Author: admin

Luke 12:49-56 On fire for Christ or…

 

Fire is fascinating.  (talk about the bonfire last night) Have you ever lost yourself as you stare into a fire; losing all sense of time and worry as you gaze into the flickering coals of a camp fire?  What makes fire fascinating for you?

For me, its the way it seems to dance about above a burning log, suspended in midair, like a kite dances when held tight by its string in the wind.  Flames whip, flicker, rise and drop, they change colours from blue through to bright white.  And what about the warmth we get from fire, nothing is better!  There is a lot about fire that attracts us; it gives us life, light, heat and energy.  But we have to treat fire with caution and respect.  We have to understand fire, know its properties, anticipate its burn rate and heat.  You see, fire is two faced; it heats, but it also burns!  It shines light, but it also blinds.  It gives life, but also takes away. We know that fire gives warmth, but we also know that if we stand too close to fire and ignore the heat for the sake of comfort, we will burn and die.

Have you heard about the ‘boiling frog’?  The boiling frog story is a widespread tale describing a frog slowly being boiled alive. The premise is that if a frog is placed in boiling water, it will jump out, but if it is placed in cold water that is slowly heated, it will not perceive the danger and will be cooked to death. The boiling frog story is generally told in a symbolic context, with the upshot being that people should make themselves aware of gradual change, lest they suffer eventual undesirable consequences. (Wikipedia)

The world is on fire…don’t worry Ros, it wasn’t because of your bonfire.  Jesus’ mission to the world has kindled the earth into a great big bonfire.  John the Baptist prepared his listeners for this declaring “I baptize you with water. But one more powerful than I will come,…and will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire…he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” Jesus fulfils John’s prediction saying “I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!” 

There is indeed fire upon the earth, but at this point in Jesus ministry, he had yet to kindle it.  There had to be an ignition point, a flint strike from which his fire would ignite.  Jesus knew exactly when, how and where he would strike the fire saying “I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is completed!”  His death on the cross was to be Jesus’ ignition point; the event in which he would set the world ablaze.  In a way, Jesus is portraying himself as the match stick that had to strike a box ,and the striking point was the cross; his death as judgment for the world’s sin, as foretold in Isaiah 53 “he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.”

Well, I hope you and I are not frogs in boiling water and about to be boiled alive, because I can’t feel any heat…what about you?  Yet perhaps we are, and if so we had better recognize, acknowledge and respond appropriately to the fire, or as the boiling frog story tells, we will suffer undesirable consequences!   St Paul reveals to us the fire of Jesus in 1 Corinthian 1:15 ‘the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

The gospel message of the cross is the fire of Jesus that now rages around us.  We can not ignore its seduction and draw; the gospel flame burns with an intensity that calls us to either life or death; to burn for Christ or burn in hell; it is foolishness to those who don’t believe, but it is the power to salvation for those who place their hope in Christ.  We are either spiritually blind, ignorant of the cross’ saving power and so, like frogs in boiling water, are doomed to death, or we respond the cross in repentance and faith and so be saved by the power of God. 

If we were to translate directly from the Greek, Jesus described his death on the cross as ‘throwing fire upon the earth’.  The message of the cross is fire, because it is two faced like fire.  It does one of two things, it warms, but it burns; it empowers, but also destroys; it brings life, but it kills.  Some will hear, confess their sins thinking; if God’s own Son had to die for my sin, there must be no other way to heaven than repent, be baptised into Jesus death and believe.  Others will reject the cross as stupidity and a remnant of our primitive society.

Jesus foretold the effect of his cross’ fire saying “Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division. From now on there will be five in one family divided against each other, three against two and two against three.” Has this happened to you?  In your family? Among your friends?  Have you lost the urge to speak about your faith because people reject your testimony?  Have you stopped encouraging others to come to church because nothing happened?  Perhaps you may have put the cross further down the list of priorities in life because its fire is too confronting, unreasonable, getting in the way or even powerless to help in life?

If this is you; if you are experiencing division, rejection or feeling your faith being challenge by the world, then you are experiencing the fire of the cross; its power and heat are upon you and you need to interpret it as the power of salvation; that the gospel message of the cross is burning its way through your life and you can either remain ignorant and indifferent, like the frog, boiling to death in our Western culture’s indifference to Christ, or you can interpret your division, suffering and even failures as the marks of the cross for blessing and salvation.  Jesus said, “When you see a cloud rising in the west, immediately you say, ‘It’s going to rain,’ and it does. How is it then! You know how to interpret the appearance of the earth and the sky. Yet you don’t know how to interpret this present time?”

Without spiritual understanding and faith in the cross, our present time, with many rejecting the gospel, turning away from regular church attendance; where sport, sex, wealth and good times are promoted as the first priority for our lives, we would be tempted to conclude that Jesus’ fire of the cross has been extinguished.  But don’t be fooled.  These very events and signs Jesus wants us to take note of and to interpret, that the message of the cross is taking effect; to respond with repentance and faith in the message of the cross and to not give in to today’s indifference as, well ‘sign of the times.’  It is the fire of the cross causing the division, with some repenting and believing, while others are rejecting and persecuting. 

St Paul always proclaimed Christ and him crucified and nothing else.  He passionately proclaimed that the only way to salvation is through the message of the cross, announcing “faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.”  He chose to preach and live the cross and so spread the fire of the gospel.  However, in doing so, he had to endure the marks of the cross; suffering as Christ did, enduring the scars and pain that the fire of the message inflicts.  Instead of giving in, he interpreted his suffering as signs from God that the fire of the cross was alight and spreading.  

In 2 Corinthians 6 St Paul gives us an account of what it means to be faithful in enduring the shame and fire of the cross  for the sake of spreading the gospel “as servants of God, he writes, “we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance; in troubles, hardships and distresses; in beatings, imprisonments and riots; in hard work, sleepless nights and hunger;  in purity, understanding, patience and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; in truthful speech and in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness in the right hand and in the left; through glory and dishonor, bad report and good report; genuine, yet regarded as impostors; known, yet regarded as unknown; dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed; sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.

Fire gives light, heat and life, it burns, destroys and kills, it gives and it takes away.  So it is with the message of the cross; it gives and takes away…yet blessed be the name of the Lord!  We all have scares, burns and wounds, suffered for the sake of the cross, but we all hold steady to the cross of Christ, for through it Jesus has redeemed us, let us not forget or be indifferent, but rejoice in this present time, and hold firm in faith saying together the words of the hymn O the old rugged cross by George Bennard

“O that old rugged cross, so despised by the world,
Has a wondrous attraction for me;
For the dear Lamb of God left His glory above
To bear it to dark Calvary.

In that old rugged cross, stained with blood so divine,
A wondrous beauty I see,
For ’twas on that old cross Jesus suffered and died,
To pardon and sanctify me.”

 

Luke 12_35-40 Ever-ready

 

(let the hymn finish and remain in my seat playing Nitendo.  Play the game until people start to get agitated and worried something is wrong.)

