Tie a ribbon round the old oak tree.

 

John.3 14/21

Over lent we have been hearing the story of God’s saving plan for the world. In Jesus’ story, and in our story. They are like a trinity; all are together or not at all. We accept forgiveness in Christ and we are overjoyed. We accept forgiveness in Christ and God is overjoyed.

God wants to forgive, not for some, not only for the small sins and not only once-but continually, and no sin is too great to be blotted off our record in Christ.

The Gospel of our Lord and Savior, we hear it every week. Why? Because we need to hear it, again, again and again.

Why? Because it is so hard to get our head around. Me, you, us-forgiven in Christ-as we are now.

It seems too good to be true. It can be dumbfounding to us-and knowing this, the devil, NOT God, latches onto our human thoughts and continually suggests there has to be more to it-and to our human nature-who could argue.

Except for one thing, it’s not what we think of ourselves, it’s not what other’s think of us, that’s immaterial-it’s what Christ has done for us: that’s it-and that’s why can it be so difficult to just simply accept.

Martin Luther wrote that if you only read one of the Gospel’s, read John, and it seems no-coincidence that the most known piece of scripture is written in the book of John.

“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”.

Pure Gospel. This one verse, those twenty six words of John 3:16 sum up the whole Gospel.

Likewise, in the Gospel today, these verses, tell us of the glory of God’s character, the nature of his life and his desire to share that life with his creatures. It is about God coming amongst us and the mixed response he receives to his offer of divine and eternal life. It is a vivid snapshot of God and our world.

When parents see their child in distress, they just wish they could take their place, it’s terrible.

Imagine how God would felt while Jesus was being persecuted.

Not enough that he was innocent. Not enough that crucifixion was the most cruelest and tortuous form of death, it was also considered shameful and degrading.

The irony abounds, because for Christ’s followers after his death and resurrection, they could not talk of their savor without talking of the manner and place in which he died.

Yet it doesn’t stop there, who put Jesus to such a terrible place. The Romans-yes, the Jewish authorities-yes, us-yes. Every person that has or will sin put Jesus on the Cross, and the irony-sin, humankind put Jesus there: and what was Jesus response-To those very present that day, what did Jesus say? “Forgive them Father they don’t what they do”.

What does Jesus say today? “Forgive them Father they are with me”.

It is all one way traffic, God who loves his son, sends his son to die for those he loves. Jesus, in love of his father and of us-lets the sin of the world, our sin cause his death.

It all seems back to front land. In human reasoning anyway.

God sending his Son Jesus into the world. Those that receive him, not from their own will, but born of God, through the gift of faith-believing in his name, become the children of God-and saved. We hear this and we know it’s true. We don’t even have to think about it, like we know that wall is made of bricks, we just know it is.

Using human logic this story is unfathomable, but from the faith worked in us, it’s simple isn’t it?

We know that’s the story, that’s the big picture. If it’s that simple, then how come life can still seem so difficult?

Looking at it from a step back, that big picture: why do we worry or struggle with anything, just enjoy the ride.

But it’s not like that, is it?

Because we are still in the battle. The battle that when not seen at arm’s length, but up close and personal is much tougher.

The ongoing battle: Conflict, good versus evil, the light versus the darkness.

Yet we can still struggle, and sometimes big time. We can suffer from moments that threaten to crush us, the darkness seems strong, the darkness of our sin, temptations, and our flesh seem on constant attack.

It’s a battle that sometimes feels unwinnable, and it would be if it was left to us-we are not strong enough. So Christ fights for us-he is our hope, and our defence. He is our light in the darkness.

When sick, troubled or lonely in the night, we wait for the sun to rise in the east-we wait for those first rays of sunshine, because we know that while we’ll still carry our woes with us, they never seem quite so bad in the light of the day.

Like in those moments when we are spiritually haunted by our failings, our weaknesses, our sin-we cling to that light of Christ-even when we can’t seem to see that light in ourselves, we cling to it; we know it’s our only ray of hope.

We have many moments of joy, moments of clarity where we feel like we are all but in heaven, blessed moments to cherish.

But sometimes, in despair because of our sin, crushed by others and our own circumstances and actions, or in despair and great sorrow due to the death of a loved one, that place can seem a long way off.

Here, this side of heaven-we dwell in the light of our Savior Jesus, yet because we are still amongst the darkness, at times, just surviving in Christ can be enough.

I was reminded of this recently when I was reading of some United States troops serving in a particularly dangerous part of Afghanistan. One of the soldiers, when talking of the amount of colleagues he’s lost from walking on land mines said;

“The only way to survive mentally here is to celebrate the small things, and that small thing is surviving another day, that is a victory-because we know that the only safe piece of ground is that which is under your two feet”.

Sometimes it can come down to as simple as that, to face another day in Christ is a victory worth celebrating. He is the safe place where we stand.

In faith, be it in our moments of sheer joy or moments of great distress-we see the true light, the light of Christ in the darkness, our saving light.

In today’s Gospel we are told of the light of Christ and of the darkness of sin, those saved and those condemned. If you are like me this can make you feel a little uneasy, because not only do I not always dwell in the light, sometimes the light even seems to be a bit dull.

But that’s life. Everyday being a Christian, is not any different from our whole life as a Christian. We have ups and downs. One minute or one month we feel on top of this “being a Christian” thing, but the next minute or the next month we’re back to square one-seemingly in the darkness.

But that’s again the irony, in the darkness is where we see ourselves and it doesn’t look so good. Any light we had seems extinguished, like someone has turned off that little torch light we were trying to see with. But then in the darkness-when our little strand of light from three triple A batteries has gone-we see the splendor of a lighthouse, shining bright-showing us the way to safety.

Verse 21: “But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light”,

It’s not the being in the darkness-our sin that condemns, what condemns is refusing to come into the light of Christ. Refusing his offer of forgiveness.

Verse 21 continued: “so that it may be seen clearly that what he has done has been done through God”.

Are these good deeds God is talking about, yes because any good deed we do is not from us but from God, from the Holy Spirit working in us.

But more so, much more so-“what can be seen clearly that what we have done has been done through God” is his bringing us redemption-that’s the good deed, the good work-not something we’ve done, but by simply accepting Christ, sent by the Father to save us-to accept and trust in his “no questions asked forgiveness-to accept his offer of life.”

So “that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life”. In the original Greek text, how it is written has two meanings: Eternal life of course, but not a waiting and wondering-but a “done deal eternal life”-it’s already in the bag-so go forward without the burden of any doubt.

Groucho Marx once famously, ill and in hospital and reading the bible was asked why he was doing so, and he answered “he was looking for a loop hole”.

The love of God and forgiveness in Christ alone, that’s not a loop hole-but a never ending canyon.

The love of God to us. Daily and throughout our lives, we may spurn it, doubt it, not return it and not always understand it. But no matter what-God’s love remains resolute and unwavering.

We may wonder away from His love, but His love for us does not wander from us. A pastor once told me a story and it about sums it up.

A man who felt he had fallen out with his wife, one morning, wrote her a note saying so and left her and lived a life of selfish careless abandon: partying, seeing other ladies and being basically reckless.

Years later, after using others and being used himself; he started thinking of his wife of long ago. How she cared for him and how she had loved him, just as he was. (and) he came to wish for those days again.

He wrote her a letter telling of all the things he had done and of how he now felt. But he finished his letter with: “You may be re-married or forgotten me. Whatever the case I have no right to even ask you to see me again, and if you do not-it would be as it should be, and I will leave you alone. But I will be the train tomorrow that passes by the old oak tree on the edge of the farm. If you tie a red ribbon to it I will l can get off at the next station. If not I will continue on my way.

The next day on the train, the passenger next to him asked him of his unease. So he told him his story, and when the train was about to round the corner before the oak tree, he asked the man if he could look for him-as he wasn’t game.

When the train came around the corner, he heard the other man crying, and said “don’t worry for me, after what I’ve done, I did not even have the right to ask her to have me back”.

The other man said, “No look for yourself”: and as he opened his eyes-he saw the oak tree covered in red bows.

The Love Of God.

Looking at our life, do we have doubts of ourselves-how could we not?

Looking at Christ’s life, do we have doubts of God’s love for us, how could we?

Amen.

 

“Fair Crack of the whip”

John 2:13-22

 

“Fair Crack of the whip”

 

Have you ever been part of breaking the protocols or rules of the day? That’s a bit of a silly question because we are Australians and that’s part of our DNA.

But what if breaking these protocols, or these ways of doing things need changing? When you are the few against the majority it can be very difficult, if not downright dangerous.

In the American civil war, a complex war but essentially characterized about North Vs. South. The North that did not have slavery against the South that did. The General of the south Robert E. Lee was attending church. Upon getting up from his pew to take Holy Communion, he noticed that a slave who had started to get up, noticed him and sat back down. On his way past him, he put his hand on his shoulder and said “come up with me, before God we are all equal”.

