Tag: Thanksgiving

Living A Life Worthy Of The Lord, Colossians 1:1-14 (Ordinary 15 Year C)

Colossians 1:1-14

When I decided I wanted to learn photography, I asked my Dad to take me to his favourite camera shop in London. There, we met a remarkable salesman who had had one hand amputated. Think about that: how do you manipulate something like a camera without one hand? He did.

He sold me a rudimentary 35mm SLR camera. The idea was that I needed to learn the basics first before I ever considered a more complicated beast. That’s what I did.

I even had to repeat the exercise when I moved from 35mm film to digital.

The nature of Paul’s thanksgiving for the Colossians is that they have learned the basics. Now they can go deeper.

What are the basics?

we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all God’s people (verse 4)

Faith in Jesus and love for his people. Faith and love. These come from the gospel and the hope it gives us (verses 5-8).

Now it’s time to build on the basics and go deeper in their faith. Specifically, he wants them to know God’s will (verse 9) so they

may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way (verse 10).

I’d like us to look at these next steps for the Colossians today. If the basics are in place for us – that we have faith in Jesus Christ for salvation and we love God’s people – then what qualities are our next steps? Paul lists four:

Firstly, good works:

bearing fruit in every good work (verse 10)

We know that good works don’t earn us salvation. That is a free gift of God that we receive by putting our faith in Jesus and his death for us on the Cross.

Instead, good works in the Christian life are a grateful response to God, once we know salvation by faith in Jesus. As I’ve said before, remember that God only gave the Ten Commandments to Israel after he had saved them from Egypt. It’s similar for us.

How might we approach this, then? We have just completed the Bible Society’s study course on Paul’s letter to the Romans. In the final session on Thursday, we were challenged as part of our mission to pray a prayer every morning: ‘Lord, who can I bless in your name today?’ I think that would be a helpful approach in knowing at least some of the good deeds God is calling us to do as our thankful response to salvation.

I have encouraged other people to consider the question: how can I make a difference for good in the world? It might be through pursuing a particular career. It might be in other ways. We might seek to live less extravagantly and give more to those who are doing things we aren’t able to do. This might involve our support for organisations working to transform things in the developing world, for example. Or we might cut back our own spending in order to give to those who are bringing positive change for those in poverty in the UK. Where can we make a difference for good in our deeds and in our giving?

Another way to approach this is found in a favourite quote of mine. It comes from the American Christian writer Frederick Buechner, when he was writing on the subject of vocation. Now you may hear me say the word ‘vocation’ and think, this doesn’t apply to me, I’ve retired from paid work. But vocation is about everything we are called to do and to be in response to God’s love.

So here are Buechner’s words:

Your vocation is where your deep gladness meets the world’s deep need.

In other words, is there something you are passionate about that can be set to the purpose of making a difference in the world?

Secondly, knowing God:

growing in the knowledge of God (verse 10)

Now before anybody gets worried, I’m not suggesting we all need to go off and study for a Theology degree! I enjoyed the two I took, but they’re not for everyone.

We do however all as Christians need to know more about God’s character, God’s plans, and what God loves. If we know God more in these ways, we shall want to love God more deeply. It seems strange to me that some Christians just want to stop at the bare minimum knowledge of God. Surely, given all he has done for us in Christ, we would want to know more about him and his amazing love.

And that’s why I’m always banging on about not simply coming to worship on Sunday, although that’s a good start. It’s why we need to read the Bible daily for ourselves and also meet with others to study it so that we can learn from each other. I was so pleased that everyone who filled in a feedback form at the end of our Romans course was looking in one form or another for us to keep meeting and looking at the Bible together. That’s encouraging.

It’s why we need to pray regularly, because prayer is not just us talking to God, it’s about waiting and listening to him.

Also, sometimes we get to know God better merely by doing what he says, even when we don’t understand it. Because in the doing of his will we get to know him better. Jesus said,

Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. (John 7:17)

So – how are we getting to know God better?