Oh no, I’m not ready!  Oops.  I forgot I had to have a sermon for this Sunday.  Perhaps someone could give a sermon for me?  Do you have one ready?  Do you?  Or do you?

Oh no, I’m just not ready, today came too fast, I wasn’t expecting to have to give a sermon so quick after last week!  I mean, I have been so busy with ministry.  I had to visit a number of people, I have taught at the women’s guild, went to Nyngan, taught at JAM and supported the ‘Shed Happens’ display at the vintage truck show.  I though I had plenty of time yet to prepare a sermon, but here we are!  Well what now, the time is here and I’m not ready.  And do you know what?  No one else can be ready for me; no one else can be me.  I am the one called to be ready for this time.

Jesus warns us as his disciples to be ‘ever-ready’ for his return “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.”  As Christians and disciples of Jesus, we are to be like ‘Ever-Ready’ batteries, ready and powered up to welcome Jesus at a moment’s notice.  For Jesus has promised to return at an unknown hour, and when he returns, it will be the end of time and life as we know it; in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, St Paul says, Jesus will suddenly appear before us.

When this happens, the time will be at hand.  Like with my sermon, in which I was not ready, yet the time came, and no one but me was responsible for being ready, so it will be at Jesus’ return; as the saying goes ‘time waits for no one.’  Jesus will appear whether we are ready or not…are you ready?  Are you watching?  Are you prepared with a lamp lit, in the right clothing and ready to open the door for Jesus at a moment’s notice?  Are you an ‘every-ready’?  If Jesus had have returned yesterday, would have you been ready?  Or tomorrow, will you be ready? 

Many of us would say yes, but our yes is one that is tainted with doubt and uncertainty, fear and weariness about what being an ‘ever-ready’ servant really means and what not being ready actually is.  After all, aren’t we all ready?                                                                                                                  

Perhaps someone can comment on what it means to be ready or not?

Jesus warns us to be ‘dressed ready for service, with lamps burning.’  What does this image conjure up in your mind? 

Perhaps we should be wearing overalls and work boots, and all have a torch in our pockets?

Dressed and ready for service in Jesus day, meant men and women had to hitch up their long cloaks under their belts, so their long clothing would not hinder their run, or cause them to trip.  When God was about to kill the first born of every Egyptian in the last Plague, God wanted his people to be ready for this and to be dressed to run, once the Pharaoh let them go, as recorded in Exodus, “This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the LORD’s Passover.”  However, Jesus is not asking his followers to be ready in this physical way, constantly dress in robes tucked under their belts. 

We are not to be ready by wearing joggers, tee-shirt and trackies.  Neither is he asking us to dress in some special ‘Christian clothing’, our Sunday bests’ to show others around us we are more ready than they.

If not, what is Jesus expecting of us?

He is challenging us to be spiritually ready for his return.  Urging us to be as ever-ready for him in faith, hope and love, as the Israelites were every-ready in girded clothing, lamps and oil; ready to take that journey to the Promised Land.  To be ever-ready for Christ, fully charged and challenged to move at an instant’s notice, is to be spiritually prepared for the journey that Jesus’ return inaugurates, our personal journey to the Promised Land of heaven, as Jesus promised in John 14, let’s read  “In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you.  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.”

 Jesus also announces in today’s gospel the great reward we will receive for being ready to welcome him saying “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.”  Jesus will be serving us in heaven!!

To be ever-ready, ever-charged and challenged in faith, hope and love, is to be spiritually ‘packed light’ for Jesus coming.  Having nothing in our spiritual lives that may cause us to be sleepy and lose our sense of urgency; nothing keeping us from always having Christ on our mind, believing, hoping, doing and planning, serving and loving as if he were to come at the very next second. 

To be an ever-ready packed light Christian, is to cast off anything in our hearts that may cause us to trip or entangle us, slowing us down or stopping us from running to open the door when Jesus knocks, as he said “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.”  As a long cloak in Jesus day stopped people from being ready to run, thus they had to hitch them up in readiness, our greatest burden and load stopping us from being ready is worry.

Our worries greatly load us down, paralyzing us, stopping us from being ready, blocking our ears to the knocking of Jesus. 

What are some of your worries?

Worry for you could be shame and guilt about your past, perhaps they are weighing you down so heavily that you struggle to have faith.  Perhaps it may be anger and bitterness that burden you to a point where we can’t even lift a finger in hope or even dare to love.  You may even worry about being ready!  Always loaded down trying to outdo yourself in good deeds, hoping this good may make you more ready than in the past. 

All of us have spiritual baggage that loads us down, stopping us from being every-ready.  An Ever-Ready battery will not be ready for use when the time comes, if it has been slowly drained or loaded with a power drawing device.  In the same way, worry drains our readiness, spiritually killing us by drawing out and draining all our faith in Christ, our hope of eternal life and our love for him. 

Interestingly, its not our suffering that causes us this burden of worry, but our lack of suffering, as Ravi Zacharias from “The real face of Atheism” wrote, “despair comes not from being weary of suffering, but from being weary of pleasure.”  No wonder Jesus warns against wealth, pleasure and worry in the verses previous to today’s gospel…have a read when you get home.

Does it mean then, to be spiritually light, we just don’t worry, as the song goes ‘don’t worry be happy’, or eat, drink and be merry, like the rich fool we heard about last week?  No!  Its how our worries are dealt with.

On whom can we ‘unload’?

Jesus himself takes our worry.  He says “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”  The good news about being ever-ready is that Jesus himself makes us ready, by taking all that burdens us and inhibits our faith and places it upon himself.  Jesus offers himself as a person to dump upon, unloading our worries so that we are every-ready to enter his kingdom and feast with him. 

He takes our burdens, not like a psychiatrist or therapist, who can do little more than listen and prescribe new ways of living, but as a healer.  Jesus actually heals us and restores our life again, keeps us charged in faith, hope and love.  This is why we are encouraged to do this in James 5:16 “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”

Soon we will confess our sins and then partake in the heavenly feast with Jesus.  Use this opportunity to really unload your heart of worry, so that you may be healed and ever-ready.   If this is not enough, come to me privately during the week, as Jesus’ very ears, and unburden and then hear Jesus comforting words of forgiveness and healing.  Now is the time to be every-ready, now is the time to encourage others in our community to be ready.  For this very hour Jesus may come and say ‘“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.” 

 

 Amen

Col 2_6-15  The fullness of Christ

Dubbo (Gilgandra) really is quite a nice place to live.  Why do you live here? (some examples).  Yes, its special to belong in a place that is safe from war, has good services, and where we actually want to live.  However, to live here comes at a cost!  Did you receive your rates bill from the council this week?  (show my bill) Yes, to be part of our community; a place were we want to be, actually costs us and demands payment from us.  We all have a letter telling us to pay up or we will lose our right to be citizens of this town; pay our dept or be forced to leave.  This seems totally unfair and expensive.  Would it help to complain?  Would it help if we just ignore the charges against us by throwing the bill into the bin?  Would it suffice if we just try our best and pay half or perhaps 2/3rds of the bill we owe?

