Sermon: A Lifestyle Of Worship

From a new sermon series on worship:

A modern Western worship team leading a contem... — A modern Western worship team leading a contemporary worship session. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I was once taken to task after a sermon I preached on worship when I was a Local Preacher. Having confined myself to the question of worship when we are gathered together on a Sunday, someone wanted to know why I hadn’t talked about the worship of our daily lives.

Well, you can’t include everything in one sermon – although some preachers try! But my friend had a point. If you consider Christian worship, you have to see that it is about more than Sunday morning. We are called to a lifestyle of worship, and is what Paul does here. Romans 12 is about Christian lifestyle, but it is packed with words from the realm of the temple – ‘offer’, ‘sacrifice’ and ‘worship’ all occur in verse 1.

And so if we are to have a series of sermons on worship, we must think about our lifestyle of worship. We speak about some people who are ‘Sunday Christians’ – they come to a church service on Sunday, but have no connection with the church in the rest of the week and Sunday morning has no effect on the way they live from day to day. The early church would not have recognised such people as authentically Christians at all. The summons is to follow Jesus, and you don’t get any annual leave away from that calling.

But behind all this is the first of two questions that Romans 12:1-2 addresses: why should we worship? Paul puts it quite simply: ‘in view of God’s mercy’ (verse 1). More fully, he says,

Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God – this is your true and proper worship. (Verse 1)

We offer a lifestyle of worship to God ‘in view of God’s mercy’. The ‘Sunday Christian’ may not understand this. On occasion, I have asked congregations for ideas to include in the opening prayers of praise and adoration. “What reasons do we have for bringing our praise and worship to God this week?” I have asked. Often, my experience has been that the answers which come back have a lot to do with the goodness and beauty of creation, and for the sort of blessings that all sorts of people, religious or not, enjoy – good health, a new job, the birth of a new family member, and so on.

Now there is nothing wrong with any of those reasons. But what is missing? What we have is a collection of reasons to be thankful that are based on the goodness of God in creation, but what is absent is any recognition of the love of God in salvation. ‘God’s mercy’ is missing. Jesus and his Cross are absent.

Remember – this is Romans chapter 12. Paul has spent eleven chapters arguing why the Cross and Resurrection of Jesus change everything. When he says, ‘in view of God’s mercy’, he has in mind all the incarnate Son of God has done for us in giving his life and in being raised from the dead. If we are only Sunday worshippers, we have not grasped what God has done for us in Christ. Either we have not realised that Christ died for our sins and rose for our justification, or we are glad to receive his forgiveness but just enjoy the blessing without showing any gratitude.

In fact, Paul’s language is even stronger. He doesn’t simply say ‘in view of God’s mercy’, he literally says, ‘in view of God’s mercies’. It isn’t as though God was merciful to us in Christ at the Cross and that’s that, we’ve had our mercy (amazing as that is). No! God is consistently and continually merciful to us. How many of us have had second chance after second chance from him? How many of us can look at our lives and see him faithfully directing our steps? We remember the Old Testament words that the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end. But where do those words come from? Of all books, they come from Lamentations, where the author is grieving the judgement of God on sinful Judah in allowing Babylon to take God’s people into exile and cause devastation and destruction everywhere. Yet even the God of judgement can be merciful every morning. If he is merciful like that in the midst of judgement, how much more merciful is he in other ways?

So if we want reason to worship by the way we live each day, we have it in the mercies of our God. Surely a God who is merciful to us in the ways the Scriptures tell us is one to whom we should be deeply and consistently grateful. Surely we show that gratitude in the way we follow his Son.

Let me make this a little more specific, then: do you know that Christ died and rose for you? As you sense gratitude welling up to him for all that he has done and all that he continues to do for you, is there any particular way at present that he is calling you to give glory to him by imitating his life?

And let that lead us into the second of the two questions: how should we worship? Paul gives us two answers to ‘how’: firstly, with our bodies, and secondly, with our minds.

Firstly, then, our bodies:

[O]ffer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God – this is your true and proper worship. (Verse 1b)

Now we might get nervous about what ‘sacrifice’ involves, rather in the way people assume that whatever they fear most is what God is most likely to ask them to do. If you don’t like the thought of going to remote regions of Africa, then God will definitely call you to be a missionary there. No wonder someone once said, “The problem with living sacrifices is that they keep crawling off the altar.”

Essentially, though, a sacrifice is an offering of something or someone over to God for him to do with as he pleases. When we say the Covenant Prayer at the beginning of each Methodist year in September, there is a fine balance stated over and over in different ways between those callings that might be congenial to our aptitudes and interests, and those which might not be. God is neither a sadist nor an indulgent grandfather. He is merciful to us, we give ourselves over to him and he deploys us for his kingdom purposes.

More specifically, Paul describes the sacrifice of our bodies with three adjectives. You may think that only the word ‘living’ is attached to sacrifices, but a more precise translation would be ‘sacrifices, living, holy and pleasing to God’.

So note that God wants living sacrifices, not dead ones. Just as you might put money into an offering plate, I invite you to imagine yourself putting your whole body on a huge plate that is carried to the front and dedicated to him. We ‘offer’ not simply our money, but ourselves. We ‘present’ our bodies. You may recall that when our previous hymn book, Hymns and Psalms, came out, some people made a fuss about the wording in the final verse of ‘When I Survey The Wondrous Cross.’ Instead of singing,

Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were an offering far too small

the words were,

Were the whole realm of nature mine,
that were a present far too small.