Thirdly, endurance:

being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience (verse 11)

Often when we read words like ‘strengthened’, ‘power’, and ‘might’ in the New Testament, we think it’s going to be about the dramatic or miracle-working power of the Holy Spirit, and I’m not about to poo-poo that.

But here, Paul prays that God will strengthen the Colossians so they ‘may have great endurance and patience.’

We need those qualities in the Christian life. To follow Jesus is not a spectacular 100-metre sprint, it is the endurance of the marathon. And over the marathon course of our lives, there will be ups and downs, joys and sorrows, peaks and troughs. The early Christians got to realise that quickly, through their experiences of suffering and persecution. Many – if not the majority – of Christians around the world today are familiar with this, too.

When we are finding it tough to follow Jesus, we can ask the Holy Spirit to help us. Sometimes, that will be an individual experience. God will give us an inner resilience that we didn’t know we had – perhaps because we didn’t have it before – and he will help us to keep on keeping on, even if it is just tenaciously putting one foot in front of the other, or living day to day or even hour to hour.

Sometimes, God will strengthen our endurance through the help of our sister and brother Christians. I had a couple in one church who underwent five bereavements in a year. Both of them lost both of their parents, and a beloved uncle died as well.

The wife of the couple said, ‘At times like these I find it hard to pray. But I am encouraged to know that the church family is praying for me when I can’t pray.’

Is life and faith difficult for us at present? Let us ask God to strengthen us in patience and endurance, just as Paul asked God to do that for the Colossians.

Fourthly, joyful thanksgiving:

and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light (verse 12)

This is remarkable, coming straight after the prayer to have the strength to endure. If our situation is such that we need the gifts of patience and endurance, then presumably life is not easy. And if that’s the case, how are we going to give ‘joyful thanks to the Father’?

Paul says it’s all because it’s a response to what God has done for us. Paul tells the Colossians it’s all because the Father

has qualified [them] to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light.

It’s a case of remembering and rehearsing all the wonderful things God has already done for us, and all the amazing things he is promising to do for us. When we ponder these things in our hearts and minds, isn’t ‘joyful thanksgiving’ the natural reaction?

On Thursday morning, I paid my monthly visit to a local Christian care home. In alternate months, I either lead devotions for the residents and staff, or I bring Holy Communion. This time, it was a Holy Communion month.

So, I led a short service in the lounge, and then Deborah and I took the bread and wine to those residents who had not been able to make it to the service. We offered the elements in each room where someone was, because all the residents are Christians.

Entering one room, we found a lady who had lost most of her sight and a lot of her hearing. But in her adversity, this beautiful saint had still found a way to give thanks and praise to her God. She had an A4 notepad and a Sharpie pen. In her large handwriting (due to her sight loss) she was writing out on one sheet after another the opening verses of her favourite hymns. This was how she expressed her devotion despite her limitations. She presented me with a sheet on which she had written the first verse of ‘Come, Thou Fount Of Every Blessing.’

That lady’s witness was a challenge to me.

How is each one of us growing in our faith? Are our good works making a difference? Are we growing closer to God? Do we know his strength enabling us to endure in faith even in difficulty? Do our hearts leap with joyful praise?

We have every good reason:

13 For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

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Living As A People Of Blessing, 2 Kings 5:1-27 (Ordinary 14 Year C)

2 Kings 5:1-27

How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land? The words of the Psalmist have echoed throughout history. Most Christians live as the minority in their society. We have had to cope with a transition from being the majority culture to being the minority, seen in so many ways and not least the way recent decisions in Parliament trampled on the sanctity of life.

But the problem goes back to before the Psalmist. In today’s passage, we have a young Israelite girl taken captive by raiders from Aram (verse 2). It’s not the full exile of many centuries later, but it still poses the question of how to live out your faith as a good witness when your beliefs are not the dominant ones. Even those still living in the Promised Land know the threat of the King of Aram and his army, as the King of Israel makes clear by the fear he displays when he assumes his opposite number wants to pick a quarrel with him (verse 7).