That may not sound that daunting until we reflect that segregation based on the color of a person’s skin was still a problem for President John F Kennedy in the 60’s.

These two men took enormous risks, both politically and physically-because they challenged and broke the rules of the day.

In our Gospel today, we see Jesus breaking a cultural, religious and social way of doing things in his times.

Last week I mentioned a quote from the movie Jerry Maguire. This week another one from it comes to mind (I have actually watched more than one movie in my life). Jerry is working for this organization and in a moment of “inspiration”, writes a memo to the bosses and every employee stating everything that’s wrong in their workplace.

The next day, everyone’s slapping his back saying ÿer Jerry, great stuff”, then as he walks off they say to each other “gone by Friday”.

Jesus in his words and actions in today’s Gospel puts it all on the line. Seen later when the authorities use these actions and words against him in his trial to be sentenced to crucifixion.

Starting at verse 13: “Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. And He found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers doing business. When He had made a whip of cords, He drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changers’ money and overturned the tables”.

Jesus is brandishing a whip. Remember in the Garden of Gethsemane when the guards come to arrest Jesus, Peter cuts off one of their ears with a sword to protect Jesus, in which Jesus tells him “to put his sword away”.

But here, Jesus has the whip out-he is not a happy man.

(and) to our ears, animals, doves and money changers-it seems a bit of a rabble-so it seems fair enough that Jesus has taken exception to all this-apart for one small matter-celebrating the Passover is, as recorded in Leviticus, as per God’s command.

Leviticus 23:4 “These are the feasts of the Lord, holy celebrations which you shall proclaim..On the fourteenth day of the first month at twilight is the Lord’s Passover…and you shall bring offerings..”

To understand why the Passover is such a big deal to the Jews, Jesus and indeed God himself we need to know the background.

To do so we go back to the book of Exodus.

God has enlisted Moses to be the middle man- to bring about the release of the Israelites who are captives-slaves in Egypt.

In short, Moses’ request for their release is declined by the Pharaoh. Then, in an effort to have the Pharaoh change his mind-God brings plaques upon the Egyptians. Our modern equivalent would be like our trade sanctions against rebel countries that won’t toe the line.

Firstly the rivers are turned to blood, so that it cannot be drank and the fish die. Then the place is overrun with frogs, then lice, flies, the livestock die, everyone gets painful boils, huge hail stones that kill everything not under cover, locusts and then pitch darkness for three days.

But after these nine plaques, the Pharaoh remains resolute. So God unleashes His piece of résistance. God instructs Moses to tell the Israelites that on the first month of the year on the tenth day, each household shall take an unblemished lamb and keep it until the fourteenth day, then they will kill and eat all of it with unleavened bread and put its blood on the doorposts of their houses.

Because that night: and let’s hear it from God himself: Exodus chapter 12, verse 12 “For I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night, and will strike the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both person and beast; and against all the God’s of Egypt I will execute judgment. Now the blood on your door frames shall be a sign. And when I see the blood, I will Passover you; and the plague shall not be on you”. God continues, “This day shall be to you a memorial: and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord throughout your generations. You shall keep it as a feast by an everlasting ordinance”.

As God had predicted, aftera tragedy of these proportions for the Egyptians-every family losing their firstborn-including the Pharaoh-the Israelites were not just released-the Pharaoh drove them out-enough was enough-no more.

The Israelites were released-free, and as commanded by God-every year in the temple the Passover was commemorated. That’s why it was such a big deal. So important that from all over Israel the people would journey to the temple in Jerusalem to make sacrifice’s like in the initial Passover.

Again, we have to understand the times; Israel in comparison to Australia is a small country, but not small when your Landcruiser is a donkey or just your two feet. Just getting to Jerusalem was a huge feat, or at least their feet probably were time they got there. So, they didn’t bring their animal sacrifices with them, they bought them when they got there.

What of the money changers? Again we must consider the times. These people from different locations traded in different currencies. So they would go to the money changers and exchange their currencies for the local currency, so they could purchase their sacrifices.

Just like if we went to England, we trade our Aussie Dollars for pounds.

So there’s a 101 of the Passover history, and the goings on all seem to make sense. Yet Jesus brings out the whip.

In Australian, when we get told off for what we think is not wrong-we may use the term “fair crack of the whip”.

But we see, indeed literally-it was a fair crack of the whip.

Because upon Jesus entering the house of God, not outside it, but in it he sees a market place. People not just undertaking commercial enterprises-which is bad enough, but also profiteering-ripping off people who come to worship.

He sees people and their actions getting in the way of true devotional worship-getting in the way between God and His people.

Fast forward two thousand years-to today’s times. As yet, thankfully I have never attended a church full of sheep, goats or doves about to be sacrificed.

Thankfully because they are no longer needed. Our unblemished lamb of sacrifice is Jesus himself.

Jesus is our Passover. In Jesus-our sins are passed over and we are free of them-released from their captivity.

We don’t come to church to bring-we come to church to receive. We don’t take to worship, we take from worship.

There’s a lovely article in this month’s Lutheran, and I quote:

“One morning I was all hot and bothered because the old people at the church had trampled all over my brilliant idea. Why are they so boring? Why aren’t they passionate about their faith? I railed at Miss Perry. Why don’t they ever do anything? Why do they think that being a Christian is just warming a pew on Sunday mornings? Ever so quietly, Miss Perry said, Linda, are you sure you will still be warming a pew when you’re their age? By then you’ll have experienced much heartache and disappointment, with people and with God. Are you sure you’ll be as strong in your faith then as you are now”.

Miss Perry has nailed it. Not because she told this young girl that enthusiasm is not good, because she didn’t. Of course we should always look at ways to connect with each other and the people around us. Always look at ways that might help bring and strengthen people’s, and our relationship with God. It’s an absolute yes to that.

But she has nailed two things-One: How our lives can be tough-it’s not just all smooth sailing, and our faith will be tested, and Two: to get through these times with our faith and trust in God intact can be quite a miracle. The miracle’s we receive in worship. Hearing the Word of God, absolution and forgiveness, Baptism and Holy Communion. Word and Sacrament is where God gives his life strengthening miracles to us.

Word and Sacrament-To the world, what these bring seem ridiculous. Even parts of the Christian church ridicule the truth by questioning and denying scripture and its teachings and promises.

These assaults on the Word of God and divine worship are from the same brush that Jesus encountered at the Passover.

As I said, the church must always look at ways of connecting, of connecting so people will come to know God. But the Church must also stand up for the truth. Stand for something or stand for nothing at all.

In the book of Revelations we are given an account of seven churches-their positives and their negatives, except for the one titled the lukewarm church. Chapter 3, verse 15: Ï know of your works, that are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth”.

 

Harsh words. Lukewarm, could this be like receiving the grace of God, his gifts we receive in worship in a “maybe they’ll help” manner.

In worship we hear and receive the Gospel. In Word and Sacrament we are given strength to believe, to be given faith and for our faith to be strengthened.

Faith like that of General Robert E Lee, essentially fighting for slavery and a slave-that both approached our Lord and Savior as equals. Equals that deserve crumbs yet receive a banquet.

Today, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ has forgiven your sins and strengthened your faith. It’s a gift and a miracle beyond our understanding. In Christ alone, we are saved.

Martin Luther was prepared to die for that belief, Jesus Christ died for it to be truth. And we live because it is the truth. Amen.

You Had Me At Hello

Mark 8:31-38

 
One cannot but feel for Peter and the disciples, and how they must have felt when we hear Jesus words to them “Get behind me Satan”. I’ve been called many things that haven’t always been pleasant, but thankfully that is not one of them.

But to Peter and the guys, “Satan”. The same guys who we know from earlier, when meeting Jesus for the first time: seemingly didn’t think twice- just gave up everything and followed him.

Starting Mark chapter 1, verse 16: “As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon (Peter) and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fisherman. ‘Come, follow me’, Jesus said, ‘and I will make you fishers of men’. At once they left their nets and followed him.

But now, looking at Peter Jesus says “get behind me Satan”, and in what seems like a stern lecture, follows with “you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men”,

and then to the crowd as well “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it”.

Seriously, they give up everything, then when trying to talk Jesus out of knowingly and purposely, like a lamb to the slaughter walking into a situation, where he’ll be set up, tortured and killed.

They get mentioned in the same breath as “Satan”.

Fair dinkum, in all seriousness, what do you think might be your response?

For me, maybe the term “thanks for nothing” might come to mind.

(and) in thinking that, right there, Jesus has got me-and anyone one else that may have felt the same way.

Our logical human response shows our focus, our focus on ourselves, or at the very least, we are thinking like Peter in human terms.

Human terms that appeal. Last week we heard in the Gospel of Mark, Jesus being tempted by the devil in the desert.

But Mark did not tell us of what the temptations were. Matthew does, and they don’t seem blasphemous or openly evil. But they are, because the devil is in the detail, or better said, in the subtlety.

