Tag: faithfulness

Paul’s Favourite Church 4: Shining Like Stars (Philippians 2:12-30)

Philippians 2:12-30

I’ve talked before about how my late father was an amateur astronomer, and how he shared his love of the subject with me as a child. I never picked up his level of interest, but he was understandably proud of one of my sister’s boys who went on to study astrophysics as part of his first degree.

But I still have fond memories of gazing up into a clear night sky with him, while he pointed out various constellations, and the names of the stars.

When my daughter as a teenager started asking me the same questions when we were walking home at night from her youth club, I installed an app on my phone that we could point to the sky and it would show us what all the stars and constellations were.

And recently my wife has been noticing these heavenly objects when we have been out on late night dog walks. So for her birthday I bought her a planisphere, a printed resource that helps you identify the planets and the stars.

I still get a thrill – and a poignant memory – when I see Orion or The Plough. I often think of Psalm 8 and get a sense of wonder and even of worship:

3 When I consider your heavens,
    the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
    which you have set in place,
4 what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
    human beings that you care for them?

In today’s passage Paul doesn’t call us to gaze in wonder at the stars but figuratively to emulate them:

Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky (verse 15b)

In the world, our calling is to shine like stars in a dark sky. We are to be those points of light in the darkness. Rather than just moan about all the darkness around us, we get on with shining with the light of Christ.

We do this, says Paul, under his call to

continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfil his good purpose.

God has saved us for a purpose. He has made us new. Now we live out that newness of life – but not on our own, because God is at work in us to make it possible. And this will make us like shining stars in the darkness of the world.

So what qualities does Paul say will enable the Philippians to shine like stars in their dark world? I think we’ll find that things haven’t changed that much.

Firstly, kindness:

14 Do everything without grumbling or arguing, 15 so that you may become blameless and pure, ‘children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.’

Well, that should be a shoo-in, shouldn’t it? Don’t grumble or argue.

Unfortunately, it isn’t in some churches. It is more widespread than some of us would like to believe, especially when we tell ourselves that our churches are friendly and welcoming.

Now I freely admit that as a minister I am sensitive to this one, because we church leaders are often the target of the grumbling, when people don’t like what we do or what we don’t do. You may know the old joke where the question is: ‘What’s the favourite Sunday lunch in a Christian household?’ The answer? ‘Roast preacher.’

And I also know that some of this grumbling comes our way because in these days of declining and aging congregations, people pin massive hopes on a new minister being the one to turn around the losses. Which is why at one previous circuit welcome service I quoted the famous line from Monty Python’s Life Of Brian: ‘He’s not the Messiah, he’s just a very naughty boy.’ The job of Messiah was taken two thousand years ago.

I’m also sensitive to this, though, not for the barbs thrown at people like me, but because in my position I hear the stories of those who have left a church, having been wounded by cruel words and actions. Do you know the damage caused by a harsh word in church?

More positively, did you notice just how highly Paul rates the idea of avoiding grumbling and arguing? He says it contributes to us being ‘blameless and pure.’ So often when we think about what makes us blameless and pure we think about the avoidance of certain ‘big’ sins, not least those involving sexual impurity. And I’m certainly not denying that these things are important.

But here, Paul says that if we want to be ‘blameless and pure, ‘children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation’’, then saying no to grumbling and arguing in the church is also part of this.

And doing this also makes us shine: we become ‘without fault in a warped and crooked generation’. A Christian community that chooses kindness over harshness will stand out in society. Indeed, we shine like stars in the dark sky.

When we are among our friends outside the church, can we truly say that the congregation we belong to is such a wonderful place of kindness and care, where people are not ripped apart by the words of others but rather are built up? Wouldn’t it be great if our churches were known in their communities as the places where people receive kindness?

Secondly, faithfulness:

Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky 16 as you hold firmly to the word of life.

Faithfulness – to the Gospel: ‘hold firmly to the word of life.’ This isn’t just an internal thing in the church, by the way: it’s also outward-facing, since it can also be translated, ‘hold out the word of life.’ In the church and in the world, we are called to hold faithfully to the Gospel, because that will make us shine like stars in the dark sky.