Some Christians didn’t like the use of the word ‘present’, but I don’t think it was a bad one. We bring gifts unconditionally to those whom we love, and Paul urges us to do something similar with our bodies. Let us offer what we can do with our physical bodies to God.

Moreover, it needs to be a holy sacrifice. To be holy is to be set apart for God’s special purposes. There is nothing mundane or routine in the offering of our bodies. God has a special purpose for us, and it can only be accomplished if we dedicate our bodies to him. What can I do with my strengths and my talents? How can they be used for kingdom purposes?

Finally, these sacrifices are pleasing to God. Do not get the image that God is po-faced and stern in the face of our offering. As we put our bodies at his disposal, he is pleased! This is what he longed for. We can give great pleasure to God by offering a present of our bodies to him.

Secondly, we worship with our minds:

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will. (Verse 2)

To say that we worship with our minds may make some people nervous, like watching the news report in the week about a thirteen-year-old girl from Surbiton called Neha Ramu, who has an IQ of 162. If we have to use our minds in worship, some of us will feel we are not qualified.

But this is not about being intellectual. It goes more like this: a lifestyle of worship involves finding out God’s will and doing it, in order to bring more pleasure to God. But the problem we have is with tuning in to God’s will. Sin affects our minds as much as any other part of our being. For example, that is why science can be used for ill as well as for good: think of weapons of mass destruction or environmental damage. It is also about the way we try to deceive ourselves and deliberately twist our thinking to find something acceptable that actually isn’t. Every part of our humanity is affected by sin, including our thinking. It is therefore part of redemption that our minds are renewed in godly ways of thinking. That is not something exclusive to eggheads, but something we all need. We remember that Jesus said we were to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength.

So how do we allow God to renew our minds and thus transform us, so that we can do his will as an act of worship? Well, although ‘Be transformed’ is passive – it is something that happens to us – ‘the renewing of your minds’ is not. We need to be intentional about renewing our minds. That is why we promote daily Bible reading notes here, such as Our Daily Bread. That is why we have house groups. That is why we ran the Sacred Rhythms course to help people learn the practice of spiritual disciplines. That is why we promoted the Week of Accompanied Prayer.

But – we have to avail ourselves of these opportunities. It’s no good complaining that we can’t discern the will of God when we’re not taking our chances to let the Scriptures shape our thinking in godly ways. After all – which kind of believer would not be serious about knowing the will of God and walking in it? Would it not be the Sunday Christian again? There are plenty of other institutions in our world that want to shape our minds according to their values. Retailers and governments want us to think like consumers, not like disciples. It takes deliberate action on our part to put ourselves in a place where God can renew and transform our minds, so that our thinking and our believing is closer to his.

Friends, let us remember again that we are worshippers in response to ‘God’s mercies’. Think again about all the ways in which God has been merciful to you. Will you now consider these questions? How am I going to offer my body in devotion to Jesus Christ? And what steps will I take to allow God to make my mind Jesus-shaped rather than world-shaped?

June 8, 2013 4

Sermon: Two Encouragements To Pray

English: Roman Centurion (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Luke 7:1-10

I wonder what your personal prayers for other people’s needs are like. Perhaps part of your regular prayers are like a shopping list – you have a collection of people you regularly pray for, and you methodically go through the list, ticking them off as you’ve mentioned them.

But what are your prayers like when an urgent need comes up? When you are only praying for one person, do you find yourself starting to rehearse before God all the reasons why he should answer your request – perhaps to heal this person? Maybe sometimes we are so daunted by the seriousness of the appeal we are making to the Lord that we are trying to buttress our own faith by deploying reason after reason why we think God should say ‘yes’ to us.

In those situations, a common component of our prayers is to say, “Lord, the person I am praying for is a good person. Here is a list of all the worthy things she has done. Here, too, is a list of reasons why it would be important to heal her.” We hope that – like some barrister pleading for a client before a jury – we can persuade God to find in favour of the friend we are representing in prayer.

And you know what? It’s wasted breath. Our story tells us that.

The Jewish elders come to Jesus about their surprising friend, the Roman centurion, whose slave is ill. Luke tells us that the slave was ‘valued highly’ (verse 2), which may indicate one of these types of prayer – ‘Lord, look what dire straits this centurion will be in if his slave dies.’ More specifically, they tell Jesus how worthy the man is:

He is worthy of having you do this for him, ⁵for he loves our people, and it is he who built our synagogue for us. (Verses 4b-5)

Now while Jesus doesn’t castigate them for this – indeed, the next thing we read is that he ‘went with them’ (verse 6) – it is apparent from the story that this is not why Jesus healed the gravely ill slave.

Remember – it is the centurion’s faith that Jesus commends. And what we hear from him is the very opposite account of himself. He does not have the temerity to approach Jesus and appeal to him on the grounds that he deserves a divine favour. Rather, we get the complete opposite. The whole tenor the centurion’s approach is not how worthy he is but how unworthy he is:

Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; ⁷therefore I did not presume to come to you. (Verses 6b-7a)

This, I believe, is the first of two elements in the centurion’s faith that Jesus praises so highly. We would say it is about grace. The centurion does not appeal to Jesus on the basis of being ‘good enough’. He knows that any divine response is never going to come on that basis. It will only come because God is gracious and merciful.