Jesus is hungry, so is tempted to “tell these stones to become bread”. In our lives this equates to doubt sown about our physical needs, our retirement, our financial needs.

These needs are real, but doubt is sown to separate us from trust in God-to create a barrier.

Next, Jesus is tempted to deny the Word of God. After taking Jesus to the highest point of the temple overlooking the city, the devil says “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written that He will command his angels to lift you up in their hands so you will not strike your foot against a stone.” This is like a dare with logic.

For the Church today, this can be seen when we put our logic before the Word of God. So much so that the Word is not preached, taught or acted on in its totality.

It’s the temptation to not trust or depend totally in God’s ways, but ours.

Lastly we hear that Jesus was ‘offered’ “all the kingdoms of the world, if only he bow down and worship him”-the devil. Firstly it is ludicrous because it was not his to offer, but his temptation is against God himself, to defy God.

This temptation involved the purpose of Jesus actual coming into the world. Jesus came to redeem people, not to rule them. Satan’s suggestion to Jesus, and still followed by many today, required no suffering and death. Thankfully, Jesus chose God’s way, the way of the cross.

The path of Glory rather than that of a suffering servant.

I don’t think we need any examples of how that works out in our society, or we might be here all day.

These temptations appear attractive and “natural” and appeal to all “natural” human instincts and that is why they are so dangerous.

The ways of the world appeal to us naturally, the ways of God don’t, and left to our own devices, as God knew, that’s how it would have remained.

Something has to give in this stand-off, and someone did. God did.

God gave himself, His Son Jesus. Jesus, fully divine, yet fully human. Jesus the messiah, our Saviour, the divine one. The Son of God, yet the Son of God who felt hunger, pain and temptation. The Son of God who in the Garden asked “is there another way”. The saviour who had his mind on the things of God, our Saviour who denied himself and willingly walked to the cross for us that we may live, to re-unite us with the Father.

To not leave us to our own devices, but to leave us to his devices. His strength and His gifts.

The gift of Holy Communion. Where we receive the true body and blood of our Jesus Christ to strengthen our faith, to bring forgiveness of sins, life and salvation.

The gift of Baptism. To deliver us from death and the devil, to bring us forgiveness and grant salvation to all who believe as the Word and promise of God declare.

In Romans 6:4. St. Paul writes, “We are buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, that we too might walk in newness of life”. Did you hear that, “newness of life”?

What is this “newness of life”? The small catechism tells us clearly, that ‘It signifies that the old Adam in us, together with all sins and evil lusts, should be drowned by daily sorrow and repentance and be put to death, and that the new person should come forward daily and rise up, cleansed and righteous, to live forever in God’s presence”.

Daily sorrow and repentance, and the new person come forward daily.

Is this not what has been instructed in today’s Gospel. That “if anyone would come after me, they must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me”. To have our minds on “divine things, not human things”.

These words from Jesus sound hard, sound impossible, sound like law, but come to life as Gospel. They bring freedom because they release us from ourselves. Release us from getting pulled along by the worlds offer and promise of self-gratification in “things”. Consumerism, that if not for Christ would imprison us.

In Adelaide, every Easter and Christmas there’s debate about opening the shops on day’s registered as public holidays. Comments like, we are backward compared to other states prop up every time.

Last year in the paper, there were numerous people who said they went on a trip interstate because there shops were open and Adelaide’s were not.

Seriously, is that where we are as a society?

In Christ we see these things-consumerism- for what they are. They are not what life is about. They are good servants, but not good masters. Christ is the life.

In Christ we are free and given life-he is our need and our focus.

So, is everybody ready to deny themselves, take up our cross and follow Jesus? To lose our lives for Jesus and the Gospel?

Well thankfully we’ve made a good start and there’s not a colosseum with hungry lions in sight.

You have made a good start because you have done it today. Because, if you had your sights on human things, you may have slept in, or gone shopping in instead of coming to church.

But you’re here, because your sights are on divine things. Today we join in worship.

We thank Jesus by accepting his grace in confession and absolution and the body and the blood of Christ in Holy Communion. These are divine things.

Even more, those who have children, children that God loves with a passion-you brought them here today, in Christ’s presence. Just like you did when you carried them to baptism. You are serving Christ and the Gospel as he has asked.

Unfortunately, there are others, others that Christ loves that are yet to know him. The people we meet and work with everyday. Play sport with, socialise with. Our friends, work mates and even those that we don’t see eye to eye with.

Each one loved by God. Each one that God wants that they know His peace and his love.

Keep our minds on divine things, and die to self and serve Jesus and the Gospel. That’s where it’s at-in the people he has brought before us in our daily lives. That’s our calling, that through us-they may hear of Christ, to be drawn closer to him.

It is amazing that sinners like us, in Christ are Saints. Forgiven.

(and) it is amazing that we, are living examples of God’s love and that we are involved with Him in his work. His desire to meet those he has placed before us.

But at times, serving those before us in and with the Gospel can seem like a very thankless task. And it is,

if our focus is on us getting or seeing the results. That’s the beauty of our Lord, we just go about our business endeavouring to live like a child of Christ, like the disciples, we don’t rush ahead of Christ, we follow Christ.

(and) in following Christ-we don’t see our love of all those we meet, we see Christ’s love of them.

Like the disciples, we follow Christ and we see him meet the hurt, the down and outs-the homeless, addicted, prostitutes and so forth. We see him meet these people-and see through His eyes. His eyes that look beyond their outwardly condition.

Whose eyes see and understand how easy it is for fragile humans to be caught up in ways of life and actions that “somehow” just seen to creep in. Through Christ’s eyes-we see what he sees-

not a looser, not a person that should just get over it, and not a person that’s got what they deserve.

We see him looking and seeing a beautiful child.

We see him weeping in sadness in their pain and loneliness,

and we see his happiness and his smile.

His happiness and smile, and the happiness of the angels and all the company of heaven when just one more person comes to faith. Faith in his promises.

Serving our neighbour is not a thankless task, because serving our Lord is not a thankless task. Not for the thanks he will give us in return for our service, but for the thanks he has already given us.

The thanks he has already given us?

But Isn’t it the thanks we give Christ?

It’s a yes to both.

In the film Jerry Maquire starring Tom Cruise and Renee Zellweger, after a break up in their romance, Tom returns, says hello and begins to apologise for his errors. Renee, stops him apologising and says “you had me at hello”.

She didn’t need the apologies. Just him returning was enough.

Following Christ and serving his people is not a task, it’s a response for his love that we have already received.

When one of his children return home, when one of his children bow down and ask for Mercy for mistakes, guilt, greed, mistakes and flaws. When one of his children ask for mercy during times of hardship. Christ says to them, says to us: thank you my dear child, but you had me at “Lord have mercy”. Amen. “

 

We cannot see the forest for the trees.


Mark 1: 9-15
As Jesus was coming out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open, and the spirit descending on him like a dove. And a voice came down from heaven, You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased”.

What a glorious picture.

But then the very next verse: “The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness for forty days amongst the wild animals and being tempted by Satan”.

What is going on here? If it was us, looking through our eyes the response of “this is not what I signed on for” might come to mind.

Thankfully Jesus is not of our ilk. Make no mistake; Jesus felt the temptation, felt pain, hunger and thirst as we do. But because his focus was God the Father, he gave himself to his Father’s will-whatever the cost.

In the wilderness, Jesus’ successful struggle against temptation prefigures His final victory on the cross. From the days of Adam and Eve, we have continually fallen into Satan’s traps .But Jesus after having united Himself with fallen human beings through His Baptism, won a preliminary victory over the evil foe’s temptations. At the cross, Jesus gained an even more wonderful victory over the devil’s temptations, and in His resurrection we see his power broken once and for all.

Jesus, with his eyes on the Father-walked to the cross for us-for our salvation, because his focus was on the will of The Father.

You will remember that in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus sweats blood. Sweating blood is a medical condition that can happen when under enormous pressure. This is the pressure Jesus is under, but he achieves His Fathers will because His focus is His Father. His life was not cluttered up with other “stuff”.

When I worked in the bank, a man after desperately trying to keep the family home, after going through the heart break that all he had worked for was going to be taken away- came in, threw the keys to the manger and said-finally it’s over, I’m free.

In our lives, at some time or other, we will spend time in the wilderness-struggling.

When things don’t seem right-where our life doesn’t seem to go to script.

A few years ago, a friend told me to go see a movie that he highly recommended. To not spoil it he didn’t tell me anything about it-just the title.

So along I went.

Unfortunately I was running a bit late and I missed the start.

But it didn’t matter; I got the gist of what was happening. The thing was I thought it was rubbish-but in trust of my friend’s recommendation I hung in there, but it didn’t get any better.

At the end, while walking out and thinking “what was my friend thinking”, I happened to notice that the movie he had told me to see-was in the room next door-I had watched the wrong movie.

