Your kingdom come.

The Text: Matthew 13:31–33, 44–52

Christians around the world love to pray the Lord’s Prayer both personally and with other Christians. Can you imagine how many times the Lord’s Prayer is being shared around the world on this day alone? This prayer is being prayed millions of times.

Amongst other petitions, the Lord’s Prayer includes the petition “your Kingdom come.”

We say this often, but what exactly do we mean by “Your kingdom come?” It is God’s Kingdom we want to see come.

Luther says: in his explanation: “God comes to rule as king even if we do not ask for this to happen. But in this prayer we are asking: “Father come and rule over us”.

Luther goes on to pose a question: “How does God’s kingdom come?” Luther answers his own question by saying: “God our Father comes to rule over us by giving us the Holy Spirit, so that by God’s goodness to us we believe his holy word and live as his people on earth now and in heaven forever.”

In today’s Gospel reading Jesus helps us grow in our understanding of God’s kingdom—God’s eternal reign of love.

In Matthew’s gospel, God’s rule is called the ‘Kingdom of Heaven’. And each of today’s parables give us another glimpse of what his kingdom is like. What we discover in these parables is that God’s kingship changes everything about our world, our values and our priorities. These parables may look simple on the surface, but when understood in their original context they are full of surprise!

In order to fully understand today’s parables, we need to recognise just how controversial they were when Jesus first shared them. It is then that they will bring new vision to our world, our values and our priorities. Let’s start with the parable of the mustard seed—v31-32.

On first glance this is a charming story about how God might make use of things beyond our common expectation. The mustard seed, a tiny seed becomes a home for birds to nest in. We might quickly conclude that God can use even the smallest of faith to grow something great—even abundant, enough to bless others.

The Mustard Seed parable might be easily reduced to the saying: “From little things big things grow.” But there is much more in this parable: You see, the mustard plant is closer to being a weed than it is to being a precious valued plant. When we think of mustard we often think of the yellow squeeze bottles of mustard sauce that we might add to hamburgers and hot dogs. That might make the mustard plant sound palatable.

But in reality the mustard plant grows like a weed—more like soursobs or thistles or dandelions.

Once one mustard seed gets a corner in your field—watch out—it will take over! Maybe the strangest part of this parable is that the mustard seed will never grow into a big strong tree like a cedar tree. Yet, Jesus chooses to use it as a picture of God’s kingdom.

The Mustard seed has a natural ability to reproduce and spread far and wide—it is hardy.

If we look back over the history of the world over the past 2000 years we can see how the rule of God in Christianity has spread like a mustard seed weed around the world! It has transformed the world bringing God’s love to life for many and it continues to do so in a humble earthy way.

Let’s move onto the next parable—he parable of the yeast in verse 33. Again, this parable would have immediately grabbed the attention of those who first heard it.

Why? Because of the yeast. Elsewhere in scripture yeast is used to represent the world and is almost always used as a negative symbol of corruption. Here yeast is presented as something good!

And the amount of bread being made by the woman would have also surprised the hearer. Usually they would make just enough for themselves, but here the woman is making enough bread to feed more than 100 people at once! We could simply conclude that this parable shows how a little can make a lot. But deeper, it also indicates that God’s rule may take hold in hidden and unexpected ways and bring about change in ways that are beyond our imagination.

Our text then jumps to verses 44-46 and shares two more parables. One about the treasure found in the field and the other about a precious pearl. In these parables we could focus on how the labourer cunningly went and sold all he had just to buy the field where the treasure was hidden. But maybe more importantly we can focus on how the treasure in the field changed his life! God’s rule in our life transforms our life for the better!

There is also another way we could read these two parables: In the parable about the pearl and the treasure, we easily focus on how the person sold everything in order to obtain the one prized thing… But what is this treasure? And who is this person who gives up all so that the treasure can be his?

What if we were to understand God as the person making the discovery and we are the treasure he wants to have as his own?

Think of who Jesus is. We confess Jesus to be God’s one and only Son.

God gave up his one and only Son to suffer and die as the payment for sin so that we could be his prized treasure forever! This might be how we could understand our baptism. In our Baptism God has come and found us and valued us so highly that he paid the price so that we could be his forever!

You are God’s great treasure and by the Grace of God alone all who are baptised live with the promise that they belong to God forever. We are part of God’s eternal family.

How exciting! What a joy that God now says to us: ‘you are my treasure’.

Together as we encourage one another, we can help each other grow to know that we are loved by God and that we are part of God’s eternal family. For Jesus has paid the price to claim us as his!

In our fellowship we can lead one another to know that – there is nothing that can separate us from God’s love. We can give thanks for the ministries of the church here on earth that help to nurture our identity as people who are precious to God and belong to God’s kingdom.

Our regional and church wide Children youth and family ministry teams do so much to help our young people grow in their identity as children who are loved and treasured by God. The many Christian Life week camps that are held in many places each year bring this blessing to many. At these camps our youth are encouraged and mentored by Christian young adults to see themselves as loved by God.

God’s kingdom has come to us in the mystery of baptism and his word. God brings us community and connection, life and light. And he continues to transform our world in unexpected ways!

May the Spirit that God gives you lead you to believe his word and live as his people on earth now and in heaven forever. Amen

The Parable of the Sower

The Text: Matthew 13:1-9; 18-23

When it comes to parables like the Parable of the Sower, there are some things that are a bit surprising, especially for any gardeners or farmers amongst us. For how many of you would be as reckless with your precious seed as this unnamed sower. Did you notice? He doesn’t seem to care much where it lands. He doesn’t drop a seed here and a seed there into carefully cultivated holes, but instead he scatters his seed to fall wherever it may – on the road, in the rocky ground, amongst the weeds, in good soil.

The Sower, of course, is God, and the seed is his word, by which God’s Spirit comes and takes root in human hearts. And God doesn’t let his word fall only on those who are prepared to hear it. He scatters the seed of his word to fall wherever it may – on the devout, the sinner, the religious, the sceptic – people like you and me gathered here this morning.

The point of this apparently reckless sowing is that, with God, there always is more than enough seed to go around. There is enough forgiveness of sins in Jesus’ death for everyone. There is enough Bread of Life come down from heaven to feed the whole world, with baskets of leftovers. There is no need for God to be careful about where he sows the seed of his word and who receives it – he sends it out with this promise: “[That] as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.” (Is. 55:10-11).

Sadly, the church today seems to be more interested in spiritual agronomy than in seed-sowing. We are told that what we need for the church to grow these days is to conduct soil studies to tell us the needs and wants of people and where God’s word is most likely to take hold. Contrast that with the picture of the Sower who sows his seed with reckless abandon, broadcasting the death and resurrection of Jesus to the wind, letting it fall wherever it lands.

The Sower sows his seed, and some of it falls on the path. Here the gospel is heard with a hardened heart; a heart that says, “I have no need for this word, for this Jesus, for this forgiveness”. This is an unbelieving hearing. The words are heard, but they ping off stubborn hearts like seeds bouncing off cement.

Now this sclerosis of the heart to the word of God is at work in each of us. This is the effect of what Paul calls our sinful flesh – our inborn pride and stubbornness, our efforts to justify ourselves by putting others down; our selfishness and spiritual laziness. Which is why we get bored with church and find it hard to read our Bibles. It’s also why we want novelty in our worship services rather than the steady reliable liturgy week after week. The angels don’t mind singing the same hymns day and night before the throne of God; but we need options and alternatives, lest the word of God go in one ear and out the other.