And that indeed is what happens. Jesus does not announce the healing on the basis of the man having funded a synagogue. In fact, Jesus even seems to honour the centurion’s request not to come under his roof, because he simply says that the healing has happened. The healing is discovered when the friends whom the man has sent (verse 6) return to the house (verse 10).

I want to say that there is both good news and bad news in this approach. The bad news is for those who want to earn their own favour with God. That is, the sort of people who want to put out a record of good works and claim they are worthy of the Almighty’s company and favour. This will not do. Not one of us. At the heart of the Christian Gospel is the stark message that ‘All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God’ (Romans 3:23). All. No exceptions. We need to put aside any religion that is based on thinking we can make ourselves good enough for God, or that we can put ourselves within his boundary markers. It isn’t possible. We delude ourselves dangerously when we do that. But we still have people in church congregations who believe this lie.

Answered prayer is not simply a reward for the good people. Do not mistake me: I still believe it is important to live a good life, and to make it a top priority to ‘find out what pleases the Lord’ as Paul said, and then do it. But that lifestyle is not a passport to heaven, it is the sign of our gratitude to God that in Christ he has been full of grace and mercy to us. A good lifestyle is the response of love to God. Having received his grace, we respond to Jesus’ call, when he says, ‘Follow me.’

So what is the good news here? Jesus invites those of us who know we are not good enough or worthy of his love still to approach him in prayer. What is it about yourself that makes you feel unworthy before Jesus? Is it all those times you have let him down? He still invites you to pray. Is it that recently you have done something you are particularly ashamed of? He still invites you to pray. Is it that you don’t feel like you fit in socially – either in society, or even, perhaps in the church? Guess what – in his grace he still invites you to pray. Perhaps you have a stigma – maybe it is the stinging words of someone who has always put you down and made you feel like dirt over the years. Jesus doesn’t speak to you like that. In fact – he invites you to pray. He says, ‘Speak to me. I am listening. I am full of grace and mercy. My Father wants you to approach him as his beloved child.’ Believe the good news.

The second of the two elements in the centurion’s faith is his understanding of authority. It’s about the delegated authority to speak an authoritative word of command. Listen to his words that his friends relay to Jesus:

But only speak the word, and let my servant be healed. ⁸For I also am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and the slave does it. (Verses 7b-8)

It’s not just, ‘Jesus, I know what it’s like to give orders in the army; you can give orders in the kingdom of God.’ It is that, but it’s more. It’s more like this: ‘I can give my orders, because I am under authority. My authority comes from my superiors and ultimately from the Emperor. That is why my orders must be carried through. You, Jesus, are in a similar situation. Your orders have to be carried out, because you have placed yourself under the Father’s authority. Your orders have the backing of heaven. You can speak an authoritative word to heal my slave, because the Father has delegated his power to you.’

Now I know that putting it like that is rather to expand things beyond what the centurion probably understood at the time, but I think in the bigger New Testament picture of things, it’s justified. Jesus, the Word who was and is the eternal Second Person of the Trinity, was incarnate of the Virgin Mary and submitted himself as a servant, even to death. On earth, Jesus – despite being fully divine – acted as ‘a man in the power of the Spirit’ (Jack Deere). Under the Father’s authority, he could command healing, he could command the wind and the waves, he could turn water into wine and make five loaves and two fish feed a multitude.

Maybe it is something like this. When I worked in Social Security, I would issue several letters a day to benefit claimants or to self-employed people about their National Insurance. I signed every single one ‘pp’ the manager. My signing authority was that of my manager. That gave me the right to say what I said in those letters. The centurion had the ‘signing authority’ of the Emperor. Jesus had – and has – the signing authority of the Father.

What difference does this make to our praying? While I don’t want to minimise the difficulties we face when our prayers are not answered in the way we hope – whether we get a ‘no’, a different answer, or even the silence of heaven – what I want to encourage us to remember is this: it’s about the rank of the Person to whom we are coming. The risen and ascended Jesus is at the right hand of the Father. He is even praying for us, and the Holy Spirit prays through us. The Father is not being badgered: Jesus and the Spirit share his authority.

So I want us to be encouraged in prayer. The court of heaven is an environment in which we are welcomed and heard. We have been encouraged into the Father’s presence by his grace and mercy in Christ. Now that we are there, we can humbly revel in the authority he desires to exercise for the sake of his kingdom, so that things conform on earth to the way they are done in heaven. If you are considering bringing a request in prayer to God and wondering whether it is worthy being brought, simply ask yourself this: if this were answered, would it be a good fit with God’s reign coming more fully on earth as it is in heaven? That doesn’t always have to mean it’s super-spiritual. It doesn’t always have to mean that it’s an earth-shattering request. But it does mean this: would it reflect God’s love for people? Would it demonstrate God’s love in Christ for the last and the least? Would it be a sign of mercy, or healing, or peace, or justice? It may still benefit us, by the way, as the healing of the slave did the centurion.

As I prepared this sermon, a couplet from an old hymn came to mind:

Large petitions with thee bring
Thou art coming to a king.

The hymn starts with these words:

Come, my soul, thy suit prepare,
Jesus loves to answer prayer.

English: John Newton (1725-1807) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Does anyone know who wrote it? John Newton, author of ‘Amazing Grace.’ You don’t need me to remind you that Newton was a former slave trader who was converted to Christ, became an Anglican clergyman and supported William Wilberforce’s campaign to abolish the slave trade from which he had previously profited. Newton epitomises both of the strands of prayer that the centurion understood. He certainly knew that he was most unworthy to grace God’s presence in any way at all, least of all to ask for things in prayer. But he understood and experienced grace. He knew that in Christ and his cross God had forgiven him for some of the very worst things one human being could do to another. He would not have earned an audience with heaven on the grounds of his goodness.

