Films])

“He was crucified – that we might be justified; He was punished – that we might be pardoned.” I thought that clip made the connection well between what Jesus was doing on Good Friday and the effect intended for us here today. He was taking our place there, as our effective substitute; and He was setting a pattern for us to follow, as our Lordship-worthy example.

Today we step back a bit in Peter’s first letter to a passage that ties in very well with Good Friday. Peter seems to be riffing off one of the most Messianic passages in the Old Testament, Isaiah 53, either outright quoting it or alluding strongly to it.

Start, for instance, with our basic human problem: sin. Had all humans been living sinless lives, what Jesus endured on the cross and died there to do would not have been necessary. But, in case you haven’t noticed lately, the world’s in a mess. And WE are in a mess. You just have to interact with other people and sooner or later you’ll realize you’re not perfect; others may even hint at that!

In Isaiah’s words: Isaiah 53:6 “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” Here’s the transfer of guilt, why Jesus the Sinless One was suffering: it’s OUR iniquity for which He’s being punished. Now look at 1Peter 2:25 - “For you were like sheep going astray, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.”

We do have sheep at our place - Calico sheep, a ram and a ewe and a little lamb. I guess that makes me a ‘shepherd’ of sorts. However it’s not generally the sheep I have a problem with so much as our 3 Nubian goats. There’s a mother-daughter combination, and where the mother goat ‘Rose’ goes, there the daughter ‘Summer’ follows. So when I let them out to the paddock each morning, or bring them in at night, there’s a checklist I have to go through. Am I standing between the door and the opposite wall? If not, Rose the mother will turn and instead of going outside, head for the metal garbage cans where the feed bags are stored. At night, I have to ask myself, is the gate closed to the horse’s stall? Otherwise when Rose comes in, instead of going into the sheep-and-goat pen, she heads into the horse’s stall, stands up on her hind feet, and sticks her head in the bin where the horse’s feed awaits her. And, as I said, where the mother goes, the daughter follows – and then you have several animals running around where they’re not supposed to be, and general commotion, bins being knocked over – you get the picture!

Isaiah and Peter are saying we’re just like that nosy inquisitive goat: Is there something tasty over there? What might be under that lid? We care more to feed our appetite than to obey the Master Shepherd’s wishes.

OUR SINLESS SUFFERING SUBSTITUTE

That day at Golgotha, Jesus was accomplishing what no other person in the history of humanity could ever have done. He was taking the place of sinners, accepting the load of their iniquity, because only He was sinless. Peter quotes Isaiah 53:9 in 1Peter 2:22 - “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.” Three times the governor Pilate acknowledged he found no fault in Jesus: “"What is truth?" Pilate asked. With this he went out again to the Jews and said, "I find no basis for a charge against him.”...“Once more Pilate came out and said to the Jews, "Look, I am bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no basis for a charge against him."” ... “As soon as the chief priests and their officials saw him, they shouted, "Crucify! Crucify!" But Pilate answered, "You take him and crucify him. As for me, I find no basis for a charge against him."”

So, why did an innocent man end up crucified? Because their shouts prevailed. Consider their motives. The chief priests and other leaders of the Jews were jealous of Jesus’ popularity, the crowds that followed Him everywhere. Pilate was selfishly concerned with saving his own hide, when the crowds started saying he was no friend of Caesar if he let Jesus off. The trial was a sham, a kangaroo court, a gross miscarriage of justice just to get rid of this irritating religious radical from the backwaters of Galilee.

Are we really all that different? Do we get jealous of others’ popularity, when they get a ton of ‘likes’ for a post? When they get promoted and we get passed over? Do we become concerned for our own welfare when others make accusations or we are misunderstood and maligned, others seeing just a part of the picture?

Peter points to Jesus as our sinless suffering substitute. V21 “To this you were called, because Christ suffered FOR YOU...” And v24 “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.” This echoes Isaiah 53:12, “For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.” Jesus places Himself under the load of sin you can no longer manage to carry, it’s crushing, you’d have not the least glimmer of hope on the day of judgment. He takes it to the cross and deals with it there, so you instead can receive the gift of righteousness, God’s ‘all-clear’.

Nobody else in history could have done that, because we all have our own sin-streak, apart from Jesus. His redemption became effective as our sinless suffering substitute.

William McComb wrote: “Chief of sinners though I be, / Jesus shed His blood for me; / Died that I might live on high, / Lives that I may never die.”

OUR EXAMPLE ENTRUSTING HIMSELF TO THE JUDGE

You may recall Peter is writing about the time of Nero, when Christians were being persecuted on account of this new oddball religion, and their allegiance to this Nazarene they hailed as “Lord” in shocking contrast to Caesar. So part of Peter’s purpose in writing is to encourage them in their time of suffering. So he emphasizes not just Jesus’ EFFICACIOUSNESS as their unique substitute, but also His being an EXAMPLE for them to follow, He’s leading the way, showing or demonstrating how to deal with hardship as a pattern they can imitate.

Let’s look at v21 more completely. “To this you were called” – to what? Peek back at v20, enduring when suffering for doing good. They are called to endure, Peter says, V21b “because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.” The word ‘example’ is taken from that of a ‘writing-copy’, like a set of alphabet letters at the top of a page which a child beginning to print would copy line by line, repeating over and over, until they’ve learned how to print their letters.

Jesus’ self-giving at the cross has its EFFECT: His blood washes away our sins, His Spirit comes into our lives when we trust Him and gives us power to live for Him. Jesus’ teaching gives us INSTRUCTION in how to live day-to-day. Gandhi was a revolutionary in helping bring India to independence from Great Britain, but Gandhi’s nonviolent protests were not grounded in any Hindu teaching, but instead in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount! Jesus instructs us very practically.

But Jesus doesn’t just have effect in His death, and give us instruction in His teaching – He Himself WALKS THE WALK, He is our example, demonstrating for us the attitude and actions that ought to characterize a Christian’s life. Words aren’t cheap for Jesus, He practices what He preaches, He lives it out, so we can be His followers / apprentices. After washing His disciples’ feet Jesus said, John 13:15 - “I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.” And Paul could urge the church at Corinth, 1 Corinthians 11:1 “Follow my example, as I follow the EXAMPLE of Christ.”

Emmy Werner, a University of California psychologist, says: "Like most things, parents teach persistence by example...One day, for example, Sam's father told him to stick with his math problem until he found the solution. As Sam worked, he could hear his father fiddling with an antique radio he was restoring. He had been at it for a week, taking the radio apart, assembling it, taking it apart again. Sam learned from that lesson – and he stuck with his math problem and other challenges he faced right on into adulthood." Likewise we learn to endure when suffering hardship from Jesus’ example.

OUR HARD-WON FREEDOM TO SERVE GOD AND COMMEND CHRIST IN PUBLIC

Jesus’ death on the cross is not just some random fluke event a couple of thousand years ago that has nothing to do with us today. We’ve seen how He’s the unique sinless Saviour we need to effectually deal with our iniquity so we can be forgiven and be counted worthy to inherit eternal life. We’ve seen how He is our Example, faithfully putting into practice what He taught. But what about when the rubber meets the road? Will we actually be found to be imitators of Christ when the hard knocks start coming?

The deadline for this year’s income tax is approaching. Maybe you’ve already been to see your accountant or finished the annual reckoning with your tax prep software for the year. Great! But were you tempted to not report any of that income the government didn’t already know about? Are you exaggerating your expense claims, erring on the side of having to pay less tax? Are you claiming deductions that really shouldn’t apply to you when you read the fine print? It can be tricky!

Earlier in this passage, Peter emphasizes the importance of submitting to the authorities over us. 1Peter 2:13f “Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake to every authority instituted among men: whether to the king, as the supreme authority, or to governors, who are sent by him to punish those who do wrong and to commend those who do right.”

This closely parallels the Apostle Paul’s guidance in Romans 13:5ff - “Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their full time to governing. Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor.” In a way this echoes Jesus’ view, as in Mark 12:17 - "Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s."

Some might protest that because Jesus is ultimately Lord, we don’t have to cooperate with governing authorities, which tend to be corrupt and infected by people who like bribes and kickbacks and, in a democracy, craft policy with an eye to what will appeal to their supporters so they get re-elected. But the apostles are very clear that we are to submit “for the Lord’s sake” to human authorities, ‘for conscience’ sake’ as well as because we might get punished for breaking the law.

How can this be? Aren’t we FREE in Christ? Doesn’t His Kingdom trump all others, aren’t we supposed to obey God rather than men? (cf Acts 5:29)

Not so fast. The Bible teaches we are to obey governing authorities unless they require us to do something contrary to God’s teaching. In fact, we are to do such a good job of supporting the government that it catches the notice of those around us and commends Christ, by our honourable behaviour. 1Peter 2:15-17 “For it is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men. Live as free men, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God. Show proper respect to everyone: Love the brotherhood of believers, fear God, honor the king.”

What’s Peter saying? “Live as free [people]”, yes, but free to DO GOOD, not using your so-called ‘freedom’ as an excuse to carry out evil or selfish plans. Respect and honour are HUGE when out in the general public. In the church, the circle of believers who consider themselves sisters and brothers in Christ, Agape-love ought to predominate. God demonstrates His own love for us at the cross of Jesus (Romans 5:8) - which empowers us in turn to prove our love for other Christians. In a few minutes when we hold the bread and cup in our hand, let’s reflect on it and examine ourselves not only in terms of our personal relationship toward God, but as a sort of check on how much we actually care and have invested ourselves, spent ourselves in loving ways toward others in our church fellowship. Are we ‘pouring out’ our lives as He poured His out for us?

DID HE DIE FOR YOU?

Clarence Macartney tells the story of Steinberg and a gypsy girl. Struck with her beauty, Steinberg took her to his studio and frequently had her sit for him. At that time he was working on his masterpiece ‘Christ on the Cross.’ The girl used to watch him work on this painting. One day she said to him, ‘He must have been a very wicked man to be nailed to a cross like that.’ ‘No,’ said the painter. ‘On the contrary, he was a very good man. The best man that ever lived. He died for others.’ The little girl looked up at him and asked, ‘Did He die for you?’ Steinberg was not a Christian, but the gypsy girl’s question touched his heart and awakened his conscience, and he became a believer in Him whose dying passion he had so well portrayed.

Years afterward a young Count chanced to go into the gallery at Dresden where Steinberg’s painting of ‘Christ on the Cross’ was on exhibition. The painting spoke so powerfully to him that it changed the whole tenor of his life. He was Count Nikolaus von Zinzendorf, founder of the Moravian Brethren.

We are preparing now to move into our Good Friday communion. As we gather at the table, can we bring what back there then, forward to here today? Does it resonate deep in your soul that He died for you? Does that make any difference in how you live out in public? By ‘doing good’, Peter says, we want to ‘silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.’ Are we known in the community for ‘doing good’, or sticking to our own little holy huddle? Can your conscience bear witness that you have not ‘use[d] your freedom as a cover-up for evil’ in your business dealings? Your social media interactions? What you’ve spent your time watching for entertainment?

If you have anything to confess, don’t be bashful about bringing it before the Lord – you won’t be telling Him anything He doesn’t already know, after all! Allow the EFFICACIOUSNESS of Jesus’ sacrifice to wash you clean. He took the burden of our sins on Himself so that we might DIE to sins and live for RIGHTEOUSNESS. By His wounds YOU have been healed, had your spiritual sickness, your straying-like-sheep waywardness cured.

As we prepare for communion, here’s a short video that takes us back to the events of Good Friday... (“Crucified” by Floodgate Productions)

“What’s Easter Mean?” - 1Peter 3:21-4:11 - Easter Sunday, Apr.17/22

DON’T GET THE WRONG IDEA

What’s Easter mean? Or to put it more Biblically, what’s the resurrection of Jesus mean? Without Easter, without the resurrection, we would have the wrong view about Jesus.

Without the resurrection, it would be just another sad story about the tragedy of human corruption. The power of evil empire. The little guy gets run over by the corporate steamroller. Rustic popular prophet from the backwoods of Galilee sets out to challenge the twisted religious system managed by the elite in Jerusalem who have capitalized on religion itself to line their pockets in collusion with their powerful Roman overlords, but the rustic prophet proves ultimately to be no match for the plots and machinations of the dominant corporate elite. It’s yet one more pathetic uprising that glimmers hope briefly for the oppressed but is crushed by the iron glove of the political wizards and Big Money. An unknown rebel gathers a massive grassroots following and tries to ‘stick it to the man’ but finally loses in the showdown and his movement fizzles, followers dejectedly scurrying back to Galilee with their tails between their legs. Scoreboard: The System - 1, the little guy - zero.

But wait! That’s not how it turned out. Without the resurrection, we would never have heard about Easter. We would certainly not be here today. To tell the story of Jesus without the resurrection would be to convey totally the wrong idea. In this particular game, God’s grace won big-time!

Harvey Penick is one fellow who had the wrong idea for a brief time, but to his surprise found out differently soon after. Harvey Penick was a golf pro whose biggest success came late in his career. He is best known for his 'Little Red Books' on golf. In reality, Penick never wrote with the intention of making money. In the 1920s, Penick purchased a red spiral notebook in which he recorded his observations on golf. He kept this notebook for decades. In 1991 he showed his notebook to a writer and asked if he thought it was worth publishing. The writer/agent told Harvey he thought it could be published and agreed to help him find a publisher.

A short time later the man sent Harvey a letter telling him that Simon and Schuster had agreed to publish it with an advance of $90,000. The next time these two met, Harvey was troubled. He told the agent that with all his medical bills there was no way he could advance the publishing house that much money. His agent had to explain to Harvey that it was HE who would be receiving the $90,000! The book was titled "Harvey Penick's Little Red Book," and it sold more than one million copies.

Harvey had the wrong idea, he was troubled to think he’d have to fork out thousands of dollars to get his notes published. But in fact it was the other way around! God’s grace is like that. Without Easter, without the cross and resurrection, it would all depend on us, and we’d never make it to heaven by our works. But the resurrection is God’s stamp of approval on Jesus’ offering Himself as a sinless sacrificial substitute for us, meaning we can be forgiven, we can gain eternal life simply by putting our trust in Him as our Saviour. That is grace. That is gift. That has a lot to do with what Easter is about. So the resurrection helps us steer clear of getting the wrong idea about Easter.

What’s Easter mean? Here are 5 things Easter means, that the Apostle Peter helps unpack for us as we continue on in His first letter to the church...

1) JESUS IS EXALTED AND EMPOWERED

Wasn’t it great to witness a couple of baptisms last Sunday? We pick up Peter’s letter where he’s explaining the motor behind the saving power associated with baptism – it’s nothing special about the water itself, but the Sovereign Lord Jesus in whom the person being baptized pledges their trust. 1Peter 3:21f “...Baptism...saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand— with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him.” It’s the resurrection of Jesus – what we’re celebrating on Easter Sunday – it’s the resurrection that saves us, not our good works. Easter means Jesus has risen from the dead, and ascended to God’s right hand, and is in the position of power in the central control room of the universe. Angels, principalities, and powers have to submit to Him, have to be subject to His control.

The author of Hebrews comments, Heb 8:1 & 9:24 “We do have such a high priest, who sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven...For Christ did not enter a man-made sanctuary that was only a copy of the true one; he entered heaven itself, now to appear for us in God’s presence.” The Sanhedrin and King Herod and Roman governor may have succeeded in eliminating Jesus’ earthly body from Palestine, but He arose a glorious spiritual body that confirmed His resurrection for forty days amongst His closest followers then ascended to be with our Heavenly Father. And what’s He doing there? Watching Netflix and sipping sodas? Did you catch that last bit? “Now to appear FOR US in God’s presence.” His ministering ‘for us’ didn’t end at the cross; He intercedes ‘for us’ at the Father’s side. Romans 8:34 “Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died— more than that, who was raised to life— is at the right hand of God AND IS ALSO INTERCEDING FOR US.” How cool is that?!

So, What’s Easter mean? Easter means Jesus is Exalted and Empowered.

2) Jesus is our Accountability

The last half of April is here so Canadians are busy getting our receipts and T-slips from last year to the accountant, for CRA’s ‘day of reckoning’ approacheth. But there is another accounting we must one day give, one for which no receipts will be accepted, and Jesus is involved in that: He is now our Accountability. 1Peter 4:5 “But they will have to give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.” We understand part of God’s very being, the Trinity or three-in-one, became incarnate and walked among us, getting tired and hungry just like us, experiencing all our normal human temptations and emotions, but remained perfect and sinless, and so became qualified to be our judge. Jesus said about this, “And he has given him authority to judge because he is the Son of Man.”

But Easter reveals that, after the most painful of executions humans have ever devised, that body could not be found in the tomb after the third day! Resurrection is God’s miracle indicating Jesus is the One to whom we must one day give account, He will judge the living and the dead. Paul wrote in Romans 14:12, “So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God.” And in 2Corinthians 5:10, “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.”

Are you ready to stand before Jesus’ judgment seat? CRA is one level of accountability, but how will you fare under God’s scrutiny? Are you fudging any entries in your moral life? Is your conscience clean? Have you applied the cleansing blood from the cross?

For those who are in Christ, judgment is not something to fear but to anticipate. Peter wrote, 1Pet 1:13 “Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed.” Hope in His grace, ‘to be given you’. Jesus is our Accountability.

3) JESUS GIVES OUR LIFE PURPOSE BEYOND OUR OWN SKIN

What’s Easter mean? It’s about Jesus being exalted, empowered, and our accountability. Easter is also about three things Jesus GIVES us: He gives us purpose, direction, and strength.

Christ gives us a reason for being here larger than ourselves, He gives us PURPOSE for our life beyond our own skin. Note the last part of verse 11. 1Peter 4:11b “ anyone serves, he should do it with the strength God provides, SO THAT in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory and the power for ever and ever. Amen.” The ‘so that’ here indicates purpose, as in, “WHY does God provide strength? For the purpose of God being praised through Jesus in all things.” And Peter even adds a little tag-line doxology for emphasis: glory and power are due to Almighty God for ever and ever.

Our lives are not supposed to be about just how wonderful we are ourselves. Our lives are not about showing off on social media what an exciting vacation we just had, or our shiny new acquisition, or even how delicious the burger is we’re currently devouring. Our purpose in life is far bigger than that! Far more than harvesting the ‘likes’ of our contacts. God has designed us as His creatures to be most fulfilled when we are bringing glory to our Creator and Redeemer, when we’re building His Kingdom, using the gifts He’s given us in a way that captures others’ attention and points to His goodness and excellence.

Last Sunday Scottie Scheffler won the 86^th Masters Golf Tournament. But Scheffler has a bigger purpose than just to win golf tournaments and make a name for himself. Golf.com reports his answer when asked about his work-life balance: “It all goes back to my faith...The reason why I play golf is that I’m trying to glorify God and all that he’s done in my life. So for me, my identity isn’t a golf score. Like Meredith told me this morning, if you win this golf tournament today, if you lose this golf tournament by 10 shots, if you never win another golf tournament again she goes, I’m still going to love you, you’re still going to be the same person.”

Did you catch Scheffler’s sense of purpose? Jesus has given him a purpose that’s larger than just his own skin! “The reason why I play golf is that I’m trying to glorify God and all that he’s done in my life.”

Christ explained to His disciples in John 15:8, “This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.” By bearing fruit we prove we are followers of Jesus, and our Father receives glory, we’re shining a spotlight on Him, making Him look good. It’s not about drawing attention to ourself, but to Him.

John wrote in Revelation 1:5f, “To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood, and HAS MADE US TO BE a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father— to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen.” Our response to Easter’s freeing us from our sins is consciousness of being a royal priesthood serving God. Jesus gives our life a larger purpose beyond ourselves.

4) JESUS GIVES US DIRECTION AND OUTLOOK SUPERIOR TO BASE HUMAN PASSIONS

We humans are created, sensate, earthy beings, mind and body, with all the impulses and urges and hungers and needs that go with being walking talking material organisms. We have drives that are rooted both in our inner body chemistry (hormones) and factors catching our interest from outside (smell, sight, taste). In an affluent society like ours, it’s easy to be persuaded to spend our discretionary money and energy seeking out the next thrill, the next gourmet meal, the next sensation that will maximally reward our nervous system with pleasure. But God has designed us for a higher plane of life than an earthworm or amoeba.

Peter is very up-front about what it’s like to live in secular culture. When your view of eternity is obscured, it’s easy to just live life looking forward to the next ‘high’, to getting ‘wasted’ on the weekend as a means of coping with the monotony of your day job. 1Peter 4:3f “For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do— living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry.They think it strange that you do not plunge with them into the same flood of dissipation, and they heap abuse on you.”

“What’s wrong with you? We’re all going down to the bar, why don’t you come along? Think you’re too good for us?” Or: “Have you tried this? My friend gave me some and it was something else. Come on, you’ll like it. Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone. Everybody’s doing it.”

Yes, it’s a choice, and it can be difficult, like you’re fighting to swim upstream against the prevailing culture. Pagans choose to do such things – because it gives a temporary ‘fix’, even if the long-term consequences of such habits drag one down and get in the way of more worthy life goals. But apart from eternity, if there is no resurrection, the way the apostle Paul characterized it in 1Corinthians 15 makes perfect logical sense: 1Cor 15:32 “If the dead are not raised, "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die."”

Peter highlights that Jesus gives us a new attitude - direction and outlook superior to our base human passions. 1Peter 4:1f “Therefore, since Christ suffered in his body, arm yourselves also with THE SAME ATTITUDE, because he who has suffered in his body is DONE WITH SIN.As a result, he does not live the rest of his earthly life FOR EVIL HUMAN DESIRES, but rather FOR THE WILL OF GOD.” The tension is clear – which will it be? Human desires, or what God wants? Jesus did not choose the cushy, pleasurable, pain-avoiding way out. Hebrews 12:2b “...For the joy set before him [He] endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” He endured what was hard and shameful – so that He might be qualified to be truly the ‘author and perfecter’ of our faith.

Paul is very blunt about what the outcome is for those who choose those pleasurable debauched human desires: Galatians 5:21 “...envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like.I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.” Do you want God’s best, His Kingdom? Then those baser urges have to be ignored, passed over for something better in the long term. Become passionate about God’s will. Locate yourself in Christ. Romans 13:13f “Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy.Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the sinful nature.”

5) JESUS GIVES US STRENGTH TO BE GRACIOUS

Christ provides us with purpose; with direction; and with strength, the power to carry out what He’s drawing us towards. It’s not like the Lord says, “There’s a humanly impossible target, now get over there on your own steam.” He graciously provides help to follow Him.

Verses 8-11 list several imperatives that ought to characterize our new way of life in Jesus. 1Peter 4.8-11 “Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms.If anyone speaks, he should do it as one speaking the very words of God. If anyone serves, he should do it WITH THE STRENGTH GOD PROVIDES...”

What’s commanded here? Love each other deeply. Offer hospitality. Use your gift. Serve with God’s strength.

The ‘love each other deeply’ is in the ‘above all’ category – after all, Jesus said that was His ‘new command’. John 13:34f “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” That will be our distinguishing characteristic as Jesus-followers. But loving doesn’t come easy, does it? Maybe it would if everybody else weren’t so blatantly imperfect... As Peter notes, “Love covers over a multitude of sins.” But that takes forgiveness, grace, longsuffering, immense patience – when that person lets you down for what seems the hundredth time.

“Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling” – literally, ‘friendly to strangers’. But it’s so much easier to be friendly to people who are ‘like us’! With our own group, we know what we can talk about, we can pick up the conversation where we left off, we share values and a history. To walk up to that stranger and strike up a conversation takes courage, nerve, to expend energy on something that might seem like a waste of time if we don’t ‘hit it off’. Or when you feel your relational ‘quiver’ is already full to bursting.

But we were strangers, misfits, when it came to the Kingdom of God. And the Lord reached out and drew us in, sinful history notwithstanding. Jesus put it this way in Matthew 25:35, “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I WAS A STRANGER AND YOU INVITED ME IN...”

Huron County has an initiative investigating what it might involve to provide help to refugees from Ukraine. Will that be an opportunity for us to somehow share what God’s given us, and show hospitality?

Jesus gives us strength to serve, using our gifts. V10 NRSV “Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve one another with whatever gift each of you has received.” I like that - God’s grace to us is ‘manifold’ (many-splendoured, multiple varieties, takes many forms). It’s not for selfish consumption but for us to ‘steward’ or administer faithfully by putting it to use, serving others. And we do it ‘with the strength God provides’. Philippians 4:13 (one well worth memorizing!) “I can do everything through him who gives me strength.”

GETTING THE WHOLE MESSAGE ACROSS

In summary – without the Resurrection, the event of Jesus’ death would have conveyed the wrong meaning. The Resurrection puts the stamp on the victory Jesus won for us at the cross on Good Friday.

What’s Easter mean? As Peter outlined, it means...

Jesus is Exalted and Empowered

Jesus is our Accountability

Jesus gives our life Purpose beyond our own skin

Jesus gives us Direction and Outlook superior to base human passions

(and) Jesus gives us Strength to be gracious.

Those give vibrant meaning to Easter, to what Jesus’ Resurrection was all about. But our follow-through is also important in showing the world what Easter really means, beyond bunnies and egg hunts. “Love each other deeply” – that shows, marks us out, distinguishes us, as His disciples. “Use whatever gift [you’ve] received to serve others” – instead of cocooning with your favourite hot drink and time-gobbling pastime: that too will make you stand out from your neighbours. People can tell if you’re really there ‘for them’ or if you’re antsy to finish with them and get on to the next project.

As we live out God’s manifold grace, with the strength He supplies, that too will prove what Easter really means. The message won’t be truncated.

General Wellington commanded the victorious forces at the great battle of Waterloo that virtually defeated Napoleon. When the battle was over, Wellington sent the great news of his victory to England. A series of stations, one within sight of the next, had been established to send code messages between England and the continent. The message to be sent was ‘‘Wellington defeated Napoleon at Waterloo.’’ Meanwhile a fog set in and interrupted the message sending. As a result, people only saw news of ‘‘Wellington defeated –’’ Later, the fog cleared and the full message continued, which was quite different from the outcome that the people originally thought had happened!

The same is true today. When many look at what happened on Good Friday, the death of Christ, they see only “defeat.” Yet, on Easter, at the Resurrection, God’s message was completed. The resurrection spelled “victory.” And the Holy Spirit continues to pour God’s strength and grace into our lives in ways that give Easter positive reality in people’s lives. Let’s pray.

Thank You Heavenly Father for the victory over sin and death won by Your Son at the cross. We praise You for Your might power shown in raising Him from the dead, seating Him at Your right hand until that day we render account before Him. Help us not give in to temptation to base human desires, but instead to know Your will and be generous in sharing the grace and gifts You’ve given us. May people see Your hand at work in our lives and start to appreciate Your goodness and glory. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Are We Really Ready to Follow Jesus?” - Lk 9:51-62 May 1/22

YOU’VE GOT TO TAKE THE LONG VIEW

As Luke begins a section that spans several chapters, it’s one in which Jesus’ focus shifts. He had begun largely ministering in the northern part of the country, in Galilee. But He turns His attention. This next section in Luke describes Jesus’ ministry in the south part of the country, Judea – an area much closer to Jerusalem where His earthly ministry will climax in His crucifixion.

It probably would have been much easier to continue teaching and working miracles in Galilee; but that’s not what He had ultimately come for. At the Transfiguration back in the middle of chapter 9, Luke records this about Jesus’ miraculous encounter with two outstanding Old Testament prophets: Lk 9:31 “[Moses and Elijah] appeared in glorious splendor, talking with Jesus. They spoke about his departure, which he was about to bring to fulfillment at Jerusalem.” The word ‘departure’ in the Greek is literally ‘exodus’.

In Luke 9:51 Luke emphasizes how deliberate Jesus is about the change in focus as He begins this new phase of ministry. Lk 9:51 “As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus RESOLUTELY SET OUT for Jerusalem.” He set out ‘resolutely’, literally He ‘set His face’ – very determined. He was taking the long view in this decision to leave the relatively less challenging north and head towards the Jewish political centre and hotbed, Jerusalem, with its various groups vying for influence (Sadducees, Pharisees, Herodians, Zealots).

It’s May and of course you know what May brings – April showers bring May flowers – and MOTORCYCLES! Yes those warming temperatures mean you will be hearing them more out on the road. When I took my motorcycle course a couple of years ago, there were some things they emphasized that were different about driving a motorcycle compared to a car. One had to do with making a turn at an intersection. In a car as you’re driving you’re often looking for the turning point around the centre of the intersection. But on the motorcycle course they emphasized taking the long view – looking way down the road you’re turning into rather than some point at the middle of the intersection. You’re searching for the path you’ll be heading into, not the actual turning point.

Jesus is taking the long view as He makes this turn in ministry direction. The cross is looming at the end of the road; His ‘exodus’ and ascension will be the time of His heavenly enthronement, to the right hand of His Heavenly Father. It’s not just fun and games any more, feeding the multitudes and walking on water. He is choosing a path that leads to a head-to-head confrontation with powers that can destroy Him, physically speaking. There is an urgency to accomplish His mission with the exact timing and circumstances that will point unarguably to His being the Paschal Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world.

In His interactions on the way, including today’s passage, we see this ‘long view’, Christ’s sense of destiny and purpose accentuate His call to others to follow Him, rather than be distracted by lesser goals and attractions.

HOW TO DEAL WITH HOSTILITY

Do you have anyone that irritates you? Are there certain personality types that tend to annoy you? Would there be some people that when you see them coming down the sidewalk, you consider crossing the street so you don’t have to meet them? What about those who actively oppose you? Are there some who’ve been hurtful to you in the past, who you’re defensive towards, maybe who tend to get your hackles up?

The people who lived in Samaria did absolutely NOT get along with the Jews. Originally they had been part of the northern Ten Tribes of Israel exiled to Assyria, but upon return they intermarried with other races so were viewed by Jews as impure half-breeds. They even had an ‘alternate Temple’ located on Mt.Gerizim. There had been attacks on their holy place in the past by Jewish radicals, so the two groups hated each other.

This explains why, when Jews that lived in the northern region of Galilee made pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the annual festivals, instead of going through Samaria they often detoured east of the Jordan then south then west to avoid the area altogether. It wasn’t so much a problem going home, but the Samaritans took it as a slight to their own temple when Jewish pilgrims were headed to Jerusalem instead.

But this time, instead of taking the detour down the east side of the Jordan River, Jesus went through Samaria. Perhaps it’s because He was taking the ‘long view’, having come to be the Saviour of all people, even the Samaritans. Did it make the Jewish disciples wince when He specifically mentioned Samaria in His departing words at the Ascension in Acts 1? Acts 1:8 “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea AND SAMARIA, and to the ends of the earth.” Oh, THAT region? You want us to go WHERE?!!

The Samaritans were hostile to Jews headed to Jerusalem. How does Jesus deal with those who are hostile? First, He GIVES THEM A CHANCE. As we’ve been saying, He didn’t take the usual detour route: He headed straight through their territory. Luke 9:52f “And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; but the people there DID NOT WELCOME HIM, because he was heading for Jerusalem.”

Humph. Think of the offence this must have come across as! Not welcoming the very Son of God, the Messiah? Would this not be an action that could warrant divine wrath? How do you feel when you can tell you’re not welcome somewhere? Doesn’t exactly warm your heart toward the person, does it? But Jesus was at least giving them a chance, He consciously had not avoided going there.

Two of Jesus’ closest disciples, James and John (nicknamed ‘Sons of Thunder’), had been with Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration and witnessed Him speaking with Moses and Elijah. Maybe that reminded them of the time Elijah was being forced by soldiers to accompany them to the king and Elijah called down fire which burned two different lots of 50 soldiers to a crisp, before they learned to ASK instead of DEMAND – see 2Kings 1:10-12.

Anyway, something prompts James and John to take revenge on this inhospitable Samaritans for not welcoming the Master. Luke 9:54 “When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, "Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?"”

Does that adequately describe how you WANT to react to those who actively oppose you, who ridicule you, who block your plans, who undermine your innocent intentions, who hate your guts for seemingly no reason? Do you want to call fire down like Elijah? “Nuke ‘em, Lord – make ‘em crispy critters!” And our innards tend to corroborate that that would in fact be the FAIR and defensible thing to do.

But instead of a NUKE for the Samaritans, Jesus has a REBUKE for His all-too-eager disciples. Luke 9:55f “But Jesus turned and rebuked them, and they went to another village.” No fire from heaven this time. Not even a harsh verbal condemnation for those who rejected Him, who were being so unwelcoming. Instead Jesus just absorbs the hit, alters His plans, and moves on to another location.

How did He respond to those who are hostile? He gave them a chance. And then He RESPONDED WITH GRACE, instead of REACTING WITH HATE.

I’m glad He did that – because there was a point in life at which I too was not welcoming towards Him. We all have turned from God and gone our own way, telling the Saviour to take a hike. Whenever we sin, we are attempting to shove God off the throne and install ourselves there instead, insisting we know best. Jesus had the cross in view – at which time He would be insulted and jeered at and ridiculed, but He would pray forgiveness for those who reviled Him. How He responded to this Samaritan village was practice for how He’d respond at the cross. Isaiah 53:3,7 “He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not...He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.”

In His earthly ministry, Jesus did not come to pronounce judgment, but to proclaim God’s Kingdom and offer of salvation. Lk 19:10 “For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost.” That was His mission, what He was about, that was His long view.

How can we respond towards those who are hostile to us? Christ’s Spirit empowers us to respond with grace, the same way He did. The Apostle Paul wrote, Romans 12:14,17-19 “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse...Do not repay anyone evil for evil.Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath...”

We don’t have to settle the score, that’s best left to God, that’s His department; we just take a deep breath and move on the next village.

On July 3, 1988, an American navy cruiser, thinking itself to be under attack by an Iranian F-14, gunned down an Iranian airliner containing 290 civilian passengers, killing them all. Polls revealed that most Americans were against paying compensation the Iranian victims' families; the hostage crisis was still fresh in many minds. In spite of this, President Reagan approved compensation. Afterward, he was asked by reporters if such payment would send the wrong signal. His response was, "I don't ever find compassion a bad precedent." Revenge may be easier to practice, but compassion demonstrates the heart of God.

HURDLES TO BEING A FOLLOWER

As Christ continues His journey towards Judea and Jerusalem, His goal of laying down His life at Golgotha no doubt was prominent in His thoughts, that was a big item in His ‘long view’. Doing His Father’s will came with a big price tag. This probably helped keep in perspective the offers of volunteers who glibly promised support without really counting the cost of what discipleship might involve.

At the end of Luke 9, Jesus interacts with 3 individuals who don’t seem to have thoroughly thought through or appreciated what following Jesus might entail. FF Bruce summarizes it this way: “The first case is that of inconsiderate impulse, the second that of conflicting duties, the third that of a divided mind.” Do any of those apply to us? Acting on impulse? Being torn be conflicting duties, unwilling to let go of what seem to us to be important responsibilities? Having a divided mind, not being totally convinced, wanting to put conditions or limitations on our willingness to serve God?

We Canadians love our creature comforts. How many Tim Hortons on local street corners is too many? Unfortunately as we ‘roll up the rim to win’ we may risk adding rolls to our anatomy! Jesus needed to warn the first candidate the life of discipleship was not one plush with earthly comforts.

Luke 9:57f “As they were walking along the road, a man said to him, "I will follow you wherever you go." Jesus replied, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head."”

If you’ve been listening to prosperity gospel preachers who’ve told you obedience is the path to material blessing and a new car and fine house and your own airplane, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but that’s a different gospel than the one Jesus preaches. The Lord promises to be with us and to supply our needs, not to line our bank accounts or increase our net worth. Jesus may have a certain project for us that requires giving up a certain measure of security or settledness. Can we put our comfort on the altar?

Recently a missionary family connected to our congregation announced they would be relocating their entire family from Ontario to Saskatoon, to work with a new mission agency producing gospel outreach materials to First Nations groups and others. That’s a huge upheaval! It’s tough being a Missionary Kid when you have to say goodbye to friends and make new ones in a strange area. As parents you long for stability and supportive relationships for your children, so it’s not easy to uproot them and start over in a new place. But following Christ’s call is paramount.

So, one hurdle to being a follower is, PREPARE TO BE UPROOTED.

Another hurdle is, PRIORITIES MAY CLASH WITH OTHERS’ EXPECTATIONS. Luke 9:59f “He said to another man, "Follow me." But the man replied, "Lord, first let me go and bury my father." Jesus said to him, "Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God."”

Now, this may sound kind of harsh at first – was the man’s father recently deceased? Wouldn’t it be all right to at least finish the funeral? But John MacArthur comments on the parallel passage in Matthew 18(21), “The phrase, ‘I must bury my father’ was a common figure of speech meaning, ‘Let me wait until I receive my inheritance.’”

Ah. It’s not that the man’s father had actually already died! He was stalling for time – biding his time until he came into his share of the family fortune. His anticipated SECURITY. Who knows how long that could take? His priority wasn’t really following Jesus, but establishing his retirement nestegg.

By contrast, Jesus’ mission has a sense of urgency. Back in 9:51 Christ ‘resolutely set out for Jerusalem’ – the clock is ticking, the cross is coming into view on the horizon of Jesus’ agenda. If the man truly wants to follow the Saviour during His earthly ministry, time is running out. Jesus responds to the man, “Let the dead bury their own dead” – probably meaning those who are spiritually dead, otherwise preoccupied, bent on earthly goals, amassing wealth or titles or status. Security (eternally speaking) is not to be had by angling craftily for anything this world offers.