No!  The charge to us remains standing.  If we want to remain citizens of Dubbo (Gilgandra) we must pay our dept in full!

There is also another city we a citizens of, the heavenly city of Jerusalem.  When we were baptised, by the power of God’s word and promise to us, we became members of God’s family who also live in heaven, as St Paul declares in Philippians 3 “our citizenship is in heaven.” St John also describes our heavenly citizenship in his vision recorded in Revelation  “I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.”  Do you want to be a citizen of heaven?  Why? Yes, St John describes heaven in this way “God himself will be [our] God.  He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

Who wouldn’t want to be living in heaven, as the Psalmist declares in Psalm 84 “How lovely is your dwelling place, O LORD Almighty!  My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the LORD.”  Well I have something for you.  (hand out envelopes with windows and get people to open them and read the bill.  On the account is the list of the Ten Commandments).  For us to be a citizen of heaven it costs.  Here is an account from God, straight from his word.  A list of his demands, the dept we own him to live and be citizens of heaven.  And worse, I am going to stamp the bill (an overdue stamp).

It doesn’t seem fair that God would demand a dept from us, especially since we want to live in a place with him; that he would command we be perfect when there is no possibility of us paying this sort of bill!  And worse, we must pay for it before we die!  What if I were to die in the next hour?  How would all this account be paid for?  Would it help to complain?  Would it help if we just ignore the charges against us by throwing the bill into the bin?  Would it be suffice if we were to simply try our best and keep half or perhaps 2/3rds of God’s commandments? 

No, just as we need to pay in full our dept to the Dubbo City Council, (Gil shire) we certainly also need to pay in full our dept to God for our failure to keep even one of the commandments.  St Paul tells us in Romans ‘There is no one righteous, not even one…Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God.’

 We own God a dept to live in heaven, that’s the bottom line.  And if we don’t pay we are excluded from citizenship, no matter how good we may feel or act, or how unfair we may think it is.

How thrilled you would be, and how grateful would you be, if some stranger paid your council rates for the rest of your life!  How exciting would it be, if you opened the windowed envelope every year, and instead of reading what we owe, we read ‘DEPT CANCELLED PAID IN FULL.  Well this undeserved payment of our debts has happened.  Not for our citizenship in Dubbo (Gilgandra), but Jesus has paid the dept we owe to live in heaven, and he paid it in full.  Not with silver or gold, but with his Holy and precious blood. 

St Paul declares this very good news, the gospel, that Jesus gave his life for us to be citizens in heaven with him, “When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross.” 

Hold out the dept written on the paper before you.  Every command has been fulfilled by Jesus, every transgression against the commandments of God have been paid in full by Jesus’ atoning death on the cross.  They no longer have power over us or demand anything from us, they are finished.  The message of Jesus is an announcement of good news, a stamping of ‘PAID’ on our dept and a declaration that we are citizens in heaven free of charge because of what Christ has done for us.  Here is a stamp that says ‘paid’, (go around to each account and stamp ‘paid and also stamp with an impression of the cross). 

Luther teaches us to understand what this means for us, writing in his commentary on John’s gospel ‘It is extremely important that we know where our sins have been disposed of.  The Law deposits them on our conscience and shoves them into our bosom.  But God takes them from us and places them on the shoulders of the Lamb of God…there are two abodes for sin: it either resides with you, weighing you down; or it lies on Christ, the Lamb of God.  If it is loaded on your back, you are lost; but if it rests on Christ, you are free and saved.’ (pg 170 vol 22)

In baptism Jesus stamped our bill with ‘paid in full.’  The guilt of sin no longer rests on us, we are free to live in heaven.  Faith takes hold of this, trusting in God’s true word, so that we are citizens of heaven, as Paul writes “in him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ, having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.”  The circumcision done by Christ is the cutting off of our debt, the paying in full. 

Jesus death on the cross crushed the serpents head, as promised in Genesis 3:15.  The devil can no longer exclude us from heaven, he has no power, his head is crushed.  However his body remains and it is thrashing and raging against our new spirit as it dies.  While still citizens here in Dubbo (Gilgandra), we still sin and so we must make use of our baptism.  It remains necessary, because of sinful nature, for us to constantly repent and fight against our sinful desires.  It remains important that we constantly remember the commands of Gos so that we can confess our sins against it to God and each other and receive the forgiveness Jesus so freely gives. 

You are a baptised child of God, a citizen of heaven, having received the gift of the Holy Spirit, you are now empowered to live under the forgiveness of sins and strive for the holy life that St Paul calls for. Therefore, a citizen of Dubbo (gilgandra), who also lives freely in heaven because of Christ, acts differently than someone who is only a citizen of this world, still under the dept for sin.  We want to gladly hear this gospel message again and again, eat the heavenly meal of Holy Communion, be willing to learn and are excited to love and share the news of free citizenship with others 

Paid in Full! You couldn’t get greater news.  Let us rejoice and be glad.  For this is God’s doing, so that no one may boast except in the cross of Christ.  Amen

25 July 2010 

Citizen of the

NEW JERUSALM

HEAVEN

Dear child of God

The debt you owe

Exodus 20:1 And God spoke all these words:

 2 “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

 3 “You shall have no other gods before me.

 4 “You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.

 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me,

 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.

 7 “You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

 8 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.

 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work,

 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God.

12 “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.

 13 “You shall not murder.

 14 “You shall not commit adultery.

 15 “You shall not steal.

 16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.

 17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”

Galatians 6_7-16 Godly tension

I have a rubber band here.  They are purpose made.  When not stretched, they are of little value, in fact of no use at all.  But when stretched, they become useful.  The tension of the rubber is used to hold things together.  The rubber stretches and flexes around any shape to hold and bundle things together.  The rubber band’s tension allows it to become the shape of a square when stretched around a box, rectangular when stretched over envelopes, or round when slipped over a roll of papers.  The rubber band, in and of itself is useless, but when stretched, the tension it develops has 1,000’s of good uses. 

(stretching out the rubber band).  However, we can also use the rubber band’s tension for bad.  We can stretch it beyond its capabilities and what?  Yes!  It snaps.  We can also use the rubber band to inflict pain and injury, when we stretch it on our finger and flick it:  who hasn’t done that!  Worse, we can make a sling shot and really cause damage.  Tension is good, but when we use it in the wrong way, or stretch it too far, we turn good into bad.

Our lives are very similar to the rubber band.  God created us with tension; to be useful; to be good and do good things toward others.  To be of service to God through serving each other, to love and cherish each other and to nurture and care for creation, as written in Genesis ‘God blessed Adam and Eve and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it.’  We live with this good tension every day, and we even express how our day is going in terms of tension: ‘I’m a bit stretched at the moment, I feel tense, I’ll spring back!’ 