But then, in backing the young Wilberforce and his parliamentary campaign of abolition, he understood something of Jesus’ delegated authority from the Father. To pray and work for abolition was huge. It took decades (and even Wilberforce’s victory did not result in the complete destruction of the slave trade). However, the elderly Newton knew that it was worth bringing ‘large petitions’ as he said in his hymn, because in prayer you are ‘coming to a king.’

Friends, this is what we do. Even if our lives are not as scandalous and colourful as John Newton’s – and unless anyone is hiding some remarkable details from us, I think I can safely say that’s the case here – we know we can and we may come to God’s presence because of his grace. Our humility does not exclude us, but leads us to the reason why we may come: God in Christ is gracious and merciful.

Then, when we come, we come to Christ who has authority from the Father. And therefore we can come with big requests. Big kingdom prayers.

Let us now allow anything to stop us. No lies of the enemy, no self-doubt, no voices of scorn or disbelief from people we know. Jesus calls us to the Father’s presence. And he tells us to ‘pray big.’

So let us pray. Not just now, in this service. But always.

June 1, 2013 4

Finding Your Purpose In Life

A good, short piece by Ron Edmondson: ‘When You Can’t Seem To Find Your Purpose‘. As the adage, goes, it’s easier to steer a moving car than a stationary one.

May 31, 2013 0

Confirmed: Methodist Ministers Have No Employment Rights

Middlesex Guildhall, location of the UK Supreme Court. Public Domain photo from Wikipedia.

Today’s Supreme Court decision confirms that Methodist ministers are office holders, not employees, and as such have no redress to Employment Tribunals for claims to unfair or constructive dismissal. I have blogged about this particular case twice before. The court has pointed out three issues in support of this judgement:

1. Our relationship with the Church cannot be analysed in ‘contract of employment’ terms;

2. Our receipt of a stipend and a manse are by virtue of being ‘received into full connexion’ and ordination, they do not constitute payment for duties;

3. We ministers cannot unilaterally resign, even if we give notice, because we need the consent of Conference, the Stationing Committee or a disciplinary body.

The official Methodist statement from Revd Gareth Powell, Assistant Secretary of the Conference, says:

“The judgement of the Supreme Court has determined that an Employment Tribunal does not have jurisdiction over Methodist Ministers. It sets out very clearly the nature of the relationship that exists and that such a relationship is defined by the Standing Orders of the Conference. It is important that we read the judgement with great care as we continue to ensure that our practices reflect the calling of the Church.

“No court ruling could change the gratitude I have for the immense amount of work undertaken by our ministers, now and in the past. Those in ordained ministry, as well as those in lay ministry, continue to be vital to the Church as we share the Gospel and seek to live faithfully in response to the call of God. I ask you please to pray for those who have been part of this case and for all who are affected by its outcome.”

What are we to make of this? While I am partly relieved by the judgement, I do not think it solves the problems our denomination clearly has. I am happy not to be an employee in that church life is vulnerable to tinpot Hitlers throwing their weight around. It shouldn’t be like that, and I certainly don’t experience anything like that in my current appointment, but I am afraid it does happen. Had we become employees, then depending on who was deemed to employ us, that was a risk.

Where I am I less than happy? I admit this is more about the experiences of friends than my own story, but this leaves Methodist ministers entirely dependent upon the ‘covenant relationship’ with the church, and no protection if that goes wrong. I know of instances where ministers have been left exposed to abuse, and where there has been no redress. One commenter on the UK Methodists page of Facebook describes the covenant relationship as an ’empty promise’ and calls for a system of independent arbitration. Essentially, the church – should it so choose – is free to sweep uncomfortable things under the carpet. There is certainly now a risk that things could be loaded against ministers. I do not know whether this is true, but there is one other comment (which I can’t immediately find again) suggesting that only ministers ‘in stationing’ (i.e., looking for a new appointment) who are unwilling to put any geographical restrictions on where they serve will be guaranteed a manse and stipend if no appointment can be found for them. We are supposed to be at the disposal of Conference for stationing, it is true, but that same Conference promises to bear all sorts of personal circumstances in mind. Geography is by no means the only limit some ministers request.

Tonight, there will be some ministers feeling a sense of relief at the judgement, and others feeling more vulnerable and afraid. I can certainly understand those of my colleagues who have joined the Faith Workers’ Branch of the Unite union. It certainly seems uncomfortable that our denomination has shown no willingness to let the ‘covenant relationship’ be scrutinised by outsiders, so that justice is not only done, but seen to be done.

May 15, 2013 1

Risk-Taking Faith

Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby (Photo credit: Messiah Lutheran (Mechanicsville, VA))

For many years now, one of my favourite quotes has been the late John Wimber‘s statement that ‘faith’ is spelt R-I-S-K. So it was a pleasure this morning while watching the live stream of the HTB Leadership Conference was to hear Archbishop Justin Welby say that ‘The church should be a safe place to do risky things in the service of Christ.’ How appropriate after that, then, to find myself listening to Esther Alexander‘s song ‘The End of the Land’, where she sings,

Is this the end of the land here
Or the beginning of the sea?