But our lives are not of fiction, they are real-and sometimes we find ourselves in the wilderness.

Tough times that hurt, that don’t seem fair.

Times when that Aussie outlook, “She’ll be right mate” doesn’t cut it.

But In our tough times, our wilderness moments-he is with us, to sustain us-to strengthen us and to give us hope.

That’s the truth, we know this in faith.

Yet, in the here and now, the events our daily lives sometimes blur our vision, and it can become hard to see our saviour there with us.

In our baptism Christ has promised to be with us, to always be with us and get us to that day when we are re-united in heaven.

But in the middle, sometimes in our lives we start to wonder what is actually going on, where the script of our lives is different to how we imagined it.

Things turn out differently.

Test Cricketers have remarked, that at the height of his powers that when Shane Warne released the cricket ball, it would spin so furiously that they could hear it zinging past them.

When Shane was asked of his freakish ability he remarked that he believed it was due to an accident he had as a child were he broke his wrist,

and having not gone to the doctor-the bone’s set incorrectly, that later seemed to give him a un- natural ability to spin the ball.

When Shane broke his wrist, I’m sure he would not have predicted such an outcome.

But our lives are not like watching a game of cricket or movie script with only our fleeting emotional attachment. Our lives are real, as are the things that come our way.

My dear Christian friend who lost his teenage son to illness would go out into the paddock,

Look to the heavens and shout “Why Lord, Why my Boy, why my boy.

I cannot imagine the pain of my friend-I could not even try.

We could look piously at people in these situations and say “Trust in the Lord”, or give some, “get some faith type of comment like Job’s mates gave him,

Until it’s us. Until our moment brings us to our knees-where the hurt is so absorbing we cannot rejoice.

And only ask why?

Yet, when we look back over times in our life, terrible hurtful times where we seem to have been abandoned, we see in hindsight that we were not alone.

In the Gospel we heard today Christ was there in his own wilderness struggle, in the Gospel everyday, he is with us in ours-carrying us on his back when we can no longer walk, bringing hope when we have no hope and bringing help when we are helpless.

When Adam and Eve fell to sin in the garden, God responded by clothing them.

Daily we fall to sin, daily we doubt and daily we follow our own way and not that of the Lord.

Yet in our failure to walk with Christ, he responds by walking with us.

He does not meet us in scorn,

But meets us in love, and reveals himself to us.

At the fall in the Garden, God clothed two sinners for their protection and warmth on their earthly journey.

In Jesus, God gave sinners his Son, for our protection and warmth on our earthly journey, and clothed us with the righteousness of His Son for our salvation.

With our world’s distractions it can be hard to see the trees for the forest: lent is a time of putting things down-these distractions, so we can focus on our Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ.

As Banjo Paterson one remarked that “If you don’t put down a brick you can’t pick up a castle”.

On Ash Wednesday we entered lent. A day that some of us, for the next forty days have decided to give something up.

How could this be described? Maybe like a New Year’s resolution without the time span.

There’s an element of truth in that-but what is different is the motivation and the desired result.

As we enter lent some of us may have made a decision to give something up and that’s fine. But giving up for lent is not like a new year’s resolution. Lent is not about not giving up the PlayStation 3 for the sake of it, it’s about purposely using that time to hear and be drawn near our Lord.

To read the bible, pray, family devotions-or simply to sit and think.

To have quiet time with God.

In our hurly burly world and its distractions, that is not as easy as it sounds. But making that time is the essence of the Lenten period, to reflect on Christ in our lives and on our priorities. To get them in order during this time of anticipation as we wait to hear of our Saviours death and resurrection at Easter.

To see what God has done for us. Given His Son to resist temptation for us. Given His Son to win the battle that we could never have won.

To see how daily Jesus meets us, walks with us, restores us and strengthens us.

 

To let us go forward, knowing Christ is with us-come what may. AMEN.

 

What are we doing?

Transfiguration Sunday

Some 4,000 years or so ago, a city of people endeavoured to build a tower, the tower of Babel which some say was to be built 91 meters high. So high that they thought  it would reach to heaven, to God.

2010 in Dubai, the 828 metre Burj Khalifa tower was opened. Nine times the height of the tower of Babel, and still not a sight of the gates to paradise.

July 20th 1969, astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first person to walk on the moon, and uttered those words that have become part of history: “That’s one small step for man (and) one giant step for mankind”.  Prior to leaving Neil and fellow astronaut Buzz Aldrin erected a plaque that read “Here men from the planet earth first set foot upon the moon, and we come in peace”.

Back on planet earth, on that day-the first Australian women was killed in the Vietnam War.

On a later moon landing, one of the astronauts looking back at earth, looking back at this beautiful  and radiant bright green, brown and blue marble, shining amongst the dark space. But knowing of its troubles made a an apt comment  “what are we doing down there?”

Several weeks ago in the paper a scientist remarked that due to the state of the earth, the pollution, population increase and the resources we need to carry on-we will need to find another planet that we can colonise within the next several hundred years.

That plaque on the moon, “we come in peace”,  good intentions but given our track record-what do you think are the chances?

Even the great St. Paul. A man of God- who after reflecting on himself stated “I do what I don’t want to do, and don’t do what I want to do”.

Humankinds desire to be the master of its own destiny, to rely only on itself-is a desire to be like God, to be God, or at the very least, to earn our right to be in God’s presence and to earn eternal life.

Essentially, in our society we are lead to believe the world revolves around us. The land of “I”.

How well do you reckon that’s been travelling? A bit like that plaque on the moon I would suggest.

Our Gospel today is like a history lesson of God’s plan for our salvation. The times leading to Christ. The realisation of Christ as the messiah, our Saviour, and our mediator. Christ that solved our problem of sin and brought us life and freedom – eternally and now, here on our earthly home.

The apostles are on the mountain top with Jesus, and before them appear Elijah and Moses.

Two of God’s great servants from the Old Testament. Elijah the prophet who God spoke to on a mountain top, and Moses, who on Mount Sinai God gave  the law, the ten commandments.

These men and the Old Testament in general, continually testified to the future coming of the messiah.  Here on this mountain top, the presence of Moses and Elijah confirm that Jesus is the fulfilment of those testimonies, that Jesus is both the focus and the fulfilment of the Old Testimont.

Yet, Jesus the Son of God, the Word, the messiah, the Holy one that all have been waiting for is standing there on the mountain top next to three normal human beings-Peter, James and John.

This is significant.

Previously when Moses had met God on Mount Sinai, God said “You cannot see My face; for no person shall see Me, and live, so while My glory passes by, I will put you in the cleft of the rock and will cover you with My hand while I pass by. Then I shall take away My hand, and you shall see My back; but My face shall not be seen”.

Why did God act in this way? He wasn’t playing charades or trying to rain on Moses parade, we was protecting Him. Due to sin, if exposed directly to the Holiness of God, Moses would have been like a piece of paper to a raging fire.

As it was, when Moses went down from the mountain, his face was glowing so brightly in God’s Glory that he had to where a veil so that others could even look at him.

Because of Human sin, brought about by the fall in the Garden of Eden, the relationship with God was fractured. We see this all through the Old Testament. In the temple, God would descend veiled in a cloud, and even them only the chief priest could approach the alter. It has been said that that in those days they used to tie a rope around the chief priests ankle, so that if didn’t make it out, they could drab him out.  “Rumour” has it that for at least one this happened .

So what of Christ. You will remember that upon His death on the cross, the curtain that surrounded the alter was torn in two. The separation between God and sinful humans had been taken away by Christ dying on the cross for our sins. .

In Christ we are free to approach God in all His Holiness because he is our the mediator and our intercessor.

Christ said “I have not come to remove the law, but to fulfil the law”. The law that we know is good-but leads death if we think that we can keep it enough to gain God’s acceptance-this is what we know as self-righteousness.

But Christ has restored our relationship with God the Father with His righteousness.

In Jesus we see God, not of the law, but of compassion, love and forgiveness.

In Jesus, God does not see us clothed in our sin, but clothed in the righteousness of Jesus. Thus,  we can approach God as we are and seek his forgiveness and help in our lives. Prayers that he hears because of our Saviour Jesus Christ.

Christ has brought God’s forgiveness. Not because we earn it, not because of anything we have done or will do-but because of what Christ alone has done.

In Christ we are free-free in this life to go about our business with surety of his promise. On the mountain top God told  us “To listen to Him”, and what HAS Jesus told us.  John 3:16. “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life”.

So what of our lives now. Do we throw the baby out with the bath water?  Saved in Christ, free in Christ-does that mean we just sit back and smell the roses while those around us are still building their towers of Babel to nowhere. Absolutely not.

Freedom in Christ allows us to take a step back, to see things clearly. To not allow for anguish over the things we suffer from others-but to suffer with them. To not worry of ourselves when taken advantage of-but to suffer with that person who does so. To be ridiculed, yet return to them our service. To lift up those from whom we have been downtrodden.