The story of Naaman’s healing shows several Gospel values we would do well to emulate in our witness. Sometimes they are displayed by God’s people, sometimes by those receiving blessing, and sometimes they are the opposite of the behaviour that is condemned in the passage.

Firstly, love

Don’t you think the attitude of the young girl in forced slavery is remarkable? Separated from her parents, much like the dreaded ICE officers are doing to immigrants in the USA at present, surely she is living in fear.

And what does she do? She loves her enemy. She shows concern for Naaman’s condition and knows how he might be healed. No resentment gets in the way. Instead, she blesses a man who doubtless was significant in causing her plight.

In the later history of God’s people, when many had been taken into exile in Babylon, and the Psalmist had voiced their feelings with those words with which I began, ‘How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?’, the prophet Jeremiah had an answer for them. In his famous letter to the exiles in chapter 29 of his prophecy, he tells them to ‘seek the welfare of the city to which they have been taken’. It’s similar. And people notice it.

To whom can we show love, despite the fact that they may be opposed to our most cherished beliefs and values? It may be a family member who has rejected the way we brought them up. It may be a political representative who stands for a party or policies that we believe are harmful to us and to others.

Think of the ways in which our society is becoming more divided and ask where we can show love to all parties. The algorithms of social media promote the viewing of content that is negative and causes anger, thus contributing to division and even violence. We have seen the consequences at the ballot box and on the streets. Imagine what we could do if we brought love into those situations.

Secondly, grace

The King of Aram thinks that Naaman’s healing can be bought. He tries to buy favour with his opposite number in Israel by sending Naaman with ten talents of silver (that’s about 340 kilograms), six thousand shekels of gold (around 69 kilos), and ten sets of clothing (verse 5). It’s so over the top that the King of Israel thinks it’s a trick to provoke conflict.

It’s a common attitude. We think we can buy the favour and blessing of God. Some of us do it by trying to be good enough (whatever that is) in our lives. Some of us try, in the words of Kate Bush, to ‘make a deal with God.’

But it doesn’t work. God rejects these approaches. He gives freely to the undeserving. We cannot make ourselves deserving of his blessing, but he still gives. And here he heals way before Naaman professes any faith in him. It is undiluted grace.

It is our calling to be grace-bearers in the world, even to those opposed to us. It’s very easy for us to call down fire and brimstone on the enemies of God, and we are altogether rather too practised in the art of cursing others, but God in Christ calls us to a different approach. The Christ who prayed, ‘Father, forgive them, they don’t know what they are doing’ is our Lord. It may go against the grain for us, but how else are people going to be opened to the possibilities of redemption?

You may want to write to your MP. It may be something you feel passionately about, and you may think the MP is likely to disagree with you. Write with grace. Bless them. Tell them you are praying for them. So many Christians write letters and emails to their MPs in such a hostile spirit that we have a pretty terrible reputation in Parliament. Speak grace. Build a relationship, if you can. You never know what opportunities that might create in the long run.

Thirdly, humility

I see this in two ways in the reading, and it’s all to do with the central encounter between Elisha and Naaman. For Elisha’s part, he does not have to come out to Naaman and do something spectacular that will build his brand or his platform, as we would say today. He just sends his messenger with the instructions Naaman needs (verse 10). It’s not about show. Elisha only cares about the exalting of the name of the Lord, not the exalting of his own name. If that means staying in the shadows, then fine.

For Naaman’s part, he must put aside his pride to wash himself in the waters of the Jordan, not in the apparently superior rivers of Abana and Pharpar in Damascus (verse 12).

Humility in pointing to our God and not to ourselves, and humility in that we must put aside our pride to meet with the one true God. That is central. What else could be our response when the Gospel is about grace and mercy?

It is not that we want to do the exaggerated ‘very ‘umble’ Uriah Heep-type routine, nor is it that we want to dress up low self-esteem in some ‘I am a worm’ attitude, but it is to say that we want to deflect all the glory from ourselves to where it belongs.