The seed that falls on the hardened path is eaten up by the birds (that is, the devil). God forces no one to listen to the gospel, and so he permits the devil to come and snatch it away from those who don’t want it. Luther once remarked that the gospel is like a little local rain shower that is in one place today and moves on somewhere else tomorrow. That’s the way it has gone down through history.

Consider the Middle East, for example, at one time the cradle of Christianity. Now the gospel is barely heard there today (except in a few persecuted pockets). Or consider Europe (and especially Germany), the land where the Reformation took hold with such power over 450 years ago. Look at how little Christ is heard in those great churches today, and how few come to hear it.

And think of our own land, Australia. For all the churches, for all the revivals, for all the religious talk out there, there is less of the gospel heard today in Australia than at any other time in our history. Oh, there are still plenty of churches to go to on Sunday morning, with services designed and scheduled for everyone’s convenience, but unless they go with an open heart to the hearing of the gospel, the precious seed will get pecked away before it has time to take root.

The Sower sows his seed and some of it falls on rocky soil. This is the shallow soil of emotionalism and superficial joy. This is religion based on wants and feelings rather than facts and faith. It is a kind of “lite” Christianity; all of the bubbles but none of the substance; spiritual milk rather than meat. This is the religion of faith without repentance. Everything happens immediately in shallow soil – the seed sprouts immediately and just as immediately it grows. But without root, without depth of soil, the tender shoots are vulnerable. They cannot survive the heat of the noon day sun, but quickly dry up when the cross of suffering comes.

Christianity “lite” doesn’t like to hear about suffering or pain. It doesn’t want to be disturbed by the idea that the good news of the gospel also involves some bad news for our sinful flesh. But the irony is that the churches throughout the world (and throughout history) that grow the most are those that are most persecuted. For only if the gospel is worth dying for, is it worth living for.

The Sower sows his seed, and some of it lands among the thorns, that choke out the young seedlings. This is a conflicted hearing. The gospel is preached and heard, but it is just one voice among many others clamouring for our attention. There are two types of thorn bushes mentioned: 1) the anxieties and cares of the world, and 2) the deceitfulness of riches. The first is the worries that come when a person doesn’t trust God to provide. Anxiety is the prayer that is prayed to the false gods of our own making when they aren’t coming through for us, choking out our prayers to our heavenly Father, who is our only help in times of trouble.

Growing along with anxiety is the thorn bush of greed; the endless pursuit of riches; the desire for more, better, faster, bigger, brighter. St. Paul says that many have wandered from the faith and pierced their hearts on the sharp thorns of greed. Greed consumes our time and energy and resources and attention, until we are no longer able to hear God’s word, to pray, to praise, even to come to the church.

You and I are that field into which the heavenly Sower sows his seed. Our hearts are that soil that he would make into good soil. But no soil (as far as I am aware) is self-tilling, and no human heart is self-softening. For the word to be planted and grow into a good crop, our hearts must first be prepared to receive it.

God does this through the difficulties and disappointments, the disasters and diseases, we face throughout our lives. He does it to clear away the stones of our pride, envy, anger, greed, sloth, lust and gluttony; to break up our hardened hearts and to uproot every weed that threatens the fruitful growth of his word. In this way, he teaches us to trust him, to receive everything as a gift from his gracious hand, to recognise his presence and his working, even in the most painful things. And then he sows his seed and waits to reap an abundant crop – a hundred, sixty, thirty-fold.

So when it feels to you sometimes as if God is ploughing you under, let the Parable of the Sower be a reminder that what he is doing is sowing Christ into your hearts. Expect a harvest from the seed that is sown. For the word of God will not return to him empty. He has bought you with a great price and given you his Spirit as a guarantee of good things to come. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, then be assured that he will also give life to your mortal bodies – like seed sprouting in good soil – through his Spirit who dwells in you. “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.”
In the name of Jesus. Amen.

Rest and recuperation

The Text: Matthew 11:28-30

Jesus said: Come to me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Something strange has happened in the way we live our lives.

Once upon a time most people spent most of their lives doing things that were physical—working the land with hand tools; running the household with great effort; making things with hard physical labour.

We can think of God’s word to Adam after he was thrown out of the Garden of Eden: Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. By the sweat of the brow you will eat food, until you return to the ground.

People would work hard all day, and by the end of the day they were exhausted. People would work hard all their lives, and by the time they were old, their bodies were worn out.

Then people started to get cleverer. People invented all sorts of machines that took over many of the hard tasks – machines for the household, and for working the land, and for manufacturing things in the factories.

I think that most of you would agree that our lives today are much easier than the lives of previous generations. Much of the burden of hard physical labour has been lifted off our shoulders.

But then something strange happened. We have realised that we need physical activity. We need physical exercise to keep us healthy. We need to do things that make us tired.

So what did we do? We invented some more machines, machines that we use to exercise, and we put them in gymnasiums, and sometimes in our own homes, and we use them, not to take away the physical efforts of life, but to give us the sort of physical effort that will help us to stay healthy.

Our text today talks about hard work, about the burdens of life, that leave us exhausted, worn out. It talks about relief from your burdens, and rest, and refreshment, and recuperation.

But then it also talks about a new burden, a new exercise that you need for the good of your health.

Jesus says: Come to me all you who are weary and weighed down with heavy burdens. Jesus promises: Come to me, and I will give you rest, and refreshment. But then he challenges us: And now pick up my yoke, and learn from me. Learn how to live a life that is healthy and strong.

What are the burdens that weigh people down? What makes you tired?

Do you get tired physically? For all the labour-saving devices that we have, life can still be physically demanding. At the end of the day we may feel tired and worn out.

Our bodies have their limits, and when we have been doing physical work, we reach the point where our bodies tell us. If we are ill, if we are carrying injuries, then we become even more aware of our physical limits. We feel tired. We need rest.

As you grow old, you become more and more aware of the loss of physical strength. You cannot do the same tasks you used to do. You appreciate rest and quietness more and more.

But there are other kinds of burdens and other kinds of weariness.

Today, when we spend less time and effort on physical work, our levels of mental stress have grown at least as much. As life has become more and more complicated, our emotional stress keeps going higher. We talk about the pressures of life. There are pressures all around us—we are expected to succeed, to be able to manage new tasks, new technology, and we often get to the point when we cry out: I can’t cope with it all. Give me a break.

We have financial pressures—all the things that we want to get, the security we hope for. We struggle to make ends meet.

We have relationship pressures. We want to love and be loved. So often our relationships become difficult and we carry disappointments and regrets.

There are pressures within us. We want to be successful. We want to be able to manage. We want to be independent. But again and again we are reminded of our own limitations. We feel that we have failed.

But the greatest pressure, and our greatest failures, are spiritual.

If we are honest, we know that we are not the people that we would like to be. We do not live the life that we know that we should live.

I know that I am not the person that God wants me to be, and expects me to be, and commands me to be. I know I should obey my God, and I should live according to the life that God has set up for me. But I don’t. I fail. I disobey God, and I break God’s commands. The greatest burden we carry is our moral failure.

We try to get around it and think that as long as we do our best, that should be OK. But it does not work. We carry a great and terrible burden of guilt. We have sinned against our God.