Depending on what is happening to us, what decisions we’ve made, who we are around and what we are currently doing, our tension changes.  Like the rubber band that changes shape and intensity of tension, depending on what it’s stretched around, our tension changes depending on our situation, our thoughts and our actions, this is good godly tension. 

(DEMONSTRATE) Like I said earlier, we were created to do good works, as St Paul emphasizes, ‘Let us not become weary in doing good, (that is, let’s not lose our tension) for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people.’  Doing good for others, living the command ‘Love God first, love your neighbour as yourself,’ or living by the Spirit, keeps you at the right healthy tension and within your created stretch.  The encouragement and promise is there “the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life.”

Sin, however, is to use our tension, our lives, for bad, like when we overstretch or fling a rubber band; to either over stretch ourselves or use our tension to inflict suffering upon another person.  We overstretch ourselves when we over step the mark, go beyond God’s commands; when we transgress our conscience, or go against what the Holy Spirit prompts us to do or, as the scriptures say ‘smother the spirit.’  We become over stretched slowly over time.  It is not an instant thing.  The thoughts and desires of our sinful nature lead us to words, which lead us to deed, the snapping point, where there is no turning back; once we have put our sinful thoughts into action, we have gone beyond our created tension, thus causing a breakage, where there is no tension to recoil us back to the way we were before.  Sin breaks our relationship with God and with others.

We can also use our over tension to inflict pain upon others.  Rather than snapping, we stretch ourselves to the point where we ‘go off’, fly off the handle, hitting out at someone, especially someone close to us; we become a slingshot.  Built up bitterness, rage and frustration stretch and stretch our lives, until finally we load our tension with a plan to withhold our love or even fire words and actions of hate.  The impact of such a quick release of our tension is just as devastating for our relationship with God and others, as overstretching ourselves until we snap.  St Paul warns “The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction.”

So, if I were to stretch this rubber band, at what point would you say the tension is at in your life: (STRETCHING RUBBER BAND) here, here, here?  (RELEASE) Are you the one, as St Paul says “ who sows to please the Spirit, reaping eternal life?” living within a good tension, or are you overstretched…are you about to snap…or go off, “reaping destruction?”  For most of us, our life will constantly cycle of good and bad tension; from tense to intense to snapping, only to start again over and over.

It doesn’t matter where on this scale you may currently find yourself; It doesn’t matter that you may be about to snap or you are over stretched, how long you have been cycling between good and bad, there is a pressure release for you.  There is one man, one redeemer, one name above all names, who has already deliberately and permanently took upon himself our over stretched lives; our sinful nature, our judgment and death and conquered it, putting an end to our destruction .  Jesus, on the cross, with each nail and blow, each wound and thorn, defused the power of sin over our lives.  There on the cross, the full power of evil tension was unleashed upon Jesus in our place. 

(DEMONSTRATE) Slowly, over the six hours Jesus endured the agony of the cross, the power of sin, that over stretched our lives, was released; the tension went into Jesus body, and there it remained until his death and there it was buried with him forever.  Then Jesus was raised by the Father to give us new life, without controlling evil.

Jesus’ death brings us back into a normal, God purposed life.  A life that is no longer over stretched, but now has flexibility, elasticity and able to recoil God’s love for us into serving and loving our neighbour. We are able to be flexed and stretched in godly ways by the Spirit, given to us in our baptism, to serve and mission to those around us, as St Paul encourages us to do ‘the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life.’  The cross Jesus endured, and the victory he won over sin and death, and the ongoing power of the Spirit, gives us a new way of seeing and experiencing our life.  The cycle of overstretching and snapping is replaced with a cycle of confession and forgiveness, love and service.  That is why Paul rejoices saying “May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”

Today, we rejoice as seven girls, Rahel, Rachael, Anna, Georgina, Ellie, Miriam, and Tabitha, will publically boast in the cross of their Lord Jesus Christ.  Today girls, you are confessing that Jesus is the only name through whom you find release and freedom from the destruction that comes through sin.  We want to join with you in sharing in Christ’s victory over sin, by hearing your confession of your faith in the Triune God, Father Son and Holy Spirit.  We want to encourage you to continually trust in the cross of Jesus and the power of the Spirit, to release you when you are hit by the inevitable stretching times in your life.  We pray that, having faith, your life can and does have purpose and meaning, because of what Jesus has done for you; That you continue to be flexed and stretched by the Spirit in a godly way, through the word and sacraments, so that you boast only in the cross of Christ and recoil his love for you, by loving your neighbour.

Amen

Galatians 5_13-25 Holy Ghosting

 

How here has had a go at the growing sport of ghosting?  Who even knows what it is?  Well let me give a demonstration!  (get someone from the congregation to walk around in the church.  I follow as close as possible, moving in the exact way as they do, following each step)  The idea of this ‘sport’ is to keep instep with someone else; to walk as they do and become and to act exactly in the way they do.  So much so, that they do not even know you are behind them!  In other words, there are two people, but due to the ‘ghosting’ there is only one action.  You could say you are walking in another person’s shoes.

Surprisingly, this ‘sport’ is not new.  It has been around for centuries.  Well, may be not in the same form, but the idea of walking in the way of, or keeping in step with someone, has been used by St Paul in his letter to the people of Galatia.  Rather than ‘ghosting’, Paul calls our new life of freedom in Christ or of discipleship ‘Holy Ghosting’.  Three times in just a few sentences he calls for believes to enter into the sport of ‘Holy Ghosting’, saying ‘, live by the Spirit…and again ‘you are led by the Spirit,’ and finally ‘Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.’  Keeping instep with the Spirit is to be ‘Holy Ghosting’. 

Why would he ask us to do such a thing?  Did you even know that there is more to your faith than faith; that God, through the exhortations of St Paul, actually asks something of us?  Paul, who is THE teacher on the sufficiency of being saved by grace alone, penning such memorable texts like, ‘For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last’ and ‘it is by grace you have been saved, through faith–, so that no one can boast,’ also penned strict training rules regarding our life of Holy Ghosting, commanding us to stay clear of things like ‘hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy and drunkenness, warning that ‘those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.’

Perhaps Paul accidentally contradicted himself, beginning this passage with ‘It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.’  Then, in a seniors moment, put us under the yoke of slavery ending with ‘Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.’ 

As much as we would like to think so and even hope so, after all, who hasn’t been jealous, hatred or caused dissension, Paul has not contradicted himself; he did not have a seniors moment.  Freedom is not a license.  Christ did not suffer and die to free us to be the people we want to be.  He died to redeem us from ourselves; to save us from our body of death, which walks in sin, and is out of step with God and in step with the devil; he died so that we are free to enter heaven. 

While it is true, that we are indeed free, saved by grace alone, sadly, we often take this freedom to mean license.  Paul calls us to be in step with the Spirit because we often fail to understand grace, that by faith alone we are saved and that the law has no control over us.  When we hear this good news our natural response is to use this freedom from the law as a license to live as we please.  We take it to mean that no one, not even the pastor, not parents, not society, not even God’s word, can have jurisdiction or authority over us. 