As free people in Christ, we take a step back and see things as they are, and seeing them in Christ they are different.

At the end of the American civil war slaves in the South were released from their bondage and told they were free to go-to do what they want and when they wanted to do it. Yet many replied, now that I am free, I will stay and work harder than I ever did-but as a free person.

2nd Corinthians 12:10 tells us that now that we are Co-labourers with God, “We are to take up the burdens that God appoints, bearing them for His sake, and ever going to Him for rest. Whatever our work, God is honoured by whole hearted, cheerful service. He is pleased when we take up our duties with gratitude, rejoicing that we are accounted worthy to be co-labourers with Him”.

American Tennis player Pete Sampras on winning the first of his 14 Grand Slam events was asked “what’s it like to be a tennis champion”, to which he responded, “I already was”.

On that glorious day when we all meet again in our eternal home before our Lord and Saviour, should someone ask you what’s it like to be free? You can respond, “I already was”.

Yes, we already are, even though this side of heaven we still carry our human traits and our sin,we still live as free people because of Christ.

Not free as if NASA has found another utopian world we can all go and settle on. Not free because we have built our own stair way to heaven, but free because of Christ. Faith not in ourselves, but faith in Christ alone.

Martin Luther stated, “Faith is a living, daring confidence on God’s Grace, So sure and certain that a person could stake their life on it a thousand times”.

On the mountain top, God said to three apostles, said to us “listen to Him”.

So we shall:

“My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand”.

“My peace I give to you; (but) not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid”.

“Whoever believes in Me will not perish but have eternal life”

“If the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed”

Yes, we are free and the world looks different. Tears and Sadness, laughter and happiness. Mistakes and achievements, serving and being served, we do as saved and free people.

In Christ our world looks different, because it is-and we rejoice.

Amen

Getting your hands dirty.

Mark 1:40-45


A few months ago, while holidaying in one of our large capital cities, I was taken aback by the amount of people asking passers’ by for some change, initially I felt sorrow for them-in that the passers’ by were simply that-they passed by as if the person wasn’t even there-

But after a few days, due to the regularity of being approached, I could see how easy it is to forget that each of these people  are unique: different in hurts, backgrounds, passions and loves.. 

It seems that without even trying, but due to the regularity of the situation-they seem to become as one.

Just this bunch of people-that when we encounter or think of as a collective, are easy to just pass by.  To not get our hands dirty so to speak.

There was a cartoon in a recent paper that spoke volumes of this type of situation. There’s a hall all lit up and full of people in fancy cloths. Out the front, standing next to a sign that reads “Charity Gala ball for the homeless” is a bedraggled and needy looking man, and upon looking to enter is advised “no ticket, no entry”. 

It’s a satire-tical look at the situation that hits home.

Thankfully for humanity, Jesus is not scared to get his hands dirty.

As we heard:

“a leper came to him and falling to his knees before Him, and said to Him, If you are willing, You can make me clean. And moved with compassion, Jesus stretched out His hand, and touched him, and said I am willing, be cleansed”.

The significance of Jesus touch is great.

Because leprosy is of a highly infectious nature, lepers were shunned by society.

Kicked out of society.

They had to live in camps, leper colonies outside the towns and cities-Leper Colonies. They were not to approach or touch no one and should anyone begin to walk near them, they had to call out “Unclean, Unclean” to warn them to stay away.

A doctor who recently conducted research into this disease in India said, “It’s a repulsive disease. It attacks the nervous system which causes the victim to lose all sense of touch and pain, initially in the fingers and toes, then spreading up the arms and legs.

Without a sense of touch, the ill person eventually damages their toes, fingers and feet. They will knock them, cut them, get infections and not even notice”.

He said that upon seeing so many people in this leper colony without fingers and toes he asked them how it happens. Some said they knocked them off, but many said they did not know, but they seemed to lose them at night and in the morning there was no trace of them left.

One night, he sat with a leper while he slept. He saw rats chewing the persons toes and fingers-but the victim did not wake, for he felt nothing.

If we were in Israel, would not we too stay away from this leper?

But Jesus reaches out and touches him-and cures him.  

But this was much more than a physical disease.

It was a disease of hopelessness.  Because being deemed “Unclean” they could not attend the temple or tabernacle worship.

They could not enter the house of God.  In a sense, they were banned from God, from hope.

The seriousness at that time of this leper’s inability to attend the temple cannot be understated. A Scholar noted that the trashing, or destruction of the temple in Israel by the Romans

is regarded by the Jews as much worse a tragedy than the Holocaust.

This leper, this man, had no physical hope, and worse, seemingly no spiritual hope.

But Jesus reached out touched him. Reaching out his saving hand-and gave him access to His Father.

Gave him hope. The same hope that we received when Jesus reached out and touched us.

In sending the leper to the priest, Jesus is preaching through illustration,

He is providing an opportunity for the priests and others, to see and hear the leper’s testimony. A testimony that is much more complete and moving than only if it was a statement about his physical healing.

The same picture, the same testimonies can be heard today, or at least they should be. Physically, God provides for us with shelter, food and clothing. He provides doctors, nurses and a government with a social conscience. Everything good we receive is a gift from God.

But like the leper, we have received more, much more.

Our gracious God gave us his Son. Who has brought us forgiveness and restored our relationship to God the Father. He covers with his blood the hurtful and hateful things we have done. The pain we have caused on others and the messes we have made.

His gives us life and we rejoice.

The Lord got his hands dirty in dealing with our sin, to bring us back to him.

The same hands he reached out to the Leper, to clean him.

The same hands that reach out to non-Christians.  Not a group of nameless people. But individuals that hurt, love and yes, are looking for hope.

But hope that is misplaced and fleeting if outside of Christ. God knows the hope they need, the only hope this world has to offer-

hope in His Son, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

God loves us and he loves them. God has brought us peace, and he looks to bring them peace-they just need to see it and to feel that blessed hope. Christ died for our sins, and he died for theirs.

His hand reached out to us, and he reaches out his hand to them. How did his hand reach out to you, maybe as an infant  you were carried to him in Baptism? Maybe as an adult someone brought you before the Word of God.

How does his hand reach out to those that as yet do not know him?

Through his church, through its members and through us.

Luther’s morning prayer basically covers our daily life as a Christian.

“In the name of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.  I give thee thanks, heavenly Father, through your dear Son Jesus Christ, that you have protected me through the night from all harm and danger. I ask you to keep me this day, too, from all sin and evil, that in my thoughts, words, and deeds I may please you. Into your hands I commend my body and soul and all that is mine. Let the holy angel have charge of me, that the wicked one may have no power over me. Amen.”

(and) Daily, the Lord carries us out to them, the people he has placed before us, so that we can carry them back to him. We are not the saviours, but we are the cleansed lepers who go to them with our testimony of Jesus. Go to them with Jesus testimony, that no matter what their ills, he wishes to wash them clean. To bring them peace, love and hope. To give them life, now and eternally.  Amen.

Free to fly.

Text: Isaiah 40:31

Those who trust in the Lord for help will find their strength renewed. They will rise on wings like eagles; they will run and not get weary; they will walk and not grow weak.

 

 

Ever wondered what it would be like to fly? I don’t mean flying in a plane, or dangling beneath a kite or parachute. I mean sticking your arms out like a bird, or out front like superman if you like, and soaring above the earth; banking over the forests; skimming over the rivers; darting through mountain canyons; diving down and scaring the living daylights out of the members of your family; breathing deeply in the fresh air of free and effortless flight! And if you are someone who is scared of heights, imagine if you had no such fear. You could come and fly with the rest of us.

From the early pages of history people have looked at the birds and wanted to fly. You may have seen on TV people flying in a wind tunnel but that’s not soaring high above the clouds. You have seen people jump out of perfectly good planes and ‘fly’ at least for a while, but gravity does it job and the skydiver has no choice but to pull the ripcord on his parachute.

I’m sure every kid at some time has wanted to fly. Maybe it’s been a theme in your dreams but like all dreams there comes a rude awakening when you wake up and discover that you are still a prisoner of gravity. As much as we really wish we could fly, we have to walk to the bathroom, walk out to the kitchen for breakfast and walk to school or work. We aren’t built for flying.

As adults we don’t think about flying as we did when we were kids. Not only aren’t we built for flying but we also carry a lot of baggage – we carry too much weight. Not only the kind of weight that shows up on the bathroom scales but the weight of worry, anxiety, paying bills, keeping the boss happy, and how our health crisis will turn out. All this weighs us down.

If you own your own business and you wonder if you’ve thought about everything and planned for every contingency. You do care about those who work for you, and you realise that there may come a time when you will have to put off some of them. And this weighs you down.

Then there’s your family. The people you love. You see your parents getting older; perhaps becoming infirm. You see your children struggling in this or that. Perhaps you’ve hit a rough patch in your marriage. When you were a kid love wasn’t so difficult and so demanding. But that’s because you were mostly on the receiving end of it. And now you are called to be the one who gives it; called to be the one who loves. This too can weigh you down.