Paul advised Timothy about true wealth in 1Timothy 6:17-19, “Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life.”

‘The coming age – the life that is truly life’ - that’s the Kingdom view, the long view, beyond this temporal life’s span.

Next, Christ’s encounters teach us to LOOK TO GOD NOT OTHERS FOR YOUR VALIDATION. Another volunteer offers to come with Jesus, but with strings attached. Luke 9:61-62 “Still another said, "I will follow you, Lord; but first let me go back and say good-by to my family." Jesus replied, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God."” The committed disciple does not say, “I will follow – BUT...” FF Bruce called this the case of ‘a divided mind’. This man was pulled in two directions. He would probably have had opportunity down the road to touch base with his family. Missionaries have sometimes found that people who are candidates for baptism in pagan cultures sometimes are dissuaded by their families if they go to spend time with them before the baptism. Our upbringing and our families of origin are huge influences in our lives, and can pull us away from devoting our lives to Christ’s Kingdom.

Jesus calls us to put Him first in our lives, above family attachments. Matthew 10:37 “Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me...” Strangely, we find when we are crucifed to self in order to belong to Christ, we can actually become BETTER parents to our offspring than if we were not a Christian. Because the Holy Spirit becomes active in our lives to pour God’s love and wisdom and grace into our parenting. But Jesus beckons us to love Him most of all.

WHERE’S YOUR FOCUS?

What do you have in view in your life? Is it the long view, the Kingdom? That’s what Jesus urged that second man to do – “But you go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Is God’s agenda overriding and steering your day-to-day, month-to-month plans? Are you just living paycheque to paycheque, or do you have a more eternal plan in focus?

Jesus used a farming analogy for that last fellow – Lk 9:62 (NLT) “Anyone who puts a hand to the plow and then looks back is not fit for the Kingdom of God.” Growing up on the farm, I got the chance to plow a fair bit (my brother was into no-till – that came later). Dad was a good plowman, I have a trophy of his from the 1947 International Plowing Match. Except I got to use a tractor whereas He started out with a horse!

He taught me, once I got the tractor lined up in the furrow, to pick an object on the horizon (like a fence post) and try to keep the centre ridge of the tractor in line with that. We need to take the long view in life and in following Jesus. Are we actually aiming at anything? As someone has said, “Aim at nothing and you’re bound to hit it every time.”

There’s a story about a farmer who was teaching his son to plow and told him the same thing, pick an object on the horizon and keep the tractor pointed in that direction. The father came back later and found the furrow wandering in all directions, very crooked. When he asked the son about it the son explained, “I did just what you said, Dad – I picked that cow over there and kept aiming the tractor right at her!” You’ve got to choose your guidepost carefully.

KEEP THE NAIL IN SIGHT

Chuck Swindoll tells this story about keeping the cross of Christ in view, informing our daily actions in a way that’s coached by God’s Kingdom...

From every direction, something or someone clamors for our attention. A distraction draws our eyes and the next thing we know, we’ve swerved off the road and headed down another detour.

One Chicago youth pastor came up with a clever way to keep his group on track. Concerned that the balmy beaches of Florida—the site of their upcoming evangelism trip—would lure the teens from their purpose, he fashioned a cross from two pieces of lumber. Just before they climbed on the bus, he showed it to the group. "I want all of you to remember that the whole purpose of our going is to glorify the name of Christ, to lift up the Cross—the message of the Cross, the emphasis of the Cross, the Christ of the Cross," he announced. "So we're going to take this cross wherever we go." The teenagers looked at one another, a little unsure of his plan. But they agreed to do it and dragged the cross on the bus. It banged back and forth in the aisle all the way to Florida. It went with them into restaurants. It stayed overnight where they stayed overnight. It stood in the sand while they ministered on the beach.

At first, lugging the cross around embarrassed the kids. But later, it became a point of identification. That cross was a constant, silent reminder of who they were and why they had come. They eventually regarded carrying it as an honour and privilege.

The night before they went home, the youth leader handed out two nails to each of the kids. He told them that if they wanted to commit themselves to what the cross stood for, they could hammer one nail into it and keep the other with them. One by one, the teens drove their nail into the cross.

About fifteen years later, one fellow – now a stockbroker – called the youth leader. He told him that he still keeps that nail with him in his desk drawer. Whenever he loses his sense of focus, he looks at the nail and remembers the cross on that beach in Florida. It reminds him of what is at the core of his life – his commitment to Jesus Christ.

Let’s pray. Lord, You ‘resolutely’ set Your face to Jerusalem; You knew very well what was awaiting You there. But You did not shrink from the Father’s plan, even though it would be painful. Thank You for loving us that much, that You saw it through. Forgive us for times we have been conflicted in our motives – the times we have let family concerns or creature comforts or this world’s yearnings get in the way of following You. Grant us grace to resolve afresh to put You first in everything; to respond with grace and compassion when others are hostile to us, rather than with knee-jerk emotional reaction. Send Your companion Spirit to guide and coach us each day, we pray. Let us not forget Your nails! In Christ’s name, Amen.

“Good News for Moms who Can’t Do It All” - Lk 10:38-42 May 8/22

THE MADNESS OF OUR MODERN MAYHEM

Have you noticed that life seems to be getting more stressful? We tend to become what we worship. When we figure we ‘want to do it all’, the abundance of opportunities and pressures and demands can become overwhelming. When we invite Jesus to be our ‘one thing’, He helps us sort through what’s most important and to be at peace knowing what’s really worthwhile.

In view of our current health challenges, an expert recently recommended a bestselling book to us called “When Your Body Says No: The Cost of Hidden Stress” by Dr Gabor Mate. It peels back the cover on the role emotions and psychological stress can play in chronic illness, including diseases such as breast cancer, prostate cancer, multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s, and others.

I was fascinated by the chapter on rheumatoid arthritis, from which my father suffered for many years. In his forties he became so debilitated he had to hire someone to be the dairyman while he went to Midwest Clinic in Excelsior Springs, Missouri for months of rehab. He learned ways to cope, such as dipping his hands in molten wax to soothe the pain. Finally in his early sixties he sold the cows and stuck with just crop farming. His arthritis improved amazingly. He lived to the age of 97. In later years he would look back and attribute much of his arthritis to stress.

The pace of modern life has been accelerating. We seem busier and doing more in less time, but are we accomplishing as much? In 2007 things took a quantum leap with the introduction of the iPhone. Now everybody can carry their own personal computing device with them 24/7, and be at the mercy of whoever wants to contact you by text, instant messaging, email, video call, or even old fashioned phone call. Congratulations, you have become infinitely interruptible - distractible.

There’s some concern amongst experts that we are losing our ability to think deeply. Notifications keep us shallow. You try to get into a book or significant planning but your phone screams at you – even when it’s just present there within sight. We are in danger of losing our capacity to concentrate; the little dopamine hits of messenger’s ‘ding’ and scrolling down to those next items on social media get in the way of deep reflection and study.

Today’s lesson is good news, not just for Moms who find they can’t do it all, but also for anyone who’s become aware they tend to be distracted or are feeling overwhelmed by all the background noise by which mega-corporations seek to usurp our attention and hone the algorithm so they can augment their profit. Jesus shares an important lesson in helping us keep sane.

A TALE OF TWO SISTERS

Just a couple miles from Jerusalem, on the east slope of the Mount of Olives, was a village called Bethany. Two sisters and their brother lived there, and it was a place Jesus visited a few times in his ministry; it seems like it was a welcome rest stop for Him. Luke 10:38f “As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him.She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said.” Let’s pause and consider these remarkably different sisters for a minute.

For more detail, check out John 11 and 12 as well. Martha seems to be the dominant one of the two, the one in charge; Luke says she “opened her home to Him”. Martha took the initiative. She seems to be the more active of the two, while Mary is more studious, contemplative. Martha is practical: when Jesus orders the stone be removed from Lazarus’ tomb, Martha objects that there will be a bad odour because her brother has been dead 4 days!

Martha seems to be the one used to running the show, taking control and getting things done. She gripes to Jesus in 10:40, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!” That sounds like part-plea, part-demand. Ordering around the Saviour of the world! When Lazarus dies and Jesus finally arrives after waiting for a while, Martha is the one who leaves the house and confronts Jesus with her complaint, “If you had been here, my brother would not have died.” She cuts right to the chase. Is there a note of blame in her voice?

Martha is an activist, she’s busy about something, moving the project ahead that needs to be done. Her motto might be, “Git ‘er done.” No time to waste.

Yet don’t sell Martha short. She’s very pious and orthodox. She trusts in Jesus; even when He seems to have let her dear brother simply die through delay, Martha can confess, John 11:27 “Yes, Lord,...I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who was to come into the world.” What a model declaration of faith! Even in the backdrop of severe grief and disappointment.

Now, Mary, Martha’s sister, is quite a different bird. She seems to be less practical, more emotional, more intuitive, a feeler. When Jesus arrives after Lazarus’ death, Mary stays in the house rather than going out to meet Him. It’s Mary’s tears that move Jesus deeply in spirit and trouble Him, to the point we get that precious shortest verse in the Bible: John 11:35 “Jesus wept.” Later, after Lazarus is raised back to life and they’re hosting Jesus again for a meal in John 12, it’s Mary that takes an expensive pint of pure nard, pours it on Jesus’ feet, and wipes His feet with her hair! Such a close bond between them. Mary’s devotion is lavish, exuberant, she adores Him, she gives Him her rapt attention. All she wants to do is sit at His feet and listen to His words.

So you have two very different sisters. Martha is the DO-er, Mary is the BE-er. Martha is hustling about getting things done, Mary is totally absorbed in whatever the Saviour is saying. Martha is all about the WORK, Mary is focused on the WORD. Meanwhile all the time the pressure in Martha’s frustration gauge is growing steadily. Sooner or later she’s going to burst.

APPRECIATING THE FUSS THAT FOSTERED US

It’s Mother’s Day. Let’s just press ‘pause’ here a minute and salute the mothers, or if our situation was different our parents or foster caregivers or whoever invested in our lives when we weren’t strong or old enough to be independent. Where would we be without the Marthas? Without all that our mother or parents or whoever toiled and sacrificed in order to care for us? It takes tons of ‘fuss’ to foster a family, to nurture little ones. Martha’s love language was ‘acts of service’, that’s how she showed those closest to her that they mattered to her, it was rewarding for her on the inside to serve others and provide a caring, nurturing environment for them.

Paul wrote to Timothy, 1Tim 5:14 “So I counsel younger widows to marry, to have children, to manage their homes and to give the enemy no opportunity for slander.” It says “manage their homes” – that’s no small feat, to manage a home! We should have the highest respect for women who are capably raising a family, feeding and forming the next generation. “Managing the home” may also mean taking on employment and working outside the home to help provide income in paying bills and laying aside for future needs.

Proverbs 31 has a daunting portrait of a woman managing her home that involves many pursuits, inside and outside its walls. [CAUTION: she’s a bit of a wonder-woman!] Proverbs 31:13–21 (The Message): “She shops around for the best yarns and cottons, and enjoys knitting and sewing...She’s up before dawn, preparing breakfast for her family and organizing her day.She looks over a field and buys it, then, with money she’s put aside, plants a garden.First thing in the morning, she dresses for work, rolls up her sleeves, eager to get started.She senses the worth of her work, is in no hurry to call it quits for the day.She’s skilled in the crafts of home and hearth, diligent in homemaking.She’s quick to assist anyone in need, reaches out to help the poor.She doesn’t worry about her family when it snows; their winter clothes are all mended and ready to wear.”

Wow! What a superwoman! Don’t get discouraged or depressed, that’s an IDEAL portrait. Martha probably has Proverbs 31 engraved on her wall. It’s motivational, as long as you don’t let it weigh you down when things don’t go perfectly and your best-laid plans don’t come to fruition.The dog pukes on the carpet. Your mother-in-law announces she’s stopping by in 5 minutes and the house is a mess. The school phones up and little Johnny has a bloody nose. It’s called ‘life’ and it happens!

I was very blessed to have a conscientious Mom who managed her home well and more; her ‘job’ was at home because she and Dad lived on a farm. Mom would rise with Dad and be out at the barn at 6:30 in the morning to milk our 35 Holsteins. After breakfast there was cleanup in the milkhouse and other daily chores. She had a large garden and did canning. She looked after the laundry – I remember an old ringer washer and the clothesline. There were school lunches to prepare and meals for a hungry husband and 3 growing sons who had hollow legs (we went through 7 quarts of milk each day). In the evening while Dad watched TV, Mom might be sitting at the dining room table doing mending, with one eye on the show. Then there was all her church work, an active member of the women’s church group, doing her Bible study for the weekly small group, and so on.

Not to mention a thousand other tasks too numerous to go into detail about. Did I mention she kept the farm ledger? And drew the picture of each new heifer calf to be registered with the Holstein Association? I was very blessed to have such a mother. Managing the home and launching three sons off to university and careers while assisting an arthritic husband required much fuss.

PRIORITIZING THE ONE THING THAT MAKES IT ALL WORTHWHILE

Take a bow, Martha. But wait – Martha doesn’t seem to be happy. Yes ‘acts of service’ is her love language but she’s taken on so much she’s about to blow her stack. She’s in danger of bending her boundaries unhealthily; she makes a move to draw Mary into the madness of her mayhem.

V40 “But Martha was DISTRACTED by all the preparations that had to be made.” The Greek word translated ‘distracted’ means ‘to be driven about mentally, distracted, over-occupied, too busy about a thing’. From a root ‘spasmos’ (as in spasm) – Martha’s mental wiring is about to go spastic!

How does Jesus sum up her condition? V41 “"Martha, Martha," the Lord answered, "you are WORRIED AND UPSET about many things...” The word ‘worried’ can mean ‘anxious’, she’s suffering some severe anxiety. The word ‘upset’ comes from a root like ‘disturbed’, a crowd or tumult; Martha’s got so many things on her mind, when she tries to go to bed at night she has trouble quieting down the ‘village of idiots’ in her head.

Martha the manager, the capable Domestic Engineer, has taken on so much it’s overwhelming – her thoughts tend in the direction of self-pity. Do you hear the whine of ‘me’? V40b “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left ME to do the work by MYSELF? Tell her to help ME!”

Jesus had cautioned the crowds repeatedly about excessive worry in the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 6:25,28,31,34 “Therefore I tell you, do not WORRY about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes?...And why do you WORRY about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labour or spin...So do not WORRY, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’...Therefore do not WORRY about tomorrow, for tomorrow will WORRY about itself.Each day has enough trouble of its own.” Do you suppose the Lord of your life, the Master of the universe, wants us not to worry?! Worry can be subtle failure to trust our Sovereign Loving God wholeheartedly. Bishop Fulton Sheen said, “Worry is a form of atheism, for it betrays a lack of faith and trust in God.”

Martha was distracted “by all the preparations that HAD to be made” – did they really HAVE to be made? NLT puts it, “by the big dinner she was preparing.” Maybe it didn’t HAVE to be so big; one course would have done instead of several. Jesus probably would have preferred to have her listening rather than running around the kitchen, stressed out. He observes she’s worried and upset about MANY things, V42 “but ONLY ONE THING IS NEEDED.Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

“Only ONE thing is needed.” Commentators vary on whether Jesus was meaning just one dish was needed instead of a big production. Clearly the ‘one thing’ Mary has chosen is to sit and listen rather than fuss over a complex menu. Jesus is emphasizing that is the “good”, the “better” thing – and He’s not going to rob her of that by telling her she should go help her sister prepare a banquet.

Are you a human DOING or a human BEING? Jesus doesn’t want your works – He wants YOU. He seeks your attention. He wants fellowship with you, interaction with you, quiet time alone with you where He can communicate the Father’s will to you, and you can align your wants and desires with His eternal and lasting purposes. He’d rather have just a bowl of soup, or a peanut butter sandwich, instead of a full-course meal if it means He could have engagement with you.

Mary was in tune with the Psalmist who wrote, Ps 27:4 “One thing I ask of the LORD, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple.” Seek HIM – not feeling like you have to somehow earn His approval or impress Him by what a big spread you can put on. What marks you can get. How much money you can make, or things you can own. Sometimes our harried busy-ness is more for us than for Him – trying to impress others as if ‘stuff’ will validate us, prove our worth. Mary was giving Jesus worth-ship by being attentive, saying ‘no’ to other opportunities or obligations that really weren’t so important.

Godly perspective, an eternal sense of values and what’s really worthwhile, may mean turning down opportunities others would jump at. Elaine Benes was the spacey Seinfeld character played by actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Her character evolved into something of a poster child for befuddled and disenfranchised females. Unlike her character, however, the actress is satisfied with her career, happily married, and the mother of two young boys. Centered and content, Louis-Dreyfus tries to keep things in perspective when faced with the inevitable clashes posed by being both a star and a hands-on mother. "If one of my sons is sick and I have to work, it's a problem – I simply can't go.But what am I supposed to do?" she says. "Movie people are shocked when they hear I will rarely travel to locations.They say it's a tragedy for my career.But people in show business don't realize there's a life outside their universe.They don't know what they're missing."

‘There’s a life outside their universe’ – I like that! Jesus wanted Martha to remember there’s a life outside the kitchen. When we put Him first, other details fall into place. We are freed from playing the ‘gotta impress others to prove my worth’ game.

What are some other strategies to avoid becoming distracted and worried? I’ve heard some advise to “parent your phone” – Carey Nieuwhof recommends turning off all notifications, so you check email or messages when YOU want to, not on someone else’s schedule. Another person has their family at 8:30 pm each night put all their devices in a big black box to charge overnight.

Some of you are reacting, “Ouch! I could never do that!” But are we addicted to our distractions, like Martha? What is the ‘better thing’ Mary has discovered, that we too might discover if we were a little more disciplined in that area? If we made Jesus’ teaching a higher priority?

A PENNEY FOR YOUR WORRIES

Jesus pointed Martha in the direction that could soothe her worries and distractions. She needed to centre on Him. Jesus knocks at the door of our heart, seeking fellowship between ourselves and Him. Revelation 3:20 “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.” Knowing fellowship with Him will help calm our worries and help us realize our worth rooted in Him, not anything we can accomplish.

One man who learned how to deal with worry was JC Penney, of department store fame. James Cash Penney, coming from a long line of preachers, grew up with deep convictions. He was unwaveringly honest. He never smoked or drank, and he was a hard worker. But in 1929 when the Great Depression hit, Penney found himself in crisis. He had made unwise commitments, and they turned sour. Penney began to worry about them, and soon he was unable to sleep. He developed a painful case of shingles and was hospitalized. His anxiety only increased in the hospital, and it seemed resistant to tranquilizers and drugs. His mental state deteriorated until, as he later said, “I was broken nervously and physically, filled with despair, unable to see even a ray of hope. I had nothing to live for. I felt I hadn’t a friend left in the world, that even my family turned against me.”

One night he was so oppressed he didn’t think his heart would hold out, and, expecting to die before morning, he sat down and wrote farewell letters to his wife and sons. But he did live through the night, and the next morning he heard singing coming from the little hospital chapel.

The words of the song said, “Be not dismayed what’er betide, God will take care of you.” Entering the chapel, Penney listened to the song, to the Scripture reading, and to the prayer. [he recalled] “Suddenly – something happened. I can’t explain it. I can only call it a miracle. I felt as if I had been instantly lifted out of the darkness of a dungeon into warm, brilliant sunlight.” All worry left him as he realized more fully than he had ever imagined just how much the Lord Jesus Christ cared for him. From that day JC Penney was never plagued with worry, and he later called those moments in the chapel “the most dramatic and glorious twenty minutes of my life.” Let’s pray.

Lord, You know how easy it is for us to get worried and distracted, frantic even when we run into roadblocks and plans don’t work out as we’d hoped. Help us like Mary to practice putting You first, listening for Your voice, understanding Your will and what’s most needed instead of just whatever we want. Thank You for our mothers and others who parented and guided and fostered us towards becoming the people we are. Even when they’re gone, help us realize we can be trusting You to carry out Your plans for us. Use us to invest Your love and caring in the lives of others, too. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“The Unsuspecting Helper” - Lk 10:25-37 ~ May 15/22

A TRUE NEIGHBOUR

Have you been blessed with some good neighbours at any point in your life? Have you been the recipient of true neighbourliness at some time, say as simple a thing as a cup of sugar when you’ve run out?

Someone has said, “A good neighbour is one who will watch your vacation slides all evening without telling that he (or she) has been there too.”

I seem to have rather a knack for needing help from neighbours now and then. Just this week we begged a ride from a friend to pick up my car after it had been cleaned at a dealership. A few years ago when I lived in Blyth our lot had some wet patches. I had managed to get the WheelHorse lawn tractor stuck up to the axle. I asked a neighbour for a tug out with his truck. We promptly got the truck stuck too! Then we turned to another neighbour, Jeff, who had a higher-powered 4-wheel-drive truck which he took mud bogging. Eventually with his knobby tires and high axles he succeeded in getting both of his neighbours unstuck.

Life has its pitfalls. It’s not always clear sailing. In today’s passage we see Jesus highlighting the importance of being a good neighbour, even if that means getting into the trench with them, not just concerned with keeping our own tires clean.

LOVE DOES – TO A POINT

To begin, Jesus is confronted by a religious lawyer who is out to prove whether this upstart Rabbi really knows his stuff. Luke 10:25f “On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. "Teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?" "What is written in the Law?" he replied. "How do you read it?"”

Jesus often answers a question with another question. A question can set the terms for a discussion, and Jesus could press against the assumptions proposed by the questioner. For instance, the expert’s query, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” assumes eternal life is something to be earned by DOING enough qualifying good works. This is the approach of many religions, where one’s merits are weighed at judgment against one’s faults. Jesus plays along with this thinking for a bit, before pointing out the flaw.

The expert gives what is actually a very good answer. Luke 10:27f “He answered: "‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’" "You have answered correctly," Jesus replied. "Do this and you will live."” Compare this interchange with Mark 12:28-34 where another teacher of the law asks about the most important commandment and you’ll find this man nailed it! In THAT account Jesus remarks the questioner is not far from God’s Kingdom – which ought to have encouraged and intrigued him.

But here there is a different motive operating. This expert is out to TEST Jesus, he has an agenda, attempting to prove whether Jesus is deserving of all the hype. He wants to position Himself as Judge and Jury. In a few minutes, though, Jesus will reveal the shallowness of the ‘expert’s’ theology and show he still has much to learn.

Jesus’ reply affirms the correctness of what he’s said – love God with your whole being and love your neighbour as yourself. Jesus concedes, “Do this and you will live.” That’s the jist of the law – keep the whole law perfectly and you will be deemed righteous before God. There’s just one problem: we KNOW we’ve failed to “do this” flawlessly! All have sinned. And the wages of sin is death. Eternal life then is not achievable by attempting to just ‘do’ in our own human strength. John MacArthur comments, “‘Do and live’ is the promise of the law. But since no sinner can obey perfectly, the impossible demands of the law are meant to drive us to seek divine mercy.”

For example, the Mosaic Law commanded a positive response toward an enemy when they are in need. That goes against our grain. Exodus 23:4f “If you come across your enemy’s ox or donkey wandering off, be sure to take it back to him. If you see the donkey of someone who hates you fallen down under its load, do not leave it there; be sure you help him with it.” My enemy? Someone who hates me? Doesn’t every fibre of our being instead cry out, ‘This is a golden opportunity to get even with them for what they’ve done to me! Justice!!’ Thus our lack of love is exposed.

THE FAKE PHARISAICAL FORTRESS

Well, so far it has not been much of a test. Jesus has drawn the man out to demonstrate he already knew the answer to his own question. Now, THAT’S unimpressive! Why did you bother asking it in the first place, then?

So the expert is thrown a little off-balance, and reaches for some follow-up question that might show there was really some point to this interchange after all. V29 “But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?"” To ‘justify’ himself – the root in Greek is the same as for ‘righteous’ – his aim is to undergird his sense of self-righteousness. “I really am all right, I have kept the law, there ain’t no flies on me, I have loved God and others satisfactorily, I am above reproach.”

And his culture probably reinforced his sense of self-righteousness, that he was justified basically. Religious Judaism taught that “neighbour” did not include certain categories of people. Gentiles, the uncircumcised, for one. Rank sinners for another, even if they called themselves Jews – this would include tax collectors and prostitutes, you were better to steer clear of them, not have anything to do with them. And particularly Samaritans, who were viewed as half-breeds both physically and spiritually, worshipping at another temple, respecting only the first books of the Bible. In the eyes of pious Jews, you were ‘off the hook’ from having to treat such fallen despicable sinners in a loving manner. Steer clear of them altogether, keep yourself ‘pure’.

Asking ‘Who IS my neighbour?’ seeks to draw the circle smaller, establish a limit or dividing line beyond which I won’t be called upon to extend my services to help anyone. “Neighbour” is literally the person who is near me, a “nigh dweller to one”. But that could be so many people, including the riff-raff that would drag me down. The question seeks to create a fortress, a boundary walling me off from others to whom I could be obligated.

Jewish religion was very much centred on remaining ‘clean’, undefiled. Don’t do anything that might fall into the category of being taboo, that would disqualify you from being able to approach the temple, any uncleanness that might force you into exile outside the camp like those poor lepers. The Pharisees prided themselves on their law-keeping ability, down to tithing the minuscule things like herbs, mint and dill and cumin. But their majoring on the minors tended to take them off-target, so they forgot weightier matters such as justice for widows and the love of God. Their obsession about ceremonial cleanness became a fake Pharisaical fortress separating them from others in genuine need.

It’s easier if you can draw the defining circle of who’s your neighbour smaller and smaller. Michael Quoist wrote this prayer...

“Lord, why did you tell me to love all men as my brothers?

I have tried, but I come back to you frightened.

Lord, I was so peaceful at home, so comfortably settled.

I was well furnished, and I felt so cozy.

I was alone – I was at peace.

Sheltered from wind and the rain, kept clean.”

WHAT’S YOUR ‘OTHER SIDE’? HOW FAR?

In response, Jesus tells a story. It shows the genius of Jesus in that He uses narrative to draw the listener in, to engage our emotions, our sense of compassion, rather than just give some instruction head-on like “Love your neighbour which includes the following categories of people – cue PowerPoint presentation – bullet point 1...” No, Jesus tells a story instead, a very memorable one, which doesn’t ‘instruct’ morality flat-out so much as portrays it in living colour on the canvas of our mind and invites us to relate to the characters in the story.

V30 “In reply Jesus said: "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead.” This could have been from a current newspaper clipping. That stretch from Jerusalem to Jericho dropped steeply 3300 feet over 17 miles, and had rugged mountain passes behind which thieves and robbers often hid to extort resources from passersby.

The setting of Jesus’ parable is realistic enough. Life is fraught with hazards. It has numerous bumps and blockages. Our health can fail – many have recently finally had a personal encounter with the pandemic after escaping it for a couple of years. Marriages can develop fractures. Family relationships suffer from friction, not unified in expectations. Inflation rises. Interest rates go up. Supply chains get stretched. Work gets backed up. Such are the perils of life: there are perennial problems; we may feel we’ve been beaten up, left powerless. But, will anybody care? Does it matter to anybody else what I’m having to struggle through?

But wait! Hope is in sight! Here come some potential helpers. All is not lost. Vv31f “A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side.”

Jericho was one of the ‘cities of priests’ so it made sense that a priest might be travelling that route from Jerusalem. And Levites were helpers to the priests, their assistants for temple duties, and responsible for distributing aid donated through the offerings out to the needy in distant towns. If they touched a dead body, that would classify them as ‘unclean’ and thus unfit to do their duties. So they had a perfectly reasonable excuse not to get involved.

It’s right here that compassion and mercy lose out to this culturally-reinforced emphasis upon ceremonial cleanness. Don’t get your hands messy. You might become the next victim – who knows but the same bandits might be hiding behind those rocks waiting to beat and plunder YOU?

Meanwhile the half-dead victim’s life ebbs further and further away. If nobody steps up soon to help him, he’s gonna be a goner. Will no one come and help?

The phrase describing both priest and Levite is that they “passed by on the other side”. The OTHER side, opposite (anti) where the injured man lay. Keep your distance. Don’t get involved. Stay away. Whom do we tend to keep at arm’s length? Who are we hesitant to become involved with, because they might require practical aid from us, drain our resources, force us to stick our neck out of our comfy cocoons and furnished fortresses? What barriers have you erected from certain types of people or certain situations to keep yourself ‘safe’, excused from becoming involved?

THE UNLIKELY, UNSTINTING HERO

Now at this point in the story, if somebody else were telling it, there were other options for the hero that would have kept Jesus the champion of the middle- and lower-class Jew and not gotten Him into further trouble. What about having a humble peasant come along? Maybe a poor widow, or a lowly shepherd? Jesus could have put a totally different spin on this story and not set anyone’s teeth on edge. But who does He choose?

Vv33f “But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and took care of him.”

A SAMARITAN? One of THOSE people?! Arch-enemies of Jews? Even Jesus and His disciples encountered hostility when they attempted to stop on a journey at a Samaritan village. The two classes just did not get along. There was a history, including attacks on the other’s holy place. John 4:9 “The Samaritan woman said to [Jesus], "You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?") (For Jews DO NOT ASSOCIATE with Samaritans.”

It is surprising that a Samaritan would even be travelling along the road between Jerusalem and Jericho, because he would be risking attack not only from robbers and thieves, but also hostility from any Jewish travellers he met. Brave lad!

But what does he see there in the distance, at the side of the road? Is it a human form? Is it a man? Is he injured? We’re not told whether it ever enters his mind to wonder, “Is he Jewish?” To the Samaritan, that’s suddenly irrelevant. What matters most is that the man is dying and in need of help.

“When he SAW him, he TOOK PITY on him.” Do you SEE that person over there? Or do you see a category that instantly releases you from any obligation? Can you see yourself if YOU were in that situation? How would you feel? What would you be crying out for others to do for you? That’s COM-PASSION, to feel with, to identify with so deeply that you share the feelings the other person is experiencing. The Greek for ‘took pity’ is ‘to be moved as to one’s bowels’, to be moved with compassion, your gut aches with their plight and misery.

Instantly our unlikely hero dives into action, whipping out his handy-dandy little First Aid pack that travelers back then would carry: wine for antiseptic, olive oil for soothing and healing. He hoists the sufferer onto his own donkey, meaning he himself has to walk the rest of the way – that’s a step down in terms of dignity. He takes him to an inn and TAKES CARE of him. Other plans are put on hold. This person God has put in front of me is now my new priority, other things will just have to wait.

The following day, the emphasis is still on TAKING CARE of this stranger, even if it means added cost and making special arrangements – even a blank cheque. V35 “The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him, [NRSV ‘Take care of him’]’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’” Two silver denarii would be two days’ wages and would probably cover a couple of months’ worth of room and board at the inn. His giving is unstinting, unsparing, he wants this person to feel totally secure and looked after during convalescence.

And all this from a person of whom the expert 5 minutes earlier might have declared, “There is no such thing as a ‘good’ Samaritan!”

Chuck Swindoll tells the following. A Greek class was given an assignment to study the story of the Good Samaritan...As is true in most classes, a couple or three of the students cared more about the practical implications of the assignment than its intellectual stimulation.

The three carried out a plan where one played the Samaritan victim. They tore his clothes, rubbed on mud and catsup to create "wounds," marked up his face and eyes, then placed him along the path that led from the dormitory to the classroom building. While the other two hid and recorded, he groaned and writhed, simulating great pain.

Not one student stopped. They walked around him, stepped over him, and said things to him. Nobody stopped to help.

Swindoll concludes, “Following the will of the Lord requires wisdom, clear thinking, and yes, action! Those Seminary students were full of the Word and probably had a great deal of love. But they did not see their fellow man lying beside the sidewalk. They were too full of "words" to see God's work right in front of their eyes.” He points to 1John 3:16f, "This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?"

NEIGHBOURING IS IN THE BEING

Jesus drives His illustration home by massaging slightly the question asked by the ‘expert’. Vv36f “"Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?" The expert in the law replied, "The one who had mercy on him." Jesus told him, "Go and do likewise."”

The poor guy can’t even bring himself to say the word ‘Samaritan’! Jesus has flipped the question from the self-righteous, fortifying “Who is my neighbour?” that draws limits around my obligations, to (in essence) “How can I BE a neighbour?” – that becomes limitless. It no longer depends on the other person’s deserving or qualifying, meeting the right conditions, but on my own heart condition: am I really ready to LOVE as God has loved me? The emphasis is not on the DO-ing, but on the BE-ing – which in turn expresses its genuineness in DO-ing. Then the heart change (repentance, trust) is driving the outward action. Jesus said in John 14:23a, “If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching.” Faith issues in action. The two go together; but it’s love for God that’s the engine issuing in love for other people and thus acts of mercy.

Robertson comments, “This parable of the Good Samaritan has built the world’s hospitals and, if understood and practised, will remove race prejudice, national hatred and war, class jealousy.”

On May 9 the government of Newfoundland and Labrador chartered a plane to bring Ukrainian refugees to their province, with partner agencies providing supports such as translation services, medical coverage, job interview services, immigration processing, and help finding accommodation. Later in the week our federal government announced plans to bring 3 planeloads or about 900 Ukrainian refugees to Winnipeg (May 23), Montreal (May 29) and Halifax (June 2). These would be examples of showing compassion to individuals who have lost so much in recent weeks.

Have you heard of the “Move In” movement? Small clusters of Christian believers coordinate to move into areas with those of low income and where the gospel does not have much representation, with the aim of being a faith community bearing witness to Jesus amongst their neighbours. In The Message, Eugene Peterson translates John 1:14, “The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood.” When we truly see people in need and are moved with compassion for them, we don’t pass by on ‘the other side’ at a safe distance but dare to move in and get involved.

Robert Raines relates... When narcotics squad detectives recently raided a loft apartment in a depressed area of New York City...every square foot of the long, dingy apartment was crowded with human derelicts who were sleeping on the floor, or sitting huddled in corners; dimly visible overhead were a number of...paper ceiling ornaments, left over from the days when the loft had been a dance hall. After searching the crowd, the detectives arrested six men who were carrying hypodermic needles and packets of heroin; they also arrested the derelicts’ host, a mild, weedy-looking man who was charged with harboring drug addicts in his apartment.

At police headquarters, the weedy-looking man claimed he was actually well-to-do, but that he had chosen to live among the homeless in order to provide them with food, shelter, and clothing. His door, he said, was open to all, including a small minority of narcotic addicts, since he had not known it was against the law to feed and clothe people with the drug habit. Checking his story, the police found that the man was indeed neither a vagrant nor a drug addict. He was John Sargent Cram, a millionaire who had been educated at Princeton and Oxford and whose family had long been noted for its philanthropies. Wishing to avoid the rigmarole of organized charity work, Cram had simply moved into the loft and set about helping the derelicts directly, at a cost of $100 or so a day. He made a point of not giving the men money, he told the police, because it only went for cheap wine.

At a later hearing, a variety of witnesses spoke of Cram’s kindness and altruism, and it was brought out that the Spanish-speaking population of the area knew him as Papa Dio— “Father God.” Amid cheers in the courtroom...Mr.Cram was freed on his promise that he would bar drug addicts from his loft. He later told reporters, “I don’t know that my work does much good, but I don’t think it does any harm. I’m quite happy, you know. I’m anything but a despondent person. Call me eccentric. Call it my reason for being. I have no other.”

Let’s pray. Forgive us, Lord, for our attempts to test You, to question Your ways, to justify ourselves – You have already done that for us by giving Your perfect and sinless Son Jesus. Thank You for His teaching, drawing us to not write off people who are unlike us, but to see beyond the exterior to their inner needs and potential. By Your community of faith, help us to bind up each other’s wounds when we’re robbed and beaten and bleeding. Pour Your compassion and caring and resources into us so we can help others when they’re down as You have exalted us in our humble state. We love You! We want to BE Yours completely. Lead us in obedience, to pour out our lives for others, in Your abundant grace. In Jesus’ name we ask it, Amen.

“Praying For Real” - Luke 11:1-13 - May 29/22 - Day of Prayer for Camp

JUST ASK HIM

Dr Lewis Sperry Chafer tells of a certain pastor who was in the habit of profound prayers, oftentimes resorting to words beyond the vocabulary of his simple flock. This went on week after week, much to the dismay and frustration of the congregation. At last, a wee Scottish woman in the choir ventured to take the matter in hand. On a given Sunday, as the minister was waxing his most eloquently verbose, the little woman reached across the curtain separating the choir from the pulpit. Taking a firm grasp on the coat tail of the minister, she gave it a yank, and was heard to whisper, “Jes’ call Him Fether, and ask ‘im for somethin’.”

Well, that’s sort of what prayer boils down to at its most basic. We pour out our urgent needs to God based on the privileged access we have in Christ as His children. Yet it’s much deeper than just a Santa list for more ‘stuff’. In today’s passage, Jesus briefs His followers on one of the most precious aspects Christians enjoy spiritually: how to pray.

PRAYER AS PATTERN

I don’t know about you, but I am a very routine-oriented person. To me it keeps life orderly, unstressful, following the same basic pattern daily. Some people are very distractable, like a video I saw this week of a pack of greyhound dogs in a race following a white fluttering flag drawn along until suddenly a REAL rabbit showed up, darted across the racetrack, and all the dogs suddenly left the track in pursuit!