We are told and tell ourselves that we are capable of making right choices; that the individual can achieve anything, be anything, partake and enjoy anything and everything.  The evidence is everywhere.  We are in an individual world; an iworld, where i am the only one that matters.  Perhaps the next big thing will be ichurch, available on our ipods, where you chose from a list of ireligions, then scroll down to chose isermons, isongs, and ibible verses, and if we don’t like what we hear, we simply cut and paste in what we do like!

When we learnt to drive, we had a competent instructor, guiding and advising us on how best to drive safely and according to the rules.  We followed every step of the instructor; we ghosted him, learning to follow, act and drive exactly like him.  When we passed our final driving test, we were then free to drive on our own.  We are free to drive however we like and wherever we like, but are we really free?   

No, we continue to ghost the instructor, mimicking and mirroring what he taught us, driving in step with him, as if he were still there.  We know that with freedom comes responsibility, with freedom there are boundaries.  We know that to step out of line, to be out of step with the instructors commands and cut and paste in our own ideas would mean we lose our license or worse, we may even be killed or kill some else.    

The same scenario applies to our salvation.  We have freedom in Christ, but this freedom came at a great cost and with this freedom comes a responsibility.  On the cross Jesus said ‘it is finished’, meaning, by his blood he put an end of the law’s demand.  The law has been fulfilled in Jesus’ death, so has no jurisdiction over us…we are free, as St Paul says “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.  But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” 

This is the good news announcement, that Jesus has set us free from any obligation to keep the law.  We trust this to be so, or by faith alone we take hold of this freedom.  The role of the church is to announce the gospel and to administer or freely give out this gift of eternal life.  Just as our freedom to drive comes with responsibility, our freedom in Christ also comes with responsibility.  The Spirit enlightens us to this responsibility through God’s word and then empowers us to live it. 

Keeping in step with the Spirit, ‘Holy Ghosting’, means we practice, train and teach ourselves in the art of ‘Holy Ghosting’, growing in the actions of the Spirit, mimicking and mirroring the Spirit as we grow in the knowledge of our freedom through word and sacrament, rather than following in the steps of sin, which will once again lead to hell. 

And to be ‘Holy Ghosting’ is to be following in the very steps and actions of the Spirit.  St Paul means for us to live in conformity, in sequence, in step with, or walking in the shoes of the Holy Spirit, as if we were one person and not two; ‘Holy Ghosting’, being in step with the Spirit, is our duty, our way of discipleship and its is our Christian discipline; a sport that requires our conscious effort, regular training and continual practice.  As ST Paul writes “You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love.  The entire law is summed up in a single command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” 

Luther comments ‘Therefore the godly should remember that for the sake of Christ they are free in their conscience before God from the curse of the Law, from sin, and from death, but that according to the body they are bound; here each must serve the other through love, in accordance with this commandment of Paul.  Therefore let everyone strive to do this duty in his calling and to help his neighbour in whatever way he can.  This is what Paul requires of us with the words “through love be servants of one another,” which do not permit the saints to run free according the flesh but subject them to an obligation.’

With Christian freedom comes ‘Holy Ghosting’, the art and sport of being in step with the Spirit; walking in the shoes of the Spirit.  Let’s enjoy our freedom from the law and be excited about the challenge and the privilege of training ourselves in Holy Ghosting.  What other sport can we participate in where the benefit s are given to the observer rather than the competitor!  After all, isn’t that what Christ did for us.

Luke 8:26-39

Looking next door

(Using a pair of binoculars, open the church door or window ajar and peer through:  Say things like “wonder what they are doing ‘over there”; look at that…o dear…no hope…just despicable and so on.  Even get some members to come and take a look.)

We just love to look across the street and watch what other, less desirable people, are up to.  We all have ‘someone’ across the street, who doesn’t quite fit in, who is a little different to us; to comment on and develop wonderful theories about.  We surmise why they might do the things they do.  Why they act in such peculiar ways, and we invest many hours trying to develop stories about them, to justify and excuse our spying on them through binoculars or the venetian blinds.

The street, the bitumen road or the dirt track that runs between us and them, acts as a barrier, a safety zone to separate us from actually meeting.  Experience tells us, the street may as well be as wide as the sea, because there would be no way we would dare cross, to actually meet with this person; we’ve convinced ourselves that they’re a lost cause; who’d want to get caught up in their problems…after all, it was their bad choices and their silly behaviours that have brought their troubles.

Barriers separating us from others come in many forms; they don’t have to be physical.  We can have psychological barriers, race barriers, and ethical barriers, religious and denominational barriers.  All of which create misunderstanding, fear and suspicion and we use these fears to widen and strengthen our barriers, convincing ourselves that there is little we can do to help these people.  Barriers can even be our excuses, enabling us to have some safe ground between them and us; Its too hard, I’ve tried once before, their no hoper’s; their someone else’s problem, some other churches problem.  Sometimes the barriers we put up are so big we are convinced that God could not even cross.  Binoculars that give us opportune to stand at a distance, are much safer and less challenging for our faith, than trusting that God can and does cross our barriers and use us to bring people into his kingdom.

During his earthly ministry, Jesus did not let any physical, social or religious barrier stop him from bringing the good news of the kingdom of God to people separated by barriers.  Jesus was known as a rebel, who had no regard for barriers.  He allowed sinful women to pour oil over his feet and kiss them.  He ate with sinners and tax collectors.  He spoke against the important religious leaders, he healed and ate on the Sabbath, a holy day, and he loved his enemies and touched dead bodies, bringing them to life; all barriers that should never be crossed.

Yet he deliberately and continually crossed these barriers, not to cause offence, but to show and tell how God’s salvation plan is for everyone, as Isaiah foretold “I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me; I was found by those who did not seek me. To a nation that did not call on my name, I said, ‘Here am I, here am I.”

Luke records how Jesus crossed one such barrier, the Sea of Galilee, the great expanse of water that separated the Jews from the gentiles.  The lake formed a natural barrier that provided safe ground between the Jewish cities of Galilee and the Greek cities of the Decapolis.  For the Jews it was religiously forbidden to enter that land.  The people there were believed to be dysfunctional anti-religious and not part of God’s plan of salvation.  The lake provided a safe no go zone, an ideal excuse to not visit such a place, or to have any contact with such people.

After all, what did they have in common?  The Greeks had their own gods and their moral and religious traditions were full of evil, completely opposite to what they believed.  Perhaps that’s why Luke in the Greek emphasises that Jesus sailed down to the country ‘opposite’ Galilee?

When Jesus arrived, there, on the other side of the barrier, opposite the religious city of Jerusalem, Jesus, ‘the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth’, met the very man opposite to him.  He was full of evil, as Luke writes ‘Many times it had seized him, and though he was chained hand and foot and kept under guard, he had broken his chains and had been driven by the demon into solitary places.’  This great evil however, was no barrier, no safe zone, or excuse for Jesus to hide behind.