So what about those dreams of flying high above the world in complete freedom and in the open spaces where there is not a worry in the world? Nah! Not anymore! Life is way too heavy to entertain such thought. Flying – that’s okay for kids to dream about because they don’t have the worries we have but for us the world is too real. A bit like gravity – we can’t ever get away from it.

And yet, what does the text from Isaiah say? “Those who trust in the Lord for help will find their strength renewed. They will rise on wings like eagles; they will run and not get weary.” Hmmm. “They will rise on wings like eagles”. With renewed strength they will soar above the earth with the powerful wings of an eagle. I don’t know about you, but Isaiah’s got my attention! Suddenly my childhood interest in being able to fly is renewed. Floating, drifting, circling, free as a bird. Is there a way to overcome the gravity of our lives, a way to lighten our loads, a way rise above it all? Is this just a dream, wishful thinking, belonging to the world of fantasy along with fairies, flying dragons and magic carpets?

Just to put these words about flying like eagles into context. The prophet Isaiah was writing to the people of Israel during a time, when they felt like their strength was sapped and they had no hope. Like us, they were worried. The news wasn’t good. The dreadful Assyrians were breathing down their necks, and later it would be the Babylonians who would take them all away to live in exile. As they thought about all the stuff that was happening around them, they were weighed down and overwhelmed by the seriousness of their situation.

They started to say things like, “God doesn’t really care about me! How can he? Look at all this bad and difficult stuff that is happening all around us. He’s not really in charge of things!” (Isaiah 40:27).

You see what was happening here? They began to see their problems as being bigger than God himself. They forgot that the creator of everything, the everlasting Lord, whose love for his people means he will never grow tired of helping them, just might be able to help them with all their worries.

You see over the years a subtle exchange had taken place. They exchanged their faith in God for a kind of do-it-yourself kind of attitude. We do the exact same thing! This DIY kind of Christianity excludes God from certain areas of our lives. I know God is there but I can handle this myself.
“Let’s see, my work, hmm, no that’s not God’s problem.
Finances, no. I can fix that.
Relationship problems, no. That’s my responsibility.
My love life, no God doesn’t know anything about that, that’s my area.”

Without even giving it too much thought we exclude God from different aspects of our lives. We can fix it we say and maybe it works okay for a time. But then we begin to feel the weight. Our blood pressure rises. We toss and turn. We get sick. We become depressed. The joy goes out of our lives. We despair. We slowly realise that the DIY approach isn’t all that successful after all.

I’m sure that a lot us, including myself, have to admit to doing this at some time, if not more often than we care to admit. We sideline God and try to be our own god. We believe that we can do it alone, but that’s something God never intended us to be. God didn’t make us to stand alone against everything that threatens our safety and happiness. God made us to rely on him.

This is where Isaiah comes in and we have this wonderful passage that was read earlier. He asks, “How can you be so dumb. Don’t you know who stretched out the heavens, made the earth and filled it with people? Don’t you know that it is God who created the stars? There are millions of them, and yet he knows when one of them is missing and if God knows each individual star, it follows that he knows each one of us personally and calls us by name. He knows when we are in trouble. No one can ever accuse God of turning a deaf ear to our needs.

Then comes these wonderful words,
“Don’t you know? Haven’t you heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God; he created all the world.
He never grows tired or weary.
No one understands his thoughts.
He strengthens those who are weak and tired. 
Even those who are young grow weak; young people can fall exhausted. 
But those who trust in the Lord for help will find their strength renewed.
They will rise on wings like eagles;
they will run and not get weary;
they will walk and not grow weak.” (40:28-31)

Jesus affirmed what Isaiah said when he said things like, “Come to me, all of your who are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” or “Your heavenly Father knows all about the sparrows even though there are so many of them and he knows when a hair falls from your head. In the same way, he knows each of us intimately and personally” or “I am the good shepherd and I know each of my sheep and if one should get lost, I will go so far as to sacrifice my life to rescue that lost one”.

Jesus assures us that there is not a moment when we are not under his love and care. Yes, there will be times when we will intentionally and unintentionally lock him out of our lives. There will be times when we could have saved ourselves a heap of stress and pressure if only we had trusted in the Lord for help and realised that he is ready, willing and able to give us renewed strength and a fresh outlook on life and its problems.

The apostle Paul realised that he knew what he ought to do and trust God more but found more often than not that he did what he knew he shouldn’t do. There were times when he was physically exhausted and drained, not knowing what will happen to him next. But in each case he came back to this one point, “God can raise me above all this. His love is so powerful that I can be confident, content, and certain no matter what the circumstances. The Lord will help me to face each thing that terrifies me and give me the strength to continue”. In the end Paul says, “I can do everything through him who gives me strength” (Philippians 4:13).

As Isaiah said, “Those who trust in the Lord for help will find their strength renewed. They will rise on wings like eagles; they will run and not get weary; they will walk and not grow weak”.

In other words, trusting in God to give us the strength that is beyond our own strength to deal with any situation, we can rise on wings like eagles. We can fly. We can soar high above our problems; we can fly free with the sky as the limit. God wants us to fly like eagles.

When we trust in God and his love for us and entrust our lives to the one who gave his life for us on the cross, everything else is dwarfed in comparison to the largeness and authority of the Lord. He is bigger than any problem we might face. And as we learn to trust him, we begin to see things from his perspective. He draws us upward in faith, so that we begin to get a bird’s eye view of things, or more correctly, a God’s eye view of things.

Remember the dreams about flying, the fantasy stories like Peter Pan where children could fly; well they are not too far off the mark. We too can fly even though our feet never leave the ground. We can rise above everything threatens our security with a strength that comes from God. “Those who trust in the Lord for help will find their strength renewed. They will rise on wings like eagles”.

Don’t worry – Be happy

Text: Matthew 6:25-27, 33-34

“This is why I tell you: do not be worried about the food and drink you need in order to stay alive, or about clothes for your body. After all, isn’t life worth more than food? And isn’t the body worth more than clothes? Look at the birds: they do not plant seeds, gather a harvest and put it in barns; yet your Father in heaven takes care of them! Aren’t you worth much more than birds? Can any of you live a bit longer by worrying about it? … Your Father in heaven knows that you need all these things. Instead, be concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God and with what he requires of you, and he will provide you with all these other things. So do not worry about tomorrow; it will have enough worries of its own. There is no need to add to the troubles each day brings.”

 

There was a man who was a chronic worrier. He would worry about anything and everything. Then one day his friends saw him whistling.

“Can that be our friend? No it can’t be. Yes it is.”

They asked him, “What’s happened?”

He said, “I’m paying a man to do my worrying for me.”

“You mean you aren’t worrying anymore?”

“No whenever I’m inclined to worry, I just let him do it.”

“How much do you pay him?”

“Two thousand dollars a week.”

“Wow! How can you afford that?”

“I can’t. But that’s his worry.”

Wouldn’t it be great if we could pay someone to do all of our worrying for us? Saying that, I presume that you are worriers like me (I’m especially preaching to myself today). It seems to be part of our human nature. As bold and as confident as some people might appear, every person is a victim of worry at some time. Even for the Christian who trusts God worry creeps in and becomes a part of everyday life.

A Mental Health Committee reported a few years ago – half of all the people in our hospital beds are there because of the effects of worry. Mental distress can lead to all kinds of health problems – headaches, arthritis, heart trouble, cystitis, colitis, backaches, ulcers, depression, digestive disorders and yes, even death. When we add to that list the mental fatigue of nights without sleep and days without peace, then we get a glimpse of the havoc worry plays in destroying the quality and quantity of life. Worry is bad for us. Worry has no nutritional value for the body or for the soul.

A little poem –

The worried cow would have lived till now,

If she had saved her breath;

But she feared her hay wouldn’t last all day,

So she mooed herself to death!

The word “worry” comes from an old Anglo-Saxon word meaning to strangle or to choke. While we need to be attentive to life’s concerns, worrying about them “chokes” the joy out of life. Worrying is like driving a car with one foot on the accelerator and the other foot on the brake. The wheels are spinning, a lot of rubber is being burnt, but you are going nowhere.

Or as someone has said:

Worry is like a rocking chair. It will give you something to do but it won’t get you anywhere!

God didn’t intend that the people whom he created and saved should hang between certainty and doubt, to be filled with anxiety over so many things. In fact, some people have made worry an art form. We feel uneasy if everything is going too smoothly and we don’t have something to worry about.

In his sermon the mount, Jesus tells us not to worry. He reminds us that animals and flowers get along fine without worrying. They don’t have to worry because God provides for them. Then Jesus goes on to say that since God provides for them, what have we got to worry about? We are worth much more to God than they are, so God will look after us infinitely better. So Jesus concludes: Don’t worry!