(You can listen to the song and download it here.)

Perhaps that’s our dilemma. We are more scared by being at the end of the land than we are by being at the beginning of the sea. What will it take for us to change, and why would we change? Too many churches want to change in order to save their skins. ‘We must reach out in order to keep this church going.’

Heaven help us. Really.

Welby also said this morning, ‘We cannot live for our cause to win, we have to live for his cause to win.’ May it be so.

May 13, 2013 0

Week Of Accompanied Prayer #1

In my last appointment, an ecumenical church I served ran a ‘Week of Accompanied Prayer‘. I missed out somehow, and was jealous of the members who clearly had a wonderful spiritual experience. So when our Catholic friends here in Knaphill offered to put one on in the village, I was an enthusiastic supporter. It started today. It’s like a mini-retreat without going away, where you have the benefit of low-key spiritual direction in your prayer life from a ‘prayer guide’ each day.

We began with a simple service and got to meet our prayer guides this afternoon. I was invited to choose a Bible passage to pray on this evening before I meet my prayer guide for the first formal session tomorrow morning. I chose Isaiah 43:1-5 from the selection offered. It made me think of an old song by Andy Piercy and Dave Clifton, from the same CD as contained their more famous ‘Praise God From Whom All Blessings Flow’. I can’t find a video online of them singing this, so here is someone’s cover version of ‘Precious In Your Eyes’:

As for other reflections on the passage itself, I had thought I would just read it pietistically, but I can’t deny the ‘theological’ side of me. So I brought into my reflections the fact that this comes from the section of Isaiah that is directed to them in exile in Babylon, when the prophet tells them that God will bring them home. They are precious in God’s eyes despite their sin. God does not give up on his people. That is something for all God’s people – me included – to cherish.

I’ll see how tomorrow goes. One thing I’m looking forward to is this: I mentioned to my prayer guide today that I find it hard to enter for myself into the kinds of prayer where I am expected to imagine what my five senses tell me. I can lead those sessions for others, but they don’t work for me, and I think it’s because in Myers Briggs terms I’m an ‘N’ – an Intuitive. I am a ‘sixth sense’ person who sees the big picture, not an ‘S’ – a Sensory person who uses the ‘five senses’ and concentrates on fine detail. Yet I enjoy photography, which as Jerry Gilpin pointed out to me on my last sabbatical, is definitely an ‘S’ practice. On quiet days in the past I have been known to take my camera gear out and about, and use it to meditate on creation. My prayer guide mentioned something about knowing a retired Anglican priest who may have some material on using photography this way, so we’ll see.

May 12, 2013 2

Sermon For The Sunday After Ascension

Luke 24:44-53

Ascension Deficit Disorder from inheritthemirth.com

Several of my friends were sharing this cartoon on Facebook in the last few days[1]. I think it encapsulates how we might regard the Ascension in the Methodist Church – or not regard it, as the case may be. We have an ‘Ascension Deficit Disorder.’

There are all sorts of reasons for this. I think we find the Ascension to be one of the more embarrassing miracles. Not only is it strange, it seems to offend against what we know of modern cosmology, and we find it hard to see the point of it. The healing miracles may also seem to go against science as we know it, but at least they seem to have a point – and a loving, compassionate one at that.

But the Ascension? What on earth is the use of it? Maybe we see it as some kind of divine blast-off, and we can’t get our heads around it. To us, heaven isn’t ‘up there’ in a literal sense, and so we chide those ancient people for their simplistic beliefs. For us, the Ascension is not like a 1960s episode of Thunderbirds, and Jesus’ final meetings with the disciples aren’t like Thunderbird 2 on the launchpad, ready to fly to rescue some people in terrible distress somewhere. In the past, when I have preached on the Ascension, I have explained it as what I call a ‘miracle of accommodation’, namely that Jesus had to be taken up into heaven in the sight of the disciples as the only way they would understand he was returning to heaven, even though heaven wasn’t literally up in the sky.

But Tom Wright has pointed out that the ancient Jews didn’t see the distinction between earth and heaven that way. In a sermon he preached six years ago, he said:

The early Christians, like their Jewish contemporaries, saw heaven and earth as the overlapping and interlocking spheres of God’s good creation, with the point being that heaven is the control room from which earth is run. To say that Jesus is now in heaven is to say three things. First, that he is present with his people everywhere, no longer confined to one space-time location within earth, but certainly not absent. Second, that he is now the managing director of this strange show called ‘earth’, though like many incoming chief executives he has quite a lot to do to sort it out and turn it around. Third, that he will one day bring heaven and earth together as one, becoming therefore personally present to us once more within God’s new creation.

One way and another, then, after the Resurrection, where God vindicated his Son and began his new creation, now in the Ascension we have the confirmation that Jesus is the rightful Lord of the universe. He is the Messiah, the King. And therefore when he gathers his disciples for final instructions, he does so as the one about to take his seat on the throne of creation. We should read his words as a king’s orders to his subjects. Certainly what Jesus says here can be read as decrees and requirements.

Firstly, he calls his disciples witnesses. He interprets the Old Testament Scriptures to them all here in the manner he did to Cleopas and his companion on the Emmaus Road, by showing how they pointed to his suffering, death and resurrection. But these are not just events in recent history: they have a meaning, importance and implications for all who hear. Thus Jesus goes on to say:

and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.⁴⁸You are witnesses of these things. (Verses 47-48)

The point is this: you have seen all this, disciples. You saw me betrayed and killed. You have met me since I rose from the dead. You know what these events mean about me. I am the true King. The world has been shown to be wrong about me. There is a question now of people showing true allegiance to me, since the Father has vindicated me and is about to enthrone me. You have seen this. You are witnesses. You have a responsibility to share what you have witnessed with others.