Unlike the many religious, who used the lake as a barrier to protect themselves from having to help, Jesus was no onlooker; he crossed the lake to confront evil face to face.  The demons knew their time had come and screamed “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, don’t torture me!“

The demons knew that their evil was no barrier for God, and that Jesus came to destroy their reign, and begged for mercy.  Commanded by Jesus, the demons entered into some pigs, and were destroyed by the very barrier that had once protected them.  The water drowned and put an end to the power of evil, bringing freedom and a new life to the man whom everyone thought could not be controlled or helped; who was kept at a safe distance.  Jesus crossed the barrier of water and used the water to bring the good news of the kingdom to those living opposite lives to God.

Jesus crossed the waters of the heavens, which were once the barrier, separating all of us from God.  He crossed the expanse of the universe to enter our world; a world opposite to heaven, full of sin and evil, and he came to us, as he did to the demon possessed man, to bring us the good news of the kingdom of God.  He crossed every human, physical and spiritual barrier, to redeem us from the power of sin, death and the devil, as the words of the song, ‘Lord I life your name on high’ list: ‘You came from heaven to earth- to show us the way,- from the earth to the cross- my dept to pay;- from the cross to the grave- from the grave- to the sky.’

And now the very waters of the sky, that separated us from God, are now used to bring us to him.  In baptism, Jesus uses water and the power of his word, just as he did to the demons in the pigs, to destroy the evil that ruled in our life.  He drowned our old sinful person and gave us what was his…the opposite to what we were.  He gave us his righteousness, his holiness and his status as children of God, while on the cross he took upon himself, our sin, our evil and all our barriers that separated us from the love of God.

St Paul, in Ephesians 2 reminds us of this pure grace and gift of new life saying ‘remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world.  But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace… and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations…He came and preached peace to you who were far away…’  

And Luther, in his Small Catechism explains what this means practically for us, now that we are made new and are disciples and followers of Jesus: ‘All this he has done that I may be his own, live under him in His kingdom, and serve him in everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness just as He is risen from the dead and lives and rules eternally.’   We now live lives that are the opposite of the world around us and opposite to our sinful human desires.  We have the Holy Spirit to guide us and empower us to live holy lives, worthy of the gospel.  Yet we dare not use our God given innocence and blessedness as a barrier to separate us from those opposite us; we dare not use our gift as an excuse or a safety zone, separating us from the community around us; excusing us from crossing barriers to reach those without God and without hope.

Jesus sends us, as he did the once demon possessed man, to ‘tell others how much God has done for us’.  Yet be comforted and assured that it is not by our power or words that we go.  It is by Jesus authority we go.  And it is by the power of the gospel that we speak and it is the foolishness of the cross that we proclaim.  Be assured, that when you put down your binoculars, and cross the barriers that once separated ‘us’ from ‘them’, Jesus’ promise is for you “surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”  Amen

2 Samuel 12 From sin to Grace

I have a balloon here. I just love balloons; they remind me of parties, of celebrations and of good times. I have been told not to touch this balloon as it is to be used for a special birthday, for someone special, but I love balloons. It’s here just asking to be blown up! Surely I should be able to blow it up. I enjoy balloons more than the person this is meant for anyway. No one will know or care if I were to bend the rules and blow it up for the birthday party. (start blowing it up, then as it gets bigger, walk among the people continuing to blow it up. The people will cringe and worry that it will burst. Finally, pop the balloon). Ask what they felt as I walked among them blowing up the balloon? Was it ‘my private fun, or did my actions have an affect upon them?

What I just did demonstrated the infancy, progression and final result of sin; it also demonstrated that there is no such thing as a private sin! The balloon represented the progression of David’s sin, from lust, to adultery with Bethsheba, to finally murder. Originally, this was a private affair, a secret and mutually consenting sexual fling, totally natural, rationally explainable; an act satisfying the needs of two lonely people; gratifying their felt need, harming no one.

David’s natural desire for a woman and Bethsheba’s willingness, bought out perhaps by desperate loneliness, excused, in their mind, God’s command to not do such a thing. Their felt needs became the catalyst to reinterpret the 6th commandment, ‘not to commit adultery’, in a way that excluded them.

As we witnessed with the balloon, which got bigger and bigger, affecting everyone, and then finally bursting, David’s sinful affair got bigger and bigger, until finally affecting a whole community. Bethsheba became pregnant, and David, wanting to ‘look good’ before God and others, tried to hide the affair by having her husband ‘accidently’ killed in battle. David’s affair had an effect the whole community.

Like an expanding balloon, the adulterous affair expanded its reach. First the commanders of Israel’s army were affected by being forced to put Uriah in the front line of the army. Secondly, Uriah was killed. Thirdly, Israel’s army were put in danger because their best fighting man was lost. The widening affects continued, with family and friends left to mourn Uriah’s death.

Sin, our re-orientating of God’s word to suit our felt needs, does not remain stagnate. Like ripples radiating out from a stone dropped into a pond, wave after wave of ramifications swamp innocent people, destroying lives, families, relationship and even churches, long after the act done; long after all appears to be normal. We all have something that tickles our fancy, floats our boat, and attracts our attention.

Something we know in our heart is wrong, know from the Ten Commandments is wrong, yet because it feels right, because it fits comfortably with our wishes, suits our inner hopes and desires, we use them as a catalyst and excuse to re-interpret God’s commands against such things, in a way that suits our needs.

We are not just talking about the so called ‘big sins’, like adulatory, or murder, and let’s face it, you and I know that we are not likely to go and suddenly kill someone. However, the same destructive forces that ripple through whole communities and separate us from God, when there is a murder or adultery, are at play even in our smallest desires. Envy, jealousy and lust, or bitterness and anger, are only inner feelings, but we use them as a catalyst to re-interpret God’s word to suit our needs and then act on them, destroying our relationship with God and others around us; just as Adam and Eve did, believing that “Surely God did not say?”

We excuse ourselves of sin by saying “If God created our feelings and they form our natural behaviour, then we must be the ultimate guide to what is right and wrong.” Sadly, even our smallest feelings and desires are tainted with sin and do not give a true indication of God’s will for us. Acting on feelings and desires contrary to what we read and know of God’s will, is sin, and as with David, sin has an ever increasing affect on our relationship with God and with others.

The rippling affects on the community continue because behind our re-interpretation of God’s law stands an angry God, who condemns sin and commands that his law, which protects relationships, be kept, and who clearly warns ‘for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me.’ David experienced firsthand the result of an angry God, as Nathan announces “You are the man!… the son born to you will die.” God, in righteous anger, put a stop to the ripples of sin by calling David and Bethsheba to account; he popped their balloon! The word of God pricked David’s conscience, deflating his ego by pointing out that his feelings and felt needs are not the measure for interpreting God’s word, or the guide to building good relationships. It was his sinful nature that had led him astray, and what he had done had broken the relationship between him and God.