If we think back to Paul’s words in Romans 7, it is one of the most honest cases of facing the guilt within our human hearts: I am a prisoner to the law of sin which is at work in my body. What a wretched man I am! We can hear his frustration, his anger, almost despair. If we are honest, we know that we all share in the same sort of struggle.

I once shared this passage with a person who was struggling with addictions—gambling addiction, alcohol and drug addiction, sexual addiction. This person wanted to break free, but the reality is that an addiction keeps grabbing you and dragging you back.

So you have the burden of terrible frustration and guilt. You want to do what is right and healthy, but the urges to do something to satisfy your desires is so great that it keeps dragging you back.

Sin is an addiction. We don’t want to sin – but we do. Those desires to do something, even if we know that it is hurtful—they keep grabbing us and dragging us down.

That is what Paul is speaking about, and we feel it too: I don’t understand what I am doing, and why I keep on doing it. I don’t do what I want to do, but I do what I hate. I know that God’s law is good, and I want to do what is right. But sin is living in me, and I keep on giving way to sin. I have the desire to do what is right, but I do not have the strength to carry it out. ….I don’t do the good I want to do, but I do the evil I don’t want to do.

We hear his great frustration, and we share that frustration. Who will rescue me from this body of death?

But Paul also has an answer. Paul knows where to go for relief, for release, for rest. Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!

That is also the answer that Jesus himself has given. That is the invitation that Christ gives to us: Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened. Come to me and I will give you rest.

One of the great gifts of God is rest. Rest is peace, relief, refreshment. When we have rest, our bodies, and our minds, and our spirits, have the opportunity to recover, to gather strength again.

When we are tired, we just want to stop, to put our feet up, to crawl into bed, to go to sleep. When we are rested, we are ready to start again. Our energy and our strength have returned.

We have been made in a way so that while we rest we are made strong. Our bodies and our minds are refreshed and rejuvenated. If we are sick, often a good rest is the best medicine, so that your bodies can heal themselves, and overcome fevers and infections.

There is a beautiful psalm verse: “In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat—for God grants sleep to those he loves” (Psalm 127:2)

Jesus Christ offers rest. But now it is rest that brings health and recovery from our spiritual weariness, from our burdens of sin and guilt. Jesus Christ offers to take our burden. Jesus Christ has taken the burden of our sin and guilt all the way to the Cross. He has carried that burden and he has paid for that guilt with his own life. So Jesus says to us that we do not have to try to prove your own goodness—not to God, nor to ourselves, nor to anyone else. Jesus takes away that pressure.

And Jesus tells us that as we come to him in repentance, he forgives us. He takes away our sin. He sets us free from the burden of guilt, and that terrible frustration when we can never avoid following our human sinful desires.

Jesus gives us that deep rest and peace, for we know that our sins are forgiven. With that rest we are refreshed, rejuvenated, recuperated. We are ready to live again, with the strength and energy that comes from God’s Spirit.

But just when we think that all of our problems have been solved, Jesus comes back and says: But now I have something for you to carry. Take my yoke on upon you. A yoke is the big heavy beam of wood that was placed over the shoulders of a team of oxen, so that they could pull heavy loads. Jesus is putting a load on us.

Is it easy to be a Christian, to follow Jesus, to live for Christ? No, because Jesus also has very high expectations on us. Jesus calls on us to be totally dedicated to our God, to serve God with our bodies, minds and spirits. That is demanding, and it can mean a huge effort, a deep sacrifice.

Has Jesus lifted off one burden, and replaced it with another? Yes—and no! Jesus takes away the real burdens that wear us out and threaten to destroy us. But remember how we spoke about another sort of effort, about work, about exercise, which is part of healthy living that creates a healthy tiredness.

That is the sort of task and challenge that Jesus gives us. Jesus says: Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

If you look at a yoke, you will see that it is not meant to be carried alone—it is always carried by a pair of oxen. Jesus tells you, I am giving you a burden, but I am not expecting to carry it by yourself. I am not plonking it on top of you to weigh you down and oppress you and destroy you.

No, I am gentle and humble in heart. I am giving you something that is going to help you and build you up.

Jesus says that he is carrying that burden with us. Learn from me. When you share the tasks and challenges of Christian life, you are sharing in the life of Jesus Christ. You are sharing the life that comes from God. That is a privilege, not a burden. And it is a challenge that makes you stronger, that builds up your faith. The more you respond, the more you grow, and you appreciate more and more what God is doing through you and what God is doing in you.

With Jesus Christ, this yoke is easy, this burden is not too heavy. As you commit to God’s tasks, yes, you do get tired. You know that you have been putting your body and mind and soul into it. But it is a healthy tiredness. It is the tiredness that brings refreshment and new life.

Until you finally have finished all of your tasks. Then you have a new rest and an eternal peace. Then you are living in the peace of your heavenly Father. For Christ has given you the rest for your souls. Amen.

Welcoming God

‘Welcoming God’

“Anyone who receives you receives me, and anyone who receives me receives the Father who sent me.” (v. 40 NLT)

It’s always good to feel welcome when we go somewhere new. For example, if we are visiting a church we’ve never been to for the first time, it can be very awkward to know where to go, what we need, when to sit or stand in the service, or where the toilets are. If we are visiting people in their homes, we can be very thankful that we have the right address to begin with, but also that the people we are visiting are warm in their welcome to us. It’s a real blessing to be invited into people’s homes, to spend time with them over a tea or coffee (or maybe something a little bit stronger), and to talk with them about life and the journey of faith that we’re all on.

In the same way, it is important for us to be a welcoming congregation. Through the way we welcome people, people who connect with us for the first time can feel at ease when they meet us, they can find a sense of belonging with us, and they can feel comfortable and valued while they are among us.

Our gospel reading for today, Matthew 10:40-42, comes at the end of Jesus’ instructions to his Twelve Disciples before he sent them out on their first missionary journey. Jesus warned them that not everyone would welcome them and receive the message they brought (vv13b,14). However, Jesus also said that those households which did receive them would also receive the peace of God (v13a). Then, at the end of his instructions, Jesus went even further by saying that those who welcomed his disciples also welcomed him, and by receiving him, they even welcomed the presence of God among them.

Stop and think about that for a moment…

On the one hand, these were Jesus’ specific instructions to a certain group of people at a particular time and place. However, as followers of Jesus whom he continues to send out into our time and place, we can also hear Jesus saying that when people welcome us, they welcome him and the presence of God with us.

One reason why this is really important is because often people ask where God is in the world. When people are hurting, confused, struggling or broken by life’s circumstances, God can often seem to be absent and uncaring. Jesus is saying here that God is present in the struggles, pain, uncertainty and joys of life through his people. As we live in the good news of God’s present and coming Kingdom, and as we participate with God in his mission to bring his peace into the world, God is present in the living, breathing body of his Son in the world. God makes himself known and extends his healing, life, cleansing and liberating presence in the lives of the people around us through our words and actions by the power of his Holy Spirit.

How do our words and actions reflect the grace and love of Jesus and our heavenly Father to others? As people welcome us into their homes and lives, is the presence of our forgiving and peace-giving God made real in their lives through us?