I am sure life with Jesus was never dull or boring, even though He did follow certain patterns. Prayer was a big part of His pattern. Early in Mark’s account we read, Mk 1:35 “Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed.” He made it a priority, while it was still dark, before the day got busy. See also Luke 5:16, “But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.” Note that little word “often”: even though He could have allowed all His precious time to be taken up with healing sickness, casting out unclean spirits, feeding thousands, and teaching multitudes, Jesus would withdraw OFTEN to isolated locations so He could pray. It’s how He got nourished spiritually, He cultivated time alone with His heavenly Father.

So it’s not surprising this habit catches the interest of His followers, prompting them to inquire more about it. Luke 11 begins, Lk 11:1 “One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, "Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples."” I wonder what made them WANT to learn to pray as Jesus took time to? Did they see how He was recharged by it? Could they tell He came back bolstered and refreshed by this time devoted to intimate conversation with God the Father? When Moses came down from Mt Sinai, his face was radiant from that time spent speaking with the Lord (Exodus 34:29) – maybe the disciples discerned something different about Jesus after these deliberate prayer encounters. Certainly it can help us emotionally when we’ve been able to pour out our stresses and concerns to the Almighty One who cares for us.

What about our own prayer patterns? Is it a ‘got to’ or a ‘get to’? Is it just a matter of duty, or do we come away invigorated spiritually such that a nonbeliever observing us might want some of what we’ve just been enjoying?

I’ve been reading and re-reading “When the Body Says No” by Dr Gabor Mate, about the impact stress and emotional burden can have on many diseases, affecting our immune defences. In one experiment, medical students were given a slight injury to their palate during exams when they were stressed, and at another time when they were on vacation. The injury healed significantly faster when they were on holiday than when they were stressed. Apparently stress inhibits the release of certain compounds from white blood cells that are important for healing wounds. So it could be that if prayer decreases our stress level because we’ve unburdened ourselves to God, it has a marked effect on our physical wellbeing.

PRAYER’S PRIORITIES

Prayer as Jesus outlines it is much more than just a wish list, as if we were treating God like some magic genie in a bottle, or a divine vending machine. It’s not just ‘asking for stuff’. Prayer can be a means by which we are brought into tune with God’s will for our lives, much as a piano string begins to vibrate sympathetically in sync with a tuning fork nearby.

You’ve probably heard the saying, “Prayer changes things.” In fact we had a little plaque hanging askew over our stairs when I lived in Blyth saying exactly that. Dr Donald Barnhouse was an American pastor and author. Once he came to the pulpit and made a statement that stunned his congregation: he said, “Prayer changes nothing!” You could have heard a pin drop. He was emphasizing, of course, God’s sovereignty, that it’s Him (not us) that’s in charge of everything. No puny human being by uttering a few words in prayer takes charge of events and changes them: that’s got to be left up to God.

There’s one exception, though, as Chuck Swindoll points out: Prayer changes ME. He says, “When you and I pray, we change, and that is one of the major reasons prayer is such a therapy that counteracts anxiety.”

On another occasion, in the Sermon on the Mount as recorded by Matthew, Jesus taught what we now call The Lord’s Prayer. Here in Luke 11 the beloved physician renders a briefer version, in response to the disciples’ request for a primer on prayer. There are basically five elements, one for each finger on a hand. I love how Luke’s version cuts away any frilliness, any flowery flourishes, and just has the brass tacks.

You’ve maybe heard of Abraham Maslow’s 1943-vintage hierarchy of needs: physiological needs, safety needs, love and belonging needs, esteem needs, and self-actualization needs. Five levels, and it’s difficult to fulfill the higher levels if the more basic ones (like food and water and a place to live) are lacking. As we look at Jesus’ prayer, we can see perhaps His own teaching on what our real priorities and needs are. Certainly physiologial needs are represented - ‘give us each day our daily bread’, that’s pretty basic! But several things are different than what Maslow would emphasized. Let’s review the 5 elements. Luke 11:2-4 “He said to them, "When you pray, say: ‘[1]Father, hallowed be your name, [2]your kingdom come.[3]Give us each day our daily bread.[4]Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us.[5]And lead us not into temptation.’"”

[1] ‘Father, hallowed be Your name.’ Here is reflected our emotional need, our sense of identity. To address the Almighty as simply ‘Father’ (‘Abba’ in Aramaic) would have been shocking to the pious Jews of Jesus’ day; they would not even venture to pronounce God’s name, substituting other titles instead when they read Scripture. But Jesus’ forgiveness provided through the cross strips away that barrier of fear and formality, allowing us intimate access to the Sovereign One. Paul writes, Eph 3:12 “In him [Jesus] and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.” As Jesus underscores in 11:13, this is “your Father in heaven”. We are His children, He wants us to come to Him freely, gladly, unreservedly.

As NLT puts the next phrase, “May Your name be kept holy.” While we come in Christ surrounded by love, God is not just a chum or buddy, someone we can presume upon or treat casually. He is the Almighty Power Sovereign, Creator of the Universe and Judge of all flesh, whose wrath against unrepentant sinners and Satan’s hordes is unendurable. We come in awe, reverently, in wonder at God’s wisdom and mystery, His vast power and eternal purposes. Knowing He is much bigger than us gives us SECURITY, we are safe protected by Him. We are given IDENTITY, we come to know who we are in Christ, God’s beloved children, the saints He has chosen in election.

[2] ‘Your Kingdom come.’ Here we find PURPOSE and SIGNIFICANCE. We are not just random molecules adrift and colliding in space, driven by purposeless forces of nature. No, the Lord is guiding Creation toward a culmination marked by the return of Jesus in glory and final judgment, when people will be rewarded according to their deeds. What we do now will have lasting meaning then. The universe does not just fizzle out and wind down with a whimper, sucked dry by entropy. You matter in relation to God’s good government of peace and righteousness and justice. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Jesus (Matt 28:18) and He has authorized You to act upon His Great Commission to make disciples and His Great Commandment to love as He has loved us. There is meaning to existence, in relation to God’s coming Kingdom, and His current governance.

E.Stanley Jones wrote, “Prayer is surrender – surrender to the will of God and cooperation with that will. If I throw out a boat hook from a boat and catch hold of the shore and pull, do I pull the shor to me, or do I pull myself to the shore? Prayer is not pulling God to my will, but the aligning of my will to the will of God.”

[3] ‘Give us each day our daily bread.’ God has in mind our most basic PHYSICAL needs. We are created physical beings, we need energy in order to operate, be that bread or other forms of food. Luke interestingly uses the present active imperative form of the verb, as it might be translated, “keep on giving” - it’s an ongoing daily dependence.

This could be seen as parallel to Maslow’s most fundamental level of human need. So in this way Maslow overlaps with the Lord’s Prayer. But let’s press on to some others that Maslow overlooks.

[4] ‘Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us.’ Here we have the need for RELATIONSHIP and INNOCENCE, freedom from guilt. God as the divine Creator and Judge is the One we must finally give answer to for our actions, He is the final yardstick defining right and wrong, good and evil. Secular philosophy would have a problem right here, for if there is no moral lawgiver, how can there be any moral law? We need forgiveness for ourselves. He has hardwired humans (insomuch as they are bearers of God’s image, though fallen) - the Creator has hardwired us with conscience, a sense of what’s fair and unfair, when others have hurt us or vice versa. Guilt is real, it’s not a fabrication or some psychological fiction. War crimes are real. When we hear of school shooters it can’t just be dismissed as someone dancing to their DNA, or being a victim of their upbringing and environment. We are real moral agents and responsible for it. We need forgiveness. Christ died on the cross as the perfect substitute, the God-Man, making atonement for us when we commit our lives to Him.

But this does not just apply between us and God: it applies between us and other people. The Bible is very definite about the fact that God will not forgive us if we do not forgive others. Jesus parable of the unmerciful servant in Matthew 18(23-34) illustrates exactly this point. When the king in the story claps the wicked unforgiving servant in prison, Jesus observes, Mt 18:35 “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart.”

We have RELATIONAL needs - relationships founded on trust, glued with forgiveness when there’s been disappointments and misunderstandings and broken promises and failures, as often happens. At the cross we find grace to forgive others who’ve hurt us time and again, the same grace that we needed ourselves in our folly and rebellion against God.

[5] ‘And lead us not into temptation.’ NLT puts this, “Don’t let us yield to temptation.” God does not play the role of tempter; James 1:13f, “When tempted, no one should say, "God is tempting me." For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed.” Sources of temptation include the world, the flesh, and the devil.

Our flesh is that unregenerate part of us that inclines us away from God with unredeemed appetites.

The world includes all around us that would prey upon us or take advantage of us, wooing us off track from living for God. So you’re browsing online and wonder, “How come Google popped up that ad for something I was searching for the other day, or just talking about to someone? How did that friend suggestion pop up in Facebook when we just happened to cross paths recently?” You are being followed! Regarding the internet, as has been said, “If you’re not paying for the product, you ARE the product.” Your data and browsing habits are being mined constantly so the algorithms can plot how best to arrest your attention. Beware!

And there’s the devil, with his associated cronies, the third or so of angels that have fallen and get their jollies from attempting to interfered with God’s glory being manifest in His people and His church. Westerners are sometimes unconscious that we live and move in a spiritual environment, accompanied by spirit-beings invisible to us. When you’re in Christ you need not fear them, but they exist. Some people who have lost loved ones may look over at a chair where they used to sit and suddenly see them there, but they vanish. Was it just imagination? It seemed so real! Was it a hoax – or a gift? Hebrews 12(1) talks about us being “surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses...” We need God’s protection in this spirit-world, with our feet of clay.

A more accurate rendering of Jesus’ idea here might be what He advised the disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane, Luke 22:40b “Pray that you will not fall into temptation.” God, give us vision to spot the traps, and the strength to resist getting drawn in!

PRAYER THAT PESTERS

Jesus accents His teaching with a couple of illustrations that encourage us to pray boldly and fervently. In the first story, a person has a friend come for a visit but there’s nothing to eat, so goes pounding on the door of another friend requesting 3 loaves of bread. In Middle East houses of the time for those in the working class, there would be just one big room where the whole family slept together. Sometimes these were on a raised area around the wall, with even farm animals indoors on a lower level. So to have to get up in the middle of the night could cause quite a stir.

Luke 11:7 “Then the one inside answers, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is already locked, and my children are with me in bed. I can’t get up and give you anything.’” Don’t BOTHER me. Go away, Pest! Stop pestering me, you’ll wake up the whole household!

Well – but what’s to be done if that needy person at the door keeps on banging? Jesus goes on to say the friend will get up and get the bread for them if only because of the man’s BOLDNESS. The word can mean importunity, with a sense of urgency, audacity, earnestness, relentlessness. Jesus is saying that’s what ought to characterize our praying! Bold, audacious prayers! Urgently, earnestly, not giving up. New Bible Commentary (Revised) calls it an “unblushing persistence”.

PRAYER’S PRIVILEGE

That’s the case with a friend; what about someone even closer, a family member? What about the relationship between a father and his child? Jesus ratchets up the intimacy one more notch.

Don’t miss the little connecting word ‘SO’ at the start of verse 9 – if God will respond to our audacious relentless bold pounding at the door even more than a friend would respond to the bother of a midnight visitor in need, THEREFORE we can ask, seek, knock with full assurance it will be given, we will find, the door will be opened.

From friend to father: Luke 11:11-13 “"Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!"”

One would expect the saying to end with our Father giving “good gifts” to those who ask – as Matthew has it (Mt 7:11) – but Luke wants to emphasize the Holy Spirit is the absolute BEST gift we could possibly ask for, God’s own presence right within our lives, the Helper/Paraclete/Counselor introduced to the church at Pentecost. Jesus promised in John 7:37ff, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him." By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive.”

Ask, seek, knock – for the best God has to give! He loves you – He won’t play a nasty trick on you and surprise you with a snake or scorpion instead.

TELL IT ALL

Why hold back? Anything you might try to hide, God knows already! The 17^th-century Frenchman Francois Fenelon said this about prayer. “Tell God all that is in your heart, as one unloads one’s heart, its pleasures and its pains, to a dear friend. Till Him your troubles, that He may comfort you; tell Him your joyrs, that He may sober them; tell Him your longings, that He may purify them; tell Him your dislikes, that He may help you to conquer them; talk to Him of your temptations, that He may shield you from them; show Him the wounds of your heart, that He may heal them; lay bare your indifference to good, your depraved tastes for evil, your instability. Tell Him how self-love makes you unjust to others, how vanity tempts you to be insincere, how pride disguises you to yourself and others.

“If you thus our out all your weaknesses, needs, troubles, there will be no lack of what to say. You will never exhaust the subject. It is continually being renewed.” (Amen, may it be so!)

Today on this DAY OF PRAYER FOR CAMP SUNDAY we are reminded that camp can be a place where the normal routines and human-flavoured superstructure of daily living in our comfortable ‘cocoons’ are removed, and God’s power and design evident in nature can prompt us to open up to Him in new ways. We close with a video from Camp Mishewah about ways God’s Kingdom is at work through camping ministry, touching people’s lives with His grace.

“What are You Counting On?” - June 12/22 - Luke 12:13-21

I CAN’T GET NO SATISFACTION

What are you counting on to truly satisfy you? Is it working?

“I can’t get no satisfaction” is the title of a song by the Rolling Stones, released in June 1965, their first ‘Number 1' single in America. (Apparently they’re still not satisfied, because I hear the Rolling Stones are currently marking 60 years by touring Europe!) The theme of their song sums up the frustrations of our experience in this life, with its occasional disappointments. Part of that dissatisfaction is fed by our insatiable consumerism, addicted to advertising. The first verse of their song says:

“When I'm driving in my car

When a man come on the radio

He's telling me more and more

About some useless information

Supposed to fire my imagination”

[I can’t get no satisfaction, etc]

If we’re counting on worldly wealth to give us security, fluctuations in the markets and vagaries of the economy, complicated by global conflicts and supply chain issues, are enough to give us the heeby-jeebies. A main headline Thursday was, “Bank of Canada sounds alarm on economic risk of high household debt amid soaring inflation.” Gee, thanks!

My financial advisor phoned this week to see if I had any questions. I can tease her a bit, so I said lightheartedly, “Just one question: where did my money go?!” My portfolio she manages, although probably about as well positioned as could be, had dropped about 10% in the past 6 months. Proverbs 23:5 notes, “Cast but a glance at riches, and they are gone, for they will surely sprout wings and fly off to the sky like an eagle.” <sigh>

When we put all our stock in stocks, if all we care about is material things, it is hard to ever be truly satisfied. Entropy is against us, things wear out and break down. There will always be a newer model, better features, tempting us to upgrade. It’s easy to fall into the trap of comparing ourselves with our neighbours in regard to what’s visible. When will we ever reach ‘enough’?

Ecclesiastes 5:10, “Whoever loves money never has money enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income. This too is meaningless.” Ecclesiastes views much of normal life as a ‘chasing after the wind’ – fraught with futility, pointless.

Spiros Zodhiates wrote, “When you fix your eyes on things, invariably it leads to materialism. You fix your eyes on things and you will continually be attracted to gadgets, money, an abundance of the plastic, chrome, metal, wood, all the elements about us. You will continually be dissatisfied. The millionaire John D.Rockefeller was asked one time, “How much does it take to satisfy a man completely?” He said, “It takes a little bit more than he has.”

After being fried by Ford Company, Lee Iacocca was forced to rethink his motives and answer some gut-level questions regarding his reasons for hanging on so tenaciously to his job at Ford. His confession of greed is not hidden. Face it, it’s tough for anyone to turn his back on almost a million a year, plus perks! A guy who has white-coated waiters available at the snap of his fingers and a chauffeur to and from work finds it extremely difficult to put on the brakes. In a moment of vulnerable honesty Iacocca admitted that of the seven deadly sins, greed is by far the worst. Hear him as he quotes his Italian born father: “My father always said, ‘Be careful about money. When you have five thousand, you’ll want ten. When you have ten, you’ll want twenty.’ He was right. No matter what you have, it’s never enough.”

Jesus cautioned in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 6:19 “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.” Maybe He who designed the human heart knew something about the foolishness but also the tendency of our human soul to desire earthly treasures, material things that nevertheless are susceptible to being stolen or becoming worn out or outdated.

In today’s reading we encounter a couple of individuals that are falling into this consumer trap; and are reminded what’s really worth putting our trust in, what can truly satisfy and won’t finally disappoint us.

WHERE’S YOUR SECURITY?

Estate squabbles are all too common. Families suffer splits when heirs feel they’ve been treated unfairly. Farmland lies fallow when the former generation has died without a clear plan for division of assets.

Apparently the same thing happened in Jesus’ time. The Hebrew Scripture gave the oldest son the ‘right of the firstborn’, that is, a double portion of the inheritance. See, for example, Deuteronomy 21:17. One day a disgruntled family member brought the issue up to Jesus. Luke 12:13 “Someone in the crowd said to him, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me."”

We don’t know the details – maybe he wanted an even split instead of 2:1, or maybe he suspected the other brother was defrauding him somehow. In that time, Rabbis could be called on for civil as well as religious matters; but Jesus was not your typical Rabbi and refused to get drawn into the fray. Nevertheless, Jesus seized the opportunity to point out an important principle, perhaps because He sensed the man was obsessed with material things. Luke 12:14f “Jesus replied, "Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?" Then he said to them, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions."” The Greek word translated “greed” or “covetousness” comes from a root meaning wanting to “have more”.

God’s Word makes clear this is a common tendency in the human heart. We are finite creatures, requiring a constant supply of inputs in order to survive, from a biological point of view. But are we more than just analogous to an earthworm, which is a long digestive tract surrounded by other tissue? Jesus maintains human life is more than just consisting of an abundance of stuff; NLT “Live is not measured by how much you own.”

Coveting what others have is warned against in the Ten Commandments. Scripture points us to trust in God for security. Job 31:24f “If I have put my trust in gold or said to pure gold, ‘You are my security,’ if I have rejoiced over my great wealth, the fortune my hands had gained...[that would be sin – I would have been unfaithful to God on high].”

Is our money drawing our heart away from God? Is it being an idol? Psalm 62:10 “Do not trust in extortion or take pride in stolen goods; though your riches increase, do not set your heart on them.” Do we have a ‘heart condition’ summed up by a dollar sign?

Instead, God’s word emphasizes finding our security in the Lord alone. Hebrews 13:5 “Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you."” See where our security should be found? He’s not going to abandon us! Similarly, 1Timothy 6:17 “Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.” Wealth comes and goes, but God is our ultimate provider of our needs.

Step back for a minute from this passage and consider the context. In response to Jesus’ miracles, the crowds have been increasing, He’s becoming very popular among the masses (11:29, 12:1). Meanwhile, opposition from religious leaders is growing – Jesus has been critical of the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and teachers of the law (11:37-54). Sooner or later these two factors will clash: His popularity will trigger the jealousy of the leaders to the point they plot to eliminate Him. How’s Jesus preparing His followers for that? What will they be able to trust in when He’s been crucified and ascended?

It’s essential that they learn to fear God and trust in God’s provision. Luke 12:4f “"I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after the killing of the body, has power to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him.” To God they are worth more than many sparrows, the hairs of their head are numbered (v7). Jesus points out that God feeds the ravens and clothes the lilies, so will MUCH MORE clothe those who follow Jesus. Luke 12:30-32 “For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well. "Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom.”

Can you trust that? God knows your needs, and is pleased to give you the Kingdom when you seek it first and foremost? Why wouldn’t God supply those who are keen about His number 1 project?!

HUGE HARVESTS, TINY MINDSET

Life is much more than the sum total of your material assets. To illustrate, Jesus tells the parable of the rich fool. Luke 12:16f “And he told them this parable: "The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop. He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’”

What to do, indeed? The ground has produced ‘abundantly’ (NLT). More than he needs himself, for now. Does the thought ever cross his mind that he might give some away? Be generous, because maybe others haven’t been so fortunate? Maybe their land missed a shower or two at seasons that were critical for kernels to set. Maybe their parents or ancestors fell into serious debt and had to sell their land. What an opportunity to be a big blessing to his neighbours! He could donate a truckload to the local community food bank. He could sell it and convert it into funds to buy food in war-torn or drought-hit areas on other continents through Canadian Foodgrains Bank. (Well, at least NOW he could!) Maybe back then it would take the form of donating more through the temple system, for Levites to distribute to the needy in their local areas.

But no, our fool doesn’t think globally, or even locally. All he can think about is HIMSELF! Note how often the words “me” or “my” pop up in his thoughts. He’s having an inner dialogue with himself. Vv18f NRSV “Then he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down MY barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all MY grain and MY goods.And I will say to MY soul, ‘Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.’” Literally, “keep on” relaxing, “keep on being” merry – a protracted private party stretching on interminably into the sunset. At least, in his mind...

Here we see, in its rawest naked form, the narcissistic, insular mindset of our consumer culture, closed in upon itself. Sealed up so tight it can barely breathe. It can’t see past the end of its nose. The ‘unholy trinity’ of “me, myself, and I”. A person who’s all wrapped up in themselves makes a very small package!

Philippians 3:19 “Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things.” Back in the Old Testament, God warned the Israelites exactly of this danger when they would enter the Promised Land: the danger of spiritual amnesia, forgetting God. Deuteronomy 8:12-14 “Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.”

Our ‘certain rich man’ is in for a rude shock. Despite his best conjuring of a preferred future, it’s not to be. God is about to take a pin and prick the balloon of his over-inflated selfishness. Luke 12:20 “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’” The meaninglessness of having heaped up wealth, like Ecclesiastes said, is about to become abundantly obvious. The fool thought he was ‘all set’, but there are many things money cannot buy – and long life or health are included in that.

Paul Lee Tan wrote, “There are many things that money cannot buy. Money can buy: A bed but not sleep. Books but not brains. Food but not an appetite. Finery but not beauty. A house but not a home. Medicine but not health. Pleasures but not peace. Luxuries but not culture. Amusements but not joy. A crucifix but not a Saviour. A church building but not heaven.”

REDEFINING “RICH”

The closing line of the parable is left hanging, a rhetorical question. God asks (NLT), “Then who will get everything you worked for?” Who, indeed? Certainly not the rich man – he’ll be pushing up daisies. Who? Not the “I” or “my” - my crops, my barns, my grain, my goods, myself. Who, then?

Maybe some of those other people that he SHOULD have thought to share his surplus with, instead of just building bigger barns in order to hoard his wealth.

Jesus’ closing line that wraps up the parable points in a different direction for what it means to be ‘rich’, it prompts an alternate idea for the possibilities of how to be a truly ‘rich’ person. 12:21 “This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not RICH TOWARD GOD.” Wow! Now THERE’S a phrase worth unpacking! What’s it mean to be ‘rich toward God’? How is the Master prodding us to redefine “rich”?

When we’re rich toward God, we put our trust in Him not in gold.

When we’re rich toward God, we say to Him, “YOU are my security.”

When we’re rich toward God, we fear Him most of all, we revere Him, we treasure Him, He’s dear to our heart.

When we’re rich toward God, we sense He’s pleased to give us the Kingdom, He’s looking out for our basic needs like food and clothes even more than for the ravens and the lilies as we seek His priorities.

Being rich in our relationship with the Lord must surely be reflected in time we want to spend with Him, listen to Him by reading His word, sharing our thoughts and requests and hopes with Him through prayer, pursuing more depth about what it means to be a follower of Jesus through group study and fellowship with other believers.

Being “rich toward God” can’t mean we have more material things than the Lord, because the cattle on a thousand hills are His, and by our offering we give Him only what’s already from Him. Yet Scripture suggests when we share with others in need, God perceives that as giving to Him. Proverbs 19:17 “He who is kind to the poor LENDS TO THE LORD, and he will reward him for what he has done.”

Is there some kind of mystical link between being ‘rich toward God’ and storing up treasure in heaven? Luke 16:9 “I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.” And Matthew 6:20 “But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.” You can’t take it with you – but you CAN send it on ahead! “Do your givin’ while you’re livin’ then you’re knowin’ where it’s goin’.”

The Apostle Paul wrote to the early church in Romans 12:13, “Share with God’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.” Through hospitality we can express in very practical ways God’s love and provision, both to churched and unchurched.

And to the church in Corinth Paul wrote, 2Cor 9:8-11 “And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work...Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be MADE RICH IN EVERY WAY SO THAT YOU CAN BE GENEROUS on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God.” Being ‘rich toward God’ would seem to be linked to being generous, in such a way that others thank God for His mercy to them through your sharing of His abundant grace.

THE JOY YOU GIVE TO OTHERS

In closing - a quick story and a poem.

A man came to his pastor for counseling. He felt convicted that he had not been faithful in giving God a portion of the generous thousand dollar weekly salary he was making. The man explained, “I had no problem thanking God and giving Him a liberal offering when I was making just $250 a week. Please pray for me.”

The pastor then prayed, much to the man’s dismay, “Father, please bring this man back to a $250 salary so that he can get back into Your will.”

John Greenleaf Whittier wrote this poem about giving and receiving joy...

Somehow, not only for Christmas

But all the long year through,

The joy that you give to others

Is the joy that comes back to you.

And the more you spend in blessing

The poor and the lonely and sad,

The more of your heart’s possessions

Return to make you glad.

Let’s pray. Father in Heaven, our Gracious Provider, we confess we recognize something of ourselves in this rich fool in the parable. We are eager to store up, kick back and relax long. Too often we’re preoccupied with “me, myself, and I” – and blind to the needs of others. Merciful Saviour, help us to find our security in YOU not anything this world affords. We want to be ‘rich toward you’ not a self-absorbed black hole. Lord Jesus, pour Your self-giving love into our hearts and convert us totally so we want only what You want, so we begin to put Your Kingdom first in all our planning and actions. Guard us against greed, and lead us into the fullness of life in You that is truly life. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“A Father’s Priorities: No Divine Deadbeat Dad” - June 19, 2022 - Lk 12:32-40

MAKING FATHER MORE FAMILIAR

Jesus calls His followers to observe His commands, to walk in His ways. As we do so, the Holy Spirit shapes us to resemble Jesus more, and not only Him but also God our Heavenly Father. For those who are fathers, being a godly parent must mean that to some degree our children (and others) will begin to be able to recognize some likenesses to God in the way we act.

A mother and her four-year-old son were looking through an old family photo album. The boy pointed at a picture of a handsome young man with dark, curly hair. He asked, "Who's that?" She told him, "That's your father." The boy looked confused. "Then who is that bald guy who lives with us now?"

We dads may not have a lot of similarity to our photos from decades earlier, but hopefully we will have an increasing resemblance to our Heavenly Father!

Our Scripture passage today suggests 5 priorities good fathers will have that are also akin to the way the Lord treats us. These 5 are: prizing, providing, protecting, preparing, and preferenc-ing. These all require involvement and interaction with our kids, having an input and investment in their lives. In contrast to non-involvement, keeping ‘hands-off’, being neglectful. God our Heavenly Father is INVOLVED with us – else He wouldn’t have sent Jesus His Son, God incarnate. God is not like the so-called ‘deadbeat dad’ that shirks on his responsibilities to his offspring.

30 years ago in 1992, Dan Quayle accused the producers of the popular sitcom 'Murphy Brown' of glamorizing what he called "America's worst crisis: missing fathers". The media accused him of going too far. But by 1995, a year in which nearly forty percent of American children lived in fatherless homes, the entire nation rallied around the idea of bringing Daddy home, or forcing him to live up to his responsibilities. Congress created a bill cracking down on deadbeat dads; the FBI began tracking them across state lines.

Kids need mentors, modeling, men who can be good examples in their lives, and fathers are an important part of that. In our family life, we dads have a major role in introducing our children to God as a heavenly Father who will be there for them even when we’re no longer around. And by our actions we can reflect our Saviour, helping our children feel loved and cared for and significant, just as God treasures us and gives us purpose and hope.

PRIZING

A father’s first priority is PRIZING. Yes we will talk about other (perhaps more usual) priorities such as being a good provider, and creating a safe protected environment, but deep down a child needs to know they are loved, cherished, prized and valued for who they ARE not just whatever they can DO. Jesus taught in Luke 12:32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom.” Does your God SMILE? Do you have this mental image of some grumpy old geezer about to hurl thunderbolts the moment you get outta line? That’s not the image Jesus presents. NLT “It gives your Father GREAT HAPPINESS to give you the Kingdom.” The New Testament teaches that God is love (1Jn 4:8). How do we know that for sure? The Apostle John explains in his first letter, 1Jn 4:10 “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” His sending of Jesus to die in our place so we could be forgiven and brought near to Him is the proof of God’s love. God takes pleasure in His faith-children. Ephesians 1:5 “he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will...” Notice those words “his pleasure”. He is pleased to adopt us; He is pleased to give us the Kingdom. Luke 10:21, “At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure.” Note that last bit? It PLEASED God to reveal His Good News to you!

God’s children bring Him pleasure and joy. In the Old Testament, Zephaniah 3:17 declared: “The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will TAKE GREAT DELIGHT in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will REJOICE OVER YOU with singing.” The Lord PRIZES us, delights and rejoices in us, we are so precious to Him as we trust in Christ and become increasingly identified with God’s Son, by the work of the sanctifying Holy Spirit.

Very much the opposite of a neglectful or absentee father who scarcely spends any time with his kids, because they don’t matter that much to him compared to his other pursuits.

V33 talks about “a treasure in heaven”, and 34 adds, Lk 12:34 “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” What are we treasuring? What’s the prize in our eyes, what’s most precious, what’s tantalizing our heart? Are we prizing the Lord above all? As parents, are we treasuring our children above this world’s entertainments or gadgets?

PROVIDING

This is probably one of the more common attributes expected of fathers, but I would still list it second because that ‘prizing’ or ‘holding precious’ aspect has major bearing on a person’s self-esteem long after they have left home and even when their parents are deceased. If you know your earthly father really loved you and was proud of you, you mattered to him, that’s much more important than whether you could afford the ‘boughten lunches’ at school or just had peanut butter sandwiches.

Still, providing is pretty important in raising a family. Unfortunately there are too many unproductive grown men, basically juvenile or what one might call ‘boys with beards’, living in their parents’ basements playing video games or failing to ante up with child support for their kids. If we have a family and are able-bodied, we should be providing for their needs. That may sometimes take the shape of looking after the kids while Mom is employed, depending on the circumstances and employment opportunities, but then the homemaking becomes a way the father provides. You still pull your weight.

Our Heavenly Father PROVIDES for those who trust in Jesus. Earlier in Luke 12 Jesus pointed out how God provides for the ravens and lilies, and concluded, “How much more will He clothe you!” (12:24,27f) Here in 12:32 we see the Father “has been pleased to GIVE you the Kingdom”. So we can do what v33 says, “Sell your possessions and GIVE to the poor.” God is a GIVING God, providing the needs of His children, so we can in turn become generous.

1Timothy 6:17b “...hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.” Even more critical than material items, God provides us with spiritual regeneration as a gift. Romans 6:23 “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Peter adds in 1Pet 1:3 “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead...” What a merciful, generous, providing Heavenly Father!

Sometimes animals can be God’s surprise agents of provision. Emperor Charles V was trying to assassinate John Brenz, friend of Martin Luther. Hearing of the plot, Brenz barely had time to grab a loaf of bread and duck into his neighbour’s hayloft. There he hid 14 days. The bread was quickly gone, but the Lord sent a hen who showed up and laid an egg each day for 14 days! In this way, Brenz was kept alive. On the 15^th day the chicken didn’t come, and the reformer wondered what he would do. But from the street below came the cries, “The cavalrymen are gone at last.”

In a similar way, a dog provided for the needs of another reformer, John Craig, who was arrested during the Inquisition. On the eve of his scheduled execution, Craig escaped, but while fleeing through the Italian backcountry, he ran out of food and money. Suddenly a dog approached him, a purse in its mouth. Craig tried to drive the animal away, but the dog persisted in bringing the purse to Craig. In it was enough money to take him to freedom.

PROTECTING

God wants us to feel safe, protected, in His care, come what may. How does the passage start out? 12:32a “DO NOT BE AFRAID, little flock...” In v33 Jesus urges, “Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.” Not exhausted; no thief or moth; nothing’s going to touch your heavenly treasure or be able to destroy it. 1Peter 1:5 “who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.” As a believer in Christ, that says you are “shielded by God’s power” through faith – doesn’t that sound like a pretty safe place to be?!

Psalm 121 celebrates this protecting aspect of God’s care, His ‘keeping’ us. Ps 121:5f KJV “The LORD [is] thy KEEPER: the LORD [is] thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.” v7 NIV “The LORD will KEEP you from all harm— he will watch over your life...” Remember the castle “keep”, the most protected part of the castle? Ever drive by the old Goderich ‘gaol’ and marvel at the thick stone walls?

This week we put up a deer fence around our vegetable garden - 7 feet high! It’s actually pretty flimsy because it’s just plastic mesh you have to stretch tight so it doesn’t flop over. Rather unimpressive. And it’s not so much to keep DEER out as it is to keep GEESE out, because they like to nibble plants. But it’s still the idea of ‘keeping’ something safe – even if it doesn’t nearly compare to the Goderich jail!

Back to our passage, v39 - “But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into.” In the parable Jesus assumes it’s the role of a homeowner to want to PROTECT their property. Human fathers can be called upon to grab a flashlight and go investigate if there’s a strange noise that goes ‘bump’ in the night. The Lord God is our principal PROTECTOR.

Robert Bruce of Scotland was running for his life, fleeing persecutors. He ducked into a small cave, and a spider immediately appeared and spun a web over the opening. Bruce’s pursuers fanned across the landscape, knowing he was near. Two of them approached the cave, and one of the men started to go in. But the other one stopped him, saying, “He could never have gotten in there without breaking that spider’s web.”

Bruce breathed this prayer: “O God, I thank Thee that in the tiny bowels of a spider you can place for me a shelter.”

In 1947, missionaries Dick and Margaret Hillis and their four children settled in the Honan province of China. Nearby, a mission church swelled with nearly one thousand Chinese people each Sunday. There was an impending war between Chiang Kai-shek and the forces of Mao Tse-tung.

One day, Nationalist Captain Hwang urgently told Mr. Hillis, "You had better take your family and flee." But it was too late. They had blown up all the railroad bridges. That evening, the Hillis family heard the first shots, and soon a battle raged around them. The city soon fell, and the streets filled with Communist troops.

Then, a new danger emerged. The Nationalist troops were lobbing shells at the rebels and one night, every shell that dropped exploded closer and closer to the Hillis' home. The house next door exploded killing the entire family, and it appeared the Hillis' home would be next. The house quaked. The children screamed and the family prepared to die. Then, the shelling abruptly stopped and the Hillis family cautiously emerged. The room was filled with debris, but no one was hurt.

As Dick tucked his children into bed, he knelt beside Margaret Anne and noticed a dirty scrap of paper stuffed under her pillow. Printed in large childish letters were these words: "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble." (Psalm 46:1) Little Margaret Anne had been resting on a very big verse from a very faithful God.

PREPARING

An important aspect of parenting is PREPARING your offspring to deal with life on their own when you’re no longer around, to give them both ‘roots and wings’ as the saying goes. Jesus prepares His disciples for the time when He will no longer be with them physically. He wants us to be prepared, to be READY, for the time when He returns to be judge of the living and the dead.

Luke 12:35f “Be dressed READY for service and keep your lamps burning, like men waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks they can immediately open the door for him.” V38 “It will be good for those servants whose master finds them READY, even if he comes in the second or third watch of the night.” And V40,

“You also must be READY, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.” Are you prepared? Are you ready?

God has spent a long time preparing a Kingdom for His children to enjoy, once we enter that new dimension. Matthew 25:34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom PREPARED FOR YOU since the creation of the world.”

God is already at work in your life through the Holy Spirit (if you have a relationship with Jesus) preparing you for the next phase of your spiritual journey. He is chipping away at the marble of the statue (as it were), so something that resembles Jesus may become apparent to others in your character. Romans 8:29 “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.” We are becoming conformed to Jesus’ likeness.

And the early apostles took pains to PREPARE other believers to cope without them; they intentionally taught and coached Jesus’ teachings, forming a community where Christlike behaviour would be reinforced and His ways remembered. 2Peter 1:15 “And I will make every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things.” Part of the preparation process.

PREFERENC-ING

Let’s recap where we’ve been, in these priorities that fathers can develop to have lasting impact, just as our Heavenly Father works in our lives to grow His children: PRIZING, PROVIDING, PROTECTING, PREPARING, and now the last, PREFERENC-ing. Giving preference to others, submitting ourselves in view of others’ needs. This is a tough one in a consumer culture where advertising constantly reinforces that we should be catering to our own appetites!

V35 “Be dressed ready for SERVICE...” What does v37 imply about how power is to be exercised in Christ’s Kingdom? How does the master respond to the servants He finds ready for His return? Lk 12:37 “It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes. I tell you the truth, he will dress himself to serve, will have them recline at the table and will come and wait on them.”

Now, THERE’S a role reversal! The master waiting on the servants? That’s entirely backwards! Aren’t the servants supposed to be showing preference to the master? But here the master is serving them, giving the servants preference. That seems to be how Jesus works. In fact, this is exactly what Jesus demonstrated the night He was betrayed!