What kind of witnesses are we to the King? This last week, Debbie has received a letter, summoning her to jury service next month at the coroner’s court. It is clear that the jury would be sitting not on a trial but on an inquest. She is therefore likely to hear two kinds of witnesses. One is the expert witness, such as a doctor who describes the cause of death from a medical point of view. Another is the ordinary witness, who may have seen something crucial that happened.

Christian witness includes both kinds of witnesses. Not all of us are expert witnesses, and we do not all have to be. However, we are all ordinary witnesses, because we are witnesses to what he has done for us through those saving events of his death and resurrection.

You could use a different metaphor from ‘witness’, especially if you want to connect this specifically to Jesus’ enthronement as King. You could use the image Paul deploys in 2 Corinthians 5 of ‘ambassadors for Christ.’ We have a privilege and responsibility to speak on behalf of the King.

And it is significant that Jesus mentions ‘repentance for the forgiveness of sins’ as part of the message. To be a witness to the king or an ambassador for him is to be entrusted with a message that calls all creation to align themselves with Jesus. That means turning away from the kingdom to which they are currently committed – the kingdom of darkness – and turning to Christ instead. Witnesses to his death and resurrection can do no less. There is a legitimate conversation to be had about how we do this, but that it is part of the task cannot be in doubt.

Secondly, Jesus the King calls his disciples to waiting. He has just given them a tremendous briefing. They must be on a knife edge. Perhaps they cannot wait to get going, out of excitement. But although he promises to equip them for the task, he tells them to wait:

I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high. (Verse 49)

Jesus is going to put his reign into action through the disciples at Pentecost. His personal presence will be replaced by his personal power in the Holy Spirit. They will start living as the kingdom community, doing kingdom things, just like Jesus himself had done in his ministry before his death. They must be champing at the bit.

But they have to wait for that transfer from the presence of Jesus to the power of Jesus, that change of personnel from Jesus to his Spirit. Therefore the king’s order to them is, ‘wait.’

Is that so unreasonable? Our Queen has ‘ladies in waiting’ – women who wait for whenever she issues a command. The timing of the command, as well as its content, is up to Her Majesty.

Now you may say that there is an important difference between the first disciples and us. While they might have had to have waited for the Holy Spirit, we do not, because the Spirit has now been given, and receipt of the Spirit is a sign of Christian conversion. If you say that, you would be right in that particular case. The Spirit has indeed been given, and we do not have to wait like that.

However, there are many instances where Jesus in his kingly authority calls us to wait. We are not to act without his command. We are not to presume upon him and go charging off. He calls us to wait until he gives the order.

And to wait effectively means learning to be attentive. Just as the ladies in waiting have to be attentive to the Queen, so we need to learn the spiritual disciplines of attentiveness as we wait for instructions from heaven, earth’s control room. That means listening. I am far too good in prayer in rattling through the things I want to talk about and then stopping as if that were the end of prayer. But it isn’t. Not if I am to wait upon my Lord. Silence, solitude and retreat are all disciplines we need to practise if we are to be those who wait upon the King of kings.

Thirdly and finally, disciples of earth’s true king are committed to worshipping. Worship is the natural reaction to knowing that God has enthroned Jesus. Thus the reading ends:

When he had led them out to the vicinity of Bethany, he lifted up his hands and blessed them. ⁵¹While he was blessing them, he left them and was taken up into heaven. ⁵²Then they worshipped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy. ⁵³And they stayed continually at the temple, praising God. (Verses 50-53)

Kingship and worship go together. The Greek word most commonly translated ‘worship’ in the New Testament is proskuneo, which literally means, ‘to move towards and kiss.’ But what kind of kiss? It is the kiss of homage. The image is the ancient one of kissing a monarch as a sign of allegiance. It is still practised in a symbolic way today when new Prime Ministers and new Anglican bishops are appointed.

Worship, then, is emphatically not in the first instance about ‘singing what I like’. I am not saying that worship should not be enjoyable, but I am saying that the focus of worship is not about whether it scratches my back, it is not about whether I am ‘fed’ (because Christians should learn to feed themselves, anyway), it is not about whether it was ‘my favourite preacher’, and so on. All those criteria and more are me-centred. Worship is meant to be God-centred. We are paying homage to God. It is about a sense of awe, wonder and devotion to him, not about spiritual entertainment. We are disciples, not dilettantes.

On Bank Holiday Monday, we decided to visit Windsor. After sitting outside in the sun eating our packed lunch, we joined the queue for the castle. Having got in after an hour’s wait, we went around and eventually decided to visit the State Apartments. While following the prescribed route around them, Becky and I suddenly heard Debbie let out a gasp, and she called us urgently to where she and Mark were. They had just seen a car arrive, and the Queen get out of it with one of the corgis. They then saw the Queen walk the corgi to her official door into her living quarters. Unfortunately, Becky and I didn’t get over to them in time, and we missed out. Becky was upset. However much I tried to say to her that the Queen is just a normal human being like the rest of us, she knew she had missed out on something special. Her mum and brother had a sense of awe that they had seen the Sovereign.