As Jesus’ disciples, he calls us to grow in the peace God gives us through faith in his grace so that we can be bringing his peace, hope and love to everyone that we meet. The goal of living and growing as Jesus’ disciples is just as much about making the Kingdom of God real in our world by extending God’s gracious and life-giving presence to everyone who welcomes us as it is about getting into heaven when we die. We can make the coming Kingdom of God real in our homes, our work places, our schools or anywhere we are welcomed and received by other people. The promise of Jesus is that they welcome him as they welcome us, and by welcoming him they also receive the presence of God who is the source of all life. This is the God who forgives sinners, who shows grace to those who need it the most but deserve it the least, who brings the light of new life out of the darkness of death, who serves his followers by washing their feet, and who gives us his all in his self-sacrificing love of the cross.

As we begin a new week, who will welcome you into their homes, their workplaces, or their lives this week? How can you be the peace-filled and grace-giving presence of God in the joys and challenges, struggles and problems they are facing? Ask the Holy Spirit of God to keep you close to Jesus through faith so that, as people welcome you this week, they may also welcome Jesus in you, and they may find peace in the presence of our gracious and loving God in you.

And the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

Take up your cross & follow me.

The Text: Matthew 10:24-39

A minister in the US, who served a very wealthy congregation, was once invited by one of his parishioners to spend a week on their yacht in the Bahamas. They just gave him the keys. His response when asked if that was hard to take was “Well, someone has to minister to the souls of the wealthy, and you can’t do that if you don’t accept their invitations!” Hmm? Not exactly, “Take up your cross and follow me!” (Matthew 16:24b) is it?

In the Gospel for today, Jesus appoints twelve of His disciples to take His mission and message to God’s people, Israel. So, what does it mean to be a disciple? What does it mean to follow Christ? Are there perks? What are the benefits?

Some church leaders today teach that people who believe in, and follow Jesus should expect to be healthy, wealthy and – above all – happy. They say that if you believe strongly enough you can have that yacht in the Bahamas, you can bypass sickness and disease, you can have a happy, fulfilling life, and you can have that perfect marriage with perfect children. It has been said that you can have all these things because of your obedience. There is a whole industry out there of Christian ‘self-help’ books and products promising success in almost everything, if you will follow Jesus (and, of course, buy the books, CD’s, DVD’s and online courses).

This “happy, fulfilling life” is not the message of today’s Gospel lesson and neither is it the message of Jesus in the Scriptures. Jesus does indeed bring true happiness (what the Bible calls ‘joy’) to His followers. We can take our trials and troubles to God and He does hear and answer us. We pray for our children when they are sick or in trouble and we turn to God when there is more fortnight left at the end of our pay than there is pay left at the end of the fortnight. Christianity is not an invitation to doom and gloom because Jesus says, …whoever loses is life for My sake will find it. In Christ, we find life revealed to us by God’s Holy Spirit.

People who study things like church growth tell us that the church today faces a ‘consumerist’ culture, which (we’re told) must shape our outreach with the Gospel or we miss the boat. People are looking for services from the church, rather than a community to serve. Given a choice between wearing a gold cross or bearing a wooden cross – most people these days will take the gold!

Today’s Gospel challenges our perceptions and perspectives. What does it mean to follow Christ? And more than that – what does it take to serve Christ (to be a disciple)? Perhaps the best way to look at this is to ask the question, “What are our expectations in being followers of Christ?” What is it that we want from Him, and from His church? In spite of anything we might have heard to the contrary, Christianity is a religion where God does all the giving and we do all the hearing, believing and responding with acts of love and kindness which are only possible because of God’s grace and blessing.

When Jesus sends out His chosen Twelve, He tells them, and us, in very clear terms what to expect. Expect persecution and expect conflict – even within our own family. Expect to make a “no holds barred” commitment. However – in the end, also expect to receive the true meaning of life and living. There are three themes in Jesus’ words to us today: Persecution, Presence, and Promise.

Persecution
When Jesus sent His chosen twelve out, He made it clear to them that they would receive the same treatment He received. They would face rejection, hostility and harassment. This may seem almost ‘other worldly’ to many of us. Some of us may not take much heat for our faith. But there are those like Michael Job, a twenty one year old college student, who was killed in India by fanatical Hindus in 1999 for his and his father’s faith. His father, Dr Job, was a well-known evangelist and Christian worker.

The fanatics did not like Dr. Job or his Christian message, so they killed his son. Dr. Job was devastated, but not broken. He responded to the hatred by starting an orphanage unlike any other in India. This orphanage is only for girls (strange enough in a culture that doesn’t value girls); but even more unusual, is that this orphanage is only for girls of persecuted and martyred Christians. Today the Michael Job Centre for Orphan Girls is an invaluable refuge for hundreds of girls of persecuted families from all over the Indian sub-continent. Each child who comes to the centre is a vision of hope for the future – a hope that is born out of the sorrow of the cross and strengthened by the love of God.

You and I may not face that kind of danger for our faith and trust in Christ, yet there may be times when our Christian values challenge the values of the world around us. Remember that a strong commitment to Jesus Christ will bring a crunch somewhere, sometime, to all of us. And when that happens – how will we respond?

Presence
The second theme of today’s Gospel is presence. Two things help when Christians face a world which is hostile to Jesus and our commitment to Him: God knows and God cares! In other words, God is present with us in every circumstance of life. It is God’s presence which gives us strength and courage to openly affirm “Jesus is Lord” and our deepest values, our commitment to our Lord! God gives us His Holy Spirit, who helps us in our weakness, to say with St Paul, Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. ¹⁰For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9b-10).

Jesus did warn that if we deny Him before others (either in word or deed) He would deny us before God. Thus we are to stand firm, all the more, because we have the knowledge of God’s care in the midst of our trials. And if our strength fades or our commitment wavers, we are blessed with the knowledge that the One who bought our souls with His life will heal our failures through His love (as He did with Peter when he denied Jesus prior to Jesus’ death).

Promise
The third, and most important, theme of today’s Gospel is promise. One of the amazing and wonderful things about our faith is that in the midst of the most difficult test of all – when the worst which can happen to us has happened or is happening to us – the promises of God come through to bring, hope, joy and new life!

Jesus said, “…whoever loses his life for My sake will find it”. Here Jesus takes the values and presuppositions of this world and turns them upside down and inside out. The way up with God is down. The first will be last and the last, first. The world says that the one who has lots of servants is great, while Jesus says that the one who serves a lot is truly great. The world says that the one who saves and invests a lot in the markets of this world will be secure, while Jesus says the one who gives up the treasures of this world will have the ultimate security – namely “treasures in heaven.” (Matthew 6:20 ESV) An old seminary professor used to quip that the holy ministry may not pay very much but the retirement benefits are out of this world.

Whether we like it or not, our Christian faith is based on the way of the Cross. In Jesus’ cross, death has been defeated and the way is opened to life and immortality. Now it is our turn. Jesus invites all of us to take up our cross and follow Him. In other words, take the crosses off our churches, our altars and from around our necks, and take them out into the world and through our love and service, put them into the hearts of people as Jesus has done for us.

For the cross is not merely a symbol, but a way of life, the way of authentic love, the way of God. It is not merely an ornament, but our hope, our only hope (and indeed, everyone’s only hope) for true health, wealth, and happiness. In the name of Jesus.
Amen.

Life for a Christian is a journey.

The Grace and Peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Let’s join in a word of prayer: Loving God, we ask that your presence and strength be felt in the lives of all who are worshipping here this morning. May we show your compassion and kindness to the world around us, as You invite us to continue our journey to eternity, as You lead us to keep our destiny in view, and as You call us to invite others to join us in the journey. May your love be a constant source of guidance and comfort. Gracious heavenly Father, hear our prayer for the sake of our risen Lord, Amen.