For too long now, we have heard church leaders say that we should adapt our message to the society we live in, because parts of it are unacceptable today. But the moment we just make Christianity like a religious version of the wider culture, then there is no longer any reason to join the church. Why join something that is just like how you are already, anyway? There is no point.

No: the only hope for the church to be like shining stars in the dark sky is if we keep to the Gospel, even and especially where it differs from the culture in which we live.

And if you don’t believe me, then listen to the respected historian Tom Holland. He has been on quite a journey in his thinking and in his life. In 2016, he wrote,

It took me a long time to realise my morals are not Greek or Roman, but thoroughly, and proudly, Christian.

He realised that we owe the good things in our society to our Christian foundations and began an excursion into the message of Christianity.

Recently, he has publicly urged churches to ‘keep Christianity weird’, and to ‘preach the weird stuff’. All those crucial values we cherish actually have their basis in the weird stuff of Christianity like the miraculous, not least the resurrection, ascension, and second coming of Jesus.

The church leaders and members who trumpet how the resurrection is just a way of saying someone stays in our memory, or that the ascension is a fairy-tale and the second coming is science fiction are not doing the church any good at all. They are doing the church a grave dis-service. They are removing all power from the Gospel and leaving it like a limp lettuce leaf.

If anyone comes into your church’s pulpit and starts preaching this stuff, do not just dismiss it and say, ‘It’s interesting to hear diverse opinions’, or ‘Let’s live with contradictory convictions.’ No! See them for what they are: wolves in sheep’s clothing.

Let’s stay faithful to the Gospel in all its weirdness: that’s where the power to transform lives is.

Thirdly, service:

Here I’m thinking of what Paul says at the end of the reading about Timothy and Epaphroditus. Paul says that Timothy will be concerned for the Philippians’ welfare, that he doesn’t spend his time on his own interests, and he has a track record of serving (verses 20-22). Epaphroditus, who didn’t enjoy good health, almost died for the Gospel and risked his life to help Paul (verses 26-30).

It’s not enough to be ‘nice’, which might be what you would think had Paul stopped after his admonition to avoid grumbling and arguing. A faith based on Jesus, who suffered and died on the Cross, cannot be reduced to ‘niceness.’ Timothy and Epaphroditus, with their modelling of selflessness and sacrifice, show such a faith in action.

People like Timothy and Epaphroditus are true Christian heroes. These are the kind of people we rightly celebrate. We write books about them. We use them as sermon illustrations! They are exceptional.

But why are they exceptional? Isn’t their example simply what should be the Christian norm? Aren’t their lives of service, sacrifice, and risk-taking the natural consequences of Jesus’ teaching and example?

And if they are, then why aren’t more of us like them?

Is it that it’s easier and more comfortable to opt for niceness rather than sacrificial servanthood? Have we bought into ‘Gentle Jesus, meek and mild’ but not the rest of him? Are we keen to scoop up the blessings of faith while not taking the responsibilities and the challenges?

Jesus certainly shone like a star in the dark sky, and so as we work out our own salvation, that is going to involve beginning to imitate him. That’s what Timothy and Epaphroditus did. They found ways to imitate Christ, and in doing so they shone brightly.

So I wonder in what ways Jesus is calling us to imitate him? Who are we being called to serve, as Timothy did? For whom are we being called to take risks, as Epaphroditus did?

And let’s remember that both of these men had their frailties. We read explicitly here that Epaphroditus had his health issues. We read in other New Testament Epistles that Timothy was timid. These were not people who were somehow genetically wired to be heroes. They had the same imperfections and weaknesses that we have.

Much as we might like to believe otherwise, the New Testament doesn’t have two categories of Christians: the ordinary ones, for whom a fairly modest standard of lifestyle is required, and the keen ones, who are held to higher standards, and in whose reflected glory we can bask. Jesus never made divisions like that.