And that is what we need to long for in worship: an awe at having encountered the Sovereign of all creation. Awe that does not concentrate on the amazing experience that we had, but awe that expresses our wonder at this Second Person of the Trinity, who now reigns until every enemy will have been put under his feet. To this King who now reigns we owe our loyalty.

It is something we have a chance to affirm formally at the climax of our service this morning. For we come to the sacrament of Holy Communion. Whatever else communion is, when we respond and take the bread and wine, that action is symbolic of our oath of allegiance to him who has ascended to reign over all. In the Roman Empire, the ‘sacramentum’ was the oath of allegiance taken by a soldier to the emperor. This morning, let us take our sacramentum, too.

[1] It appears to come from the website Inherit The Mirth. However, I cannot find it on that website at present. If the owner of the site needs me either to pay for the use of this image or remove it, I would be grateful for him to contact me.

May 11, 2013 0

Church Anniversary Sermon: The Holy City

If I’m honest, I wish I could have spent more time preparing this. I think I could have distilled my thoughts better. However, this is the best I could do in the time available. I hope it helps you and others.

Revelation 21:10-22:5

So, it’s Church Anniversary today – a time when it’s natural to look back with thankfulness to God for his faithfulness in the past. As the hymn says,

We’ll praise him for all that is past
And trust him for all that’s to come.

But sometimes looking back degenerates from gratitude to complaint. In one of my previous churches, one woman had a regular refrain in her conversation. It was about the time when the Sunday School had a hundred children, and it was run by a particular man who must have been a strong personality. It felt like it was my fault when the only children present at Junior Church were my own two children.

So there is a healthy looking back and an unhealthy looking back. What we often forget to do on occasions like this is look forward. It may be that in times of declining and aging church congregations we find it easier to opt for the warm duvet of nostalgia, because we think that if we look forward we might not see a church.

But the hymn doesn’t just say, ‘We’ll praise him for all that is past’, it also says, ‘And trust him for all that’s to come.’ How can we look forward with hope for the church? I believe we can do that by feasting our eyes on God’s vision for the future of the church, and letting that future destination affect the way we are church today.

Our reading from Revelation does just that. In the picture language of that book, its vision of the Holy City gives us images of God’s perfected new society in his new creation. This is where we are going! So let us use this future vision to check where we are now and look at the direction we are taking.

Just to give you extra value I am going to pick out six elements of the Holy City, the new Jerusalem. This doesn’t mean a double-length sermon, but I hope it does mean we get a rounded picture of the community of which we are a part, and of which we shall be a part.

Firstly, let us look at the gates.

It has a great, high wall with twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and on the gates are inscribed the names of the twelve tribes of the Israelites (21:12).

Angels and the twelve tribes. Let’s take the angels first. When do we first hear of angels at the gates? Is it not when the first humans are expelled from Eden, and an angelic guard is set at the gate of the garden to prevent further access? But what about here? The great story of God and humankind that begins in a garden ends in this city, and angels are at the gates again. However, this time it cannot be to keep all comers out. They might be there to keep certain people out, but they are definitely not on guard duty to keep all and sundry out of the new Jerusalem. For the power of sin which led to that initial expulsion of the first humans from Eden has now been reversed. The curse has been neutralised. Now there is only blessing for those who will walk with the Son of God. Where sin broke relationships between humans and God, between humans and each other, between humans and creation and even within humans themselves, all that is now healed and restored. Eden is back, but with such a large community it can no longer be a mere garden. Now it is a city.

And note that word ‘community’. It is no accident that ‘the names of the twelve tribes of the Israelites’ are on the twelve gates. For what God has done in his project of salvation is to take fractured relationships and build a new, healed community by his grace. Salvation has never been just something that individuals receive. It has always been about reconciliation, not only with God but also with each other. We express this by working on our relationships, to make sure we are at one with each other. We speak the truth in love. We build each other up. We forgive one another. We share The Peace as a sign of this.

Secondly, we have the foundations.

And the wall of the city has twelve foundations, and on them are the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. (21:14)

The twelve apostles then locate this redeemed community specifically around Jesus. They are ‘the twelve apostles of the Lamb’ – the Lamb of God, Jesus. It is not just any group: it is a body of people united as disciples of Jesus. He it is who brought God’s work with Israel to a climax. The twelve apostles witness to this, since a requirement of apostleship at the beginning of the church was to be a witness to the Resurrection.

So here is what our community life is centred on: the birth, life, death and Resurrection of Jesus. The church is the gathering that sits forgiven and forgiving at the Cross. We rejoice in new hope at the empty tomb. By the power of the Holy Spirit we seek to imitate Jesus together.

Now if that’s true, what does it do to our priorities? Much as we need to discuss property and finance, the heart of our conversation and action together should surely be centred on Jesus himself. We find it easier to talk about the weather or our aches and pains. Some of us don’t read our Bibles from one Sunday to another, and along with other signs of lukewarm behaviour it’s no wonder our churches are not magnetic to those interested in spiritual questions.

There can be all sorts of reasons why this is so. But perhaps it therefore becomes us to have a conversation about why we struggle to make Jesus explicitly central to our church life – let alone the rest of life. There is no foundation other than the New Testament Gospel of Jesus Christ for the church. From her beginning through eternity it is the basis of her existence. We need to be renewed in that Gospel.