Some time ago I attended a ‘Get Real’ conference held in Sydney, where I was confronted with a new definition of mission. Well, at least a definition I had not considered before. As Christians we have a common destiny – a common destination.

Eternity with our Saviour, Jesus Christ. Where our names are recorded in the book of life. And right beside each of our names, I visualise a gold star, with faith written in the heart of it. A golden star placed there beside our name when we were baptised.

Life for a Christian is a journey together with others, keeping the destination in view. In all that we do, we keep heading toward this common destination. Mission is simply inviting others to join the journey. Mission is simple, when we have our destination clearly in view, and we have the support of others who are with us on the journey. Mission becomes impossible drudgery when we feel alone, and our vision becomes confused by all that happens around us in this broken world.

Today’s Gospel is a vivid portrayal of the essential pattern of God’s relationship to people. First we are loved. Through God’s love, we are gifted and blessed. Then we are invited to respond to that love. To enter into that loving relationship where even more blessings are promised. And finally, we are called to offer that love to others. By showing our love for others, we show to them that God loves each of us and want’s to bless our lives.

God entered humanity in Christ Jesus – and he died for us upon the cross so that we might be set right with Him. Jesus invites us to follow in his path, assisted by his presence – so that we might indeed be made whole – and others with us. And we respond by placing our trust in him.

Gift, blessing, call, response. It is circular, and it is constant, but notice the order of things. Freely says Jesus you have received. Freely give.

Gift, blessing, call, response.

We are loved – first and foremost we are loved

There is nothing that we have to do to earn it.

There are no conditions made before God promises to make us his children. Before God blesses us with the presence of his Holy Spirit to encourage and uplift our spirits with his word and his sacrament.

Only after we have received his love is there any hint of a demand . We are invited after the love is shown – to love in return, to love and be loved. Obedience is our joyful response to God’s gracious gift of his love.

When Jesus journeyed through his life in humanity, ‘he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd’ as Matthew records. No one can say that God does not know what we go through in our journey through this life. And ‘Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness’.

Jesus blessed many with a gift of healing, of learning, of wholeness. The only response to such a blessing is to trust in the giver of the gift. God the Son, Jesus Christ.

Only after blessing those who followed with the gift of wholeness, did Jesus call a few to action. His disciples. “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”

We are often called to pray for special things. We are given a strong intuition to pray, and we are given a desire to take these things to God in prayer. But we are also prepared to respond to God’s answer in prayer. Given the will to join in, to participate in the solution, and sometimes to lead. God gives us this gift by his Holy Spirit. He blesses us with the ability to respond, and then He calls us to put our response into action.

When Jesus asked the Disciples to pray, He already knew what the response to this prayer would be. He had been preparing the disciples to respond to God’s answer to the call for workers in the harvest.

He taught them first, He showed them his own example, He gave them the will to respond, and He empowered them with spiritual authority. Jesus gave them some final instructions, and sent them on their way. Fully prepared to respond to God’s call.

Gift, blessing, call, response. As Jesus said, “Freely you have received, freely give”.

This call to the Disciples was both a call to action and a prophecy. A prophecy relating to every Christian, of every time and place. A call to pray for God to send workers into the harvest. A call to be ready to be sent as workers into the harvest.

A call to keep our destination firmly in our mind, to journey together through life, and to invite others to join us in the journey.

We are called to be disciples. And disciples have met opposition while responding to the call to mission in every age. Some with open hostility, some with subtle condemnation, and still others with indifference. But the good news of Jesus Christ has not been silenced in 2000 years, and will be heard above the commotion around us in our broken world.

As Paul writes in his letter to the Romans:

‘we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.’

Gift, blessing, call, response. As we consider these, may the grace and peace of our Triune God, which passes all understanding, keep our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. AMEN.

Jesus sends out the twelve

The Text: Matthew 9:9-13

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No one likes to be an outsider. To be excluded. To be told “you don’t belong.” To have the door shut in your face or simply to be shunned, left alone, isolated. Have you ever been on the outside? Perhaps wanting to enter but being afraid you wouldn’t be accepted so you didn’t even try? Do you realise that there are people who are honestly afraid to walk into a church on a Sunday morning? They are afraid of being recognized as “outsiders,” as people who don’t belong in a place like this. “Unreligious people.”

I recall one man saying to me, “the church roof would cave in if I showed up here on a Sunday morning”. He was joking, but completely serious. He was convinced he didn’t belong in religious circles. There’s a famous picture of two cowboys on horseback peering through the window of a crowded church. Inside the people are singing a hymn. One of the men on the outside is singing too, while the other is leaning forward, listening attentively.

I wonder – what keeps them on the outside? Why don’t they get off their horses and join the people inside the church? Perhaps they aren’t dressed properly, or they haven’t had a bath in a while. More likely they aren’t comfortable in the polite society of the church and are much more comfortable worshipping on horseback. They are outsiders.

Matthew the tax-collector was an outsider to his own people. We tend not to love the tax collectors of our day, but it’s nothing like it was in Matthew’s day. Tax collectors were considered traitors of Israel, lackies of the Roman government, opportunist crooks and scoundrels of the worst sort. The Roman system of taxation was ingenious. A tax collector like Matthew would pay a fee to the government in exchange for a license to open a tax office, permitting him to collect all the taxes he could. Needless to say, tax collectors were unwelcome in polite society, much less in religious circles.

It comes as a bit of a surprise that Jesus should walk up to Matthew at his tax collector’s office and say to him what He said to the fishermen: “Follow me.” Discipling words. Words that invite Matthew to join Jesus’ rank of followers; words that empower him to arise, leave his tax office, and follow Jesus. An outsider, a tax collector, had just become, by the undeserved kindness of God, an insider, one of Jesus inner circle, the chosen, apostolic Twelve. I’m sure that raised a rabbinic eyebrow or two, don’t you think?

What on earth was Jesus doing, calling a tax-collector to be one of HIs closest disciples? Is this any way to start a messianic movement? You could understand the four fishermen – strong, hard-working. You could even understand Simon the Zealot – he hated the Roman government and was itching for revolt. But a tax collector? You’ve got to be kidding!

To make matters even more outrageous, Matthew invites Jesus over to his house for a little party to celebrate his new calling and his group of new friends. The Pharisees looked in on all this with disapproval. They were predisposed to disapproval when it came to Jesus, looking for some way to discredit him. Dinner was an open affair; people on the street could peer in and see the kind of company you kept. They asked Jesus’ disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with this rabble – tax collector and sinners?” They wouldn’t go near such people. No respectable rabbi would. Why was Jesus hanging out with the losers when He should have been keeping company with the winners?

Jesus heard their question and turned the tables on them. “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.” When you’re well, or at least you think you are well, you have no need or interest in a doctor. But if you suspect something is wrong, if the symptoms are lining up poorly, grab the phone and call for an appointment. You want to see the doctor right away.

Imagine a doctor who didn’t want to be around sick people, who comes into the waiting room and looks at all those runny noses and itchy eyes and hears all the coughing and sneezing and covers his mouth and nose and runs out of the room as fast as he can. Not much of a doctor is he? Nor would Jesus be much of a Saviour if He didn’t care for the company of sinners.