The call to kindness, to faithfulness to the Gospel, and to sacrificial service is for all of us. Do we want to shine like stars in the dark sky? Or do we want our light to be snuffed out?

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Seven Churches: 4, Thyatira (Revelation 2:18-29)

Revelation 2:18-29

Let me ask you a question or three: is tolerance a good thing? And if you say yes, why is it good? And what are the extents and limits of tolerance?

It’s a live question in our society today. As many thinkers have pointed out, there are vastly different views in our culture about what it means to be human. But proponents of some views shout down those who hold other convictions.

So, for example, some people essentially believe that we are just minds trapped in physical bodies. (This is called ‘transhumanism.’) Others say that our biological sex is decisive for understanding who we are. But others say we should listen to Nature at large, or to our own intuitions and desires, or we just make our own choices to construct reality as we see fit.

Hence, you get the situation where even a lesbian professor at Sussex University, Kathleen Stock, was driven out of her post because she believed that biological sex was primary, but militant transgender activists wouldn’t tolerate an opinion that disagreed with theirs.

In other parts of public life in the UK, the majority opinion has a low tolerance for immigration, refugees, and asylum seekers. Our Prime Minister wants to ‘stop the boats’ and our Home Secretary wants to send people to Rwanda – despite both of them coming from immigrant families themselves.[1]

Tolerance, it seems, is rarely the two-way exchange it claims to be. It often ends up as a one-way street.

As we’ll see in a few minutes, tolerance of the wrong kind is a big issue at Thyatira.

But first, let’s look at what Jesus commends at Thyatira. Because there’s actually some pretty good stuff going on in the church there.

19 I know your deeds, your love and faith, your service and perseverance, and that you are now doing more than you did at first.

If that were the sum total of a church’s profile that I saw when I was looking for a move of appointment, I would probably think yes, I’d love to be the minister of that church! And if you had moved to a new town and came across a church that could be described like that, perhaps you too would think that this was the kind of church where you would like to belong.

I mean, what’s not to like? This is not just a Sunday religious club. They are serious about their faith and putting it into practice. And I could connect a lot of Thyatira’s qualities to Midhurst. ‘Deeds … love … faith … service … perseverance … doing more’ – yes, I can think even after only two months with you of ways in which this church exemplifies these qualities.

I think of the way some members are getting involved in the Midhurst Community Forum, in order to make a difference for good in this town, and the possibility of an official partnership between the church and the forum.

I think of the way you showed care and concern for Debbie and me when you learned that we had had a difficult move here.

I think of how I learned at the Pastoral Committee of the quiet dedication of our Pastoral Visitors, who get on without fuss in regularly staying in touch with the people on their lists.

I think of the way Jeanette took the trouble to contact me specifically to tell mw how much she had loved being your minister. If you ever formed a church fan club, I think Jeanette might stand for election as the President!

In fact, risky as this may be to put on record after only such a short time with you, I want you to know how much Debbie and I look forward to driving over here to see you.

So yes, I know the age profile of the congregation has skewed older. I know the numbers are not what they used to be. But while we may need to draw some lessons from that, don’t let it hide the fact that a lot of good, commendable Christian things are going on here.

And provided we don’t overload the same few individuals, a good challenge for us would be to consider how, like Thyatira, we could be ‘doing more’ of the ‘deeds, love, faith, service, and perseverance.’ What are the opportunities for us to do that?

Let’s not forget that the kind of church which receives praise from Jesus is one in which the prevailing attitude is, ‘What can we give?’ rather than “What do I get out of this for myself?”

Then secondly, let’s look at what Jesus criticises at Thyatira. Here’s where the question of tolerance in a bad way will come in. What we have is cultural compromise by some Christians that is tolerated by the church.

You might say this is a variation on a theme from the previous church, Pergamum. In that city, there was cultural compromise in that some members, like in Thyatira, were eating food sacrificed to idols and committing sexual immorality (verses 15, 20). The difference at Thyatira is that the church was actively tolerating it (verse 20).