John 13:1b,4f “Having loved his own who were in the world, [Jesus] now showed them the full extent of his love...He got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.”

This was a very intentional object lesson, emphasizing Jesus’ priority of serving others. Jn 13:15 “I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.”

That’s just like God, showing such grace! Unmerited favour. He doesn’t love us or bless us because we deserve it, because as sinners we don’t: it’s simply because of who HE is, merciful, forgiving, passing over our faults when we cry out to Him. Ephesians 1:7f “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding.” Riches of grace LAVISHED on us!

In our parenting we will be successful if we help our kids become ready to serve those who they’re not necessarily obligated to help, but just want to reach out to due to sheer kindness and compassion. Giving others PREFERENCE. Peter was one of the chief leaders in the early church, yet in his letter to other church leaders he didn’t try to pull rank, but appealed to them humbly. He reminded them not to abuse their leadership privileges by serving for monetary gain or exploit their power and position. 1Peter 5:1-3 “To the elders among you, I APPEAL as a fellow elder, a witness of Christ’s sufferings and one who also will share in the glory to be revealed: Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care, SERVING as overseers— not because you must, but because you are WILLING, as God wants you to be; not greedy for money, but EAGER TO SERVE; not LORDING IT OVER those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock.”

Can we as dads, as parents, as uncles or aunts or just friendly mentors, be demonstrating that for the next generation? Not the attitude that asks, “What’s in it for me?” but, “How can I serve this person before me? How can I help them feel cared for and helped in a way that points to God’s love and care for us all, seen in Jesus?”

WORTH MORE THAN SOFTBALLS

In closing, Chuck Swindoll shares a personal story of a time his father walked with him through an embarrassing situation but helped him forge a realization of what’s really worth having in life.

[Swindoll recalls] “I remember stealing six softballs when I was working as a stock boy in a five-and-dime store in my early years in high school. And I remember trying to find a place to hide them when I got home. I don’t know what in the world I planned to do with six softballs. To this day it just baffles me, the logic of it. But I stuck them in the back of my drawer and my mother found them. My father presented himself to me and told me that we were going to make a trip back to the store where I was going to talk to the owner and I was going to confess.

“I will never forget his instruction on the way. I mean, I was sitting there just dying thinking about it. It was just like passing razor blades to think about standing before my employer. Well, I stood there and told him what I had done. My dad was waiting in the car. He didn’t go with me. And I heard my boss say, “You’re fired.”

“I stumbled back out to the car and sat down. I was as low as I could remember ever being. On the way, I remember my dad beginning to rebuild my emotions. I had done wrong, and I had learned an incredible lesson. He didn’t overdo it, but he drilled into me that when you steal, you get fired. And if you don’t get fired at the moment, you lose something that can’t be bought with any price, and that’s your self-respect. I remember, too, we got on the subject of what in the world I was gonna do with those six softballs.

“But there was something about the ornament of grace that came around my neck from my father who before we went in the house took the time to put his arms around me and to understand. This teenage kid was most concerned about my father’s not telling my friends. And as far as I know, he took that story to his grave and never told on me.”

Let’s pray. Heavenly Father, thank You that although we had sinned and fallen short of Your glory, You not only draw it out of us to confess, but You also accompany us to the Cross where things can be made right. You sent Jesus to die in preference to us, that we might be saved and forgiven and set free and reborn. We bless You as our Protector and Provider, we adore You for treating us as Your precious prized ones. Continue we pray to prepare us for Your Kingdom. Help those of us who are earthly fathers to model Christ’s grace and caring for those young lives who are watching us so closely and being deeply impacted by us. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Jeremiah's Call and Confidence” - July 10, 2022 - Jer.1:4-19

HE’S GOT GUTS (BUT HE’S NO BULLFROG)

Our ‘big idea’ in today’s message is this – Whatever problems we face, God is with us to save, and His Word strengthens us.

I’d like to introduce you to Jeremiah the prophet, and to do that I’d draw a parallel with someone in current events that shows similar chutzpah (boldness, audacity, guts). When Russia invaded Ukraine in February this year, many figured the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy would simply bolt and run – after all, the Russian military outweighed the Ukrainian forces many times over. But to everyone’s surprise, Zelenskyy stayed, and has shown incredible spunk and nerve in leading his nation through the crisis.

It’s interesting the Zelenskyy was born to a Jewish family and grew up speaking Russian in central Ukraine. He obtained a degree in law but pursued a career in comedy, creating a production company which spawned a TV series ‘Servant of the People’ in which he actually played the role of the Ukrainian president! Go figure! The series ran from 2015 to 2019 and was immensely popular. Zelenskyy then actually ran for president and was elected in 2019, positioning himself (according to Wikipedia) as an anti-establishment and anti-corruption figure. No doubt he has weaknesses, but one has to admire his tenacity, his nerve, and inspiring leadership through a time of national crisis. One would hope the title of that earlier TV series, “Servant of the People”, would become characteristic of all national leaders.

Zelenskyy’s courage in facing the Russian juggernaut has been breathtaking. All that to say – picture the prophet whose book we’re studying these next few weeks a similar way! Jeremiah faced severe opposition from religious leaders, the government, the people, and his own relatives, over five decades – but he didn’t cave in. He had guts. Where did Jeremiah get such strength, courage, and confidence?

Who was Jeremiah? Was he a bullfrog? I’m referring to a popular song from 1970 by the band “Three Dog Night”. Some lyrics were -

“Jeremiah was a bullfrog

Was a good friend of mine...

[CHORUS] Singin' joy to the world

All the boys and girls now

Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea

Joy to you and me

[V2] And if I were the king of the world

Tell you what I'd do

I'd throw away the cars and the bars and the war

Make sweet love to you.”

A bullfrog’s resounding ‘ribbit’ may sound like a beckoning to peaceful waters. Perhaps songwriter Hoyt Wayne Axton was inspired somewhat by the Biblical prophet Jeremiah. After all, the real Jeremiah was sounding out a warning. He wanted the nation of Judah to avoid impending war, and return to a sincere love-relationship with the Lord God.

Jeremiah was born to a priestly family in a village about 3 miles northeast of Jerusalem in the territory of Benjamin. He ministered over the span of about 5 decades, from 627 to 586 BC and beyond. Jeremiah wrote the longest book in the Bible, containing more words than any other book. By the volume of his writing, and the vulnerability of his writing, we the reader can come to feel like we ‘know him’ personally perhaps more than any other Old Testament writer.

We see Jeremiah get COMMISSIONED by God – and the Lord reiterates that commissioning at several points in the book (chapters 3, 7, 11, 13, 17).

We see Jeremiah enduring CONFLICT. He started off on friendly terms with good king Josiah (whom our children’s focus today was about – the book of the Law was discovered during Josiah’s reign, and he repaired the temple and introduced many religious reforms). But it was downhill from there. During King Jehoahaz’ reign there was a distinct shift in the attitude of the court towards Jeremiah. King Jehoaikim showed open hostility toward Jeremiah the prophet: once when Jeremiah’s prophecies were being read to the king in his winter quarters, the king took a knife and kept cutting the scroll off every so often and throwing it in the fire! (36:21-23) He treated the prophet’s utterances with contempt.

Next, under King Jehoiachin, Jeremiah predicted captivity was imminent (22:24ff). King Zedekiah was weak and vacillating, allowing Jeremiah’s enemies to mistreat and imprison him. Later, after the Babylonians conquered, governor Gedaliah (whom Jeremiah was encouraged to advise) was murdered (ch.41), and the Judeans fleeing to Egypt forced Jeremiah to accompany them (43:44ff).

So you can see Jeremiah’s life was full of conflict, it was no picnic. The Lord instructed him NOT to marry and have children because destruction was imminent. One tradition says he died by stoning in Egypt, another tradition says he was taken captive from Egypt to Babylon around 561 BC, by which time he may have been in his nineties.

John MacArthur summarizes Jeremiah’s hardships this way: “He was threatened, tried for his life, put in stocks, forced to flee from King Jehoiakim, publicly humiliated by a false prophet, and thrown into a pit.” In that pit he sank in the mud up to his knees... There’s a job description for ya, sign up today!!

Because Jeremiah had to face such opposition, that gave rise to several passages we might label as COMPLAINTS (12:1-3, 15:15; 17:18; 18:19-23). These are personal appeals from the prophet asking God to deal with those who were causing problems. For instance, 12:1-3 - “You are always righteous, O LORD, when I bring a case before you. Yet I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease? You have planted them, and they have taken root; they grow and bear fruit. You are always on their lips but far from their hearts. Yet you know me, O LORD; you see me and test my thoughts about you. Drag them off like sheep to be butchered! Set them apart for the day of slaughter!” You can start to glimpse the prophet’s humanness, and feel for his plight.

There’s even a word coined in English specifically deriving from the prophet’s name: “Jeremiad” - it means “a long, mournful complaint or lamentation; a list of woes.” Jeremiah is rightfully referred to as ‘the weeping prophet’. Not only on account of those who were being hostile to him; he ached for those in his country who would be suffering from siege, warfare, famine, and captivity. What would it be like to know calamity is coming on your neighbours, yet not have them heed your warning or pay attention?

Jeremiah also wrote down several passages of CONFESSION in his book. These are sections of self-examination, honest doubts, questionings (11:18-23, 12:1-4, 15:10-21, 17:12-18, 18:18-23, 20:7-18). As one commentary puts it, he “lays bare before us the intimate dealings of his own soul with God...” (New Bible Commentary Revised)

But to me one aspect that makes Jeremiah a spiritual giant is his COVENANT PERCEPTION. [GRAPHIC] Consider this snapshot of the Biblical timeline (NIV Study Bible). Things have been going steadily downhill since the ‘Golden Era’ of Kings David and Solomon. In the Northern Kingdom, a stream of bad kings resulted in its fall to Assyria in 722 BC. In the Southern Kingdom of Judah, there have been a few good kings such as Hezekiah and Josiah, but the latter’s reforms seem to have been superficial and not stopped the widespread worship of idols. Jeremiah ministers [SHOW HERE] at a crucial time just before the Exile to Babylon. Has the whole project of God’s choosing a people to be a light to the nations been a flop? Once the curses related to disobedience of the Sinai covenant result in the Israelites being evicted from the Promised Land, what’s next? Is it all a colossal failure? Is the whole endeavour just a write-off?

To Jeremiah is given the insight that God’s grace to people is about to take a fresh turn, a new form, not one tied up with political boundaries and geography. God’s going to bring a fresh covenant, a ‘new deal’. We see this revolutionary idea in Jer 31:31ff - “"The time is coming," declares the LORD, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah.It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them," declares the LORD. "This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time," declares the LORD. "I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts.I will be their God, and they will be my people.No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest," declares the LORD. "For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more."”

Totally rad, dude! What spiritual insight! We see this come true in the New Testament, when Jesus’ ministry and sacrifice clears the way for people to repent, have their sins forgiven, and receive the Holy Spirit who regenerates them and saves them from their old sin-patterns. That’s quite a shift from the old rule-keeping approach of the Pharisees and the Law of Moses.

So, that’s a brief introduction to Jeremiah and overview of the main themes of the book. Remember, our ‘big idea’ today is - Whatever problems we face, God is with us to save, and His Word strengthens us. We see that play out throughout Jeremiah’s life, in the face of the problems he encounters.

THE PROBLEM

Now, to our passage in chapter one. To begin, there is reference to THE PROBLEM of sin that’s got the nation of Judah ensnared. See Jer 1:16, “I will pronounce my judgments on my people because of their wickedness in forsaking me, in burning incense to other gods and in worshiping what their hands have made.” Let’s break that apart.

“Their wickedness in forsaking me...” Fundamentally sin is turning away from God, saying ‘no’ to the Almighty, rejecting Jesus’ Lordship. Hosea had prophesied in Israel over a century before Jeremiah (750-715 BC) and portrayed sin as akin to marital infidelity, as when the prophet Hosea’s wife left him to engage in immorality. God seeks a relationship with us His creatures; to ignore Him is to forsake Him. Jeremiah would hear God say in Jer 2:13, “"My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.” How are we at risk of ‘forsaking’ God? Do we seek water for our thirsty souls in the wrong places?

Next, “in burning incense to other gods...” The people of Israel and Judah had taken up worship of gods of other lands and the traditional local Baal-gods of Canaan, often based on fertility rites. Frankly, worship that involved shrine prostitutes and the like was just more ‘sexy’ (!) - and appealed to our baser instincts. Yet along with that in the case of the god Molech went the practice of infant sacrifice; immorality with a murderous undercurrent.

The last phrase, “in worshipping what their hands have made”. When we manufacture our own gods, it has the advantage of making us feel like we’re in control, we’re the centre of the universe – and that ejects God from His throne. Now, we may not place idols carved from wood or precious metals in the corner of our living room – but do we get entranced by celebrities on the screen? Are there gadgets or property or vehicles we feel we absolutely ‘must have’? What’s our entertainment ‘go-to’ or substance we resort to for a fix, without which we feel deflated? Are we able to let God be ‘enough’ for us – or do we worship idols of our own making?

Some instances of the sin-problem... About a century before Jeremiah, Ahaz had been king in Judah. 2Kings 16:3f, “He walked in the ways of the kings of Israel and even sacrificed his son in the fire, following the detestable ways of the nations the LORD had driven out before the Israelites. He offered sacrifices and burned incense at the high places, on the hilltops and under every spreading tree.”

Hezekiah, a good king, came next; but then Manasseh reigned 55 years (697-642 BC), with devastating results spiritually. 2Kings 21:2-6,10-12 “He did evil in the eyes of the LORD, following the detestable practices of the nations the LORD had driven out before the Israelites. He rebuilt the high places his father Hezekiah had destroyed; he also erected altars to Baal and made an Asherah pole, as Ahab king of Israel had done. He bowed down to all the starry hosts and worshiped them. He built altars in the temple of the LORD, of which the LORD had said, "In Jerusalem I will put my Name." In both courts of the temple of the LORD, he built altars to all the starry hosts. He sacrificed his own son in the fire, practised sorcery and divination, and consulted mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the eyes of the LORD, provoking him to anger...The LORD said through his servants the prophets: "Manasseh king of Judah has committed these detestable sins. He has done more evil than the Amorites who preceded him and has led Judah into sin with his idols. Therefore this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: I am going to bring such disaster on Jerusalem and Judah that the ears of everyone who hears of it will tingle.”

So that was a mere couple of decades before Jeremiah’s prophetic ministry begins. God has already determined to bring disaster; the clock is ticking. Will the people listen to the prophet’s warnings and spare themselves much grief and pain?

THE PERIL

We see the Lord telling Jeremiah that judgment is about to happen in a couple of sections of chapter 1. In a general way, verse 10: “See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant."” Two pairs of verbs there are negative: “uproot / tear down, destroy / overthrow.” Only the last pair are positive: “build / plant”. After the destruction, there will be a remnant; after the close of the Old Testament, there will be a New. But for now most of Jeremiah’s words are aimed at warning the people of Judah to save themselves from the impending disaster.

More peril is predicted in vv14-15: “The LORD said to me, "From the north disaster will be poured out on all who live in the land. I am about to summon all the peoples of the northern kingdoms," declares the LORD. "Their kings will come and set up their thrones in the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem; they will come against all her surrounding walls and against all the towns of Judah.”

The term for the visual image God provides here, a ‘boiling pot tilting away from the north’, is actually more like a cauldron, or a big cast iron tub you might wash clothes in. It’s not small, it’s a huge pot! Disaster is about to be poured out. “Northern kingdoms” points to Babylon, which conquered Assyria, then mighty King Nebuchadnezzar was on the march. The significance of ‘setting up their thrones in the entrance of the gates’ has to do with the fact that the gateway was where local court was held, governance was carried out, legal transactions happened. So to have the enemy’s throne sitting at the entrance to the gate meant THEY were now ruling, they were in control; you were their vassals.

THE POSITIONING

In view of this massive sin PROBLEM and the consequent grave PERIL, God has taken the step of preparing His spokesman, the prophet Jeremiah, and placed him in a POSITION to call the nation back to God. V5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.” The predicament has not taken God by surprise. Decades ago the Lord began preparing Jeremiah, from before he was in the womb God ‘knew’ or ‘chose’ him (there’s a powerful pro-life statement right there: we are known to God even before birth!). The Lord ‘set apart’ Jeremiah before birth, ‘appointed’ him as a prophet, not just to Judah but to ‘the nations’ (i.e.Gentiles; later on he does prophesy to surrounding nations). Jeremiah has a divine APPOINTMENT, God’s placed him at that position for this time in history.

V10 “See, today I APPOINT you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant.” What an exalted position is that, to uproot and overthrow and plant entire nations and kingdoms! Is that somewhere in excess of the power of the General Secretary of the United Nations (today)? Yet it doesn’t go to Jeremiah’s head.

See also v18, “Today I have made you a fortified city, an iron pillar and a bronze wall to stand against the whole land— against the kings of Judah, its officials, its priests and the people of the land.” A fortified city – that’s impregnable, indestructible, firm and steadfast, not needing to worry. God is Jeremiah’s fortification, his ‘bronze wall’. And time would show that Jeremiah would need that, as he is later opposed by treacherous kings and false prophets. But at the end, he is the one left standing when the dust settles.

THE POWERFUL PRONOUNCEMENT

Finally, the essential thing about being a true prophet is speaking for the Lord, perceiving what God has to say and relaying it to the intended audience. God is Spirit, and His Word is powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword. Jer 23:29 “"Is not my word like fire," declares the LORD, "and like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces?"” Have you hefted a sledge-hammer lately? God’s saying His word is powerful and weighty like a rock-crackin’ sledge hammer! Worthy of being treated like respect like a fire ablaze.

Several places in chapter one we see ‘The word of the Lord’ emphasized, that’s central to Jeremiah’s calling and ministry. V4 “The word of the Lord came to me, saying...” V7 “But the Lord said to me...” V11 “The word of the Lord came to me...” V13 “The word of the Lord came to me again...” V16 “I will pronounce my judgments on my people...”

This is pictured most concretely after Jeremiah protests in v6 that he doesn’t know how to speak because he’s only a child or youth (maybe around 20 at the beginning of his career). The Lord tells him not to say that, “for I am with you and will rescue you...” (V8) Then v9, “Then the LORD reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, "Now, I have put my words in your mouth.” How cool! That must have been really assuring for Jeremiah to have the Lord actually touch his mouth. God was assuring the prophet he would be speaking truth from the Lord. Despite what culture said. Despite the king’s opposition. Despite a crowd of false prophets saying something to the contrary! God was with him and would save him, making Jeremiah’s words count. THAT’S where the real power lay – in God’s revealed word.

Our experience as Christ-followers is similar, in that Jesus’ words are spirit and life to us. As Simon Peter once protested when many were turning back from following Jesus and Christ asked if they wanted to leave too: Jn 6:68 “"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” As today’s ‘big idea’ puts it, Whatever problems we face, God is with us to save, and His Word strengthens us.

SAVED FROM GANG-MEMBER TERRORISM

Nicky Gumbel tells a true story that illustrates the power of God’s word to save us from desperate circumstances.

“Stephen Lungu...was the oldest son of a teenage mother from a township in Zimbabwe. She was trapped in a difficult marriage to a man more than twenty years her senior. She dealt with her struggles by drinking heavily. One day, when Stephen was three years old, his mother took him, his brother and baby sister into town. Saying she needed to go to the toilet, Stephen’s mother left him holding his sister in the busy town square, while his brother John played on the ground. Two hours later she had not returned. Their mother had run away, leaving the three children in the reluctant care of an aunt. By the age of eleven, Stephen too had run away – preferring to live on the streets.

“Growing up, Stephen developed a strong bitterness against God. As a teenager he was recruited into one of the urban gangs, called the Black Shadows, which carried out violence, theft and destruction on the streets of Zimbabwe. When a travelling evangelist came to town to speak to thousands of people about Jesus in a large tent, Stephen went to firebomb the event. He carried a bag full of bombs. He wanted to attack the event because he wanted to attack God. As Stephen awaited the moment for his attack, Shadrach Maloka, a South African evangelist, took to the stage and announced that the Holy Spirit had warned him that many in the audience may die soon without Christ. Astonished, the Black Shadows thought someone had figured out their plan. Stephen Lungu was captivated by the preacher...The speaker’s words convinced him about his sins and drew him into an encounter with Jesus. He experienced God’s presence. He heard about God’s grace and peace. Stephen staggered forward to the stage, grabbed hold of the speaker’s feet and began to sob. That evening, he became a follower of Jesus Christ.

“The next morning he presented himself at the local police station and confessed his crimes. The desk sergeant looked at the long charge sheet, listened to his story and released him. Boarding a bus with the morning commuters, Stephen felt so happy that he was compelled to tell others on the bus the good news. He didn't stop there. Stephen went on to be a full-time evangelist and spent his life telling others about Jesus.

“At an event a few years ago, an old lady came forward wanting to follow Jesus. That woman turned out to be his own mother who had abandoned him all those years ago!

“God’s presence, protection and peace are a powerful combination. As Stephen said himself, ‘Because I look at myself as a miracle of God’s grace, so I believe that the power of Jesus Christ to save sinners still exists. If he can change me, he can change anyone.’” Let’s pray.

Lord God, we see Your amazing sovereignty at work in the ministry of the prophet Jeremiah and continuing on into our own world today. Help us not be dismayed by opposition to Your message, but to trust Your powerful Word to do its work in Your mysterious and wonderful way. Thank You that You have promised to be with us and to rescue us. Strengthen us by Your Spirit to resist idols and instead say and do according to Your Word. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Seasoned with Salt” - Funeral of Jim Whytock - July 14, 2022

Ps.8, Mt.5:13, Col.4:2-6, Jn.14(various)

As we read earlier, Jesus said His followers “are the salt of the earth”. He affirmed that salt is good, but warned us against losing our saltiness.

Salt has various abilities. It’s used as a preservative, as in pickling brine, or sprinkled on fish to help it last in storage. Back in the days before refrigeration, salt was very valuable for storing food so it wouldn’t ‘go bad’. In some places salt was even used as currency, hence the term arose of someone being ‘worth their salt’.

More commonly these days we use salt in cooking, to help enhance the flavour of food. In that sense salt serves in a secondary role: you want to put on just enough to help the flavour of whatever the dish is to be accented; if you start to taste the salt itself, you’ve put on too much! Thus salt in a way is bashful, self-effacing, it wants to put the spotlight somewhere else than on itself.

In some ways, we could refer to Jim here as an ‘old salt’. He had a nautical part to his life. Early in his career he worked as a deckhand on the freighters, even earning his cook’s papers and becoming an expert in the galley. A cook serves a supporting role, they supply nourishment for the rest of the crew. He enjoyed his time on the boats, sailing the ‘salty main’ (or fresh water as the case may be on the Great Lakes).

For much of his later working life, Jim was employed at the salt mine, part of a working team that supplied this valuable substance for the rest of us – whether we’re putting salt on our food or (in winter) on our sidewalks and roads.

Jim did not strike me as brash or arrogant, but humble, the type of person who’s more interested in who he’s speaking with than in spouting off about his own greatness. Paul urged Christians to let their conversation always be “full of grace, seasoned with salt”. I found Jim to be respectful and encouraging in my interactions with him.

Jim was conscious of the grace he’d found believing in Jesus as His Saviour. In April he felt the Lord leading him to be baptized, and Jim testified to the grace of God in saving him and forgiving his sins, thanks to the cross of Jesus. Again, he was not pointing to himself or being boastful, but pointing to the One who is greater than all of us.

Later, when his medical condition deteriorated and it became apparent modern medicine was not able to provide a cure, Jim did not become bitter or poisoned against God, but instead committed himself into God’s care. He trusted the Lord to work for the good of those who love him, even if that meant an earlier departure for heaven.

Jim appreciated nature, being out in it for walks with the dog, or planting or weeding or harvesting in his vegetable garden. The Psalmist talks about God’s majesty being reflected in what He has made; “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?” To Jim, what we see around us points to a Creator who has crafted a beautiful planet for us to inhabit and care for. Could not some other dimension brought into existence by the same divine being be just as good and beautiful and enjoyable, or maybe even better? As Paul put it, "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him..." (1 Corinthians 2:9)

Jesus said there are many rooms in His Father’s house; He was going to prepare a place for those of us who believe in Him. And He will come again to take us to Himself, that we may be where He is. He spoke of the Father loving us and the Father and Son “making [their] home” with those who believe. Jim’s faith did not waver even through the end stages of his battle with cancer. He was already ‘at home with the Lord’ by having the Holy Spirit dwell inside him. So Jesus’ promises give us peace even through the sadness and grief of realizing we’re not going to be seeing Jim again in this life.

Trust in God’s promises seasons and flavours even this time of loss, and gives us strength to bear up under it; we saw that peace and cooperation with God’s purposes exhibited in Jim these past months. Eternal life had already begun for him, as he walked through this valley. What a promise we have from Christ – “I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life.” (John 5:24)

May the same faith Jim demonstrated despite serious circumstances encourage and establish you, help you stay ‘salty’ in the best sense and not lose your flavour. God’s grace will help each of us continue to have a preserving and enhancing effect in our lives, in our environment, showing us how to be loving in how we act toward others, pointing to Him and our eternal hope. Amen.

“God’s Shock at Our Fickleness” - July 17, 2022 - Jer.2:1-13

WARNINGS OF WANING ONENESS

Our Big Idea today is this: “To whet your PASSION for God, recall how PEERLESS He’s been.”

We’re continuing our exploration of the Bible’s longest book, Jeremiah. In the second chapter we get into some specifics of what the spiritually dangerous drift the Israelites of the southern Kingdom of Judah were caught in. Yes there had been somewhat superficial reforms under Kings Hezekiah and Josiah, but the undercurrent of idolatry was still there – although the Temple had been repaired, pagan worship at the high places and under the larger spreading trees still continued. It was a distinctly downward drift, accelerated by the godless leadership of some wicked kings (such as Manasseh) and corrupt priests and prophets.

Is there similar drift in our day? Many churches have been noticing attendance is not near pre-pandemic levels; and that’s not accounted for merely by online streaming of services. In the past couple of weeks, Carey Nieuwhof featured John Eldredge (who you might recall from Wild at Heart) on his podcast. Eldredge maintains the pandemic has caused significant TRAUMA for people that makes it hard to get back to ‘normal’ as in the way we were pre-pandemic. In fact Eldredge wonders if what we’re witnessing spiritually is connected to what Jesus predicted around the end times.

In His remarkable ‘Olivet Discourse’ in Matthew 24, Jesus predicted: Mt 24:10-14 “At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Because of the increase of wickedness, THE LOVE OF MOST WILL GROW COLD, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”

Is this ‘love of most’ growing ‘cold’ what we’re witnessing? People seem to be less interested in attending church and more intent on recreation, picking up other pursuits, devoting their attention to other pursuits than worship and Bible study and fellowship. John Eldredge has been struck by this attack on faith. In his book Resilient he writes, "The perfect storm has converged over the human heart." He elaborates in the podcast transcript...

“So over the last eight months, I have received more text and emails from friends, mature people who are giving up on faith, they're giving up on God... And I think this is the vulnerable moment. So we've talked all about, first, there was the modern life, which was just insane in itself, and then the pandemic rolls through and clobbers everybody. Now we're in this deeply, deeply depleted condition, and the enemy of our soul sees an opportunity to cause a sweeping loss of faith in the world. Paul warns about this in Second Thessalonians chapter two, he says, "Look, before the climax of this whole thing, there's going to be a great falling away." And it's not thousands of people marching in the streets with placards, I hate Jesus. It's not that...It is heartache, in your depleted condition some heartache enters in, infertility, the company collapses, betrayed by a friend, an affair by a spouse, heartache enters in. And in that moment, the enemy pounces to urge us to give up on God. You see, he's not good. He's not for you. He's not with you. And I am reading texts from people who have walked with God for 40 years saying, "I think I'm done. I just don't think I can hang in there anymore. It's too disappointing. He doesn't seem to be coming through." And what they don't understand is that in their vulnerable condition, the enemy of their souls has swept in to cloud and poison their relationship with God.”

Is Eldredge reading your mail? Can you relate to that? Painful circumstances can insert a wedge between us and the Lord. Is your faith hanging on by a thread? Are you just in the spiritual doldrums, a desert of dryness where once there was excitement and you really felt God loved you?

In today’s passage, Jeremiah diagnoses the spiritual depletion of his countrymen, and provides some clues to help us not fall away, how to keep our love for the Lord simmering rather than let it grow cold.

THE PUZZLED JILTED PARTNER

God has a complaint to bring against the people of Judah – He’s been treated so unfairly, it’s as if he has a legal case to present, where the injustice would be recognized in a court of law. It’s a legitimate beef. Jer 2:9 “"Therefore I bring charges against you again," declares the LORD. "And I will bring charges against your children’s children."”

What are the charges? That they have turned their backs on Him even though He did nothing to deserve it. In fact He had been a faithful partner to them all along, nevertheless He’s been jilted, they’ve abandoned Him for other gods.

His faithfulness to them can be seen in at least 4 aspects: patronage, protection, provision, and possession.

PATRONAGE: He’s been their ‘patron’ the way a medieval artist survived by having a wealthy person sort of ‘adopt’ them, underwrite their living expenses in exchange for creating works of art that adorned their homes and their chapels. The wealthy person was the artist’s ‘sponsor’. It was a close arrangement that benefited both parties.

Verses 2-3a, “"Go and proclaim in the hearing of Jerusalem: "‘I remember the devotion of your youth, how as a bride you loved me and followed me through the desert, through a land not sown. Israel was holy to the LORD, the firstfruits of his harvest...’”

Note the significant attachment suggested in those words: “devotion”, “bride”, “loved”, “followed”, “holy to the Lord”. To be ‘holy’ here means ‘to be set apart to Him and His service’. NIV Study Bible comments that the Hebrew word for “devotion” “refers to the most intimate degree of loyalty, love and faithfulness that can exist between two people or between and individual and the Lord.” There was a real bond here, God had undertaken to rescue this particular people out of slavery in Egypt.

PROTECTION: V3B, “‘All who devoured her were held guilty, and disaster overtook them,’ declares the Lord.” Picture Pharaoh’s army and chariots chasing them down into the Red Sea then washing up on shore, dead. Remember the destruction of Og king of Bashan and Sihon king of the Amorites and their territories when they refused to let Israel pass through their land unmolested. God protected them from their enemies.

PROVISION: It’s estimated there may have been about two and a half million refugees from Egypt, when you include the women and children amongst the Israelites. How would you even begin to manage to sustain such a crowd for forty years wandering through desert wastelands? But the Lord led them to water, miraculously at times breaking rocks open, and sent manna day by day so they were all fed. This is reflected in v6, “They did not ask, ‘Where is the LORD, who brought us up out of Egypt and led us through the barren wilderness, through a land of deserts and rifts, a land of drought and darkness, a land where no one travels and no one lives?’”

POSSESSION: God brought them into the Promised Land, one they could call their own, as He had promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the patriarchs. Jer 2:7 “I brought you into a fertile land to eat its fruit and rich produce. But you came and defiled my land and made my inheritance detestable.” New Living Translation for ‘inheritance’ has ‘the POSSESSION I had promised you.’ It started out as a good land, ‘flowing with milk and honey’. But as they dined on its richness, they forgot God and started taking it for granted, defiling it instead with their handmade idols and immoral rituals. They did not observe Sabbath years so the land did not get its fallow rest, but was ‘mined’ and depleted.

So in all these ways - patronage, protection, provision, possession - God has upheld His end of the bargain, the covenant, but Israel has not. So He has a legitimate charge to bring against them for breach of covenant. He’s puzzled, like a partner who’s acted faithfully all along but been inexplicably dumped. The charge is summed up in the rhetorical question at the start of v5, “This is what the LORD says: "What fault did your fathers find in me, that they strayed so far from me?"” What fault, indeed!

MUTINY FROM THE BOUNTY

Despite all this bounty that Yahweh has provided, the Israelites have rebelled against Him, they’ve committed mutiny, ousting Him from leadership in favour of the Baals and other fertility gods popular in neighbouring lands. And it wasn’t just the lower class, the uneducated commoners who didn’t know any better: the Lord blames the leaders, religious and civil, who knew exactly what they were doing, how treasonous they were being. V8 “The priests did not ask, ‘Where is the LORD?’ Those who deal with the law did not know me; the leaders rebelled against me. The prophets prophesied by Baal, following worthless idols.” Priests and prophets – the spiritual leaders, who were familiar with holy writ, but nevertheless allowed occult and idolatrous worship to be introduced and even promoted. Lawyers and leaders – civil authorities, “those who deal with the law” did not KNOW God – not just knowledge ABOUT Him but walking with Him intimately. Leaders rebelled against Him, ‘rulers turned against’ Him (NLT). They sought alliances from the big power-brokers in the region, Assyria or Egypt.

About 732 BC, King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet the Assyrian king Tiglath-Pileser III. He sent instructions back to the priest at Jerusalem for a new altar he wanted built, based on a design he had seen in Damascus. The original altar was shunted aside in favour of this new pagan innovation. So God’s word and design was ignored and outright replaced with human invention.

Later in the chapter, persecution of true prophets is mentioned: 2:30 “In vain I punished your people; they did not respond to correction. Your sword has devoured your prophets like a ravening lion.” As a nation, Judah had strayed far from God; prosperity at first dulled their sense of dependence on Him; new ‘worship fads’ crept in, incorporating fertility rites and prostitution, and finally the animosity towards Yahweh became active, involving persecution of faithful followers. They had mutinied despite the bounty. But why? How had God so disappointed them as to warrant such rejection?!

Remember our Big Idea for today: “To whet your PASSION for God, recall how PEERLESS He’s been.” The passion of Judean priests and leaders had waned because they forgot how faithful He had been in His covenant with them, and instead they became infatuated with other gods.

TRADING IN TRASH: WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BECOME?

AW Tozer said in his book The Knowledge of the Holy: “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” Worship is key to life. Worship has to do with our fundamental value system, what we ascribe ‘worth’ to, hence ‘worth-ship’. Repeatedly the Bible emphasizes that, in a sense, we become what we worship.

Society offers several options that entice us, such as power, sex, and money. These appeal to very basic drives in the human makeup, at a kind of primal or unconscious level. That little ‘ding’ of a Messenger notification or a ‘like’ on Facebook from one of our favourite friends can become addictive. But God’s word warns us that such idols would lead us astray, cause us to become sidetracked from His best goal for us. To become addicted to lesser lords is to allow ourselves to become fit for the trash-heap. So our passions are worth protecting.

Highlight v5b, “They followed worthless idols and became worthless themselves.” Compare 2Kings 17:15 “They rejected his decrees and the covenant he had made with their fathers and the warnings he had given them. They followed worthless idols and themselves became worthless. They imitated the nations around them although the LORD had ordered them, "Do not do as they do," and they did the things the LORD had forbidden them to do.”

Also put alongside that Psalm 115:8, describing the silver and gold hand-fashioned idols of the nations: “Those who make them will be like them, and so will all who trust in them.”

What are you worshipping? What are you becoming? Is that what you really WANT to become? Why do the lives of so many celebrities end up tragic, full of brokenness, even suicidal? Why do lottery-winners find their worries and problems multiplied by having excess money? Why does a Canadian government website plainly admit, “Canada is facing a national opioid overdose crisis that continues to have devastating impacts on communities and families”?

The Lord wants to spare us from becoming worthless like the idols many chase after and serve. He would have us recognize He is the source of fullness of life. Jer 2:13 “"My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.” The cracks in our cisterns drain the life out of us. Tap into Him, “the fountain of living water”! (NLT)

God expresses His puzzlement at Judah for rejecting Him. It’s not like any other nation to reject its own gods. Vv10-11 “Cross over to the coasts of Kittim and look, send to Kedar and observe closely; see if there has ever been anything like this: Has a nation ever changed its gods? (Yet they are not gods at all.)” Kittim would be around Cyprus, in the west; Kedar would refer to the Bedouin tribes of Northern Arabia, in the east. So God’s saying, “From West to East, you won’t find this happening anywhere.”

But then He adds a clue that points us in a preventive direction: V11b, “But my people have exchanged their Glory for worthless idols.” He didn’t say ‘exchanged their God’ but ‘exchanged their Glory’ – do we glory in our God? Do we exult in Him, boast about how great and good He is? Do we appreciate and prize Him – or ignore Him, downplay what He’s done for us?

V13 says they have ‘forsaken’ or ‘abandoned’ (NLT) God. Later in 2:19b, “Consider then and realize how evil and bitter it is for you when you forsake the LORD your God and HAVE NO AWE OF ME," declares the Lord, the LORD Almighty.” Do we hold God in AWE? Or is He nothing all that spectacular to us?

Don’t exchange your Glory for worthless idols. It’s a bad deal. When we treasure God more, when we realize how glorious He is, how superior and excellent compared to rival idols, we’ll be less tempted to swap Him for junk.

Think back to how God rehearsed all He’d done for the Israelites and translate that into Christian equivalents.

PATRONAGE – when we’ve received forgiveness by trusting in Christ, God becomes our Heavenly Father, the cross demonstrates His love and boundless commitment to us (Rom 5:8). We are ‘holy to the Lord’, sanctified, set apart as His people, firstfruits of a global harvest. James 1:18 “He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.”

PROTECTION - The Lord brought disaster on Israel’s enemies. What about us? 2Thessalonians 3:3 “But the Lord is faithful, and he will strengthen and protect you from the evil one.”