That was Jesus’ mission, his purpose for coming into the world, to seek and to save the lost, to become “lost” in our death in order that we might be found in Him. He came in solidarity with sinners, baptized with sinners in John’s baptism of repentance, crucified as a sinner, bearing the guilt of the world on His own shoulders. He became our sin; He embodied our sin in His body. Jesus became the outsider, forsaken, alone, isolated so that in Him we might become “insiders,” the children of God, disciples, baptized into his death and life.

Think again about that picture of the cowboys on horseback. Now think about the Pharisees looking in on Matthew’s party with Jesus and all of his tax collector friends. There’s an irony here – the insiders are outside, and the outsiders are inside. The Pharisees, who imagined themselves to be God’s insiders by virtue of their commandment keeping, are sitting on the outside looking in on a party of tax collectors and sinners surrounding Jesus, the friend of sinners. Where’s the church? Outside with the Pharisees or inside with Jesus?

And yet, the gracious light of that party with Jesus shines out even to the Pharisee. There is mercy even for the religious. Jesus gives them a little take home assignment – Go and learn what this means (quoting from Hosea) – “I desire mercy and not sacrifice.” Go to Hosea and learn what that passage means. Hosea, the prophet who taught that those who were “not my people” would be called the people of God. The outsider would become the insider by grace through faith, just as Abraham became an insider by God’s grace and calling through faith which God credited to Abraham as righteousness.

Go and learn what it means – I desire mercy, not sacrifice; the knowledge of God and not burnt offerings. Not religious rituals, that’s not the way to the heart of God. “I came not to call the righteous but sinners.” That’s the company that Jesus keeps at his table. Sinners who are justified for his sake, by his blood. Make no mistake, the Pharisees are welcome at Jesus’ party. But they are welcome as sinners, not as the righteous ones they thought they were.

The sin of the church people, the people in the pews singing the hymns, is that we have turned this banquet of sinners into a country club of the religious elite. We have all too often by our words, our actions, our attitudes looked down on the sinners of our day, those people who just don’t seem to get it, and we forget that we are, in ourselves, no better, no more “righteous” no less sinful, than those outside these walls. There are people who are listening in to the church, like those two men on horseback, straining to hear that this good news applies to them too, that they are accepted by God in Jesus.

None of us deserves to be here. We don’t deserve to be baptized, to hear the Word, to receive the Body and Blood. We haven’t earned our way here by our right choices and decisions. We are here because of God’s undeserved kindness in Jesus, the same grace that called Abraham to be the father of nations, that calls a tax collector to be a disciple, that breaks bread with the sinner, that declares the outsider to be the insider.

Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Welcome.

In the name of Jesus,

Amen

In the name of the Father, Son & Holy Spirit

Text: Matthew 28:16-20

It’s common for us to begin our worship services in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy Spirit. When we do that, we’re dealing with the overflowing love, life and faithfulness of God. This familiar Trinitarian opening to our public worship echoes the name that was spoken together with our name when we were baptised. Following the words of Jesus, which we heard in today’s gospel lesson, we baptise people in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy Spirit.

Whenever we join together for public worship, we are gathered as the people of the Triune God, people linked by God to the gracious will and works of God. This is a profound reality.

We’re people who belong to the Triune God as the result of God’s wonderful choice. That’s who we are. We remember who we are when we say our morning and evening prayers, making the sign of the cross and saying ‘in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy Spirit’. We remember who we are when we pray the Lord’s Prayer. We remember who we are when we praise God through the words of the Apostles’ Creed, or the Nicene Creed.

These regular reminders of who we are and whose we are very helpful for us. That’s because there’s a lot going on in and around us that works to contradict the truth of our identity. The current circumstances of our lives might challenge our relationship as God’s children. The truth is that God has lovingly and graciously claimed us and made us part of the body of Christ through baptism into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy Spirit.

That joyful state of affairs provides us with a good way of approaching the subject of the Trinity. We can tell our story.

Today, Trinity Sunday, is not really a day to get all caught up in fanciful explanations and half-baked philosophy about God. We will never come up with words that can explain the Trinity. We don’t really have the words, or the experience, or the ideas to talk about the Triune God in an abstract way. That would be something like an earthbound creature like an ant trying to explain and describe the flight of a magpie. We won’t try to do any explaining.

Does that mean that we have nothing to say about the Trinity then? On the contrary, we have a great deal to say. What we have to say is not philosophical explanations, but rather we simply retell the story of God’s boundless love.

We can retell the story of God’s boundless love, which has always nourished and cared for us and has also sought us out and claimed us. Since we’re baptised people of God, we’re part of the story and have the story to tell.

We can tell the story of God’s boundless, overflowing love. That’s what the Trinity is about. We can tell the story of God’s faithfulness and patience. We can tell of God’s reluctance to punish and overwhelming desire to forgive and save people, who are hell-bent on their own destruction. We can tell about Jesus, our Saviour. This is all part of our story, and we can tell our story, which is in reality talking about and praising the Trinity.

Telling the story of God’s love is fantastic. The story of God’s love is so fantastic that it’s most of the reason why the author of this sermon became a pastor. He writes:

“You might know that I was fortunate enough to grow up in a very good home. All my life I’ve had the joyful blessing of loving parents. During my childhood, we said grace before each meal and said a prayer of thanks afterwards as well. We had regular devotions. We joined with our local congregation for worship each Sunday. You could note that I had a very good grounding in the faith. I knew the Small Catechism by heart. I must have known a lot of the story.

Yet, in an odd way, I hadn’t really heard the story. There was some kind of gap, and I thought being a Christian was mostly about obeying the commandments, doing the right thing, and being quick in my heart to judge people who weren’t. As I recall, my thinking was roughly along the lines that God forgave my sins so that I could continue trying to keep the commandments. The focus was largely on myself and my efforts.

Now, I’m sure that the gospel was being preached to me repeatedly. I’m sure that I was told the story of God’s boundless love many, many times.

However, it’s funny how long it can be before it takes hold, before we dare to trust it. It’s so easy for people to slip back into trusting self. That’s why the church’s main agenda item is to tell the story. We teach that what makes church ‘church’ is the proclamation of the gospel and the administration of the sacraments. It’s about telling the story of God’s boundless love and allowing it to do its work in people.

One day the penny dropped for me. The holy Spirit had clearly been working long and hard. By the grace of God I realised that the story of God’s boundless love is my story. I think it was a retelling of, and some teaching around, the parable we usually call the prodigal son, when that happened.

It was as though I heard something fresh and new. I realised my story is not about me being good enough or faithful enough for God, but rather it’s about God, who is unswervingly faithful, gracious and merciful to me. Now that’s something that’s really worth talking about. That’s when being a Pastor made any sense at all. In truth, I have no desire to be a moral policeman, and my heart for people is still very much a work in progress, but the story of God’s unfailing love is so worth telling.”

We all have stories that tell God’s story. The holy Spirit is at work in us so we can tell it in our own way. We will always be talking about the Trinity although we may seldom, if ever, use that word. I suspect we never need to use the word ‘Trinity’ when we’re telling the story of God’s saving love. That’s because we’ll be talking about Jesus.

We can tell people that we’re baptised, that we’re rebellious sinners, whom Jesus has saved and redeemed and made his very own at the cost of his life. We can tell people that God loved us, and the world, so much that he sent his only Son to save us. Jesus died for me, and for you, to set us free so that we can live with him forever.