Why am I describing these sins of eating food sacrificed to idols and committing sexual immorality as cultural compromise? Thyatira had a number of professional guilds for the different trades and occupations that were followed there, and these guilds were the basis for social recognition and progress. It was particularly known for coppersmiths (which may explain why Jesus introduces himself as having ‘feet like burnished bronze’, verse 18). Each of the guilds had a patron god. At social events held by the guilds there would be a meal, and beforehand the food to be served would have been dedicated to that god. Post-meal entertainment was usually provided by prostitutes.[2] 

So if a Christian tradesman went to his guild meeting and wanted to get on in the society, he probably associated with the false god by accepting the food, and then broke Christian sexual standards with a prostitute.

You might think that the church would condemn such behaviour, but evidently not. If we think that the church in the early centuries was just filled with zealous, passionate Christians who were willing to give up everything for Christ, we are mistaken. There was cultural compromise going on regularly, as one new book amply illustrates.

This, then, is the wrong kind of toleration. It’s good and fine to tolerate people who are different from us and show them kindness and love, but what was going on here was a toleration of outright sin.

Do we do that? Sometimes we do. It may be that a church member has committed an egregious sin, but pressure is placed on the minister not to engage in our disciplinary procedures, because the friendship of church members with this person over-rides the concern for the holiness of the church.

I know that all too well from when I began ministry as a probationer thirty-one years ago and had to deal with a long and painful child protection situation, when Safeguarding had not fully come in. Some church members cared more that I was raising queries against members of the church family than they did that I spent eighteen months living under threats of violence from them.

Or another common example is this. A church is so concerned to make ends meet that it will allow regular bookings from organisations whose practices are in conflict with Christian belief. For me, it’s a really delicate issue when a church is approached by a yoga teacher. For yoga is originally not just a set of exercises but an act of Hindu devotion, and therefore not to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. If the meditation aspect is left out and all that is being taught is an exercise regime, I am less worried, but I find too many churches will brush this all under the carpet (or should that be the yoga mat?) because when push comes to shove, balancing the books matters more than costly devotion to Christ.

Could it be that today, as in the days of Thyatira, that Jesus is also calling some churches to repent? Could it be also that he has given some churches time to change their ways and they have refused, leaving Jesus himself to cause their decline and death?

The Anglican New Testament scholar Steve Walton warns that

Compromise is not about choosing to worship other gods instead of Jesus; it’s trying to include other gods along with our worship of Jesus.[3]

What are the stages of compromise? Walton says we go through four stages[4]: attraction to the other ‘god’, rationalisation that it’s OK to do so, indulgence in practices contrary to Christ, and finally a re-definition of our faith. If we recognise that process going on in our personal lives or our church, we need to turn back to Christ.

In conclusion, what does Jesus ask of his church? In Thyatira’s case, he says,

hold on to what you have until I come (verse 25)

and

do[es] my will to the end (verse 26).

In other words, keep on with all the good things the church is known for, and weed out the cultural compromise.

Let us not judge our success in the faith on whether we are a big and growing congregation or not. Instead, let us judge it in the way Jesus does: are we doing things that bring joy to his heart, and are we faithfully keeping ourselves away from the idols of our day with a single heart for Christ alone?

[1] I am indebted to Steve Walton for this approach to introducing the passage.

[2] Again, I’m following Steve Walton here. See his slides.

[3] Walton, slides, slide 11.

[4] Walton, slides 12-15.

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How To Be Better Than The Pharisees, Matthew 5:21-37 (Ordinary 6 Lent -2 Year A 2023)

Matthew 5:21-37

In last week’s Gospel passage from the preceding verses, Jesus said that his kingdom community was being watched by the world and so needed to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world.

But he then went on to say a third thing: that the world needs to see that we are better than the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law. We are not just forgiven people, we are people on a journey of transformation.

This week’s passage puts flesh on those bones. In these verses, Jesus gives us specific examples of how we are meant to be better than the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law.