PROVISION - God provided manna in the wilderness; what about our needs? Philippians 4:19 “And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.”

POSSESSION - God’s old covenant with Israel involved residency in a geographical location; His new covenant involves His Holy Spirit taking up residence in our lives! Jesus promised in John 14(16f,23), “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever— the Spirit of truth...But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching.My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.” We become God’s possession.

When we stop and reflect on all the ways God has blessed us to this point, what He’s done for us in Christ, the character of being He’s proven Himself to be through centuries of Israel’s and the church’s experience – we come to appreciate and treasure God more for who He is, we’ll be less tempted to jettison Him in favour of lesser substitutes.

Our ‘Big Idea’ again? “To whet your PASSION for God, recall how PEERLESS He’s been.”

RESISTING THE ENEMY

Earlier I referred to the Carey Nieuwhof podcast hosting John Eldredge. I’ll close with an example this seasoned Christian gives of how he battled the temptation to forget God and yield to despair in the face of discouraging circumstances...

[Eldredge refers to an event the previous year] “There were a couple of things that I thought God had promised Stasi and I, that not only did not come true, the opposite happened. And one of them was a real heartbreak in a relationship with one of our children. And that alone happens to every human being. We all experience heartache, okay? Everyone has disappointments, chronic disappointment in their life. But in that moment, this cloud of darkness rolled over me. And for several weeks I would wake up in the morning and wonder, am I a believer anymore? Because I had lost what is for me my normal intimacy with God. And thankfully I've lived in this work long enough to know exactly what was happening.

“I began to pray, to reject the presence of the enemy in my life. ‘I reject you. I make no agreements with you. I disavow you. I choose God.’ And over time the cloud began to clear and all I was left with was my heartache. The heartache is real. The heartache remains. The cloud does not need to be there. But as James urges us, he says, "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." This stuff doesn't go away with wishful thinking. It is in the name of Jesus. ‘No - No, I'm not cooperating with this. I make no alignment with it. I don't welcome it. I banish it.’ And as I began to share this, so we put this on our podcast...I told this story in a longer form, more openly. And thousands of people have reached out to us to say, ‘Me too.’”

Eldredge made a conscious decision to choose God instead of the lie. He stood firm in the name of Jesus - and though the heartache remained, the cloud lifted. He refused to exchange His Glory for an idol. He clung to His PASSION for God. And once again, the Lord proved how PEERLESS He is. Let’s pray.

Holy and precious God, how awesome has been Your care for us, Your commitment to us, Your carrying us all this way – and on to heaven itself. Forgive us for the times we’ve faltered and doubted you or given space to the devil or other idols in our lives. We see now in the illumination of Your dazzling glory just how worthless and dangerous those are. Show us how to daily tap into You, the fountain of living water, to be refreshed and sustained, firstfruits of Your harvest. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Consequences for Conceit” - July 24, 2022 - Jer.8:7-20

BYE BYE MISS JERUSALEM PIE

It was an enigmatic song that had everybody guessing as to its true meaning. Don McLean’s “American Pie” topped the charts for weeks and has endured through many decades, being covered by other well-known artists. Last week a documentary about it hit the theatres, and McLean finally explained some of the cryptic allusions in it.

The song is shot through with religious references. Apparently (according to McLean) the “King” with the “thorny crown” is actually Jesus, not Elvis as some had speculated. There’s an outright reference to the Trinity near the end of the 8-minute 42-second wonder.

“And the three men I admire most / The Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost

They caught the last train for the coast / The day the music died.”

Some other religious symbols mentioned:

“Did you write the Book of Love?

And do you have faith in God above?

If the Bible tells you so

Do you believe in rock 'n' roll?

Can music save your mortal soul?...

“Jack Flash sat on a candlestick

'Cause fire is the devil's only friend...

“No angel born in Hell

Could break that Satan's spell

And as the flames climbed high into the night

To light the sacrificial rite

I saw Satan laughing with delight

The day the music died...”

Commentators have tried to interpret the symbolism, but McLean retorts that it’s not a board game, he was being impressionistic. Art is like that. Consider a Group of Seven painting of an island and lake in Algonquin Park compared with a photograph: the latter is more accurate in detail, but a painter is trying to convey an impression, something besides or beyond the actual number of branches on the tree.

What impression do YOU get from the song “American Pie”?

To me, a general impression is that of disappointment, aimlessness, and even despair. The optimism of the early rock’n’roll Kennedy era gave way to protests and drug culture in the Vietnam War period. What was McLean suggesting was happening to the American Dream? Bye-bye? Is there a jaded reaction and disillusionment? McLean sees the Trinity catching the last train for the coast; “The church bells all were broken.” Philosopher Nietzsche famously said, “God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.” Then what? What’s life about if there is no final courtroom verdict, no judgment of right and wrong? As McLean sang,

“The courtroom was adjourned / No verdict was returned...”

When the music and the dream die, what’s to live for? Is the only thing left, to get ‘wasted’? As the refrain reiterated over and over,

“Them good old boys were drinking whiskey and rye

Singing, "This'll be the day that I die"

This will be the day that I die...”

The Apostle Paul described poignantly the despair and dissipation that a life devoid of reference to God leads to in 1Corinthians 15:32, “If I fought wild beasts in Ephesus for merely human reasons, what have I gained? If the dead are not raised, "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die."” Whiskey and rye, anyone?

The first part of that famous refrain goes,

“bye-bye Miss American Pie /

Drove my Chevy to the levee / But the levee was dry...”

Do you recall how last week’s reading from the prophet Jeremiah ended? Jer 2:13 “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.” Dry levee – broken cisterns – could there be a connection? In some ways McLean’s famous song paints a picture of a life that has attempted to leave God behind but ends up confronted by despair and disillusionment. Purpose has evaporated. Are humans even designed to endure a life like that?

Today’s “Big Idea” in this message is:

WE IGNORE THE LORD AT OUR PERIL – WE NEED HIS COMFORT AND CORRECTION.

Jeremiah’s is the longest book in the Bible. Don McLean’s masterpiece held the record for being the longest song to reach number one for almost 50 years! They both used symbolism, and repetition, and plays on words (the Hebrew puns are kind of lost on us!). In a way they were both ‘seers’, poets, visionaries – and help us see reality through a different lens. So maybe instead of thinking of Jeremiah as a stuffy irrelevant ancient prophet, think of him as Judah’s Don McLean just around 600 BC, near the time Jerusalem fell. Bye Bye Miss Jerusalem Pie. His work deserves a Grammy Hall of Fame award.

IGNORANCE, DECEIT, AND BRAZEN REJECTION

All right, enough pop culture, let’s get to our text! Jeremiah is a protester, but what bothers him is how the people of Judah are defiantly disobeying God. They are ‘silly as a goose’ - in fact, sillier than a Canada Goose. You know how when fall comes and temperatures start to cool, you start to see the big V’s overhead and hear ‘honk-honk-honk’ as geese practice their flying techniques for the long trip south?

Jeremiah contrasts the Israelites with migratory birds – the birds know better! The Israelites refuse to follow the laws God has set forth for their good. Jer 8:7 “Even the stork in the sky knows her appointed seasons, and the dove, the swift and the thrush observe the time of their migration. But my people do not know the requirements of the LORD.” God revealed His ways through Moses at Sinai and reminded the people often through the prophets, but they disregarded the Law.

How do you stack up against a goose? Are you sillier? Do you have Biblical truth hard-coded in your conscience and life-goals the way a goose has migratory pathways hard-coded in its instinctual mental channels? If not, what might you do about that?

Jeremiah points out five things he sees that are symptoms of the people’s deliberate ignorance of God’s truth. The “lying pen” - V8 “How can you say, "We are wise, for we have the law of the LORD," when actually the lying pen of the scribes has handled it falsely?” Those that were guardians of the scrolls and charged with teaching God’s revealed truth were mis-handling it, misinterpreting it, avoiding those passages which went against popular preferences. Do we just read our ‘favourite’ parts of the Bible, and ignore the parts we don’t like? Are we like Thomas Jefferson who went through and actually cut out all the parts of his Bible that had anything miraculous?

Next, there’s outright rejection of God’s word. V9 “The wise will be put to shame; they will be dismayed and trapped. Since they have rejected the word of the LORD, what kind of wisdom do they have?” What kind, indeed? Humanistic, I suppose. The kind that fills the shelves in the “self-help” section of the bookstore. Horoscopes and New Age and Mindfulness and spiritualism (including tarot cards and psychic readings) are coming into vogue, becoming ‘respectable’. The so-called ‘wise’ ones Jeremiah talks about here REJECTED God’s word; but we are spiritual creatures, so they turned to counterfeits to address that gap.

See v10A, “From the least to the greatest, all are GREEDY FOR GAIN...” We don’t like it when we own property and real estate values fall. We don’t like it when we’ve overspent and gone into debt to buy things and then the interest rates climb and climb. We’re not sure about how we feel when we’re in the top 1% or so of the wealthiest people on the planet and all these immigrants are eager to come to Canada – will they take our jobs? Do we seem like ‘fat cats’ compared to them? Sharing the wealth and ‘justice for the poor’ is all well and good, but don’t ask me to give up any of my hard-earned possessions, please! “Greedy for gain” – advertising constantly reinforces it as one of those ‘respectable sins’ we don’t harp on.

Our greed is evidenced in one instance by the popularity of gaming and gambling in many forms, including lotteries. Jan and her sister were on the way home from shopping when her sister said she forgot to buy her lottery tickets for the Saturday night drawing. She suggested that they stop at the first lottery retailer they spotted, and she could go in and get the tickets. "Why don't we save some time?" Jan responded. "I'll drive by and you can just throw the money out the window."

Continue on in V10B, “Prophets and priests alike, all practice DECEIT.” Truthfulness is foundational for trust and relationship. It’s implicit in the second-last of the Ten Commandments, Ex 20:16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.” Jesus describes the Devil this way in John 8:44b, “He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” Deceit is a standard card in the deck the Devil plays. Colossians 3:9 admonishes us, “Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices...”

And these four more overt ways to disobey – the lying pen, rejecting God’s word, being greedy for gain, practising deceit – result in such a damaged and seared conscience that sin doesn’t even register with us so as to cause shame or blushing. Jer 8:12 “Are they ashamed of their loathsome conduct? No, they have no shame at all; they do not even know how to blush.” It’s one thing to commit the sin; it’s another thing to not even have it register in our conscience, so it makes us ashamed or blush! The phrase “brazen harlot” is applied to someone who is so practised and comfortable with sinning, it’s so routine to them, that they’re brazen about it, their countenance or expression becomes hardened, they’ve lost the capacity to even show it on their face by blushing. Compare Jer 3:3 “Therefore the showers have been withheld, and no spring rains have fallen. Yet you have the brazen look of a prostitute; you refuse to blush with shame.”

In the case of a guy, Christian counsellor John Regier of Caring for the Heart Ministries used to say when a man is habitually immoral, there’s a certain expression that comes to his face like a smirk. It’s a form of conceit, an “I know better than God’s moral law” sort of look. But there are consequences for such corrupt conceit.

DISOBEDIENCE DESERVING DOOM

Again our main point today is, WE IGNORE THE LORD AT OUR PERIL – WE NEED HIS COMFORT AND CORRECTION. The people of Judah disregarded God’s law and correction through the prophets; Jeremiah prophesied a handful of consequences that were on the horizon.

V10 reminds them of the covenant repercussions for breaking God’s law. Moses had warned Israel in Deuteronomy 28:30 the following would happen if they disobeyed the Lord: “You will be pledged to be married to a woman, but another will take her and ravish her. You will build a house, but you will not live in it. You will plant a vineyard, but you will not even begin to enjoy its fruit.” Now in Jer 8:10 the Lord states, “Therefore I will give their wives to other men and their fields to new owners.” God is keeping the terms of His covenant. See also v13, “I will take away their harvest, declares the LORD. There will be no grapes on the vine. There will be no figs on the tree, and their leaves will wither. What I have given them will be taken from them.”

The prophets and priests were not dressing the people’s moral wound as if it were serious, instead saying, “Peace, peace” (v11). But what would result? Note the connecting word “so” in v12b, “So they will fall among the fallen; they will be brought down when they are punished, says the LORD.” When Nebuchadnezzar invaded, it was the ruling elite that would suffer the harshest punishment.

V14 “"Why are we sitting here? Gather together! Let us flee to the fortified cities and perish there! For the LORD our God has doomed us to perish and given us poisoned water to drink, because we have sinned against him.” And v17, “"See, I will send venomous snakes among you, vipers that cannot be charmed, and they will bite you," declares the LORD.” Here the ‘snakes’ may be figurative language for the invading army from the north. But ‘poisoned water’ and ‘venomous snakes’ are reminiscent of hardships the Israelites encountered when God delivered them from slavery in Egypt and led them through the wilderness; the snakes were a consequence for grumbling (Numbers 21:6). But even then, Moses at God’s direction made a bronze snake and raised it on a pole for people to look at and be healed, foreshadowing Jesus’ crucifixion for the remission of our sins. Jesus explained to Nicodemus in John 3:14f, “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.”

Back to Jeremiah 8 – v15 predicts ‘only terror’ as a consequence for people’s sin. There are invaders coming: v16 “The snorting of the enemy’s horses is heard from Dan; at the neighing of their stallions the whole land trembles. They have come to devour the land and everything in it, the city and all who live there.” Nebuchadnezzar’s forces would even burn the beloved capital Jerusalem, tear down the walls, and destroy Solomon’s massive beautiful temple that the people of Judah took such pride in.

And v20 reflects final ABANDONMENT, it’s a cry of despair and defeat: Jer 8:20 “The harvest is past, the summer has ended, and we are not saved.” Typically if a foreign king was bringing his army to rescue Judah, he would have done it in the spring and summer, when conditions were favourable; they didn’t march out in winter for such missions. The saying is proverbial: the season’s over, the time has passed, it’s just not happening – it’s a despairing lament. “We are not saved – we’re goners. We’re done for. Nobody’s going to help us now.”

You may not have disobeyed God in exactly the same ways the people of Judah did – greed, deceit, and so on. But do you feel you’ve sinned so badly God has abandoned you, turned His back on you, that there’s no hope? No matter what you’ve done, however badly you’ve messed up, there’s no sin too big for the cross of Jesus to handle. He will not abandon you as an orphan if you turn to Him and repent genuinely and receive Him. He is the God of lost causes and fresh starts.

THE PARACLETE’S CORRECTION AND COMFORT

[big idea] We ignore the Lord at our peril – we need His comfort and correction.

To get back on track, first we need a CORRECT APPRECIATION OF GOD’S REVEALED TRUTH. The God of the universe, the Creator who made your ears and tongue and gave you a brain, does not have a speaking problem! He wants to communicate His truth to you. The Bible is our inspired, God-breathed deposit of what He’s revealed to His holy prophets and apostles through centuries past. As we read it, the Author, by His Holy Spirit, illuminates us as to its meaning and applicability to our daily lives.

Look back at Jer 8:8 again, “How can you say, "We are wise, for we have the law of the LORD," when actually the lying pen of the scribes has handled it falsely?” They were partly right in their logic - the law of the Lord makes one wise – except it’s not just a matter of HAVING it, but also HEEDING it, and the scribes’ ‘lying pen’ was misinterpreting it and not teaching its basics. Jesus held a high view of Scripture and internalized it, being our model in that sense. He once rebuked the religious experts of His day, Mark 12:24 “Are you not in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God?”

The Apostle Paul urged his disciple Timothy who he was raising up to be a church leader, not to mis-handle God’s law like the scribes’ lying pen - but, as in 2Timothy 2:15, “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth.” There are MANY ways to access Scripture today (best done as a daily discipline) in a variety of formats – hard copy in several translations, or digitally on your phone, or in audio format either by itself or along with many interesting commentaries or devotional guides. Make it your foundation for your day.

But faith involves more than head knowledge. It’s been said that the longest distance is the 18 inches between the head and the heart. We need the Holy Spirit’s COMFORT, to be our Paraclete (one who comes alongside to help), the Spirit of Truth, our Counsellor. See the passages in John 14-16 where Jesus describes the Spirit’s coming and ministry, for example Jn 16:8,13a “When he comes, he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment...But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth.”

Jesus promised this “Counselor” or as some translations put it, “Comforter”, to be with us forever (Jn 14:16). Jeremiah even refers to God as his Comforter, back before the fall of Jerusalem: see Jer 8:18 “O my Comforter in sorrow, my heart is faint within me.” We need the Lord to provide both CORRECTION (through Scripture we learn, and the Spirit’s conviction of guilt when we mess up) and COMFORT (assuring us that there is grace and forgiveness when we come to God with a contrite heart).

FREED FROM DRINK AND DESPAIR

We began by referring to Don McLean’s song in which them ‘good old boys were drinking whiskey and rye singing this’ll be the day that I die’. Take God out of the picture and soon some lesser idol will take over your life, often greed or deceit or addictive substances that numb the pain of pointless living and give you a temporary (if gradually diminishing) ‘buzz’. But addictive substances cannot satisfy our deepest yearnings with regard to origin, destiny, meaning, and morality. Something that you put inside you and passes through your system cannot give you significance and security. You need Jesus for that, to give you a new heart.

Nicky Gumbel relates the following story. “At the age of eighteen, Billy Nolan ran away from the merchant navy. He was an alcoholic for thirty-five years. For twenty years he sat outside HTB [Nicky’s church] drinking alcohol and begging for money. On 13 May 1990, he looked in the mirror and said, ‘You’re not the Billy Nolan I once knew.’ To use his own expression, he asked the Lord Jesus Christ into his life and made a covenant with him that he would never drink alcohol again. From that day on, he didn’t touch a drop. His life was transformed; he radiated the love and joy of Christ. I once said to him, ‘Billy, you look happy.’ He replied, ‘I am happy because I am free. Life is like a maze and at last I have found the way out through Jesus Christ.’”

Nicky concludes, “Many people think that if they serve God they will lose their freedom. In fact, it is the very opposite. Living for ourselves is, in fact, a form of slavery. Serving God ‘in the new way of the Spirit’ (Romans 7:6) is the way to find perfect freedom – free to have a relationship with him and to be the kind of person that deep down you long to be.” Let’s pray.

Father, we praise You for revealing Your truth to us through Jeremiah and the other prophets, and most especially through the wonder of Your Son Jesus, in whom You took on flesh. We confess that like the people in Jeremiah’s time, we have sold our souls for greed and deceitfulness, to the point we don’t even know how to blush, we are so ashamed. We need You to dress our wound, to give the peace we so desperately want. Jesus, send Your Comforter to renew us and guide us and empower us to live for You, to correct and counsel us each day. Help us know that same freedom Billy Nolan discovered after so many years adrift. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“The Unfairness of Injustice -- and God's Impending Response” - July 31, 2022 Jer.12:1-13

SURPRISED BY A SHOULDER SLIDE

In a chaotic world where change seems to be accelerating and institutions and relationships disappoint, the sureness and steadfastness of God’s character provides assurance and hope. Our BIG IDEA today is: AMIDST THE SLICK OF HUMAN FICKLENESS, GOD’S FAITHFUL CARE GIVES SURE FOOTING.

Recently I had anything BUT sure footing. Most of you know I have been riding a motorcycle in the summer for a couple of years now; my confidence has been building with each successive ride. But not long ago I had an abrupt wake-up call that I needed to pay more attention.

I was riding my Yamaha 950 V-Star towards our home when I noticed the flag was up on our mailbox. No problem, I thought, I’ll just stop to catch the mail on the way by – I’d done it many times before, putting the bike in neutral and using both hands to fetch the mail and close the lid. However as I slowed and signalled and moved to the right of the highway towards our mailbox, I failed to notice the grader had recently been by and touched up the gravel on the shoulder so it was even again with the pavement surface. No sooner had my wheels touched the shoulder than the back end of the bike slid out from under me, as the rear wheel swam freely in about 3 inches of loose gravel! Over went the bike, and embarrassed was the rider. I felt like a ‘newbie’ all over again! Thankfully I had already slowed and the foot platforms prevented the bike from laying down completely, so no injury or damage was done. But as I picked the bike up I was reminded to pay closer attention to changing surfaces beneath me.

As we delve into the 12^th chapter of the prophet Jeremiah, we find him experiencing the fickleness and even threat of a society that’s loose in morals, not gravel. It’s a culture of deceit and lies where he can no longer trust his own townspeople or his own family. There’s no sure footing when it comes to the relationships he formerly felt safe in. Chapter 9:4-6 describes this shifty people thus: “"Beware of your friends; do not trust your brothers. For every brother is a deceiver, and every friend a slanderer. Friend deceives friend, and no one speaks the truth. They have taught their tongues to lie; they weary themselves with sinning. You live in the midst of deception; in their deceit they refuse to acknowledge me," declares the LORD.”

Jeremiah finds he needs to put his faith in God when others around him are so deceptive and creative in lying.

While Jan, who was 35 years old, was visiting her mother, they went for a walk and bumped into the pastor. "Is this your daughter?" he asked. "Oh my, I remember her when she was this high." Without pausing Jan's mother said, "Well, she's twenty-four now." Jan nearly fainted on the spot. After everyone had said their good-byes, Jan asked her mother why she'd told such a whopper. "Well," she replied, "I've been lying about my age for so long, it suddenly dawned on me that I'd have to start lying about yours too."

Deceit kind of expands out of necessity, doesn’t it?!

DARE TO PRAY YOUR WHY’S

Let’s turn our attention to chapter 12 of Jeremiah. Last week we were in chapter 8. We find in chapter 9 and 10 more details about the actual sins of the people of Judah that were soon to bring judgment upon them – this is after 625 BC and Jerusalem was destroyed and the nation taken into exile in 586 BC, so within four downward decades. Chapter 9 described the deceitfulness of so many in that culture, as we read earlier. Chapter 10 tells about the manufacture of carved idols, as the surrounding nations practiced – in sharp contrast to the one-and-only Almighty Creator God who made the heavens and the earth. Chapter 11 tells how the Israelites have broken God’s covenant and are bringing curses upon themselves; there is a conspiracy against the reforms begun by good King Josiah, and even the people of Jeremiah’s hometown, Anathoth, are plotting against him. It sounds serious! They are saying: 11:21B “Do not prophesy in the name of the LORD or you will die by our hands...” Kind of sounds like a clear threat to me!

Chapters 11 and 12 contain sections described as Jeremiah’s ‘confessions’ or ‘complaints’ – they are very personally, informally worded sections in which Jeremiah spills to God exactly what’s on his heart, what he’s most worried about. This suggests we can DARE TO PRAY OUR WHY’S to God. The Lord has ‘broad shoulders’ (so to speak) and can tolerate us being our most honest and frank when we bring our concerns to Him. Listen to the “why’s” and “how long” – Jer 12:1B,4 “I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease?...How long will the land lie parched and the grass in every field be withered?”

Several of the Psalms share this questioning nature; there are laments, puzzling and grieving over downturns and calamities that have befallen the Psalmist. In many cases the Psalm resolves by ending in recalling God’s faithfulness through rough spots in the past, but not always (e.g.P.88).

Don’t hold back in your prayer time when you need to ‘spill it all’ before the Lord. You’re not going to surprise Him by telling Him something He doesn’t already know! Jesus urged us, Matthew 6:6 “But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.” Psalm 62:8 tells us, “Trust in him at all times, O people; POUR OUT YOUR HEARTS to him, for God is our refuge.” Lamentations 2:8b advises, “pour out your heart like water in the presence of the Lord.” He wants us to be completely open and honest with Him.

Why bother to pray? There wouldn’t be much point in praying if God’s character weren’t one anchored in justice and righteousness and faithfulness. Notice how Jeremiah leads into his ‘Why’ and ‘How long’ questioning at the very start of chapter 12: “You are always righteous, O LORD, when I bring a case before you. Yet I would speak with you about your justice...”

Jeremiah endured through some four or more difficult decades of moral slide and resulting disaster for the southern kingdom of Judah. It must have been very discouraging and depressing for him – including to have those threats made on your life! But his faith in God’s righteousness helped him not to give up. He believed that justice and righteousness were at the very core of God’s being, Jeremiah could count on God to make things work out right. Some good verses to memorize are Jer 9:23f: “This is what the LORD says: "Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom or the strong man boast of his strength or the rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boasts boast about this: that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight," declares the LORD.”

What do you boast about? How smart you are, how strong you are, how rich you are? Those can all be taken away from us. No, Scripture tells us to boast in knowing and being familiar with the Lord – because of His being quintessentially KIND and JUST and RIGHTEOUS. That should be our primary point of reference, not our own flimsy resources or gifts.

Our BIG IDEA today: AMIDST THE SLICK OF HUMAN FICKLENESS, GOD’S FAITHFUL CARE GIVES SURE FOOTING.

We can be buoyed up in the seas of stress by casting our cares on Him. 1 Peter 5:7 “Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.” But in our noisy culture, we need to carve out time for prayer and to be quiet enough before God to hear our soul-cries and His reassuring response.

Back in 1956 Billy Graham wrote: "America seems to be pleasure-mad. We have to be amused morning, noon, and night. Television is making a tremendous change in America's spiritual sensitivity. I have had pastor after pastor write me and tell me that he can see the difference in the spiritual life of his congregation since television came. People have to be amused, and we do not have time for thought, meditation, prayer, and Godly pursuits, as we used to."

And that was back in 1956! Television was just coming into its own – we had 3 channels, two of which were identical. Now we have the internet, and social media, and podcasts, and on and on. But the prayer lines remain open, you just need to pause long enough to approach the throne of grace.

EVIL’S INVASIVE EFFECTS

Jeremiah is bothered by seeing the wicked prosper. It’s upsetting to him to see the “faithless live at ease” (v1). We have mentioned the culture of deceit, how laying with one’s tongue was becoming an art-form. Jer 9:8 “Their tongue is a deadly arrow; it speaks with deceit. With his mouth each speaks cordially to his neighbor, but in his heart he sets a trap for him.”

This lying in their speech even extends to their religious services. V2, “You have planted them, and they have taken root; they grow and bear fruit. You are always on their lips but far from their hearts.”

What about us? When we’re singing in church, do we just kind of mouth the words and think about what we’re having for lunch, or do we really mean the lyrics we’re singing? Do we ‘make it our own’? Are we simultaneously opening our heart to let the Lord show us what we need to have brought to our attention?

I enjoyed the hymn sing on Seniors’ OASIS Day this past Monday at Stayner camp. Some of the hymns were so old they were even new to me! But maybe that made me pay more attention to the actual verses. It’s a wonderful sound to hear more than 300 people singing out familiar choruses. But it’s a continual exercise to consider the meaning of the words and not get sidetracked by details of harmonizing, or the appearance of whoever is leading.

The worshippers in Jeremiah’s day were HYPOCRITES, pretenders, having God on their lips not their hearts. Pope Francis was in Canada this week apologizing for the way church workers in residential schools had failed to show God’s kindness and justice to indigenous families and children. Survivors tell heart-wrenching stories of cruelty for such a basic thing as speaking their native language. Today we say we love God, but do we recognize and respect the ‘imago Dei’ (image of God the Creator) in those of other races? Or do we still feel we’re a bit superior because we’re white and speak English? Is it easier to be genuinely neighbourly with those who are ‘like us’? Our Elders approved helping with the immigration initiative of Huron County in welcoming Ukrainian refugees by providing winter clothing for a family. Such acts of kindness and generosity offset charges of hypocrisy, saying one thing but doing another.

Evil permeates a society when unrestrained and has far-reaching consequences. Jeremiah makes a connection between the wickedness of people and its effects environmentally. See v4, “How long will the land lie parched and the grass in every field be withered? Because those who live in it are wicked, the animals and birds have perished.” Why have the creatures perished? BECAUSE those who live in it are wicked.

Look also at vv10,11 – “Many shepherds will ruin my vineyard and trample down my field; they will turn my pleasant field into a desolate wasteland. It will be made a wasteland, parched and desolate before me; the whole land will be laid waste because there is no one who cares.” “Because” no one cares, here in NIV; NRSV has “but no one lays it to heart.” Either way, there’s apathy. The environment is suffering, desolate, yet people just don’t seem to give two hoots.

I’m far from being an environmental activist, but the signs of climate change are getting harder to ignore. The extreme temperatures in Europe this summer have been drastic. When I was young, we used to have to hoe the milkweed because it was so prevalent. Almost annually you could easily find a monarch butterfly caterpillar, feed it leaves in a container and watch it spin a chrysalis then emerge as a beautiful butterfly, ready for its long migration. Now monarchs are being added to the “endangered species” list! How can we ‘steward’ our environment better in a way that does not result in the extinction of animals and birds and other wildlife? Has that being ‘greedy for gain’ we talked about last week brought deadly effects for other species? Jeremiah seems to see a connection here between human sinning and their suffering.

One small example from Thursday’s news concerning an oil-and-gas compressor operation in the southern States... “The Mako station...was observed releasing an estimated 870 kilograms of methane -- an extraordinarily potent greenhouse gas -- into the atmosphere each hour. That's the equivalent impact on the climate of burning seven tanker trucks full of gasoline every day.” And it was only one of 533 “super emitters” detected during a 2021 aerial survey! The article notes, “There's now nearly three times as much methane in the air than there was before industrial times. The year 2021 saw the worst single increase ever. Methane's earth-warming power is some 83 times stronger over 20 years than the carbon dioxide that comes from car tailpipes and power plant smokestacks.” Thankfully, to their credit, some companies are beginning to monitor and repair or upgrade facilities.

PRESSURES GOD’S PRESCHOOL

In v5 God begins to reply to Jeremiah’s complaint about all this prospering of the wicked that he’s seeing. The Lord seems to be cautioning the prophet against getting too worked up or discouraged by some opposition. His hometown neighbours and family members are against him now, but he will face heavier-weight authorities: Judah’s king and the royal court, and eventually Jeremiah will even be advised by officials of Nebuchadnezzar’s empire! Jer 12:5 “If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?”

Pressures from opponents are God’s pre-school – training opportunities, preparing God’s spokesman for later postings. God isn’t out to maximize Jeremiah’s CONVENIENCE AND COMFORT – God is out to GROW HIS CHARACTER. Get him ready for even bigger assignments, more responsibility.

Right now it’s local opposition, the neighbours in Anathoth and Jeremiah’s family: v6 “Your brothers, your own family— even they have betrayed you; they have raised a loud cry against you. Do not trust them, though they speak well of you.” (Note the pervasive DECEITFULNESS again!) Jesus’ own brothers did not believe He was the Messiah (Jn 7:5) - Jeremiah is getting a similar rebuff from his kin. But this is a classroom where the Lord is teaching Jeremiah to trust Him, that God will preserve his life despite the serious threats.

V13 summarizes the come-uppance the wicked will eventually receive: they will reap what they sow. V13 “They will sow wheat but reap thorns; they will wear themselves out but gain nothing.So bear the shame of your harvest because of the LORD’s fierce anger.” Paul reminds the church in Galatians 6:7, “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.”

GOD’S INTIMATE IMMENSITY

Once again, today’s ‘big idea’ - AMIDST THE SLICK OF HUMAN FICKLENESS, GOD’S FAITHFUL CARE GIVES SURE FOOTING.

Yes there is human wickedness abounding, people are lying with their tongues, the culture has become so shot-through with deceit you can’t trust anyone. Even Jeremiah’s own family members are apparently plotting against him. But in spite of it all, God’s in control, God’s going to protect the prophet and keep him safe to accomplish God’s mission. Treachery abounds, people are trying to trip Jeremiah up with their lies and plotting like a slippery oil slick, but God is faithful and will give him sure footing.

Jeremiah has a BIG view of God, His IMMENSITY: yet Jeremiah also realizes God is very personal and INTIMATE in His dealings with people. For the ‘bigness’ of Jeremiah’s view of God, see 10:6f in the midst of a description of man-made idols: “No one is like you, O LORD; you are great, and your name is mighty in power. Who should not revere you, O King of the nations? This is your due. Among all the wise men of the nations and in all their kingdoms, there is no one like you.” Jeremiah recognizes how BIG God is. The end of chapter 12 even describes how God is concerned with the nations around Israel, and will uproot or establish these Gentiles depending on whether they learn His ways and acknowledge Him. God is sovereign and concerned about other nations, holding them accountable, not just the Jews.

Yet this righteous, just, almighty God is also KIND, loving, caring, intimate. Note the beginning of v3 in chapter 12: “Yet you know me, O LORD; you see me and test my thoughts about you.” FASCINATING! God is not so big, so preoccupied with judging the rulers and nations, that He does not also see YOU personally and know you better than your closest friend. He ‘tests your thoughts’ about Him because what you think of Him MATTERS greatly to the Lord.

We see this INTIMACY reflected in Jesus teaching His followers to call God “Our Father”, “Abba/Papa”. This is a Heavenly Father who ‘gives good gifts to those who ask Him’ (Mt 7:11 – isn’t that an appropriate verse reference?!). This Abba/Papa knows the number of hairs on our head (Mt 10:20). Now THAT’S detailed intimate knowledge!

Yes it’s a great big world, at times a scary and unpredictable world. There are plenty of people out there wanting to trip you up and scam you and profit at your expense, kick you to the curb even. But God SEES you and KNOWS you, He’s got you in His faithful care.

[big idea] AMIDST THE SLICK OF HUMAN FICKLENESS, GOD’S FAITHFUL CARE GIVES SURE FOOTING.

DESPITE THE WORST EBBS AND FLOWS

Helen Roseveare was a British medical missionary in the Congo uprising when the Mau-Mau revolutionaries invaded. She was brutally attacked. This pure, godly, gracious, innocent woman of God was raped, assaulted, humiliated, hanging on with her life to a faith that would not be shaken. While recovering from that horrible event, Helen and the Lord grew closer together than they had ever been before. She wrote a statement in the form of a question that every person needs to ask herself or himself: “Can you thank Me for trusting you with this experience, even if I never tell you why?”

God’s faithful care gives us assurance even if we never find out the ‘why’s’ for some of our questions and experiences.

In closing, here’s a prayer by Chuck Swindoll riffing off a quote by Vincent Van Gogh, who once said, “There’s ebb and flow, but the sea remains the sea.” That’s a helpful metaphor considering life’s ups and downs. Let’s pray.

“Dear Lord, Today I thought of the words of Vincent Van Gogh. It is true that there is an ebb and flow but the sea remains the sea. You, oh God, are the sea. Although I experience many ups and downs in my emotions and often feel great shifts and changes in my inner life, You remain the same. Your sameness is not the sameness of a rock, but the sameness of a faithful lover. I am sustained and to Your love I am always called back. My only real temptation is to doubt Your love, to think of myself as beyond Your love, to remove myself from the healing radiance of Your love. To do these things is to move into the darkness of despair. / Oh Lord, sea of love and goodness, let me not fear too much the storms or winds of my daily life. And, let me know that there is ebb and flow, but that the sea remains the sea. Amen.”

“Gone to Pot: God's Mercy in Warning – and Our Resistance” - August 7, 2022 - Jer. 18:1-17

CHANGE YOUR MIND?

It can be easy or hard to change our mind – depending whether or not we WANT to!

A young second lieutenant at an army base discovered that he had no change when he was about to buy a soft drink form a vending machine. He stopped a passing private and asked him, "Do you have change for a dollar?" The private said cheerfully, "I think so.Let me check." The lieutenant drew himself up stiffly and said, "Soldier, that's no way to address an officer.We'll start all over again.Do you have change for a dollar?" The private came to attention, saluted smartly, and said, "Sir, No, sir!"

What exactly was it that went on there? A little bit of pressure, a little coercion, can go a long way – but not always in the desired direction. Our pride gets in the way, we can get our back up and become resistant when someone seems to be trying to get us to do something we don’t like. Our stubbornness kicks in.

In today’s reading in Jeremiah, the Lord through the prophet tried to show the people they had a real choice: they could change their mind, change their ways, and avoid disaster. He was offering them a real opportunity to spare themselves much grief and get back on track. But their stubbornness kicked in and they persisted in going their own way, worshipping idols and perverting justice. They preferred their own brackish pools instead of the Lord, who was offering them a spring of living water.

Our “Big Idea” for today: it’s a question, a mystery – “WHY DO HARD HEARTS RESIST A GOOD GOD DESPITE WINSOME WARNING?!”

A HARD HEART’S HARVEST

It’s been wonderful these past weeks seeing the season’s harvest starting to make its way in off the farm fields – hay, wheat, straw. Roadside stands have begun to offer fresh sweet corn for sale. Especially encouraging to hear that a ship of Ukrainian wheat was finally able to leave that nation’s port on its way to markets to feed the world’s hungry.

But there are non-agricultural harvests too. We talked last week about a person reaping what they sow. As Paul pointed out, Galatians 6:8f “The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”

The problem is – it doesn’t come NATURALLY to do good; what tends to come naturally (what pleases our ‘flesh’) is to do good to OURSELVES, to be selfish, to foster our own comfort and feed our appetites. See the way the Lord describes the hearts of the people of Judah in Jer 18:12, “But they will reply, ‘It’s no use.We will continue with our own plans; each of us will follow the stubbornness of his evil heart.’”

That’s a bit of a ‘stock phrase’ with Jeremiah; back in chapter 13 the Lord had the prophet conduct an object lesson. He bought a new linen belt, and wore it for a while so others saw it. Later God told him to pack it in a crevice in the rocks, so he did. Many days later God sent him back to retrieve it, but the fresh linen belt had been ruined by being sunk in the ground; it was ‘completely useless’ (13:8).