We really have stories to tell. We can tell people about how close and personal God is. Jesus is with us always and we’re especially aware of his good and gracious presence when he makes himself known in word and sacrament. The holy Spirit prays with us and for us, so that we can pray as if we’re conversing with a dear parent. We can tell of the hope and joy that we have, which is the work of the holy Spirit in us.

When Jesus sent the disciples to make disciples, he sent them with God’s story and their own. Even though some doubted they were sent to make disciples by baptising in God’s name and teaching. That was able to work, the church was able continue through history, because God is here. Jesus is graciously and mercifully present with his church, always ready to forgive and restore according to his promise.

We’re not alone when we live our lives and tell our story. We have each other and we have God. In holy baptism God has brought us together so that we all live, and have our identity, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy Spirit. We tell the stories of dearly loved children of God. We have much to tell about the Father, Son and holy Spirit who embraces people with such wondrous, faithful and boundless love.

The peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

The outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

Text: John 20:19-23

Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ,Christ is risen! He is risen indeed!

This joyful cry leads us beautifully into our Pentecost celebrations. As part of God’s magnificent plan of making peace throughout the whole creation, Christ’s resurrection is followed by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

Each of the readings today tell us something about the gift and the work of the Holy Spirit, giving us a taste for the richness of the Spirit’s activity. It’s wonderful that we hear four Bible readings each Sunday. The four readings we’ve heard today, from Psalms, Acts, 1 Corinthians and the gospel of John each tell us something different. This is wonderful because it shows us how diverse and generous God’s outpouring of the Holy Spirit is.

We’re taught not to become trapped in a prescriptive and limited understanding of how the Holy Spirit is given and what the Spirit does. For example, it would be quite wrong to say that the Spirit hasn’t come to a person, or group of people, if there is no sound of rushing wind, or tongues of flame, or speaking in tongues. We hear about those dramatic signs as Acts chapter two describes the day of Pentecost. Later in chapter 2 we read how 3000 people were convicted by what they heard and, we believe, prompted by the Holy Spirit to repentance and baptism.

However, Acts chapter two is not everything that the book of Acts, let alone the Bible, says about the Holy Spirit.

For example, in our psalm for this day (Psalm 140), we sang about God’s abundant, overflowing, joyful, playful creative activity, where the Spirit is very much involved in creating and sustaining life, in quite a concrete way. Instead of trying to limit God’s activity, the psalmist simply stands in awe of God’s wondrous and ongoing work of creating and sustaining all that exists, even some things that we’re not so sure about, like the Leviathan frolicking in the ocean.

For another example, there’s John’s gospel, which has no fire or rushing wind to signal the presence and work of God. The gospel reading we heard today is a section of the same gospel reading that we heard on the second Sunday of Easter. On that Sunday we tend to be captivated by the action involving Thomas. Today the focus is on Jesus and the gift of the Holy Spirit. We clearly heard about the risen Lord Jesus himself, God in the midst of the disciples, who breathed on them and said “receive the Holy Spirit”. In both the gospel of John and in the book of Acts it is clearly God who gives his Holy Spirit to the church. Jesus and the Father send the Spirit so that God’s mission to the world will be carried on as the church’s mission to the world.

It’s helpful to hear these different accounts which have both obvious differences and important similarities. We can be encouraged to notice that in both the reading from Acts and John’s gospel, the Holy Spirit is given to empower God’s mission through the church. In both cases the proclamation of the good news of salvation in Jesus’ name is central. In Acts we heard Peter’s pithy sermon using the book of Joel, when he proclaimed that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. The same wonderful, gracious message is contained in Jesus’ instructions to the disciples when he said, “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”(John 20:23)

The heart of the work of the church is to go out and tell the news that reconciliation has been won. Jesus has taken away the sin of the world. In Jesus there is peace. God is bringing everything into harmony in Jesus, and we have been baptised into Jesus. The Spirit empowers us to live in this wonderful truth, trusting completely in Jesus’ death and resurrection, and sharing this wonderful news in word and deed.

Jesus has given us the Spirit so that everything we say and do becomes a proclamation of the good news of God’s salvation.

We’ve already mentioned God’s overflowing creative genius. The beauty of God’s outpouring of the Spirit is the sheer diversity which works for a common goal. St Paul teaches us that we all have the same Spirit, but we are not all the same.

The basic gift is the gift of faith, which allows us to live confessing and trusting Jesus as our Lord, the Lord.

But then the wondrous diversity opens up. St Paul writes,

“Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.”(1 Cor 12:4-7)

There are many gifts with one overarching goal and purpose.

What a wonderful insight it is, to realise that the working of the Spirit doesn’t look the same in each Christian, and it doesn’t need to look the same. The working of the Spirit is not the same from Christian to Christian. We can expect differences; differences which add to the health and richness of the body; differences which reflect God’s unstoppable creative genius.

Our differences are a reason for rejoicing. These differences are evidence of the presence and working of the Spirit.

Fully in keeping with God’s wonderful creativity is a church full of people of different abilities doing different activities. We can rejoice in our differences. We can rejoice that the Father and the Son have poured out the Spirit so richly on the whole church, including us.

It’s true that, from time to time, there have been profound signs and activities in conjunction with the Spirit’s presence, but mostly the Spirit’s work is to build up the body of Christ in all sorts of ways that people easily overlook. The activities of the Spirit are for the building up of the body, as St Paul wrote “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.”

Today we’re encouraged when we hear that Jesus gives us the Spirit so that we can proclaim his forgiveness, an essential part of building up the body. He’s not saying that you or I can decide on whether or not we forgive other people. That would be to jump out of the story and to pretend that we’re God. No, Jesus does something very important so that we trust that we are forgiven and can live in a good relationship with God and each other.

Jesus gives his church the authority to declare that sins are forgiven. We have the privilege and responsibility of telling people, including one another, that sin is forgiven. When someone confesses their sin, we can declare confidently: Your sin is forgiven for Christ’s sake. The Holy Spirit helps us to trust in that forgiveness and to live in it. We have peace with God. The barrier is gone. Jesus has taken our sin away.

There is another side to that message. Since Christ’s work is so wonderful and complete, it’s not to be taken lightly or ignored, and we might sometimes have to tell people that they are not forgiven. Who would that be, we might wonder? Certainly not any despairing sinner, since forgiveness comes from Jesus and isn’t dependent on us pulling our socks up by ourselves. It might come as a shock to realize that those who may need to hear that their sin is not forgiven are the proud and self-righteous, who are often seen as ‘good people’, like the Pharisees, who considered that they had little that needed to be forgiven. Jesus wants everyone to turn to him and accept his gracious forgiveness – that includes you and me. In turn, he sends us to proclaim God’s mercy in the power of the Spirit.

Today, we rejoice in the gift of the Spirit’s presence and work. We rejoice in the rich and diverse activities of the Spirit among us. We rejoice in God’s manifold creative works that are evident in the creation and in the church.

Let us rejoice in his creative, life-giving presence, knowing that God’s Spirit is at work in us.

The peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

The Ascension of Jesus.

Acts 1: 1:11; Ephesians 1 :15-23, St Luke 24: 44-53

The Ascension of our Lord Jesus into heaven as also the coming down from heaven of God’s Son in the Incarnation at Bethlehem creates for many members of the community questions; these which pose significant barriers for them understanding/accepting the Christian faith.