Jesus does this by taking examples from the Ten Commandments specifically and the Jewish Law, the Torah, generally. You will have noticed there was something of a formula going on in each example in the reading. First, there is a statement along the lines of ‘You have heard that it was said long ago’, followed by the law in question, and then Jesus says, ‘But I tell you’ and he then proceeds to up the ante and make that particular Law even more challenging.

This formula of ‘You have heard that it was said’ followed by ‘But I tell you’ is one that several Jewish teachers used. It’s a way of saying, ‘I have a different and better interpretation of the Law than what you have heard up to now.’ Well, you can bet Jesus has!

What is he trying to get over? That it’s not enough to obey externally in our actions the letter of God’s Law, what God is looking for is more than that. He is looking at our character.[1]

Now it’s easy to see what sort of character faults Jesus is condemning here, but maybe we should take those and reverse them to see what character traits he is commending as worthy of his kingdom.

So let’s look at the four examples he gives that we read.

Firstly, when Jesus talks about the command not to murder, he identifies anger, putting people down, and broken relationships as character faults behind the outward action and similar to it. The positive quality he identifies as important for his followers is reconciliation (verses 21-26). Be reconciled to the person who has something against you before you come to worship. Be reconciled to the person who is taking you to court for a debt.

We know how this fits into wider Christian theology. Because God has reconciled us to himself through the Cross of Christ, he calls us to be reconciled to each other. The church is meant to be a community of reconciliation.

We reflect this at least in part in our denominational structures in the Methodist Church. If a formal complaint against someone cannot be resolved to the satisfaction of all parties in the local circuit, it is passed onto the District. And the body there which tries to resolve the problem is called the District Reconciliation Group.

It’s a shame, then, that some people in our churches would rather complain and assassinate someone’s character, and even make up false accusations rather than seek reconciliation. And after I first wrote those words, I reflected on the expression ‘character assassination’ – you can see why Jesus links attitudes of the heart to murder there.

When I call for reconciliation I am not asking that we sweep differences or pain under the carpet and pretend they don’t exist. That is not reconciliation.

Of course, reconciliation can be difficult, if not downright painful. Sometimes we need a mediator to steer all the parties on a helpful course. It can help to have some mediators who have had particular training and gained certain skills.

But make no mistake, reconciliation is core to who we are as the Christian church. If we undermine it or despise it, then we are undermining our very identity as the church. We become not a place of life but of murder.

Secondly, when Jesus talks about adultery and the adultery of the heart that is lust (verses 27-30), he is calling us to the positive character trait of contentment. For what Jesus is doing here is linking the commandment not to commit adultery with the commandment not to covet. If a man lusts after another woman, he is lusting after someone else’s spouse or partner or daughter.

Jesus does not, of course, refer here to passing attraction, “but the deliberate harbouring of desire for an illicit relationship”[2].

When we are not content with our possessions, we covet buying more. When we are not content in our relationships, we covet someone else.

One of the problems we have with relationships today, and I think I’ve said this before, is that in the absence of belief in God, we expect too much of our romantic partners. We expect them to fulfil all sorts of needs – not just physical, but emotional too. We place a heavy burden on them that really only God can fill.

So when our loved ones fail to meet all our needs, the seeds of discontent are sown. And as those seeds grow, they burst through the surface of the soil as weeds that strangle our contentment. We begin to think that someone else would suit us better.

It’s a delusion. It doesn’t work. And if the thought is allowed to proceed to action, then two families can get destroyed.

As the church, we need to be a community that resists the lies of our world that say we shall only be satisfied with more, more, more. It bankrupts our bank accounts and it breaks up our families and relationships. Betrayed spouses may spend years before they ever trust someone again. Children suffer in their upbringing, however heroic many lone parents are.

I’ve quoted before in weddings the old saying that the bride’s aims and goals on a wedding day are Aisle-Altar-Hymn. But we need to accept one another’s imperfections and frailties, showing some of the grace that God has shown to us in Christ. We need to be less concerned with changing them for the better (and if they don’t, changing them for a newer model) than with changing ourselves.

Thirdly, when Jesus talks about divorce (verses 31-32) the positive character trait he has in mind is faithfulness.