The Lord did not bring an end to David’s sin out of spite or revenge, but revealed his sin in order to restore David back into a proper relationship with him and the Israelite community through the cleansing of repentance and forgiveness. When his sin was publically found out, announced through the prophet Nathan, David soon realized that first of all his sin offended God and had broken his relationship with him; David confesses “I have sinned against the LORD.” Only once this vertical relationship was restored, between David and God, could the horizontal relationships between David and the community begin to be restored. Only through the vertical and horizontal plains of the ‘cross’ can true healing begin.

He also calls us also to account, not out of malice or nastiness, but as a servant king, offering to firstly restore the vertical relationship between him and us, then to rebuild the horizontal relationships with each other; cleanse our lives through Jesus’ death on the cross for our sins. It is only through the way of the ‘cross’ that true relationships are forged. God first pops our balloon, sometimes by allowing our actions to become public, so that we can acknowledge that God is king and that our feelings are not. Only then, like with David, can confess that Jesus is Lord and saviour who washes us clean, and only then, by the grace given to us, can we do the same, restoring the horizontal relationships through confessing our sin and mutual forgiveness. God, the servant king begins with us through the cross, washing us clean, as Isaiah foretold ‘by his wounds we are healed’. Then he calls us to do the same ‘washing’ with each other.

Jesus demonstrated the washing and restoration he gives and calls for, achieved by him through the cross, when he washed the disciple’s feet. There, he humbled himself, as he would soon do on the cross, and washed the dirty feet of the disciples; people who had no idea they needed washing. They were embarrassed to have their ‘dirtiness’ revealed to all, and they were ashamed that Jesus, their master, needed to wash them. Some even protested saying “you shall never wash my feet.”

Determined to clean; determined to demonstrate how his blood, soon to be poured out on the cross, will wash us of sin, determined bring restoration on the vertical plain, Jesus said “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.” Only once the vertical relationship between us and God is restored through the suffering and death of Jesus on the cross, can we have a true heart to confess our sins, and bring restoration to the community; it is only through the relationship restoring cross do the ripples of sin change into ripples of love, joy, peace and forgiveness.

The relief and comfort that comes thorough Jesus’ washing is expressed by David in Psalm 32 “When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long…Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD”– and you forgave the guilt of my sin.” The same relief is expressed to Jesus by the sinful woman when she poured out her appreciation for the grace she received with tears and expensive oil. Jesus washed her clean, saying ‘your sins are forgiven’, their relationship was restored; she then began to ‘love much’. Restoration of relationships begins at the cross of Christ, from there, with ever increasing ripples of grace, we too love much. Amen

Luke 7:11-17 Jesus raises a widow’s son from death

Wouldn’t it be good if we could have a second chance at life?  If we could just have another go, how we would do things differently!  What would you do, or what would you change, or who would you be if you could have a second chance in life?  (question) Would it mean that you would be a different person than you are today? Would it mean that you would have done things differently or not have done them at all?  While we are mostly happy with our lives, there are the times which we wish never happened, and we want to have a second chance at life, or at least turn back time so things would be different. 

Cher if you are old enough to remember, had a famous song called ‘If I could turn back time’.  And not too embarrassed to admit it, you might remember the lyric’s going like this, and no, I’m not going to sing. ‘If I could turn back time
If I could find a way I’d take back those words that hurt you and you’d stay

Then she goes on to sing…
I didn’t really mean to hurt you I didn’t wanna see you go I know I made you cry, but

If I could turn back time
If I could find a way
I’d take back those words that hurt you…
If I could turn back time

This song really reflex’s all the instances in our lives in which we messed up, in which, if we had a second chance, we would change the things we said or done.  But what about the things that happen to us that are out of our control?  The things that can never change, no matter how many chances we have at life?

What about death?  Either our death or the death of loved ones?  Dying is something no one can avoid.  And when we hear of tragic deaths, we are saddened and even angry.  A ship carrying relief supplies and medical equipment is raided by army commandos; there is death and injury.   

The two processions of people.  Both heading in different directions; one procession trying to get into Gaza, the other trying to keep them out.  Both on a journey, both however, with different intentions, and unfortunately, both collide, with catastrophic consequences.  8 people are killed and we pray to God that he would bring his comfort to those in mourning.  Yes, our hearts go out to them. 

And sure, if both sides could turn back time, if we all had a second chance, perhaps something could have been done, but ultimately though, there is one thing that we can never change; dying.  Whether of old age or suddenly in an act of aggression, the wages of sin is death, and there is nothing we can do about it.

Jesus, in today’s gospel, is in a procession.  A group of people on a journey with Jesus, and they also have a destination, a little town called Nain; a little more than a day’s walking journey apart. You see, Jesus had just the other day, in Capernaum, healed a centurion’s son; a great miracle of life.  And now he, his disciples, and a huge crowd who witnessed the healing, were journeying in a joyful procession to another town; the town of Nain which means ‘a pleasant place’.

However, Nain is not the pleasant place its name suggests!  No, definitely not.  There is another procession of people in progress.  A group of people on a journey to the grave yard.  And this procession of people, are deeply grieved.  They are face to face with the reality of death.  They are carrying the dead body of a boy, the only son of a widowed mother.  And I suspect no one would be grieving more than his mother.  Not only has she lost her only son, but also her status and well being in the community.  A widow in Jesus time had no way of supporting herself.  The death of her son was the end for her as well.

Yes, this was a sad procession of people with one goal; to reach the grave yard.  So here we have it, Jesus procession going into Nain, and the widow’s procession going out of Nain.  Two processions of people, both heading in different directions, both having different destinations….Both collide at the gate of Nain.  One group of people going out to bury the dead, the other group going in to celebrate a life.  Life and death collide at the gate of Nain. 

However, unlike the collision between the activists and the commandos, which ended up in death and suffering.  The collision between Jesus, the resurrection and life, and death, the wages of sin – the death of a young man, has completely the opposite result.

Jesus, seeing the distraught widowed mother, feeling the anguish of her heart, had compassion on her, and the two processions stop in their tracks.  They stop while Jesus goes; goes and reaches out to the woman and reaches out to the dead son in compassion.  Jesus knows he has the power over death and he just can’t stand by and allow death to have its way; not yet. 

The compassion Jesus has, according to the Greek, is a deep out pouring of emotion; a spilling out of his insides.  The sort of compassion a Father has when he sees his prodigal son return and he runs out to greet him; the sort of compassion which urges Jesus to feed 5000.  Yes, this is exactly the compassion of God our Father, the pouring out of his heart which caused him to send his Son Jesus into the world to rescue the world; rescue you and I, from the power of death, as Jesus said ‘For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.’

Yes, the compassion of Jesus collided with death that day and it resulted in new life; a second chance, both for the mother and the son.  Jesus reaches out, touches the coffin, reaches out touches the heart of the grieving mother, and says ‘do not cry mum’, son, I say to you get up’.  In an instant, with a mighty Spirit filled word, Jesus turns back time, he gives a second chance to those who are without hope.  The young man is raised from the dead.  And what is most touching is Jesus next action ‘he brought the young man back to the mother’.