What was the moral of the enacted parable? God was about to ruin the pride of Judah and Jerusalem. 13:10 “These wicked people, who refuse to listen to my words, who follow the stubbornness of their hearts and go after other gods to serve and worship them, will be like this belt— completely useless!” Pride and selfishness are ruinous, wasting.

Back to chapter 18; this phrase, “each of us will follow the stubbornness of his evil heart.” We see various harvests from these stubborn evil hearts. A first harvest is PLANS. 18:12 “But they will reply, ‘It’s no use. We will continue with our own PLANS...’”

Because they turned away from God, where did those plans have them turning TO? Towards other gods. V15 “Yet my people have forgotten me; they burn incense to worthless IDOLS, which made them STUMBLE in their ways and in the ancient paths. They made them walk in bypaths and on roads not built up.” Worthless IDOLS led them to STUMBLE, they left the right path and took moral shortcuts, detours, using false weights in their trading, cheating the poor, becoming skilled in lying and deception.

More consequences would be harvested from their immoral actions and worship of false gods. V16 “Their land will be laid waste, an object of lasting scorn; all who pass by will be appalled and will shake their heads.” The land would be devastated and pillaged by invading armies and raiders. Passersby would scoff and hold God’s people in contempt for what had happened.

Another harvest they would reap would be EXILE. V17 “Like a wind from the east, I will scatter them before their enemies; I will show them my back and not my face in the day of their disaster."” Not only would God scatter them to other lands and send them away as prisoners to Babylon, He would refuse to answer them when they cried out on the day of destruction. They had turned their back on God: so He would turn His back on them. Compare what the people had done in Jer 2:27, “They say to wood, ‘You are my father,’ and to stone, ‘You gave me birth.’ They HAVE TURNED THEIR BACKS TO ME and not their faces; yet when they are in trouble, they say, ‘Come and save us!’”

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Sow a thought and you reap an action; sow an act and you reap a habit; sow a habit and you reap a character; sow a character and you reap a destiny.” What are YOU sowing and reaping? What’s your behavioural ‘harvest’? Read through the news headlines and you will probably agree the hardness and evil of the human heart can be astounding. Malcolm Muggeridge was a journalist and author who witnessed many notable events in his lifetime; he observed, “The depravity of man is at once the most empirically verifiable reality but at the same time the most intellectually resisted fact.”

In the previous chapter, Jeremiah summed up succinctly the lowest common denominator for humans: Jer 17:9, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.Who can understand it?” It’s both a sage observation and an implicit plea for deliverance. Who can rescue us from the harvest our evil hard hearts sow?

Jewel Shuping, now around 37 years old from North Carolina, reportedly has Body Integrity Identity Disorder. That’s a psychological condition where healthy people believe they are meant to be disabled. Ms Shuping fantasised since she was young about being blind. Now, I worked with blind people for 2 years in Congo with Christian Blind Mission International. We taught them farming and handicrafts and other skills so they could earn a livelihood; it was very admirable what some of those blind people could do! One fellow used a form to make concrete blocks. But WANTING to be blind when you have the ability to see would be hard for me to fathom. Sight is such a wonderful gift from God!

Nevertheless, Ms Shuping persisted in her fantasising. As a teen she started to wear thick black sunglasses. She got her first white cane at 18, and was fully fluent in braille by 20. Then in 2006 she found a psychologist willing to pour drain cleaner in her eyes to help her fulfill her wish to become blind. How awful! How sick! I don’t know which is more twisted – wanting to be blind and going through with it, or being a medical professional actually willing to provide that service.

“The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.Who can understand it?” “We will continue to live as we want to, stubbornly following our own evil desires.” (NLT)

THE POSITIVE, PERSISTENT POTTER

The visuals prophets use can be quite arresting. God told Jeremiah to go down to a certain potter’s house, where God would give Jeremiah His message. Let’s read what happened in vv2B-4: “So I went down to the potter’s house, and I saw him working at the wheel.But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.”

It’s a very simple yet profound analogy, pointing to both divine sovereignty and creaturely responsibility. On the one hand, God’s sovereignty. As an earlier prophet, Jeremiah’s predecessor Isaiah, wrote: Isaiah 64:8 “Yet, O LORD, you are our Father.We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.”

God begins to interpret the parable of the potter to the prophet. Jer 18:5f “Then the word of the LORD came to me: "O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter does?" declares the LORD. "Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel."” So far, simple enough, the analogy seems straightforward: God as Creator has the right to do as He pleases with what He has made.

This is the emphasis the apostle Paul parks on in Romans 9. There Paul is wrestling with the puzzle of why Jewish people are not being very receptive to the good news about Jesus, while the church is growing amongst the Gentiles. Paul is adamant God can have mercy or harden whomever He wants to. Romans 9:20-24 “But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’" Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use? What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath— prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory— even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?”

Yes, God as ‘potter’ absolutely has the right to fashion objects as He chooses, whether for wrath or to receive mercy. God does not ‘owe it to anybody’ to make sure they get into heaven; He is absolutely just in condemning sinners to hell, otherwise heaven and His presence would be tainted. Knowing that should heighten our appreciation as believers for His mercy and grace to us.

Yet there’s another layer to Jeremiah’s object lesson. That particular lump of clay seems somehow uncooperative; there’s something about it that resists being made into the original design the potter had in mind. The text says the clay “was marred in his hands”, same word in Hebrew as the “ruined” linen belt back in chapter 13(7), spoiled, wrecked. The clay is giving the potter push-back! But that doesn’t faze the potter; he just goes on to make something different out of that uncooperative lump. He ‘formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.’ (4)

Seems like there’s another element at play here BESIDES simply God’s sovereignty, the Lord’s ‘right’ to do as He pleases with what He’s made.

Recall our BIG IDEA for today: “WHY DO HARD HEARTS RESIST A GOOD GOD DESPITE WINSOME WARNING?!”

WET PAINT: GOD’S WARNINGS AS CARING

Recently I was re-painting some Muskoka chairs we’d had repaired. Unfortunately I also succeeded in painting a fair amount of my coveralls! Have you seen those signs that say, “Wet paint”? They are NOT invitations to have you leave your fingerprints on the freshly painted wall. The sign is a warning placed there with a benevolent purpose, namely to spare you the grief of accidentally getting paint on your hand, your body, or your clothing – and consequently on whatever else you touch.

Jeremiah was continually showing people “Wet Paint” signs as it were – not to make them feel startled or bad, but to spare them grief. God’s purpose in warning us about evil is beneveolent, He’s warning us because He cares about us and wants to spare us the grief that comes as a result of transgressing His ways, His design for loving human relationships and community, and His design for meaningful divine-human fellowship.

Look closely at the “if-then” pairings in verses 7-10: “IF at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed, and IF that nation I warned repents of its evil, THEN I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned. And IF at another time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be built up and planted, and IF it does evil in my sight and does not obey me, THEN I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it.”

God is sovereign, but that doesn’t mean He’s dealing with merely passive agents; the clay can be uncooperative, it plays an ACTIVE role interacting with the potter. The clay has a mind of its own. Here we get into the mystery of the interplay of divine sovereignty and human responsibility. Reformed theologians emphasize God’s sovereignty, Anabaptists point out human agency, freedom, responsibility. The choice God is offering does seem to be a real choice. When we humans make a decision, we experience it as true freedom, we sense we have the option of going one way or the other. Yet in the big picture you can see the Sanhedrin and Herod and Pilate all making free (to them) meaningful choices with fallen or evil motives, yet somehow God’s sovereign purpose governs the whole proceeding to bring about His desired objective.

God’s saying if He announces destruction for a nation but it repents, then God will change His plans and not bring the disaster. Conversely, if He announces a nation will be built up, but it does evil and is disobedient, He will reconsider the good He had intended for it.

Is God being fickle or wishy-washy? Does He change His mind on a whim? Is He arbitrary and temperamental like the gods of the Greek pantheon – you want to catch Him on a good day? No. God is faithful, trustworthy, true, He can be counted on, He keeps His word. Numbers 23:19 “God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?”

Yet, God is making the point that He IS responsive to human willingness. Our choices are not predetermined or robotic, they are real choices; love is not coerced, but a free response of the creature to the Creator. (Mind you, human fallenness and original sin get in the way of mortals even WANTING a relationship with God; we need His Spirit to regenerate us, to awaken us and give us that capacity. We were ‘dead’ in our trespasses and sins before the gospel came along.)

God is a communicating God, the prophets and apostles and Jesus in His teaching ministry were all vehicles of God’s revealing Himself, making His ways known so we could have our sins identified and forgiven and come into a relationship with Him. His warnings through the prophets are “wet paint” signs to help us, for our benefit, to spare us the grief sin would trap us in by its consequences.

Jeremiah’s words to his countrymen reveal the fairness and mercy of a just, holy, revelatory God who genuinely cares about them and wants what’s best for them. Rather than just letting them stumble blindly on their way. Hear v11, “"Now therefore say to the people of Judah and those living in Jerusalem, ‘This is what the LORD says: Look! I am preparing a disaster for you and devising a plan against you. So turn from your evil ways, each one of you, and reform your ways and your actions.’”

The goal is not perdition but salvation, not condemnation and death but repentance and life. “Turn from your evil ways! Reform your actions!”

It’s a stern warning, yes, but underneath is a loving desire for people to come to their Maker and be healed. Along the lines of Ezekiel 33:11, “Say to them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, O house of Israel?’” God gets no jollies out of consigning anyone to hell. There’s no pleasure for Him in that, at all!

A PERNICIOUS PUZZLE

Now, let’s say you know some IDIOT (or prankster?) is going to come along and sit in those bright yellow Muskoka chairs you just painted – EVEN IF you put those large ‘wet paint’ signs up. Would you be pleased? What might your attitude be towards individuals that would do that? And, do you even bother putting up the ‘wet paint’ signs, if that’s how they’re going to behave?

Yes, God is sovereign. Yes, humans have a degree of free will and are responsible for their actions (as Judas was still responsible for betraying Jesus). BUT God still has foreknowledge of events. All time is but a fishbowl from God’s perspective, He can see the beginning and the end, He can look at it from any angle He pleases. Space-time is His construct.

He KNOWS those mischief-makers are going to come along and sit in the chair, wreck the paint job. Does He still put up the ‘wet paint’ sign?

That’s EXACTLY why He’s commissioned Jeremiah to be His spokesman to a rebellious people. He’s still going to warn them, regardless, even though HE KNOWS they won’t heed His words. Vv12-15a, “BUT THEY WILL REPLY, ‘It’s no use.We will continue with our own plans; each of us will follow the stubbornness of his evil heart.’" Therefore this is what the LORD says: "Inquire among the nations: Who has ever heard anything like this? A most horrible thing has been done by Virgin Israel. Does the snow of Lebanon ever vanish from its rocky slopes? Do its cool waters from distant sources ever cease to flow? Yet my people have forgotten me; they burn incense to worthless idols..."”

It’s a pernicious puzzle. It seems like God just can’t understand it: WHY would they resist His invitation? Why don’t they heed His warning? It’s like you could ask some rhetorical question, something painfully obvious – “Does water flow uphill? Can pigs fly?” ‘Of course not’ is the expected answer. Yet, WHY have God’s special people forgotten Him, and turned to worship of false gods instead?!

Some of the mountains in the Lebanon range towered over 10,000 feet above sea level – their snow-capped peaks provided welcome fresh water even in the heat of a Mediterranean summer. You could count on it, like icebergs drifting past the coast of Newfoundland having broken off from far away Arctic sources, principally western Greenland. It would be super strange if that didn’t happen.

Again, our BIG IDEA today - WHY DO HARD HEARTS RESIST A GOOD GOD DESPITE WINSOME WARNING?

So, focus not on the warning but see beneath it to the yearning of the Lord for His people to take heed and come back to Him. To destroy their idols; to start loving their neighbour as He’d instructed them. To care for others the way He cared for them and wanted to spare them catastrophe.

There are parallels in the New Testament. Jesus explaining to Nicodemus both how God ‘so loved the world’ in John 3:16 but also warning two verses later, John 3:18 “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.”

See Jesus’ tears as He weeps over the city of Jerusalem that’s rejecting Him, Luke 19:41f “As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it and said, "If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace— but now it is hidden from your eyes.”

Hear Jesus invitation in Revelation 3:20, “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.” Jeremiah knew the Lord is “the spring of living water” (17:13) – why do we persist in rejecting Him and hewing our own ‘broken cisterns’ that can hold no water?! (2:13)

I close with the response one of our congregation wrote on their membership application in response to the question, “How did your life change after you received Christ?” This person recalls – “I remember feeling immediately lighter and an intense sense of joy, even though I was very young at the time I can still remember the place, the weather that day, and how I felt after. My life changed more dramatically in my 20's as I sought to follow Christ as my Lord and not just my saviour. I see His hand at work in my life daily as He demonstrates both His attentiveness to the smallest details, and His capacity to sustain me through intensely hard times as well.” Let’s pray.

Lord, it is so true – You are the potter, we are the clay; our lives are in Your hands. Forgive us for the times we resist Your touch, Your nudges, we kick against the goads. Show us the idols we have yet to let go of. Thank You for Your great mercy and patience, and Your grace in fashioning something beautiful for Your glorious Kingdom out of mere lumps of clay. Help us share that wonderful message with others, grounded in Your loving care. In Christ, Amen.

“A Marvelous Hope Offsetting Temporary Troubles” - August 28, 2022 - 2Thess.1(1-12)

CHECK IF YOU’RE IN TROUBLE

There are many kinds of trouble you can find yourself in through life: relationship troubles, health troubles, financial troubles. However if you’re in the latter category, it’s not recommended you resort to crime in order to get money, because that lands you in even more trouble.

For instance: Robbers in training can learn a thing or two from Kenneth Richardson. Lesson No.1: Do not use your cheque stub as a holdup note when attempting to commit a bank robbery. Richardson, 40, of Moncks Corner found that out after he was arrested and charged with entering a First Citizens Bank branch with intent to steal. Investigators called to the scene said a man had handed a teller a note demanding cash. When police inspected the note, they found Richardson's name and Social Security number on the top. The note was written on a cheque stub!

Further, here’s Lesson No.2 for fledgling criminals: If you're going to go to the trouble of committing a serious crime, make sure it's at least worth your time. Police said Richardson’s attempted bank robbery yielded only $85. Bail was set at $300,000!

The early followers of Jesus in Thessalonica found themselves encountering troubles of a different sort. They were being persecuted for their faith. The Apostle Paul wrote to encourage them to stand strong despite the troubles they were facing. Their hope was not in a sudden surplus of cash such as might be had by robbing a bank or committing other crime. Instead, Paul reminds them their hope lay in Jesus who would be revealed to rescue them from their stress, and reward them for their faith and share His glory with them because of the kind of people they were becoming through the testing.

Today’s “Big Idea” is this: WHEN TROUBLES PERPLEX, JESUS’ COMING PROTECTS, HIS GLORY CONNECTS.

WHEN TROUBLES PERPLEX

The letters to the Thessalonians were written to believers in the city of Thessalonica, a large city (perhaps 200,000 inhabitants), a capital of its district in Macedonia. It held an important location near the Aegean Sea and on the Via Egnatia or Egnatian Way, a sort of ‘superhighway’ of the time connecting Rome to it far-flung colonies all the way to Constantinople – about 20 feet wide and paved with stones or hard sand [SEE MAP]. A very strategic location for spreading the gospel. Paul had planted a fledgling church in Thessalonica, but it was only 3 weeks before some Jews, jealous of Paul’s influence and growing popularity, formed a mob and started a riot. Paul’s host Jason was forced to post bond and send Paul and companion Silas away. (See Acts 17:1-9) So Paul would understandably have been anxious to know how the infant church was making out, based on just three short weeks of instruction. Later Timothy brought back a good report to Paul when the latter was at Corinth, which must have caused Paul to rejoice and be relieved. So these letters give him an opportunity to encourage them and flesh out some of the doctrine he hadn’t had time to thoroughly present, some of which they had perhaps misunderstood or been drawing wrong conclusions.

In some ways, there are parallels to our situation today. We are living in a post-Christian culture; ‘Christendom’ in Canada has not been dominant for some time now. In many settings, to voice Christian beliefs can be met with stares, indifference, or even accusations of ‘exclusivity’ or ‘imposing your morality’ or bigotry. Often it seems safer to stay quiet about your beliefs rather than speak up.

It’s clear the believers in Thessalonica were experiencing persecution for their faith. If things had begun with a mob and a riot, they hadn’t really gotten much more receptive since. See 2Thess 1:4, “Therefore, among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring.” The word behind ‘persecutions’ means ‘to drive away, to harass’. The term behind ‘trials’ in the Greek is “thlipsis” – from a root meaning to press, bring pressure; hence affliction, tribulation, distress. New Living Translation has “...in all the persecutions and hardships you are suffering.” Life wasn’t easy for the young believers at Thessalonica.

Look further down at verses 6 and 7: “...He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well...” The Christians there were being ‘troubled’ by their opponents; the root word again is “thlipsis” – hard-pressed, facing affliction.

What troubles and pressures are you facing? What’s stressing you out? Sometimes it’s just ‘life’ in a fallen world – health issues, lack of resources, environmental factors. But the Thessalonians were being persecuted for their faith. Are you encountering opposition from unbelieving family members or co-workers? They just don’t seem to ‘get’ why you would be a follower of Jesus? Perhaps your values clash with others who don’t see any problem in being self-centred, living for the moment, chasing the big buck, cheating in order to get ahead. Who find pleasure in immoral pursuits. To whom ‘integrity’ is a concept they require of others but don’t practice themselves.

When we encounter hardship and trouble, it’s easy to give in to whining and complaining. We start to wonder why life is so unfair. Our murmuring festers, and soon we start to resent the way God has been letting things turn out for us. The age-old question of theodicy arises: “How can a good God let there be so much suffering and pain?” Our TROUBLES PERPLEX.

JESUS’ COMING PROTECTS

Paul acknowledges this ‘theodicy’ problem is very real for the poor Thessalonian church which is encountering such opposition. As it is, right now, life doesn’t make sense. But we haven’t seen the end of the story. God WILL make things turn out right if we’re patient and persevere. Today’s Big Idea:

WHEN TROUBLES PERLEX, JESUS’ COMING PROTECTS, HIS GLORY CONNECTS.

Both verses 5 and 6 refer to God’s righteousness despite our current suffering. The context from v4 is the believers’ perseverance and faith in the face of their persecutions and trials they’re enduring. V5 “All this is evidence that GOD’S JUDGMENT IS RIGHT, and as a result you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are suffering.” God’s judgment is right. NRSV “This is evidence of the righteous judgment of God”; Bible in Basic English, “Which is a clear sign of the decision which God in his righteousness has made.” In other words, right now God is already supplying them with strength and faith through His Holy Spirit to persevere and stand strong, and that resistance they’re putting up in the face of suffering is evidence God’s in control and will make things turn out fairly.

Paul reiterates God’s righteousness in vv6f: “GOD IS JUST: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels.” Hear that? “God is just” – He’s not being unfair. Wait and see how He settles the score with perfect justice. You can’t see it in the English translations, but in v8 the phrase “He will punish” is directly connected to the Greek root meaning righteousness / justice: “to vindicate one’s right, to do one justice”.

Paul’s saying God is already bolstering the Thessalonian believers now in the immediate, strengthening them in the face of persecution by His Holy Spirit; plus God will vindicate them in the future by how God ‘pays back’ or makes those hurting them ‘pay the penalty’ in eternity. And for their opponents, the prospect is terrifying!

Jesus will be revealed or unveiled from heaven “in blazing fire” – think of the burning bush that caught Moses’ attention in Exodus 3(2), or Mount Sinai ablaze with God’s glory when the Israelites received the Ten Commandments after being rescued from slavery in Egypt (Ex.19:18). Fire is bright and radiant, but it also is dangerous, it purges and purifies. Verses 8 and 9 are very sobering, awe-inspiring, they stop you in your tracks: vv8f “He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power...”

Do you ‘know God’? Do you have a relationship with Him, or is He just a quaint archaic concept? Do you ‘obey the gospel’? It’s not just a news item that we can watch on a screen or ignore if we like. It’s a royal invitation to be accepted; reject it and you’ve snubbed the King of the Universe, it’s a cosmic affront. How did Jesus begin proclaiming the Good News at the outset of His ministry in Mark 1? Mk 1:15 “"The time has come," he said. "The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!"” Hearing and responding requires repentance, changing your ways, leaving your sinful patterns behind, starting over again with God’s help.

Punishment awaits those who refuse to listen. V9 mentions “everlasting destruction” - not annihilation, but ongoing complete ruin. “Shut out” from the Lord’s presence, “shut out” from the majesty of His power, cut off permanently and forever from the One who alone is absolute goodness and love and truth and holiness – whose company does that leave you in? The Bible has a name for that place of outer darkness and unquenchable flame – it’s called hell. You don’t want anyone you know to end up there!

What Paul’s talking about here isn’t some invention of his own, some legalistic doctrine introduced later in the church by those who’d lost sight of Jesus’ ministry of grace and love. We do have it mentioned in the earliest credal statements, for example the Apostles’ Creed, “From thence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead.” But the prospect goes right back to Jesus Himself, who taught: Mt 24:30 “At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn.They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory.” And long before Jesus’ ministry, Daniel the Old Testament prophet was predicting it, to which Jesus was alluding: Dan 7:13 “In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven...” So this isn’t some quirky tangential add-on idea to the Bible’s main thrust, it’s woven right in. Are you ready for His coming? Have you gotten right with God? Jesus is the key for being reconciled to the Holy One.

HIS GLORY CONNECTS

To recap, we’ve seen how the believers in Thessalonica were suffering, being persecuted, troubled on account of their trust in Jesus. The mob had not been on their side! Riotously infuriated at Paul and his teaching. This naturally raises the question of how can God be good and all-powerful yet allow such hardship to happen. We’ve seen how His strengthening of believers, helping them persevere, is evidence of His righteousness here and now; and eventually, His justice will be obvious when the troublemakers are ‘paid back’ for the trouble they’ve brought on believers without cause, unjustly. But there’s more that’s positive to give believers hope and meaning when suffering happens. Let’s say again together today’s Big Idea:

WHEN TROUBLES PERPLEX, JESUS’ COMING PROTECTS, HIS GLORY CONNECTS.

His ‘glory’ - His honour, His renown, His radiance, His outstanding excellence par none. What does our suffering, our troubles and trials, have to do with that?!

There’s a little phrase occurring twice in this passage you may have missed if you’re not careful: something of ultimate value that’s directly connected to our suffering. Look for the word “worthy”. V5b “...as a result YOU WILL BE COUNTED WORTHY of the kingdom of God, FOR WHICH you are suffering.” Pay attention. What does this say we are suffering FOR? “The Kingdom of God.” The Thessalonians by their testimony, by sticking fast to the Good News about Jesus, were helping spread the Kingdom of God. Paul says in v3 not only is their faith growing more and more, what else? V3b “...the love every one of you has for each other is increasing.” In the midst of a secular culture, that stands out majorly: the church’s love and fellowship points to the Lord, beyond it. (Side note!)

Back up a bit in v5: Paul says their perseverance in the face of persecution will result in them being COUNTED WORTHY of God’s Kingdom, for which they are suffering. Counted worthy; shown to be of value, to be deserving, to merit the Kingdom. To be significant, treasured, held dear, to MATTER in the light of eternity – by God’s grace. Isn’t that the bottom line of living, to COUNT in the eyes of God? Jesus’ suffering to death on the cross is EVIDENCE (demonstrable proof) of God’s love for us sinners (Rom 5:8), it redeems us, gives us value, shows how much we matter to the Lord. Now our suffering for His Kingdom results in us being counted worthy of that Kingdom.

There’s an echo of this down in v11, “With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may COUNT YOU WORTHY of His calling...” It’s not that we earn our salvation – Jesus bought that for us at the cross by the price of His blood – but our endurance of hardship is evidence of our being counted worthy of God’s calling, of His Kingdom.

And this being worthy, having value, being significant, is connected to Jesus’ own glory. There’s a very surprising little preposition in this passage. Why is Jesus coming back? V10 has part of the answer, that may surprise you... 1:10 “on the day he comes TO BE GLORIFIED IN HIS HOLY PEOPLE and to be marveled at among all those who have believed. This includes you, because you believed our testimony to you.” The second part there is straightforward enough: “to be marveled at among all those who have believed” – yes, we will marvel at seeing Jesus bodily! His earthly presence drew crowds, His post-Resurrection appearances were miraculous; how much more wonderful will be His return!

But that first bit – “to be glorified IN His holy people...” Not ‘by’ but ‘in’ – what’s that mean? Jesus will actually be glorified in us, by our behaviour, our character, our believing uprightness will actually reflect on Him, make Him look good? Yes. His glory is connected to you.

That’s not a one-off on Paul’s part; look further down at v12, “We pray this so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be GLORIFIED IN YOU, AND YOU IN HIM, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.” There it is again – Jesus is ‘glorified in you’ – you make HIM look good, you bring Him honour. New Living Translation - “Then the name of our Lord Jesus will be honoured because of the way you live, and you will be honoured along with Him.” Because of the way you live; because of the way you persevere and keep trusting God when things aren’t going right; because you keep confessing Jesus even when others ridicule you or despise you or write you off as crazy, ludicrous, ridiculous.

Your witness reflects on Him, your comportment gives Him a good ‘name’, an honourable reputation. There’s a reciprocal glorying: Jesus makes you look good, and vice-versa. You’re connected, your reputation is tied up with His. As Jesus alluded in John 15, we’re identified with our Saviour: Jn 15:4 “Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.” Abiding in each other, the vine and the branch are one and the same plant.

Another apostle, Peter, conveys a similar idea; for context, he’s talking about believers who ‘have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials....’ 1Peter 1:7 “These have come so that your faith— of greater WORTH than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire— may be proved genuine and may result in praise, GLORY AND HONOR when Jesus Christ is revealed.” Your endurance reflects well on your Lord and Saviour.

WHAT’S IN YOUR TEACUP?

A couple of short illustrations to close. In 1895, Andrew Murray was in England suffering from a terribly painful back, the result of an injury he had incurred years before. One morning while he was eating breakfast in his room, his hostess told him of a woman downstairs who was in great trouble and wanted to know if he had any advice for her. Andrew Murray handed her a paper he had been writing on and said, “Give her this advice I’m writing down for myself. It may be that she’ll find it helpful.” This is what was written:

In time of trouble, say, “First, he brought me here. It is by his will I am in this strait place; in that I will rest.” Next, “He will keep me here in his love, and give me grace in this trial to behave as his child.” Then say, “He will make the trial a blessing, teaching me lessons he intends me to learn, and working in me the grace he means to bestow.” And last, say, “In his good time he can bring me out again. How and when, he knows.” Therefore, say “I am here (1) by God’s appointment, (2) in his keeping, (3) under his training, (4) for his time.”

On another occasion, Hudson Taylor, founder of the China Inland Mission (now OMF Overseas Missionary Fellowship), was talking to a young missionary who was about to start work in China. Hudson Taylor said, “Look at this” – and then proceeded to pound his fist on the table. The tea cups jumped and some tea spilled out over the top. While the startled young man was wondering what all this was about, Taylor explained, “When you begin your work, you will be buffeted in numerous ways. The trials will be like blows. Remember, these blows will bring out only what is in you.”

What’s in YOUR teacup? When pressures and persecutions pound us, may the Lord help what spills out bring glory to Him and reflect well upon us. Let’s pray.

Lord Jesus, how glorious it will be when you return on the clouds with Your powerful angels to set things right and take us to be with You forever! Maranatha, may You come soon! But until then, help us be strong in the face of life’s troubles. By Your Spirit give us grace and wisdom to be witnesses to those who oppose Your Good News. Keep our faith growing and our love for one another increasing, so others may see how good You are through the way we behave together. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Doom-Man’s Portrait and Prevention” - September 4, 2022 - 2Thess.2(1-17)

A SHORT HISTORY OF THE HYPER-HUMAN

As we begin, I’d just like you to know I have spent hours in careful study and research on today’s passage, including watching a couple of movies! Namely “Left Behind: The Movie” and “Left Behind: World at War”.

You Kirk Cameron fans will appreciate that! [PHOTO: SCENE FROM MOVIE - ANTICHRIST SETTING HIMSELF UP IN GOD’S TEMPLE]

It’s hard to get into a passage that mentions the ‘great rebellion’ and the ‘man of lawlessness’ without calling to mind the 16-novel series written by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins.

These books have shaped to some degree the imaginations of evangelicals, reinforced by movies in 2001 and 2005, rebooted in 2014 starring Nicolas Cage.

There are pre-tribulation, pre-millennial, dispensational assumptions that not all Christian scholars would be too sure about.

So let’s set aside any artistic licence that is understandable in crafting a novel or movie and orient ourselves to hear God’s word more directly: what does the text actually say?

There are larger cultural motifs at play here, too.

In the Left Behind series, the Antichrist figure takes the form of Nicholae Carpathia, head of the UN or “Global Community” who rises to prominence promising the world a time of peace despite food shortages and other problems.

(At time of writing I actually only got part way through the second movie, to the point where hero “Buck” played by Kirk Cameron is stockpiling vaccines OF ALL THINGS to prepare for a threatened period of “pestilences” brought on by bio-engineering...Say, what have we just been through these past 2 years? And this movie was released in 2005? How uncanny!)

When society is breaking down and lawlessness increases, people become desperate in their hurting and deprivation.

They long for a strong leader to emerge who will guide them back to safety and security.

That could describe the nation of Germany back in the 1920s&30s which was struggling to make reparations for its part in the First World War, ending in 1918.

A charismatic dynamic leader rose to popularity who proposed Germans had the makings of a master race, their potential was great, they could be leaders in the world.

His name was Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist party turned the nation’s economy around and whipped people’s fervour and confidence to new heights through various programs and propaganda.

Hitler was embodying the philosophy of one of his heroes, Friedrich Nietzsche, a German (actually Polish-born) philosopher (1844-1900).

When Hitler officially congratulated the Italian fascist dictator Mussolini, he gave him a copy of Nietzsche’s book! Nietzsche introduced the concept of the ‘ubermensch’ or what I’ll call the ‘hyper-human’.

To quote from Wikipedia (please bear with me) - “Nietzsche introduces the concept of the Übermensch in contrast to his understanding of the other-worldliness of Christianity: Zarathustra proclaims the will of the Übermensch to give meaning to life on earth, and admonishes his audience to ignore those who promise other-worldly fulfillment to draw them away from the earth...Zarathustra ties the Übermensch to the death of God.

While the concept of God was the ultimate expression of other-worldly values and their underlying instincts, belief in God nevertheless did give meaning to life for a time.

"God is dead" means that the idea of God can no longer provide values.

Nietzsche refers to this crucial paradigm shift as a reevaluation of values.

According to Nietzsche, the moral doctrine of Catholicism had become outdated.

With the sole source of values exhausted, the danger of nihilism looms.Zarathustra presents the Übermensch as the creator of new values to banish nihilism.”

What’s the upshot of that in plain English? Nietzsche perceived that humans at large had killed God - that “God is dead” phrase.

But if there’s no God, that paves the way for nihilism, “the rejection of all religious and moral principles, in the belief that life is meaningless.” Now THAT would be discouraging! For life to be meaningless, pointless, no sense of right and wrong, good or bad.

Nihilism leads to despair.

To fend that off, Nietzsche proposed this ideal of the “hyper-human’ or ubermensch, the human that transcends others and points a meaningful way forward.

Do you see how this fed into Nazi philosophy, tyranny, and eugenics? Hitler would believe himself to be the “strong man”, providing leadership and direction to others in society.

Relegate society’s misfits - the disabled, those suffering from gender confusion, non-Aryans like the Jews - to the gas chambers.

His approach “worked” to the point that his fellow citizens largely allowed him and his cronies increasing power politically.

In Paul’s second letter to the Thessalonians, he looks into the future and warns of another “strong man” who will arise to prominence in a time of rebellion and proclaim himself to be God.

What else would you expect, if God is in fact ‘dead’? That creates a huge vacuum, a meaningless environment people find hard to tolerate.

But Paul foretells the destruction of this ‘strong man’ or ‘hyper-human’ by One stronger yet – God may have been dead in a tomb three days, but rose again!

It’s a temptation to dwell on end-times speculation and conjectures about exactly how the timeline will unfold.

But I want to start from a more productive and positive angle.

What is the ‘hyper-human’ God is calling US to become through faith in Christ? How is He transforming US mere mortals from fallen sinners into overcoming saints? So before we develop the portrait of ‘the man of lawlessness’ or Antichrist, let’s look first at who, by God’s grace, WE are fashioned to be, in contrast!

Today’s BIG IDEA: “BE SO STRONG IN GRACE THAT ANTICHRIST LOOKS A LOSER.” (Put hand to forehead in “L” sign)

THE BELIEVER: FASHIONED FOR FAVOUR

You may recall from last week in chapter 1 of 2Thessalonians that Paul was writing to commend believers for standing firm in the face of “all the persecutions and trials you are enduring” (1:4).

Compounding these sufferings, it seems a false letter purporting to come from Paul had suggested the coming of Jesus and gathering of the faithful to Him had already happened, that the Thessalonian believers had been ‘left behind’ (so to speak).

Paul asks them, v2 “not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by some prophecy, report or letter supposed to have come from us, saying that the day of the Lord has already come.” He wants to reassure them they haven’t missed out.

He seeks to comfort them in their troubles.

We see those words ‘encourage’ and ‘comfort’ emphasized in 2:16f.

So the verses at the end of chapter two paint a portrait of who the believers are becoming by God’s grace, Paul’s focusing on the positive.

His description provides a real contrast to the character of Antichrist described earlier.

First, believers are SELECTED SAINTS.

V13a “But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit...” Can you get more positive than that? You are ‘brothers/sisters loved by the Lord’! You were ‘chosen’, selected by God, to be saved.

Jews in the Old Testament were God’s chosen people, picked to be witnesses for Him to the nations.

Christians are chosen by the Lord similarly to let our light shine before others in such a way that they see our good deeds and glorify our Father in heaven (Mt 5:16).

The Holy Spirit indwells us and “sanctifies” us, making us holy, set-apart for God’s purposes, increasing in personal righteousness, living Jesus’ way.

Believers are TRUTH-TRUSTERS.

V13b “...God chose you to be saved...through belief in the truth.” We are truth-trusters, putting our faith in the Gospel or message about Jesus – a message that will be shown to be true, according to reality, when Jesus comes back to gather us to him (v1).

Believing is key to salvation.

As John put it in a most assuring way in 1John 5:13 “I write these things to you who BELIEVE in the name of the Son of God SO THAT YOU MAY KNOW that you have eternal life.” Do you have that faith, that assurance? Put your trust in Christ and discover how real and alive He is!

Third, we are GLORY-SHARERS.

The Holy Spirit is producing His fruit and gifts in our lives so we come increasingly to resemble Jesus, whose love and caring and peace drew people to Him magnetically.

And when He returns, we will share His glory more visibly.

V14 “He called you to this through our gospel, that you might SHARE IN THE GLORY of our Lord Jesus Christ.” The best beauty-treatment is to have the Lord’s joy, peace, and love bathing your heart and consciousness!

Fourth, believers are TEACHING-TETHERED, anchored in God’s instruction amidst life’s confusing messages and temptations.

V15 “So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the teachings we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by letter.” The phrase ‘passing on’ is akin to that in rabbinic Judaism where a rabbi repeatedly ingrained Biblical truth and sayings into the memories of his disciples.

Also this hints that Paul’s teaching is not something he cleverly invented or ‘made up’ as he went along, but he was passing along to others the same teaching he had received – whether from Scripture, or others who followed Jesus before him.

Make it your personal goal to try to read the Bible and pray daily, even if it’s just for a short time.

That practice anchors your soul, gives you a solid base from which to construe meaning from life, and God’s voice will coach you on the path to take.

Jeremiah 6:16 says, “This is what the LORD says: ‘Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.’” We are Teaching-Tethered.

Fifth, we are CORE-ENCOURAGED.

Do you find life discouraging or challenging at times? Does it seem sometimes the world’s gone to pot, and things just keep getting worse instead of better? Has the endless stream of negative news started to make you cynical? Find encouragement in your Lord.

Vv16-17a, “May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal ENCOURAGEMENT and good hope, ENCOURAGE your hearts...” There’s God’s ‘love’ for us again (see point 1 ‘Selected Saints’).

I’ve emphasized words with the root ‘encourage’ there twice in the same sentence.

The root in the Greek is “paraclesis” which you may recognize is a term Jesus uses for the Holy Spirit, our Counselor, Comforter, one who comes alongside to help.

I mentioned earlier how Paul’s aim in writing is to give COMFORT to the Thessalonians amidst their troubles and persecutions.

In fact both NRSV and NLT here translate it ‘comfort’ instead of NIV’s ‘encouragement’.

2:16f NLT - “Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal COMFORT and a wonderful hope, COMFORT you and strengthen you in every good thing you do and say.” We are CORE-ENCOURAGED.