We do have to read Jesus’ words here in parallel with what he says elsewhere in Matthew (in chapter 19) where he underlines sexual immorality as grounds for divorce, and what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 7, that if a Christian is married to a non-Christian and the non-Christian wants out, that too is a ground for divorce, but what is at the root of this teaching is that marriage is meant to be one man and one woman exclusively for life. The New Testament scholar Craig Keener says that Jesus and Paul

… exonerate those who genuinely wished to save their marriage but were unable to do so because their spouse’s unrepentant adultery, abandonment, or abuse de facto destroyed the marriage bonds.[3]

Jesus in his typical use of extreme hyperbolic language is not here sending abused wives back to their abusers, as I have sadly heard some Christian ministers do, but calling on those who have done wrong to mend their ways.

The other week Byfleet church hosted a wedding blessing for another church – one that doesn’t have its own premises. As the pastor took the young couple through their vows, I noticed that when he asked them questions such as ‘Will you be faithful to her/him until you are parted by death?’ their answer was ‘I will.’

Now that’s fine up to a point. ‘I will’ indicates both that it is a promise going into the future, and that sometimes love and faithfulness is an act of will. Because for all the joys of marriage, it will also be tough at times.

I much prefer our marriage service, where the bride and groom don’t say ‘I will’ but ‘With God’s help I will.’ God is ready by the Holy Spirit to help us with those challenging assignments he gives us.

And that isn’t just about marriage. It’s about us in the church being faithful to Jesus and faithful in our commitment to each other. Does Jesus see faithfulness to his teaching and to one another among us?

Fourthly and finally, when Jesus talks about whether or not you should swear an oath in court (verses 33-37), he has in mind the positive character trait of integrity.

Jesus’ banning of oaths wasn’t an unique position, but it was rare, and of course there are examples of oaths in the Old Testament, where the expectation is that if you make an oath you must keep it, even at great cost to yourself. It also warns against foolish oaths.

The intention behind Jesus’ teaching is probably similar to the ancient Greek view that your word should be as good as your oath. It makes me think of my late father’s experience of working in banking in the City. When the so-called ‘Big Bang’ happened in the financial world in 1987, my father bemoaned the fact that what disappeared overnight was the notion that a gentleman’s word was his bond. So much business was conducted in the city on a well-founded basis that if someone gave their word they would keep it. A handshake sealed the commitment of both parties. But this was replaced by lies and suspicion that had to be kept in check by laws.

Jesus is calling his people to be so known for their commitment to truthfulness that our reputation means no-one needs to ask us to back it up in some legal way. He calls us to remember that when we speak, we do so not merely in the presence of human witnesses, but in the presence of God. Yet how much do we live our lives in the knowledge that God is present? Should that not have an effect on our commitment to truth?

In Jesus’ day, some people thought it OK to break an oath and deceive people if they swore on something trivial, such as their right hand, but he wants his people to be different. In our day, we know how easily some people find it to engage in bare-faced deceit. Sadly in the last couple of years we have had too many examples of that in Parliament, but it’s not the only arena where we’ve witnessed this disturbing trend. Some people think they can say anything they like on the Internet, and there will be no consequences. They are wrong.

So if Jesus calls us to be people who are habitually known for their truth-telling, it is another way in which he is calling us to be distinctive in the face of the watching world.

The same is true of the other character virtues we’ve been thinking about today. His call to faithfulness comes to us in a society that has replaced lifetime faithfulness with serial monogamy, and now ‘throuples’. His call to contentment comes to us in a society where we are forever meant to buy bigger and better things, regardless of whether we need them, relationshhips included. His call to reconciliation comes to us in a society where we seem to have caught the American disease of ‘If it moves, sue it.’

How is God calling me to be distinctive as a Christian today?

How is he calling us as a church to be distinctive?

How indeed shall we be the light of the world?

[1] Craig Keener, The Gospel of Matthew: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary, pp 180-182.

[2] Op. cit., P189.

[3] Op. cit., p192.

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