Thirdly, we look at the walls. We have a vivid description of the holy city’s walls being made out of previous stones and metals (21:18-21). No expense has been spared in making the new Jerusalem a place of dazzling beauty.

God is intent on making his new community beautiful. He expects the church to become stunningly attractive, if at the same time also perhaps terrifyingly so. At the cost of the Cross, he has not only seen to it that people are forgiven through his Son’s offering, but also the transforming power is there to make people new. The Easter events lead not only to forgiveness, but also to holiness. There is a perfection in the measurements of the holy city, too, and I think this is all imagery that points us to the holiness of the church.

It is worth remembering how people responded to the early church. There was something wonderfully attractive about those first disciples, but there was also something quite unnerving about the white heat of holiness they displayed. Do you think today’s world sees anything like that in us? The Christian life is not simply one of gaining a ticket to heaven through the forgiveness of sins and then waiting until we die for our arrival at heaven’s station. It is about being the new community, as a sign of God’s future to the world, and therefore calling others to hear the challenge to follow Jesus. As such, our lifestyle is as important as our message.

Fourthly, there is a temple – or is there?

I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. (21:22)

The temple is the place of worship. Specifically to Jewish religion, it was the location for the major festivals and the authorised place for sacrifices. The devout became attached to the temple. They admired its architecture, as did Jesus’ own disciples.

But we can become too attached to a building, even one that has been set aside for holy purposes. Jesus knew that. His new community does not finally gather in a bricks and mortar location, it gathers around ‘the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb’. In the holy city we foreswear our idolatry of buildings and concentrate our worship precisely where it belongs: on the God who made and redeemed us. In the new Jerusalem there will be no rivals for our affections: there will only be the Lord our God and his Son. The Holy Spirit will direct our eyes to them.

So what else goes from our worship, along with our buildings? All the other idols of our age and any age. Money, status, possessions, fame, celebrity and power: we cannot chase any of these in the new creation, because only God will be the object of our devotion. It therefore seems sensible to start getting our focus right now. What do we set our hearts on more than God? Is it time to reorder our priorities as we prepare for eternity?

Fifthly, a city needs light. And just as there is no temple but the Lord God and the Lamb, so the Almighty is the light and the Lamb is the lamp (21:23). There will be no darkness (21:25), not even moral darkness (21:27). Rather, the nations will walk by God’s light (21:24) and the glory of the nations will be brought into the city (21:24, 26).

What does this mean? For one thing, it means that we shall live by God’s light – Jesus is, after all, the light of the world. Nothing else will compete to steer our lives. Fear will not speak to us, nor will hatred or greed. Only the pure light of God in Christ will guide our steps. And so again, that is something where we can get used to that at least in part now. How committed are we to wanting God to show us our path in life? We do not stand still if we want that. Just as it is easier to steer a moving vehicle than a stationary one, so we get moving by following Jesus in whatever ways we know how, while at the same time asking him to shed his light upon our ways.

The light of God in Christ also means something else. If the glory of the nations are brought into a city that basks in that light, then this says something positive about all that is good and worthy in human culture. The new Jerusalem is a place to celebrate the fact that we are made in God’s image and likeness, and so we can produce things of great beauty, value and wonder. I think it is no accident that over the centuries, the Christian church has sponsored and promoted the best of the arts, for example. And while much of that has historically been used in the explicit service of worship, I am sure this does not mean that heaven will be littered with the worst in kitsch religious trinkets. What it does mean is that the best of human achievement will be laid at the feet of Christ in adoration. Do we bring our best to him now? Do we deploy our gifts and talents to praise his name?

Sixthly and finally, there is a river in the city. I don’t know about you, but I like that. When we were living in Chelmsford, Debbie and I sometimes liked to go to a sandwich bar in town, buy lunch and sit outside on tables by the River Chelmer. Even if the river seemed dirty, somehow it was still refreshing. We did something similar in Guildford a couple of months ago.

Perhaps it’s not surprising, then, to discover in the new Jerusalem a river whose functions are life and healing. It flows from – guess where? – ‘the throne of God and the Lamb’ (those two again), through the centre of the city (22:1-2). The ‘tree of life’ (echoes of Eden again) grows on both banks ‘and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations’ (22:2). All accursed things will be gone (22:3).

There were rivers in Eden and there is a river in Ezekiel 47 that runs from the temple out to the land, and healing springs up on both banks. This is similar. Christians have sometimes imagined Ezekiel’s river to be a picture of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit of God brings healing to the world. But surely the people of God are sent out from the temple with the Spirit of God. We are sent by God with a healing message to the world, the healing that only Jesus Christ can bring. If we have been at the throne or the temple, the natural thing to do afterwards is to go into the world with the good news of healing in Jesus Christ. It is good news for individuals, and it is good news for whole societies. One day, that mission will be complete. But until that time, we anticipate that glorious fulfilment of all God’s purposes by going out from our worship gatherings proclaiming with our words and demonstrating with our deeds and our lives that God in Christ has the cure for a broken and wounded world.

Perhaps the best act of devotion we could offer in gratitude for God’s faithfulness to his church here would be a renewed commitment to showing his healing love outside our fellowship in the wider world.

May 4, 2013 0

WordPress, Akismet And Spam

WordPress logo blue (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Is any other WordPress blogger receiving higher than usual incidents of spam getting past Akismet and entering the normal moderation queue for comments? My Akismet is fully enabled, but over the last two to three weeks I have had a high amount of blatant spam to trash.

May 4, 2013 9