As we all know, that’s easier said than done. Someone saying to me on a bus crowded with coughing, sneezing, panting, nose blowing passengers, “Don’t worry. You won’t catch a cold,” does nothing to ease the anxiety I’m feeling. Now that the situation has been pointed out to me, that makes me worry even more.

And isn’t it true that we often worry about things that happened in the past, and we can’t do anything to change that? On the other hand, we worry about things that might happen in the future most of which never become a reality. And when we do achieve that moment when we don’t have anything to worry about, we worry because we aren’t worrying.

We know from what we read in the Bible that God understands our deepest needs. He understands us better than we understand ourselves most of the time. Jesus spoke with understanding to those who were anxious about the ordinary problems of working and living, preoccupied with anxieties about food, clothing and shelter.

Jesus first points out that God has been and will continue to be extremely generous toward us. We acknowledge this today as we celebrate this Thanksgiving Festival. In his typically down to earth way, Jesus tells us to look at the birds. They neither sow nor reap, yet God doesn’t let them starve. If God feeds the most insignificant bird, don’t you think he will provide for us who are his very special dearly loved children?

The flowers don’t fuss and worry over what they will wear. God clothes the wild flowers which are here one day and gone the next with the finest and most beautiful colours. If God does that for something growing in the wild surely he will care for those whom he has created “a little lower than God” and crowned us “with glory and honour” as the psalm says (8:5).

We have come here today with a song of praise on our lips for the graciousness and goodness of our God. We are reminded again that all things come from his loving hand.

Every discovery of humanity in science and technology,

every seed we have sown,

every article that has been manufactured,

every piece of clothing,

every morsel of food we have placed in our mouths

every dollar we have had in our hands,

– all have come to us through the generosity of God. We praise God for seedtime and harvest, for the time and abilities he has given us to carry out our daily tasks.

We have the resources of the God of the universe to take care of every need that we have. With God and all his resources and power caring for our welfare, there is little room for worrying.

Can you see what Jesus is doing here? He is setting up a powerful argument against worrying, getting stressed and uptight. He is reminding us that when we worry and become anxious we become blinded to the God who cares for birds, plants and us. We lose our focus as our worries take control and consume all of our energy.

When we are overcome with anxiety we forget the one who has the greatest concern for you and me, for our families, for our nation. Our heavenly Father. Worry has a distracting effect. It takes our eyes off our heavenly Father, and focuses our attention on ourselves, our problems, and our inability to handle things.

We focus on our problems,

we let our anxiety take control,

we get to the point where we can’t think straight anymore,

we churn things over and over again in our minds,

we get stressed and depressed;

we can’t see any way of getting out from under the weight we are carrying.

It has been said, “Worry is a thin stream of fear trickling through the mind. If encouraged, it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained.”

Worry blocks out any thoughts of what God is able to do for us. We are worried about how we are going to handle the situation.

So when Jesus talks about worry he just doesn’t say “Don’t worry”, he tells us how to prevent worry from talking control. “Be concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God and with what he requires of you, and he will provide you with all these other things.”

That’s simply saying: put first things first. What we need to do more than anything else is to realise that God can be trusted, we can depend on him, that he will take care of us, if only we would have faith in him as our loving God. Let God be God, as the saying goes, and let him take charge of your life.

First and foremost,

as a member of God’s Kingdom, realise that you are dearly loved by your heavenly Father who is always watching out for you, as is seen in what he has done for us through his Son Jesus.

Get to know what great things God can and will do for you.

Learn to trust him.

Learn to focus not so much on yourself but on your loving God.

Come to God in prayer and “leave all your worries with him, because he cares for you” (1 Peter 5:7).

The question that remains is this:

Can you and I change?

Can we put a stop to our worrying,

the anxious hand-wringing,

the stress and the subsequent depression?

Can we bring about a change in the way we deal with the problems that arise.

Maybe we won’t change over night, but as God feeds the birds which do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and as God beautifies the wild flowers which do not labour or spin, so God can feed and beautify our lives.

Why not try it out? “Be concerned above everything else with the Kingdom of God and with what he requires of you, and see what happens. For instance:

Give time to God first.

Find time for prayer and worship and notice how this decreases your hectic anxiety.

When getting into serious worry mode, pull yourself up and let God take control. Hand your worries over to him and take note how fewer catastrophes happen.

Change your attitude to the place that God has in your life.

If our heart is in tune with God, if our heart seeks God and his will, we have nothing to worry about. This doesn’t mean that we will be free of trouble. Rather it means that God will be with us in the middle of our trouble to uphold us and to drive away our fear. For many of us the struggle with worry will be an ongoing battle, but we can be assured that this is not one that we fight alone.

Let me finish with some words from the prophet Isaiah:

You Lord, give perfect peace to those who keep their purpose firm, and put their trust in you.

And a little later he says:

Israel why do complain that the Lord doesn’t know your troubles or care if you suffer injustice? Don’t you know? Haven’t you heard? The Lord is the everlasting God… Those who trust in the Lord for help will find their strength renewed (Isaiah 26.3; 40.27,28a,31a).

Where is God?

Text: Psalm 40:1,2

I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along.

 

What a week this has been. Last Sunday we were thinking about and praying for the people up north in Rockhampton, Theodore and other places out west as flood waters surged through their communities leaving a trail of mud and debris, flooded houses and ruined businesses and farms. I was worshipping with my parents thousands of kilometres from here and we prayed for those people up north.

Within a few days unexpectedly this whole situation came closer to home than we would have preferred. The day I was due to fly back from Adelaide ferocious storms and subsequent flooding hit our community. Then there was the devastation that hit Toowoomba and the Lockyer Valley and the loss of life that accompanied such an “inland tsunami” as it has been called. Then the flooding of the Brisbane River with homes, schools, the central business district of Brisbane shut down, sports facilities inundated with muddy sludge.

We witnessed on our TVs the bravery of those who rescued people being washed away by fast flowing water or from the roofs of their homes. We witnessed the despair of those who tried to save people only to watch helplessly as those in the water were swept away. We saw men and women, some victims of the floods, others rescue workers, others state and community leaders fight back tears as they recalled what had happened and what was still unfolding.

Right now people are going back to their homes and discovering the devastation. Some houses have been completely destroyed, cars wrecked, slimy oozing mud covering everything in their homes and businesses.

People and congregations around the world Canada, USA, Denmark, Japan, – around Australia who have come to know St Paul’s through the internet have emailed that they are praying for those affected by all that has happened. WE are told that this is the largest natural disaster that our nation has ever had.

One man in his email said that he couldn’t help but ask the question, “Where is the hand of God in all of this?” Maybe he is reflecting the same thoughts as the psalmist when he calls on God to help him. He wrote in Psalm 69,

Save me, O God, for the floodwaters are up to my neck.

Deeper and deeper I sink into the mire; I can’t find a foothold to stand on.

I am in deep water, and the floods overwhelm me.

I am exhausted from crying for help; my throat is parched and dry.

My eyes are swollen with weeping, waiting for my God to help me.

The writer isn’t talking about floodwaters in a literal sense but using this image to refer to the many things that are threatening to overwhelm him and drown him in grief and pain, and yet in spite of this he calls on God to help him. He is exhausted from praying. He believes that God knows what is happening and wonders why God has let all this happen – he is waiting for God to intervene. The imagery of these verses about floodwater, mud and sludge and being overwhelmed emotionally could well be a description of the experiences of this past week and how people are feeling. We understand and can sympathise with those who join the writer of Psalm 22 and ask, “My God, where are you? Why have you abandoned me just at the time when I need you the most?”

The writer of Psalm 147 says that God sends the snow and frost and hail

God speaks, the ice melts. God breathes, the waters flow.

If we believe that God directs the weather

that God speaks and the earth shudders

that God can calm the waves with a word

it follows then God has power over a flood and a bushfire.

Is it possible to take one more logical step and say that God causes disasters like those we have seen this week or perhaps stands back and lets them happen?

In recent memory we have had bushfires, drought, tsunamis, cyclones, other places have had snowstorms and blizzards and now floods – all involving loss of life. That’s not to mention all the human tragedies like September 11, wars, abortions, suicides, and so on. It only takes a small step to conclude that if God is a loving God as Christians claim then why does he do nothing to prevent floods, tsunamis, and bushfires, brain damaged babies and youth suicide? How can anyone be expected to believe in a God like that?

Sometimes we try to defend God and in the process give pat simplistic answers that really aren’t very helpful when people are struggling to come to terms with personal loss and suffering as experienced by our fellow Australians at the moment. Answers like –

“God has sent this to test (or strengthen) our faith” or

“One day we will be able to look back and see why God has allowed this to happen”.

We might even say that these natural disasters were never intended when God created the world, but to use Paul’s expression “because of death and decay, all creation is groaning” – groaning as a result of the sinfulness of humanity.