You may recall Corrie ten Boom, the Dutch Christian of ‘The Hiding Place’ fame. She and her sister Betsy were imprisoned by the Nazis for hiding Jews as an expression of their faith. Betsy died in the concentration camp. After the war, Corrie exercised a remarkable ministry of compassion and reconciliation at no small cost to herself.

After she had given a talk or a sermon at an event, she would often have people come up to her and thank her for what she said. How did she handle the compliments? She said she thought of them as like a bouquet of flowers. She would smell the beautiful scent and then say, ‘These are really for you, Lord.’

Is that an attitude we can cultivate? A humility that gives glory to God?

Fourthly, thanksgiving

After he is healed, Naaman wants to offer Elisha a gift. But the prophet declines it. This is not about him. It was God who healed Naaman (verses 15-16).

But Naaman still wants to show his gratitude, and he wants to do so by transferring his allegiance to the Lord who had healed him. He does so, following the pagan belief of many cultures in Old Testament times, that the gods were limited to certain geographical areas, and so he asks to take some of the Promised Land home with him to the land where the idol Rimmon (whom he now probably realises is a false god) is worshipped (verses 17-18).

The measure of a true response to a genuine encounter with the Lord is simply this: thanksgiving. Remember when Jesus healed ten lepers, and just one returned to give thanks. That was the one who truly knew and appreciated what Jesus had done for him.

There are a couple of sides to this for us. For one, while we shall be unconditionally blessing people with grace and love in all humility, we shall be praying that some will respond with thanksgiving and encounter God in Christ. Our blessing is never conditional upon a person responding in a particular way, but it is a witness, and we put prayer behind that witness that people will respond in thanksgiving to God.

The other side for us is that we ourselves, as those who have already discovered the God of grace and love in Jesus Christ, are seen to be thankful people, too. At the graduation service for our son on Wednesday, the Dean spoke on Paul’s words in Colossians 3, ‘And be thankful.’ She quoted the famous words of Dag Hammarskjöld:

For all that has been, thank you. For all that is to come, yes!

How revolutionary would a thankful lifestyle be in an acquisitive society?

Fifthly, generosity

So the last part of the story is the dark episode that ends it, one that we often don’t read. Gehazi, the servant of Elisha, is scandalised that his master lets Naaman go without him leaving a gift. He says these chilling words to himself:

“My master was too easy on Naaman, this Aramean, by not accepting from him what he brought. As surely as the Lord lives, I will run after him and get something from him.” (verse 20)

‘My master was too easy on Naaman.’ Here is someone who does not understand grace. ‘I will run after him and get something from him.’ It’s all about getting, not giving. As such, his character is contrary to the God he supposedly serves. He is a precursor of the TV evangelists and other scammers, determined to make money out of those who have a need.

But God is a generous giver, not a taker. God gave out of love in creation. God gave his only begotten Son for the salvation of the world. God gave the Holy Spirit to the disciples of Jesus. Gave, gave, gave. God is generous.

I am not about to suggest that we are like Gehazi. He became diseased in body because he was diseased in spirit. But I do ask the question, what are we known for in society? Although we are called to speak out against wrongdoing, are we primarily known as those who are negative? Think again of those letters to MPs. Or are we known as those who positively give to society, who overflow with generosity to those in need and for the well-being of our towns, our cultures, and our nations?

By the grace of God, may it be that we are not a Gehazi, who grasp for ourselves, but a servant girl who knows how to love, an Elisha who humbly lives in and by the grace of God, and a Naaman, who by thanksgiving grows in grace.

Surely such a people will have an impact for Christ on their culture.

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Harvest Thanks-Giving, Deuteronomy 26:1-11

Deuteronomy 26:1-11

Harvest is a time of giving -it’s a thanksgiving – and so without any further ado I’m going to explore two aspects of our harvest giving.

Firstly, our giving is a response to God’s giving.