I mean the idea of an ascension to and the location of heaven in time and space. This is a basic question about the nature of the physical world in which we all inhabit.

According to Luke in the Gospel and the Book of Acts. The Angels say,

“Men of Galilee”, they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven”. (Acts 1:11.)

This idea of space as “up” is a common assumption of the Biblical writers. They inhabited a three storied universe, earth, heaven and the netherworld of hell beneath their feet. Some of you will possess old family Bibles with illustrations of this kind of world depicted in its illustrations. But such a view of space and time is no longer tenable post Einstein and the development of modern physics. Space and time here are understood as relative to the velocity of light and the mass of an object. Also, space and time can be warped not only by speed and mass but gravity too.

But we no longer live in a universe with static conceptions of space, time and matter. There is no such thing as up or down in terms of the universe of space, time and matter. We inhabit a universe of the relativity of space, time, matter. Consequently, what are we to say of the Ascension of our Lord Jesus into heaven? Some believe the New Testament accounts of these events must be demythologised, the time/space elements false of these accounts must be stripped away so that their truth may be understood.

But what are we left with if we strip away the time/space conditioned elements of the Incarnation of God and His Ascension? What we end up with is an abstract notion of God’s goodness based on the Jesus’ teaching of universal moral maxims. Any idea of God acting personally in our history for the redemption of sinners and the promised renewal of creation is without meaning because the accounts are based on outmoded thinking.

It is, of course, a fact we all live with the view that space is understood as up, down and across, three dimensional. We experience life in this three-dimensional way. This is how our life on earth is normally understood. It is the way our language comes to terms with the reality of our life’s experience as human.

Consequently, if the events of the Bible are to be communicated to us in ordinary language, instead of stripping these elements of its teaching away and describing the way the Bible speaks of the Incarnation and Ascension of the Lord Jesus as mythological and therefore false; we must hold on to these space time constructs that the writers use and seek an understanding of God based on the meaning of the Bibles’ words.

If we do this, we see that the way in which they describe the Incarnation of Jesus as coming down from heaven and the Ascension as a going up into heaven tells us something critically important about the God who is revealed in Jesus. Though this God is not contained in the space time constructs of our universe, God in inconceivable freedom deigns to become involved in the space time of this world as we experience it. Not some abstract world of moral principle. Solomon was aware of the paradox our human language creates when says in his prayer, at the dedication of the Jerusalem Temple, “Will God in very deed dwell with men on the earth? behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house which I have built?”2 Chronicles 6:18

The Bible makes crystal clear God cannot be contained in our thoughts about God. No matter how sophisticated they maybe. God is inconceivable by the very nature of God’s being who God is. That we may come to know who God is only possible if God gives God’s very self to be known to us in terms that our language can communicate. The central claim of the Bible is that God has accommodated God’s own self to be known to us in the forms and thought structures that we have based on our experience of being earthly creatures. Instead of being a hindrance or an obstacle to our coming to know and believe in who God is for us; the earthly constructed language we use of space and time becomes the vehicle of our knowledge of God. God who is not contained by our thoughts or our language, nevertheless graciously condescends to make God’s own self known through them. This is precisely what God has done in the descent of God’s self in His Son Jesus to be one with us in our humanity and to take that humanity into the mysterious life of God’s own eternal life. This inconceivably free action of God’s grace is the basis of all that the Bible has to say to us as it speaks to us in the limited structures of our language and minds so that we may come to know and love the Creator and saviour of the world in all His glory.

Consequently, if we are to understand and communicate the relevance of God’s action in our human world of time and space conditioned language, we must set aside the normal human question “how”, “how is this possible?” and ask instead the “Who” question, “Who is the God who by grace, comes us in our own human terms and reveals the truth of God’s own self to us?” The answer is the free God of the Bible who wills to be with and for the human creature of His creation by His gracious condescension and accommodation of Himself to our human situation.

In the Ascension, the Christian creed says of the ascended Jesus Christ that He “is seated at the right hand of the Father”. This is how the Christian confession expresses the meaning of the ascension of Jesus Christ. It uses the language of metaphor taken from the protocols of a royal court, of someone who sits at the right hand of the King. The Kings right hand man exercises the authority and power of the monarch. We still use this metaphor in every day language. We say so and so is “his or her right-hand man”. Thus, when the Christian church says that by means of His ascension Jesus Christ’s place is at the right hand of the Father it intends that the power, the sovereignty and might of God is to be understood in terms of this One. That Jesus Christ rules the world on behalf of God the Father: He it is who both reveals and inaugurates the Father’s kingdom on earth. God the Father’s rule is the kingdom and rule of Jesus Christ.

But, if this is so, it turns upside down our normal understanding of power and majesty, of authority and lordship. For the one who sits at God’s right hand is the crucified risen and ascended Jesus. The One who bears in His body the mark of the spear and the nails: the One Thomas recognises because he bears in his body the marks of His continuity with the Him who had been “crucified, dead and buried”. The One whom the angel describes to the disciples at the Ascension as, “This same Jesus”. The One whom the disciples knew to be incarnate and crucified, whom they witnessed as resurrected on the third day.

The God then of whom the Christian gospel speaks is not some abstract idea of power or almightiness; it speaks of the One who is now God’s “right hand man”. It therefore shows that God’s power and authority is such, that it can be denied and pursued all the way from Pilates judgment hall to the cross of Golgotha. God’s power and authority is such that not only can it be denied, but also God himself can be killed.

When we say therefore, that the ascended One is the crucified One, the meaning of the mystery of the ascension of Jesus Christ into heaven is that this One who reveals the Father’s majesty and glory allows Himself to be edged out of the world and suspended between heaven and earth on a cross. If this One is Lord, then it should not be strange or incongruous, but entirely consistent with the truth of who Jesus is, that we say that God’s power is so great that He can accept the path of pain and weakness in the world as the way, the means, by which He rules the world.

Christians who know this Lord’s power will confess His truth during their own struggle with evil in its personalised and in its institutionalised form; for they experience in Jesus Christ God’s absence from the world and in their own lives. And it is precisely there, not apart from this experience, but in the depths of their alienation and loneliness that they know the power of the ascended crucified Lord. For it is as the godforsaken One, The One who was abandoned above all by God who lives and reigns at God’s right hand. This is the heart of the mystery of Christ’s ascension into heaven. So that we may know the majesty of God’s grace for us as a reality; not divorced or separated from the world in which we find ourselves, sometimes albeit abandoned by God. Here and now in places where we know God is silent. For we live our lives experiencing both the heights of human achievement, of joy and human love, but also the depths of human depravity and the blind fury of nature.

The Ascension of Jesus Christ into heaven teaches us that God is so free as not to be bound by our abstract ideas of divinity and power but that at God’s right hand lives the crucified One. That God’s godness includes the possibility to emptying Himself of all but love for the sake of the weak and threatened human creature. The Christian confession of the ascension of crucified One is that the contradictions of creation are not alien to God Himself, not external to whom He wills to be as God.

We know through the ascension that before light could gladden us and darkness torment us, He was aware of both, separating and expressing His lordship over both. Before life greeted us and death tormented us, He was the Lord of both life and death. And He did not do this through mere superiority, He made His own both creations menace and hope. He did not spare himself but gave Himself up for us all.

This is the great gospel news of the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ into heaven. So to God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit be all the honour, glory, power and dominion to the ages of ages. Amen
Dr. Gordon Watson.