A favourite passage of mine that similarly emphasizes God’s comfort and points out this is for sharing with others, is 2Cor 1:3-7: “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the GOD OF ALL COMFORT, who COMFORTS us in all our troubles, so that we can COMFORT those in any trouble with the COMFORT we ourselves have received from God.

For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our COMFORT overflows.

If we are distressed, it is for your COMFORT and salvation; if we are COMFORTED, it is for your COMFORT, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer.

And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our COMFORT.”

Is there someone you know who might benefit from you sharing with them the COMFORT and encouragement you find in knowing Jesus?

Sixth, we are GOODNESS-GIVING.

Vv16f again, “May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father...strengthen you in EVERY GOOD DEED AND WORD.” God is good all the time; and all the time, God is good! Our job is to share that goodness with other people, to dispel the rumour that ‘God is dead’, or even worse, that God is malicious or a meanie.

Titus 2:14 says Christ “gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, EAGER TO DO WHAT IS GOOD.” Would those who know you best describe you as someone ‘eager’ to do good? Or eager to goof off and hog the remote, say?

So there are some characteristics that the Lord is producing in our lives, appealing traits that should set us apart and make other people want what we’ve got.

Selected Saints, Truth Trusters, Glory Sharers, Teaching-Tethered, Core-Encouraged, Goodness-Giving.

That sounds so positive! Again, our BIG IDEA today: BE SO STRONG IN GRACE THAT ANTICHRIST LOOKS A LOSER.

REVELLING IN REBELLING: CLUES TO THE CONDEMNED

Paul talks of a ‘rebellion occurring’ in the last days in v3.

But he adds in v7, “For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way.” Lawlessness was already at work in Paul’s day, and it’s still at work in our day.

To some degree the ‘man of lawlessness’ is already with us.

Rebellion is endemic in fallen human nature: witness the toddler (aka ‘Terrible Twos’) who stamps their foot, curls their forehead into a frown and says defiantly, “No!”

There are many theories as to what Paul’s referring to in the words ‘the one who holds back’ the secret power of lawlessness.

Seems when he was with them he had spoken more plainly about these things.

One theory would be the current government, as the state has a role in restraining lawlessness (see Romans 13) - so when Paul talks about it being ‘taken out of the way’ he could have been misconstrued as politically seditious had he been more exact.

He’s choosing his words carefully in case this letter were to fall into the wrong hands.

It’s a very live topic in Canada today, what is the role of government in protecting health and safety, when does governmental overreach occur, what should be the limits to constitutional rights, when does ‘freedom’ verge on rebellion and lawlessness? For Christians, whatever country we live in, God’s Spirit within us should always be guiding us in love, peace, kindness, goodness, and self-control.

The ‘royal law’ of love informs how we treat our neighbour.

It would seem from Paul’s letter that whatever is holding back ‘the secret power of lawlessness’ is removed, be that some human or supernatural agency.

At that point, v3, “the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction” - NLT “the one who brings destruction”.

Doom-man.

However bad sinners have been through history, the Hitlers and the Stalins and the Paul Bernardos and even you and I in our moments of worst failure – all these coalesce in one supremely evil person, the ‘hyper-human’ to whom God is dead.

John calls him the Antichrist but he’s not been the only one of his kind: 1John 2:18 “Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come.

This is how we know it is the last hour.”

The portrait Paul paints of this enigmatic figure contrasts with the characteristics we’ve seen of your typical Christian.

First, while believers are Selected Saints, the Doom-man is ANTI-GOD.

V4 “He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped...” We saw how Nietzsche’s hyper-human ubermensch figure arose in the vacuum created by thinking ‘God is dead’.

Antichrist steps forward to assume that role and power once attributed to God by those who revered divinity.

Second, Christians are Truth-trusters; Doom-man is TRUTH-DESPISING.

V10 “...and in every sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing.

They perish because they REFUSED TO LOVE THE TRUTH and so be saved.” It’s a conscious choice, they ‘refuse’ to love the truth; apart from God’s intervention, we are spiritually dead, the Bible seems like nonsense or fairy tales, irrelevant.

See also V12 “and so that all will be condemned who HAVE NOT BELIEVED THE TRUTH but have delighted in wickedness.” NRSV “took pleasure in unrighteousness”.

If God is dead, what’s to say anything is right or wrong? Why not just please yourself, any way you know how? Regardless of whether other people are taken advantage of or abused.

Third, believers are Glory-Sharers, Jesus sharing His own glory and splendour with us as we are transformed into His likeness.

But Antichrist is SELF-PROMOTING, his ego is big enough to fill the universe! V4b “He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, PROCLAIMING HIMSELF TO BE GOD.” The serpent’s trap, descended all the way through the ages from the Garden of Eden, Genesis 3:5b “...You will be like God, knowing good and evil.” Paul may be recalling Emperor Gaius trying to get a statue of himself installed in the temple at Jerusalem AD 40.

You may master every other type of immorality but pride and vanity can still get you even then! We need accountability, we need others we can trust to be honest with us about our areas of weakness and blind spots.

Fourth, the Christian is Teaching-tethered; Antichrist is LAW-SCORNING.

V3 “the man of lawlessness is revealed”, v7 “the secret power of lawlessness”, v8 “then the lawless one will be revealed...” Government officials and church leaders are not ‘above the law’.

That doesn’t mean believers should be legalistic and judgmental: Jesus hung out with tax collectors and sinners, they heard Him gladly, but He could still counsel them to ‘go and sin no more’.

Yet the predominant note was God’s grace and welcome to those who the religious establishment had pushed afar off.

Jesus came to fulfill the law by His perfect, once-for-all sacrifice.

Fifth, believers are Core-Encouraged, God working in our lives to cheer us on; but those who follow Antichrist are DIVINELY DELUDED.

Because they ‘refused to believe the truth’ - V11 “For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie...” - and be condemned (v12).

God’s not being unfair, it’s entirely their own decision whether or not to be receptive to the truth of the Gospel.

But they choose not.

So God is just deepening the rut they’ve chosen.

As in Romans 1(24, 26,28), God “gave them over...to sexual impurity...to shameful lusts...to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done.” In essence, God says, “Have it your way” - along with the associated consequences.

Sixth, Christ-followers are Goodness-giving, but Antichrist is DEVIL-DISPLAYING.

His works are evil, deceptive, not good.

Vv9-10a “The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders, and in every sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing...” Deceptive works of Satan: yes there is a power at work there, but it’s a counterfeit, tricking the observer, not genuine.

AWARE BUT NOT ALARMED

Should we be afraid of the end times? Should we be trembling in our boots at the potential rise of Antichrist to power? That’s not the impression Paul gives.

His purpose is to ENCOURAGE those suffering persecution at Thessalonica.

In fact, he says, even Antichrist is ‘no contest’ for Jesus!

Note well v8 for the fate of this dreaded Doom-man: V8 “And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming.” Huh? How’s that again? Is there a knock-down, drag-em-out fight? It’s not even close, no contest.

Jesus overthrows Antichrist “with the breath of his mouth”, destroys him “by the splendour [NRSV manifestation] of His coming”.

A breath - poof! - he’s gone.

Paul may be alluding to an Old Testament prophecy, Isaiah 11:4 “but with righteousness he will judge the needy, with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth.

He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth; WITH THE BREATH OF HIS LIPS he will slay the wicked.”

Antichrist may be somewhat imposing, but compared to the humblest believer, he “ain’t no match”! Christ in you completely outclasses Doom-man.

Again our Big Idea for today, BE SO STRONG IN GRACE THAT ANTICHRIST LOOKS A LOSER.

ONE LITTLE WORD WILL FELL HIM

In October 1527, the plague was approaching, and a former monk in Germany named Martin Luther penned a hymn which was to become the theme song of spiritual liberation for many, then and through following centuries.

Historian Louis Benson observes, “It was...the Marseillaise of the Reformation.

It was sung...in all the churches of Saxony, often against the protest of the priest.

It was sung in the streets; and, so heard, comforted the hearts of Melanchthon, Jonas, and Cruciger, as they entered Weimar, when banished from Wittenberg in 1547.

It was sung by poor Protestant emigrants on their way into exile, and by martyrs at their death.

It is woven into the web of the history of Reformation times, and it became the true national hymn of Protestant Germany.”

Tim Challies notes, “Based on Psalm 46, the hymn is a celebration of the sovereign power of God over all earthly and spiritual forces, and of the sure hope we have in him because of Christ.

After its publication, it gained immense popularity throughout Reformed Europe.”

Martin Luther faced formidable foes, but saw the Gospel emerge afresh in a way that invigorated Christ’s church.

Paul the apostle sought to encourage the fledgling church by his writings and insight into the future: rebellion and lawless times may come, but Jesus is still Lord and in control, even of Doom-man.

As Luther’s hymn “A Mighty Fortress” put it:

And tho’ this world, with devils filled, Should threaten to undo us;

We will not fear, for God hath willed His truth to triumph through us.

The prince of darkness grim — We tremble not for him;

His rage we can endure, For lo! his doom is sure,

One little word shall fell him.

Let’s pray.

Sovereign God, with the saints You have privileged us to peer far down the corridors of time to when things will be wrapped up and evil and lawlessness at last be stopped in their tracks.

Help us to be faithful witnesses, portraying Jesus by our words and deeds, even when society around us seems to have abandoned all moral moorings.

Thank You for Your teachings and truth that keep reminding us which side is up, and the hope to which you have called us.

We praise You for Your victory at the cross, and when the Son of Man returns, whom we await eagerly.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“A Model Life: Protection, Perseverance, Productivity” - Sept.18, 2022 - 2Thess.3(1-18)

WORK: WORTHWHILE OR WEARISOME?

What’s your attitude toward work? Do you love it, or would you rather leave it?

Our society has a sort of love-hate relationship with work; it depends a lot who you ask. When the federal government proposed a holiday September 19 to mark former Queen Elizabeth’s funeral, the responses reported on the news were interesting and varied. One ‘man on the street’ commented much to the effect, “Well, we can always use more holidays!” At first, that seems understandable; but what’s it imply about our attitude toward work? Is it ‘just a job’, just a means to obtain a paycheque so we can afford to buy the stuff and entertainment that really make life worthwhile?

On the other hand, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business urged provincial governments NOT to designate Sept.19 a statutory holiday. Its vice-president commented, “There are many ways that you can pay tribute to the legacy of the Queen's life...But at the same time, it's important not to hurt small businesses.” To an employer, more holidays could interfere with being profitable.

As a pastor, I’m in kind of a unique position. I like the idea of a holiday in general. But I’m already working most Sundays so the ‘3-day weekend’ doesn’t really apply. Plus Sunday has this habit of keeping coming around each week, so I often end up working Mondays anyway just to meet deadlines and get the work done that has to be done that week anyway – so I can understand an employer’s frustration as well.

There are a couple of idols our society worships that can be a problem in regard to work. One is the addiction of workaholism. The previous generation, the “Builders” or “GI Generation” were sometimes “children of the depression” so had this innate drive to work as if survival depended on it. They remembered the days before Old Age Security, Canada Pension Plan, universal health care; if you didn’t work, you went hungry. They worked long and hard and built much of Canada’s economy and institutions we benefit from today.

I grew up in Perth County, the motto of which said: “By work and worth we rise”. In other words, to get ahead, you’d better be ready to work hard. In fact, ‘work’ and ‘worth’ are implicitly associated. This could be related to what’s known as PBA syndrome, that stands for “Performance-Based Approval” – when someone affirms your worth because of what you DO instead of who you ARE.

Workaholism can be addicting because the rewards may reinforce the behaviour. One source says, “Research indicates that workaholism affects between 27% and 30% of the general population today...Workaholism, or work addiction, is actually a serious problem that can lead to career burnout, or overworking oneself to serious health issues — even death.”

Here’s a quick quiz that might ‘twig’ if you happen to be a workaholic. Top ten traits of workaholics:

- prioritizing work before personal life

- worrying about work on a day off

- having difficulties switching off, or working on vacations

- checking emails during the night

- being the first to arrive at work, and the last to leave

- feeling too pressured or busy to take annual leave

- skipping the lunch break at work

- feeling anxious if unaware of what's going on at work

- being told by friends/family that they work too much

- checking emails first thing in the morning

How we doing? Anybody out there getting convicted yet?

Fundamental to the Judean-Christian worldview is the concept of “Sabbath”. It’s solidly there in the first chapters of Genesis; it’s emphasized in the Ten Commandments. It comes through in the New Testament especially in the book of Hebrews, Heb 4:9 “There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God” – to enter God’s rest we rest from our own work, as God did from His (Heb 4:10) – though not in a legalistic sense as the Jews did on Saturday, for us it’s the first day of the week that Jesus rose and became special as “the Lord’s Day”.

The “Boomers” benefited from their parents’ hard work (in general). Economists predict a huge transfer in wealth must happen in coming years as Boomers leave the workforce and consider preparing the estates for what is inevitable at life’s end.

Meanwhile, some accuse younger generations of another idol, that of “Entitlement”. Such people seem to have been ‘born with a silver spoon in their mouth’, or act like they were; they seem to think others have worked so they don’t have to. It can express itself in reluctance to take on employment that is difficult or challenging or not exactly up one’s alley, aligning with one’s passions. People can flit from job to job in search of better options, seeming dissatisfied with current offerings. They may be too ready to fall back on Employment Insurance, to let the so-called “Nanny State” take care of them. Let’s note it is a real blessing to have welfare programs and universal health care and such ‘safety nets’ are legitimately needed by many people – but they can also be abused if someone is really too fussy or not particularly motivated to work. Not without reason is “sloth” or laziness reputed to be one of the ‘seven deadly sins’ in Catholicism.

Employees in a Detroit business office found the following important notice on the bulletin board: “The management regrets that it has come to their attention that workers dying on the job are failing to fall down. This practice must stop, as it becomes impossible to distinguish between death and the natural movement of the staff. Any employee found dead in an upright position will be dropped from the payroll.” (!)

How do we navigate between these two prominent idols, workaholism and the entitlement mentality? These are two powerful forces trying to drag us off the path of peace, damaging individuals, families, and society.

In today’s reading, the final chapter of 2Thessalonians, the Apostle Paul urges believers live a model life, following his example: one in which he worked so as not to be a burden to others, yet drew strength and guidance from the Lord in doing what’s right.

Our BIG IDEA: GOD’S GRACE PROVIDES GUMPTION FOR AN EXAMPLE TO EMULATE.

GRACE: THE BELIEVER’S SECRET CHARGING STATION

Electric Vehicles are becoming all the rage, however they will require frequent charging in order to become widely accepted. This past Wednesday US President Biden announced $900 million in infrastructure money to build EV chargers across 53,000 miles of the national highway system and 35 states. He remarked, “The great American road trip is going to be fully electrified.”

Followers of Christ may or may not be using superhighways, but we ARE on a path of obedience walking with our Saviour. That path can be challenging, and we need an INTERNAL charging station. To review, in chapter 1 of 2Thessalonians, Paul noted the sufferings and persecution the believers there were enduring. In chapter 2, Paul speaks about the rebellion and lawlessness that will be associated with the ‘man of sin’ or Antichrist, and how the ‘secret power of lawlessness is already at work’ (2:7); he warns believers about those who refuse to love the truth and be saved, instead they delight in wickedness.

We need God’s help when we face suffering and persecution; we need God’s help when we are tempted to believe Satan’s lie and get sucked in by evil. So in chapter 3 Paul points out several ways God strengthens and supports us on our journey through this life.

God answers prayer. Paul begins by asking the church to pray that the gospel will spread, literally “run”, and for their protection. 2Thess 3:1f “Finally, brothers, PRAY for us that the message of the Lord may spread rapidly and be honored, just as it was with you. And PRAY that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men, for not everyone has faith.”

Verse 3 highlights how God is faithful, He can be counted on to keep His promises: v3 “But the Lord is FAITHFUL, and he will STRENGTHEN and PROTECT you from the evil one.” He is faithful, He can be counted on, relied on, in contrast to the ‘wicked and evil’ people in v2, “for not everyone has faith”. God’s faithfulness stands in stark contrast to human fickleness and deceit.

V3 mentions other aspects of God’s internal charging station for us. He will “strengthen” - the Greek word here means “to make stable, place firmly, set fast, fix; to strengthen, make firm”. Wouldn’t you like that in your life? Stability, strength, something solid to hold onto? Life in our post-modern cyber-speed age can be so dynamic, evolving, shifting with different philosophies and technologies. In June a Canadian quantum computing company announced that it will deliver Canada's first quantum computer for public research to Calcul Québec; what are they going to call this computer, you ask? “Monarch”. Science and culture may change, but God gives us strength and stability; Hebrews 13:8 “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”

V3 says the Lord “will protect you from the evil one” - literally ‘keep’ or ‘guard’. This is particularly relevant since a few verses earlier back in the previous chapter Paul was predicting the ‘man of lawlessness’, the human representative of Satan the evil one; 2Thess 2:9 “The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders...” Gonna need protection.

Skip down to verse 5: three things are indicated that ‘charge us up’ here - guiding our hearts, God’s love, and perseverance. 2Thess 3:5 “May the Lord DIRECT YOUR HEARTS into GOD’S LOVE and CHRIST’S PERSEVERANCE.” NLT “May the Lord lead your hearts into a full understanding and expression of the love of God and the patient endurance that comes from Christ.”

Praying for the Lord to direct our hearts: can we allow Him to set our priorities, govern our wants, funnel our passions into pursuits that please Him? Psalm 51:10 “Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.” Ps 119:11 “I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.” Give your heart to Him to lead.

“A full understanding and expression of the love of God” – that can mean either God’s love for us or our love for Him, but in context (with the parallel phrase) it’s more likely God’s love for us. Can you feel deep in your core that God loves you? That it’s not conditional love based on performance, requiring perfect works, but He loves you just for who you are, in His Son? Romans 5:5 “And hope does not disappoint us, because God HAS POURED OUT HIS LOVE INTO OUR HEARTS BY THE HOLY SPIRIT, whom he has given us.” Experience and contemplate His love, that will save you from many a misstep.

(Continuing) “And Christ’s perseverance” / “the patient endurance that comes from Christ”. Steadfastness, constancy; “the characteristic of a [person] who is not swerved from [their] deliberate purpose and [their] loyalty to faith and piety by even the greatest trials and sufferings”. Jesus bore up under tremendous pressure and pain and helps us do the same.

Paul wraps up this chapter with a reminder God supplies His PEACE and His PRESENCE. See v16, “Now may the LORD OF PEACE himself GIVE YOU PEACE at all times and in every way.The Lord BE WITH all of you.” He Himself is “the Lord of Peace”, He gives us His peace. He told His disciples that night in the Upper Room when within hours He was to be arrested, beaten, whipped, and crucified: John 14:27 “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.I do not give to you as the world gives.Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” Note Paul’s adjectives describing the peace Christ gives: ‘at ALL times and in EVERY way’ – that just about covers all eventualities, doesn’t it?!

Is there something troubling you today? Are you unsettled in your spirit about something? Jesus offers you His peace, if you sincerely ask Him for it.

And His presence, through the Holy Spirit; He has promised to “be with” us. Matthew 28:20B “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

So there are many aspects of God’s grace that bolster us: He answers prayer; He’s faithful; He strengthens and protects us, directs our hearts, allows us to experience His love, reinforces our perseverance, and gives us His peace and His presence.

Our BIG IDEA again: “God’s Grace provides Gumption for an Example to Emulate.”

GUMPTION: TO LOAF OR EARN OUR LOAF?

Christ’s GRACE empowers us. It frees us from Performance-Based Approval, feeling we have to WORK indefinitely to try to earn God’s favour; yet it also stimulates us to not do nothing, but instead to share the gifts and goodness with which the Lord has touched our own lives. So we are freed from both workaholism and entitlement (or laziness). His Grace gives us Gumption.

The church at Thessalonica saw this modeled for them in the apostle’s life. He set an example for them which they could in turn imitate amongst their neighbours. V7A “For you yourselves know how you ought to FOLLOW OUR EXAMPLE...” Also see the end of v9, “We did this...in order to make ourselves A MODEL FOR YOU TO FOLLOW.” He was illustrating a pattern for them, what a representative Christian life could look like.

The particular application here stems from a misunderstanding of theology that occurred when the church was planted. Paul had been with the believers a very short time before persecution sent him packing to other destinations. He had preached about Jesus’ return, but some supposed this had somehow already happened, and others took it to mean if Jesus was coming back soon, they should suddenly retire, sell their possessions, and sit around waiting for the heavenly chariot come for to take ‘em home. So Paul took pains in his two letters to address this misunderstanding. Yes Jesus was returning on the clouds and evildoers would be condemned, but in the meantime Christians were to keep on serving Him obediently in their regular livelihoods.

He warned them repeatedly against the ‘idol’ of being ‘idle’. In the first letter, fourth chapter: 1Thess 4:11f “Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.” Work with your hands – be productive, contribute something positive to society; be responsible with your talents - to win outsiders’ respect, to not be dependent, but instead have something to share with those in need (Eph 4:28). Again in 1Thess 5(14), “And we urge you, brothers, WARN THOSE WHO ARE IDLE, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone.”

You’d think they would have got the message – but laziness can be hard to lick. So here again in Paul’s second letter he calls them out on the recurring problem, 2Thess 3:11f “We hear that SOME AMONG YOU ARE IDLE. They are not busy; THEY ARE BUSYBODIES. Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and EARN THE BREAD THEY EAT.” They’re to quit loafing and start earning a loaf for lunch.

Paul underscores this with what may have been a Jewish proverb, v10 “For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: "If a man will not work, he shall not eat."” It may be based back in the Creation story in Genesis 3:19, “By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return."” By your sweat you will eat: no sweat, no eat. Highly motivational!

And Paul wasn’t just talking through his hat here – in the time he had been with them, they had seen his work ethic, as he reminds them in vv7B-8: “We were not idle when we were with you, nor did we eat anyone’s food without paying for it. On the contrary, we worked night and day, laboring and toiling so that we would not be a burden to any of you.” No free lunch. Even though as an apostle Paul had the RIGHT to accept meals from those he taught, he had taken pains to not be misunderstood as if he were preaching for profit like some false teachers. He’s echoing here what he’d already pointed out back in his first letter, 1Thess 2:9 “Surely you remember, brothers, our toil and hardship; we worked night and day in order not to be a burden to anyone while we preached the gospel of God to you.” The principle was not to be a burden, but to look after their own physical needs so they could make the Gospel available entirely free of charge. Paul did not want to be perceived as a leech or a drain or burden on anyone.

God’s grace supplied Paul with gumption to work to provide his own needs. A word that might cover the overall topic here is RESPONSIBILITY. Are you a net ‘plus’ or ‘minus’ in society? What are you contributing, according to your ability? Robertson comments on v11, “These theological dead-beats were too pious to work, but perfectly willing to eat at the hands of their neighbours while they piddled and frittered away the time in idleness.” Paul’s saying, by God’s grace, you can do better than that!

As we look around at our tech-rich, entertainment-soaked society, would any of that apply to us? “Frittering the time away in idleness”? A lot of time we have a device in our hand, as if we were bionically tethered to the media/networking/entertainment industry; does the command to “work with your hands” require us to put down the smartphone or remote that’s in our hands so much of the time?

Some of the Thessalonians were not busy, they were busy-bodies (yes it’s a word-play in the Greek). So much free time, they were meddling in others’ affairs. By our Facebooking and YouTubing and TikToking are we somehow meddling in others’ business, complicit in voyeurism where we really have no right to intrude? “Settle down,” Paul says; “mind your own business” (1Thess 4:11). But the Kardashians are so distracting... (substitute your favourite celebrity)

Verse 13 has a good overall principle on which to land this plane. 2Thess 3:13 “And as for you, brothers, NEVER TIRE OF DOING WHAT IS RIGHT.” Do the good, the honourable thing. What model are you making for others to follow? Is your example good, would it enhance Christ’s reputation on the front page of the newspaper? Does it shine a light on His excellence, or just add a fleeting moment to your enjoyment?

“Never get tired of doing good.” (NLT) Akin to Galatians 6:9, “Let us NOT BECOME WEARY IN DOING GOOD, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” Harvest time approaches!

Remember our BIG IDEA: GOD’S GRACE PROVIDES GUMPTION FOR AN EXAMPLE TO EMULATE.

PLODDING TO PRODIGIOUS PRODUCTIVITY

I was reading this week about the owner of the outdoor clothing company Patagonia giving his company away, forming a charitable trust to help the environment, receiving all the net profit from the new for-profit company. It’s estimated the trust will receive approximately $100 million dollars each year towards environmental work. The owner, a rock-climbing enthusiast, started out back in 1973 making metal spikes for climbers to drive into the rock, then branched into durable outdoor clothing. Mr Chouinard is reported to have a net worth about $1.2 Billion; you may say, “He can afford to be generous” – but if you had built that company from scratch, would you be able to give it away?

In his open letter on the company’s website, Mr Chouinard writes, “I never wanted to be a businessman.” Later he adds, “If we could do the right thing while making enough to pay the bills, we could influence customers and other businesses, and maybe change the system along the way.” Did you notice a little phrase there akin to Paul’s? “Do the right thing.” I don’t know this man’s religious affiliation, but he is trying to be an example to others by his actions.

Christ’s grace gives us gumption to serve wherever He leads us, to set an example for others to imitate as we imitate Jesus. The Lord is faithful, and calls us to be faithful in doing good to others – not to earn His favour, but in response to His love and favour towards us.

An eleventh-century German king, King Henry III, had grown tired of court life and the pressures of being a monarch. He applied to a monastery to be accepted for a life of contemplation. The religious superior of the monastery, Prior Richard, is reported to have said, “Your Majesty, do you understand that the pledge here is one of obedience? That will be hard because you have been a king.”

Henry replied, “I understand. The rest of my life I will be obedient to you, as Christ leads you.”

“Then I will tell you what to do,” said Prior Richard. “Go back to your throne and serve faithfully in the place where God has placed you.”

When King Henry III died, a statement was written: “The King learned to rule by being obedient.”

Like King Henry, we too often tire of our role and responsibility. And we can come to realize that God has placed each of us in a particular place to be faithful there. Be it as a plumber, accountant, mother, father, or whatever, God calls and empowers us to be faithful where he has placed us. Let’s pray.

Thank You Heavenly Father for Your incredible grace filling our lives, Your love warming our hearts, Your beautiful gift of talents and abilities distributed to each person. Lord Jesus, help us not tire of doing good, nor to drift into idleness and apathy, but to see the needs around us and respond joyfully as labourers in Your vast workshop, being a help to others and not a burden. Strengthen us afresh each day. In Christ’s name, Amen.

“Rich Treasures Offsetting Serious Struggle” - Thanksgiving Sunday Oct. 9/22 - Col.1:24-2:5

GRATEFUL FOR A SPECIAL PIG

Are you thankful for all you could be thankful for? Are we ever thankful enough?

[PHOTO OF MINNIE] This is a picture of our pet pig, Minnie. Her breed is partly “American Miniature” hence her name “Minnie”. Minnie is very thankful to live with us. You see, Patti is a vegetarian, so Minnie the pig will never end up on someone’s plate, as far as we know. In secular parlance, Minnie has ‘hit the jackpot’ as far as a pig would be concerned. Minnie is a special pig, and she is thankful. She is NOT the pig in the following story...

A woman was visiting some people who lived on a farm, and she noticed a pig limping in the backyard with a wooden leg. She asked the farmer, "What happened to the pig?" The farmer said, "Oh, Betsy is a wonderful pig. One night the house caught fire and she oinked so loud she woke us and we got the fire truck in time to save the house." The woman said, "That's really something!" The farmer continued, "That's not all, one day my youngest fell in the pond and Betsy oinked so loud that she got our attention and we were able to pull my daughter out of the pond in time." The woman said, "That's really amazing! But I still don't understand why the pig has a wooden leg.” The farmer said, "Well, when you have a pig that special, you don't want to eat it all at once!" (!)

...I think they could have expressed their gratitude a little better to such a special pig! But – do we treat God a little bit like that? We’re thankful for all He’s done for us, yet we kind of presume upon Him and take advantage of Him, even forget God at times – our attitude toward Him could use some improving?

In today’s lesson the Apostle Paul tries to help the church at Colosse understand better all God had done for them in Christ, how the mystery of Jesus’ incarnation and crucifixion and resurrection could give them lasting fullness and purpose in living. Our BIG IDEA for today: The MARVEL of Christ’s MYSTERY prompts PURPOSE in our PAIN.

THANKFUL FOR STUFFING AND NONSENSE: COMING TO TERMS

At Thanksgiving it’s easy to be thankful for just the material side of things; you know, maybe you enjoy a hearty turkey dinner with an extra slice of pumpkin pie and whipped cream, and you stuff yourself to the point that afterwards you just want to crawl off and curl up on a comfy couch somewhere for a nap. That’s a very ‘satisfying’ feeling, but it doesn’t last. In few hours you’ll be up and wandering about the house looking for leftovers to be a culinary chaser.

When Paul was writing to the Colossians, there was a teaching called Gnosticism gaining popularity. We see Paul capturing some of their terminology and imbuing the words with new meaning. Gnosticism taught that spirit is good and matter is evil, a type of dualism. Thus a person’s body, which is matter, must be evil, in contrast with God who is entirely spirit and therefore good.

How could a person be saved? Not through trusting in Christ – the Gnostics held that salvation is escape from this [evil] body, and the way to do that is by special knowledge. The more you advanced in the training and levels of instruction, the closer you came to be one of the mature ‘elite’. Some Gnostics taught that since the body is considered evil, it’s to be treated harshly, leading to asceticism. We see this later in the book of Colossians where Paul criticizes rules like, Col 2:21 “Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch.”

In contrast to the ascetics, others in the Gnostic movement held that since matter is inherently evil, it’s not breaking God’s law that’s evil – so you can basically ‘do what you like’ leading to licentiousness. What you did with your body was basically irrelevant, only the spiritual world mattered.

Do we see any of that in culture today? What would be the parallels now? Ascetics could be religious legalists, hyper-moralistic; or other religions that focus on works as a means of earning salvation. To be holy you’ve got to withdraw from the world, keep in your spiritual ‘bubble’, only go to approved church activities, try to be better at keeping religious laws than the next person. For example, living as a strict Mormon... The U.S.Department of Health conducted a survey of Americans 2020: Utah came in at number one in the country for what they termed mental health problems. A motto here might be “Try Harder”. Secular folk would gravitate toward self-help books and podcasts, listening to motivational speakers, continually beating yourself up to excel in virtue.

On the other hand, those who might err on the side of licentiousness are well represented in culture. “Party hearty”, “Live it up”, “You only live once” would be their motto. These might have a no-holds-barred approach toward sex, drugs, alcohol, and the overwhelming food choices we are privileged to enjoy. Like the stuffed feeling after a rich Thanksgiving meal, it’s nice for a short while – but does it really satisfy? Why does the ‘fullness’ vanish so soon, leaving us hankering for the next ‘high’?

Paul asserts that what people are searching for to fill that inner void can only truly be found in Jesus Christ. To make his case, Paul co-opts some of the terms popular amongst the Gnostics. Let’s note some of these before diving into our passage, let’s come to terms...

FULLNESS: see 1:19,25; 2:2,9. For the Gnostic, ‘fullness’ meant the sum of the supernatural forces controlling people’s fate. For Paul, ‘fulness’ means the totality of God with all His powers and attributes, encapsuled in Jesus – see especially 2:9f, “For in Christ all the FULLNESS of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given FULLNESS in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority.” In other words, JESUS is the only One who can truly satisfy us.

MYSTERY is another key term Paul uses (see 1:26f; 2:2; 4:3). In pagan teaching, the so-called ‘mystery religions’, it referred to secret information available only to an exclusive group of people. Paul explodes that: for him, God’s mystery is always something not to be kept concealed but to be unpacked - disclosed, made plain, revealed. That’s Paul’s main mission, to proclaim the mystery of Christ, unpack it for folks to make it plain and understandable.

PERFECT is another code-word for the Gnostics, meaning those who had become possessors of the secrets or knowledge boasted of by that particular religion. But for Paul, ‘perfect’ would describe your ordinary garden-variety Christian who was becoming mature in character (see 1:28, 2:2).

A final more general term used in the pagan teachings was ‘knowledge’ or ‘wisdom’ – that’s how you got saved and gradually ascended higher in the system, by familiarizing yourself with deeper and deeper esoteric teaching, amassing knowledge until you’re one of the elite. But for Paul, wisdom is something he proclaims to everybody (1:28); he maintains about Christ, 2:3 “in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” It’s available in Jesus freely to all who believe.

So please keep those special code-words in mind as we go through today’s passage: Paul is lassoing some of these terms used by pagan teachers and giving them more accurate meaning in relation to orthodox Christianity.

THE STRANGE STRUGGLE

Praise appreciates the Lord for who He IS, in His excellence, beauty, power, and radiance. Thanksgiving honours the Lord for what He has DONE for us, His actions rather than His being. It’s not too hard to thank God when things are going well; but what about when the going is rough? When there’s pain? When things don’t turn out as you’d hoped? Can you still thank God even then? That becomes more of a sacrifice.

How Paul begins this section may take us aback. Col 1:24 “Now I REJOICE in what was SUFFERED for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions, for the sake of his body, which is the church.” How can he say he actually had JOY about the suffering? Paul endured imprisonment, beatings, shipwrecks, stoning, hunger, exposure, and other physical trials all because he was Christ’s messenger (see 2Cor 11:16-33). How could he put up with it? And more than that, how could he even become thankful or rejoice in it all?

He sees it as connected to Jesus’ sufferings for the sake of the church. As v24 notes, they are ‘Christ’s afflictions’ Paul is ‘filling up’ in his flesh – not that anything was lacking in the atonement for sinners Jesus accomplished at the cross; but His salvation has its outworking through difficulties believers encounter as they spread His message. Paul identifies with Jesus in affliction, even as Jesus identifies with His followers; recall Acts 9:4, “He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"” Paul (then Saul) had been persecuting Christians, not actually Jesus, yet Jesus took it personally, as if the hardships were being done to Himself.

Also Paul can stand the suffering because he knows it’s happening for a reason, a goal, there’s purpose in his trials. V24 “for the SAKE of his body, which is the church”; also in v25 Paul says God gave him a ‘commission’ to present the word of God in its fullness to his audience. He’s fulfilling a stewardship entrusted to him; an administration or management he’s been put in charge of. See more of this purpose in v28, “so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ”; v29, “To this END I labour, struggling...”; and 2:2a, “My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding...” Whenever you see words like ‘that’ and ‘so that’, there’s purpose reflected there. Paul has a goal, an objective, that makes the hardship worthwhile.

Our BIG IDEA again for today: “The MARVEL of Christ’s MYSTERY prompts PURPOSE in our PAIN.”

THE SURPRISING SECRET

What happens when you get a parcel delivered from FEDEX? Well, our dog gets a treat, a little baked dog-bone, but besides that? You open up the package to see what it is. You don’t just say, “Well, I guess it’s a box with something inside, but I’ll just leave it over there to age for a couple of years.” A parcel delivered is meant to be unpacked.

Paul sees himself as a courier service of sorts: he has a very valuable parcel to deliver, and not to leave taped up but to be taken out and put on display for all to see! This brings us to that concept of ‘mystery’ we were talking about earlier. In so-called ‘mystery religions’ the secrets were kept for the initiated and the elite; but the mystery of Christ is to be unpacked for everyone, both Jew and Gentile. Vv26f “the mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations, but is now disclosed to the saints. To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.” Also 2:2bf, “...in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”

The written revelation of Scripture down through the centuries had been pointing ahead to the illuminating of this wonderful mystery, that Almighty God would somehow become incarnate, one of us, and make reconciliation for sinners to His holy being. No human mortal would be good enough, being sinful from birth; who would be a sufficient sacrifice? How could God make atonement to God? That’s where the Trinity comes in, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Would Messiah be deliverer for Jews only, or for the nations besides? These were wonders the Old Testament sages and prophets only had glimpses of.

But now the apostles and other New Testament figures could see it all unfolding in retrospect. Jesus had explained to the two dejected disciples on the Emmaus Road how the Scriptures pointed to Himself; Luke 24:26f, “[Jesus said] Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?" And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.” Jesus is the hermeneutical (interpretive) key that unlocks the whole Bible!

And the wonder is not just that Christ comes; it’s that He comes IN! The Holy Spirit makes it possible for us to experience fellowship with Jesus right inside us. “...This mystery...is Christ IN YOU, the hope of glory.” The Spirit is our ‘earnest’ or advance deposit or down payment on what’s to come. By faith, Jesus comes into our lives and transforms us more and more into His likeness, from the inside out.

2:2 “...so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may KNOW the MYSTERY of God, namely, Christ...” To know or experience a relationship with Jesus, walking with Him, praying to Him, hearing His voice, coming to understand the Kingdom, beginning to see life through His eyes, sensing His hand upon us and guiding us. That is a mystery worth unpacking your whole life long. It’s not just cerebral, in your head, but felt at your heart; like the Jesus-knocking-at-your-door verse Revelation 3:20 - “I will come into him and EAT with him, and he with Me...” It’s sit-down dining like a multi-course feast, not just a quick burger standing on the sidewalk.

To the pious first-century Jew, such an intimacy between a person and the Maker of Heaven and Earth would have been shocking, unthinkable, inconceivable. Let alone to an unclean Gentile! But that’s what Jesus invites us to.