There is so much God has given us. Under this heading I’m going to consider three ways he gives and our responses.

Number 1: The first-fruits of what Israel produced from the soil in the Promised Land were there by virtue of God’s creation. God has given to all humankind a physical, material creation filled with good things that we need and that we can enjoy.

So our giving back to God here recognises him as Creator. Perhaps that’s why people who don’t even have a clear faith can connect with harvest. They are aware they are surrounded by good things, and that they owe that to the One who created this universe.

We know too that God cares for such people. Jesus said that his Father sends the rain upon the righteous and the unrighteous. This is a blessing available to all. It is what John Calvin called ‘common grace.’

Initially, then we are giving at harvest in response to that general provision that God has made for all of us in this world. It does mean, though, that when we hear of peoples and places who do not have the basic necessities of life we are called to share out and redistribute the blessings of God.

It also means we take care of what God has given us. So it’s entirely reasonable to have a special concern at this time about climate change. We hear how East African nations have had four consecutive years of little or no harvest, thanks to a lack of rainfall that is almost certainly due to the climate change for which the heavily industrialised and developed nations bear a huge responsibility.

In that respect, our giving at this time needs also to encompass a giving up of dangerous things and a move to other approaches. We want there to be a land which contains what God has provided for us, and which can be harvested and dedicated to our God in gratitude for his fatherly supply of all we need.

Number 2: there is all that God has given to us not only as Creator but also as Rescuer. The ceremony described in Deuteronomy 26 is directly related to Israel’s liberation from enforced slavey in Egypt. We heard in the reading how in the prescribed form of words the worshipper recalls the suffering of God’s people in Egypt and their liberation at the hand of God.

How has God set you and me free? Not in a similar dramatic way to Israel in Egypt, I expect. But he has rescued us in other ways, and we can respond to that.

Sometimes on a smaller scale God rescues us from wicked people. In my first appointment I had trouble with some unsuitable children’s workers. One of them was a Freemason, and he was chummy with one of the church organists, who was also a Mason. Eventually, the opposition of the organist became so intolerable that I prayed, “Lord, please change him or move him. I’d rather you changed him, but if he won’t change, then please move him.”

Within a week his house was on the market. He moved a hundred miles away. I would have gladly put up bunting to celebrate.

It doesn’t always happen as simply and strikingly as that, but our God is a rescuer. We have reasons to be grateful and to bring our gifts in response.

And we also have our reasons here to pray and work for those today who we know need rescuing, for example our persecuted brothers and sisters. We can support them as a sign of gratitude for the freedoms God has given us.

I am currently reading an astonishing book. It is called ‘What Is A Girl Worth?’ It is written by Rachael Denhollander, an American woman who as a teenage gymnast was sexually abused by Larry Nassar, the team doctor to the USA Gymnastics squad. Later, Denhollander became a lawyer and those gifts and her faith in Christ led her into a position where she spearheaded the legal efforts to get Larry Nassar jailed.

Rachael Denhollander believes in a God who rescues, and she didn’t want vengeance for what happened to her but rather for other girls to be protected and rescued. Nassar is serving life in prison, and US Gymnastics has had to reform its practices.

I believe Rachel Denhollander did a deeply Christian thing in offering the pain of her own testimony alongside her legal skills, because she gave those things in response to her belief in a God who rescues.

We give in response to God as Creator and Rescuer. Number 3: we give in response to God as Saviour.

Christians have taken the motif of Israel being set free from Egypt and used it as an image of God setting us free, not from what others have done to us, but from our own sin. Through Jesus Christ and his death and resurrection, we are the recipients of the most generous gift of love ever: salvation.

It is therefore also in the harvest spirit of giving for us to dwell on all that God has done for us in Christ and then ponder our giving. What can I give of my money? My time? My possessions? My talents, skills, and interests? Our harvest giving is not limited to what we grow in the back garden or the allotment, or what we grab out of the pantry. Harvest for the Christian makes us look at all of God’s blessings and all of the good things we possess, to ask, what can I offer in response to all that he has done for me?