Though there is truth in these statements from a head knowelge point of view, they aren’t all that helpful in a situation of overwhelming emotional pain and anguish. They don’t help the suffering person who is trying to make sense of his/her pain. They only add to the conflict in their minds of how God can allow this to happen to the people he claims to love.

There is one thing that is clear. We have more questions than we have answers. There is certain hiddenness about God. There are so many things that we don’t understand about the way God works.

 

As Christians it’s ok to question God and ask him what he thinks he is doing. The writers in the Bible did that when trouble overwhelmed them. Didn’t Jesus call out from the cross quoting Psalm 22, “My God, My God, why have you abandoned me”? No doubt there will be times when each of us in the depths of trouble and overwhelming emotion question God and ask where he has been during everything that has been happening.

We are people who like to have answers. We are uncomfortable with the whole notion that something is beyond our grasp. We have an acute sense of what is fair and just and what we have witnessed this week doesn’t match what we would consider to be fair and just. What have people done to deserve this kind of trouble? We have to admit that we don’t have all the answers.

We have to say that the indiscriminate way that natural disasters strike people confuses us, makes us sad and even angry and we wish we had more answers to the questions that fill our minds.

The question that faces us is this: In pain, in suffering, in bewilderment and confusion, in sickness and in disasters, can we still trust God to be our God?

Can we love God in spite of the cards that are dealt out to us in life?

I guess for many of us we can keep on trusting most of the time, but occasionally something hits us and really overwhelms us like a raging torrent. It strikes us so deeply that our love and trust in God is rocked.

Because we have been shaken to our very core, we find it hard to have the faith, the strength and the trust to hang on to God. Our own personal resources to cope are as low as they can get.Thank goodness God is right beside us, holding on to us and keeping us safe. Even when we think God has left us all alone in our personal sadness and grief, God promises that he will keep on loving us and holding on to us and supporting us and helping us whatever may happen. As Christians we know that when we have come through it all we realise that it has been God’s strong hand that has held us up above the thing that wants to drown us.

It just so happens that the psalm set down for today is Psalm 40 and it says it so well, “I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along”.

The writer has come to the realisation that even when it seemed that God hadn’t heard his prayer and his pleas for help, he was there all the time. He did hear his cry and he has lifted him up out of the mud and sludge of despair; he has set his feet on solid ground and steadied him when he felt as if would fall again.

As we think back on all that has happened in our lives, the mistakes, the tragedies, the one thing that enables us to keep our senses is knowing that the love of God supports us through every tragedy and difficult time. It is the love of God we see in Jesus that assures us that God does care. Even when we are in the murkiest and muddiest places the psalmist reminds us that the love of God will hold us up and steady us as we move on with our lives and that he will hold on to us even when we are too weak to hold on to him by ourselves. In the arms of Jesus we know what kind of heart God has for us no matter what may happen.

Without a doubt, we struggle to make sense of the disasters that cause so much ruin and pain in our world. There will be times when we will seriously question God’s wisdom.

We will struggle to make sense of the disasters and find ourselves saying again and again, “I don’t understand”.

But one thing we do understand is that God’s goodness and love can be trusted, that gives us a new hope for the future and that’s all that counts.

As the writer of the psalm said,

I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along.

What the world needs now.

Sermon for the 1st Sunday after Epiphany – The Baptism of our Lord.

Bible reading: Mark 1:9-11

A few years into the Vietnam War, and two years after John F. Kennedy’s assassination, one of the most popular songs of last century hit the charts in 1965:

What the world needs now is love, sweet love,
It’s the only thing that there’s too little of,
What the world needs now is love, sweet love,
No, not just for some, but for everyone.

And if the world needed love then, it needs it more than ever now. From the Middle East, to the average home of Adelaide, there seems to be too little love. But is that true?

If God is love, and God so loved the world that he gave his only Son so that everyone who believes in him should not die but have eternal life, how can we say there’s too little love? There is plenty of love. God has enough love for the whole world. God didn’t just love some, but everyone. Everyone who believes in God should not die, for lack of love,but have eternal life, filled with love for God and for one another.

And that’s how we find our world. Turned away from God’s love. … There’s plenty of love, yet people are starved of love.

From Eden on, people have turned away from the love of God, to find love elsewhere. Always without success. God is love. Love comes from God. (see 1 John 4) To look for love anywhere but in God is to seek in vain, to find nothing more than “clayton’s love”, to be left disappointed and ultimately cynical. Sin is the rejection of divine love, turning away from a relationship of love with God.

And that’s how we find our world. Turned away from God’s love. Not believing there is a God of love. Not loving God. Struggling to love their partners in marriage, their neighbours, their enemies. There’s plenty of love, yet people are starved of love. It’s crazy!

But God is filled with love for the world. He loves the world so much he sends his dearly loved Son into the world, to become one of us. And finally his Son grows up and joins the crowds flocking to the Jordan for Baptism, not because he needed baptism, but because we loved-starved ones do. And God his Father spoke to him at his Baptism.

What did God his Father say to Jesus at his baptism?

You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.

What a wonderful way to speak to your Son. These are the first words the Bible records the heavenly Father speaking to Jesus his Son, on earth, and they are words of love and affirmation: You are my Son … I love you … I am very pleased with you. At his Baptism, and launch of his ministry, the Father makes quite clear that Jesus is his Son, that he loves Jesus, that he’s proud as punch of him.

The love the Father has for Jesus, Jesus passes on to us.

Isn’t it good when we hear a Father telling his Son how much he loves him and how proud he is of him? But there’s more. Jesus says: As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you. The love the Father has for Jesus, Jesus passes on to us. Through Jesus we are drawn into this relationship of love between the Father and the Son. But there’s more:

Jesus goes on to say that: those who love me will be loved by my Father. As the Holy Spirit softens our hearts to love Jesus, the Son, God the Father also loves us.

What a breakthrough! So many people only see God as angry, punishing, judging. They think Jesus seems quite friendly, but not God his Father. They like the God of the New Testament, but not the God of the Old Testament. Yet both are the same. The love of Father & Son is the same.

In some churches this Sunday (the Baptism of our Lord) is Baptism Sunday. Elsie never liked Baptism Sunday, but because she was such a committed Christian she endured it. What made it worse this Sunday was that somebody had taken her seat – probably some of the families of those to be baptized.

Elsie’s church had a custom that after the baptism, the pastor would take the newly baptized infant to a member of the congregation to hold as the pastor prayed for the child.

This day the pastor headed strait to Else and to her dread gave her the infant to hold. That week Elsie visited the pastor to explain why she was so uneasy on Baptism Sunday. She’d fallen pregnant at 16. Her father pulled her out of school on the pretext that she was needed on the farm. When the baby was born it was not well. She did not call the pastor for fear he would condemn her. She did not have the baby baptized. The child died at 14 days. After all these years she still worried about it. Every Baptism Sunday drove her to sorrow and guilt.

The pastor used the Baptism of Jesus to explain how loving God is. As Jesus came out of the water …

he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven saying: You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.

God takes dramatic measures to drive home to us how much he loves us. He tears open the heavens; he tears open the temple curtain.

Only in one other place does Mark tell us anything is torn apart. That is when the curtain of the temple is torn apart at the death of Christ, showing that through Jesus we have access to the love and mercy of God. God takes dramatic measures to drive home to us how much he loves us. He tears open the heavens; he tears open the temple curtain. Through it he shouts: I love you …I love you …I love you.

Is something holding you back from hearing and experiencing God’s love for you? Something you’ve done long ago, or been told long ago by a pastor or parent or teacher?

God tears open the heavens, and the temple curtains, to shout: I love you… I forgive you.

In a world of voices shouting: you’re no good… you’re not worthy… you’re a failure…you’re a sinner… God breaks open the heavens to tell his own Son how loved and precious he is – and his only Son loves you the same way. See the way Jesus treated all the people he met in his ministry; see how Jesus loved even his enemies as he died for all our sins on the cross; see how Jesus came to you in your baptism and welcomed you into his family of love; taste how Jesus still comes giving his body and blood in the Lord’s Supper.

You can breath in his love, and go out to love your neighbour as you love yourself.

Remember how Jesus said: love your neighbour as you love yourself? Because God and His Son Jesus love you so much, and are pleased with you, you can be pleased with yourself, you can accept yourself, you can love yourself. You don’t have to walk around as a miserable sinner, burdened down with guilt, despising yourself. In Christ, God loves you and forgives you and renews the image of God in you. You can breath in his love, and go out to love your neighbour as you love yourself.

All around you sit people who are equally loved by God, and Jesus says about them: love one another as I have loved you. (You might even want to glance at one of them now!) And Jesus said that because God is totally loving and compassionate we can go even further and love our enemies, those who for whatever reason have no time for us. And finally, when God opens our ears to hear his love, and our eyes to see it, and our hearts to receive it, His Spirit will move us to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength.

In God, the world has all the love it needs. Through God’s love breaking into the world in Jesus there is enough love to go around, not just for some, but for everyone. Amen.