Today, it seems as if we are two processions, both going in different directions.  One procession, Lutheran have had to make the break from regular worship here in Nyngan, the other procession, Uniting, remain and have had to accept this sad reality.  Two groups of people, both with different intentions, both going in different directions, meet together today in God’s house.  We too meet at a gate.  Not the gate of Nain, but with Jesus who said ‘I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. He will come in and go out, and find pasture.’

We meet today in the presence of Jesus, just as the widow did, and we come as one procession mourning the loss, or ‘death’ if you want to call it, of our joint Uniting/Lutheran services and fellowship.  It is not ‘accident’ that we meet today, we come deliberately to The gate, for through Jesus we are all saved and given a second chance.  Yes, today is our opportunity to give thanks to God for the past 30 years of Lutherans worshipping here, and we meet to praise God for the past 10 years of joint worship together and for the blessings this has brought.

Most importantly we come today as one procession, gathered by Jesus to meet him.  For we know and believe Jesus is ‘the resurrection and the life’ and he is present to give us a second chance.  His word and sacraments give us new life in him, resurrecting us from sin and death and bringing us to eternal life.  This is our common faith and what unites us.  Even though we are going in different directions, our second chance at life in Christ is what still unites us as one.

So, how might people who have a second chance at life, have a new life in Christ, live?  How might you here in Nyngan, who now have your own minister to serve you and bring God’s grace, see this as a second chance in ministry?  Perhaps, this second chance may mean you can be as Christ to one another and like him have compassion for those in need around us.  While other stop, caught in mourning and death, we go, go like Jesus and reach out and touch other people’s lives. 

Let our new life collide with others so that they to may experience the goodness and compassion of God, rather that the cold hand of injustice and rejection.  We may not change the world, but we may, by the power of God, change a life.

And in doing this, in bringing others to Christ for healing and new life, those who have been touched and those who have witnessed the new life will praise God and say ‘God has come to help his people’.  Amen

Pentecost john 14_7-18 Show me.

 

(in connection with a skit on trying to workout what a personalised number plate may mean)

 

For many people, perhaps even for you, the bible is like looking at a personalized number plate; you read the numbers and letters, but are left to work out what they really mean.  Like the HRT4GD plates on the car, where we have to unravel the letters to reveal ‘HaRT 4or GoD’, we read each book of the bible, each letter, gospel, each psalm and prophet and try to reveal its true meaning for today.  The message and purpose of the bible seems to be up for grabs.  Like the kids on the bus, is it true that all our different opinions are just as valid as anyone else’s?  Perhaps the bible’s message is depended upon our situation in life and therefore doesn’t have one central message, but rather a thread of relevant points to suit our felt needs.

The way the bible s quoted to validate so many different causes, it certainly appears that way;  its message is about rights, our rights, women’s rights, gay rights, human rights, for the rights of the unborn, for the rights of children, or for the elderly.  Others say it’s a message about morals and how to live the Christian life.  Its message dictates the role of women in society, men in the church, how children should look and act, how we are to love, to discipline, to guide even to the point of what we should wear.  Then others understand it to be a book of revolution; the world is evil and we must ‘win the world for Christ’.  We need Christian laws and leaders for our land to run the country with biblical principles, like Israel.  We need to use only Christian plumbers, electrician, lawyers and doctors so the jobs done better.

With all these voices, claiming to have the right answer to the bible, we get so confused…what is the bible’s message, will someone tell me!

There was a similar confusion over Jesus.  Though John the Baptist called out “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”, giving a definite answer, there was still great confusion over who Jesus was and what his message meant, particularly when it came to his interpretation of the Holy Scriptures.  Some, like the Pharisees heard him and took him as a threat to the Jewish faith and the laws of Moses.  Others, like the Romans, feared he was preparing an uprising against them.  Even the disciples struggled with his message.  John records Phillip questioning Jesus “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.”  Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time?”

We are certainly not the first to try and speculate or hold differing opinions and ideas about the central message of the bible.  Right from Jesus day until now, many falsely claim to hold the truth to the bible.  Jesus warned that this would be the case saying in Matthew 24 “At that time if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or, ‘There he is!’ do not believe it.  For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even the elect– if that were possible.  See, I have told you ahead of time.”  So, ahead of time he also promised to send the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth teach us the truth about the bible’s message.

Today we celebrate the birthday of the church, Pentecost; the coming of the promised Holy Spirit 50 days after Jesus’ resurrection.  So it should be no surprise to us then, that we should pay special attention to the Holy Spirit’s message spoke that day.  Peter speaks publically for the first time about Jesus and explains the message of the scriptures.  The Holy Spirit came with signs and wonders, with flames and with the disciples speaking in many languages, and prophesying, but that was not the central message from the Spirit; not the truth. 

Though many today believe speaking in tongues and having power to prophesy is what makes a Christian.  Perhaps you have heard, like I have, people tell you they know, by direct knowledge from the Spirit, who and who hasn’t got the spirit, what your role in the church will be and what future is install for our church.  Somehow God has singled out them alone to tell the truth.  Others demand only some have the Spirit, those who speak in tongues or perform some miracle or possess some power from on high.

Yet, is this the truth of the Holy Spirit? Is it true only some have a word of knowledge, only some of us have the Spirit to interpret scripture?  Does this mean the rest of us then, remain confused and unable to understand the bible?  No, in the confusion that followed the coming of the Holy Spirit, when many we perplex and asked “what does this mean”, and others thought that the disciples were drunk, Peter, filled with the Spirit, speaks clearly and he speaks to everyone, in their own language.  The Holy Spirit has something to say to all people, and by his power, the disciples speak in tongues, to announce that his message is the truth about God and it was for everyone to hear, know, receive and believe.

There was no confusing word or special directive for a selected few to understand and pass on.  The Holy Spirit did not prompt Peter to speak about human works or the gifts of the Spirit or any other human endeavor, even those given by the Spirit.  Peter, filled with the Spirit announces the truth and thus the true message of the scriptures; “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”  The coming of the Holy Spirit is to show everyone the way to Jesus; to show everyone now has the knowledge of Christ and him crucified, as St Paul would say.  The Spirit’s truth is that the bible points us to Christ alone as Luther would say and explained in his Small Catechism:

‘I believe in the Holy Spirit; one holy Christian Church, the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins;

the resurrection of the body; and the life everlasting. Amen.

 What does this mean?—Answer.

I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him;

but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in

the true faith; even as He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth,

and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith; in which Christian Church He forgives daily and

richly all sins to me and all believers, and at the last day will raise up me and all the dead, and will give

to me and to all believers in Christ everlasting life. This is most certainly true.

The truth about the bible and its central message is to make known that “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”   Peter continues to expand this in his speech.  I encourage you today, you and your children, to go home and read aloud Peter’s speech, and to know that through this gospel message, the promised Holy Spirit will enlighten your heart and give you faith to believe that there is no confusion, that in Christ alone “there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.“  Amen