So that wraps up our first point. To summarise: our giving is a response to God’s giving to us as Creator, Rescuer, and Saviour.

Secondly, we give our best to the Lord.

I don’t know what the Sunday morning of harvest festival is typically like in your home, but when I was growing up there was often a panicked realisation not long before going out: “Oh no, it’s harvest festival! What are we going to take?” This would be followed by Mum scrambling through the kitchen cupboards to give my sister and me such things as tins of baked beans or anything else we could spare to bring to the front of the sanctuary during the first hymn.

I have to tell you that baked beans were a particular sacrifice for me. I was extremely fussy about vegetables as a child, but fortunately Mum had apparently had a craving for baked beans while she was pregnant with me, and she must have passed the influence down the umbilical cord to me.

But in all seriousness, I don’t suppose that sense of ‘What have we got to spare?’ is all that unfamiliar on harvest morning. However, it wasn’t what God commanded Israel in Deuteronomy 26. What the worshipper says to the priest marks a very different attitude:

9 He brought us to this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey; 10 and now I bring the firstfruits of the soil that you, Lord, have given me.’ Place the basket before the Lord your God and bow down before him.

First-fruits. The first and the best is what Israel brings in gratitude for all God has done for her.

I think I can only remember two ways that ‘giving our best’ was codified into church life as a youngster. One was the idea of wearing your smartest clothes – your ‘Sunday best’ for church. The other was a certain assumption what constituted the ‘best’ music for use in worship.

It is of course much wider than that, and the cultural assumptions behind them. Giving our best takes me back to what I said earlier about the range of things we offer to God in response to his giving to us. I talked about money, time, possessions, talents, skills, and interests. In what way can we cultivate giving the best of these to our Lord?

It needs to be more than a ‘spare change and leftovers’ attitude. Our giving is not to be simply what’s left over afterwards: if he’s lucky, God will get something from us. Why does God sometimes only get the fag end of our lives? That cannot be right. It is not the spirit of the first-fruits.

Look at the way our military are rolling out and executing these precise and brilliantly planned exercises in our nation’s life at present to honour our late Sovereign Lady and our new King. That is a whole culture dedicated to offering the first and the best of all their resources in service of the monarchy.

Now consider that we are offering ourselves to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And we are doing that every day and every week, not just at one-off spectacular events. What is a fitting way for me to offer my best to my Lord after all he has given to me?

Cast your minds back just one week to our Covenant Service where we dwelt on how ‘Christ has many services to be done’, and how sometimes we can please him and please ourselves, but on other occasions we can only please him by denying ourselves.

So what am I delighted to offer him? Think for a moment. There must be something in your life that gives you great pleasure and nothing would thrill you more than to find a way to dedicate it to Jesus.

But also, where is he calling us to make a sacrifice to him? Is there something he calls you to do in which you don’t feel comfortable? I’ve told you before how being a minister doesn’t always sit easily with me. But I continue to serve Jesus this way, given how much he has given to me.

What about you? How can each of us give our first and our best in response to all that Christ has given to us?

Let’s remember: it isn’t simply ‘harvest festival’: it’s harvest thanksgiving.’

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Thanksgiving: Two Messages On Gratitude

For my American friends on Thanksgiving today (and indeed for others), here are two very different reflections on gratitude.

The first is a meditation by Max Lucado, in which he reflects on the power of expressing gratitude to God for the simple, everyday things in leading us through difficulties. Read it here.

The second comes from a tradition very different from my own. Benedictine monk David Steindl-Rast claims there is a lot of common ground between Christianity and Buddhism – a view of which I am sceptical.

But gratitude is a big theme of his. He is a co-founder of ANG*L (A Network for Grateful Living) and here is his TED Talk on how gratitude leads to happiness. See what you think.

Whatever you think, may you give thanks to the One who is worthy of all thanksgiving.

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