Robertson’s Word Pictures comments on 1:27, “It is the personal experience and presence of Christ in the individual life of all believers that Paul has in mind, the indwelling Christ in the heart as in Eph 3:17" (“so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith”). It’s a ‘dwelling’ not a ‘flit through’.

THE SUSTAINING STRENGTH

The Christian life is a struggle, Paul admits; there’s suffering involved. He hadn’t even met the people at Colosse or Laodicea (as far as we know) – they were likely church plants by other converts, such as Epaphras (1:7). He says, 2:1 “I want you to know how much I am STRUGGLING for you and for those at Laodicea, and for all who have not met me personally.” It’s tough for Paul, he’s likely writing from prison in Rome. But he’s doing it for all who will believe his message. There’s purpose in it. They riches of the mystery of Christ justify the agony and ill treatment.

Plus Paul has an internal charging dock. Persevering in the pain is possible because of this personal power plug-in. Read 1:29: “To this end I labor, struggling with all his ENERGY, which SO POWERFULLY WORKS in me.” Struggling, yes, labour, yes – but not just on Paul’s own ability: he says Christ’s energy “so powerfully works in me”; NLT “depending on Christ’s mighty power that works within me.” More literally, “His energy that energizes me dynamically”.

Perhaps a hint here of that great verse Philippians 4:13, “I can do everything through him who gives me strength.” That ‘mystery’ of Jesus in me doesn’t remain a vague abstract concept – Christ Himself gives us power and ability to face each challenge as it comes. They could lash Paul, they could stone him, they could shipwreck him 3 times, they could lock him up and chain him 24/7 to Roman guards – but somehow he just kept on ticking!

This same supernatural strength from Jesus helps the church stay firm. 2:5 “For though I am absent from you in body, I am present with you in spirit and delight to see how ORDERLY you are and how FIRM your faith in Christ is.” John MacArthur comments that this ‘good order’ and ‘steadfast faith’ are “both military terms depicting a solid rank of soldiers drawn up for battle”.

His power helps strengthen the individual and the church for His purpose – in the face of opposition from forces of culture and the enemy that would undermine it. Our BIG IDEA once more: “The MARVEL of Christ’s MYSTERY prompts PURPOSE in our PAIN.”

“I HOPE YOU SAID THANK YOU, GRAN”

Can we thank God for the mystery of Christ living in us, revealing God’s wisdom and understanding, giving us power for His purpose, and stick-to-it-iveness in our struggles? Can we ‘rejoice in what was suffered’ like Paul says? Yes, thank Him for that great food and ginormous turkey dinner. But thank Him for the power and grace Jesus gives even when you’re hungry and feeling beaten like Paul. Thank Him continually.

I close with a true story Nicky Gumble shares in his commentary on BibleInOneYear(.org), about a woman who suffered long but learned to thank God for a miraculous healing. Nicky recalls...

“Jean Smith told me her story. She was in her mid-sixties. She came from Cwmbran in Wales. She had been blind for sixteen years. She had a white stick, and a guide dog named Tina. An infection had eaten away at the retinas and mirrors behind her eyes – they could not be replaced. She was in constant pain.

Jean went on a local Alpha course. They had a day away to focus on the work of the Holy Spirit. During this time, the pain left. She went to church the following Sunday to thank God. The minister anointed her with oil. As she wiped the oil away she could see the communion table. God had miraculously healed Jean.

She had not seen her husband for sixteen years. She was surprised at how white his beard was! Jean had never even seen her daughter-in-law before. Her six-and-a-half-year-old grandson used to guide her around the puddles to avoid her getting her feet wet.

He said to her, ‘Who done that Gran?’/ She replied, ‘Jesus made me better.’

‘I hope you said thank you, Gran.’ / ‘I will never stop saying thank you,’ she answered.”

[Nicky Gumble concludes] “Like Jean, Paul was also constantly giving thanks to God. He had an attitude of gratitude... Praise is giving glory to God for who he is. Thanksgiving is giving glory to God for what he has done for us. It is the lens through which to view our entire life.” Let’s pray.

Thank You Father for this marvelous gift of Jesus Your Son coming right inside us, helping us know You, giving us rich understanding of Your ways and Your purpose for us. Forgive us when we grumble because of hardships and suffering. Jesus, You suffered so much to bring us to Yourself! How can we ever stop saying ‘Thank You’? Give us courage and boldness to share these riches with others, so that they too may be ‘encouraged in heart and united in love’ – Your awesome love. In Christ’s name, Amen.

“Are You Ready?” - 1^st in Advent - Nov.27/22 - Mt.24:36-44

ROBBED!

Matthew 24:43 - “But understand this: [Jesus said] If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into.”

A relative of mine runs a diesel engine repair and tweaking shop down in the Norwich area. November 11 is a day he will remember – about 2:35 am security cameras show an invading truck towing away a GMC pickup that was in his yard awaiting repair. Just hitched on and towed it away! (PHOTO) Three days later it was discovered, dumped and abandoned, stripped down of any valuable parts (PHOTO). He had been robbed in very brazen fashion.

I recall one time when my oldest brother lived in Grimsby, he and his wife were away on vacation. A truck backed up to their suburban home and carted away furniture, appliances, valuables... My brother and his wife felt like they had been violated to come back and find their home had been invaded and looted.

Robbers and thieves are not rare. They frighten us, are a threat to our security. Jesus described our spiritual enemy as a thief, in sharp contrast to Him who came to GIVE instead of take: Jn 10:10 “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

What’s Satan stealing? How is he being a thief, what’s he out to take from us? I see at least three things in our passage he wants to rob us of – truth, morality, and devotion.

TRUTH: there are many ideologies out there, many worldviews, and those who are deceptive or at least deceived have a vested interest in persuading us to adopt their version of reality, their relativistic version of truth. Jesus warned earlier in this passage about the end times, Matthew 24:11 - “and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people.” Also V24, “For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even the elect— if that were possible.” Actually PERFORMING great signs – isn’t that convincing? Aren’t they actually demonstrating their claims are true? Yet, Jesus says it’s deceptive.

Thanks to the Internet and YouTube and podcasts, we are now awash in all sorts of hucksters promoting alternative worldviews and ideologies. Some of them sound very adamant and convincing, their presentations hammer away with polished words and emphatic statements that wow us with the person’s surety. It’s easy for us to find a few favourites that spout what we want to hear, what reaffirms our own biases and suspicions. But the apostle Paul in 2Timothy 4 warned there would come a time when people would turn away from the gospel toward doctrines according to their liking: 2Tim 4:3 “For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine.Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.” Truth becomes a casualty when we dedicate ourselves to listening only to our pet echo chamber.

WHOLESOME MORALITY is another item Satan’s robbing us of. Mt 24:12 “Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold...” THE INCREASE OF WICKEDNESS. Marriage’s exclusivity is being honoured less and less. World Cup players had planned to wear a “One Love” armband in support of homosexual and other deviances. Pornography is addictive for both men and women, and robs us of appreciation for our mate by engraving our brain cells with images of air-brushed and extreme models. It’s getting tougher to find wholesome options to watch on our streaming services – apparently what’s ‘popular’ is not necessarily what’s ‘pure’.

DEVOTION is a third thing Satan steals. Jesus predicts, “The love of most will grow cold...” (24:12) Church attendance has broadly taken about a 30% hit over the pandemic; people find it easier to just stay home and watch online, or simply fall away from church participation altogether. The pace of life leaves Sunday as the one day when you still have some discretionary time, and for many, church just doesn’t succeed in outweighing the competing options. How about when our service was cancelled last Sunday due to power outage and bad weather – did you feel like you were missing something? Or did you welcome the extra time to devote to a favourite pastime? Did we actually feel a little guilty about being so relieved we didn’t have to bundle up and head to worship?

The regular habit of gathering with other believers for fellowship helps keep our devotion strong for our Lord and His people. Two coals burn more brightly when placed beside each other. Hebrews 10:25, “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another— and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” In the book of Revelation, with letters to the early churches planted in Asia Minor, Jesus rebuked the church at Laodicea; Rev 3:15f, “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm— neither hot nor cold— I am about to spit you out of my mouth.”

How do we keep our fervour and devotion for the Lord hot and bubbling? Have we unwittingly allowed the enemy to quench the spiritual flames, distracting us with entertainments or material quests that yield faster feedback?

HOPE WORTH HAVING

What’s our BIG IDEA for today?

“Though Satan is stealing,

at Jesus’ revealing

the real goal of life

will be most appealing.”

The chapter begins with the disciples being wowed by Herod’s Temple in all its grandiosity, but Jesus rains on that parade by pointing out all will be thrown down, not one stone will be left standing on another. And that actually happened within about 40 years when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem. Jesus wants to shift their gaze to a new wonder: His return to gather His people to Himself.

The focus of the chapter can be found in vv30f, “At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn.They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory.And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.” This turning point in history harks back all the way to a vision of Daniel, Dan 7:13f - “"In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.”

Before we become too ‘wowed’ by things in this life, rather than let our focus be submerged in the mundane patterns of daily subsistence, Jesus would remind us He is coming back – and everything will be different after that. He is the true lasting reference point in all history. Pleasing Him, being ready for Him, is the “real goal” of life!

Note, v30 says at His appearing “the nations of the earth will MOURN” - why wouldn’t they be happy instead? Have their own goals been wrong? Are they mourning because they recognize the futility of what they’ve been living for, how much they’ve let the enemy steal and rob from them?

Jesus’ “coming” is emphasized in a couple of other verses here. V37 “So it will be at the COMING of the Son of Man;” and v39, “This is how it will be at the COMING of the Son of Man.” The word translated ‘coming’ here is ‘parousia’ in the Greek, which means coming, arrival, or ADVENT. Hence this First Sunday of Advent heralds a season of 40 days looking forward not only to Christmas, Jesus’ first coming in human form, but also to His eventual return, His ‘second coming’.

This passage underlines 5 things about Jesus’ return that highlight it’s a Hope Worth Having – it is CERTAIN; it is SECRET; it is SUDDEN; it is SURPRISING; and it is SUBVERSIVE.

First, it is CERTAIN. You can count on it. Jesus wasn’t wrong about the destruction of Jerusalem, even though such a thing must have seemed unthinkable to the disciples as they admired the glistening buildings. Study vv34-35, which Jesus begins with the solemn expression “Amen” - “I tell you the truth, this generation will CERTAINLY not pass away until all these things have happened.Heaven and earth will pass away, but MY WORDS WILL NEVER PASS AWAY.”

‘Heaven and earth will pass away’– but isn’t that what’s ‘really real’, what our scientific method is based upon, what materialists trust in fundamentally – even though at an atomic level we know it’s actually mostly empty space, with some tiny particles whirling around in energy fields? Jesus is saying HIS WORDS will outlast heaven and earth, His truth is what’s ‘really true’, will NEVER cease to be.

Considering that – what are YOU “banking on”? Is your security, what you’re hoping in, ‘really real’? Or in light of eternity is it a mirage that vanishes?

A shallow earthquake Nov.22 left over 270 Indonesians dead. Stock markets have seen significant declines in the past years. Pension funds that invested in cryptocurrency exchange FTX (including the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan) lost millions. Let the Lord set the values of your heart.

Second, Jesus’ coming is SECRET. V36 “No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.” And v42, “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come.” We can’t predict when it’s going to happen – although some signs of the end times seem to becoming apparent. So we need to be ready, anytime, regardless.

An Encyclopedia Brittanica article online by Rachel Cole titled “10 Failed Doomsday Predictions” has some interesting reminders that those who’ve tried to predict Jesus’ return in the past have failed miserably. “Harold Camping has publicly predicted the end of the world as many as 12 times based his interpretations of biblical numerology.In 1992, he published a book, ominously titled 1994?, which predicted the end of the world sometime around that year.Perhaps his most high-profile predication was for May 21, 2011, a date that he calculated to be exactly 7,000 years after the Biblical flood.When that date passed without incident, he declared his math to be off and pushed back the end of the world to October 21, 2011.”

Cole adds, “Religious leader William Miller began preaching in 1831 that the end of the world as we know it would occur with the second coming of Jesus Christ in 1843. He attracted as many as 100,000 followers who believed that they would be carried off to heaven when the date arrived. When the 1843 prediction failed to materialize, Miller recalculated and determined that the world would actually end in 1844.” (Oops, wrong again!)

But my favourite is what Cole titles “The Prophet Hen of Leeds” - she writes, “In 1806, a domesticated hen in Leeds, England, appeared to lay eggs inscribed with the message ‘Christ is coming.’ Great numbers of people reportedly visited the hen and began to despair of the coming Judgment Day.It was soon discovered, however, that the eggs were not in fact prophetic messages but the work of their owner, who had been writing on the eggs in corrosive ink and reinserting them into the poor hen’s body.” Poor bird! What a FOWL ploy!

All of which demonstrates – the date of Jesus’ coming is a secret.

Third, it is SUDDEN. This is memorably driven home by our Lord in vv40-41, “Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left.Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left.” This image probably haunts those who sang Larry Norman’s 1969 classic “I Wish We’d All Been Ready” – “Two men walking up a hill

One disappears and one's left standing still

I wish we'd all been ready...”

However as John MacArthur points out, this probably isn’t about believers being ‘raptured’ or ‘snatched away’ or ‘caught up’ as in 1Thessalonians 4:17; in the Matthew 24 context, ‘taken’ probably means ‘in judgment’, as just before in v39 the flood comes when Noah enters the ark and ‘took them all away’ (and that was not a positive experience!).

Nevertheless, it happens very suddenly. Like lightning. Mt 24:27, “For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.”

Fourth, His coming is SURPRISING. At the start today we talked about a truck being towed off surprisingly in the middle of the night. Most unexpected! Jesus likens His ‘parousia’ to that of a thief; v44 “So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when YOU DO NOT EXPECT HIM.”

We don’t usually think of Jesus in connection with a thief, do we?! But this is sort of a common thread in the New Testament. 1Thess 5:2 “for you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.” Rev 3:3b “But if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what time I will come to you.” And again, Rev 16:15 “Behold, I come like a thief! Blessed is he who stays awake and keeps his clothes with him, so that he may not go naked and be shamefully exposed.”

And, fifth, Jesus’ coming is SUBVERSIVE. (I saved this till last because I find it most significant!) Upending, cataclysmic, upsetting the apple cart. Jesus compares it to the unique and tumultuous event of Noah and the flood.

Press pause for a moment: note Jesus is treating the account of Noah as HISTORY, not as just a parable or made-up fiction. If Jesus plainly expects His hearers to acknowledge it as history, that it really happened, who are we to suppose the story of Noah and the flood and the ark is just a fairy tale? It was cataclysmic, earth-shaking, divine judgment punctuating human dealings. And why did the judgment of the Flood happen? Genesis 6:5f “The LORD saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain.” Our wickedness, our evil hearts and inclinations, GRIEVE God - cause Him pain!

Back to Jesus’ point. He describes normal everyday life - v38 “For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark...” NLT “the people were enjoying banquets and parties and weddings...” Sounds like just yer normal folk, doesn’t it?! ‘Party hearty’ / ‘YOLO - You Only Live Once.’

BUT after Noah entered the ark – V39 “and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away.That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.” His coming is cataclysmic, exposing the shallowness of our preoccupations, the limitedness of our vision, the self-centredness of our existence. The real goal of life is NOT eating and drinking and getting hitched: the real goal is pleasing Him to whom one day you must give account.

So, don’t get too cozy with culture. Christians are by definition counter-cultural, for we are looking to Him who will one day return to gather us to Himself. His promise helps us see the larger picture, to live for higher ideals, nobler purposes than just filling our gut and satisfying our senses. Don’t settle for these pale temporal mortal pursuits. Again, our BIG IDEA for today:

“Though Satan is stealing,

at Jesus’ revealing

the real goal of life

will be most appealing.”

VIGILANCE VINDICATED

Such HOPE WORTH HAVING motivates us to KEEP WATCH. v42 “Therefore keep watch”, v43 the owner ‘would have kept watch’ and not let his house be broken into. V44 “So you also must BE READY, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”

The chapter closes with an illustration Jesus offers of a faithful servant. A wicked servant would suppose the master’s not returning for a long time: v49 “and he then begins to beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink with drunkards.” That basic default human nature eat-and-drink mode. Back to that pre-Noah lifestyle, living for the moment, grabbing what you can while the getting is good. Abusing others, exploiting them to feed your greeds. Where does v51 say the wicked servant ends up? Cut to pieces! And assigned a place with – who? The murderers? The rapists? The underworld low-lifes? No – “the hypocrites”! Those who preach one thing but practice otherwise. Hmmm...

By contrast, what’s the faithful servant do? Gives the others in the household their food at the proper time. The faithful servant is OTHER-centred, knowing His Master is returning, and he’s just discharging a stewardship on His Master’s behalf. How does the Master reward the faithful servant? V47 (prefaced by another ‘Amen’) “I tell you the truth, he will put him in charge of all his possessions.” Get out! How stellar! But the point here is not ‘the stuff’ – the point is THE CHARACTER that the faithful steward demonstrates, he’s responsible, unselfish, watching out to take care of others. And that’s precisely the kind of person the Master delights to put in charge! Such a faithful servant has discovered the REAL GOAL of life.

Let’s pray. Father, as we proceed through this Advent Season, help us look forward not only to this Christmas December 25, but to be looking forward to Jesus’ coming, His appearing or parousia, and not to be wowed by even the best this world offers. We want to watch with eyes that see beyond daily distractions, all that the advertisers try to entice us with. Help us live each moment in such a way that, no matter when Jesus comes, we can feel ready instead of mourn. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Sowing for the Master” - Funeral of Susan Howson - Dec.9/22

Is.61:1-3; Hosea 10:12; 1Cor.3:6-9, 15:35-44; Gal.6:7-10; Mt.13:22-23

Susan loved music, especially Southern Gospel; and she began her career as a teacher. So let’s start today with a musical quiz.

There’s an old gospel piece that has these lyrics in the verses, let’s see if you recognize it and can guess which one...

Sowing in the morning sowing seeds of kindness

Sowing in the noontide and the dewy eve

Waiting for the harvest and the time of reaping

We shall come rejoicing – bringing in the sheaves...

Going forth with weeping sowing for the Master

Tho' the loss sustained our spirit often grieves

When our weeping's over He will bid us welcome

We shall come rejoicing – bringing in the sheaves.

Human life is very interactive. You can’t survive being born without being in community, being dependent on others. Life consists of a web of relationships. We are always having an impact on others, positive or negative, building them up or - hopefully not very often - tearing them down.

Scripture often uses the imagery of sowing and reaping, of planting and harvesting, to describe this effect we have on those around us. The prophet Hosea implies the person who seeks the Lord will sow righteousness for themselves, and reap the fruit of unfailing love. The prophet Isaiah, in a familiar passage describing the ministry of the long-expected Messiah, describes God’s people as “a PLANTING of the Lord for the display of His splendour.” How are we growing? Are we focused on displaying God’s goodness by our actions?

Coming to the New Testament, Jesus in His teaching used the imagery of fields and planting several times. He likened God’s kingdom to a sower scattering seed on several different types of soil, with a variety of responses. Thorny soil represented God’s message coming to those preoccupied with this life’s worries and what Jesus called the “deceitfulness” of wealth. That’s in contrast to the good soil, where those who understand the word produce a rich harvest, as much as 100 times what was sown.

When we hear God’s word, does it have any effect on us? Do we let it kind of just ‘bounce off’ us, as if we’re impervious – or do we actually let it penetrate and modify our attitudes and behaviour? What fruit do we let it bear in our lives?

The Lord’s brother James reminds us of the importance of what we sow relationally. Peacemakers who sow in peace, he said, “raise a harvest of righteousness”. Our actions can produce major positive results.

But it’s the Apostle Paul who in several letters reminds the early church that we are constantly sowing and reaping. The early church missionaries, such as he and Apollos, sowed and watered, but God gave the growth; and each would be rewarded according to their labour. He tells the church at Corinth bluntly, “YOU are God’s FIELD...” Think of that next time you furrow your brow! We sow into each other’s lives.

Be careful – there are a couple of directions we can sow. As he explained to the Galatians, we can sow to please our sinful nature or ‘flesh’, the animal-drive or ‘fallen’ inclinations, our selfishness. If we do that, we reap destruction. However those who sow to the Spirit instead reap ETERNAL LIFE. We’re in a funeral home today, where we mark communally an exit from this mortal life. Wouldn’t you have wanted to be sowing in such a way as to reap ‘eternal life’ when you finally wind up here?

In a parallel way, to the church at Rome Paul spoke of being slaves either to sin or to God. Being a slave to sin means we reap death; but to be God’s slave brings the benefit of reaping holiness and (again) ETERNAL LIFE. Not that we’ve ‘earned’ that by our works: eternal life in Christ is a sheer GIFT of God.

Many of us have been blessed to be the ‘field’ to some extent into which Susan sowed. She did not seem to weary in doing good, but looked for opportunities to serve in her family, her church, and her community. She maintained an impressive ‘greeting card’ ministry remembering others’ birthdays and anniversaries. She welcomed others into her home. She gave much of her time in leading women’s Bible studies, Junior Choir, planning numerous Faith-in-Song concerts and Women’s Days Out, and instigating a YouthPark for the children and teens to enjoy.

My deceased wife Yvonne was a particular recipient of Susan’s kindness. There was a silver ball ornament that was hinged to open in the middle they passed back and forth with little gifts inside – nothing too expensive or exotic, just a sweet ‘thinking of you’ token of thoughtfulness. In this gesture of mutual support we tried not to ‘drop the ball’ (so to speak).

God’s word sets before us the honorable goal of becoming an ‘oak of righteousness’, a ‘planting of the Lord for the display of His splendour’. We witnessed a good deal of the Lord’s unfailing love and goodness through Susan’s diligent acts of kindness.

Today we come to the end of her earthly journey, and plant her body beneath the soil, yet in resurrection hope as she trusted in her Risen Lord. The seed we sow in terms of her material remains Paul describes as ‘perishable, in weakness’, a natural body. But from the Bible we understand God will give this seed a different kind of body, as the first disciples witnessed Jesus had when He rose from the dead at Easter. Paul describes such a ‘spiritual body’ as ‘imperishable, in glory, in power’. Only a supernatural God such as brought the universe into being in the first place out of nothing could make that happen!

And so we come to realize the truth about Christ that Isaiah described: binding up the brokenhearted, comforting all who mourn, providing for those who grieve – the oil of gladness instead of mourning. In the face of death, we place ourselves in the hands of Jesus our only Hope, whose pure and very special blood can cleanse our sins and whose victory o’er the grave changes everything. May He help each one of us sow our lives to please His Spirit, that we too may reap eternal life! Amen.

“The Wrapping of a Christmas People” - Dec.25/22 Titus 2:11-14

GETTING SERIOUS ABOUT CHRISTMAS

As a legend has it, Satan and his demons were having a Christmas party. As the demonic guests were departing, one grinned and said to Satan, “Merry Christmas, your majesty.” At that, Satan replied with a growl, “Yes, keep it merry. If they ever get serious about it, we’ll all be in trouble!”

Well, let’s get serious about it. It’s the birth of the Infant Saviour. It’s the coming of God. It’s the intervention of God’s presence among people.

In today’s brief Scripture reading, the Apostle Paul reminds Titus of the deep significance of that event. It’s not just a cute story with some local yokel shepherds gathered around a sweet newborn baby gurgling and cooing in a rustic stable. This is God Himself appearing amongst us, to save us from eternal peril and change us permanently to live for Him not just basic human desires. And it points ahead to Messiah’s return, renewing Creation and inaugurating His neverending reign, in which His people enjoy eternal relationship with their Maker.

Our “BIG IDEA” for today:

God’s grace showed up at Bethelehm

to cleanse and claim our lives, and then

adorn (do good) as we wait for Him.

TEMPTED TO GET OFF TRACK

Travelling by train is a real treat. No getting stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic. No having to keep your hands gripped on the steering wheel and adjusting your speed depending on the traffic around you, or vehicles cutting in on you. You can just sit back, relax, and listen to the clickety-clack of the wheels on the rails as the engineer does the driving and conveys you safely to your destination.

As long, that is, as the switches are set right. If the switch is set the wrong way, you might end up in Kitchener rather than London, or Montreal rather than Ottawa. You’d have gotten seriously off track.

Crete is an island in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea about 160 miles long and on average about 20 miles wide. It’s at the south end of the Aegean Sea which separates Greece from modern-day Turkey. Paul had brought the gospel there, but left a young assistant named Titus behind to appoint leaders in the young churches and “put in order” what was yet to be done. Honestly, there was quite a bit of “putting in order” needed! Deceivers with selfish motives had made inroads and were pocketing ill-gotten proceeds. Titus 1:10f “For there are many rebellious people, mere talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision group. They must be silenced, because they are ruining whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach— and that for the sake of dishonest gain.” The lax behaviour of the general population on the island was summed up in a proverb, Titus 1:12B “Cretans are always liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons.” How’s that for a reputation?! (We won’t compare that with our own having a bit too much to eat then curling up on the couch with the remote and the tube.)

Truth be told, we have all been ‘off track’ in our behaviour at some time in our life. As Paul describes in 3:3, “At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another.” “WE TOO...” Sin has beguiled us all, at some time or other. None of us has a perfect record, not even the apostles. We have rebelled against God’s commands. We have dabbled in forbidden fruit and consequently found ourselves trapped, enslaved by the results, the passions that proved too strong for us to control.

What kind of society results when good is rejected? Paul suggests “malice and envy, being hated and hating one another.” Everyone for themselves; grab what you can while you can. A sad news story this past week involved a group of teenage girls (16 and younger) from across Toronto gathering and even attacking a 59-year-old man, who later died from the injuries. What happened to “Toronto the Good”? Is this where our society is headed? When order breaks down, you have a situation like the capital of Haiti, where gangs determine their turf and decide what’s allowed. Darkness creeps in, till you’re afraid even to go out in public.

In such a setting of darkness and disorder, the little faith-fellowships called churches are lighthouses of hope, beacons sustaining order and community in the face of threatening anarchy.

THE EPIPHANY TUCKED AWAY

How do you fight darkness? You need a light. [LIGHT BULB ILLUSTRATION] All it takes to dispel the darkness is light even the smallest candle.

Paul implies such a light has come; 2:11 “For the grace of God that brings salvation has APPEARED to all men.” The root word for ‘appeared’ in the Greek is the same from which we get ‘epiphany’ – as when a light goes on and your surroundings become clear, what was hidden suddenly shows up. Paul is saying the Incarnation and ministry and crucifixion / resurrection of Jesus was God’s GRACE becoming apparent or visible in a dark world. Because Jesus came, we know grace. John 1:14 “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” Also Jn 1:17 “For the law was given through Moses; GRACE and truth came through Jesus Christ.” Take a whiff of a worldview: if it doesn’t smell like Grace, it can’t be Christianity! “Accept no substitutes.”

God’s grace “brings salvation”, Paul says (2:11); the Angel told Joseph the baby’s name would be Jesus, “because He will save His people from their sins” (Mt 1:21). Heroic deeds can save people from drowning, from burning buildings, a kidney transplant can save a young person from endless dialysis and possible death – but only a perfect sinless sacrifice could save us from the penalty of our sins, and there is only One Human that ever lived who could fit that bill.

Paul circles back to that “epiphany” term in 2:13, “while we wait for the blessed hope— the glorious APPEARING of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ...” Grammatically that’s not two beings, but both describing the same entity – Paul’s declaring Jesus is both “Saviour” and “our great God”. That little seven or eight-pound bundle amidst the straw, wrapped tight in swaddling cloths, is in fact God invading our existence incognito. Luke doesn’t actually describe the shepherds as worshipping before the manger, but Matthew says about the Wise Men or Magi, Mt 2:11 “On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down AND WORSHIPED HIM.” Worship is only appropriate for a divine being.

The Magi were non-Jews, and astrologers at that. So they’re a good illustration of what Paul says in Titus 2:11, “the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to ALL MEN.” Even the Gentiles. Even astrologers! God could command the stars and planets to communicate His appearing even to foreign pagans. Yes, and your next-door neighbour today who’s looking at their horoscope and putting their hope in lottery tickets.

Our Big Idea:

God’s grace showed up at Bethelehm

to cleanse and claim our lives, and then

adorn (do good) as we wait for Him.

THE GIFT THAT TAKES AWAY

Paul continues to say of Jesus in 2:14, “who GAVE HIMSELF for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.” The best gift at Christmas is JESUS! He ‘gave Himself for us’.

It’s an incredibly long way from the throne room of heaven to that dusty smelly stable behind the no-room inn. Jesus left behind His eternal glory and unbroken fellowship with the Father and Holy Spirit to become limited in many aspects, constrained by our human form, susceptible to becoming weak and tired and hungry, struck and despised and spat upon. Writing to the Philippians, Paul described it as ‘kenosis’ or ‘emptying’: Php 2:6-8 “Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but MADE HIMSELF NOTHING, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death— even death on a cross!”

In v14 Paul breaks Jesus’ saving work into two aspects, CLEANSING and CLAIMING. 2:14 “who gave himself for us to REDEEM us from all wickedness and to PURIFY FOR HIMSELF a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.” ‘Redeem’ from wickedness - that’s the cleansing; ‘purify for Himself’ - that’s the claiming.

To redeem is to buy back; the Greek terms point to a ‘ransom’, an amount of money paid to free a slave. We see a similar idea in Gal 1:4, “who gave himself FOR OUR SINS to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father...” Also 1Timothy 2:6, “who gave himself as a RANSOM for all men— the testimony given in its proper time.” Jesus paid the price to set you free, no matter how badly you’ve messed up, no matter how great your guilt. Your iniquity was laid on Him.

By trusting in Jesus and receiving Him as your Saviour you are delivered or rescued in a judicial, legal sense; the penalty has been paid. But He doesn’t stop there. He works an internal transformation in you by the Holy Spirit to change you and your behaviour from the inside out (what’s formally called ‘regeneration’ and ‘sanctification’). He has CLEANSED you: now He CLAIMS you. See the part of 14 after the ‘and’ – “AND to purify FOR HIMSELF a people that are HIS VERY OWN...”

He PURIFIES us: if something’s ‘pure’, it doesn’t have other stuff mixed in. There’s a singularity, ‘only’ or ‘exclusively’ one element. We have a reverse osmosis unit that sends water to our kitchen sink that’s relatively pure; but if I go to make a cup of coffee, I heat the water, then run it through the coffee grounds in the French press, pour it over half a teaspoon of honey, add a teaspoon of cream... It’s certainly not ‘pure’ water when I’m done with it!

When Jesus purifies us, He gives us a single focus, we’re exclusively HIS, sold out to our Saviour, not torn in multiple directions. It’s a ‘catharsis’ for a purpose: Pauls says ‘purify for Himself’, a people ‘His very own’. We belong to Him. 1Peter 2:9 “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, A PEOPLE BELONGING TO GOD, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” Called-out-ones - ekklesia or ‘church’- called-out to be exclusively HIS, declaring His goodness and awesomeness.

[PADLOCK] To illustrate this ‘claiming’ aspect, consider this PADLOCK. In high school we used a padlock for our very own locker; if anybody else wanted into it, they’d have to use bolt cutters! That was MY locker and no one else had access to it or could use it. Does Jesus have that much ‘claim’ on us? Are you HIS, purified for Him?

That helps us keep unadulterated from wrong influences in our everyday living. Paul says of God’s grace that brings salvation in v12, “It teaches us to say "No" to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age...” Just say ‘no’ to godless living and sinful pleasures. Remember the coffee, don’t let those things get you into hot water!

We mentioned at the start how ‘off-track’ Cretan culture could be - ‘liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons’ (1:12). Or the circumcision group, coercing people to adopt all the Mosaic laws and dietary regulations. The ‘rebellious people’ in 1:10 full of meaningless talk and deception, disrupting households. In 3:9 Paul says, “But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless.” Don’t get side-tracked from God’s grace.

If you read the whole of this short letter to Titus, you’ll see ‘self-control’ is a big theme. 1:8 an elder must be self-controlled. 2:2,5,6 teach the older men to be self-controlled; the younger women are to be self-controlled and pure; encourage the young men to be [you guessed it!] self-controlled. NASV translates “sensibly”; a lexicon has “with sound mind, soberly, temperately, discreetly.” Don’t let your appetites run away with you.

If you pause to think about it, Paul’s short phrase at the end of v12 describes succinctly how we are to behave in 3 different spheres. New International Bible Commentary (Revised) notes, “Positively, we must seek to live rightly in relation to ourselves, to others, and to God - i.e.sober, upright, and godly lives.”

In right relation to ourselves, to others, and to God – self-controlled, upright, and godly lives.

Time for our BIG IDEA again as we’re working our way through...

God’s grace showed up at Bethelehm

to cleanse and claim our lives, and then

adorn (do good) as we wait for Him.

DOING GOOD MAKES HIM LOOK GOOD

The verse just preceding our passage today caught my attention. In 2:10 Paul says the trustworthy behaviour of slaves toward their masters - 2:10b “...in every way they will make the teaching about God our Savior ATTRACTIVE.” The word translated means to adorn, “to ornament...metaph.to embellish with honour”. Literally it’s kosmeo - think ‘cosmetics’ - is anyone here wearing ‘cosmetics’ to ‘embellish’ your appearance? (Don’t raise your hand!) A bit of touch-up cream covers up that zit or scratch and helps your appearance.

By our behaviour we ‘adorn’ our Saviour, we make Him ‘attractive’ to others. Doing good makes HIM look good! What’s the popular beef by other about church-goers? “The church is full of HYPOCRITES.” Usually said by someone who has been treated in an unChristlike way by some church-goer.

How many of you have a bare undecorated Christmas tree in your house? Would look pretty ‘blah’, wouldn’t it? I mean, trees are fine and green and make oxygen and we need them to live, but who would put just this huge green blob in your living room that takes up space and drops needles everywhere?!

[ORNAMENT] No, we decorate our tree, we add – ORNAMENTS. Pretty bows and garland. Delicate shiny glass balls coloured silver or gold that break and smash into a thousand bits on the floor if you drop them. Why such trouble? Because they help the tree look absolutely BEAUTIFUL.

By ‘doing good’, you put an ornament on the tree that is Jesus’ reputation amongst others, as it were. You ‘trim the tree’ to honour Him by good deeds; hmm - is there any behaviour you should consider ‘trimming out’ of your habits that doesn’t honour Him, doesn’t make Him look good to onlookers?

The Apostle Paul really hammers away on this all through this short letter. 1:8 an overseer must be one who “loves what is good”. 1:16 (about those who are corrupt) “They claim to know God, but by their actions they deny him. They are detestable, disobedient and UNFIT FOR DOING ANYTHING GOOD.” 2:3 The older women are to “teach what is good.” 2:7 Paul tells Titus regarding the young men, “In everything set them an example by DOING WHAT IS GOOD.” 3:1 “Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to DO WHATEVER IS GOOD...” 3:8b “And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to DOING WHAT IS GOOD.” And 3:14, “Our people must learn to devote themselves to DOING WHAT IS GOOD, in order that they may provide for daily necessities and not live unproductive lives.”

Are you sensing a theme here? I guess if Christians are criticized for being ‘do-gooders’, we come by it on good authority. A corrective question would be – are we doing our ‘good deeds’ to be seen by other people? Or are we just intent on making Jesus look good, rather than trying to boost our own reputation? Are we ‘keeping up appearances’ drawing attention to ourselves, OR are we doing good even secretly, quietly, not caring about getting credit so long as Jesus’ honour is embellished?

“Well, pastor, that all sounds very fine – being self-controlled, doing what’s good. But it gets tiring real fast. How can I keep it up?”

You can’t, not in your own strength. You need God’s help, otherwise you get depleted very fast. There’s a clue in verses 11-13 about how it’s possible. “The grace of God...TEACHES us to say ‘no’...and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, WHILE WE WAIT FOR the blessed hope – the glorious appearing of our great God and Saviour, Jesus Christ...” That HOPE motivates us. His cleansing and claiming of us prompt us to be ‘eager to do what is good’ (v14).

Our ‘doing good’ is not an attempt to earn God’s favour, but a response to His grace and love poured into our lives. He is involved in ‘setting up’ the opportunities for us to do good. Ephesians 2:8-10 “For it is by GRACE you have been saved, through faith— and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For WE ARE GOD’S WORKMANSHIP, created in Christ Jesus to DO GOOD WORKS, which GOD PREPARED IN ADVANCE for us to do.”

Let’s rehearse our BIG IDEA one more time as we close.

God’s grace showed up at Bethelehm

to cleanse and claim our lives, and then

adorn (do good) as we wait for Him.

Let’s pray. Jesus, Saviour, how awesome it is that You came all the way from the Father’s side to a crude barn, to be born among peasants, to never own a car, never marry, never have kids, but just to teach us Your way and to give Yourself on a cross so we could have our sins forgiven and be Yours forever! Holy Spirit, pour out Your love in our hearts, strengthen our determination to do good, grow in us a sense that we are indeed Your people, Your very own, dear to You and set apart for Your purposes. Help us live in a way that attracts others to You. And thank You for the blessed Hope only You can give. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

“Seasoned with Salt” - Funeral of Jim Whytock - July 14, 2022

“Are You Ready?” - 1st in Advent - Nov.27/22 - Mt.24:36-44

“Are You Ready?” - 1^st in Advent - Nov.27/22 - Mt.24:36-44